Category: Questions

“Community Care Starts With Us”

These are among the truest words ever spoken. From Momsrising’s blog, here are resources: we should share them far and wide so that people can at least get by. I write letters and make phone calls with Momsrising; this is good and vital information. And, you don’t have to be a mom to use, share, or help anyone with this info! It’s for all. -A

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Tina Sherman

We moms shouldn’t have to hold the nation together on empty.

Yet here we are in the middle of a government shutdown that has thrown families into chaos. SNAP benefits are being cut; air traffic controllers, 

We moms shouldn’t have to hold the nation together on empty.

Yet here we are in the middle of a government shutdown that has thrown families into chaos. SNAP benefits are being cut; air traffic controllers, military school teachers, families in several states are losing child care as Head Start centers start to close; and other federal employees are facing another missed paycheck (while still showing up every day, keeping our country running!). WIC is barely hanging on by thread, and rising costs are pushing families past the brink.

Moms are holding it all together and we see you!!

We see your strength. We see your exhaustion. And we know that love shouldn’t have to come with this kind of struggle.

While the Trump Administration continues to play politics with families’ livelihoods, we want to make sure you have support right now while we keep up the fight.

You are not alone. You are not invisible. And you should never have to carry this weight without care and community surrounding you.

We see you. We’re with you

Community care starts with us! Share this list so more families can find the help they deserve.

We know this shutdown is taking a toll. Your story matters. If you are being impacted by the shutdown, SNAP cuts, or rising costs, please share your story with us! When moms speak out, leaders listen!

Karoline Leavitt Goes Full Fascist With Chilling Fox New Interview

Let’s talk about Trump’s new Reagan problem….

Let’s talk about Biden’s pardons being ‘void’ according to republicans….

From Jenny Lawson-

What Scottie’s has always stood for, too:

I thought you needed this. by Jenny Lawson (thebloggess)

It might be my compulsive thoughts talking, but here goes. Read on Substack

Dear friend,

This is the last week of October and so I drew you a Halloweeny sketch but then Sunday I had this really weird thought that someone out there needed to hear something specific and so I drew it up and thought I’d share it next week but my very compulsive mind is telling me that I need to post it now. This might just be my OCD winning but I also believe in following your gut, so next week you’ll get my Halloween drawing WAY AFTER HALLOWEEN and I’m so sorry I’m like this.

But…maybe you’re the person who needs to hear this today…

it’s going to be okay. I love you. You are doing amazing.

The world is hard at times and we’re all fighting so many battles, but you’re doing so much better than you think. You are making differences in the lives of people in ways you’ll probably never see. It’s easy to let the darkness around us overshadow the light, but your shine is integral. It may be impossible for your own eyes to recognize the glow you bring, but it is so gorgeously obvious to so many others.

“I can’t always keep the rain away. But I’ll always share my umbrella.”

There is always space under my umbrella for you.

I super crazy love you.

Your friend,

~ Jenny

ICE Agents Go Full Snowflake

An Author Speaks

Bestselling author Jodi Picoult pushes back after her musical is canceled by Indiana high school

By  MARK KENNEDY

NEW YORK (AP) — Author Jodi Picoult has the dubious honor of being banned in two mediums this fall — her books and now a musical based on her novel “Between the Lines.”

“I’m pretty sure I’m the first author who has now had censorship occur in two different types of media,” Picoult says. “Honestly, I’m not out here to be salacious. I am writing the world as it is, and I am honestly just trying to write about difficult issues that people have a hard time talking about because that is what fiction and the arts do.”

The superintendent of Mississinewa High School in Gas City, Indiana, canceled a production last week of “Between the Lines,” saying concerns were raised over “sexual innuendo” and alcohol references in the musical. Jeremy Fewell, the superintendent, did not respond to a request for comment.

“It’s devastating for us to know that these kids who put in hundreds of hours of hard work had that torn away from them because of the objections of a single parent,” says Picoult.

“What I know, perhaps better than most people, as someone whose books have been banned, is when one parent starts deciding what is appropriate and what is inappropriate for the children of other parents, we have a big problem.”

Picoult noted that the same Indiana high school has previously produced “Grease,” where the sexual innuendo and alcohol abuse is much greater, including a pregnancy scare, sex-mad teens and the line “Did she put up a fight?”

“Between the Lines” centers on Delilah, an outsider in a new high school, who finds solace in a book and realizes she has the power to write her own story and narrate her own life. “It is a very benign message. And it’s actually a really important one for adolescents today,” says Picoult.

The original work, which features a nonbinary character, had already been edited with licensed changes to make it more palatable for a conservative audience, including removing any reference to the nonbinary character’s gender orientation.

The production was scheduled for Halloween weekend at the Gas City Performing Arts Center. The show has music and lyrics by Elyssa Samsel and Kate Anderson, and a story by Timothy Allen McDonald, based on the 2012 novel by Picoult and her daughter, Samantha van Leer. It played off-Broadway in 2022.

Picoult, the bestselling author of “My Sister’s Keeper” and “Small Great Things,” has also written about the moments leading up to a school shooting in “Nineteen Minutes,” which was banned 16 times in the 2024-2025 school year, according to PEN America, making her the nation’s fourth most-banned author.

“I had 20 books banned in one school district in Florida alone because of a single parent’s objection and she admitted she had not read any of the books,” said Picoult, a PEN America trustee. “She said that they were banned for ‘mature content and sexuality.’ There were books of mine that did not even have a single kiss in them.”

The uptick in book banning has spread to stages as well. The Dramatists Legal Defense Fund has documented recently challenged plays and musicals from states including Pennsylvania, Florida, Indiana, Kansas, Ohio and New Jersey after parents or teachers complained that the works’ social themes weren’t appropriate for minors.

The Northern Lebanon High School, in Fredericksburg, Pennsylvania, canceled a 2024 production of “The Addams Family,” citing concerns over scenes with violence, children smoking and subtle queer themes. Paula Vogel’s play “Indecent,” which explores a flashpoint in Jewish and queer theatrical history, was abruptly canceled in Florida’s Duval County in 2023 for “inappropriate” sexual dialogue.

Last year, the Educational Theatre Association asked more than 1,800 theatre educators in public and private schools across the U.S. about censorship. More than 75% of respondents reported pressure to reconsider their play and musical choices during the 2023-24 school year.

“We are not protecting kids,” said Picoult. “We are robbing them of materials that we use to deal with an increasingly complex world.”

https://apnews.com/article/jodi-picoult-between-lines-musical-banned-3eff9a30aed283c10a80c6590f1f3496

So Many

things that are just wrong about this; things to be said about him being full of BS; things to be said about him being full of himself; that he presents as if he is actually designing and building these; that he names them Optimus (from Optimus Prime, a hero in “Transformers”), and so on, and so on, and so on…

Elon Musk Wants ‘Strong Influence’ Over the ‘Robot Army’ He’s Building

In a Tesla earnings call Wednesday, the world’s richest man pondered the future of his company’s Optimus robots—and his control over them.

Tesla might be an electric auto maker, but CEO Elon Musk has made clear that he thinks of it as much more: an innovator in artificial intelligence and software, a builder of world-shaking robots. He’s also argued that Tesla should be worth a lot more than it is today: up to $20 trillion, he posted in July, more than five times the current worth of Nvidia.

Musk has also made it clear that he wants to get paid, a lot. In November, Tesla shareholders will vote on the board’s proposal to pay the CEO a remarkable $1 trillion over the next decade. The deal would also increase Musk’s stake in Tesla from 13 percent to a quarter. But Musk would only get that big figure—and the extra control—if he hits a series of ambitious metrics, including 20 million vehicles delivered, 1 million robotaxis in commercial operation, and an $8.5 trillion valuation. And also, 1 million Optimus humanoid robots delivered.

On a call with investors on Wednesday, Musk locked on to that last point to make his most threatening argument for a gigantic payday yet. “My fundamental concern with regard to how much voting control I have at Tesla is, if I go ahead and build this enormous robot army, can I just be ousted at some point in the future?” he said. “If we build this robot army, do I have at least a strong influence over this robot army? Not control, but a strong influence … I don’t feel comfortable building that robot army unless I have a strong influence.”

Generally, Musk talks about Tesla’s Optimus project as more of a force for peace than war. He’s said that Optimus will upend the job market and free humanity from the drudgery of work. (“Working will be optional, like growing your own vegetables, instead of buying them from the store,” he posted this week.) Elsewhere on the investor call Wednesday, he said that Tesla’s robots would “actually create a world where there is no poverty, where everyone has access to the finest medical care.”

Optimus, he added, “will be an incredible surgeon, and imagine if everyone had access to an incredible surgeon.” For Tesla, Optimus will be “an infinite money glitch,” Musk said, arguing that everyone will want a humanoid robot who can do their work for them.

At Tesla events—and at the Tesla Diner in Los Angeles—Optimus robots are usually seen doing service work: serving drinks and popcorn, or entertaining visitors by dancing or playing rock, paper, scissors. (Optimus participants in a 2024 Tesla event were later acknowledged to be not fully autonomous, but remotely operated by humans.)

Whether Optimus chooses to do laundry or battle, Tesla’s vision of a robotic future still seems a ways away. On Wednesday’s call, Musk dwelled on the challenge of building humanoid hands and forearms, seeming to confirm earlier reporting that the features were proving especially hard for Tesla engineers to hack. And while Tesla set internal goals to produce 5,000 Optimus units this year, The Information reported this month that the company scaled down those production plans over the summer. On Wednesday, Musk said Tesla would have a “production-intent prototype” ready by February or March. Full-scale production, he said, would start at the end of next year.

Criminal Israel and the IDF set a Palestinian US citizen up to be attacked and murdered by West Bank illegal settlers. They routinely attack and beat / kill Palestinians while simply stealing their stuff at gun point.

This was the first report I watched on this.  This one is longer because he tells the whole story and shows clips he took on his phone at  the time.  The mob was going to kill him after the IDF set the group up to be murdered at the hands of illegal settlers.   The military told them to go to the spot where the settlers were hiding.  Please watch to see the very illegal and horrific ways Israeli is treat people to simply drive them off of and steal their lands.  Hugs

 

 

US Embassy ABANDONS Journo After Israeli Mob Attack

 

VIDEO: Disturbing Israeli Settler Attack Video Sparks Outrage, Elderly Palestinian Woman Hospitalized

A 55-year-old Palestinian woman, Umm Saleh Abu Alia, was hospitalized after being brutally attacked by a masked Israeli settler in Turmus Ayya, West Bank. Captured on video by US journalist Jasper Nathaniel, the unprovoked assault shows the woman struck unconscious and hit again on the ground. Settlers continue to harass Palestinian farmers during the olive harvest, while the Israel Defense Forces claim to have intervened. This horrifying incident highlights escalating tensions and ongoing violence in the occupied West Bank.

Israeli settlers burn trees, assault Palestinians in occupied West Bank olive harvest attacks

In the occupied West Bank, armed Israeli settlers systematically attack Palestinian olive harvesters and farmers, burning trees and beating farmers. These assaults, often protected by Israeli forces, have caused severe injuries. Palestinians, joined by international activists, continue harvesting to avoid surrendering their land, despite the violence and threats aimed at driving them away. For them, this is a fight for their very livelihood and homeland.

Israel’s Next Move: Create ‘Six Little Gazas’ In West Bank | Jasper Nathaniel | TMR

Welcoming people and being willing to answer over the top weird questions.

Right from the start of my leaving the military I vowed to be an out proud gay man.  This was in 1986.   It has lead to a lot of embarrassing conversations.  People have asked me such personal questions on same sex actions and how gay feelings might differ from straight feelings.  At first I found it weird and offensive, but as I got older I realized I brought a lot of straight cis people to be allies simply by being willing to answer sensitive or stupid questions.  I remember one weekend a straight co-worker with two young children showed up at my house.  Thankfully he had left his children at home with a sitter as he had lost his wife.  After talking for a few minutes he got around to discussing gay sex and why I liked it.  I struggled to understand his questions and to explain it to him.  He then surprised me.  He said show me.  I was like what?  He said let’s have sex.   I thought oh shit a straight guy who just wants to fuck a gay guy and put that notch on his sex card.  I was wrong.  He started taking off his clothing and said to me, you say it feels good, it is like me with a woman, so it should be the same.  He wanted to do oral sex and then anal, but wanted me to do anal with him being the bottom first.   I was desperately trying to explain to him that the first time can be bad or painful and it is not just about sex.  It is a need, and emotional feeling.   He was like we are friends, I like you, you like me so it should be OK. 

Let’s just say after that night he was still straight but he understood how two men had sex.   I was surprised when after giving him oral he insisted on doing the same to me.  But later I remembered my years in the military and how many straight young guys begged me to go with them on passes and have sex.  It was never one sided.  I have realized a lot of bigotry can be undone, can be reversed by simply sharing time with those that are the “other”.  Everyone needs someone to hold, to touch, to feel a connection with.   Hugs

https://www.tumblr.com/reagan-was-a-horrible-president/797871991266967552