Sen. Elizabeth Warren asks Trump Fed pick Kevin Warsh if he has investments tied to the Trump family. He won't answer directly.

Nothing has killed more soldiers in the history of humanity than disease. While worst is a more complicated question Hegseth is absolutely the dumbest secretary of defense the United States has ever had. bsky.app/profile/ones...

Palantir's Manifesto Is as Subtle as a MAGA Hat Palantir's 22-point manifesto is nonsense, writes Dave Karpf. But it at least it is short enough to be clarifying, he says.

My latest, for @techpolicypress.bsky.social

When I read Alex Karp’s book last year, I thought it should’ve been a tweet. Now Palantir has turned it into a tweet-length manifesto, which could’ve just been a picture of a MAGA hat.

Karp is… not a subtle thinker.
www.techpolicy.press/palantirs-ma...

Is he also going to make body armor optional?

shouldn't be allowed to choose their own clerks, shouldn't be allowed to accept fees for speaking or prize money or awards. shouldn't be able to get book deals, etc. etc. if what you want is to be famous, well, no one is forcing you to be a supreme court justice.

let's make a cultural value judgment: palantir are a bunch of execrable fascist shitheads and their ideas go against the basis of every civilized country on earth, from which they should be extirpated like the intellectual cancer they are

i was just saying to a friend a few days ago that trump's public opinion collapse opens up the field of possibilities in ways that are truly unpredictable. it is one thing for a president to be this popular at the *end* of their turn, but not even two years in?

Gonna spend the next two years spamming every elected Dem about the concept of "damnatio memoriae." Chisel his name off every inscription. Build over the various Trump Towers like they're Nero's Golden House. Remove him from physical memory, not to forget but as a sign of disrespect to the man.

Excited to attend the ribbon-cutting for the next segment of California’s solar canal initiative later this month in Hickman. Imagine generating solar power over 4,000 miles or so canals across the state. A lot of Sierra and Colorado River water to save via avoided evaporation.

“Parents must realize that refusing vaccinations doesn’t just put your own child at risk. It puts other children at risk. I don’t know where Renae picked up measles. It’s one of the most contagious viruses that exists, and it could have been from anywhere.”

Somewhere Bismarck is looking down in confusion as Germany projects power by sending 4,000 pensioners, 12 buffet stations and a TUI loyalty program through the Strait of Hormuz

This piece begins with Amity Shlaes' most common and most deceitful trick -- citing the unemployment numbers in 1938, when the country fell into a recession because FDR had been persuaded to *ease off* the New Deal, as proof that the New Deal didn't work.

Pure hackery.

So I just got sacked by @collegeofeurope.bsky.social by email

My course next academic year has been cancelled, I was not even asked about its future

More than 10 years teaching there ended in an email saying “Thank you for you understanding and for your cooperation”

It's notable that Sen. Ossoff is pressing this attack in a tight re-election fight in a purple state. The rest of the party needs to pay attention.

We’re defending Western Civilization by kicking Plato and Shakespeare out of university classes.

Power without accountability: The Palantir manifesto The problems with our tech philosopher kings

New, from me: Take the Palantir manifesto seriously, if not literally.
It reveals that our tech philosopher kings want public money, but without public accountability. This creates a dilemma for governments unaligned with its techno-fascist vision. 🧵
donmoynihan.substack.com/p/palantir-w...

On point. These guys wrap themselves in the flag to deflect any criticism of their cash grab. They're basically high-tech bank robbers who insist that bank robbery is the price we must pay for freedom.

Trump and FIFA Have Already Broken the 2026 World Cup Travel bans, ICE fears, and astronomical costs are ruining the tournament before it begins—not that Trump or Gianni Infantino care.

“For Trump and his administration, the World Cup is an opportunity not so much to launder his unsavory reputation as to embrace it: to take center stage as a global strongman. For Infantino and FIFA, it is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to rake in a fortune…”

newrepublic.com/article/2092...

Russian economy is faltering despite oil windfall, Sweden warns Stockholm’s military intelligence head says Moscow is manipulating data to make its economy look better

Exclusive: Sweden has intelligence indicating Russia's systematically manipulating data to fool Ukraine’s western allies into believing its economy has withstood the strain of its war spending & western sanctions, Thomas Nilsson, head of Sweden Military Intelligence, told me & @maxseddon.bsky.social

"The world’s top 100 oil and gas companies banked more than $30m every hour in unearned profit in the first month of the US-Israeli war in Iran"

That cash comes from all of us locked into reliance on dirty fossil fuels despite none of us asking for it

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

As wealth concentrates, so does power — the power to influence elections, shape policy, tilt markets and define the terms of public debate.

Taxing billionaires is not radical.

What is radical is allowing a system where extreme wealth exists alongside widespread hardship.

Reopen the Golden Door Repeal The Immigration and Nationality Act: immigration restrictionism is the Slave Power of the 21st century

“In 2025, 31 people died in the custody of ICE. In 2026, the count has already reached fifteen—and it is only April. Nearly every one of those deaths, as with nearly every death in ICE custody, would have been prevented with adequate medical care and humane treatment.”

And the Lord said: Behold for I have made man.

And the angels replied to the Lord: you screwed up a perfectly good monkey is what you did. look at it. it's got anxiety.

How South Korea plans to use the Iran crisis to spur a renewables revolution Energy crisis unfolding in Middle East has added political urgency, and more funding, to transform the solar industry in particular

This village uses its solar income on free communal lunches, buses and other communal efforts.“If you divide money as individual income, people feel disconnected. People who didn’t know each other for years now get to know each other within days”

I love everything about this.

“It’s a couple of things that work beautifully in concert. First: no music. Audiences are so sophisticated, but what they’re not accustomed to is not being told how to feel,” Wyle says. “You take all that out and it forces a level of engagement where you’re now looking for clues within the frame of the screen, which forces you to look up from your phone. And I think that is extremely engaging, especially to young viewers who aren’t accustomed to being asked to participate in a nonpassive way in the viewing experience.

“Second point, shooting it with almost exclusively 50-millimeter or 65-millimeter lenses, which is the most comparable to the human eye—and only shooting from the point of view of a human being that’s present in this space. There are no cameras on gurney wheels going in the hallway. There’s no cameras on the ceiling looking down from a God point of view. You are limited to the perspective of a participant. You can look away, but you can’t leave, and it becomes an endurance test for you to stay on your feet as long as we’re on our feet. Which [brings me to my] third point: real time. Real time has an aggregate sense of tension that you don’t get in any other form of storytelling. What happened before is happening now, and these two things are going to add up to the next thing. And if we throw more ingredients into this cooker and keep ratcheting it up, it’s going to pop.”

Wyle makes eye contact for his next point, delivering it with a Robby-esque matter-of-factness. “Fourth point: The election went the other way,” he says with a shrug. “We could have been a really good show with a lot of nice things to say in a perfectly normal Kamala Harris universe. And instead we became almost a beacon of hope and humanity in an alternative universe. But in the midst of that, fifth point—this is essentially competence porn. You’re watching really smart, dedicated people do what only they know how to do at a level that you don’t know how to do it, and you’re so fucking glad that they’re there doing it, and compartmentalizing their own stuff to put your broken pieces back together. You’re so reassured by knowing that there are people out there that laugh and joke and have the ability to lock in like that.”

this is fucking unreal stuff from Noah Wyle on the magic of The Pitt. www.gq.com/story/noah-w...

Me: I spoke to the New York Times about the Trump triumphal arch plans today.

Husband: What did you tell them?

Me: That I am the structure’s Arch Nemesis.

Husband: Puns? To the NYT?

Me: It’s a good pun. 10/10 Cicero would support this.

Husband: *exasperated sigh*

What happens to Britain's radical right if Orbán loses? Inside the money, power and patronage connecting Hungary and the British right

As Hungary votes, would recommend this piece about how Viktor Orban has used public money to bankroll an international ultraconservative network - including Roger Scruton cafes and €10k a month for failed Reform candidate Matt Goodwin

democracyforsale.substack.com/p/orbans-brits

ZDF-Politbarometer: AfD erstmals vor Union Erstmals liegt die AfD vor der Union. Gleichzeitig verliert die Regierung weiter Vertrauen, auch wegen der nicht sinkenden Energiepreise.

Studien belegen es, Umfragen belegen es, es ist komplett klar: Wer die AfD kopiert, stärkt sie. Jetzt muss diese banale Erkenntnis nur noch bei Merz und der CDU ankommen.

#afdverbotjetzt

www.zdfheute.de/politik/deut...

An ADSBx map showing Journey’s N62FF going from Mesa AZ to Shannon airport in Ireland.

HEADS-UP, IRELAND: A likely ICE flight has just landed at Shannon again, likely to refuel before delivering shackled migrants to god-knows-where.

This is the same plane that sent migrants to Uganda — a country they had never been to before — on April 1.

#spéirghorm

Andreas Rödder, der Mann, den Friedrich Merz zum Leiter der Fachkommission "Wertefundament und Grundlagen" gemacht hat, wirbt für Faschismus: