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Heather Cox Richardson (TDPR) @HC_Richardson
, 6 tweets, 4 min read Read on Twitter
@led260 @DineshDSouza @KevinMKruse Thanks, Lisa.

The first two books were quite fine-grained scholarly looks at GOP from 1850-1901. Then:
@led260 West from Appomattox (a NYTBR editor's choice), about politics and the rise of the middle class. Important ideas, lots of good material, but a detailed read: amazon.com/West-Appomatto…
@led260 Then Wounded Knee, about how weak politicians use human pawns to stay in power, and how we are all responsible. Great read (this is my best written book), but heartbreaking (as in, I still have nightmares). Lots on 19th C politics: amazon.com/Wounded-Knee-P…
@led260 Then To Make Men Free: A History of the Republican Party, another NYTBR Editor's Choice and selection of History Book Club (oh, WK was one, too). Looks at GOP swing between ideology and backlash three times in US history. amazon.com/Make-Men-Free-…
@led260 I talked about some of that, here: c-span.org/video/?324575-…
@led260 And, fwiw, I write about politics and history once or twice a week at my FB page. And I co-edit @werehist, which tries to put current issues in historical context (and also to find cool stories that people don't know).

I love history and politics, can you tell? :)
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Our first government shutdown happened in 1879, when former Confederates tried to achieve in Congress what they had failed to win on the battlefields of the Civil War. That moment is instructive for today.

Let's take a look at the 1879 shutdown, shall we? /1
In 1878, economic issues gave Democrats both houses of Congress. To make sure Ds would win the presidency in 1880, they set out to get rid of black voters (who tended to vote Republican) by getting rid of the federal soldiers in the South who were protecting black rights. /2
Before Ds took over Senate in 1879, Rs in House refused to appropriate funds for the 1879 fiscal year beginning July 1 unless troops left. Congress adjourned in March w/o funding the government. /3

(It is a myth that troops left the South in 1877. See: mappingoccupation.org/map/)
Read 11 tweets
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Remember the "caravan?" Trump is not the first to try to save the midterms by deploying troops against a pretend threat. On November 13, 1890, Republican Benjamin Harrison sent troops into South Dakota to put down a Lakota "uprising."

Let's see how that turned out, shall we? /1
By 1890, Republicans were on the ropes. No longer the party of farmers and workers, they propped up big business with tariffs that enabled industrialists to collude to raise prices. In 1884, voters elected Democrat Grover Cleveland, who promised to protect workers. /2
Panicked Republicans flooded media with pro-tariff literature and said Ds were socialists who would destroy the economy. In 1888 election, GOP won Congress, but voters reelected Cleveland by 100K votes. So GOP installed Harrison through the Electoral College. /3
Read 20 tweets
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Apparently some folks are just now learning Abraham Lincoln was a Republican. Lincoln helped to organize the GOP in the 1850s. He and his colleagues articulated a vital American ideology, and then put it into practice.

Let's take a look at Lincoln and his GOP, shall we? /1
In the 1850s, rich slave owners-- less than 1% of the population-- controlled the federal government and ran it for their own benefit, refusing to pay taxes or submit to regulation, but demanding federal power to hunt down their slaves and protect slavery. /2
They silenced opposition by controlling the media; warned voters that slavery was all that protected the status of poor white men; and insisted they had the right to spread slavery to the West, and then nationally, because the Constitution protected property, including slaves. /3
Read 22 tweets

Related threads

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Today's #TenThings will be on CRAFTING A GREAT MAIN CHARACTER. Let's start with a confession: My very first MC was pretty much just me with a different name, and my second MC was a cardboard cut-out. Neither book sold. But my 3rd book had Criminy Stain, and he changed everything.
1. The key to writing a great main character is making them REAL. That means they have real strengths and, most importantly, real flaws. If your MC is perfect, where's the tension, the stakes, the struggle? I try to give 3 strengths and 1 big flaw, to start with. And that flaw...
2. Your main character's flaw should run deep. Not,' she's kinda clumsy until her powers kick in' or 'fears trust' or 'stubborn'. An actual flaw that would make someone unlikeable or hard to deal with, and a backstory that explains it. And a redemption arc to overcome/face it.
Read 19 tweets
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1. This does not fit into #TailorSnarkWars
It doesn’t fit into #Fiction.
Maybe #MediaCrit and #RecentHistory with a dose of #HowTherapyActuallyWorks

It’s my experience, and not everyone’s. I’m a behaviorist, and trauma is my jam.
2. So new tag: #MediaPTSD
Superheroes Need Shrinks: Batman, Wanda & Pietro Maximoff, 9/11 and mass casulty events

(or how we and our government participate in mutual gaslighting, and some thoughts on breaking the cycle for the benefit of our politics.)
3. When I decided to be a shrink, back in the dim dark days of the 1990s, my university still ran most of the student computers as terminals attached to a mainframe. There was one Win3.1 lab and 2 Apple labs. For 30K people.

We just didn’t use ‘em. Some of us still TYPED.
Read 132 tweets
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In a week's time, it will be ten years since Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy (September 8, 2008). Given the upcoming 10th anniversary, here's a thread on the best books on the financial crisis, which followed Lehman Brothers going bust.
Securitisation and derivatives were at the heart of the subprime crisis which is how the financial crisis first started. Satyajit Das' Extreme Money is by far the best book to cover this aspect of the crisis.
amazon.in/Extreme-Money-…
Bill Bonner and Addison Wiggin, started talking about the possibility of a crisis, much before than others did.
Their book, The New Empire of Debt, is a terrific read.
amazon.in/New-Empire-Deb…
Read 24 tweets
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🔥WHOA🔥

Elliott Broidy — top @GOP fundraiser & convicted felon — is under CRIMINAL investigation for allegedly trying sell his influence w/the Trump administration to *foreign* officials for TENS OF MILLIONS of dollars‼️1/

#Corruption
#FARA

washingtonpost.com/politics/gop-f…
Broidy’s shady dealing w/Saudi Arabia & UAE were reported previously.👇🏼

Now, Broidy is being probed for his shady dealings w/China & former Malaysian officials.🤨2/

#Corruption

Broidy is being investigated for allegedly developing a plan to try to persuade the Trump government to extradite a Chinese dissident back to #China, a move sought by the Chinese president.🤨

The same guy Trump chillaxed with at Mar-a-Lago.🙄 3/

cc @911CORLEBRA777
#TrumpChina
Read 17 tweets
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1. You’ve probably seen articles like this today and, hopefully, you’re reading them — and not just for the joy of watching the #GOP squirm at a squeaking defeat in what should’ve been a GOP blowout. The reactions of the opposition are strategic clues. apple.news/AmbTmoZhNTRqtK…
2. Particularly, I want to draw your attention to this statement from Paul Ryan. Basically, he’s pointing out that because Lamb didn’t have a primary opponent, he was able to run as a more conservative Dem which allowed him to win a district DT won by 20 pts.
3. Let’s unpack that a little. Two things are implied here. One, they know that GOP (and their support of DT) is frowned on enough that there is willingness to vote Dem in red districts with palatable messaging (moderate, willingness to work in a bipartisan manner).
Read 14 tweets
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I want to do this too!! So many cool threads!

📚 1 like = 1 book in my TBR for 2018 📚
I will try to do it with Amazon links (US Amazon affiliate links as usual) so you can preempt me and read the books even faster :D
1: Juniper Leaves: The Otherworldly Tale of a Lonesome Magical Girl by @JazJoyner

* I love magical-girl stories
* Black nonbinary author
* Fabulous-looking cover!!
* I just got a copy

amzn.to/2CsdD6o
Read 104 tweets

Trending hashtags

#EnoughIsEnough #Corruption #incompetence #Taqiya #GOP #ActuallyAutistic #complicit #SCOTUS #CultureOfCorruption #SocialSecurity #Democrats #Caravan #Books #WhatsAtStake #Medicaid #rawdeal #TrumpPutin #SteeleDossier #AvaDuVernay #GOPTaxScam #MeToo #Embrace #Medicare #Yeltsin #PAM

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