Ben Alpers
Professor of US History. Author of HAPPY DAYS: IMAGES OF THE PRE-SIXTIES PAST IN SEVENTIES AMERICA (Rutgers University Press, 2024). Opinions are entirely my own. He/him.
- Reposted by Ben AlpersThis isn’t some anonymous tip. This is sworn testimony, under penalty of perjury, from someone who said Trump threatened to kill her if she exposed Epstein’s sexual abuse.
- Reposted by Ben Alpers"For much of the 2010s and likely before and since, it appears the crime rate of CBP agents and offices was higher PER CAPITA than the crime rate of undocumented immigrants in the United States." www.doomsdayscenario.co/p/accountabi...
- Reposted by Ben AlpersA reminder! George Lakoff came up with the 'truth sandwich' concept during Trump's first term. It's not magic but it's good basic information hygiene and should be the default when fighting against bullshit en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth_s...
- Reposted by Ben Alpersthree years ago all the radical centrists got convinced via group chats that if we simply threw trans people under the bus, the fascists would let us win everything else. instead we lost everything, and also trans people got thrown under the bus
- Beauty and the Beast (1946)
- Reposted by Ben AlpersPlease circulate and share this important resource: thepanorama.shear.org/2025/04/09/t...
- Reposted by Ben AlpersForbes 30 under 30 has a better arrest record than the FBI
- Reposted by Ben AlpersThe king of law firm capitulators was also apparently an Epstein fanboy. www.ft.com/content/e12a...
- Reposted by Ben Alpersthe Epstein files make it very clear why the MeToo backlash was so extreme and why so much of elite society preferred Donald Trump ruling us like a king to the barest hint of accountability
- Nothing But a Man youtu.be/Buh76o2Wkl0?...
- Reposted by Ben Alperswhatever you do don’t ask their age
- Reposted by Ben AlpersTwo days ago, the president used his social media platform to endorse this "phenomenal candidate" and to urge "all America First Patriots" in the district to get out and vote for her. Today, he says he doesn't know anything about it and had nothing to do with it. He's lying or demented or both.
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- Reposted by Ben AlpersIn America we now have a criminal regime where the secret police kidnap you www.npr.org/2026/02/01/n...
- Democrats in Congress were deeply divided on the Iraq War in 2002. Most House Democrats opposed the AUMF (81 for, 126 against). Most Senate Dems supported it (29 for, 21 against). en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authori...
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- The "Big Beautiful Bill" gave ICE $75 billion over four years. Democrats can (and should) block further funding for DHS and ICE in this round of budgeting. But they cannot fully defund ICE. Sorry.
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- Actually, our entire political culture seems to have been Gamergate.
- Never mind the jobs you had, tell me five classes you took in college: 1. Human Evolutionary Anthropology 2. Hindu Myth and Image 3. Medieval Russian History 4. Political Development of Western Europe 5. Social Studies 10 (iykyk)
- Reposted by Ben AlpersThey said "free speech" and "academic freedom" but never believed in either and now in texas you need a permission slip to mention race in class and they're fine with it. Might not have worked if people with large platforms weren't furious about marginal increases of black people in their offices
- Reposted by Ben Alpers"new tone" was a totally imaginary story that the media invented to try to staunch the bleeding Trump was suffering this weekend and help move past what turned out to be a completely disastrous story for the administration
- 99% of the time people who that claim that "x is just a distraction from y" are really just saying "I care about y, not x," but who, rather than owning up to or defending this hierarchy of concern, instead try to attribute it to the Trump regime itself.
- Reposted by Ben AlpersThe college at which I'm employed, which has signed a contract with the AI firm that stole books from 131 colleagues & me, paid a student to write an op-ed for the student paper promoting AI, guided the writing of it, and did not disclose this to the paper. www.thedartmouth.com/article/2026...
- Congratulations to whomever had "The 3rd Amendment becomes relevant again" on their 2026 bingo card.
- I visited hotels all over Minneapolis, went into back rooms & talked to the staff. They're afraid. One told me she resents how her undocumented coworkers spend their days cleaning the rooms of agents who are “hunting down their family members.” @notus.com: www.notus.org/immigration/...
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- All the American professions are currently splitting between those with an ethical commitment to doing the work of their profession and those willing to prioritize doing the bidding of our fascist federal government.
- Breaking on MS NOW: Career DOJ prosecutors in both Minnesota and Los Angeles refused to be involved in charging Don Lemon and the other journalists who covered the Minneapolis church protests. The prosecutors believe the evidence does not support the charges, per @carolleonnig.bsky.social.
- This makes me really disgusted with Darren Aranofsky, a very uneven filmmaker (imo), but one whose work is very distinctive and (I thought) kind of the opposite of the inclination to create AI slop.
- Reposted by Ben AlpersJesus Christ. The "pivot" lasted about 15 minutes. Arresting a black journalist under the Ku Klux Klan Act for covering a pro-immigration protest at a Christian nationalist church led by an ICE officer is the perfect encapsulation of this administration's authoritarianism, racism, and trolling.
- Reposted by Ben AlpersA Minnesota woman observing ICE agents in her car was cornered on one-way streets. An agent approached, called her by name—citing facial recognition. Days later, her Global Entry and TSA privileges were revoked, with no explanation.
- Reposted by Ben AlpersMinnesota based Independent Journalist GEORGIA FORT has been arrested for filming a protest of the church pastor that works as an ICE manager. SPREAD THE WORD! Georgia has been doing outstanding reporting from ground zero!
- Reposted by Ben AlpersNEW: Ahem. For all of you "Melania" nay sayers out there, there are at least two sold out shows in the US for tomorrow's global release. Are they both before 3pm? Yes. Is one in Florida? Also yes. @regret.bsky.social reports: www.wired.com/story/we-fou...
- The Wall of Crazy
- Reposted by Ben AlpersDemocrats Sick Of Being Blamed For Cowardice On Issues They Actually Just Don’t Care About theonion.com/democrats-sick-of-b…
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- Or maybe the problem is that its author is a tremendous bigot.
- Would you accept breakfast? youtu.be/CMkPIW22bq4?...
- Dexter
- 💯
- Reposted by Ben AlpersOnce you start noticing it you can't stop: when the real Trump falters and is incapable of defending his administration (more and more frequent) the actual Trump is "subbed out" of news coverage for an invented, imaginary, often explicitly hypothetical version of Trump who is reasonable and cogent
- Young Heinrich Himmler vs Young Greg Bovino
- Reposted by Ben AlpersNew CBS News contributors: Aaron Rodgers, Roseanne Barr, Anton Chigurh, Stephen Miller, Stephen Miller (the other one), Stephen Miller (found a third one), a smokin' hot babe with huge bazongas, Walter White, Tom (not Jerry), big bucket of gravy, Budd Dwyer (deceased), Thomas Chatterton Williams.
- Reposted by Ben AlpersLegitimately a feat of carefully calculated writing to issue a Holocaust Remembrance Day statement of this length without mentioning either (1) the people who perpetrated the Holocaust or (2) the people against whom they perpetrated it
- Reposted by Ben AlpersI'm sure people will make me regret this but we dont need to let american institutions like ICE off the hook for their behavior. They didnt need to learn from Israel (or any other country) to act the way theyre acting. Im not saying ignore the connections but lets just pump the brakes a little
- Reposted by Ben AlpersGermany's paper of record (not exactly a paragon of progressiveness) comes out in favor of boycotting the World Cup.
- During the Second Red Scare of the late 1940s and 1950s, people were blacklisted for "premature antifascism." That is, if you opposed fascism too early in the 1930s, it was a sign that you were a dangerous commie.
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- Reposted by Ben AlpersFeeling depressed. Share the funniest thing you've ever seen. Mine is the Tiny Train World incident.
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- Fateful Findings
- Reposted by Ben Alpersoh commuters just found the motherlode of ice agents at a suburban hotel, including, potentially, bovino himself. a bunch of confirmed ICE and CBP cars from the bovino convoy there. spring hill suites in maple grove. people of the twin cities, do with this info what you will.
- Waiting for the first reactionary centrist think piece arguing that, if the NY Times had published Tom Cotton's op-ed calling for the federal government to invade US cities to violently put down protests, the federal government wouldn't be invading cities and violently putting down protests today.
