‘Did you have pet lions growing up?’

I like to think of it as encouraging you to advocate for single-payer yourselves, but yeah, very aware how fortunate we are. ;) 

Thirded as a Australian. I hate taxtime, being on the line between two brackets, but I never begrudge the levy for Medicare, which is a universal single-payer system, cause I know it’s paying for vulnerable people to get vital care (which lately has included me - I’d be screwed without it and the PBS.)

kay, I gotta ask, does fruitcake mean fruitcake or is it one of those weird British slang words, it’s gonna bug me all day.

Dude, what? I’m 35, and she looks like my mums older sister who smokes.

It’s not like it’s hard, people. You wash your hands BEFORE handling food and AFTER handling anything that could harbour germs, like bodily secretions or raw meat or children (kids are the worst). And wash means you SCRUB like a surgeon (palms, backs, between fingers, under nails) and DRY your hands - not vaguely…

Purple potatoes make awesome next-day salads (ie roast a pan with dinner to turn into tomorrow’s lunch). Mix with other brights like corn, radish, capsicum, yum.

That’s my shopping list, dammit.

Just FYI, in Aus, where we have single-payer, a ventolin inhaler is about $7. Serotide is $40 retail, about $34 PBS (govt pharmaceutical scheme price) and concession price is $6.30 ($5.30 at some discount places). And there’s safety net schemes if your pharmacy expenses go over a certain amount each year.

Meh, probably some shmuck assistant manager from the golf course. The Secret Service doesn’t have the money to send one of their own guys and leave the detail a man short (tho no doubt the charge for the truck and the shmuck’s time will turn up on their budget).

Is there any info on how pregnant women are getting put into custody in the first place? Is it just coincidence?

My fave author once said, a [sex worker] should be judged like any other professional - is her service good? [etc]. No false morality, no sex-is-sin, it’s just another job. It took me years to unpack the unspoken privilege underlying the quote - the assumptions that the work is chosen, not forced, that the worker is…

The Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse issued its final report on Friday. The stories of the victims are horrific, but the actual abuse pales next to the systemic silence, coverups, and victim blaming that allowed the abusers to continue virtually unchecked for decades.

Am ded. Needs more stars.

I am wondering, (if we disregard those who only vote Republican, and/or only vote anti-abortion), whether these white women are basing their vote:

I’m curious - when I get my tax return from the Australian Tax Office, along with my individual return I get a page that summarises where my money actually goes - this much to health, this much to defence etc, according to that year’s federal budget. Similar information is available online, if you know where to look…

My dad picked his cat the same way - small town caravan park, either abandoned or got lost, cause he was litter trained and knew what a plastic food dish was. Been travelling together in the camper ten years now.

Worth a search thru your local secondhand bookshop. I read a lot of golden age scifi and pulps - American culture really hasn’t changed much since the thirties, i’m constantly amused by stuff that still applies today.

You get a star for Job. Don’t forget that Yahweh and Satan may have been gods to Alec, but to themselves they were artists. (And Yahweh was the only artist to use the concept of ‘worship’ in his art.)

I like it! And it works for a boy or a girl!