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Race, gender, sexuality — these aren't matters of shame or pride. They aren't the substance of anyone's identity. They're happenstance.
I honor the dignity/potential of every individual, but real pride is derivative of character and achievement. Pride isn't trivial; it's earned.
I honor the dignity/potential of every individual, but real pride is derivative of character and achievement. Pride isn't trivial; it's earned.
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Kmele 🖐 retweeted
Outside of Talarico, who managed to run a “big tent” lefty-populist campaign, there was a pretty strong correlation between being more progressive and under performing in these midterms. Which is something Dems should probably pay close attention to!
The worst-performing Democrats in competitive Senate races were the candidates Bernie endorsed. (link in next tweet, no paywall)
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Kmele 🖐 retweeted
Absolutely wild numbers among young voters tonight. Worse than anything I ever wrote about in The Selfie Vote.
I was trying to sound the alarm when young voters broke 2-to-1 for Dems in 2006/2008.
76D to 21R among 18-24? Goodness gracious.
I was trying to sound the alarm when young voters broke 2-to-1 for Dems in 2006/2008.
76D to 21R among 18-24? Goodness gracious.
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Kmele 🖐 retweeted
Missing our Election Night coverage today for a very good reason 👶🏾🩵. But I’ll be watching and cheering on my colleagues from afar. Hope you tune in also! CNN.com/allaccess
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Kmele 🖐 retweeted
New in @washingtonpost: @TheFIREorg tracked 200+ deplatforming attempts in 2026—a record. For the second year, more came from the RIGHT of the targeted expression than the left.
But the constant? Administrators who were supposed to protect speech and instead policed it.
But the constant? Administrators who were supposed to protect speech and instead policed it.
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Kmele 🖐 retweeted
Astonishing.
I've been tracking Trump admin corruption and self-dealing for the last 20 months.
Here are 10 stories (!!!) from just the last three weeks.
Literally. Every single one from October.
I've been tracking Trump admin corruption and self-dealing for the last 20 months.
Here are 10 stories (!!!) from just the last three weeks.
Literally. Every single one from October.
JD Vance: "I've not seen a single shred of evidence that Donald Trump participates or sanctions in that corruption ... I've not once seen evidence that Donald Trump has enriched himself"
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Kmele 🖐 retweeted
Today, I'm thrilled to announce that I'm reviving my old column, A Grain of Saul. This was the first column I ever wrote (in college), and used to be the column I wrote on my website and for various news outlets.
I'm bringing it back now under the @TangleNews banner as part of s.
It'll come out every week or two, cover controversial political and political-adjacent topics, and give me an opportunity to wade into some topics that we don't get to in Tangle's main suite of coverage.
It'll be more raw, more personal, more loose. It's all part of my own effort to hand more of the business side of Tangle off while I focus, again, on writing and hosting our podcast. I really can't wait.
To receive it, all you have to do is sign up for Tangle. First edition drops tomorrow. Subject: Are Americans just stupid?
readtangle.com
I'm bringing it back now under the @TangleNews banner as part of s.
It'll come out every week or two, cover controversial political and political-adjacent topics, and give me an opportunity to wade into some topics that we don't get to in Tangle's main suite of coverage.
It'll be more raw, more personal, more loose. It's all part of my own effort to hand more of the business side of Tangle off while I focus, again, on writing and hosting our podcast. I really can't wait.
To receive it, all you have to do is sign up for Tangle. First edition drops tomorrow. Subject: Are Americans just stupid?
readtangle.com
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Kmele 🖐 retweeted
I met @kmele and @mcmoynihan on separate CNN roundtables and immediately wanted to talk to them more. So it was great to sit down for a longer, more substantive conversation on @wethefifth about the midterms, the Democratic Party, and just about every crazy headline of the k link below.
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Societies get wealthier by figuring out how to produce more stuff w/ less human labor.
If you’re worried the tax code disadvantages human labor relative to automation, you could try taxing software and robots… or maybe just tax the humans less.
(Bastiat. Candlemakers. Etc.)
And if AI produces the massive payoff Gates imagines, it should make governments cheaper too.
If you’re worried the tax code disadvantages human labor relative to automation, you could try taxing software and robots… or maybe just tax the humans less.
(Bastiat. Candlemakers. Etc.)
And if AI produces the massive payoff Gates imagines, it should make governments cheaper too.
Bill Gates on why we should tax A.I. work: “If you’ve let go of a worker and hired a robot to do that job, why are you so incentivizing the trade-off against the human labor that you don’t ask the robot to also pay into the pension fund? What is it? Is it that the pro-robot union to say: No, if you’re not flesh, then let pensions go bankrupt?”
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Kmele 🖐 retweeted
1501: Pope Alexander VI criticizes Gutenberg’s printing press safety
“The art of printing can be of great service in so far as it furthers the circulation of useful & tested books; but it can bring about serious evils l..it will, therefore, be necessary to maintain full control”
“The art of printing can be of great service in so far as it furthers the circulation of useful & tested books; but it can bring about serious evils l..it will, therefore, be necessary to maintain full control”
Pope Leo criticises Nvidia’s Jensen Huang over AI safety ft.trib.al/azwdiGc
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Kmele 🖐 retweeted
This is a great contrasting companion piece to the one written by @kmele awhile back about his experience with school and his daughter. readtangle.com/lets-have-an-a…
Another @wethefifth invite for @nhannahjones ?
Another @wethefifth invite for @nhannahjones ?
Ooof. Hard reading. Brave to write. True personally, false impersonally.
Everything she documents is a management and accountability failure rather than a resource failure. NYC spends $36k per pupil, the highest of any large district in the country. There haven't been big gaps in funding within states by race or income for decades.
Ironically, she pulls on the heroic history of blacks integrating schools to justify segregating her child.
A great piece on why voice fails, even a powerful voice, in the absence of the threat of exit. See The tragedy of Jonathan Kozol below
nytimes.com/2026/09/20/mag…
marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolu…
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Kmele 🖐 retweeted
I’m honored to serve as the President of PEN/America, which has been defending free expression and celebrating literature for over a hundred years.
pen.org/press-release/…
pen.org/press-release/…
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Kmele 🖐 retweeted
I remember her writing that the only person who understood “Holy the Firm” was a child and that he understood it completely.
She was a theologian, a philosopher, a perfect writer. She spent every day thinking and also every day being. She made me a better person.
She was a theologian, a philosopher, a perfect writer. She spent every day thinking and also every day being. She made me a better person.
Farewell to Annie Dillard, who could see our world so clearly.
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BREAKING: Skynet CEO Warns Company May Bring About Apocalypse, Overshadowing Modest UI Update
Claude Cowork and chat are merging into one Claude.
Ask a quick question or hand over a report, and Claude takes it from there, even after you close your laptop. If something's unclear, Claude asks—you keep the final say.
Rolling out to Pro and Max over the next few weeks.
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“AI doomers should be held accountable for their doomsday claims. It’s made up… It’s irresponsible. We ought to just keep track of all that and remind people when their claims don’t come true”—@JensenHuang NVIDIA
I agree and hold the CEOs and executives of the companies that make these outrageous claims criminally libel.
x.com/innovationcncl…
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"We wake, if we ever wake at all, to mystery, rumors of death, beauty, violence..."
***
"Our life is a faint tracing on the surface of mystery, like the idle curved tunnels of leaf miners on the face of a leaf. We must somehow take a wider view, look at the whole landscape, really see it, and describe what's going on here. Then we can at least wail the right question into the swaddling band of darkness, or, if it comes to that, choir the proper praise.
At the time of Lewis and Clark, setting the prairies on fire was a well-known signal that meant, “Come down to the water.” It was an extravagant gesture, but we can’t do less. If the landscape reveals one certainty, it is that the extravagant gesture is the very stuff of creation.
After the one extravagant gesture of creation in the first place, the universe has continued to deal exclusively in extravagances, flinging intricacies and colossi down aeons of emptiness, heaping profusions on profligacies with ever-fresh vigor. The whole show has been on fire from the word go.
I come down to the water to cool my eyes. But everywhere I look I see fire; that which isn’t flint is tinder, and the whole world sparks and flames."
- Annie Dillard (April 30, 1945 – September 15, 2026)
***
"Our life is a faint tracing on the surface of mystery, like the idle curved tunnels of leaf miners on the face of a leaf. We must somehow take a wider view, look at the whole landscape, really see it, and describe what's going on here. Then we can at least wail the right question into the swaddling band of darkness, or, if it comes to that, choir the proper praise.
At the time of Lewis and Clark, setting the prairies on fire was a well-known signal that meant, “Come down to the water.” It was an extravagant gesture, but we can’t do less. If the landscape reveals one certainty, it is that the extravagant gesture is the very stuff of creation.
After the one extravagant gesture of creation in the first place, the universe has continued to deal exclusively in extravagances, flinging intricacies and colossi down aeons of emptiness, heaping profusions on profligacies with ever-fresh vigor. The whole show has been on fire from the word go.
I come down to the water to cool my eyes. But everywhere I look I see fire; that which isn’t flint is tinder, and the whole world sparks and flames."
- Annie Dillard (April 30, 1945 – September 15, 2026)
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So this is that white supremacy thing they’re always talking about. Diabolical.
New York Regents member Felicia Thomas-Williams on why she thinks students shouldn’t have to take Regents exams to graduate:
“You don’t assess a fish on climbing a tree because fish can’t climb trees”
Maybe asking a student to read or do math on a test is a little more a fish to climb a tree? 🤔
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