[-] FirstCircle@lemmy.ml 18 points 2 weeks ago

The assault was one of at least 439 mass shootings in the U.S. this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit that defines mass shootings as incidents involving four or more victims.

[-] FirstCircle@lemmy.ml 16 points 2 months ago

A "quick haircut" sort of place (kind of a barber, sort of , but super-high-volume and just one worker, the owner) that I've been using for a while now has a super-annoying dark-pattern in their payment flow. They book appointments, and take in-person payments using Square. After your cut, when you're paying via their hand-held kiosk with a card, the screen shows you a bunch of huge "tip amount" buttons, and it's implied that the customer has to choose one of them, while the provider looks on, in order to finish the transaction and leave (probably not true - they've already got your CC info by that point). Guess which button is highlighted/pre-selected and front-and-center! That's right, 20%. If you want to select another tip, or no tip, you have to select another button while she watches you do so. The owner lists all prices on her square website, and it's those prices you think you'll be paying when you book an appointment online, but she still feels the need to be tipped. You KNOW that the provider/barber has configured Square to present that UI to the customer. Not quite the same as the restaurant fees scam, but it's actually more manipulative though, in my view.

[-] FirstCircle@lemmy.ml 17 points 3 months ago

I don't know what's in a rape kit but I'm guessing that there might be something that could (with luck) prevent conception in a female child who's raped. Idaho Christofascist Republicans WANT rape victims who get pregnant as a result of the rape to be forced to carry the fetus to term. That's how they exercise power and control over women, and that's one of the main things that they get off on in life. This news post is absolutely repulsive but nothing surprises me about that Christofascist hellscape called Idaho anymore.

[-] FirstCircle@lemmy.ml 14 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

“both sides” BS to not vote

I have an acquaintance, a "formerly" rabid-right-wing, anti-union, global-warming-isn't-real, they-hate-our-freedom, wealthy, fossil-fuel-family Reactionary from the western US who is doing this now. Apparently now with grown daughters and an immigrant son-in-law, Trump, formerly touted to me by this guy as "a really smart guy" and "doing some great things" (at the time, the great thing was withdrawing from the Paris accords), is not quite as palatable as before. But rather than focusing on Trump's shortcomings, it's better in the Reactionary's view to fixate instead on Biden's genocide support (while ignoring Trump's and the GOP's enthusiasm for the practice), assert that "both sides" are just a "uni-party", and throw up his hands and claim to be not voting this time around, or voting for some hopeless brain-worrmed third party candidate. Anything, anything at all, except for showing one iota of opposition to old Doddering Donald, anything but admit that you, the Reactionary, made disgusting wrong choices in the past and are about to, for all intents and purposes, make them again. The bottom line aim is that taxes remain low, dividends and capital gains remain high, and regulations, whether it be on the Environment or child labor, remain minimal. Voting for Trump directly is preferred to achieve these aims, but both-sides-ing him into office again is fine too if you need the plausible deniability because of pressure from your misguided Communist family members.

[-] FirstCircle@lemmy.ml 17 points 3 months ago

Absolutely, bring it. These LARPer pussies need to learn a lesson, one they're not getting from video games, firearm manufacturers, and their imbecile Discord blabberings. So funny to think that THEY think that everyone but them is quaking in fear of their 'civil war' talk and vague threats of violence. Nobody's afraid of them at all, nobody respects them at all, and that's not going to change, period.

[-] FirstCircle@lemmy.ml 16 points 4 months ago

When Arizona passed the legislation that allowed for private school vouchers, the program was projected to cost $65 million in 2024 and $125 million in 2025. But the most recent estimates put that cost at a staggering $940 million per year, more than 1,000 percent of the initial estimate.

The Christofascists won't be satisfied until every school is a 100% Christian-run, 100% taxpayer-funded, stone-age-war-god-ideology fascist brainwashing center.

[-] FirstCircle@lemmy.ml 18 points 5 months ago

Welp, I can see it's time to re-up as a member with the ACLU, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, the Freedom From Religion Foundation, and maybe a few more. I haven't been active in the Church:State fight since the early 2000s when GWB was kissing-up to Christofascists but the latter are really gaining momentum of late now that they have Their People in power from the SCOTUS on down to the lowliest municipal admin spot. We as a country are truly f*cked if we don't neutralize these people. I'll probably join TST too because I agree with them ideologically, they're doing some great women's health care work, and I want to make sure that I get on all the Christofascist's Lists as a certified Demonic influencer.

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Televisions that can stream platforms like Hulu or Max usually come loaded with technology that collects information on what viewers are watching, and buyers consent to have their viewing tracked when they open their new TV and click through terms of service agreements. Sometimes, data firms can connect those viewing habits to a voter’s phone or laptop via their IP address, promising a trove of information about an individual and the ability to track them across screens.

Other times, firms focus on dividing households into groups based on what they’re watching, how they use their TVs and how many campaign ads they’re seeing, which is a boon to political campaigns eager to target specific groups of voters. Connecting this data to voter files is increasingly a focus — a move that adds individual voting habits into the mix.

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Another Boeing whistleblower has stepped forward, a Senate office announced hours before the company’s CEO is set to testify Tuesday in Washington for the first time since the door plug of a 737 Max 9 blew off during an Alaska Airlines flight in January.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal’s (D-Conn.) office identified the whistleblower as Sam Mohawk, a quality assurance inspector for the planemaker in Renton, Wash. Mohawk alleges Boeing improperly tracked and stored faulty parts, and that those parts were likely installed on airplanes including the 737 Max, which is manufactured at the Renton facility.

“Mohawk has also alleged that he has been told by his supervisors to conceal evidence from the FAA, and that he is being retaliated against as result,” according to a statement from the Senate Homeland Security’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations.

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For most of his career at Spirit AeroSystems, Santiago Paredes worked at the end of the line. It was his job to catch production errors before the fuselage left the factory in Wichita, and Paredes caught a lot of them.

“It’s poor quality. Poor quality of work, just plain and simple,” he says, flipping through photos on his phone of the serious mistakes that he flagged during his dozen years as a quality inspector at Spirit.

Boeing is trying to rebuild its battered reputation for quality after a door plug blowout on a 737 Max in midair last January. The troubled plane-maker is in talks to buy Spirit AeroSystems, a key supplier that makes the fuselage for Boeing in Wichita, Kan.

“They say the correct things like they've always said,” said whistleblower Santiago Paredes. “But I know how they really are.” A clash with management

Paredes says he brought his concerns to his managers repeatedly. But they were more worried about getting fuselages out of the factory faster to keep up with Boeing’s backlog.

“They were upset for me finding defects,” Paredes said. “It was never the people that created the defects fault. It was my fault for finding it.”

It got to the point, Paredes says, that a manager ordered him in writing to essentially undercount the number of mistakes.

“They wanted me to basically falsify the documentation on the amount of defects that were being found,” Paredes said. “They were telling me to lie.”

[-] FirstCircle@lemmy.ml 17 points 5 months ago

I swear he comes across as even more senile each and every day. But ...

The rich would support this - they can only consume so much after all, and most of that would be discretionary. No more income taxes on vast incomes, stop buying imported shit, huge win for them. The chowderheads supporting Drumpf would probably be enthusiastic about such an idea too - imagining their small paychecks without that hated tax deduction box and imagining no more paying every year for that scary tax return software. And then, they lose their jobs because countries that we export to retaliate with their own tariffs. Prices on pretty much everything goes through the roof (because even domestic products have foreign supply chains), and most of the cheap shit they used to be able to afford (like electronics from China, bulk foods from overseas and (fast-)foods made with it) they can't afford now.

Meanwhile, with the economy crashing, federal receipts (both tax and tariffs) dry up and it's Government Shutdown time. All working according to the Plan. Grandma and Grandpa lose their incomes and health care and have to move in with unemployed, impoverished JimBob and the wife, which is darn near intolerable what with all the hillbilly kids being home all the time now that the schools have been shut down. Kids that are wailing about being hungry all the time just like the oldsters.

It would be fun to see what carve-outs to the tax/tariff policy they'd have, to try to keep the MIC funded. Borrowing is of course the preferred way to fund it, but nobody's going to be touching the bonds issued by an actively collapsing national government.

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submitted 5 months ago by FirstCircle@lemmy.ml to c/news@lemmy.world

Less than an hour after taking off from Phoenix on May 25th, the plane experienced an uncontrolled side-to-side yawing motion known as a Dutch roll while cruising at 32,000 feet. The pilots of Southwest flight 746 were able to regain control and the plane landed safely in Oakland, according to a preliminary report from the FAA.

“A Dutch roll is definitely not something that we like to see,” said Shem Malmquist, a commercial pilot who flies the Boeing 777 and an instructor at Florida Tech.

The Boeing 737 Max 8 jet involved in the Dutch roll incident is less than two years old. According to the FAA, a post-flight inspection revealed damage to a backup power control unit, known as a PCU. That system controls rudder movements on the plane's tail.

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For senior Boeing engineer and whistleblower Martin Bickeböller, a 37-year career at the jet maker is coming to a frustrating end.

For a decade, in complaints filed internally at Boeing as well as with the Federal Aviation Administration and Congress, Bickeböller documented significant shortfalls in Boeing’s quality control management at suppliers that build major sections of the 787 Dreamliner.

The FAA substantiated his claims in complaints in 2014 and 2021 and required Boeing to take corrective action. His latest complaint, submitted in January, alleges Boeing has not properly implemented the fixes it committed to after those earlier complaints.

Bickeböller doesn’t point to a single safety issue but rather to a systemically flawed oversight process.

He asserts that Boeing lacks control of the manufacturing processes at its suppliers to the extent that it cannot ensure — as safety regulations require — that every plane delivered meets design specifications.

Separately in January, Bickeböller filed an aviation whistleblower complaint with the U.S. Labor Department alleging that Boeing has retaliated against him.

He claims Boeing sidelined him from his central work and penalized him with lowered performance reviews.

Bickeböller, 66, earned his doctorate in theoretical nuclear physics at UW. He joined Boeing in 1987 and rose to become a technical fellow, designating him a top company engineer.

His expertise at Boeing and his central concern is what’s called “configuration control” — which means guaranteeing that any jet delivered to an airline is built exactly as designed with all parts installed correctly.

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Annabelle Jenkins walked onto the stage during her graduation ceremony from the Idaho Fine Arts Academy in the West Ada School District with a book tucked into her sleeve.

When she stood before West Ada Superintendent Derek Bub, she slipped out the book — the graphic novel of “The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood and Renee Nault — faced the audience and smiled, and handed it toward Bub. It was one of 10 books the West Ada School District had removed from libraries earlier in the school year.

Bub did not take the book. Jenkins dropped it at his feet and walked off the stage without shaking his hand.

A TikTok video she posted of the incident that night garnered over 24 million views and more than 15,000 comments.

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submitted 5 months ago by FirstCircle@lemmy.ml to c/privacy@lemmy.ml

As the week draws to a close, clients of Cencora and The Lash Group have been submitting breach notifications to state attorneys general.

The Lash Group partners with pharmaceutical companies, pharmacies, and healthcare providers to facilitate access to therapies through drug distribution, patient support and services, business analytics and technology, and other services. Their substitute notice explains that based on their investigation, personal information including personal health information was affected, “including potentially first name, last name, date of birth, health diagnosis, and/or medications and prescriptions.

With only partial numbers from some clients available, there are already 542,062 patients affected. When full numbers are revealed, the grand total for this incident will likely be significantly higher. (See UPDATE below)

Update 1: Added Johnson & Johnson entries and Abbott entry, bringing current partial total affected to 717,723 for 18 clients.

Update 2: Added Amgen, but no numbers available, so partial total remains at 717,723 but for 19 incidents.

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Trump is a fascist. But the mainstream political press doesn’t want to say it. They want to act like 2024 is just another election year.

With their obsession with horse-race coverage, political reporters tend to judge what Trump says or does by whether his words and actions will help him politically. By doing so, the press is saying that Trump’s racism, corruption, criminality, and insane abuses of power matter only so far as his electability.

There are exceptions: major news organizations, including the New York Times and the Washington Post, have done some important stories about Trump’s dictatorial plans for a second term. But those investigative stories are drowned out by the chorus of horse-race stories — sometimes published on the same days and by the same news organizations behind more substantial coverage.

The media is sleepwalking.

I’ve often wondered how the press, both in Germany and around the world, failed to see Hitler for the monster that he was before he gained power. After Trump, I think I understand.

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The bodies of four Israeli hostages were recovered from Gaza. The Israeli government intensified its attacks in the northern and southern parts of the strip, five Israeli soldiers were killed and seven more were injured by friendly fire in Jabalia, and an estimated 800,000 Palestinians have fled Rafah. The Rafah crossing remained closed, and Egypt blamed Israel for blocking aid from entering Gaza. In the West Bank, Israeli settlers looted aid trucks, destroyed food packages, and torched vehicles that they mistakenly believed were delivering aid to Palestinians, injuring drivers, two Israeli officers, and a soldier. “We do not currently assess that the Israeli government is prohibiting or otherwise restricting the transport or delivery of U.S. humanitarian assistance,” the U.S. State Department said in a report, which concluded both that Israel likely violated international law using American weapons and that there was no hard evidence that Israel violated international law. The first shipment of aid arrived through a U.S.-made floating pier off the coast of Gaza, which cost about $320 million to build. “One cabinet sends humanitarian aid convoys and the other burns them,” the Israel opposition leader Yair Lapid posted on X, criticizing Benjamin Netanyahu’s government.14 Seventeen American doctors were evacuated from a Rafah hospital, but at least three refused to leave, and another U.S. government official resigned over Biden’s response to the war. “Encourage the voluntary departure of Gaza’s residents … It is ethical! It is rational! It is right! It is the truth!” Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir said at a rally attended by thousands, including several other ministers. After pausing a single shipment of bombs, the United States government announced another $1 billion in military aid to Israel. The International Criminal Court’s prosecutor has requested arrest warrants for Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and three Hamas leaders. At a bar in Kyiv, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken performed “Rockin’ in the Free World” by Neil Young a day before announcing $2 billion in foreign aid to Ukraine. “The United States is with you, so much of the world is with you. And they’re fighting, not just for Ukraine but for the free world,” he said from the stage. “What the United States performs for the free world is not rock ’n’ roll, but some other music similar to Russian chanson,” said a Ukrainian lawmaker and former diplomat.

Iran’s president, Ebrahim Raisi, and its foreign minister, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, died in a helicopter crash, and Robert Fico, the Slovakian prime minister, was hospitalized after being shot multiple times. France declared a state of emergency in New Caledonia after a clash between voting-reform protesters and security forces in which four people were killed and more than 300 were injured. At New York University, pro-Palestine student protesters were required to complete a 49-page disciplinary workbook that included a section inspired by an episode of The Simpsons in which Lisa cheats on a test. “What, if anything, could Lisa have done or thought about to make better decisions?” the workbook asked. Columbia University faculty members passed a no-confidence vote against President Nemat Shafik over her response to student protests, and Sonoma State University’s president, Mike Lee, announced his early retirement after being placed on leave for publicizing an agreement with protesters via email. At their graduation ceremonies, Morehouse College students turned their backs on Biden, and Duke University students walked out on Jerry Seinfeld. Democratic Senator Bob Menendez blamed his wife for bribery charges at his corruption trial, and Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito blamed his wife for displaying an upside-down American flag, a symbol associated with the pro-Trump “Stop the Steal” movement and the January 6 insurrection, at their home in Virginia days before Biden’s inauguration. “Her life truly started when she began living her vocation as a wife and as a mother,” said the Kansas City Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker of his wife at a commencement speech at Benedictine College before encouraging young women to give up on having careers. Sixteen women accused the magician David Copperfield of sexual assault, and Brett Kavanaugh beat other justices in a three-mile race in Washington, D.C.

Buckingham Palace unveiled King Charles III’s first official portrait since his coronation. “It was a bit of a shock—all that red, dripped here and there and scrubbed on and scrubbed off,” one artist said of the painting, adding, “Is it the blood that has been shed as a result of British colonialism for centuries?” “Yes, you’ve got him,” was Queen Camilla’s response to the work. In Taiwan, MPs brawled after spending more than 10 hours debating legislative reforms; they pulled, shoved, punched, and tackled each other, and one ran off with the bill. Snakes bit a West Virginia politician, delayed a train in Tokyo, crashed a wedding in Arizona, and invaded an Indy 500 track, and an Australian woman chose to share her car with a red-bellied black snake after several removal attempts failed. In Germany, the world’s oldest sloth turned 54. A dog named Luna was awarded a New York City Council citation for killing more than 200 rats, and a cat named Max received a doctorate in “Litter-ature” from Vermont State University. Seven hundred and six Kyles in Kyle, Texas, failed a second attempt to break the world record for the largest same-name gathering, and more than 3,000 people in dinosaur costumes in Drumheller, Alberta, didn’t receive a Guinness World Record; organizers “weren’t entirely prepared for that many people to come.” The New York–Dublin Portal was shut down after an OnlyFans model flashed it. “I thought the people of Dublin deserved to see my two New York, homegrown potatoes,” she said in an Instagram video. In Texas, 50,000 pounds of potatoes were given away after an anonymous donation.

[-] FirstCircle@lemmy.ml 20 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Cowart was held on a $37,000 bond before being released from jail the same night.

TF, she walked free and presumably is free currently? I guess this behavior is no big deal in TN.

[-] FirstCircle@lemmy.ml 18 points 1 year ago

I was wondering that too. Never heard any MAGA types talking about Biden's nose before. I have to say I find it amusing that the Orange Child is exhibiting his fixation on certain bits of Biden's anatomy and expressing a strong desire to put his hands thereon. Homonasal desires today; tomorrow ...?

[-] FirstCircle@lemmy.ml 17 points 1 year ago

The fact that we have a world that is still so controlled by religions is disgusting.

Especially religions that provide absolutely zero Slack for your money. "Bob" is my savior, and he can be yours too, for a price. Terms and Conditions apply. Not available in stores.

[-] FirstCircle@lemmy.ml 22 points 1 year ago

Mr. Putin, meet Lieutenant Columbo, from the LAPD. He'd like to have a few words with you Sir. Just a few questions about this tragic accident involving an acquaintance of yours, a Mr. Prigozhin. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PyfywQ98dIU

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FirstCircle

joined 2 years ago