Old Fucking Punk @lwriemen@librem.one

Yet again the Associated Press normalizes the most corrupt presidency, by far, in American history. This story about Trump's kabuki-theater shakedown of the government he controls barely mentions that until the very end.

https://apnews.com/article/trump-treasury-irs-lawsuit-tax-whistleblower-c710244db618b066f3070a65e75820a5

All corruption in Trump world, all the time.

🧵Trump's war against Pope Leo is about something far larger than his foreign wars, it's actually a struggle for control of American Christianity.

This thread will summarize the main points of my latest essay about how Trumpism is a replacement Christianity. Continue or click through:
https://flux.community/matthew-sheffield/2026/04/trump-hates-pope-leo-because-he-sees-himself-as-the-real-vicar-of-christ/

Don't forget to salute everyone you see in their Boston Athletic Association tracksuits this weekend.

Ok, fellow hackers, I propose a pact: That new EU age verification app thingy ... do NOT help improve it.

Don't publish findings. Don't responsibly disclose insecurities. Don't facilitate them making it bulletproof.

If personal data is directly at risk, by all means, slam their asses into the ground. GDPR them into oblivion.

But on its core functionality this needs to be, to become, and to stay, the most insecure, the most easily circumventable piece of shit code on the planet.

RE: https://mastodon.social/@mcc/116415821939972420

The Bluesky mothership failure allowed to get a glimpse of realy how the other skys are independent from it, the black and the euro one.

I was looking for the answer to this question for a long time. This thread has it.

[Spoiler : I will stick to the Fediverse]

NYC Home Care workers declare hunger strike.

"Fifteen home health aides started what they called an indefinite hunger strike on Thursday after the City Council failed to advance a bill banning 24-hour shifts, an issue that has roiled the mostly immigrant women working in the home care industry and the vulnerable patients who rely on their round-the-clock care."

https://www.thecity.nyc/2026/04/16/hunger-strike-home-care-24-hour-menin-council-labor-protections/

📣 IT'S BRAND NEW THE TOM THE DANCING BUG REVIEW!
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💦 Dementia Donnie is back! And he's PISSED!
🐕‍🦺 Otis the Inner Hive Dog
💣 Nerrex, Inc. Joins the Nuclear Club
🦸 Less-Than-Mysterious Man
🐂 Comix for Cro-Magnon
AND MUCH MORE!
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Free for your eyes! 👀
https://tomthedancingbug.substack.com/p/dementia-donnie-is-back-and-hes-pissed

DoorDash Grandma isn't a paid plant. (For that, you need to be paid!) Instead, her story is far worse.

She's a depressing example of how MAGA cultists have internalized the lies that justify their own oppression.

An analysis.

https://www.salon.com/2026/04/17/trumps-doordash-grandma-isnt-a-plant-the-truth-is-much-darker/

Extraordinary journalism from Dave McKenna at Defector about a long-ago killing in Virginia, where local authorities refused to follow the obvious evidence, engaged in an ongoing cover-up, and left a victim's family endlessly damaged in the wake of undone justice. https://defector.com/the-killing-that-wont-let-go?utm_source=defector.beehiiv.com&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=microblogging-services-down-try-big-blogs-instead

"Stop New York's Attack on 3D Printing"

"New York's proposed 2026-2027 budget currently includes provisions that will require all 3D printers sold in the state to run print-blockingcensorware—software that surveils every print for forbidden designs."

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2026/04/stop-new-yorks-attack-3d-printing

#Privacy

> RTM is part of a larger, international tech federation called Co-op Cloud. It’s a collective of tech-based organizations committed to building and sharing tools based on libre software, which users can use and distribute freely

@rtm gave a shoutout to Co-op Cloud in the Guardian! (US, not the transphobic bin-fire that is Guardian UK) Congrats, and thanks!

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/apr/16/big-tech-breakup-parties

Invisible labor is labor.
Get 40% off all labor titles and 20% off select merch thru 5/1 with code MAYDAY.
Shop here: https://pmpress.org/index.php?l=product_list&c=50

The world’s leading #cancer charity to stop funding #openaccess publishing because of hybrid journals - https://walledculture.org/the-worlds-leading-cancer-charity-to-stop-funding-open-access-publishing-because-of-hybrid-journals/ sadly, unlikely to be the last to do this #copyright

Since the Snowden revelations, more than a decade ago, it's been clear that those big American tech companies have colluded with the US federal government against their own American and overseas users. The reelection of Donald Trump in 2024 has put this even more in the spotlight.

This week's comic is now up on Daily Kos
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DEMENTIA DONNIE IS BACK, and he's pissed!
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https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2026/4/16/800020143/cartoon/tom-the-dancing-bugs-dementia-donnie-brilliant-strategies-in-his-war-against-his-roommate/

@aral

The late great David Graber had it right. The value of someones work should be defined as the amount of care a person does at work.

For example:-

I work in IT for a massive multi-national corporation. I have what Graber famously described as a Bullshit Job. Hardly anything I do has any impact on the rest of the world. I certainly don't do anything that could be described as care as part of my job. My salary puts me in the top 5% of earnings in the UK.

My wife works in a council owned day center for people with many different disabilities both physical and mental. She basically makes people happy for a job. This means that she gets paid a tiny fraction above minimum wage.

Under Graber's formulation our pay rates would be reversed. Or my job would be deemed entirely unnecessary and I would be made redundant (yet again)

I think Graber would have said that so called "AI" is useless as it cannot care for humanity. The people running the AI dog-and-pony show certainly don't care for humanity.

#DavidGraber #care #CareBasedEconomics #BullshitJobs

Italy to stop sending arms to Israel because of Lebanon

Italy is the third-biggest arms exporter to Israel, according to figures from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cr71184ex91o