iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

This is why structural solutions—things like more parties—are better than new rules and standards to check executive power and corruption.

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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 23/06/2026

Again, adding a few seats to SCOTUS is now the table ante bare minimum moderate position. More serious positions are also available: - No clerks - No building - No shadow docket - No pay raises - 25 justices - 47 justices - 101 justices - Riding the circuit, preferably on horseback

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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 23/06/2026

it's because the major questions doctrine is a crock of shit

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Molly Coleman @mollycoleman.bsky.social · 07/04/2026

The fact that nobody seriously believes there is an institution in this country that will check the president—that we’re all just sitting here hoping that he gets distracted and fails to follow through on his genocidal threats—is the most damning indictment of our political system I’ve seen yet.

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SEIU_ORG @seiu.org · 09/10/2025

Worker power in action! Let's get it!💜

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Adam Bonica @adambonica.bsky.social · 08/10/2025

As the Supreme Court term begins, keep this framework in mind: Autocratic Legalism. Instead of “rule of law” (law constrains the power), we get “rule by law” (law as a weapon for power). Authoritarians usually have to install allies. Trump started his second term with that step already complete.

The only effective opposition is through the language of morality and documented harm—not legal technicalities that can be swept away with a 6–3 vote.” The text is centered on a neutral background, with “morality” and “documented harm” slightly emphasized to underscore the moral and empirical contrast with “legal technicalities.”

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United For Democracy @weareufd.bsky.social · 02/10/2025

An independent court doesn’t help one man evade justice. An independent court doesn’t silence voters, ban abortion, and purge independent agency watchdogs. This court has chosen sides—and it's not the people. We must remind them. This country is FOR and BY the people.

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 30/09/2025

And the fact that the system creates greater incentive for these folks to act as representatives of a national political party than as representatives of a geographic area or as leaders of a separate, co-equal branch of government only underscores the Article I failure hiding in plain sight.

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Brad Lander @bradlander.bsky.social · 25/09/2025

I was back at 26 Federal Plaza today, where an ICE agent violently threw this bereft woman to the ground in front of her kids. She had not touched him. She did not pose any threat. She had to be taken to the hospital. (🎥: Elias Eliahu)

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 22/09/2025

Congress js a dead letter, because upper chamber bicameralism is an outdated relic, and the two-party system fails to represent most Americans. We are experiencing a system-wide failure.

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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

👇🎯 Folks look at you like you’re crazy when you say we’re in the midst of the worst Article I constitutional crisis in 🇺🇸 history, & then, well, 👇🤷‍♂️

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 09/09/2025

It's almost like the fact that the US political system gives white, rural voters way, way more representational power than the rest of us has some kind of distorting effect on our national discourse.

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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 29/08/2025

Once again, we are in the midst of the worst, most unprecedented Article I constitutional crisis in 🇺🇸 history

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Fartin Van Buren @fartinvanburen.bsky.social · 23/08/2025

On the slate gabfest this week, she discussed a revealing part of their strategy, which is to find takes that will generate engagement and reach, especially through arguments that generate intra-left conflict. I suspect you can create a successful business on this premise, but not so much a polity

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Kevin Elliott @kjephd.bsky.social · 23/08/2025

Having a plurality of extremists in your electoral coalition is a huge problem when institutions empower them directly

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 19/08/2025

I’m a fan of the fight in @chrismurphyct.bsky.social — but I live here, and it doesn’t feel like a distraction to me. It feels like they are preparing to occupy the city so it’s easier to maintain power after they lose the election.

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Greg Sargent @gregsargent.bsky.social · 19/08/2025

Yep. As I try to argue in this pod chat, Trump's military occupation of DC and LA, his threat to end vote-by-mail via executive order, and the corrupt Texas gerrymandering scheme are part of the same big story.

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Evan Bernick, a finite mode with a smol hooman and a lorg floof @evanbernick.bsky.social · 19/08/2025

checkpoints are by definition stops made without reasonable suspicion. They are presumptively unconstitutional. I don’t know what they’re saying this is about, but I’m certain whatever they say will be a pretext for general crime-detection and that that is not ok.

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Kevin M. Levin @civilwarmemory.bsky.social · 15/08/2025

Watching video today of ICE agents roaming the streets of American cities and reading about the anger and fear of Bostonians during the Fugitive Slave crisis is a reminder of why it is so important that the institutions charged with interpreting the past be allowed to do so without interference.

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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 13/08/2025

the thing everyone is going to have to accept is that the post-trump period, whenever it comes, will not and cannot be a project of national unity, it must be a project of partisan project of renewal, in the same way that reconstruction and the new deal were partisan projects of renewal.

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 13/08/2025

"Strength lies in organisation, in careful long-range planning and implementation, in consistency of action over an indefinite period of years, in the scale of financing available only through joint effort, and in the political power available only through united action and national organizations."

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 11/08/2025

The reason for this asymmetry is in part because rural voters' votes are worth more than urban voters' votes. They count more than we do in our political system. In fact, they count disproportionately more than any other country in the world. www.economist.com/graphic-deta...

economist.com

Upper legislative houses tend to be biased and malapportioned

Variation in district sizes benefits conservatives, but not in lower chambers

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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 03/08/2025

👇🎯 A lot of folks don't seem to understand that 90+% of our authoritarian problem is the total failure of Article I of the Constitution, not Article III.

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Bill Grueskin @bgrueskin.bsky.social · 03/08/2025

From a director at the … American Enterprise Institute

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Radley Balko @radleybalko.bsky.social · 31/07/2025

I guess it will at least be amusing to watch the Roberts Court twist itself into knots to declare the new Texas map legal, moral, and virtuous, and the new California map a brazen perversion of democracy.

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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 01/07/2025

Again, the platform needs to be institutional reform. None of the policies can get through our failed, broken, incredibly anti-democratic electoral, legislative, & judicial institutions. And the guardrails of democracy have failed. Fixing that is first, second, & third order. 👆 is simply not it.

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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 16/07/2025

👇🎯 Norms and duct tape worked for a long time. Sort of. But we’re all out of norms, & we’ve shredded our last rolls of tape.

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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 16/07/2025

Folks look at you like you’re crazy when you say we’re in the midst of the worst, most unprecedented Article I constitutional crisis in American history, & then, well, 👇🤷‍♂️🤦‍♂️

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 15/07/2025

What are we left with? An Art I that does all the bad stuff and none of the good stuff. It's gonna need a rewrite.

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 15/07/2025

But it DOES prevent government from redistributing wealth away from concentrated elites, even when most Americans support it.

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 15/07/2025

It also does not provide state-based representation during the development of legislation - because the pull of party loyalty always trumps state or regional representation.

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 15/07/2025

The Senate has repeatedly proven that it is not a check on the executive branch -- particularly, given its rural state bias, when Republicans are President.

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 15/07/2025

This is part of the structural problem with Article I. It was always lousy, but it's especially bad now that parties have fully nationalized. Why?

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 15/07/2025

Who should I be looking to as I try to make sense of this in a fuller way? @moiradonegan.bsky.social @juliekohler.bsky.social @kashenj.bsky.social

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Steph @stephsterling.bsky.social · 15/07/2025

I'm only seeing white men comment on the Epstein scandal. And while I see how the MAGA movement is animated by an anti-elite discourse, it seems like most takes are missing the role that protection against child sex predation plays in authoritarian movements and the populist right.

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Kevin M. Kruse @kevinmkruse.bsky.social · 14/07/2025

I was skeptical that the MAGA majority on the Supreme Court would ever rule that Trump could run for president again but after today’s ruling I think they’d probably roll over and do that too.

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Anthony Michael Kreis @anthonymkreis.bsky.social · 14/07/2025

First day of Constitutional Law, August 2025. Can you count to 5? Excellent. Have a nice semester. See you in the spring.

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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 14/07/2025

Yes. But a reminder that the Article III constitutional crisis is really primarily an Article I constitutional crisis. If & when Dems ever govern again, there must be wholesale reform of SCOTUS' size, powers, & funding, until it stops acting as a lawless super-legislature. bsky.app/profile/mcop...

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graham steele @grahamsteele.bsky.social · 14/07/2025

According to this Supreme Court, President Biden's Department of Education was exceeding its power by trying to forgive peoples' student loans. President Trump, on the other hand, has the power to just completely dismantle the entire Education Department.

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Aaron Sojourner @aaronsojourner.org · 13/07/2025

Goal: Crush Fed independence Need a policy tool: Can replace Fed chair only if the chair is malfeasant, criminal, or derelict in duties. Need a violation to allege: Manufacture false concern about construction project management. It's pretextual and dangerous. www.politico.com/news/2025/07...

politico.com

White House probe fuels speculation Trump could oust Powell

The investigation into cost overruns on a renovation of Fed headquarters is drawing concern that it's a pretext to eventually fire the central bank chief.

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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 09/07/2025

Your regular reminder that this could all end tomorrow if we had a minimally functioning Article I of the Constitution: bsky.app/profile/mcop...

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Micah @rincewind.run · 10/07/2025

if being part of the union does not entitle you to any of the benefits of the union, we do not, in any real sense, have a union

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Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social · 07/07/2025

notice how strategically he says "we" and build that into your politics yesterday

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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 04/07/2025

And again, as long as Article I and Article III of the Constitution are completely failing, he is correct: bsky.app/profile/mcop...

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