Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
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pt007.bsky.social
Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
@pt007.bsky.social
Cancer & Developmental Biology, PhD👩‍🔬 🏳️‍🌈
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital
Organic Chemistry, MS
UCLA, Go Bruins 💙 💛
Chemistry, BS
UCSC, Go Slugs 💙💛
Encephalitis Warrior 🧠🔥
Politics
Southern Illinois
Pinned
A hard, necessary 💊 to swallow.
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
Hegseth’s only qualification for the job of Secretary of Defense was his TV punditry in support of war crimes. Of course he would do that. That’s why Trump hired him.
GOP Rep. Don Bacon: "I don't think Secretary Hegseth would be foolish enough to make this decision to say, 'Kill everybody. Kill the survivors,' because that's a clear violation of the law of war."
November 30, 2025 at 6:11 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
Number of states where average gas prices are below $2:

Zero.

Number of states where average gas prices are anywhere NEAR $2:

Zero.
HASSETT: Gas prices dropped below $2 a gallon in a lot of places

CORDES: Gas prices on average are still at $3 a galloon

HASSETT: For a few states they got below $2
November 30, 2025 at 6:43 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
Mark Kelly: "This president, when he says things like 'third world countries,' what is he really saying? I think what he's saying is he doesn't want brown people in our country. And that's disturbing. It's un-American."
November 30, 2025 at 2:23 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
The president is a political cartoon of corruption come to life, a gaudy grifter who is selling off pardons and lining his pockets, building a golden ballroom and protecting his fellow sex predator elites, all the while regular Americans are suffering and struggling to make ends meet.

Run on *that*
November 30, 2025 at 5:02 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
You don’t get to pick. That’s the whole damn point of the rule of law.
KARL: Did you know about the judge's order when you issued your order for the planes to continue?

KRISTI NOEM: This is an activist judge. We comply with all federal orders that are lawful and binding.
November 30, 2025 at 5:25 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
The US government is totally audience-captured by a tiny faction of internet fascists, and spends huge amounts of time trying to impress them, dedicating official communications channels to barely-concealed in-group references, and making horrific, murderous policy decisions to thrill this group
November 29, 2025 at 10:34 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
Meanwhile, Ukrainian sea drones disabled two of the "shadow fleet" tankers carrying Russian oil. No doubt the start of a campaign
kyivindependent.com/ukrainian-na...
'Successful' Ukrainian naval drone strike disables 2 Russian shadow fleet tankers, source says
The operation targeted ships that, according to the source, could have transported nearly $70 million worth of oil and helped Moscow bypass international sanctions.
kyivindependent.com
November 30, 2025 at 2:37 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
Physicians and academics often believe that they/we are immune to being radicalised online, but the reality is the opposite. No one is immune, and I saw this happen to Prasad and so many other physicians and academics when covid started. It’s pure hubris to believe anyone is immune.
Prasad is exhibit A of Twitter brain. Someone needs to do a detailed case report tracking his decline from reasonable skeptic of high price oncology drugs with questionable outcomes to COVID mask skeptic to full on vaccine skeptic. It was all in plain site on Twitter, and a hell of thing to see.
November 30, 2025 at 1:40 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
The billionaires who own much of the the infrastructure of our 21st century lives have progressively enshittified that infrastructure while expanding their wealth, and then they scold us for being small-souled peasants who don’t believe in progress anymore.
it is amazing how so much tech gets unremittingly worse year on year at whatever you once used it for and less pleasant to use and more bound up with creepy politics as well as personal and environmental harms and yet also still less productive of actual goods and these are somehow great visionaries
November 30, 2025 at 1:38 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
Very hard eldercare and logistics is a subject I have extensive experience with. This article nails why it's so hard, including logistics, $, coordination w/ family, $ again, & no one wants to hear you talk about it. The author acknowledges she had a lot of resources others won't. Gift link:
Opinion | The People Holding Everyone Together Are Coming Apart
www.nytimes.com
November 30, 2025 at 12:29 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
Remember 6 weeks ago when Admiral Alvin Holsey, head of the U.S. military’s southern command, abruptly decided to retire?
Makes me think at least one top-ranking officer knows what a war crime is.
US admiral to retire amid military strikes in Caribbean and tensions with Venezuela
Alvin Holsey just took over the US southern command late last year for a position that normally lasts three years
www.theguardian.com
November 30, 2025 at 12:02 AM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
Bash: "Do you believe if there was a second strike to eliminate any survivors that it constitutes a war crime?"

Mark Kelly: "It seems to."

Bash: "If you received that order, would you have carried it out?"

Mark Kelly: "No…Going after survivors in the water is unlawful."
November 30, 2025 at 2:15 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
This should worry everyone.

“US officials contacted by Reuters were surprised by Trump's announcement and unaware of any ongoing military operations to enforce a closure of Venezuelan airspace.”

Trump’s failing faculties could walk the US into war.
November 29, 2025 at 11:11 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
Plus, while the President can pardon them from federal charges, they can't immunize them from international accountability under the laws of war.
A presidential memo saying officers carrying out Caribbean boat strikes can’t be prosecuted is a confession the attacks are war crimes.

Virtually every lawyer across the political spectrum identifying them as blatant, unambiguous violations of the laws of armed combat is because they’re war crimes.
On the horrific news that Pete Hegseth ordered the killing of boat bombing survivors, remember: The Trump Murder Memo "authorizing" the strikes preemptively clears those carrying them out. That's unusual. And we still haven't heard from the commander who resigned:

newrepublic.com/article/2032...
November 30, 2025 at 2:05 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
Trump is trying to make up a specious legal doctrine that has been explicitly rejected time and time again in war crimes trials.
The whole idea of war crimes, based on lessons from centuries of bloodshed, is that there’s no such thing as “battlefield immunity.”

War permits a lot of horrific things, but even with that standard some actions are over the line.

Not a nicety or a favor. A way to make it somewhat less horrific.
November 30, 2025 at 2:08 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
The reason I want to see Secretary Hegseth and Admiral Bradley charged with murder, based on what we know, isn't because I hate the US military. It's because I served in the US military and respect it, and want to see its honor restored.
November 30, 2025 at 5:34 AM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
He scammed over 1,000 people, most of whom were not wealthy - veterans, farmers, teachers, nurses, small businesses owners. Some lost everything. But he’s a rich Republican, so Trump let him get away with it. www.nytimes.com/2025/11/29/u...
Trump Frees Fraudster Just Days Into Seven-Year Prison Sentence
www.nytimes.com
November 30, 2025 at 12:22 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
Lincoln was re-elected on a party platform saying "That foreign immigration, which in the past has added so much to the wealth, development of resources and increase of power to this nation, the asylum of the oppressed of all nations, should be fostered and encouraged by a liberal and just policy."
They're not hiding it, folks—straight up neo-Nazi advertising, from the font to the language to the 11 stars for the Confederacy. Then you have the DHS openly using white nationalist language of "remigrate", which means ethnic cleansing.

This is who MAGA is now.
November 30, 2025 at 8:03 AM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
This is the most alarming story I’ve read today. Giving up the fight before it’s started
November 30, 2025 at 9:57 AM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
Imagine if they just subsidized newspapers and magazines the way they’re subsidizing this slop
"All of this falls apart if humans don't adopt the tech. This is why you've seen Meta cram its lame chatbots into WhatsApp and Instagram. This is why Notepad and Paint now have useless Copilot buttons on Windows. This is why Google Gemini wants to "help you" read and reply to your emails."
Analysis: OpenAI is a loss-making machine, how can it survive?
Don't call it a bubble! Loss-making monster OpenAI is on the hook for $1.4 trillion (with a T) in compute commitments. How can this go on?
www.windowscentral.com
November 30, 2025 at 12:35 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
"All of this falls apart if humans don't adopt the tech. This is why you've seen Meta cram its lame chatbots into WhatsApp and Instagram. This is why Notepad and Paint now have useless Copilot buttons on Windows. This is why Google Gemini wants to "help you" read and reply to your emails."
Analysis: OpenAI is a loss-making machine, how can it survive?
Don't call it a bubble! Loss-making monster OpenAI is on the hook for $1.4 trillion (with a T) in compute commitments. How can this go on?
www.windowscentral.com
November 29, 2025 at 11:30 PM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
This is *not* the sort of thing you see in this era, which makes it all the better that we are seeing it this weekend.
UPDATE: I added in the congressional response to the boat-strike section once I saw we had bipartisan, matching statements from both House and Senate Armed Services Committees. www.lawdork.com/p/trump-admi...
November 30, 2025 at 3:19 AM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
The house and senate have both expressed interest in investigating the strike on survivors of the first boat strike.

Both Hegseth and adm Bradley will need to answer some questions.

This is why a reminder to not follow illegal orders is important
November 30, 2025 at 3:57 AM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
November 30, 2025 at 3:34 AM
Reposted by Vanessa Enriquez-Rios
The White House’s new anti-media website includes denunciations of:

-ABC, which bribed the president
-CBS, which bribed the president and moved away from fact-based journalism trying to appeal to him and his fans
-WaPo, which spiked a Harris endorsement and tilts coverage in Trump’s favor

Fools.
November 30, 2025 at 3:15 AM