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Created
Wed, 29/01/2025 - 07:00
It’s happening: There was some question as to whether student loans would be allowed to continue and from what I can see at the moment that, like everything else in the federal government,that decision is being decided by some flunky political appointee but nobody knows if it’s going to work or not. This situation is developing rapidly so who knows whether this will last past the day. If you look at the memo that went out suggesting that it’s being done because of “Marxist” policies, transgenderism and the green new deal, it’s pretty clear that the memo was written by a moron. So who knows?
Created
Wed, 29/01/2025 - 06:36

As we look ahead to what will come in 2025, it's a perfect time to reflect on the remarkable journey our Drupal community has undertaken over the past year. Traditionally, we've gathered at two major annual events—DrupalCon North America and DrupalCon Europe. However, the past year was a year of expansion and innovation, marked by three dynamic DrupalCons in Portland, Barcelona, and Singapore, each contributing uniquely to our project's evolution.

Embracing Innovation in Portland

In May 2024, DrupalCon Portland brought together a diverse group of developers, designers, and strategists. The conference featured a comprehensive schedule, including sessions on community health, development and coding, and user experience. A highlight was the Driesnote, where Dries Buytaert, our founder, provided insights into the future of Drupal. The event also emphasized contribution, with dedicated spaces for general contribution and Birds of a Feather (BoF) sessions, fostering collaboration and community engagement.

Created
Wed, 29/01/2025 - 05:30
In the face of a massive assault on the basic functions of the federal government, the Democrats have decided they are going to ignore it and talk about kitchen table issues, crime and the border. Less than 48 hours after President Donald Trump was inaugurated, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries held a closed-door meeting with Democratic lawmakers to issue a warning and a clarion call. The new administration was going to “flood the zone,” and Democrats couldn’t afford to chase every single outrage — or nothing was going to sink in for the American people, Jeffries told them, according to a person in the room who requested anonymity to discuss the private meeting. Jeffries, D-N.Y., urged members to focus their message on the cost of living, along with border security and community safety. “The House Republican Contract Against America is an extreme plan that will not lower costs for everyday Americans,” Jeffries told reporters the next day, referring to the GOP agenda and spending cuts it is weighing.
Created
Wed, 29/01/2025 - 05:00

From the moment my husband Jon and I saw the sun-drenched loft on Mercer, we knew two things: We absolutely loved it, and we had to change everything.

We loved the location, the fourteen-foot ceilings, the exposed brick, the historic pre-labor-law building. But the more modern additions were intolerably bourgeois. This space was not meant to be a luxury condo; it was meant to be a vehicle for ruthlessly extracting wealth from the sweat of the proletariat. So, determined to bring a little authenticity back to the neighborhood, we rolled up our sleeves and paid someone else to get to work.

We started by rectifying the primary crime committed against this architectural gem: the gauche “walls” installed by previous owners. What was a tacky two-bedroom, two-bath gave way to the true space in all its original glory: a magnificent no-bed, no-bath open concept with a completely inaccessible fire exit.

Next, we filled the place with period details, like a wood-burning garbage pail, original molding (the spores were hard to find but the smell was worth it), and low-wage labor.

Created
Wed, 29/01/2025 - 03:19
Trump’s Doing Everyone A Favor With His Tariffs (Emphasis on Canada)

(Keyboard fixed, at least for now, so let’s get on with it.)

Trump has threatened blanket tariffs on multiple nations, including most of Europe, Canada and Mexico. This is an effective threat. The Bank of Canada estimated the effect of such tariffs on Canada at six percent of GDP, and I’ve seen an estimate for Germany of about one percent of GDP, after previous losses due to anti-Russia sanction effects on energy costs.

Created
Wed, 29/01/2025 - 02:30
And not in a good way This oligarch cover of “All Over the World” won’t be spawning flash mobs. At least not the dancing kind. Anne Applebaum writes in The Atlantic: During an American election, a rich man can hand out $1 million checks to prospective voters. Companies and people can use secretly funded “dark money” nonprofits to donate unlimited money, anonymously, to super PACs, which can then spend it on advertising campaigns. Pod­casters, partisans, or anyone, really, can tell outrageous, incendiary lies about a candidate. They can boost those falsehoods through targeted online advertising. No special courts or election rules can stop the disinformation from spreading before voters see it. The court of public opinion, which over the past decade has seen and heard everything, no longer cares. U.S. elections are now a political Las Vegas: Anything goes. That is not how it works in other countries, Applebaum explains. Campaign spending in European countries is limited by law, and such barricades against the influence of Big Money exist elsewhere.
Created
Wed, 29/01/2025 - 01:30

On January 10th, one day before the 23rd anniversary of its opening, a much-anticipated hearing was set to take place at the Guantánamo Bay Detention Facility on the island of Cuba. After nearly 17 years of pretrial litigation, the prosecution of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), the “mastermind” of the devastating attacks of September 11, 2001, seemed poised to achieve its ever-elusive goal of bringing his case to a conclusion.  After three years of negotiations, the Pentagon had finally arranged a plea deal in the most significant case at Guantánamo. Along with two others accused of conspiring in the attacks of 9/11, KSM had agreed to plead guilty in exchange for the government replacing the death penalty with a life sentence. After... Read more

Source: The Forever Charade appeared first on TomDispatch.com.

Created
Wed, 29/01/2025 - 01:00

Have you ever time-traveled? I didn’t think I had until that day in the freezer aisle at Horizon Market, staring at an ice cream flavor that seemed like a practical joke: Jeni’s Cosmic Bloom. It sounded like an overpriced candle. The carton teased: “Citric like a mandarin, refreshing like a kiwi, punchy like passion fruit.” That told me absolutely nothing. But the color—a dreamy pastel orange—made my inner child hope, could it be?

I dropped my usual raspberry sorbet and gambled on this pastel-orange mystery. Back home, I tore off the lid, scooped up a perfectly creamy ball, and popped it in my mouth.

Indistinguishable citrus. It had that same syrupy, borderline-fluorescent smell I hadn’t experienced since the early 2000s, a tangy, wildly unnatural orange, radioactive creamsicle. Cosmic Bloom was not trying to pretend it was made of real fruit—something the future ruined with its obsession over real ingredients. It was something else, something familiar.

The second I had a second bite, my kitchen vanished.

Gone.

Created
Wed, 29/01/2025 - 01:00
More headlines we’re sure to see Donald Trump is already making America “great again” … for lowlifes. This first gentleman’s demise predates Trump’s Jan. 6 pardons, but he might have received one if he’d still been in jail. Plus, if he’d owned a GMC Denali, it would now be a McKinley, January 4: A man who fired an assault rifle inside a Washington, D.C., restaurant in December 2016 while claiming to investigate the “pizzagate” hoax died this week after being fatally shot by police during a traffic stop in Kannapolis, North Carolina. On the night of Jan. 4, Edgar Welch was a passenger in a 2001 GMC Yukon that was stopped by officers, Kannapolis police said Thursday in a news statement. The traffic stop was conducted after officers linked the vehicle to Welch, who was wanted at the time on an outstanding arrest warrant, police said. When officers recognized Welch and moved to arrest him, he produced a handgun from his jacket and pointed it at one of the officers, police said, and after refusing commands to drop the gun, two officers opened fire on him.