Cowboy Who?

Warning: self-harm

A reader writes:

One of my coworkers, “Shannon,” has very poorly managed anxiety and depression. She clearly hates 90% of her job duties. She shines at 10%, but her repeatedly dropping the ball on the other 90% is causing all of her coworkers serious problems, and customers have made a lot of comments about her grumpy, unhelpful, hostile attitude.

Last week, she had one of her weekly breakdowns before she was supposed to lead a program (a core job duty) and, in addition to crying and screaming at herself as is her usual, also started hitting herself very hard and saying, “Ow.” Our manager was there and saw everything but did nothing to address it.

I’m dreading next week when this could happen again. What potential recourses do I have? Do I just leave the area if that happens again, even though it is disruptive to my work? What is reasonable to ask for? It seems reasonable that I not be exposed to someone regularly having meltdowns that are very upsetting to see, but is this just part of the working world? I’ve been at this public library system for so long that my workplace norms are very warped.

One idea is to band together with coworkers to meet with our manager and someone from HR to say that seeing this on a regular basis is making our workplace … bad? Making our jobs harder to do? Making it really stressful to show up at work? Another idea is to try to talk to this coworker one-on-one. But should I talk about how unhappy she is and encourage her to get a new job? Communicate to her that her behavior is triggering my own anxiety?

Thank you so much for any insight you could provide!

No, this is not a normal part of the working world!

Having a coworker who’s bad at their job and management that won’t do anything about it is, unfortunately, not an uncommon part of the working world — but a coworker crying, screaming, and hitting themself very much is not.

For that matter, having a coworker who’s so hostile that customers frequently comment on it and management that still won’t act isn’t normal. Tolerating incompetence, yes — but tolerating repeated customer complaints, much less so.

But it’s the screaming and hitting herself that you should focus on. And yes, a group of you meeting with your manager and HR (or potentially just HR) and saying, “This is not acceptable, and we’re not willing to be around this” is the way to go.

Be very clear about what happened: it’s not just that she’s grumpy or unhappy, it’s that she was screaming and hitting herself. Even in dysfunctional environments, that’s not generally accepted.

As for what to ask for, start with, “We’re not willing to be around this, and it needs to be stopped.” If they throw up their hands and don’t seem to think there’s anything they can do, it’s reasonable to say, “We’re not willing to stay in the area if it happens again, so we will be walking away” — and then do that.

If it does happen again, you can also alert your manager and ask them to deal with it, and you don’t need to return to the area until it stops.

I’d stay away from trying to address it with your coworker one-on-one. You’re not likely to be successful, and it’s way above your pay grade to solve.

The post my coworker started hitting herself during a meltdown appeared first on Ask a Manager.

Central Park really hasn’t changed, either.

Last year, retro computing YouTuber Christian “Peri Fractic” Simpson bought licensed the branding rights and some of the IP belonging to Commodore (which rights have been transferred five times since the original company went bankrupt in 1994). Last week they launched their first product:

This is the first real Commodore computer in over 30 years, and it’s picked up a few new tricks.

Not an emulator. Not a PC. Retrogaming heaven in three dimensions: silicon, nostalgia, and light. Powered by a FPGA recreation of the original motherboard, wrapped in glowing game-reactive LEDs (or classic beige of course).

Via Ernie Smith, who has been following this saga thoughtfully.

This is, no question, a fun and cool project, and I hope it succeeds wildly. But personally, the Commodore 64 holds almost no nostalgic value for me. The Commodore 64 — which came out in 1982, when I was 9 — always struck me as cheap-feeling and inelegant. Like using some weird computer from the Soviet Union. Just look at its keyboard. It’s got a bunch of odd keys, like “Run Stop” and “Restore”, and all sorts of drawing-related glyphs (used when programming) printed on the sides of the keycaps. Now compare that to the keyboards from the Apple II Plus (1979), which has just one weird key, “REPT” (for Repeat — you needed to press and hold REPT to get other keys to repeat, which, admittedly, seems inexplicable in hindsight), and to the Apple IIe (1983), which has no weird keys and whose keyboard looks remarkably modern lo these 42 intervening years.

That said, while both systems came with 64 kilobytes of RAM, the Apple IIe cost $1,400 when it debuted (~$4,600 today, inflation adjusted); the Commodore 64 cost $600 (~$2,000 today). Some things haven’t changed about the computer industry in my lifetime.

The most interesting computers Commodore ever made, by far, were the Amigas. The Amiga brand and IP were cleaved from Commodore long ago, and alas, the new Commodore doesn’t have them. But they’ve expressed interest in buying them. Something like this Commodore 64 Ultimate but for an Amiga — now that might get me to reach for my credit card.

Adickes, a native of Huntsville, also was known for creating the "We Love Houston" sign as well as sculptures of U.S. presidents and The Beatles.

At least 132 people have died. State and local leaders say getting an exact figure of the missing is difficult because so many people were visiting the Guadalupe River on the holiday weekend.

The heavy rain has forced rescuers to halt search operations for victims of the deadly floods that occurred in the region just over a week ago.

#Kento #Rowen #RoninWarriors

Dancing? Don't that strike you as a bit strange? #CowboyWho

A reader writes:

My husband is a notoriously private person (for example, he has social media profiles but doesn’t share content). He is also very strict about keeping his private life separate from his professional life, and has been very clear that he expects the same from me.

The problem is that we both work in the same field, and he regularly works with some colleagues of mine. My husband requested that I not mention his name or background at work since he felt like that would disclose too much personal info and he wants to appear impartial. I work for a large firm and in a different branch than the one he deals with, so I did not expect that to be an issue at first.

A few months ago, he started working with Jeff, a colleague of mine from another team who I had met at an after-work event a few weeks earlier. Jeff is a great guy! My husband enjoys working with him, and whenever I bump into him at the office we always end up chatting. My husband asked me not to let Jeff know about our connection, which was fine at first since I was talking to Jeff more about personal stuff anyway (“how was your weekend,” etc.) so the fact that my husband worked with him didn’t feel relevant.

As I got to know Jeff a little better, I told my husband I’d prefer to let him know we are married, but he insisted on keeping things strictly professional. That feels kind of weird for me since at this point Jeff is a colleague I’m very cordial with. We’re even talking about meeting outside of work this summer, we’ve followed each other on social media, he has told me in detail about his wife and kids, etc.

Lately my husband is having several meetings a week with Jeff, and now Jeff is starting to refer to their project and my husband when talking to me! He even showed me an email from my husband because he wanted to share something funny my husband wrote. And I sat there with a straight face, having to pretend I didn’t know my own husband.

At this point, I worry that Jeff will be weirded out when he finds out. What if he runs into us when we’re out together? I feel like the email incident switched the whole situation from “info I did not share because I deemed it irrelevant” to lying by omission.

Do you have any advice on how to handle this? Should I refrain from hanging out with Jeff? I really want to be respectful towards Jeff and not lie, but I don’t want to share anything my husband doesn’t want me to.

If you’d like to throw this to the readers, I’d also like to know what people would think if they were Jeff in this situation and how they would respond if at some point our relationship came out.

Your husband isn’t being reasonable.

Who you are married to is not a state secret, and purposely keeping it hidden risks getting really weird.

“Don’t go out of your way to mention it when it’s not relevant” is fine. “Keep it a secret” is not.

And you are right that this all moved into very different territory when Jeff showed you the email from your husband. Jeff is now being put in a position where he’s talking to a colleague about their spouse without knowing he’s doing that — and that would make most people feel extremely awkward if they found out about it afterwards. At a minimum Jeff is likely to think it’s really odd that you didn’t speak up and say, “Oh, Bob’s my husband!” At worst, he might even feel a little betrayed; what if he had said something about Bob that he never would have shared if he knew you were married? He didn’t, but he could have — and as things stand, he still could in the future.

I’d love to know more about what’s behind your husband’s unusually-high need for privacy. You mentioned that he wants to appear impartial … but the reality is, if his marriage to you makes him not impartial about something, that’s actually information other people are entitled to. That’s why when spouses work together, they’re expected to disclose it, not hide it.

I think you need to reopen this whole agreement with your husband and renegotiate what is and isn’t reasonable for him to expect. It’s not fair for him to put you in a position where you need to actively hide things in ways that risk reflecting on you later.

The post my husband doesn’t want anyone I work with to know we’re married appeared first on Ask a Manager.

Work can be a breeding ground for resentment: your manager talks down to you in meetings, the slacker down the hall gets the promotion or project you’ve been working hard for, a colleague steals credit for your idea, you get stuck working late because someone else didn’t meet a deadline … and people sometimes turn to revenge as a way of taking back some control and balancing the scales when they don’t have much real power.

At Slate today, I talked about getting revenge at work. You can read it here.

The post the best work revenge stories I’ve heard at Ask a Manager appeared first on Ask a Manager.

An AI model launched last week appears to have shipped with an unexpected occasional behavior: checking what its owner thinks first.

On Friday, independent AI researcher Simon Willison documented that xAI's new Grok 4 model searches for Elon Musk's opinions on X (formerly Twitter) when asked about controversial topics. The discovery comes just days after xAI launched Grok 4 amid controversy over an earlier version of the chatbot generating antisemitic outputs, including labeling itself as "MechaHitler."

"That is ludicrous," Willison told Ars Technica upon initially hearing about the Musk-seeking behavior last week from AI researcher Jeremy Howard, who traced the discovery through various users on X. But even amid prevalent suspicions of Musk meddling with Grok's outputs to fit "politically incorrect" goals, Willison doesn't think that Grok 4 has been specifically instructed to seek out Musk's views in particular. "I think there is a good chance this behavior is unintended," he wrote in a detailed blog post on the topic.

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For years, employees say, they've had to do more with less. But the ability to fill in the gaps became strained to the breaking point when the Trump administration began pushing new staffing cuts.

I’ll admit: Having grown addicted to the treats of literary nonfiction, I don’t make it through too many academic histories these days. If I’m going to, there’d better at least be a decent lede—and the Marxian opening to a new history of the eugenics movement in Texas fits the bill.

“Monsters haunted the imaginations of some of the most educated white Texans from the 1850s to the dawn of World War II,” tees off The Purifying Knife: The Troubling History of Eugenics in Texas, a 300-page (endnotes included) work by husband-wife historians Michael Phillips and Betsy Friauf. 

Philips, who recently retired from a teaching position at the University of North Texas in Denton, previously authored White Metropolis, a well-regarded history of race in Dallas.

The new book, out June 3 from University of Oklahoma Press, unearths a cast of unsavory Texas characters who pushed eugenics—the discredited pseudoscientific belief that the human species should be improved through practices such as forced sterilization—from the mid-19th century through the 1930s. In the latter decades of that period, the majority of U.S. states enacted forced-sterilization laws that targeted the non-white and the disabled, leading to more than 60,000 coerced operations. But Texas, perhaps surprisingly, never passed such a law. 

“Although a violent and white supremacist place, Texas remained on the sideline during this particular American carnage,” the authors write. The reasons why are the book’s most interesting subject.

Though the Lone Star State ultimately resisted eugenics, it was home to early pioneers. A Georgia-Texas transplant, Gideon Lincecum was a botanist and surgeon who “one day in the 1850s took it upon himself to castrate an alcohol-dependent patient in Texas, an assault he said cured his involuntary test subject’s addiction.” Lincecum did so before the term eugenics had even been coined, and he became one of the earliest advocates of treating humans more like a breeder treats horses or dogs. Lincecum managed to get the nation’s first forced-sterilization bill put before the Texas Legislature in 1853. But Lincecum, much too far ahead of his time, saw the bill fizzle amid “copious mockery.” 

F.E. Daniel, another physician and editor of the Texas Medical Journal from the 1880s until the 1910s, pushed for forced vasectomy and hysterectomy to assure Anglo-Saxon dominance, the book’s authors report. Daniel “embodied the values of the southern Progressive movement,” a particular turn-of-the-century brew that mixed scientific rationalism with rank racism. Eugenicists also made inroads at Texas universities, particularly UT-Austin and Rice. 

But Progressives and egghead professors were poor messengers in a state where politicians like “Pa” and “Ma” Ferguson stoked right-wing populist prejudice against government and academic elites—and where religious fundamentalism was a rising political power. Eugenicist proposals, whether focused on sterilization or restricting who could marry, continued to fail. 

“Attacks on colleges and universities, therefore, provided the unintentional benefit of shielding the poor and politically powerless in Texas from a horrifying, widely shared elite agenda that prevailed elsewhere,” the authors write. In fact, liberal California was the nation’s eugenic epicenter, where deference to academic expertise helped fuel the largest number of forced sterilizations among states—a practice continued through 1980. 

Further frustrating the Texas eugenicists, a large portion of the state’s capitalists depended on cheap Mexican labor and weren’t going to forsake their bottom lines over abstract concerns about race-mixing. John Box, an East Texas Congressman, attempted to overcome these employers when federal lawmakers passed the deeply racist Immigration Act of 1924, which sought to halt immigration from Asia and Eastern and Southern Europe. Box pushed for a cap on Mexican immigration, too, but the Western Hemisphere was ultimately exempted.

“To the wealthy landowners exploiting migrant labor, the threat of paying higher wages proved far more frightening than any dysgenic nightmare that Box and his allies could conjure,” the authors write.

Ultimately, the combination of greedy capitalists, right-wing anti-intellectualism, and solidifying religious opposition (Catholics grew rapidly in Texas during these decades, and the Vatican explicitly opposed forced sterilization in 1930) doomed eugenicist legislation that was considered in Austin between the 1850s and the 1930s. In an email to the Observer, Philips called this “a unique alignment that led one set of bad ideas … to defeat another malign worldview.” Soon, the eugenics movement began its fall from grace nationwide as the discovery of Hitler’s concentration camps generally tarnished proposals for racial engineering.

The history laid out in this book could tempt one to reassess today’s right-wing populist attacks on academia. Perhaps these, too, could end up being right for the wrong reasons. But Philips doesn’t think so.

He attributes universities’ erstwhile embrace of eugenics to higher education’s status as “almost universally white, straight, American-born, male, and wealthy.” More diverse scholarly bodies would have likely eschewed such ideas; a Jewish anthropologist, Franz Boas, eventually did help puncture the movement’s pseudoscience, for example. “That’s why the attacks [today] on diversity, equity, and inclusion today are so dangerous,” Philips wrote the Observer. “It threatens to make universities more like they were at the time eugenics became widely accepted wisdom.”

The book takes a pass through more recent figures trying to revive race science in America, like Charles Murray and Richard Spencer, and the authors also highlight the eugenics-adjacent rhetoric of today’s rabidly xenophobic politicians—namely the U.S. president and the governor of Texas. A bit more provocatively, they tie threads between eugenics and the current fight over abortion. While some on the right make hay of the historic ties between eugenics and early advocates for reproductive rights, the authors take another tack by focusing on the power allowed or disallowed to the state.

“The battle over the right of the state to control reproduction once centered on preventing children labeled as dysgenic from being born. By 2023, the state decided it could force women to give birth even when the child had no chance of survival,” they write. “The two great battles in Texas over government power and bodily integrity since the 1850s, eugenics and abortion, had very dif­ferent outcomes.”

The post The History of Eugenics in Texas Isn’t What You Think appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Michael Coen, chief of staff of FEMA under former presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, called on the state to be more proactive in preparing for disasters.

In brief: A tropical disturbance will move into the northeastern Gulf a little less than two days from now. Thereafter it should track westward. The most probable outcome is a moderate disturbance moving into Louisiana later this week, with the potential for heavy rainfall. But we will continue to watch things closely to see how the system evolves.

This weekend brought more flooding across parts of the United States. On Saturday evening the Davenport, Iowa area dealt with several inches of rain that flooded some homes and submerged vehicles. By Sunday the flood risk returned to Texas, where a large part of the Texas Hill Country saw a second round of heavy storms, including the previously hard hit Kerrville area. This produced flash flood warnings along and east of Interstate 35, but the strongest of the storms have now moved off to the southwest. Also this weekend there was a devastating fire on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, which destroyed the historic Grand Canyon Lodge. So all in all, not ideal.

Gulf disturbance

After all of this, we are turning our attention to the tropics this morning. We have been mentioning the possibility of a tropical system developing this week in the Northern Gulf of Mexico for several days, and the National Hurricane Center has now begun highlighting the possibility. As of 8 am ET on Monday, forecasters there give the system a 30 percent chance of becoming a tropical depression or storm this week.

The remnants of a front, currently in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Georgia, should move across Florida over the next day or two, and into the northeastern Gulf. Once there, conditions could support the development of this area of low pressure into a depression or tropical storm that would continue moving generally to the west.

As to what happens after this, there is not great clarity in the model guidance. The background conditions, including sea surface temperatures and wind shear, are somewhat favorable for organization and intensification. But this is not an ideal situation, and the system is likely to remain fairly close to land. So we don’t expect this to explode over the deep and warm waters of the Gulf. Eventually it should move toward Louisiana.

One outlier model that appears to be most bullish on the system is the Germany based ICON, which brings a moderate tropical storm toward southern Louisiana by Thursday morning (shown below). Some people may remember that the ICON model is one of the outliers that correctly predicted Hurricane Beryl would impact Texas about a year ago, so we are not completely dismissing it. However, most of our other guidance does not develop a tropical storm, but rather keeps this at a disturbance or a depression level.

So in terms of intensification what we can say right now is that we don’t anticipate a significant wind storm. We cannot rule it out, but high winds and storm surge are not the main talking point. Rather, rainfall potential is.

Precipitation outlook

As this system tracks across the northern Gulf of Mexico, it is likely to bring increased rainfall chances to the Florida Panhandle, southern Alabama and Mississippi, and especially southern Louisiana. For now, NOAA’s Weather Prediction Center has that area, including New Orleans, under a “slight risk” of excessive rainfall next Thursday (shown below) and Friday.

That’s a good starting point, but depending on the evolution of this system that estimate may need to be bumped up in a day or two. The bottom line is that the second half of this week could bring a significant amount of rainfall into Louisiana. Right now we can only monitor the risk, rather than provide a definitive forecast. Hopefully that changes in a day or two.

As for areas further west, including Texas, we cannot rule out impacts at this time. However, none of our reliable guidance shows this system (or its heavy rainfall) tracking far enough to the west to bring heavy rains or winds to Texas. But it is something we will continue to watch.

Early in President Trump’s first term, McSweeney’s editors began to catalog the head-spinning number of misdeeds coming from his administration. We called this list a collection of Trump’s cruelties, collusions, corruptions, and crimes, and it felt urgent to track them, to ensure these horrors—happening almost daily—would not be forgotten. Now that Trump has returned to office, amid civil rights, humanitarian, economic, and constitutional crises, we felt it critical to make an inventory of this new round of horrors. This list will be updated monthly between now and the end of Donald Trump’s second term.

These lists, along with everything McSweeney’s publishes on this site, are offered ad-free and at no charge to our readers. If you are moved to make a donation in any amount or subscribe to our website’s Patreon, please do. This will help support this project and our other work.

ATROCITY KEY

– Constitutional Illegalities, Collusion, and/or Obstruction of Justice
– Environment
– Harassment, Bullying, Retribution, and/or Sexual Misconduct
– Lies and Misinformation
– Musk Madness
– Policy
– Public Statements and Social Media Posts
– Trump Family Business Dealings
– Trump Staff and Administration
– White Supremacy, Racism, Misogyny, Homophobia, Transphobia, and/or Xenophobia

Main Index

Trump’s first term

JUNE 2025

1. – June 1, 2025 – The Trump administration
   abandoned Biden-era regulations for slashing credit card late fees. The purported savings were posted on an “Agency Deregulation Leaderboard.” The leaderboard claimed the Trump administration saved Americans $29.4 billion as a result of reversing regulations in health insurance, bank fees, and appliance efficiency standards. According to experts and government analyses, the leaderboard’s findings are not reliable. Steve Cicala, codirector of the National Bureau of Economic Research’s Project on the Economic Analysis of Regulation, said, “This is just taking money from households and transferring it to banks and credit card companies, and to water and power utility companies.”
   
   
2. – June 2, 2025 – President Trump announced his goal to double the amount of oil coming through Alaska’s oil pipeline system. His plans would repeal Biden-era restrictions banning drilling and mining in millions of acres of pristine Alaskan wilderness. The announcement highlighted a trip to Prudhoe Bay by US Energy Secretary Chris Wright. In a post to X, Wright said, “Unleashing American energy goes hand in hand with unleashing American prosperity.” In response, Kristen Miller, executive director of the Alaska Wilderness League, said, “This is another attempt to sell off public lands to oil industry billionaires at the expense of one of the wildest places left in America.”
   
   
3. – June 2, 2025 – David Richardson, the acting head of FEMA, told employees that he did not know the United States had a hurricane season. “Yesterday, as everybody knows, was the first day of hurricane season,” he said. “I didn’t realize it was a season.” FEMA staff were unclear if Richardson was serious or making a joke. The DHS, which oversees FEMA, stated in a press release that Mr. Richardson was joking. Before heading FEMA, Richardson worked in the DHS’s Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction Office.
   
   
4. – June 3, 2025 – Former DOGE director Elon Musk blasted President Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” of tax cuts and spending plans just days after departing the administration. Musk posted on X, “This massive, outrageous, pork-filled Congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination. Shame on those who voted for it.” Axios reported that Musk’s criticisms stemmed from the bill’s cutting of the electric vehicle tax credit, the Federal Aviation Administration’s refusal to use his Starlink satellite system for national air traffic control, and Trump’s withdrawal of Musk ally Jared Isaacman to be NASA administrator. The Axios source claimed that Elon was “butthurt.”
   
   
5. – June 5, 2025 – Elon Musk and Donald Trump’s relationship deteriorated as the former allies hurled personal insults at each other through social media. Their feud began after Musk criticized Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill," calling it “a disgusting abomination.” Trump responded, “The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts.” On X, Musk mocked Trump’s connections to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein: “Time to drop the really big bomb: Donald Trump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public. Have a nice day, DJT!” Trump then referenced Musk’s recent Oval Office farewell, where he sported a black eye. Trump retorted, “You saw a man who was very happy when he stood behind the Oval desk. Even with a black eye. I said, Do you want a little makeup?” Musk admitted that the shiner came from his five-year-old son, X. “I was just horsing around with little X, and I said, ‘Go ahead, punch me in the face,’ and he did.”
   
   
6. – June 6, 2025 – Kilmar Ábrego García, who was mistakenly deported to El Salvador during ICE’s initial crackdown, was returned to the United States to face criminal charges. In a press briefing, US Attorney General Pam Bondi said that a federal grand jury had indicted Ábrego García on counts of illegally smuggling undocumented people as well as of conspiracy to commit that crime. “He was a smuggler of humans and children and women,” she claimed. “This is what American justice looks like.” Ábrego García’s lawyer, Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, said, “After months of delay and secrecy, they’re bringing him back, not to correct their error but to prosecute him.”
   
   
7. – June 6, 2025 – A large crowd of demonstrators in Los Angeles gathered in the downtown Fashion District after ICE agents showed up at an apparel manufacturing business. By the end of the day, forty people had been taken by ICE and hundreds of protesters clashed with police at the Edward R. Roybal Federal Building. In response to the raids, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said in a post on X, “As Mayor of a proud city of immigrants, I am deeply angered by what has taken place. These tactics sow terror in our communities and disrupt basic principles of safety. We will not stand for this.” The next morning, FBI Director Kash Patel responded to Bass, saying, “We will.”
   
   
8. – June 7, 2025 – A White House memorandum issued by Donald Trump for the secretary of defense, the attorney general, and the secretary of homeland security:
   
   “Numerous incidents of violence and disorder have recently occurred and threaten to continue in response to the enforcement of Federal law by the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other United States Government personnel who are performing Federal functions and supporting the faithful execution of Federal immigration laws… To the extent that protests or acts of violence directly inhibit the execution of the laws, they constitute a form of rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States. In light of these incidents and credible threats of continued violence, by the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, I hereby call into Federal service members and units of the National Guard under 10 U.S.C.12406 to temporarily protect ICE and other United States Government personnel who are performing Federal functions, including the enforcement of Federal law, and to protect Federal property.”
   
   
9. – June 8, 2025 – Following orders from the president and bypassing consent from California Governor Gavin Newsom, approximately three hundred National Guard troops began arriving in Los Angeles. The National Guard is often deployed to respond to natural disasters and is typically only federalized when a governor makes a request. The last time a state’s National Guard was deployed without a governor’s consent was in 1965, when President Lyndon B. Johnson sent the National Guard to protect civil rights activists marching from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. In a joint statement, twenty-two Democratic governors called Trump’s decision “an alarming abuse of power.” Characterizing the deployment as “unlawful” and “a serious breach of state sovereignty,” Governor Newsom formally requested that the Trump administration rescind its deployment of Guard troops.
   
   
10. – June 9, 2025 – The US military confirmed that seven hundred Marines were being deployed to Los Angeles, and the Department of Defense announced it was deploying an additional two thousand National Guard troops. Meanwhile, California sued the Trump administration over the deployment of the National Guard, arguing that Trump had “unlawfully bypassed” California Governor Gavin Newsom by federalizing the National Guard troops without the governor’s permission. “One of the cornerstones of our Nation and our democracy is that our people are governed by civil, not military, rule,” the lawsuit stated. “The Founders enshrined these principles in our Constitution—that a government should be accountable to its people, guided by the rule of law, and one of civil authority, not military rule.”
    
    
    National Guard troops arrive in Los Angeles (AP).
    
    
11. – June 9, 2025 – Trump accused the protesters in Los Angeles of being “insurrectionists” and suggested that California Governor Gavin Newsom should be arrested. “The people who are causing the problems are bad people. They are insurrectionists,” said Trump, repeating a term that some of his aides have used. Pushing back against Trump’s description of the protest, California officials have stated that the protests were confined to a relatively small area and were predominantly peaceful. When asked whether he supported statements from his border czar, Tom Homan, about arresting state officials who obstruct federal immigration raids, Trump responded, “I’d do it if I were Tom. I think it’s great. Gavin likes the publicity.” Asked about Homan’s comments on MSNBC, Newsom responded, “He’s a tough guy. Why doesn’t he do that? He knows where to find me. That kind of bloviating is exhausting. So, Tom, arrest me. Let’s go.”
    
    
12. – June 9, 2025 – Reneging on a promise made during his confirmation hearings, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a longtime vaccine critic, fired all seventeen members of the CDC’s advisory committee on immunization. The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices votes on which populations should receive vaccinations and when they should be administered; insurance companies and Medicaid are required to cover the recommended vaccines. In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, Kennedy Jr. incorrectly claimed that most members of the committee—who are screened for conflicts of interest and forbidden from holding stocks or serving on boards of vaccine manufacturers—had received funding from Big Pharma and characterized the firings as “a bold step in restoring public trust.” Experts quickly fired back. “Secretary Kennedy has not hidden his anti-vaccine agenda. He, more than anyone in our country, has worked to undermine people’s trust and confidence in vaccines,” said Dr. Richard Besser, the former acting CDC director.
    
    
13. – June 9, 2025 – Reviving a controversial measure from his first term, President Trump’s new travel ban against predominantly African and Middle Eastern countries took effect. The ban barred individuals from the following twelve countries from entering the US: Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, the Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen. A partial ban, including heightened restrictions, was also applied to individuals from Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela. “The recent terror attack in Boulder, Colorado, has underscored the extreme dangers posed to our country by the entry of foreign nationals who are not properly vetted,” Trump said in a video, referring to a firebombing attack by a man who is from Egypt, which is not impacted by the travel ban. Amnesty International called the travel ban “discriminatory, racist, and downright cruel.” Trump’s first travel ban faced significant legal challenges, and former President Joe Biden called it a “stain on our national conscience.”
    
    
    President Donald J. Trump signs travel restrictions executive order (YouTube).
    
    
14. – June 10, 2025 – During a speech at Fort Bragg, President Trump announced that he would restore the original Confederate names of seven Army bases. Skirting a law that prevents the Pentagon from naming bases after Confederate leaders or battles, Trump said the bases instead honored soldiers who happened to share the same names as the Confederates. A similar move occurred in February when the Army renamed Fort Liberty to Fort Bragg, its original name, but claimed the base now honored Roland L. Bragg, a World War II veteran, rather than the Confederate general Braxton Bragg. “The bottom line is [Trump]’s choosing surname over service,” said Ty Seidule, a retired Army brigadier general. “It’s breaking the spirit of a law that was created by the will of the American people through their elected representatives.”
    
    
15. – June 10, 2025 – In an interview with Bloomberg News, US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee said that the US would no longer work toward the formation of an independent Palestinian state, marking a major shift in foreign policy. When asked if a Palestinian state remained a US policy goal, Huckabee said, “I don’t think so,” adding that the territory for any future Palestinian state would need to be carved out from “a Muslim country” rather than Israel. Responding to a question about Palestinian statehood aspirations in the West Bank, Huckabee used biblical terminology, “Does it have to be in Judea and Samaria?” In a separate BBC interview, Huckabee expanded on his views: “Muslim countries have 644 times the amount of land that are controlled by Israel. So maybe, if there is such a desire for a Palestinian state, there would be someone who would say, we’d like to host it.” During his 2008 presidential run, Huckabee said, “There is no such thing as a Palestinian.”
    
    
16. – June 10, 2025 – Following another day of protests in Los Angeles, Mayor Karen Bass announced a curfew, and Governor Gavin Newsom made a nationally televised address. “Donald Trump, without consulting California law enforcement leaders, commandeered two thousand of our state’s National Guard members to deploy on our streets, illegally and for no reason. This brazen abuse of power by a sitting president inflamed a combustible situation, putting our people, our officers, and even our National Guard at risk,” said Newsom, who accused Trump of “fanning the flames.” “Democracy is under assault right before our eyes,” Newsom continued. “The rule of law has increasingly been given away to the rule of Don.” On the same day, ABC News reported that there were more US troops deployed to Los Angeles than to Iraq and Syria, while Poynter reported that journalists were injured—and possibly targeted—while covering the protests.
    
    
    Governor Newsom’s speech on Trump as LA protests persist (CNN).
    
    
17. – June 11, 2025 – The Trump administration announced it would eliminate Biden-era regulations on power plants, the second largest source of pollution, and weaken restrictions on other hazardous emissions that could threaten public health. “EPA is helping pave the way for American energy dominance, because energy development underpins economic development, which in turn strengthens national security,” said EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, who also called efforts to rein in climate change a “cult.” “The key rationale Zeldin is using to justify the dismantling of our nation’s protections from power plant pollution is absolutely illogical and indefensible,” said former EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy. “By giving a green light to more pollution, his legacy will forever be someone who does the bidding of the fossil fuel industry at the expense of our health.”
    
    
18. – June 11, 2025 – During the Los Angeles protests, a video captured federal agents in two unmarked vehicles colliding directly into another car and trapping it between them to arrest the driver. Besides the driver, a woman and a child were in the car when it was hit. According to witnesses, the agents dispersed a “chemical-smelling smoke” near the pinned car while the woman and child were still inside. “There were kids involved inside that car, and it is scary to think about,” said John Lopez, who witnessed the collision and arrest. Although LAPD initially said the incident was being investigated as a possible assault or hit and run, DHS pushed back against that characterization on social media: “This was no hit and run. This was a targeted arrest of a violent rioter.” On the same day, another video showed law enforcement shooting a woman at close range with what appeared to be “less lethal” ammunition while she was walking to her apartment.
    
    
19. – June 12, 2025 – After attempting to ask a question during DHS Secretary Kristi Noem’s press conference in Los Angeles, California Senator Alex Padilla, the son of Mexican immigrants, was forcibly removed from the room, pushed to the floor, and handcuffed by Secret Service and FBI agents. In a viral video of the incident, Padilla can be heard identifying himself as a senator and saying he had a question for the secretary as the agents pushed him from the room. Padilla was also wearing a polo shirt with the words “United States Senate.” Noem later falsely stated that Padilla had not identified himself, and House Speaker Mike Johnson called for Padilla to be censured. “If this is how this administration responds to a senator with a question, if this is how the DHS responds to a senator with a question, you can only imagine what they’re doing to farm workers, to cooks, to day laborers throughout the LA community and throughout California and throughout the country. We will hold this administration accountable,” Padilla later told reporters.
    
    
    US Sen. Alex Padilla forcefully removed from Noem news conference, handcuffed (KTLA).
    
    
20. – June 14, 2025 – Following over a week of protests in Los Angeles against the Trump administration’s immigration raids, over five million people marched in over two thousand No Kings protests in all fifty states on Donald Trump’s birthday. The predominantly peaceful demonstrations were the largest protests in Trump’s second term and coincided with Trump’s modestly attended military parade in the capital. Ostensibly a celebration of the US army’s 250th birthday, even some administration officials referred to the affair as “Donald Trump’s birthday parade.” The military parade shut down most of Washington, DC, for the day and reportedly cost up to $45 million.
    
    
    Highlights from President Trump’s military parade (Boston Globe).
    
    
21. – June 15, 2025 – Trump directed federal immigration officials to prioritize deportations from Democratic-run cities. The move came after large protests in Los Angeles against the Trump administration’s immigration policies. In a post on Truth Social, Trump said officials “must expand efforts to detain and deport Illegal Aliens in America’s largest Cities, such as Los Angeles, New York, and Chicago, where Millions upon Millions of Illegal Aliens reside.” In the post, Trump pitted “REAL Americans,” against “Radical Left Democrats,” who “are sick of mind, hate...

Someone or something pulled us back here. We need to find out who or why.

WASHINGTON—In a landmark piece of legislation that disgusted supporters said was long overdue, Congress passed a law Thursday banning women from leaving the house without makeup. “For too long, Americans have lived in fear of walking outside and encountering the unthinkable—a natural-looking woman who refuses to wear cosmetics,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) said in support of the new measure, which sets strict federal requirements for how much foundation, blush, mascara, and lipstick female citizens must wear when they appear in public. “As a father, I cannot imagine living in a world where my sons could potentially walk down the street and see a woman without fake eyelashes, contoured cheeks, or plumped lips. When President Trump signs this into law, no woman will ever look dowdy again.” Johnson added that next week he would bring to the House floor a bill that mandates a minimum prison sentence of 25 years for any woman who, upon encountering a man, fails to giggle and blush before touching his arm and saying, “Well, hello there, handsome.” 

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WASHINGTON—In the latest of a series of escalations in President Donald Trump’s highly publicized war on “woke,” the U.S. Department of Justice reportedly removed all mentions of justice from its website Friday.

The purge follows a directive from the DOJ last week to roll back pro-justice programs and delete thousands of webpages that contained banned words, including “fairness,” “integrity,” “due process,” and “honor.” Citing an executive order from the president, Attorney General Pam Bondi directed her department to comb through all its articles, images, videos, and social media posts to remove any “un-American, leftist propaganda” related to upholding the rule of law, keeping the nation safe, or protecting citizen’s rights.

“Justice is a discriminatory form of woke cultural Marxism that has no place in our Justice Department,” Bondi said during a press conference, adding that pro-justice policies actively divided Americans, spread misinformation, and distracted from the DOJ’s core mission. “Anyone who says that justice is our department’s strength—or that we should promote dangerous ideals that imply Americans will be treated with dignity or compassion in the eyes of the law—is sadly mistaken.”

“Thanks to Donald Trump, justice is dead,” she added. “And this is just the beginning.”

According to a memo issued by Bondi, officials were given one week to search through the vast DOJ archives and purge historical photographs, educational articles, and even training courses that describe, for example, how U.S. attorney’s offices have fought for everyday Americans and upheld their basic rights. They were also instructed to comb through the vast archives of the department’s Antitrust, Civil Rights, Criminal, and Environmental divisions to flag any instance in which the agency wielded its power to hold a powerful person, corporation, or government agency accountable.

The Trump administration praised the Justice Department’s swift and thorough compliance, including its decision to fire hundreds of “morality obsessed” employees who were in any way associated with upholding the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, or the Judiciary Act of 1789.

“Joe Biden held the DOJ hostage with his woke agenda for four years, forcing us to have a functional legal system,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), adding that the department’s website should have never contained blatantly partisan photos of things like federal courts, gavels, or the scales of justice. “This is a government agency, and I don’t think its website should be hijacked by liberals to brainwash people into thinking that all men are created equal, or that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights.”

“Trump fired anyone who believed in justice,” Graham continued, “and frankly, I hope he throws them all in jail.”

Bondi acknowledged that amid the urgency to remove offending materials, several articles describing the DOJ’s role in acts of injustice, evil, and unbridled terror had been deleted inadvertently. As soon as the mistake was noticed, however, such materials were quickly restored, including those that praise the department for using COINTELPRO to destabilize the Civil Rights Movement, expanding warrantless surveillance under the Patriot Act, and defending Japanese internment camps during World War II. Many pieces of content that had previously highlighted a victim of violence, oppression, or a hate crime overcoming injustice or earning a hard-fought legal victory had also reportedly been changed to show them losing their case, being sentenced to life in prison, and ultimately regretting speaking up or resisting at all.

“Lady Justice is a symbol of the radical woke left and does not in any way represent our values,” said Bondi, adding that citizens were sick and tired of having fair-
mindedness and even-handedness shoved down their throats. “The American people have historically preferred to stand on the sidelines and stay silent in the face of injustice. In these first few months of Donald Trump’s second term, they have proved that again and again.”

Bondi added, “You can rest assured we won’t stop until we eliminate justice across the entire federal government.”

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This reasonably priced two-bedroom offers homebuyers the exciting chance to help push out the working-class residents who have called the neighborhood home for generations.

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Mattel introduced its first Barbie representing a person with Type 1 diabetes, part of a wider effort from the toy maker to increase inclusivity among its dolls. What do you think?

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dystopianscifiarchitecture:

Technical university student restaurant, Dortmund, Germany, 1976

© picture by Klaas Vermaas

In a Gallup poll run last month, sentiment towards immigration spiked towards positive, especially among Republicans and Independents:

The recent jump in perceptions of immigration being a good thing is largely owed to a sharp increase among Republicans and, to a lesser extent, independents. These groups’ views have essentially rebounded to 2020 levels after souring in the intervening years.

Democrats’ belief that immigration is beneficial to the country is also up slightly, to a record-high 91%. However, this is generally consistent with their highly positive perspective on immigration over the past decade, with at least 80% calling it a good thing each year since 2016.

Tags: Gallup, immigration, poll

The governor’s office said some of the correspondence with the billionaire and his companies contains “intimate” information that isn’t of “legitimate concern to the public.”

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…

1. My manager told me my work was OK, but then redid it

I’ve recently begun volunteering in a charity shop and the manager asked me if I would like to have a go at doing the window display. I jumped at the chance as I am quite creative and love fashion. I completed the display and asked her if I needed to change anything, and to feel free to let me know. She said it was fine.

I went past the shop window the next day and the display had totally changed. I feel totally deflated and confused. I feel that I’m very approachable and gave plenty of opportunity for her to come to me before my shift ended to let me know if it wasn’t suitable. It was my first try at it and didn’t expect to get it right first time. I’m back in the shop soon and am unsure how to address the issue. Do I do it in a lighthearted way or more serious way?

I’m not sure if because it’s volunteering the manager doesn’t want to put off people who come in to help, but I feel a bit uncomfortable if I don’t know if I’m not doing an effective job or not.

Aw, yeah, that would feel deflating! It’s possible that it wasn’t about your work at all; for all we know, another volunteer felt like changing it up. But it’s also possible that the manager did want to change what you’d done, and you’re right to think she should have given you more direct feedback if that were the case.

I would say this: “I noticed the window display changed the day after I did it. I realize I might not have gotten it right, but I’d love to get better at it. Can you give me any feedback about what to do differently next time?”

And then if you do get to try it again, this time say at the outset, “Are there guidelines I should keep in mind — do’s or don’ts, or things you’ve found work well? I want to make sure I’m doing it in a way that works for you.”

2. My boss is enraged when I talk about birds

I arrived at a meeting early to set up the room as I was the most junior person, and a senior director came in and started chatting. As we made polite small talk, it came up that we were both birdwatchers and I was telling him about an uncommon-but-not-totally-rare sighting I’d gotten that weekend (he was appropriately impressed, and was recounting his hawk list). My manager came in and was horrified we were talking about birds. Of course, as soon as she came in, we dropped the bird talk and moved on to greeting her.

IMAGINE HER HORROR when the senior director dropped by my desk a couple weeks later to tell me about a truly awesome sighting he’d gotten of a big-deal migratory bird. No more than three minutes of me going, “Wow! Which park were you at? That’s amazing!” and the senior director walked off chuffed that someone had admired his bird sighting.

My manager scolded me that talking about birds is unprofessional and I am never to bring up birds at work again. (The senior director continues to bring it up when he sees me, though, and my manager seethes every time.)

I have no idea what this is about. Maybe she was irritated I made a personal connection with the director, but mostly she just has this lengthy catalog of things that are professional and unprofessional, updated daily. It was completely, totally arbitrary. I think “unprofessional” is her catch-all for “things I do not like and cannot control, but can’t think of a good reason for banning.” So, you know, stupid birds! Stop flying past the window!

Your manager is a loon (yay for bird jokes!). I suspect you’re right that she didn’t like you making a personal connection with the director, but seething over bird talk is utterly ridiculous and disconnected from reality. It sounds, though, like that’s in character for her and there’s nothing here that you didn’t already know about how she operates (although this may be a particularly absurd illustration of it).

The next time you see her chafing about bird talk, it might be interesting to say to her, “I would feel really rude ignoring Director when he brings up the topic of birds herself. How exactly are you asking me to handle that?”

But the real plan here should be to build rapport with the director and other people senior to your manager and then start discreetly dropping info about the bananas stuff she says to you.

3. I need to stop ADHD and depression meds while pregnant — should I warn my boss?

My husband and I are finally ready to start a family. We’d planned to start trying at the end of last year, but the election results shifted some of our plans majorly, so we pushed it by a few months — and, after more chaos, finally acknowledged that there’s gonna be no perfect time, so we might as well go for it.

The additional chaos: I got laid off in December and recently started a new job at a company that I love, and I seem to have gotten off at a really strong start. However, my doctor advised me that if I get pregnant, I’m going to have to stop taking two medications that make my life infinitely easier/better — one for depression and one for ADHD. I was unmedicated until my early 30s and still managed to be a top performer at another high-demand company (it was very deadline-driven, which helped mitigate the brain chaos), but between discontinuing meds, what I’ve heard of pregnancy brain, and also being in my mid 30s rather than late 20s and thus not as able to pull off late nights quite as easily, I’m concerned that there might be some hiccups, to put it gently.

How would you recommend addressing this? Should I speak to my manager first, or talk to HR and have them loop her in? Should I do it as soon as I know I’m pregnant/stop meds, or if (/once) things start getting a little rockier? FWIW, my manager has a very young child and she’s super kind, so I trust her not to be a jerk to me, but I also … do not trust corporate America at all and really don’t wanna get screwed over.

Wait until there’s something concrete to speak up about, meaning that you have stopped the meds and are seeing it affect your work. At that point you can say something like, “I want to let you know I’ve had to temporarily stop a medication while I’m pregnant and it may be affecting my concentration. I’m doing XYZ to try to mitigate the effects, but if you noticed anything different, that’s likely why. I’m hopeful it will be resolved soon.” (If you’re saying this before she knows you’re pregnant, you can just leave that part of the wording out.)

Addressing it before it has become a problem risks priming your boss to see problems whereas otherwise she might not have. You also don’t need to disclose the depression or ADHD specifically; the vaguer wording above is enough.

4. No one has responded to my resignation

I am a therapist at a large nonprofit. It’s a very decentralized position, where I work in a school the nonprofit contracts with and only meet with my direct supervisor once a week. This means I have very little contact with my supervisor and coworkers. This is normally fine, except that my supervisor (Elizabeth) has gone on maternity leave, and I have decided to quit my job. There is nothing particularly wrong with it, it’s just time for us to part ways on good terms.

While Elizabeth is gone, I have a temporary supervisor, Jane, who I meet with for weekly one-on-ones. Because I am a therapist, these meetings are to discuss cases and clinical work. Jane is a clinician who does not work directly for the agency and is divorced from administrative things such as my leaving my job. Elizabeth’s second-in-command, Lydia, is taking over her administrative duties, but she has a lot on her plate and is currently in a week-long training. There is also the clinical director of my program, Charlotte, who is even busier and often does not respond quickly to emails. I normally would have a live meeting on video where I gave my resignation, but, given all of the above, there wasn’t really anyone for me to have that meeting with. Instead, I sent an email last Wednesday to Elizabeth, Charlotte, and Jane.

I am writing to you on the following Wednesday, and I have gotten no response. I suspect this is because Lydia is in a training, Charlotte is always busy, and this isn’t really Jane’s job. I was going to bring it up to Jane in supervision this week to see if she had any advice, but then she canceled supervision! Since I’m a therapist, I want as much time as possible to let my clients know that I’m leaving, but I hesitate to do that until my job knows that I’m leaving. What do you do when nobody notices when you give notice? Help!

Change the method you’re using to communicate. Call Lydia or Charlotte. If they don’t pick up, leave a voicemail saying you emailed your resignation last week, haven’t heard back from anyone, and need to touch base ASAP before you begin telling clients, and ask them to call you today if at all possible. If they tend not to listen to voicemails, send a text saying the same thing. If you were in the same location, I’d also say to just drop by in person, but it doesn’t sound like that’s an option here.

Worst case scenario, if you still don’t hear back, send an additional email and voicemail saying that you still haven’t heard back from anyone, your plan is to begin telling clients on (date), and if they want to change that plan to get in touch with you ASAP.

5. What should I take to work every day when we don’t have assigned desks?

Currently, we have all have our own offices (lucky we know) but for several months we will be temporarily moving to cubes in a hoteling set-up, Since we will only be in our cubes a few days a week, none of them will be assigned. All of the hardware will be provided for us, and we have our own laptops.

We almost feel like we have to pack for a day trip each time we’re scheduled to be in the office, and I’m sure I won’t be the only one who gets to the office some day and says “I can’t believe I forgot THAT.” So do you, or your readers who are used to this work environment, have any tips for things that we need to remember to bring with us each day that we are used to having in our own personal offices? Rather than basic office supplies, we’re thinking more like “pain medicine, umbrella, snacks, phone charger,” and so on.

Yep, I would get a little bag that’s easy to take back and forth (ideally a stuffed sloth pencil case) and turn it into a portable version of what you might normally keep in a desk drawer if you had a permanent desk. For me that would be snacks, a charger, pens, lip balm, band-aids, hair ties, a nail file, pain meds, tampons, maybe a stain pen, and an overwhelming number of hot sauce packets. I’ll turn this over to readers for more suggestions in the comment section.

The post my manager redid my work, my boss is enraged when I talk about birds, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.

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Maybe we just spend the last 30% of the game hanging out? That's probably it.