Richard Stallman

Richard Stallman's Political Notes -

Punishing 12 countries peoples en masse - 2025-06-08T02:38:42+00:00

The bully has returned to his favorite theme: banning people from various countries from traveling to the US at all.

This is foolish and unjust because the ban punishes hundreds of thousands of people, of whom perhaps a handful might do some harm.

Rupa Marya, an elite medical student, CA - 2025-06-08T02:38:42+00:00

*In late May, UCSF terminated Rupa Marya following a nine-month suspension from the elite medical school based on social media posts in which she criticized Israel’s genocide in Gaza and questioned how Zionist ideology affects health care outcomes.* The school fired her and is trying to smear her reputation. She has sued the school for this.

The article reports that the school has committed similar repression against others.

Fire danger up, FEMA down - 2025-06-08T02:38:42+00:00

Global heating has given the western US a warm spring and a high danger of wildfires. Put this together with sabotage of FEMA and the Weather Service and it spells danger.

USA attacks science and education. Why? - 2025-06-08T02:38:42+00:00

Why the wrecker attacks education, even education that Americans admire.

*Authoritarians know that if they can convince us our country has never been wrong, they can make us believe our ruler is always right.*

Pregnant in WV. What to do? - 2025-06-08T02:38:41+00:00

A prosecutor in West Virginia threatens to prosecute women who have miscarriages.

It is not safe to be pregnant in West Virginia. If you get pregnant there, move to a state that won't prosecute you, and stay away. Even if you want to have the baby, you are not safe doing that in West Virginia.

Immigrants mostly abide by local customs - 2025-06-08T02:38:41+00:00

Immigrants in the US are unlikely to commit crimes, compared with native-born citizens, and unauthorized immigrants are even less likely. But the bully is using an example of a hate crime committed by a marginally authorized immigrant as an excuse to demonize all immigrants.

Work stopped by blocking SS numbers - 2025-06-08T02:38:41+00:00

The wrecker blocked millions of recognized immigrants from working by making the Social Security Administration stop giving them social security numbers.

Musk VS Trump - 2025-06-07T14:38:43+00:00

The two would-be emperors of the US have fallen into a harsh public dispute, reminiscent of Caesar and Pompey.

They could tear up the US in their civil war.

ICC sanctions on judges, US - 2025-06-07T14:38:43+00:00

The US has put sanctions on judges of the International Criminal Court.

The US has tried to fight the ICC since around 20 years ago ever since Dubya realized that some US actions in the occupation of Iraq might be war crimes and the ICC might prosecute them.

Let's wish for a US that won't tolerate war crimes and will prosecute Americans who commit or order them. That way, the ICC would not get involved. Its mission is to prosecute criminals whose countries won't prosecute them.

Urgent: PFAS and drinking-water - 2025-06-07T14:38:43+00:00

US citizens: call on the EPA to Keep PFAS out of our water.

For background, see this.

Urgent: NO KINGS protests next weekend - 2025-06-07T08:38:54+00:00

Join the worldwide anti-Trump protest — NO KINGS — on Saturday, June 14, next weekend.

Millions of Americans have already been protesting, every weekend, sending a strong message to their representatives, but June 14 is also Flag Day and Trump's birthday.

Show the world how Democracy works.

Urgent: Restore Logan Rozos's NYU diploma - 2025-06-07T08:38:52+00:00

US citizens: call for the immediate reinstatement of Logan Rozos's diploma.

Un-American NYU punished him with shocking cruelty for stating forbidden political views.

Insectageddon - 2025-06-06T14:38:37+00:00

Even in a protected rain forest, with no pesticides, insect diversity has crashed in the last few decades. A light trap used to photograph 3,000 species in one evening. The same light trap, operated nowadays in the same way at the same season, now records a small population of few species.

Sharp population decreases are also observed in animals that eat insects.

Scientists suspect the damage is done by ecological mismatches caused by changed aspects of the climate in each place. If so, to avoid disaster we need to stop the global heating that causes the other changes.

Urgent: Veterans' medical care - 2025-06-06T14:38:36+00:00

US citizens: call on the US government to continue medical care for veterans.

US deficit VS taxing - 2025-06-06T14:38:36+00:00

Republicans are now split between their pre-bullshitter goal of reducing the deficit and the wrecker's goal of cutting taxes for the rich.

Avoiding the increase in deficit would avoid wiping out Medicare. But if the way they choose to reduce the deficit is to cut other non-military spending, that could make the disaster even worse.

Urgent: Call on Paramount to resist bully's censorship lawsuit - 2025-06-06T02:38:40+00:00

US citizens: call on Paramount to resist the bully's censorship lawsuit and let CVS defend itself.

Here's how to make the actionnetwork.org letter campaign linked above work without running the site's nonfree JavaScript code. (See https://gnu.org/philosophy/javascript-trap.html.)

First, make sure you have deactivated JavaScript in your browser or are using the LibreJS plug-in.

I have done the next step for you: I added `?nowrapper=true' to the end of the campaign URL before posting it above. That should bring you to a page that starts with, "Letter campaigns will not work without javascript!"

They indeed won't work without some manual help, but the following simple method seems adequate for many of them, including this one.

To start, fill in the personal information answers in the box on the right side of the page. That's how you say who's sending the letter.

Then click the "START WRITING" button. That will take you to a page that can't function without nonfree JavaScript code. (To ensure it doesn't function perversely by running that nonfree code, you can enable LibreJS or disable JavaScript by visiting that page.) You can finish sending without that code By editing its URL in the browser's address bar, as follows:

First, go to the end and insert `&nowrapper=true'. Then tell the browser to visit that URL. This should give you a version of the page that works without JavaScript. Edit the subject and body of your letter. Finally, click on the "SEND LETTER" button, and you're done.

This method seems to work for letter campaigns that send the letters to a fixed list of recipients, the same recipients for every sender. Editing and revisiting the URL is the only additional step needed to bypass the nonfree JavaScript code. I'm sure you'll agree it is a small effort for the result of supporting the campaign without opening your computer to unjust (and potentially malicious) software.

Urgent: Call on Chief Justice Roberts to stand up for judges - 2025-06-06T02:38:40+00:00

US citizens: call on Chief Justice Roberts to stand up for judges against the bully's campaign of demonization.

Google search summaries of medical web sites - 2025-06-06T02:38:40+00:00

Google search allows its bullshit generator to summarize some web sites instead of just directing users to the site. When it does this for medical web sites, the summaries are often inaccurate, and this can be dangerous.

It is a mistake to call these errors "hallucinations" because that presumes the LLM tries to understand the site's text and the supposed summary that it constructs. It does not understand either of them, because its mechanism does not understand the semantics of anything.

Hong Kong supporters of democracy released from prison - 2025-06-06T02:38:40+00:00

Some prominent Hong Kong supporters of democracy have been released at the end of the four-year prison sentence they received for advocating democracy and trying to practice it.

TikTok is bad for mental health advice - 2025-06-06T02:38:40+00:00

TikTok is a bad place to get mental health advice.

*The experts established that 52 out of 100 videos offering advice on dealing with trauma, neurodivergence, anxiety, depression and severe mental illness contained some misinformation…*

This is in addition to various other kinds of dangerous misinformation and disinformation. And the whole thing is based on running a nonfree client program that surely tracks each user's activities. It may do other nasty things too — nonfree software generally does.

TikTok influencers and their misleading medical claims.

Hegseth calls on Asia to boost military spending - 2025-06-06T02:38:39+00:00

*Hegseth calls on Asia to boost military spending in face of "imminent" threat from China.*

China is certainly expansionist and repressive. Whether Xi aims to conquer and subjugate other countries, aside from Taiwan, I don't know. China's navy is already trying to muscle in on their territory, though not as grossly as the bully does in Mexico and Central America.

Turning to the US for support would be a natural thing for China's neighbors to do, and several are already doing it. Their problem is that the wrecker has made it clear that the US government under the power of the bully does not respect any soft of commitment; he has even threatened war against US allies such as Denmark to seize Greenland. Australia's government is starting to doubt whether the agreed-on purchase of submarines from the US is safe.

Texas thugs searched license plate cameras of other states - 2025-06-06T02:38:39+00:00

Texas thugs searched records of license plate cameras of various other states, looking for a women who (they suspected) might be seeking an opportunity for an abortion.

These records were copied and stored by a company which makes them conveniently accessible to thugs from Texas.

Letter Ramon Morales-Reyes appeared to have signed - 2025-06-06T02:38:39+00:00

Ramon Morales-Reyes appeared to have signed a letter threatening to assassinate the corrupter. Noem found this an ideal example to prove how vicious immigrants are, and rushed to present it to the press. Then it turned that he didn't write, sign or send the letter.

The magats are in the habit of circulating accusations without checking them, and nowadays some of their carelessness becomes visible.

US Jews protested at Columbia - 2025-06-06T02:38:39+00:00

US Jews protested at Columbia University against the university's repression carried in the name of "fighting antisemitism".

Right wing leaders tout riches of repressive countries - 2025-06-06T02:38:39+00:00

Leaders of the plutocratist right-wing tout the riches of the rich people of countries such as Salafi Arabia, Dubai and China, without a word of about their repression. The danger is that they will teach young people in the west that that those riches are the thing to admire.

US border thugs taking genetic samples of non-citizens - 2025-06-06T02:38:39+00:00

The US border thugs are taking genetic samples of pretty much every non-citizen entering the US who they stop and "detain".

Amazon Echo devices now sending all audio to Amazon servers - 2025-06-06T02:38:38+00:00

Amazon arbitrarily decided to make all Echo devices send all the audio they hear to Amazon servers. The server will figure out what (if anything) someone asked it to do.

What else will it do with that recording? There are no limits except management's will. It might save some of the utterances what it hears and present them years later to the political police.

It will also make this available to the persecutor's political police.

The FBI and Big Ag treat Animal Rights Activists as Terrorists - 2025-06-06T02:38:38+00:00

*How the FBI and Big Ag Started Treating Animal Rights Activists as Terrorists.

These activists induce fear … of unfavorable but accurate publicity. This should not be treated as a crime. Businesses are not morally entitled to privacy in the way human beings are.

Israeli strikes on Gaza schools used as civilian shelters - 2025-06-06T02:38:38+00:00

*Israeli strikes on Gaza schools used as civilian shelters part of deliberate strategy, say sources.*

Karratha gas plant in Australia - 2025-06-06T02:38:38+00:00

In Australia, the Karratha Gas Plant's main activity is contributing to global heating and the consequent likely fall of civilization, but it has a secondary effect: releasing emissions that degrade the 50,000-year-old rock art (plus other rock art that is less old) in the surrounding Murujuga area.

UNESCO would like to designate that art as a World Heritage site, but there is an objection: World Heritage sites are supposed to be protected. Australia's response is to pressure UNESCO to make an exception there.

Meta stops asking experts to judge whether changes are safe. - 2025-06-06T02:38:37+00:00

Meta has decided to stop asking human experts to judge whether changes in the behavior of its systems could cause harm to human users. Instead it will use some sort of "artificial intelligence" system to determine whether a change is safe enough for actual use.

We could imagine a truly intelligent program that would fully understand human psychology and could make such judgments as well as the most capable humans. But there is no reason to assume that whatever system Meta has designed is as wise as that.

On the contrary, since Meta will not have to convince anyone else to test how well this system makes such judgments, Meta has every incentive to skimp on the design, so that the system would disregard some possible problems and systematically give grades that are too high.

Censorship of US doctors, scientists - 2025-06-05T20:38:31+00:00

The persecutor has imposed political censorship on veterans' doctors and scientists' publications about medicine.

Cutting public funding divides citizens - 2025-06-05T20:38:31+00:00

*Parks, libraries, museums: here's why [the bully] is attacking America's best-loved institutions.

Most of these institutions suffer the damage without casting blame on the one responsible — so he gets away without a penalty. Even if there is nothing more you can do, never cease to cast the blams!

Wilderness protections removed, AK - 2025-06-05T20:38:31+00:00

Planet-roaster officials plan to allow oil drilling in the National Petroleum Reserve.

This is bad because (1) it means additional greenhouse gas emissions, (2) it would destroy an important de-facto wildlife reserve, and (3) because the petroleum there is being saved for some possible future pressing need.

War tech, CHI - 2025-06-05T08:38:30+00:00

China has built peculiar, innovative bridge-landing ships for invading Taiwan. They are designed to land vehicles onto roads at some distance from the shore, where there is no beach, by deploying a bridge extending across the land's edge to the road.

I hope Taiwan is getting Ukraine's guidance in making maritime drones to attack naval ships with.

No-fault divorce VS covenant marriage - 2025-06-05T08:38:29+00:00

US Christians seek to make divorce more difficult, for couples that have a special kind of marriage called "covenant marriage." Such marriages impose extra hoops to jump through in order to qualify for divorce.

If people make that choice after due thought, I don't think that is a disaster. But many people will be pressured in the name of religion into choosing this sort of marriage.

Capturing Israeli war criminals - 2025-06-05T08:38:29+00:00

The Hind Rajab Foundation calls on various countries' governments to pursue Israeli war criminals who visit those countries.

Urgent: Stand with Harvard - 2025-06-04T20:38:28+00:00

US citizens: call on the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities to stand by Harvard in its refusal to submit to the bully.

Senator: Well, we are all going to die - 2025-06-04T20:38:28+00:00

Republican Senator Joni Ernst did not quite say it is of no importance whether her constituents live or die. Rather, she made a pedantic quip about careless wording in a constituent's criticism of the substance of her position.

The criticism's intended point was that the Medicaid exclusions she supports would leave many unable to afford medical treatment, and that would cause some of them to die much sooner.

Fewer trained professionals for US - 2025-06-04T20:38:28+00:00

*Proposal to limit student loans for "professional programs" risks driving people away from medicine, critics say.*

The magats figure that after big spending cuts on medical treatment for the poor, the US will employ fewer doctors and nurses.

Human aid as a crime - 2025-06-04T20:38:27+00:00

The persecutor's henchmen claim that providing temporary aid to border-crossers is a crime, and threaten to prosecute the people who do so.

Supreme Court on climate-chaos lawsuits - 2025-06-04T02:38:30+00:00

The US Supreme Court ruled that cities can sue oil companies in state courts for the damages from global heating.

As the article says, these lawsuits' judgments won't be able to repay the cost of the damages done by global heating. All the money in the world won't be able to do that. We have to hope it will lead to a political decision to decarbonize.

Urgent: Rep. LaMonica McIver V DOJ - 2025-06-04T02:38:30+00:00

US citizens: call on the Department of Justice to drop all charges against Rep. LaMonica McIver, She was arrested trying to demand answers about a deportation, along with the mayor of Newark, New Jersey.

Recognizing ecocide as a crime - 2025-06-04T02:38:30+00:00

*Classing grievous acts of environmental harm as crimes against peace may hold states and corporations to account.*

As with crimes against humanity, the hard part will be to overcome the ways they use their power to make governments protect them — and protect their crimes too.

I question whether it is wise to include "of a given territory" in the definition of ecocide. The biggest ecocides now in progress cause damage around the world, but that fact should not exclude them from being considered ecocide.

Mahmoud Khalil letter from SLV prison - 2025-06-04T02:38:30+00:00

*My name is Mahmoud Khalil and I am a political prisoner.*

He published that article over two months ago. It reflects the American ideals of freedom and democracy.

He is still in jail now.

Greenpeace free speech right to protest - 2025-06-04T02:38:30+00:00

A court in North Dakota ruled that Greenpeace must pay hundreds of millions of dollars in damages for protesting against the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline.

The fossil fuels transported in that pipeline will increase and hasten the damage caused to nearly everyone by global heating disaster. If that leads to the collapse of civilization and the death of most humans, there will be no way to measure the damages Energy Transfer is liable for, nor to collect them from what remains of that company, nor to pay them to the descendants of the dead.

DOGe employees in COI as privateers - 2025-06-03T14:38:51+00:00

*[DOPE] employees hold stock in firms set to benefit from cuts, Democrats allege.*

When officials know they won't be prosecuted for corruption, they often turn to corruption. The DOPE's slogan could be "Corruption Я Us." I wonder if the corrupter will ask Putin for official Russian permission to use the letter Я.

Urgent: Explicit tariff taxes - 2025-06-03T14:38:51+00:00

US citizens: call on several major US stores to state on product labels how much of the price is due to the bully's tariff decrees.

Here's how to make the actionnetwork.org letter campaign linked above work without running the site's nonfree JavaScript code. (See https://gnu.org/philosophy/javascript-trap.html.)

First, make sure you have deactivated JavaScrupt in your browser or are using the LibreJS plug-in.

I have done the next step for you: I added `?nowrapper=true' to the end of the campaign URL before posting it above. That should bring you to a page that starts with, "Letter campaigns will not work without JavaScript!"

They indeed won't work without some manual help, but the following simple method seems adequate for many of them, including this one.

To start, fill in the personal information answers in the box on the right side of the page. That's how you say who's sending the letter.

Then click the "START WRITING" button. That will take you to a page that can't function without nonfree JavaScript code. (To ensure it doesn't function perversely by running that nonfree code, you can enable LibreJS or disable JavaScript by visiting that page.) You can finish sending without that code By editing its URL in the browser's address bar, as follows:

First, go to the end and insert `&nowrapper=true'. Then tell the browser to visit that URL. This should give you a version of the page that works without JavaScript. Edit the subject and body of your letter. Finally, click on the "SEND LETTER" button, and you're done.

This method seems to work for letter campaigns that send the letters to a fixed list of recipients, the same recipients for every sender. Editing and revisiting the URL is the only additional step needed to bypass the nonfree JavaScript code. I'm sure you'll agree it is a small effort for the result of supporting the campaign without opening your computer to unjust (and potentially malicious) software.

Feeding the troll - 2025-06-03T14:38:50+00:00

Robert Reich: the corrupter is still a threat, but we can see that the tide is turning against him.

Revenge on Harvard - 2025-06-03T14:38:50+00:00

*[The persecutor]’s revenge spree on Harvard echoes well beyond education. Attacks on the university make clear that [his henchmen's] administration will wield its power against anyone who incurs its displeasure