Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Reposted by Sandhya Dirks

Lex McMenamin (they/them) @leximcmenamin.com · 23h

Over 45 days, then-21 year old Alaqad moved from one temporary shelter to another, unable to process the horrors she documented on her phone.

“Every time I read [my diaries], I just feel disbelief, like, is this real? Did I really live that? Are there still thousands of people in Gaza living that?”

Journalist Plestia Alaqad Is Publishing Her Diaries From Gaza: "A Dystopian World"

"Every time I read it, I just feel disbelief — is this real? Did I really live that? Are there still thousands of people in Gaza living that?”

www.teenvogue.com

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Kendra "Gloom is My Beat" Pierre-Louis @kendrawrites.com · 11h

It has also become normalized for journalism outlets to say they are advocates for "free markets" and "personal freedom" without pausing to recognize that that is in itself a kind of bias.

But it's a bias that the billionaire class likes.

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Molly Jong-Fast @mollyjongfast.bsky.social · 14h

This is so dark

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Seth Stern @sethstern.bsky.social · 12h

A federal grand jury declined to indict two people charged with assaulting law enforcement agents outside a suburban Chicago ICE facility, an attorney for one of the defendants said, Megan Crepeau and @benjaminpenn.bsky.social report

news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

Grand Jury Declines to Indict Two Chicago-Area ICE Protesters

A federal grand jury declined to indict two people charged with assaulting law enforcement agents outside a suburban Chicago ICE facility, an attorney for one of the defendants said.

news.bloomberglaw.com

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Rolling Stone @rollingstone.com · 1h

Justin J. Pearson — the 30-year-old Memphis representative and member of the “Tennessee Three” who protested gun violence — has announced a bid to primary 76-year-old Democrat Steve Cohen for a seat in the U.S. House.

Justin J. Pearson of the 'Tennessee Three' Has Had It With 'Mediocrity' -- So He's Running for Congress

bit.ly

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 1h

The elimination of USAID is a moral atrocity and all involved made a choice to enable, and then lie about, ending the lives of some of the most vulnerable people in the world.

MAE SOT, Thailand (AP) - Mohammed Taher clutched the lifeless body of his 2-year-old son and wept. Ever since his family's food rations stopped arriving at their internment camp in Myanmar in April, the father had watched helplessly as his once-vibrant baby boy weakened, suffering from diarrhea and begging for food.
On May 21, exactly two weeks after Taher's little boy died, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio sat before Congress and declared: "No one has died" because of his government's decision to gut its foreign aid program. Rubio also insisted: "No children are dying on my watch."
That, Taher says, "is a lie."

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Prisonculture @prisonculture.bsky.social · 1h

Local cops are not on the side of Democratic politicians or under their actual control. People refuse to understand this too even though we've been making this point for decades.

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Emissary Of Night | ليلى @diplomatofnight.com · 12h

Fascinating report just released by DropSite which reveals that David Frum, while working on a profile of an Israeli ambassador to the United Nations for the Atlantic, was also shadow-writing speeches for that same ambassador.

David Frum, Douglas Murray Secretly Drafted Speeches for Israeli Ambassador

Leaked emails from former Israeli UN Ambassador Ron Prosor show David Frum, Douglas Murray offering to write his speeches and a CNN producer fundraising for Israel’s Iron Dome during Israel’s 2014 war

www.dropsitenews.com

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Gregory Pratt @royalpratt.bsky.social · 2h

The President of the United States is calling for the mayor of Chicago and governor of Illinois to be jailed.

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Governor JB Pritzker @govpritzker.illinois.gov · 1h

I will not back down.

Trump is now calling for the arrest of elected representatives checking his power.

What else is left on the path to full-blown authoritarianism?

Donald Trump Truth Social Post: Chicago Mayor should be in jail for failing to protect Ice Officers! Governor Pritzker also.

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Sandhya Dirks @audiosand.bsky.social · 1h

so not all opinions, just regime ones.

Dave Jorgenson @davejorgenson.bsky.social · 2h

The Post laid off seemingly the remaining of their liberal-leaning staff members on Opinion last Thursday, when some of them were observing Yom Kippur.

from @oliverdarcy.bsky.social for Status
status.news/p/washington-post-opinion-cuts-adam-oneal

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Sandhya Dirks @audiosand.bsky.social · 1h

Exactly. I know personally how people with "normal qualifications" can slowly shape and chip away at what kind of stories can be covered, what kind of questions can be asked, what kind of reporting is rewarded. This can significantly impact the way the news reflects and alters reality.

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Sarah J. Jackson @sjjphd.bsky.social · 14h

Discussing this phenomenon w/ a group of profs. Someone morbidly joked, “& northern profs are fleeing the country.” The next person said…”even if we were all willing & able to abandon this place there are not enough jobs for us globally and the U.S. employs a huge # of international scholars too.”

‘Fear and hopelessness’: study finds one in four professors consider leaving US south

Survey by American Association of Professors shows nearly quarter of respondents are switching due to states’s politics

www.theguardian.com

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Sandhya Dirks @audiosand.bsky.social · 1h

"cleansing" alongside lying about whose doing the "violence" generally leads to good things.

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 22h

Schmitt: "Let's just call it out. We need a cleansing here. Let's just be truthful about what's happening. This left-wing political violence is not a both sides thing. It's not."

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London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 1h

‘None of this is being done in secret – the judgments are public – but the changes have barely registered. Judges, whether serving or retired, tend not to speak out. Barristers know on which side their bread is buttered.’

Conor Gearty on the Human Rights Act: www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

Conor Gearty · Unwelcome Remnant: Erasing the Human Rights Act

The Supreme Court is quietly editing the Human Rights Act out of existence. In cases where human rights cannot be...

www.lrb.co.uk

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Radley Balko @radleybalko.bsky.social · 3h

The first episode of Collateral Damage, my reported podcast with The Intercept, went up today.

Hope you’ll check it out and, if you enjoy it, give it a favorable rating or review.

Eternal thanks to my producers @lauraflynn.bsky.social and Andrew Stelzer for making it happen.

Ep. 1 Dirty Business: The Atlanta Narcotics Unit’s Deadly Raid on 92-year-old Kathryn Johnston.

Podcast Episode · Collateral Damage from The Intercept · 10/08/2025 · 55m

podcasts.apple.com

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Bruno J. Navarro @brunojnavarro.bsky.social · 5h

A study published in The Lancet journal in June said the U.S. funding cuts could result in more than 14 million deaths, including more than 4.5 million children under age 5, by 2030.

Starving children screaming for food as US aid cuts unleash devastation and death across Myanmar

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has repeatedly said “no one has died" because of his government’s decision to gut its foreign aid program.

apnews.com

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Sandhya Dirks @audiosand.bsky.social · 5h

OMG

Joshua J. Friedman @joshuajfriedman.com · 12h

What will the new Adam O'Neal–hosted WaPo opinions podcast sound like for the next few decades? Maybe a little something like this x.com/WashPostComm...

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Andy Craig @andycraig.bsky.social · 15h

Never before in American history has one state's military force been deployed in another state over its objection.

I say never because the Civil War involved states whose governments legally ceased to exist, their offices vacated by constructive resignation, with no legitimate governors to object.

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Anthea Butler @antheabutler.bsky.social · 5h

I'm not a quoter of scripture, but this seemed appropriate for the horror that has been unleashed because of the gutting of USAID.

“Whatever you do to the least of these, you do to me.” -Jesus

Starving children screaming for food as US aid cuts unleash devastation and death across Myanmar

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has repeatedly said “no one has died" because of his government’s decision to gut its foreign aid program.

apnews.com

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Courtney Vaughn @courtneyvaughn.bsky.social · 12h

Streets are still closed off in front of the Portland ICE facility at 8:30pm. Protesters have gathered on a side street. Dance party in progress.

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Daniel Knowles @dlknowles.bsky.social · 15h

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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Timnit Gebru @timnitgebru.bsky.social · 20h

for those of you who are serious about understanding the eugenic lineage of the whole AGI movement, on the other hand, you can peruse some of the resources at www.dair-institute.org/projects/tes...

The TESCREAL Bundle

The array of utopian ideologies that power Silicon Valley's elite is ultimately bleakly eugenicist.

www.dair-institute.org

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Noah Berlatsky @nberlat.bsky.social · 14h

as I tried to explain to corey robin, the Nazis were incompetent boobs.

not that that's much comfort to all the people they murdered.

Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social · Feb 5

that said: I think the "it's not fascism unless they're good at it" brand of analysis probably isn't the move

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Kavitha Rajagopalan @kxraja.bsky.social · 14h

It is unconscionable what innocent Palestinian people have been made to suffer in retaliation for the vicious attack of 10/7. They didn’t have anything to do with it. Many of the dead hadn’t even been born yet, or were old people sipping tea at home.

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