So Many Links! And a Picture

I've been experimenting with TiddlyWiki, and having fun doing it. So much so, I've just assembled a list o' links, rather than writing anything today.

But here's a pretty picture, too:



Links!
  • Library Land
    • Libraries as a luxury item "We need government services that support our physical wellbeing, and we need the services that support our intellectual, aesthetic, and cultural lives too. Not only that, but libraries, museums, and cultural institutions don’t exist apart from essential services'; they’re intertwined with them, and in fact they often provide them.... Libraries and arts organizations are not luxury items for our society. (That’s especially the case for those segments of our society who already have the fewest luxuries, and yet poor and less educated people have seen disproportionate declines in library use — perhaps because of cuts to local services.) Spending on them, and on the agencies which support their work, is not government waste. These agencies have earned their place on our list of national priorities, and they deserve to stay there."
    • Seed Librarians Are Fighting to Protect the U.S.’s Resilient and Diverse Food System "Inside every seed library — and there are more than 400 of them now — is another tale. Here are seeds that have been locally cultivated, saved, and passed along from farmer to farmer. They are repositories of genetic information that have been quietly spreading across America during the last decade. They tell the story of how, at a time of unprecedented climatic stress on our food supply, people are fighting to expand their range of crop choices to respond to changing climate conditions."
  • International
    • Emirates, Royal Jordanian Bite Back at Electronics Ban on Twitter "Get ready for some serious social media sass." I am never not ready! "Nineteen airlines around the world were affected by Tuesday's dual electronics bans. The new regulations, released by both the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the U.K. Department of Transport, prohibit passengers flying to the U.S. or U.K. from certain airports in the Middle East and North Africa from bringing any electronic devices bigger than a smartphone into flight cabins (more on why here). Of those 19, a handful seemed determined to make the best of a bad situation, using it to emphasize their planes' in-flight entertainment set-ups—or even better, to make some serious(ly hilarious) digs at the whole affair. Because, really, what's a little harmless sassing interspersed with more informative tweets?" 
    • Russian police Russians Take To The Streets In Nationwide Anti-Government Protestsopposition leader, hundreds of protesters  "In a rare show of force, thousands of Russians took to the streets of Moscow and other cities in the biggest anti-government protests in years. In Moscow, police arrested hundreds of demonstrators, including prominent Russian opposition leader and anti-corruption activist, Alexei Navalny, who orchestrated the uprising. On Monday, officials announced that Navalny will serve a 15-day jail term, saying that he disobeyed police."
    • Hong Kong elections: Carrie Lam voted leader amid claims of China meddling  "Lam’s loyalty proved far more important than the will of ordinary Hong Kong citizens. Tsang was the more popular candidate, ahead of Lam by 26 points in the day leading to the election, according to a poll by Hong Kong University. Many in the city’s pro-democracy camp decried the poll as a 'selection, not an election', and about 1,000 protesters gathered in the city’s main shopping district a day before the poll to rally against the vote."
      • Related: Hong Kong protest leaders charged day after new leader chosen "The protest leaders dubbed 'the Occupy trio' - law professor Benny Tai, sociology professor Chan Kin-man and Reverend Chu Yiu-ming - were each charged with conspiracy to commit public nuisance, incitement to commit public nuisance and incitement to incite public nuisance.... Six others including two legislators and two former student protest leaders were also charged with crimes related to public nuisance during the 2014 unrest, which brought parts of the city to a standstill for months."
  • U.S. News
    • Sessions says grants to be withheld from sanctuary cities  "'Such policies cannot continue. They make our nation less safe by putting dangerous criminals back on the streets,' Sessions said during a surprise appearance in the White House press briefing room."  Which is an old (and verifiably false) argument.
    • Trump Administration Is Said to Be Working to Loosen Counterterrorism Rules  "The Trump administration is exploring how to dismantle or bypass Obama-era constraints intended to prevent civilian deaths from drone attacks, commando raids and other counterterrorism missions outside conventional war zones like Afghanistan and Iraq, according to officials familiar with internal deliberations." Because who wants to prevent civilian deaths?! 
      • While there may be no official backtracking from these rules, it certainly appears they're being ignored: CENTCOM Investigates Whether U.S. Airstrikes Killed 200 Civilians In Mosul "The dramatic uptick forced Airwars — a monitoring group which notes casualty numbers — to stop tracking Russian strikes and only focus on U.S. and coalition strikes that result in civilian casualty claims. For the first time since Moscow's intervention in Syria, claims of civilian casualty deaths caused by the coalition outstripped claims against Russia, according to Airwars."
      • It's no surprise. Trump really just dislikes human rights, apparently: U.S. pulls out of human rights panel on Trump executive orders "'The U.S. has attended these hearings for the last eight years,' said Goncalves Margerin. 'By failing to be present at this hearing, the U.S. joins Cuba and Venezuela in turning its back on people in the Americas who seek justice for human rights abuses.'"
    • Human rights protections aren't the only thing Trump would like dismantled: EPA Chief: Trump To Sign Order Undoing Obama Plan To Curb Global Warming "EPA chief Scott Pruitt says the executive order to be signed Tuesday will undo the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan, an environmental regulation that restricts greenhouse gas emissions at coal-fired power plants." Clean air? Safe water? Stable environment? Liberal nonsense, I guess.
    • Democrats Delay Vote on Supreme Court Nominee Neil Gorsuch  "Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee forced the delay of a vote on Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch on Monday. The one-week delay in sending the nomination to the full Senate comes as the partisan battle lines over his final confirmation votes begin to harden. At least 19 Democrats have come out in opposition to Gorsuch and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has said that he will filibuster the nominee, which means he'll force a 60-vote threshold once it clears the committee."
    • Trump Becomes Ensnared in Fiery G.O.P. Civil War "Like every one else who has tried to rule a fissured and fractious party, Mr. Trump now faces a wrenching choice: retrenchment or realignment. Does he cede power to the anti-establishment wing of his party? Or does he seek other pathways to successful governing by throwing away the partisan playbook and courting a coalition with the Democrats, whom he has improbably blamed for his party’s shortcomings?"
    • Schumer Warns of Government Shutdown Over Trump’s Border Wall "Senate Democrats warned Republicans Monday that attempts to take funding away from Planned Parenthood or pay for President Donald Trump’s border wall in a stopgap spending bill that must pass by late April would result in a government shutdown."
    • Nearly 1 out of every 3 days he has been president, Trump has visited a Trump property  "As of writing, it’s not clear who was included in Trump’s three meetings at Trump National. A post on Instagram tagged at the club on Sunday appears to show Trump and two other people watching television in the course’s clubhouse.... If Trump traveled to Trump National for meetings, it raises another question: Couldn’t those meetings have been held at the White House?" 
      • Democrats Introduce ‘MAR-A-LAGO’ Act to Force Trump to Provide Visitor Logs "Democrats are giving Donald Trump a transparency gut check in the form of a new bill with a mouthful of a name — and an acronym that takes an unsubtle dig at the president.... The legislation, introduced in the House and Senate on Friday, calls for the creation of a publicly available database to be updated every 90 days.... '[Trump] basically moved the office of the presidency," said Richard Painter, the former ethics czar for the George W. Bush administration and vice chair of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, or CREW. 'Under those circumstances, in which taxpayers are paying for you to do government work and for your Secret Service protection, they're entitled to know what private parties are moving in and out of there.'"

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