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Benjamin McKean

@blmckean.bsky.social
5.4K followers 1.1K following 4K posts

associate professor of political science at Ohio State University // global justice, supply chains, populism, climate change, critical theory, etc // all tweets (skeets?) produced accidentally by having my phone in a pants pocket while I walk the dog

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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 5h
9 million names removed from voting just in one state!
Mr. Modi's B.J.P. had for decades fallen short of a majority in elections for the state legislature in West Bengal. It finally came to power in May, right after a voter roll revision that removed about nine million names.
India's top court allowed the election to proceed, even though millions of people who had challenged their removals were still waiting for their cases to be heard. In about 100,000 appeals to have been adjudicated so far, a majority were found to be legitimate and ordered restored to the roll.
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 5h
“Protests intensified after the Indian Express reported last week that two election commissioners had questioned Kumar's voter-list revisions that removed roughly 130 million names from voter lists.” 130 MILLION!
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 12h
Preparing borscht looks especially gruesome as Halloween approaches
A box grater covered in beet juice that looks like blood
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 19h
dudes rock
The band Sugar on stage with a big banner behind them that says SUGAR
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 10/10/2026
Crowd at this Sugar reunion show is old enough that they’ve entirely given up the pretense of carding anyone
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Gillian Branstetter @gbbranstetter.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
How fast will this come to a public school near you
A U.S. charity in Gaza is worried that teachers at its schools might stray from a curriculum it says promotes peace and tolerance, so it plans to record classroom conversations and use artificial intelligence to flag speech deemed “hateful” or “inciting.”

The plans laid out by the founder of the Gaza Children Village in a webinar last month have elicited ethical, safety and privacy concerns from some Palestinian and advocacy groups and at least one of the charity’s partners.

There is no indication the charity intends to share its classrooms’ recordings with anybody else, but fears about the potential misuse of surveillance technology are heightened in Gaza after three years of war. The Israeli military has used AI to sift through intercepted communications and find suspicious speech, including to identify targets for strikes.
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
This also speaks to an important limit of Trump's pardon power - all these bozos will continue committing crimes after Trump leaves office or dies for which they can, should, must be prosecuted
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Tom Dannenbaum @tomdannenbaum.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
A direct and shameless assault on the rule of law. Hegemonic malevolence. www.reuters.com/world/us-imp...
reuters.com
EXCLUSIVE: US imposes sanctions on ICC hours after former judge wins Nobel Peace Prize
The Trump administration has long been hostile to the court and has previously imposed sanctions on its prosecutors and judges.
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
but how does this affect my h-index

» Academia Mentions jesus christ cited your paper
Academia.edu Academia.edu View your ci...
7:17 AM
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Erik Loomis @erikloomis.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
This Day in Labor History: October 9, 1961. The Supreme Court refused to review a Tennessee state Supreme Court order revoking the charter of the Highlander Folk School. Let's talk about this legendary space of radical labor and civil rights organizing in the rural South!
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
Conflict of interest!!
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
but how does this affect my h-index

» Academia Mentions jesus christ cited your paper
Academia.edu Academia.edu View your ci...
7:17 AM
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Dan "Mr. Bones and Me" Greene @dmgreene.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
feral dobbs (spooky)
@SwagMarxist
There are two types of Jacobin videos:
1) really interesting interview with the left wing academic you appreciate
2) "identity politics is turning you gay and stealing your electricity"
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
how much more literal is the choice between socialism and barbarism going to get
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
this is so offensive - excuse me, J. D. Vance went to *the Ohio State University* and can't define socialism
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Thanks but no thansn
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Being from California but living in Ohio, I get to experience two completely different ways for a state Democratic Party to be totally useless
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David Dayen @ddayen.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
California Democrats have been exposed as actively pushing for the Paramount-Warner Bros merger. With the new company giving David Ellison a $150 million bonus while firing Warner Bros' hitmakers, those Dems must own whatever happens next, writes Harold Meyerson. prospect.org/2026/10/08/d...
prospect.org
The Democrats Who Let Trump’s Oligarchs Buy Hollywood - The American Prospect
The Ellisons enlisted a host of Democratic notables to undercut the proposed merger’s opponents.
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
The recipient of almost half a billion dollars in tax subsidies from the state of Ohio, everyone!
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Elizabeth Jacobs, PhD @elizabethjacobs.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
It’s simply unimaginable that CDC Director Dr. Erica Schwartz has just bowed to RFK Jr. and approved funding for an utterly unethical clinical trial that will withhold the birth dose of HepB vaccine in Guinea Bissau. It is to be conducted by researchers accused of academic misconduct.
rollingstone.com
CDC Is Moving Forward With a Previously Shelved Controversial Hepatitis B Vaccine Study
“It’s a wholly unethical trial, and it shouldn’t be allowed,” says Dr. Paul Offit of Guinea-Bissau study
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Local media's credulous coverage of Anduril has been bad for years, but this fawning profile is really a new low: "In the end, Stephens finds morality in choosing to help stop others’ plans to destroy America and its people." Not a word of skepticism - just shameful work from Dispatch Magazines.
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
university communications staff: "Today the federal government recognized U.C. Davis as among 'America's most elite universities'!"
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Bryan Based International Order 🇨🇦 @bryanpeeler.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Goin' in the Intro IR slide deck
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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
One simple way to see that neither the GOP nor the national media really cares about THE DEBT & only pretends to when Democrats propose spending on left-coded domestic policies is that neither CNN nor anyone else in the media is asking “How can we afford that?” about this incredible waste.
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
youtu.be
Bad Religion - "Fuck Armageddon...This Is Hell" (Full Album Stream)
YouTube video by Epitaph Records
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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Flydubai pilot was deep into manosphere content, routinely used derogatory sexual slurs about women, and wanted a tradwife Misogyny is a gateway drug www.ft.com/content/a92b...
ft.com
The online life of the Flydubai attacker
[FREE TO READ] Co-pilot of flight 1073 gravitated towards the ‘manosphere’ and expressed misogynistic views
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
If only Danielle Allen would debate Yarvin at the Harvard Faculty Club one more time, I’m sure he and his admirers would see the error of their ways
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Stone Cold Steve Austin lives there?? Man, i am learning so much
nytimes.com
‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin is racing toward a new frontier
The one-time WWE star endeared himself to pro wrestling fans with his tenacity, deadpan humor and flippancy.
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
You were beaten to the punch lol
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Reading about the town in Nevada where my uncle moved after he left California and uhhhhhhh
It was a sundown town; a siren would be blown at 6 p.m. daily alerting Native Americans to leave town by sundown. 6]I71[8] The practice was ended in 2023 by SB 391 passed before the Nevada Legislature and signed into law by the governor.19! The area claimed that the nightly siren was a tribute to first responders. 10]
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Finally trained autocorrect to let me type “fucking” only for it now to turn “hell” into “he’ll”
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Ben Ansell @benansell.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Ah yes, the academic discipline most focused on decentralised markets and outcome based decision-making is also oddly the most concentrated and status driven.
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🎃 Seasonal Creep 👻 @windingdot.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
It’s too early in the morning for this shit
Columbus Dispatch Letter to the editor headline that says Yes, I'd rather elect a Christian, but God using Ramaswamy like he used King Cyrus | Letters

Letters to the editor
Oct. 7, 2026, 4:19 a.m. ET
We need more religious leaders in Ohio
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
going back and re-liking all the posts I un-liked after seeing your original post saying they got the wrong guy
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Nathan K. Hensley @nathankhensley.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
🚨 ALERT 🚨: All of Stuart Hall's notebooks have been digitized and are freely available to browse and read??? stuarthalldigital.bham.ac.uk/archival_mat...
Stuart Hall notebook: NOTES ON THE REPRODUCTION OF IDEOLOGIES AND THE MEDIA (Orange notebook, "Summit Students Pad")Stuart Hall notebook page with headline: "Problems for a Marxist Theory of the Media" and a series of bulletpoints. Lined notebook paper with black handwriting.
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Not sure what’s funnier about this ridiculous press release that the local news has credulously published - the absurd claim Columbus has the 4th best nightlife in the U.S. or that this “recent study” comes from something called “Gambulls, a crypto gaming platform”
nbc4i.com
How highly Columbus ranks among top U.S. cities for nightlife
A recent study by the crypto gaming platform Gambulls ranked Columbus, Ohio, as the fourth best city in the United States for nightlife based on factors like affordability, safety, and entertainmen…
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
I have a lot of questions but I guess my chief one is, how can you advocate a neo-Kautsky-ite “strategy of patience” and not say one word about climate change?
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
lmao
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칠락싱하는중 @lcj-faure.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Breaking out a tangentially related classic
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
I know the people involved mean well and I even sort of get why they moved in this direction but "The 2026 program will bring the same meaningful conversations to our campus community, now in the form of a podcast" is always always always going to get a laugh from me
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Makes sense - I usually pencil in a day and a half to appreciate the gavel properly
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
What else was on his bucket list? The topiary garden? The Arnold Schwarzenegger statue?
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Craig Calcaterra @craigcalcaterra.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Glen Matlock of the Sex Pistols visited the big gavel outside the Ohio Supreme Court on Sunday and posted about it. In the comments someone asked him WTF and he said "it's the biggest gavel in the world."
Glen Matlock, bass player of the Sex Pistols, standing in front of the giant gavel sculpture in front of the Ohio Supreme Court. Caption: "Bucket list day & half in Columbus"
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
shhhhhhhhh
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Sam “The Great Pumpkin” Thielman @samthielman.com · 07/10/2026
oh look paid protesters
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
"Rather than specify the concepts that are legally off-limits, [Ohio’s new civics bill, SB 461] simply gives unprecedented control over curricula and classroom materials, including textbooks, to unappointed, unelected, and unremovable committees that operate outside of state open meetings laws."
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
“Administrators seek to turn every problem into a process and integrate every process into software. They then outsource the implementation to others. When staff, faculty, and students have a poor experience with the processes, their backlash requires even more staffing to mitigate the disasters.”
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Candice Johnson @cyjohnson.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Great reporting that reveals a complete defunding of the social sciences at NSF
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
“Does anyone really believe that there are couples out there saying, ‘Hey, sweetheart, you and I should get married and raise a passel of kids because a dozen years from now, maybe they’ll build light rail out to our neighborhood?’”
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
I did this when my kid was selling Girl Scout cookies and people fucking HATED it lol
URGENT UPDATE: Elka's
cookie sales are heating up and she has just 24 hours to finish strong!
This sale could decide what kind of Girl Scout trinket the entire troop earns, so Elka needs YOU on her team! Please, will you personally buy cookies from Elka today? 

-Team Elka
Text STOP to quit
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