Alexander Reid Ross
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areidross.bsky.social
Alexander Reid Ross
@areidross.bsky.social

Charité envers les autres; Dignité envers soi-même; Sincérité devant Dieu.
- George Sand
tbf, Trump's so malignant that he everyone else gets a little moral halo by comparison. Trump stopped the gov from fighting disinformation, bc he lies all the time. Hoover's secretary of state Henry L. Stimson dismantled codebreaking, bc he thought reading other ppl's mail was ungentlemanly.
Herbert Hoover was horrible. In fairness, we could say that he caught a lot of the blame for presiding over the wreckage created by the disastrous policies of his predecessor Calvin Coolidge.

But this McArdle take is white hot garbage.
February 19, 2026 at 3:20 PM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
the president of my alma mater canceled all the diversity scholarships bc of this and I showed up at a fancy event he had in Georgetown and got in his face about it and told him this is how it would end up

pretty sure he just wanted to do it anyway
BREAKING: The Department of Education has ended its directive that attempted to restrict diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts in schools nationwide.

This is a victory for academic freedom and education equity.
February 19, 2026 at 12:23 AM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
The buried lede here is that the woman he had an affair with committed suicide through self immolation
February 19, 2026 at 3:35 AM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
US Energy Secretary Chris Wright urged the @iea.org to abandon its climate work and focus on energy security. Wright criticized the IEA for prioritizing climate change, calling it “political stuff”. 🙄
US energy chief urges IEA to 'drop the climate'
At a meeting in Paris, US Energy Secretary Chris Wright called on the International Energy Agency to abandon its climate work and return to its core mission of energy security.
www.lemonde.fr
February 18, 2026 at 6:49 PM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
Sullivan: "We need to eat and encourage Americans to eat Alaska freedom fish, not Russian and Chinese communist fish."
February 18, 2026 at 8:43 PM
oooh, USA wins against Sweden in overtime with a sudden death goal...
February 18, 2026 at 10:41 PM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
Noted place that’s never acted to the benefit of capital. The 2026 peoples republic of China
February 18, 2026 at 6:09 PM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
BREAKING: The Department of Education has ended its directive that attempted to restrict diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts in schools nationwide.

This is a victory for academic freedom and education equity.
February 18, 2026 at 5:39 PM
brings us back to the ole "get off twitter vs. stay on to counter-message" argument... twitter is actively turning people to the right, like FOX News, so that argument becomes a throwback to the old "should liberals go on fox news?" dispute from 10 years ago.
This is a very interesting new paper in Nature about the role that feed algorithms on X play in influencing political attitudes.

No paywall: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
February 18, 2026 at 8:01 PM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
This is a very interesting new paper in Nature about the role that feed algorithms on X play in influencing political attitudes.

No paywall: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
February 18, 2026 at 7:35 PM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
Texas sued Dow, the largest North American chemical manufacturer, on Friday afternoon, describing hundreds of "habitual" water pollution and waste disposal violations at its Seadrift complex insideclimatenews.org/news/1702202...
Texas Alleges ‘Habitual Non-Compliance’ of Wastewater Rules at Dow Chemical Complex  - Inside Climate News
But the lawsuit, filed Friday by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office, could shield the petrochemical giant from harsher litigation from a local citizen group.
insideclimatenews.org
February 18, 2026 at 5:07 PM
I get why ppl are mad about the Texas dem speaking about Christianity so much. Separation of church and state is critical. At the same time, being a PDX transplant, I think a lot of ppl just don't know what the South is like. Look at "frequency of prayer" (red). www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/...
Most and least religious U.S. states
Explore our interactive database to find how religious adults are in your state based on service attendance, prayer, belief in God, and importance of religion.
www.pewresearch.org
February 18, 2026 at 6:14 PM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
Saw an artist on IG whose photography reminded me of this famous painting (really just the coloring).

📷: Oye Diran, The Weight and the Wings
February 18, 2026 at 3:14 PM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
Good news alert!!!

“The sharp decline reflects a crackdown on illicit clearing by miners, loggers, and farmers under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who returned to office in 2023.”
February 18, 2026 at 2:39 PM
nihilistic doomerism is the classic "right where they want us" position
I am not v interested in continuing the “the Democrats will betray us on #$ISSUE the moment they get into power” B/S because a. There’s no way to falsify it and b. It’s fundamentally rooted in a nihilistic doomerism that nobody believes anything, we’re all gonna get betrayed, nothing matters anyways
February 18, 2026 at 5:58 AM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
Do I deplore or admire the anti-abortion movement's creativity? Yes? At state & federal levels they're going after mifepristone on water pollution grounds as well as trying to mandate special disposal kits for abortion remains caused by the drug. (Too?) clever?
news.bloomberglaw.com/health-law-a...
Anti-Abortion Effort Pushes States for Wastewater Restrictions
State battles over reproductive rights are turning toward environmental law as legislatures and advocates grapple over whether abortions pose a threat to community water supplies.
news.bloomberglaw.com
February 18, 2026 at 4:07 AM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
im sure thats fine
February 18, 2026 at 1:22 AM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
On her Instagram, Univision’s Lidia Terrazas reports that baby Juan Nicolás has been deported and “abandoned at the border” with his mother
“His life is in danger,” Rep. Joaquin Castro said Tuesday about Juan Nicolás, the 2-month-old baby who was hospitalized with bronchitis overnight — and is being held at Dilley Family Detention Center, which reported a measles outbreak earlier this month.

thebarbedwire.com/2026/02/17/2...
2-Month-Old Baby Juan Nicolás Was ‘Unresponsive’ at the Hospital Hours Before He Was Sent Back to ICE Facility, Castro Says
“His life is in danger,” Congressman Castro said Tuesday about the baby.
thebarbedwire.com
February 18, 2026 at 12:16 AM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
I mean at least there’s a study to wave about for the thing we all already knew
Trump supporters' extreme views driven by personal insecurity: research
Trump supporters' extreme views driven by personal insecurity: research
PsyPost reports that a new study published in the journal Advances in Psychology suggests that White people who personally perceive themselves as ranking at the bottom of the racial economic hierarchy or “tied” with Black Americans were the most likely to support President Donald Trump. Previous research identified a phenomenon known as “last place aversion,” where people fear being at the very bottom of a social hierarchy — and Trump voters apparently feel the sting of smallness more acutely than others, whether or not they are actually at the bottom rung of the ladder. Surprisingly, researchers found that these attitudes were not driven by actual poverty. The researchers controlled for objective indicators of socioeconomic status, such as income and education levels. They found that belonging to the “last place” profile predicted Trump support and anti-DEI attitudes regardless of how much money or education the participant actually had. “We … [expected] a subset of non-Hispanic, white Americans who feel ‘last place.’ That said, we expected this profile to be more likely among working class individuals,” Cooley told PsyPost. “However, perceiving oneself to be ‘last place’ was not associated with the lowest objective income nor the lowest objective education among the White Americans in our samples.” The United States currently exhibits a significant racial wealth gap with economic statistics consistently showing that the average white family holds considerably more wealth than the average Black or Hispanic family. But despite this reality, surveys indicate that many white Americans feel they are “personally falling behind” in terms of status without realistically weighing the resources at their disposal. “This line of research was motivated by recent political trends among some white Americans, including support for DEI bans, alignment with alt-right ideology, and endorsement of political violence in pursuit of political goals (e.g., January 6th),” said study authors Erin Cooley and Jazmin Brown-Iannuzzi, associate professors of psychology at Colgate University and the University of Virginia, respectively. “Many of these attitudes are not only extreme but also anti-democratic, raising questions about how such views can coexist with identities centered on being ‘most American’ (e.g., white nationalist belief systems).” The tool researchers used to assess personal status was a box measure called the “Perceived Self-Group Hierarchy.” Participants viewed a diagram representing a status ladder based on money, education, and job prestige, and they were asked to place markers representing themselves, white people, Black people, Asian people, and Hispanic people onto this ladder. Researchers found a consistent link between this “last place” profile and specific political views. “White Americans who fit this profile reported the highest levels of support for Donald Trump throughout the campaign season. They also expressed the strongest intention to vote for him. When surveyed the day after the election, this group was the most likely to report having cast their ballot for Trump,” PsyPost reports. This same group of insecure white people also showed “the strongest opposition to DEI programs, favoring policies that would ban such initiatives in universities.” Additionally, they showed higher alignment with alt-right ideologies, agreeing more frequently with statements such as “White people are generally under attack in the U.S.” and “The government threatens my personal rights.”
dlvr.it
February 18, 2026 at 12:13 AM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
From six total miles of BAT lanes in October, to 14 miles of BAT lanes today. One member of the project committee said the voices of transit advocates is what made the difference.

It would be Portland's largest-ever transit priority project.

bikeportland.org/2026/02/17/a...
A win for transit on 82nd, but concerns remain
A decision on BAT lanes moves the project forward. For now.
bikeportland.org
February 17, 2026 at 9:55 PM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
DHS is abusing administrative subpoenas to target and silence its critics. @repespaillat.bsky.social and I will be introducing legislation that would make this practice illegal and help end these authoritarian abuses.
Homeland Security Wants Social Media Sites to Expose Anti-ICE Accounts
www.nytimes.com
February 17, 2026 at 10:14 PM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
Today marks the first legislative session since our friend Melissa, her husband Mark, and their dog Gilbert were murdered. It will never be the same again.

She accomplished so much as our beloved Speaker, and her legacy will benefit Minnesotans for generations to come.
February 17, 2026 at 3:01 PM
Reposted by Alexander Reid Ross
being the slightest of public figures, with some wildly nonsensical conspiracy theories and defamatory material out there on the internet about me already, makes this a fucking lot to take in
NEW: ChatGPT and other chatbots are feeding users' fixations on real people, reinforcing users' delusional ideas and obsessions about others as they descend into unwanted harassment, stalking, and/or domestic abuse — traumatizing victims and profoundly altering lives.

futurism.com/artificial-i...
AI Delusions Are Leading to Domestic Abuse, Harassment, and Stalking
ChatGPT and other AI chatbots are reinforcing users' delusions about other people — fueling fixations linked to stalking and other abuses.
futurism.com
February 17, 2026 at 9:57 PM