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Trump's crypto reserve fund isn't a pet project or strategic investment. It's crony capitalism, strip-mining public resources for private gain: www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

submitted 3 days ago • 10 comments

🎙️ON AIR: We're speaking w/ KQED's politics correspondent Marisa Lagos, The Atlantic's @annielowrey.bsky.social and former Middle East negotiator and advisor Aaron David Miller about President Trump's speech last night and the most recent news from his administration . 📻 Listen:

submitted 3 days ago • 1 comment

well, stagflation's going to be fun to try to get out of

submitted 4 days ago • 1 comment

hey guess what trump's numbers about social security are total horseshit www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/202...

submitted 4 days ago • 135 comments

The IRS manages 3,000 returns per employee, and collects $57m per employee. It's a hyper-efficient benefits administrator; its budget is 67 times smaller than the military budget. What are we doing here. (I mean, I know what we are doing here.) apnews.com/article/irs-...

submitted 4 days ago • 9 comments

Reminder that the Census determines how federal dollars, and House seats, are allocated. This is, yet another, five alarm fire.

submitted 4 days ago • 21 comments

George, the first story is about how cartelization is in part responsible for high egg prices; the second is about why consumers kept spending as prices rose in 2022, and seem to have become less price-sensitive in general. You have to read the articles, my guy. bsky.app/profile/geor...

submitted 7 days ago • 6 comments

Since this has somehow risen to the level of death threats (!?)... the article doesn't say eggs should be more expensive! It actually says... a. it took billions in farm, infrastructure, and tech $$ to get them this cheap, given how fragile they are b. prices are high due to cartelization

submitted 7 days ago • 8 comments

Working on credit card story. Are you struggling with an insane APR? Or are you a card-accumulating, airline-lounge-skipping points-savant? (Both?) I'm [email protected] and annielowrey.25 on Signal.

submitted 9 days ago • 4 comments

How eggs went from being something nobody bought to something supplied by an animal-immiserating, price-fixing, price-gouging cartel that crushes small farms and is making the bird-flu crisis worse. (Prices aren't coming down anytime soon, btw.) www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

submitted 9 days ago • 32 comments

Trump (on chickens and eggs): vaccines save lives, PPE and biosecurity measures work, and importing goods lowers prices bsky.app/profile/nyti...

submitted 10 days ago • 4 comments

New — I wrote about how the 5 bullets email is nothing but an escalation of Musk and the Trump administration’s psychological war on federal workers. Read here:

submitted 13 days ago • 33 comments

On the five-bullet-points DOGE homework: Now heard from civil servants in multiple agencies who haven't been tasked with doing much. They'd do more if they had directives from the top, but they don't; they're terrified of doing something that would get them fired.

submitted 14 days ago • 3 comments

The attacks on DEI are a pretext for a much more radical agenda of reversing the gains of the civil rights movement, an objective the Trump administration is pursuing with zeal. A Great Resegregation. www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc...

submitted 14 days ago • 140 comments

New, from me @theatlantic.com: No, the federal government is not too big It has real human capital needs Firings are indiscriminate, weakening state capacity Creating a toxic and politicized workplace is driving away dedicated employees www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

submitted 14 days ago • 62 comments

New from @karenhao.bsky.social: more than a dozen workers in federal agencies outline how the administration is pushing a new ideology and stoking paranoia within the government’s ranks. “People are terrified,” one source said, “not for losing their jobs but for losing democracy.”

submitted 15 days ago • 4 comments

A week of conflicting statements makes me wonder whether Trump's staff knows what he really thinks about Medicaid -- or, honestly, whether Trump himself knows But I think the ambiguity tells us a lot --about where this debate is headed, how he'll act and what the program's defenders need to do

submitted 15 days ago • 8 comments

An irony of the current moment: Layoffs aren't "efficient" for businesses! They don't improve margins, boost valuations, or lead companies to outperform their peers. They're expensive!! Bad for morale!! Hinder the performance of retained workers!! A sign of mismanagement, not leadership!

submitted 15 days ago • 5 comments

On changes to #NIH indirect rates, there is a law in place that prohibits NIH from making such changes without the approval of Congress. See Division D, Title II Section 224 of The Further Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2024 (Public Law No: 118-47) grants.nih.gov/grants/guide...

submitted 29 days ago • 82 comments

Biomedical research is... 1. high-return 2. a minuscule part of the budget 3. an American strength, redounding to firms and to individuals 4. not a major source of graft 5. a source of some bloat, sure, but how does this address it? grants.nih.gov/grants/guide...

submitted 29 days ago • 8 comments

Nonpartisan civil services are more efficient, more productive, more experienced, higher morale, protect taxpayers against graft, and are associated with lower sovereign-debt costs and stronger growth. Supporting them shouldn't be a partisan thing! www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

submitted 30 days ago • 19 comments

Trump's bringing back the spoils system, and it's not going to make America great again. Fun fact: the quote "to the victor belong the spoils" comes from an Andrew Jackson supporter, not, like, ancient Rome. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

submitted 30 days ago • 3 comments

The GAO! Publishes reports on waste, fraud, abuse, duplicative spending, staffing levels, fiduciary standards, and efficiency! It has 5,388 recommendations!! You can read them all right here!!! www.gao.gov/reports-test...

submitted 30 days ago • 1 comment

The Hamilton Project at @brookings.edu has published a daily federal outlay tracker, showing whether agencies & federal projects are being funded. Something that in the past would have been overkill & in the weeds, but in the current moment feels essential. www.hamiltonproject.org/data/trackin...

submitted 33 days ago • 1 comment

Whelp. I'm back from leave, and revving up my reporting on DOGE and bureaucracy again. If you work in government or your job and/or contracts are affected, I'm on [email protected] and annielowrey.25 on Signal.

submitted 33 days ago • 15 comments

Things I worry about with the Trump EO on birthright citizenship: Does this trash the Social Security enumeration-at-birth system? CHIP coverage for infants born to low-income, undocumented parents? How many kids are going to end up uncovered by SNAP, WIC, Head Start, etc.?

submitted 45 days ago • 19 comments

[dam bursts] for the sweet love of dog learn to blend your under-eye concealer; you're cool-toned, not warm-toned; the blush and bronzer should pull pearly pink, not clay; get highlights not single-process; go bronde, not auburn; will knock 10 years off your 47 bb www.techspot.com/news/106344-...

submitted 52 days ago • 12 comments

Spent a few weeks asking folks what risk crypto poses to financial stability with Trump in office. Stablecoins, volatility, scams, Ponzis, sure. But the real risk is Congress creating crypto loopholes big enough to fit an investment bank through. HODL. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

submitted 60 days ago • 14 comments

Such a good piece on expectations, community-building, parenting, and letting go. www.theatlantic.com/family/archi...

submitted 65 days ago • 1 comment

Yes, politics is political! A barrier, the barrier, to M4A is that you'd have insurers, investors, hospitals, doctors, etc. lobbying against it! bsky.app/profile/mich...

submitted 83 days ago • 1 comment

I’ve been thinking about this story for a long, long time. I hope you will read it. www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...

submitted 88 days ago • 39 comments

During the election, Trump hawked a new crypto firm. Which just became the conduit for a Chinese crypto magnate — a guy personally being sued by the SEC, whose firm is "the preferred choice for Asian crime syndicates" — to funnel $15m to Trump and his sons. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

submitted 94 days ago • 11 comments

Wow, this guy gets it. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

submitted 94 days ago • 36 comments

Hard to see DOGE as anything other than cover for a deregulatory push. Which is a shame. Because improving service delivery, modernizing government systems, revitalizing the civil service, updating procurement practices, etc. -- gosh do we need it. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

submitted 94 days ago • 59 comments

An old Thanksgiving story about a little town in the Ozarks that celebrates fall by throwing turkeys out of an airplane — and the limits of human empathy, towards animals and one another. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

submitted 101 days ago • 3 comments

listen to @annielowrey.bsky.social! www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

submitted 108 days ago • 1 comment