| January 25, 1930 Mohandas Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and other leaders of the anti-colonial movement in India pledged to achieve complete independence, or Purna Swaraj, from Great Britain. Nehru said: “The British Government in India has not only deprived the Indian people of their freedom but has based itself on the exploitation of the masses, and has ruined India economically, politically, culturally and spiritually . . . We hold it to be a crime against men and God to submit any longer to a rule that has caused this fourfold disaster to our country.” |
January 25, 2002 Israeli Refuseniks A group of Israeli reservists issued a declaration saying they would not serve the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) if assigned to the occupied West Bank or Gaza Strip. It was called the Combatants’ Letter, and the organization Courage to Refuse grew out of their resistance. Captain David Zonshein and Lieutenant Yaniv Itzkovits, officers in an elite unit, realized the missions assigned to them as commanders in the IDF had in fact nothing to do with the defense of the State of Israel, but were rather intended to maintain control of the occupied territories at the price of oppressing the local Palestinian population. Within three months, 69 such refuseniks had been jailed. 629 Israeli soldiers ultimately signed the pledge. Over 280 members of Courage to Refuse were court-martialed and jailed for periods of up to 35 days as a result of their refusal.  The Israeli refusnik movement today |
Some The Majority Report from this last week. You should check out their YouTube channel and if you want to see the fun half free I can explain how. Hugs
Hopeful SFF Literature
Snippet:
Though I’ve spent a large part of my early adulthood overthinking and despairing about the state of the world, a part of me continues to remain stubbornly hopeful. Over and over, I’ve looked for evidence that people are inherently good, that we have solved problems in the past and that we will keep doing so (just as we keep creating those problems in the first place). And I believe this because I believe in people; to not do so would be to give in to helplessness, to surrender my life to the whims of the universe, which I simply refuse to do. Part of this capacity for optimism and hope comes from reading the kind of SFF stories that are essentially thought experiments in how things could turn out well. Consider the following examples…
Some important Bluesky posts. Really you should be there.
You Are Fabulous!
I just now learned that today is International Compliment Day, and you know I’m here for that-I love giving compliments! Stay As Wonderful As You Are! (Also enjoy this toon, which is funny, but unfortunately on topic. YOU Are Still AWESOME!)
Last Kiss by John Lustig for January 24, 2025
Everyone’s FINALLY Admitting Bernie Sanders was Right About Everything
Trump’s inauguration is just days away. It didn’t have to be this way. In fact, Bernie Sanders warned the Democratic Party that Americans would fall for a far right demagogue if their material needs weren’t addressed. Hacks in the Democratic Party and mainstream media are finally admitting Bernie Sanders was right. In this video we explain why his theory of change was 100% correct and look back at how Democratic Party elites sabotaged the very movement that could’ve saved us all from Trump’s rise.
Peace & Justice History for 1/24
Also, in the early 2000’s as my Dem. county party chair, I had the great honor of representing Kansas St. Senator David Haley-a very gracious man!-at a local candidate’s forum as he was running for Secretary of State (he came close but did not prevail. I tried to take the blame, but he would not let me.) KS is a red state, but he ran against the Republicans anyway. At that time, Republicans loved the computerized voting machines with no chits, but Sen. Haley wanted verification. He is author Alex Haley’s nephew.
| January 24, 1970 John Lennon & Yoko Ono cropped their hair short for the first time in years, declaring 1970 “Year One for Peace” and helped organize a Toronto Peace Festival.  John and Yoko An interview with John later that year |
| January 24, 1977 The TV mini-series ”Roots,” based on the Alex Haley novel, began airing on ABC.  LeVar Burton portrayed Kunta Kinte, a young man captured in Africa and shipped to America to be a slave, in “Roots.” The story followed an African sold into slavery, and his family’s history through emancipation. It won numerous awards and drew an enormous and broad-based audience (third-highest Nielsen ratings ever for its final episode). 85 percent of all Americans watched at least some part of the series. Listen to thoughts on Roots 30 years later |
https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryjanuary.htm#january24
Interesting. She Gives Follow-through Commentary, Even.
The ‘MAGA Granny’ Plans to Reject Trump’s Jan. 6 Pardon, and Her Reasons Behind it Might Shock You
Pamela Hemphill was sentenced to jail after posting videos of her inside the Capitol during the insurrection.
On his first day in office, President Donald Trump made good on his promise to pardon all of the roughly 1,500 Jan. 6 insurrectionists. But while many MAGA supporters like Jacob Chansley, the self proclaimed “QAnon Shaman” and the face of the deadly Capitol riot, celebrated their pardons, one MAGA celebrity is singing a different tune.
Pamela Hemphill is a 71-year-old Boise, Idaho resident. She was known as “the MAGA granny” to Trump’s supporters, but in May 2022, she was sentenced to two months in jail on a misdemeanor charge in the Capitol attack, according to the Department of Justice.
Hemphill pled guilty to the charge after she was caught live streaming the insurrection and posting videos on YouTube from inside the Capitol during the attack. More than two years later, Hemphill said she got exactly what was coming to her. “We were wrong that day, we broke the law,” she told BBC. “There should be no pardons.”
It’s been confirmed that five U.S. citizens were killed during the Jan. 6 riot. This includes Capitol police officer Brian Sicknick, who died on Jan. 7 as a result of injuries sustained during the attack, according to U. S. Capitol Police.
Rachel Scott, a senior congressional correspondent for ABC News, said she spoke to Sicknick’s brother. “We now have no rule of law,” he reportedly told Scott. The brother even went as far as to call Trump “a poor excuse of a man.”
Hemphill said accepting the president’s pardon “would only insult the Capitol police officers, rule of law and, of course, our nation.” She continued to the Idaho Statesman saying, “The J6 criminals are trying to rewrite history by saying that it was not a riot; it wasn’t an insurrection. I don’t want to be a part of their trying to rewrite what happened that day.”
So with that, she’s turning down the pardon offer, going against the president and his MAGA movement’s wishes, and she’s well within her rights to do so. The MAGA granny wouldn’t be the first person to reject a presidential pardon. In 1833, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a pardon recipient can indeed turn down the offer. The ruling was later upheld in 1915, according to the Library of Congress.
Hemphill says her attorney plans to file an official letter of rejection of the president’s pardon.
Music in the A.M.
Have You Heard of Kris Kross? These 90s Teen Hip-Hop Stars Endured Fame and Tragedy
The teen hip-hop duo known for wearing their clothing backwards had everyone jumping in the early 1990s.
If you were around in the 1990s, you’ve probably heard of Kris Kross, the pint-sized rap group that had everyone wearing their clothes backwards and moving to their mega hit “Jump.”
With the help of producer Jermaine Dupri, friends Chris “Mac Daddy” Kelly and Chris “Daddy Mac” Smith started a cultural phenomenon. But it wasn’t long before issues with their image and battles with drug addiction brought their success to a screeching halt. We wanted to take a look back at the careers of these talented teens and the impact they made during their time in the spotlight.
This is the story of Kris Kross. (snip-click through; there’s a slide show with captions. Ah, youth! And we were all younger, too.)
Breakfast and supper on Wednesday. Started on Thursday and finished on Friday.
As some viewers know as my health has been failing over the last couple of years and Ron is starting to show his age also, so we have been spending a lot more time together doing things. Also I have been not able to spend as much time on the blog as I used to and love doing. So this morning as a treat to Ron I made a good sized breakfast for us. Normally breakfast in our home is a catch as catch can. I normally have leftovers from the supper meal as normally I am unable to eat at night, and Ron cooks grand supper. Ron normally has a breakfast he cooks / makes for himself.
I asked him if he would like an egg scramble with bacon and sausage, with a side of toast. He said he would love it. So I took a bunch of thick sliced bacon out of the meat drawer of the refrigerator and also some small link sausage from both that place and the freezer below. Then I prepared two trays that have grill racks over them and on one I placed 8 or 9 long strips of bacon, and on the other I put 10 small sausage links. I had preheated our very large Black and Decker counter oven. It is similar to a toaster oven only much larger. I put the bacon in first at 450.
While the bacon cooked I got the eggs cracked and put into bowls. 3 eggs in each bowl. I use a heavy knife on the sharp edge to crack the eggshell then they easily open the shell with no eggshells into the bowls. I find it works best if the eggs and shells are very cold. Into the bowls of eggs I add a heavy splash of water. Enough to make the eggs cook up fluffy but not leave water in the cooked eggs. Then I set them aside to put the sausage in the oven with the bacon. The thing about cooking sausage in the oven instead of on the stove in a pan is the sausage come out fully cooked but still juicy and soft.
Once the meat was cook Ron chopped what we both wanted in our scrambles, and I combined the meat and eggs in a small sauce pot. Ron had me put chopped opinion and peppers in his. I use a hard spatula like the kind you would frost a cake with not the kind that flip burgers, to stir the eggs and meats together and make scramble eggs. I started the toast as the stuff on the stove cooked up. Just before the eggs finished cooking the toast popped up so I buttered them and called Ron to come get his food. Even though I was happy to make the food I again was unable to my egg scramble, I ate my one piece of toast with grape jam on it. I put the scramble in the fridge for another time. I ate it the next morning and it was great.
During the afternoon I took another nap. This is now being written on Friday. So for supper that Wednesday I had the idea of taking the red sauce I had made the day before to make supper in a different way. I told Ron my idea and he agreed it sounded great. So we took an 8 X 11 baking pan and spread a layer of red sauce on the bottom of the pan. The idea was to use the chicken patties we normally fry to make chicken Parmesan, just with a different cheese. I took six patties and place them in the pan sort of pushing them a third of their height into the sauce. Then set in the oven to bake. When nearly done we took provolone and layered in on the chicken and put them back in the oven. Serve with spaghetti and sauce. Great.
Thursday morning we got up to a rainy cold day … again. But we needed groceries and I had decided it was better now to go with Ron to help him. He is 70 and not walking well. Plus while he is still smart, he does have periods of confusion and gets slow to think or respond. He complains of becoming very forgetful. To be honest I am the same way. I will 62 very soon. But he likes me to drive when possible and he likes the comfort of me being there for him.
So we went and spent all morning filling a grocery cart at Walmart. Some people say that you don’t save any money there and some say you do. Ron has the patience to stand there and compare price and size, unit price, and get the best deal. I can not do this. But I walk with him, talk to him, keep him company, watch our cart when he needs to go get something or his back is too it. I have seen people take stuff from other peoples carts or drop stuff in them. Ron had one of my dragon canes stolen when he had his back to the cart comparing prices. Turned back and the cane was gone. We have a game to guess the cost after it is wrung up on the register. I guessed 260 but he felt it would be well over 325. It came to 257 and change.
We were to go to another store but by the time we got everything put away both of use were tired so decided to go this morning. Temps are better so far than yesterday which had feel like temps in the 30s. This morning we have feel like temps of 41 degrees. The high is to be in the 50s. We plan to hit three small stores and then going to the big flooring store in Fort Myers to pick out the new flooring for the Florida room that I will soon be moving into to. I am leaning toward a light floor. The walls are a soft cream, the molding / trim a light tan / brown. Just enough of a difference to show up but not startling. The north long wall of almost 30 feet is entirely windows except for three feet at the bottom of the windows, even the turn to the east facing wall which has another large window and French doors made of mostly insulated glass panes in a wooden heavy frame. The room is very bright and cheery. Because the door going outside is to the carport and on the same level we were thinking a brown. But once I saw the shocking difference between the light and dark … I think I want a light floor. I am thinking a white marble with gray whirls. Ron thinks it will always look dirty even when not. So maybe we will go with a tan or light gray? That is why I have not done much on the blog or computer since Tuesday. Hugs.
Scottie's Playtime 