Saturday, November 26, 2022

Today's News: FluTruxKlan hearings wrap up

Hey everyone -- first of all, please forgive the lack of posts these days - along with thousands of others, I have been searching for a social media platform to keep up with the day's commentary, as Twitter continues to implode into a racist hellhole. 
But the Twitter platform is miles ahead of all the other social media sits for a blogger like me - no wonder they had so many staff to keep it going. I have been using their Bookmarks, Lists, and Embed Post functions just about every day, and unfortunately the other social media sites just don't offer these features in such an easily usable format. 
I am still searching -- Mastodon does have some of the twitter features, but I am still finding it too clunky to use easily.  Tribel looks good but has no way to save posts so they can be retrieved later. Instagram and TikToc don't have political posts as far as I can understand them. Just yesterday I got accepted onto the Post platform, and it looks promising. 
Also, a large number of the people I follow now have their own Substacks or daily newsletters so this is promising too.  Many of them are navigating to the Post too, so that platform will be more useful I think.
Anyway, I will get it sorted out as soon as I am able. 

In the meantime, Canadian news yesterday and today was full of the testimonies at the FluTruxKlan inquiry (AKA the Public Emergency Order Commission). Overall, Trudeau and the other cabinet ministers and PMO staff did a good job explaining why they turned to the Emergency order to resolve the crisis last February:

This thread from pundit Scott Reid sums it up:
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Thursday, November 24, 2022

Great stuff!

Here's some of the funny stuff I have collected recently.

Can you find both the rabbit and the mouse? Dogs, bruh!
 
https://doggo.tube/post/701771764593770496/sunny-the-rescue-dog-growing-up-with-his-favorite
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Monday, November 21, 2022

Today's News: Update about the war in Ukraine

I haven't posted as much about Ukraine lately so I wanted to assemble an update now. 

First, this remarkable photo: When this war is over, and Ukraine has won, I expect Ukrainians will create a mile-wide border of salted soil, so they never have anything to do with Russia ever again. 
As Adam Silverman said in his Balloon Juice post last night: 
I just want to take a moment and note, again, that what Russia is doing and has been doing since the start of the re-invasion, is the systemic targeting of civilians, civilian residential areas, civilian infrastructure such as power generation, power transmission, water treatment facilities, reservoirs, railways, agriculture, hospitals, schools, cultural facilities, the widespread mining of Ukrainian territory occupied by Russia, the kidnapping of Ukrainian children to Russia, the use of Ukrainian citizens as hostages, etc. The vast majority of Russia’s targeting in the re-invasion constitute war crimes and crimes against humanity. ....the news media regularly fails to make this clear. 
A powerful statement.
In regard to progress in the war itself, it appears that the war is in a lull phase at the moment, until the mud is frozen and heavy trucks can move again: But Russians are still dying: I read Silverman's account tonight expressing concerns about Russia increasing its alliances with Iran and with Syria - previously my concern was whether the Russia-Ukraine war would spread to Europe, but a spread to involve the Middle East might also be problematic. Canada hosted the Halifax International Security Forum this weekend, described as the world's leading security conference for democracies: Here is more detail on what Zelenskyy said:
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has called on Canada to help spearhead a long-term peace plan with Russia, as the nearly 10-month war in Ukraine enters a critical phase with the approach of winter.
The Ukrainian leader threw down the gauntlet in a pre-recorded video address to the Halifax International Security Forum, where senior government and military officials from Canada and around the world are gathering this weekend.
Zelenskyy, whose country was invaded by Russia in February, told participants that real and enduring peace between Kyiv and Moscow will require agreement on 10 different areas.
Those include the withdrawal of Russian forces, the release of prisoners, the securing of Ukraine's nuclear, food and energy security, the restoration of his country's territorial integrity and a tribunal to hold those responsible to account.
The Ukrainian president went on to encourage countries to "choose which item you can help with," adding: "I believe that Canada, which strongly supports us, will also choose one of the peace formula items for itself and will show all strands of leadership."

And I wonder how those Russian soldiers will do after this war, too: Here is some sad news: Finally a couple of posts about some of the ways Canada continues to help Ukraine:
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Sunday, November 20, 2022

Cold weather blues and other news

So pending Twitter's possible demise, I have now signed up at Mastodon and at Tribel -- I'm not sure either of them can work as easily as Twitter did so we'll see how it goes. 
Here are my links to these sites, if you have to find me someday soon: 
I haven't made many posts on these sites yet and I'm not sure how much I will be able to use them, because they don't seem to have easy ways to save posts or to embed them here on Blogger. 

Moving on to today's news, here in Saskatchewan tonight, its COLD. Damned cold.
People have already died of exposure in Saskatchewan this winter: To humanize and publicize the problem,Yann Martel writes of his 36-hour "homeless" experience: 
Over and over, I met people who showed me the respect and dignity that poverty and homelessness so quickly strip you of. 
That’s how we begin to deal with homelessness in our city, by re-humanizing people from whom so much has been taken. Homelessness is not a cancer. It’s the suffering of fellow citizens, and if we don’t help them, we’re all brought down, the homeless and everyone around them, residents, business owners, the city, everyone. 

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Friday, November 18, 2022

Today's News: Sometimes I wanna go Where a few hundred people know my name...


After ordering everyone back to work, Musk has now locked up his office buildings and ordered everyone to stay home for a few days. 
Nobody knows whether Twitter will reopen or just disappear. 
So the feeling on Twitter tonight is gloomy. 
I know Twitter wasn't perfect, but I liked it -- met some great people there, and I even got followed by a few hundred good folks too.  
I would be sad to see it all disintegrate.
So tonight I tried out my Mastodon account - here it is:  
It took me FOREVER to find where I could turn off the "dark mode" that Mastodon apparently defaults to - I find it too difficult to read white print on black background all the time - but I notice here when I embed a toot it is coming through in Dark mode still.
Anyway, for anyone interested in following me there, my Mastodon name is:
I will add it to the side column as soon as I can figure out how to do this. 
UPDATE: Just had to share this one, too:
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Thursday, November 17, 2022

Today's News: Christ, what an asshole!

Time for this week's edition of "Christ, what an asshole!" 

So this happened: Leading, of course to this: Here's the reference:
   

 Speaking of perfection: And here's the reference:
   

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Wednesday, November 16, 2022

Today's News: It is to laugh!

The least surprising news of the day was Trump announcing he would run for president again --to the delight only of cartoonists and Maggie Haberman, I think. 

"Growing visibly" Maggie? What, is Little Donnie eating more donuts again?










The hashtags "NotAgain and #GoAway reflect exactly the way I feel, too: And from overseas: Other reactions:
Finally, in other news:
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Sunday, November 13, 2022

From the bookmarks


Of course dinosaurs and humans never co-existed - dinosaurs went extinct 65 million years before humans developed, and the CBC knows it, as do all paleontologists. 
But no scientist wants to put their job on the line with our nutty right-wing government over such a stupid issue, just because the CBC is trying to play Got-ya! with Scott Moe:

Remembrance Day was Friday - here are some tweets I noticed especially:

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Friday, November 11, 2022

Today's News: When the waves turn the minutes to hours

 
"Does any one know where the love of God goes 
When the waves turn the minutes to hours?" 

Here is a great thread about a great song: This is a beautiful version, too: In other news:
Trudeau does it again! The Canadian right may froth and scream but Trudeau doesn't care, he just keeps on reaching out and leading Canada to become a happier and more inclusive place - sunny days:
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Tuesday, November 08, 2022

Finally!

Finally ... Ford blinked. Finally .... Canada is finding out who the FluTruxKlan organizers actually are: Finally...the US midterms are almost over: Finally...the Musk Lettuce Watch has begun:
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Sunday, November 06, 2022

Today's News: The story behind Russia-gate and the Ukraine War

The New York Times has published a major article The Untold Story of "Russia-gate" and the Road to War in Ukraine (gift article link), and the story actually turns out to be remarkably simple -- Putin wanted to get Trump elected so Trump could support a plan that would give Putin control of Ukraine's industry and agriculture. 
Paul Manafort was the go-between - he had a plan to trade Mariupol for Russia's help in electing Trump in 2016. After Manafort's arrest, Giuliani jumped into the game in 2020.  It was a domestic and international scheme to hand Ukraine to Putin. When that failed, war became inevitable. 
This story explains everything from the inexplicable deletion of Ukraine support in the 2016 Republican platform, to the incredible July 4 2018 Congressional trip to Russia, to Trump's incredibly inept series of secret meetings with Putin.  Here's an excerpt that summarizes the thesis of Jim Rutenberg's article:
Putin’s assault on Ukraine [in 2022] and his attack on American democracy [in 2016] have until now been treated largely as two distinct story lines. Across the intervening years, Russia’s election meddling has been viewed essentially as a closed chapter in America’s political history — a perilous moment in which a foreign leader sought to set the United States against itself by exploiting and exacerbating its political divides.
Yet those two narratives came together that summer night at the Grand Havana Room. And the lesson of that meeting is that Putin’s American adventure might be best understood as advance payment for a geopolitical grail closer to home: a vassal Ukrainian state. 
Thrumming beneath the whole election saga was another story — about Ukraine’s efforts to establish a modern democracy and, as a result, its position as a hot zone of the new Cold War between Russia and the West, autocracy and democracy. 
To a remarkable degree, the long struggle for Ukraine was a bass note to the upheavals and scandals of the Trump years, from the earliest days of the 2016 campaign and then the presidential transition, through Trump’s first impeachment and into the final days of the 2020 election. Even now, some influential voices in American politics, mostly but not entirely on the right, are suggesting that Ukraine make concessions of sovereignty similar to those contained in Kilimnik’s plan, which the nation’s leaders categorically reject.
Its a long read but worth it. 
In other Ukraine news: Here is an American pilot's message to Putin:
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Friday, November 04, 2022

Friday funnies

Just some of the funny stuff collected this week: Elon Musk continues to demonstrate why he so richly deserves the sobriquet "Christ, what an asshole!": An interesting comment here, too -- and see this article at Daily Kos for more:
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Wednesday, November 02, 2022

Today's News: It's another edition of "Christ, what an asshole!"



Elon Musk - he will be the gift that keeps on giving, at least until he has bashed Twitter into the ground: Elon's inner 12-year-old is emerging now: Everyone is declaring "their stance" about whether they will quit Twitter or not:
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Monday, October 31, 2022

Hey, its Halloween!

Likely the best video ever:
   

 Here are some good Halloween tweets and tweet-stories I have been collecting! Some posts about Halloween in Ukraine: "I love candy!"
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Sunday, October 30, 2022

Twitter stories

I have collected a few more great twitter stories

First, follow this one from @ppirapokin about his Power Rangers adventure in a ramen restaurant -- the tweet below is the beginning of the thread, the photo in the second tweet is one that someone else took of the restaurant: Who knew bike safety could be so interesting? A thread that all parents and teachers should take to heart: Here's an interesting discussion from Josh Marshall: I love this story. Click the tweet to see the entire text: What it was like to be a doctor during the time of Covid:
Finally, enjoy!
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