{"id":56657,"date":"2025-04-25T06:00:11","date_gmt":"2025-04-25T13:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=56657"},"modified":"2025-04-24T17:19:29","modified_gmt":"2025-04-25T00:19:29","slug":"open-thread-april-25-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2025\/04\/25\/open-thread-april-25-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread April 25 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yesterday, Andy Borowitz<\/a> was “reporting straight news” again. I won’t say it made me smile, because it didn’t, but maybe it will someone. (And I can’t respond to his question. Free subscribers cannot comment at Substack unless the owner opens the comments to us, and the only one I’ve found so far that foes consistently is Wonkette. But, if I could answer, I’d say Kash Patel. Those eyes – he really looks the part.) Also yesterday, apparently DHS has posted Kilmar Abrego Garcia<\/a>‘s home address in Maryland, forcing his wife and kids to go into hiding.<\/p>\n

It took me a couple of days to get this posted. If anyone knows someone, or knows someone who knows someone else who is an illegally fired Federal Civil Servant, There is a nonprofit called “Work For America<\/a>” which has set up a program to help them find new jobs. Since this program is new, it’s difficult to check its bona fides. I would start by checking out the list of partners on their home page, none of which I recognize – but then I haven’t been looking for work since I retired either. I grant it sounds too good to be real, and I certainly wouldn’t send them any money without knowing more, but if it is legit it could be a needed lifeline for some very deserving people.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/19thnews.org\/2025\/04\/supreme-court-children-books-lgbtq-censorship\/
\nThis article from the 19th is a few days old – but the issue is not going away any time soon.0<\/p>\n

This article at Joyce Vance’s Civil Discourse<\/a> contains a video which was originally on the other guy’s site – which is why it sounds like Joyce is the guest – because she is. It’s not quite 40 minutes. I found it very listenable. There is stuff in it about their respective religious traditions, and it occurred to me I don’t think I have done this rant here before because I never thought it was needed, and it may not be needed here. So I’ll make it as brief as I can. At many liberal sites, especially those which encourage commenting, I see people all the time pontificating that “religion is the problem.” But, just as alcohol is not the problem in alcoholism, it is not religion which is the problem. It is the abuse and\/or misuse of religion which is the problem. (For some specialists in allergy and intolerance, alcoholism has been described as an “addictive allergy,” but I won’t push that metaphor now.) If you can tolerate them discussing what is good in their respective religious traditions, there’s a lot of good advice in the discussion. If not, there’s a short article to read.<\/p>\n

And this, also from Joyce Vance<\/a>, is bad news which we cannot afford to ignore. I’m not saying thet the Civil Rights Division eliminated the stacking of the deck against the most vulnerable, because that would have been impossible. But over the years it has done a great deal to alleviate that deck-stacking, and without it we will be in big trouble.<\/p>\n