Mark Arnest

"Fascist regimes are doomed to lose their wars, because they are constitutionally incapable of making an objective assessment of the enemy’s strength." –Umberto Eco, Ur-Fascism, pub. in Five Moral Pieces

The SAVE Act just sets up barriers to voting, and it solves a nonexistent problem

@thehairycats The ONLY thing that offended Merlin was the scent of hand lotion. He was certain that I’d only put lotion on to upset him.

Don't you hate it when your human has a new handcream and it smells absolutely vile ! I'm not letting her touch me even though it's hours since she used it.

@CleeWeezy Opie checking in with an outdoor Clee Sit!

its clean sit sunday , dont stop becleaving !!

Speaking of the 1930s Dust Bowl… many all-time US heat records were set during that time. It’s important to understand that the Dust Bowl was - in large part - a manmade phenomenon. So when people claim “man can’t change the climate” the Dust Bowl flies in the face of that claim. If you have genuine interest in the history, how it happened etc… watch this 5-minute video I did a few years ago. I interviewed a Plain States historian and a climate scientist who offered some great perspective. cbsnews.com/amp/news/dust-…

@magachrchpastr But if you’ve already given your children Easter eggs, the damage can be mitigated by a donation to your Prayer Force One campaign, right?!?

Just a quick reminder that Easter is not about bunnies and eggs. If you let your kids have Easter eggs you may as well just become an atheist right now, smh🙏🇺🇸

@TheRealThelmaJ1 Matchka being philosophical about the heat

It's Caturday you all, we obliterated Iran and won the war again edition, so show me your furbabies. It's a hot day here in Phoenix and I sure do need to see them.

@pepperbug Congratulations!

i passed 🥳

@TakeThatClouds Of course they can explain it: Obviously you are in on it!

8am vs 3pm. From grids covering the sky to cloudless blue, just as I predicted this morning. Can the chemtrail crowd explain that? (Not the same location but within a couple of miles)

@TheCatSenate Everyone is better off except for the carpet!

6 months (ish) ago, these tiny babies were fighting alley bears for food on the mean streets of Baltimore. Not all they know is soft bed, meow for attention and throw up on carpet

@swagmastarpaul If you give him all of it, there is no need to talk to a professional!

I see you are having ice cream for dinner again I think you should talk to a professional and also give me some

@WalterBestBoy Love those rattly purrs!

Lentil says good night ❤️ (volume up)

@TheNerdyCatLady I describe Matchka, our semi-mean female, as someone who has the sweetest disposition in the world – but things KEEP PISSING HER OFF.

I hate the discourse on girl cats being mean or unfriendly! I love all my cats of course, but my girl cats are the sweetest, most angelic, least troublesome, little angels and my boy cats are also sweet, but they're himbos who try to eat plastic and break things.

@thehairycats Beautiful AND patriotic!

The man on the tv news said we have to save energy. I am very good at that. I'll take an extra nap to save my energy.

Anne Applebaum nails it:

@TheNerdyCatLady They will also never crash your car.

Yeah their food is expensive, and their litter is expensive, and their vet visits are expensive, but at least I don't have to pay for them to go to college. 😹😹 #CatsOfTwitter

@EdFatherOfCats 💔

Harpo ❤️❤️❤️

@graveghostie You realize that he can kill you when you’re asleep, right?

it’s practical too bc I hear him jingling if he’s getting into mischief again

what having a cat is like:

@ryankatzrosene Regarding point #1: Years ago my wife and I wanted to buy some land in the Arkansas River area east of Pueblo, Colorado. We soon discovered that the the difference in price between land with water rights - where you might grow things - and land without was an order of magnitude.

This AI-click bait seems to be making the rounds. As someone who lives on a picturesque family farm in the rolling Gatineau Hills, and who works as a professor, let me add my two cents on the 'Skip the degree. Buy land. Become a farmer' advice (from a North American perspective): 1) Farm land is incredibly expensive. A real cabin like the AI-rendition below, nestled in a valley below beautiful snowcapped mountains.. would cost *MILLIONS* of dollars. It's also not prime agricultural land (you could put ruminants on it to graze, but any kind of horticulture or crop production at a scale necessary to make a living, let alone cover your mortgage and property costs and taxes, are kind of out of the question). All this to say, unless you're somehow independently wealthy, the land you will be able to afford as a young person today is unlikely to be prime agricultural land and/or unlikely to be close to populated areas (where much of your agricultural output can be marketed). The land you will buy and start farming may appreciate in value, and relatively quickly, but the question is how will you afford it in the first place, and will you be able to cover the costs without going broke. Getting a degree BEFORE buying land can often help just from the point of view of increasing the amount of time saving up for a down payment AND increasing the likelihood of having a better paying job during that period. 2) Farming is hard work. I'm not a farmer but my wife is and I help out as much as I can (a little bit every single day). It's incredibly hard work. When we first got into farming about 15 years ago I couldn't help thinking that farming was just a series of 'challenges' that had to be overcome before a new challenge arises. Every day a new kind of problem is thrown at you, requiring you to either have (or quickly develop) new skills (Ok I'm being a bit hyperbolic here, but you get the idea). This is one of the things that makes farming incredibly rewarding. Learning how to do new things and then succeeding in overcoming challenges (IF you succeed). I've learned, for instance, how to replace an starter on a tractor and how to troubleshoot malfunctioning machinery; how to fix a broken chain on baler; how to set up electric fences and build chicken tractors; how to pull a lamb out of a ewe struggling with labour; how to castrate a bull calf without getting murdered by its angry mother; how local farmer's markets operate and how consumer preferences evolve... so on an so on. The point is, it REALLY helps if you have *some* skills to fall back on. Even if you have, say, a business degree, it can help to manage the finances and marketing of the farm. If you have an engineering degree, it can help with dealing with mechanical challenges. If you have some kind of biology or science degree it can help with improving the condition and productivity of your crops or animals. Better yet, there are agricultural science or similar farm skills college programs that offer degrees which cover a wide range of skills you might need as a farmer. Having a degree almost certainly helps to make some aspect of your farming career easier. 3) Hobby farming is not farming for a living. So much of the 'back to the land' romanticization that drives posts like this is not really about 'farming' as an occupation; it's about 'hobby farming'. There's nothing wrong with hobby farming in my opinion. And for people who try to provide for themselves or become as 'self-sufficient' as possible from raising animals and/or having a garden and/or foraging - all the power to them! But... that is not farming as an occupation. That is not farming to make a wage. It is NEXT TO IMPOSSIBLE to be a fully self-sufficient produce-everything for yourself hobby farmer or homesteader in today's world unless a) you were gifted farm land or had prior income to buy it; b) you live off grid; and c) you settle for a fairly simple life without too many modern material needs. Otherwise, you're going to need d) OFF FARM INCOME. In fact, so many aspects and forms of real farming today - even as an OCCUPATION - require Off-farm income just to survive (that is especially the case for non-corporate, family farms). And guess what comes in real handy to land a good well-paying job off the farm? A degree! So, my advice to the younger generation. Get a degree. Keep your doors open. Learn about the world and expand your networks. If you want to produce some of your own food, grow a garden, get backyard chickens, and learn how to preserve food. And, if you want to get into farming, come up with a holistic plan that is realistic about the costs of land and the slim margins in this sector, and take some time to develop your skills in some domain first, whether via a degree or employment experience or other.

@frisky9 Very sorry for your terrible loss!