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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie

@audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app
87K followers 1.7K following 13K posts

Words at ballsandstrikes.org, and even more words in The Originalism Trap: How Extremists Stole the Constitution and How We the People Can Take It Back Out now at tinyurl.com/originalismtrap !

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Reposted by Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie
Kevin M. Kruse @kevinmkruse.bsky.social · 3h
"For decades, we've provided election coverage that's based on in-depth political reporting by an experienced team of journalists backed by commentary from political leaders. But now we're throwing that aside so we can tell you what some of the most irredeemable uninformed gamblers are guessing."
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I Travel Like Sound Dog @chadstanton.blacksky.app · 2h
His entire business model hinges on hoovering up public money and then turning around to use some of that money to promote white supremacy which somehow brings in more public money.
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Elizabeth Spiers @espiers.bsky.social · 2h
Now seems like a good time to say that the more I look at what doge did with USAID the more it looks like a straightforward eugenics project and Elon’s protests that he didnt know anyone might die seem doubly evil
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Chris Geidner @chrisgeidner.bsky.social · 2h
Justice Kavanaugh, please explain to me — and Christa Pike— how this is an “interim” decision? Justice Barrett, please explain to us how this is merely a “preliminary” ruling?
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 1h
So he decided to just roll the headass conspiracy dice and see what happened?
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 30/09/2026
* checks the news * aaaand speaking of the Supreme Court abusing the shadow docket
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 1h
Vacating a stay of execution, and without even a word, is in-sane and horrific (Yes I know they've done similar shit before, that was wildly fucked up too)
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Charlie Warzel @cwarzel.bsky.social · 9h
There is a moment at the very very end of Abdul El-Sayed's podcast with Ezra Klein (book recommendation section) where he talks about the idea of "speaking truth to pain" and this will be staying with me for an extremely long time. www.nytimes.com/2026/09/25/o...
But there’s also something about truth to pain. We talk a lot about truth to power, but I think it’s actually a lot harder to speak truth to pain. I say that as someone who went to medical school, realizing that in a lot of our politics right now, we’ve got to get a lot better at speaking truth to pain if we’re going to get through some of these challenges that we have.

What does “truth to pain” mean?

It’s one thing to look power in the eye and say: You’re wrong about this. But there’s a way in which pain is very difficult to reason with. Because when somebody is in their pain, they’re in their trauma. They see that pain, and they may not see what’s causing it.

I remember just very explicitly being in a trauma ward with a gunshot wound patient and watching this big guy with his hand on his gunshot wound. All the folks are trying to pull his hand off his pain, that point of his gunshot wound, this clear vulnerability.

And this emergency room doctor had the presence of mind to be like: Everyone, stop. And she looks him in the eyes, and she’s like: I get that really hurts, and I’m so sorry that you’re here. You don’t want to be here. We don’t want you to be here. But if you don’t let us fix this, you could die. So I’m going to take your hand, and I’m going to move it off, OK? Because I need to get there so that you can live.

She was speaking truth to pain. He understands he’s at the hospital, he needs care, but he also doesn’t want anybody to touch the wound. Which is a natural thing. And I think it is a really great metaphor for how we think about a lot of these challenges we talked about today.
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 30/09/2026
the whole point of exercising "equitable powers" on the shadow docket is to quickly address imminent, irreparable harm it is infuriating and disgusting for the GOP justices to deploy that to block the harm of, what, insufficiently slow ethnic cleansing? ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/ketan...
ballsandstrikes.org
Ketanji Brown Jackson Is Getting Tired of the Supreme Court’s Shadow Docket Abuses
The conservative supermajority keeps refusing to take the real-world harms of its work seriously.
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 9h
clearly the real ethical problem is speaking about ethical problems
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 9h
oh shit! since Tennessee's governor denied clemency two days ago, and the Supreme Court denied a stay of execution yesterday, I definitely assumed Tennessee would execute Christa Pike today but the execution has apparently been paused TBD if 'paused' becomes 'called off'
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evy kwong @evystadium.bsky.social · 10h
whenever you feel like you’re too small to change anything know that citizens from small towns and cities that speak up against flock and axon cameras in their communities (and sometimes get arrested for it) are fighting and sometimes succeeding against this
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 9h
DOJ’s arguments in the White House press ban lawsuit really reflect the admin’s view of the Constitution writ large: where normal people see “rights,” the Trump administration sees mere privileges to be granted or withheld at Trump’s leisure ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...
ballsandstrikes.org
The Trump White House Keeps Treating the First Amendment as More of a Suggestion
Where normal people see “rights,” the White House sees privileges that the president may grant or withhold as he sees fit.
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 9h
the White House press ban lawsuit isn't the first time Trump’s DOJ has argued that the govt can single people out for worse treatment because of their viewpoints, and that the First Amendment doesn’t say anything about it ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...
ballsandstrikes.org
The Trump White House Keeps Treating the First Amendment as More of a Suggestion
Where normal people see “rights,” the White House sees privileges that the president may grant or withhold as he sees fit.
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 9h
"the code is more what you'd call 'guidelines' than actual rules"-ass Justice Department ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...
ballsandstrikes.org
The Trump White House Keeps Treating the First Amendment as More of a Suggestion
Where normal people see “rights,” the White House sees privileges that the president may grant or withhold as he sees fit.
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 10h
me watching this without sound: nope, too big. snuggly? apparently. but terrifyingly big. big as hell me watching this with sound: that's just a lil guy
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 11h
I wrote about the Supreme Court's nonstop lawless cruelty ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/ketan...
Screenshot of a paragraph excerpted from the linked article, with the text highlighted in green from the word "But" onwards. Excerpt reads as follows:

In places like Thursday’s speech and Friday’s dissent, Jackson has continuously sought to call attention to the deeply perverse ways that the Court is exercising its equity jurisdiction on the shadow docket. Under the Court’s precedents, emergency applicants are supposed to show that they’re “likely to succeed on the merits” of their appeal from a lower court’s ruling, that they will be “irreparably injured” without immediate relief, and that the balance of the equities tilts in their favor; in other words, fairness is both the explicit purpose and the explicit standard. But the Republican justices have repeatedly abandoned those standards in service of their own purposes. And when the people empowered to wield equitable jurisdiction are actively hostile to the concept of equity, they produce injustice instead.
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Greg Greene (he/him/his) @greene.haus · 29/09/2026
To quote a @chrislhayes.bsky.social jape at the Roberts Court: "They go fast when they want to go fast and slow when they want to go to slow and the decision is *always* an ideological one."
Steve Vladeck, a professor a Georgetown Law, writes up breaking developments from the Supreme Court. The last post in the three-post thread is the kicker, for our purpose here.

"#BREAKING: Over dissents from the three Democratic appointees, #SCOTUS grants a stay in the third-country removals case; clears way for Trump admin. to continue removing non-citizens without a full chance to litigate the conditions in those countries (while also taking up the full merits appeal). 

"Link: [URL of a supremecourt.gov PDF]

"By my math, the order was filed 11 minutes after the Trump administration's reply brief came in."
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mtsw @mtsw.bsky.social · 20h
look, if you're worried about being remembered, don't try to pursue immortality or whatever, the smart move is to start selling substandard copper and then make sure anyone who complains deposits a physical copy of that complaint in a site that will later be archaeologically significant
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Deva Woodly @devawo.bsky.social · 14h
Make the argument you want to make in resonant terms. It changes opinions.
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c0nc0rdance @c0nc0rdance.bsky.social · 13h
Omigod, this is the most heartwarming story possible! Backpack (bear 89) is the son of the 2019 winner of Fat Bear Week, Holly (bear 435). In 2007, he injured his foot & a practice of riding on momma's Holly's back had a new meaning: he was mobility-restricted while it healed. So Holly moved him.
From DISCVR blog's Facebook page, a momma bear & a yearling cub on her back in the shallow water.  I think the background has been swapped out, and I can't rule out some AI use there?  God, Facebook has become the social media for AI slop : (

The title of the article, which I link below, is "How Bear 89 earned the name Backpack"
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GOLIKEHELLMACHINE @golikehellmachine.com · 12h
occasionally you see birds which make you think, “oh yeah, okay, i can see how these were once dinosaurs”
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Micah @rincewind.run · 29/09/2026
anyway if you want actual honest coverage these days you should read @jaywillis.net and @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app and everyone else at @ballsandstrikes.org instead of brett kavanaugh’s personal friends
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 30/09/2026
the whole point of exercising "equitable powers" on the shadow docket is to quickly address imminent, irreparable harm it is infuriating and disgusting for the GOP justices to deploy that to block the harm of, what, insufficiently slow ethnic cleansing? ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/ketan...
ballsandstrikes.org
Ketanji Brown Jackson Is Getting Tired of the Supreme Court’s Shadow Docket Abuses
The conservative supermajority keeps refusing to take the real-world harms of its work seriously.
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 30/09/2026
* checks the news * aaaand speaking of the Supreme Court abusing the shadow docket
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Steve Vladeck @stevevladeck.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Just a reminder that this is the same Sen. Schmitt who repeatedly claimed that Chief Judge Boasberg was receiving a disproportionate share of Trump-related cases because he confused the D.C. Superior Court (which has 62 judges) with the D.C. district court (which has 15).
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Aaron Reichlin-Melnick @reichlinmelnick.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Incredible. The 11th Circuit, in a 3-0 opinion (two Obama appointees and one Trump 1.0 appointee), agrees that Trump and his lawyers have failed to rebut the judge's finding that the entire IRS settlement was collusive, highlighting that no other explanation for their conduct was even offered.
IV
The appellants mount two main attacks on the district
court’s speech-related sanction. First, they argue that the court
lacked a sufficient basis to find that the lawsuit and the settlement
were collusive and that Messrs. Brito and Epstein acted in bad faith.
Second, they contend that the sanction is a broad and impermissible gag order which constitutes a prior restraint and violates the
First Amendment. We conclude that the appellants have not made
a strong showing that they will succeed on either of these grounds.The appellants did not submit or offer any evidence to explain their litigation conduct or demonstrate that the lawsuit and the settlement were not collusive. Given the record before us, the
appellants have not made a strong showing that the district court
committed clear error in its collusion and bad faith findings
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 29/09/2026
if i send you this, it means im feelin wrong and strong
image of Senator Schmitt of Missouri with a dumbass smirk on his face, full of unearned confidence that's about to come crashing down
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I Travel Like Sound Dog @chadstanton.blacksky.app · 29/09/2026
Look at his face when he thinks he's just got him lol
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Asheesh Kapur Siddique @asheeshks.org · 29/09/2026
It's remarkable (in a very good way) to see an elected member of the Democratic Party saying this. For decades, the Party has treated public higher education as a jobs training program, not a site for cultivating democratic habits of mind. I deeply hope that things are changing.
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 29/09/2026
oh my God lol you can tell dude was absolutely feelin himself like 'we got him boys!' only to end up red in the face, flustered, and mad as hell as Klobuchar can barely keep herself from laughing in his face
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Marisa Kabas @marisakabas.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
if you know anything about senator schmitt's monumental fuck up in the jack smith hearing, i implore you to reach out. can be anonymous. signal: marisakabas.04 email: marisa@thehandbasket.co
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Zesmerelda @zesmerelda.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
"The Originalism Trap: How Extremists Stole the Constitution and How We the People Can Take It Back" -Madiba K. Dennie #Booksky #307 ⭐⭐⭐⭐/5 Great book about the far-right's take-over of the legal system via selective use of the originalism argument. Has counter-points to it that seem promising.
Book cover of "The Originalism Trap: How Extremists Stole the Constitution and How We the People Can Take It Back" by Madiba K. Dennie.
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sleepynaut @grovewalker.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
photo of werner herzog with a speech bubble added so that it looks like he is saying the quoted post
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 29/09/2026
"SCOTUSblog’s small army of new contributors includes Federalist Society co-founder Steven Calabresi, for example, and Brian Fitzpatrick, a former Scalia clerk whose column promises to “recreate lunch with Justice Scalia one blog post at a time.”" just lost my appetite all of a sudden
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Jay Willis @jaywillis.net · 29/09/2026
If you’d asked me to parody how silly and broken legal journalism is, I genuinely don’t think I could have come up with “so the best-known ‘nonpartisan’ Supreme Court outlet is now run by an ex-Trump DOJ flack who had her longtime personal friend Brett Kavanaugh officiate her wedding”
ballsandstrikes.org
The Conservative Takeover of SCOTUSblog Is Just What the Supreme Court Needed
SCOTUSblog used to cover the Supreme Court. Now, it cheers for it.
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Jay Willis @jaywillis.net · 29/09/2026
Wrote about the decline and fall of SCOTUSblog, which used to be the single best resource for Supreme Court stuff, and (thanks to some intervening crimes committed by its co-founder) is now a weird platform for conservative pundits to talk about what a good job the conservative justices are doing
slate.com
It Was the Essential Home of Supreme Court News. Now It’s a Joke. What Happened?
How high-stakes poker brought down a pillar of Supreme Court coverage.
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 28/09/2026
KBJ is this close 🤏🏾 to referring to Chief Justice John Roberts as Chief Justice Save-A-Ho ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/ketan...
screenshot of two paragraphs excerpted from the linked article. excerpt reads as follows:

At a public appearance in March 2026, Jackson attributed the spike to a corresponding “uptick” in “the court’s willingness to get involved.” Indeed, the Court has granted more than 70 percent of the administration’s requests. In her speech on Thursday, Jackson talked about what those grants look like in practice. She specifically highlighted the Court’s shadow docket orders allowing Trump to slash the Department of Education’s workforce, cancel hundreds of millions of dollars in government grants, and, as she put it, authorize “roving ICE patrols to conduct race-based searches and seizures of Latino residents in Los Angeles.”

With these grim examples, Jackson illustrated how transforming the emergency docket into a “special avenue that certain privileged litigants can use selectively” puts people in danger, and compromises both the functioning of the judiciary and the Court’s credibility with the public. And in Friday’s dissent, she similarly rejected the idea that the government is injured and requires emergency response services from the Supreme Court “whenever it is prevented from violating the law.”
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Evan Urquhart @evanurquhart.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Definitely click through on this story for the quotes from the Third Way spokesperson, who AGREED Democratic candidates should NOT adopt Republican language on trans issues. I was floored - even tried to get Billie to put it in the headline. This is not just analysis, these quotes are news.
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Maggie Tokuda-Hall @maggietokudahall.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
I did a painting outside my comfort zone today and I am so proud of myself
A little house on a grassy field under a lightly cloudy sky from a photo I took in Tierra del Fuego in 2017
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Brooke @brooklynmarie.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
You know what's messed up is this is like the fourth time in twenty years I've read this exact headline
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 29/09/2026
anyway basically everyone except Ken Paxton hates how the Supreme Court has allowed big money to distort democracy--and states are trying to do something about it! ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...
ballsandstrikes.org
How States Are Pushing Back Against the Supreme Court’s Citizens United Decision
As it turns out, normal people do not like political corruption as much as the conservative legal movement does.
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Alex Ip 葉清霖 @alexip718.com · 29/09/2026
A reminder that America cannot have a multiracial, multicultural democracy if the United States Supreme Court is allowed to continue to exist in its current form
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Gillian Brockell @gillianbrockell.com · 29/09/2026
One family, after the capture of a loved one, found out about it from activists and took steps to move other loved ones to non-287(g) jurisdictions. Another family still had no idea about why their loved one was captured until I told them about this and took steps to protect others that day.
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Gillian Brockell @gillianbrockell.com · 29/09/2026
Talking recently to family members of people snatched up and expelled to third countries by ICE, I learned: 1) All of those captured were in 287(g) jurisdictions; 2) None of the family members had known what 287(g) was and had erroneously thought people with no arrests were safe.
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Twirling towards Freedom @twirlingtofreedom.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
“Jackson highlighted the Court’s shadow docket orders allowing Trump to slash the Dept of Ed’s workforce, cancel hundreds of millions of dollars in government grants, and, as she put it, authorize “roving ICE patrols to conduct race-based searches and seizures of Latino residents in Los Angeles.””
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Claire Willett @clairewillett.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
the world is a rough place these days, but there are tiny glimmers of light everywhere if you know where to look for example, my sister just texted that their youngest decided to take up the trumpet and was honking away all evening in the garage, driving them nuts, and that did bring me real joy
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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 28/09/2026
aight i had more to say about this ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/ketan...
ballsandstrikes.org
Ketanji Brown Jackson Is Getting Tired of the Supreme Court’s Shadow Docket Abuses
The conservative supermajority keeps refusing to take the real-world harms of its work seriously.
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Dr. Nneka D. Dennie @nneka.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Anyone in or around the DMV looking for #USWNT tickets for the game at rowdy Audi on October 10? My family can't make it anymore so I've got 6 for sale.
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