2. ECONOMIC BLACKOUT. We support the economic boycott occurring this Friday, Feb. 28, of any entity that has dismantled their DEI programs and pandered to this administration. The buck will stop with us!

And the funding announcement for diversity supplements now has been updated to expire today. Supplements are so important to the careers of junior scientists. This is crushing for post docs and early career faculty

grants.nih.gov/grants/guide...

NIH grants also provide research assistantships that offset tuition and living expenses for students, without which many would not be able to attend. This is especially true for my students at the University of Montana, where many come from rural communities and are first gen college students.

Indirect funds from research grants have become an essential way to balance the budget at public universities that have continued to endure budget cuts enacted by state legislatures (read: every public universityin the U.S.).

This is because federal research grants also come with an "indirect" cost allocation, which provides an important source of funding for Universities to keep the lights on and pay living wages in staff jobs that support the mission of educating.

I'm not sure that the broader public recognizes this freeze impacts many, many more people than career civil servants at NIH and PhDs at elite research institutions. It will impact those who live in college towns and those who hope to become the first person in their family to go to college.

No one in public health is satisfied with the current status quo, but let's at least recognize the successes made for the health of the average American.

Like when open sewage ran down city streets? Or, when it was common to know someone with lifelong disability from Polio and most kids suffered measels? Or, when I was growing up and restaurant smoking "sections" were about as effective as having a peeing section in a swimming pool?

Even while Walmart doesn't dominate corporate reporting in the same way today, it was certainly a harbinger for our post-Citizens United world and the rise of both corporate facism and, ultimately, Trumpism.

When I reported on it as a writer for the AZ Daily Sun (where the ad was published), Walmart's corporate PR machine refused comment, local Walmart employees (there was a normal-sized store in town) were threatened with their jobs if they talked to me, and I was effectively banned from the store.

Walmart degrades more than local economies. 20 years ago in Flagstaff, Ariz a Walmart-backed campaign published an ad that depicted a Nazi-era book burning and stated a referendum that would ban the super-sized big boxes in city limits was facism: it limited mass consumption "choices".

Think sanitation. Think food and drug safety. Think clean air and water. These are the very things that will be dismantled under Trump/RFK and replaced with even more rhetoric on individual choice and blaming individuals for their poor health.