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Brian Lyman

@brianlyman.bsky.social

7K followers 630 following 4.2K posts

Editor, Alabama Reflector. Podcaster, Becoming Lincoln. 2024 Pulitzer finalist. Past: MGM Advertiser; Press-Register; The Anniston Star; Norwich Bulletin; Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Politics, history, science, horrific puns.

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · Nov 12

Here’s our mission statement at @alreflector.bsky.social. From my first column on launch day in February 2023.

Alabama Reflector: Covering the pain and promise of our home • Alabama Reflector

Laws are made in the State House. Alabama is made outside it. Alabama Reflector will cover these dynamics that shape our home.

alabamareflector.com

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Julia Azari @juliaazari.bsky.social · 10m

Here's the thing. I am a lucky person and pay a fair bit in taxes. I can think of no better use for my tax dollars than feeding children, because I think all people are equally deserving of basic humanity.

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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Alabama Reflector @alabamareflector.com · 16h

Via Amanda Hernández and Stateline: The nation’s prison population grew for the second consecutive year in 2023, reversing more than a decade of steady decline. But even with recent increases, the prison population in 2023 was still about 20% below the 2013 level. https://ow.ly/Vnq950X7Qrm

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eke @eke.bsky.social · 1h

you can throw in galveston, too. we're literally a different historic culture (and a couple different languages!) than the inland deep south

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 1h

The Gulf Coast areas of Florida, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana could be turned into their own state. Here in Alabama, the two coastal counties of Mobile and Baldwin pump a lot of tourism money into state coffers but often struggle to have their particular concerns addressed in Montgomery.

William Hazen @williamhazen.bsky.social · 1d

This is the most accurate depiction of the Midwest to date. Wichita has always felt like the last Midwest city while also being the first plains city.

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 1h

Montgomery has a rich and painful history, and it has two of the nation’s most powerful monuments to American suffering and resilience. That’s thanks to Stevenson and EJI, who have done this largely on their own, and certainly without any explicit support from the state.

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 1h

A great piece, and I’m not just saying that because my lovely wife @juliebennettphoto.bsky.social took the photos.

Civil Rights Lawyer Bryan Stevenson on How America’s Story Should Be Told

www.nytimes.com

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Alabama Reflector @alabamareflector.com · 2h

Via Andrea Tinker: HB 44, sponsored by Rep. Donna Givens, R-Loxley, would direct the Alabama Department of Human Resources (DHR) to request a waiver from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) to allow recipients of SNAP benefits to buy hot rotisserie chickens. https://ow.ly/N9ct50X8oKg

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Justin Sherin @wychstreet.bsky.social · 17h

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Alabama Reflector @alabamareflector.com · 3h

Via Anna Barrett: Montgomery police said Tuesday they have not yet made arrests in connection with a Saturday shooting that left two dead and 12 injured. https://ow.ly/zz0g50X83BY

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 3h

The cost of driving an EV is even cheaper in Alabama. And we’re starting to see more charging stations. The real milestone was when the Auburn Buc-ee’s installed fast chargers.

How Much It Costs to Drive an E.V. and a Gas Car in Every State

www.nytimes.com

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Philip Bump @pbump.com · 12h

You can’t talk seriously about gun violence in Chicago without talking about where the guns come from. www.pbump.net/o/the-red-st...

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 14h

In the 1990s, American Heritage ran a piece from a man who as a child was called over to shake the hand of a Civil War veteran in the 1920s or 30s. The veteran, who had shaken the hand of an American Revolution veteran when *he* was a kid, told him he was two handshakes away from the Revolution.

rax ‘levon honkers’ king @raxkingisdead.bsky.social · 17h

you ever think about those real weird overlaps. like tennessee williams might have listened to the ramones

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Alabama Reflector @alabamareflector.com · 20h

Via Jennifer Shutt: The Trump administration may try to interpret a law enacted during his first term in office differently than it did following the last government shutdown, potentially denying back pay to hundreds of thousands of furloughed federal workers. https://ow.ly/uiaY50X7Uw5

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 1d

Anyway, I wrote yesterday about an immigration system less interested in integrating foreigners into the United States than creating a class of people outside the law.

Immigrating legally shouldn't be hard. Harassing immigrants shouldn't be easy. | Alabama Reflector

You can't immigrate to the United States "the right way" when the system makes it effectively impossible to come to the country legally.

alabamareflector.com

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 1d

Much as I dislike reading hate mail, it's usually a good sign of how much my column is being read.

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Alabama Reflector @alabamareflector.com · 1d

Via Anna Claire Vollers and Stateline: The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday is scheduled to hear oral arguments in a case that could reverse or solidify state laws across the country that ban a controversial counseling practice for LGBTQ+ youth.

Conversion therapy for LGBTQ+ minors goes before the Supreme Court | Alabama Reflector

The U.S. Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments on Tuesday in a case that could reverse or solidify state laws across the country that ban conversion therapy, a controversial counseling practice for LGBTQ+ youth that has been discredited by much of the medical community.

alabamareflector.com

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 1d

And I think I first heard all those songs at The Ram.

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Dave Thomer @davethomer.bsky.social · 1d

And they sure as heck weren't one and done.

Here's Where the Story Ends. I Feel. Their cover of Wild Horses.

Reading, Writing & Arithmetic is one of those albums where they somehow took a very specific mood of my teenage years and encoded it onto a CD.

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ryan cooper @ryanlcooper.com · 1d

solar and wind generated more electricity that coal for the first time ever in the first half of 2025. that's the good shit ember-energy.org/latest-insig...

Global Electricity Mid-Year Insights 2025 | Ember

Solar and wind outpaced demand growth in the first half of 2025, as renewables overtook coal’s share in the global electricity mix.

ember-energy.org

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 1d

The Sundays and Dance Hall Crashers: Two female-fronted 1990s bands that deserved the success a lot of lesser outfits got.

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 1d

Summertime by The Sundays

Taylor Nichols, MD FACEP @tnicholsmd.com · 1d

What is a song that likely doesn't make anyone's top lists, but that you think is a perfect song, or absolutely beautiful, or that you could listen to on repeat?

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Alabama Reflector @alabamareflector.com · 1d

The Perry County PREP program is a a 90-day residential curriculum to assist former prison inmates with the transition back into the community. According to Pardons and Paroles, none of the PREP program's 400 graduates have been reincarcerated. https://ow.ly/nHkr50X6tWo

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 1d

This likely reflects a strong social safety net as much as gun restrictions, but still, it’s good when you *don’t* let everyone pretend to be Dirty Harry.

Again: Alabama (pop. 5M), with few gun restrictions, has more gun deaths each year than New York State (pop 19M), which has strong gun laws.

Michael Hobbes @michaelhobbes.bsky.social · 1d

It's so incredible how low homicide rates are in Europe. The UK, with a population of 70 million people, had fewer than 600 murders in 2023.
www.connexionfrance.com/news/double-...

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 1d

A weird little fact about gun restrictions is they actually work, and a “public safety” plan that doesn’t include them is little more than police cosplay.

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Brian Lyman @brianlyman.bsky.social · 1d

More people in Alabama die from gunfire each year than in New York, a state four times our size, and it is the height of hypocrisy for state leaders who have flooded Alabama with firearms and attacked local anti-gun efforts to lecture a city about public safety.

Alabama Reflector @alabamareflector.com · 1d

Via Anna Barrett: Alabama GOP officials attacked Montgomery leaders over crime in the wake of a mass shooting. City leaders pushed back on Monday, noting police spending is up over 26% and that state leaders had thwarted local efforts to prevent gun violence https://ow.ly/OHbX50X7GoU

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