Janet Bufton

@jbufton.bsky.social

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Canadian mum, libertarian misfit, 3D liberal in Babylon
Writing collected at janetbufton.substack.com
diversity dynamism democracy

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Janet Bufton

this piece was good imo

J.D. Vance has directly and openly invoked Carl Schmitt and finding him persuasive in explaining his evolution to becoming a devoted illiberal NatCon. I know Schmitt is not a name normies recognize, but still, that Vance considers a literal Nazi one of his ideological role models is newsworthy.

The Nazi Jurist Who Haunts Our Broken Politicswww.nytimes.com A contempt for compromise. An expansive vision of executive power. Both owe much to Carl Schmitt.

By "unity" they mean concession by the centre and left that their goals and plans are within the normal bounds of American politics. And they're not wrong. One party states have unity. Democracy isn't about unity. It's about peaceful contestation.

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Janet Bufton

Reupping @unlawfulentries.bsky.social post, because scholars interested in discussing how Project 2025 goals match JD Vance’s will find many, many examples on social media right now, and right now, people will very much be looking for intelligent, expert pieces about this. Drive the narrative.

Junior Scholars: Project 2025 is now breaking through to public consciousness. The more people learn about it, the more they hate it. Now is a great time to search that website, go to the section of your expertise, and write an oped. Keep the drip of bad news for them coming, all the way to Nov.

Oh my god.

This whole excerpt tells you multitudes about our current political moment.

🧵

Institutions work until they don’t. It’s banal but true. Courts as institutions worked when Trump tried to steal the election, but FedSoc has been chipping away at them for decades, and I think it is very rational to doubt they will work any more to restrain an executive.

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Janet Bufton

The R responses to this event, from JD Vance to Mike Lee to Marjorie Taylor Greene have offered proof that the democracy arguments against Trump & the GOP are justified They’ve spread lies, turned up the rhetoric, & used the event to delegitimize any criticism of Trump www.vox.com/politics/360...

The Republican response to Trump’s shooting is beyond irresponsiblewww.vox.com Political leaders should try to douse the flames. The right’s leaders are fanning them.

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Janet Bufton

We cannot let the Republicans use this attempt on Trump's life to silence criticism of his extreme agenda. www.thestar.com/opinion/cont...

Thank goodness Donald Trump survived. Now let’s get back to defending democracywww.thestar.com The shooting has already fuelled the paranoia and anxiety that has defined this presidential election race. And things are likely to get worse, writes Justin Ling.

The tone of this is right. It warrants sharing.

“Nobody seems to have language to say: We abhor, reject, repudiate, and punish all political violence, even as we maintain that Trump remains himself a promoter of such violence, a subverter of American institutions, and the very opposite of everything decent and patriotic.“ #giftarticle

The Gunman and the Would-Be Dictatorwww.theatlantic.com Violence stalks the president who has rejoiced in violence to others.

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Janet Bufton

The Gunman and the Would-Be Dictatorwww.theatlantic.com Violence stalks the president who has rejoiced in violence to others.

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Janet Bufton

Reopening my Serwer hymnal

While I am grateful not to have Covid in the dead of winter when I'd be locked in the basement and probably always masked (not everyone in the house has it), it is really hot out there, folks.

Worth checking out @kathleenbelew.bsky.social's work on leaderless resistance in the White Power movement. Not that all these folks are White Power, but far-right spaces cultivate movements that preserve plausible deniability for leaders. (Also aim to increase the impression of danger and chaos.)

Good work -- actual journalism -- from ABC News. h/t Joy Reid 'No Blame?' ABC News finds 54 cases invoking 'Trump' in connection with violence, threats, alleged assaults. abcnews.go.com/Politics/bla...

'No Blame?' ABC News finds 54 cases invoking 'Trump' in connection with violence, threats, alleged assaults.abcnews.go.com President Donald Trump insists he deserves no blame for divisions in America.

An abyssal sea cucumber declaring, "I am unemployed, and ungovernable!" is just what I needed this Coviddy Saturday morning.

Ever get overwhelmed with the myriad nightmares we've created for ourselves to plague our collective existence? You ever wish you were like, idk, an abyssal sea cucumber? Join me to explore the lives of the denizens of the deep to escape... all this for a bit. www.atlasobscura.com/experiences/...

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Janet Bufton

My personal experience at bluesky has been fantastic, much of the good of pre-Musk Twitter and none of the bad. Yet I’ve never felt as pessimistic about the future of this app as I do right now, watching another important Black voice get run off the platform. Seriously, what the fuck, people?

Ffs, really? JUST LET ME LOOK AT THINGS

More like this. (🎁link)

Joe Biden has big problems. Donald Trump is a problem so big he’s invisiblewww.theglobeandmail.com The pundits have spent the past two weeks gnawing obsessively on the Biden problem, while Donald Trump and his Republican Party float languidly free of any such expectations

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Janet Bufton

At #LibCon2024 with @theunpopulist.net and smart people who still believe in liberal democracy.

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Janet Bufton

This morning: www.ismaglobal.org/conference-s... #LibCon24 @theunpopulist.net

My body is still sore and tired this morning and my antigen test is now wildly positive but my brain is a lot less soupy and this is going to be terrible for trying to rest.

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Janet Bufton

This is a great thread.

< clears throat I created my own degree in this very question in ye olde year of our livejournal 2005 because new york university didn't have a digital journalism program at that time journalism has never been a professional endeavor and to the extent it was, it was a problem

Instead of going to bed early or even just being horizontal and still I made mango sticky rice for a bedtime snack (which takes forever, turns out) so I think the covid anxiety is officially high.

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Janet Bufton

A young Black man in my hometown was killed by police during a traffic stop. Activists were quick to blame police, but the tragedy is more complicated than that. My latest newsletter. theblanksslate.substack.com/p/a-hard-con...

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Janet Bufton

Excellent from @aaronrosspowell.com www.reimaginingliberty.com/p/false-equi...

The False Equivalence Trapwww.reimaginingliberty.com Why "Both Sides" Thinking Fails in the Face of Authoritarianism

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Janet Bufton

The Supreme Court's immunity ruling will make it hard to punish Trump for his past lawlessness, while inviting future abuses. New from @jacobtlevy.bsky.social:

Justice Roberts Subverted the Separation of Powers and Created a Dangerously Unaccountable Presidentwww.theunpopulist.net The court's immunity ruling will make it hard to punish Trump for his past lawlessness, while inviting future abuses

I meant to share this a lot earlier today, but it's the 231st anniversary of the passage in Upper Canada of the Act Against Slavery, or An Act to prevent the further introduction of Slaves, and to limit the Term of contracts for Servitude within this Province.

Act Against Slavery - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.org

I absolutely love when she does these. Best threads.

Anyone done anything cool lately? Personal victory? End of a hard journey? Please use this excuse to brag on yourself!

I challenge any Hayekian liberal/libertarian to pick up Shklar and not be like "OH BOY" (despite my frustration with how long it's taking me to get the time to sit down seriously with Ordinary Vices).

It came easier to those of us who encountered Shklar at basically the same time as Hayek...

Smol rant. In 2009, Peter Thiel wrote for Cato Unbound: "Since 1920, the vast increase in welfare beneficiaries and the extension of the franchise to women — two constituencies that are notoriously tough for libertarians — have rendered the notion of “capitalist democracy” into an oxymoron."

Everyone who pointedly states that G. Brennan & Lomasky, Caplan, and Jason Brennan are wrong is ignored and has been ignored in anti-democratic libertarian circles for 50 years, whether they skeet, tweet, blog, publish in mainstream journals, or publish in flagship libertarian journal 𝘗𝘶𝘣𝘭𝘪𝘤 𝘊𝘩𝘰𝘪𝘤𝘦.

The Education of a Libertarianwww.cato-unbound.org

I was a principled non-voter. I was presented many arguments for not voting (or only voting for a perfect candidate), including—prominently!—the "1 in 60 million chance" it'd matter, anyway. No one on the other side gave me the empirical case. When I saw it alluded to, no non-voters could explain.

“It’s still the case that your vote does improve our chances of not having a king, and your vote is worth much more than the time it takes to cast it.” www.liberalcurrents.com/elections-ar...

Elections Are Purely Practicalwww.liberalcurrents.com Don’t be vain about your vote.

My jetlagged body, all day: Please go back to bed please go back to bed Thing 2 (2yo)after a still-later-than-planned bedtime: MUMMY I WANT TO WAKE UP I WANT TO WAKE UP MUMMY 🔂 Honestly it's just wasted on them.