Jason

In about 24 hours, poles will open here in Israel. In what is a strong contender for Israel’s most critical elections. The election pits Netanyahu’s extremely unpopular coalition against a non-coherent, but moderately more liberal, opposition. Here are some thoughts as we head into it.

The ability of the Trump administration to keep breaking the law depends on telling staffers that they will be pardoned www.washingtonsun.com/whitehouse/w...

“It’s not only unlawful, but it’s not in the US interest to have Russian technology controlling the commercialization of Arctic gas in the North Slope,” says ex-Polar LNG CEO who quit after discovering secret Russian funding. www.nytimes.com/2026/10/23/u...

THEY ARE NOT POWERLESS TO STOP HIM! Go back to Washington, stand on the steps of the Capitol and demand Johnson and Thune recall the House and Senate, and impeach him. THIS IS HOW IT IS SUPPOSED TO WORK! THERE IS LITERALLY AN INSTRUCTION MANUAL! (It's called the Constitution.)

Humiliating and dangerous: Trump has now finally just made America an ally of the Kremlin and is aiding Putin in his war against an American friend and partner. Shameful betrayal of a US friend, and pathetic submission to a US enemy. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/1...

The saddest “do you denounce” going unasked is “do you denounce seditionists convicted beyond a reasonable doubt of violently attacking America?” For nearly every Republican, not only is the answer no, but their revealed preference is that the Jan. 6 attackers should be pardoned, even celebrated.

The leader of the Republican Party supports murderous anti-American war criminal Vladimir Putin. Will Republican candidates be repeatedly asked if they denounce Putin? The Republican Party's biggest donor also boosts a German Neo-Nazi party. Will Republican candidates be asked if they denounce AfD?

This past week serves as a valuable reminder that, the vague term "collusion" notwithstanding, Trump has spent his whole political career these last 11 years serving Russian interests, obstructing US foreign policy to help Ukraine, and jeopardizing NATO's unified front against Russian aggression...

golly gee, who could have predicted this? www.thebulwark.com/p/senate-vot...

YIKES #mesen #mepolitics

Does arresting the wife of an enlisted man and mother of four US citizen children, a person who’s been here since she was 6 years old, make our country great again?

Almost like the boat strikes are just performative murder and not a serious counter-drug tactic. www.wsj.com/world/americ...

Average hourly earnings, adjusted for inflation, fell 0.5 percent in September and are now back to where they were in January, 2025. That means that Americans, on average, have experienced zero real wage growth since Trump returned to office.

Billions of dollars’ worth of contracts predicting oil would fall and the S&P 500 would rise were placed about 15 minutes before Trump announced a U-turn on Iran in a post on Truth Social. CFTC staff began to investigate...then were told to lay off. www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...

With Trump openly admitting his announced Russia-Ukraine “energy ceasefire” was nothing more than words out of his mouth—no actual ceasefire, not even words from Ukraine or Russia that they’re violating, just empty BS—can the press finally stop with headlines presenting his pronouncements as fact?

More damaging revelations about Ken Paxton: A previously unreported New Year’s Eve 2024 celebration where Paxton partied in Dubai with two fugitives from U.S. justice and a woman who wasn’t his wife on.wsj.com/4yKLe4d

It's already illegal. Congress banned it near-unanimously in 2022. That law allows the ban to be lifted only if Russia withdraws from Ukraine. He's simply breaking the law that's already on the books.

Never forget: www.theguardian.com/media/2019/f...

Countries in history have turned to socialism—whether you mean authoritarian communism like the USSR or social democracy like Norway—and I can't think of any that experienced a big demographic change right before. The MAGA definition of "socialist" is "not white." Same definition of "criminal."

7/ Among the most jarring trends we found: 36 U.S. citizens were not allowed to contact their family or a lawyer.

The government *still* isn’t tracking how often immigration agents detain U.S. citizens. We are. 500+ Americans have been handcuffed, held at gunpoint or held against their will in Trump’s second term. Our tally is almost certainly an undercount. THREAD (content warning: violence) ⬇️

Updated this piece about abuses in grants/contracts: Noem gave $900 million in no-bid contracts to the company of a donor, Salus, which in turn was telling other contractors they had to pay her boyfriend tens of millions if they wanted to get govt contracts. donmoynihan.substack.com/p/governing-...

A 10K contribution and a $900 million return. The scale of the graft in Homeland Security is a) off the charts and b) possible because no-one believes they will face any accountability

Where in the law does it say that Constitutionality depends on whether a Supreme Court Justice feels an established right has or has not “engendered reliance interests” in other people?

JUST POSTED: Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff have pushed a multibillion oil deal with Russia as part of peace talks that will bring profits to their family business partners. A new front for Trump-era conflicts of interest. www.nytimes.com/2026/10/03/u...

wow oh my who could have seen this coming www.semafor.com/article/10/0...

This is the 59th death in ICE detention since Trump took office.

Visitors to the US are on track to drop by almost two million year-on-year. “We’re the only major country in the world losing visitation,” the head of the US Travel Association said. “It’s mind-boggling.” www.semafor.com/article/09/2...

Trump expressed support for the Iraq war as it started. He later criticized Bush for not stealing oil or doing enough war crimes (namely targeting innocent family members of insurgents). Then he acted on that vision of war with Iran, and it's failing badly. Enough Trump-absolving revisionist BS.

A phenomenal moment in the Senate. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., claims he has evidence Jack Smith went to a HAWKS game in Atlanta. Smith denies it. Schmitt declares he has busted Jack Smith for perjury. Smith, vexed, says he went to HAWKEYES game in Maryland. WATCH IN FULL, UNINTERRUPTED

1. How has MAGA Inc. raised an unprecedented amount of money? Let’s review:

Saudi Arabia is in big trouble, with their oil industry under attack from multiple directions. The Saudis spent years bribing Trump and Kushner. At first, it seemed like a good investment. But the Iran war screwed them, now they really need help, and the US can't/won't. Me, in @foreignpolicy.com:

Remember when legal eminences scolded everyone saying “Constitutional crisis” to settle down because it’s not a Constitutional crisis without the government blatantly violating court orders, then the White House blatantly violated more and more court orders, and those prominent lawyers said nothing?

This seems like a pretty big deal: donors made illegal contributions to Susan Collins and then were awarded lucrative contracts after her office intervened with the Navy. An FBI investigation was dropped under Trump. www.propublica.org/article/fbi-...

Susan Collins is corrupt, the FBI probably had her, but Trump made the investigation go away? Collins’ actions show she’s been on board with the corrupt, anti-democracy ideological project since at least 2017—while pretending to be “concerned” about it—but a personal angle too fills in some blanks.

Sen. Susan Collins helped steer millions in federal defense contracts to Navatek, whose CEO illegally funneled thousands of dollars to her campaign. The FBI sought to launch a probe and was eyeing Collins and other lawmakers. Then Trump gutted the unit in charge. THREAD 🧵

ICE is erasing immigrants with final deportation orders from a searchable online database, leaving families and attorneys in the dark as they try to find out where someone has been taken. www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/...

It really is striking how many authoritarian states have ended up in this exact same place, where the leader seizes control of scientific inquiry. Lysenkoism in the Soviet Union, Aryan Physics in the Third Reich, Great Leap Forward (also related to Lysenko) in China.

Trump’s Iran War Is a Rolling Disaster With No End in Sight The conflict is expanding, cutting off more oil supply routes—and the president has no idea what to do except lie In @theunpopulist.net:

The Trump administration's lawless killing spree at sea continues with a lethal strike on four more supposed "narco-terrorists" in the Caribbean. Very real killing in a make-believe war. Outside of war the general term for premeditated killing is murder.

As of today, both the House and Senate have passed this idiotic bill. It now heads to the president's desk.

Imagine a job where, faced with a difficult decision, you could just stop going to work www.nbcnews.com/politics/con...

NEW: DHS's Inspector General releases a scathing report about the Everglades detention camp known as "Alligator Alcatraz." The OIG finds that the now-closed camp, violated multiple ICE standards. The OIG also confirms detainees were punished with placement in a metal cage in the Florida heat.🧵

internal audit released by DHS’s inspector general found a significant dip in Homeland Security Investigations’ enforcement efforts against fentanyl trafficking from FY 2024 to FY 2025, because resources were diverted toward immigration instead. (via @eggerdc.bsky.social)

this is the bill that would give Trump authority to tariff basically any country he wants. it passed the senate with bipartisan support. ostensibly a Russia sanctions bill, but the sanctions provisions have no teeth and the new tariff authorities are enormous. www.thebulwark.com/p/senate-vot...

Credit to PBS News. This is by far one of the most accurate descriptions of what trump did. None of the sanewashing we saw with so much of the news coverage.

Just did a quick look around and I don't see very many headlines about the President of the US making people pledge allegiance to him personally while telling everyone to commit election fraud and "cheat like hell" to support his party. Seems like it should be a story?

@thebulwark.com did a supercut of all the prior times Trump said he was going to give Americans a $5000 check or whatever. It is glorious

It’s been driving me crazy for a while that this is not a bigger story so I tried to do something about it. I think it’s pretty jaw dropping. youtu.be/bFpHYSoi2CI?...

It's worse than this. Because in the early morning of October 7, Israeli intelligence picked up signs that Hamas was doing something - but concluded that it was likely just a drill. Had Netanyahu passed along the specific warning from MBZ that Sinwar was planning something big and imminent ...