Martha Carlson

Pic from outcrop at Petrified Forest National Park

Looking out over the most east entrance to the Petrified Forest National Park

Pulled of 40/66 to take a picture of the Arizona landscape. This area has a ton of old tourist stops

Looking ready to turn in at Tucumcari NM Blue Swallow Motel, a vintage Route 66 stop. It has new owners since 2020, coincidentally from the Chicago burbs

I grew up in the San Jacinto Valley (CA) and even tho I left it 40+ years ago, the desert colors, people and landscape still make my heart feel most spacious. Spent the last 4 days driving parts of my parents’ belongings here to IL with extra time in AZ and NM. Pics for those who’ve never been

This seems like a good time to remind my fellow Illinoisans to NOT vote for Raja.

For The New York Times to choose to publish Jesse Singal today, of all times, is a choice to attack trans people, to make them even more vulnerable while they are already under attack. It is an appalling abdication of the Times’s journalistic duties.

Former Senator Bob Kerrey Resigns From Nebraska Start-Up Amid Epstein Emails

“I will offer no defense of my meetings with Jeffrey Epstein,” Mr. Kerrey said. “If I knew then what I know now, I would not have said yes to a meeting.”

The meetings in question, were after Epsteins first arrest.

#SheShed #EpsteinFiles

www.nytimes.com/2026/02/25/u...

Cover of A Field Guide to Getting Lost by Rebecca Solnit

Exactly what I needed. @rebeccasolnit.bsky.social from 2005

Black cat curled up in a ball covering eyes

Much of this was only superficially understood by me but lol how little these tech guys understand actual people

Simply horrific. What are we becoming?

And yet, every day, our most prominent Democratic politicians, scholars, public intellectuals, universities & university leaders, & other civil society organizations continue to use his platform as their primary social media outlet. One cannot help but notice this & draw conclusions.

So when thousands of women (and children) were being duplicated--including in non-consensual AI porn--it was no big deal. But it took "only a 15-sec clip" of these two famous white men to draw outrage and fear. Gotcha. Cool cool.

“Earth is a pleasure cruise for 1000 people and we're all just the staff.”

It's unchartered, but we can see the terrain: the territory ahead includes masked secret police taking people to concentration camps but not new vaccines. That's our reward for a system in which fewer than 20 people, all of them deranged and malicious, control over $3 trillion.

Chicago teen who battled cancer while fighting for father's release from ICE detention dies Ofelia Giselle Torres Hidalgo, 16, was diagnosed in 2024 with a rare soft tissue cancer. Her father, Ruben Torres Maldonado, a Mexican immigrant, was detained in mid-October and ordered released later...

Chicago teen who battled cancer while fighting for father's release from ICE detention dies

Reporting by Elleiana Green: chicago.suntimes.com/immigration/...

Congresswoman Lateefah Simon on the poorly written Save Act. Unfortunately, the House doesn’t get it. Call your Senators.
📞 (202) 224-3121

Swear to god, ICE could just announce they're leaving a city but not leave and the media will just stop covering that city completely even though ICE never left.

It's what ICE and the media did with LA and they're doing it with Minneapolis too

Here's a problem with TrumpRx I'm looking at now. Some of these drugs have generic equivalents which means getting the generic w/ insurance or via cash pay w/ something like cost plus drugs should be cheaper even with a brand discount. So far I've found 6 drugs but am still going through the list.

After 6am this morning in Whittier, Minneapolis—FOUR BLOCKS from where Pretti was murdered.

18 agents with Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) markings smashed an apartment window, ran in, and came out with one man.

The dude who rented out the city of Venice for his wedding just fired a third of WAPO staff to save money. If you use or consume Amazon products you are helping an inglorious asshole become richer.

Awful stuff from @uofilsystem.bsky.social College Republicans. These are students who at a minimum should be censored. I hope the school finds the courage to act

Some jawdropping CBP crime statistics here...

A statement from Sahan Journal, Minnesota Star Tribune, Minnesota Public Radio, Minnesota Reformer, Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder, Center for Broadcast Journalism and Minnesota Newspaper Association:

Whatever we’re doing, it’s not enough.

"You have to use it. You have to trust it.": Forced Adoption of AI is The Subtext of Davos Authoritarianism is the AI Bailout; But If AI Doesn't Need a Bailout, Does it Need Authoritarianism?

‘They are no longer strategizing for voluntary adoption by those who come to recognize the technology’s utility by electively applying it to the problems they face. They are planning how to cross the chasm by forced adoption.’

By @mattseybold.bsky.social

TAPPER: They're asking for voter roll information after the death of Alex Pretti. What was it like to see that letter?

SIMON: It was really deeply disturbing. Literally hours after the second killing of a citizen in Minneapolis by ICE agents, there's this ransom note

The fact that the regime is executing citizens in the street and then asking for lists of citizens who voted against them might raise a few alarm bells.

Just going to say they ask “who is hidden?” so tagging @faceofstage4.bsky.social @thelmaperrybrown.bsky.social @projectlifembc.bsky.social

All I have ever heard about every news story from Bill Clinton to drag shows is “it’s awful, parents have to explain this to their children, why can’t we just let kids be kids?”

Now an entire classroom is going to go home to parents trying to explain why their five year friend was taken by the govt

For those outside the Twin Cities, the person posting this GoFundMe is a member of Minneapolis city council (and among the many locals doing absolutely heroic resistance to ICE), so it's legit.

This line graph illustrates the percentage change in agency staff levels from the previous year for nine major U.S. federal scientific and health organizations between the fiscal years 2016 and 2025. The agencies tracked include the CDC, Department of Energy, EPA, FDA, NASA, NIH, NIST, NOAA, and NSF. For the majority of the timeline between 2016 and 2023, the agencies show relatively stable fluctuations, generally staying within a range of +5% to -5% change per year. However, there is a dramatic and uniform plummet starting in the 2024–25 period. Every agency depicted shows a sharp downward trajectory, with staffing losses ranging from approximately -15% to over -25%. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) shows the most significant decline, dropping to roughly -26%, while the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) shows the least severe but still substantial drop at approximately -15%.

This is the most astonishing graph of what the Trump regime has done to US science. They have destroyed the federal science workforce across the board. The negative impacts on Americans will be felt for generations, and the US might never be the same again.

www.nature.com/immersive/d4...

If we continue to compromise with people whose stated goal is to destroy NIH, then we will not be successful in saving it.