Rick Coelho (he/him)
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rickcoelho.bsky.social
Rick Coelho (he/him)
@rickcoelho.bsky.social
Father, activist, rural renewable energy siting advocate, radio DJ, hockey player, photographer, music lover, book lover, and lover of food. Flyers, Phillies, Badgers. Proudly Madison, WI.

"It is darkest before the dawn."

*Opinions are my own*
This could have been Dems. Good job Biden.
President Trump signs executive order to reclassify marijuana as a less dangerous drug under Schedule 3. Read my story @forbes.com www.forbes.com/sites/willya...
December 18, 2025 at 8:30 PM
I originally thought this was a joke.

It still is but a different kind of joke than I thought.
For America's 250th anniversary next year, the "Patriot Games" will feature “one young man and one young woman from each state and territory,” announces President Trump in a video. youtu.be/zsykDQFIXao?...
President Trump Launches Freedom 250 to Lead America’s 250th Birthday Celebration
YouTube video by Freedom 250
youtu.be
December 18, 2025 at 8:29 PM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
Use Signal for everything the end
Trump's DOJ has been ordered to embark on a sweeping crackdown on "left-wing domestic terrorism." Civil liberties experts warn it could lead to a level of politicized FBI surveillance of Americans not seen since the era of J. Edgar Hoover and COINTELPRO.

Our story today: wapo.st/3L9lpr4 (gift link)
Trump administration prepares sweeping crackdown on leftist networks
The Justice Department’s program to root out violent “Antifa” extremism is raising First Amendment concerns.
wapo.st
December 18, 2025 at 5:50 PM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
These are the people who are willing to go on the record.
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/18/u...
December 18, 2025 at 5:26 PM
Having an FBI file created on you as part of this campaign, at this moment in history, should be considered a badge of honor.
Trump's DOJ has been ordered to embark on a sweeping crackdown on "left-wing domestic terrorism." Civil liberties experts warn it could lead to a level of politicized FBI surveillance of Americans not seen since the era of J. Edgar Hoover and COINTELPRO.

Our story today: wapo.st/3L9lpr4 (gift link)
Trump administration prepares sweeping crackdown on leftist networks
The Justice Department’s program to root out violent “Antifa” extremism is raising First Amendment concerns.
wapo.st
December 18, 2025 at 5:02 PM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
PragerU and TPUSA received over $2M to create media targeting Gen Z voters with far-right content.

We desperately need Democratic donors to step up and begin investing in youth.
December 17, 2025 at 2:29 PM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
Trump published this ad in 1987 only a few weeks after he returned from his first visit to the Soviet Union, an invited visit the Soviets paid for. The ad calls for the US to dismantle its military alliances around the world - a basic Soviet goal since 1945.
"Likewise, President Trump was a fan of his!" concludes the new White House Ronald Reagan plaque

Here's the full-page ad Trump ran during Reagan's presidency in 1987 claiming "let's not let our great country be laughed at anymore"
December 18, 2025 at 12:50 AM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
Terrorizing trans kids and their families isn’t going to bring grocery prices down. It won’t make housing affordable or give you decent healthcare or get you into “heaven.” It will just terrorize a minority and cause undue death. Every representative who voted for it is a despicable person.
“Three Democrats—Henry Cuellar (TX), Vicente Gonzalez (TX), and Don Davis (NC)—crossed party lines to vote in favor of the felony ban, siding with Republicans to criminalize providers and potentially parents involved in transgender youth care.” www.erininthemorning.com/p/breaking-m...
MTG's Felony National Youth Trans Ban Passes House; 3 Dems Vote For It, 4 GOP Vote Against It
The bill is not expected to pass the Senate, but marks the first time a national trans youth care ban has passed a chamber of Congress.
www.erininthemorning.com
December 18, 2025 at 12:37 AM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
One of the biggest mistakes Dems made in transition is in not having Jack Smith testify openly about Jan6 before Durbin lost his gavel.
December 18, 2025 at 12:08 AM
I have to admit, been on here less lately and generally speaking been feeling better about state of the world. Or at least my small little part of it.

N=1, YMMV, etc.
December 17, 2025 at 5:04 PM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
One of the most blatantly authoritarian threats in a Trump term full of them
December 11, 2025 at 4:51 PM
Democrats should be a daily drum beat of questions about the coverup on Trump’s health.
December 11, 2025 at 1:09 PM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
the defensiveness and incredulity of a good chunk of the commentary class toward arguments about trump’s racism is, imho, downstream of the same impulse behind the endless trump voter safaris and self-flagellation about being out of touch with the heartland
Thinking back to how people were "hysterical" for calling trump white supremacist and now he's doing nordic theory on the campaign trail
December 10, 2025 at 4:06 PM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
Wow — even China doesn't do this.

www.nytimes.com/2025/12/09/t...
U.S. Plans to Scrutinize Foreign Tourists’ Social Media History
www.nytimes.com
December 10, 2025 at 2:08 AM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
Susan Tincher, a 55-year-old American citizen, said agents told her in the truck that if she didn’t watch herself “they were going to pull me over to the side of the road and give me this OC,” law enforcement shorthand for pepper spray.
Federal agents arrest citizen observer watching ICE detain neighbors on her north Minneapolis block
Susan Tincher, a 55-year-old American citizen, appears to be the first observer arrested by federal immigration enforcement officers since the agency launched an immigration surge in the Twin Cities l...
www.mprnews.org
December 9, 2025 at 11:19 PM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
That is patently false: not only do immigrants score better than native-born Americans in tests, the mere presence of immigrants improve test scores for all students, when factoring in white flight

sesp.northwestern.edu/news-events/...
December 9, 2025 at 9:21 PM
The same was said about my great-grandfather on my mother’s side, my great-grandmother on my mother’s side, and my great-grandfather on my father’s side. They originated in 3 different countries.

Same old shit, another day.

People saying crap like Miller here hate the real America.
If your origins are Southern Italian, Irish, Polish etc. some version of this claim - the immigrant is a criminal underclass incompatible with the true Americans - has been around forever. They hate that the idea of America is more important than any group.
Stephen Miller: "If Somalia keeps failing, if these societies all over the world continue to fail, you have to ask yourself if you bring those societies into our country & then give them unlimited free welfare, what do we think is going to happen? You're going to replicate the conditions they left"
December 9, 2025 at 9:38 PM
Gotdang Dodgers!
December 9, 2025 at 5:49 PM
When you’re talking to a Canadian colleague, “I’m going to see some of the World Juniors games” does not require more explanation.

Looking forward to my trip there next summer.
December 9, 2025 at 5:48 PM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
“Supreme Court reform is now the sine qua non of any reformist program in the United States, any program to re-implant/re-secure civic democracy in the United States”
-- @joshtpm.bsky.social talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/court...
Court Reform: Breaking the Corrupt Rule of the Six GOPers Is Everything
I’ve become something of a broken record on this. But repetition sometimes...
talkingpointsmemo.com
December 8, 2025 at 8:47 PM
Road the bike today. Was about 10 degrees when I left this morning. Was dressed appropriately and was pretty comfortable.

Added studded tires to make the commute a bit safer. Means I am a lot slower but better than a quick fall leading to an ER visit or the like.
December 8, 2025 at 8:53 PM
How many anti-welfare memes have been posted by the farmers who will line up to take their part of the $12 billion bribe coming from the guy they votes for?
December 8, 2025 at 6:46 PM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
Trump and his family are in business with Russia and the Gulf Arab states to loot and plunder, and destroy the West and our democracies along the way.

It's Bond Villain level stuff, and we should be fighting it with everything we got.

bsky.app/profile/carl...
Son-in-Law Watch:

When he’s not brokering geopolitical surrenders in meetings with Putin, he’s financing global media consolidation.
December 8, 2025 at 5:25 PM
Reposted by Rick Coelho (he/him)
The headline, the main takeaway from a European viewpoint is this:

The transatlantic relationship as we know it is over. Yes, we kinda knew this. But this is now official US White House policy. Not a sppech, not a statement. The West as it used to be no longer exists.
December 5, 2025 at 9:49 AM
Put the studded tires on the bike. Ready for my first single-digit bike ride.
December 5, 2025 at 12:30 PM