Welcome to MAY! Yes, we’re here at last, on May 1, 2025. Here’s Julie Andrews celebrating the Lusty Month of May in “Camelot”:
and May from the illuminated manuscript Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry (1412-1416):
Besides May Day, it’s also Law Day, Mother Goose Day, Save the Rhino Day, Global Love Day, National Chocolate Parfait Day, National Salad Day, International Workers’ Day, and the National Day of Reason.. Here’s a Workers’ Day poster from the 1980s that you can buy for $200. It is of course from California:
There’s also a Google Doodle today; click on image to see where it goes:
Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the May 1 Wikipedia page.
Da Nooz:
*Attention First Amendment supporters! The Supreme Court may deal all of us a blow in the coming months by allowing public funding of religious charter schools. (h/t Luana). Article is archived here.
The Supreme Court appeared open on Wednesday to allowing Oklahoma to use government money to run the nation’s first religious charter school, which would teach a curriculum infused by Catholic doctrine.
Excluding the school from the state’s charter-school system would amount to “rank discrimination against religion,” Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh said.
The justices appeared to be divided along the usual ideological lines, with the court’s Republican appointees largely sympathetic to the school and its Democratic ones quite wary. But Justice Amy Coney Barrett was recused, raising the possibility of a tie vote if a single Republican appointee joined the three Democratic ones. That would leave a state court decision rejecting the school intact.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who asked questions supportive of both sides, seemed to be the most likely member of such a potential alliance.
The school: The school, St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School, aims to incorporate Catholic teachings into its activities. A powerful conservative Christian legal group, the Alliance Defending Freedom, is representing it.
Oklahoma fight: After the state’s charter school board approved the proposal to open St. Isidore, the state’s attorney general, Gentner Drummond, a Republican, sued to stop it. He said a religious public school would violate the First Amendment and the State Constitution’s ban on spending public money to support religious institutions.
And indeed, using public money to fund a Catholic school is indeed a violation of the First Amendment. But if the Supreme Court rules it okay, I see no way of overturning this violation. This is what you get when you allow charter schools that are paid for in part by public money. What’s next: schools funded by the public that teach creationism?
*Fires are raging around Jerusalem and other parts of Israel, certainly prompted by a call from Hamas to burn the country.
Terrorism is suspected in the wave of massive fires that have triggered a national emergency across parts of Israel, according to an unnamed Israeli security source speaking to The Media Line. The fires erupted on Tuesday, as the country marked Memorial Day for Fallen Soldiers and Victims of Terrorism and prepared to transition into celebrations for its 77th Independence Day.
The source confirmed that several arrests have been made in connection with the suspected arson attacks, but declined to provide further details due to the sensitivity of the ongoing investigation.
The fires, intensified by strong winds and dry conditions, have led to the evacuation of numerous communities. Emergency services are battling to contain the blazes, which have already caused widespread property damage and forced road closures. No fatalities have been reported so far, but officials have warned that the situation remains dangerous and unpredictable.
“This is being treated as a national emergency,” the source said, pointing to evidence that suggests the fires were set deliberately and in a coordinated manner. The timing—on a day of national mourning followed immediately by celebrations of statehood—has raised concerns that the attacks were intended to provoke panic and undermine the national morale.
Hamas posted a message encouraging Palestinians to “burn whatever you can of groves, forests, and settler homes,” on Telegram on Wednesday.
“Youth of the West Bank, youth of Jerusalem, and those inside Israel, set their cars ablaze… Gaza awaits the revenge of the free,” the terrorist organization wrote.
Earlier, the Jenin News Network Telegram channel called on Palestinians to “burn the groves near the settlements” in a post on Telegram on Wednesday.
As the wildfires continue to burn across central Israel, the channel posted a photo of a masked person setting fire to a field as a town burns in the background, with the text “Settlers’ homes will be ashes under the feet of the revolutionaries” and the hashtag “Burn settlers’ houses.”
The wildfires broke out in the Judean Hills on Wednesday morning and spread across the Jerusalem area as the day continued.
I’m wondering if any other countries will send firepeople to Israel to help stop these first. They are, of course a war crime, and are aimed deliberately at civilians, but nobody is going to criticize Hamas for this except for petulant people like me. (Imagine what would happen if Israel called for setting fires to Palestinian houses in the West Bank!) I did find this in the Jerusalem Post:
International aid from the global community — including neighboring countries Greece, Croatia, Italy, Cyprus, and Bulgaria — is not expected to arrive until Thursday morning, as fires continue to rage across the country on Wednesday.
*More evidence that RFK Jr.’s appointment as Secretary of Health was not only deeply misguided, but dangerous. (NYT article archived here.) In an interview with Dr. Phil, the benighted Kennedy (Jr.) was ambiguous about vaccines:
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. advised parents of newborns to “do your own research” before vaccinating their infants during a televised interview in which he also suggested the measles shot was unsafe and repeatedly made false statements that cast doubt on the benefits of vaccination and the independence of the Food and Drug Administration.
Mr. Kennedy made the remarks to the talk show host Dr. Phil in an interview that aired Monday on MeritTV to mark the 100th day of the Trump administration. He said, as he has in the past, that “if you want to avoid spreading measles, the best thing you can do is take that vaccine.”
But Mr. Kennedy also made clear, as he has in the past, that he believes it is up to individuals to decide. In suggesting vaccines are unsafe, he contradicted decades of advice from public health experts, including leaders of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“I would say that we live in a democracy, and part of the responsibility of being a parent is to do your own research,” the health secretary said, in response to a question from a woman in the audience who asked how he would advise a new parent about vaccine safety. “You research the baby stroller, you research the foods that they’re getting, and you need to research the medicines that they’re taking as well.”
The phrase “I did my own research” became a cultural and political touchstone during the coronavirus pandemic, when proponents of vaccination, mostly on the political left, used it to denigrate those who had chosen not to get vaccinated. It became an internet meme and popped up on mock tombstones in Halloween-themed graveyards in liberal neighborhoods.
The Department of Health and Human Services did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Mr. Kennedy’s comments came amid the largest measles outbreak in about 25 years in the United States, which has included the deaths of two young children and an adult.
Seriously, “Do your own research” really means “read online,” and if you know who to trust, then that’s okay. But you know what kind of stuff about vaccines you can find online. Kennedy, by not affirming that vaccines are the best way to protect against measles, is being lax; he speaks only about “spreading measles” but not “getting measles”. He is abnegating his responsibility as the nation’s chief health official. It’s like telling someone with diabetes, “do your own research on insulin.” At some point one has to trust experts, and what Kennedy has shown is that he is neither an “expert” or a person to be trusted. His behavior is reprehensible.
*The Free Press has a collection of short takes on the “100 Days of Trump“. Participants include Bill Maher, Nellie Bowles, Sam Harris, Coleman Hughes, and Mike Pompeo. I’ll give four (Nellie Bowles is off the mark and I won’t put her bit).
Coleman Hughes on Trump’s Squad:
If the first 100 days of Trump’s second term have taught us anything, it’s that it really matters who Trump is surrounded by.
Though I’ve never supported Trump, I have often drawn comfort from the fact that his first term included several massive policy victories, from the Abraham Accords to Operation Warp Speed and the First Step Act. Such victories seemed to indicate a well-intentioned and rational actor hiding behind the bully we see on TV.
But there was a competing theory behind those policy wins as well: that Trump’s insanity sometimes works well when his impulses are filtered through the sieve of the “adults in the room,” people like H.R. McMaster, Jared Kushner, and many others.
Now that the adults in the room have been replaced (with notable exceptions) with cranks and yes-men, the results have been starkly different. From tanking our economy with tariffs to using executive orders to retaliate against law firms that represented his rivals to mucking around with due process, we can now say with some confidence that Trump’s first-term policy wins were probably not the result of a decent man existing underneath the mask. They were the result of a madman restrained.
Bill Maher on Bad Things:
In a word: shitshow. I said after he won the election, I’m not going to pre-hate anything. But after 100 days, there are probably 100 things to legitimately hate, starting with disappearing people, the inefficiency of DOGE, ignoring the Supreme Court, killing people overseas with drastic aid cuts, firing the guy in charge of his election-integrity office because he won’t say 2020 was rigged, tariff-related market collapse, America no longer being seen as a safe place, the third-term talk, suing the media, Andrew Tate. . . I mean, I could just keep going. And I want to emphasize: None of my disapproval for any of this comes from reflexive Republican opposition. On all these issues, it’s just objectively bad. And they know that, too.
Yet Maher is still getting crap for saying that Trump was gracious at dinner in the White House. Once you say that, you’re marked for life.
Sam Harris on Bullshit:
In the run-up to the 2024 election, Trump’s defenders assured us that there was nothing to fear from a second Trump term, because there had already been a first one, and nothing too terrible had happened.
Many people knew this was bullshit at the time, and it was revealed to be bullshit even before the second inauguration. Trump and his ravenous family launched their meme coins, skimming hundreds of millions of dollars from the MAGA cult and creating a mechanism by which supplicants, aspiring crooks, and foreign agents could purchase influence with the new regime.
From this moment, it was clear that a second Trump presidency would degrade our country in ways that few had imagined possible. One hundred days later, it is hard to overstate just how much damage has been done to America’s standing in the world. When the history of this period is written, it will be widely acknowledged that the second Trump administration was stunning as much for its incompetence as for its corruption. Those who remained silent will find no shelter in the claim that they did not know how bad things were at the time. Everyone knows what everyone knows—and everyone knows you know it.
John McWhorter on Megalomania:
Trump has revealed himself in these first 100 days to be the smallest person ever to occupy the office, despite standing six-foot-three. Only two things drive him, both grievously inappropriate as prime movers of a national leader.
One is revenge. Against DEI because it threatens his white maleness. Against campus protests—not out of philosemitism but a desire to punish, à la Richard Nixon’s revulsion at “hippies.” The stunning absurdity of his cabinet picks pokes a stick in the eye of the “deep state” of his fantasies. His tariffs are crackpot economics that allow him to get back at the whole world.
Then there is the sandcastle-kicking megalomania: wanting to annex Canada and Greenland, the adoration of dictators, the contempt for the leader of Ukraine as a loser, the Gulf of America.
At around this time in Theodore Roosevelt’s first term, the British ambassador to Sweden said of his enthusiasm and energy, “You must always remember that the president is about six.” For the next 900 days or so, our country will be run by someone who, mentally, actually is.
There are also people who are excited about Trump, including Chritopher Rufo, but I’m quoting people who have featured in these pages recently.
*Another one from the Free Press, which reports that two janitors held hostage by pro-Palestinian protestors during a Columbia building takeover are suing the protestors for a number of crimes (see also this article at the New York Post).
he Columbia University janitors who were held hostage during the violent takeover of a campus building last spring are suing their alleged captors for battery, assault, and conspiracy to violate their civil rights, according to a copy of the suit reviewed exclusively by The Free Press.
The lawsuit was filed in federal court on Friday evening by Torridon Law and the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law on behalf of Columbia janitors Mario Torres and Lester Wilson. It alleges that over 40 Columbia students and “outside agitators,” some but not all of whom were arrested by police following the takeover of Columbia’s Hamilton Hall last April 29, “terrorized” both Torres and Wilson “into the early morning of April 30th, assaulted and battered them, held them against their will, and derided them as ‘Jew-lovers’ and ‘Zionists.’ ”
The occupation of Hamilton Hall occurred almost exactly a year ago, and both Torres and Lester say they have been struggling to cope ever since. The lawsuit statesboth men suffered physical injuries the night of the occupation, and that they have also been suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder that has required ongoing medical care. Neither has been able to return to work, and are instead “subsisting on interim Workers Compensation payments” which are “inadequate” to pay for their basic needs and medical bills, according to the suit.
“Mario and Lester are decent, honest, hardworking men who have been through hell. None of this ever should have happened,” said Tara Helfman, one of the Torridon lawyers on the case.
The lawsuit describes the protesters, the majority of whom “donned masks and hoods to conceal their identities,” as “reminiscent of the Ku Klux Klan.” It claims they “are part of a broad pro-Hamas, anti-Semitic network of organizations, groups, and cells that are connected through a largely untraceable underground communications system. They promote and resort to violent and illegal tactics, and are motivated by invidious discrimination against Jews and supporters of Jews.”
The Brandeis Center also filed a federal lawsuit late Friday on behalf of two students, a professor, and a rabbi at the University of California, Los Angeles, alleging that several groups, including National Students for Justice in Palestine, Faculty for Justice in Palestine Network, American Muslims for Palestine, and Westchester People’s Action Coalition, engaged in “a coordinated campaign of egregious acts of racial exclusion, intimidation, and assault” to “intimidate Jewish students, faculty, and staff.”
This is one reason why Columbia got nicked for allowing an antisemitic atmosphere to develop:
Over 40 protesters, including Carlson, were arrested and charged with trespassing in the days after the Hamilton Hall occupation. But Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg’s office dropped the charges, claiming the charges would have been “extremely difficult” to prove because the protesters wore masks and covered security cameras.
But there could have been University discipline, and there wasn’t. Trespassers taken into custody have to show IDs. And, in fact, the article gives several names of people who occupied the building.
While Torres and Wilson are not Jewish, the lawsuit alleges that antisemitism played a central role in the harm inflicted upon the janitors, who the protesters knew were likely to be in the building that night. The lawsuit states that “the Occupiers were motivated by perceptions that Mr. Torres and Mr. Wilson supported Jews and presented potential obstacles to the execution of their plot to take over and occupy Hamilton Hall.”
Yep, the non-Jewish janitors were called “Jew lovers” and “Zionists”. So much for the faux distinction between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. Throw the book at them. Free speech, yes, vandalism, tresspassing, and holding people hostage, no.
Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is chilling:
A: Oh, here you are.Hili: Yes, I took a short break from politics.
Ja: O, tu jesteś.Hili: Tak, zrobiłam sobie krótkie wakacje od polityki.
*******************
From Jesus of the Day:
From Strange, Silly, or Stupid Signs:
From Another Science Humor Group:
Masih’s book has been translated into Arabic. Let’s hope some copies find their way into Iran:
3/ Because as @AlinejadMasih says,
“Fighting compulsory hijab is about much more than hair—just as Rosa Parks refusing her seat was about more than an unjust seating policy. It’s about fighting for what’s right.”
That’s the threat: the fight for dignity, not dress. pic.twitter.com/6SsKvPCcJI
— Ideas Beyond Borders (@IdeasB2) April 30, 2025
From Luana: These moronic thugs brag about their recent vandalism at Columbia University, which seems to be completely impotent in the face of this kind of stuff.
Anonymous submission:
Overnight, an autonomous group acted against Amerika’s repression of the Palestine movement. The group attacked one of Columbia University’s border checkpoints — structures created to surveil and suppress the student movement. Security equipment was… pic.twitter.com/ZdAZwSrYoG
— Unity of Fields (@unityoffields) April 30, 2025
From Simon, who calls this “All Presidential at the Pope’s funeral”. But I can’t say that I would have stayed awake!
— Someone needs a nap. It’s me. I’m someone. 🙋🏻♀️ (@menard2530.bsky.social) 2025-04-28T14:37:12.703Z
From Malcolm; a cat as mousepad:
Cat got a job as a mousepad. pic.twitter.com/48N9IvGnGV
— cats with jobs 🛠 (@CatWorkers) April 8, 2025
From my feed. There’s always this kind of competition at the border, but this is like an Indian/Pakistani haka faceoff.
Shit’s poppin’ off on the India/Pakistan border! pic.twitter.com/QIvKlvrKsT
— David Santa Carla 🦇 (@TheOnlyDSC) April 29, 2025
Here’s a full ceremony at the border:
From the Auschwitz Memorial; one that I retweeted:
A German Jewish girl was gassed to death upon arrival at Auschwitz. She was twelve.
— Jerry Coyne (@evolutionistrue.bsky.social) 2025-05-01T11:04:02.705Z
Two tweets from Dr. Cobb. First, adorable cougar cubs:
Meet Link and Nova! Orphaned in the wild in November and brought to the zoo by WDFW, these cougar cubs are exploring their outdoor habitat and getting plenty of play time.
— Oregon Zoo (@oregonzoo.bsky.social) 2025-04-29T20:05:00.153Z
. . . and Mariah the lovely moose:
Beauty In The Wild… Early morning. The incredible, Mariah The Moose. Absolutely gorgeous. She was preparing to forage for snacks. A truly gentle soul.🫎📸🇨🇦#AlgonquinPark #Moose #Mammals#Wildlife #Nature #WildlifePhotography #Photography #OntarioParks #Canada
— Remy Michaels (@remyscameraeye.bsky.social) 2025-04-30T08:12:38.089Z
It looked like the Indian and Pakistani troops were about to have a dance off.
As for Trump sleeping, a man with head bowed, eyes closed, hands together at a funeral? I call praying.
Trump doesn’t pray.
Of all the things that the Current President has done recentlly, this is probably the most respectful and useful thing he could be doing.
And a contract view at 100 says in, “The Media’s Fake Narrative on Trump’s First 100 Days,” which points out that the media that has hated Trump for nine years is hardly like to say good things about his first 100 days of his second term.
As I Trump vote, all I can say is that, while I am not totally happy, in some cases because not enough has been done, I don’t regret voting for him, especially when contrasted with the alternative. I think the tariffs are a mess in how they are being implemented, and that Trump has contradictor goals with them (negotiating lower trade barriers vs. income generation and protectionism, but I don’t oppose tariffs in general. Frankly, I am unhappy with Congress for sitting on their hands and not making radical cuts in government. I expect the “great big beautiful bill” will be pork.
I feel like Sam Harris’ comments sum it up for me. Corruption on an unprecedented scale. Imperial president. This is exactly why so many of us held our noses and voted for Kamala. Trump has turned our strong economy around, rather quickly. And anybody who has ever worked for any organization will know that bringing in outsiders like DOGE to start cutting here and cutting there, is a recipe for disaster.
As far as the budget is concerned, once you pay for Social Security, Medicare, and Defense, there is really no money left at our current tax rates. Personally I feel there is a role for things like the CDC and FEMA and the EPA. The better way to do this is for us to agree, as a country, what services we want the federal government to provide, and tax accordingly.
As far as Trump sleeping at the Pope’s funeral, even Snopes agrees it was not the case.
Even if he was dozing off, I won’t criticize him for that. I would probably do the same.
“As far as the budget is concerned, once you pay for Social Security, Medicare, and Defense, there is really no money left at our current tax rates.”
Possibly I’m mis-interpreting this sentence, but perhaps one could not be much faulted for getting the impression that federal income taxes (and not separate Social Security and Medicare taxes) pay for Social Security and Medicare. (A quick search online informs me that the employer S.S. and Medicare contributions are income tax deductible.)
How convenient for the federal government to be able to borrow from and effectively treat the two Trust Funds as additional sources of income tax, to that extent allowing Congress to avoid raising income tax rates. (Over the years have any S.S. and Medicare monies been transferred to the DOD budget?)
The government currently owes the S.S. Trust Fund approximately $2.77 trillion. Notwithstanding the “good faith and credit” of the U.S. government, a national debt in excess of $30 trillion gives one slight pause.
Filippo:
My comments was general in that, if you look at all revenue collected (payroll taxes, income taxes, tariffs, etc.) then that is about enough money to cover SSI, Medicare and defense. There is other ‘mandatory” spending outside of SSI and Medicare that I am not even including.
I use this as a reference (for year 2023): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget
My position is this: we need to have a real ‘Come to Jesus’ meeting here in the USA, decide what we need to invest money in. Once that is done, then we set tax rates to raise the revenue. I am not holding my breath.
A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
Three grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love, and something to hope for. -Joseph Addison, writer (1 May 1672-1719)
Thank you, Rick! Really liking the return of Quotes/Thought for Today. Positive, timely, and good to know that sane people from all times were capable of carefully crafted thoughts.
My history with “charter” schools goes back to the 1980’s in Virginia when these proposed schools came from two groups: 1. religious and 2. anti-integration t/a neighborhood schools. The religious groups, such as the one in the current Supreme Court case, mostly were after public funding for their established religious schools. The neighborhood schools crowd simply wanted to keep our traditional Southern white schools white for their children and since, even two decades after the Brown decision, our neighborhoods were still pretty much segregated, neighborhood-zoned schools would also be. This group was also the anti-busing group. When a clear frontal attack to get public money for religious or as we called them in those days, parochial, schools failed, the subterfuge of charter, followed closely by the revised moniker “public charter” after charter failed in our state general assembly…we are the home of Thomas Jefferson after all… came into the lexicon. The neighborhood schools people also jumped on the public charter bandwagon and were successful in creating a local option from the general assembly wherein each locality through its school board can decide to support proposed charter schools…thus giving some fig leaf or facade of local control and oversight.
I was personally strongly opposed to charters, as was my local board and the state school boards association, the professional association representing the 132 local school boards across the state. But eventually the grass roots parents groups’ testimony wore down the legislators and threatened their re-election and within a few years the option was created. I think that overall it has not been a great success as for-profits have failed after a few years leaving the local public school boards to pick up the pieces and find places for the suddenly school-less children.
Good historical perspective, Jim. Thank you.
I lived for 12 years in Virginia when I was a professor at Virginia Tech, and I remember these subterfuges. Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University was only 90 miles away in what we (mostly secular) academics called the “Buckle of the Bible Belt.” My guess is that the same subterfuge (for religion) is at play elsewhere, and the Catholic school case may be an example. I also think that the home schooling moment is similarly often another way to get religion into the heads of students, but I don’t know how the funding works for home schooling—whether home-schooled kids (I should say home-schooled parents) get public funding or not.
I have been away from the game for awhile but I recall the home schoolers nibbling away at supplementing their home programs with freebies from the public schools, first in extra-curricular athletics, then one or two advanced courses. And yes, almost all of our home schooled were fundamentalist religious families. The state seems to provide a number of nods to home schoolers in its distance learning opportunities. Local school districts’ state funding is per pupil registered, so we receive no funding from the state for home schooled students.
Jim, my experience was opposite. When I was on our local board, we started an in-district charter school focused on STEM.
It operated as a selective school with admissions testing, and also open to students from any district (my state had school choice for quite a while). It was not for-profit but was operated outside of the main school union contract and had separate administration. While not for-profit, it brought in significantly more money than was spent, as a result of obtaining out-of-district students’ allotments from their home districts. We sent about 95% of our graduates on to university, vs. about 40% for the main district. We maintained local control, and had a separate committee composed of 3 of our 7 board members who met monthly to discuss issues at that school. I would deem it highly successful in terms of student outcomes.
That said, I do agree that religious schools fall outside of the government school program. Kavanaugh’s comment seems 180 to how this should work under 1A.
Glad you had success with charters Darryl. Virginia is a right to work state so that teacher “unions” operate as simple associations…no contracts. Close to what you describe are our Governor’s Schools in Virginia each of which is led by a district or a collection of several districts, serves by law two or more districts, has a board usually made up of selected school board members from each of the participating districts, and a focus such as STEM, arts, foreign languages or the like. Last I looked we had 19 of these specialty schools across the state, the most famous of which may be the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, located in Northern VA, administered by the Fairfax County Public Schools and generally has been ranked in the top five high schools in the nation. I served on the board of another Governor’s Schools in Southeast Va serving eight school districts and offering advanced science and computer sciences. I think that these specialty schools allow for the good and unique educational ideas of Virginians while keeping control and responsibility in the hands of publicly elected board members or members appointed by elected officials. They are publicaly funded by the participating local districts plus an extra stipend from the state. Again, glad your STEM Charter has been successful.
When I was a kid in VA in the ’60s, the Catholics had their own schools, but they had to provide their own bus fleet.
Now, outside Pittsburgh, the local school district, HQ next door, is obliged to bus any kid to any charter school within a 10mi radius. There are ONE HUNDRED of them.
Yep. This is an example of the overhead responsibilities and mandates that would drag away the educational focus for ALL children that our public schools districts are charged with by our state constitution.
“Excluding the school from the state’s charter-school system would amount to “rank discrimination against religion,” Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh said.”
Brave Justice Kavanaugh! Forever to be known for opening the door to public funding for Wahhabi Madrassahs across our great and fruitful plains.
Excellent Mr. Baker – Wahhabi Madrassahs are the leading edge of this scandal – way more than, say, Jesus academies. Both are terrible – as is the woke public system – but some things are more evil than others.
So glad I’m voluntarily, happily childless so I can’t be driven bonkers by this.
D.A.
NYC
Fidel Catstro and Frida Katlo:
https://bsky.app/profile/sanho.bsky.social/post/3lo4dv2r5722o
Fidel Catstro and Frida Katlo! Love it!
I was waiting for this and was not disappointed.
PBS – aka Voice of Al Qaida and the Taliban etc….. attributed the Israeli fires to “climate change” – as they do utterly everything. No mention of Pal terrorism.
On some issues our media is so laughably unserious. I’ve never said this before but in the past few years I have: defund public media.
(Particularly in the UK where the formerly most respected BBC is utterly beclowned.)
Things that are no longer fit for purpose, or actively damaging, must go.
Onwards Israeli firefighters.
D.A.
NYC
I’m not surprised. I can’t watch PBS or listen to NPR without yelling at the TV or the radio.
They do the border face off theatrics at Wagah (India/Pakistan)… I think every day closing the gate. It is a big production, famous and crowds of people come to watch.
Perhaps with fewer wars and nukes more borders could put on such shows?
Prob wouldn’t work in Israel… but there are other borders.
D.A.
NYC
Who said Pakistanis and Indians don’t appreciate gay culture. And LOL at the MJ soundtrack; maybe Over the Rainbow would be equally appropriate.
If the Supreme Court rules as we fear, this is pretty much guaranteed.
It is already happening in Florida where we have universal vouchers. State money is available to parents to use to send their children to the private school of their choice. That includes very conservative religious schools that teach all kinds of theological claptrap from young earth to evolution denial, all based on biblical literalism.
It started with vouchers funded by “donations” that served as tax deductions, a program that was ruled constitutional because the money never became part of general revenue for the state. The last time I bought a car the salesman offered me the opportunity to donate my sales tax on the vehicle to a “scholarship fund” to support school vouchers. Gov. Ron Desantis and his lackeys in the legislature finally went the Full Monty a few years ago and authorized the expenditure of funds from the state treasury to expand the program to all parents and all private schools. The heavily stacked state supreme court has been no help. Public education is being strangled by the loss of funds.
Yep. That’s the strategy: peck, peck, peck until the peckers have returned us to the 16th century.
I would laugh if it weren’t sadly true.
Or even worse, we could end up with schools that teach nonsense like that sex is a spectrum, that men can get pregnant, or that trans women are actually women.
Oh, wait, we already have those. They’re called public schools and elite universities.
“Do your own research” also implies that there is no simple answer. If there was a simple answer then he could just state it.
So RFK has launched the “autism study” which he says will provide “definitive answers” within six months. Will be pretty funny when he concludes that vaccines cause autism and then gives garbage for evidence. I can’t do this for four years.
Be strong, this too shall pass (although I expect the blowback to be just as bad or worse).
Do your own research means make your own decision. It does not mean don’t listen to the experts, it means evaluate what they are telling us. What experts need to do is not lie, as Dr. Fauci did when it came to masks.
As A Different Mike pointed out, it’s complicated. I took every COVID vax and booster I could and would do it again. I’m 70 and have asthma. I suggested against the vax for my grandchildren, and as we know now, shutting down schools was a mistake.
Dr. Fauci did not lie about masks:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2021/06/03/fact-check-missing-context-claim-mask-emails-fauci/7531267002/
https://apnews.com/article/fact-check-fauci-interview-face-masks-covid-406605262832
Thanks for those links. Demonization of Fauci is at epidemic levels.
Fauci’s real crime was doing an end run around the Obama administration’s moratorium on gain of function research by funding Ecohealth Alliance to perform gain of function research in Wuhan. That is why his pardon extended back to 2014.
http://www.chalkbeat.org/2022/6/6/23157103/child-care-workers-teachers-covid-fatality-death-rates/
But we did not know then what we know now….and someplaces were really in a heck of a fix with hospitals slammed, admissions (of all age groups) accelerating with no end in sight. Hell, our local Catholic schools will close for two weeks during a particularly heavy flu season…and we know about flu and have a vaccine for it.
Did we stay closed for too long? Likely. Did we not distinguish between sparsely populated rural areas and dense urban ones? Yeah. But we did not know these things before we had data to actually know these things. My hat is off to Fauci and Company….who by the way funded basic research that led to a timely, matured mrna technology and funded long covid investigation early on based on small signals in the surveillance data.
I am concerned about the Supreme Court allowing federal funds to support religious schools. They may argue that supporting religious schools does not violate the separation clause because doing so does not favor particular religions. We’ll see, but enabling such funding would undoubtedly have add-in effects, possibly even to the point of teaching creationism, as some religious schools almost certainly do teach creationism of some flavor or other.
The fires in Israel. You’re almost certainly right that the fires will not be criticized by the media, although they may be mentioned. The coverage will be of the pro forma type that slants against Israel’s right to defend itself. I’m glad that you have this forum where people of good will can rightly criticize this effort to burn Israel to the ground.
+1
Looks like a number of countries have volunteered to help Israel with the fires, Norman. Azerbaijan, Czech Republic, Spain, France, UK, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Croatia, Cyprus… I’m reading a thread on Dan Senor’s account from April 30. Maybe more today. That’s good news.
The administration signed the mineral deal with Ukraine and it might be a fair deal according to AP.
The deal says that the Trump administration is committed to a free, sovereign and prosperous Ukraine over the long term and that no state or person who financed or supplied the Russian war machine will be allowed to benefit from the reconstruction of Ukraine.
A straight forward deal were both sides are beholden to specifics may be better for Ukraine than where they just hope for the kindness of strangers.
ABC News:
“President Donald Trump on Monday said that further attacks or retaliation by the Houthis would be considered an attack by Iran and it would face “dire” consequences.”:
https://abcnews.go.com/International/houthi-missile-drone-attack-us-navy-ships-failed/story?id=119863896
Sounds like progress to me. When it gets expanded to Hamas and Hezbollah I will be truly happy.
May 1: By some accounts, Valborgsmässoafton in Sweden extends to May 1. I always knew it as just April 30. It’s basically the Viking celebration of the end of winter, when all across the country folks in towns and farm villages have a bonfire. Some are quite large.
I would’ve posted this yesterday, but much of Pittsburgh was without power due to a near-dericho. I had my own fire out back, and while that was going on the power came back after about 28hrs.
One reason I am optimistic is that Americans voted for change, and they got change. This is in contrast to most other countries, where even when people vote for change, nothing actually changes.
A key component of democracy is the ability of the people to get rid of incompetent leaders. In the UK, Johnson and especially Truss were examples. A major problem with the EU is that appointed Commissioners are untouchable. So, if the USA is a democracy, I look forward to the early impeachment of its elected monarch.
That is simply not true. EU commissioners are not “untouchable” and there are many ways that they can be voted out of office.
In theory.
The whole commission can be removed en bloc by the Parliament: it will never happen.
The President of the Commission can force an individual to retire: one unelected oligarch in conflict with another.
My point stands, just as in theory Trump can be removed by impeachment.
Do you think that any of the issue with his actions are that he’s actually doing something? I think most people vote for a candidate based on their platform, but also don’t think that they will carry out the full platform. For instance, other Republicans campaigned on reducing spending, but did not. Trump is the first president that I’ve seen who seems to be checking off a list of all the things he said he’d do, and he’s getting them done quickly. He said he’d enact tariffs, and people said “Yeah, let’s bring jobs back to the US!” but now that he’s doing them and we’re starting to experience the effects, I wonder how many voters are saying, “we didn’t think that he’d really do it, especially not in a way that would affect us”.
Is the FP article on response to Trump’s first hundred days a surprise?
The people interviewed have had strong views one way or the other, and aren’t going to change. They’re preprogrammed to like or hate Trump, so they’re wired to find evidence supporting their views. Similar to how his actions to shut down campus antisemitism lead to charges that he’s going to make the problem worse or being called a dishonest actor.
Additionally, where the respondents are getting their news matters a lot. As VD Hanson noted, Media Research Center reports that 92% of coverage of Trump has been negative, while at the same time 59% of Biden’s coverage in the same period was positive (note: I’m pretty sure Hanson is primarily reading pro-Trump stuff). Many of respondents are not seeing the administration work first-hand, so their opinion can only be formed on the reporting. I see the FP report as merely parroting what the respondents are being fed in terms of news, with them adding their own spin.
As I was looking at The FP, I also about Hasan Piker https://www.thefp.com/p/the-handsome-face-of-terror-apologia was certainly eye-opening. I knew of his popularity among younger people, but not of his comments regarding Jews and Israel. Why is he not talked about in the same manner as Nick Fuentes, or worse, given his much larger audience?
Something mildly humorous re the Columbia vandalism video:
Knowing no Arabic, near the end of the video is a lyric I heard as “Haggis in my head”. Ach aye.