Open Thread February 6 2025

 Posted by at 6:06 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 062025
 

Yesterday, I got the results of my bone density test and was disappointed but not terrible surprised to learn I have osteoporosis. I have no symptoms, but I do have the early signs, such as loss of height. I’ve taken calcium religiously all of my adult life, which may have slowed it down some. I’m sure my new PCP and I can come up with something which will help. Off topic – the reason I had to so the blood draw at a place which was so hard for me to find was not that the place near me was booked up – it was because the place near me was closed for repairs. That lab expects to reopen well before the next blood draw I’m going to need in early April. (I already made the appointment for that one. Apparently hypo- and hyperthyroidism are related to osteoporosis. Who knew? Probably Nameless and possibly Dave, but anyone else would surprise me.)

From The 19th from Monday, but we have a whole month to reflect. And this is real stories from real people, which IMO is always refreshing even if not always victorious.

The link to Brennan Center should work. After I copied it, I tried it and it worked for me. But since it looks like a blanket link to the site, I’ll mention thet the name of the srticle I had in mind is “Breaking the Law” and that it’s in the category “Checks & Balances.”

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Open Thread February 3 2025

 Posted by at 6:06 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 032025
 

I’ve been sitting a few days on proposing a new word to describe the government this administration is doing its best to impose. It isn’t meritocracy – no one involved has the least bit of merit. Oligarchy is closer, but isn’t specific enough. I propose we call it leucandrocracy – rule by white males. Both racism and misogyny are openly vital elements of it, and this term reflects both. Sure, it’s the oligarchs who are being given official government roles. But without the support of white men with grievances, white men terrified of people of color and people of any gender identity other than theirs – whose fear has been transformed into rage, and the rage into hatred, the oligarchs would not be where they are. Perhaps Black History Month – for those of us who celebrate it, could be an opportunity to push this.

Robyn with Wonkette‘s headline asks one heck of a good question here. Another question might be, with ideas like theirs, are they actually even human, or are they demons in human form? She provides a trigger warning for one paragraph and rightly so.

In 1944, the CIA created a written guide for, among others, civilians in occupied territory whose sympathies were with our side – a manual on how to use little sabotages to weaken the Nazis (or other axis powers). This manual has recently gone viral. I checked three sites from which anyone who wants a copy can download it. It’s not very long, especially for a government publication. The one direct from the CIA is a 12-page pdf but most “pages” contain 2 pages of text. The one at Internet Archive is the same. Project Gutenberg is the one which gives you choices on how you want it to look, including Kindle. I generally go for plaintext to a “Notepad” file and then, if I want to keep it, into Word and play with the font and font sizes until I like the way it looks, but you do you.

As much as I would prefer to focus on Black History this month, this from Joyce Vance (and other sources) cannot be ignored. Not the actions of the Apricot Antichrist himself so much as the lack of outrage in response. I realize decent people are exhausted – I am too – but this is no time to sit on our hands. It was only huge public outrage which caused the rescission of the OMB freeze memo, and even then, it was only the memo, not the executive order behind it. I hope that by the time you read this there will have been more outrage. Heather Cox Richardson does too.

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Open Thread January 31 2025

 Posted by at 6:02 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jan 302025
 

As Nameless pointed out, I was raised by cats. Well, Katie Porter was raised by basset hounds. I know that because I’m on her mailing list and on Monday, she sent me puppy pix of Poppy, her (and her kids’) new basset hound. Sorry, you can’t see them unless I forward the email. And yesterday – y’all know that Ann Telnaes quit the Washington Post because Bezes would not print her cartoon of all the CEOS handing money bags to The Mango Mandarin. If he thought that was bad … I wonder what he would say to the new one at the bottom of this post (It’s very tall – scroll all the way down.)

Wonkette follows up on the Friday night purge (attempted) of Inspectors General. The letter is a pleasure to read.

This from Robert Hubbell aims to calm and to motivate at the same time. To do so, he quotes two experts with slightly different takes on what to do and where we go from where we are. No reason a person couldn’t pick and choose from both. (After these, he also has some news which may be old news now.) His “daily dose of perspective” photo is IMO the most beautiful one yet. But that may be just me.

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Open Thread January 28 2025

 Posted by at 6:11 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jan 282025
 

Yesterday, I had not only yesterday’s email to deal with, but also Sunday’s and about half of Saturdays still. So what did I do? I attempted to get my sewing machine working, of course. This took most of the day. I had not used it for so many years that I had forgotten how to thread it, both upper and lower. So I went to DuckDuckGo and at least has a stroke of luck with the results. My model number is 3577, and it wasn’t a very popular machine, so no search results showed it. One result showed 3537, and I thought, well, that’s close, maybe they’ll work alike, so I went to that page, by golly, the manual was written for both 3537 and 3577. So I now have a manual. But it then took some time to clean it up – and I didn’t stop to oil it, which I clearly should have. I was able to get two urgent repairs done, but not without breaking a needle, and all the rest will have to wait. And I still need to oil it – but at least this time I covered it. Also most of the email will have to wait.  I’ll do my best to at least

I don’t think Robert Reich says anything here that y’all don’t already know. It does provide evidence that we are not overreacting or imagining the horrors of this administration. They really are doing what the Apricot Antichrist said they would. And yet black people, women, Latinx people voted for him. Oh, and seniors too. And the price of insulin for one senior on Medicare had the price of a month’s supply of insulin go up by $772 from December to January (from DU)

As Heather Cox Richardson says, we have all earned a break from last week. Sadly, it’s a break we are not going to get, or not today. This is why I decided to do good-news-only Sundays – it’s the only way I can think of to give us all a tiny break. But this is Tuesday – so that’s over for this week. Instead, here’s news you’re going to need a break from.

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Open Thread January 26 2025

 Posted by at 6:02 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jan 262025
 

Yesterday, the radio opers was Verdi’s Aida, which may be the most performed opera which exists. Certainly it is at the Met, which means it’s had more performances than La Boheme or Carmen. This may be the first time in my life – I don’t remember any other – when I have heard the tenor sang his opening aria the way Verdi wanted it sung – the high note ending on a pianissimo floating away. From the time of Caruso (which is pretty close to the beginning of recorded sound), few tenors have been able to resist the temptation to hit it an hold it forte to show off the high note. The soprano, Angel Blue, reminded me of Leontyne Price in the role. The only other I’ve heard who was as good as those two in the role was Latonia Moore.  I believe there is exactly one race of humans and that is homo sapiens, so I don’t believe in radial memory.  But it is interesting that all three of those divas are African American

I think I have all good news today – Well, Belle’s may not be exactly good, but it is funny.

A few days old, but it is good news. Besides the speed of getting this into court, there’s a short preview of other court action to come. I’m also linking to Joyce Vance, who has some additional details on what actually happened in the courtroom.

This happened on Tuesday, but was published Wednesday. I just received the link yesterday from JL. As y’all know, I got a very late start yesterday – and had email left over from Friday -and had not found any other good news yet, so I’m using this. I do subscribe to Huff Post, but not to everything, just the “Fringe.”

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Open Thread January 25 2025

 Posted by at 4:16 pm  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jan 252025
 

Yesterday, before I could post, I attempted to restart my computer (because my browser kad kicked me out, and when it does that, it has a blackout on all my autofills, and I have to restart to get them back. But, instead of restarting, it gave me the “missing operating system” error. It'[s done that before, and if I leave it alone long enough, it usually eventually starts. I couldn’t start it last night, and I couldn’t restart it today until now. I occupied myself with untangling all the cords attached to it an/or accessories, figuring I would need help, though the help line was not open. After I made sure everything was plugged back in, I tried again and this time is stated. Since the sun hasn’t set yet, I’ just putting up what I had prepared, and then will start on tomorrow’s. Whew! Please send gratitude vibes to Nameless, who posted a reassurance, and to Trinette, who texted him so he knew to do so.

steveschmidt.substack.com/p/the-big-lie
I am as sure as I can be that there is no one who reads here who needs to read Steve Schmidt’s essay in order to understand where we are. I wish I could say the same of elected Democrats – but I can’t. I do note that a personal letter to an individual is not subject tp copyright law – you can quote the whole thing as long as it’s just in a private letter. Even if that person is an elected official. Just Sayin’.

https://robertreich.substack.com/p/what-you-can-do
On thie other side of the coin is this from Robert Reich. I live not in a city but in an unincorporated area, and I absolutely do not trust County officials. I leave my house only to see Virgil or for a medical appointment – neither are places I am likely to observe others’ unrestrained behavior. I have been boycotting X before it as X, and Amazon and Fox for years. There are better people out there – Penzey’s, for example. and everyone eats. Not everyone cooks, but Bill Penzey’s letters are worth the click. And who knows – you might find a product to try. And so on. Bottom line, all the advice is good, not all of is can follow it, those who can probably are already. But keep it in mind for sharing in case you are asked.

Belle Rosa Parks

Dog

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Open Thread January 23 2025

 Posted by at 6:02 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jan 232025
 

Yesterday, following a day of undeserved pardons (and commutations), a day which itself followed a few days of richly deserved pardons (and commutations), many not even reflecting any crime, but issued for protective purposes – The Huff Post Fringe had words. Also, this happened. The link is from The Root, but I’m sure others are not getting left out of the purge. Meanwhile, The Root compiled a list of what it describes as the Canteloupe Caligula’s “most worrisome” executive orders.

This is only the second article from the Contrarian, and it has already come a long way. It is a roughly 18 minute video, and it has CC, and it has a transcript for which you have several options, including saving as a PDF (which I did), saving as something else, printing (which should mean either to paper or to your hard drive or a thunb drive), and reloading. I did save it as a PDF, haven’t looked at it yet, but assume it’s more accurate than YouTube – not that that’s hard.) Mechanics aside, the episode is a “how did we get here” story which should frighten (but not, I hope, paralyze) you.

When I read this article from Steve Schmidt in situ, I also looked at one of the comments – the first one (I don’t know whether they change position as time passes, so I’ll add it was by Martin Dillon.) It ended with “Are there no Republicans that want to save this country?” My mental response to that was “Yes, there are, but few, if any, are in office, elected or appointed.” And that makes them difficult to find. Many have re-registerd as Independent or Unaffiliated. Don’t try to look for them in Congress or State legislatures. Look for them in your community. There are at least 3 Special Elections coming up, to replace Congressmen who have been appointed to some other position, and there are non profits who want to save democracy helping to fund Democratic candidates. That’a the place to start. And sooner than later.

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Open Thread January 21 2025

 Posted by at 5:53 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jan 212025
 

Yesterday – Protective pardons, political and family. Tangerine Palpatine orders executive shock and awe, and promises “Golden Age of America” (but I think he means “Gilded II.”) And all of that was before 4:00 pm EST. I signed petitions as many as possible, and skimmed through most of my email. I’m tired already. Even Axios is tired. They didn’t do a new email each time they sent an alert on TSF, just added to the story and updated the old one the earlier one. That’s why only one link for multiple headlines. Oh, and Ceclie Richards died. It was announced in the morning, so at least she escaped before the inauguration. But she’s a great loss.

ProPublica sent the newsletter including this link on Friday. But I figure since TSF was inaugurated just yesterday at noon, he only had a half day anyway, and then there are the inaugural balls. So the headline’s question will not have been answered yet.

This from The F* News, is a list of some of the Biden Administration’s achievements. It isn’t 27 pages long (I have one that is, although it’s somewhat double spaced -I would guess somewhere around 18-20 pages if all the extra spacing was removed; if anyone wants it as a PDF let me know) but is also offers some of the reasoning behind its choices, and sorts them into categories rather then just listing by date. So they both may be keepers.

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