Some developments in the newsletter today. Michael S. Graham and I have signed a two book deal to continue the research from The Great Dechurching. We are going to field a huge survey. And you can partner with us to get your own data from that effort. Details below.

New polling from Data for Progress confirms a strong inverse relationship between news consumption and support for Trump. Those who paid "a great deal" of attention to political news were Harris +6 while those who paid "none at all" went +19 points for Trump dataforprogress.org/insights/2024/…

beautiful woman can treat me like their pet if they want

🚨 Ranked-choice voting survives in Alaska (pending a possible recount). Alaska released the final count of all its ballots, and with it the final result on the measure to repeal RCV: The 'no' leads the 'yes' by 664 votes.

And that's that. With Stanislaus dropping nearly all of its ballots and netting Gray votes, Gray is all but certain to lead pre-recount. There's only ~725 ballots left, which Duarte would have to win by 25%. That's just not happening. Pending recount, Gray wins CA-13. 220D-215R

I can't believe I have to say this but PLEASE please do not donate to the go fund me scammers that dm you holy shit

Western Aleppo province has just been completely overtaken by the Syrian opposition. In just 48 hours. Reports that internally displaced civilians are on track to resettle in their homes.

The issue here is, I suppose, whether HTS turns toward Sheikh Maqsood or focuses on the rest of Aleppo. Ankara will be watching closely. It would be a shame if Ankara is able to use this to attack the SDF, which is always Ankara’s goal; Ankara has worked for six years to try to

The fact is that HTS and SDF are the only remaining strong independent groups in Syria that emerged out of the civil war. Turkey sought to turn the SNA into a proxy; and the regime had its own proxies. The goal of Ankara and Moscow and Iran and Assad will be to get the SDF and

Looks like HTS and SDF have reached an agreement to cease fighting and allow Safe Passage of Forces in Aleppo City and its countryside

OK folks, here's what we know so far from #Syria - a 🧵: #Aleppo city has fallen, along with the entire western countryside & much of the south too -- including the international airport & Kuweiris Airbase. A few #Russia airstrikes, but little else.

As predicted Ankara and its extremists have only one goal in Syria: killing and ethnically cleansing Kurds. It doesn’t has the SNA to fight the regime ever. The only units of Syrian rebels who get to fight the Assad regime are those with HTS. Ankara has quietly backed Russia,

If Assad can be defeated in Syria, Putin can be defeated in Ukraine. Iran can be free, Lebanon can be free, Sudan can be free, Belarus can be free, Georgia can be free and Myanmar can be free. Dictators need not run the world and the world’s long arc and still be toward freedom

I love this as an insult. Yes, I love regime change. I want all dictatorships to be replaced with democracies. As a liberal democrat, by definition, I oppose all regimes. I support revolutions to overthrow regimes. Put “regime change fanatic” on my tombstone, that’s fine.

Let it be remembered for posterity that one of the celebrities who peddled pro-Assad propaganda was Harry Shearer. He approvingly shared conspiracy theories that Assad was not behind chemical weapons attacks. He appears to have deleted the tweets, but I'm sure screenshots exist.

Everybody boo these people.