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Lumina

@lumina54.bsky.social
244 followers 909 following 381 posts

Political sociologist by training (AoS: ethnic conflict, soc mvmts, democratization), pol sci (IR) data analyst for a living, digital organizer working to elect Democrats. Here to read news & gain insights, w/ just occasional random posts. Repost ≠ endorse

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Reposted by Lumina
Quinta Jurecic @qjurecic.bsky.social · 14/10/2026
the ukraine news is giving me flashbacks to the 2019 impeachment, not in a good way
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Abdul El-Sayed @abdulelsayed.bsky.social · 14/10/2026
My name is not the reason we're paying $5/gallon for gas. My name is not the reason you can't afford your groceries. My name is not the reason you can't afford your mortgage or rent. My name is not the reason you can't see a doctor. Their policies are the reason.
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James Goodwin @jamesgoodwin.bsky.social · 14/10/2026
Very revealing moment for the press here. The unstated premise of this question is they cannot understand how Democrats are different from Republicans. That Democrats are capable of abstract, critical thought, and Republicans just use their mouths to reflexively echo.
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Catherine Rampell @crampell.bsky.social · 14/10/2026
Billions of dollars’ worth of contracts predicting oil would fall and the S&P 500 would rise were placed about 15 minutes before Trump announced a U-turn on Iran in a post on Truth Social. CFTC staff began to investigate...then were told to lay off. www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...
bloomberg.com
CFTC Staff Were Told to Retract Analysis of Suspicious Oil Trades
Chairman’s adviser intervened to take over examination of lucrative bets that were made around Trump reversal on Iran power plant attack.
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Bluesky @bsky.app · 12/10/2026
This is NOT an ad for @alexgibneyfilm.bsky.social’s new documentary “MUSK” (in theaters now). We are promoting it for free. Join us right here on October 20, 2026 at 9am Pacific/noon Eastern for a livestream hosted by @niedermeyer.online.
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Dan Ancona @danancona.bsky.social · 10/10/2026
Motherfuckbuckets, this is giving me feels. I absolutely love this one. The combination of the time theme and the decades of everything feeling like it's getting more difficult, just super powerful. His rough around the edges delivery is so perfect for this.
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Laura Bassett @lebassett.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
“If you don’t like public executions just don’t watch it” says the crowd trying to ban drag shows and books
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Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani @mayor.nyc.gov · 09/10/2026
This afternoon in Marble Hill, a New Yorker was shot by an ICE agent in a residential neighborhood. Early reports indicate agents surrounded him and a 5-year-old child in his car before firing multiple rounds. We believe the child was physically unharmed.

This is an unconscionable and incredibly serious situation. I have called the President; when we speak I will demand that he ends all ICE enforcement actions in our city. I will not stand by while ICE agents terrorize our communities.

Our thoughts are with the injured New Yorker and his family tonight. We are praying for his recovery.

Get ICE out of our neighborhoods. Get ICE out of our hospitals. Get ICE off our streets. Get ICE away from our children.

Abolish ICE.
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Ari Berman @ariberman.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
In 1868 Louisiana elected first Black congressman. He was never seated In 1875 Louisiana elected second Black congressman. He served just one term It took 114 years for Louisiana to elect another Black member of Congress And now Roberts Court wants to wipe out Black representation across South
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Assigned Media @assignedmedia.org · 08/10/2026
@rikiwilchins.bsky.social 2026 Oct Advocate Human Rights Campaign president Kelley Robinson tells Dems caving on trans rights: "You’re doing too much and getting too little. You don’t have to sacrifice any member of our community to win.” www.advocate.com/politics/ele...
advocate.com
Human Rights Campaign president to Dems caving on trans rights: ‘You’re doing too much and getting too little’
“You don’t have to sacrifice any member of our community to win,” Kelley Robinson told reporters as she outlined HRC’s $15 million midterm investment.
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Social Media Lab @socialmedialab.ca · 30/09/2026
The world is moving on... It always does. "Overseas visitors to the US are on track to drop by almost two million year-on-year, with even the FIFA Men’s World Cup failing to arrest the decline in tourism." www.semafor.com/article/09/2...
semafor.com
Decline in tourism hits US economy
Overseas visitors to the US are on track to drop by almost two million year-on-year.
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Josh Marshall @joshtpm.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Rusty Red State Candidates With Rusty Values talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/rusty...
talkingpointsmemo.com
Rusty Red State Candidates With Rusty Values
This afternoon I saw an ad being run by a SuperPAC supporting...
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Josh Marshall @joshtpm.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Holy shit, this ad! I cannot imagine the impetus for pardoning this guy. But I’m not even sure it matters. Kind of along the lines of that Roger Marshall ad. If you’re explaining you’re losing.
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Media Matters for America @mmfa.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Farmers who were promised “America First” policies say that $6 diesel — an all-time high — is “eating everyone’s bottom line” as Trump’s ongoing war with Iran stretches toward peak harvest season.
mediamatters.org
Local TV news stations across the nation tell story of US farmers struggling to adapt to high diesel prices
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Dr. Damien P. Williams, dread portent down from a mountain cave @wolven.blacksky.app · 22/09/2026
2 things, in ascending order of importance: 1) Polls are Possibility but they don't vote; don't stop working. 2) El-Sayed has Massive support in a mid-west rust-belt state while vocally supporting transgender kids & adults/directly Dismissing claims that trans people are "dangerous." Learn from that
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Candice Bernd @candicequestions.com · 21/09/2026
NOW: Just arrived at the intersection of Research Blvd and Anderson Lane—near where ICE shot & wounded 29-yr-old Wilber Rafael Garces Perez earlier today. Between 300-500 people still holding intersection here. ICE is reportedly not letting Garces Perez’s family access him at the hospital.
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Max Kennerly @maxkennerly.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
If you're a Dem who thinks you'll gain something by going anti-trans, look at Gallup's "most important problem" and Fox News' "most important issue" polling and see where trans issues rank. Whoever told you going anti-trans is a savvy or necessary move spends too much time on X and should be fired.
Gallup polling. "LGBTQ rights" moves between 0 and 1%.Fox news polling. Wokeness/transgender issues at 0%.
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Catherine Rampell @crampell.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
It really is striking how many authoritarian states have ended up in this exact same place, where the leader seizes control of scientific inquiry. Lysenkoism in the Soviet Union, Aryan Physics in the Third Reich, Great Leap Forward (also related to Lysenko) in China.
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Faine Greenwood @faineg.com · 15/09/2026
Combatants are hunting civilians from the sky with small drones more than ever before - and the international community isn’t doing enough to stop it. My latest on the ways we can protect civilians from drones, written with Nathaniel Raymond of @hrl-yalesph.bsky.social :
foreignpolicy.com
The Laws of War Must Change for the Drone Age
Hunting civilians from the sky is growing disturbingly common.
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Scott Horton @robertscotthorton.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
The CNN investigation concludes that the devastation that was visited on 16 US military installations in the Gulf region was clearly possible because of Russian missile technology and guidance data supplied to Iran. That's the same folks who paid for Trump Jr's wedding party, by the way.
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Jamie Dupree @jamiedupree.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
As expected, the Senate failed to force the start of debate on the CLARITY Act, a bill designed to set up a regulatory framework on cryptocurrency. Democrats said the bill did not do enough about ethics issues / crypto / government officials (read: Trump). 60 votes were needed to advance.
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Jay Willis @jaywillis.net · 15/09/2026
Genuinely an insane paragraph from Sam Alito. “Voter fraud is real and scary and we have to stop it, so the fact that implementing Trump’s mail ballot rule will disenfranchise millions is legally irrelevant.” Brain melted. A right-wing podcaster in a robe. www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25p...
___, (slip op., at 9) (internal quotation marks omitted).
As for the equities, the Government has a strong interest
in enforcing the rule, and implementing it will also “en-
hance the visibility of Federal Ballot Mail” in order to better
detect election fraud. 91 Fed. Reg. 54972. On the other side
of the balance, the plaintiff States invoke the practical ef-
fects of implementing the rule close to the midterm elec-
tions. I take that problem very seriously, but it is not
enough to convince me to deny the application.
First, as the District Court acknowledged, the States dis-
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Kristian G. Andersen @kgandersen.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
Good read. What truly baffles me seeing this "AI-designed-printed-in-the-lab-bioweapon will kill us all" guff is the fact that we have *the* biggest, out-of-control, Gain-of-Function experiment, in BSL-0, already running rampant in the US. In cattle 🐮. Yet, 🦗. www.theatlantic.com/health/2026/...
theatlantic.com
The AI Pandemic Isn’t On Its Way
Yet plenty of others might be, thanks to evolution.
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Rob Bon Vivant🌊 @77sunnyandclear.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
You cannot make this stuff up. The GOP’s Dallas midterm convention put Ross Ulbricht—the Silk Road founder convicted on 7 federal counts, including narcotics trafficking and money laundering—on stage. Trump pardoned him in 2025. TWO LIFE SENTENCES. And THIS is who they’re putting on a pedestal?
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Brandon Friedman @brandonfriedman.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
Last month, the Pentagon fired the publisher and editor-in-chief of Stars and Stripes. Two opposite headlines this morning show the results were swift.
Hormuz shipping traffic falls to single digits, data shows
By Reuters
September 10, 2026 10:48 PM CDTOil shipments through Strait of Hormuz rise with US military assistance

By ALISON BATH  STARS AND STRIPES Published 27 minutes ago

Read more at: https://www.stripes.com/theaters/middle_east/2026-09-11/middle-east-iran-hormuz-navy-tankers-22817340.html
Source - Stars and Stripes
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Coach Finstock @coachfinstock.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
Seriously if any president ever did this besides him he would be gone in 5 seconds. Yet it won't be above the fold every day for the next month and it won't be the leading story on cable news every day until the midterms even though it should be.
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Acyn @acyn.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Dean: He spent billions of your tax dollars wrecking the White House and building monuments to himself. He will be remembered for rot and rubble
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David Roberts @volts.wtf · 07/09/2026
christ
politico.com
Crypto billionaire among dozens to back startup from Gillibrand’s son
Chris Larsen, John Griffin and Mark Ein are angel investors in a new financial exchange led by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand’s 22-year-old son.
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Gil Durán @gilduran.com · 06/09/2026
Silicon Valley's effort to destroy democracy is the biggest story of our political moment. Beware of those who have nothing to say about it.
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Henry Farrell @himself.bsky.social · 06/09/2026
Why we need the social sciences to understand AI www.nytimes.com/2026/09/06/o...
nytimes.com
Opinion | We Can’t Know Our A.I. Future if We Don’t Study It
Just as A.I. is poised to change the world, we’re losing our best ways of studying what that change will look like.
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Jay Rosen @jayrosen.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
At @status.news this weekend I got a word in about the "media frenzy" surrounding Hasan Piker. www.status.news/p/hasan-pike...
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Dr. William Horne @wihorne.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
We are in the “you can’t learn that anymore” stage of fascism, for anyone still keeping track.
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Scott Horton @robertscotthorton.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
For Trump, colleges and universities are the enemy for a fairly obvious reason: no one with a college education votes for him. The denial of international visas aims to suck up an essential revenue stream for universities and to put their continuation in doubt. That's the object of this exercise.
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Adam Bienkov @adambienkov.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
The Nigel Farage and Reform foreign donations scandal excluded from all but one national newspaper front page this morning. No sign of it at all on the front pages of the two papers which splashed the polls secretly funded by a Reform donor earlier this year
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Timothy McBride @mcbridetd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Max Miller,a domestic abuser of his wife and child, gets NRCC’s help on the airwaves Really? www.politico.com/live-updates...
politico.com
Max Miller gets NRCC’s help on the airwaves
The Ohio Republican facing allegations of domestic abuse is not on a list of national GOP priority candidates.
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Lumina @lumina54.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
I didn't vote for this cosplay working-class dude in the primary for a reason -- he showed exactly who he was back then. Consider 2028 PASen to be a must-flip race because it is effectively a flip. Act accordingly.
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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 04/09/2026
turns out the guy who looked, talked and dressed like he didn’t give a shit about the job…doesn’t give a shit about the job
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Greg Sargent @gregsargent.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Egregious omission by NYT: Its report on Vance-AES feud quotes AES's barb about Usha and Papaw without including the original Vance quote that AES was responding to. That makes it look like AES brought up Usha out of the blue and drains his quote of its real meaning: newrepublic.com/article/2149...
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Nate Raymond @nateraymond.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Scoop: The U.S. State Department has drafted guidance requiring parents applying for passports for their children ​to provide proof of their own citizenship or immigration status as part of President Trump's latest effort to limit birthright ‌citizenship, @kristinacooke.bsky.social and I report.
reuters.com
EXCLUSIVE: Trump birthright curbs may prompt US passport checks on parents
The U.S. State Department has proposed requiring parents applying for passports for their children ​to provide proof of their own citizenship or immigration status as part of President Donald Trump's ...
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Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
Can't get numb to this: it's frightening how Trump et al have normalized lawless behavior by govt officials. US govt cruelty to immigrants is not remotely new, but people like Rubio, the nation's top diplomat, moved the Overton window on accepting scandalous outrages. www.nytimes.com/2026/08/30/w...
nytimes.com
Deportees Sent to Liberia Recount Harrowing Details of U.S. Expulsion and Treatment by ICE
Ten deportees said they experienced or witnessed what they called abusive or violent treatment by ICE. They spent months in detention, they said, before being sent to nations where they had no ties.
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David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
Former USAID disaster-response chief @jeremykonyndyk.bsky.social suggested that the Trump regime’s DOGE funding cuts to USAID, including the SERVIR program, impacted flood prediction and early warning systems in Nepal and made it way more deadly.
rawstory.com
Unsettling question raised over Trump admin's role in devastating Nepal floods
The devastating flash floods in Nepal this week that killed at least 670 people and left around 3,000 missing — including 90 Americans — might have claimed fewer lives if not for the actions of the Tr...
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Kevin Rothrock @kevinrothrock.me · 26/08/2026
Food for thought. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
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Aaron Reichlin-Melnick @reichlinmelnick.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
An incredible story. The Iranian Christian woman who wrote “help” on the glass on the hotel in Panama has finally found permanent safety; in Canada. The Trump admin deported her to Panama soon after taking office, rather than let her seek asylum. Read her story 👇 www.nytimes.com/2026/08/25/w...
nytimes.com
Christian Convert Who Fled Iran and Was Deported By Trump Finds New Home (Gift Article)
Artemis Ghasemzadeh, who had escaped religious persecution, was deported to Panama under Trump’s immigration crackdown. Now, Canada has given her asylum.
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Greg Sargent @gregsargent.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
People are missing something big about Trump's insane new trade war with Canada: Its impact will hit right in the heart of the Midwest, where many midterm races will be decided. I talked to Dems in the region. They're already using this against Rs. 1/ (new piece) newrepublic.com/article/2146...
newrepublic.com
How Trump’s Crazed Fury at Canada Is Already Backfiring Badly for Him
The escalating trade war with Canada will hit hard in the Midwest—right where some of the most important contests in the midterms will be decided.
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Toby Buckle @polphilpod.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
modern fascists aren't posturing, or saying stuff for some other purpose—they mean it my latest with @liberalcurrents.com www.liberalcurrents.com/fascists-rea...
liberalcurrents.com
Fascists Really Believe It
Millions could die because of ideas intellectually and morally equivalent to the ‘lizard people’ conspiracy theory.
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Center for Democracy & Technology @cdt.org · 24/08/2026
Government data faces a privacy paradox: statistical data is becoming less useful while administrative data is increasingly consolidated and repurposed, putting Americans’ privacy and public trust at risk. A new analysis by CDT intern Grace Jin examines what’s at stake.
cdt.org
The Privacy Paradox: How Government Data Has Become Less Private and Less Useful
Authored by CDT Intern Grace Jin. Introduction Unlike data collected by private companies, information collected and maintained by the government is often understood to be a public asset. Because tax payer dollars primarily fund staff and data systems that enable the collection of this information, public agencies have an obligation to make these data publicly […]
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Tim Karr @timkarr.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
There’s a common culprit in the massive backlash against Flock cameras & data centers: The unholy alliances struck between Big Tech & govt. Millions are rightfully suspicious of a billionaire class pushing advanced AI & surveillance tools w/o first seeking the consent of surrounding communities...
pressingissues.org
What the Flock? Exposing Big Tech’s Surveillance State
As spying becomes big business, more people are mobilizing to resist mass surveillance
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Soumya Rangarajan, MD, MPP @soumya-goblue.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
#Wyoming, where Trump has a +14 approval rating "Wyoming is projected to lose 335 physicians by 2030 [for context, only have 1300 physicians in whole state]...HB 129 creates a provisional license pathway for internationally trained physicians" These #physicians come on...wait for it... #H1B #visas
cowboystatedaily.com
Wyoming Projected To Lose 335 Physicians By 2030, Lawmakers Look To Foreign Docs
In an effort to fix Wyoming's physician shortage, a bill to create a new pathway for foreign-trained doctors has advanced in the House. Rep. Jacob…
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Norm Eisen @normeisen.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
Natalie Harp spent over a year beside the president with no security clearance The forms didn't move until Trump personally told her to file them, so this was never a backlog It was a favor, & the country carried the risk I told @theguardian.com why this should shock people👇 -TN
theguardian.com
White House faces questions over security clearance for top Trump aide Natalie Harp
Former ethics tsar calls report that executive assistant to president worked for a year without clearance ‘shocking’
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