Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
@parrav.bsky.social
A visa ban for South Sudan just compounds and adds to what is already an immensely challenging time, especially for a country that helped birth an independent South Sudan: www.nytimes.com/2025/04/07/w...
U.S. Visa Ban Adds to South Sudan’s Mounting Troubles (Gift Article)
The Trump administration’s revocation of all visas held by South Sudanese nationals comes as the East African nation faces the threat of renewed war.
www.nytimes.com
April 7, 2025 at 5:31 PM
A visa ban for South Sudan just compounds and adds to what is already an immensely challenging time, especially for a country that helped birth an independent South Sudan: www.nytimes.com/2025/04/07/w...
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
NYTimes front page June 30, 1930: " [Treasury Secretary] Mellon declares new tariff law will aid business. Secretary asserts the act will neither retard recovery nor hinder foreign trade. Holds uncertainty ended." timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine...
April 7, 2025 at 9:51 AM
NYTimes front page June 30, 1930: " [Treasury Secretary] Mellon declares new tariff law will aid business. Secretary asserts the act will neither retard recovery nor hinder foreign trade. Holds uncertainty ended." timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine...
If it weren’t so damning for everyone in the near and longterm term I’d find their collective shock psychologically fascinating.
CEOs in response to Trump tariffs: We’re in shock, losing money, thrown for a loop, Never imagined he’d go this far.
Me, before Trump took office: He’ll do widespread tariffs and break the system of global trade. Just listen to what he has repeatedly said, and observe what he already did.
Me, before Trump took office: He’ll do widespread tariffs and break the system of global trade. Just listen to what he has repeatedly said, and observe what he already did.
April 5, 2025 at 12:59 PM
If it weren’t so damning for everyone in the near and longterm term I’d find their collective shock psychologically fascinating.
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
"We owe each other everything actually" is exactly the reminder I think we all need right now.
if the united states ever has even a hope of recovering we have to destroy the idea of american individualism. "they don't owe you anything" we owe each other everything actually
April 5, 2025 at 12:39 PM
"We owe each other everything actually" is exactly the reminder I think we all need right now.
I feel like from now on this will happen in short bursts to help bump poll numbers during a tough news cycle: fhttps://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-administration-shutters-dc-foreign-policy-think-tank-wilson-center-2025-04-04/
Trump administration shutters DC foreign policy think tank Wilson Center
Nearly all employees at the Wilson Center, a non-partisan foreign policy think tank in Washington, have been placed on leave, the New York Times reported on Thursday.
www.reuters.com
April 4, 2025 at 6:46 PM
I feel like from now on this will happen in short bursts to help bump poll numbers during a tough news cycle: fhttps://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-administration-shutters-dc-foreign-policy-think-tank-wilson-center-2025-04-04/
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
BIG new report from @crisisgroup.org out this morning.
April 1, 2025 at 11:49 AM
BIG new report from @crisisgroup.org out this morning.
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
The fall of Rome seems so much less exciting now that I realize everyone was kinda just working their regular jobs and paying bills and stuff the whole time
April 1, 2025 at 2:11 PM
The fall of Rome seems so much less exciting now that I realize everyone was kinda just working their regular jobs and paying bills and stuff the whole time
I accidentally ingested some shrimp (which I am very allergic to) over the weekend and I couldn’t quite put my finger on what my face reminds me of rn and….it’s a Bratz doll.
a barbie doll wearing glasses and red lips is holding her hand to her ear .
ALT: a barbie doll wearing glasses and red lips is holding her hand to her ear .
media.tenor.com
April 1, 2025 at 1:35 PM
I accidentally ingested some shrimp (which I am very allergic to) over the weekend and I couldn’t quite put my finger on what my face reminds me of rn and….it’s a Bratz doll.
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
I received a heartbreaking email today: A paper in a special issue I’m editing is being retracted because one of its authors is afraid of losing their job and their legal status in the U.S. if they publish a scientific study on evolution. Yes, on evolution, nature's engine of diversity.
March 29, 2025 at 11:52 PM
I received a heartbreaking email today: A paper in a special issue I’m editing is being retracted because one of its authors is afraid of losing their job and their legal status in the U.S. if they publish a scientific study on evolution. Yes, on evolution, nature's engine of diversity.
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
A mockumentary about the people who create prescription drug ads
March 25, 2025 at 4:29 PM
A mockumentary about the people who create prescription drug ads
Based on my recent re-watch of Battlestar Galactica and recent events it feels most apt that the cylons would destroy us when humans lost the master password to control them or something similar.
March 25, 2025 at 4:06 PM
Based on my recent re-watch of Battlestar Galactica and recent events it feels most apt that the cylons would destroy us when humans lost the master password to control them or something similar.
It’s not a job interview process until I bring up a reference to The Expanse and / or Battlestar Galactica. This time it was both. 10/10
March 19, 2025 at 5:41 PM
It’s not a job interview process until I bring up a reference to The Expanse and / or Battlestar Galactica. This time it was both. 10/10
One thing about me is that regardless of the friend or how / where / when I met them it’s 1,000 percent assured I am going to get a social media fwd about the Library of Alexandria.
March 13, 2025 at 5:58 PM
One thing about me is that regardless of the friend or how / where / when I met them it’s 1,000 percent assured I am going to get a social media fwd about the Library of Alexandria.
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
It's illegal for TSA workers to strike, their union isn't ready, it's unfair to them to be in this position, but this is it. If this stands it's going in the history books as the tipping point when labor got truly broken.
www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/strike-or-...
www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/strike-or-...
Strike, or Else
As Trump tosses out the TSA union contract, everything is on the line.
www.hamiltonnolan.com
March 7, 2025 at 9:59 PM
It's illegal for TSA workers to strike, their union isn't ready, it's unfair to them to be in this position, but this is it. If this stands it's going in the history books as the tipping point when labor got truly broken.
www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/strike-or-...
www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/strike-or-...
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
Call it by its name: Trumpcession
March 4, 2025 at 6:11 AM
Call it by its name: Trumpcession
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
March 4, 2025 at 11:01 AM
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
Being able to drop a quarterly US GDP prediction by 5.1% from +2.3% to -2.8% in a single week is one of the most impressive economic developments in the history of the world.
March 4, 2025 at 9:02 AM
Being able to drop a quarterly US GDP prediction by 5.1% from +2.3% to -2.8% in a single week is one of the most impressive economic developments in the history of the world.
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
From @reuters.com: President Donald Trump's sweeping foreign aid freeze has stalled a United Nations program in Mexico aimed at stopping imported fentanyl chemicals from reaching the country's drug cartels, according to eight people familiar with the situation.
www.reuters.com/world/americ...
www.reuters.com/world/americ...
February 24, 2025 at 7:14 PM
From @reuters.com: President Donald Trump's sweeping foreign aid freeze has stalled a United Nations program in Mexico aimed at stopping imported fentanyl chemicals from reaching the country's drug cartels, according to eight people familiar with the situation.
www.reuters.com/world/americ...
www.reuters.com/world/americ...
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
Your regular reminder that the US air & water pollution laws passed in the 60s & 70s -- and the elaborate federal bureaucracy created to administer them -- constitute one of the most successful gov't interventions in history. WILDLY successful. The envy of the world.
February 24, 2025 at 6:43 PM
Your regular reminder that the US air & water pollution laws passed in the 60s & 70s -- and the elaborate federal bureaucracy created to administer them -- constitute one of the most successful gov't interventions in history. WILDLY successful. The envy of the world.
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
Hey Bluesky! I love doing solutions journalism on global issues and I'm feeling the urge to tell a good news story right now.
What do you got?
What do you got?
February 24, 2025 at 8:32 PM
Hey Bluesky! I love doing solutions journalism on global issues and I'm feeling the urge to tell a good news story right now.
What do you got?
What do you got?
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
NEW - Rep. Mark Alford tells fired KC federal workers ‘God has a plan’ at hostile town hall
Folks, I've been covering politics for a dozen years in Kansas and Missouri and this is probably the most intense, angry town hall I have ever seen
www.kansascity.com/news/politic...
Folks, I've been covering politics for a dozen years in Kansas and Missouri and this is probably the most intense, angry town hall I have ever seen
www.kansascity.com/news/politic...
Rep. Mark Alford tells fired KC federal workers ‘God has a plan’ at hostile town hall
The Missouri Republican faced an angry crowd during a Monday town hall in Belton.
www.kansascity.com
February 24, 2025 at 7:26 PM
NEW - Rep. Mark Alford tells fired KC federal workers ‘God has a plan’ at hostile town hall
Folks, I've been covering politics for a dozen years in Kansas and Missouri and this is probably the most intense, angry town hall I have ever seen
www.kansascity.com/news/politic...
Folks, I've been covering politics for a dozen years in Kansas and Missouri and this is probably the most intense, angry town hall I have ever seen
www.kansascity.com/news/politic...
Devex has done some very impressive reporting during an extremely challenging time. Invaluable resource right now.
The decision to close USAID has reverberated throughout the aid sector. But what has the cost been? Devex mapped out what we know — and what we don’t.
The US aid freeze in data: Mapping an unfolding catastrophe
www.devex.com
February 11, 2025 at 9:29 PM
Devex has done some very impressive reporting during an extremely challenging time. Invaluable resource right now.
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
Major humanitarian relief org can't do its job
"We currently have millions of dollars in outstanding payment requests to the US government. Without an immediate solution we may, at the end of February, be forced to halt US-funded lifesaving humanitarian programmes."
www.nrc.no/news/2025/fe...
"We currently have millions of dollars in outstanding payment requests to the US government. Without an immediate solution we may, at the end of February, be forced to halt US-funded lifesaving humanitarian programmes."
www.nrc.no/news/2025/fe...
NRC forced to suspend essential aid for 100,000s
www.nrc.no
February 10, 2025 at 6:28 PM
Major humanitarian relief org can't do its job
"We currently have millions of dollars in outstanding payment requests to the US government. Without an immediate solution we may, at the end of February, be forced to halt US-funded lifesaving humanitarian programmes."
www.nrc.no/news/2025/fe...
"We currently have millions of dollars in outstanding payment requests to the US government. Without an immediate solution we may, at the end of February, be forced to halt US-funded lifesaving humanitarian programmes."
www.nrc.no/news/2025/fe...
Reposted by Vanessa Parra 🪐💫
Feeding USAID into the wood chipper - a snapshot:
Internews, which does media training and development, had an office in Liberia with 28 staff working on three projects. Twenty of those staff have summarily had their contracts terminated and the office has been closed down.
Internews, which does media training and development, had an office in Liberia with 28 staff working on three projects. Twenty of those staff have summarily had their contracts terminated and the office has been closed down.
February 11, 2025 at 2:57 PM
Feeding USAID into the wood chipper - a snapshot:
Internews, which does media training and development, had an office in Liberia with 28 staff working on three projects. Twenty of those staff have summarily had their contracts terminated and the office has been closed down.
Internews, which does media training and development, had an office in Liberia with 28 staff working on three projects. Twenty of those staff have summarily had their contracts terminated and the office has been closed down.