Had a dental appointment today, made a red sauce with meatballs for a spaghetti supper, and some thick sliced garlic cheese toast for supper. I had to take extra medication to be able to do that. So I am too tired to finish the roundup. I don’t have any appointments tomorrow so I plan to add the cartoons I missed today ( about half the normal pages I go to ) into tomorrows roundup. Best wishes to all
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No one buys the exact things each week. But we all buy mostly the same foods all the time that we like to eat and we normally by the same detergents or other supplies. And the truth is only lately has wages started to rise but there are still far too low. In my area I am reading that to be able to rent a 1 bedroom apartment a person needs a wage of $20.17 an hour for 40 hours. $24.82 for a two bedroom. Most people work for less than $15 dollars an hour around here.
This is what a corrupt political system looks like. This is why billionaires get richer. This is what Oligarchy is all about. https://t.co/WyKfp3dt2r
National Archives confirms in a statement that they had to retrieve 15 (!!!) boxes of Trump presidential records from Mar a Lago in January of this year.
Btw, this redistricting cycle is the first in 50+ years where states with a history of discrimination don’t have to approve voting maps with the federal government.
No reason to sugarcoat this. If Dems fail to pass voting protections before the midterms, the GOP is going to gerrymander their way into power across the country.
The same Court that twice gutted Voting Rights Act & upheld extreme partisan gerrymandering now giving green light to extreme racial gerrymandering. Black voters make up 27% of AL electorate but hold just 1 of 7 Congressional districts (14%) under GOP plan reinstated by SCOTUS https://t.co/ibhytst6Ze
Kagan, dissenting: The court's decision today "does a disservice to Black Alabamians" who "have had their electoral power diminished—in violation of a law this Court once knew to buttress all of American democracy." https://t.co/iM4jxk75popic.twitter.com/YCKjLYCSbg
Lots of observations to make here, but here's one: Mississippi's speech ban would outlaw historically black colleges and universities explaining why they exist in the first place. https://t.co/9As4mGEv1I
In Tennessee, a right-wing activist group is using the state's new anti-CRT law to argue that 2nd Graders shouldn't read a book about MLK Jr. https://t.co/7j51LDwxmg
Sandra Bland would have turned 35 years old today, but her life was tragically cut short following a minor traffic violation. We honor her life, and will continue to fight to protect Black women. #SayHerNamepic.twitter.com/i2B8Cyh5hT
6/ Some white supremacists, by the way, want Jews in America to either convert to Christianity or move to Israel. They support Israel because they think it’s needed to fulfill the “end times.” They are still antisemitic. https://t.co/Wf6V53zUnx
It doesn’t have to be this way. One way to fix this, rent a large space to have children spread out at tables, have good wifi, and have a few adults to circulate around the large space. Just like a classroom but much bigger and each kid working on their own computer at their own speed. It is done in other countries why not the US.
And the misleading right wing cartoonist fails to mention the parties did a complete swap on ideals with the Democrats currently being against discrimination and the Republicans being for discrimination and oppression, not to mention insurrection and other throwing the government.
Pelosi said that the contestants should be aware of their situation and their safety so they might want to wait on their criticisms of China until they were safe. She did not say they shouldn’t say anything negative about China, she did not try to stop them from insulting China. But again facts don’t really matter to the right wing.
I want to scream when I see these cartoons. Because so many of the right wing cult members believe this is the god’s honest truth. I argue that no polices have changed other than family detention, I show court cases preventing Biden from making changes on the southern border, I point out illegals can not vote and illegals can not become citizens. Nothing matters to them. tRump said 3 million illegals voted for Hillary and now every right winger is convinced that Biden is busing illegal immigrants across the border to vote for Democrats.
Yet no outcry from Branco when ICE under tRump was taking children separated at the border from their parents on midnight flights all over the country and given to Christian adoption agencies to adopt out to Christian parents, collecting fees from those adopting parents, many of those children who have not been returned to their rightful parents. The very definition of child human trafficking.
The brazen occupation of Ottawa came as a result of unprecedented coordination between various anti-vaccine and anti-government organizations and activists, and has been seized on by similar groups around the world.
It may herald the revenge of the anti-vaxxers.
The so-called “freedom convoy” – which departed for Ottawa on 23 January – was the brainchild of James Bauder, an admitted conspiracy theorist who has endorsed the QAnon movement and called Covid-19 “the biggest political scam in history”. Bauder’s group, Canada Unity, contends that vaccine mandates and passports are illegal under Canada’s constitution, the Nuremberg Code and a host of other international conventions.
Bauder has long been a fringe figure, but his movement caught a gulf stream of support after the prime minister, Justin Trudeau, announced last year that truckers crossing the US-Canada border would need to be fully vaccinated against Covid-19. The supposed plight of the truckers proved to be a compelling public relations angle and attracted an array of fellow travelers.
Until now, a litany of organizations had protested Canada’s strict public health measures, but largely in isolation. One such group, Hold Fast Canada, had organized pickets of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s headquarters, where they claimed that concentration camps had already been introduced in the country.
Another group, Action4Canada, launched legal challenges to mask and vaccine mandates. In one 400-page court filing, they allege that the “false pronouncement of a Covid-19 ‘pandemic’” was carried out, at least in part, by Bill Gates and a “New World (Economic) Order” to facilitate the injection of 5G-enabled microchips into the population.
Both groups are listed as “participating groups” on the Canada Unity website, and sent vehicles and personnel to join the convoy.
Other organizers joined Bauder, including Chris Barber, a Saskatchewan trucker who was fined $14,000 in October for violating provincial public health measures; Tamara Lich, an activist for a fringe political party advocating that western Canada should become an independent state; Benjamin Dichter, who has warned of the “growing Islamization of Canada”; and Pat King, an anti-government agitator who has repeatedly called for Trudeau to be arrested.
Since they have arrived in Ottawa, the extreme elements of the protest have been visible: neo-Nazi and Confederate flags were seen flying, QAnon logos were emblazoned on trucks and signs and stickers were pasted to telephone poles around the occupied area bear Trudeau’s face, reading: “Wanted for crimes against humanity.”
The official line from Bauder and his co-organizers, however, has remained focused; in a Facebook live broadcast, Bauder instructed his supporters to “stop talking about the vaccine” and instead stick to message of “freedom”.
Such strict message control has attracted mainstream support. Numerous members of the Conservative party, Canada’s official opposition, have come out to meet the protesters. Elon Musk and Donald Trump have both endorsed the convoy. Fox broadcasters Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson have provided glowing updates on the continuing occupation.
Bauder vowed the convoy would camp out in Ottawa until their demands are met, insisting to his followers that a “memorandum of understanding” would force the government’s hand, possibly even triggering fresh elections, if enough people sign.
A Canada Unity organizer went further, saying it would require the Senate to “go after the prime minister” for “corruption” and “fascism”. There is no legal basis for those claims.
King has laid out a more direct plan of action to the occupiers: “What we want to focus on is our politicians, their houses, their locations,” he said in a January Facebook stream. If political pressure doesn’t work, King said, blocking major supply chains “will be later on”.
Soon after, the head of security for parliament issued an extraordinary warning to members of parliament to avoid the protest entirely, for their own safety.
The occupiers have deliberately made life difficult for anyone in Ottawa’s downtown core. Trucks have been laying on their air horns throughout the day, often well into the early morning hours. An Ottawa court granted an injunction on Monday afternoon, ordering that the honking must cease.
In the shadow of parliament, a flatbed truck was converted into a stage – functioning as a speaker’s corner during the day, where far-right politicians and occupiers took the microphone to decry Trudeau and Covid vaccines. At night, the stage functions as a DJ booth for raucous dance parties.
US anti-vaccine mandate campaigners aim to mimic Canadian convoy tactic
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Technology has made the occupation even easier: drivers share information on routes and the best ways to evade police barricades via the walkie-talkie app Zello. Organizers in other cities use the secure messaging app Telegram to share information, coordinate messaging and plan solidarity protests.
The occupiers now have the resources to stay for an extended period of time: they have raised more than C$6m (US$4.7m) through various crowdfunding platforms, in cash and bitcoin, despite having been booted from GoFundMe’s platform after raising over C$10m.
The Ottawa occupation is proof that a few thousand determined protesters can overwhelm police and shut down major cities with enough vehicles and coordination. Solidarity convoys have shut down the busy Coutts border crossing between Alberta and Montana, strained police resources in Toronto and Quebec City, and activists as far away as Helsinki, Canberra, London and Brussels have taken note. On the convoy channels, protesters warn this is just the beginning.
