Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 2h

Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island told us in a statement that “every American should be alarmed that their President has decided he can wage secret wars against anyone he calls an enemy.”

www.theatlantic.com/national-sec...

The Boat Strikes Are Just the Beginning

What the Trump administration is portraying as a drug mission may be about a lot more.

www.theatlantic.com

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 10h

Hahahahaha…nice try, AI

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 12h

‘I’m haunted by what a former senior IDF official told me after I left government: “Our initial plans for Gaza were to fight for three months and then stop. We assumed you—the Americans—would make us stop. But you never did.”’

@ilangoldenberg.bsky.social
jstreetdotorg.substack.com/p/peace?r=yq...

PEACE

Hopefully...

jstreetdotorg.substack.com

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 13h

Yep.

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 15h

This @yalereview.bsky.social Krasznahorkai short story is a nice entry point for anyone curious about the new Nobel Laureate

yalereview.org/article/kras...

László Krasznahorkai: “An Angel Passed Above Us”

A short story by László Krasznahorkai: “I’m open to anything, he said, pushing the AK-74 a bit farther away and reaching under his bulletproof vest to…

yalereview.org

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 1d

“You stand with me and I stand with you, and the church will continue to accompany and stand with migrants.”

www.politico.com/news/2025/10...

Pope Leo will ‘stand with’ Catholic leaders in protecting immigrants’ rights, advocates say

The comments from the pope mark the most recent push from the Vatican against the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.

www.politico.com

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Reposted by Phil Klay

The Atlantic @theatlantic.com · 2d

Donald Trump’s deployments of the National Guard to American cities “are best understood as an effort to erode the nation’s sense that such use of the military is unacceptable,” Quinta Jurecic argues.

Trump Is Destroying One of America’s Oldest Traditions

America has always had a strong aversion to seeing the military on the country’s streets. That is not stopping the current president.

bit.ly

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Reposted by Phil Klay

Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social · 3d

eventually politicians need to start advocating for criminal and civil penalties for people involved in fabricating stories to get citizens incarcerated.

or, put another way: a society that would like to keep functioning has to discourage baldfaced lying, especially by authorities

Chicago Sun-Times @chicago.suntimes.com · 3d

Body-camera video appears to contradict the government’s claim that Marimar Martinez, 30, drove toward officers before one of them opened fire at her late Saturday morning in Brighton Park, her attorney claimed.
trib.al/9Sxu9IN

Attorney for woman shot by Border Patrol claims officer said 'Do something b-----' before shooting

Body-camera video appears to contradict the government's claim that Marimar Martinez, 30, drove toward officers before one of them opened fire at her late Saturday morning in Brighton Park, her attorney claimed. A judge ordered Martinez and a co-defendant released pending trial.

trib.al

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 4d

The Books I Have Not Read, by Shel Silverstein

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Reposted by Phil Klay

Sharon @sharonk.bsky.social · 4d

usual rates of death and wounding, and so erode more quickly than the
general mass of the force.7
This selection-destruction cycle means that a force with too high a proportion of elites—an army with too many special forces units, a navy that
diverts too many of its most aggressive junior commanders into the submarine arm, or an air force (like that of imperial Japan) with aircrew standards
that prove unsustainable over a long war—can actually damage its adaptive potential. Such a force experiences a brain drain, where individuals
who would have been leaders in regular units (and would likely have
survived to spread their knowledge to others) are instead segregated into
subgroups where, even if they survive, their talents are lost to the wider
force. Meanwhile, major combat formations can cease to be much more
than feeders for specialized units, providing the recruiting base for elite
forces that increasingly usurp normal combat roles, exacerbating both the
brain drain and the selection-destruction cycle that Beaumont describes.

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 5d

You’re welcome

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 5d

Oh boy

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 5d

“As he sets about demonstrating that our apparent irrationalities are in fact the work of our inner game theorists, the reader wonders if he has ever read a novel or interacted with another person.”

—Becca Rothfeld on Pinker

www.washingtonpost.com/books/2025/1...

Review | To Steven Pinker, human knowledge is just a game

In ‘When Everyone Knows That Everyone Knows...,’ the best-selling cognitive scientist writes about an interesting subject but gets sidetracked by hobbyhorses

www.washingtonpost.com

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Reposted by Phil Klay

Brian Finucane @bcfinucane.bsky.social · 7d

If you are a skeptic of war powers reform, I would invite you to check out the commander in chief's social media posting.

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Reposted by Phil Klay

Scott Horton @robertscotthorton.bsky.social · 8d

Kori Schake: “Yesterday morning, Trump and Hegseth behaved reprehensibly. Their speeches…were tantamount to incitement—a genuinely dangerous effort to suborn the military’s oath and condition them for using violence against their fellow Americans.” foreignpolicy.com/2025/10/01/t...

Trump’s Speech to Generals Was Incitement to Violence Against Americans

Military leaders’ quiet professionalism offers hope amid a maelstrom.

foreignpolicy.com

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 7d

One other thing about this whole dumb affair. In what universe did Hegseth think inviting comparisons to Patton would work to his benefit?

I’d rather have George C Scott as SecDef

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 7d

“The Marines I fought alongside knew a thing or two about warrior culture. Watching Hegseth’s speech, I was struck by the glaring absence of two traits those Marines embodied that he does not: competence and humility.”
Elliot Ackerman in @thefp.com

www.thefp.com/p/pete-hegse...

Pete Hegseth Wants a ‘Warrior Culture.’ Does He Know What That Means?

The secretary of defense talks a lot about peace through strength. In his speech to the military top brass, he projected weakness.

www.thefp.com

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 8d

@deadcarl.bsky.social

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 8d

‘The appeal to the mystical image of the “warfighter” is that it avoids having to discuss war in concrete terms. It sells the attractive myth that by doing more of the parts of war that look cool and really make you feel like a man, you can actually win wars.‘

www.deadcarl.com/p/clausewitz...

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Reposted by Phil Klay

Kori Schake @kschake.bsky.social · 8d

The Secretary of Defense was lecturing military leaders about the warrior ethos when he should have been ensuring military pay was exempted from the government shutdown.

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 8d

“[Hegseth] was ridiculous…it was the kind of thing that a battalion commander might say to some scruffy lieutenants and sergeants. His dream world is the world of Ranger school (from which he never graduated), not the actual world of complex military operations.”

www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

Pete Hegseth Is Living the Dream

A man who retired as a major lectures hundreds of generals about the need to meet his standards.

www.theatlantic.com

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 9d

If they’re going to attempt to promote partisanship within the ranks (to the detriment of American national security), I guess it’s better to have it done by someone repellent.

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Phil Klay @philklay.bsky.social · 9d

In retrospect, it’s probably a good thing Trump chose a SecDef whose character, knowledge and comportment could only fill a genuine military professional with contempt and loathing.

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Reposted by Phil Klay

Risa Brooks @risabrooks12.bsky.social · 9d

It's easy to see this speech as just weirdly performative, but there's a lot more—and a lot worse—going on here.

The meeting & speeches are part of a larger project aimed at promoting the military leadership’s partisan alignment with the administration.

How? 1/

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 9d

Hegseth: "If the words I'm speaking today are making your heart sink, they you should do the honorable thing and resign."

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Reposted by Phil Klay

Brad Duplessis @bradduplessis.bsky.social · 9d

One early morning in Feb ‘04 outside of Fallujah I was next to a then MAJ who called in AC-130 fires so close to our position that we were pelted with debris from the target building. That now 4⭐️ had to fly in from Europe to listen to Pete talk about Lethality™️ and standards.

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