I didn't take my laptop with me on my East Coast trip, mostly because I figured we'd be out and about a lot, especially in New York. I was mostly correct in this, so I fell a little behind on world events while I was gone, which is probably just as well.

• I found this overview of the violent protest in Berkeley this Saturday to be a good and ( Read more... )

• A presidential appointee to an EPA leadership position is stepping down because staffers won't play along with his climate change denial agenda. "They’re here for a cause," he said. A cause, like, say, protecting the environment? WHO KNEW.
• The New York Times and The Washington Post Are at War, and Everyone Is Winning: when two major news ( Read more... )

Anyone else think that they referred to last night's speech as an address rather than his first State of the Union as a ploy to keep expectations low? Just me? Okay.

• If it was intentional, it sure seems to have worked -- mainstream media spent last night and today falling all over themselves to congratulate the president for his ability to read ( Read more... )

I'm trying to keep these to stories and links that I think have long-term use, rather than responding to whatever particular outrage has happened within the last fifteen minutes. There's just no way to keep up with a White House and Congress that's churning out stuff at the rate things are coming in a long-form journal, so I'm not even going to try ( Read more... )

Welp, here we are. Day 7. Here's hoping we make it the rest of the way.

• More proof that California is not remotely fucking around: Governor Jerry Brown's State of the State address. He's previously had some strong words on taking action against climate change, but he laid down the law on a bunch of other issues too: immigration, healthcare, etc. ( Read more... )

I probably need a catchier name for this project....

Not much this time because I actively avoided posting news and politics links while I was in Hawaii. A few gems, though.

• A quick rundown of the attempt of Congressional Republicans to defang House ethics rules and the almost immediate reversal. The two main takeaways: public outcry sometimes ( Read more... )

This will be my last link collection for the year, since I'll be out of town the week after Christmas.

• I haven't read this yet, but The Indivisible Guide sounds like an amazing resource. Basically a plan of action for creating the progressive version of the Tea Party, to stand against the Republican majority and build up the party for the future ( Read more... )

• Here's a pretty fascinating look at how different state boundaries would have affected the Electoral College results. Based on such things as commute patterns, phone call patterns, states of equal population, etc. A good reminder of how arbitrary the Electoral College is as a way of deciding anything.
• The always-excellent Jamelle Bouie writes about ( Read more... )

I've been thinking I'm sharing most of the best resources I find on Twitter and Facebook these days, and given the speed at which things have been happening since the election, good stuff sometimes gets lost in the social media firehose. If I noted the best of those links and posted them here, say on a weekly basis or so, would people find that ( Read more... )