AshleyKimWeiss

Social entrepreneur/advocate/creating communities for people with disabilities/views are my own.

[Greg Lukianoff @glukianoff]

I’ve always found people who bristle at “American exceptionalism” kind of… weird. Not because I lack self-awareness — I’ve spent my career cataloging every way this country fails to live up to its own rules. But that’s exactly why I love it so damn much. We built a system designed to be shamed by its own founding documents, and it still delivered one of the most spectacular, world-altering runs in human history. A genuine force for human flourishing.

I also found the argument against American exceptionalism to be historically illiterate. Here’s a sample of what we were first at:

• The first large-scale democratic republic in human history — not a city-state, not a monarchy with a parliament bolted on, but a bold continental experiment in self-rule, popular sovereignty, and ordered liberty.

• A written Constitution (1789) with separation of powers and checks & balances — still the oldest national constitution in force anywhere.

• The Bill of Rights (1791): the first time a nation wrote “the government cannot touch these” into supreme law and actually meant it. A dare the world copied — from later rights charters to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

• Public land-grant universities and mass higher education (Morrill Act), opening college to ordinary people no aristocracy would have let near the gates. (but don’t get me started about what happened after we started. Massively federally funding it.)

• Kitty Hawk, 1903 — first controlled powered flight.

• The Moon, 1969 — still the only ones who’ve been there.

• The world’s largest economy since ~1890, powering unprecedented prosperity through grit and genius.

• The assembly line, skyscraper, transistor, personal computer, ARPANET — the backbone of the modern world.

• Telephone, phonograph, GPS — connecting and powering daily life.

• Surgical anesthesia, polio vaccine — saving and transforming millions of lives.

• Jazz, blues, rock ‘n’ roll — brand new American art forms that conquered the globe.

• Hollywood’s dreams, blue jeans, bourbon, and a culture so open a kid like me could devour sushi, burritos, stuffed cabbage, and tabouli in the same week and rightfully think of it all as American.

That’s the part that fills me with genuine love and pride: not just the power or the wins, but the appetite for freedom, creativity, and reinvention. The audacity to say “We the People” and keep trying to live up to it.

What do you love most about this truly exceptional country? 🇺🇸

[AshleyKimWeiss @AshleyKimWeiss]

Olmstead and ADA was always about choice. Grateful for the @USDOJ memo on integration mandate.

https://t.co/TKHo4YPg4Q

[AshleyKimWeiss @AshleyKimWeiss]

@bungarsargon For some reason, Audible just cancelled my order. I tried it again and it’s not working. Thought you should know.

[Mazelit Airaksinen 🎗🇺🇸 🇮🇱 @Mazelit_]

“I have no more earth to cling to” 🎗️

Yosef Wiener, a Holocaust survivor who lost his grandson Yahav, his granddaughter Hadar, and her husband Itay on October 7th, has passed away. Before his passing, he wrote these inconceivable words:

"My name is Yosef Wiener, and I am 97 years old. I was saved from the fire of the Nazi beasts; my entire family was annihilated in that terrible inferno. I was severed from my deep roots, and I erected a monument of basalt stones in their memory.

Out of total exhaustion, out of despair, while drowning, I clung to the earth and planted myself in Zion.

I married Aviva, and together we raised two magnificent children, Ofer and Nurit. From Ofer and Michal, four grandchildren were born to us in Kfar Aza. From Nurit and Miki, six grandchildren were born to us in Kfar Aza. I had reached the stage of a family tree firmly planted in the soil of the homeland, bearing fruit.

But suddenly, from within the fences of evil, October 7th, 2023, arrived. The terrifying sights of fire and dust, the slaughter and horrific murder of innocents reached me once again.

My grandson, dearer to me than all, Yahav (of blessed memory), was murdered while protecting his wife, Shaye-Lee, and his one-month-old daughter, Shaya.

My granddaughter, dearer to me than all, Hadar (of blessed memory), and her husband Itay (of blessed memory), were murdered while protecting their ten-month-old twins, Roee and Guy.

Once again, I am at the end of my strength, in despair, drowning.

And I have no more earth to cling to."

💔

[The Hill & Valley Forum @HillValleyForum]

"Our head count in Manhattan when I got to JPMorgan was 35,000 and now is 26,000. Our head count in Texas started at 11,000, now it's 33,000. That's what happens."

Jamie Dimon on why companies are leaving New York:

"Highest individual taxes, highest estate taxes, highest corporate taxes, anti-business sentiment."

"When I grew up as a kid in New York City, there were 120 of the Fortune 500 headquarters there. In the 1970s, 60 of the 120 left, including Exxon, GE, IBM, Union Carbide. They're all going to Texas."

The Hill & Valley Forum 2026

@HillValleyForum @jpmorgan @ChairmanG

[AshleyKimWeiss @AshleyKimWeiss]

Journalism at its worst. This man is not typing words. He’s randomly pointing and his mother is making up her own script. Shame on you @TODAYshow

Author of Read With Jenna Book Club Pick Shines Light on Autism https://t.co/JMVaaRHZIn via @TODAYshow

[Marina Medvin 🇺🇸 @MarinaMedvin]

The most enlightening perspective on Iran —

[AshleyKimWeiss @AshleyKimWeiss]

@ErinFriday75490 Congratulations. Thank you for your courage and perseverance!

[Masih Alinejad @AlinejadMasih]

What a powerful video. The regime blinded this iranian women in a peaceful protest in Iran. Shot directly into her eyes.
She stood beside me in US federal court when I faced the men who were sent to assassinate me in New Yourk, no I will stand with her.
To young Americans. Western women:
Don’t feel sorry with a regime that shoots women in the eyes. Stand with their victims.

[Masih Alinejad @AlinejadMasih]

A video of Iranian people celebrating inside Iran: “Am I dreaming? Hello, new world.”

#Iran

[Eylon Levy @EylonALevy]

Iranian women are dancing in the streets—without hair coverings—after hearing that Israel killed the tyrant Khamenei.

So many Western leaders should feel ashamed at their cowardly response this morning. We will all remember.

[Sana Ebrahimi Ledene @__Injaneb96]

What you’re hearing is the sound of a nation roaring in celebration at the death of Khamenei, the man who murdered thousands of Iran’s children.

[Pat Forde @ByPatForde]

Column: Guy Gaudreau and his family dried their eyes, sang the anthem and then watched Johnny Hockey’s kids take the ice for the team picture.

“He grew up with all these guys. He’s probably here with them right now in spirit, right?”

https://t.co/6UKfxCRNOU

[AshleyKimWeiss @AshleyKimWeiss]

Rule vs. Reality: Ann Jeanette Pierce https://t.co/3Z5T68YQqP via @YouTube

@HHSGov @CMSGov @ACLgov

[Mor Edge Insight @MorEdge_Insight]

Stand with Iranian women against the oppressive Islamic regime.

Free Iran ✌🏼

[هزارپا @1000pa2]

این عکس بقدری نمادین شده که همیشه در تاریخ ما باقی خواهد ماند

[Masih Alinejad @AlinejadMasih]

This is not a protest. It is a revolution.
Yes, Iran is looking at FREEDOM.

January 2026 Iran.

[Shirion Collective @ShirionOrg]

TEHRAN NOW - 2:00 AM: Millions are out on the streets, with their phones lit in the darkness to show the world they WILL NOT be silenced.

They are doing this under threat of death.

LIONS!

[dahlia kurtz ✡︎ דליה קורץ @DahliaKurtz]

Burning headscarves in Tehran tonight.

Iranians are also setting fire to possessions of the regime forces, including cars, mosques, and their homes.

They are sending Khamenei a message.

But they are also trying to send the world a message.

Please help spread it.

[Sana Ebrahimi Ledene @__Injaneb96]

This is tonight in Tehran.
People have taken over the streets. Iran is still under a total blackout.
Only very few people have access to Starlink, and the regime is actively trying to jam and disrupt it.
Despite everything, the streets are alive and the world is being kept in the dark.
People are chanting:
"Until the mullahs are dead, this homeland will not be free."