From downstairs:
re: #288 steve_davis
even more mind blowing is that burgess was probably 60 when he did that, and then he lived another 60 years.
He lived to be 89; he died back in 1997, as I recall, just shy of 90 years old.
My CL’d.
re: #295 Nerdy Fish
They weren’t the most intelligent bunch, that’s for sure.
Intelligence is unmanly!
Amazing
I can confirm that even faculty IDs are deactivated at Columbia today, and that it is impossible to access the buildings without security escort.
— Howard French (@hofrench.bsky.social) 2024-04-21T16:22:05.828Z
Trump is violating the gag order again, posting a Fox News interview of his former attorney Jim Trusty attacking the jurors.
re: #3 goddamnedfrank
More:
Reposting with alt text
— Breen says Read “Border and Rule” (@acab.dad) 2024-04-21T15:19:56.147Z
re: #4 jaunte
Trump is violating the gag order again, posting a Fox News interview of his former attorney Jim Trusty attacking the jurors.
Throw his fat fucking orange ass in jail.
It’s a death cult.
— Charles Johnson (@charles.littlegreenfootballs.com) 2024-04-21T17:50:53.000Z
reposted from below:
re: #286 Romantic Heretic
re: #218 Patricia Kayden
An abortion rights group, Coloradans for Reproductive Freedom, appears to have been more successful in its signature collection efforts. It hopes to put a constitutional amendment enshrining the right to an abortion on the ballot and submitted 230,000 signatures to the secretary of state’s office on Thursday. The group’s signatures must now be validated by the secretary of state.
In the words of Han Solo, “Well, that’s the tricky part, isn’t it?”
Maybe not so tricky: Colorado’s SoS, Jena Griswold seems to be a good Democrat, so the likelihood of her office trying to slow-walk or scuttle an abortion-rights amendment seems fairly low.
re: #7 Charles Johnson
Drs Salk and Sabin must be rolling in their graves.
These Trump supporters lack the ability to follow their own ‘reasoning’ past one or two followup questions.
Let me introduce you to Skaly and their jewelry store. Skaly is a lovely young non-binary person who makes exquisite and affordable jewelry for gifts to give loved ones and yourself.
re: #1 Dr Lizardo
From downstairs:
He lived to be 89; he died back in 1997, as I recall, just shy of 90 years old.
Yeah, I’d actually thought he’d made it to 100 just because I remembered him playing one of the lead’s dads in Grumpy Old Men and that just doesn’t seem like a movie from that long ago. Apparently it was!
CLed
re: #197 Nerdy Fish
I’m gathering that I got insanely lucky with my birdle.
Grrrr. And good job. I had four guesses and still failed. Looking back (hingsight blah, blah) and it should have been more obvious.
This defiant Ukrainian general has no smile — and surprising remarks on Trump
wapo.st (gift link)
KYIV — Lt. Gen. Kyrylo Budanov’s glowering face is barely visible in the half-light of his office. He likes to work in the dark, as befits the chief of Ukraine’s military intelligence service, the GUR. Behind him in the gray gloom, you can see a painting of a giant owl, the symbol of his service, savagely devouring a bat that is the motif of its Russian counterpart.
Budanov is the dark prince of the Ukraine war. His drop-dead stare has become an icon for Ukrainians — a symbol of bravery and defiance in this third year of conflict with Russia. Ukraine’s NV news outlet calls him the man “without a smile.” A meme that circulates on the internet shows nine identical pictures of his scowling face, labeled “happy,” “angry,” “troubled,” “excited” and so on.
Budanov spoke with me for 90 minutes last month in his forbidding office on what Ukrainians call “the Island,” a derelict string of buildings on a peninsula on the Dnieper River. He was, as always, the voice of resistance — promising to take the fight into Russia with drones and special operations, confirming reports that he’s battling with Wagner mercenaries in Africa and scoffing at a Korea-style negotiated settlement.
re: #7 Charles Johnson
The rethuglican party really is a death cult.
I noticed in the last thread there was a post about Colorado anti-abortion fanatics trying and failing to get an allegedly “pro-life” amendment on the ballot. The sponsors whined:
In a press release, the Colorado Life Initiative blamed abortion opponents they deemed “ProLife In Name Only” — even calling them “PLINOs” — as well as insufficient publicity and recruitment for its failure to obtain enough valid signatures.
What this didn’t go into is that the “pro-lifers” are tearing themselves apart in the wake of Dobbs. The “professional pro-lifers” never really had an actual plan for a post-Roe overturn world. And yet there are people to the right of them who want to go further. It’s not enough for this particular group of bozos that abortion is banned. It’s not even enough that maybe doctors get prosecuted. Why no, these “abortion abolitionists” want to execute women who obtain abortions. You can see these guys (and they’re almost always guys) on Twitter, they have a tree and an axe next to their names, if you can’t figure out their garbage from their tweets. And yeah, they’re the kind of people who would spit “PLINO” at some pro-lifer who doesn’t want to prosecute doctors and women.
So yeah, just be aware of this, the pro-life movement is like the dog that caught the car, and now a whole pack of dogs are trying to decide what to do with said car, but none of them can drive the car.
Time to call it a day. Have a good one, Lizards and stay healthy. And remember, it’s Monday tomorrow. No one likes Mondays.
But you know really doesn’t like Mondays? Donald Trump. He’s really gonna be hating Mondays, at least for the next few weeks.
And you can be happy in the knowledge that no matter how lousy the week ahead might be, at least it’s likely not going to be as Donald Trump’s week ahead.
re: #20 A Cranky One
Taking that literally I see.
re: #20 A Cranky One
This recalls for me Jot’s childhood anxiety about Watching For Ice On Bridge.
Remarque in the Archival Press edition of THE VANISHING TOWER by Michael Moorcock.
— Michael Whelan (@michaelwhelan.bsky.social) 2024-04-21T16:16:33.561Z
From downstairs
A reminder that the people saying “what about Americans” are the same folks who vote no on free lunch for hungry kids.
They don’t care about Americans. It’s just a shell game to them. The truth is, they don’t care about other people, regardless of who they are. https://t.co/oYajY02Evy— RandomWhiteGuy📖 Heretic & Disheveled Misfit (@TheReelRandom) April 21, 2024
Ok ill bite.
how should we spend that $60bn specifically to help people in need in this country?
Tax cuts/tax reduction is not an answer.
Come at me with that “Biden and Trump are the same” bone-headed nonsense and I will block your irrational ass immediately.
I’m so done with that bullshit.
— Charles Johnson (@charles.littlegreenfootballs.com) 2024-04-21T19:10:36.000Z
re: #28 Charles Johnson
No they are not the same and I rather have Joe as President.
re: #14 steve_davis
Yeah, I’d actually thought he’d made it to 100 just because I remembered him playing one of the lead’s dads in Grumpy Old Men and that just doesn’t seem like a movie from that long ago. Apparently it was!
60+60=120 years old
I thought it was a joke
re: #30 A Cranky One
Redbud? Ours haven’t started yet. Gorgeous.
I’ve rewritten the Bluesky embed code to make it work a bit smoother, and also to add a callback routine when all rendering is finished, so dynamic elements can be re-centered.
re: #32 Colère Tueur de Lapin ✅
Yup. Wanted to catch a photo before it fully changed color.
Republican Congressman Gonzales: I serve with some real scumbags. Matt Gaetz, he paid minors to have sex with him at drug parties. pic.twitter.com/rPlSsvPH6k
— Adam Parkhomenko (@AdamParkhomenko) April 21, 2024
There once was a beast with orange skin
Who trashed all the laws just to win.
But the court wouldn’t budge
And sayeth the judge:
“The bastard is guilty as sin.”— Steve S (@eclecticcyborg.bsky.social) 2024-04-21T19:29:36.272Z
re: #30 A Cranky One
Yard is waking up.
[Embedded content]
That’s gorgeous. For my sins, nature has sentenced me to at least 4 hours of yard labor today.
1. “RFK Jr.’s support draws more from Trump than Biden. Though the CW is that Kennedy is a bigger threat to Biden than to Trump, …”2. … There’s a difference between what voters identify as the ‘most important issue facing the country’ (on that, “inflation and the cost of living’ registers 23%, followed by immigration/the border, at 22%) and what they identify as the issue most important in determining their own vote (on that, ‘protecting democracy or constitutional rights’ was on top with 28%, followed by immigration/the border at 20% and abortion at 19%).”
Remarque in the Archival Press edition of THE VANISHING TOWER by Michael Moorcock.
— Michael Whelan (@michaelwhelan.bsky.social) 2024-04-21T16:16:33.561Z
re: #18 mmmirele
So yeah, just be aware of this, the pro-life movement is like the dog that caught the car, and now a whole pack of dogs are trying to decide what to do with said car, but none of them can drive the car.
And in the absence of a consensus decision, “killing and eating the driver” seems to have emerged as the default strategy.
re: #39 Dangerman
But the issue depends on individual states. It doesn’t matter in a state that is solidly red or blue — but it can be deadly in a swing state. So you have to look at state-by-state statistics. It’s similar to 2016: Hillary got more votes overall but in individual states, the third party cost her enough votes to swing the election to Trump.
re: #42 Hecuba’s daughter
Not the time to get comfortable. Foot on the gas until it’s over.
Remarque in the Archival Press edition of THE VANISHING TOWER by Michael Moorcock.
— Michael Whelan (@michaelwhelan.bsky.social) 2024-04-21T16:16:33.561Z
Sorry for repeated posts - testing something.
re: #48 Eclectic Cyborg
The judge will really love that one.
re: #40 Charles Johnson
[Embedded content]
Elric was my first encounter with an adult fantasy anti-hero. I loved the series, even with its religious / magic overtones, and “superior race” undertones; & without it I would not have kept reading fantasy long enough to find Zelazny, Tolkien, Howard, and others.
re: #48 Eclectic Cyborg
TESTIFY, COWARD! STOP HIDING BEHIND YOUR “ATTORNEY’S ADVICE.”
re: #48 Eclectic Cyborg
[Embedded content]
This should go over well with Judge Merchan.
/
“If democracy can’t withstand me getting a few jurors killed is it really worth saving?”
Maybe Democratic party women should start daring Trump to testify.
re: #39 Dangerman
when they say “constitutional rights” I wonder if they’re not looking at the abstract at all, they’re thinking particularly about either abortion or the right to protest.
re: #7 Charles Johnson
[Embedded content]
The mind boggles at the utter idiocy that is today’s GOP. We should be prepared for when the loonies start calling for leeches and blood letting.
re: #4 jaunte
Trump is violating the gag order again, posting a Fox News interview of his former attorney Jim Trusty attacking the jurors.
He gets off on doing this, and shoving it right in the judge’s face, knowing it’s unlikely they’ll take any real action to stop him.
He’s always done his crimes right out in the open for this reason.
re: #58 Charles Johnson
Tuesday will be interesting
the two genders
— Marisa Kabas (@marisakabas.bsky.social) 2024-04-21T20:14:53.639Z
Obviously this asshole didn’t put his brain in gear and game out the consequences!
Arizona House Speaker finds himself in eye of abortion-rights tornado
Arizona state House Speaker Ben Toma (R) is facing a reckoning as he tries to navigate the fallout from Arizona’s Supreme Court decision enforcing an 1864 abortion ban.
Since the decision last week, Toma has twice helped block House Democrats’ efforts to repeal the ban on procedural grounds.
Toma is facing pressure from national Republicans, including former President Trump and Kari Lake, who want to see the Civil War-era ban repealed, which would then reinstate a 15-week ban passed in 2022.
But Toma is also running for Congress in a crowded Republican primary, where voters and anti-abortion groups are not likely to reward him for compromising in favor of a less restrictive abortion ban.
Like many other conservatives across the country, Toma and the Republicans in Arizona’s Legislature have long believed abortion was immoral and should be banned. Yet, the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade has showcased how the issue can be a nuanced one for Republicans and Democrats alike.
Last year, Toma defended the 1864 law in an amicus brief to the state Supreme Court.
But those beliefs are now running into the political reality that there is no safe position for Republicans to take on abortion. The backlash against the territorial ban could upend conservative majorities in the state and hurt Trump’s campaign in the crucial swing state.
Looks like Mr. Speaker is in a lose-lose situation!
I had a very surreal dream last night. Trump was found guilty in the hush money trial and was sentenced to Rikers for three years. There was a documentary crew following him as he was getting processed into prison. I have no idea what this next part means….. But prisoners who were guilty of either white collar crime or pedophilia were forced to wear a fanny pack so they would stand out. Lol.
The last part I remember: he was handcuffed, like a Daisy chain, to 10 prisoners who were all singled for drug testing.
Any dream Interpretation experts?
From Amy Siskind on FB on the movements of Truth Social stock. Apologies if a similar explanation was posted previously:
I’ve been meaning to write a primer about why Trump Social dropped like a stone to roughly $22/share, then rebounded to $36 on Friday with no improvement in financial results or prospects.
Basically there was a massive short squeeze. Let me explain.
Shorting stock is making a bet that it will go down. Instead of buying it, you sell it at a price without owning it. In most cases, you get charged by a broker for borrowing the underlying stock. If a short is very popular, that cost can be high.
Trump came out blazing midweek, saying there was naked short sellers. That means people sold stock without borrowing the underlying stock. Trump owns 60% of stock outstanding. He said he would not lend out his share and encouraged his followers to do the same. This immediately caused shares to get called in, and short covering - meaning short sellers being forced to cover their bet by buying stock (hence forced buying and price goes up).
But here’s the other rub: it is NOT illegal to naked short. The SEC notes on its website that naked short selling is not “not necessarily a violation of the federal securities laws” unless it is being intentionally deployed to manipulate the market.
By Friday, the genius CEO Devin Nunes was claiming market manipulation (without grounds).
Bottom line: this stock will find its value once the dusk clears. And that is lower. But it will take some time since Trump controls 60% of the float.Hope this makes sense. Will try to answer your questions as time allows.
Jen Sorensen @jensorensen.bsky.social
A bill in Louisiana, HB 777, would make it a crime for librarians to use public funds to join the American Librarian Association or attend an ALA conference, punishable with prison time and hard labor for up to two years.
“…House Bill 777 by Rep. Kellee Dickerson, R-Denham Springs, would prohibit any public employee from spending public funds with the American Library Association. Anyone who does would be subject to up to two years in prison or a fine of up to $1,000.
The bill would force public libraries, including parish and university libraries, to sever their memberships with the association and would prohibit libraries from sending their librarians to ALA conferences and other continuing education events.
Dickerson said in an interview she filed the bill because she wants money to be spent locally, rather than with a national organization.
The villainization of the American Library Association is something that perplexes most librarians.
“I’m not sure exactly what these people think go on at ALA conferences,” Suzanne Stauffer, an LSU library and information science professor said in an interview. “It’s workshops about how to better meet the needs of their community.”
lailluminator.com
Hey America, great job making one of the most flagrant great replacement theory spreading antisemites in the US Congress the arbiter of who is and is not an antisemite. Fucking amazing work, no notes.
Rep. Elise Stefanik has called on Columbia University President Minouche Shafik to resign immediately and the board of trustees to appoint someone “who will protect Jewish students and enforce school policies”
— Phil Lewis (@phillewis.bsky.social) 2024-04-21T21:21:16.182Z
re: #65 jaunte
Hannah @hrolf.bsky.social
*[Embedded content]
“I’d like to share the word of our lord and savior, Jesus Christ…”
re: #71 goddamnedfrank
Hmm. Looks like the Bluesky devs still need to tweak some of their CSS settings in embedded posts. The container is set to max-width 600px, but the image is wider than that.
re: #127 Patricia Kayden
I had forgotten all about Post.
re: #46 Backwoods Sleuth
An important bit of context that’s being elided is that what’s happening outside Columbia U is a situation almost entirely created by the administration’s draconian response to the peaceful protests inside the campus gates.
This is truly horrifying. It is important to note the clear difference between the peaceful demonstration I saw *inside* the gates of Columbia on Thursday and the huge protests *outside* those gates now. But I also note there was basically no one protesting outside until Shafik called the NYPD.
— Lydia Polgreen (@polgreen.bsky.social) 2024-04-21T15:23:41.799Z
I saw maybe two dozen people outside the university gates on Thursday before the cops cleared the quad. Now there appear to be many, many more, though I have not been back uptown to see with my own eyes. What is clear is that university leaders escalated this situation.
— Lydia Polgreen (@polgreen.bsky.social) 2024-04-21T15:27:35.713Z
Series of tweets about Columbia from an NBC News reporter.
— Mark Harris (@markharris.bsky.social) 2024-04-21T21:58:10.931Z
oops - misposted downstairs
re: #13 silverdolphin
Maybe but there are also 5 jurors who are either lawyers or have family members who are lawyers. They might be able to keep the jury from running away. They might also be able to tell a judge that a juror lied to get on the jury and get an alternate to replace.
(Ianal) you have to negotiate in the jury room in good faith. You can’t just sit there with your arms folded and say not gonna convict no matter what no way no how.
You have to be reasonably intelligent to pull that off without tipping your hand to your real motive
re: #58 Charles Johnson
He gets off on doing this, and shoving it right in the judge’s face, knowing it’s unlikely they’ll take any real action to stop him.
He’s always done his crimes right out in the open for this reason.
I think I read yesterday that in NY there are only two options re the gag order:
-$1000 per violation
- jail
There is no middle ground
No creativity
No other penalty
re: #77 Dangerman
I think I read yesterday that in NY there are only two options are the gag order:
-$1000 per violation
- jailThere is no middle ground
No creativity
No other penalty
I think jail might be the more effective deterrent.
re: #67 Hecuba’s daughter
From Amy Siskind on FB on the movements of Truth Social stock. Apologies if a similar explanation was posted previously:
[Embedded content]
I hate inconsistent spell check
“Once the dusk clears”
re: #78 darthstar
I think jail might be the more effective deterrent.
I don’t know.
$1000 might just break him…
re: #77 Dangerman
I think I read yesterday that in NY there are only two options are the gag order:
-$1000 per violation
- jailThere is no middle ground
No creativity
No other penalty
No way to up the fine for the violations? Maybe 100,000 per violation would attract his attention. It’s ridiculous that a supposed “billionaire” and a defendant with no assets have the same penalty.
re: #70 jaunte
People might learn Republicans are evil.
re: #79 Dangerman
I hate inconsistent spell check
“Once the dusk clears”
not a spell check issue — given “dusk” is a real word — seeing a wrong word in context requires a more sophisticated algorithm. They can do some of that — but it’s not perfect detection.
re: #81 Hecuba’s daughter
No way to up the fine for the violations? Maybe 100,000 per violation would attract his attention. It’s ridiculous that a supposed “billionaire” and a defendant with no assets have the same penalty.
In some countries penalties are based on income. There was a story about a guy getting a 6 figure speeding ticket.
re: #85 JC1
In some countries penalties are based on income. There was a story about a guy getting a 6 figure speeding ticket.
Now that’s a fucking brilliant idea.
Mmf, looks like Bluesky is limiting us again. I contacted them about it, haven’t heard back yet.
Putting a rate limit on embedded posts seems like a bad idea. Not even Twitter does that.
re: #88 Charles Johnson
So, cool it on the embeds for now?
.@SpeakerJohnson repeatedly met w/ Christians from Ukraine and was moved. Russia intentionally persecutes evangelicals in occupied Ukraine. Here he met with leaders of evangelical denominations and executive secretary of the conservative movement of Ukraine Pavlo Unguryan pic.twitter.com/hXT9LvsDBz
— Melinda Haring (@melindaharing) April 21, 2024
This probably had a lot to do with little Mikey finally doing his job. The Russians have been persecuting, arresting, beating up, and worse the evangelicals in Russia and occupied Ukraine, because they’re not Orthodox. This looks like it ended up being a monstrously stupid thing to do just for this reason, but the RU army is either too ignorant or too undisciplined (or porque no los dos) to actually stop themselves.
re: #93 Backwoods Sleuth
fart magic…
[Embedded content]
🎶Got a fart magic
fart magic
Oh, what a fart magic
Oh, it’s a fart magic 🎶
re: #85 JC1
In some countries penalties are based on income. There was a story about a guy getting a 6 figure speeding ticket.
Wasn’t that in Finland?
And the speeder was some wealthy techbro, with an income up in the “GDP-of-some countries” level, so had to pay 0.0X of his income as a fine?
I would like to wish all of my fellow Jewish Lizards and those who celebrate the holiday a Happy Passover.