The Jonas Brothers - Wings

Reactions to History-Making Indictment

  

 

The GOP's Continuing War on Education

The Republican position on education now seems clear: Children should not be exposed to anything that the most bigoted, fearful parent in their school objects to. To do otherwise would be to violate the “rights” of parents. The parents whose rights merit the most concern seem to be white and Republican. The "right" in question is to control not just one’s own children but other people’s children and the concept of education as a public good.

Last week, House Republicans passed a "Parents Bill of Rights" intended to move this toward a reality nationwide, but you only have to look at Florida to see how it plays out. In Pinellas County, Florida, a movie about Ruby Bridges has been removed from the schools for review after a parent named Emily Conklin complained that it might cause white kids to learn that white people hate Black people.

The film in question is a Disney production released in 1998 and shown in Pinellas County schools for years, according to the Tampa Bay Times, and now, in 2023, it’s going to be a problem because … white kids are going to learn to be more racist? Or white kids are going to feel bad about white racism? We’ve been through the “white woman objects to kids learning about Ruby Bridges” thing before.  The reality is that these privileged snowflake parents object to having kids learn just how how ugly racism is, how recently segregation existed, and how racism was open, public and vicious. The objection is to kids identifying with Bridges and being upset about how she was treated.

This is about the idea that one parent’s objection can up-end the curriculum for an entire school district.  Emily Conklin had already decided not to allow her child to watch Ruby Bridges. But that wasn’t enough for her-- she had to keep every kid from seeing it by claiming that it was inappropriate for all of them. Again, we are talking about a 1998 Disney movie about the experiences of a first-grader that has been shown in the schools for years. What kind of parents wouldn't want their kids watching Ruby Bridges and discussing it with their classmates under the leadership of a professional educator?  Don't these parents want their kids to be educated about the real world or not?

Pinellas County also recently pulled Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye from high schools after a single parent’s complaint. And this is all happening in a state that last year rejected 42 math textbooks because they included social-emotional learning concepts and discussion of race that the state prohibited. A similar review of social studies textbooks this year led a textbook company to preemptively strip mentions of race out of the Rosa Parks story. It’s a state where the governor is instituting a partisan takeover of public higher education, with political appointees having the last word on faculty hiring decisions. The objections to specific texts may come from individual parents, but they are empowered by the entire state political structure.

Public education should be a public good. It should be about ensuring that all children have access to a good education.  It’s also about strengthening democracy by educating kids about how we got where we are and about what threats to democracy—like segregation and institutionalized racism—look like. It’s about teaching kids that their communities go beyond people who look and think just like them. Republicans are trying to dismantle all of this. 

Nashville Gun Culture

This is the Christmas card sent out last year from Congressman Andy Ogles-- the gun nut that represents the district in which the Nashville school shooting happened. 

Willie Wonka and the Woke Factory

Publisher Puffin Books, an imprint of Penguin Books, recently announced that it is editing Roald Dahl's books in an effort to reflect a more inclusive language. Titles like James and the Giant Peach, Matilda and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory have been altered by modifying words that are now deemed offensive.

In a statement to The Telegraph, Puffin said the changes were made so that the books “can continue to be enjoyed by all today.”   For example, the character Augustus Gloop from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is no longer referred to as “fat” and is now described as “enormous.” The Oompa-Loompas are gender-neutral and no longer referred to as “small men” but are now “small people.” Additionally, they are not described as “tiny,” “titchy” or “no higher than my knee.” 

Language related to weight, mental health, violence, gender and race has been cut and rewritten. Remember the Cloud-Men in James and the Giant Peach? They are now the Cloud-People. The Small Foxes in Fantastic Mr Fox are now female.  Miss Trunchbull, the villain in Matilda, is referred to as the “most formidable woman” instead of the “most formidable female.” In the same story, the lead character now reads Jane Austen instead of Rudyard Kipling.

The changes were made by the publisher Puffin in conjunction with the Roald Dahl Story Company, which is now owned by Netflix. Sensitivity readers were hired to review the books in 2020.  To be more sensitive to readers about mental health, words like “crazy” and “mad” were also edited.

Song lyrics from James and the Giant Peach were altered too.  Instead of  “Aunt Sponge was terrifically fat/And tremendously flabby at that,” and, “Aunt Spiker was thin as a wire/And dry as a bone, only drier” the Centipede now sings, “Aunt Sponge was a nasty old brute/And deserved to be squashed by the fruit,” and, “Aunt Spiker was much of the same/And deserves half of the blame.”

 

Making Fun of a Douchebag

Florida Principal Forced Out in the Ongoing War on Education

The principal of Florida’s Tallahassee Classical School is out of a job after three parents complained that their sixth-grade children were shown Michelangelo’s 16th century “David” sculpture, with one parent claiming that their child was exposed to pornography, the Tallahassee Democrat first reported.

The complaint arose from a Renaissance art lesson where students were shown Michelangelo's statue of David. The iconic statue is one of the most famous in Western history.  The 17-foot statue depicts a naked David, the Biblical figure who kills the giant Goliath.   The lesson, given to 11 and 12-year-olds, also included references to Michelangelo's "Creation of Adam" painting and Botticelli's "Birth of Venus". 

Principal Hope Carrasaquilla of Tallahassee Classical School said she resigned after she was given an ultimatum by the school board chair to resign or be fired.   The Tallahassee Democrat reported that Carrasquilla did not know the reason she was asked to resign, but believed it was related to the complaints over the lesson. Carrasquilla had been principal for less than one year.  She was the school’s third principal since it opened in the fall of 2020.   There is no reporting on the reason for the high turnover in such a critical position.

Carrasquilla said she has taught in classical education for a decade and knew that “once in a while you get a parent who gets upset about Renaissance art.”  School board chair Barney Bishop inadvertently admitted to his bias when he disclosed that he was currently lobbying for state legislation that would give parents even more input in primary education. “Parental rights trump everything else,” Bishop said. “[Parents don't] like the woke indoctrination that [is] going on,” he added.   Last year, Bishop lobbied in favor of Florida's "don't say gay" bill, saying that if parents "don’t draw a line in the sand now,‭ ‬the next thing we know, we will have drag queens in elementary schools.‭”

Bishop has also admitted to his belief that teachers are not authorities on education.   In a rant during a Slate interview, Bishop said, "Parents choose [our] school because they want a certain kind of education. We’re not gonna have courses from the College Board. We’re not gonna teach 1619 or CRT crap."  He went on to say that even the use of the word "pornography" is inappropriate in a classroom-- regardless of the students' ages.

Former principle Carrasquilla said in an interview that many other parents and faculty members were upset about her ouster and have been reaching out with support.  Without a trace of irony, Bishop told the media that Carrasquilla was trying to “gin up a lot of publicity” by sharing her experience.

The Tallahassee Classical school is a public charter institution that focuses on "classical learning", a teaching philosophy centered on a traditional Western liberal arts education. The teachers at the school are also forbidden to discuss sex identity or sexual orientation with its students.  "Classical learning" is also popular within the Christian homeschooling movement.  The Tallahassee Classical School is affiliated with Hillsdale College, a conservative Christian institution that has sought to expand its influence over the last decade by helping set up public charter schools. 

Hillsdale has raised funds for the charter school network by pledging to fight “leftist” and “distorted” teaching of American history, such as the lessons about slavery contained in The New York Times’ 1619 Project, the newspaper reported last year.  “We don’t use pronouns,” Bishop said. “We don’t teach CRT and we don’t ever mention 1619 — those are not appropriate subjects for our kids.”

 

Ed Sheeran - Eyes Closed

A Big Boo-Boo Over Some Choo-Choos

Two top Spanish transport officials have resigned over a botched order for new commuter trains that cost nearly $300M.  Incredible as it sounds, the trains that were ordered were too wide to fit into non-standard tunnels in the northern regions of Asturias and Cantabria-- and nobody at the rail agency noticed the error.

The head of Spain's rail operator Renfe, Isaías Táboas, and the Secretary of State for Transport, Isabel Pardo de Vera, are no longer employed. The Spanish national government says the mistake was spotted early enough to avoid a complete financial loss. However the region of Cantabria has demanded compensation. 

Renfe ordered the trains in 2020 but the following year manufacturer CAF realized that the dimensions it had been given for the trains were inaccurate and stopped construction.  

The rail network in northern Spain was built in the 19th Century and has tunnels under the mountainous landscape that do not match standard modern tunnel dimensions.  The mistake means the trains will be delivered in 2026-- two years late. 

Renfe and infrastructure operator Adif have launched a joint investigation to find out how the error could have happened.  Spain's transportation ministry also fired a Renfe manager and Adif's head of track technology over the blunder.

 

Florida Undercoer Agents Find Nothing at Drag Show, Still Try to Shut it Down

On Dec. 28, 2022, The Plaza Live theater in Orlando, Florida, hosted “A Drag Queen Christmas.” Drag Queen Christmas shows have been around for almost as long as there have been Christmas shows, and they tend to be as advertised: fun, satirical, kitschy, bawdy, high-energy live entertainment. A little singing, a little dancing, a lot of lights and colors. And while the show does not feature any nudity, it does feature bare male chests and there are a lot of gay people involved.

The Miami Herald reports that in addition to the many patrons attending the Dec. 28 performance, there were a slew of “undercover agents” sent in to … take photos of three minors in the audience at the Orlando drag show. The minors were accompanied by adults. According to a report filed by the agents, “Besides some of the outfits being provocative (bikinis and short shorts), agents did not witness any lewd acts such as exposure of genital organs. The performers did not have any physical contact while performing to the rhythm of the music with any patrons.”

And yet, the Herald reports, the state’s Department of Business and Professional Regulation filed a complaint against the nonprofit that runs The Plaza Live on Feb. 3 of this year. The complaint asks that the theater lose its liquor license.

To be clear-- Florida officials sent people to a theater performance to surreptitiously take photos of other Floridians’ children, like a bunch of creeps. Those people found nothing wrong going on, except an entertaining show that people like Ron DeSantis say violate their personal opinions on what is “lewd or lascivious."

 

Trump is Drumming up Another Insurrection

It’s starting to feel a lot like Jan. 5, 2021. Donald Trump doesn’t like the situation he’s in. He’s urging his fans to protest—not just for him, he says, but for the future of the country. And on the Trump fansites, users are talking about taking on the government, potentially violently. 

Back then, Trump didn’t like that he had lost the election and Congress was about to certify his loss. Now he doesn’t like that he might be indicted for his hush money payments to prevent voters from learning about his (brief) affair with Stormy Daniels. But the rhetoric is the same.

“PROTEST, TAKE OUR NATION BACK,” Trump wrote on Truth Social late last week.  Unfortunately, he’s getting the response he’s looking for. The Daily Beast reported on posts from Trump supporters.

“Surround Mar-a-Lago or wherever he currently is and prevent ‘law enforcement’ from entering,” one commenter wrote, receiving hundreds of positive votes.

Another user responded, “What if they use choppers to circumvent the Patriot moat?”

Stop the Steal leader Ali Alexander wants “100,000 patriots” to “shut down all routes to Mar-a-Lago.”  The Maga mob is not shying away from full-on civil war language: “Accelerating the civil war to this week. Hold the fuckin line guys. Don[‘]t be afraid to use your constitutional rights. Remember 2a is there incase 1a fails,” Rolling Stone reports another Trump supporter wrote.  ("1a" being a reference to free speech, and "2a" a reference to firearms).

Steel barricades have arrived outside Manhattan Criminal Court—but they’re the kind of barriers we saw battered down and ultimately used as weapons against police at the Capitol on Jan. 6. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg sent his staff a memo assuring them that his office is working with law enforcement to investigate “any specific or credible threats against the office.” That can’t just be reassuring language. They need to be taking this very seriously. Deadly seriously.

 

Corporate Welfare is No Laughing Matter

Secret GOP Plan to Fuck Over the Iranian Hostages

Ben Barnes is 84, but in 1980 he was the youngest speaker of the Texas  youngest speaker of the Texas House of Representatives and on his way to becoming lieutenant governor. He was also a close ally of former Texas Gov. John Connolly. At Connolly’s request, Barnes took on a very special role in 1980—travel the Middle East and convince Iran to not release U.S. hostages, so that Ronald Reagan could beat Jimmy Carter.

As The New York Times reports, Barnes has sat on this story for the last 43 years. However, with President Carter currently in hospice care, Barnes has decided to reveal the traitorous plot, and the role he played in sabotaging Carter’s campaign.

“History needs to know that this happened,” said Mr. Barnes. “I think it’s so significant and I guess knowing that the end is near for President Carter put it on my mind more and more and more. I just feel like we’ve got to get it down some way.”

The plot was simple enough. Connally and Barnes traveled “to one Middle Eastern capital after another” over the summer of 1980, as U.S. hostages were being held in Tehran. On every one of those stops, they passed along the same message for the new leadership in Iran: Don’t make a deal with Carter. Wait for Reagan. He’ll give you a much better deal.

What this plan callously disregarded is the fact that every day of captivity put the lives and health of the hostages in Iran at risk. In addition, the military planned and attempted to execute a rescue operation in which eight U.S. service members died and another four were injured. Prolonging the crisis created a risk every day to the lives of those in Iran, and to members of the U.S. military. It also created ongoing harm to U.S. standing abroad and to national security in general.

For his role in “torpedoing” Carter’s chance at reelection, Connolly had hoped to be rewarded with the job of Secretary of State. He was not. The Iranian government announced the release of the hostages after the election. Jimmy Carter was there to welcome them home on what should have been the first day of his second term, but was instead his last day in office.

This wasn't the first time treasonous GOP politicians imperiled national security and hurt Americans.  Doris Kearns revealed in her LBJ biography that Nixon and Kissinger spiked the negotiations for the end of the Vietnam war to help Nixon's presidential campaign.  Kissinger promised the North Vietnamese a better deal if they waited for Nixon to win the election. They did, and Nixon was elected...as thousands of Americans in Vietnam continued to die in that war.

 

Willie Nelson - I Don't Know a Thing About Love

Life Now Sucks for the Taliban

The Taliban may have won the war in Afghanistan, but the jihadists who once spent their days riding horses in the countryside are now stuck behind a desk, lamenting their boring computer jobs, spending all their time on Twitter, high rent, and commutes to work.

It’s been almost two years since the U.S. withdrew from Afghanistan and the Taliban took over. In that time, the country’s new leaders have had time to take over its industries, occupy its buildings, and get very bored of the day-to-day drudgery of running the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.  In a series of interviews with five former mujahideen turned government functionaries and police officers, the Afghanistan Analytics Network shed light on the inner lives of the men who spent a lifetime fighting an empire only to win and have to run a country.

Huzaifa, a former sniper, said life was simple and free during jihad. “All we had to deal with was making plans for ta’aruz [attacks] against the enemy and for retreating,” he said. “People didn’t expect much from us, and we had little responsibility towards them, whereas now if someone is hungry, he deems us directly responsible for that…the Taliban used to be free of restrictions, but now we sit in one place, behind a desk and a computer 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Life’s become so wearisome; you do the same things every day. Being away from the family has only doubled the problem.”

“I sometimes miss the jihad life for all the good things it had,” said 25-year-old Abdul Nafi. “In our ministry, there’s little work for me to do. Therefore, I spend most of my time on Twitter. We’re connected to speedy Wi-Fi and internet. Many mujahedin, including me, are addicted to the internet, especially Twitter.”

None of the interviewed men are native to Kabul, they’re all men from the provinces who moved into the city after the U.S. left. “I haven’t brought my family to Kabul, said Omar Mansur. “The rent of houses is very high for us since our salary is no more than 15,000 afghanis ($180).  

Mansu also complained about the traffic. “Last year, it was tolerable but in the last few months, it’s become more and more congested,” he said. Then he lamented the freedom he lost when the Taliban won the war.  “In the group, we had a great degree of freedom about where to go, where to stay, and whether to participate in the war,” he said “However, these days, you have to go to the office before 8 AM and stay there till 4 PM. If you don’t go, you’re considered absent, and [the wage for] that day is cut from your salary. We’re now used to that, but it was especially difficult in the first two or three months."

A man named Kamran also lamented office life. “I’m sort of happy with my job but often miss the time of jihad. During that time, every minute of our life was counted as worship,” he said. “We used to live among the people. Many of us have now caged ourselves in our offices and palaces, abandoning that simple life.  At the time of the jihad, it was simple-- but now things are much more complicated. We are tested by cars, positions, wealth and women. Many of our mujahedin, God forbid, have fallen into these seemingly sweet, but actually bitter traps.”

Nafi has also realized how replaceable he is.“There is a proverb in our area that money is like a shackle,” he said. “Now, if we complain, or don’t come to work, or disobey the rules, they cut our salary. Unlike jihad, now particularly, when the battles are long gone and the risk is zero, the Emirate could find countless people to work with them in return for a salary."

Suck it, you jerks.

We Should Thank the GOP for the SVB Collapse

In the wake of  SVB's collapse, it should be pointed out that it was all completely avoidable. In 2018, Donald Trump and the Republican Congress—at the behest of the banking industry—rolled back key parts of the Dodd-Frank law that protected consumers. The legislation passed the House 258-159 (with 33 Democrats joining almost all Republicans), and the Senate 67-31 (with 17 Democrats in support). 

The original Dodd-Frank Act, known as the most far-reaching Wall Street reform in history, was supposed to prevent the excessive risk-taking that led to the financial crisis and create a new consumer watchdog to prevent mortgage companies and payday lenders from exploiting consumers.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren sounded the warning bell in a floor speech against the roll-back legislation, saying "Washington is about to make it easier for the banks to run up risk, make it easier to put our constituents at risk, make it easier to put American families in danger, just so the C.E.O.s of these banks can get a new corporate jet and add another floor to their new corporate headquarters.”

Had the GOP not weakened Dodd-Frank, Big Banks would have been subject to stronger liquidity and capital requirements to withstand financial shocks. The collapse we now see could have been predicted and prevented, and consumers' assets would have been protected.

Instead, we saw Silicon Valley Bank executives give themselves huge bonuses—hours before the federal bank regulators rushed in to take over a failing institution. They did this because, in the current financial regulatory environment, they believed that they could get away with it.

 

Oh, Those Millenials . . .

 

2023 Oscars: You Weren't Missing Much

New Rule from Bill Maher on the "He Gets Us" Campaign

He may be a bit of a blowhard, but Maher's spot-on regarding the "He Gets Us" campaign that's been inundating the media landscape the last few months:  

"Now that a group is spending a billion dollars on the "He Gets Us" campaign of billboards, internet ads and even a Super Bowl ad to promote Jesus . . . they need to go fuck themselves.

You've got a billion dollars-- go feed some poor people!

Because . . . news flash: we've all heard of Jesus.

Americans may not know their senator, or what state is above South Dakota-- but we've heard of Jesus.

Go find some tribe in the Brazilian jungle and bug them!"

Collapse of SVB Threatens the Economy and Leaves Tech Workers Unpaid-- But Rich Fuckers Make Out OK

Yesterday, financial markets were rocked by the second-largest bank collapse in U.S. history.  

In the week before the collapse, Moody's Investor SErvice informed SVB Financial, the bank's holding company, that it was facing a potential downgrade of its credit rating because of its unrealized losses.  Apparently, the bank's asset portfolio was over-invested in interest rate sensitive products.  Despite steps taken by the bank to improve its position, Moody's downgraded SVB on March 8.

In response to this news, shares of SVB Financial plunged the next day.  In addition, investors at several venture capital firms, including Peter Thiel's Founders Fund, urged startups to withdraw their deposits from the bank.  By close of business on March 9, customers had withdrawn $42 billion, leaving the bank with a negative cash balance of about $958 million.  Interestingly, Thiel’s Founders Fund had no money with Silicon Valley Bank as of Thursday morning (March 9) before the bank began to descend into chaos.  It is not clear whether Thiel was able to move so quickly due to his access to information that was not available to the general public.  Founders Fund refuses to confirm whether the firm’s cash withdrawals happened on Thursday (as the startup world was panicking about SVB’s financial position) or earlier.

Founders Fund took even further action, and issued a capital call to its own investors.   As Thiel's limited partners initiated transactions to satisfy the capital call, they encountered issues using SVB services as they tried to transfer the funds-- they weren’t immediately going through as expected.  There are accusations that this additional activity exacerbated the collapse of SVB.

On the morning of March 10, agents from the Federal Reserve and the FDIC arrived at the offices of SVB to assess the company's finances. Several hours later, the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation (DFPI) issued an order taking possession of SVB, citing inadequate liquidity and insolvency, and appointed the FDIC as receiver. 

There are reports that the CEO of SVB sold $3.57M of the bank's stock two weeks before it collapsed - and that the CFO Daniel Beck cashed in $575,000 the same day, dumping 2,000 shares at $287.59.  CEO Greg Becker sold 12,451 shares at an average price of $287.42 each on February 27.  When the bank collapsed, the bank's stock price was at $39.49.  

Because Silicon Valley Bank served start-ups and wealthy individuals, the majority of its deposits were above the $250,000 that is federally insured, raising the prospect that billions of dollars worth of money might not be recovered.   One entrepreneur based in San Francisco said he withdrew $250,000 after investors urged him to remove at least some money Thursday, but attempts to wire out the rest of the money failed. The company now has $2 million in funds frozen.  With about 90 percent of his company’s reserves frozen, it is at risk of bankruptcy within weeks. But he knew other start-ups with all of their cash and credit lines now frozen who could fail much sooner.   Digital Media company Roku had $487M in accounts at SVB; Digital asset lender BlockFi (which is in bankruptcy) held $227M at SVB.    Gaming platform Roblox had $150 million on deposit at SVB, while aerospace's Rocket Lab held $38M there.

Many start-up CEOs are at a loss for how they will pay their employees and run their businesses. Alex Meshkin, the CEO of Flow Health said that if payroll funds don’t make it to workers early next week, the company will need to figure out a way to manually pay their more than 1,000 employees in the United States and Canada, something they don’t currently have infrastructure for.  “We have a lot of angry employees,” he added. 

 

Twice - Moonlight Sunrise

The Latest Episode in the Gym Jordan Show

Representative Gym Jordan’s latest “weaponization of government” hearing rolled around today, and it was as unpleasant and lie-filled as you could imagine, with Jordan scrambling to make up ground after the previous hearing was widely seen as a flop. This episode was about the “Twitter Files,” Elon Musk’s effort to unveil the company he had bought as unfairly biased against conservatives despite large amounts of evidence to the contrary, and suffice it to say, it once again didn’t produce the fireworks Jordan wanted.

In Thursday’s hearing, two of the handpicked “journalists” to whom Musk fed internal Twitter information to produce the desired narrative did their best to give Jordan what he wanted just as they had given Musk what he wanted. Democratic Rep. Gerry Connolly used some of his time to show that Matt Taibbi and Michael Shellenberger had been very selective in what they looked for when they built their narrative about bias at Twitter.

Connolly’s basic question was simple: What did you find about Donald Trump leaning on Twitter to get what he wanted? And the answer, basically, was that they never even looked.

“When you release information,” Connolly asked, “have you released any information of for example right-wing elements or the Trump White House attempting to moderate content at Twitter?” 

“I did not find that,” Shellenberger answered.    “You didn’t find that?” Connolly asked in mock surprise. “So we had a hearing the other day, on Twitter, and we had four witnesses, and all four testified under oath they had never received a request for content moderation or takedown from the Biden White House, but they did from Donald Trump’s White House.”

Taibbi copped to having heard about this in the news, but said he had not seen any email exchanges from the Trump White House, then rushed to mention that he had seen requests from Democrats. “Yeah, nice try,” Connolly responded. “We’re talking about the Trump White House and people under oath confirming it, and my question is, in the Twitter Files, did Elon Musk or Twitter provide you with that exchange with Chrissy Teigen?” (The incident when the Trump White House asked Twitter to take down Teigen's tweet calling Trump a "pussy-ass bitch")

Taibbi lamely responded, say, “No, but that’s probably because the searches that I was making ...”

“Well, it’s probably because it didn’t confirm the bias that this is all about, as the gentleman from Texas would say ‘the left’ attempting to control content when in fact the evidence is that the Trump White House most certainly attempted content at Twitter. Mr. Shellenberger, were you aware of that or is this all news to you?”

Shellenberger admitted that “the Teigen exchange was news to me.”

 

Something to Think About

Time to Boycott Walgreens!

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) said the state is cutting ties with Walgreens, the nation’s second-largest pharmacy store chain, after it was revealed that the company will refuse to sell abortion pills to consumers in 20 GOP controlled states.

“California won’t be doing business with Walgreens ― or any company that cowers to the extremists and puts women’s lives at risk,” Newsom wrote in a tweet on Monday, sharing a link to a CNN article about the company. “We’re done.”   Newsom did not specify what business the state does with the chain, and his office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But a Newsom spokesperson told Reuters that “all relationships” between Walgreens and the state of California are under review.

Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last summer, abortion care has been severely restricted. Many states have passed or are in the process of introducing legislation to limit abortion, while some access remains blocked by lawsuits. Some Republicans are specifically going after medication abortion, a safe, commonly used method to end a pregnancy. 

Walgreens’ decision came earlier this month after 20 Republican state attorneys general signed a five-page letter on Feb. 1 urging Walgreens and CVS not to mail or distribute abortion pills in their states.

Walgreens wrote letters to the Republican attorneys general confirming that its stores do not yet distribute mifepristone, one of two pills used for medication abortion, and would not dispense or ship the drug to their states, Politico reported last week.  Mifepristone can be combined with another medication, misoprostol, or used alone. Abortion by way of medication makes up half of all procedures across the U.S., according to the Guttmacher Institute. The medications are also prescribed for miscarriage care.

Heroine Epidemic Has Taken Over an Island Paradise

Some 10% of the local population in the tropical island nation of Seychelles is dependent on heroin in what is now an epidemic, according to the country's government.  It is so bad that foreign workers are having to be brought in to do the work that drug-dependent locals cannot. 

Even President Wavel Ramkalawan acknowledges that "the drug situation is very bad".  "At this point in time, per capita, as far as consumption of heroin is concerned, Seychelles is number one in the world. And this is not a statistic that gives me personally great pleasure."

In Victoria, every morning a white van with a distribution window on its side makes several stops around the city, where long queues form as people from all walks of life wait to get methadone.  For many Seychellois though, this daily dose is nothing more than a free morning hit which is incredibly dangerous. Using methadone and heroin at the same time can lead to a fatal overdose.

Taking methadone without a detox plan and counseling is rarely a good long-term recovery solution. Despite this, political decisions have led to the closure of all residential rehabilitation centers across the islands. The president, who has been in office for two years now, blames his predecessors for the lack of much needed in-patient care.  He says that politics got in the way of dealing with the issue under the previous administration. "But we have received a grant from the UAE to build a proper rehabilitation centre. And so we are going in that direction," Ramkalawan says.

The problem in Seychelles is so bad because the islands are caught up in well-established trafficking routes from Afghanistan and Iran to East Africa and Europe - but President Ramkalawan says the issue was exacerbated when a group of Iranian drug traffickers were incarcerated in the country.  "When they were here, they developed their network. After that, there were more Seychellois involved in the drug trade from Iran, and now today we find ourselves putting in so many resources just to fight those Iranian dhows coming into our waters to sell their poison."

Heroin mostly comes into Seychelles by boat - through its vast, porous water borders. With more than a million square kilometers of territorial seas, smugglers have easy access.  Once it makes land, it is largely sold out of small, improvised shops at the back of people's homes in the country's many ghettos.  It is basically a cottage industry, and whole communities are involved.  Drive five minutes off any main street - past the fancy hotels and expensive restaurants - and you can see for yourself. This drug is everywhere, and the fear is, worse is yet to come. While heroin remains the front runner, for now at least because it is relatively cheap, there are new players on the market. Crack cocaine and crystal meth are both beginning to be used and neither drug can be treated with methadone. 

 

Niall Horan - Heaven