Michael Chow

Photography, running, soccer, kids, wife and wine (order subject to change). IG: @photochowder

[Popular Liberal 🇺🇸 @PopularLiberal]

HUMILIATING GOP MELTDOWN CAUGHT ON CAMERA: Rand Paul just pulled the chair out from under Marco Rubio in the Senate hearing — and the hypocrisy exploded in real time.

Rand drops the hammer:
“If another country bombed our air defenses, captured and removed our President on U.S. soil… would THAT be okay?”

Rubio freezes. He starts frantically erasing his notes, forgets how to breathe, and looks like a Trump sycophant who just realized he sold his soul for nothing.

Rand reminds him point-blank:
Congress declares war.
Congress controls the checkbook.
That Constitution you swore an oath to?

GOP loves executive power when Trump’s doing regime change abroad.
But flip the script? Suddenly it’s not so sexy.

Rubio couldn’t even choke out “NO.”
He couldn’t defend the endless foreign adventures he’s been selling for years.

Our tax dollars. Their cowardice.

This isn’t politics.
This is a bought-and-paid-for senator auctioning off the Constitution for donor dinners and Fox News applause.

GOP in power = rules for thee, but never for me.

[Ted Lieu @tedlieu]

The corruption among trump insiders is out of control. Only those close to trump would know what he is about to announce before he does so.

A future administration will prosecute these criminals.

[Dittie @DittiePE]

$580,000,000 in oil futures moved 16 minutes before Trump announced a pause in Iran strikes.

Not after. Before.

The BBC just documented five separate instances of massive, suspiciously timed trades preceding Trump’s biggest market-moving announcements — oil futures, the tariff pause, Maduro’s capture, Iran ceasefire bets.

The platforms where anonymous accounts cashed in? Polymarket and Kalshi. Donald Trump Jr. sits on Polymarket’s advisory board and is a strategic advisor to Kalshi.

There’s even a law against this. The STOCK Act (2012) explicitly covers executive branch officials. Zero prosecutions in 14 years.

Oh, and the DOJ unit created after Watergate to prosecute exactly this kind of corruption? Trump cut it from 36 lawyers to 2 and stripped its authority to file new cases.

[Furkan Gözükara @FurkanGozukara]

The White House is completely silent as BBC confirms a consistent pattern of massive financial spikes occurring just minutes before Donald Trump makes market moving announcements. The administration is facing severe allegations of illegally profiteering off inside knowledge.

[Senator Bob Duff, Majority Leader, Connecticut @senatorduff]

Today’s Truth Social post by the man in the Oval Office shows instability, bad temperament, and puts all Americans at risk. It’s time for Republicans to stand with us and call for either invoking the 25th Amendment or a vote of Article 2, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution

[ELIZABETH LANE @imelizabethlane]

I’m going to be blunt. I’ve reached the point where I find Erika Kirk deeply disturbing, not because of rumors or gossip, but because of consistent, observable patterns of behavior. To be clear, everything I say in this post is my opinion, I’m not claiming this is a fact I’m saying this is what I think Erica Kirk is.

I come from the world of acting and modeling. I’ve spent years around social climbers, opportunists, image-curators, and people who treat relationships as ladders, that is why I left that world. Most of these people are shallow and harmless. A few are dangerous. Erika falls into the latter category not because she is just ambitious, but because of how calculated and performative her ambition appears to be. I believe she maybe a psychopath.

What stands out immediately is the reaction she provokes in people, which is very common with psychopaths. Across the board including from people who support her publicly, the private reaction is the same: “I can’t watch her.” Not criticism, just physical discomfort. People turn off interviews because the presentation feels artificial to the point of being unbearable. let me explain:

That kind of response does not happen accidentally, and it does not happen often. Research in psychology shows that humans are highly sensitive to emotional incongruence, mismatches between facial expression, tone, and content. When affect appears simulated rather than genuine, the brain registers it as a threat signal. This activates discomfort and avoidance, even if the person cannot consciously explain why. So many of us felt this way but we could not explain why we could not watch her.

Studies on psychopathy, particularly those building on the work of psychologists like Robert Hare, describe traits such as rehearsed emotional display, and shallow affect. These traits can create what observers experience as an “uncanny” interpersonal dynamic. The discomfort arises and people want to shut it off because most people rarely encounter extreme affective mimicry in everyday life, so the brain struggles to categorize what it is detecting. (Comment below if this is what you felt like when watching her.)

Erica is attractive enough, and she had every tool in her position to sell this organically except for one thing - emotion. The entire story of what happened could have helped her sell this fully, she really would have been the last person on earth to be a suspect, if not for the FBI’s terrible mistakes, TPUSA’s lies, and her very fake performance.

Plenty of attractive, ambitious women move through media spaces without triggering that response, even though we know what they are. This is about something else, an extreme disconnect between presentation she puts out and perceived authenticity.

Erica is not the archetype of a model/actress seeking money and fame and then settling into a quiet life with a wealthy good looking husband. She’s the wolf type. Who wants to be in the place of that husband.She is not born for a supporting role, she’s a decision-maker type. She appears to pursue proximity to power, moving fluidly between television, nonprofits, branding opportunities, and ideological spaces that maximize exposure.

Her previous partners are guys women like her would date, muscular, jacked, good-looking. Even though they are not people with huge potential, they are all somewhat established. They are good stepping stones until the right person shows up. Now, looking at her previous partners, I’d say Charlie probably was not her type visually, but he was exactly what she was looking for in a man - potential to be a great power.

What Erica was looking for is the same thing Hillary Clinton was looking for when she met Bill. She recognized that Bill Clinton was her ticket to power, the power she could control and she was right. She realized she could create a great brand out of him and herself, and they still are a brand. The Clintons. No one in this world can say they love each other. They are a brand that works. This is why she’s sticking around despite Epstein and Lewinsky. Also, if you think Bill is the decision-maker there, you must have never been in close proximity to the Clintons. She moves the game, she is the decision-maker.

Erica saw a brand with Charlie. She also saw that Charlie could one day become President of the United States if he wanted to. Charlie had the ear of the most powerful segment of any society - students! He was going to be a very important player in politics, and she was not missing that ride.

What’s striking is how completely her public identity reshapes itself after that relationship begins. The aesthetic, the tone, the values, the presentation all change. Overnight, the persona shifts into the role that best fits Charlie’s world, devoted Christian, modest, supportive housewife. That kind of rapid adaptation is quite impressive for a usual person but not for a psychopath, they do it all the time.

In my head story goes like this: For a moment, it works. She becomes the wife of a rising political figure with access to donors, institutions, and national platforms. At that point, the ceiling isn’t social media influence, it’s empire-building, foundations, global reach, a legacy brand - Kirks!

It’s obvious that Charlie listens to her, whether it’s about donors or the trajectory of TPUSA. The most influential figure in any mentally healthy man’s life is his wife. She is going to be the biggest influence, and that’s just how it is. That is why you need to pick you partner wisely!

Everything was going well until Charlie makes decisions based on conscience rather than expansion and money. He turns down money. He refuses to play dirty politics. I’m assuming someone like Erica who married into this because she had a vision for this brand would not be very happy that. The life she appears to have signed up for - power couple, expanding influence, historical relevance, was collapsing into something else entirely, domesticity, housewife kids and now Charlie's refusing to accept the money that can make him a global power. A supporting role instead of center stage is not her thing.

Her husband died a few days ago, and she walks onto the stage as if she were born there. It comes naturally to her, she knows it, and she wants it. Just days after her husband’s death, she was already laying out ambitious plans for the company over Zoom. It’s obvious she was always deeply involved in the business and knew exactly where to pick up when her turn came.

What people struggle to watch, what makes the screen unbearable, is not grief. It’s the absence of emotional continuity. Performances can be learned, trust me, as a former actress I can speak to that, but emotion can’t be improvised or mimicked if you’ve never experienced it. That’s why I think we are dealing with a psychopath who has never really experienced these emotions and does not know how to play them. And audiences feel it instantly. It’s fake. Again just my opinion.

This isn’t an accusation of crime, I’m not claiming this is what happened and it's a fact. It’s an analysis I made after watching her long enough. And quite honestly I am sick of this shit.

[NBC Olympics & Paralympics @NBCOlympics]

The drone pilots at the #WinterOlympics are ALL IN. 😎

[Joe Pompliano @JoePompliano]

The drones that NBC is using for its Olympic coverage weigh just 250 grams and can travel at speeds up to 75 miles per hour. These drones have been a great addition to the broadcast — it really helps you appreciate the speed of some of these events.

[AnthroVet50 @spooked75]

I grew up Republican. Still am in many ways. But MAGA pushed the party so far right that I get called a liberal now.

Let me explain the difference:

Traditional Republicans believe in:

• Fiscal responsibility (balanced budgets, not exploding deficits for tax cuts)
• Limited government (actual small government, not big government that punishes your enemies)
• Strong institutions (courts, elections, constitutional norms matter)
• Personal responsibility (your actions have consequences)
• Free markets (not tariffs and trade wars)
• Strong alliances (NATO, international partnerships)
• Rule of law (no one is above it, including the president)
MAGA Republicans believe in:

• Whatever Trump says today (even if it contradicts yesterday)
• Loyalty tests (agree 100% or you're a traitor/RINO)
• Conspiracy theories over facts (stolen election, deep state, QAnon adjacent stuff)
• Grievance politics (owning the libs > actual policy)
• Personality cult (Trump loyalty above party, above country, above truth)
• Performative outrage (culture war theater instead of governance)
• Ends justify means (storm the Capitol, ignore election results, whatever it takes)
I didn't move left. The party moved off a cliff.

I still believe in conservative principles. But when you say "maybe we should respect election results" or "fiscal responsibility matters" or "rule of law applies to everyone," you get called a liberal.

That's not conservatism. That's a cult.

[FDU Women's Basketball @FDUKnightsWBB]

we sincerely apologize for the lack of gameday content.

#uKNIGHTED | #NECWBB

[Bill Madden @maddenifico]

We're used to seeing images like this of Nazi Germany. This is what an execution looks like. It's an image that will haunt America for years to come. Alex Pretti was an ICU Nurse whose life was dedicated to saving lives. Under the fascist authoritarian Trump regime, in the eyes of the world, America has become the monster it used to fight against.

[Democratic Wins Media @DemocraticWins]

BREAKING: In a powerful moment, Charles Barkley just delivered a strong rebuke of what Donald Trump is doing to our country. Everyone needs to see this.

[Congresswoman Yassamin Ansari @RepYassAnsari]

The president of the United States is extremely mentally ill and it’s putting all of our lives at risk. The 25th Amendment exists for a reason—we need to invoke it immediately.

[Ed Krassenstein @EdKrassen]

The letter that Donald Trump sent to Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre of Norway is insane!

This is why you don't elect a narcissist to be your president.

Is this what you voted for, Trump's supporters?

[ᗰᗩƳᖇᗩ @LePapillonBlu2]

🎯

[𝓝𝓲𝓴𝓴𝓲 𝓑𝓪𝓻𝓷𝓮𝓼 @NikkiBarnes]

Best explanation I’ve heard about US interests in Venezuela today.

P.S. She recorded this over 2 weeks ago.

[ScrippsHowardAwards @SH_Awards]

Congratulations to @azcentral for being named a #SHJAwards finalist in Excellence in Local Video Storytelling, honoring Jack R. Howard, for “Preston Lord's death uncovers 'Gilbert Goons'.”

[Michael Chow @photochowder]

@Jeremy_Cluff My view from the field

[Robert Anglen @robertanglen]

“For the family of Preston Lord, there is only before and after …” A year ago today, the 16-year-old was fatally beaten at a party. His parents talk to us about the impact of his life — and death. With @ecsantacruz3 and @photochowder via @azcentral

https://t.co/w4wXjrbKqB