Good morning, just a quick post today. My dad has not been doing well, so I am taking care of him. I thought I would have to take him back to the ER…so yeah, it is just a cartoon post.
Cartoons via Cagle:
Stay safe out there….
Fuck SCOTUS and Fuck Trump:
And then there’s Maude:
Hey, it is after 4:30 in the morning, I was up checking on my dad and saw this:
This is going to be a shitty day…
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The Sky Dancing banner headline uses a snippet from a work by artist Tashi Mannox called 'Rainbow Study'. The work is described as a" study of typical Tibetan rainbow clouds, that feature in Thanka painting, temple decoration and silk brocades". dakinikat was immediately drawn to the image when trying to find stylized Tibetan Clouds to represent Sky Dancing. It is probably because Tashi's practice is similar to her own. His updated take on the clouds that fill the collection of traditional thankas is quite special.
You can find his work at his website by clicking on his logo below. He is also a calligraphy artist that uses important vajrayana syllables. We encourage you to visit his on line studio.
Sky Dancing 
Ok, what else can we pile on today?
Girl, your posts are never “just” anything. They are great.
Hope your Dad improves fast. They are wrecking our health services at breakneck speed.
I wonder if the Hackmans were victims of monoxide poisoning? Very sad.
I think it’s Spring here in ATL already….was 76 yesterday. Sigh.
Enheduanna
Thanks babe…💜
I think the same thing about the Hackmans, carbon monoxide poisoning or gas…the Guardian said the cops were waiting on a search warrant, so if there was no obvious crime the cops would need that to go through the house.
My dad is having a difficult time healing from his surgery. He is also not an ideal patient.
https://www.wsbtv.com/news/trending/gene-hackman-death-gas-company-assisting-with-investigation/KGNTCN2IGJD3JAIKJLFKDLQUHM/
Forwarded this email? Subscribe here for moreFebruary 26, 2025
Heather Cox Richardson
Feb 27READ IN APP
This morning, Office of Management and Budget director Russell Vought and Office of Personnel Management acting director Charles Ezell sent a memo to the heads of departments and agencies. The memo began: “The federal government is costly, inefficient, and deeply in debt. At the same time, it is not producing results for the American public. Instead, tax dollars are being siphoned off to fund unproductive and unnecessary programs that benefit radical interest groups while hurting hardworking American citizens. The American people registered their verdict on the bloated, corrupt federal bureaucracy on November 5, 2024 by voting for President Trump and his promises to sweepingly reform the federal government.”
Vought was a key author of Project 2025, the blueprint for a second Trump administration, and in July 2024, investigative reporters caught him on video saying that he and his group, the Center for Renewing America, were hard at work writing the executive orders and memos that Trump would use to put their vision into place. But his claim that voters backed his plan is false. An NBC News poll in September 2024 showed that only 4% of voters liked what was in Project 2025. It was so unpopular that Trump called parts of it “ridiculous and abysmal” and denied all knowledge of it.
But the policies coming out of the Trump White House are closely aligned with Project 2025 and, if anything, appear to be less popular now than they were last September. Under claims of ending diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has been slashing through government programs that are popular with Republican voters like farmers, as well as with Democratic voters.
Yesterday, Secretary of Veterans Affairs Douglas A. Collins celebrated cuts to 875 contracts that he claimed would save nearly $2 billion. But, as Emily Davies and Hannah Natanson of the Washington Post reported, those contracts covered medical services, recruited doctors, and funded cancer programs, as well as providing burial services for veterans. The outcry was such that the VA rescinded the order today. Still on the chopping block, though, are another 1,400 jobs. Those cuts were announced Monday, on top of the 1,000 previous layoffs.
Despite the anger at the major cuts across the government, Vought announced that agency heads should prepare for large-scale reductions in force, or layoffs, and that by March 13 they should produce plans for the reorganization of their agencies to make them cost less and produce more with fewer people. Before Trump took office, the number of people employed by the U.S. government was at about the same level it was 50 years ago, although the U.S. population has increased by about two thirds. What has increased dramatically is spending on private contractors, who take profits from their taxpayer-funded contracts.
In his memo today, Vought instructed agency heads to “collaborate” with the DOGE team leads assigned to the agency, who presumably report to Elon Musk.
Also today, Trump signed an executive order putting the DOGE team in charge of creating new technological systems to review all payments from the U.S. government and then giving the head of DOGE the power to review all those payments. “This order commences a transformation in Federal spending on contracts, grants, and loans to ensure Government spending is transparent and Government employees are accountable to the American public,” the executive order says.
Make no mistake: This order transforms federal spending by taking it away from Congress, where the Constitution placed it, and moves it to the individual who sits atop the Department of Government Efficiency.
Yesterday the White House announced that the acting head of DOGE is Amy Gleason, who was hired on December 30, 2024, at the technology unit that Trump tried to transform into the Department of Government Efficiency. Nevertheless, members of the White House, including President Donald Trump, have repeatedly referred to Musk as “the head of [DOGE].”
Musk appeared to be in charge of the first Cabinet meeting of the Trump administration today. As Kevin Liptak and Jeff Zeleny of CNN reported: “If anyone was still in doubt where the power lies in President Donald Trump’s new administration, Wednesday’s first Cabinet meeting made clear it wasn’t in the actual Cabinet.” Katherine Doyle of NBC News described “Senate-confirmed department heads spending an hour as audience members.”
A photograph of the meeting in which Musk, wearing a Make America Great Again ball cap and a T-shirt that said “Tech Support,” appears to be holding court while Trump appears to be sleeping reinforced the idea that it is Musk rather than Trump who is running the government. When Trump did speak, CNN fact checker Daniel Dale noted, his remarks were full of false claims.
Cabinet officers, who had brought notes for the statements they expected to make, sat silent, while Musk, the unelected billionaire from South Africa who put more than a quarter of a billion dollars into electing Trump, spoke more than anyone except Trump himself. Trump didn’t turn to Vice President J.D. Vance until 56 minutes into the meeting, and Vance spoke for only 36 seconds.
But Trump appeared to be aware of the popular anger at Musk’s power over the government and today dared the Cabinet members to suggest they weren’t happy with the arrangements. “ALL CABINET MEMBERS ARE EXTREMELY HAPPY WITH ELON,” Trump wrote on his social media channel this morning. “The Media will see that at the Cabinet Meeting this morning!!!”
“Is anybody unhappy?” Trump asked the Cabinet officers during the meeting. When they applauded in response, he commented: “I think everyone’s not only happy, they’re thrilled.”
—
Notes:
https://federalnewsnetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/OPM-OMB-Memo-Guidance-on-Agency-RIF-and-Reorganization-Plans-Requested-by-Implementing-The-Presidents-Department-of-Government-Efficiency-Workforce-Optimization-Initiative-2-26-20.pdf
https://federalnewsnetwork.com/workforce/2025/02/trump-administration-tells-agencies-to-begin-conducting-reductions-in-force/
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/poll-project-2025-broadly-known-severely-unpopular-voters-rcna172660
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/the-project-2025-policies-the-trump-administration-is-already-implementing
https://www.politico.com/interactives/2025/trump-executive-orders-project-2025/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/02/25/veterans-affairs-contracts-canceled/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/02/26/veterans-affairs-contracts-canceled-reversal/
https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/02/implementing-the-presidents-department-of-government-efficiency-cost-efficiency-initiative/
https://www.cnn.com/2024/08/15/politics/russ-vought-project-2025-trump-secret-recording-invs/index.html
https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-praises-project-2025-2000245
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/25/us/politics/amy-gleason-doge-administrator.html
https://www.cnn.com/2025/02/26/politics/fact-check-trump-cabinet-meeting/index.html
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/you-must-read-this-uproar-over-malicious-and-malicious-cuts-at-va
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/26/trump-executive-order-musk-doge
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-administration/trump-elon-musk-dominate-first-cabinet-meeting-rcna193836
https://www.cnn.com/2025/02/26/politics/cabinet-meeting-musk-trump/index.html
Bluesky:
annabower.bsky.social/post/3lj4iyds7nk2y
sundaedivine.bsky.social/post/3lj46qlsapk2i
it is so depressing…
Republicans terrified of crossing Trump due to physical threats, Democrat says
Eric Swalwell says threats to them and their families are stopping GOP officials from criticizing president
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/27/republicans-trump-threats
“Republicans on Capitol Hill are shying away from criticizing Donald Trump’s policies over fears for their physical safety and that of their families, a Democratic member of Congress has said.
Eric Swalwell, a Democratic representative from California, said his Republican colleagues were “terrified” of crossing Trump not only because of the negative impact on their political careers, but also from anxiety that it might provoke physical threats that could cause personal upheaval and require them to hire round-the-clock security as protection.
Swalwell’s comments came in a webinar chaired by the journalist Sidney Blumenthal in response to a question on whether Republicans might be driven to rebel against or even impeach Trump.
“I have a lot of friends who are Republicans,” he said. “They are terrified of being the tallest poppy in the field, and it’s not as simple as being afraid of being primaried and losing their job. They know that that can happen.”
Our country is in the hands of the MAFIA NAZIs.
FAA contract with Verizon canceled and awarded to Musk. Nah, there’s no conflict of interest there…..
Rachel Maddow staff to be let go as part of MSNBC overhaul
News comes as leading network star criticizes management for decision to cancel shows hosted by non-white anchors
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/25/msnbc-layoffs-rachel-maddow
“MSNBC has told the majority of the employees who produce Rachel Maddow and Joy Reid’s prime-time evening news shows they are being let go as part of the network’s programming overhaul with the option to apply for new roles, according to two people directly familiar with the matter.
Maddow, the biggest star and highest-rated anchor at MSNBC, will get to keep her executive producer, Cory Gnazzo, and several other senior producers, the people said.
But the rest of Maddow’s team – along with producers who worked on the other cancelled shows, hosted by Katie Phang, Jonathan Capehart, Ayman Mohyeldin and José Díaz-Balart – have been given the option to claim severance or reapply for new roles at the network, the people said.
The Maddow team was let go because of a quirk of how they worked on both Maddow’s show and Alex Wagner’s show, when Maddow scaled back to hosting only Mondays and Wagner hosted Tuesday to Friday.”
They basically neutered her.
https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/elon-musk-faa-starlink-contracts-b2705933.html
As DOGE slashes budgets, FAA close to canceling $2.4b contract with Verizon and giving it to Musk’s Starlink
The FAA could hand the contract to overhaul an integral U.S. air traffic control communications system to the mogul’s satellite company
Okay, that’s an important partnership. How can you not know basic economic and foreign policy entities that the US is a part of and really be the leader of the free world, or Podunk NJ, for that matter? Suppose he knows anything about the ASEAN group of countries or SEATO or are we just a full-blown satellite of Russia now?
He embarrasses in front of the British PM now. Looks like the Aussies are concerned too
https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-america/asked-about-aukus-trump-replies-what-does-that-mean-20250228-p5lfua.html
“Donald Trump appeared to be unaware of Australia’s new military pact with the United States and Britain during a meeting with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer at the White House.
The US president was asked directly by a British reporter in the Oval Office ahead of his meeting with Starmer: “Will you be discussing AUKUS with the prime minister?”
Trump then replied: “What does that mean?”
The reporter then explained it was the Australia-US-British defence technology alliance, to which Trump said: “Well, we’ll be discussing that. We have another great relationship. And you have, too. With Australia. Yeah, we’ve had a very good relationship with Australia.”
Under the AUKUS agreement, Australia has committed to paying the United States $4.78 billion ($US7.6 billion) to enhance the US submarine industry’s capacity. In return, Washington will sell Australia several Virginia-class nuclear-powered submarines, expected to be delivered in the early 2030s.
Additionally, Britain and Australia will collaborate on the development of a new AUKUS-class submarine in the years to come.”