paula

@govpritzker.illinois.gov owns every arrest and act of violence against protesters this morning. He is aiding and abetting Operation Midway Blitz by allowing state cops to do this. He tells us to film ICE. His cops have shoved me around for filming this morning.

For context Hegseth was basically fired from every job he had, including resigning from his national guard duty because he had a Deus Vult tattoo. He got fired from all his other jobs for drinking and abusing women on the job.

Heres a letter his own mother wrote to him about his treatment of women

I just spoke with Principal Cook about today's protest, having Tom Homan living in the community, and maintaining hope that her students who ICE stole will be returned.

Story to come on The Handbasket: www.thehandbasket.co/subscribe

Yo @durbin.senate.gov, no one is picking up your Senate phone and you don’t even have a voicemail. Vote no on cloture and the spending bill or I will do whatever it takes to make sure the next Senator from Illinois has basic constituent services set up during business hours.

[“Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisoned by the enemy, don’t we consider it his duty to escape? The moneylenders, the know-nothings, the authoritarians have us all in prison; if we value the freedom of the mind and soul, if we’re partisans of liberty, then it’s our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as we can.”]

Ursula le Guin, on the accusation that fantasy is an escape from reality

From EARTHSEED: THE BOOKS OF THE LIVING Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is to be controlled by all that the coward fears. To be led by a fool is to be led by the opportunists who control the fool. To be led by a thief is to offer up your most precious treasures to be stolen. To be led by a liar is to ask to be told lies. To be led by a tyrant is to sell yourself and those you love into slavery.

from “Parable of the Talents” by Octavia Butler

a maximalist strategy of opposition against every nominee as unqualified would have stood a better chance of creating the kind of public outrage that might have led to more republican defections, but i'm sure the imaginary family that chuck schumer relies on to guide his decisions disagreed

I think it's worth repeating plainly that a federal judge halted Musk's federal funding freeze nearly two weeks ago but funds are still very much being frozen in violation of the court order.

They’ve called armed federal officers to the scene. We aren’t dangerous. We are here to represent our people. To defend public education. This is an authoritarian regime. You cannot block members of Congress from entering the Department of Education.

Oh

more than not caring about women, most of them actively despise, demean, and otherwise harm women. attacks on trans women are attacks on all women.

there is in fact an entire deep-rooted american ideology — producerism — that is a method of appealing to "class" in a manner that reifies and reinforces received hierarchies of race and gender

SpaceX Total Awarded Amount $20.1 billion from 1,834 transactions View awards to this recipient

I wonder why Musk is focused on the federal civilian workforce (4% of the budget) and not federal contractors, which account for 3x more annual spending and are more prone to waste, fraud, and abuse?

As Trump tries to dismantle the Department of Education, remember that his plan to cut the corporate tax rate to 15% would give the 100 largest corporations a tax cut larger than the entire department's K-12 budget.

Really think about how twisted this all is.

RAT. FUCKS.

Republicans ran into the room to SHEILD Elon Musk from having to come and speak to Congress. They want their billionaire takeover done behind closed doors. The people deserve transparency. No one elected Elon Musk.

It's not a demolition site it's a mass grave. It's not a demolition site it's a crime scene. It's not a demolition site its a homeland. It's not a demolition site it's Palestine. It's not a demolition site it's a genocide.

DOGE is a trojan horse for Elon Musk to gut labor, consumer, and environmental protections. If he actually wanted to cut waste, he'd look at the massive tax loopholes, government contracts, and subsid... TikTok video by Robert Reich

www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8YjVvBh/

take the money from where it really goes- tax breaks for the wealthy, private equity, contracts with musk and his collaborators

i think this is a good take.

if you're a democratic senator and you're still voting to confirm trump nominees despite him allowing elon musk to gleefully dismantle the government then your brain has fallen out of your ass.

The IRS Direct File program is very popular with the American people. It is not, however, popular with companies that file your taxes for a fee.

So I'm sure it's just a coincidence that Marsha Blackburn sided with H&R Block over the American people after taking money from H&R Block's PAC.

An EEOC admin. judge sent a fiery all-department email this AM alleging:
1. Trump's exec orders & instructions to target private citizens with them are illegal.
2. the judge had sent an earlier email with a similar tone yesterday that later vanished from their sent folder & colleagues' inboxes.

9. I understand from our Office Manager, however, that as of Sunday, February 2, no funds have been deposited to our bank account. We have checked our accounts multiple times a day since January 29, but no funds have been transmitted. We have received no information or explanation from the Administration for Community Living about the interruption in funds. 10. In short: we have received no federal funds since the OMB Freeze Memo was issued. Our Center had enough money to meet payroll on Friday, January 31, and to cover outstanding bills. But we did not have enough money on hand to cover another two-week pay period at full staffing. 11. Thus, on Friday, January 31, the Board of Directors voted to lay off three of our five employees and drastically reduce services to our customers. This presented a dire situation for our customers, who have immediate needs. 12. For example, on Monday, February 3, we are scheduled to take an 86-year-old woman to dialysis treatments (which we do for her every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday). Our agency is her only way to get to these life-sustaining appointments.

NEW: The board president of a small WV nonprofit says they haven't received their HHS funding since the Trump/Musk budget freeze. They had to lay off 3 of 5 employees on Friday. An 86-yr-old woman is counting on them to take her dialysis tomorrow. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

THE ASK This week, between Monday and the vote on Vought, we're asking people from all over the country to plan a visit to Senate State Offices to demand Democrats fight and to hold Republicans accountable for their complicity. DEMOCRATS MUST USE EVERY PROCEDURAL TOOL TO SHUT DOWN TRUMP'S AGENDA Yes, we need Democrats to vote no on Vought's nomination, but no is not enough. Democrats have the power to grind Senate business to a halt and force Republicans to feel the political cost of backing Trump's extremist agenda. Here's how: 1. Deny a Quorum: If Republicans don't have 51 votes in the chamber, Democrats can walk out and shut down Senate business entirely. 2. Block Unanimous Consent: Object to every procedural shortcut, forcing Republicans to take the longest possible route for every step of the confirmation process. 3. Max Out Debate Time: Use all 30 hours of debate on Vought to expose Project 2025, Musk's Treasury takeover, and the funding freeze. 4. Delay and Disrupt: Force roll-call votes, quorum calls, and procedural delays to slow everything down. 5. Blanket Opposition: Democrats cannot continue to vote for Trump's other nominees, helping to install more MAGA loyalists into powerful positions in the federal government while this power grab continues. No Business as Usual: This is a constitutional crisis. Democrats must abandon the old rules and fight with everything they have. Bottom line: Senate Democrats must block, delay, and obstruct every step of this process-no cooperation, no easy votes, no fast-tracking Trump's takeover. To learn more about how Senate Democrats can shut down Trump's agenda with procedural hardball, check out our explainer here.

Indivisible is urging people to visit their senators' local offices between now and Thursday to demand that they use every tool—including denying a quorum and blocking unanimous consent—to fight the confirmation of Project 2025 architect Russell Vought for head of OMB docs.google.com/document/d/1...

The Logic of Destruction And how to resist it

open.substack.com/pub/snyder/p...

again this is a full scale attack on constitutional government

Montgomery County Public Schools comes out and tells Trump to pound sand with his EO telling schools that they have to discriminate against transgender students.

This is how you refuse to comply.

the collapse is not simply economic but if people can’t shut up about spending then don’t let them lie about it either

i think that every time there is a headline about cost cutting in the government there needs to be a ; and a dollar amount of how much trunpo is spending on golf, or how much is lost by cutting taxes for companies, or how much salary is paid to consultants, WHATEVER.