Israel hits Hezbollah targets after football pitch attack kills 12 young people
The Lebanon-based group denies carrying out the deadly strike on children and teenagers as fears of wider conflict grow.
Read in BBC News: https://apple.news/AftMMtjq8QvGoxngzPssrEA
Shared from Apple News
Best Wishes and Hugs,Scottie
The moment Joe Biden said that it was better for him, his family and his country that he does not run for another term was met in my heart with a bit of sadness, but unfortunately not a great deal of surprise. We all come to that moment when we must set down our sword, let another carry the load, and finally be at peace with our fight. So to that, I give a nod to a very human Joe Biden who I feel faced the slings and arrows the best he could and allowed the country to heal from the disaster of 4-years preceding his tenure.
Trump posted that he felt the Democrats owed him a great deal of money because he spent fortunes trashing the Biden name, the Biden presidency and the future of the presidency under Joe Biden. But, Joe stepped aside. Wasn’t that what you wanted, DonDon? Some would say you have a bit of a snowflake problem; I say you are a cryin’ bitch.
So, what has changed? Did the theft of state secrets suddenly now not happen? Did he now not steal from his own charity? Did he actually not defraud his “university” (?) students? Did he now not actually assault that woman, did he not actually cheat on his wife with a porn star as she was giving birth to his son, and did he not actually bribe that porn star to keep her silence? Did he not pump up a crowd to “go fight” for a lost election? Did he not conspire to defraud a state election? Did he now not meet in private with the Russian ambassador, kicking his own staff out of the room? Did he not so incompetently mishandle an international epidemic that we are still suffering the consequences? Did he not destroy nearly every career of every person who worked with and for him? Seriously! Where is the line? What does it take? Who has to die and what has to be destroyed before this man is seen as the con-man that he truly is?
to Scottie, a few times. It’s Jenny Lawson, the author and bookstore owner. She has an art Substack, too, to which I subscribe on the free plan. Again, Jenny Lawson is hilarious, but also sensitive, and sharing in a good way. Maybe some of you have caught her books. Anyway, I just read her recent blog post, referring to this Substack entry. So here’s the Substack, because there is a Share button there. Enjoy!
It’s okay to rest by Jenny Lawson (thebloggess)
Read on Substack
JENNY LAWSON (THEBLOGGESS) JUL 22, 2024
This week I was more exhausted than normal. I fell asleep on the couch at 6pm. I couldn’t drag myself to see an author I love that I’d been looking forward to for weeks. It felt like it took an extraordinary amount of energy just to breathe, and the time that I normally devote to drawing while watching 90-Day-Fiance ended up with me curled up in a little ball wondering if this was illness or depression or both.
By this weekend I was feeling much better but I didn’t have enough time to draw the more complicated doodle that I’d sketched out with a pencil but never started to ink, so instead I did a simple portrait of my son, Hunter S. Thomcat, who was having his seventh restorative nap of the day and not feeling guilty about it at all. And it’s messy and imperfect and probably one of my favorite doodles because it was fun and ridiculous and reminded me that art is can be all of those things.
We can all take a lesson from cats sometimes.
It’s okay to rest, my friend. It’s okay to not always be productive. It’s okay to just be.
You’re further along than you think.
Hugs,
Jenny
========
Another note from me (not Jenny Lawson): Jenny Lawson also blogs on WP, and is hilarious also there, but there is no reblog button; so check it out: https://thebloggess.com/ . I’m not trying to drive readers away from Scottie’s, but I bet we have time to read another article now and then! She’s great.
Because we had a story from Ukrainian media though not this outlet, I thought it could be of interest to hear from someone who is also in Ukrainian media (probably not about the nuke plant story.) Benjamin Wittes is a diligent supporter of Ukraine. Here’s a snippet; I used the embed link to post. (It’s not as nice as a reblog WP to WP, is it?) The piece is actually a podcast; there’s a transcript button up top on the page.
“Last week, I wrote this piece urging people to support the independent Ukrainian media organization, Svidomi. In that piece, I promised a podcast with the organization’s chief and founder, Anastasiia Bakulina. Our conversation got delayed by a few days for technical reasons. First, my recording software failed for reasons that may or may not be related to the worldwide cyber outage. Then, just as we were ready to try again, the power in Lviv went out. Apologies for the delay, but here is the conversation. As you’ll see, Nastya has a remarkable story to tell—one I find inspiring and which I cannot help but think about in relation to the history of Lawfare, which like Svidomi, began as a volunteer project of three friends and has developed into something much more professional and substantial.”
Anastasiia Bakulina Discusses Svidomi Media by Benjamin Wittes
A chat with the 25-year-old head of an independent Ukrainian media organization
Please click right on through, and enjoy. Maybe with a cool beverage and a snack, if you care for one.
SIMON ROSENBERG JUL 22, 2024
Happy Monday all, and what a Monday it is. We have a new Presidential candidate, a new ticket soon, an historic, profoundly successful President to honor and be grateful for and an election to go win.
To talk about our new moment I’ve scheduled two calls this week – tonight at 7pm for paid subscribers, tomorrow night at 7pm for the broader Hopium community. The Tuesday night call will be recorded and shared here on Wednesday. You can RSVP to either by following the links above and if you want to become a paid subscriber to join the call tonight you can do so here.
Since President Biden announced he was leaving the race the new Harris campaign has raised over $50m online, and we’ve contributed more than $55,000 so far here at Hopium. I hope all of you will take an action on her behalf today, this week – Donate | Volunteer | Learn More. Let’s help the campaign get to $100m raised and overwhelm their volunteer shifts!
We are all going to learn a lot about the Vice President in the coming days – her story, her vision, her agenda. Let’s start with this ad from her 2020 primary campaign. It’s a good indication of what we can expect from her:
A few things about the 2024 election remain true today:
In the last few months we’ve gotten repeated and powerful confirmations of the success of the Biden-Harris Presidency – inflation *fell* last month and is running at the Fed’s target rate over the past six months, crime and murder rates are way down, gas prices are down, the flow to the border is down. We’ve had the strongest economic recovery of any advanced economy in the world, the best job market since the 1960s, the lowest uninsured rate in American history, the deficit is trillions less, the Dow has broken 40,000 and all three indices continue to hover in record territory. Domestic oil, gas and renewable production continue to be at all time highs leaving America more energy independent than it has been in decades. The Wall Street Journal has called the American economy the “envy of the world,” and the Economist recently wrote about the unprecedented start up boom America is experiencing right now. The three big Biden-Harris investment bills have dramatically accelerated the energy transition necessary to combat climate change and will be creating opportunities and jobs for our workers for decades to come. Together, the President and Vice President have reinvigorated the Western alliance, been an historic champion of democracy and freedom, and President Biden helped successfully defeat the fascists in recent European and French elections.
What is also true today is the election remains close and competitive. The Vice President has led Trump in several recent polls. Our Senate polling has held, and remains encouraging. We have one of our largest leads in the Congressional Generic this year, and the largest since Mid-May. We’ve been winning elections of all kinds all across the country these last few years and the far-right was just denied power in Europe, the UK and France – folks just keep voting against the fascists. We have no idea where polling on the race will be for some time, but right now the race is close, and winning the Presidential, keeping the Senate and flipping the House remains something we can do. Expect lots of games from right wing pollsters in the coming days – prepare to block out the noise – as we just won’t really know where the race is for weeks, perhaps until after the Vice President chooses her running mate and we have our Convention in August.
What is also still true today is that Trump remains a rapist, a fraudster, a traitor and a felon. He is old, unfit and unwell; a dangerous extremist; and here’s what he and his Project 2025 and Russia loving VP want to do if in the White House:
They want Putin to win, the West to lose. The border to be in chaos, and migrants to keep flowing into the country. Americans to lose even more rights and freedoms. The planet to warm faster. 10 year olds to carry their rapist’s baby to term, and for more women to die on operating room tables. Tens of millions to lose their health insurance. More dead kids in schools. Verified rapists in positions of authority. A restoration of pre-Civil Rights era white supremacy. Huge new tariffs which will raise prices on everything and wreck the global economy which has made us prosperous. Big new tax cuts for their wealthiest donors and tax increases for every day people. Books banned across the US. Seniors to pay more for insulin and prescription drugs. Foreign governments free to pollute our daily discourse and harass our citizens. Teenagers to work night shifts in meat packing plants and not go to school. The minimum wage to stay at $7.25. Mass arrests and mass deportations of immigrants long settled in the US. Insurrectionists to be pardoned. To end American democracy for all time.
What also remains true today is that in addition to rallying behind the new Harris campaign, we have other critical candidate and state parties who need your help today, for here at Hopium we do more and worry less:
Here’s how you can do even more:
Finally, I want to thank all of the members of the Hopium community for raising your game these last few weeks as we debated the best way to beat Donald Trump. I asked folks to be guided by respect – respect for our President, respect for our Party leaders, respect for each other. I asked you to not be a bystander but a leader, and to work to keep us together during a tough period, and bring us back together when the path became clear. I know there are many in this community, many many of you, who love and admire President Biden and wanted him to remain our candidate. I am sure yesterday came as a shock and that many of you will need some time to process what happened, to take some time off and focus on other things. That’s fine. Yesterday was a shock. After returning from Raleigh yesterday and a great trip to North Carolina, I was at a Nats baseball game when the news broke. I thought I was going to have a day off. The weather was beautiful in DC yesterday and the Nats are playing good baseball right now. And then my phone started going crazy and we all got the news.
(snip-more Hopium on the page)
Again the phone post did not put the article in the post on WordPress. As I told Ali it looks great on the phone and when I post it the links to the story is not there. Below are the links supplied by Ali. Thanks again Ali. Hugs. Scottie
ALI REGISTER & VOTE! REDFORDI haven’t opened email yet, so did a search, and got these 3. Different headlines, same story.
https://apnews.com/article/gaza-israel-war-latest-july-22-bc3d06280090adf1ed52c533f5d05483
I’d say they ought to be more careful; I am aware that Oklahomans do not like malfeasance with their tax dollars one little bit.
OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) — State Superintendent Ryan Walters and his top staff continue to bill Oklahoma taxpayers for expenses related to out-of-state trips — including for talk show appearances, a multi-day retreat, PragerU events at five-star resorts, and even a hot air balloon tour — according to open records obtained by News 4.
This week, News 4 obtained out-of-state travel expense records for State Superintendent Ryan Walters, his Chief Policy Advisor Matt Langston and his spokesperson Dan Isett dating back to the day Walters took office in 2023.
News 4 did not obtain the records through the Oklahoma State Department of Education, but rather from the Oklahoma Office of Management and Enterprise Services (OMES).
In January, News 4 reported when Walters faced intense scrutiny for his out-of-state travel expenses billed to taxpayers, which at that time included other trips for talk show appearances, partisan conferences, and even a movie premiere.
The new records News 4 has obtained indicate, since facing that scrutiny in January, Walters and his staff have continued to bill the state travel expenses for trips Walters makes to help grow his national political profile.
Now, multiple Republican and Democratic Oklahoma lawmakers tell News 4 they want to see Walters’ spending formally investigated.
Back on March 19, Walters appeared on Fox News. On the studio backdrop behind him was a picture of the Phoenix skyline.
The records obtained by News 4 indicate Walters went to Phoenix for a five-day retreat hosted by national conservative think tank ‘the Heritage Foundation.’
Walters’ travel itinerary for March 19 scheduled him to begin the day at 5:45 a.m. for a “sunrise hot air balloon tour.”
Other things on Walters’ five-day itinerary included attending sessions titled “Philosophy and Conservative Vision of Education” and “How do we grow the movement,” among others. (snip-graphic on the page)
Walters also attended a reception dinner hosted by Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts.
Roberts is a main co-author of the Heritage Foundation’s controversial ‘Project 2025’ plan.
Walters recently named Roberts to an executive review committee he tasked with rewriting Oklahoma’s social studies curriculum standards.
The records obtained by News 4 show, in total, Walters billed the State of Oklahoma $1,160 for airfare, mileage, per diem, taxi and “miscellaneous” expenses. The records indicate he did not seek to be reimbursed for lodging expenses on the trip.
Lansing, MI parents are concerned about their school librarians, in a good way:
LANSING, Mich. (WLNS) — Concerns over library access sparked a packed Lansing School Board meeting Thursday night, with parents sharing their worries about staffing priorities in the Lansing School District.
Almost 100 people filled the Eastern High School gym, with over a dozen parents and community members showing their support for the school’s librarians with book-themed shirts.
Many of them worry about the district possibly cutting librarians off its staff and whether or not libraries would be included in new school construction plans—specifically the Lewton School campus.
Several district directors shared a plan during the meeting that would cut the number of certified librarians from seven to five in exchange for adding 34 assistants to their staff. Officials say that the assistants would support literacy, instruction, and library usage.
“Students would access the library before and after school, during lunch, our collections would remain protected under our certified positions,” said a district official. “It also allows for opportunity for our parents and our community to help us with check-in and check out when they have been obviously trained.”
While parents like the idea of more library access, many of them are not on board with the plan. Some think there are skills that only a librarian can teach, and that the aides might not have as much training or expertise—which they think is unfair for the staff.
“You set that person up for failure, but it’s also unfair for my kids who will now have to learn with someone who’s not up to the task,” says Gaelle Cassin-Ross, whose two children attend Post Oak Academy. “I’m not saying someone can’t learn. I’m saying we already have people who know the job, why not go with them?” (snip, graphic on the page)
Superintendent Ben Shuldiner says there’s a long road ahead before any plan is set in stone, and that this discussion must balance experts in the district and the desires of the parents.
“You also have to be respectful to the community and to listen to what is right for their children,” said Shuldiner. “Because it’s ultimately up to them if their kids go here or somewhere else.”(snip-a bit more)
https://www.wlns.com/news/lansing-parents-concerned-by-school-library-staffing/
Scottie's Playtime 