Brian Ward

  • Watching tonight: Matewan

    🎬

  • We’re living Animal Farm here:

  • Why won’t Trump release the INNOCENT MAN he sent to an El Salvadoran TORTURE PRISON? Did they MURDER him? Are they AFRAID OF WHAT HE WILL SAY if he makes it back? www.tiktok.com/t/ZTjdYdQ…

  • LegalEagle – On Due Process:

  • The Trump regime appears to be pressuring Amazon to ban books that they don’t like (under threat of withholding federal contracts): www.tiktok.com/t/ZTjeXcB… 😡

  • I want to live in the world where pop music sounds like THIS: www.tiktok.com/t/ZTjJMqa… 🎵

  • DSA: Stuff we can do RIGHT NOW to fight fascism and build socialism

  • Watching tonight: The Wobblies

    🎬

  • I’m no Rand Paul fan, but this speech is mostly right. He voted with Dems to try to stop the Trump tariffs and to reassert Congress’s role in enacting them. The Smoot-Hawley Act was Congress, not the President. Power of taxation is constitutionally assigned to the House:

  • A message from Bernie Sanders:

  • On tariffs:

  • When You Wish Upon A Star beautiful reharm! www.tiktok.com/t/ZT236o7… 🎶

  • Good discussion between Jon Stewart and Ezra Klein:

  • Chomsky from a few years ago talking about right now:

  • Bernie Sanders is the only honest politician we have:

  • My new tiling protest sign creator now sorta works on mobile. It’s brand new and a little bit buggy though. Give it a try and lemme know how it works for you. Video included to show workflow. You can get to it at go-protest.us

  • Chuck Schumer's Surrender is Clarity

    Great discussion with Senator Chris Murphy about the CR:

    It boils down to this: The Democrats are like watered-down seasoning – there’s a hint of something great, but ultimately, they’re ineffective. Nothing made that clearer than Chuck Schumer’s preemptive surrender to Donald Trump last week. Instead of using his power to stand firm, he caved. And this is the cycle we see over and over again.

    For decades, Democrats have positioned themselves as the party of working people, of big, bold governance. But the truth is, they’ve been seduced by corporate interests and have stopped fighting for systemic change. In some ways, that’s even worse than what Republicans do – at least the GOP is upfront about their allegiance to the wealthy and powerful. The Democrats, on the other hand, keep dangling hope in front of us, only to let it slip away. Where was the public option? Why should we accept that as our stretch goal when we should have been fighting for Medicare for All? Why do we keep lowering our expectations instead of demanding what we actually need?

    This is what Jon Stewart was getting at: At some point, the Democratic Party stopped being the party of big government solutions. Bill Clinton even said it outright: “The era of big government is over." But why did we accept that? Why did we buy into the conservative framing that government is inherently inefficient, when history tells us the opposite?

    The New Deal coalition built the 1950s America that everyone nostalgically worships – when the middle class thrived, unions were strong, and the economy worked for ordinary people. That happened because government took an active role in lifting people up. The Democratic Party of today could reclaim that legacy, but instead, they’re too busy playing a game that’s already rigged.

    If Democrats actually governed like Bernie Sanders, they could build an unstoppable coalition in this country. A movement that doesn’t just settle for the least-worst option, but actually demands and delivers change. Because we know what’s possible – we’ve done it before. We can do it again. But first, we need leaders who will actually fight.

  • The world doesn’t trust us anymore:

  • One of the most incredible tenor sax solos I’ve ever heard. Remember the name Santosh Sharma.

    Listen to this:

    I’ve not heard anybody since John Coltrane himself pull off that sound so faithfully.

    America’s in the 1930s, but this group is solidly in 1964. 🎷

  • Ignore This Warning At Your Peril

    The excuses are always the same:

    • I didn’t take him seriously.

    • I had no idea something like this would happen.

    • He said he was fighting for me.

    These are all catastrophic failures of critical thought. Ignorance is not an excuse – what is knowable is your responsibility to be aware of. Take it from Hitler’s personal secretary, Traudl Junge:

    Right now, America is witnessing the systematic dismantling of the rule of law. It is not normal for a president to stand at the Department of Justice podium and publicly name political opponents he wants eliminated or investigated. That happened today.

    It is not normal for a president to declare that two major news networks are now “illegal” in his view – and then promise to act on it. That happened today.

    Historically, the DOJ has operated as a nonpartisan institution, a firewall against political corruption. But Trump doesn’t believe in that. He follows a deeply flawed “unitary executive” theory, where the president wields unchecked control over the federal government. This is not democracy – it’s the architecture of authoritarian rule.

    You might not feel the impact yet. But it is happening.

    And I’m sorry to say: you’re not safe either.

    Politics is no longer functioning as normal. It has been consumed by one man’s unquenchable thirst for power. You might not see yourself as a target, but to him, you don’t exist. And if you get in his way, he will destroy you.

    He doesn’t care about you. He is using you. He lets you keep things that don’t threaten him while he consolidates more power for himself.

    If you’re not scared yet, you should be.

    The window to stop this is closing fast.

    –

    Credit to @danielpunkass for his post, which inspired me to write this one up.

    For some additional follow-up about what fascism is and how it works, I recently made a playlist to try to explain it all. It’s not an easy concept to understand.

    Finally: The most important thing you can do right now is to get involved in protests. Show up. Speak out. Talk to friends, neighbors, and strangers about what is happening: Make sure nobody has an excuse to claim ignorance.

  • This is fascism:

  • Bernie Sanders responds to today’s CR vote:

  • Donald Trump is attacking law firms he doesn’t like, but not without purpose. This is a direct assault on the legal system in order to break the rule of law and we’re underreacting to it: www.tiktok.com/@cohen489…

  • Senator Murray on the CR situation:

  • So I’m mad about the CR news this evening, but I’m also willing to believe that I don’t have the whole picture here.

    Chuck Schumer gives his side of the story:

    His explanation doesn’t sound totally unreasonable. He’s on the front line. Tell me why he’s wrong. 🤷‍♂️

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