It's springtime in America

 YOU get a plane...and YOU get a plane...Anyway, Ukraine gets a plane.  The Antonov AN-124 cargo plane that has been parked at Toronto-Pearson for over a year will be donated to Ukraine by the Canadian government as part of its latest round of sanctions on Russia.  I hope they load it up with tanks and missiles first.

Aurora borealis fans got a bonus this year as a blue spiral also appeared in the sky over Alaska.  There's a boring scientific explanation involving frozen fuel from the SpaceX rocket, but I prefer to believe it's two snakes chasing each other through the night.

Andrew Lester has been charged with armed assault and armed criminal action for shooting Ralph Yarl through the door of his house.  The police chief said Lester couldn't be arrested until police spoke with Yarl, so I assume he's awake and talking.  Also, he and his family got a call from President Biden.

Get directions, get GPS, get a local resident to draw you a map.  Four people looking for a friend's house in tiny Hebron, New York, pulled into the wrong driveway on Saturday night.  They were trying to turn around when the owner, Kevin Monahan, came outside and fired two shots, one of which killed twenty-year-old Kaylin Gillis.  It wasn't racial, it wasn't gang-related, it was just another instance of guns making Americans safe and free.

Ex-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick has been charged in Wisconsin with sexually assaulting an eighteen-year-old man in 1977.  The complainant says McCarrick began molesting him when he was eleven and shared him with other men at parties.  Despite many complaints and rumors, Saint John Paul made him a cardinal in 2001.  

Florida Man of the Day:  Rep. Greg Steube, who said on Newsmax, "I'm happy and honored to endorse Donald J. Chump for president in 2024."  Leave the jokes to us, OK, Greg?

What is it with the Air National Guard?  First Teixeira, now Josiah Garcia of the Tennessee ANG.  In a sting operation that isn't well explained, Garcia answered an ad for a hitman, telling the FBI (for it was their sting) that he was an excellent marksman and thought he'd be good at killing people.  He was also up for torture.  RentAHitman.com?  Really?

Then again...Kevin Stitt, co-governor of Oklahoma (with Jesus), has asked some officials in McCurtain County to resign after hearing a recording of the conversation where they discussed hiring a hitman to kill two reporters and bury their bodies.  These county commissioners also joked about a woman who died in a fire and lamented the passing of lynching.  You know, the people's business.  

The FBI also arrested two men from the Ministry of Public Security who were spying on Chinese dissidents -- in New York's Chinatown.  Show this to the next Trumpanzee who demands we "defund the FBI!"

Manual aspiration -- is it the answer or only the next phase of the War on Women?  Dr. Joan Fleischman says it's easy and safe and she can teach general practitioners how to use one of these in the privacy of their offices and clinics or even at home, circumventing the next Supreme Court ruling or legislative assault.  

With training, women could use this method on one another, or on themselves, while the "pro-lifers" are yowling outside a Planned Parenthood clinic and shooting at the homes of gynecologists.  It's safe up to sixteen weeks.  Who knows?  One day we may catch up with Bangladesh.

All right, here's the Trump news:  The days are getting longer and worse for "your favorite president (me)."  He continues to be obsessed with Ron DeSantis, accusing Pudding Paws of being afraid of an ugly reception at the Indiana gun gala.  The judge rejected his request for yet another delay in the E. Jean Carroll case -- Trump complained of "negative publicity" and Judge Kaplan pointed out that the media coverage was "invited and indeed provoked by Mr. Trump."  He's angry at Elon Musk, who reinstated his Twitter account and made the platform fascist-friendly so Trump would feel at home:  "His space company, car company, battery company, tunnel company, and even Twitter, which was illegally controlled by the FBI, need government HELP & SUBSIDIES.  HE IS JUST 'MENDING FENCES!'" by making friends with the "absolutely horrible Biden Administration."  (No good deed, eh, Elon?)  Big donors are flocking to DeSantis, who leads by five points in Michigan, where the Republicans are presumably as barking mad as their new chair Kristina Karamo.  (She's best known for outing Beyonce as a recruiter for paganism and comparing the media to Nazis.  If Michigan is no longer Trump Country he's in deep shit.)  

Workers at the Ben & Jerry's mother store in Burlington, Vermont, have filed for a union election.  If successful, they will join the militant Workers United, affiliated with Service Employees International United (SEIU).  Though technically owned by Unilever, B&J's continues to support progressive causes.  This will be a chance to do it again.  All power to the scoopers!