Dr. Francis Collins, the legendary former director of the National Institutes of Health, has retired, NPR has learned.
Collins, who notified the NIH on Friday of his decision, did not specify the reasons for his departure. But his retirement comes as the world largest funder of biomedical research is in turmoil under the Trump administration, facing cutbacks and layoffs.
“I have loved being employed by this extraordinary, life-giving institution for 32 years.” Collins wrote in a statement dated Saturday.
” I will continue to devote my life in other ways to seeking knowledge and enhancing health, to healing disease and reducing suffering, and to doing what I can to bring together our fractured communities around the shared values of love, truth, goodness, and faith.”
Collins, who joined NIH in 1993 and led the agency from 2009 through 2021 under three presidents of both parties, stepped down as NIH director in 2021 and returned to his lab at the agency.
Music, religion … and science
Collins, a guitar-playing geneticist who discovered genes for a number of diseases and lead the historic Human Genome Project that mapped the human genetic blueprint, is a rare figure in the scientific world. An evangelical Christian, Collins espoused that science and religion could co-exist.
But Collins, and Dr. Anthony Fauci, the long-time head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, were bitterly criticized by some members of Congress and others during and after the pandemic.
Collins’ retirement was effective Friday. The NIH did not issue a statement.
Dr. Ashish Jha emailed NPR about the news: “Francis Collins is one of the most important scientific leaders of our era,” wrote Jha, the dean of the Brown University School of Public Health who served as President Biden’s COVID-19 response coordinator. “As a scientist and as a leader of NIH, he helped usher in the era of genomic medicine and so many of the cures we are seeing now are due to his vision for what mapping the human genome could accomplish.”
Jha also noted: “There have been criticisms of his leadership during the pandemic and no one managed things perfectly, But he marshalled the scientific forces of the NIH to help us launch a vaccine in record time, ” Jha wrote in an email to NPR. “We all owe Dr. Francis a large debt of gratitude.”
“Francis was a stellar scientist and a passionate advocate for basic and translational biomedical research,” said Dr. George Daley, the Harvard Medical School dean, in an email to NPR. “His visionary leadership and tireless efforts maintained the NIH as a premier government institution, garnering support from both political parties in Washington. His departure is a huge loss to both the federal government and the U.S. biomedical enterprise.” (continued)
“The free exchange of ideas is essential to scientific progress, just as it is integral to the founding ideals of the US. The integrity of the scientific process does not depend on blind trust in science or on an assumption that a scientific finding is always right. Rather, this integrity hinges on the confidence that the free exchange of scientific ideas grounded in rigorously conducted scientific inquiry, including the discussion, debate, and disagreement that results in further inquiry, ultimately leads to insights that are likely to be true.
Supporter Spotlight: Alan F. Black Charitable Fund
We are filled with gratitude for the Alan F. Black Charitable Fund’s wonderfully generous support of the Forest History Project, which, when combined with state funding received from the Department of Archeology and Historic Preservation and other donors, will enable us to tell the stories of Washington’s forestry history in articles illustrated with archival images, maps, video, audio interviews with people who have lived that history, podcast episodes, curriculum materials, and a timeline history book.
Alan Black was a beloved member of the community. As his obituary in The Seattle Times said:
Full of energy and drive, Alan accomplished many things. He was a leading force in the revitalization and restoration of historic buildings in Pioneer Square during the 1970s. A man who avoided the limelight, Alan moved mountains quietly through his generosity. Because of Alan Black’s legacy, a robust body of tales of logging, labor unions, politics, immigration, Indigenous forest management, wildfires, technological innovations, battles over environmental issues, and more, will be freely available on HistoryLink.org for the public to enjoy
Posted inHistory|Comments Off on Remembering Skyline resident Alan Black
‘Shredding Light’ is a narrative light painting stop motion short film by DARIUSTWIN. There are hundreds of light painting photographs that make up the project. Each of these long exposure light painting photographs are straight out of the camera and arranged side by side to create motion.
Ed note: Unfortunately, facts can be unpleasant. Alcohol, even red wine, can be a contributor to A-fib and cancer,the hype from the industry not withstanding. The secret is likely moderation along with “Dr. Diet, Dr. Quiet and Dr. Merryman.”
For a glorious decade or two, the drink was lauded as good for the heart. What happened?
In a 1991 segment of “60 Minutes,” the CBS correspondent Morley Safer asked how it could be that the French enjoyed high-fat foods like pâté, butter and triple crème Brie, yet had lower rates of heart disease than people in the United States.
“The answer to the riddle, the explanation of the paradox, may lie in this inviting glass,” Mr. Safer said, raising a glass of red wine to viewers.
Doctors believed, Mr. Safer said, that wine had “a flushing effect” that prevented blood clot-forming cells from clinging to artery walls. This, according to a French researcher who was featured in the segment, could reduce the risk of a blockage and, therefore, the risk of a heart attack.
At the time, several studies had supported this idea, said Tim Stockwell, an epidemiologist at the Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research. And researchers were finding that the Mediterranean diet, which has traditionally encouraged a glass or two of red wine with meals, was a heart-healthy way of eating, he added.
But it wasn’t until the “60 Minutes” segment that the idea of red wine as a virtuous health drink went “viral,” he said.
It would take decades for the glow of wine’s health halo to fade.
How our understanding of alcohol and health has evolved
The possibility that a glass or two of red wine could benefit the heart was “a lovely idea” that researchers “embraced,” Dr. Stockwell said. It fit in with the larger body of evidence in the 1990s that linked alcohol to good health.
In one 1997 study that tracked 490,000 adults in the United States for nine years, for example, researchers found that those who reported having at least one alcoholic drink per day were 30 to 40 percent less likely to die from cardiovascular disease than those who didn’t drink. They were also about 20 percent less likely to die from any cause.
By the year 2000, hundreds of studies had reached similar conclusions, Dr. Stockwell said. “I thought the science was in,” he said.
But some researchers had been pointing out problems with these kinds of studies since the 1980s, and questioning if the alcohol was responsible for the benefits they saw.
Perhaps moderate drinkers were healthier than non-drinkers, they said, because they were more likely to be educated, wealthy and physically active, and more likely to have health insurance and eat more vegetables. Or maybe, these researchers added, it was because many of the “non-drinkers” in the studies were actually ex-drinkers who had quit because they had developed health issues.
Kaye Middleton Fillmore, a researcher at the University of California, San Francisco, was among those urging more scrutiny of the research. “It is incumbent on the scientific community to assess this evidence carefully,” she wrote in an editorial published in 2000.
In 2001, Dr. Fillmore persuaded Dr. Stockwell and other scientists to help her sift through the previous studies and reanalyze them in ways that could account for some of these biases.
“I’ll work with you on this,” Dr. Stockwell remembered telling Dr. Fillmore, who died in 2013. But “I was really skeptical of the whole thing,” he said.
As it turned out, the team found a surprising result: In their new analysis, the previously observed benefits of moderate drinking had vanished. Their findings, published in 2006, made headlines for contradicting the prevailing wisdom: “Study Puts a Cork in Belief That a Little Wine Helps the Heart,” The Los Angeles Times reported. (continued)
by David B. Williams in the Street Smart Naturalist (thanks to Mary M.)
Many, many years ago, I was a national park ranger at Arches National Park and the Frederick Law Olmsted National Historic Site. As a ranger, I led tours, helped people understand what they were seeing, cleaned up trash, removed graffiti, and answered numerous questions. (The most popular was “Where’s the bathroom?” “Out the door and to the left,” was the answer.) I assisted on search and rescue, carried out visitors who needed first aid, and fought fires.
I knew that I was privileged to be a ranger and work in these amazing places. I knew that I was not alone. My best friend was a career employee for the National Park Service. “The primary thing I liked about my career was that nearly everyone was passionate about the mission,” he said. “People weren’t there just to make money, they believed in the agency mission and were putting their heart and soul into the job. It seems like that dedication and commitment is being undervalued right now as agencies just haphazardly terminate employees.”
Over the past three decades, I have continued to be impressed with the federal employees I have met in my adventures writing about human and natural history.
I have skimmed across Admiralty Inlet in a Zodiac with a United States Geological Survey biologist focused on diseases in forage fish, such as herring and sand lance. His work is helping protect these important fish species. As another federal biologist told me, herring “link predator and prey…[and] are very much the hub in the wheel of the Sound.” Without the increased knowledge of forage fish that is coming from federal studies, we significantly reduce the ability to improve herring runs, to the detriment of salmon that feed on herring, and the orca that feed on salmon. No herring, no orca.
Pacific sand lance caught by me in Admiralty Inlet. A few were kept to study; the rest were released.
I have walked through ponderosa pine forests on the east side of the Cascades with a United States Forest Service ecologist. He showed me how a century of fire suppression had created forests highly susceptible to fire and how future conditions could lead to even more devastating fires with climate change. He told me of research that illustrated the deep relationship between Indigenous people and fire and how their stewardship had created resilient and adaptable forests. He gave me insights and observations clearly based on his passion for and knowledge of these forests.
I have hiked out onto the Nisqually Glacier at Mount Rainier National Park with a National Park Service glaciologist. Our goal was to change the batteries on two seismic probes he had set up to monitor water discharge and sediment movement. His long-term project was a novel test for developing non-contact methods to obtain basic, on-the-ground data. This information would help the NPS with management of the Nisqually and other glaciers in the park, along with habitat downstream of the ice. I could never have accessed this stunning area without him.
A gray and gloomy and wonderful day on Nisqually Glacier in Mt. Rainier NP.
I have boated across Puget Sound with a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration ecologist working on a study of bycatch of lingcod and rockfish. (When fishers accidentally catch a species other than the one they planned to catch, the “wrong” fish is known as bycatch.) The goal of the NOAA project is to determine whether there are better ways to catch lingcod without bycatching rockfish. This is important because overfishing of rockfish in Puget Sound led to the listing of two rockfish species on the federal list of endangered and threatened species. As part of their long term research, federal biologists have also helped develop a better understanding of rockfish (27 species of which inhabit the Sound) life histories. This, in turn, has resulted in improved management and a consequent increase in rockfish populations, though we still have a long way to go. Yet another reason for on-going research.
A copper rockfish caught in the Sound as part of the bycatch study. The fish was released back into the water.
Unfortunately, I have also encountered people and reports who felt that government scientists were biased and questioned the accuracy of their research. I find this assertion hard to believe. Of the dozens of state, federal, tribal, and academic biologists I have interviewed, all of them clearly expressed their concern about the environment and how people, government, and industry affected it. I am sure that each has some bias—we all do—but they are scientists who take great pride in eliminating those biases to try to get to the underlying truths. They were up front about where they lacked knowledge and recognized that they didn’t always have enough experimental data to fully explain what was going on, which is why they were out in the field trying to get the data.
I write this now, of course, because of the unprecedented dismantling, abuse, and firing of thousands of federal employees in the past few weeks. These ill-conceived actions are short-sighted and narrow-minded and predicated on a fantasy of agencies rife with abuse, fraud, and mismanagement. In fact, most of the mismanagement and fraud comes straight out of the mouth of the guy who is foisting these bad ideas. Why should we think that Elon Musk (aka Leon Skum, or King Skum) has a clue as to what he’s doing? The estimated value of Twitter since Musk bought it has dropped 80%.
All of the federal employees I have spent time with have been forthright and helpful, insightful and inspiring, and always dedicated to the land, people, plants, and animals where they worked. Without their kindness and knowledge, I couldn’t have written my books. Thank you to all of them and to the many others dedicated to doing their jobs well.
Here are three links to stories and newsletters addressing this issue.
Westerners Favor Protecting the Land – A High Country News story on a recent Colorado College poll that shows that even MAGA voters prefer public land conservation over oil and gas development.
One final note. Once again the great clam debate has been chowered. Lawmakers in Olympia couldn’t mollusk the might to garnish the votes to cook up their plan for a state clam. Neither the geoduck nor the Pacific razor clam advanced. As they say, legislation for an honored clam is mired in the muck.
Posted inGovernment, Parks|Comments Off on Keepers of the Land
Date: Sunday, March 23Time: 7:30 pm PDT Cost:$10 – $35 Sliding Scale – Get Tickets
Despite grief being one of the most universal of human experiences, there is still much that we do not know about it. Can we die of a broken heart? What happens in our bodies as we grieve; how do our coping behaviors affect our physical health, immunity, and even cognition? While we may be more familiar with psychological and emotional ramifications of loss and sorrow, we often overlook its impact on our physical bodies.
In The Grieving Body: How the Stress of Loss Can Be an Opportunity for Healing,the follow-up to its successful predecessor The Grieving Brain (2022), grief expert, neuroscientist, and psychologist Dr. Mary-Frances O’Connor focuses on how the painful ordeal of grief impacts the body.
O’Connor shares scientific research, charts, and graphs coupled with personal stories, revealing new insights on grief’s physiological impact and helping illuminate the toll that loss takes on our cardiovascular, endocrine, and immune systems and the larger implications for our long-term well-being. The Grieving Body is for anyone who has experienced loss and who may want to learn more about what they are going through and how to support them.
Mary-Frances O’Connor, PhD,is a professor of psychology at the University of Arizona, where she directs the Grief, Loss and Social Stress (GLASS) Lab, investigating the effects of grief on the brain and the body. Her book The Grieving Brain was included on Oprah’s list of Best Books to Comfort a Grieving Friend. O’Connor holds a PhD in clinical psychology from the University of Arizona and completed a post-doctoral fellowship in psychoneuroimmunology at the UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior.
Dr. Anthony Back, Professor of Medicine at the University of Washington, is a pioneer in patient-oncologist communication and co-founder of the nonprofit VitalTalk. Educated at Stanford and Harvard, with training at UW and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, his research spans physician-assisted dying, communication pedagogy, and psilocybin therapy for healthcare providers and patients with cancer-related anxiety. He is also an ordained Zen priest in Roshi Joan Halifax’s lineage.
Posted inGrief|Comments Off on Grief and the Body – at Town Hall
Ed Note: There’s an old joke–The masochist and sadist meet up. Masochist says, “Beat me, beat me.” The sadist replies, “No I don’t think I will.” So who wins in the battle of retreat?
Thanks to Mary Jane F.
By James Carville
Mr. Carville is a veteran of Democratic presidential campaigns, including Bill Clinton’s in 1992, and a consultant to American Bridge, a Democratic super PAC.
The Republican Party is all too often effective at campaigning and winning elections, but there’s another fact about it that a lot of Americans forget: The Republican Party flat out sucks at governing. Even Tucker Carlson agrees with this. For all the huffing and puffing on the campaign trail in 2016, the first Trump administration largely amounted to tax cuts for the wealthy, 500 miles of a border wall and a destructive pandemic gone viral. George W. Bush got us into a harebrained war in Iraq and then tried to privatize Social Security while letting our financial system drive smack into the Great Recession. And George H.W. Bush governed his way into a one-term presidency because of the economy.
For Round 2 in office, instead of prioritizing the problems he campaigned on — public safety, immigration and the border and, most of all, the economy — President Trump is hellbent on dismantling the federal government. To accomplish this, he has put his faith in the most incompetent cabinet in modern history: a health and human services secretary who is already targeting federal vaccination efforts and dumped a bear carcass in Central Park as a fun prank at age 60, a director of national intelligence who was devoted to an allegedly abusive yoga-centered cult, a WWE tycoon turned head of Department of Education and a former cable news talking head as defense secretary. Which will result in one clear thing: disorder. There will probably be more enormous tax cuts for the wealthy and Medicaid cuts hitting a lot of other people, but there is nothing the American public despises more than disorder and a broken economy.
And there’s nothing Democrats can legitimately do to stop it, even if we wanted to.
With no clear leader to voice our opposition and no control in any branch of government, it’s time for Democrats to embark on the most daring political maneuver in the history of our party: roll over and play dead. Allow the Republicans to crumble beneath their own weight and make the American people miss us. Only until the Trump administration has spiraled into the low 40s or high 30s in public approval polling percentages should we make like a pack of hyenas and go for the jugular. Until then, I’m calling for a strategic political retreat. (continued)
On Friday, February 21, former transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg posted: “A defining policy battle is about to come to a head in this country. The Republican budget will force everyone—especially Congress and the White House—to make plain whether they are prepared to harm the rest of us in order to fund tax cuts for the wealthiest.”
Buttigieg was referring to the struggle at the heart of much of the political conflict going on right now: How should the U.S. raise money, and how should it spend money?
Generally, Democrats believe that the government should raise money by levying taxes according to people’s ability to pay them, and that the government should use the money raised to provide services to make sure that everyone has a minimum standard of living, the protection of the laws, and equal access to resources like education and healthcare. They think the government has a role to play in regulating business; making sure the elderly, disabled, poor, and children have food, shelter and education; maintaining roads and airports; and making sure the law treats everyone equally.
Generally, Republicans think individuals should be able to manage their money to make the best use of markets, thus creating economic growth more efficiently than the government can, and that the ensuing economic growth will help everyone to prosper. They tend to think the government should not regulate business and should impose few if any taxes, both of which hamper a person’s ability to run their enterprises as they wish. They tend to think churches or private philanthropy should provide a basic social safety net and that infrastructure projects are best left up to private companies. Civil rights protections, they think, are largely unnecessary.
But the Republicans are facing a crisis in their approach to the American economy. The tax cuts that were supposed to create extraordinarily high economic growth, which would in turn produce tax revenue equal to higher taxes on lower economic growth, never materialized. Since the 1990s, when the government ran surpluses under Democratic president Bill Clinton, tax cuts under Republican presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump, along with unfunded wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, have produced massive budget deficits that, in turn, have added trillions to the national debt.
Now the party is torn between those members whose top priority is more tax cuts to the wealthy and corporations, and those who want more tax cuts but also recognize that further cuts to popular programs will hurt their chances of reelection.
That struggle is playing out very publicly right now in the Republicans’ attempt to pass a budget resolution, which is not a law but sets the party’s spending priorities, sometimes for as much as a decade, and is the first step toward passing a budget reconciliation bill which can pass the Senate without threat of a filibuster.
Under the control of Republicans, the House of Representatives was unable to pass the appropriations bills necessary to fund the government in fiscal year 2025. The government has stayed open because of “continuing resolutions,” measures that extend previous funding forward into the future to buy more time to negotiate appropriations. The most recent of those expires on March 14, putting pressure on the Republicans who now control both the House and the Senate to come up with a new funding package. But first, both chambers have to pass a budget resolution. (continued)
If you’re on Medicare and have leveraged convenient telehealth appointments, that’s about to end.
Medicare originally expanded its coverage of at-home telehealth services during the Covid-19 emergency, which was an important move to protect seniors and has become a critical service for those in rural communities.
As part of the deal to keep the government open in December, Congress proposed a bill to extend telehealth coverage for two years. However, Elon Musk struck down that bill; the ultimate package that kept the government open only extended coverage through March 31.
The change doesn’t apply to all telehealth services: for those in urban areas, monthly home dialysis visits for end-stage renal disease, acute stroke, and mental/behavioral health visits can still occur via telehealth. For those in rural areas, people must be at a healthcare facility to access telehealth services.
Posted inHealth|Comments Off on Heads up: Medicare will stop covering telehealth in April.
Ed note: Historian Heather Cox Richardson helps make the current current political chaos understandable putting events in context.
In an appearance at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) yesterday, billionaire Elon Musk seemed to be having difficulty speaking. Musk brandished a chainsaw like that Argentina’s president Javier Milei used to symbolize the drastic cuts he intended to make to his country’s government, then posted that image to X, labeling it “The DogeFather,” although the administration has recently told a court that Musk is neither an employee nor the leader of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency. Politico called Musk’s behavior “eccentric.”
While attendees cheered Musk on, outside CPAC there appears to be a storm brewing. While Trump and his team have claimed they have a mandate, in fact more people voted for someone other than Trump in 2024, and his early approval ratings were only 47%, the lowest of any president going back to 1953, when Gallup began checking them. His approval has not grown as he has called himself a “king” and openly mused about running for a third term.
A Washington Post/Ipsos poll released yesterday shows that even that “honeymoon” is over. Only 45% approve of the “the way Donald Trump is handling his job as president,” while 53% disapprove. Forty-three percent of Americans say they support what Trump has done since he took office; 48% oppose his actions. The number of people who strongly support his actions sits at 27%; the number who strongly oppose them is twelve points higher, at 39%. Fifty-seven percent of Americans think Trump has gone beyond his authority as president.
Americans especially dislike his attempts to end USAID, his tariffs on goods from Mexico and Canada, and his firing of large numbers of government workers. Even Trump’s signature issue of deporting undocumented immigrants receives 51% approval only if respondents think those deported are “criminals.” Fifty-seven percent opposed deporting those who are not accused of crimes, 70% oppose deporting those brought to the U.S. as children, and 66% oppose deporting those who have children who are U.S. citizens. Eighty-three percent of Americans oppose Trump’s pardon of the violent offenders convicted for their behavior during the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. Even those who identify as Republican-leaning oppose those pardons 70 to 27 percent.
As Aaron Blake points out in the Washington Post, a new CNN poll, also released yesterday, shows that Musk is a major factor in Trump’s declining ratings. By nearly two to one, Americans see Musk having a prominent role in the administration as a “bad thing.” The ratio was 54 to 28. The Washington Post/Ipsos poll showed that Americans disapprove of Musk “shutting down federal government programs that he decides are unnecessary” by the wide margin of 52 to 26. Sixty-three percent of Americans are worried about Musk’s team getting access to their data.
Meanwhile, Jessica Piper of Politico noted that 62% of Americans in the CNN poll said that Trump has not done enough to try to reduce prices, and today’s economic news bears out that concern: not only are egg prices at an all-time high, but also consumer sentiment dropped to a 15-month low as people worry that Trump’s tariffs will raise prices. White House deputy press secretary Harrison Fields said in a statement: “[T]he American people actually feel great about the direction of the country…. What’s to hate? We are undoing the widely unpopular agenda of the previous office holder, uprooting waste, fraud, and abuse, and chugging along on the great American Comeback.”
Phone calls swamping the congressional switchboards and constituents turning out for town halls with House members disprove Fields’s statement. In packed rooms with overflow spaces, constituents have shown up this week both to demand that their representatives take a stand against Musk’s slashing of the federal government and access to personal data, and to protest Trump’s claim to be a king. In an eastern Oregon district that Trump won by 68%, constituents shouted at Representative Cliff Bentz: “tax Elon,” “tax the wealthy,” “tax the rich,” and “tax the billionaires.” In a solid-red Atlanta suburb, the crowd was so angry at Representative Richard McCormick that he has apparently gone to ground, bailing on a CNN interview about the disastrous town hall at the last minute. (continued)
Like many, I am tired of waiting for the congressional Republicans to grow a spine, and for Democrats to get their resistance act together. Instead, I suggest aspects of a shadow government and an emerging new politics, with these components.
A candidate for president. Now.
Such a candidate would begin to assemble a new, broad coalition and issues that will focus attention on the resistance agenda. The candidate would not be a standard-issue Democrat and would appeal to independents and Never-Trump Republicans. He or she might signal that their candidacy might end when the primary season commences.
An impeachment trial.
If Congress won’t do it, citizens should. Present key evidence, with rebuttals, and make the case public for removal of Trump. It would be catnip for the media.
Select 20 congressional targets.
There might be 10 from each chamber, who are in swing districts and thus vulnerable to a primary. The goal is to squeeze out candidates who have given up on congressional independence and can be attacked for wimpiness. One hopes there would also be challenges from the right, meaning only one-third of voters are needed to remove them in the primary. Raise money to fund the challenges, and pick challengers who suggest a new, third party.
Develop political leverage that pinches.
Some candidates: secession by Northeast or West Coast; a general strike for government agencies; armed Minutemen doing field exercises; product boycotts for Tesla and Trump resorts.
Build a Defense Fund.
There will be massive legal expenses, so create a large pool of money to pay for lawyers (and seek volunteers). Create a mechanism for distributing the funding in a tactical way. The fund, along with the congressional targets, gives people an effective way to volunteer and send money.
The patriotism model.
The script for this is along the lines of De Gaulle’s Free France during World War II in England and France, and the patriotic tide that produced the American Revolution and pushed out the mighty British. That is: rallies, marches, websites, and modern versions of Sam Adams’s Committees of Correspondence. All are meant to focus the resistance and generate a new politics and a sense of hope.
David Brewster, a founding member of Post Alley, has a long career in publishing, having founded Seattle Weekly, Sasquatch Books, and Crosscut.com. His civic ventures have been Town Hall Seattle and FolioSeattle.
Ed note: We’re fortunate to have David and Joyce as fellow Skyline residents. David is a creative activist–just what we need.
Ed note: Will someone explain whether this will really help?
Posted by Jon Stewart but initiated by John Clemens:
“The 24 hour Economic Blackout” As our initial act, we turn it off. For one day we show them who really holds the power.
WHEN: Friday February 28th from12:00 A.M. to 11:59 P.M.
WHAT NOT TO DO: Do not make any purchases; Do not shop online, or in-store; No Amazon, No Walmart, No Best Buy; Nowhere! Do not spend money on Food & Gas Do not use Credit or Debit Cards Do not hire anyone to do work around your house, etc.
WHAT YOU CAN DO: Only buy essentials if absolutely necessary (Food, Medicine, Emergency Supplies) If you must spend, ONLY support small, local businesses.
SPREAD THE MESSAGE Talk about it, post about it, and document your actions that day!
WHY THIS MATTERS? DT and his minions only care about their pocketbooksCorporations, banks only care about their bottom lineFinancial markets rely on consumers to spend If we disrupt the economy for just ONE DAY, it sends a powerful message.If they don’t listen (they won’t) we make the next blackout longer (We will)
This is our first action.
February 28thThe 24 Hour Economic Black Out Begins.
PLEASE PASS IT ON
Posted inEconomics|Taggedprotests|Comments Off on “The 24 hour Economic Blackout”
Donald Trump’s post proclaiming himself “king” rightfully earned a heap of backlash – more so after it was shared on official White House social media accounts with an apparently AI-generated image of him in a crown.
On Wednesday, Trump posted “CONGESTION PRICING IS DEAD. Manhattan, and all of New York, is SAVED. LONG LIVE THE KING!” to his Truth Social account after the administration put an end to the daytime tolls in New York. Shortly after both the official White House X and Instagram handles posted the quote along with an image of the president in a crown standing in front of New York.
Reactions to the Instagram posts in the comments ranged from “This must be new wall art for his bathroom” to “Really??? Posting this on the official White House account is so embarrassing and disrespectful to our country.”
Over on X, a number of users – both familiar faces and regular users – rallied against the comment and wondered loudly why more Republicans were not crying out with similar concern. Many also asked how organizations like Fox News might have reacted if former presidents Barack Obama or Joe Biden had proclaimed themselves a “king” on their social media platform of choice.
From Foundation Fighting Blindness – Thanks to Ann M.
Join A Virtual Quarterly Vision Webinar onAge-related Macular Degeneration (AMD)February 27th | 7:00 p.m. ET (4 PM PT)
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Webinar DetailsDate: Thursday, February 27th, 2025 Registration Page: Quarterly Vision Webinar on AMDPS: Forward this to anyone you know who’s interested in eye health research.
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