To everyone appalled by NYT's July 4 op-ed "Why I don't vote. And maybe you shouldn't either", note that 1) author Matthew Walther DID vote in both 2020 and 2022, and 2) he's an extremist Catholic graduate of Hillsdale College, part of the religious-right faction behind Jan 6. 1/
Walther voted in both 2020 and 2022. (His Michigan voting record was posted by Timothy Burke on Bluesky.) In fact Waltjer wrote an entire essay about voting. The NYT did not do the most basic fact-checking. Even an op-ed shouldn't be a lie. 2/ voteref.com/voters/MI/view…
This account has written often about how Hillsdale was a driving force behind Jan 5. The "1776 Commission", chaired by Hillsdale president Larry Arnn, was the quid pro quo for support of Trump's coup - letting the religious right control US education. 3/
Hillsdale, which runs a network of for-profit charters, was all in for the coup. Three Hillsdale officers helped with the MI fake-elector scheme: its president (Arnn), general counsel, & DC Dean. Even the NYT covered it, though they omit key texts showing Arnn was in the loop. 4/
Hillsdale was a "feeder of staffers" for Trump. Hillsdale set his education agenda (via Betsy DeVos). In 2020 Hillsdale officials met with fake electors; Hillsdale graduates filed election-fraud lawsuits. The NYT article just scratches the surface. 5/ nytimes.com/2024/01/08/mag…
On Jan 6, Hillsdale president Larry Arnn was out and about in DC, taking pictures with rally-goers. He'd come to DC to chair the one and only meeting of the "1776 Commission", hastily called by Trump for Jan 5 - to design an education agenda for a 2nd Trump term. 6/
If anyone doubts Walther's Hitler-esque photo, it comes from a 2023 article by Hillsdale College's own newspaper. Everyone signed off on this look. (Note: Walther's often called a Hillsdale graduate, but seems he didn't quite finish his degree...) 7/ hillsdalecollegian.com/2023/03/qa-mat…
There's so much more on Hillsdale. The Prince/DeVos support. (It's Erik Prince's alma mater). The charter and vouchers scams. The tie to Moms for Liberty. This is who NYT editors think Americans should hear on July 4. Do we really trust these guys on what's good for democracy? 8/
Coda: NOW the NYT is editing! First title: "Why I don't vote. And why maybe you shouldn't either". Then just: "Why I don't vote". Now they realize the lie: title suddenly is "Why I won't vote" (graphic not changed though). Archived link is from 10 AM. 9/ archive.is/ZczNC
Adding to this thread because although Walther is in the Hillsdale penumbra now, he seems to have actually attended N. Michigan. Here's a 2016 bio claiming he had a BA, though apparently that's a lie too. Same Hitler-esque photo he re-used in 2023. 10/ tfas.org/wp-content/upl…
Walther's been doing the "I don't vote" shtick since at least 2018, when he said democracy was bad: choosing leaders was too "psychologically taxing", so people should accept their rulers "untroubled by futile expectations of change". Except..he votes. 11/ theweek.com/articles/80259…
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Yes, the NYT is shameful for sourcing an anti-Mamdani article from notorious white supremacist Jordan Lasker. But it's worse. Lasker, who they call an "academic", is a student whose only paper of note is INFAMOUS for unethical data use that got his tenured co-author fired. 1/
Who is the NYT's "academic" source? Lasker is or was a PhD student at Texas Tech, but his only paper of note is earlier, from 2019: "Global Ancestry and Cognitive Ability", whose misuse of data triggered a major investigation and got Cleveland State Prof. Bryan Pesta fired. 2/
The Chronicle of Higher Ed wrote about the scandal. It wasn't just that the article was "racist pseudoscience". It was that the authors misused data from the NIH and lied on their data application - filed by Bryan Pesta. A flagrant ethics violation. 3/ archive.is/KwbGy
Reminder: Elon Musk, whose Starship just blew up on the test stand (with its extra fuel tanks nearby), was allowed for THIRTY YEARS to lie about his training in science. He started lying in 1995, kept lying - and suffered no consequences. But physics itself has consequences. 1/
Just listen to the man's nonsense about how he is shaped by physics and consider: the press allowed him to bullshit like this for 30 YEARS. Of course he got convinced he can just make up his own reality. If anyone died in the Starship explosion tonight, blame the press too. 2/
In 2022 I did a 69-Tweet thread on Elon's fake AstroBoy Genius image, hoping to ward off what was coming: Elon helping to overthrow democracy. What you saw on the launchpad tonight, that's what he's doing now to US science, to our country: exploding it. 3/
Sure, it's funny that Fox News is now using "86" in talking about a fired reporter, when less than a month ago they demanded the FBI investigate "86" as a death threat. But the joke is on us. Performative outrage over bullshit is a test of YOU, to see if you'll accept it. 1/
You can't criticize Fox's words as hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is when someone committed to the truth is inconsistent. Fox and others are post-truth: they're just making noises to see if they can get you to react. They're gaming you. 2/
All of us have a psychological need for rationality. We need to feel that words have meaning, that people mean what they say. We do understand that people lie: a lie is a meaningful but false statement, to deceive. But what Fox is doing here is worse, and harder to cope with. 3/
ABC's explanation of why they suspended correspondent Terry Moran misuses the word "objective". Moran said Stephen Miller was a "world-class hater" and "his hatreds are his spiritual nourishment". Those are objectively true statements. Miller's hatred is deeply documented. 1/
Moran ascribed to Miller an emotion: "hatred". A decade of reporting has documented, objectively, that Miller hates. In 2018, LA Mag interviewed his high school classmates and reported their stories of how Miller hated minorities. "Hate" is their word. 2/ lamag.com/politics/steph…
Terry Moran also said that for Stephen Miller, "hatred is his spiritual nourishment". That's colorful language, but also documented. Here's a high school classmate of Miller's with a story of Miller saying awful, provocative things to immigrants: "he wanted to be hated". 3/
Reminder: Trump has tried this before. It's part of his dream of control, to send in the National Guard against the will of a state or mayor. On May 29, 2020, he Tweeted the threat: "Any difficulty and we will assume control but, when the looting starts, the shooting starts.." 1/
Trump has also overtly sought a Secretary of Defense willing to order the National Guard to shoot at protestors. In 2020 he fired Mark Esper and put in Chris Miller for that reason. Pete Hegseth may face a terrible test now. 2/
On Jan 6, the National Guard arrived late likely because sane heads in the Pentagon delayed them til local police had regained control, out of fear of what Trump might order. There are fewer sane heads now. Hegseth is already failing his test. 3/
Howard Lutnick, our Sec. of Commerce, shows a disconnect from material reality that will make Americans die. A weather forecast cannot be "automated" or MADE AT ALL without data. And Trump is cutting the satellites and weather stations that provide that data. 1/
Lutnick, who is in charge of NOAA and its National Weather Service, seem to think that if you say "web" and "cloud" and "computer" and "AI" then by some magic knowledge appears. But weather forecasts depend on MEASUREMENTS. Which Lutnick is cutting. 2/ kcci.com/article/propos…
The proposed NOAA budget cuts both current satellite operations and planned future satellites meant to make better predictions. Lutnick's testimony suggests: people have forgotten that not everything is a simulation, that reality exists (and bites). 3/ spacenews.com/omb-suggests-n…