Please check out Senator Jeff Merkley on the Senate floor right now, yes, right now, defending our democracy.
Now another science post. Some stories I found interesting in the animal world. Ben Hooper (UPI) reports:
A
wild bear wandered into a California zoo and "interacted" with the
facility's resident bruins before leaving peacefully through a service
gate.
The Sequoia Park Zoo in Eureka said on
social media that employees were conducting a daily inspection when they
spotted the wild bear on the Redwood Sky Walk.
"The
wild bear did not appear aggressive and was observed interacting with
Tule, Ishŭng, and Kunabulilh through their habitat fencing," the post
said.
Tule, Ishŭng, and Kunabulilh are the
zoo's resident black bears. Tule and Kunabulilh, aka Nabu, were rescued
by wildlife rehabilitation groups when they were cubs, and Ishŭng came
to the zoo from an animal sanctuary. The three became permanent zoo
residents after experts determined they would be unlikely to thrive in
the wild.
I have to wonder what the
bear thought. Did he look around to see what they had to eat? Had he
ever noticed the bears before that day? Jake Rossen (MENTAL FLOSS) notes:
Cats:
People love them, but few understand them. From chilling out in
bathroom sinks to having their tongue hang out of their mouth, felines
have certain behaviors that can be puzzling to owners. One common cat
habit is to stick a paw in a bowl of drinking water. Is the cat afraid
their owner is poisoning them? Do they realize this is not hygienic
behavior? Why do cats do this?
According to cat
behavior expert Pam Johnson-Bennett, cats have a number of motivations
for wetting their paw. One relates to the sensitivity of their whiskers.
If a cat dips their head into a bowl before sampling how shallow or
deep it might be, they run the risk of feeling pressure on the hairs
from the sides or bottom of the bowl. To avoid the discomfort, cats will
assess the bowl's "feel" or just use their paw like a spoon, slurping
water from it to avoid irritating the hairs.
Cats
dislike deep water bowls for another reason. If lowering their head
inside one means they can no longer visualize their environment, they
might feel vulnerable, especially in a multi-cat household. If the bowl
is too close to the wall, this may motivate them to use the
paw-as-utensil trick as well, otherwise they'd have to keep their back
turned toward the room in order to drink from it.
I
figured they might be determining depth but the other aspects were news
to me. Never, for example, thought of a water bowl needing to not be
against a wall. (But my mom knew that. She said, by the way, I don't
mention her enough here. So let me brag on my mom because growing up
she would not let us put the water bowls by the wall.)
August Croft (AZ ANIMALS) notes monarch butterflies:
Whether
you’re a butterfly fanatic or simply interested in nature, the monarch
butterfly is worth a study. Beautiful and serene, monarch butterflies
have a unique lifespan. But how long do monarch butterflies live, and
what is their life cycle like from beginning to end? In this article, we
will discuss what monarch butterflies experience, how long they live on
average, and how unique their life cycles are when comparing different
generations of monarchs throughout the year.
What
is the average lifespan of a monarch butterfly? Monarch butterflies
generally live for five weeks, with a range of two to six weeks during
summer months, while migratory monarchs live for six to nine months. The
final monarchs born during the year are usually born in late August or
September, and these are the ones that migrate.
While
migrating monarch butterflies can live longer in order to reach their
warmer destinations and climates, this does not necessarily mean that
they accomplish this. A migrating monarch is much more at risk of
getting eaten by predators or dying while in flight. However, should a
migrating monarch survive their perilous journey, it will hibernate and
overwinter in warm locations. Then, they will begin the monarch life
cycle all over again, mating and laying eggs in the early spring.
Monarch butterflies are special for this reason. They are one of the few
insects that migrate, and their lifespan changes based on when they are
born in the year. Miraculously, the final generation of monarchs can
survive significantly longer than the first generation of monarchs born
that year.
"The Snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):
Tuesday, October 21, 2025. Chump and his never ending lies.
Last night, at the top of her MSNBC show, Rachel Maddow reported on Saturday's NO KINGS protests.
Now let's move over to the Epstein-Maxwell
scandal since it's been a couple of days since we covered it. Both
Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell were friends of Donald Chump.
Back then, the two were active pedophiles and sex traffickers. Just
Donald's type of people, right? Epstein and Maxwell were both convicted
of their crimes at separate times. Epstein is said to have killed
himself in prison. Maxwell went on the run but was eventually caught,
tried and sentenced to 20 years. Amanda Marcotte (SALON) notes how Speaker of the Closet Mike Johnson continues to run interference for Chump (at the expense of the country):
Speaker
of the House Mike Johnson is lying. Yes, I know. Writing that is like
writing “cats are furry” or “it’s pumpkin spice season.” But the current
purpose of the lie is even more depraved than we usually get from this self-proclaimed beacon of Christian morality.
The purpose is silencing the victims of infamous child sex predator
Jeffrey Epstein and his alleged fellow abusers. Worse, it’s all done to
protect President Donald Trump, a man who was already found by a civil
jury in New York to have sexually abused journalist E. Jean Carroll in a
department store dressing room.
The
Louisiana Republican has already gone to great lengths to make sure FBI
files chronicling the alleged misdeeds of Epstein and his associates
never see the light of day. In July, Johnson started the House’s summer recess early to avoid Democrats bringing up a bill
that would force the Justice Department to release the voluminous files
on convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, who died by suicide in jail
in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. The reason for
Johnson’s action wasn’t mysterious. Trump, whom Epstein called his
“closest friend,” is reportedly in the files. According to a lewd
birthday message attributed to Trump by the Wall Street Journal — that
was leaked by House Democrats — Trump wrote to his longtime buddy, “We
have certain things in common, Jeffrey.”
There is allegedly more. During Attorney General Pam Bondi’s recent Senate hearing,
for instance, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., asked about “photos of
President Trump with half-naked young women.” Bondi refused to answer.
Now
Johnson has found another excuse to block a House vote to release the
Epstein files: The government shutdown. The speaker has adjourned the
House and refused to seat Rep.-Elect Adelita Grijalva, D-Ariz.,
blaming the shutdown — despite the fact that the Senate is still open
and holding votes. Grijalva has pledged to be the deciding vote on a
discharge petition to release the Epstein files. In comments to the Arizona Republic, Sen. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., was blunt in assessing the situation: “Speaker Johnson is protecting pedophiles. That’s what this is all about.”
Johnson
has denied the charge, but his pattern of behavior is clear. He knows
that if Trump turns against him, he would likely lose the speakership.
Hiding the Epstein files appears to be Johnson’s first priority, even
above reopening the government so federal employees can be paid.
The
whole country knows that Johnson is covering for Chump. He's never
been interested in serving the people of his state, let alone the people
of the country. Katie Francis (DAILY BEAST) notes:
The
House Speaker was grilled on This Week Sunday about why Arizona
Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva has waited weeks to be sworn in—with some
suggesting the delay is because the Democrat plans to force a vote on
the Epstein files.
After first
saying that Chuck Schumer and the government shutdown were responsible
for the slowness, the House Speaker then blamed Nancy Pelosi.
“This is the way the institution works. I’m following the Pelosi precedent, by the way,” he said.
“When
my dear friend from Louisiana, Julia Letlow, was elected to fill the
seat of her deceased husband because of Covid, Nancy Pelosi took 25 days
to swear her in.”
“Are you saying that Nancy
Pelosi refused to swear her in earlier?” host Jonathan Karl asked, as
Johnson insisted that the long wait was normal.
The
ABC host added: “Because my understanding is that was the date that
actually the representative-elect, Letlow at the time, requested—”
Johnson tried to divert the conversation to “some more examples” of delayed ceremonies, but Karl remained focused on logistics.
After
Johnson doubled down on his claim that the so-called “Pelosi precedent”
justified the delay, Karl pressed him on what some might see as a
Republican double standard.
“And what about the Johnson precedent?” he asked. “You swore in two Republicans the day after their election—”
Johnson
didn’t address GOP Reps. Randy Fine and Jimmy Patronis, who were both
sworn in while the House was out of session in April. Instead, he
deflected back to Pelosi, citing his own examples.
“Pat
Ryan, Joe Sempolinski. They were elected during an August recess, so 21
days later when the house returned to legislative session, they were
administered the oath. That’s what we’re doing,” he said, adding that
Grijalva would be sworn in “as the Democrats decide to turn the lights
back on.”
MSNBC last night. found Jonathan Capehart sitting in for Lawrence O'Donnell on THE LAST WORD.
Though Chump has dismissed
those people preyed upon by Epstein and Maxwell (there's at least one man who is known to have been
targeted but there are said to be at least 19 more) as a "hoax," they
are not a hoax. They are real. In Virginia Giuffre's case, she was
real. And though she has passed away, her book is released in the US
today. Becca Longmire (PEOPLE) notes:
Virginia
Giuffre said she believed she might "die a sex slave" as she opened up
about her alleged sexual encounters with Jeffrey Epstein and his circle
in her forthcoming posthumous memoir.
In
an excerpt published by the BBC from her forthcoming memoir Nobody’s
Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice, Giuffre —
who died by suicide on April 25 of this year at age 41 — spoke in detail
about having sex with Epstein and his alleged sex trafficking.
Giuffre
wrote that the girls were required to look "childlike," alleging that
her childhood eating disorder was "only encouraged" under Epstein's
roof, per the BBC.
"In my years with them, they
lent me out to scores of wealthy, powerful people," she said, adding,
"I was habitually used and humiliated - and in some instances, choked,
beaten and bloodied."
"I believed that I might die a sex slave," Giuffre wrote.
Again, the book is out today in the US. Covering it, Victoria Richards (INDEPENDENT) adds:
Giuffre,
before her tragic suicide in April, had been trying to speak out for
years about the horrors she’d experienced at the hands of the late
paedophile and financier Jeffrey Epstein, who “sold” her to powerful men
when she was just a teenager. We witnessed her long, difficult fight
for justice against the establishment – including the settling in 2022
of a sexual assault lawsuit against Prince Andrew, whom she said had had
sex with her when she was just 17 (and on two other occasions), though
he has always vehemently denied having done anything wrong.
We
saw her fight for other women, too – for fellow survivors of sex
trafficking. And we watched her get torn down, every single time. We
heard the men who spoke about her with such contempt deny ever having
met her, before dismissing her testimony out of hand; we read the
painful details shared by her family, as they described how she’d faced
financial ruin and received death threats for working with the
authorities against Epstein and his accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell, who
hired her as a masseuse when she was only 16. Giuffre later alleged in a
lawsuit that she was first abused by Epstein and Maxwell together
before being “lent out to other powerful men”, including Prince Andrew.
To
get her to comply and never reveal these horrors, all Epstein had to do
was let her know he knew where her little brother went to school. (And
he showed her a photo proving it.)
I find this
claim believable because someone I know recounted a story from one of
his attorneys in a business-related lawsuit against Epstein. He
described how during a phone conversation, Epstein mentioned having seen
the attorney’s children crossing the street, and warned him to be extra
careful so nothing would happen to them.
Back
to Giuffre’’s claims: Epstein also bragged that he “owned the Palm Beach
police department.” (Manipulating Giuffre was easy: At the age of
seven, she had already been molested by a family friend.) Giuffre sued
Maxwell and Epstein and became an advocate for other survivors. She
committed suicide in April, at the age of 41.
Nobody’s
Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice seems to be
mentioned all over the place — The New York Times, The Washington Post,
Vanity Fair, PBS, CBS, etc. — and it has got to be one of Donald Trump’s
worst nightmares, assuming he can even fall asleep.
Because it’s bound to make more and more people demand to see the Epstein files. And to see just how he — Trump — is mentioned.
From
the grave, Giuffre powerfully challenges the idea that all those famous
people hanging out with Epstein had no inkling what he was up to:
Don’t
be fooled by those in Epstein’s circle who say they didn’t know what he
was doing. Epstein not only didn’t hide what was happening, he took a
certain glee in making people watch. And people did watch — scientists,
fundraisers from the Ivy League and other heralded institutions, titans
of industry. They watched and they didn’t care.
Epstein
and Maxwell are human trash (Epstein was, of course, thankfully dead
now) and so are those around him including Chump, including Alex Acosta
who created the original sweethear deal in 2007 along with human trash
Matthew Menchel. TAMPA BAY TIMES reports:
Jeffrey
Epstein had multiple appointments, phone calls and dinners with Matthew
Menchel — the Miami U.S. Attorney’s office chief criminal prosecutor
who spearheaded Epstein’s sweetheart deal in 2007, newly released
documents show.
A tranche of over 8,500 pages
of records from Epstein’s estate — released by the House Oversight
Committee Friday — show that Epstein’s calendars and emails reflect that
Menchel, who left the DOJ in 2007, had multiple meetings or dinners
with Epstein in 2011, 2013 and 2017. Lawmakers also referred to a
photograph of Menchel on a ski trip with Epstein sometime in the 2000s,
but didn’t produce the photo.
Seems like Matthew Menchel needs to lose his license. Disagree? Here's another detail from the report:
In its coverage of the case, the Herald raised questions about Menchel’s role in negotiating the deal. Besides Acosta and Menchel, the case was overseen by prosecutors Jeffrey Sloman, Andrew Lourie and Ann Marie Villafaña.
The Herald found that Villafaña, the lead line prosecutor, drafted an 82-page prosecution memo directed to Acosta, his deputy, Sloman, and Menchel, who was then head of the criminal division. In the memo, she proposed a 60-count indictment of Epstein on sex trafficking charges.
A subsequent probe by the Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) later found that its child exploitation division in Washington reviewed Villafana’s materials, offered to work with her and called the memo “exhaustive” and “well done.”
Acosta would later tell federal investigators he could not recall ever reading her memo, and that he relied on Menchel and others to know the details of the case. Acosta testified that he never met Epstein or his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, who is now serving a 20-year sentence for child sex trafficking and abuse. In his comments before the committee, Acosta also reiterated that he trusted Menchel, who proposed the plea deal with Epstein’s lawyers.
An OPR report issued in 2020 describes how Villafaña became angry in July 2007, when Menchel explained to her in an email that he had offered the deal to Epstein lawyer Lilly Sanchez, the only woman involved in Epstein’s defense. Villafaña felt it was an end-run around her, the report said.
The report also noted that Menchel had dated Sanchez, should have informed his bosses about it and probably should have been recused from the case.
Acosta was asked about Menchel at least 17 times during his testimony before the House Oversight Committee. He indicated that he had not been aware that Menchel had a prior romantic relationship with one of Epstein’s lawyers and that Menchel should have told him so that they could have discussed whether there was a conflict of interest.
They cover up for their own. Just like Mike Johnson and Donald Chump are doing today.
Let's move on to another topic. We know Chump lies, the entire administration is, in fact, incapable of telling the truth. Idrees Ali and Phil Stewart (REUTERS) write,
"The U.S. last month started a campaign of attacks in the Caribbean
that the Trump administration has described as 'a non-international
armed conflict' against narco-terrorism. Yet legal experts aren't
surprised that the U.S. government opted against using the term
'prisoners of war' to describe the two survivors of a Thursday attack by
the U.S. military on a semi-submersible vessel. Rather than holding
them, the United States sent them back to their home countries, U.S.
President Donald Trump said Saturday. The move, which was first reported
by Reuters, suggests that for now U.S. officials don't want to grapple
with legal issues surrounding military detention for any alleged drug
traffickers captured during the Caribbean operations, legal experts
said."
That should raise real suspicion. If they are drug runners, why let them go? If they are. Most likely? They're not. Terrence McCoy, Ana Herrero and Samantha Schmidt (WASHINGTON POST) report:
Two
family members of the 11 men killed in September in the first attack
acknowledged by Trump did not deny that the men aboard had been taking
marijuana and cocaine from Venezuela to Trinidad. But they said Trump’s
allegation in his announcement was inaccurate that they’d worked for the
Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua.
The
Trump administration’s justification for blowing up suspected drug
traffickers off the Venezuelan coast has been clear and consistent:
These people aren’t just criminals; they’re “narco-terrorists” smuggling
a “deadly weapon poisoning Americans” at the behest of terrorist
organizations.
“We take them out,” Trump
told the nation’s three- and four-star generals and admirals last month.
“Every boat kills 25,000 on average — some people say more. You see
these boats, they’re stacked up with bags of white powder that’s mostly
fentanyl and other drugs, too.”
Claiming the
power to summarily kill traffickers as though they’re enemy troops,
Trump has authorized the U.S. military to strike at least six speedboats
the administration has deemed suspicious, killing dozens of people
since the beginning of September. At least half of the strikes and 21 of
the killings, locals say, have transpired in the waters between
Venezuela and Trinidad and Tobago — nations so close that on clear days
they’re within eyesight of each other.
But
records and interviews with 20 people familiar with the route or the
strikes, including current and former U.S. and international officials,
contradict the administration’s claims. The passage, they said, is not
ordinarily used to traffic synthetic opioids such as fentanyl, present
in 69 percent of drug overdose deaths last year. Nor are the drugs
typically headed for the United States.
Lies is all Chump ever serves up. Back to the article:
“I
knew them all,” said one of the family members, who spoke on the
condition of anonymity for fear of retribution. “None of them had
anything to do with Tren de Aragua. They were fishermen who were looking
for a better life” by smuggling contraband.
On
Tuesday, Trump said, a new strike had killed “six male
narco-terrorists” off the Venezuelan coast. That afternoon, one mother
in the Trinidadian community of Las Cuevas received a call from her
brother, a fisherman. Her son Chad Joseph, the second of her six
children, had been killed in the explosion.
Speaking
by phone Thursday morning, Leonore Burnley was furious. Her son had
been deprived a trial. And she’d been deprived of any chance of closure.
“You can’t get the body to bury it,” she said.
Joseph
had spent the last three months in Venezuela working odd jobs, Burnley
said. He had written her recently to say he would be returning home.
She called Trump’s claim he had been involved in trafficking drugs a lie.
Sen.
Rand Paul on Sunday questioned the wisdom and legality of President
Donald Trump's policies toward Venezuela and suspected drug dealers
coming from its coast.
Speaking on NBC's "Meet
the Press," the Kentucky Republican again raised concerns about the
legality of the Trump administration's strikes on boats that it claims
are carrying drug traffickers, as well as the president's statement that
the United States might conduct direct attacks on Venezuela's
territory.
"When
you kill someone, you should know, if you're not at war, not in a
declared war, you really need to know someone's name at least," Paul
said. "You have to accuse them of something. You have to present
evidence. So all of these people have been blown up without us knowing
their name, without any evidence of a crime."
He
said that given the distance these boats are from the United States,
it's more likely that if there are indeed drug smugglers, they are
bringing them to nearby islands such as Trinidad and Tobago, instead of
the U.S.
Paul added: "For decades, if not
centuries, when you stop people at sea in international waters or in
your own waters, you announce that you're going to board the ship and
you're looking for contraband, smuggling, or drugs. This happens every
day off of Miami. But we know from Coast Guard statistics that about 25
percent of the time the Coast Guard boards a ship there are no drugs. So
if our policy now is to blow up every ship we suspect or accuse of drug
running, that would be a bizarre world in which 25 percent of the
people might be innocent."
Last week, Senator Adam Schiff's office issued the following:
Washington, D.C. — U.S. Senator Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) joined Senators Tim Kaine (D-Va.), and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) to introduce a War Powers Resolution that would block the use of U.S. Armed Forces to engage in hostilities within or against Venezuela, following reporting that the Trump administration is considering land strikes inside that country.
“The Trump administration has made it clear they may launch military action inside Venezuela’s borders, and won’t stop at boat strikes in the Caribbean,”said Senator Schiff. “In recent weeks we have seen increasingly concerning movements and reporting that undermine claims that this is merely about stopping drug smugglers. Congress has not authorized military force against Venezuela. And we must assert our authority to stop the United States from being dragged—intentionally or accidentally—into full-fledged war in South America.”
“I’m extremely troubled that the Trump administration is considering launching illegal military strikes inside Venezuela without a specific authorization by Congress. Americans don’t want to send their sons and daughters into more wars—especially wars that carry a serious risk of significant destabilization and massive new waves of migration in our hemisphere,” said Senator Kaine. “If my colleagues disagree and think a war with Venezuela is a good idea, they need to meet their constitutional obligations by making their case to the American people and passing an Authorization for Use of Military Force. I urge every senator to join us in stopping this administration from dragging our country into an unauthorized and escalating military conflict.”
“The American people do not want to be dragged into endless war with Venezuela without public debate or a vote. We ought to defend what the Constitution demands: deliberation before war,” said Senator Paul.
War Powers Resolutions are privileged, meaning that the Senate will be required to promptly consider and vote upon the resolution.
Today’s resolution comes shortly after Schiff and Kaine introduced a similar measure focused on repeated and ongoing strikes in the southern Caribbean Sea that the Trump administration has carried out without congressional authorization, killing dozens of unknown individuals. That measure gained bipartisan support but fell two votes short of passage.
Full text of the legislation is available here.
###
Chump's
lying. He's so desperate to lie as Ben (MEIDASTOUCH NEWS) notes in the
video above, he's pimping photos of another drug bust from over a year
ago as photos of a ship attacked in the last weeks. He's a liar.
The following sites updated:
Tyshawn Sorey's powerful sounds of silence
3 hours ago
Gavin was the grown up in the room
7 hours ago
Chump continues to rot
7 hours ago
Slow Cooker Chicken Posole
7 hours ago
Weekend Box Office
8 hours ago
A Posting Glitch
1 day ago
