March 2024, the article date, is while Biden was still president. Trump got elected in November 2024 and did not become president until January 20, 2025 at noon.

I can’t stand Trump but this TRACON move to Philly was done on Biden’s watch (and that of SecTrans Buttigieg and VP Harris.}

Then Trump will just federalize the New Jersey National Guard. Which presidents can do. Putting the Guard directly under Trump’s (really SecDef Pete Hegseth’s) control, making the governor’s orders invalid. Removes the governor from the Guard’s chain of command.

That’s an existing presidential power as Commander-in-Chief. In better times used by a president to take over the Alabama National Guard to enforce anti-segregation federal law and protect a little black girl going to school. Now may be used by a mad king racist fascist to ensure nobody protects vulnerable brown and black people.

I’m afraid that my country the US is entering a dictatorship similar to the 1973-85 dictadura in Uruguay. Even about 40 years later, when I (stupidly) left there, I could see the political and social PTSD from it. Along with Uruguayans being “never again with that horror” from there successful transition to one of the strongest democracies in the Americas.

The big difference is, instead of being a “civic-military” dictatorship, the US is beginning a “civic-techbro” dictatorship.

The military will follow along later. Much of the enlisted, non-officer troops are pro-Trump. Even some officers are.

Source: immediate relative who is a sergeant in the US Army. He is horrified by the Trump supporters in his unit.

Others have explained why Chinese ownership of Opera might be bad.

I suggest you try the Vivaldi browser which is made by a company started by the co-founder & CEO of the original Opera. Basically builds upon the heritage and philosophy of the original Opera. Extremely customizable, tracker and ad blocking built in along with speed dials, gestures, UI customization of just about everything.

Has desktop for all platforms including Linux, and mobile for Android and iOS with sync (not going through Google) for all platforms.

Optional email, calendar, Mastodon and RSS clients in the desktop versions. Optional email account and Mastodon account accessible from any standard client and the Web, or via their desktop.

Not fully open source (nor is Opera) and built on the same open source Chromium base as Opera, Brave, Chrome, but seriously de-Googleized and does not use the Chromium UI. Will continue to support ad blocking even after Google/Chromium removal of the interfaces for ad blocking extensions. Yet desktop versions do allow installation of extensions from the Chrome/Chromium extension store.

Edit: fix link and some grammar

I like UMCOR (United Methodist Committee On Relief) and as a member of that (mostly) progressive, non-fundamentalist denomination I do give to them at times.

But I feel it’s important to let folks here know that a) UMCOR is the relief agency of a Christian church, because some may not want to donate through a religious agency; b) their international relief is not solely targeted at Gaza or Gaza+Israel; and c) some of its works are targeted there:

Long-time UMCOR partner International Blue Crescent (IBC) serving food to earthquake victims at the Kilis Community Center in Turkey. The community center is serving as a major hub for coordination and relief efforts, including cross-border response into Syria. UMCOR has provided an initial solidarity grant to IBC to provide basic supplies to earthquake victims UMCOR and its partners are responding to disasters across the globe every day. Please join us in prayer for the affected areas and consider giving to UMCOR International Disaster Response to support these efforts.

War in Israel/Gaza

Please join us in offering continued prayers for safety, comfort and peace for those in the Holy Land.

To date, UMCOR has awarded five emergency grants to local partners in Israel and Gaza. Partners are using funds for relocation support, food and hygiene kits for internally displaced people, psychosocial treatment and trauma counseling to women and children, and telemedicine services for disabled children in need of follow-up care, but without safe access to a clinic. We will provide additional updates as other grants are awarded.

In early October, Global Ministries issued a joint statement on the attacks with the World Methodist Council and the Methodist Church in the United Kingdom. On Friday, Nov. 11, The Council of Bishops of The United Methodist Church issued a call for peace. On Monday, Nov. 13, Global Ministries General Secretary Roland Fernandes joined Churches for Middle East Peace and thirty American Christian leaders in calling for support of an immediate ceasefire, de-escalation and restraint by all involved.

You can give to UMCOR’s international disaster response and recovery efforts at: https://advance.umcmission.org/p-641-umcor-international-disaster-response-and-recovery.aspx[https://advance.umcmission.org/p-641-umcor-international-disaster-response-and-recovery.aspx](https://advance.umcmission.org/p-641-umcor-international-disaster-response-and-recovery.aspx).

(update as of Nov. 28, 2023)

Even before anything else, you should change your DNS from your ISP to one of the many third party, respected, fast resolvers. Clooudflare 1.1.1.1, Quad9 9.9.9.9, both do not log and are free. There are many others.

I use the paid $1.99 USD/mo NextDNS with malware-only blocking on my router, and malware, ads, trackers blocking on my Android devices, Linux desktop and Windows desktop.

Mastodon, Lemmy, Bookwrym.

Spending more time on Lemmy than Mastodon lately.