A reminder to the news media: “conflicting accounts” is what you say BEFORE the incontrovertible video evidence appears. After that, your job is to ask why one side is lying, not to repeat the lie and pretend no one knows the truth.

This is becoming a very long January.

My latest story on Substack.

My latest story is about a city’s Christmas tree tradition.

There’s nothing quite like a reading nook. It took letting go of a few things to make room for it, but I now have a chair, pretty foot rest, small table, lamp, and cozy blanket set up in my room. After a long work day, I’m now ready to reeeelaxxxx.

My latest story for WestSound Magazine.

My latest story for Gig Harbor Now.

A local group called Thriving Generation, organized by educators, faith leaders and medical professionals, is trying to encourage kids to put down their phones and interact IRL. A campaign kickoff event is scheduled for Oct. 10 at Gateway Park. www.gigharbornow.org/news/educati...

BREAKING: Our client Mario Guevara, an Emmy-winning journalist detained by ICE in retaliation for livestreaming law enforcement activity, will be deported tomorrow to El Salvador. Mario and his family are being punished for his reporting. This cruelty is meant to stifle our free press.

Katharine Graham’s father bought The Washington Post in 1933. These 7 principles have basically been the bedrock of journalism, and still are for many. But, I wonder what she and her father would think of that paper now?

A refugees memories of Voice of America. What Trump is doing is monstrous.

REVEALED: we identified the operator of an overtly racist X account, "GlomarResponder," as ICE Assistant Chief Counsel James Rodden, based on an overwhelming number of biographical details matched through publicly available documents, other social media activity, and courtroom observation.

With Handmaids Tale people focus on the shock of the mass rapes in the book and the show. But how the regime came to be in power in that book keeps me awake at night because it is playing out in very intricate detail in our real lives right now.

Don’t you just love how the people who wanted school open during the pandemic think we don’t need a Department of Education?

SCOOP: A US Treasury threat intelligence analysis has designated DOGE staff an ‘insider threat'. An internal email reviewed by WIRED calls DOGE staff's access to federal payments systems “the single biggest insider threat risk the Bureau of the Fiscal Service has ever faced.”

Feel kind of like I did on 9/11. Am I supposed to write, and work, while the country is under attack? Except this time I’m not in an office, surrounded by co-workers feeling the same emotions. God help us all.

If you are looking for a good coming-of-age memoir that explores the many intricacies of family heritage, pain, and triumph, Both Sides of Then, by Jennifer Griffith delivers.

Jan. 4, 1925: Italy's Fascist regime gives police prefects orders to close down opposition newspapers and clubs, a day after PM Benito Mussolini vowed to rule as a dictator. Over the next few days officers aided by Blackshirt militia will raid hundreds of houses and offices. 1/2

Goals for 2025: Remain staunch. Make it count.

I continue to be deeply moved by this statement to the heavens by President Carter.

Doing well and doing good are more synergistic than many corporations think. It's not either/or...It's both/and.

Ringing in the New Year hits differently this year.

ICYMI.

I had a Solstice party one year, and everyone brought something that they wanted to burn. We gathered in my back yard, each of us said a few words about our item, tossed it into the fire, and watched it all burn. Happy Solstice!

150 volunteers and countless donors helped provide gifts for 975 Gig Harbor-area kids as part of the Gig Harbor Peninsula FISH Toy Drive, which wrapped up this week. Story by @staunchginger.bsky.social www.gigharbornow.org/news/communi...

In South Korea, 10 days after attempting a coup d'état, president Yoon Suk Yeol is impeached. In the US, 4 years after doing the same, Trump is re-elected. The president agreed to “step aside” after parliament voted to remove him, more than 200,000 showed up to make sure he didn't challenge it.

Since B-sky is all about norms, might I suggest one? If you write a “breaking news” post about legal news you wouldn’t know about but for the work of a journalist, you should credit that person, who actually bothered to (1) check the docket, (2) pay for the doc, (3) upload it, and (4) report on it.

No one who implements AI into their business gets to be called a working class anything except enemy.

Just a note: anyone who has a felony or misdemeanor cannot be an executor of a will in Washington state. I assume the same in all states. And yet, everyone seems OK with handing over national security to someone who has multiple felonies. My poor Libra sensibilities are anguished.

It's weird that we have to keep saying "They don't care about (debt, the law, healthcare, women, regular people, etc., etc.). The object of the exercise is to burn it all down, pick over the spoils, and sell the rest for scrap. I worry that people don't understand this. They. Don't. Care.

I keep reading that this is a place for kinder people, but gentle souls have always been among us. We just couldn’t hear them anymore. Perhaps our gathering here is proof that we missed those voices. What a wonderful thing to believe about ourselves. It can be a bold move to choose kindness.

Wild Crime Season 4 on Hulu: welp, Washington state adds another serial killer to its list of homegrown killers. And, it seems those beautiful remote areas of the state are where hate festers.

From this weekend's Stuff the Bus to the FISH food drive, here are six ways to help your neighbors this holiday season: www.gigharbornow.org/news/communi...

I don't know who needs to know this, but Pro Publica has an online thing that will format a letter to your US health insurance company to demand the records behind a claim denial. (which the insurance is then legally required to provide in most cases) projects.propublica.org/claimfile/

Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield rolled back a policy change that would have capped payments for anesthesia for patients, and would have denied claims altogether if any given procedure exceeded a time limit.

As a veteran, I can tell you this: They have no f*cking idea of the backlash this would create. If they start taking away the promised benefits of people who are already depressed and pissed off 3/4 of the time... taskandpurpose.com/news/veteran...

295,000 journalists from 44 countries will stop posting content on X. We are making change and the world has spoken. www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/media/e...

At this point it’s been said in a hundred different ways, so I think people are being intentional about not getting it.

Hey. If you’re looking to start your own freelance business, check out my friend Rodika Tollefson’s book, “The Freelancer’s Compass.” It’s available on Amazon.

Column: A thank you to the undocumented on the eve of Trump’s deportation storm. www.latimes.com/california/s... @latimes.com #migrants #immigrants #humanrights

Turkey is overrated.

The plus side of being a freelance writer: I can hustle and get work finished to take the rest of this week off. Happy holiday week.

Nonprofits known as 527s can raise unlimited sums for political spending. We built a database so you can more easily search these organizations' finances — which we just updated with a total of ~350k new contributions and expenditures: https://propub.li/4i01FSv