Good Morning:
I now carry chalk with me wherever I go in the District of Columbia.
Friday on #DogShirtTV, I badgered the estimable
into coming on the show and then mocked her relentlessly for an hour. A whole cacophony of estimable members of the Greek Chorus joined us to ask Alicia about her new book, discuss the atrocities currently being committed by the US immigration system, and debate how early one should get to the airport.Yesterday on #DogShirtTV, the estimable
, the estimable , the estimable John Hawkinson, and the estimable Eve Gaumond all joined me for a festival of technical difficulties! In between tech issues, we talked about sidewalk chalk and crimes to commit with it:Friday On Lawfare
Compiled by the estimable Mary Ford
What Happened During Fed Governor Cook’s Hearing?
Anna Bower breaks down a hearing in Cook v. Trump, a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s efforts to fire Lisa Cook from the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors.
The two-hour hearing, held at the E. Barrett Prettyman courthouse in Washington, D.C., focused on Cook’s request for a temporary restraining order to block her removal from the board.
Judge Cobb concluded the hearing without issuing a ruling. The earliest a decision is expected is Tuesday, following further briefing from Cook’s legal team.
Social Identity and Misinformation
Jon Roozenbeek reviews Dannagal Goldthwaite Young’s book entitled, “Wrong: How Media, Politics, and Identity Drive Our Appetite for Misinformation.” Roozenbeek argues that although Young’s focus on the United States limits the universality of some of her arguments, her refusal to frame misinformation as stemming from individual failure—instead assigning responsibility to information suppliers and curators—strengthens the quality of her analysis.
Based on this framework, Young proposes a model of identity distillation in which individual-level social identities, such as political or ideological affiliations (as well as individuals’ theories about the state of the world, their values, and their beliefs), are shaped and reinforced by what we see (e.g., content appearing in the media), as well as by political elites, norms in news content production, and our modes of communication (including partisan and social media). In so doing, Young seeks a symbiosis between individual psychology (demand) and media production (supply). However, she (in my view rightfully) avoids a false equivalence of responsibility of the two by putting the onus on partisan elites and social media platforms, rather than individual consumers, as prime movers of polarization and the spread of misinformation. She describes her model this way: “The behaviors of political elites, news organizations, partisan media, and social media platforms are symbiotic and synergistic. They operate in anticipation of the norms and incentives of the others to maximize attention, engagement, profit, and power.”
Inside an Arctic Town on the Frontline of Russian Hybrid War
Anastasiia Lapatina—writing from Kirkenes, a Norwegian town not far from the Russian border—weighs the dynamics, politics, and history of an area that is increasingly representative of Russia’s hybrid war against the West.
A microcosm of Russia’s constant hybrid warfare on Western soil, Kirkenes—which sits on Norway’s northern coast, well north of the Arctic Circle, where the country crashes into both Finland and Russia—is now home to roughly 4,000 people, including hundreds of Russian citizens. It is exactly what you would expect: quiet, secluded, cold, with only one decent restaurant and “terrible nightlife,” as Nilsen put it. The liveliest parts of Kirkenes are a small shopping mall, whose very existence surprised me, a local school, and the lobby of my hotel, buzzing with tourists who come for nature and something called “king crab safari”— a boat ride to retrieve enormous crabs from their seabed traps before cooking them. To the extent that there is a town center, which is just three blocks of a street, it’s occupied by shops, pubs, and an art gallery.
America Wants to Hack the Planet
In the latest edition of the Seriously Risky Business cybersecurity newsletter, Tom Uren discusses legislation proposed by a Republican congressman that would allow private-sector entities to hack foreign crime enterprises that target the U.S., Microsoft’s attempts to disentangle itself from Chinese security firms, and more.
Microsoft has scaled back Chinese security firms' access to its bug disclosure early warning program. The move came after the company investigated whether a leak led to hacks exploiting vulnerabilities in its SharePoint software. But Microsoft still has a long way to go to untangle itself from the China web it finds itself in.
Podcasts
On Lawfare Daily and Scaling Laws, Peter Harrell joins Kevin Frazier to examine the Trump administration’s announcement that it had acquired a 9.9 percent equity stake in Intel and the policy rationale and legality of this decision.
Videos
On August 29 at 4 pm ET, I sat down with Bower, Scott Anderson, James Pearce, Loren Voss, and Quinta Jurecic to discuss President Trump’s decision to expand the Department of Defense’s role in domestic law enforcement, the latest updates in the Kilmar Abrego Garcia case, and the attempted firing of Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook.
Announcements
The Section on National Security Law is accepting submissions for the Section’s “National Security Law ‘New Voices’” panel to be held at the 2026 Annual Meeting of the Association of American Law Schools. Learn how to submit papers here.
Today’s #BeastOfTheDay is the baby armadillo, seen here playing armadillo games:
In honor of today’s Beast, hug your favorite stuffed toy.
Today’s #BeastOfTheDay is not this cactus, because the Beast of the Day must be from Kingdom Animalia, making the cactus ineligible. Nevertheless, this cactus is a Beast worthy of recognition:
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