Lucas O’Connor
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loc.bsky.social
Lucas O’Connor
@loc.bsky.social
Unionist. Avid Indoorsman. Terror since the public school era. San Diego. ED of Progressive Labor Alliance. It is our duty to win.
Reposted by Lucas O’Connor
Former House speaker / Trump adviser newt Gingrich, saying on the record what we’d heard so much on background from those others:

“Look at the rage on the left. It doesn’t sound like a victory party to me. All you have to do is look at the reaction on the left to figure out who won this shutdown…”
November 11, 2025 at 3:38 AM
Reposted by Lucas O’Connor
scenes from a victory lap

zeteo.com/p/senate-dem...
November 11, 2025 at 3:14 AM
Kaine is one of the few Sens being honest about all this. They're sending a handful of folks to bsky to try to mollify the angry people, but TK's condescending dismissal over and over again is the real contempt behind all of this. They really are more upset about a powerful movement than about Trump
Tim Kaine on backlash he's getting: "I got the first good night's sleep last night that I've gotten since Oct 1, b/c I wasn't worried about being able to look Capitol Police in the eye when I walked in, or what a furloughed fed worker would say to me at church, or what somebody would say about SNAP"
November 11, 2025 at 3:37 AM
Reposted by Lucas O’Connor
incredibly funny that Joyce Carol Oates owned Musk so hard he's started trying to post like a regular person with normal interests
November 10, 2025 at 5:45 PM
Reposted by Lucas O’Connor
We are literally mad about your failure to fight the real dangers.
But there are real dangers out there that must be fought; and energy spent fighting each other is energy lost to that bigger fight.
November 11, 2025 at 1:37 AM
And yet weirdly, the fighting stopped. Sounds like a major leadership problem!
My promise to you: I will never stop fighting to protect your health care.
November 11, 2025 at 2:21 AM
Trouble is, nobody has any reason to imagine Senate Dems will do this, or follow through on anything, so there's no good faith way to ask for this

And there's no way back from that fully broken faith, to work productively on anything at all, without a major change

Which again, is the disaster here
1. We need to fight hard for a good ACA extension early in December and hold Republicans fiercely accountable if they betray everyone.
November 11, 2025 at 1:38 AM
Imagine if Lincoln had refused to keep changing generals until he finally found Grant
Many feel betrayal and frustration, and the feelings are hot right now.

I get it. I have my own feelings.

🧵
November 11, 2025 at 1:05 AM
Reposted by Lucas O’Connor
🚨 Tim Kaine is saying the quiet part out loud - underscoring why anyone shouldn't be satisfied with any of the "no" statements or posts from Dem Senators.

If Dem Senators are truly disgusted with this save they should be calling on #SurrenderSchumer to step aside as the Leader immediately.
November 10, 2025 at 7:32 PM
The more I think about it, the more this is also the bloody fight that's necessary to overcome the failed institutional actors orchestrating this cave and all the other surrendering. Fair to debate whether delaying the fight builds power or loses it, but clearly tons of people are ready to get to it
Boils down to: These Dems do not have the stomach to win the fight they are in. Whether it’s this shutdown or something else someday, they have to be willing to fight a truly bloody fight through to victory, and they just aren’t.

This cave sucks, but the true disaster is there’s no pretense left.
For a lot of senators they have people yelling in one ear about airline delays and food stamps and a bunch of other cascading problems and in the other about health care. Ds who flipped say it’s clear Rs were never going to give them what they wanted.
November 10, 2025 at 7:33 PM
Over/under 0.5 Dem Senators who were issuing horrified press releases last night and will now take this opportunity themselves
There are some discussions about Sen. Rand Paul getting a hemp-related vote as part of shutdown deal. Could speed things up at least on the GOP side

Any one senator can jam this up for a few days
November 10, 2025 at 6:36 PM
Reposted by Lucas O’Connor
“ A scholarship at UC San Diego — created to honor victims of Klan violence & help Black students — was forced open to white applicants after a legal challenge…A program meant to repair racial terror…has to include descendants of those who were never targets of it.”

calmatters.org/commentary/2...
Opinion | Flipping fairness: California's "colorblind" laws fail Black students
A scholarship meant to repair racial terror now must include descendants of those who were never targets of it. But is it, and programs like it, truly discriminatory?
calmatters.org
November 10, 2025 at 6:29 PM
Was saying last night as statements from Third Way types started coming out that they’d be super pissed as ones who were generally less interested in all this but went along with it, only to not just get screwed, but get screwed by the wrong villains, undermining all their hippie punching
Even the Dem centrists at Third Way are mad about the deal moderate Senate Dems cut with Republicans to end the shutdown:

"We should not have surrendered until we received at least something tangible on lowering health care costs."
November 10, 2025 at 5:43 PM
Reposted by Lucas O’Connor
This is the entire thing. They ended up with nothing on their PR point and nothing on the real discussion which was submerged. The way they shut down RIFs showed they understood how to stop the power grab and chose not to.
prospect.org/2025/11/10/m...
November 10, 2025 at 5:08 PM
Reposted by Lucas O’Connor
Sure, it takes skill to deliver the most self-defeating sound byte imaginable on national TV mere moments after needlessly surrendering on the vital political conflict of our moment, but for the sound byte to be factually wrong as well? That's when you know you're in the presence of a true great
Sen. Angus King: "Standing up to Donald Trump didn't work"
November 10, 2025 at 4:35 PM
Hoyer has been in the House since three months before I was born and I am, sadly, extremely not young.
November 10, 2025 at 4:34 PM
Even more proud to be a paid @blockclubchi.bsky.social subscriber
“As they exited, Bovino called Block Club Chicago “Chicago’s Liars Club.” He questioned the publication’s coverage of federal immigration operations in the city.”

“How come you never report on the work we do to improve the community?” Bovino inquired.“
Border Patrol Agents Pose At The Bean For Apparent Photo Op
The photo op came after agents tear-gassed a Little Village street and were spotted in the area numerous times. At the Bean, one agent shouted, "Everyone say, 'Little Village!'"
blockclubchicago.org
November 10, 2025 at 4:24 PM
The thing about caving on the shutdown is that it immediately emboldens the GOP on every other issue. www.politico.com/newsletters/...
Republicans take a big swing on labor reform
Senate HELP Committee Republicans unveiled a slate of bills aimed at raising the bar for filing grievances with the National Labor Relations Board.
www.politico.com
November 10, 2025 at 4:19 PM
Reposted by Lucas O’Connor
"In fact, they were acting with the express approval of Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and were reporting to him daily." prospect.org/2025/11/08/w...
Why Does Schumer Keep Trying to Cave? - The American Prospect
The Senate Democratic leader and his Gang of Eight keep trying to snatch defeat out of the jaws of victory. On Thursday, they told their caucus colleagues they had ten votes to reopen the government—i...
prospect.org
November 10, 2025 at 4:03 PM
Reposted by Lucas O’Connor
Echoing some points I made yesterday.

Sen. Kim is a great examples of a center-left Democrat who pushed out some ossified leadership and reformed his state party as part of his run.
Don’t even need a Justice Dem or a committed leftist. Just someone like Andy Kim willing to burn bridges with the political establishment of the state for the sake of a better delegation (and a promotion).
November 10, 2025 at 2:42 PM
Reposted by Lucas O’Connor
Chuck Schumer has not met this moment and Senate Democrats would be wise to move on from his leadership.
November 10, 2025 at 3:37 PM
This boils down to "This is fine, because everyone agrees it's not fine at all" which doesn't work, but I'm not going to begrudge people doing what they need to do to keep fighting.
November 10, 2025 at 6:27 AM
Yup. There's a reflexive contingent who will always declare "this won't matter by then, people will vote against Trump" but they have to believe there's a vote against Trump available on the ballot.

For now, they're being shown that voting harder just gets Trump on a slightly different timeline.
the Dems keep operating like this cynical shit has no effect. It’s why their core voters don’t fucking show up. When they say “we fight for you” nobody believes them, because they constantly pull shit like this and say “what else are you gonna vote for.” But then people STAY HOME.
November 10, 2025 at 5:46 AM
We have two completely distinct approaches now for Dems:
The November 2024 election approach, and
The November 2025 election approach

Senate Dems looked straight at the November 2025 approach, and chose the November 2024 approach.
November 10, 2025 at 5:37 AM