a luminous presence shaped like Seth D. Michaels Profile picture
Voted People Magazine's Seth D-est man alive. He/him. Comms @UCSUSA; everything here is personal, not official. Grappling with time and the mercury line.
Sep 28, 2018 7 tweets 3 min read
a feature i love about the NYT/Upshot polling project: the little link in each district write-up that takes you to a detailed map with the district outlined nytimes.com/interactive/20… click on "this interactive map" and you get great context
Sep 12, 2018 5 tweets 2 min read
every argument like this needs to contend with the fact that President Trump was chosen by the anti-majoritarian “moderating” institution over the preferences of the popular will. “we can’t trust the people because they’ll elect demagogues” is a weak argument when the people don’t choose the demagogue but the intervening political mechanism overrules them
Jul 16, 2018 4 tweets 1 min read
it turns out propaganda works! the successful inflation of MS-13 into a perceived nationwide existential threat justifying a massive increase of ethnically-selective state force should make everyone nauseated and terrified.
Apr 25, 2018 9 tweets 1 min read
there’s a temptation to say that Trump’s corruption and friendly deals with corporate lobbyists is hypocritical in light of his promise to “drain the swamp,” which I’ve come to think is an overly generous reading of what he means by “swamp.” “the swamp” is not rich white guys in suits who can buy their favored policies. “The swamp” is Medicaid, DACA and environmental justice.
Apr 11, 2018 8 tweets 1 min read
Paul Ryan is lowkey the most cynical politician in Washington plenty of politicians have agendas that will objectively make poverty more common and more difficult to manage, but it takes a special creature to promote that agenda on a dewy-eyed tour announcing he’s focusing on fighting poverty
Jan 12, 2018 4 tweets 1 min read
have i already gone off on you on my "broccoli and cheese theory"? it's basically this Republicans sold a lot of broccoli (small-govt, austerity, upward redistribution) by seasoning it with cheese (racism, attacks on "cultural elites")...