Michael Mechanic

Yet another anti-wealth-tax opinion from @washingtonpost.com. A big factor she misses here: Billionaires have families, and they may well have other preferences. What's more, all the action and money in tech right now is in Northern California pretty much. If they move away, it'll be their loss.

Gonna ask students in the journalism ethics class I'm helping with: Who here thinks it is ethical for newspapers to run op-eds under the names of people who didn't write the piece but merely signed off on it? (They do this all the time.)

The Ramaswamy ad has pushed the largest newspaper in Ohio, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, to reverse its position on endorsements. "A candidate who uses childhood sexual abuse as a weapon against the person who endured it has crossed a line that Ohioans should defend, whatever their party."

NEW: Maricopa County will restore 25 voters’ registrations after they were falsely flagged as noncitizens, Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes (D) announced. Mayes sued Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap (R) Thursday, demanding that he add the voters back to the registration rolls.

I hope these people clapping in the background will at some point wake up and realize that their god frowns upon this kind of shit.

The midterms are packed with ballot measures that could dramatically affect natural spaces. www.vox.com/climate/5073...

Kudlow clearly knows nothing about California. I mean, is he even American?

Oh so a country *can* choose not to make the same mistake twice

This line from the legislative analyst in the CA voter guide section on Prop. 40, the billionaire wealth tax initiative: "California is home to a few hundred people with net worth over $1 billion, often called billionaires." That's quite an analysis!

Don't believe any scandalous things you read about Democratic candidates on social media in the week before the election, because they are likely part of a Russian disinformation campaign designed to help Trump (with help of RW enablers) keep Congress. Putin has much to gain—and a lot to lose.

Your periodic reminder that the way we do elections in America, especially the national races, is stupid and unfair and results in elected officials who don't represent the preferences of their constituents. Here's a fun little explainer I wrote for @motherjones.com a while back...

So much zeitgeist & craziness on @motherjones.com home page today.

Here's how Elon Musk and his DOGE could end up killing a ton of Americans.

Allowing one unelected man to have control over crucial aspects of the US military, allied militaries, the US space program, and so many other aspects of human life is absolutely insane. We were stupid to allow this to happen and it must be fixed ASAP.

“Jared promised MBZ that he’d push their agenda with Trump if they participated in a fund. He wanted normalization with Israel so that business could take off.” Wow, this story is damning. www.vanityfair.com/story/jared-...

"Honestly, if we end up with two hundred and twenty-five seats on the White Council, I would be disappointed. I would rather Sauron keep control of Middle-earth by five seats than have the Fellowship win by five, because then we’d be hostage to the Ents." buff.ly/9WluK1y

Remember "do no evil"?

Elon Musk fully believes that the entire US Government is fully under his control. And he may be right.

Whenever you're looking at/commenting on the latest polling data that people post here, try and distinguish between the high-quality polls and low-quality ones—some of which don't even poll real people! via @motherjones.com

Both are newsworthy. So the headline, though long, should be: "United CEO Calls for Wealth Taxes He Knows the Supreme Court Will Never Allow, and Suggests a New Way to Milk Money From the People Who Fly Coach"

Had a great conversation on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart about my new book "HOW RUSSIA WON: Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, and the Fight for America." Who would think that talking about Trump's betrayal of America could be so amusing? Check out the book: HowRussiaWon.com

Here's that yowza reporting from @nlanard.bsky.social www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Are you kidding? They are NOT powerless to stop him. The list of things Trump could legitimately be impeached and removed for is as long as Santa Christmas list. Low-hanging fruit in abundance. Tantalizing, as it were. They can stop him as soon as they grow a pair.

Lol, Tommy was a plant! But Tommy and Timmy Teepell tanked.

Wait a sec. We already have major programs to compensate people who report serious wrongdoing—typically by corporations, wealthy individuals, and government officials. They're called whistleblowers, and Trump is doing his best to crush them.

Traitor.

I'm not sure how much more blatant it can get that these guys are looting the federal government and then pointing over there and saying "look what THOSE BLACK PEOPLE ARE GETTING AWAY WITH!!!" bsky.app/profile/atru...

That's funny. I had exactly the same question. For him.

State legislative races should be getting a lot more attention Dems could flip 500 seats, pick up new majorities in 7 states & break up GOP majorities in 6 states 2026 could be 2010 in reverse

Tim Murphy came, but Ken Paxton couldn't take it.

An oldie but a goodie.

Musk says he'll give 1 share of SpaceX ($147.96) to each of the nation's ~72,021,348 minor children, so ~$10.7 billion, less than 1.2% of his wealth. Meanwhile, he swings our elections, kills USAID, neuters basic science, destroys countless lives, and reaps billions from taxpayers. He's a plague.

“The immigration judge works for the Trump administration. So does the prosecutor. Under your plan, so would the child’s lawyer. That is unacceptable,” @duckworth.senate.gov, @durbin.senate.gov, @warren.senate.gov, @markey.senate.gov, @schiff.senate.gov, and @wyden.senate.gov wrote to RFK Jr.

Remember: FBI agents disclosed that Elon Musk had several direct communications with Putin, which were a violation of US law because of the security classifications he holds in his capacity as owner of SpaceX.

Because other people's property taxes paid for your education and local government services?

I don't know how Trump can unilaterally end sanctions passed by Congress. Either way, it's abhorrent. He's sided with a monster, a dictator, against a democratically elected leader, and contrary to the will of the US public. What kind of president does this? May he be the last of his kind.

What kind of terrible person thinks this is acceptable? These people who came out to see Trump speak should be fucking ashamed of themselves. Also, I wager pretty much all of the 2 million to 3 million Muslim Americans registered to vote are damn well going to do so.

Love this headline.

I'm worried Trump is going to attempt a coup on Election Day. I really am. All of these clearly bullshit cases just feel like a pretext for them to invoke the Insurrection Act, declare martial law, and seize ballots and voting machines. I wouldn't put it past them.

Call it the Mar-a-Lago about-face.

Please stopcalling them "megadonors" @washingtonpost.com. They are political investors, who absolutely expect a return on investment. The people giving $25 are the donors.

Nothing to see here, just a president whose policies are directly taking away good, mostly AI-proof, jobs for Americans.

Can you guess what these women were protesting?

Given that the administration's claims of 16,000 noncitizens on Nevada voter rolls turned out to be 100% bogus, this almost certainly is bogus, too. It really sucks to have a DOJ that is both incompetent and untrustworthy.

Congratulations Maryland! You put a moron in Congress.