Paddle Pressure
paddlepressure.bsky.social
Paddle Pressure
@paddlepressure.bsky.social
Lawyer lurking in Grand Rapids
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UPDATE: The Senate votes 53-47 to shoot down the Baldwin amendment to extend ACA funds for 1 year. A party-line vote with every Republican rejecting it.
An important vote in this series: Tammy Baldwin’s proposal to extend ACA expiring funds for 1 year. It’s structured as a motion to table (i.e. scrap it from the amendment tree). But it’ll show the appetite (or lack thereof) in the Senate to address this issue.
November 11, 2025 at 12:38 AM
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I agree. I don't judge Kim Kardashian for failing the California bar. It's a tough one, and TBH the bar exam in general bears little relationship to the practice of law.

I do, however, judge her for her own statement that she relied on four psychics who told her she would pass the bar.
Everyone is dunking on Kim Kardashian. The truth is the California bar is notoriously hard, the pass rate was only 55%, the pass rate for people who didn‘t go to an accredited law school is way lower, and lots of very smart and dedicated people don’t pass the first time and become good lawyers.
Kim Kardashian slams psychics who told her she'd pass the bar exam: 'All fucking full of shit'
November 11, 2025 at 4:58 PM
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I want to thank all the veterans who have served this country, but especially the transgender veterans who served and still desire to serve in spite of being treated like 2nd class citizens by the very country they defend. Thank you all for your service.
November 11, 2025 at 5:01 PM
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"In the first half of this year, the Trump Organization’s income soared 17-fold to $864 million from $51 million a year earlier, according to Reuters calculations." Wild. www.reuters.com/investigatio...
Inside the Trump family’s global crypto cash machine
The U.S. president’s family raked in more than $800 million from sales of crypto assets in the first half of 2025 alone, a Reuters examination found, on top of potentially billions more in unrealized “on paper” gains. Much of that cash came from foreign sources as Donald Trump's sons touted their business on an international investor roadshow.
www.reuters.com
October 28, 2025 at 4:33 PM
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The fundamental problem is his ongoing treatment of tariff revenue as somehow a private kitty he can spend at whim, rather than going into the general US Treasury pot (and subject to Congressional appropriation). No one will ever persuade him otherwise.
November 11, 2025 at 5:34 PM
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Hassett's invocation of the Laffer Curve should be your tipoff that this is ALL bullshit.

The best possible explanation for the $2000 tariff rebate idea is that Trump is trying to prep the political ground for losing at SCOTUS, ginning up backlash to his PROMISE to pay back the tariffs.
QUINTANILLA: What's more likely -- a $2,000 tariff rebate check or a 50 year mortgage?

HASSETT: They're both really good ideas
November 11, 2025 at 5:00 PM
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One of the greatest (fictional) trial lawyers need six tries to pass the bar: Vincent LaGuardia Gambini.

youtu.be/yOFGhnr4rto?...
My Cousin Vinny - six times was the charm
YouTube video by nuvestyle
youtu.be
November 11, 2025 at 5:35 PM
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In case it's not obvious, none of this is true. He's either innumerate, or lying.
November 11, 2025 at 3:24 AM
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BOTH
In case it's not obvious, none of this is true. He's either innumerate, or lying.
November 11, 2025 at 5:35 PM
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The thing about Mamdani is that he’s a talented politician but not otherworldly or one in a billion, he’s just a competent guy with popular ideas who ran against an entitled piece of shit and to me it’s a lot more optimistic to imagine 1000 campaigns like his than to view him as a unique phenomenon
November 11, 2025 at 1:42 AM
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Don’t ask him to recite any Bible verse or any of the lines in God Bless America. bsky.app/profile/atru...
Trump knows the first three words to "God Bless America" but that seems to be about it
November 11, 2025 at 5:35 PM
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Still thinking about this story. Imagine how cooked your brain has to be on Fox News -- how terrified you have to be, every day in your isolated suburban castle -- to start *shooting* when you see brown people at your door, before the door is even open. We're such a nation of terrified cowards.
Cleaning worker who mistakenly went to wrong home fatally shot: Police
The shooting victim died from a gunshot wound to the head, the coroner's office said.
abcnews.go.com
November 11, 2025 at 5:38 PM
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Not trusting the United States of America with intelligence is a very good idea
November 11, 2025 at 5:39 PM
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i parachute into X/Twitter a lot for my job and obviously have chronicled the devolution but today it feels that, even outside of the realm of groyperposting the broad culture there is just like *i have lead poisoning*
November 10, 2025 at 6:59 PM
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“The taxes were illegal but it’s just too much money for the government to give back” sounds like something you would have been tarred and feathered for saying in 1773.
November 10, 2025 at 8:36 PM
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Though Trump’s pardons can’t extend to state crimes, I think it’s worth pointing out the message being conveyed:

Trump’s allies are alleged to have stolen data from state voting systems in an effort to help him overturn an election he lost.

Now he’s pardoning them for it.

bsky.app/profile/anna...
News coverage of this has focused on the pardon of those involved in the fake electors plot.

But the pardon also extends to key figures who participated in the unauthorized breach of voting systems in Coffee County, Georgia

My reporting on the breach: www.lawfaremedia.org/article/what...
November 10, 2025 at 6:56 PM
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Homeland Security thugs are enjoying themselves while they terrorize people in Chicago.
Border Patrol agents posed at "The Bean" for an apparent photo op after a weekend of clashes in Little Village. blockclubchi.co/4oUHKae
November 10, 2025 at 5:52 PM
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While Trump murders people on boats for supposedly trafficking drugs, Jonathan Braun, a convicted drug trafficker serving a 10 year sentence he pardoned in 2021, will be sentenced in court today after he sexually assaulted a woman after Trump freed him from prison.
November 10, 2025 at 3:15 PM
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Ma dude😍
November 10, 2025 at 1:39 PM
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Mark Kelly notably declines to endorse Chuck Schumer as the leader of Senate Dems going forward
November 10, 2025 at 6:13 PM
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Tell me you don’t understand risk pools without telling me you don’t understand risk pools
November 10, 2025 at 3:02 PM
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What this guy seems to demand is that only sick people get coverage, which would represent the total collapse of the healthcare system. Not an exaggeration. Every aspect would implode at once.
Tell me you don’t understand risk pools without telling me you don’t understand risk pools
November 10, 2025 at 3:24 PM
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US citizen George Retes speaks out about his unlawful detainment by ICE.

Institute for Justice website: ij.org
November 9, 2025 at 7:33 PM
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What would Trump do if he wanted the military to help him establish a dictatorship?
He’d order troops into U.S. cities.
He’d order strikes on foreign targets to show he could get the military to kill people without congressional OK.
He’d purge the military of top brass who might defend democracy.
Hegseth Is Purging Military Leaders With Little Explanation
www.nytimes.com
November 9, 2025 at 8:07 PM
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"Only a LOSER would not agree to doing this."
November 8, 2025 at 6:56 PM