Old Fucking Punk @lwriemen@librem.one

To wrap it up, here's some important info on US farmers & wealth.

Most US farmers today are millionaires- yes, small family farms too. They make way more take-home pay, AFTER farm debts & expenses, than non-farmers.

It's been like that since 1998.

ps. The $1.2M median net worth for US small family farms? Yeah that puts you in the top 10% of Americans for wealth.

"85% of what happens on a farm is up to God" I'm sorry, no.

YOU own the land. YOU decide what you plant.

When YOU choose to keep raising things like cattle & tobacco, that have been known for decades now for unreliable income even in a good year- you can't blame God for that!

And here we see the result: People who get born into wealth that was built on the taxpayer dime.

They never develop the entrepreneurship skills needed to survive on their own.

Of course they're begging for handouts. It's the only life they've ever known.

By the way this conversation happened in a large arena/convention hall with her family's name on it.

"Poor salt of the earth" these folks are not.

To understand US agriculture right now, you have to start with their wealth situation.

Most of US farmers today are quite well off financially, thanks to inherited wealth. And a lot of them are way more skilled at complaining on TV than they are at running the farm they inherited.

I don't know Batten, but Kim Kornegay in particular is one of the least reliable narrators you could hope to find on agriculture.

Now that there's a bit more breathing room for this whole CVE mess, it's important to keep a few things in mind

The people who got us here by definition can't fix the problem. If they could, they would have a long time ago

There was no reason for this emergency. The people in charge knew this was coming and decided to say nothing. That's how you erode trust. We should treat anything the CVE program says with extreme caution

Beware anything that has popped up as a "solution" in the last 24 hours. These are hard problems, anyone ambulance chasing almost certainly can't create a sustainable solution

We have an opportunity to have a proper discussion now before this happens again (and it will happen again). Let's hope we don't squander this opportunity

While we have already restored the server from a hardware failure, we're having struggle reconnecting the node to our Galera (MariaDB database) cluster. The issue seems to be independent.

Everyone should be able to travel without the fear of surveillance and retaliation. States like California, Illinois, and Massachusetts are taking steps to protect location data privacy and defend our right to move freely without fear. More states must join. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/04/privacy-map-how-states-are-fighting-location-surveillance

Hackers, educators, tinkerers:
The 2025 Hacker Initiative grant cycle is open. Apply here 👉 https://hackerinitiative.org/apply-now/ Signal boost appreciated.

Today is an unlucky day for Codeberg, we're having a little bit of trouble with various systems.

We're working on restoring service availability ASAP. Thank you for your patience.

Uncle Sam abruptly turns off funding for CVE program. Yes, that CVE program

Because vulnerability management has nothing to do with national security, right? US government funding for the world's CVE program – the centralized Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures database of product security flaws – ends Wednesday.…
#theregister #IT
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2025/04/16/homeland_security_funding_for_cve/

Is there any confirmation that Bluesky has obeyed Turkish government order to shut down accounts or access there? I've seen purported screenshots but I haven't seen anything that looks "official" --

Good morning Fedi friends!

It's 11am, I'm still in my pyjamas and my parents are looking after my little one downstairs... so that I can work.

I'm formatting in Ghost a new blog post about "resistance to the digital coup" for #TheFutureIsFederated. I will post it later today here: https://news.elenarossini.com

Thanks for your thought-provoking questions & input... I tried to incorporate multiple POVs (following my divisive thread about Cadwalladr).

Off I go shower and grab my 3rd coffee 🤗

Must-read report from NPR, showing once again that DOGE is a massive threat to the cyber/national security of the United States:

"In the first days of March, a team of advisers from President Trump's new Department of Government Efficiency initiative arrived at the Southeast Washington, D.C., headquarters of the National Labor Relations Board.

The small, independent federal agency investigates and adjudicates complaints about unfair labor practices. It stores reams of potentially sensitive data, from confidential information about employees who want to form unions to proprietary business information.

The DOGE employees, who are effectively led by White House adviser and billionaire tech CEO Elon Musk, appeared to have their sights set on accessing the NLRB's internal systems. They've said their unit's overall mission is to review agency data for compliance with the new administration's policies and to cut costs and maximize efficiency."

"But according to an official whistleblower disclosure shared with Congress and other federal overseers that was obtained by NPR, subsequent interviews with the whistleblower and records of internal communications, technical staff members were alarmed about what DOGE engineers did when they were granted access, particularly when those staffers noticed a spike in data leaving the agency. It's possible that the data included sensitive information on unions, ongoing legal cases and corporate secrets — data that four labor law experts tell NPR should almost never leave the NLRB and that has nothing to do with making the government more efficient or cutting spending."

Meanwhile, according to the disclosure and records of internal communications, members of the DOGE team asked that their activities not be logged on the system and then appeared to try to cover their tracks behind them, turning off monitoring tools and manually deleting records of their access — evasive behavior that several cybersecurity experts interviewed by NPR compared to what criminal or state-sponsored hackers might do.

https://www.npr.org/2025/04/15/nx-s1-5355896/doge-nlrb-elon-musk-spacex-security

Even the right-wing Cato Institute is sounding the alarm about the Trump regime's headlong race into fascism. That's more than I can say for Big Journalism, which mostly continues to ever-so-politely do both-sides stenography.

https://www.cato.org/blog/where-writ-courts-does-not-run

For god's sake, journalists, take a stand. Now.

Hey, so, you know CVEs?
https://www.nextgov.com/cybersecurity/2025/04/mitre-backed-cyber-vulnerability-program-lose-funding-wednesday/404585/

"he U.S. government funding needed for non-profit research giant MITRE to develop, operate and maintain its flagship Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures Program will expire Wednesday, the company confirmed to Nextgov/FCW."

Homeland security told US-born immigration lawyer to leave country - https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/15/self-deportation-email-citizen-immigration-lawyer "Email to Massachusetts lawyer warned her to ‘depart the US immediately’ even though removing US citizens is illegal" #trump

An immigration judge's ruling that Mahmoud Khalil can be lawfully deported for his pro-Palestinian political speech sets a dangerous precedent for the future of free speech in America.

Read the rest of this Jacobin story by Chip Gibbons:

https://jacobin.com/2025/04/mahmoud-khalil-ice-deportation-louisiana

Inside a Powerful Database ICE Uses to Identify and Deport People
https://www.404media.co/inside-a-powerful-database-ice-uses-to-identify-and-deport-people/?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub

Posted into 404 Media @404-media-404media

We’re proud to announce that Eric King's new book A Clean Hell is now available for preorder.

To go with the release, Eric curated a playlist inspired by the book—songs that fueled his spirit through repression and resistance. Listen while you read, rage, or reflect.

Eric is an anarchist, antifascist, and former political prisoner who served time for acts of solidarity during the Ferguson uprising.

Playlist and pre-order links available at the link in our bio.