The PRO Act may not be very close to passage nationally, but the PRO Act has passed in Vermont, and will not only outlaw those forced propaganda meetings corporations like to make folks attend like they don’t have enough work to do, but will let domestic workers organize and let public workers form a union via card-check. There’s a lesson here for all Americans – don’t strap yourself too closely to Democrats, and fight for what you actually want, and you might more easily get Democrats to go along with you. I mean, they can put their finger to the wind just like anyone else. Come to think of it, didn’t New Deal legislation pass pretty much because the politicians were following the people’s lead? Why, yes!
Study published in The Lancet predicts that worldwide life expectancy will increase by almost five years by the year 2050, from around 73 now to around 78. Why? Because we have more non-communicable disease these days than communicable. Say, remember that time we all had to wear a mask all the time so we didn’t accidentally kill each other? Turns out that’s a habit that helps people live longer! And think how much better we’d do if we adopted better ventilation practices in public buildings! But it’s also going up because, well, a lot of nations have a lot of room to grow their life expectancy. What will be a drag on life expectancy? The fact that a lot of us are too fat because we eat too much crap.
Team Trump sends a cease-and-desist letter to the makers of the movie The Apprentice. Can you say “diaper-loaded brat,” boys and girls? How about frivolous lawsuit? And why don’t Republicans defend the free speech rights of the filmmakers? Because the only lawsuits they find “frivolous” are lawsuits that make corporations pay for the harm they do to good Americans, that’s why. In a peripherally-related note, GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY.
Tim Cushing at TechDirt tells the story of what happened to a couple of cops who literally tortured a Fontana, CA man into confessing to a murder that never occurred. The “suspect” actually called the cops for help because he thought his father had disappeared; turns out his father had taken public trans to visit a relative and a female friend, but the cops decided he was dead and decided the son was the killer, pretty much without thinking very hard about it, or at all. You’ll really love the part where they threaten to euthanize his dog if he doesn’t confess, and then bring the dog into the interrogation room. Sadly, these cops didn’t lose their jobs but the city paid almost a million bucks in damages to the tortured citizen (four years later!), which of course came out of his and everyone else’s taxes. Who bellows I SUPPORTZ TEH POLICEZ!!!!! after hearing that story? Someone you should straight-up eject from your life, that’s who.
Donald Trump endorses primary challenger to Rep. Bob Good (E-VA), which is probably the death-knell for the otherwise noxious right-wing incumbent. And also an opportunity for Democrats, if they have the sense to recognize it: Virginia’s 5th Congressional district usually votes Republican in federal and state elections, but not by absurd margins, plus the 2020 election saw 400,000 out of 580,000 potential voters actually vote. So a lot of these 180,000 folks might be persuaded to turn out against the Republican – by an actual populist Democrat who won’t let the party’s consultant class dominate their messaging. I’m not sure I see that individual among the Democratic primary candidates, but I’d be happy to be wrong.
Despite all the bad PR they’ve received for their, ah, unique educational “reforms,” Florida’s government continues to leave a trail of slime wherever they go, now putting together training materials that lump “cancel culture” “victims” in with Josef Stalin murdering three-quarters of a million political dissenters. When they lecture us about “the dangers and evils of Communism,” and then equate the quite deserved shame of garden-variety racists with the imprisonment or murder of actual political dissenters, they’re telling you that shame is only for right-wingers to use against you, never for you to use against them. What has two thumbs and won’t eat Florida blueberries until they stop being fascist? This guy!
Finally, Louisiana passes law reclassifying abortion drugs mifepristol and misopropol as “controlled dangerous substances.” People have been using these drugs safely for decades, and the fact that some asshole somewhere may have misused it – if the bill’s sponsor’s “personal story” isn’t some made-up sack of dung – doesn’t change that. Let it be known that having a Democratic Governor for two terms hasn’t changed Louisiana politics one little bit, so be wary of supporting weak “centrists” (or “the only people who can win”) in red states. The only liberal who can really win in a red state – which is to say, win an election and be of some utility to the people of that state – is a populist.
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