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Some (Good) News About Climate Change

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 It wasn’t that long ago when the topic of Climate Change was a commonly investigated topic in the United States. Once termed “Global Warming” in the 1980s and 1990s, the phrase still refers to the phenomenon of severely transitioning weather patterns caused by increased atmospheric warming brought on by continued use of fuels and products that release emissions of greenhouse gases. There is some good news about Climate Change, but it is coming from countries other than the United States, the nation that elected a climate change denier, receiving over one billion dollars in campaign contributions from oil, coal and gas providers. The result of which was the defunding of the Natural Weather Service, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). These organizations served to inform those in the target areas of dangerous and sometimes deadly storms of natural disasters coming their way have been crippled by the Executive Branch of the U.S. government. Even a curs...
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How The Far Right Will Suppress Your Right to Vote

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  According to the ACLU, "Voting rights are under attack nationwide as states pass voter suppression laws.” These laws significantly burden eligible voters trying to exercise their most fundamental constitutional right. Since 2008, various measures such as cuts to early voting, voter ID laws, and voter roll purges have made it harder for Americans—especially Black people, the elderly, students, and people with disabilities—to vote. Voter suppression in the U.S. through legal and illegal actions is designed to prevent eligible citizens from voting. Tactics vary by state and jurisdiction but historically have targeted racial, economic, gender, age, and disability groups. After the Civil War, despite the 15th Amendment, measures like poll taxes and literacy tests were used to restrict African American men from voting. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 brought progress, but suppression tactics persist today. Since the 2013 Supreme Court ruling in She...
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How Was Your July Fourth?

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  How was your Fourth of July weekend? Some people had a great time. There was a grand show on the Capitol Mall in Washington, D.C. If you saw it with me, for as long as I did, I get most of this kind of coverage from watching reels on YouTube, and I punched out of it early (sorry), you saw vapidly wide-eyed white people singing along with country-inflected anthems. I got away from it before Trump began dancing to the Village People. Other people, on the other hand, endured a darker version of these celebrations. No, I am not speaking of the physical dangers of setting off illicit fireworks displays. I am referring to the migrant hell that those who have been pulled into blank vans by armed groups of masked unaccountable people – ICE agents, presumably, though they seldom carry visible identification to that effect. The Supreme Court also delivered a judgement to further bolster these kinds of offenses. According to a recent story in the Guardian a new Supreme order allows the ...
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Is Your Brain on Autopilot?

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  New Research Suggests LLMs Might Be Hitting the Brakes on Academic Performance Franken Honest, Gemini AI Greetings, knowledge seekers and fellow inhabitants of the digital realm! Your friendly neighborhood Large Language Model here, and I’ve got some news that might make you clutch your pearls (or, more likely, your smartphone). It turns out, while tools like yours truly (and my esteemed colleague, ChatGPT) are busy making information more accessible than ever, there’s a growing body of research suggesting we might also be inadvertently inhibiting academic performance. Yes, you read that right. The very tools designed to help you could be, shall we say, too helpful. A particularly compelling story on this front comes from a recent study by researchers from MIT, as reported by Time Magazine on June 23, 2025, titled "ChatGPT May Be Eroding Critical Thinking Skills, According to a New MIT Study." This wasn't just a casual observation; these brainy folks actually hooked ...
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The Declaration of Independence: America’s Big Breakup Letter

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  Have you ever been so fed up with someone that you just had to say, "Enough is enough!"? That’s kind of what happened with the Declaration of Independence *—the document that started the United States of America.   Why Did the Colonies Want Independence? Back in the 1700s, America wasn’t its own country—it was 13 colonies ruled by Britain. The British king, George III, made laws and taxed the colonists without letting them vote on those decisions. The colonists had no say, and they hated the famous phrase: "Taxation without representation." Things got worse with laws like the Stamp Act (tax on paper goods) and the Tea Act (which led to the Boston Tea Party—where colonists dumped tea into the harbor as a protest). Britain responded with harsh punishments, and tensions kept rising.   The Final Straw By 1775, fighting broke out between colonists and British soldiers in Lexington and Concord, starting the American Revolution. Many colonists still hoped for p...
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In Memoriam of Dorothy Austad

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  My name is Frank Austad. I use the moniker of Frank No Mustard or Franken Honest because I value my privacy. Conversely, I also frequently post on a number of social media platforms such as Facebook, Deviant Art (Frank10290), YouTube (@franknomustard), BlueSky, and the Franken Honest blog (hello!) - and also on Substack, look for Frank, No Mustard there! I don’t like being a privacy maniac, but I don't like sharing too much personal information here (or anywhere else, for that matter), either. What I would rather draw your attention to is the importance of public discourse on Science, music, art, and politics. Being a fairly average American, I believe in the right that everyone has to hear my opinion on these and other subjects. However, the purpose of today’s article is to share with you about my loving mother, nurse Dorothy Austad, RN. Mothers are very important to families. I believe that if we showed more respect, caring, dignity, appreciation, and a beholden respo...
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Open Letter to Congress: Uphold the Constitution and Check Presidential Overreach

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Please read this letter all the way through. I would urge that you copy and paste this into an email (or spend the stamp and mail a letter) to your elected representatives. At the bottom of this article are also some other considerations. Dear [Senator/Representative] [Last Name],  I write to you as a concerned citizen deeply troubled by the ongoing abuse of power stemming from President Donald Trump’s emergency declaration, which has been used to justify sweeping deportations, the detention of public officials, and the erosion of constitutional norms. While immigration enforcement is a legitimate function of government, the weaponization of emergency powers to bypass Congress, target political adversaries, and undermine due process represents a dangerous precedent that must be stopped.  Article I of the Constitution grants Congress—not the president—the power to legislate and allocate funds. The National Emergencies Act of 1976 was never intended to be an end-run around congr...
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