zeitzoff.bsky.social - Profile | ThreadSky | a Reddit-style client for Bluesky

On Friday at 17:00 (1A.10) I'll present "The Logic of Connective Faction: How Far-Right Media and Digitally-Networked Elites Radicalize Politics" (co-authored w/@curdknupfer.bsky.social & @yunkangyang.bsky.social) on panel "Politics, Media, and Radicalization" #EPSA2025 Paper: tinyurl.com/38czxhh6

submitted 15 hours ago • 3 comments

Wow. I really didn't think he'd be foolish enough to do it. Some initial thoughts, as writing them down will help me not scream 🧵

submitted 2 days ago • 1 comment

Trump’s domestic politics have been awful, but the tail risk from his foreign policy is what keeps me up at night.

submitted 2 days ago • 2 comments

Is it possible to treat psychopathy before it starts? Fascinating article on new therapies and approaches. www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-i...

submitted 2 days ago • 0 comments

Never thought I’d be saying this, but a part of me yearns for the Wall Street “Masters of the Universe” elite of the 1980s-early 2000s. The Tech Bro Oligarchy we have now is worse on all dimension. www.hks.harvard.edu/faculty-rese...

submitted 4 days ago • 1 comment

I wrote about how the 2020 protests hurt Trump politically. I also wrote about how counternarratives about left-wing violence are just spin — and wildly at odds with the reality of extremist violence. Gift link: wapo.st/3SOEv6e

submitted 7 days ago • 55 comments

A lot of people exercising their 1st amendment right in suburban Maryland today—great turnout too!

submitted 9 days ago • 0 comments

Highly recommend “More Everything Forever” by @adambecker.bsky.social Does a good job explaining narratives and philosophy of the bizarro politics of Silicon Valley elite—and how they have infected our politics. www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/adam-...

submitted 10 days ago • 0 comments

A few observations about where we are right now: The Trump administration is clearly targeting Democratic politicians through arrests and repression. This rightfully scares academics like myself who have seen this movie play out in other countries (Ukraine, Turkey, etc.). It doesn’t end well.

submitted 11 days ago • 6 comments

Trump isn’t a popular president. That means he and his advisors have incentives to use heavy-handed repression. What’s unfolding in LA is a deliberate effort to stoke outrage and invite violence. It’s a risky and dangerous strategy. See bsky.app/profile/zeit...

submitted 15 days ago • 0 comments

DHS wanted 20K national guard troops for immigration enforcement. With crossings down >90% since Trump took office it'll be difficult to sustain a declaration of emergency. Plus, this is a bad idea, will damage public support for the military. The Pentagon should deny the request.

submitted 17 days ago • 13 comments

As someone who wrote a book on “nasty politics”—why politicians insult and threaten their opponents—here are 4 observations about the Musk-Trump fissure.

submitted 18 days ago • 2 comments

Election waves don’t just happen organically. One big factor is the behavior of strategic politicians. 1/

submitted 18 days ago • 1 comment

Want to understand peak U.S. soft power? I’ve got one word for you: “Smooth.” As in Carlos Santana and Rob Thomas’s irresistible 1999 hit that was blasting in every car, mall, and Best Buy. It was loud, polished, and undeniable because it was just “so smooth.” m.youtube.com/watch?v=6Whg...

submitted 18 days ago • 3 comments

Honestly, for all this is mocked, not enough money is spent on research relative to program. Perhaps this is me talking my own book, but I would advise “tithing to research”, that is spending 10% of program budget on research to make it more effective www.politico.com/news/2025/06...

submitted 19 days ago • 0 comments

Huge scale of destruction - on science, technology, on students and researchers' careers, on patients, caregivers, private industry and for no discernable gain.

submitted 19 days ago • 2 comments

~NEW EPISODE~ Part two of our conversation with @josephmbrown.bsky.social about Stop City and the Future of Protest. We discuss the status of the project, dive deep into the repression that forest defenders are facing and talk about the evolution of non-violence strategies. 🎙️: bit.ly/3Hr5jqQ

submitted 20 days ago • 0 comments

Cutting NIH or NSF funding sounds abstract. Seeing what research is actually being cut makes it real. Kudos to @nytimes.com for this piece: www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

submitted 19 days ago • 3 comments

As an indication of the upside-down we are now living in, a Ukrainian friend who lives in Kyiv under the daily threat of aerial bombardment reached out to me today: “Are you doing OK? I’ve been following the news about American universities and it sounds bad.” 🙃

submitted 22 days ago • 32 comments

Was at CVS today, and so I asked the pharmacists there: “Are we still still able to get COVID vaccines?” I got 3 different answers: 1) “Children, and pregnant women can’t get it anymore, and you can only get it if you have a condition that puts you ‘at risk.’ ”

submitted 25 days ago • 2 comments

New paper in PSPB! journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/... Well, actually, not "new". We first put this paper online way back Dec 2022... in any case, we think it's really cool! We find that conspiracy believers tend to be overconfident & really don't seem to realize that most disagree with them

submitted 25 days ago • 13 comments

Immigrants increase innovation and economic growth [full stop]

submitted 25 days ago • 1 comment

Popularism could use some conceptual clarity. Is it 1) Talk about the areas where you have popular positions, so the issues where you are popular are salient to the public immediately before votes are cast, OR 2) The first, but also adopt the popular positions advocated by your opponents

submitted 28 days ago • 1 comment

Lately I’ve been keeping a list of things to repair in the U.S.—if and when we get through the next 3.6 years: Not hard -Tariffs Medium hard -Corruption -Politicized law enforcement -Clean energy transition Very hard -Higher ed & scientific research -State capacity & expertise -Supreme Court

submitted 31 days ago • 6 comments

Huge congrats to my colleague @triciabacon.bsky.social on her promotion to full professor!!!

submitted 31 days ago • 0 comments

A lot of the same people saying: “AGI and our machine overlords are here. The singularity is upon us.” Are also saying: “Let’s burn the U.S. science and research infrastructure to the ground.” Wild levels of idiocy and harm being done.

submitted 33 days ago • 2 comments

Important piece in the Michigan Law Review by Steffen Seitz on the growing use of conspiracy charges against left-wing activists—from Stop Cop City to pro-Palestine students. The charges are designed to suppress and kill social movements papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

submitted 38 days ago • 1 comment

Based on official data, these are the homicide and disappearance rates in Mexico since the onset of the drug war. Over 100K people have been reported missing & remain unlocated, while nearly half a million have been killed since 2007. One key question is how many of the disappeared remain alive?

submitted 39 days ago • 0 comments

Want to understand how we got a celebrity president and a cabinet filled with cable news jockeys? I highly recommend: “The American Mirage: How Reality TV Upholds the Myth of Meritocracy” by @eunjikim.bsky.social press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...

submitted 45 days ago • 3 comments

I am very excited to share a new working paper coauthored with @amaliaab.bsky.social. Using a field experiment, we find that, in the real world, it is more costly to express far-right preferences than other political preferences. osf.io/preprints/os... 1/8

submitted 45 days ago • 8 comments