News and commentary for understanding and coping with the years ahead...
A lawyer's courage
[I]t has been a blatant disregard for rule of law and it's been building an obvious over the last several weeks. But Paul Weiss' decision to give in to the Trump administration and particularly what they chose to give him made clear to me that the industry is not prepared to meet it. And if the industry is not prepared to meet it, then I cannot work within it.
This PBS interview with Rachel Cohen, a former associate at a top national law firm, is an example of two valuable actions. The primary one, of course, is the courage of a lawyer who resigned rather than keep working for a firm that won't make a commitment to the rule of law in the Trump era. I hope (but don't really expect) that countless others in her position will do the same.
The other noteworthy element of this piece is that PBS, which has mostly served as a Trump normalizer in recent years, seems to have grown more of a backbone lately. Notice that the interviewer, John Yang, gives Cohen all the time she needs to fully answer this on-point questions – and that those questions demonstrate his (and presumably his editors') grasp that they, as journalists, have to stand for something in this edge-of-disaster days.
By the way, click here to see a photo of the chairman of the Paul Weiss law firm, who led the cave-in to Trump's extortion. Yes, his firm was under enormous pressure. But he and his cowardly "leadership" colleagues have caused incalculable damage to what's left of our democracy – throwing the firm's avowed principles, and many of its people, under the bus – and they obviously did it for money. These contemptible executives will be remembered as quislings.
There is only one issue today in American politics: President Trump’s hacksaw attack on the American Republic. Even if you describe it more favorably, no one questions that. The only available position is opposing it. Championing it is taken. If Democrats aren’t aggressively opposing it, they become irrelevant to the vast majority of voters who don’t actively support President Trump. The central part of a party’s “brand,” to the extent there is such a thing, is whether it is able to defend the people or priorities it champions. If it’s priorities are unpopular it loses doubly: it alienates supporters and it suffers loses since unpopular policies are inherently difficult to defend. DOGE’s spree is packed with 80/20 issues favoring Democrats. It’s open political territory and the only territory available.
This is the latest must-read from one of our best political reporters and analysts. It revisits the astoundingly terrible decision by the top Senate Democrat, the endlessly hapless Chuck Schumer, to give away the party's sole piece of leverage: the ability to force Republicans to stop breaking every law and agency in sight or face responsibility for government shutdown they, the Republicans, would have forced.
Yet the Democrats' collapse might have become inevitable, as the essay explains. They total failed to explain to the American public what was happening in all the budget and continuing resolution wranglings. It was only the latest political malpractice from a party that routinely demonstrates incompetence at messaging.
But as the piece also makes clear, the Democrats still have at least some ability to awaken themselves from their torpor – and that opportunity lies in the flood of awfulness coming from Trump, his apparatchiks, and the entire Republican establishment. Will they take that opportunity?
Meanwhile, if there is a single obvious political reality right now, it's this: Schumer should not be Democrats' leader anymore.
The "defiance" needs institutions, not just leaders
Yes, we need more charismatic leaders who can communicate more effectively than a 78-year-old man who recycles (!) pat lines about how he builds relationships with Republicans at the House gym (yes, Jon Stewart caught him doing exactly that). As Corbin Trent argues, we need to be building year-round muscles, including a candidate recruitment and training pipeline, a media arm, a fundraising apparatus that can rival AIPAC, the Koch network, or the crypto bros; policy shops that pump out model legislation and ideas; legal orgs that back up this network and leadership development programs for the next generation. Bits and pieces of this infrastructure exist – see for example Run for Something (for candidate recruitment) or projects like the High Road Strategy Center and its Government Performance Action & Learning project. The money for all of these long-term projects exists; but we’ve been misdirecting nearly all of it into short-term electoral campaigns (and the pockets of highly-paid political consultants) to build sandcastles instead. Rallies and protests are the bandaid; building new institutions and changing the rules of the game are the cure.
This piece (note: here's a link to a non-Substack page) follows up the author's recent commentary with more specifics on how to move the anti-Trump crowd into action rather than simple protest, while acknowledging that both are needed. (He prefers the word "defiance" to "resistance" – and has some nuanced thoughts on why.)
In particular, he reminds us of something he's been saying as long as I've known him and his work, which I admire immensely. While the left basically abandoned grassroots organizing in favor of national politics, most notably in its promotion of people like Obama, the right wing, for all its terrible and destructive policies, systematically built institutions over decades, and did it from the ground up.
If we want to save what's left of democracy, we have to build those institutions. This will be enormously difficult, and quite possibly futile if the new fascists wipe out free elections (among so many other things). But participation – working with others who share your values and goals – is at least as important as voting. It's the other part of democracy that liberals have almost totally forgotten.
[I]n partnership with Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF), [Wired Magazine is] going to stop paywalling articles that are primarily based on public records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. We commend Wired for tipping the balance between public interest and business toward the former. We hope others will follow its lead (and shoutout to outlets like 404 Media that also make their FOIA-based reporting available for free). And we hope readers will reward these outlets’ sacrifice. Subscribe to Wired here and 404 here.
I have subscriptions to both of those publications, and have contributed to the Freedom of the Press Foundation as well. I hope you will do the same.
This initiative is excellent because it reminds us of the vital nature of open records laws – the federal Freedom of Information Act is great and has inspired many state laws. They are among the core tools Americans have had in recent decades to find out what governments are doing with our money and in our name.
We can expect the Trump regime and at least some state governments (Republicans are especially willing to hide their dealings from scrutiny) to challenge existing laws. We can almost certainly also expect the Trump apparatchiks to simply ignore it on a routine basis. When official acts can be carried out in secret, corruption is the guaranteed result. Given the routine corruption of Trump world, we'll need to fight to protect the FOIA. Keep an eye on your state legislature, too, and tell your representatives that you're paying attention.
On Tuesday morning, a huge scoop was consuming social media. The story went like this: Elon Musk’s X had banned legendary Irish-American punk rock band The Dropkick Murphys from his platform on Monday night after the lead singer made fun of Donald Trump and Musk at a concert. Soon it was the talk of Bluesky. Typical Elon behavior, right? Well, no—because it didn’t happen.
This piece is an apt warning to journalists – at least those who claim to have integrity in their work processes – to check things out before publishing. Of course, it's absurd that we have to ask for fact-checking during the reporting process, rather than after publication. But here we are.
Near the end, moreover, the piece eases up a tiny bit on the guilty parties by saying they fell for a bad report from "a reputable American news source" – meaning Forbes. But that publication long ago trashed its own credibility, with a business model that worked but which invited conflicts of interest if not outright grifting.
As for the "Tennessee Holler," which I believe wants to do the right thing with what it posts, it grossly failed this time and then (so far as I can tell) hasn't corrected its error. It's the kind of site I might have linked to from time to time, but now won't. I'll reconsider if it issues a correction and appropriate regrets.
Of course, the site did what is standard operating procedure for right-wing media – which creates and amplifies extremist propaganda fully knowing what it's lying and/or misrepresenting reality. It's crucial that we keep pounding the right wing for its contemptuous view of honor, but let's not adopt the fascists' contempt for integrity, too.
Kudos: Jacqueline Sweet
How I put this together
This newsletter is a compendium of the reporting and commentary that best explains the America's political, economic, and social conditions – and, most important, how we can find a way back from the dark days ahead. You will rarely find anything here from the New York Times or Washington Post or any of the other Big Journalism companies that failed us so completely during the 2024 elections and are now sucking up – even more than usual – to Donald Trump, his cult, and corporate oligarchs. My focus will be on smaller, more honorable outlets (and individuals). I hope you'll support them with your attention and your money. For more details, please read my About page.
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Josh Marshall
Micah L. Sifry
Freedom of the Press Foundation
