Lindsay Beyerstein
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beyerstein.bsky.social
Lindsay Beyerstein
@beyerstein.bsky.social
Journalist
Pinned
My latest: Charlie Kirk was a gutter bigot who built his career on censorship and bussed insurrectionists to the Capitol on J6. Why are liberals like Ezra Klein trying to paint him as a paragon of reason and dialogue?
Why are some liberals turning Charlie Kirk into a martyr for liberal democracy?
Holding him up as a champion of dialogue paints him in a false light to millions who might only know him in death, writes Lindsay Beyerstein.
www.editorialboard.com
Bulldoze the ballroom.
"When it happens, Republicans will object (and you can only imagine the meltdown Trump himself will have on Truth Social). The response Dems give should be simple: *Too bad. We have the power now.* A strong message must be sent to the country and future generations that Trump will not be honored."
Why every vestige of Trump must be torn down
He's trying to create a physical legacy. The moment he's out of power, it has to be smashed to bits.
www.publicnotice.co
December 29, 2025 at 10:27 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
If you have a billion dollars, you literally have enough money to never have to hear any criticism for the rest of your life. Just because they’re all addicted to going online and getting yelled at isn’t my fucking problem.
The perfect Yglesias post: declaring “billionaires are good, actually,” as if it was some bold, counterintuitive take.
December 29, 2025 at 9:51 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
“But in a modern, free, and truly democratic society, it should not be a mystery for days to its population and its voters whether or not their president has just bombed a new sovereign nation, without any declaration of war – all while the federal government that’s funded by our tax dollars…
December 29, 2025 at 9:26 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
Pelosi: “The President incited an insurrection. We begged him to send the National Guard, they never sent them. This President is trying to re-write history… it was an assault on the constitution of 🇺🇸.”
December 29, 2025 at 9:09 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
Trump: "We have a fool at the Federal Reserve. I mean, Biden reappointed him. It's too bad. You would have thought he wouldn't have done that."

(Jerome Powell was appointed by Trump)
December 29, 2025 at 9:16 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
Somehow we’ve ended up in a position where the richest most powerful people in the world are innocent benevolent bystanders while a college professor with no tenure is part of a decadent and corrupt establishment that controls everything
The perfect Yglesias post: declaring “billionaires are good, actually,” as if it was some bold, counterintuitive take.
December 29, 2025 at 8:53 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
I like how this could be anything from an antivaxer to a Stalinist because everyone talks the same now
December 29, 2025 at 9:31 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
December 29, 2025 at 9:11 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
It appears the whole Putin “Ukraine tried to kill me with 91 drones last night” was entirely made up. And of course Trump repeated it and said he was mad at Ukraine.

Nightly Russia launched drones and missiles at innocent people.

And tried to Kill Zelensky every day

Spare me the gaslight
December 29, 2025 at 8:41 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
It's a good commentary on 2025 that the US President announces a major military attack on a foreign country and even the straightest arrows think, 50% chance it's an attack, 50% chance president is on another cognition bender.
December 29, 2025 at 8:10 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
CNN broadcast audio of Trump obliviously announcing land strikes on Venezuela during an obscure radio interview last Friday
December 29, 2025 at 8:32 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
little-known fact: folks MASSIVELY over-estimate how much $ is spent on foreign aid, ~20-25% of federal budget. they want to cut it drastically... to ~5%. figures from "Misreading the Public: The Myth of a New Isolationism," 1999, but echoed by more recent polls as well.
December 29, 2025 at 9:07 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
Putin in particular blames usaid for the color revolutions and his own near toppling. Thats why he wants McFaul.

Unfortunately he has also painted the UK as the ultimate existential enemy. Not sure how you walk that back.
December 29, 2025 at 9:04 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
also a LOT of foreign aid $ is spent right here in the US, especially food aid money from Trump-supporting farmers. again it's evil vs dumb.
December 29, 2025 at 9:03 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
Every policy rationale is transient when you are Republican. There are no fixed beliefs except: accumulate more power.
December 29, 2025 at 8:58 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
Trump guys on Twitter are using Grok to “hunt” daycares in their nearest city to see if there are kids in them and, if there are, if they’re Somali.
This is so fucking dangerous.
December 29, 2025 at 8:31 PM
There’s also a long tradition of conservatives seeing foreign aid as a communist plot—even though it propped up more far right regimes than far left ones.
The last four words are also important here. The USAID cuts should primarily be seen as a eugenicist project. Elon Musk and the far right, generally, believe that foreign aid is a part of the Great Replacement.
This thought has been lingering in my head for a while but this tweet prompted me to write it out.
December 29, 2025 at 8:47 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
very hard to imagine trump protecting a friend, esp when it's not politically expedient. outside of his children, he's treated every relationship as disposable or transactional, in service of self-gain or self-preservation.
December 29, 2025 at 7:56 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
honestly I think it’s heartwarming that it’s still possible to milkshake duck as an internationally known icon posthumously at age 91
Chappell Roan shares follow-up story after deleting Brigitte Bardot tribute post:

“Holy shit i did not know all that insane shit Ms. Bardot stood for obvs I do not condone this. very disappointing to learn.”
December 29, 2025 at 8:04 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
What a quote.
December 29, 2025 at 6:42 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
never taken a dime from a billionaire, I merely *incidentally* profited by publishing a complete horseshit story a billionaire wanted published, on the condition I do it on the platform he owns, so that I could convert the attention into subscribers on a different billionaire-funded platform
a lot of dumb dumbs at the Atlantic, but man, Caitlin Flanagan is on another level
December 29, 2025 at 6:45 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
If only we had this thing called the United States Intelligence Community that could advise the old man.
Trump to a reporter: "You're saying maybe the attack didn't place? That's possible too I guess. But President Putin told me this morning it did."
December 29, 2025 at 6:47 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
How we beat back the corporate takeover of America:

1. Break up corporate monopolies
2. Continue building union power
3. End Citizens United and get big money out of politics

Let’s keep working to unrig the system.
December 29, 2025 at 7:00 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
I went to Texas to write about the sudden end of one of America's most successful experiments: the six decades of welcoming India's most educated and ambitious citizens. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/29/o...
Opinion | One of America’s Most Successful Experiments Is Coming to a Shuddering Halt
www.nytimes.com
December 29, 2025 at 7:25 PM
Reposted by Lindsay Beyerstein
"Norman Rockwell was antifa," his granddaughter says. (Fact check: literally true.)
www.thebulwark.com/p/norman-roc...
The MAGAfication of Norman Rockwell
Trump uses the artist’s work—like other cultural icons—to promote Gestapo tactics and nativist ideas.
www.thebulwark.com
December 29, 2025 at 3:54 AM