Note for new subscribers: On Fridays I send out a post with a list of notable quotes from the past week (ranging from insightful and informative to delusional and deranged), along with links to some of the best longform essays and articles I’ve come across. You can opt out of these posts by clicking “manage subscription” on the top right.
“At this point, my only hope for the US to avoid becoming an ally to Russia is a violent resistance by our military.” — UCLA Law professor Peter Arenella
“It is not a criminal violation to enter the country illegally. It is not a crime.” — Democratic Rep. Jasmine Crockett, speaking on MSNBC
“It’s striking but it’s true. Right now, 500 million Europeans are begging 300 million Americans for protection from 140 million Russians who have been unable to overcome 50 million Ukrainians for three years.” — Polish President Donald Tusk
“Feels weird that we’re setting our clocks forward by an hour in an era when some are trying to turn the clock back a century.” — David Axelrod
“We’ve arrived at the point where democratic nations like Canada and Poland need nuclear weapons in order to protect themselves from America.” — The Bulwark’s Jonathan V. Last
“I do not care what you think of this sports issue that is definitely not affecting you in any way shape or form, the Republican Party’s broad project against trans people is a sin. You are committing a sin by signing on to any of it and you are not loving your brothers and sisters, and Jesus thinks you’re going to hell, which is gratuitously pornographic torture for eternity, so maybe if you Believe, perhaps don’t fucking do this, thx.” — Rolling Stone’s Asawin Suebsaeng
“I think that what has happened is there’s another piece to this, which is there is not the same, strong mainstream non-partisan media there was in 2016. It is much, much, much smaller. So, it has fallen on these Democratic senators to narrate what’s happening. Right? Like, to explain what they’ve seen in the last seven weeks.” — MSNBC’s Molly Jong-Fast
“Ah yes, making sure that our soldiers have the right facial hair is essential to Protecting Americans. It is so obvious that Hegseth got a little stiffy from those Russian propaganda videos on the eve of the Ukraine invasion and now wants to reshape the US military in that specific image.” — NYT’s Jamelle Bouie, regarding Pete Hegseth ordering a force-wide review of physical fitness and grooming standards
“Hegseth wants an all white and all male military and he is going to look for every bureaucratic trick he can find to get nonwhite and women service members to leave.” — Also Jamelle Bouie
“These are, you know, the scariest times in my lifetime, that’s all. I think that’s objectively the truth.” — Bernie Sanders, who was born in 1941
“What does Trump expect? Oh, I believe he expects violence. I believe he expects confrontation. I believe he’s working toward a civil war.” — Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters, speaking at Thursday’s conference for the Congressional Black Caucus
“If you’re ok with sacrificing the lives of tens of millions of disabled ppl bc u don’t want to wear a mask and take public health precautions during an ongoing pandemic amidst total state abandonment, then you are playing a key role in ensuring minority groups are expendable.” — Taylor Lorenz
“Wear a respirator mask to stop the spread of deadly and disabling disease, which kills LGBTQ ppl and other marginalized groups at higher rates. Stop killing and disabling those around u by spreading infection. Have solidarity, we need to protect and care for each other bc our govt certainly won’t.” — Also Taylor Lorenz
“Russia has been all-in for him ever since he ran for office the first time, and Donald Trump is all-in for Russia. And it doesn’t matter what it does to our national security, doesn’t matter to him what it does to our standing in the world, doesn’t matter to our European allies. The only thing that matters is Donald Trump gets to pay back his Russian benefactor.” — Adam Schiff, speaking on MSNBC (note that not only has Trump retained all Biden-era sanctions on Russia, he’s now increasing sanctions against the Russian oil, gas, and banking sectors, relative to what Biden imposed)
“There’s a particular place in hell for academics who use their academic expertise and power to distort and do violence to people in the world.” — Harvard professor Timothy McCarthy, who says that any professor “who is a member of organizations that are critical of ‘gender-affirming’ medical treatments” should face dismissal
“Trump Republicans hate the Department of Ed for the same reasons they hate education. They view education as a waste of funds since it exposes their fraud and prevents their abuse of American minds through their outlets of disinformation. Trump Republicans want a country of believers, not thinkers.” — Ibram X. Kendi
“I have a 12-year-old son who, as he learns more about various kinds of dark chapters in American history, can get really down on this country. So I often find myself in the strange position of trying to talk up American greatness because I don’t want him to feel despair about the country that he’s growing up in. It’s occurred to me that every single thing that I have pointed out to him as a sign of American greatness or goodness, whether that be foreign aid, whether that be our support for Ukraine, our success in welcoming immigrants and refugees, or scientific pre-eminence, everything that I thought was best about America, Trump has either destroyed or tried to destroy in less than two months.” — NYT’s Michelle Goldberg
“Amazon forest felled to build road for climate summit” — BBC headline
“The Ukrainians are the noble, good guys. In some ways they’re more American than we are, over the last couple years.” — Paul Rieckhoff, president of Righteous Media Inc., during an appearance on MSNBC
If you need to get past a paywall, try Archive Today, 12ft.io, or Wayback Machine.
The New York Times: “What I Found on the 365-Mile Trail of a Lost Folk Hero”
The New York Times: “30 Charts That Show How Covid Changed Everything”
N.S. Lyons: “Love of a Nation”
IM-1776: “Lessons From Ukraine”
Vanity Fair: “Thieves in the Night: A Vast Burglary Ring From Chile Has Been Targeting Wealthy U.S. Households”
The New Yorker: “The Fourth State of Matter”
Tampa Bay Times: “Angels and Demons”
Good to see Jasmine Crockett is efforting to replace Joy Reid as a weekly contributor
"Trump Republicans want a country of believers, not thinkers.”
Irony at it's finest from lbram X. Kendi.