Everyone needs to read this thread to understand how the Constitution is being targeted and that NED is a key player in this.
NED is my red line for Republicans. If you vote for NED, you deserve primarying. I don't care if you have sentimental attachments to NED as being founded by Reagan to destroy Communism, or that the people you know in NED are conservative and well-meaning.
If you don't believe me - let's go to Rachel Kleinfeld. She is perhaps the most credentialed expert with NED:
・Trustee of the National Endowment for Democracy
・Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
・Trustee of Freedom House
・Served on the U.S. State Department’s Foreign Affairs Policy Board under President Obama
・Senior advisor to the Democracy Funders Network, the same $33B philanthropic coalition steering “democracy” funding
In 2022, Kleinfeld wrote a document that has been foundational for many NGOs: "Five Strategies to Support U.S. Democracy," saying it is in grave danger.
But why is US democracy in crisis? Because Trump. Because populism.
In her view, it's not enough to just increase turnout and help Democrats win.
(That a NED scholar lists "electing Democrats" as an implicit tactic to preserve democracy should signal to any Republican how unserious they are being when they support NED.)
The document is entirely focused around suppression of MAGA.
First tactic is to strip populism away from the Republican party. How? By infiltrating and flooding primaries, creating open primaries, et cetera.
This is why I keep saying that the primaries will be where the elections happen from now on.
They are investing massive amounts of money and candidates into overwhelming every primary at every ballot in every state.
The R/D labels will not matter.
Second tactic: they think that populism is being driven by grievances, so let's install "dignity" back into them.
Which means infiltrating churches and further DEI engineering designed to erode moral agency to help those pesky MAGA know their place.
Third tactic: Engage the left by making democracy deliver for them.
In other words, give the Left all the socialist freebies they've been clamoring for and maybe they'll fight for NED.
All sticks for conservatives, all carrots for Communists.
Fourth tactic is a lot of word salad, but it comes down to "flood every aspect of civic life with NGOs."
This is where Stephen Heintz (quoted in the original thread) comes in. It's through those NGOs that they create a bottom-up movement to change the Constitution.
Fifth tactic - Strengthen accountability to reset norms. This means increased fines, increased lawfare, suppression of speech, and everything to make sure conservatives cannot rise up.
Kleinfeld is NED. This is what NED believes.
I cannot emphasize enough what a stupid, foolish, idiotic thing it is for Republicans to support NED. They are either mentally retarded or secretly Democrats.
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. @PunchbowlNews would you like to comment on this business model I've reversed engineered of how you keep @LeaderJohnThune in line?
@PunchbowlNews @LeaderJohnThune Punchbowl, would you also like to comment on how virtually every major sponsor of yours has donated to John Thune for a total of 1.2 million?
@AndrewDesiderio , any comments?
@PunchbowlNews @LeaderJohnThune @AndrewDesiderio By the way ... the only people who are sponsoring me on this are my $3/month subscribers. I don't know any heavy hitter here who's been approached to go against SAVE America Act.
I'd been looking at PAC contributions when I should have been looking at the people who actually have daily access to the Capitol - the media. The true lobbyists.
Punchbowl News represents a whole lot of powerful industries and they are unflinching admirers of Senate Majority Leader John Thune.
John Thune is the "paid influencer ecosystem." 𝕏 merely exposed how that machinery works in the Senate.
Just look at the posts of @AndrewDesiderio , their senior Senate "correspondent." Almost every single one is about defeating the SAVE America Act and praising Thune.
Punchbowl isn't shy about where their money comes from. Founder Jack Sherman himself admitted that 90% of Punchbowl's revenue is from "corporate sponsorships." They made 10 million dollars in revenue their first year... what kind of "journalist" company pulls that off?
The podcast featuring them outright describes their business model as getting their money from "sponsorships bought by trade groups and companies looking to get their public affairs messaging in front of those making and influencing policy."
Punchbowl got in ethical hot water when they treated a whole bunch of lobbyists to luxury box seats at a NFL game.
If you want to know why SAVE America Act is being slow-walked...
Start with @PunchbowlNews .
. @AndrewDesiderio do you want to share which of your employer's clients are against the SAVE America Act, or should I figure it out myself?
Thune access timeline documented: Five distinct confirmed Punchbowl-Thune interactions between Sept. 2025 and March 2026, including two Fly Out Day appearances. Punchbowl's Feb. 26, 2026 piece declaring the "talking filibuster dead" was the key conventional wisdom-setting event, published before Trump's March 9 ultimatum, using Thune's framing and characterizing SAVE Act supporters as a caucus "tearing itself apart."
🛰️ New Article: Building an OSINT Pipeline to Cut Through the Iranian Conflict Noise.
SPOILER ALERT: We're winning.
I just published a long-form analysis on the Iran conflict and the strategic dynamics around it. Sorry for the Substack-only publication; the article itself was far too long and complex in formatting to publish with 𝕏 tooling. (Feedback to the 𝕏 team - if you can just make full Markdown capability, I would be thrilled.)
Before anything else: I'm only a civilian data analyst, not a military officer or intelligence professional. This piece is the result of two weeks of intensive work where I did something unusual.... I built and experimented with an AI-assisted OSINT synthesis pipeline using military doctrine, think tank research, and public reporting.
Part of the goal was to produce something useful for readers.
But honestly, the bigger goal was education for myself, forcing a structured process to sort signal from noise in an information environment that's chaotic right now.
The pipeline pulls from sources like CSIS, ISW, CEPA, ISIS nuclear reporting, CENTCOM and IDF briefings, plus open-source economic and energy data. Where I step beyond what those sources explicitly state, I mark it clearly as [ASSESSED] and try to show the reasoning.
This article is the first full output of that process.
If you have expertise in:
🔹 air campaign planning
🔹 nuclear nonproliferation
🔹 Middle East security policy
🔹 energy markets
🔹 OSINT methodology
I would genuinely welcome corrections, critiques, or improvements. The entire point is to make the analytical process more rigorous over time.
The pipeline itself will keep evolving. Bring on the rotten tomatoes.
🧵WOLF IN SHEEP'S CLOTHING: Meet David Pascoe, candidate for SC Attorney General. He's running as a Republican. But is he actually a Democrat?
Joe Biden is in South Carolina today.
Which makes this the perfect moment to introduce you to David Pascoe, candidate for SC Attorney General, running as a Republican, and what he said about Joe Biden in January 2020:
"He is the most decent man I have ever met in American politics. Joe has been a role model of mine for many years. He is someone my sons look up to. Joe is the first and only candidate I have ever endorsed for public office."
That's not only a Democrat who voted for Biden. That's a Democrat who hosted Biden's campaign fundraiser at his own annual oyster roast, endorsed him for president, and was Biden's frontrunner to become US Attorney for South Carolina.
David Pascoe spent 20+ years as an elected Democrat, 6 consecutive terms as SC First Circuit Solicitor. He pushed DEI-style racial quota systems for SC judges as recently as December 2023. Six months before his "conversion," he endorsed a Democratic state rep who voted against banning gender procedures on minors.
And here are the receipts. 👇
As always, patience as I pull together this thread.
David Pascoe spent 20+ years as an elected Democrat, 6 consecutive terms as SC First Circuit Solicitor. On April 10, 2025, he switched to the GOP. SC Dem Chair Christale Spain says he "has been trying to find a lane to run for higher office."
Pascoe switched parties in April 2025.
Pascoe launched his AG campaign in August 2025.
That's 4 months, in a state where no Democrat has won a statewide race since 2006.
You do the math.
If you're a subscriber, enter your oppo research request below! I haven't scaled it out yet, so can only do about 3 a day. It also helps if you pair a name with a focus (e.g., investigate connections to so-and-so entity)