FEMA won’t enact a major housing program that would help California wildfire survivors

juicetrump:

zeshuetoral:

feelingbluepolitics:

Recommended.

“The Disaster Housing Assistance Program (DHAP), created in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, provides housing subsidies to survivors and evacuees, and covers the cost of rent, security deposit, and utilities.”

…“FEMA has refused to enact DHAP for any declared disaster since [t]rump has taken office. It has previously been enacted following Hurricanes Katrina, Rita, Gustav, Ike, and Sandy.”

Studies show this approach is more stable and more cost effective than housing people in hotels and motels, which the trump administration is doing for a small number of people while leaving thousands of others, who also qualify, homeless without any assistance in a complete failure of FEMA’s mission.

This administration is politicizing disaster aid and only helping states perceived as “loyal” to the president and leaving others to suffer. They’re should be no doubt that the president has every intention of abusing his power to damage every part of the country that’s not part of his racist bigoted and hate filled cult.

…AND a substantial portion of FEMA emergency funding was reallocated to cage children in immigrant concentration camps. Perhaps More FEMA funds were transferred than we know.

FEMA won’t enact a major housing program that would help California wildfire survivors

youngchronicpain:

For everyone who has chronic pain or a chronic illness that will hear the same questions of “what do you…do?” and “are you feeling better now?” from relatives you never see today, remember that they have a minimal understanding of what you are going through and you are amazing for surviving this life. That’s what you are doing, surviving. You deserve life and happiness no matter your level of ability. So rock those mobility aids, take those meds, and ignore all the ignorance that you will be forced to listen to. 

plain-flavoured-english:

Storytime. Cooking in a different country makes you realize how many things you take for granted are just, Not A Thing Here. Like apple juice. Surely you can find apple juice at your local Athenian grocery store, right? Wrong. Greeks drink orange juice and peach juice and mixed fruit juice and sour cherry juice, but… plain old apple juice, nope, not so much. You’ll have a hard time finding vanilla extract in Greece too, since Greeks are used to vanilla powder in little plastic capsules and you have to go to specialty shops for the liquid stuff. Sour cream is virtually nonexistent here (but hey, it’s the land of yogurt, which is a good enough substitute). But surprisingly cornmeal (which is a specialty ingredient in the UK) is everywhere, since Greeks have their own versions of cornbread and corn pudding.

So basically: I knew it might be impossible find vegetable shortening (aka Crisco) for my Thanksgiving pie crust here in Athens. Crisco is pretty uniquely American, and Greeks are more likely to use phyllo than shortcrust anyway. That said, there are a handful of specialty shops in central Athens that sell things like Heinz baked beans and custard powder and Worcestershire sauce and other Weird Foreign Foods™ so us Sad Homesick Expats don’t have to go hungry (I’m always reminded of A Passage to India and their corned beef and tinned peas). So I went on Skroutz (the search engine for buying stuff in Greece) and typed in “vegetable shortening” to see if any stores carried it.

A notification came up asking me to confirm that I was over 18 years old?

???

I clicked “yes”??

Turns out there is, in fact, one shop in Athens that carries vegetable shortening. It’s a sex shop. The shortening is listed under “sex essentials”, as lube. For fisting. It’s literally called “βούτυρο για fisting” – “butter for fisting”.

I decided I didn’t need a flaky pie crust that badly.

mothermayhem:

commiekinkshamer:

basically emotional manipulation and guilt tripping as social justice praxis is pointless and not sustainable imo. it doesn’t promote real growth or solidarity if the entire basis of your activism is stemming from guilt or fear 

it’s also worth pointing out that it turns “social justice” into something uncomfortably like religion. it establishes patterns of behavior that you’re expected to follow, not necessarily because you understand them or agree with them, but because you are afraid of the consequences if you don’t. it turns communities of “activists” into self-aggrandizing moralistic pissing contests, where the pecking order is defined by who knows more of the rules, and who is more willing to enforce them on others (usually, by any means necessary). it encourages ideological purity and discourages debate, discussion, education, and subsequent individual and community growth.

klubbhead:

nunyabizni:

becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys:

motivatedslacker:

ainawgsd:

Owls are masters of disguise, blending seamlessly into their surroundings. 

These trees appear to be judging me.

They are, but the owls are beautiful

@sirowl1

Holy crap

An Atomwaffen Member Sketched a Map to Take the Neo-Nazis Down. What Path Officials Took Is a Mystery. — ProPublica

invisiblelad:

fromacomrade:

It was a grisly scene inside Apartment 3722 at the Hamptons, a gated community in Tampa, Florida.

One body lay face up on the floor, wedged between a wall and an air
mattress. A handgun was stuffed in a holster on the dead man’s waist.
The other body, clad in a black T-shirt and shorts, was slumped back on a
futon, a shattered and bloody iPhone on his lap. A police investigator
would later write that the two men had been “shot multiple times at
close range with an assault rifle.”

There were some obvious clues that this was no ordinary double
homicide. Tacked to the wall near the bodies was a large black-and-white
flag bearing the insignia of the Schutzstaffel, or SS, Adolf Hitler’s
elite paramilitary unit. On a nearby shelf was a black Stahlhelm, the
distinctive helmet worn by Nazi soldiers during World War II. There were
multiple copies of “Mein Kampf” and a prominent place was
reserved for “The Turner Diaries,” the infamous novel of race war in
America that has inspired generations of terrorists, among them Timothy
McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber. A framed picture of McVeigh sat on a
dresser.

On that night in May 2017, the police quickly took two suspects into
custody and developed a rough outline of what had happened. One of the
suspects, Devon Arthurs, 18, said the victims were his roommates, and
members of a neo-Nazi group called the Atomwaffen Division. Arthurs said
that he’d decided to leave the group, and that he’d killed the men to
keep them from carrying out what he said were their plans for violence.

The second suspect detained by police, Brandon Russell, also lived in
the apartment. Russell told the authorities he’d just returned home
from a weekend of training with the Florida Army National Guard. And
then Russell revealed something that should have set off alarms among
federal investigators assigned to track the growing threat from armed,
violent right-wing extremists. He said, and the police quickly
confirmed, that the single-car garage attached to the apartment was full
of explosives.

Explosives experts from the Tampa Police Department and the local FBI
field office soon found components of a crude pipe bomb as well as
radioactive materials. The search turned up ammonium nitrate and
nitromethane, the mixture used by McVeigh to destroy the federal
building in Oklahoma City in 1995. There were sacks of explosive
precursors, including potassium chloride, red iron oxide and potassium
nitrate. There were homemade fuses fashioned from brass 5.56 mm rifle
cartridges. In a closet, they found two Geiger counters.

And there was a cooler with the name Brandon scrawled on the lid in
black marker. Inside, the investigators discovered HMTD — hexamethylene
triperoxide diamine — a potent, highly volatile peroxide-based
explosive. It has become a favored tool of terrorists both here and
abroad, who cook it up in small batches using recipes circulating on the
internet and in improvised weapons manuals.

At Tampa police headquarters, investigators put Arthurs and Russell
in separate interrogation rooms. They wanted to know about the killings,
about the neo-Nazi group and about the explosives.

Arthurs said the apartment had served as a nerve center for
Atomwaffen Division, a white supremacist organization of 60 to 70 people
that has spoken openly of its hopes of igniting race war in the United
States. If the authorities could access the group’s encrypted online
chats, Arthurs said, “it’d be easy to track down each member.” The
interrogation was videotaped, and a recording was obtained by ProPublica
and Frontline.

“The things that they’re planning were horrible. They’re planning
bombings and stuff like that on countless people, they’re planning to
kill civilian life,” Arthurs said.  A detective asked if Atomwaffen had
drawn up a list of specific targets. “Power lines, nuclear reactors,
synagogues, things like that,” Arthurs replied.

“I’m telling you stuff that the FBI should be hearing,” Arthurs said, adding that he thought lives could be saved.

To this day, it is unclear if the FBI talked with Arthurs or what
steps it took to shut down Atomwaffen. The FBI declined repeated
requests to discuss the case. But this much is clear: Within months of
Arthurs’ warnings, Atomwaffen members or associates had killed three
more people.

https://www.propublica.org/article/an-atomwaffen-member-sketched-a-map-to-take-the-neo-nazis-down-what-path-officials-took-is-a-mystery?fbclid=IwAR31XtZdIkgRdQ1fSpT0ivQFSgN8AXCrD-ypPGfbQpvvfeQo1zWFpiTfcL8

This was a damning read. Florida pd genuinely dropped the ball here

An Atomwaffen Member Sketched a Map to Take the Neo-Nazis Down. What Path Officials Took Is a Mystery. — ProPublica