Urgent: Big media consolidation

US citizens: call on Congress to block Paramount from consolidating the main US news media.

US citizens: Join with this campaign to address this issue.

To phone your congresscritter about this, the main switchboard is +1-202-224-3121.

Please spread the word.

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Cannabis law

The bully is eager to reclassify marijuana. The change in regulations he wants would make it easier to do research on medical uses, but would not relieve the threats and restrictions on people who actually use marijuana or its derivatives.

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Movie review used to accuse protester of being terrorist

*I Wrote a Movie Review. Cops Took It From a Protester's Home to Make the Case That He's a Terrorist.*

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Argentina's President ordered government to invest in cryptocurrency

Argentina's President Milei imitated another right-wing extremist president by accepting a personal payoff for ordering the country's government to invest in cryptocurrency.

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Some schools want to remove personal computers from classrooms

Some schools, and some US states, want to get rid of personal computers for students in the classroom, for educational reasons.

It is too bad they don't appreciate the injustice of the software in those computers, because that is an separate reason for doing the same thing. The two reasons are not entirely independent — the fact that the software is nonfree is part of the explanation for why it does bad things. But they are independent enough that they can broaden the base of the argument.

We need to bring these two converging movements together.

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Columbia's Center on Global Energy Policy

* Columbia's Center on Global Energy Policy (CGEP) describes itself as an independent organization producing research on energy policy.* In fact, it gets millions of dollars from oil companies, and what it "produces" is obtained wholesale from them.

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Smaller fraction of people post on "social media" in UK

In the UK, a social change is occurring: a smaller fraction of people post regularly on "social media".

People who formerly loved Twitter and the idea of "social media" say that there is no such thing any more, and they miss it.

I don't personally know what it is they miss. I never used Twitter because that required running nonfree JavaScript code, and I refuse on principle to do that. I could not even see individual postings there, until Nitter provided a way to do that without submitting to nonfree software. But ex-Twitter killed off the API which made that possible.

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Urgent: Public education V vouchers

US citizens: call on your federal legislators in Congress to repeal federal school vouchers and protect public education.

See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code--not trivial, but not hard.

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How Israel struck hospitals in Lebanon

*Israel escalates attacks on medics in Lebanon with deadly "quadruple tap".*

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Friendly fire info as terror, Kuwait

A Kuwaiti-American journalist was visiting Kuwait and made footage of the mistaken shooting of an American F-15 and reported on this. Since then, Kuwait has arrested him, possibly for publishing that, or possibly for other journalism, under repressive new "terrorism" laws which can define journalism as "terrorism" under rather vague conditions.

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Urgent: Balcony solar power

US citizens: call on your state governor to legalize balcony solar power.

See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code--not trivial, but not hard.

US citizens: Join with this campaign to address this issue.

Your state's agency-contact information is at USA.gov.

Please spread the word.

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Urgent: Deportation in the US

US citizens: phone your senators and call on them to cancel the funding for the deportation thugs and eliminate that agency,   +1-202-998-6094.

National Nurses United recommends this short script to when you call:

Hi, my name is _______. I am a constituent and I’m a nurse/other health care worker/patient. It is unconscionable, after a year of constant violence and militarization of our neighborhoods by the Trump administration, that Congress would consider sending billions more in funding to continue this harm. I am calling today to urge my senator to vote NO on the Senate Homeland Security reconciliation funding package that includes another $70 billion in funding for ICE and CBP, rescind the already $75 billion allocated to ICE and $65 billion for CBP in last year’s Republican budget reconciliation bill, and take immediate action to abolish ICE.

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Lobbyists making case for more dirty energy

*In Europe, lobbyists are using soaring fuel prices to make the case for more dirty energy.*

I understand how professional lobbyists would find this a profitable and appealing business. What I do not understand is why so few governments hold firm and denounce the invitation to follow the road to megadeaths.

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Woman attacked by thug at No Kings rally

A woman in her 60s went to a No Kings rally wearing an inflatable penis costume and carrying a sign "No Dick Tator". A thug attacked her violently and she faces serious prosecution for ridiculous charges.

It seems that the local magats are using her as an example to demonstrate that they are always serious about punishment as repression, no matter how absurd the grounds for punishment are.

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Sycophantic discourse in major LLM dis-services

Major LLM dis-services show a pattern of sycophantic discourse and its effect on the user is to decrease prosocial intentions and promote dependence.

It is unfortunate that the article adopts the marketing practice of equating LLMs with "AI". LLMs are certainly artificial, but do not qualify as intelligence, and the artificial systems which do qualify as intelligence are not LLMs.

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Google ready to destroy civilization for Pretend Intelligence

Google is ready to destroy civilization (through global heating) to make its Pretend Intelligence a success.

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EPA designation of microplastics and pharmaceuticals in drinking water

*EPA moves to designate microplastics and pharmaceuticals as contaminants in drinking water.*

Even if this is advocated by RFK jr, it is a reasonable direction for effort provided it is done in a rational and scientific manner.

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Population growth past sustainable level

Many countries have experienced population growth past the sustainable level. Yet people continue to call for further population growth as a way to achieve unsustainable further economic growth.

I suspect that a large part of the motive for these pseudo-solutions is to distract the non-rich from the need to reduce the share of wealth and income that the rich get.

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North Sea drilling would barely reduce UK gas imports

*New North Sea drilling would barely reduce UK gas imports at all, data shows.* Planet roasters exaggerate the short-term benefit to distract the public from the urgent need to stop using fossil fuels.

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US government expelling daughters of Iran high officials

The US government is expelling the daughters of Qassem Soleimani and of Ali Larijani, two high officials of Iran that were killed by the US.

What I wonder about is why their daughters moved to the US in apparent conflict with the positions and offices of their fathers. It is conceivable that they did so to act as agents of Iran, but it is also possible that they did so out of disagreement with the revolution's misogyny.

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