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They won't stop until they're stopped, so Dems will stop 'em - Wednesday Good News Roundup [1]
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Date: 2023-03-08
Let’s start with Beau
🚚💙 Democrats Deliver! 💙🚚
Note to Gnusies: I object to the misleading title of this otherwise excellent article. The presidential bully pulpit is not giving Joe Biden these “wins”, Joe Biden is using the bully pulpit to achieve these important policy priorities. There’s a big difference, and that difference is due to POTUS’s experience and competence!
Biden’s Bully Pulpit Is Giving Him Wins Congress Couldn’t, Kevin Robillard, HuffPost, March 6, 2023.
On Wednesday, Biden celebrated pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly’s announcement that it would slash and cap the cost of insulin. Earlier in the week, the Commerce Department announced it would require chipmakers to offer plans for affordable child care to qualify for more than $50 billion in subsidies. And three major airlines responded to Biden’s call in the State of the Union to eliminate fees for parents and children to sit together by doing just that. All three announcements advance the administration’s long-standing policy goals — to lower prescription drug costs, to expand affordable child care options and to eliminate so-called “junk fees” — in ways Congress has so far been unable to. It shows how the administration is turning to public pressure and regulations to enact its agenda. “The president’s bully pulpit is a really important tool that he’s using to reduce costs for families in a number of ways,” Bharat Ramamurti, the deputy director of the White House’s National Economic Council, told HuffPost in a phone interview. “It’s not meant to substitute for getting things through Congress, or for getting something done in rulemaking.”✂️ “We pick these issues where there is something fundamentally unfair and unreasonable that is happening, and you shine the presidential spotlight on it,” Ramamurti continued. “The president must have talked about lowering the price of insulin 100 times over the last year and a half as he’s been pushing for this, and this week you saw a pharmaceutical company respond to his call to act.”
Oh yeah, and repetition works! Joe gets it.
💙 Dems will save Medicare and SS
Joe Biden plans new taxes on the rich to help save Medicare, Chris Megerian and Josh Boak, AP, March 7, 2023.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden on Tuesday proposed new taxes on the rich to help fund Medicare, saying the plan would help to extend the insurance program’s solvency by 25 years and provide a degree of middle-class stability to millions of older adults. In his plan, Biden is overtly declaring that the wealthy ought to shoulder a heavier tax burden. His budget would draw a direct line between those new taxes and the popular health insurance program for people older than 65, essentially asking those who’ve fared best in the economy to subsidize the rest of the population. Biden wants to increase the Medicare tax rate from 3.8% to 5% on income exceeding $400,000 per year, including salaries and capital gains. The White House did not provide specific cost-saving estimates with the proposal, but the move would likely increase tax revenues by more than $117 billion over 10 years, according to prior estimates in February by the Tax Policy Center. “This modest increase in Medicare contributions from those with the highest incomes will help keep the Medicare program strong for decades to come,” Biden wrote in a Tuesday essay in The New York Times. He called Medicare a “rock-solid guarantee that Americans have counted on to be there for them when they retire.”
💙 Dems fighting for ERA
Illinois is leading the way to finalize the Equal Rights Amendment, Michele H Thorne, Chicago Sun Times, March 2, 2023.
😬🤬 Republicans in Disarray 😫😡
Senate Republican Leader McConnell slams Fox and Tucker Carlson for Jan. 6 portrayal, Claudia Grisales, NPR, March 7, 2023.
"It was a mistake, in my view, for Fox News to depict this in a way that's completely at variance with what our chief law enforcement official here at the Capitol thinks," McConnell told reporters. Earlier Tuesday, Manger asked his statement be read at roll call meetings for rank-and-file and posted on all Capitol Police bulletin boards. In the memo, which was obtained by NPR, Manger listed out a series of falsehoods portrayed by Fox: Carlson pushed "outrageous and false" allegations that officers acted as "tour guides." Manger refuted that characterization saying that officers who were severely outnumbered were using "de-escalation tactics to try to talk rioters.
The program "cherry-picked from the calmer moments" outside the violent attack to push a false narrative dismissing the violence of the siege.
The Fox News host claimed fallen officer Brian Sicknick's death had "nothing to do with his heroic actions on January 6." The department maintains, Manger wrote, "that had Officer Sicknick not fought valiantly for hours on the day he was violently assaulted, Officer Sicknick would not have died the next day."
"TV commentary will not record the truth for our history books," Manger said in closing. "The justice system will. The truth and justice are on our side."
x Ooh, such profiles in courage. Did any of these soggy milquetoasts call out McCarthy? No.
Not interested in whitewashing Jan. 6th?
They're already doing it, none of the so called presidential candidates running for the republican ticket will mention it.
Try reporting that.
https://t.co/C8dJCNc9HI — Andrea R MD (@AndreaR9Md) March 7, 2023
Arizona GOP in chaos after election deniers accuse them of taking Mexican cartel money: report, Matthew Chapman, Raw Story, March 7, 2023.
The Arizona Republican Party is turning on one another over a new set of conspiracy theories from election deniers that politicians and officials all over the state — including some of the Republicans themselves — are on the payroll of Mexican drug cartels, reported the Huffington Post on Tuesday. "Even after getting washed out in the midterms, state Republicans can’t quit these outlandish theories — and now, it has thrown the party into chaos," reported Matt Shuham. "For the past two weeks, Republicans have faced wild accusations of bribery, money laundering and election fixing — from their own supporters. Their conspiracy theories involve a cast of bad guys ranging from a Mexican drug cartel to the 'Mormon mafia.'"✂️ According to the report, the hearing made Breger and Thaler "instant celebrities" with far-right conspiracy theorists — but because they implicated several Republican lawmakers, including state Sen. Wendy Rogers, herself an avowed conspiracy theorist, the Arizona GOP is finally starting to turn on election deniers.
CPAC brings simmering GOP tensions to the surface, Heather Digby Parton, Salon, March 6, 2023.
The GOP has been declared to be cracking up many times and it didn't happen so I'm not going to suggest that. But the truth is that there is a growing schism around the Trump cult of personality and many of the rest of the party who are anxious to move on. It's not about ideology, around which the aspiring presidents club is pretty much in agreement: "woke" is bad, China is bad, Democrats are bad and America First blah, blah, blah. What's starting to happen is some very serious infighting and calamity among important players and it includes the right-wing media apparatus as well as the political actors. We all know about Fox News' implosion with their Dominion libel case revelations. But as Jedeed reports, there is also the implosion of Project Veritas, this throwdown between the Club for Growth and CPAC, the Matt Schlapp sex scandal, a feud between The Daily Wire vs Stephen Crowder and more. Despite the reluctance of those who are running or planning to run in the GOP presidential primary to take on Trump directly, it's only a matter of time before full-scale war breaks about among them. Trump has already declared war on on the GOP establishment which probably illustrates the current state of the GOP better than anything else✂️ His crowd seemed happy enough to see him. But it wasn't the delirious love fest we would have seen a couple of years ago. I have to wonder what would have happened if he'd decided to deliver a speech with the theme of his latest video instead of the negative pile of grievance upon grievance.
The Sad, Desolate Scenes of CPAC 2023, Laura Jedeed, The New Republic, March 4, 2023.
Two years ago, Fox Nation was a major sponsor of the conference; attendees received a free yearlong streaming service membership and a tote bag full of branded swag. This year, the cable news giant is nowhere to be found: It’s not on sponsorship signs, not in CPAC Central, not even in Broadcast Row, where Newsmax and Real America’s Voice now dominate. ✂️ If the Ronald Reagan Dinner is any indication, a lot of donors are in Florida with DeSantis and the Club for Growth. The gala, which costs nearly $400 a plate, has always sold out far in advance. This year, CPAC pushed a text encouraging people to buy tickets the day of the dinner, and footage of the event shows—you guessed it—many empty seats.✂️ It’s not the only feud, another attendee pointed out to me, and he’s not wrong. You can’t take two steps without running into either vicious infighting or complete catastrophe. The Daily Wire versus Stephen Crowder. Project Veritas in shambles. News articles about Matt Schlapp, the longtime face of CPAC, all feature at least a paragraph about the male Herschel Walker staffer who alleges that Schlapp nonconsensually “grabbed [his] junk and pummeled it at length.” Fox versus Trump, DeSantis versus Trump, the Club for Growth versus the American Conservative Union … it’s infighting all the way down. In 2016, Donald Trump remade the Republican Party in his own image. He was more than a party leader, he was God-emperor, creator and destroyer of worlds. For six years, the GOP has known just what to do and just where to go: Back Trump, get on the train, and enjoy the ride. The possibility of a DeSantis run was very abstract last year at this time. Before that “red wave” fizzled out, it was possible to imagine with crystal clarity the way 2024 would go: the debates, the media histrionics, oceans of liberal tears, then victory. It’s all a blank slate now. The primaries will be ugly, the outcome no longer predetermined. The Republicans are a flock without a shepherd, a party used to marching orders that finds itself suddenly still. No leader. No galvanizing cause. No hope. No wonder these seats are empty.
Fox
Jaw-Dropping Filings Reveal Civil War Inside Fox News, Matt Young, AJ McDougall, Brett Bachman, the Daily Beast, March 7, 2023.
A Delaware judge on Tuesday unsealed hundreds of pages of damning text messages, testimony, and emails from Fox News’ top executives and its most famous faces—adding to the trove of explosive documents released last month as part of Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against the network. The documents show a network at war with itself as it balanced the need to juice its ratings with the apparent knowledge that it was platforming false claims of fraud by then-President Donald Trump in the days and weeks following the 2020 election. A number of depositions also released on Tuesday pull back the curtain on how those at the top of the Fox food chain, including owner Rupert Murdoch, were aware that the network was airing false information.
Inside the Panic at Fox News After the 2020 Election, Peter Baker, New York Times, March 4, 2023.
Typically, it is a point of pride for a news network to be the first to project election winners. But Fox is no typical news network, and in the days following the 2020 vote, it was besieged with angry protests not only from President Donald J. Trump’s camp but from its own viewers because it had called the battleground state of Arizona for Mr. Biden. Never mind that the call was correct; Fox executives worried that they would lose viewers to hard-right competitors like Newsmax. And so, on Monday, Nov. 16, 2020, Suzanne Scott, the chief executive of Fox News Media, and Jay Wallace, the network’s president, convened a Zoom meeting for an extraordinary discussion with an unusual goal, according to a recording of the call reviewed by The New York Times: How to keep from angering the network’s conservative audience again by calling an election for a Democrat before the competition.✂️ Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum, the two main anchors, suggested it was not enough to call a state based on numerical calculations, the standard by which networks have made such determinations for generations, but that viewer reaction should be considered. “In a Trump environment,” Ms. MacCallum said, “the game is just very, very different.” The conversation captured the sense of crisis enveloping Fox after the election and underscored its unique role in the conservative political ecosystem. The network’s conduct in this period has come under intense scrutiny in a $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit by Dominion Voting Systems. (Beau explains it all really well here ⬇) x YouTube Video
Fox News anchors argued for viewers’ feelings to override “statistics and the numbers” on the network’s 2020 presidential election calls, Eric Kleefeld, Media Matters, March 5, 2023.
By the time of the Zoom meeting on November 16, there could not have been any remaining doubt over the fundamental accuracy of the Arizona call. Baier and MacCallum, however, were still arguing that it had been a political mistake for the network to be first on the air with this truthful story. This newest reporting further reveals the extent to which Fox does not have a “straight news” side, but instead is just another cog in a right-wing propaganda machine. This story must also be considered in the context of revelations from Dominion Voting Systems’ ongoing defamation lawsuit against Fox, which reveals that Fox Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch and other key executives knew that the Trump campaign’s conspiracy theories about massive electoral fraud were indeed false, but that the network continued to push them in the pursuit of profit. In the two-week period after the Fox News decision desk had declared Joe Biden the president-elect, the network’s coverage undermined that projection by questioning the results of the election or pushing conspiracy theories at least 774 times.
⚖️ Legal News ⚖️
5 Texas women denied abortions sue the state, saying the bans put them in danger, Sarah McCammon, NPR, March 7, 2023.
"Just because Roe v. Wade is no longer the law of the land does not mean that women and pregnant people are without constitutional and basic human rights," says Molly Duane, senior staff attorney with the center. "We're talking about people who are in medical emergencies, who need urgent medical care and whose physicians are too scared to provide that care because of the state's laws and because of the state's failure to provide any clarification around what its law means." The suit names Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton as a plaintiff. His office responded Tuesday by saying Paxton "will continue to defend and enforce the laws duly enacted by the Texas Legislature" and by forwarding a "guidance letter" on the state ban triggered by the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization.✂️ Two Texas doctors, Damla Karsan and Judy Levison, also are suing the state on behalf of themselves and their patients. The lawsuit notes that doctors who violate Texas' abortion bans could face severe penalties. "With the threat of losing their medical licenses, fines of hundreds of thousands of dollars, and up to 99 years in prison lingering over their heads, it is no wonder that doctors and hospitals are turning patients away—even patients in medical emergencies," the suit reads.✂️ Duane, with the Center for Reproductive Rights, says the goal of the new suit is to obligate the state to provide clear guidelines for Texas doctors whose pregnant patients face serious medical complications.
⬆⬆The doctors’ and patients’ cases in Texas are excellent examples of the advice that Beau gave in the video at the top of this GNR — they are going to court to make the forced-birthers spell out their position clearly, instead of hiding behind deliberately vague new laws that allow their extremism to be normalized and obfuscated. Good.
AZ Dem AG just saving democracy
Arizona Sues to Block Election Skeptic From Controlling Voting, Tracy Connor, the Daily Beast, March 7, 2023.
The Arizona attorney general filed suit on Tuesday to stop the Cochise County Board of Supervisors from handing its authority over elections to the county recorder, who has spread skepticism about the voting system.✂️ AG Kris Mayes explained the decision to sue the Board of Supervisors in a statement accompanying the complaint. “While counties may appropriately enter into cooperative agreements with their recorders to manage elections, Cochise County’s agreement steps far over the legal line. In addition to this broad transfer of power, I am deeply concerned this move might shield or obscure actions and deliberations the Board would typically conduct publicly under open meeting law,” Mayes said. “Suing other public officials is not something I take lightly–but it is my job as Attorney General to bring action when public officials unlawfully exercise their power or act outside the confines of their authority.”
Pardons for Marijuana convictions
Thanks to Andrew Cockburn for mentioning this in Monday’s GNR comments! 🎩
Justice Department Announces Application Form for Marijuana Pardon Certificates, U.S. Department of Justice, March 3, 2023.
The online application will be available on the Office of the Pardon Attorney’s website: Application for Certificate of Pardon. The web form allows eligible persons to submit documentation to the Office of the Pardon Attorney and receive a certificate indicating the person was pardoned on Oct. 6, 2022, for simple possession of marijuana. The President’s pardon, effective Oct. 6, 2022, may assist pardoned persons by removing civil or legal disabilities — such as restrictions on the right to vote, to hold office or to sit on a jury — that are imposed because of the pardoned conviction. The application released today may also be helpful as proof of pardon for those who seek to obtain licenses, bonding or employment. As President Biden said at the time of the proclamation, his action intends to “help relieve the consequences arising from these convictions.” Those who were pardoned on Oct. 6, 2022, are eligible for a certificate of pardon. Consistent with the proclamation, to be eligible for a certificate, an applicant must have been charged or convicted of simple possession of marijuana in either a federal court or D.C. Superior Court, and the applicant must have been lawfully within the United States at the time of the offense. Similarly, an individual must have been a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident on Oct. 6, 2022.
DOJ taking down Russian criminals
Justice Department task force takes aim at Russian oligarchs and their riches, Ryan Lucas, NPR, March 6, 2023. (Public news source, so I am quoting a bit more):
Task Force KleptoCapture, Garland said, would hold accountable Kremlin-aligned Russian elites who try to evade sanctions the U.S. and its allies had imposed in response to Putin's invasion. "We will leave no stone unturned in our efforts to investigate, arrest and prosecute those whose criminal acts enable the Russian government to continue this unjust war," Garland said in his announcement. In the year since, the task force has brought charges against at least 35 individuals and corporate entities as the Biden adminstration and its allies seek to impose pain on Putin and the Russian elites who back him. ✂️ Monaco says that over the past year, the task force has seized, forfeited or otherwise restrained more than $500 million in Russian oligarch assets. The task force, meanwhile, has now shifted into a second phase, she says, "which is go after the enablers, the facilitators, the companies that prop up and enable and facilitate the ability of these oligarchs to hide their wealth, to shield it, to evade sanctions, and to capitalize on the kind of dark corners of the global financial system."✂️ As the fighting on the battlefields of eastern Ukraine rages on and Putin shows no sign of looking for a brokered peace, the the Justice Department is putting to use a new tool that gives it the ability to transfer to Ukraine assets seized from sanctioned oligarchs. The attorney general recently authorized the transfer of some $5 million to Ukraine—the first time this tool has been employed. The money pales in comparison to Ukraine's needs in the middle of a devastating war, but Monaco says it's just the first step. "We're not pausing in our effort," she said. "We're going to move this money out as quickly as possible to the benefit of the Ukrainian people."
TFG’s family circus continues
Ivanka Trump throws family under the bus in fraud case: 'Other individuals were responsible', David Edwards, Raw Story, March 7, 2023.
Bloomberg News correspondent Erik Larson reported that Trump had joined her father and brothers in asking for a trial delay, but she offered a very different reason. According to Larson, Trump's lawyer has argued that the case is "not simple" because she left the Trump organization in 2017 and has a "unique" defense because she has not been accused of lying about the company's finances. "The Complaint does not contain a single allegation that Ms. Trump directly or indirectly created, prepared, reviewed, or certified any of her father's financial statements," Trump's attorney said in a court filing this week. The document alleges "that other individuals were responsible for those tasks."
Meanwhile, from the schadenfreude file…the finding out commences
FAFO, Gym!
Former FBI agent reveals 'the report Jim Jordan doesn’t want you to read' about his whistleblowers, Sarah K Burris, Raw Story, March 7, 2023.
Former FBI agent Asha Rangappa is posting excerpts of a report about Rep. Jim Jordan's (R-OH) so-called "FBI whistleblowers" from the alleging "deep state" conspiracies at the FBI. ✂️ "The Committee has now heard from three of these so-called whistleblowers," the report says. "George Hill, a retired FBI Supervisory Intelligence Analyst from the FBI's Boston Field Office; Garret O'Boyle, a suspended FBI special agent from the Wichita Resident Agency in Kansas; and Stephen Friend, a former special agent with the FBI's Daytona Beach Resident Agency. None of these witnesses has provided evidence of misconduct by the FBI, the Department of Justice, or any other public official. Each offered a wide range of personal opinions, but to the extent that they testified about matters to which they claim to have firsthand knowledge at all, none showed any evidence of wrongdoing." Instead, the report implies that they're merely former employees with an axe to grind and being paid to serve as Jordan's "whistleblowers." The report also says that the men have also been "directly connected to a network of extreme MAGA Republican operatives including former Trump administration officials Kash Patel, Russell Vought, and Mark Meadows, who have incentive to promote these witnesses and their meritless claims..." Patel paid both O'Boyle and Friend "$5,000 almost immediately after they connected in Nov. 2022. Patel has also promoted Friend's forthcoming book on social media." x I'm reading the report by House Judiciary Committee Dems on the "whistleblowers" that Jim Jordan has brought in for his weaponization committee. HOO BOY. Jim does NOT want you to read this report, because it pre bunks a lot of his best material. So read it
https://t.co/U1OKvsLhPN — Asha O’Rangappa (@AshaRangappa_) March 7, 2023
FAFO, bigot!
Restaurant staff walks off en masse after owner floats serving cocktail called 'The Negro': report, Brad Reed, Raw Story, March 7, 2023.
The Gettysburg Times reports that 16 employees at Mela Kitchen in Gettysburg walked off in disgust after their boss insisted that they serve drinks with racially charged nicknames. Staff members who spoke with the Gettysburg Times say that they tried to work out a change to the cocktail names with owner Donald Hoffman, who refused to heed their pleas. Former shift manager Madison Melton tells the publication that "The Caucasian" was to have been modeled on the white Russian cocktail and that Hoffman proposed calling it the "Redneck Russian" as an alternative name. Former server Emily Kate Hessler tells the publication that when employees went to Hoffman with their concerns about "The Caucasian" cocktail, he said they should "buckle up" because he planned to start serving a cocktail called "The Negro" the following week. In the wake of the walkout, Mela Kitchen was closed for at least three straight days.
Sure, Ron 🙄
Oops! The neofascist governor of Florida is trying to distance himself from the blatantly fascist legislation that one of his fellow Republicans has brought up. That’s because some other prominent Republicans have come out and denounced the bill, thus alerting Ron the Dullard that the bill is an egregious example of Republican nazism. Reporters need to follow up and ask — will he sign it if it comes to his desk? Make him go on record.
Ron DeSantis trashes blogger registration bill: 'Not anything that I've ever supported', David Edwards, Raw Story, March 7, 2023.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) on Tuesday came out against a bill that would require bloggers to register if they report on political figures. The bill, sponsored by state Sen. Jason Brodeur (R), would have bloggers disclose who paid them and fine them up to $2,500 for late reporting. Following DeSantis' State of the State address on Tuesday, the governor lashed out at the legislation at a press conference. "I see these people filing bills, and then there's articles with my face on the article saying that, oh, they're going to have to, bloggers are going to have to register for the state, and it's like attributing it to me," DeSantis complained. "And I'm like, okay, that's not anything that I've ever supported, I don't support." "I don't control every single bill that has been filed or amendment, so just as we go through this session, please understand that," he insisted.
📥 🧩 Bits ‘n’ Pieces 🧩 📤
When my neighborhood Barnes&Noble closed late in the first year of the pandemic, I was… well, I don’t want to overstate it and say “devastated”. But I was. Devastated. I am not a shopper, but that bookstore was my one browsing (and buying) pleasure. My grandchild was leaving babyhood and I already had dreams of taking him there for outings to pick out a new book and look at all the others. We had one — ONE! — such outing when he was still a toddler in a stroller and then the store was gone. 😢
But now there is wonderful news! Reports of bricks and mortar bookstores’ inevitable demise were premature! Barnes & Noble is enjoying a renaissance! Thanks (ironically) to the pandemic and even more thanks to the leadership of B&Ns new CEO who seems to have a refreshing and workable vision for successful bookstores, the struggling chain has a new lease on life and will be opening 30 new stores this year! Many of them will be near former locations (I am hopeful for my neighborhood 🤞 My daughter’s local B&N just opened in new premises across the street from the old location!) ← I actually replaced one exclamation mark in this paragraph with the fingers-crossed emoji. Can you tell I am excited about this news? 😄
Bookstore Revival!
How Barnes & Noble Came Back From Near Death, Ezra Klein, New York Times, January 28, 2023.
The chain, long in contraction, is expanding for the first time in a decade. It plans to open 30 new stores this year, including some in locations where Amazon tried and failed to build good brick-and-mortar bookstores. It is increasingly seen as an ally, rather than the enemy, of indie booksellers.✂️ Barnes & Noble is a private company, so its financials aren’t visible. But Daunt insists that the gains are holding and that the reason should be obvious to anyone who loves books. “The pandemic was very good for reading,” he said. “You force people to spend a lot of time at home, and at some point the TV becomes dull. People resorted to other forms of entertainment, and most of those we sold — books, of course, but also puzzles and games and the like. There’s a snapback in puzzles and games, but books carried on. They’re a habit. When people had the time to read, they found out they liked it, and after the pandemic a significant portion carried on doing it.” That’s been true, at least for me. I started going back to Barnes & Noble’s stores during the pandemic. I began buying more physical books and remembering how different their pleasures are. And I never stopped. I spent two days last week working out of Barnes & Noble’s cafe, a stack of journals and comics piled in front of me for breaks. It was lovely. Barnes & Noble’s resurgence is a reminder that there is nothing inevitable about its (or any bookstore’s) demise. Great bookstores and libraries still provide something the digital world cannot: a place not just to buy or borrow books but to be among them.
More: How Barnes & Noble turned a page, expanding for the first time in years, Alina Selyukh, NPR, March 7, 2023. (This reporter had way too much fun writing this article 😂)
The ghost of Barnes & Noble past meets the spirit of Barnes & Noble future in a single shopping center in a suburb of Baltimore. The new store in Pikesville, Md., separated by half a parking lot from its shuttered predecessor, is part of an unlikely plot twist: Barnes & Noble is staging its largest expansion in over a decade. After years on the brink of extinction, the book chain is planning to open some 30 new stores this year. Many are returning the retailer to areas it previously abandoned. In a few, Barnes & Noble is even taking over former Amazon bookshops. The retailer hopes this will turn a new leaf. Barnes & Noble sales have been rising, and last year grew more than 4%, according to Shannon DeVito, director of books. "What has changed is, I think, my hope that we're going to be here for decades and decades and decades now," she says.
USPS issues stamp honoring nobel laureate, writer Toni Morrison
Toni Morrison honored with new stamp, unveiled at Princeton, Nardos Haile, AP. March 7, 2023.
New Toni Morrison stamp featuring photo by Deborah Feingold. PRINCETON, N.J. (AP) — Nobel laureate Toni Morrison is now forever immortalized on a stamp honoring the prolific writer, editor, scholar and mentor that was unveiled Tuesday morning in a tribute at Princeton University, where she taught for almost two decades.✂️ “Our new stamp will be seen by millions, and forever remind us of the power of her words and the ideas she brought to the world,” Mehra said.✂️ In 1993, Morrison became the first Black woman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature.✂️ In addition to the events this month, an exhibition exploring Morrison’s creative process will be held at the university library through June 4. Drawn from her archives, the exhibit features more than 100 pieces, some of which have never been seen — including manuscripts, correspondence with other Black women, photographs and hand-drawn maps she created while working on her acclaimed 1987 novel “Beloved.” The exhibit also features some of the only existing drafts of “Song of Solomon,” as well as various unfinished projects.✂️ “She was a writer of rare genius, brilliant originality and genuinely historic importance,” Eisgruber said.
Costa Rica continues to lead in Central American green policy
Costa Rica ponders ways to sustain reforestation success, JAVIER CÓRDOBA and CHRISTOPHER SHERMAN, AP, March 7, 2023.
Costa Rica went from having one of the world’s highest deforestation rates in the 1980s to a nation centered on ecotourism, luring world travelers with the possibility of moving between marine reserves and cloud forest in a single day.✂️ The program that has paid landowners for 25 years not to cut down trees depends almost entirely on fuel tax revenue, which stands to fade away by 2050 as Costa Rica converts public and private transportation to electricity in pursuit of net-zero emissions. That has the government hunting for alternative funding options. Those could include new taxes or a tweaked mix of existing ones. Tourists who flock to see toucans, sloths and brilliantly colored frogs might someday see a charge on their hotel bill to aid forest conservation. And Costa Rica will continue to pressure developed countries — the planet’s biggest polluters — to compensate countries doing more than their share to store carbon.✂️ Costa Rica reforestation got a boost last year with President Rodrigo Chaves’ announcement of $16.4 million from the World Bank for forests that are reducing carbon emissions. The program will bring in a total of $60 million by the end of 2025, money Costa Rica hopes can double the amount of protected forest.
🐩💙 CG’s Picks 💙🐩
Hello Everybody! It’s me, CurlyGirl! Today I want to give you a nice update on the beautiful Friesian horses in the Netherlands. Remember I posted a video of the mother horse who lost her foal and the boy foal who lost his mother and they were brought together and Queen Uniek raised Rising Star as her own little foal? Well, Rising Star is now an almost grown up colt and not long ago Yvonne took this video of the horses out in the field and a strange but beautiful natural phenomenon — a fogbow!
Rescue Mania!
🐶 Next, I want to tell you that it really isn’t fair that Mama won’t get us a puppy. Lots of people have plenty of dogs and everything works out great and the dogs have loads and loads of fun!
She says, “Oh CG, puppies are a LOT of work and they need training and watching!” and I tell her, “but I will watch her AND I will help train her, too!” And then Mama says, “but CG, what about grooming? You cannot help with grooming! I can’t even keep up with just YOUR grooming these days!” And I say back to her, “We can take her to the groomer at Petco!” And Mama says back, “That would be a big hassle, CG!” and I tell her back, “well that’s just fooey because if THIS GUY can do it for 20 dogs, we can do it for one little puppy and me!”
And I showed her this video and she never said another word! (nifty here: I was in shock — twenty dogs!):
🐕 By the way! Speaking of rescues! Check out this very cool story which unites two things me and Mama like: dogs and theater!
Rescue dogs take center stage in ‘Annie’ role, Tricia Despres, Chicago Sun Times, March 7, 2023.
“[Rescue advocates Chris and Bruce Leone] reached out to me and told me they had found a dog that looked like a ‘Sandy,’ ” remembers legendary animal trainer William Berloni, who throughout his career has rescued over 100 dogs that would go on to play the role of Sandy in the Broadway musical “Annie.”✂️ “She was a little firecracker,” said Berloni, a Tony Award honoree. “She was outgoing and gregarious, and she loved cookies.” It’s this outgoing and gregarious cookie lover who will take the stage as Sandy in the all-new touring production of “Annie,” ✂️ “First we heal their physical and emotional wounds, and then we start training them and socializing them and working them up to the moment they are ready to take the biggest stage,” Berloni says of the training process, which can take anywhere from one to two years. “If they’re having a good time and if they enjoy it, they become a performing dog. And if they don’t, we will retire them. They will be a great pet for somebody.”✂️ “I’ve often asked myself why Sandy, who is in ‘Annie’ for all of nine minutes, is so very popular,” says Berloni, who will hand over Addison and Georgie to animal handler Mel Rocco while in Chicago. “But when an animal walks on stage, it brings us into a different place. It becomes very real. It’s that simple of a thing. It charms people.”
ALSO! If you want a good newspaper with no paywall, the Chicago Sun✶Times provides all it’s online content openly on the internet at chicago.suntimes.com — they have great stories like the one about the Sandy dogs and also international news and national news and all sorts of national columnists and stuff like that. Check it out! (we don’t know anyone at this newspaper, but we get it delivered every day and we love it!).
YES! I DO Have a Lion Story!
🦁 Pressley asked me yesterday in the comments below NNNE’s GNR if I was going to have a lion story today and GOSH! I almost forgot to check on those lion triplets at Lincoln Park Zoo! 😱 So I dashed straight over there (to their website, I mean — I do NOT go near to actual lions!) and here is an update:
All 3 of the kittens cubs are boy lions! I am kind of disappointed that there isn’t a girl lion amongst them, to tell you the truth. Although, if I am completely honest, it wouldn’t matter because — girls or boys — I am not going near to any lions! But I am still proud of them! And Chicago is proud of them AND we are proud of our Lincoln Park Zoo (people can go to our zoo for free, did you know that?). Mostly, I am proud of Zari who is an excellent mother and has now successfully raised 4 cubs!
#LionWatch: The Three Lion Cubs Are All Male! Lincoln Park Zoo, February 23, 2023.
This week, the cubs had their very first veterinary exams at six weeks of age. The veterinary team has determined that all three are boys! They weighed roughly 2 pounds at birth, but now tip the scales at a robust 15-18 pounds each. During this examination, the lion cubs received their first vaccinations. They each also had a portion of hair on their forearms shaved to make it easier for the zoo’s animal care team to quickly identify each individual cub before they develop additional distinctive markings. To minimize disruption to the natural bonding behaviors between mother and cubs, a team of 18 keepers, veterinarians, and veterinary technicians carefully choreographed an approach that allowed all cubs to receive needed care in under eight minutes. Meanwhile, mom Zari participated in a training session in a separate space.✂️ Over the next several weeks, the cubs will begin voluntary, positive training enforcement sessions designed to let them participate in their own healthcare—just like their mother did when she assisted in her own ultrasound before the birth. The cubs will remain behind the scenes until Zari determines that they are ready to be introduced to the rest of the family pride. x YouTube Video
That’s all I have for you today. Bye for now! Luv, CG 💙🐾
⚡️ Lightning RoundUp ⚡️
⚡️ Rs would love to stop youth from organizing via social media — so let’s figure out what is really going on: Social Media Isn’t the Main Reason Teens Are Depressed, Mike Males, Yes! Magazine, March 2, 2023.
⚡️ How to Do Nothing author is back with more good stuff: Jenny Odell Wants You to Reclaim Your Time, Sarah Franklin, the Nation, March 6, 2023.
⚡️ Lots of people have dealt with this since 2016: Stuck in a loop of worrying thoughts? Here’s how to stop it, Megan L Rogers, Psyche, March, 2023.
⚡️ Super interesting! How we get high: our bodies are perfectly primed for consuming cannabis, CBC, January 25, 2023.
⚡️ MAGA just wants our sweet city money: Red Staters Should Want Blue Staters to Move In, Eleanor Clift, Daily Beast, March 6, 2023.
⚡️ Every corner of R world is in disarray: 'Bewildering loser' Trump scorched by conservative for refusal to step aside, Tom Boggioni, Raw Story, March 7, 2023.
💗 How Can You Help Build Our Democracy Back Better? 💗
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