erronis
erronis's JournalThe Ecological Destruction from the Border Wall, in "American Scar" (New Yorker)
Very good documentary.
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-new-yorker-documentary/the-ecological-destruction-from-the-border-wall-in-american-scar
Film by Daniel Lombroso
Text by Murat Oztaskin
April 30, 2022
In 2016, Donald Trump energized his Presidential campaign with three words: Build the wall. On the campaign trail, Trump insisted that Mexico would pay for the project, but once in office he looked to a more likely source of funding, Congress, which for two years declined to offer the moneya battle which eventually sparked the longest government shutdown in U.S. history. Then, in early 2019, the President found a different way: he declared a national emergency at the southern border, a move that allowed him to reallocate funds for the walls construction from the Department of Defense. All told, the Trump Administration built more than four hundred and fifty miles of the barrier, about a quarter of the length of the U.S.s border with Mexico. Construction continued until the moment of Joe Bidens Inauguration.
Construction projects of this size typically have enormous environmental impacts. But funding the project from the D.O.D.s budget and classifying it as a matter of national security offered the Trump Administration a way around protections: it made the walls construction exempt from the stipulations of the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the Endangered Species Act, and more than eighty other laws and statutes. Theres a certain kind of lawlessness that applies to the southern border that does not apply anywhere else, Stephania Taladrid, a New Yorker writer whos covered the effects of the border wall, and who reported and produced American Scar, told me. In the aftermath of the 2020 election, and the Inauguration in particular, people were thinking that, with Trump gone, we could afford to just forget about the wall. And, in reality, there were just a series of questions that were left unanswered. Among them are the impacts on the seventy-plus animal and plant species that the new sections of wall now endanger, including the jaguar, the ocelot, the desert bighorn sheep, and the Mexican gray wolf.
Couple stays in Ukraine to take in all the pets left behind
https://twitter.com/i/status/1514325046596014082Couple stays in Ukraine to take in all the pets left behind (wait til the beautiful message at the end ❤️

https://digbysblog.net/2022/04/22/friday-night-soother-151/
A bit of musical and scientific "enjoyment". Dedicated to Judi Lynn and elleng
https://phys.org/news/2022-04-physics.htmlThe singing saw video may (or may not) be your cup of tea. I'm very impressed!
TooLoose LeTruck: Too good to not read
https://www.emptywheel.net/2022/04/21/three-things-dead-deader-deadest/#comment-933023But please read the whole thread. There are some brilliant (and some not) posters there.
April 21, 2022 at 8:38 pm
In honor of dead Russian generals
He Was the Very Model of A Russian Major-General*
He was the very model of a Russian Major-General,
With knowledge biological, nuclear, and chemical,
He knew the czars of Russia, great battles territorial
Kulikovo to Stalingrad, so famous in memorial;
A highly educated man, proud son of Mother Russia,
Keen to take the fight abroad, if needed into Prussia,
Hed studied all the theories and memorized the tactics,
The ideal one to send to fight the Nazi drug fanatics;
The battle started well that day until the Javelin struck,
Blowing up the generals tank and the generals luck,
And now hes headed home in a mood quite funereal,
He was the very model of a Russian Major-General.
*with apologies to Gilbert and Sullivan
I am horrified and furious at what the Ukrainians are suffering thru
I can even muster some sympathy for Russian conscripts who dont want to be there
I feel ZERO pity for dead Russian generals.
Sometimes when I see a video of a Russian helicopter being shot down, or a tank erupting in flames, I find myself cheering and then I realize I just watched several human beings die a horrible, ugly death, too and I feel sick to my stomach
But when a Russian general bites it? Im fine w/ that
If we go to war with russia, can we arrest Fucker Karlson, all of fux news and their funders?
Just asking the question...
Seems that most of the RW/libertarian news media and money-bags are in traitorous territory - aiding and abetting the enemy.
Why Brexit Britain is turning purple with shame - The Guardian, Stewart Lee
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/17/why-brexit-britain-is-turning-purple-with-shameAnd some purple prose...
...
Gary Kasparov: Stand with Ukraine in the fight against evil - TED.com
https://www.ted.com/talks/garry_kasparov_stand_with_ukraine_in_the_fight_against_evilI knew the spaghetti tree was for real!
It's been labeled as a hoax but it's obviously for real.
https://www.ststworld.com/spaghetti-tree-hoax/
A worker stacks vermicelli, which is used in making traditional sweet dishes popularly consumed during the holy month of Ramadan, at a factory in Allahabad, India, on April 5, 2022. #
Sanjay Kanojia / AFP / Getty
https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2022/04/photos-of-the-week-tile-tapping-tomb-sweeping-beach-mines/629515/
But I'm not sure about those marsh mallows.
https://www.democraticunderground.com/10027343311
GOP operative Stuart Stevens on how Republicans went from Cold Warriors to Putin apologists
https://vtdigger.org/2022/04/08/vermont-conversation-gop-operative-stuart-stevens-on-how-republicans-went-from-cold-warriors-to-putin-apologistsGreat interview with one of the members of the Lincoln Project.
"I think that the compromising of the Republican Party by Putin and Russian intelligence is the most successful intelligence action in modern history."
I think that there is a large element of the conservative movement that has become a pro-Putin autocratic movement. Donald Trump did not change the Republican Party. He revealed it. And for those of us who worked in the Republican Party for a long time, its a devastating conclusion. But I think its the only honest one, Stevens told The Vermont Conversation.
We have an autocratic movement in America that is threatening democracy itself, Stevens said. Theyll be for democracy when they win and they wont be for it when they lose. That means youre not a democracy. And if we dont wake up and face this, were going to lose democracy.
A large element of the conservative movement has become a pro-Putin autocratic movement. They see Putin as a white Christian nationalist. There are no gay people in Russia. You never see any women in power in Russia. It is not a democracy. Putin is a strong man. All of this draws much of the Republican Party.
Donald Trump did not change the Republican Party. He revealed it. And for those of us who worked in the Republican Party for a long time, its a devastating conclusion. But I think its the only honest one.
Bill Clinton: I Tried to Put Russia on Another Path - The Atlantic
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/04/bill-clinton-nato-expansion-ukraine/629499/Not sure how much of this will escape the firewall. An interesting read from a first-hand participant.
If Russia stayed on a path toward democracy and cooperation, we would all be together in meeting the security challenges of our time: terrorism; ethnic, religious, and other tribal conflicts; and the proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons. If Russia chose to revert to ultranationalist imperialism, an enlarged NATO and a growing European Union would bolster the continents security. Near the end of my second term, in 1999, Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic joined NATO despite Russian opposition. The alliance gained 11 more members under subsequent administrations, again over Russian objections.
Lately, NATO expansion has been criticized in some quarters for provoking Russia and even laying the groundwork for Vladimir Putins invasion of Ukraine. The expansion certainly was a consequential decision, one that I continue to believe was correct.
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