Force says 😷#MaskUp😷

Kate; 40yo; nonbinary they/them; leftist/ancom; disabled , #ActuallyAutistic, and #QueerAsFuck. 🏳️‍🌈🏴‍☠️🍊🦄🗼🪴

[Force says 😷#MaskUp😷 @ForceMonument]

Important news for younger folks on/applying for disability! New change means you can set up an ABLE account if you were disabled by age 46.

More info in this post, but it will help a lot of folks. 🎉🎉🎉

https://t.co/tUqV69FMWY

[Force says 😷#MaskUp😷 @ForceMonument]

@softestbuckley

[WeRateDogs @dog_rates]

This is Baby. She is celebrating her first ever International Corgi Day today. Personally thinks she should be celebrated every day, but this is a good start. 14/10

[Jvnior @Jvnior]

🚨🇮🇱 BREAKING: The International Court of Justice has ruled that ISRAEL has committed acts capable of violating the GENOCIDE CONVENTION.

What the hell are we waiting for now?

[ángy @angynity]

i genuinely will never understand why would someone make this brutal amount of money and just keep it all to themselves

[SpeakOutSister @speakoutsister]

I once had someone ask me if i was "sexually active" in the middle of a smear test. I asked her to define what she meant by "sexually active" ( knowing what the answer was likly to be) She said "could you get pregnant".

And THAT is the problem. Homophobia.

[Ryan Grim @ryangrim]

Rep. Adam Smith (D-Washington), top ranking Democrat on the committee, says that of course he does not like Netanyahu (like all good Democrats say now) but that "we benefit from that technology partnership..Israel's been actually having to fight."

This is known as the "Palestine Laboratory." Israeli weapons are tested in real time on the bodies of Palestinians, which the Israeli weapons industry uses in its marketing. Smith is arguing that we should benefit from that human experimentation too.

[BeadsAgainstFascism 🇵🇸 @beadagainstfash]

Especially in the West where that society spares no second thought for their political prisoners the second they're locked up. There must be ongoing support for these people, and arrests need to be minimized to prevent more imprisonment. True community is necessary for both.

[Caitlin Johnstone @caitoz]

Can you imagine how explosively the right would shit themselves if a group of Muslims were driving around London impersonating police officers and intimidating non-Muslims under the justification of countering Islamophobia? The shrieking about "Sharia law" would shatter glass.

[Caitlin Johnstone @caitoz]

I love how this segment is all about the Jewish community fighting "record levels of antisemitism" but exactly zero antisemitism happens anywhere in this segment. A guy gets frightened by a Jewish woman telling him the Shomrim are coming and they have guns. People are scared that a fire is an act of antisemitic terrorism but it turns out it's just an electrical fire. Someone's car temporarily stalled in front of a Jewish person's house. An imam says he's disturbed by a Jewish man taking photos of him. That's it. Nothing happens. It's an entire news segment about absolutely nothing happening, reported in a solemn and urgent tone.

[Glenn Greenwald @ggreenwald]

When Larry Ellison donated a record-breaking amount of money to the IDF (not to US soldiers, but to the IDF), he repeatedly talked about the "country we call our own" and the importance of the IDF "to defend our home."

By "our country," he is referring to Israel, not the US.

[Wayside Scribbles @waysidescribble]

– Help!
– But have you tried just ignoring the water?

#longcovid #postcovid #ableism #satire

[COLE @colehairlesscat]

"I may be crazy, but that don't make me wrong". - Marsha P. Johnson

[Nomadic Warriors for Pritzker⚔️ @Nomads4Pritzker]

So, I've worked in the beef industry. I have a fairly detailed knowledge of beef markets, the supply chain, parasites and parasiticides, etc. Suffice it to say, this is a nightmare scenario, but one we've known was coming since at least 2022.

New World Screwworm was eradicated from North and Central America in the mid-90's. The US gov't (APHIS) funded a program of screwworm drops, where they bred sterile males so that extant populations couldn't reproduce and move northwards. But in 2022 NWS jumped the Darien gap and started moving northwards once again. It's most likely that they came undetected on livestock brought alongside migrants fleeing political instability in South and Central America. Elon Musk/DOGE, of course, cut several monitoring programs that would have detected this exact scenario. The screwworm drops are still funded, but the monitoring programs are what have been cut - a stupid move if there ever was one.

A serious Central/South America policy would have worked hand-in-hand with CA/SA governments to help contain this, but we've never had a serious policy towards South America, not during the Biden years, and especially not under Trump. The USDA broke ground on a sterile screwworm facility in Texas... last month. I worry it's too little, too late.

Screwworm is so dangerous because, unlike other fly larvae, they lay eggs and feed on living flesh. So something like a small scratch (or even bug bite) can quickly becomes infested, and the larvae will burrow into the flesh, growing the wound and attracting more screwworm. They don't only parasitize cattle, but will also feed on wildlife, domestic pets, even humans. Since they have detected screwworms in domesticated cattle right now, it's likely that there is a wild reservoir as well. We can quarantine herds and pets, but we can't quarantine deer and armadillos. They will move, and so will the NWS.

Under normal circumstances, cattle are moved around - a lot. Calves will be sent to stockers through their adolescence, then shipped to feedlots for finishing. A lot of calving operations (like 70%) are small, and small-time producers don't always catch parasite infestations. Cattle moved in-state don't require a certificate of veterinary inspection, so it's easy for an infested animal to be moved without being noticed. Animals crossing state lines do need a CVI, but Texas has such an enormous cattle population (something like 13 million head) that as goes Texas, so goes the nation.

Fortunately, we have a lot of drugs that treat NWS. The FDA has issued several emergency use authorizations in the last year or so. But every input raises the price of beef, and treatment only makes a difference if producers catch an infestation early. If an infestation spreads unnoticed on a large feedlot, it can hit hard, both in terms of cattle that have to be killed, and treatments that then have to be deployed. Producers will spend days at a time running cattle through the chute, inspecting them and applying parasiticides. It costs a lot of money, which is then passed on to the consumer.

What does that mean for you? Beef is a commodity, and just because there's no NWS up here in Illinois doesn't mean that prices won't skyrocket - and they will skyrocket. US herd size is already at record lows, and this will result in culls. Consumer prices also run 18-24 months behind, which means that shocks to the supply chain now are still going to be felt by consumers in 2028.

It's hard to say if our government will be able to muster an effective response - though I don't trust our current administration, which can't even throw a 250th anniversary party, to be able to deal with an ecological issue of this magnitude. It doesn't help that our current USDA secretary is a lawyer and think-tank creature. I don't much trust the state government of Texas either. The industry has also taken the workforce of large animal veterinarians for granted - a monopoly/market power issue that I just can't get in to here.

For me, it comes back to our federal government having an incoherent policy on Central and South America. We knew what was coming, we know what's going to happen, but we cut the program meant to prevent this scenario. Instead of taking those countries seriously as partners, the government has been stupid and domineering.

Here's the kicker: this is what the industry voted for. They might scream, they might get bailed out, but all that means is that you, the consumer, are going to be paying more for beef, plus whatever bailout gets shoveled their way. Until the industry accepts that they are part of a larger system; that they cannot eternally privatize the gains and publicize the losses of beef production; that they need to consider sustainability and stewardship in the management of their operations, this is only going to keep happening. Eventually, they may find that there is very little goodwill for them among the public, and people will decide that a Brazilian ribeye tastes just as good as one from Texas.

[Nightowl @Nightowl5099]

They have a GoFundMe and you can buy plushies made by his wife, if you wanna support

https://t.co/IGXMdd9jAU

[Cxspxxr✘🧸 @_6signxxx]

And this is why education is important: the Republican Party under Donald Trump and the Republican Party under Abraham Lincoln are two very different things.

[Conor Browne @brownecfm]

This is an absolutely superb response thread from Dr. Duncan. It really is worth your time to read it in full.

[BLACK LIBERATION MATTERS❤️🖤💚🍉 @naagnool_]

Female youth …so underage???

[Gay Gay Hunsecker @stockpiledclay]

The implication that if you’re having a discussion about queer identity Judith Butler will immediately teleport to your location

[Jamie Bonkiewicz @JamieBonkiewicz]

I think it’s funny how Christians say “god loves you unconditionally” but then make up all kinds of conditions.

[Mike Levin @MikeLevin]

This is so insanely corrupt, I can’t even believe it.

More than half the donors to Trump’s $400 million White House ballroom just won over $50 billion in new federal contracts in six months.

And here’s the part that should make your blood boil.

Sixteen of these 27 donors were facing federal enforcement actions, antitrust reviews, labor cases, securities charges. Many of those cases have been quietly dropped or scaled back since Trump took office. You write a check, your legal problems disappear. That’s not a coincidence.

The White House won’t even release the full donor list. They’re hiding it on purpose, because daylight is the one thing pay-to-play can’t survive. A federal judge already ruled ballroom construction has to stop until Congress authorizes it.

Government is supposed to serve the people, not auction itself off to the highest bidder. When access goes to whoever pays the most, working families always end up paying the price.

We either end the corruption, or the corruption will end us.

https://t.co/4MGFzSseFl