Marty
thwartedneedle.bsky.social
Marty
@thwartedneedle.bsky.social
When costume nerd meets history obsessive.

MN, USA
Reposted by Marty
The blatant corruption would be staggering in any other administration.

Here? It’s just Tuesday.
"Trump Pardoned Tax Cheat After Mother Attended $1 Million Dinner"

"Paul Walczak’s pardon application cited his mother’s support for [Trump], including raising millions of dollars and a connection to a plot to publicize a Biden family diary." via NYT 🎁 🔗 www.nytimes.com/2025/05/27/u...
Trump Pardoned Tax Cheat After Mother Attended $1 Million Dinner (Gift Article)
Paul Walczak’s pardon application cited his mother’s support for the president, including raising millions of dollars and a connection to a plot to publicize a Biden family diary.
www.nytimes.com
May 27, 2025 at 3:58 PM
Reposted by Marty
UNREAL. ICE implies in a sworn declaration that MOST of the Venezuelans sentenced to hard labor in a brutal Central American prison without charge or trial or so much as a cursory hearing had never been convicted or even charged with ANY CRIME whatsoever, not even a trivial one, anywhere, ever!
March 18, 2025 at 1:48 PM
Reposted by Marty
This is horrible to post, but I may as well post it. We are essentially shutting down research operations in my group, which is focused on treatments for pediatric brain cancer. I’m a well funded investigator, and there’s no choice. Science can’t function without the stability of NIH
March 15, 2025 at 5:32 PM
Reposted by Marty
The former head of the Social Security Administration says he expects the agency to miss on some payments over the next three months, interrupting some people's benefits, for the first time in Social Security's history of eight decades: www.cnbc.com/2025/03/01/d...
Social Security has never missed a payment. DOGE actions threaten 'interruption of benefits,' ex-agency head says
New changes at the U.S. Social Security Administration may put its ability to deliver monthly benefit checks at risk, former agency head says.
www.cnbc.com
March 3, 2025 at 5:03 PM
Reposted by Marty
Just look at these paragraphs from the AP story.

Hegseth called Brown unqualified solely because he's Black. Then they fired him... and replaced him with a white guy so indisputably unqualified that he requires a Presidential waiver.

This is what "merit" means to them.

apnews.com/article/trum...
February 22, 2025 at 1:53 AM
Reposted by Marty
How many federal workers would DOGE need to fire to make up for Musk not paying his fair share of taxes?

Answer: 677,000. That's 44% of the entire non-DoD federal workforce.

Again, this power grab is not about the budget. It’s about politics.
February 21, 2025 at 1:12 AM
Reposted by Marty
DOGE's funding is up to $40MM, @ProPublica.org finds

And this: "If DOGE is a federal agency, it can’t shield its records from the public. If it’s not an agency, then DOGE’s tens of millions in funding weren’t legally allocated and should be returned, some contend" www.propublica.org/article/doge...
DOGE’s Millions: As Musk and Trump Gut Government, Their Ax-Cutting Agency Gets Cash Infusion
The Department of Government Efficiency is funded — and acts — like a federal agency. But the White House has shielded DOGE from the rules that govern such agencies, ProPublica found as it examines th...
www.propublica.org
February 20, 2025 at 9:49 PM