1/Today's @bopinion post is about Trump's taxes, and what they show about how America allocates capital.

We appear to have some big problems.

Very interesting new report about how America's economic geography has changed since the great recession: https://t.co/l3YE4WzgKx

Short version: Places with lots of skilled workers are doing great, other places aren't. But more people are moving to the former, which is good.

And here are cool interactive maps to go along with the

Report is via @LettieriDC, who is doing great work on struggling places.

A bit of good news: People are moving from economically bad places to economically good places, though probably too slowly.

Rural America continues to languish.

1/Lately I've been reading a ton of books about immigration and diversity. The most recent one is "Americanism in the Twenty-First Century", by @debbiejsr.

https://t.co/neqzyYVaYS

What did I learn?

2/This book is not very "pop". It's a dry political science book that's basically a concatenation of several research papers, all based on one big survey that was done in 2004.

3/The survey, the 21-CAS, asks people about how they define their own identity - race, national origin, and/or "American".

It also asks them about what they think being an "American" entails.

4/Basically, the survey asks people about 5 types of "Americanism":
1. Feeling like an American
2. Believing traditional American values like freedom
3. Civic participation (voting, etc.)
4. Multiculturalism vs. blending in
5. Being white and/or Christian

5/I edited out a few others (e.g. being born in America, being a citizen, speaking English). Anyway.

The upshot is that except for being white/Christian, most of these definitions of "American" get broad endorsement from all groups of people surveyed.

First off; “We The People” need those who have sworn an oath to protect Us and the constitution to read this article...NOW, not tomorrow! We are at war for this country! @USMarshalsHQ @USMC @usairforce @USArmy @SpaceForceDoD

We know so much more than this. Since 2015, Donald J Trump running for Office of the President has thrown a wrench in the plans that very bad traitors had for us. For decades, elected officials have infiltrated ideological people into ALL aspects of OUR agencies to do their

bidding! The cia, nsc, doj, fbi, cdc, nsa, just to name a few, have perpetrated a series of lies to “frame” Donald Trump before during and now after his presidency! Google; Pelosi, “Wrap up smear”! ALL of which was knowingly false just to stop DJT from getting in their way!

You and I both know this absolutely was a coordinated effort which proves conspiracy! The media as well is not just bought, they have proven time and again by their own reporting, foreknowledge of many of the falsehoods. These evil ppl have pulled out ALL the stops to what they

won’t do! With this new (false) administration, they are telling Us, up is down, black is white, and left is right, and if you don’t STFU and obey, we will send you to re-education camps. This is NOT a Dems v Reps operation, as we have proof that there are only a handful from

I am just one woman in Texas writing this to you @realDonaldTrump , not expecting that you will ever read this, but in honor of my family who fought in the Revolutionary war and every war America has fought ever since, I must cry out for freedom. 1/9

My family came to America to be free. We crossed the country in covered wagons, settled in inhospitable swamps and worked the land all the live long day until we could feed ourselves and our communities. Every drop of sweat & blood was worth shedding for because we were free. 2/9

We were a people free to worship our God when, where & how we wanted. We married in our churches. Buried our loved ones on our church grounds. We made choices for the betterment of our people & communities so we could all thrive. Life was hard but so good because we were free 3/9

We said goodbye to loved ones going to war. We lost loved ones on the battlefield who would gladly do it all over again if they had more than one life to give for America. We grieved as communities in tragedies and we laughed and danced during times of joy. We were free. 4/9

Then, the darkness came. Politicians we elected began to betray us in favor of foreign interests and big businesses who helped them grow fat and happy. Now we know their methods of obtaining and keeping power. 5/9

The media spent years pretending Trump could magically pardon his co-conspirators, consequence-free, at any time, even though nothing works that way. Now the media is pretending the GOP can magically filibuster, consequence-free, at any time. Nothing works that way. It gets old.

Every media pundit understands that there are always consequences to every move in politics. Yet they always frame the Republicans as being able to magically do anything they want, with no consequences, to try to scare/enrage you into staying tuned in.

"But the Republicans are indeed getting away with it all..." No they're not. They lost the Senate, the House, and the presidency. Their top leaders in the House are at each others' throats. They're out of power, adrift, losing donors. These are the consequences for their antics.

The catch is, it's just not the consequences you want. Because even as TV pundits convinced you that republicans were magically winning, liberal Twitter pundits convinced you that republicans could be defeated by imaginary simplistic magic wand solutions.

So now the pundits have spun you around to where you don't even realize your side won the election, you don't realize the Democrats are going be able to pass everything they want to pass, and you're pissed at Democratic leaders for imaginary reasons.