Latest posts

  • Trump sold who the Pentagon? Inside America’s First Crowdfunded Military Payroll

    Trump sold who the Pentagon? Inside America’s First Crowdfunded Military Payroll

    There’s something exquisitely American about a shutdown that ends with the Pentagon passing a hat. Somewhere between a bake sale and a Bond villain subplot, the Department of Defense just accepted a $130 million “gift” from an anonymous donor—yes, a literal donation—to help pay soldiers’ salaries while the government remains closed for business. President Trump,

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  • Shutdown: The First Hairline Fracture in the Blue Wall

    Shutdown: The First Hairline Fracture in the Blue Wall

    For three weeks, Chuck Schumer has performed the Senate equivalent of yoga on hot coals—keeping forty-nine Democrats in the lotus position while the government burns around them. It worked, until it didn’t. Axios dropped the news like a leaky ceiling tile: Georgia senators Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock quietly crossed the aisle on a Republican

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  • The People’s House, Privately Bulldozed: How the East Wing Vanished While We Were Looking Away

    The People’s House, Privately Bulldozed: How the East Wing Vanished While We Were Looking Away

    Let’s start with the blunt fact: the East Wing of the White House—the entire public-facing half of the executive mansion—no longer exists. It’s gone. Not “under renovation,” not “under review,” but demolished. The Office of the First Lady, the Social Office, the Calligraphy Office, the Visitor Entrance, the East Colonnade, the Family Theater—flattened to rebar

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  • The Red Scare Remix: Why “Democratic Socialism” Is Not Communism, and Capitalism Was Never Pure

    The Red Scare Remix: Why “Democratic Socialism” Is Not Communism, and Capitalism Was Never Pure

    There’s a certain irony in the fact that Americans can’t define “socialism” but they can sure yell it. It’s our national reflex: hear a policy that sounds vaguely public-minded, grab the nearest flag, and shout “Communism!” as if Khrushchev himself were hiding under your Medicare card. So let’s do something rare for this political century—define

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  • “You’re on Your Own, Kid”: The Chaos That Would Follow Killing the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare)

    “You’re on Your Own, Kid”: The Chaos That Would Follow Killing the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare)

    Picture it: You wake up tomorrow and the Affordable Care Act—the rickety scaffolding that keeps our health-care carnival from collapsing—has vanished overnight. No repeal-and-replace. No Medicare-for-All sequel. Just an empty folder where your coverage used to live, and a nation of 330 million people standing in line at CVS holding expired insurance cards and prayer

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  • Theocracy Is So 1095 AD: Why I Defend Your Right to Pray So I’m Free Not To

    Theocracy Is So 1095 AD: Why I Defend Your Right to Pray So I’m Free Not To

    An atheist’s field guide to keeping the pulpit off the payroll and the state out of your soul I’m an atheist. Not the hat-throwing, slogan-on-a-bumper kind—more the “coffee, quiet, and a stubborn allergy to being preached at by anyone with a lanyard” variety. I have no congregation, no creed, and no appetite for a government-approved

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  • The Man Who Sued Himself: How Trump Turned “Equal Justice Under Law” into “Cash App Me, DOJ”

    The Man Who Sued Himself: How Trump Turned “Equal Justice Under Law” into “Cash App Me, DOJ”

    If late-stage empire ever needed a mascot, Donald Trump just nominated himself—and sent the bill to the Justice Department. According to The New York Times (and verified by outlets that still remember what fact-checking is), the President of the United States is currently pressing his own Justice Department to pay him $230 million. Not for

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  • The Mirage Economy: When the GDP Grows but Nobody Hires

    The Mirage Economy: When the GDP Grows but Nobody Hires

    It’s official: America is thriving—on paper. The GDP is glowing like a ring light on a politician’s livestream. The stock market is preening. The White House comms shop is drafting victory tweets about “resilience.” And yet, if you’re an actual human being with a pulse, a rent payment, and a résumé floating in the void,

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  • Watchdog? More Like Watchdogged: The Tanking of Trump’s “Nazi-Streak” Nominee

    Watchdog? More Like Watchdogged: The Tanking of Trump’s “Nazi-Streak” Nominee

    You’d think after a year of government face-plants, someone in Trump’s orbit might nominate a watchdog who didn’t actively bite democracy. Instead, the White House delivered Paul Ingrassia—a 30-year-old law school graduate with the résumé depth of a TikTok bio—to run the Office of Special Counsel, the federal agency designed to protect whistleblowers and keep

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  • The Ten-Minute Louvre Heist: How to Rob an Empire Before Your Coffee Cools

    The Ten-Minute Louvre Heist: How to Rob an Empire Before Your Coffee Cools

    There’s a reason Paris loves a good crime. The city romanticized heists before Hollywood did, and it’s been living off the legend of the 1911 Mona Lisa caper for more than a century. But this one isn’t charming. This one hurts. In a daylight raid that lasted roughly the length of an espresso break, a

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