U.S. News

Parenthetical added because of clickbait hed. Basically, the writer, who's working on a book about JFK, finds this to be a nothingburger.

> In many cases, the removed redactions reveal proper nouns that a reader could have easily inferred before or that seem totally inconsequential. For instance, there is a 1974 memo about the Watergate conspirator E. Howard Hunt’s history with the CIA. A previously released version of the document mentions that the Office of Finance had asked a CIA station whether Hunt had received payments from it while he was living in Madrid. We did not know which station had been asked. Now we know it was the Madrid station. (Wow!) A 1977 document about the New York Times reporter Tad Szulc includes a rumor about Szulc being a Communist; in previous versions of the document, this information was “apparently from a [REDACTED] source.” With the redaction removed, we now know that it was “apparently from a British source.”

The real surprise here is how long it's been since we saw one of these.

> Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said the new warplanes would send a strong message about America's commitment to remaining a global leader in military aviation. > > The new fighter jet, he said, "sends a very clear, direct message to our allies that we're not going anywhere."

What allies? Russia and Hungary?

But more seriously, the last thing Boeing needs is another project to fuck up. Maybe once they're able to reliably design and build a commercial airliner, this would make some modicum of sense. Thing is, drones are the future of war (inasmuch as we should even want that), not fighter jets.

If only someone had warned us about the military-industrial complex at some point. This is the most clear-cut example in recent memory, with a sprinkling of presidential narcissism on top.

I'm not a medical examiner, and all I have to go off is this story, but you don't generally die at 43 without something happening. Could be as simple as an aneurysm, but the timing is suspect.

Meanwhile, every time I go to the store, it seems like another apartment complex has sprung up to trap people in the rent cycle.

> In recent weeks [California lawmakers] introduced five bills to address the issue, making predictive pricing based on a customer’s personal information one of the most popular tech policy concerns in the Legislature this session. > > Ride-sharing apps, travel companies, and retail giants such as Staples, Target, and reportedly Amazon have engaged in the practice, which can set different prices for customers based on factors including internet browsing data or where they live. In one recent example published by SFGATE, a person in the Bay Area was offered a hotel room for $500 more than people in less affluent areas. > >The pricing isn’t based on supply or demand. It’s based on predictions made about your eagerness and desires, said researcher Justin Kloczko. In one recent instance he found that Lyft charged his wife $5 more than him for the same ride. Kloczko works at Consumer Watchdog, an advocacy group that cosponsored one of the bills.

> The package of bills proposed by California lawmakers to regulate AI responds to a call by Speaker Robert Rivas following elections last fall to focus on measures to address the cost of living.

> Columbia's interim President Katrina Armstrong announced she will ban masks on campus, with exemptions for health or religious reasons, train three-dozen campus police officers with authority to arrest people, and appoint a new senior vice provost who will conduct a “thorough review” of the Middle East studies department. > > The moves came amid unprecedented pressure on the Ivy League university from the White House. Earlier this month, the federal education department moved to terminate $400 million in federal funding for Columbia, citing what it called "relentless violence, intimidation and antisemitic harassment" on campus. > > Federal education officials then sent Columbia a detailed list of demands for the funding to be restored.

> “With Sebbag leading Liebb, the pilot proceeded to repeatedly push the [two] back to their seats while making threats of getting [them] arrested and making scathing remarks about their Judaism, and how ‘Jews act’,” the lawsuit continued.

But the real antisemitism is pro-Palestinian rallies at colleges?

Reagan would be proud. Finally!

This is a long, truly wrenching story of who we've gestures broadly become.

> The reality became clear: Ice detention isn’t just a bureaucratic nightmare. It’s a business. These facilities are privately owned and run for profit. > > Companies like CoreCivic and GEO Group receive government funding based on the number of people they detain, which is why they lobby for stricter immigration policies. It’s a lucrative business: CoreCivic made over $560m from Ice contracts in a single year. In 2024, GEO Group made more than $763m from Ice contracts. > > The more detainees, the more money they make. It stands to reason that these companies have no incentive to release people quickly. What I had experienced was finally starting to make sense.

Who knew a multinational conglomerate would put its boot on progressive causes?

> Gov. Kathy Hochul is reviving her push to restrict the wearing of masks in public, urging lawmakers in state budget talks to bring back some form of a previous ban, Gothamist has learned. > > The Democratic governor told members of the state Assembly and Senate this week that some form of partial ban on public face coverings to improve public safety is among her top policy priorities, according to four lawmakers. The governor didn’t include masking restrictions in her formal budget proposal and hasn’t put forth details on what she wants, the lawmakers said.

Also, water wet, pope Catholic.

Here we go. He's apparently pissed it's taking more than 53 days.

It's no nonexistent basement of a pizza shop, but when are people going to get that the GOP are the diddlers?

Oh no, who could have predicted this besides anyone who was paying attention?

FTA: > The Trump administration is working tirelessly to undo the accomplishments of President Joe Biden—including the ex-president’s pardons.

> “The ‘Pardons’ that Sleepy Joe Biden gave to the Unselect Committee of Political Thugs, and many others, are hereby declared VOID, VACANT, AND OF NO FURTHER FORCE OR EFFECT, because of the fact that they were done by Autopen,” Donald Trump posted on Truth Social within the first hour of Monday.

(Hope I'm doing this right, I don't post much news and I forget the conventions.)

> Monica Duque never knows how many hours she is going to get in a given week. She works at the Jerry’s Cub Foods on East Lake Street at the front of the store, helping customers, overseeing cashiering, and running online shopping. She finds out her hours, she explains, “when the schedule is posted on Friday, for the week after next.” > > “There is no consistency,” says the 24 year old, which makes it hard to save money, or plan much for the future. She makes a little over $20 an hour, and even being cut 10 hours in a week can have a big impact on her finances. “I can do morning one day then night shift the next day. I go from eight-hour days to barely getting seven-hour days. I can never really rely on how much money I’m going to make.” > > “People just want to be able to afford to live. One job should be enough to do that.” > > Duque is one of around 9,000 Minnesota grocery workers whose union contracts with 14 different companies expired in early March. Of these workers, approximately 7,000 are engaged in coordinated bargaining with seven employers: Haug’s Cub Foods, Jerry’s Cub Foods/Jerry’s Foods, Kowalski’s Markets, Radermacher’s Cub Foods, Lunds & Byerlys, Knowlan’s Festival Foods, and UNFI Cub Foods. > > At least the bargaining is coordinated on the part of their union, United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW) Local 663. The union sits down at the table with the employers together, and gives them joint proposals, but the employers are insisting on bargaining seven different agreements.

> Last year the Guardian revealed that three of the biggest manufacturers of medical-grade nitrogen in the US had put a block on their products being used in executions. Airgas, Air Products and Matheson Gas all took steps to prevent their nitrogen reaching departments of correction in death penalty states. > > Airgas, which is owned by the French multinational Air Liquide, told the Guardian that it would not supply nitrogen or other inert gases “for the purpose of human execution”.

I don't think I need to explain on how many levels this is a shitshow. This said, 35 (we use IH if anything, so KXAN clearly has interns from out of state -- at least they didn't go full Californian by adding "the") is itself a clusterfuck, and as such, naming it after Trump almost makes sense.

Almost.

This is Texas, and no one is going along with this Gulf of America bullshit. Yes, it's Austin, but I can't see this being any different in Dallas, Houston (not along 35) or San Antonio. And the last one knows how to make picante sauce.

(Was unsure to put this under food and cooking, but I consider this US News/Political, sooo)

>With a new spin on cooking french fries, Steak 'n Shake is joining the campaign "Make America Healthy Again," made popular by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

>The company recently made a change and now is cooking shoestring fries in beef tallow instead of vegetable oil. Some Florida locations were the first to start cooking their french fries in beef tallow at the end of January.

>But on March 1, the company posted on the social media platform X that all locations nationwide now serve fries cooked in "100% beef tallow... No preservatives, chemicals or additives.">

> With a steady gaze and unwavering voice — the confidence of rote memorization — a long-COVID patient can tell you exactly what their body experienced as it was ravaged by an invisible illness. > > “Long-haulers” in the Roaring Fork Valley describe tingling skin that itches like lice on their scalp, tinnitus that rings “like thousands of crickets” in their ears, migraines akin to “a sharp needle through the eyeball” and chest pain that feels as if an orange has been shoved under their sternum. They speak of a brain fog that robbed them of their vocabulary — like looking in the refrigerator, staring at a head of lettuce, and not knowing what it’s called — and of a “numbing and debilitating” fatigue that can leave them bedridden for days, an exhaustion so all-consuming that even a sip of water seems out of reach. > > The “internal shaking” can feel as if their entire body were quaking from the weight of a heavy barbell; the inflammation and pain as if they were “on fire.” They’re sidelined by nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and abdominal pain; heart arrhythmias turn a short walk into a cardiac event. They struggle to breathe and to get that oxygen into their bloodstream; they struggle to sleep even as they feel completely depleted. > > They have told this story before, to doctors and specialists and holistic medicine professionals and family and friends, and they have told it again and again until they could find somebody to believe them — somebody, at least, to listen.

> Nearly every morning for the last month, Jay has been waking up before sunrise to drive around the streets of Lincoln Heights, patrolling neighborhood bus stops to make sure children are getting to school safely. > > "We have a very tight community, so all of our kids, they know us," he said. > > But for anyone outside the community, Jay's presence might be a mystery. He wears a face covering along with tactical vests, and Jay is not his real name, which he asked not to use to prevent harassment from hate groups. > > He's a member of the Lincoln Heights Safety and Watch program, an initiative that started shortly after Feb. 7, when a neo-Nazi group waving swastika flags and shouting racial slurs demonstrated on a highway overpass just on the edge of this majority-Black community about 30 minutes north of Cincinnati.

Good thing we're defunding NOAA.

What the fucking hell?

> SEATTLE — A Tesla Model S was set on fire in Seattle's Capitol Hill neighborhood on Thursday night, according to the Seattle Police Department. > > A witness told police that a man threw gasoline on the Tesla, lit it on fire and then ran off. > > Police say the right front tire area of the car was damaged. A quarter of the panel, the hood and the car's battery all melted. > > Earlier this week, four cybertrucks caught fire at a Seattle Tesla storage lot on 4th Avenue, near Spokane Street in the SODO neighborhood. The next day, a Tesla dealership in Lynnwood discovered six of their cybertrucks had been spraypainted with swastikas and profanity directed at Tesla CEO Elon Musk. On March 12, the FBI confirmed they are working to investigate a number of Tesla charging station fires in Centralia. The agency confirmed there are a number of other, similar incidents occurring around the country.

> The cost of child care now exceeds the price of college tuition in 38 states and the District of Columbia, according to a new analysis conducted by the Economic Policy Institute. > > The left-leaning think tank, based in Washington, D.C., used 2023 federal and nonprofit data to compare the monthly cost of infant child care to that of tuition at public colleges. > > The tally increased five states since the pandemic began. EPI’s last analysis relied on 2020 data, which showed child care costs outstripped college costs in 33 states and Washington, D.C., said EPI spokesperson Nick Kauzlarich. > > The organization released a state-by-state guide on Wednesday showing the escalating cost of child care. Average costs range from $521 per month in Mississippi to as much as $1,893 per month in Washington, D.C., for households with one 4-year-old child, EPI found. > > The analysis also found child care costs have exceeded rent prices in 17 states and the District of Columbia.

The beatings will continue until morale improves.

I sort of figured S&P would deliver the first blow with a credit downgrade. This is not a list one wants their country on.

>Iris Turmelle, one of the plaintiffs now in high school, told Them in a statement last August that her goal is simply to compete alongside her peers.

>In Brighton Park, a majority Latino neighborhood on the city’s southwest side, an elementary school principal has been sharing his experience as an immigrant, so that families feel more comfortable.

>In Pilsen, a predominantly Latino neighborhood and historically a neighborhood where Mexican families have immigrated to, a high school launched an emergency immigration chat and told parents that it’s OK for students with immigration concerns to stay home.