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What was perhaps the least timely book tour in American history has been postponed. Fresh from his Friday vote for a funding bill that much of the Democratic base objected to, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer was set to embark on a tour this week for his latest tome. But its hard to execute a successful book event, let alone a string of them, when fired-up protesters are shouting down the authors every breath. Over the past few days, that outcome looked increasingly inevitable. Postponing the tour may have seemed like the only way Schumer could save face. It wont do anything to defer his reckoning online, however, especially on Bluesky, where the senator has sunk to previously unimagined lows of unpopularity. The left-leaning alternative to X had been seething with anger the past couple months, mostly directed at omnipresent targets Donald Trump and Elon Musk. At the same time, the social media site also carried an ambient current of rage aimed at Democrats for not mounting an effective opposition to Trumps administration. Generally, that rage has seemed kind of amorphous: not bound too much to any particular ball the Dems dropped, but rather a desire to see meaningful action of any kind. Last weeks funding bill vote presented an opportunity for critics to more sharply target their disapproval. Swallowing the poison pill To recap: Republicans excluded their Democratic colleagues from negotiations on a spending bill to avert a government shutdown, offering them a bill littered with insulting provisions, like the one that would make it impossible for Congress to undo Trumps haphazard tariffs. It was a poison pill for Dems to swallow, suffused with the not-even-implicit threat to blame them for the resulting shutdown if they refused (despite the fact that Republicans currently control all three branches of government and polling suggests they would shoulder the blame). While House Democrats were ready to call the GOPs bluff, and Senate Democrats hinted that they would do the same, Schumer ultimately capitulated, swallowing the poison pill. On the right, his move was greeted with crocodile-smile congrats from Trump and outright mockery from the House Judiciary. On the left, the response was far more venomous. Schumer had finally assumed ownership of the general anger toward Democrats that had been roiling online for months, redirecting it toward himself. While there has been plenty of cathartic venting and activist organizing around Schumer on Bluesky, many of the sites users have also been channeling their fury into savage memes. Some pop culture-themed digs at Schumer place him alternately in the worlds of Die Hard, Star Wars, and Liam Neesons avenging dad series, Taken. [if Chuck Schumer replaced Liam Neeson in Taken]CHUCK SCHUMER: [on phone] I dont know who you are or what you want, but I will find you and I will help you kill my daughter— born miserable (@bornmiserable.bsky.social) 2025-03-14T02:36:35.850Z One popular post begged the music industrys most merciless antagonist, Kendrick Lamar, to turn his attention to Schumer, while another likened the Senate minority leader to Lamars utterly annihilated bte noire, Drake. Other posters on Bluesky played with Schumers name in every conceivable insulting permutation. If it rhymes with Chuck and is unflattering, people posted it in droves. The fact that the Senators last name can be easily slotted into the cross-generational insult ok boomer did not escape users notice either. And a surprisingly large number of others opted instead for calling him Charles Entertainment Schumer, the official full name of childrens pizza restaurant mascot Chuck E. Cheesewho, incidentally, is a rodent. Senator Schumer on the Galactic Empire: we will allow them to blow up planets for now in the event this makes them unpopular and then maybe we can get some of their support to stop blowing up planets— Tyler, from the Internet (@tylerjameshill.com) 2025-03-14T00:20:38.544Z “So I have a book coming out” A lot of the Bluesky hostility prior to Mondays cancellation announcement had focused on Schumers planned book tour. One viral tweet depicted Schumer as the fire-engulfed This Is Fine dog, a symbol of ill-timed complacency during Trumps turbulent first term, with the titular phrase changed to So I have a book coming out. Even before Fridays vote, the idea of such a high-profile member of the opposition party spending valuable time promoting a book during such an incendiary moment in American history rubbed some observers the wrong way. After the vote? It was more like a massage parlor run by Edward Scissorhands. With activists circulating Schumers tour itinerary on Bluesky, clearly not for autograph-obtaining purposes, the senators team cited security reasons for calling off the tour, according to the New York Times. The breadth of jokes, memes, and straightforward invective have made Schumer inescapable on Bluesky, leaving room for reflexive jokes about his newfound main character status. At a moment when Democrats favorability levels have reached record lows, Schumers favorability on Bluesky seemed leagues lower. As much as all the posts about him represent the simmering outrage and hopelessness shared by many of the sites users, they may also offer a refreshing change of pace from the constant focus on President Trump and Elon Muskwho seemingly set out to make themselves the main character every day on purpose. Whats unusual, though, is not just the saturation-level of Schumerposting, but the range of political ideology it encompasses. For as many publications portray Bluesky as a lefty echo chamber for people who fled X because they cant handle opposing views, Bluesky tends to be teeming with opposing viewsfrom centrist Dems to progressives to straight-up communists, along with everything in between and some of whats beyond. These factions are always infighting, which is reflective of why the phrase Dems in disarray has become such a cliché. At this moment on Bluesky, however, each of these groups seem to at least agree on one thing. That its time to chuck Schumer from a position of leadership.
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E-Commerce
As March Madness takes over this week, how many people are filling out NCAA brackets and why? A new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows what share of Americans typically take a shot at bracket predictions and their motivation for joining in the madness. The survey found that about one-quarter of Americans fill out a men’s March Madness bracket every year or some years. But what about the women’s tournament? High-profile NCAA womens basketball games have closed the gap with mens tournaments in terms of viewership and there is more money flowing in and around womens sports in general; womens teams will now be paid to play in the tournament, just like men have for years. It all points to higher interest in how womens teams fare even if the bracket frenzy has not quite caught up. The survey found that 16% of U.S. adults fill out a women’s tournament bracket every year or some years. And it’s much more common for bracket participants to only fill out a bracket for the men’s tournament than the women’s about 1 in 10 U.S. adults only fill out a men’s tournament bracket, while only 2% fill out only a women’s bracket. Another 14% fill out a bracket for both tournaments at least some years. So, a sizeable chunk of Americans are into NCAA bracketology, but what’s behind the hype? Among those who fill out brackets at least some years, about 7 in 10 say a reason for their participation was for the glory of winning, the chance to win money or the fact that other people were doing it. They’re less likely to be motivated by support for a specific school or team and in particular, to say this was a major reason for their participation. There’s certainly a financial motivation for correctly predicting the Final Four, and it’s hard to deny NCAA college basketball is in a betting-heavy era. More Americans can legally bet money on the NCAA mens and womens basketball tournaments than in previous years, and many will place a wager on their brackets success. Does that mean Americans think the tournaments are all about wagering, or that it’s technically gambling to enter a friends-and-family pool with only a modest payout at stake? Most U.S. adults 56% say that if someone enters a March Madness bracket pool for money, they consider that to be gambling. About 2 in 10 say it depends on the amount of money, and another 2 in 10, roughly, say this is not gambling. Who are the March Madness bracket diehards? Men tend to make up the bulk of the regulars who fill out a bracket at least some years. Among the March Madness bracket regulars, about 6 in 10 are men, including about one-third who are men under the age of 45. These bracket regulars are less likely to be women; only about 4 in 10 are women, and theyre about evenly split between being older or younger. Those who only fill out a bracket for the mens tournament are also overwhelmingly men. About 7 in 10 people who fill out a men’s bracket and not a women’s bracket every year or some years are men. About 4 in 10 are men over 45, and about 3 in 10 are younger men. If you can’t beat them, avoid them? Not everyone wants to risk a bracket buster and people avoiding the Madness this month are hardly alone. About 7 in 10 U.S. adults say they never fill out a mens or womens bracket. This group leans more female: About 6 in 10 bracket avoiders are women. And roughly one-third in this group are women over 45. ___ The AP-NORC poll of 1,112 adults was conducted Feb. 6-10, using a sample drawn from NORCs probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 4.1 percentage points. Linley Sanders, Associated Press
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E-Commerce
U.S. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy said on Monday he had asked the government efficiency team led by Elon Musk for assistance with a number of issues, including a review of the agency’s retail center lease renewals and combating counterfeit postage. In a letter to the U.S. Congress, DeJoy said the U.S. Postal Service needs help with the renewal of leases on its 31,000 retail centers and faces a counterfeit postage that he called a $1 billion problem in need of “additional innovative solutions.” DeJoy also reiterated in a letter to Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) team that the Postal Service is an independent establishment of the executive branch. “When the DOGE team recently reached out to me to pitch in, I decided to constructively direct their attention to the areas I know we can use any and all help,” DeJoy said. “The fact is that DOGE is the only other game in town that seems oriented toward helping us to achieve our efficiency and cost goals.” DeJoy noted that price hikes in retail center renewals were a key issue, with landlords “well aware of the political difficulties we face when moving or consolidating a retail location,” even though half of retail post offices fail to cover the costs of their local operations. Last week, DeJoy signed an agreement with DOGE to provide assistance to the agency as it works to address “big problems.” USPS, an agency with 635,000 employees that lost $9.5 billion last year, has been exempt from DOGE-directed federal employee reductions. DeJoy said last week that USPS plans to reduce its workforce by 10,000 workers in the next month through a voluntary early retirement program first announced in January. The agency has cut 30,000 jobs since 2021. He cited a number of issues including other government agencies’ management of USPS retirement assets and its workers’ compensation program, unfunded mandates, burdensome regulatory requirements and the government’s calculation of USPS retirement liabilities. DeJoy has not sought DOGE’s help in shrinking the size of the USPS workforce. DeJoy has led a dramatic effort to restructure USPS over the last five years, including cutting forecasted cumulative losses over a decade to $80 billion from $160 billion. The outgoing postal chief has used tactics similar to the DOGE team, including shrinking the workforce and canceling or renegotiating contracts. Two media outlets reported last month that President Donald Trump was preparing to issue an executive order to fire the USPS’ board of governors. The White House denied the plan, but Trump said he was considering merging USPS with the Commerce Department, a move Democrats said would violate federal law. Musk said this month he thought USPS should be privatized. David Shepardson, Reuters
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E-Commerce
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