Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 2h

I mean I’m old enough to know that ‘Shake It Off’ is a Mariah Carey song.

AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 2h

The War on Italian Beef

Kim Masters @kimmasters.bsky.social · 17h

These war fighters don’t appear likely to pass muster with our war-fighting Defense Secretary.

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 2h

If someone typed 'yinz's' I'd think they were a jagoff.

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 2h

This is interesting in light of the research I’ve been doing on science denial (which dovetails with MAGA). A lot of PMC sci-comm is about fact-checking and things that ‘speak for themselves,’ but it never works. The self-evident rarely is in reality.

Brian Beutler @brianbeutler.bsky.social · 5h

Watching so many people in high places go through the motions of polling and median-voter whispering can make you feel like you're in Bodysnatchers. It's worth a reminder that the typical experience of tyranny is...basically normal life. Which means we have to will ourselves to fight harder.

The Median Experience Of Tyranny

If the politics of tyranny were self-discrediting, we wouldn't need mantras like "never again."

www.offmessage.net

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 2h

During covid, one of the far-right influencer guys on twitter posted something like 'if you're a man wearing a mask it means you want to get fucked in the ass,' and I wish I could find it and ask ICE what they think.

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 3h

Bartleby-ass tactics

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 1d

Mike Johnson ignores a question about when he'll swear in Rep.-elect Grijalva and walks away

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Reposted by AR Hanlon

Garrett M. Graff @vermontgmg.bsky.social · 1d

If appropriations bills are not seen as enforceable contracts, why should any Member of Congress vote to fund any part of the federal government under Donald Trump? You're voting to provide money for lawlessness. www.doomsdayscenario.co/p/there-is-n...

There is no budget "deal" to be made

President Trump has so broken the constitutional framework as to make joint normal, responsible government impossible.

www.doomsdayscenario.co

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Reposted by AR Hanlon

Brendan Nyhan @brendannyhan.bsky.social · 17h

Monstrous.

"federal agents detained nearly every resident of the 130-unit building—including children and babies—placing them in zip ties and separating them by race into vans for more than two hours early Tuesday morning."

Daniel Knowles @dlknowles.bsky.social · 20h

Good reporting on the South Shore raid from South Side weekly here.

Confirms one thing I was told but didn't put in my own piece because I didn't have a second source and it seemed too insane: border agents segregated arrested residents by race

southsideweekly.com/federal-agen...

Federal Agents Storm South Shore Building, Detaining Families and Children

Families were woken by flashbangs and helicopters as hundreds of federal agents raided their homes. Days later, neighbors are still searching for the missing.

southsideweekly.com

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 1d

Clowns

Andy @andyoregon.bsky.social · 2d

Jess Waters recycling the same guy over and over to represent “former” different enemies

Reposted by AR Hanlon

Representative Becca Balint @balint.house.gov · 2d

The type of regime that uses military-style raids to tear children out of bed in the middle of the night is an authoritarian one. This is a manufactured crisis and an escalation in force and violence that is traumatizing families. Terrifying scenes in Chicago due to ICE.

'Military-Style' ICE Raid In Chicago Shows Escalation in Tactics

Witnesses said children were taken from their homes unclothed and separated from their parents during the raid.

time.com

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 1d

With the exception of Rogan, these guys are dipshit nihilists who just want to use slurs without judgment so they can keep getting rich by courting the attention of teen virgins who match their level of intellect and self-awareness.

Rolling Stone @rollingstone.com · 2d

“I voted for none of this."

Prominent influencers, including Theo Von, Joe Rogan, and Andrew Schulz, are starting to distance themselves from the president they helped propel to the White House.

Story: www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...

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Reposted by AR Hanlon

Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social · 1d

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 · 1d

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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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 1d

Seems bad

Justin Hendrix @justinhendrix.bsky.social · 2d

"The hundreds of billions of dollars companies are investing in AI now account for an astonishing 40 per cent share of US GDP growth this year... In a way, then, America has become one big bet on AI."

America is now one big bet on AI

It’s seen as the magic fix for every threat to the US economy

www.ft.com

AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 1d

Damn, just missed out on competing with him in the 800m by a year it looks like.

ryan cooper @ryanlcooper.com · 2d

"lying silver-tongued charlatan runs to the US, attempts to reinvent himself, turns out to be pretty good at an important job" this is like one of the foundational American Stories www.nytimes.com/2025/10/05/u...

The Superintendent’s Bio Seemed Too Good to Be True. It Was.

www.nytimes.com

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 2d

Also, while I happen to have you, I absolutely love Dreyer’s English. I recommend it to my students all the time.

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 2d

This guy never says anything credible, logical, accurate, or precise.

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 2d

Stephen Miller claims that in Portland "ICE officers have to street battles against antifa, hand to hand combat every night, to come and go from their building"

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 2d

I’ve published around 80 articles in national media and they’re all more or less motivated by this principle:

Benjamin Dreyer @bcdreyer.social · 2d

If you want to irritate your readers, do it on purpose, do it for a reason, and do it knowledgeably.

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 2d

This is exactly it. The 9/11 attacks were even more horrific than we tend to acknowledge, and I would guess the fallout of nationalistic, illiberal government overreach against the people of the US was part of the terrorist plan.

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 2d

But history didn’t stop in 1992 and then start again in 2016

like its fucking nuts that we don’t understand the “War on Terror” — the political event — as one that transformed American society and the presidency and how the GOP grabbed power, attacked civil liberties and … literally created the DHS

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 2d

And it won’t be vengeance, it will be accountability before and within the bounds of the law, for all of the lawbreaking currently going on in the name of installing a very unpopular dictatorship.

AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 2d

Fascism always deserves to fail, justice always deserves to prevail.

SE Gyges @segyges.bsky.social · 2d

curtis yarvin seems somewhat unhappy

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Reposted by AR Hanlon

Yashar Ali 🐘 @yasharali.bsky.social · 2d

Statement from Illinois Governor JB Pritzker

This evening, President Trump is ordering 400 members of the Texas National Guard for deployments to Illinois, Oregon, and other locations within the United States. No officials from the federal government called me directly to discuss or coordinate.
We must now start calling this what it is: Trump's Invasion. It started with federal agents, it will soon include deploying federalized members of the Illinois National Guard against our wishes, and it will now involve sending in another state's military troops.
I call on Governor Abbott to immediately withdraw any support for this decision and refuse to coordinate. There is no reason a President should send military troops into a sovereign state without their knowledge, consent, or cooperation.
The brave men and women who serve in our national guards must not be used as political props. This is a moment where every American must speak up and help stop this madness.

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Reposted by AR Hanlon

David Gilbert @davidgilbert.bsky.social · 2d

Over the weekend, Trump's deputy chief of staff for policy Stephen Miller repeatedly attacked judges, calling them part of an "organized terrorist attack" on the US government....

On Saturday, the home of a judge who ruled against Trump, went up in flames

time.com/7323442/sout...

House of South Carolina Judge Criticized by Trump Administration Set Ablaze

Authorities are investigating a fire at the home of a South Carolina judge who had reportedly received death threats in what could be the latest incident of political violence across the country.

time.com

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 2d

Always a good ruling

Katie Phang @katiephang.bsky.social · 2d

BOOM 🔥:

Judge Immergut issues a second Temporary Restraining Order prohibiting the relocation, federalization, or deployment of ANY NATIONAL GUARD FROM ANY STATE into the state of Oregon.

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Reposted by AR Hanlon

Jo Wolff @jowolff.bsky.social · 4d

Excuse me! I’m not giving you criticisms but a critique.

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AR Hanlon @aaronrhanlon.com · 4d

I think this is correct, and that it's increasingly challenging for adults to get into this rhythm as well, because of all the other, quicker rhythms. I can't even read and answer my email without a 2FA push notification, for example. Even the mundane is frenetic, short-attention-grabbing.

Tobias Wilson-Bates @phdhurtbrain.bsky.social · 4d

My take, which I’ve banged on about before, concerning the state of young people reading these days is that reading is a rhythm. It’s like a mix of slow breathing and being pleasurably bored. We need to bring back spaces and times where our young people can breath and think and get lost in a world.

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