America's Two Christmases, and Why Santa Lives On
Plus: What You Missed This Week From The Bulwark
Happy Saturday! Overtime is for everyone. If you’re a Bulwark+ member: thank you. If you’re not, there’s no better time to subscribe to Bulwark+ than today. If you like this holiday issue, you can share this newsletter with someone you think would value it.
ICYMI: Here are links to each newsletter section so you can quickly get back to that edition you may have missed this week.
Morning Shots - Triad - Huddled Masses - Press Pass - Bulwark Goes to Hollywood - The Opposition - False Flag - The Breakdown - Receipts
🚨OVERTIME🚨
Come join me tonight! I’ll be on a Twitter Space with the New Rhino Coalition tonight at 8:30 p.m. Eastern.
Trump officials showed their hostility to the Constitution on Christmas Day… The Trump administration’s overtly religious social media posts appear to forget a key line from the First Amendment, writes Anthony L. Fisher at MS Now.
Good Cheer… Jay Nordlinger on a program of Christmas music.
The Best Things… The Defector staff heard In 2025.
This week’s discussion prompt: What is something over the holidays that motivated you? (For me: Realizing that Abigail Spanberger is about to become Governor of Virginia in mere days.)
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Editorial photos provided by Getty Images. For full credits, please consult the article.
So much to be thankful for… And so much to keep fighting against! One thing that motivated me was hearing from so many of my friends at holiday gatherings how their new insurance rates have priced them out of coverage for 2026, and though I am grateful that I’m on Medicare, I realize how much work there is to be done to make sure everybody has reliable, affordable health insurance. And that’s just one of the long, long of disasters this administration has wrought. Happy new year to you and the entire Bulwark family! Onward!
I am inspired by my other daughter's laughter. Last weekend I got married to the man I was meant to find in midlife. We both have children from our previous marriages. In addition to English, we both were raised speaking Tamil; in Tamil the word for niece is other daughter. I told her that's what she was to me since I could never replace the mother she lost as a young child and I wanted to welcome her more closely than step daughter implies. She smiled the sweet smile of a scared 22 year old unsure of her place. We spent the whole week together with friends and wellwishers and family members weaving in and out of an elaborate dance to knit two families together, enjoying Hindu story discussions, Hannukah Rock Shabbat at Temple Emanu-El, a peaceful visit to the Taung Pulu Kaba Aye Buddhist Monastary, a chicken biryani cooking lesson from our Muslim house guest, and unexpected gifts under the tree on Christmas morning. My new husband calls me a universalist. My new other daughter doesn't know what to call me yet. But yesterday she laughed out loud with me to my jokes, movie jokes, and her first joke to me. That precious laughter from a young person who has seen difficult and depressing times will carry me for months into the future. We are past the longest night of the year. Here comes the sun.