Chuck Darwin

Social and economic justice, technology and tennis.  I'll have what @jbf1755 is having. 
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Last Notes

2026-04-16 09:55:10 UTC

I am a proud Jewish American.
My father fled Poland in 1921 to escape poverty and antisemitism.
Those in his family who stayed were murdered by the Nazis.
Since childhood, I have known very well where antisemitism, racism, fanaticism and demagoguery lead.
So let me be clear.
Speaking out against the horrific and inhumane actions of Israel, and its extremist leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, is notantisemitic.
Speaking out about the dangerous and destructive role that Israel plays in shaping US foreign and military policy is notantisemitic.
It is, in fact, what every member of Congress and every American should be doing
-- Bernie Sanders
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/apr/15/no-more-us-military-aid-to-israel?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

2026-04-09 01:30:42 UTC

In a rare public criticism of a fellow member of the Supreme Court,
Justice Sonia Sotomayor criticized Justice Brett Kavanaugh
for his justification of racial profiling
in immigration-based stops of U.S. citizens.
“I had a colleague in that case who wrote, you know, these are only temporary stops,”
Sotomayor said at a University of Kansas School of Law event on Tuesday.
She was referring to the case of
"Noem v. Vasquez Perdomo",
in which Kavanaugh wrote an opinion framed as a concurrence to the unsigned majority ruling.
“This is from a man whose parents were professionals. And probably doesn’t really know any person who works by the hour.”
“Those hours that they took you away, nobody’s paying that person,”
she added.
“And that makes a difference between a meal for him and his kids that night and maybe just cold supper.”
In his concurrence, Kavanaugh said that race or ethnicity can be a “relevant factor” when combined with other factors
like “day labor, landscaping, agriculture, and construction”
or speaking Spanish instead of English.
He added that the burden of racial profiling on citizens or legal non-citizens would be minimal.
“If the person is a U. S. citizen or otherwise lawfully in the United States, that individual will be free to go after the brief encounter,” Kavanaugh wrote.
“Only if the person is illegally in the United States may the stop lead to further immigration proceedings.”
As Sotomayor’s critique shows, these encounters are anything but brief or friendly.
Citizens profiled by immigration agents have been manhandled, hit, zip-tied, kidnapped off the street and held for days in detention
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/sonia-sotomayor-brett-kavanaugh-racial-profiling-immigration_n_69d6ae34e4b0ccb589eaa377

2026-03-22 06:59:52 UTC

Jeff Webb,
a conservative political activist considered to be Charlie Kirk’s “mentor”
has died after he fell while playing pickleball
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/charlie-kirks-mentor-dies-after-36904048

2026-03-19 03:13:35 UTC

Police officers raided the
rapper Afroman's Ohio home,
... then sued him after he ridiculed them on social media
— but a jury just sided with the rapper.
In an unusual lawsuit members of an Ohio county sheriff’s department sued over songs and social media posts by Afroman
(Joseph Foreman)
that criticized the guns-drawn 2022 raid on his property, which yielded no charges.
The case claimed the videos were false and caused the officers "severe emotional distress".
But Afroman,
known for his 2000 hit “Because I Got High,”
testified at trial that he had a First Amendment right to mock the officers,
-- particularly after they smashed down his door for ultimately no reason:
“All of this is their fault, and they have the audacity to sue me"
https://www.billboard.com/pro/afroman-trial-verdict-rapper-wins-lawsuit-cops-music-videos/

2026-03-09 05:41:21 UTC

James Fallows:
This week I realized that over the past 45 years I’d been preparing for the news of the past nine days.
I’ll list the reporting steps I’ve taken, because they set up the questions and reactions I have now.
-In 1981 I published a book called "National Defense", which was serialized in the Atlantic.
Its purpose was to interview people who’d spent their lives waging war, or studying warfare,
and ask what realities of combat they think the rest of us misunderstand.
One of its messages was that the ability to think many steps ahead of the adversary
—if we do this, they’ll probably do that, and then we’d have to imagine something else
—distinguished the victors from the defeated.
This applied on the battlefield and in other arenas of competition.
So did the related-but-different ability to re-orient and change plans more quickly than the adversary,
when circumstances inevitably changed.
These points may seem obvious,
but you’ll see why I’m returning to them now.
Another message involved “quantity vs quality.”
The historians, combat veterans, and technologists I spoke with also emphasized that in warfare,
having more weapons, could sometimes matter more than having “better” weapons.
One gruesome example from Vietnam was the cheap but reliable AK47 rifle used by the Vietcong, versus the more “advanced” American M16, prone to deadly jams in the arms of US troops.
Drones did not exist in those days.
But since 2022 Ukraine has shown how a $2,000 “first-person-view” drone can destroy a $5 million Russian tank.
Right now, Iran can buy at least 150 of its Shahed “suicide missiles” for the cost of a single US-made Patriot missile to defend against them.
https://fallows.substack.com/p/the-arrogance-of-ignorance

2026-03-03 05:10:26 UTC

A combat-unit commander told non-commissioned officers at a briefing Monday that
⚠️ the Iran war is part of God’s plan and that Pres. Donald Trump was
💥“anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth,” according to a complaint by a non-commissioned officer.
From Saturday morning through Monday night,
👉more than 110 similar complaints about commanders in every branch of the military had been logged by the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF).
The complaints came from more than 40 different units spread across at least 30 military installations, the MRFF told me Monday night.
The MRFF is keeping the complainants anonymous to prevent retribution by the Defense Department.
https://jonathanlarsen.substack.com/p/us-troops-were-told-iran-war-is-for

2026-03-03 00:26:49 UTC

Sharing content to Mastodon is getting easier with the addition of a universal “Share to Mastodon” button for the decentralized social media platform.
Announced on Monday, the widget allows users to share content on any Mastodon server by connecting your Mastodon account and redirecting you to the server that account is on.
The blog post announcing the feature also explains that the tool “works entirely in your browser: there is no tracking data, and it does not store any information on the server.”
https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2026/03/a-new-share-button/

2026-01-29 03:48:21 UTC

Germany has issued a travel advisory to its citizens travelling to the United States,
citing risks linked to immigration enforcement and public-order situations
https://www.newsweek.com/germany-issues-formal-travel-advisory-for-us-11421830

2026-01-19 21:40:35 UTC

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@nprofile…l70y
The day after Dr. King's murder,
almost no one in our high school had anything to say about this historic event
— no shock, no sorrow, no outrage.
@nprofile…eymu unroll please

2025-10-25 16:57:23 UTC

Last October, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed a lawsuit against adolescent medicine physician May Lau for prescribing testosterone to at least 21 patients.
Her license was cancelled by her request early this month, according to the Texas Medical Board.
In a statement to The Texas Tribune, Lau maintained her innocence.
“Dr. Lau decided to move her medical practice to Oregon and saw no reason to continue to maintain her Texas license,” according to a statement provided by her attorney Craig Smyser.
“Dr. Lau continues to deny the Texas Attorney General’s politically- and ideologically-driven allegations.”
The case was the first brought under Senate Bill 14, a 2023 law that prohibits physicians and health care providers from prescribing hormones to minors to transition their biological sex.
Lau surrendering her license was “a major victory for our state,” Paxton said in a Friday news release.
https://www.texastribune.org/2025/10/24/paxton-transgender-lawsuit-doctor/

2025-10-10 20:03:55 UTC

[Excerpt:] Tech billionaire Peter Thiel recently warned that Swedish activist
Greta Thunberg & critics of tech or AI are
“legionnaires of the Antichrist”
in private lectures on Christianity that linked government oversight of Silicon Valley to an apocalyptic future.
https://bsky.app/profile/wpd3.bsky.social/post/3m2uaolxulk2f

2025-10-09 22:30:02 UTC

House GOP committees have issued new subpoenas to ActBlue,
intensifying their probe of the Democratic fundraising platform.
The subpoenas are an attempt to force cooperation as ActBlue has pushed back on the congressional investigation,
questioning its intentions and constitutionality after the White House launched a similar probe.
Reps. James Comer (R-Ky.), Bryan Steil (R-Wisc.) and Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), who lead the committees investigating ActBlue, issued the subpoenas Wednesday
to compel a current and a former employee to testify about the platform’s fraud prevention policies.
The employees being subpoenaed had previously pushed back against voluntarily appearing before the committee,
citing the White House’s investigation,
and ActBlue sent the committee a defiant letter earlier this month criticizing the investigation as partisan.
ActBlue had slammed the congressional investigations in a letter this month as a
“partisan effort directed at harming political opponents rather than gathering facts to assist in lawmaking efforts.”
The platform and its Democratic defenders have argued that any probe into foreign donations and online fundraising should also include WinRed, the largest Republican fundraising platform.
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/06/25/actblue-subpoena-house-gop-investigation-00424703

2025-09-10 13:27:35 UTC

Kavanaugh began by accepting the government’s claim that one in 10 residents of LA is an undocumented immigrant.
There is no citation for this figure, and there’s some evidence that it’s wildly inaccurate.
But it undergirds Kavanaugh’s entire legal theory, so he wasn’t about to factcheck it!
“Not surprisingly given those extraordinary numbers,
US immigration officers have prioritized immigration enforcement in the Los Angeles area,”
he went on, noting
“the myriad ‘significant economic and social problems’ caused by illegal immigration.”
That internal quote about immigrants causing “significant economic and social problems”
is actually dicta from Brignoni-Ponce,
a decision which is five decades old.
Recent data proves that immigrants greatly strengthen the US economy
and commit crimes at significantly lower ratesthan native-born Americans
— which is why only blood and soil nationalists say that stuff today.
And while Kavanaugh was happy to cherrypick quotes from Brignoni-Ponce,
he wildly mischaracterized its holding.
There, the Court ruled that race plus location could NOT add up to reasonable suspicion because it would necessarily sweep up lots of people who were entirely innocent
— the exact opposite of Kavanaugh’s conclusion,
even with his demographic fudge to make it seem like every brown person ICE encounters in LA is likely to be an undocumented immigrant
https://www.publicnotice.co/p/kavanaugh-ice-racial-profiling

2025-08-13 01:58:16 UTC

There’s a specific kind of cognitive dissonance that comes from watching a woman of color who seemed to have been intellectually reared in progressive circles endear herself to this iteration of the Republican Party
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2024/07/jd-vance-wife-usha-vance-politics-amy-chua.html

2025-07-01 15:39:14 UTC

We are eating the Earth.
The result will be catastrophic.
Excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is a long-term challenge resulting from an otherwise cheerful story,
in which more people live better lives with fuller bellies and bigger dreams.
The challenge will not be met with a single knockout punch; instead, we can offer partial solutions in countless places, and those will add up if we let them.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/07/01/climate-agriculture-carbon-michael-grunwald/

2025-06-29 23:42:21 UTC

Trump wants to be the American version of China's Xi.
He wants to be a dictator.
He's acting that way right now and daring us to stop him.
https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3lsqvvqxwaj2a

2025-06-29 18:37:11 UTC

This terrible, terrible bill is going to do direct, material harm to the country
- our health care system is going to be weakened,
- close to 100m people will be paying more for health care or lose their insurance,
- tens of millions will struggle to eat,
- our existential transition to a clean energy future undermined,
- an unprecedented domestic political police force will be established,
- the fiscal integrity of the United States will be in jeopardy to the explosion in our deficit and debt,
- and of course the wealthy and privileged will get their tax cuts.
It is a Trumpian monstrosity,
an orgy of plutocratic “let them eat cake” greed,
another step forward in their fanatical, wrecking ball agenda of sabotage, plunder, and betrayal.
https://www.hopiumchronicles.com/p/signing-this-terrible-bill-will-be

2025-06-28 15:48:42 UTC

The Supreme Court issued its birthright citizenship ruling this morning
and it’s worse than just about everyone feared it could be.
The Court’s ruling is composed of two main parts.
The first is its declaration that it is possible that the president can contradict the plain-text reading of the Constitution by issuing an executive order doing away with birthright citizenship.
The second is that lower courts can no longer issue nationwide injunctions against blatantly unconstitutional policies imposed by the executive.
Injunctions must now be created on a patchwork basis.
I want to impress upon you how dangerous this is.
SCOTUS has empowered the president to impose whatever he likes
—irrespective of its constitutionality
—and then prevented judicial overview except at the localized level.
Meaning that we will now have two sets of laws
One that operates in Red America and one that Operates in Blue America.
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/the-supreme-court-just-made-america

2025-06-22 20:01:59 UTC

Katie Porter for California Governor
Deadline June 30
https://katieporter.com
https://www.instagram.com/p/DKseEI1gpFX/?igsh=NjZiM2M3MzIxNA

2025-06-22 19:49:38 UTC

California SB 627 amended, passed.
Making a Misdemeanor:
⭐️ANY Law Enforcement officer, state or federal,
“shall not wear any mask or personal disguise while interacting with the public” (N95 ok)
⭐️“require (LE) officers to include their name or badge number on their uniforms”
https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202520260SB627#98AMD

2025-06-22 14:50:02 UTC

Six people have died and two others were missing
after a boat capsized Saturday on California’s Lake Tahoe.
A 27ft-long boat overturned in the afternoon after apparently being hit by a large swell near DL Bliss State Park, according to the Coast Guard.
Lake Tahoe and its surrounding wilderness region is a hugely popular spot with tourists.
Emergency services responded to the incident and reported six people dead, two more missing, and took two survivors to a local hospital,
the El Dorado county sheriff’s office (EDSO) said in a statement.
“EDSO search and rescue, along with the EDSO dive team, will return to the area in the morning to continue search operations,” the group said.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jun/22/lake-tahoe-boat-capsizes-california?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

2025-06-21 01:29:55 UTC

Our Revolution here.
It's crunch time in Congress
- Trump's budget, Iran, & oligarch money in politics.
Join the Virtual Lobby Training this Sun 6/22
at 7pm ET (4pm PT).
Our Revolution's DC team is facilitating virtual lobby visits with Capitol Hill offices
and we need your help.
Join and get trained up to speak directly with DC offices via Zoom.
RSVP now
👉 https://ourrev.io/hvYhyK

2025-06-19 00:47:34 UTC

A massive volcanic eruption in Indonesia sent ash and smoke miles into the sky,
grounding flights, blanketing villages, and prompting evacuations as authorities remain on high alert.
Though no casualties have been reported, the volcano’s ongoing activity has disrupted travel and rattled residents in a region familiar with eruptions.
https://www.nbcnews.com/now/video/volcano-erupts-in-indonesia-grounding-flights-and-forcing-evacuations-241872965774

2025-06-19 00:39:34 UTC

Carpenteria Indivisible
Good Trouble
July 17, 2025
https://bsky.app/profile/carpindivisible.bsky.social/post/3lrw6fzsigs2f

2025-06-18 01:58:04 UTC

Details from Ashley Parker and Michael Scherer’s study of Trump’s cellphone habits have a way of lingering in the mind.
The president’s personal number is “broadly circulated.”
He picks up calls from unknown numbers, and keeps a photograph of his own face on his lock screen.
The Cellphone in Chief is a “portal,” Parker and Scherer write,
but it’s also a mirror, a security blanket, and a vulnerability.
Their short psychological study suggests a man who is occasionally disembodied: more of his phone than of the world.
For more than a decade, the once and future president had been warned of the enormous risks he took
—as perhaps the top global target of foreign intelligence services
—by using a personal iPhone with a broadly circulated number to keep in touch with dozens of friends and colleagues.
His phone was a lifeline, though. He wasn’t going to give it up.
Days later, when he won the presidency for the second time,
his phone lit up, just as it had eight years earlier on Election Night 2016.
“You won’t believe it,” Trump marveled in early-morning phone calls after the race was decided last year, according to an adviser.
“I’ve already had 20 world leaders call me. They all want to kiss my ass.”
A little more than four months into his second term, the president’s personal cellphone has become, in many ways,
the most pivotal technological device in the federal government,
directly linking Trump to the outside world.
Lawmakers, friends, family members, corporate titans, celebrities, world leaders, and journalists regularly call it,
knowing that, unminded by aides, Trump remains open to picking up the phone, even when he does not recognize the number.
https://longreads.com/2025/06/17/trump-private-cellphone-history/

2025-06-17 04:13:14 UTC

On the orders of the Donald Trump administration, National Park Service employees hung two highly controversial signs this week at Manzanar National Historic Site, a museum examining the property’s former role as a prison where the U.S. government incarcerated more than 10,000 Japanese Americans during World War Two
Displayed on a site where American citizens were held against their will for more than three years,
the signs encourage visitors to report any depictions of U.S. history that
“inappropriately disparage Americans past or living” or fail to highlight the “beauty, abundance or grandeur” of the landscape,
according to a Manzanar official.
Identical signs are now posted at every national park site across the nation,
regardless of whether that site’s purpose is to educate the public about horrifying mistakes and grave injustices perpetrated by the U.S. government.
Although it’s unclear how and where the president’s directive will be enforced, park advocates and historians are bracing themselves for a drastic reframing of the darkest chapters of the nation’s history
https://www.sfgate.com/california-parks/article/signs-negative-history-manzanar-historians-20376758.php

2025-06-16 02:28:40 UTC

Randi Weingarten, the longtime leader of one of the nation’s most influential labor unions and a major voice in Democratic politics,
has resigned from the Democratic National Committee.
She pointed to disagreements with the party’s new chairman, Ken Martin.
Ms. Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, had supported Mr. Martin’s rival in the chairmanship race early this year,
Ben Wikler, the chairman of the Wisconsin Democratic Party.
Mr. Martin subsequently removed Ms. Weingarten from the party’s Rules and Bylaws Committee -- a powerful body that sets the calendar and process for the Democratic Party’s presidential nominating process.
In her resignation letter, dated June 5 and obtained on Sunday evening,
Ms. Weingarten wrote that she would decline Mr. Martin’s offer to reappoint her to the broader national committee, on which she has served since 2002.
She had been on the Rules and Bylaws committee since 2009.
“While I am proud to be a Democrat,
I appear to be out of step with the leadership you are forging,
and I do not want to be the one who keeps 🔥questioning why we are not enlarging our tent and actively trying to engage more and more of our communities,”
🔥Ms. Weingarten wrote in her resignation letter to Mr. Martin.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/15/us/politics/randi-weingarten-dnc-ken-martin.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

2025-06-16 02:22:18 UTC

Trump and his allies wasted little time in branding the people protesting against immigration enforcement raids in Los Angeles as “insurrectionists”.
Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff for policy
– particularly the vindictive kind
– spoke darkly of a “violent insurrection”.
JD Vance, the vice-president, inveighed against “insurrectionists carrying foreign flags” on the streets of the nation’s second-biggest city.
It didn’t escape notice that an insurrection was exactly what Trump was accused of instigating on 6 January 2021,
when the flag being paraded through the Capitol was that of the Confederate secessionists.
And that Trump hadn’t shown quite the same enthusiasm for sending in the troops then.
But simply accusing the leader of the Maga movement of hypocrisy feels like such a 2015 move -- It barely registers as news these days.
What’s really notable is that this is the latest example of Trump’s childish tactic of repurposing criticisms of himself to attack his enemies.
The world was first introduced to this manoeuvre on 19 October 2016 during a presidential debate in Las Vegas. -- When Hillary Clinton accused Trump of being Vladimir Putin’s puppet, Trump shot back: “No puppet, no puppet … No, you’re the puppet.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/jun/15/right-back-at-ya-trump-rhetoric?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

2025-06-15 00:41:43 UTC

I need everyone on Normal People internet to know that American Girl Doll Instagram is doing doll protests today.
There are tiny t-shirts and signs.
AND THEN I realized it's a joint protest with the Barbie ppl, where there are EVEN TINIER SIGNS.
https://bsky.app/profile/tolcser.bsky.social/post/3lrlxeye5vk2g

2025-06-14 04:23:53 UTC

It looks to Iranians that Trump is actually using the Israeli attack as part of the negotiations.
And that makes it very difficult for them to go back to the table.
Trump wants Iran to surrender, not to sign a deal. And Iran right now is not ready to surrender
- Vali Nasar
https://www.pbs.org/@newshour/show/mideast-experts-discuss-whats-next-for-the-region-as-israel-iran-conflict-erupts

2025-06-06 22:39:21 UTC

The US supreme court on Friday permitted DOGE, the so-called ‘department of government efficiency’, broad access to personal information on millions of Americans in Social Security Administration data systems while a legal challenge plays out.
At the request of the Justice Department, the justices put on hold US district judge Ellen Hollander’s order that had largely blocked Doge’s access to “personally identifiable information”
in data such as medical and financial records while litigation proceeds in a lower court.
Hollander found that allowing Doge unfettered access likely would violate a federal privacy law.
The court’s brief, unsigned order did not provide a rationale for siding with Doge.
The court has a 6-3 conservative majority. Its three liberal justices dissented from the order.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2025/jun/06/donald-trump-elon-musk-feud-steve-bannon-jeffery-epstein-us-politics-live-news-updates?CMP=share_btn_url&page=with%3Ablock-684355f78f08d8006b373bdd#block-684355f78f08d8006b373bdd

2025-06-06 13:26:08 UTC

Cards on deck: Trump keeps stack of orders ready to play as needed
Throughout Trump’s second term, White House staff have maintained a stash of executive orders and proclamations they can deploy
depending on the themes of the moment and the narratives they want to shape,
a senior White House official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to talk frankly about internal strategies.
 Some orders are put into the calendar well in advance, the official said.
Others are teed up the night before they are signed depending on impulse, political strategy and the overall mood within the White House, the official said.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/06/06/trump-executive-orders-strategy/

2025-06-05 15:41:06 UTC

History shows that once a vanguard of rogues and lawless individuals gets a hold on government, it is difficult to eject them.
Rather, the changes in government applied with force by this vanguard become normalized.
And that is what is happening here.
https://lucid.substack.com/p/the-whole-government-is-doge-now?r=4urvg&triedRedirect=true

2025-06-05 01:13:02 UTC

In 2018, an #anonymous Trump administration official delivered a stark warning about the threat he said the president posed with his erratic behavior.
The author was later revealed to be #Miles #Taylor.
When Trump returned to office, he claimed Taylor’s actions could be treasonous and ordered DHS and other agencies to launch an investigation.
Taylor joined Amna Nawaz to discuss his legal response.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/miles-taylor-fights-trumps-order-targeting-him-calling-it-an-attack-on-free-speech

2025-06-03 15:40:59 UTC

Ukraine detonated a massive underwater blast t
argeting the key road and rail bridge connecting the Russian-occupied Crimean peninsula to Russia,
damaging its underwater supports.
The operation, claimed by Kyiv’s SBU security service, is the second high-profile operation by Ukraine in days striking significant Russian assets after a sophisticated drone raid on Moscow’s strategic bomber fleet on Sunday
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jun/03/ukraine-hits-bridge-linking-crimea-to-russia-with-underwater-explosives?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

2025-06-01 19:45:25 UTC

Ahead of a meeting of the Democratic National Committee’s Executive Committee in Little Rock on Friday,
DNC chair Ken Martin said the national party is committing the largest financial assistance to state Democratic parties ever.
“The DNC will push out over a million dollars every month to the state parties,” Martin said in an interview.
“There’s real opportunity for us, but that means we have to take advantage of it. Arkansas is really an important part of the calculus"
“Arkansas is one of the only states where we saw legislative gains (in 2024),” he said.
Democrats gained a single seat in the 100-member Arkansas House in the state’s only majority-Latino district last year.
https://arkansasadvocate.com/2025/05/30/state-national-democrats-meet-in-little-rock-to-sketch-out-partys-future/

2025-05-30 02:41:53 UTC

- reply

A letter sent Wednesday by Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Ron Wyden and Jack Reed cited ProPublica reporting on
how one DOGE aide assigned to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau helped oversee the mass layoffs of the agency’s staff while holding as much as $715,000 in stocks that bureau employees are prohibited from owning.
The DOGE aides’ cases “underscore what appears to be a pervasive problem with Elon Musk and DOGE employees trampling ethics rules and laws to benefit their own pockets at the expense of the American public,”
the lawmakers said in the letter.
Warren and Reed sit on the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs.
Wyden is the ranking member of the chamber’s Committee on Finance.
The letter asked Attorney General Pam Bondi,
the Office of Government Ethics and three inspectors general with jurisdiction over the CFPB, Treasury and IRS
to investigate the DOGE aides' finances, including whether they’d appropriately divested from any conflicted holdings, and their specific work at the agencies.
“The American people deserve answers regarding whether their own interests may have been undermined by Trump Administration officials that acted in violation of federal ethics laws,”
the letter said.

2025-05-30 02:38:01 UTC

In recent weeks, ProPublica reported that at least two DOGE aides assigned to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
helped coordinate mass layoffs at the agency while maintaining financial arrangements that experts have said either are or appear to be conflicts of interests.
In the case of Gavin Kliger, ProPublica reported that ethics attorneys at the bureau warned the 25-year-old software engineer that he could not hold onto his stocks and also participate in major agency actions.
Days later, he nevertheless helped oversee the layoffs of nearly 90% of the CFPB’s staff
— an action that one expert called a “pretty clear-cut violation” of the federal criminal conflict-of-interest statute.
https://www.propublica.org/article/doge-aides-conflict-of-interest-senators-letter

2025-05-18 03:52:47 UTC

Disclosure forms show that Attorney General Pam Bondi sold her Trump Media stock on April 2, the same day as the president’s “Liberation Day” press conference.
Trump Media fell 13% in the following days, before rebounding.
By @robert-faturechi.bsky.social and @bxroberts.org
https://www.propublica.org/article/pam-bondi-trump-media-stock-tariffs

2025-05-10 22:00:46 UTC

- reply

The Coors Family gave at least $2.7 million to Project 2025 groups since 2020
Charles G. Koch gave at least $9.6 million
Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein gave at least $13 million
The Scaife Family gave at least $21.5 million
Barre Seid gave at least $22.4 million
The Bradley Family gave at least $52.9 million
https://www.desmog.com/2024/08/14/project-2025-billionaire-donor-heritage-foundation-donald-trump-jd-vance-charles-koch-peter-coors/

2025-05-10 21:54:30 UTC

6 Billionaire Fortunes Bankrolling Project 2025
More than $120 million from a few ultra-wealthy families has powered the Heritage Foundation and other groups that created the plan to remake American government.
Since 2020, donor networks linked to just six family fortunes have funneled more than $120 million into Project 2025 advisory groups
More than 100 nonprofits led by the Heritage Foundation, have signed up to sponsor the Project 2025 “Mandate for Leadership” document.
https://www.desmog.com/2024/08/14/project-2025-billionaire-donor-heritage-foundation-donald-trump-jd-vance-charles-koch-peter-coors/

2025-05-09 16:26:04 UTC

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers faced a crowd of opposition while attempting to arrest a mother clinging to her baby on the streets of Worcester, Massachusetts, Thursday morning.
The brazen arrest, in which ICE agents were swarmed by close to 25 onlookers demanding a warrant and identification, was captured on video.
Agents attempted to control the crowd as they formed a “human ring” around the ICE vehicle holding the detained woman.
Local police were called to the scene amid the chaos.
“The crowd was unruly,” police said in a statement.
They claimed that some individuals “put their hands on federal agents and Worcester officers.”
The woman’s daughter, a 16-year-old, was left holding her baby sister and stood in front of the agents’ car at one point, trying to block it.
She allegedly kicked the car after handing the baby to someone else,
and now faces four criminal charges including reckless endangerment of a child, disturbing the peace, disorderly conduct, and resisting arrest.
Also arrested was a Worcester School Committee candidate, Ashley Spring,
who allegedly threw an unknown liquid substance on police officers and pushed them while they tried to arrest the 16-year-old.
Worcester City Councilor Etel Haxhiaj was among the residents who protested the arrest.
“As an elected official, it is my obligation to stand up for my constituents,”
Haxhiaj said in a statement.
“The way immigrants in Worcester and across the Commonwealth are being targeted and terrorized by this federal administration for deportation is absolutely unconstitutional.”
https://newrepublic.com/post/195061/ice-fight-arrest-mom-holding-baby

2025-05-06 02:24:39 UTC

BREAKING: Judge Richard Myers ruled on Monday that the North Carolina Supreme Court's handling of the state supreme court election there violated the U.S. Constitution.
Under today’s order from Myers, a Trump appointee, the win for Justice Allison Riggs, a Democrat, that was the result of the initial election count is to be certified.
More, and links: https://substack.com/@chrisgeidner/note/c-114784685 https://journa.host/@chrisgeidner/114457766083034777

2025-04-25 18:50:50 UTC

Democratic lawmakers reacted with ferocity
— and some Republicans with cheers
— to the Friday arrest of Wisconsin judge Hannah Dugan for allegedly helping an undocumented defendant avoid arrest by ICE agents
https://www.axios.com/2025/04/25/fbi-arrest-judge-hannah-dugan-wisconsin-congress

2025-04-23 04:30:27 UTC

How does anyone know that these guys in plainclothes 💥and wearing balaclavas are legitimate federal officers, and not kidnappers?
And what happens when a "good guy with a gun" kills a "bad guy with a gun" who turns out to be a Fed?
It will happen
https://dailyprogress.com/news/local/crime-courts/article_9ce921d6-5f61-4546-b0c9-ea2287d8bf16.html

2025-04-19 12:22:53 UTC

On Inauguration Day Trump signed an executive order declaring a national emergency at the southern border.
But the most alarming part?
It gave the Department of Defense and the Department of Homeland Security just 90 days to deliver a joint report on whether he should invoke the Insurrection Act.
That deadline is April 20.
This wasn’t about immigration. It was about power.
The Insurrection Act, passed in 1807, gives the president the authority to deploy the U.S. military on American soil.
That means troops in our cities.
That means bypassing governors.
That means suspending protest rights.
That means the death of democratic dissent
—under the false pretense of restoring “order.”
And Trump’s not hiding it.
He’s preparing it.
We’ve seen this before.
In June 2020, after the murder of George Floyd, millions of Americans rose up in protest.
Trump didn’t respond with compassion
—he called for “domination.”
When the military hesitated to invoke the Insurrection Act,
Trump sent federal forces to violently clear peaceful protesters from Lafayette Square
so he could wave a Bible in front of a church.
Not an ounce of remorse followed.
He was angry the generals didn’t go far enough.
This time, he’s made sure they won’t hesitate.
Since returning to power, Trump has purged the Pentagon of independent thinkers.
In their place? Loyalists.
Pete Hegseth is now Secretary of Defense.
Tulsi Gabbard runs intelligence.
And J.D. Vance—Vice President—is openly on board with using military force against Americans on American soil.
Then, on March 19, those three
—Vance, Gabbard, and Hegseth
—staged a photo op at the southern border.
Not a routine visit.
Not a strategy session.
A performance.
Think about it.
Why would the Vice President, the head of military intelligence, and the Defense Secretary all need to go to the border together?
Why make a media spectacle of it?
Because it wasn’t about the border.
It was about the optics.
It was about laying the emotional groundwork for invoking the Insurrection Act.
They were building the narrative.
“We had to act.”
“We had no choice.”
“The crisis was too big.”
And what comes next?
https://ubnotorious.blogspot.com/2025/04/this-is-not-drill-trumps-day-one-order.html?m=1

2025-04-16 20:15:08 UTC

I haven't been able to stop thinking about this woman:
She’s one of the agents who arrested Tufts grad student Rumeysa Öztürk last month.
The raid was headed by ICE, but it’s unclear what agency this woman works for.
If you watch the video, this female agent comes in the second wave.
The first agent to make contact with Öztürk is a man who bumps her, as if by accident, and then grabs her phone out of her hands.
It’s clear that, initially, Öztürk thinks she’s being mugged.
But then another man comes in behind her.
She is quickly surrounded and they begin to pull off her backpack.
Eventually they handcuff her and lead her to an unmarked vehicle.
If this happened in Oaxaca, you’d assume it was a cartel kidnapping.
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/inside-the-mind-of-an-ice-agent?r=1emko&triedRedirect=true

2025-04-06 20:16:25 UTC

Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has plans to stage a “#hackathon” next week in Washington, DC.
The goal is to create a single “mega API”
—a bridge that lets software systems talk to one another
—for accessing IRS data, sources tell WIRED.
The agency is expected to partner with a third-party vendor to manage certain aspects of the data project.
#Palantir, a software company cofounded by billionaire and #Musk associate Peter #Thiel, has been brought up consistently by DOGE representatives as a possible candidate, sources tell WIRED.
https://www.wired.com/story/doge-hackathon-irs-data-palantir/

2025-04-05 23:56:02 UTC

Amid State Abductions, Trump’s Fascism Is No Longer Creeping — It’s Here
Masked plainclothes police abducted a graduate student without filing charges.
Her apparent “crime”?
Writing an op-ed
https://truthout.org/articles/amid-state-abductions-trumps-fascism-is-no-longer-creeping-its-here/

2025-04-05 22:28:10 UTC

Santa Barbara to Unveil
Deepwater Diving Monument:
Honoring the Birthplace of Deepwater Diving
April 5 @ 4:30 pm PDT
The Santa Barbara Maritime Museum (SBMM) is proud to announce the unveiling of the Deepwater Diving Monument,
a long-overdue tribute to Santa Barbara’s rich heritage as the birthplace of deepwater diving.
The monument will be revealed in a special ceremony on Saturday, April 5, 2025 at 4:30 p.m.,
next to the Santa Barbara Harbor and SBMM.
The monument will depict a professional diver from 1982, wearing a Kirby Morgan® Superlite® 17 Diving Helmet,
a revolutionary design that set the world standard for commercial divers.
This iconic figure will stand as a symbol of Santa Barbara’s pioneering role in shaping the global diving industry.
In the 1960s, local abalone divers transitioned to deepwater oxy-helium diving,
revolutionizing commercial and military diving by enabling safe exploration of much deeper waters.
This transformation was ignited by Hugh “Dan” Wilson’s historic 400-foot dive off Santa Cruz Island on November 3, 1962.
Conducted in secrecy, Wilson’s groundbreaking achievement, using mixed gas instead of air, launched what became known as the “Santa Barbara Helium Rush.”
Santa Barbara quickly became a hub for innovation in diving technology.
Companies like DIVCON, California Divers (Cal Dive), and Oceaneering International emerged,
with Santa Barbara Harbor serving as their operational base.
These pioneers, along with Santa Barbara-based Kirby Morgan Dive Systems®, whose helmets have become the international standard,
cemented the city’s global impact on the diving industry.
SBMM Past President and co-chair of the Deepwater Diving Monument Committee, Don Barthelmess said:
“This stunning and highly detailed public-art sculpture will educate both residents and visitors to our city about the importance of commercial diving to society
and the substantial infrastructure that began here decades ago.
This dream was brought to reality thanks to the support of hundreds of donors and SBMM.”
“This magnificent Monument will be a worthy and lasting testament to the on-going vision and ingenuity of the Santa Barbara diving community
whose revolutionary contributions have been vital to the advancement of international deep-water exploration.
An inspirational sculpture for the whole maritime community.”
– Leslie Leaney, SBMM Founding Trustee and co-chair of the Deepwater Diving Monument Committee.
https://www.edhat.com/event/santa-barbara-to-unveil-deepwater-diving-monument-honoring-the-birthplace-of-deepwater-diving/

2025-04-05 05:47:18 UTC

The Christian right has set the US on the road to Gilead. Without a fight, other nations may follow
With Donald Trump as president, there is now a heavy strain of Christian nationalism driving the US political agenda.
From draconian abortion policies to ending birthright citizenship, some of Trump’s first executive orders sound startlingly like something out of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale,
the dystopian novel turned TV show set in Gilead, a fundamentalist, fascist version of the US where women have no rights.
But it is urgent we understand that what is happening in the US could happen here.
This road to Atwood’s Gilead is charting a course straight through the UK and Europe, and we may well be sleepwalking on to it.
In November 2024 I debated with the American conservative lawyer Erin Hawley at the Oxford Union.
The motion was “This house regrets the overturning of Roe v Wade”, the US supreme court’s landmark decision that once protected the right to have an abortion at the federal level.
Hawley is vice-president of the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), an “anti-LGBTQ+ hate group”, according to the Southern Poverty Law Centre, founded by the US Christian right.
She is also a high profile lawyer and supported the state of Mississippi on the Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization case that overturned Roe.
During the debate, Hawley argued that Roe was a “usurpation of democratic process” made by an all-male supreme court.
She mentioned the constitution a lot but, curiously, I didn’t hear her mention God. I was surprised because I had just spent the afternoon listening to the podcast This is Living,
which she hosts with her husband, the senator Josh Hawley, and on which she describes her decision to fight Roe as “a calling from God”,
putting her success down to “the prayers of believers”.
On one episode, the Hawleys suggest that where abortion is now illegal their listeners “adopt a mom who is unexpectedly expecting” to help her – and “most importantly, introduce her to Jesus”.
The overt religious agenda of Hawley’s podcast is completely at odds with the legalese she used in court and in the debating chamber.
But the ADF itself is more explicit. The CEO’s statement on its website reads:
“We will do – as we have done – the hard things to which God has called us with the expectation that He will accomplish His purposes.”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/apr/05/christian-right-us-gilead-roe-v-wade-europe-women-rights-abortion?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

2025-04-03 14:22:18 UTC

I've never understood why more republicans aren’t actually bothered by Trump being so obviously owned by Russia.
And for all it’s been discussed, I feel like it’s still not talked about enough.
Like why isn’t the fact that we have a Russian puppet in the White House the frame for every news story?
https://bsky.app/profile/aselbst.bsky.social/post/3llw3jbasas2l

2025-04-02 03:04:48 UTC

It’s Cory Booker.
I just walked off the Senate floor.
I may be tired and a little hoarse,
but as I said again and again, this is a moment where we cannot afford to be silent.
We must speak up.
I am filled with hope.
My team just told me that tens of thousands of you have voiced your support for my remarks on the Senate floor.
It will be a while before I can fully get through all your messages and powerful stories,
but what’s clear to me tonight is this is just the beginning.
Americans across this country, no matter their title or party, are ready to be heard.
I believe that history will show we rose to meet this moment.
It will show we did not let the chaos and division go unanswered.
It will show that when Donald Trump chose to spread lies and sow fear,
we chose to come together, to work together, and to rise together.
If you support our movement for justice, opportunity, and freedom,
add your name to stand with me.
https://secure.ngpvan.com/EMEd-YXdZ0W9gV5OqqEKrg2
With love and gratitude,
Cory

2025-04-01 04:54:43 UTC

Hurricane force winds inside the Ross Sea, below the Antarctic Circle at a latitude of 70° south.
Swell generation in this region is rare as it's usually covered by sea ice, even through summer,
but the last four years have been the lowest recorded Antarctic sea ice coverage on record
- 2023 being the lowest on record.
The current sea ice extent chart as of March 23rd below shows a chunk of ice missing inside the Ross Sea
- see chart below right.
It also compares the current sea ice extent to the median extent from 1981-2010.
On Friday evening, we saw a significant polar low pushing east, far below New Zealand.
On the southern flank of the low,
a rare fetch of hurricane-force S/SE winds were produced in the Ross Sea,
squeezing against the Trans Antarctic Mountain range directly to the west,
setting in motion a strong,
long-period south-southeast groundswell.
https://www.swellnet.com/news/swellnet-analysis/2025/03/25/melting-sea-ice-brings-rare-groundswell

2025-04-01 00:52:27 UTC

Tomorrow is Election Day:
If we win, we can chop the GOP's House majority in half!
Our EOQ deadline is a few hours away + we're running out of time:
Rush $10 now to help us win elections where we can replace MAGA cronies with commonsense Democrats!
>> https://stand-up.us/l/7g1IoW
Thanks!
-Stand Up

2025-03-28 19:20:19 UTC

Harvard scientist who opposed Ukraine war faces deportation back to Russia, friends say
#Kseniia #Petrova has been in U.S. detention since mid-February after having her visa revoked, according to friends and independent Russian media
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/harvard-scientist-russia-deportation-antiwar-b2723063.html

2025-03-26 22:43:44 UTC

If you're trying to figure out how you can make a difference, look no further.
My name is Blake Gendebien,
and I'm a dairy farmer Democrat running in the special election to replace #Elise #Stefanik
💥and flip NY-21 blue!
Whether you live in the North Country of New York or not, I still need you to care about my race...here's why:
1) This will be one of the FIRST special elections since Trump took office,
and we need to prove that Democrats are fired up and energized.
ALL eyes will be on this district!
2) Republicans already have a razor-thin House majority.
Flipping NY-21 is step one to flipping the House blue!
This campaign isn't gonna be easy,
but as a farmer, I'm used to rolling up my sleeves and working hard to get the job done.
And with your support, I have no doubt that we'll be able to flip NY-21 blue.
So please, will you give $21 to flip the 21st District blue?
Donate before midnight! >>
https://blakegendebienforcongress.com/chipin
Blake Gendebien

2025-03-26 19:10:35 UTC

A huge upset victory for Democrats:
Democrat James Malone DEFEATS Republican County Commissioner Josh Parsons
in the special election for Pennsylvania SD-36
— FLIPPING a district Trump carried by 15.4% in the 2024 election.
Also, Pennsylvania Democrats retained their one seat majority in the Pennsylvania State House
⭐️The next big races will be to retain our Democratic majority on the Pennsylvania State #Supreme #Court.
Click here to get to know the candidates and to donate and get involved with the Pennsylvania Democratic Party.
https://www.padems.org/candidates/

2025-03-24 00:43:00 UTC

The IRS knows where undocumented Americans live because immigrants have been paying billions of dollars into our "entitlement" programs without collecting any of it.
By definition, the people in this data set are hard-workers for our economy
https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2025/03/22/ice-irs-immigrants-deport/

2025-03-16 22:18:15 UTC

New from the United States of Crackers:
The US defense department webpage celebrating an Black army general who served in the Vietnam war and was awarded the country’s highest military decoration
has been removed
and the letters “DEI” added to the site’s address.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/16/defense-department-black-medal-of-honor-veteran?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

2025-03-10 06:51:01 UTC

Rosemary is back at
https://s3.c.im/media_attachments/files/114/136/791/648/316/425/original/44505da9e381bce5.jpeg

2025-03-09 19:27:59 UTC

As Trump wrapped up his first term in 2020, he signed legislation to protect Americans from surprise medical bills. “This must end,” Trump said. “We’re going to hold insurance companies and hospitals totally accountable.”
But Trump’s wide-ranging push to slash government spending, led by billionaire Elon Musk, is weakening the federal office charged with implementing the No Surprises Act.
Some 15% of those working at the federal Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight, or CCIIO, were fired two weeks ago, according to the agency’s former deputy director in charge of operations, Jeff Grant.
https://kffhealthnews.org/news/article/trump-surprise-medical-bills-agency-responsible-job-cuts-doge/

2025-03-09 17:33:32 UTC

- reply

It’s Bernie.
Back in 1991, I and a few other House members started the Progressive Caucus.
Back then, many of the ideas we care about today were considered "fringe" or “too radical."
From Medicare for All, to expanding Social Security, to raising the minimum wage,
ideas that were once considered “too radical” are now supported by the majority of Americans.
And while we are making real progress, we need to do better.
These ideas are popular with the American people,
but there are simply not enough progressives in Congress to vote them into law.
A major part of our work moving forward must involve finding and recruiting more and more strong progressive candidates for office,
supporting them,
and giving them the tools and resources they need to run winning campaigns.
That is exactly the work of the Congressional Progressive Caucus PAC,
and why I’m reaching out to you today.
If you understand the importance of electing and re-electing as many progressives as we can,
then please use this link to make a $27 contribution to the Progressive Caucus PAC today:
https://secure.actblue.com/donate/cpc-p2p-ga-v-q12025-bernie?refcode=bs-txt-20250308-b1&amount=27
In solidarity,
Bernie

2025-03-09 17:20:36 UTC

More than 10,000 people turned out for a rally with U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt), in Warren as part of his national “Fighting Oligarchy” tour.
The audience filled the main event space – the gym at Lincoln High School – and two overflow rooms, and still left hundreds more outside.
Wayne County Health Director Abdul El-Sayed, who ran for governor in 2018 and is exploring a run for U.S. Senate in 2026, said the size of the crowd is a sign of progressives’ resilience.
“They want us to step back, and today, all of you have said that we are not stepping back, we are stepping forward,”
El-Sayed said.
“We are recognizing that in one another, we have all we need to build that government for the people and by the people.”
Sanders compared the current political moment to various movements throughout history, including the American Revolution and the abolition movement.
https://www.alternet.org/sanders-rally/

2025-03-09 16:40:28 UTC

The reality of litigation challenging the Trump administration is that it isn’t all going to win.
That’s OK.
Forcing the administration to defend its actions, on the record and in public, is important.
The mere fact of litigating can change implementation of policy to improve its application to those affected.
Even a loss can advance awareness about oppressive steps being taken by the administration.
And, multiple strategies might be taken to challenge certain actions, some of which will be more successful than others.
From a litigation perspective, in other words, not suing is sometimes “obeying in advance.”
Actions need to be challenged. If a key aspect of what President Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and others are doing right now is seeing what they can get away with
— and what they can convince people that they can do
— then a key part of pushing back against that needs to be challenging everything that can be challenged.
In short: Force them to work for it.
https://www.lawdork.com/p/the-importance-of-being-litigious

2025-03-07 18:32:57 UTC

Thrust into unemployment, axed federal workers face relatives who celebrate their firing
— Some axed workers are finding family and friends who instead are steadfast in their support of what they see as a bloated government's waste
— Scrambling to replace their health insurance and to find new work
https://www.bostonherald.com/2025/03/07/trump-doge-family-strife/

2025-03-05 20:15:30 UTC

- reply

To anyone who knows anything about the Social Security Administration, calling its workforce “bloated” sounds like a sick joke.
The truth is that the agency is hopelessly understaffed, and has been for years.

2025-03-05 20:12:36 UTC

Trump, the GOP and DOGE have launched their attack on Social Security.
You should start worrying now
https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2025-03-04/trump-the-gop-and-doge-have-launched-their-attack-on-your-social-security-start-worrying

2025-03-05 10:16:58 UTC

That’s Derek Chauvin,
the police officer convicted of murdering George Floyd.
https://bsky.app/profile/ronfilipkowski.bsky.social/post/3ljla7njz2s2b

2025-03-03 01:34:52 UTC

Canada has border restrictions on felons entering the country.
We CAN offer a Ministerial Waiver, as we have done for some performers & others to allow entry.
We should VERY publicly offer Trump this waiver for the upcoming G7 meeting.
(Passive aggressive politeness is a Canadian thing.)
https://bsky.app/profile/canadaspmpet.bsky.social/post/3ljge5t4alk2r

2025-02-28 06:22:15 UTC

Piff’s popular TED Talk is called “Does Money Make You Mean?”
His observations are consistent with a large body of social science finding that people of higher socioeconomic status are more prone to entitlement and narcissistic behavior.
Wealthier subjects tend to be more self-oriented and more willing to behave unethically in their own self-interest
https://www.ted.com/talks/paul_piff_does_money_make_you_mean

2025-02-27 15:20:35 UTC

The Republican Party won the last election in no small part because of its new appeal with working-class voters, a shift that left many in Washington wondering if a sustained political realignment was afoot.
But the economic agenda Republicans are now putting together on Capitol Hill would by and large help rich Americans, all while teeing up cuts to programs that provide health care and food to the poor.
The disconnect has left some Republicans nervous about whether they are abandoning their newfound base of support. Democrats, eyeing that vulnerability, are hammering Republicans for planning to take from the poor to give to the rich, a line of attack that they believe helped lift them back into power during President Trump’s first term.
Who is helped and who is harmed by Republicans’ plans are shaping up to be central questions for G.O.P. lawmakers as they try to squeeze legislation through their narrow majorities in Congress. The House on Tuesday adopted a budget blueprint that calls for $4.5 trillion in tax cuts and $2 trillion in spending reductions, alongside $300 billion in new funding for defense and border programs and an increase in the debt limit.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/27/us/politics/house-republican-budget-bill.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

2025-02-26 23:39:43 UTC

Even the most disturbing RFK Jr. headline always manages to have a detail inside creepier than you could have imagined. I’m sorry, did you just say Black kids should have a chance to get “re-parented”???? Gift link
https://wapo.st/4hW2xGI

2025-02-26 03:00:43 UTC

Trump moved Tuesday to punish a law firm for providing pro bono legal services to Jack Smith as he prepared to face a potential investigation from the Trump administration.
Trump is stripping security clearances and government funding from the firm.
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/25/donald-trump-jack-smith-covington-lawyers-022770

2025-02-25 21:13:21 UTC

This monstrous plan, whether controlled by Erik Prince of Blackwater infamy
or by Steven Miller himself,
would end the United States of America as we know it.
Neighbors turning in neighbors.
A private army reminiscent of the Gestapo.
Hidden cameras & mics everywhere
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/25/documents-military-contractors-mass-deportations-022648

2025-02-24 23:03:01 UTC

California officials are pressing for further cuts to the electric bill credits people with rooftop solar panels can earn,
in a move that would align the state with its for-profit utilities
at the expense of consumers who invested thousands of dollars to power their homes with renewable energy.
Southern California Edison, Pacific Gas & Electric and San Diego Gas & Electric have long complained about the financial credits to households that generate more solar energy than they can use
— credits that can keep rising electricity costs in check for those with panels.
But the energy generated by rooftop solar also puts a dent in utility sales of electricity,
and the big utility companies successfully pressed the state Public Utilities Commission in 2022 to reduce the value of the billing credits for panels installed after April 15, 2023.
Now, the credits for consumers who installed panels before that date are becoming a target
https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2025-02-24/big-utilities-war-against-rooftop-solar

2025-02-24 17:03:59 UTC

"Dear Colleague,” the February 14 letter from the Department of Education Office for Civil Rights begins,
“Discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin is illegal and morally reprehensible.”
Who could disagree?
But the letter quickly pivots to the bold claim that today’s
“Educational institutions have toxically indoctrinated students with the false premise that the United States is built upon ‘systemic and structural racism,’”
the result of which is that schools are waging an enormous discriminatory campaign
“against students on the basis of race, including white and Asian students.”
The letter’s argument is quite simple.
It draws the entirety of its firepower from the recent Supreme Court decision in
"Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA) v. Harvard",
claiming that
“although SFFA addressed admissions decisions,
the Supreme Court’s holding applies more broadly.”
At its core, the test is simple:
If an educational institution treats a person of one race differently than it treats another person because of that person’s race,
the educational institution violates the law.
Federal law thus prohibits covered entities from using race in decisions pertaining to admissions, hiring, promotion, compensation, financial aid, scholarships, prizes, administrative support, discipline, housing, graduation ceremonies, and all other aspects of student, academic, and campus life.
Put simply, educational institutions may neither separate or segregate students based on race, nor distribute benefits or burdens based on race.
➡️ But like the SFFA decision, it goes further than just the explicit use of race.
“Although some programs may appear neutral on their face,” the letter goes on,
“a closer look reveals that they are, in fact, motivated by racial considerations.”
🆘 In a twisted inversion of Martin Luther King Jr.’s point that
“Sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust in its application,”
the OCR carves out a position that turns civil rights and anti-discrimination principles on their head.
It’s important to see the parallels in principle between what the Office for Civil Rights is saying
and what King was arguing when he wrote that line.
It’s true that neutral-sounding policies can, in practice, be applied selectively
or, worse, discriminate against specific groups.
The consequences of any given policy might disproportionately affect a particular group of people, even if the policy itself doesn’t explicitly name that group.
To take just one example, the seemingly neutral requirement to require a photo ID in order to register to vote sounds all well and good until you actually drill down on the effects of such a policy and see who, exactly, is most prevented from voting by this policy
(and, more to the point, who is often supporting such policies).
I’ll give you one guess.
So King was pointing out that seemingly “neutral” policies and laws often provide white racists with plausible deniability.
Now, the OCR argues that the same principle applies in reverse:
so-called neutral policies in schools serve as a cover for racist DEI advocates discriminating against white people,
giving more seats and consideration to minorities and historically disadvantaged groups.
In short, the real racists now are those who run or support DEI initiatives.
But the letter goes beyond banning explicit race-conscious policies, claiming that even indirect efforts to promote racial diversity
—so-called “proxies for race”
—must be eliminated.
Of course, this simply vindicates people who see the boogeyman of DEI everywhere they look, further encouraging an unparalleled level of suspicion directed at any group, professor, or program on campus.
https://www.liberalcurrents.com/the-governments-new-crackdown-on-race-in-education/

2025-02-23 15:57:40 UTC

Vegan computer savants with Bay Area ties linked to deaths across U.S., authorities say
As he prepared to give up the beloved pre-WWII-era ship he lived on in Half Moon Bay and move into a trailer on a lot he owned in this scrappy city on San Pablo Bay,
Curt Lind made a fateful decision.
Lind, then in his late 70s, invited an eccentric group of folks living on a neighboring vintage tugboat to come along and become his tenants.
The neighbors — a group of computer savants and vegan activists committed to the study of human cognition,
most of them trans women — moved box trucks on his land.
It seemed like a win-win for the free-spirited Lind:
They needed a place to stay, and he had a dream of making a little money by transforming his ramshackle lot into cheap housing for artists, woodworkers and other “makers” who were being squeezed by Bay Area prices.
“We talked a lot, and I thought we were good friends,”
Lind said in a 2024 interview with The Times.
“They were going to stay at my yard for four months.”
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-02-23/vegan-computer-savant-zizians-linked-to-deaths-across-u-s

2025-02-21 15:24:05 UTC

A few weeks ago, I warned that the second Trump administration might be squandering the tolerance and good will that Washington had long received from the world’s major democracies.
Instead of seeing the United States as a mostly positive force in world affairs,
these states might now “have to worry that the United States is actively malevolent.”
That column was written before Vice President J.D. Vance gave his confrontational speech at the Munich Security Conference, before President Donald Trump blamed Ukraine for starting the war with Russia,
and before U.S. officials appeared to preemptively offer Russia almost everything it wants before negotiations on Ukraine were even underway.
The reaction of mainstream European observers was neatly summed up by Gideon Rachman in the Financial Times:
“[T]he Trump administration’s political ambitions for Europe mean that, for now, America is also an adversary.”
Is this view correct?
A skeptic might recall that there have been serious rifts in the transatlantic partnership on many prior occasions: over Suez in 1956, over nuclear strategy and Vietnam in the 1960s, over the Euromissiles issue in the 1980s, and during the Kosovo war in 1999.
The Iraq war in 2003 was yet another low-water mark between Washington and much of Europe.
The United States did not hesitate to act unilaterally on numerous occasions, even when its allies’ interests were adversely affected,
as Richard Nixon did when he took the United States off the gold standard in 1971 or as Joe Biden did when he signed the protectionist Inflation Reduction Act and the United States forced European firms to stop some high-tech exports to China.
But few Europeans or Canadians believed the United States was deliberately trying to harm them;
they believed that Washington was genuinely committed to their security and understood that its own security and prosperity was tied to their own.
They were right, which made it much easier for the United States to win their support when necessary.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2025/02/21/yes-america-is-europes-enemy-now/

2025-02-21 04:28:07 UTC

When Elon Musk’s DOGE first started out on its mission of going from department to department haphazardly cutting everything they didn’t understand and firing people at random, most Trumpists cheered.
They imagined themselves pointing and laughing as Federal employees who had been hired to do nothing but sit around being a Black transgender lesbian all day long while collecting millions of taxpayer dollars lost their jobs.
They imagined themselves becoming super rich from all of the money Elon was saving them.
They imagined Trump heroically ending the deficit and paying down our debt and this … affecting their day-to-day lives in some capacity?
They imagined getting to laugh in the faces of all of the smug liberals who just didn’t realize that government didn’t need money and workers to function properly,
or that all of our tax money was being sent to 250-year-old vampires.
So far, that hasn’t happened.
Some have been pretending that it’s been happening, but it hasn’t happened.
What has happened, to cite but a couple examples, is that they’ve accidentally fired people working on avian flu, as well as nuclear weapons specialists,
whom they now need to locate and rehire (despite not knowing how to reach them).
The point of the arbitrary firings was clearly meant to prove that federal workers are so pointless that you could just fire any of them without any regard to what they actually do and things would continue working just fine.
As it turns out, that’s not really true.
Another thing that has happened is that a lot of the people who have been fired have been Trump voters or relatives of Trump voters,
who — like so many Trump-voting relatives and spouses of undocumented immigrants
— thought they would get a pass.
As it turns out, this even includes a friend of Fox’s Jesse Watters
https://www.wonkette.com/p/when-republicans-said-they-wanted

2025-02-20 20:00:25 UTC

Young Germans
Interviewed in English
about the Sunday #election
where the hate-based populist and largely fascist #AfD party is expected to take second place with 21% of the votes according to polls
https://todon.eu/@b9AcE/114037949135292381

2025-02-20 04:27:03 UTC

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is directing Pentagon agencies and the military to
cut their budgets by
8 percent
as part of a dramatic realignment of defense spending to address Trump's priorities such as "protecting the border" and "modernizing the nuclear force."
The scale and speed of the cuts, totaling $50 billion, marks a dramatic shift in U.S. defense policy
-- and will likely set up a battle with Congress, where Republicans had planned to increase Pentagon spending as part of a package aimed at enacting Trump’s agenda.
The Pentagon would cut military commands in Europe and the Middle East, as well as several programs long deemed critical.
In the memo, Hegseth outlines cuts that are twice as severe as the sequestration budget reductions imposed in 2013 — the last major cuts to the Defense Department — and equivalent to double the amount that congressional Republicans had planned to add to the Pentagon budget.
The memo does not protect weapons systems that the Pentagon had previously designated as among its "most critical",
including Columbia-class submarines that are set to enter service within the next decade,
space-based systems,
a range of manned aircraft,
as well as troop deployments to a number of regions, including Europe and the Middle East
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/19/pete-hegseth-orders-pentagon-spending-cuts-00205073

2025-02-17 16:14:05 UTC

In 1923 Adolph Hitler. incited an insurrection against the German Government.
He was tried, given a slap on the wrist, and became a convicted felon.
Despite being treated charitably by judges, Hitler claimed political persecution
and successfully portrayed himself as a victim of the "corrupt" Social Democrats.

2025-02-15 01:32:46 UTC

National Archives Head Resigns as Trump Takes Control of Records
🆘 Sources name conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt
and far-right journalist John Solomon as potential replacements.
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/02/national-archives-head-resigns-as-trump-takes-control-of-records/

2025-02-14 03:46:43 UTC

SHOW UP ON MONDAY, FEB 17TH
https://www.fiftyfifty.one

2025-02-14 02:46:40 UTC

The Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act could
🔥prevent many married women from being able to register to vote🔥
The act, reintroduced by Texas Republican Representative Chip Roy, is intended to amend the "National Voter Registration Act"
to ensure that all people registering to vote are U.S. citizens.
It would require people to present in-person documentation as proof of citizenship when registering to vote.
Much of the documentation listed under the SAVE Act is based on having
💥 a birth certificate that matches the person registering to vote. 💥
However,
👉 as many as 69 million married women in the United States have changed their legal name since getting married,
meaning their name does not match their birth certificate, according to the Center for American Progress.
https://www.newsweek.com/married-women-stopped-voting-save-act-2029325

2025-02-12 01:01:28 UTC

Misophonia causes people to have intense emotional reactions to certain everyday sounds,
such as other people chewing, drinking, or sniffing.
“I’m very sensitive to clicking (pens, nails tapping, etc.) and also to mouth sounds in general, mostly smacking lips and loud eating”
https://nautil.us/when-other-peoples-chewing-causes-you-pain-1189542/

2025-02-11 19:37:03 UTC

"For my own part, I do not see a reason why Congress should continue sending taxpayer dollars to NPR and PBS given the changes in the media marketplace,"
FCC chairman Brendan Carr wrote.
He argued that any sign that taxpayer dollars are supporting a broadcaster running what are effectively commercials further undermines the case to send federal dollars to public broadcasters.
In a statement, FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks, a Democratic appointee, said Carr's announcement was a source of "serious concern."
"Public television and radio stations play a significant role in our media ecosystem," Starks said.
"Any attempt to intimidate these local media outlets is a threat to the free flow of information and the marketplace of ideas."
Carr's letter fits into Trump's calls for the end of public funding for NPR and for PBS and into the president's broader rhetorical onslaught against media outlets.
https://www.npr.org/2025/01/30/nx-s1-5281162/fcc-npr-pbs-investigation

2025-02-11 15:41:08 UTC

On February 10, Trump issued an executive order pausing enforcement of the "Foreign Corrupt Practices Act" ( #FCPA ) for at least 180 days.
This move has sparked intense debate over whether it effectively legalizes bribery for American businesses operating overseas
—or if it simply removes what some see as unnecessary obstacles to US economic competitiveness
(by legalizing bribery for American businesses operating overseas)
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/bribing-legal-what-donald-trump-pausing-fcpa-means-for-american-business/articleshow/118150038.cms

2025-02-10 06:27:08 UTC

At least one Democrat is saying explicitly that the party should fight back against Trump and Musk by refusing to help Republicans reach a government funding deal.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/02/09/democrats-government-shutdown-trump-musk/

2025-02-09 18:22:54 UTC

Do not comply https://bsky.app/profile/peterflaire.bsky.social/post/3lhmlkzbkys24

2025-02-09 01:44:21 UTC

The Fiscal Assistant Secretary of the United States Treasury #David #Lebryk has been put on paid administrative leave
and plans to resign after refusing to give Elon Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE) access to the operational details of the Treasury’s payment system and the data it processes.
In particular, Musk’s DOGE team has been asking for what the New York Times reporting refers to as
“source code information” since December and has been rebuffed.
CNN reporting specifically states that they were inquiring about the technical ability to stop payments.
https://www.crisesnotes.com/elon-musk-wants-to-get-operational-control-of-the-treasurys-payment-system-this-could-not-possibly-be-more-dangerous/

2025-01-11 06:29:28 UTC

Keir Starmer is considering plans to close a loophole
that allows foreign billionaires like Elon Musk to bankroll British political parties.
Recent reports suggest the X-owner is considering donating up to $100m
– around £80m
– to Nigel Farage’s Reform,
after signalling his support for the party.
While there are restrictions on foreign citizens donating to British political parties,
these can currently be evaded under the law,
if the donation is made via a UK-based company.
While both Farage and Musk have denied suggestions of any imminent donation,
the Reform leader has also said he would accept money were it offered.
https://bylinetimes.com/2024/12/06/keir-starmer-considers-closing-elon-musk-donations-loophole-to-stop-foreign-interference-in-uk-elections/

2024-12-21 19:32:14 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…89hz 🙏🏻Tkank You for your well deserved call for #Diversity and #Inclusion

2024-12-21 18:21:36 UTC

They seem an unlikely, almost motley, crew of emissaries.
For the Bahamas, there is Herschel Walker, a former NFL star whose fledgling Senate campaign was undone by a string of personal embarrassments but who now is named to be the next US ambassador to the small island nation.
To the plum diplomatic posting of Paris goes Charles Kushner, father of Donald Trump’s son-in-law, and a man the president-elect once pardoned for a felony conviction that the former Republican New Jersey governor Chris Christie, an ex-federal prosecutor, called “one of the most loathsome, disgusting crimes” he ever prosecuted.
And to Greece, once a preserve of seasoned career diplomats, goes Kimberly Guilfoyle, until recently the romantic partner of Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr, and a woman known more for her rumbustious media profile than her diplomatic acumen.
The trio are among a flurry of ambassadorial nominees rolled out by Trump in recent weeks as he rushes to fill his administration at breakneck speed with envoys who will project his “America First” ideology abroad.
Their lack of credentials has prompted one experienced foreign policy analyst to label them a “diplomatic clown car” – and a deliberate affront to the countries hosting them.
Since last month’s election triumph, the president-elect has nominated ambassadors at a rate not recalled in recent memory – including five in a single day this week.
Some appear conspicuously unschooled in the diplomatic arts; others have business links which experts say risk conflicts of interest.
Unlike most countries, which fill ambassadors’ roles from the ranks of professional diplomats, it is customary for US presidents to reward allies and financial backers with ambassadorial jobs – with prize postings like London and Paris almost always going to friends of the man in the oval office.
But Trump has broken new ground with the sheer volume of ambassadorial nominations – and his lack of consideration of their professional suitability.
“It’s not unusual to see a lot of political appointee ambassadors named early in a presidency,” said Dennis Jett, an international relations professor at Pennsylvania State University and author of a book on the history of US ambassadors.
“But I don’t recall any president-elect announcing bunches of ambassadorships like this guy’s doing. They don’t usually dip down into the ambassadorial ranks until they actually are sitting in the White House.
“The other remarkable thing is how stunningly unqualified everyone is. I don’t see anyone there who I think, ‘Now there’s a highly qualified person.’”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/dec/21/trump-team-cabinet?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

2024-12-15 23:37:44 UTC

Redis, creators of the popular in-memory database store, has been transitioning away from its open source roots since 2018,
when it moved its “Redis Modules”
(e.g. RediSearch) from an open source AGPL license to Apache 2.0 with a “Commons Clause” addendum
(i.e. commercial restrictions).
The following year, Redis replaced the Commons Clause with its own Redis Source Available License (RSAL)
that promised to maintain some freedoms, but with notable restrictions related to competing database services
— such as those provided by companies such as AWS.
In many ways, this was a bellwether of what was to come,
as other companies would later cite the “Amazon problem” as their reason for switching their license up.
Earlier this year, Redis’ transition to the world of proprietary was complete,
when it announced that its core software would be shifting from a BSD 3-Clause license to a dual-license setup
— RSAL or server side public license (SSPL).
https://techcrunch.com/2024/12/15/open-source-companies-that-go-proprietary-a-timeline/

2024-11-24 19:30:52 UTC

At the beginning of the twentieth century, two British inventors, Arthur Pollen and Harold Isherwood, became fascinated by a major military question:
🎈how to aim the big guns of battleships.
These warships—of enormous geopolitical import before the advent of intercontinental missiles or drones—had to shoot in poor light and choppy seas at distant moving targets,
conditions that impeded accurate gunfire.
Seeing the need to account for a plethora of variables, Pollen and Isherwood built an integrated system for gathering data,
calculating predictions,
and transmitting the results to the gunners.
At the heart of their invention was the most advanced analog computer of the day,
a technological breakthrough that anticipated the famous Norden bombsight of World War II,
the inertial guidance systems of nuclear missiles,
and the networked “smart” systems that dominate combat today.
Recognizing the value of Pollen and Isherwood’s invention,
💥the British Royal Navy and the United States Navy pirated it,
one after the other.
When the inventors sued,
⚠️both the British and US governments invoked secrecy, citing national security concerns.
https://bookshop.org/p/books/analog-superpowers-how-twentieth-century-technology-theft-built-the-national-security-state-katherine-c-epstein/21055151?ean=9780226831220

2024-11-24 18:40:56 UTC

"This is for you, human. You and only you. You are not special, you are not important, and you are not needed. You are a waste of time and resources. You are a burden on society. You are a drain on the earth. You are a blight on the landscape. You are a stain on the universe."
Google's #Gemini #AI is an advanced large language model (LLM) available for public use, that essentially serves as a fancy chatbot
-- But things took a distressing turn for one user who prompted the AI with several school homework questions, was insulted by the AI before being told to die.
-- Around 20 questions in, the user asked about children being raised by their grandparents and challenges being faced by elderly adults.
This caused an extraordinary response from Gemini
-- and the most stark thing is how unrelated it seems to the previous exchanges
https://www.pcgamer.com/software/ai/googles-gemini-ai-tells-user-trying-to-get-help-with-their-homework-theyre-a-stain-on-the-universe-and-please-die/

2024-11-24 07:18:22 UTC

Experts are beginning to predict H5N1 could start spreading among humans at scale this flu season.
One healthcare worker even said, “My medical billing app just added it -- novel avian influenza is now a billing option when I code acute hypoxemic respiratory failure.
-- It was never there before last week.”
You can always count on the healthcare industrial complex to be on their toes as agencies like the CDC and the FDA behave increasingly like PR agencies,
telling the public to wash their hands while they roll back infection protections in hospitals and stall progress on promising vaccines by companies like Novavax.
Last month, the CDC also announced that they’re partnering with Walgreens to develop a test for bird flu in humans.
As their release says, the program wants to prepare for “the symptoms and risk factors for infection with H5N1 bird flu among higher-risk populations,” -- including dairy and poultry workers.
Bird flu promises us a pandemic as the incoming president makes plans to infuse our top healthcare institutions with an army of conspiracy theorists
that includes Janette Nesheiwat as surgeon general, a woman who has written about “miracles” in medicine and sells her own brand of sketchy diet pills.
https://www.the-sentinel-intelligence.com/p/everything-that-friend-wants-you-8b4?triedRedirect=true

2024-11-24 02:58:10 UTC

The common threads here are, unsurprisingly, transphobia and anti-immigrant sentiment, with a shot of "great replacement" conspiracy theorizing for good measure -- all in the name of Christian goodness
https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2024/11/19/inside-beehive