Alexander Howard
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digiphile.bsky.social
Alexander Howard
@digiphile.bsky.social
Dad, writer, cyclist, citizen, cereal dilettante. Advocate for freedom of information, open governance, & democracy. Lover of the Oxford Comma, hater of hubris. Recovering journalist. Trying to move carefully, & fix things. https://civic-texts.ghost.io
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Good morning from DC 🥵

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Reposted by Alexander Howard
Just wow. @pluralistic.net.web.brid.gy came out swinging in this article. He's right though and that's the coolest part.
December 26, 2025 at 12:47 PM
Historic malapropism by @AP.org: “A Defense Department official, who insisted on animosity to discuss details not made public,” claimed the U.S. worked with Nigerian government to carry out air strikes today.

TLDR: President Trump bombed another nation on Christmas, without Congress declaring war.
Trump says US struck Islamic State targets in Nigeria after group targeted Christians
President Donald Trump says he launched a “powerful and deadly" U.S. strike against Islamic State forces in Nigeria, after spending weeks accusing the government there of failing to rein in the persec...
apnews.com
December 26, 2025 at 1:45 AM
Merry Christmas ☕️🎄🎁 to everyone celebrating this morning around the United States and the world. 🌎

May you and yours find peace, community, and kindness today.🕊️

Much love and light to everyone who’s missing family, wherever you are. May you be blessed by their memories.🌟
December 25, 2025 at 3:03 PM
Reposted by Alexander Howard
This is not a “duel,” which suggests both sides are equally culpable, but the latest salvo in the Trump administration’s ideological war on Harvard and higher education.
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/24/u...
In Private Letters, Harvard and Trump Administration Escalate Duel
www.nytimes.com
December 25, 2025 at 11:49 AM
“We can neither confirm nor deny any incidents with a ‘jolly old elf’ who engaged in unlawful surveillance & breaking & entering on hundreds of millions of Americans over the past two and a half centuries.” #Satire
Asking the FBI to Release the Santa Files
Podcast Episode · Disclosure · 12/16/2025 · 38m
podcasts.apple.com
December 25, 2025 at 1:42 AM
Per @axios.com, @whitehouse-47.bsky.social took control of @TheJusticeDept & is using it like @RapidResponse47, further eroding public confidence in USG accounts as nonpartisan, trustworthy sources of info.
Congress should confirm & check partisan abuses of official accounts by taxpayer-funded staff
December 24, 2025 at 11:05 PM
“Not everything Jeffrey Epstein got away with can or should be laid at Trump’s door. But Congress has passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act, & Trump’s DOJ is violating it, flagrantly.”— @joycewhitevance.bsky.social
The Justice Department is supposed to be for the People— not for POTUS or Trump
Which Side Is DOJ on: The Epstein Files
With apologies for writing about such a serious topic as we enter the Christmas holidays, these developments seemed too important to ignore.
joycevance.substack.com
December 24, 2025 at 10:48 PM
WSJ: “the ham-handed publication process” of the #EpsteinFiles “is sowing further doubts among the public” about the Trump administration’s “commitment to full transparency as well as its competence at handling the unwieldy & unprecedented task.” whatsnews.cmail19.com/t/d-l-girlrk...
DOJ Finds a Million More Epstein Files It Needs to Review
Officials seek emergency recruits to work through Christmas and warn they need a ‘few more weeks’ to check documents.
whatsnews.cmail19.com
December 24, 2025 at 10:40 PM
“While cloud forest today is the most widely used term, in some regions, these ecosystems or special types of cloud forests are called mossy forest, elfin forest, montane thicket, and dwarf cloud forest.”
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_f...
December 24, 2025 at 8:00 PM
I’ve been dreaming of white Christmas. This morning, it’s looking increasingly likely that we will wake up to one tomorrow, with more snow to come. Yay. ⛄️🎄❄️
December 24, 2025 at 6:00 PM
President Trump just asked Americans to tell him if we would like him to resign to take a job as the “full-time” MC at the Kennedy Honors.

If you wish to petition him, you can call the (currently unlisted) White House comment phone line (202-456-1111) or use the online form: whitehouse.gov/contact/
December 23, 2025 at 8:41 PM
Records disclosed on Monday by The United States Department of Justice after Congress mandated more transparency for the #EpsteinFiles include a 2020 email from a prosecutor stating President Donald J. Trump was a passenger at least 8 times in the 1990s.
December 23, 2025 at 7:38 PM
Reposted by Alexander Howard
On DOGE’s watch, federal spending did not go down at all. It went up. But is still led to cuts that closed offices, canceled programs and deprived people of food, medicine and other aid.

www.nytimes.com/2025/12/23/u...
How Did DOGE Disrupt So Much While Saving So Little?
www.nytimes.com
December 23, 2025 at 4:29 PM
Reposted by Alexander Howard
"the researchers found that withdrawing support for rapidly advancing mRNA vaccine technology could result in over 49,000 preventable deaths annually among patients diagnosed with four major cancers"
A new report from researchers at the Yale School of Public Health warns that the U.S. government’s abrupt cancellation of funding for mRNA vaccine research could have devastating health and economic consequences for the nation.
New report sounds alarm on health fallout from mRNA vaccine funding cuts
A new report from the Yale School of Public Health warns that the U.S. government’s abrupt cancellation of funding for mRNA vaccine research could have
ysph.yale.edu
December 23, 2025 at 2:50 AM
Reposted by Alexander Howard
The full spiked 60 Minutes CECOT package, clean & subtitled. 1/5
December 23, 2025 at 1:28 AM
Reposted by Alexander Howard
“If the truth of the operation does not match the narrative of the ‘worst of the worst,’ it’s going to be killed," said a DHS official.
New: We obtained thousands of internal chat messages from the ICE team creating viral videos of raids and "EPIC takedowns."

A scramble to satisfy the White House and "feed the beast" spawned a new "propaganda" machine, current and former officials told us.

"It's a war!"

wapo.st/4s6YnC5
‘It’s a war’: Inside ICE’s media machine
Thousands of internal ICE messages show how its public affairs team has coordinated with the White House to satisfy Trump administration demands for viral arrest videos
wapo.st
December 23, 2025 at 12:36 PM
Reposted by Alexander Howard
Even BILL CLINTON is saying he doesn’t care if the full release of the files implicates Bill Clinton. Amazing.
Bill Clinton releasing a statement saying 'release the Epstein files, you cowards' was not on my bingo list.
December 23, 2025 at 12:31 AM
Reposted by Alexander Howard
The right, along the Roberts Court, is trying to nullify the Reconstruction amendments guaranteeing equality under the law, in order to restore the Antebellum Constitution, which envisions “liberty” as an eternal aristocracy of race and class (gift link) www.theatlantic.com/politics/202...
December 22, 2025 at 1:11 PM
Corporate Democrats are inaccurate in describing progressives as “far-left,” @mkraju.bsky.social: As you know, there are no elected Communists (far-left) in Congress.

Rep. AOC, Sen. Sanders, & Mayor-Elect Mamdani are center-left, globally.

In European politics, social democrats, in a Green Party.
‘They’re attacking their own’: DC Democrats irked by surge of left-wing challengers with House majority on the line | CNN Politics
When Rep. Dan Goldman first ran for Congress in 2022, he was cheered on the left as the party’s top lawyer during President Donald Trump’s first impeachment.
www.cnn.com
December 21, 2025 at 9:58 PM
Reposted by Alexander Howard
Reclassifying marijuana is a welcome step toward aligning federal policy with science, evidence, and the reality of its legalization in many states.

We still need to fully legalize marijuana nationwide and to get justice for the communities harmed by the disastrous war on drugs.
Trump signs executive order fast-tracking reclassification of marijuana
The order does not legalize marijuana, but reclassification would allow the FDA to study it for medical purposes.
www.nbcnews.com
December 19, 2025 at 3:28 PM
Reposted by Alexander Howard
I spent some 15 years arguing against the post-9/11 expansion of surveillance authorities. I was routinely told I was paranoid because robust layers of checks guaranteed the political abuses of the Hoover era could never happen again.
Since 9/11, federal agents have gained broad powers to surveil Americans in the name of counterterrorism, including via FBI "assessments" that come w/ little oversight & allow agents to cast a wide net as they try to build cases for further investigation. Now they're explicitly targeting the left.
December 19, 2025 at 12:49 AM
Reposted by Alexander Howard
Trump's DOJ has been ordered to embark on a sweeping crackdown on "left-wing domestic terrorism." Civil liberties experts warn it could lead to a level of politicized FBI surveillance of Americans not seen since the era of J. Edgar Hoover and COINTELPRO.

Our story today: wapo.st/3L9lpr4 (gift link)
Trump administration prepares sweeping crackdown on leftist networks
The Justice Department’s program to root out violent “Antifa” extremism is raising First Amendment concerns.
wapo.st
December 18, 2025 at 4:51 PM
After many years of absence, they’re rebuilding the classic carousel on the National Mall, just in time for our nation’s 250th birthday. It’s a jewel of American history, heritage, culture, & art that closed in March 2020 & left a void since. Glad to see rebirth.
www.smithsonian.com/carousel/#:~....
December 19, 2025 at 12:37 AM
10+ mile hike in Rock Creek Park & all the way back to the Hill. The dogs loved it. I need a hot shower & ibuprofen. Walking out stress & grief outside helps, especially in balmy weather. Proud I didn’t fall down fording a mostly frozen creek. Glad I saw our Capitol city decked out for the holidays.
December 18, 2025 at 10:45 PM
Reposted by Alexander Howard
NEW: Humanitarian officials staged a last-minute plea to Trump officials at their fancy hotel to re-start food aid $ for a huge refugee camp in Kenya.

The Trumpers blew it off and babies starved.

@annamaria.bsky.social & Brett Murphy

www.propublica.org/article/keny...
December 17, 2025 at 12:36 PM