Tootfinder

My neighbors definitely do not think this is more of the same. You don’t have to take my word for it. Look at how many Somali and Latin-American restaurants were thriving in November and now are closed, or getting almost no business if they are taking the risk of staying open. Look at how many kids are staying home from school — regardless of legal status, just because of the color of their family’s skin. Look at how many families are living in houses filled with dirty laundry because they won’t even take the risk of leaving the house to go to the laundromat.
My neighbors are living in •terror•.
If it’s more of the same, why did all of this suddenly change in the last two months?
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... That would make working remotely pretty easy. With my house at the back of the lot and the neighbor's house at the front of the lot, I have started thinking about the idea of building a new house in the front yard and then having the current house declared an ADU by the city. I could build the house of my dreams in a neighbourhood that I like, rent the old house out to offset the cost, and hopefully come out the other end without too much pain. ...

Guatemala has opted out of renewing a lease agreement
on a 7,000-acre oil field in order to use the land for better protection of the surrounding Laguna del Tigre Biosphere Reserve.
An 830,000-acre component of the greater Mayan Biosphere Reserve
which allows Mesoamerican wildlife to roam freely between the country and neighboring Belize and Mexico,
it’s one of the world’s most important protected areas.
As such, the presence of an oil field inside its borders wa…

Guatemala Opts Out of Oil Extraction in Favor of Protecting Jaguars and Macaws in Mayan Biosphere
Natural Resources Minister Patricia Orantes said the government is trying to do a “180-degree” shift on many management decisions.

This is as good a time as any for a thought experiment.
You're in Nazi Germany. You know about the camps, you know what they do, you see the ash fall, you smell it. People who resist alone are killed, some are sent to the camps too. You're afraid to even talk to people about it for fear that they'll turn you in.
You think back to when the camps were being built. You had all the warning signs, but you didn't know how to interpret them. You could believe it would happen. You thought you'd have a chance to vote him out. You thought there might be another way. You thought maybe things would turn out differently if you just sat tight, kept your head down, kept yourself safe.
You see a family being dragged from their home. You know they will be killed. You want to fight, not just for them but for yourself. You opposed Hitler, and at any point you know you could be on the list... Even if you do nothing.
You wish you could rise up, shoot the SS, open the gates, fight it all. You know you aren't alone, but you don't know how to connect with the people who want the same thing.
Using the knowledge we have now, what should you have done in the preceding months and years to connect, to build a community that would open up all paths of resistance?
There were people who resisted. We know it wasn't enough.
Gun laws in Nazi Germany were very similar to US laws in that Nazis were largely free to own guns and everyone else was not. Unlike the US, where "others" have historically controlled using the fear that they might be randomly executed, Germany did codify it. Red flag laws were one more step in the US towards that codification, and there will be more.
When Nazis were taking away those guns, the social networks didn't exist to make resistance possible for most folks. But some Jews were able to resist.
It wasn't the guns that made the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising possible, though they definitely helped. The Warsaw Ghetto uprising was made possible by labor organizing in the precessing years.
If there were more uprisings like that, the Holocaust could have been stopped if not prevented. Social networks make resistance possible. Guns are only useful tools to resist authoritarianism *after* you build a community able to support that resistance, and they are only one of many tools made useful by that community.
Getting guns is easy, and not always necessary. Building community is hard. Guns won't keep you safe. Community will.
Single acts of resistance may slow the machine down, but to actually bring down a monster you need to be able to attack more than once. You need a society of resistance. If you are afraid now, build that. Talk to people while it's still safe to do so. Ask them where their red line is. Talk to neighbors. Figure out your network.
Take the steps you need now to keep your neighbors safe, to keep yourself safe.
#USPol

Tomorrow, I plan to operate in the North Carolina QSO Party CW. I can't imagine going from 10AM to 8PM US/Eastern; I don't have that kind of Morse stamina. My initial plan was single-operator home, but I might decide the weather is too enticing to work from indoors, and go out into the field.
Maybe I should have planned ahead a bit more.
My club,

Incredible. I love the idea of taking checkpoints and the "papers please" mentality, and turning it around on the nazis.
#FuckICE #Minnesota (and yes, this is very much also #TacticalUrbanism

A Minneapolis story:
Today, I took my kid to the neighborhood park to go ice skating. A beautiful thing about this city is that •everyone• has a neighborhood park: early in the city’s history, planners made it a goal to have a park within walking distance of every single residence. They didn’t have to shoehorn this goal in; they built up the city around it. There are little parks all over the city, many just a couple of blocks in size.
And in the winter, they flood the athletic fields: ice rinks!
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At least 22 people were killed in Pakistan on Sunday
as thousands gathered At least 22 people were killed in Pakistan on Sunday as thousands gathered across the country to denounce U.S. and Israeli airstrikes on Iran,
-- including 10 who died as crowds tried to storm the U.S. Consulate in Karachi.
The airstrikes have already spurred fear, uncertainty and unrest in Iran’s eastern neighbors,
Afghanistan and Pakistan
— two countries with sizable Shiite minorities w…

Protesters Try to Storm U.S. Consulate in Karachi, Pakistan
At least 22 people were killed in protests across Pakistan as Iran’s neighbors brace for turmoil and the fallout of a possible regional conflict.

All of what’s happening in Minneapolis is deeply rooted in US history. And in Minneapolis and St. Paul history specifically: Read about the Rondo neighborhood, for example. It’s no accident the the flagship lake in the City of Lakes was named after the vice president of the Confederacy until just a few years ago. Don’t get too excited about making saints of us all here.
It’s crucial for us to recognize that historical precedent. It’s also crucial for us to recognize the extreme new danger of the present moment.
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In 2012, I bought the least expensive house (in a reasonable condition) that I could find in the most expensive zip code in the area. I like the neighborhood and the house is comfortable but this is my front yard. Over the years, I have thought about upgrading to something more. I have also thought about buying a condo in Mexico and spending part of the year there in hopes of eventually getting dual citizenship. After all, Mexico City is in the same time zone as Milwaukee. ...