Yup. Just Like, “Look What You Made Me Do.”

Grok … ?

Bill Nye, The Science Guy!

Science Nerds Demand America’s New God-King Give Back Their Lunch And Cancer-Research Money by Rebecca Schoenkopf

On Friday, nerds all over the US staged rallies to protest the Trump administration’s cuts to federal funding research. Thousands rallied on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC to plead about the benefits of funding science and research in the knowns, known-unknowns, and unknown-unknowns.

Like so many DC rallies before it, the steps of the Lincoln Memorial were transformed into a temporary stage. There wasn’t a big, black riser with rows of cameras and media crews. There weren’t throngs of journalists roaming around and shoving microphones in the faces of flag waving attendees. The crowd didn’t have any kind of uniform apparel, like colored hats and/or armbands.

With a few exceptions, like Bill Nye the Science Guy, and patients who owe their lives to federally funded medical research, a number of speakers were fairly boring. They stood awkwardly at podium and told corny jokes that fell flat. At one point, some of the older folks sang out-of-tune folk songs.

These were scientists. They proudly identify as nerds. They’ve dedicated their careers to saving lives and the planet we’ve all been mucking up for generations. And now many of them were facing unemployment because a merry band of bigots, buffoons, and bros decided science is, like, queer, or whatever.

People in the crowd cheered on speakers — their colleagues and fellow researchers — who lamented the loss of funding that didn’t just help find cures for cancers and disease, create new technologies, or reveal secrets of the universe; they were pissed there was no money for things like coolant used in specialized freezers that preserve decades of biological specimens.

Dr. Allison Agawu speaks to people protesting the Trump administration’s federal funding cuts during the Stand-Up for Science Rally in Washington DC, Friday, March 7, 2025. Photo by Dominic Gwinn.

“This will lead to more deaths,” summarized Dr. Allison Agawu, Professor of Adult and Pediatric Infectious Diseases at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. “Science is a beautiful art built on a canvas of ideas. The best science comes from diverse ideas, from diverse people with diverse perspectives, spurring innovation and progress … We collectively reject that inclusion, diversity, equity and access are bad words. In fact, programs championing these ideals should be celebrated and expanded, as that is how we get the best science and the best outcomes.”

A retired mathematician from the National Security Agency explained that it could be difficult for people to understand why research jobs were important. Not everything can be easily described in an elevator pitch. “Are there places we could cut,” they said, “Sure, but people just don’t understand what we do. We can’t talk about it. I know my work saved lives.”

Lloyd Franklin, 64, stood at the front of the stage wearing a blue NASA jacket. He is a retired aerospace engineer who, like many kids, grew up wanting to be an astronaut. He held a sign with a photo of Apollo astronaut Gene Cernan from 1972. Cernan is taking a selfie while holding the American flag as the Earth, a pale blue dot, floats in over his shoulder. It was the last time humans walked on the Moon.

Above the photo on Franklin’s sign were the words: “Science gave us this.”

“I know this is important,” Franklin said. “I know we have to make a stand.”

Lloyd Franklin, 64, protests the Trump administration’s federal funding cuts during the Stand-Up for Science Rally in Washington DC, Friday, March 7, 2025. Photo by Dominic Gwinn.

These types of protests have been happening almost daily over the last few weeks. Much of this is being carried out by federal workers themselves through private, encrypted chats and public message boards. Mustering a sizable crowd on short notice in the middle of the week in DC can be a Herculean task, but they have been showing up to protest regularly since congressional Republicans turned a blind-eye to Donald Trump’s sweeping cuts to federal agencies.

If they get any media attention, it’s from struggling freelancers or niche bloggers. National broadcasters or their local affiliates are not really showing up to show hundreds of federal workers protesting on the evening news. There’s a massacre being carried out in broad daylight and the pathetic reality is that much of the DC press corps is either too scared to do their jobs, or they just don’t care.

“It’s bad optics,” a colleague said.

Two From Clay Jones

Enola Macho by Clay Jones

Ooh, yeah Read on Substack

The Pentagon is conducting a DEI (diversity, equity, inclusiveness) purge, and one of the victims is the plane, Enola Gay. Trust me, there’s nothing further from Woke than dropping an atomic bomb on a city full of non-white foreigners.

The Trump administration (sic) is making me suffer from an overload of stupidity.

The Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, sent a directive last week for the Pentagon to “remove all DoD news and feature articles, photos, and videos that promote Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion,” citing one of Trump’s idiotic executive orders.

This doesn’t just include the Enola Gay, but over 26,000 images in the military database across each branch. One anonymous source said the purge could delete as many as 100,000 images and posts in total.

Some of these include the first Black military pilots and mentions of commemorative months, including Women’s History Month and others associated with Hispanics and Pacific Islanders. Anyone with the last name “Gay” is being deleted, along with a Corps of Engineers project on fish because it mentioned gender. But then again, maybe these are gay fish. We already found out how the Trump administration (sic) feels about fish.

These are mistakes, though, right? RIGHT?

Pentagon spokesperson John Ullyot told the Associated Press (despite the fact the outlet won’t use the name “Gulf of America) that the department is “pleased by the rapid compliance across the Department with the directive removing DEI content,” clarifying if “content is removed that is out of the clearly outlined scope of the directive, we instruct components accordingly.” Clearly? Are you sure, Mr. Ullyot?

That means they’ll fix it, right? RIGHT? It’s not clear. (snip-MORE, and it’s choice!)

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Elon Cuts in the Burg by Clay Jones

DOGE eliminates local IRS office Read on Substack

This cartoon was drawn for The Fredericksburg Advance.

When I sent this to one of my proofers, she didn’t know there is an IRS office in Fredericksburg, at least for now.

You may think, “Good. Fuck the IRS and delete all those offices.” But when you’re having tax issues, it’s much better to deal with them in person. I used the local office once about two decades ago, and my issue was worked out.

Think of it like a city bus. If you drive, you don’t plan to ever take the bus, but you’re glad your town has buses just in case. This isn’t a good analogy for me because I use the local bus all the time.

But yeah, a lot of IRS offices are on Elon’s list, and Fredericksburg’s is one of them. According to the DOGE website, the lease for the 6,162-square foot office space will be terminated as part of a “mass modification” of government contracts.

The website states that the lease costs $153,000 per year and that terminating it will save $395,504, but the website does not provide a source for that information. I also wonder how much of that lease has already been paid. Elon has boasted about saving money by cutting government contracts that have already been paid. He’s an idiot.

I don’t know how long the office will be there, but in case you need it now, it’s located on the fourth floor of 1320 Central Park Boulevard. I hope something else comes up and it’s saved, like a court order.

Neither Elon nor DOGE has legal authority to make cuts. This is something MAGAts and a LOT of Republicans keep ignoring. DOGE operates outside of the three branches of government and ignores the other three.

DOGE is making cuts without transparency or oversight from the three branches. Many of these cuts are being made from the recent Nazi college grads Elon has hired without any oversight, even from Elon.

As Harry would say in Resident Alien, this is some bullshit.

According to the Advance, other Virginia leases targeted for termination are the Office of U.S. Attorneys, the Animal and Plant Health Inspection office, and the Geological Survey office in Richmond; the General Services Administration in Charlottesville; the General Services Administration, the Office of the Undersecretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Mine Safety Health Administration in Arlington; the General Services Administration in Lorton; the Bureau of Industry and Security in Herndon; the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Hampton; and the Government Accountability Office in Virginia Beach.

Creative note: When I saw this story, my first thought was I shouldn’t do a cartoon about it this week because I’ve drawn on Elon and DOGE for the Advance the past two weeks, and this would make it three weeks in a row. Check out here and here. But these issues are important, so I drew it anyway, and then I sent it to my editor.

I wasn’t going to fight for this cartoon because we’ve done Elon the past two weeks, so I sent a rough on a different subject along with this one. I was also prepared to draw more roughs because Martin, my editor, had sent about five subjects for me to choose from.

Martin picked this one while acknowledging we’ve done a lot on Elon and DOGE. So, we probably won’t do another Elon cartoon next week…unless he does something else extremely stupid that hurts our community. What are the odds of that happening again? (snip)

Peace & Justice History for 3/10

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistorymarch.htm#march10

Most banned books feature people of color and LGBTQ+ people, report finds

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/27/banned-books-people-of-color-lgbtq

Study counteracts claims by conservative lawmakers that books being removed from classrooms are sexually explicit

Becka Robbins of Fabulosa Books packs up LGBTQ+ books to send to parts of the country where they are banned, on 27 June 2024 in San Francisco. Photograph: Haven Daley/AP

The majority of banned books in US public schools last year dealt with people of color, LGBTQ+ people and other demographics, according to a new study from PEN America.

The report also counteracts claims by conservative lawmakers that books being removed from classrooms are sexually explicit and that book bans are altogether a “hoax”, an assertion made by Donald Trump.

There were more than 10,000 instances of books being banned in the 2023-24 school year, PEN America reported, a sharp increase from the previous year, as Republican-led states implemented new censorship laws.

Out of 4,218 book titles that were banned, 1,534 – or 36% – featured people of color, the most censored identity group in book bans. Some removed titles included August Wilson’s Pulitzer-prize winning play Fences and Innosanto Nagara’s A is for Activist, a picture book for children about social issues.

Books featuring people of color were disproportionately targeted in all banned-book categories, the report found, especially in removed historical and biographical titles. Of such banned books, 44% included people of color; more than one-fourth, or 26%, of those books featured Black people.

Advocates with PEN America noted that at the same time as the onslaught of book bannings, more than 50% of young people in the US are children of color, according to 2021 data from the Children’s Defense Fund.

“This targeted censorship amounts to a harmful assault on historically marginalized and underrepresented populations – a dangerous effort to erase their stories, achievements, and history from schools,” said Sabrina Baêta, senior manager for PEN America’s Freedom to Read program, in a press release about the report. “When we strip library shelves of books about particular groups, we defeat the purpose of a library collection that is supposed to reflect the lives of all people. The damaging consequences to young people are real.”

Titles featuring LGBTQ+ characters also made up a sizable number of book bans: 1,066 books, or 25% of all banned titles, included LGBTQ+ people. Transgender or genderqueer characters were specifically targeted in such book bans, as 28% of removed books featuring LGBTQ+ characters included that demographic.

Beyond people of color and LGBTQ+ people, books including disabled people were also affected by nationwide bans. About 10% of all removed titles included characters with physical, learning or developmental disabilities or who were neurodivergent. Several affected books with disabled characters focused on “confidence, self esteem, or experiences with ableism”, PEN America reported.

Meanwhile, only 13% of removed titles included “on the page” instances of sexual experiences. Inferred or “off the page” instances of sexual encounters were included in 31% of banned books.

The vast majority of banned books (85%) were fiction, with 14% being non-fiction and 1% poetry. About 67% of removed books were for younger audiences, PEN America reported.

The ongoing banning of books comes as the Trump administration has cracked down on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts in US public schools and universities. In a memo last week, Trump threatened to withhold federal funding from any schools that refused to eliminate diversity initiatives, such as scholarships for students of certain identity groups and school programming.

Exposing the Fascism of Gender Critical ‘Feminism’

As anyone who follows me on this blog might or should know I love the content Ethel produces. I followed this young woman from when they were a teen struggling with their sexuality and their finally blossoming out and accepting herself as they are. How she feels inside themselves, and how they deal with that in the world around them. It is a hard struggle. I know I had to do it as a gay teen constantly surrounded and barraged by anti-gay propaganda, and that is what Ethel went through as a trans girl. It was complicated by her being autistic, which there is nothing wrong with being autistic, but it did mean a lot of people did not understand her and were unable to appreciate how detailed she can be. I know it is hard for her to cover these haters talking about abusers as she was abused as a child. However she stands up and gives grand videos supporting trans people and she includes her own strengths to the issue. Hugs

There is no meaningful difference between the claims made by gender ‘critical’ fascists when targeting trans people and those made by the Nazis of Nazi Germany. Said monster has been empowered by the press for too long and now threatens us all.

Hi, welcome to Essence of Thought with me, Ethel Thurston, as your host.

A bit of Love

I used to have a small lawn care business, just me and two lawnmowers, weed wackers, a couple of brooms putzing around the neighborhood in my old pick-up truck and Dad’s old snowmobile trailer. I couldn’t do much about the customer’s dandelions, but I let them grow in my own yard. I liked them. My neighbor’s were pissed. -randy

Gavin Newsom Teams Up With Charlie Kirk To Throw Trans People Under The Bus

Lots Of Good Ones This Morning,

this one made me lol!

Sherman’s Lagoon by Jim Toomey for March 09, 2025

Sherman's Lagoon Comic Strip for March 09, 2025

Priorities

One of the strangest arguments I have ever had and will ever have, I sincerely hope, is that we should make sure we are feeding our children. On the face of things, you would rarely hear someone argue differently, but when people talk about discontinuing food stamps and school lunch programs, that is the real argument: feeding kids isn’t an important enough use for my money. In this country, we throw away food because our leadership is unable/unwilling to prioritize taking care of our people at a basic level of food, housing, education, health. Hugs all. randy

In fiscal year 2023, the federal government spent $112.8 billion on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which is the largest nutrition assistance program in the United States. This was about 1.84% of the federal budget.

According to research, childhood hunger can significantly impact adulthood by increasing the risk of chronic health conditions like diabetes, osteoporosis, and cardiovascular disease, as well as contributing to mental health issues like depression, lower cognitive function, and reduced life satisfaction, even when adjusting for socioeconomic factors in adulthood; this is largely due to the developmental disruptions caused by malnutrition during critical growth periods in childhood.

40% of American families are one paycheck away from poverty. This means that they would be unable to cover an unexpected expense if they missed a paycheck

In 2022, 9.1 percent of U.S. households with adults aged 65 and older were food insecure at some time during the year, meaning they had difficulty providing enough food for all their members because of a lack of resources.