Notices by Lot⁴⁹ (12thrits@mstdn.social)

1/Trump is declaring the entire El Paso-to-San Diego border a "military installation" to allow himself to use soldiers (and who knows, maybe airmen and sailors) to patrol the border and arrest people This is a workaround to the restrictions of the Posse Comitatus Act, which has an ugly history of its own.

Profiles in courage: Whitmer in the White House.

The antique concept of "privacy" lost a hero.

Arguing that you don't care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about free speech because you have nothing to say.
— Edward Snowden

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/03/memoriam-mark-klein-att-whistleblower-about-nsa-mass-spying

Stuart Stevens has some thoughts about his former party. It's worth punching through all the pop-ups to read it.
#ChunderRoad https://newrepublic.com/article/192407/republican-party-trump-worst-generation

Bad news for veterans:

@catsalad Here too. #Yoyo #CatsOfMastodon

@Infoseepage @adapalmer Here's the one we visit, which is available for events, if you ever come that way!

And yes I love Macaulay's books, starting with Great Moments in Architecture.

@Infoseepage @adapalmer That's beautiful, thank you. Every summer we visit the castle in Italy where my wife grew up. Work started on it in 1413 or so, and I've often wondered how they did it.

@Infoseepage @adapalmer It's amazing to think of all the pre-Mechanical-Age labor it took to hew, move and stack all that stone.

@Infoseepage @adapalmer It also has to do with fields of fire. Star-shaped fortifications give you two angles from which to shoot at or pour boiling oil on attackers. Here's Fortress Monroe, VA, a beautiful example that is still in use today (although not to defend against attackers).
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Fort+Monroe,+Hampton,+VA/@36.9983495,-76.3076793,613a,35y,351.79h,41.38t/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x89ba853112971ded:0xcbbf5eda8390db5c!8m2!3d37.0171968!4d-76.2985941!16s%2Fg%2F1tfc2y15?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI1MDExNS4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

@lowqualityfacts Can't help but point out that if it's legal to "grow drugs" where you live, you don't need to do so indoors.

Well this is frustrating bad news. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/15/business/jeffrey-epstein-estate-tax-refund.html?unlocked_article_code=1.pU4.ivby.BiW2Q26EjeP7&smid=url-share

#Music #Vinyl #ChunderRoad

@skinnylatte Midwestern soul food. Take it from a boy who grew up in Chicago

“It does seem[Luigi Mangione] has some ill will toward corporate America,” [PA Chief of Detectives] Kenny said.

Ya think?

@br00t4c Donald J Trump is an innocent man!

Listen to @pluralistic
https://pluralistic.net/2024/11/21/policy-based-evidence/

@persagen Concerned Veterans for America was not a veterans advocacy organization. It was a privatize-VA-medical-care lobby

@killyourfm Beautiful. Where is this?

@pluralistic doesn't hesitate to tell it like it is.
https://pluralistic.net/2024/11/11/rip-jane-mcalevey/