Roberta Baskin
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robertabaskin.bsky.social
Roberta Baskin
@robertabaskin.bsky.social
1.8K followers 1.2K following 580 posts
CBS, PBS, ABC News investigative reporter alum. Think #climate justice in shopping, eating, voting & investing. In these cataclysmic times, embrace good trouble & the First Amendment. ☮️🍃🌎🌊
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robertabaskin.bsky.social
Roberta Baskin @robertabaskin.bsky.social · 11d
Shame on #CBS. What a crushing blow to the once revered #60Minutes. Corporate politics & censorship is destroying journalistic excellence.
annabower.bsky.social Anna Bower @annabower.bsky.social · 11d
Per NY Times’s Michael Grynbaum on X, this is Sharyn Alfonsi’s email to her “60 Minutes” colleagues in full:
News Team, Thank you for the notes and texts. I apologize for not reaching out earlier. I learned on Saturday that Bari Weiss spiked our story, INSIDE CECOT, which was supposed to air tonight. We (Ori and I) asked for a call to discuss her decision. She did not afford us that courtesy/opportunity. Our story was screened five times and cleared by both CBS attorneys and Standards and Practices. It is factually correct. In my view, pulling it now-after every rigorous internal check has been met is not an editorial decision, it is a political one. We requested responses to questions and/or interviews with DHS, the White House, and the State Department. Government silence is a statement, not a VETO. Their refusal to be interviewed is a tactical maneuver designed to kill the story. If the administration's refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a "kill switch" for any reporting they find inconvenient. If the standard for airing a story becomes "the government must agree to be interviewed," then the government effectively gains control over the 60 Minutes broadcast. We go from an investigative powerhouse to a stenographer for the state. These men risked their lives to speak with us. We have a moral and professional obligation to the sources who entrusted us with their stories. Abandoning them now is a betrayal of the most basic tenet of journalism: giving voice to the voiceless. CBS spiked the Jeffrey Wigand interview due to legal concerns, nearly destroying the credibility of this broadcast. It took years to recover from that "low point." By pulling this story to shield an administration, we are repeating that history, but for political optics rather than legal ones. We have been promoting this story on social media for days. Our viewers are expecting it. When it fails to air without a credible explanation, the public will correctly identify this as corporate censorship. We are trading 50 years of "Gold Standard" reputation for a single week of political quiet. I care too much about this broadcast to watch it be dismantled without a fight. Sharyn
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
acyn.bsky.social
Question: But the president’s statements that he believed the election was rife with fraud—those are statements protected by the First Amendment, correct?

Smith: Absolutely not. If they are made to target a lawful government function and are made with knowing falsity, then no, they are not.
December 31, 2025 at 9:04 PM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
joncooper-us.bsky.social
Who agrees? ✋
December 30, 2025 at 3:10 PM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
cwebbonline.com
“Out of touch” isn’t it.

A president who gilds the Oval Office in gold, slaps his own name on a cultural institution, tears down the East Wing for his own vanity project, and then tells us the affordability crisis is all in our heads.

It’s not out of touch; it’s contempt for the people he governs.
December 30, 2025 at 8:52 PM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
chesapeakeclimate.bsky.social
Dominion’s at it again, trying to jack up our bills and gut rooftop solar in Virginia. Net metering lets families get fair credit for the solar power they generate. Speak up for affordable, clean energy for all Virginians. Sign on now: ccan.link/netmetering
#VASolar #CleanEnergy #ClimateAction
December 19, 2025 at 10:53 PM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
kevinmkruse.bsky.social
They’re not sending their best.
reuning.bsky.social Kevin Reuning @reuning.bsky.social · 8d
Update. The ICE supervisor, who is 47, was arrested for domestic violence against his non-citizen partner who he started a relationship when she was 18 and he was 40.

www.fox19.com/2025/12/22/i...
December 27, 2025 at 3:25 PM
robertabaskin.bsky.social
Sickest priorities in presidential history.
December 27, 2025 at 4:49 PM
robertabaskin.bsky.social
Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS): it’s contagious. But a vaccine becomes available to stop the insanity in November 2026. #vote

www.instagram.com/reel/DSU8PXO...
Randy Rainbow on Instagram: "Well…I got it! ✅🥴 #TDS #TBT"
This video explores the concept of Trump Derangement Syndrome, a humorous take on the feelings of anxiety and outrage that can come with living in a world of political turmoil. With a lighthearted and...
www.instagram.com
December 27, 2025 at 4:43 PM
robertabaskin.bsky.social
Remember America when: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free…”
-The Statue of Liberty inscription
open.substack.com/pub/robertre...
The Brazen Cruelty of the Trump Regime
Its plan to warehouse immigrants has shades of Nazi concentration camps and America's shameful imprisonment of Japanese Americans during World War II.
open.substack.com
December 25, 2025 at 4:48 AM
robertabaskin.bsky.social
Just what DC residents are clamoring for: AR-15s. How much more insanity can our Nation’s Capitol take from this insane Adminstration?
Trump Officials Sue to Loosen D.C.’s Gun Laws www.nytimes.com/2025/12/22/u...
Trump Officials Sue to Loosen D.C.’s Gun Laws
www.nytimes.com
December 23, 2025 at 5:02 AM
robertabaskin.bsky.social
Hundreds of Big Post-Election Donors Have Benefited From Trump’s Return to Office www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
Hundreds of Big Post-Election Donors Have Benefited From Trump’s Return to Office
Well into his second term, the president and his allies have continued aggressively raising money. Many donors have interests before his administration, The Times found.
www.nytimes.com
December 23, 2025 at 4:55 AM
robertabaskin.bsky.social
Excellent reporting and shame on CBS’s new boss Bari Weiss for her censorship to placate Trump. #60Minutes #journalism
muellershewrote.com Mueller, She Wrote @muellershewrote.com · 11d
BREAKING: WATCH the full 60 Minutes CECOT segment here. This was sent to me anonymously. It appears to be the segment CBS' Bari Weiss killed. www.muellershewrote.com/p/watch-the-...
WATCH: The 60 Minutes CECOT Segment
I was sent the CECOT segment anonymously in a group chat.
www.muellershewrote.com
December 23, 2025 at 1:42 AM
robertabaskin.bsky.social
Shame on #CBS. What a crushing blow to the once revered #60Minutes. Corporate politics & censorship is destroying journalistic excellence.
annabower.bsky.social Anna Bower @annabower.bsky.social · 11d
Per NY Times’s Michael Grynbaum on X, this is Sharyn Alfonsi’s email to her “60 Minutes” colleagues in full:
News Team, Thank you for the notes and texts. I apologize for not reaching out earlier. I learned on Saturday that Bari Weiss spiked our story, INSIDE CECOT, which was supposed to air tonight. We (Ori and I) asked for a call to discuss her decision. She did not afford us that courtesy/opportunity. Our story was screened five times and cleared by both CBS attorneys and Standards and Practices. It is factually correct. In my view, pulling it now-after every rigorous internal check has been met is not an editorial decision, it is a political one. We requested responses to questions and/or interviews with DHS, the White House, and the State Department. Government silence is a statement, not a VETO. Their refusal to be interviewed is a tactical maneuver designed to kill the story. If the administration's refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a "kill switch" for any reporting they find inconvenient. If the standard for airing a story becomes "the government must agree to be interviewed," then the government effectively gains control over the 60 Minutes broadcast. We go from an investigative powerhouse to a stenographer for the state. These men risked their lives to speak with us. We have a moral and professional obligation to the sources who entrusted us with their stories. Abandoning them now is a betrayal of the most basic tenet of journalism: giving voice to the voiceless. CBS spiked the Jeffrey Wigand interview due to legal concerns, nearly destroying the credibility of this broadcast. It took years to recover from that "low point." By pulling this story to shield an administration, we are repeating that history, but for political optics rather than legal ones. We have been promoting this story on social media for days. Our viewers are expecting it. When it fails to air without a credible explanation, the public will correctly identify this as corporate censorship. We are trading 50 years of "Gold Standard" reputation for a single week of political quiet. I care too much about this broadcast to watch it be dismantled without a fight. Sharyn
December 22, 2025 at 5:15 AM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
tbluvoter.bsky.social
In the meantime...

And donate to PBS because they're going to need to replace our networks. bsky.app/profile/theb...
December 22, 2025 at 2:33 AM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
ronfilipkowski.bsky.social
Why did CBS delete this promo and cancel this from airing in full?
December 22, 2025 at 12:41 AM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
atrupar.com
Rand Paul: "We've never in our past decided just to shoot smugglers who are unarmed without even proof they're smuggling anything. So I think this is a horrendous thing that should stop. I think it's illegal & immoral... the kids in the military - I'm not for sending them down there to die for oil"
December 18, 2025 at 3:28 PM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
sanders.senate.gov
We are spending $1 trillion every year on the military. That's more than the next NINE nations combined.

Meanwhile, millions lack health care & we have the highest childhood and senior poverty rate of almost any major country.

Congress needs to get its priorities straight.
December 18, 2025 at 9:13 PM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
namwella1961.bsky.social
In a shocking twist that everyone saw coming, Trump has renamed the Kennedy Center in honor of himself.
#ProudBlue #Pinks #TrumpisaNationalDisgrace
December 18, 2025 at 9:56 PM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
zacheverson.com
It gets even more pathetic—

x.com/RepBeatty/st...
Rep. Joyce Beatty @RepBeatty · 6m For the record. This was not unanimous. I was muted on the call and not allowed to speak or voice my opposition to this move. Also for the record, this was not on the agenda.
December 18, 2025 at 7:21 PM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
timothysnyder.bsky.social
We will pay a price for putting utterly incompetent and self-serving people in charge of national policing.
www.thebulwark.com/p/fbi-spent-...
The FBI Spent a Generation Relearning How to Catch Spies. Then Came Kash Patel.
As China’s spies grow more aggressive, the FBI is distracted and off-balance.
www.thebulwark.com
December 15, 2025 at 6:50 PM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
timothysnyder.bsky.social
Exactly the sort of tyrannical behavior that the Constitution was written to prevent. See the Fourth Amendment in particular.
robertscotthorton.bsky.social Scott Horton @robertscotthorton.bsky.social · 19d
Armed ICE agents trapped US citizens in a restaurant and demanded their papers. Federal agents walked into East African restaurants in Cedar-Riverside, MN. They closed and blocked the doors. Then they demanded to see everyone’s papers. Every person present was a US citizen.
Federal agents use chemical irritant on crowd in Somali neighborhood of Minneapolis amid Trump crackdown
Federal agents have used chemical irritant to disperse a crowd in a heavily Somali neighborhood in Minneapolis. This happened Tuesday during a identification checks amid the Trump administration's cra...
www.mprnews.org
December 15, 2025 at 6:51 PM
robertabaskin.bsky.social
RFK, Jr. has no respect for science. He's a vaccine conspiracy spreader who Trump's Republican Congress put in a position to oversee healthcare. What could go wrong? American children will get sick and die of diseases from the past. Playing #politics with lives. #Trump #GOP
December 13, 2025 at 8:27 PM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
rebeccasolnit.bsky.social
My position on taking action. And on the important space between everything and nothing.
And everything is flawed, if you want to look at it that way. The analogy that has helped me most is this: in Hurricane Katrina, hundreds of boat-owners rescued people—single moms, toddlers, grandfathers—stranded in attics, on roofs, in flooded housing projects, hospitals, and school buildings. None of them said, I can’t rescue everyone, therefore it’s futile; therefore my efforts are flawed and worthless, though that’s often what people say about more abstract issues in which, nevertheless, lives, places, cultures, species, rights are at stake. They went out there in fishing boats and rowboats and pirogues and all kinds of small craft, some driving from as far as Texas and eluding the au- thorities to get in, others refugees themselves working within the city. There was bumper-to-bumper boat-trailer traffic—the celebrated Cajun Navy—going toward the city the day after the levees broke. None of those people said, I can’t rescue them all. All of them said, I can rescue someone, and that’s work so meaningful and important I will risk my life and defy the authorities to do it. And they did.
December 13, 2025 at 4:54 PM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
rbreich.bsky.social
Oligarchy (noun):

A government of and by a few at the top, who exercise power for their own benefit. Their power and wealth increase as they make laws that favor themselves, manipulate financial markets, and create monopolies that put more wealth into their pockets.
December 13, 2025 at 7:00 PM
Reposted by Roberta Baskin
ronfilipkowski.bsky.social
At least while we are screwing over our allies around the world we will be doing it in an anti-woke font.
December 10, 2025 at 9:44 PM
robertabaskin.bsky.social
Data Centersa are popping up like weeds in VA. Let's make these rich companies pay for their electricity and investment in renewable energy. insideclimatenews.org/news/2610202...
How Did This State Become the Data Center Capital of the World? - Inside Climate News
From America Online to the rise of AI, Virginia has been good for an industry now transforming the economy and grid. Has the industry returned the favor?
insideclimatenews.org
December 11, 2025 at 2:45 AM