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Benjamin Coates

@benjamincoates.bsky.social
1.7K followers 804 following 118 posts

History Prof at Wake Forest studying US & the World, empire, law. Writing a history of the Us and economic sanctions. Co-editor, US in the World book series w/Cornell UP. Wrote a book: global.oup.com/academic/product/leg…

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Reposted by Benjamin Coates
Kieran Healy @kjhealy.co · 02/10/2026
I’ve written this up here. In addition to there not being a Covid-scale drop in tourism recently, you might also be wondering why visits from Mexico seem to double around 2004-05. The answer is not a sudden shift in Mexican preferences but rather our old friend, There Was A Change In The Measure.
kieranhealy.org
Trump Tourism Effects
In the past day or two on social media I kept seeing this graph from a Semafor story on the declining volume of international visitors to the United States. Semafor Graph. It seems to show, and was be...
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Reposted by Benjamin Coates
Elisabeth Piller @elisabeth-piller.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
I am hiring another postdoc for BLOCKADE's Freiburg team. A 4-year, full time position to explore the impact of blockades in the Americas in both world wars "from below". Please share! @shafrhistorians.bsky.social @historians.org @royalhistsoc.org www.hsozkult.de/job/id/job-1...
hsozkult.de
Making sure you're not a bot!
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Reposted by Benjamin Coates
American Historical Association @historians.org · 04/09/2026
As sanctions continue to shape international relations today, history can provide critical context. This AHA program, presented to elected officials and congressional staff on Capitol Hill in 2024, offers historical perspectives on the role and impact of sanctions. Watch the recording:
youtu.be
AHA Congressional Briefing: Historical Perspectives on Sanctions
AHA Congressional Briefing | February 6, 2024 On February 6, 2024, the American Historical Association hosted a Congressional Briefing offering historical perspectives on the role and impact of sanctions as an instrument of international relations. Pan...
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Reposted by Benjamin Coates
Patrick Iber @patrickiber.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Today you're going to see a lot of tributes and assessments of Gloria Steinem (I thought this one very good: www.thecut.com/article/glor...). You'll also see some people raising her involvement with the CIA, and others ignore it. (That obit doesn't even mentioned it.) What was that about?
thecut.com
Gloria Steinem Loved Women
The feminist icon, who has died at the age of 92, epitomized the contradictions and hopes of the women’s liberation movement.
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 22/06/2026
In 1979, people predicted US sanctions on Iran would lead to the collapse of the dollar...
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 03/06/2026
buncha bums if you ask me; must have gotten lucky
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 03/06/2026
I think 2020s Jokic was the last one
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 03/06/2026
MJ+Jokic+Oscar+Durant+Jokic = 82-0
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 21/05/2026
This book has a number of great pieces. I've assigned Blower's essay on the times square 1945 photo, as well as Andy Rotter's piece on Taft's underwear. www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9780801...
cornellpress.cornell.edu
The Familiar Made Strange by edited by Brooke L. Blower and Mark Philip Bradley | Paperback | Cornell University Press
In this volume, twelve distinguished historians offer original readings of American icons and artifacts that model new interpretive, transnational approaches to studying American history.
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 13/05/2026
in that case, James?
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 13/05/2026
llemy = Jamey?
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 12/04/2026
Better to remain silent and be thought a psychopath than to post and to remove all doubt
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 12/04/2026
good thing Nixon didn't have his own social media platform
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 31/03/2026
this is the most any president has talked about ballroom since LBJ ordered pants over the white house telephone
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 11/02/2026
5. These people are not very smart
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Reposted by Benjamin Coates
Boyd van Dijk @boydvandijk.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
a fascinating 4-year PhD vacancy on the interwar history of blockade & sanctions werkenbij.uva.nl/en/vacancies...
werkenbij.uva.nl
Vacancy — PhD position - Benign Blockades? Blockades and sanctions, 1919-1939
The Amsterdam School for Historical Studies (ASH) invites applications for a fully funded PhD position (4 years, 1.0ft). This position is part of the ERC Synergy-funded research programme BLOCKADE, wh...
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Reposted by Benjamin Coates
Ronald Angelo Johnson @ronajohnson.bsky.social · 17/09/2025
IT’S A REAL BOOK!!! My copy of ENTANGLED ALLIANCES arrived from @cornellupress.bsky.social! 📚
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 10/09/2025
Closing at 3
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Robert Colby @rkdcolby86.bsky.social · 21/08/2025
Fantastic resource for historians: a spreadsheet of NARA's digitized microfilm, with links to the files in the Archives catalog. May it help you as much as it has helped me. www.archives.gov/files/colleg...
archives.gov
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 07/08/2025
Paul Musgrave on the end of an era in U.S. foreign policy: “After Trump, U.S. commitments can no longer be relied upon to be structural; they will be viewed as individual.” musgrave.substack.com/p/a-new-era-...
musgrave.substack.com
A New Era of Foreign Policy. Damnit.
We can now mark the end of a period. Welcome to a new world.
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 21/07/2025
Everything’s about cover ups these days
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 17/07/2025
It’s not impossible that they completed the bulk of the ms before the article came out and missed seeing it while they were doing the revisions. Or maybe they are just petty
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 17/07/2025
If you aren’t already there, terminal A is the best place to hang out. Less crowded than the others. Plus there’s a weird little mezzanine level
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Reposted by Benjamin Coates
SHAFR @shafrhistorians.bsky.social · 18/06/2025
We're excited to welcome our exhibitors to #SHAFR2025 next week! Be on the lookout for old friends, familiar faces, and some new kids on the block.
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 24/04/2025
@danmargolies.bsky.social
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 24/04/2025
Tariff hero William McKinley, the day before he was assassinated: "We must not repose in fancied security that we can forever sell everything and buy little or nothing.... Commercial wars are unprofitable." millercenter.org/the-presiden...
millercenter.org
September 5, 1901: Speech in Buffalo, New York | Miller Center
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 11/04/2025
“Wrote”
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 09/04/2025
Party City was already dead. Now others are likely to follow. www.cnn.com/2024/12/20/b...
cnn.com
Party City is going out of business | CNN Business
Party City is closing down all of its stores, ending nearly 40 years in business, CNN has learned.
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Boyd van Dijk @boydvandijk.bsky.social · 08/04/2025
excellent opportunity for aspiring historians of Japan - focusing on blockade and WWII. werkenbij.uva.nl/en/vacancies...
werkenbij.uva.nl
Vacancy — PhD Position: Blockades and the Second World War in Asia (4 years)
The Amsterdam School for Historical Studies (ASH) invites applications for a fully funded postdoctoral researcher position (3 years, 0.8ft). This position is part of the ERC Synergy-funded research pr...
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 07/04/2025
In preparation for our glorious return to the McKinley era I am loading up on telegraph stocks and laudanum
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 06/04/2025
Is he actually praising Trump or just suggesting greater coherence than is warranted?
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Rob Levine @roblevine82.bsky.social · 05/04/2025
Absolutely. What is there to stop them?
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 03/04/2025
that's like 15% of the fellowship of the ring right there
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 03/04/2025
ahead of its time, but The Coup's take on Donald Trump holds up pretty well: youtu.be/z6Homo_amHQ?...
youtu.be
Pimps (Free Stylin At The Fortune 500 Club)
YouTube video by The Coup - Topic
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Reposted by Benjamin Coates
Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 15/03/2025
Trump just signed an executive order ordering the closure and elimination of the world renowned Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, created by an act of Congress in 1968. @shafrhistorians.bsky.social @raskin.house.gov @vanhollen.senate.gov
whitehouse.gov
Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Continues the Reduction of the Federal Bureaucracy
ELIMINATING WASTE AND REDUCING GOVERNMENT OVERREACH: Today, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order continuing the reduction of the Federal
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 06/03/2025
OK hot cheesy poutine vs. hot cheesy Putin is pretty good.
theguardian.com
‘We are not the 51st anything’: viral Canada ad gets Trump-inspired update
Remake of 2000 Molson beer ad has the same message as Trump threatens tariffs: Canada will not cower to the US
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 06/03/2025
MAGA as Cultural Revolution
nytimes.com
Many Chinese See a Cultural Revolution in America
People in China are expressing alarm at what seems to be an authoritarian turn in the United States, long their role model of democracy, that feels familiar.
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 05/03/2025
I for one am excited about our new avocado factories
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 24/02/2025
Obituary for Frank Wisner, son of the CIA plotter of the same name. Toward the end of his life he "voiced concern about the way the United States had exercised its global power, starting with the Vietnam War in the 1960s and through to the decades of conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan"
nytimes.com
Frank G. Wisner, Diplomat With Impact on Foreign Policy, Dies at 86
He headed U.S. embassies around the world and relished the role, bringing a gregarious style to promoting American interests. But he clashed with the Obama White House.
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Reposted by Benjamin Coates
Tori Bedford @bedford.bsky.social · 18/02/2025
Five employees at the JFK Library in Boston were laid off today in connection with a Trump administration overhaul of federal workers. "Without them, we are unable to stay open," a source tells @gbhnews.bsky.social. "It has been chaotic and we are seeking clarity."
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Miles Kellerman @mileskellerman.bsky.social · 11/02/2025
Trump is designating Mexican drug cartels as terrorists (FTOs). But this is easier said than done. In a new post, I discuss how the FTO label can cause chain-reaction patterns of de-risking -- with severe economic consequences. #polisky #econsky #lawsky mileskellerman.substack.com/p/the-design...
mileskellerman.substack.com
The Designation Dilemma
Trump wants to designate drug cartels as terrorists. The economic impact, both for America and Mexico, could be disastrous.
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 02/02/2025
how long until this site gets taken down? www.cia.gov/readingroom/...
cia.gov
From Typist to Trailblazer: The Evolving View of Women in the CIA's Workforce | CIA FOIA (foia.cia.gov)
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
"We are back to the age of Jackson and Tyler, but with nuclear weapons and a global reserve currency." musgrave.substack.com/p/a-long-way...
musgrave.substack.com
A Long Way Down
When Caesar moves fast and breaks things, it's hard to catch up or rebuild
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
Reminiscent of Ruben Dario poets.org/poem/roosevelt
poets.org
To Roosevelt
It is with the voice of the Bible, or verse of Walt Whitman
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 22/01/2025
Sanctions overcompliance, cartel edition www.nytimes.com/2025/01/22/w...
nytimes.com
Labeling Mexican Cartels ‘Terrorists’ Could Expose U.S. Companies to Sanctions
Isolating U.S. companies from cartel activities could be almost impossible given that the criminal groups operate in sectors like agriculture and tourism, leaving some American businesses vulnerable t...
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ECFR @ecfr.eu · 08/01/2025
@agathedemarais.bsky.social explains how a staged sanctions lifting process could provide economic relief while ensuring accountability 👇 buff.ly/3VJxCFd
buff.ly
The purpose of sanctions: Why Europe and America should begin lifting measures on Syria
Europeans and Americans should work closely together on a staged sanctions lifting process. They must connect this to respect for human rights and the holding of elections
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Benjamin Coates @benjamincoates.bsky.social · 08/01/2025
“The current abandonment of the principles of neoliberal globalization leaves the entire field of international development in chaos…One cannot imagine how a World Bank mission to Egypt could argue for reduced tariff rates or lower subsidies…”
branko2f7.substack.com
How the mainstream abandoned universal economic principles
(but forgot to mention it)
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