Oct 082025
 

Yesterday, I was checking my yahoo email account and started with spam. I saw an email whose sender name started with “Department of G” – that was as much as I could see and I needed the magnifier to read it – which is why I went to tutamail in the first place. That turned out to be “Department of Government Efficiency” – but a hover showed it was actually from a gmail address. As if we didn’t have enough government reality to be suspicious of – now we need to watch for scams masquerading as official scams. In other news, you may remember that, of all people, MTG is on our side on releasing the Epstein files. Well, now she is also on our side about the shutdown. I don’t know if my brain can handle it. Also, there was a lot of news about MAGA freaking out about Bad Bunny being booked for the Super Bowl halftime show (Bad Bunny is an American citizen by birthright).

Several topics here, at The F*News: the first is on Judge Immergut (you gotta love her name – “Always good” in German), but then it goes into Social Security cuts (mine for this month is in my account as “pending.” On Wednesday, the “pending” will disappear and my balance will reflect it) and two more. Along the way, Jonathan does a little bragging, which I certainly would too for the achievements he cites.

This week the Supreme Court’s term begins, and they will start hearing arguments again. Joyce Vance has posted the full calendar, through June, of which days are argument days, and the first two weeks of which cases when. And there’s more. Also, from a different site which included Joyce Vance in a video, the Supreme Court heard arguments on but did not decide one case last term – Louisiana v. Callais – and will be hearing arguments again on Wednesday, October 15. Meanwhile, the Election Assistance Commission has a comment period open on this case. Why is this important? Because all we have left of the Voting Rights Act is Section 2 (the Court previously overturned Section 5). This case could overturn Section 2. The link for comments is here. I have put up a separate post with suggestions for comments, because I have no link to it. The to-and-fro directions below the comments section should direct you to it. Although arguments are October 15, you have till October 20 to comment.

Dan Froomkin has put a lot of thought into his premise here. I don’t think he is seeing ghosts. Robert Reich has similar, though not identical, thoughts as this map he drew suggests.

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Sep 162025
 

Yesterday, I really overslept. I’m not complaining – I do need that on Mondays as a rule to make up for sleep lost on the weekend. But it does mean I need to be savage with my inbox. Also yesterday – at one time there was a way to link an image to a website here – but that seems to have disappeared. I am concerned that, between its size and the elongation to images we are experiencing, the cartoon may not be legible – there’s so much in jt. So here’s a link where it can be read larger and in proportion.

Chris Bowers has established an Act Blue page addressed to the points he makes. I’m not intending to push that. What I take from this is, frankly, confirmation that, although we can now successfully elect women to the Senate and to be state Governors, even to be Vice President, we cannot yet elect a woman to be President. And, at least for a while, we should quit trying. Because we have only accomplished three things trying – we have ended one woman’s career and allowed her legacyto be tarnished, and we have damaged another woman’s career path (both outstanding women), and we have handed the country over to fascists. I am not saying there will never be a woman President (although I will not live to see one). I am saying we have done enough damage for a while and we need to rebuild the country first – and to work for changes which are not political but cultural in nature.

I confess I did not watch the video that Steve Schmidt included as evidence in this post. But I have no doubt Steve Schmidt has pretty much nailed it (except that I would say Miller is a full-sized Eichmann, not a little one any more.)

From Harry Litman of Talking Feds. Not so much about law as about history. It certainly clarifies the moment – although the moment is unquestionably a dark one.

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Jul 172025
 

Yesterday, I had a good night’s sleep the previous night. I suspect because, though heaven knows I have plenty of stuff to worry about, major changes in my medications aren’t among them. Also, this from John Pavlovitz caught my eye, and since it’s in the periphery of politics rather than being actually political, I decided to put it in as an extra. It just makes sense that authoritarian men (and women) are weak, since they need the assurance of authoritarian power. Egalitarians would naturally be stronger, because by definitions they (we) have faith in their (our) own judgment.

This from Lever News has a few popups, including, ironically, one for a popup blocker. But they all closed and I could read the whole article. However, I went to archive.is for those who don’t like popups – and, also ironically, the archived version has a frozen popup – it only hides most of the title and part of a photo, and the article is intact. Either should work.

This is from the “Wolves and Sheep” Substack, which is not part of but does have a relationship to Bowers News Media, to which I do subscribe. It doesn’t state much, if anything, which isn’t obvious if you think about it. But who has time to think in this chaos? And there’s alwaus a need for Captain Obvious, because the obvious, exactly because it is obvious, can be difficult to see as obvious, as opposed to being a given (and therefore safe to ignore.) I for one am grateful that someone – someone on our side – is not ignoring it.

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Jan 142025
 

Yesterday, it occurred to me that the name Zuckerberg – with just a little bit of license – translates to “Big Rock Candy Mountain.” I couldn’t even begin to count the possible disrespectful jokes that could be gotten out of that. Also yesterday, the story which was yanked last week did get published, and I went to the new link, and it is working. Here it is. You can see why I jumped to the conclusion I did. It’s very frank.

The Reich on the left is right again. I, and progressives and liberals I am aware of, generally have positive impressions of universities, nonprofits, and labor unions. The media is in a different position. But allowing media, however imperfect, to be destroyed by The new administration’s lawsuits and other attacks is not the solution. And that goes multiple times for small and independent media, who are as much more likely to promote truth as they are to come under attack. I know I probably sound like an obsolete “broken record,” but go over to Substack, see the many people who are posting there, and if you find someone or some two or so whom you respect (and preferably whom I am not regularly citing, to broaden yourself,) sign up for a free subscription. That costs nothing but time – and knowledge is priceless.

(Edited just before midnight to add link to Jack Smith’s Volume #1 (Jan 6)

Robert Hubbell debunks all the lies being pushed by MAGA about the Los Angeles wildfire(s). Unfortunately, the LA Times, now MAGA-billionaire-owned, is widely spreading them anyway. Was it Mark Twain who said “a lie can get halfway around the world wile truth is still putting its pants on”? Or is he just one of the many to whom it has been mis-attributed? Also, you might appreciate, if you have any past or present connection to California, his next rant is here.

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Nov 192024
 

Yesterday, I was stressed out by the feeling that everything I did or wanted to do was fighting with me. So I’ll likely be brief in my comments on the articles I post. Honestly, I just feel exhausted.

https://robertreich.substack.com/p/trumps-first-buddy-is-in-deep-shit
Robert Reich reports Elno is calling himself’ Trump**’s “first buddy.” Without comment on intellectual intelligence which Elno may or may not possess, it’s been clear for some time that his EQ (Emotional intelligence quotient) is a single digit.

https://joycevance.substack.com/p/the-democracy-index
Joyce Vance lays out how she plans to chronicle this Trump** administration (differently from the wayshe did so last time) in hope of minimizing distractions. I’m not sure she realizes that it’s not just the media, or MAGA, or Putin, who are actively working to distract us. When I dug out the Windows 10 laptop earlier ths year, and again when I dug out the Windows 10 desktop, I literally spent over a week on each one just uninstalling distractions. And I have not yet finished on either – I just got to a point where I could cope. But now both are getting worse. Please note too that uninstalling some of this is in no way obvious -but the amount of links providing instructions on how to do so (not all of which even work, which is part of the issue) suggests that I am far from alone in not wanting to be distracted by crap I will never use.

Belle 4 Tuesday

Cat

 

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Nov 092024
 

Yesterday, hoo boy, did I ever wake up from a strange dream. It startes with my preparing to teach some kids how to adapt and bake an adapted cookie recipe. Tere were actually several dozen kids, 5th-7th grade, in the class, but I was one of many teachers, so no one of us was dealing with more than 5 or 8. I prepared by actually baking different adaptaions, and making printouts of the one I considered the best. No one else had done this, so I ran horribly short of printouts, and all the kids had attitudes. Afterwards, the supervisor of all the teachers asked me to deliver an object for him and i agreed. It was to a place somethng like Chaco Canyon, though I have never actually been there. When I delivered it, the recipient asked me to deliver a different object to someone else. In fact, everywhere I went, everyone to whom I delivered somethng had something else for me to deliver to someone else. Some of these people were children and young adults, but some were much older. Some were lovers separated by circumstance. There were various ethnic and lingual groups represented, and multi talents. Most of the spaces were kind of wilderness, but one thing I was asked to deliver was to a college to which the asker had applied, and that was in a small city. Among the people I delvered to were a little girl who said she wanted to be President when she grew up, and a little boy who said he wanted to be President now. At the very end, the person I was delivering to was not there, and an elderly lady said she would deliver it, so I gave it to her and returned to the supervisor who has started the chain, who picked up a small rifle and shot the person standing behind me, who turned out to be the elderly lady from my last stop, who had been aiming at my back with a bow and arrow. That was when i realized that the stuff I had been delivering was not just stuff, but objects of great spiritual significance and power, and I was returning them to their rightful owners, and I was doing so on behalf of a resistance movement. If I could remember (or reinvent) all the details, it would make a great fantasy novel. I would love it if Margaret Atwood would do so – wry humor was prominent among the wide range of emotions in it. But if anyone wants to tackle it,I would not dream of claiming copyright for a dream (pun intended.) I actually have been working on a cookie recipe IRL – maybe I will have managed to bake something by today.

Talking Points Memo Wednesday morning listed a whole lot of catatrophoc stuff which we wll knew was comng – but there was just so much of it, it’ barely possible to hold it all in mins at one time. So, in case anyone forgot anything, here is it. Yea, I held it a couple of days. Including from myself. I can only take so much.

I realize I am in no danger of being raped by Nick Fuentes, for a large number of reasons (or at least not sexually – financially is another matter). But the mere thought of it is enough to make me start thinking anout mixing a potassium cyanide-grapefruit juice cocktail. I actually anticipate seeing the suicide rate among women of all ages skyrocket in the near future.

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Nov 052024
 

Yesterday, I learned that Kamala Harris had appeared on Saturday Night Live’s cold open along with Maya Rudolph. (Yeah, even with the extra hour, I didn’t get through Sunday’s emails on Sunday.) Mitch, sweetie that he is, had sent me a link to the NYTimes article on it, which I did archive, but frankly I don’t much care what the NYTimes has to say about anything any more. So here’s a link to the Cold Open on YouTube. Also yesterday I learned that Quincy Jones died Sunday – and I might not have learned that without subscribibg to The Root’s free enail newsletter, so much has the election sucked the life out of all other news (although in the evening I did hear about it on CPR Classical.)

Heather Cox Richarddson has just returned fro a thirteen month book tour, and is admittedly exhausted. But, while o tour, everywhere she went she was asked the same question – to wit, how she managed to maihtain hope in the face of – well, everything. this is her answer. I’m not adding a tissue alert – I needed one, but I think that’s at least in large part because I’m low on antidepressant just now – and I don’t see this history being taught in red states any time soon. But the history itself is filled with hope.

Joyce Vance’s “The Week Ahead” (also from Sunday evening) may not be as radiantly hopeful as Cox Rixhardson, but it is full if information which should not be missed. What we don’t know about, we cannot defend against. And it’s not all bad. There’s some good news also. (And did you know that chickens can purr? The previous day’s column even had a short video with sound which proves it. I am speechless.)

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Jul 312024
 

Yesterday, I came across a short post sharing that MSNBC had shown an image of JD Vance over the chron “Look what the cat dragged in.” That gave me a smile. I also attempted making cookies, oatmeal raisin, with a non-wheat flour. I knew I would need more liquid than I normally use on account of the oatmeal (I used instant) but I overdid it a little. So they look odd. But they taste alright.

It may have been done before – but I have not seen this quote about fascism applied to democracy (don’t worry, it’s not negative) in this way – particularly combined with the concept that it happens a lot, in and outside of government in both small and large ways.

(non-paywall link) I don’t know how Rolling Stone does it – but so many scoops that are truly significant seem to start there. The New Yorker used to do that, with reporters like David Remnick and Ronan Farrow, but I’ve lost confidence in them. This story, of course, we’ve known what seems like forever – at least in the general outlines – but the details are now included.

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