With more resources!
OK. Here’s Annie Asks You’s Immigration Resources Post.
With more resources!
Author: ali redford
I love dogs and people. I want living creatures to thrive. I love to cook, and share the food, but ya gotta get in line in front of the dog.
Hopium PM in the AM
(Because I live in a later time zone than many readers here.)
Hopium PM – Court Blocks Trump’s Dangerous Power Grab, New Reuters Poll Shows Trump Taking A Hit, Keep Making Calls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! by Simon Rosenberg
Kennedy and Gabbard Hearings Tomorrow, Patel Thursday Read on Substack
Good evening peeps. A federal judge has blocked Trump’s outrageous suspension/cancelling of Congressionally mandated funding for programs of all kinds across all 50 states. From the Washington Post:
A federal judge on Tuesday temporarily blocked President Donald Trump from imposing a sweeping pause on trillions of dollars in federal spending, capping a frenetic day of disruption to government programs that fund schools, provide housing and ensure low-income Americans have access to healthcare.
The order prevented the new restrictions from taking effect until at least Feb. 3, buying time for a coalition of public-health advocates, nonprofits and businesses — represented by the left-leaning group Democracy Forward — to proceed with a case that may test Trump’s claims of expansive power over the nation’s fiscal trajectory.
The decision arrived amid a wave of chaos and confusion in Washington, where few appeared to understand the scope and intention of a White House memo that had directed agencies to “temporarily pause” the disbursement of key federal funds. Even before it could officially take effect at 5 p.m., thousands of government services — many dedicated primarily to Americans’ health, safety and well-being — appeared to be at risk of interruption or shutdown, at least temporarily.
The NYTimes has a good backgrounder on “impoundment” – Trump’s attempt just to cancel government programs he doesn’t care for and “impound” the money (gift article). I also found this article by Russell Berman in the Atlantic helpful in understanding where we are.
Yes, in the first few weeks of Trump’s Presidency we are already facing one of the gravest Constitutional crises in America history as Trump is attempting to seize a level of control over our government no President has ever had.
If there was an upside to this dark day Democrats across the country at all levels of government loudly rose up against the latest acts of our Mad Orange Wannabe King. It appeared to have woken us from our collective slumber, as the threat Trump clearly represents became impossible to ignore. Can we compete with Trump, contest his out of control Administration, score some wins in the coming days?
First, a new Reuters poll suggests Trump has already overreached, as his approval rating has already taken a 9 point hit:
- Jan 21 – 47% approve, 39% disapprove (+8)
- Jan 28 – 45% approve, 46% disapprove (-1)
We will see if these results are replicated in other polls but this one sure shows that Trump is struggling out of the gate. Note below how unpopular many of his early actions/proposals are (but also note the broad public support for “downsizing the federal government”): (snip-MORE; go see it! It’s free and you don’t have to log in.)
Pax Christi in Peace & Justice History for 1/29
| January 29, 1996 |
| Three Ploughshares activists, Lotta Kronlid, Andrea Needham and Joanna Wlson, caused millions in damage and were arrested in Warton, Lancashire, England, for disarming a British Aerospace F-16 fighter jet destined to be sold to Indonesia for use in its illegal occupation and genocide of the people of East Timor. |  |
| Seeds of Hope/East Timor Ploughshares activists > |
| Angie Zelter was arrested later for saying she planned to finish what the other three had started. The four were later acquitted of all charges on the grounds of preventing a greater crime. |
https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryjanuary.htm#january29
Good Morning!
the cat, a black fur sausage with yellow Houdini eyes, jumps up on the bed and tries to get onto my head. It’s his way of telling whether or not I’m dead. by Worriedman
Margaret Atwood – “February” Read on Substack
I hope everybody goes and reads this terrific poem. It’s a joy to read. Every word is right. The focus of the poem shifts from a cat’s butthole to the spectre of widespread famine and the end of civilization. In like, two stanzas. That’s pretty nimble!
I can’t wait for this! Working a happy horse and a warm sunny day –
It’s not February yet. Just a few days though.
Barncat isn’t a black cat. More relentlessly gray.With pretty green eyes.
I am very fond of giant flowers that grow in the house in the dead of winter.
Starlings, in the field across the road.
Sunrise in the Greenhouse
Juice !
Juice loves late ’60s Grateful Dead.
I need to explore the Fen/Zardoz connection
That’s all I have room for – Thanks for dropping by.
Reading News Has Been Pretty Anxiety-Producing, For Me Today.
I’m sure I’m not the only one. Still, I found a couple of items that help with that. And I’m on the lookout for more! We still have the power, even thought it doesn’t feel like it. We the people still have the power, if we stay constructively informed.
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I don’t even recall now what I was reading this morning that linked Transvitae, but here are its resources pages. I am not trans, so I only hope there isn’t anything there are the site that is, let’s say inappropriate. I read around and it seems like a decent place, but I am no expert. Resources are resources, though. We need to know about resources.
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Plus, I’m going to try to draw Number Nine Eight One, and anyone else who has such an urge should do so, also! 🌞 🧑🎨
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Pa. supervisor resigns after appearing to mimic Elon Musk’s alleged Nazi salute
Laura Smith resigned from the Towamencin Township Board of Supervisors after a video appeared to show her mimicking Elon Musk’s alleged Nazi salute
By David Chang • Published January 26, 2025 • Updated on January 26, 2025 at 5:32 pm
(There’s a video there, if it’s something you want to see. The still shows a person doing what she appears to be doing, if I am clear.)
A supervisor of a town in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, resigned after a video in which she appeared to mimic Elon Musk’s alleged Nazi salute went viral.
Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, owner of the social media platform X, and Administrator of the Department of Government Efficiency, sparked outrage when he made a gesture that resembled a Nazi salute while addressing a crowd at an inauguration event for President Donald Trump.
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) later posted a statement on X saying it seemed like Musk “made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute.”
This is a delicate moment. It’s a new day and yet so many are on edge. Our politics are inflamed, and social media only adds to the anxiety.
It seems that @elonmusk made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute, but again, we appreciate that people are on…— ADL (@ADL) January 20, 2025
Despite the ADL’s statement, many have still accused Musk of performing the salute. In response, Musk posted a series of Nazi-related puns on X which led to more backlash.
He also sparked more controversy while appearing to reference Germany’s Nazi history while making a virtual appearance at a campaign event for Germany’s far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party on Saturday.
Amid the controversy surrounding Musk, Laura Smith, a Republican and the Vice Chair of the Towamencin Township Board of Supervisors, posted a video of herself on the social media platform TikTok in which she appeared to mimic Musk’s gesture. (snip)
Well, This One’s A Thinker, To Me.
A Few Comics
that have made me laugh while I’m trying to get a good BP after reading headlines.
Close to Home by John McPherson for January 28, 2025
https://www.gocomics.com/closetohome/2025/01/28
Cattitude — Doggonit by Anthony Smith for January 27, 2025
(This one was a happy accident as I thought I’d clicked on a different one.)
https://www.gocomics.com/cattitude-doggonit/2025/01/27
Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson for January 28, 2025
https://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/2025/01/28
Arlo and Janis by Jimmy Johnson for January 28, 2025
Trump’s Extreme ICE Plan Hit With Lawsuit—From the Quakers
After Trump removed a key restriction on where ICE agents can make arrests, the Quakers are fighting back.
The Quakers are suing Trump’s Department of Homeland Security for allowing ICE raids in places of worship.
The lawsuit, filed in Maryland on Monday by multiple different Quaker groups from across the country, states that “the very threat of [immigration] enforcement deters congregants from attending services, especially members of immigrant communities,” and notes that the raids infringe on religious freedom.
“A week ago today, President Trump swore an oath to defend the Constitution and yet today religious institutions that have existed since the 1600s in our country are having to go to court to challenge what is a violation of every individual’s constitutional right to worship and associate freely,” said Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, which is representing the Quaker groups in court. “The troubling nature of the policy goes beyond just houses of worship with sanctuary programs—it is that ICE could enter religious and sacred spaces whenever it wants.” (snip-MORE)
https://newrepublic.com/post/190756/trump-ice-lawsuit-quakers
A Brain Cleanser from Lit Hub
Snippets from my this week’s newsletter, with links.
| Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven” is published in The Evening Mirror. |
| In January 1845, the greatest goth in literary history published what would swiftly become his most famous poem: “The Raven.” Poe first sold the poem (for $9, the equivalent of about $375 today) to the American Review, where it would appear—under the pen name “Quarles”—in the February 1845 issue. It was published concurrently in the January 29 edition of The Evening Mirror, prefaced by a note from editor Nathaniel Parker Willis, who called it “the most effective single example of ‘fugitive poetry’ ever published in this country, and unsurpassed in English poetry for subtle conception, masterly ingenuity of versification, and consistent sustaining of imaginative lift and ‘pokerishness.’” Well, sure. “The Raven,” if for some reason you don’t know it, is a narrative poem about a young scholar who, sitting alone on a bleak December night, mourning his lost love Lenore, is visited by a raven, who torments him by speaking, over and over again, a single word. Poe later wrote that he knew he wanted this word—“nevermore”—to be repeated throughout the poem, but finding the idea of a person uttering it too implausible, he struck upon “the idea of a non-reasoning creature capable of speech; and, very naturally, a parrot, in the first instance, suggested itself, but was superseded forthwith by a Raven, as equally capable of speech, and infinitely more in keeping with the intended tone.” Well, it worked pretty well, you might say. The poem, writes Poe biographer Arthur Hobson Quinn, “made an impression probably not surpassed by that of any single piece of American poetry. It was widely copied, parodied, and one humorist even took over a page of the Mirror to suggest five alternatives as to the relation of Lenore to the poet.” One-hundred-eighty years later, it may be still unsurpassed, though contenders abound. Either way, as you have probably noticed, the parodies and tributes have never stopped. We shall be quoting it forevermore. |
MORE WHERE THAT CAME FROM
In Search of the Rarest Book in American Literature: Edgar Allan Poe’s Tamerlane
A Brief and Incomplete Survey of Edgar Allan Poes in Pop Culture
The Greatest Goths in Literary History
| YEP, STILL SLAPS Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore— While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door. “’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door— Only this and nothing more.” –EDGAR ALLAN POE, “THE RAVEN” |
| In other (old)news this week Benjamin Franklin writes a letter to his daughter, pooh-poohing the bald eagle as the symbol of America, and instead championing the great and noble turkey (January 26, 1784) • John Millington Synge’s play The Playboy of the Western World premieres at The Abbey Theatre in Dublin and causes a riot (January 26, 1907) • The first part of Henry James’s novella The Turn of the Screw is published in Collier’s Weekly magazine (January 27, 1898) • Franz Kafka begins work on his novel The Castle at the mountain resort of Spindermühle (January 27, 1922) • Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice is published anonymously in London (January 28, 1813) • Thomas Jefferson sells his library to the government after the Library of Congress burns down (January 30, 1815) • Anton Chekhov’s The Three Sisters premieres at the Moscow Art Theater (January 31, 1901) • The first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary is published (February 1, 1884) • Great American Iconoclast Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is published (February 1, 1962) • David Foster Wallace’s eerily prescient Infinite Jest is published (February 1, 1996). (snip-More) |
I hope you enjoyed it! These newsletters are free, and are great for brain/heart health breaks.
Peace & Justice History for 1/28
| January 28, 1992 Nuclear production at the Rocky Flats Nuclear Arsenal – a complex used for both power plants and nuclear weapon munition manufacture – was permanently closed after repeated revelations of environmental contamination in the surrounding land and water supply, 25 miles northwest of Denver. Following closure, the facilities were completely dismantled and the site cleared.   The principal product of Rocky Flats was the fissionable plutonium trigger or “pit” at the core of every nuclear warhead in the U.S. arsenal. Since its construction in 1951 it was managed at different times by Dow Chemical, Rockwell International and EG&G. Dow and Rockwell paid fines in the tens of millions of dollars and were ordered to pay damages in the hundreds of millions to local residents for the environmental damage. Despite the residual plutonium contamination on the 6500-acre site, it has been transferred by the Department of Energy to the Fish and Wildlife Service (Interior) as the Rocky Flats Wildlife Refuge. Rocky Flats Right to Know |
January 28, 1995 Soldiers’ Mothers Committee members Over 100 members of the Committee of Soldiers’ Mothers of Russia went to a Red Army training camp to reclaim their sons. Since its founding in 1989 the Soldiers’ Mothers Committee had worked to expose human rights violations within the Russian military and has consistently supported a true alternative service option for conscientious objectors. The Mothers Committee earned the 1996 Right Livelihood Award This link takes us to the Right Livelihood Award main page. Apparently 1996 is too far back, or I didn’t search it correctly. P&J’s link goes to an error page on the site. -A. |
https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryjanuary.htm#january28
Scottie's Playtime 