Barbara 🇺🇦 @babs_at_masto@qoto.org

Russia launches the pre-invasion playbook in Moldova. A "breakaway region" of the small state asks for Russian "protection" (against a peaceful, open, pro-European Moldovan government) https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/28/world/europe/moldova-russia-transnistria.html

A reminder that a core strategy of the Republican Party is to deny eligible voters the right to vote, or to have their vote counted if they do manage to cast ballots.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/03/us/politics/trump-voter-rolls.html

(This is excellent journalism in a major outlet about a crucial political issue, and it's in the NY Times, both of which are surprising if gratifying.) https://1ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2024%2F03%2F03%2Fus%2Fpolitics%2Ftrump-voter-rolls.html

Update: France and Ukraine have signed a bilateral security agreement. It includes more weapons and training of Ukrainian soldiers, as well as a pledge by Paris to provide "up to" 3 billion euros in additional military support to Kyiv this year.

The biggest challenge in 2024 is to get enough people to actually listen to what Trump and those around him are openly, consistently, and explicitly promising to do once they get back to power.

It is utterly deranged, and discounting it as just rhetoric would be a disaster.

Fatality.

Tucker Carlson is right at home in the belly of a beast that routinely imprisons real journalists, in the warm embrace of one of this era's most evil dictators.

Finally sitting down to compose some thoughts on what we can and probably should do about the swatting problem in the US. I'm finding I have quite a bit to say, and a lot of it involves mythbusting around this issue (e.g. that most of these swatting calls come through 911).

Another example: recent legislation to make swatting specifically a federal offense w/ real jail time for those convicted (introduced by a GOP lawmaker who was swatted). That might feel like a solution, but I doubt it's much of a deterrence for the sim-swatters.

Make it explicitly a federal offense with federal consequences, okay sure. But the feds have prosecuted these cases just fine using existing laws. The problem is, until the feds are aware of swatting incident, it remains effectively a local issue, which means the cops are less likely to investigate because these crimes are generally inter-state crimes They are usually by definition federal crimes for that reason, but they are still mostly dealt with by local authorities and local laws. One way a federal anti-swatting law could help is to require state and local law enforcement to report these crimes as violent crimes to some entity responsible for tracking them as such. Right now, there is no specific designation for swatting, and reporting is only required for federal law enforcement agencies. Reporting also serves an important accountability check on law enforcement responding to these incidents.

“Begging for money”: Trump under “enormous financial strain” as report reveals massive legal costs

https://www.salon.com/2024/01/31/begging-for-money-under-enormous-financial-strain-as-report-reveals-massive-legal-costs/

#TrumpFinancialStrain #LegalCosts #MassiveLegalExpenses #FinancialChallenges #BeggingForMoney #EnormousFinancialBurden #Politics #News

Biden Opens Up About Personal Tragedies In Call To Grieving Parents of Soldier Killed In Jordan - 'I've been there,' the president told the emotional parents, offering to accompany them when their daughter's body is returned home

https://themessenger.com/politics/joe-biden-kennedy-sanders-parents-phone-call

#BidenGrievingParents #SoldierKilledInJordan #PersonalTragedies #AccompanyGrievingParents #ReturnedHome #EmotionalParents #Politics #News

“The precise origins of P.D.Q. Bach are shrouded in the bibulous mists of time …”

What a wonderful obituary by Margalit Fox of Peter Schickele and his creation, P.D.Q. Bach. R.I.P.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/17/arts/music/peter-schickele-dead.html?unlocked_article_code=1.Ok0.CAl6.zDaXgYrCCUEi&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

“Aged moonlight, how many times
have you shone on me, beside the plum blossoms?”

Shangyang Fang translates and reads “Poems from the Song Dynasty.” https://emergencemagazine.org/poem/poems-from-the-song-dynasty/

Claudine Gay read many books and articles for research, and a clever person armed with a computer can find out where and how she used what she learned in her own writing. Usually she was scrupulous about attributions and footnotes, and once in a while she seems to have been careless.

But she did not commit plagiarism, as far as I can see from the examples put forward by her accusers. I’ve been plagiarized myself—it’s serious. The word shouldn’t be used lightly. https://dair-community.social/@timnitGebru/111688501659826023

This year, share your amazing #wetland science! Submit by Jan 12 to Session #6 “Advances in Wetland Science: Connecting the Land, Water, and People” at #IAGLR24 in Windsor.
Co-Chairs: @kirkwoodlab.bsky.social @girls-can.bsky.social @cdrobich.bsky.social @tylerbhampton.bsky.social

From Learned Hand (that really was the name of a judge):

"The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which seeks to understand the minds of other men and women; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which weighs their interest alongside its own without bias. . ."

This quotation came to me as I was contemplating the latest from certain MSNBC legal pundits.

https://www.btboces.org/Downloads/1_The%20Spirit%20of%20Liberty%20by%20Learned%20Hand.pdf

V Guardian:
'West must rearm in the face of #Russian threat, urges #Poland ’s foreign minister'
By Shaun Walker

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/23/west-must-rearm-in-the-face-of-russian-threat-urges-polands-foreign-minister?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
#Sikorski #UkraineWar #Ukraine

Go ahead. Be angry at the Cheneys for their politics.

But recognize what Liz Cheney is doing and why she is doing it.

She is willing to endorse her ideological rival -- and anger her own base and colleagues--to keep Trump out of power because she recognizes that he is uniquely dangerous.

In her book, she is calling out the Republicans who continue to kiss Trump's ring as moral cowards.

I don't like her politics, but I respect what she is doing and why.

4/

When one veteran oak tree becomes a bit of an obsession.

Here are four of the many photographs I've made of this tree in the last year.

#trees #forest #woodland #nature #treesofmastodon #landscapephotography #photography #wednesday #mastoart #fourseasons

This headline is actually erroneous (I would tag @washingtonpost if I thought they were listening). The people indicted were not “pro-Trump electors”; they weren’t electors at all. They were pro-Trump people falsely pretending to be electors.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/12/06/nevada-fake-electors-indictment-trump/

25 November 1894 | A Dutch Jew, Bob Hanf, was born in Amsterdam. A painter, writer, violinist & composer.

He was arrested on 23 April 1944 & incarcerated in Westerbork. From there he was later deported to Auschwitz where he perished in September 1944.

#Auschwitz #Birkenau #Holocaust #Shoah #Jews #history #histodons #Nazis #Germany #NeverForget #ww2 #Memorial #Remember #memory #otd #facts

I was sceptical before, but after seeing his management skills in action, I think allowing Elon to oversee the migration of Earth’s wealthiest elites to Mars is a great idea.