Redhead Rambles

I'm Kiley Miller (كايلي), a 25-year-old native Texan & graduate from the University of Missouri. I blog mostly about world events, politics, pop culture and the St. Louis Cardinals.

[kileyrae]

Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy. It’s been like 500 years, but look I made this collage of books I read this year. As the only goal I made (i.e. read more) and kept for 2017 I’m pretty proud of myself, so I’m putting it here. I started off with a goal to read 10 books and kept adding five each time I hit that goal until I got to 50. I ended up reading 57 books in 2017 and as someone who loves to read, but has been reading an average of about 5 books a year for the past few years I’m really happy about it. I did see a tweet from someone who read 200 books in a year and while maybe one day I’ll get there, I’ve set my 2018 goal to a more realistic 50 books. Happy reading!

Come be my friend on Goodreads!

[badgyal-k-deactivated20190901]

Regarding Hurricane Donations:

I’m going to provide some links to get you started in terms of donation resources that are available at this time for regions affected by the hurricanes that have passed through or will be coming soon. Feel free to add on.

Houston:

Coalition for the Homeless

Houston Food Bank

LGBTQ Hurricane Harvey Disaster Relief Fund (to help homeless youth, seniors, people living with HIV, hate crime survivors, and those devastated by the storm)

SHAPE- Self-Help for African People through Education (Donations will allow SHAPE to assist with medical prescriptions, make emergency cash contributions, and more)

Flood Relief for Texas Children’s Hospital

Antigua and Barbuda:

Even though the Red Cross is Questionable, Ticketing, an app developed by Antiguans, is collecting donations in-app and all funds received will be donated to the joint efforts of the National Office of Disaster Services and the Antigua and Barbuda Red Cross. Download the app on Google Play and the Apple App Store

Habitat for Humanity of Trinidad and Tobago (for Barbuda relief)

Antigua and Barbuda citizen Jessye Romeo is raising funds for Barbuda relief out of London, UK

St. Martin/St. Maarten:

St. Maarten youth living in France raise funds for relief of the island

St. Maarten Relief Fund on Youcaring 

Hurricane Disaster Relief for St. Martin/ St. Maarten on Fundly

The French and Dutch Red Cross organizations are seeking donations at this time for their respective territories  on then island (do research on any organization you are curious/ wary about before donating, as the Red Cross track record isn’t so hot)

Haiti:

Action Against Hunger

Oxfam 

Care.org

Hope for Haiti

Dominican Republic: 

Oxfam 

Outreach 360

Kinship United

Puerto Rico:

Cáritas de Puerto Rico

Americares

Asociación Puertorriqueños en Marcha

US Virgin Islands:

USVI Relief Fund on Gofundme

UNICEF

Florida:

Feeding Florida

Coalition for the Homeless of Central Florida

Florida Keys Children’s Shelter

United Way of Miami-Dade

This is just a starting list. As said before, please feel free to add on.

[badgyal-k-deactivated20190901]

It goes without saying but if you cannot afford to donate, share the information so someone who can afford to help has some options or a place to start looking if they’d like to help

[kileyrae]

I feel like I used to be some sort of news source here (maybe just in my head) and now that I don’t blog as much anymore I feel like I’m letting people down. However I am also fully aware that y’all have access to the internet just like I do and probably don’t need my bad jokes and commentary to figure out what’s going on. Anyways, I miss y’all whoever y’all is anymore (seriously I don’t who still gets on here regularly). I am pretty active on Twitter if y’all don’t already follow me there.

[kileyrae]

What’s going on? I don’t know how to blog anymore.

The Trump administration ended DACA. It’s now in the hands of Congress, but Trump tweeted (yes, tweeted) that he will “revisit” issue if Congress doesn't legalize DACA in six months. You can donate to help some Dreamers whose permits are expiring prior to March 5, 2018 here. 

Hurricane Irma is now a Category 5 storm and is predicted to affect the Caribbean (Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Cuba, Haiti, Dominican Republic, Bahamas, Turks and Caicos) and Florida causing potentially catastrophic damage.

Rohingya, a Muslim ethnic minority, are fleeing Myanmar into Bangladesh with “stories of systematic rape, murder, and arson they escaped.” The Guardian has a good intro to the ongoing conflict here.

The North Korea situation continues to escalate. Trump meanwhile is planning to end trade deal with South Korea and calling them out on Twitter because ????

The La Tuna fire is now 70% contained according to officials.

Eagle Creek Fire: “Officials believe the teen and others may have been using fireworks that started the forest fire. Police made contact with the teen in the parking lot of the Eagle Creek Trailhead, and he is cooperating with police.” Potential ways to help those affected here.

Flooding in South Asia (India, Nepal, Bangladesh) has caused more than a thousand deaths so far this year.

Over 100,000 people have been displaced in Nigeria due to flooding.

The U.S. Justice Department confirmed on Friday that neither they nor the FBI has any evidence that the Obama administration wiretapped Trump Tower during the 2016 presidential campaign despite Trump’s tweet in March.

[kileyrae]

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner, an attorney, showing what a true Texan looks like.

[kileyrae]

[kileyrae]

Hurricane Harvey - How To Help

The Red Cross has a dedicated donation page for Hurricane Harvey victims and is also asking for volunteers and blood donations. You can also text HARVEY to 90999 to make a $10 donation.

United Way of Greater Houston -- Text  UWFLOOD to 41444

The Texas Diaper Bank is taking both monetary donations and diapers to help families affected by Hurricane Harvey. “ The Texas Diaper Bank is creating disaster relief kits that include diapers and other baby necessities for families and individuals with children that have been displaced and effected by Hurricane Harvey. “ via News 4 San Antonio

Save The Children -- Hurricane Harvey Children’s Relief Fund

Global Giving -- Hurricane Harvey Relief Fund

Southern Baptist Disaster Relief -- Hurricane Harvey Response

Heart to Heart International 

Samaritan’s Purse

Catholic Charities USA

Americares

South Texas Blood & Tissue Center

Carter BloodCare

Here’s Charity Navigator’s list of charities providing relief.

Portlight is dedicated to helping people with disabilities and has set up a hotline  [phone] to connect those who need help with resources in the area.

Between August 23 - September 01 Airbnb is waiving all service fees for those affected by Hurricane Harvey. If you need a place to stay or have a space to offer for free go here.

GoFundMe has consolidated all Hurricane Harvey related campaigns here.

Austin Pets Alive! is an Austin based animal rescue organization that has been helping out shelters affected by Hurricane Harvey. You can learn more about them and how you can help here.

You can also donate to the SPCA who is assisting animals displaced by Hurricane Harvey and/or sign up to become a foster.

Houston Humane Society

San Antonio Humane Society

Animal Defense League of Texas

Houston Food Bank is currently closed, but will be reopening as soon as possible to provide disaster relief. Also: Corpus Christi Food Bank, Galveston County Food Bank, Central Texas Food Bank, San Antonio Food Bank MORE

The Houston Coalition for the Homeless is updating about local shelters for homeless people.

H-E-B is in Victoria, Texas to provide disaster relief and meals for displaced residents. They have also pledged $100,000 toward Hurricane Harvey relief efforts and are also taking donations.

Driscoll Children’s Hospital is in Corpus Christi and accepts online donations.

Here’s an interactive map showing shelters, resource drop offs and other volunteer opportunities.

Houston Texans player JJ Watt has started a YouCaring fundraiser called Houston Flood Relief Fund with a goal of $200,000.

Direct Relief USA

Austin Disaster Relief Network - Text AUSTINRELIEF to 444999, Hope Family Thrift Store

You can donate canned goods at any Freebirds World Burrito in Texas until 9/3.

Celebrity Jensen Ackles is partnering with charity Random Acts to raise money for Hurricane Harvey victims.

Harris County Animal Shelter

Humanity First USA is asking for volunteers and monetary donations.

Gulf Coast STARS Rescue is animal rescue center and has an Amazon wish list.

You may have heard about the hawk that got a ride from a cab driver during the storm. He’s safe and currently being cared for by TWRC who is asking for donations for ‘Harvey the Hawk’ and animals like him.

Assist the Officer is taking donations for Houston Area law enforcement officers whose homes have been destroyed as they have been assisting in rescue efforts.

You can donate to the LGBTQ Disaster Relief Fund by The Montorose Center here.

Coastal Bend Disaster Recovery Group

Team Rubicon

Organizacion Latina de Trans en Texas

National Disaster Search Dog Foundation

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner has established a relief fund at the Greater Houston Community Foundation. Find out more here.

Center for Disaster Philanthropy

 SBP -- Hurricane Harvey Recovery Fund

Airlink

World Vision

*Please share and update*

[mattbors]

I made this political cartoon in 2010. Enjoy! http://thenib.com/daily

[dendroica]

That statuary which is only beginning to come down in our day dates largely from this era and constituted a celebration and affirmation of this victory. Not the victory of the Civil War, which was of course a defeat but the sectional victory to define the post-war settlement. Consider some dates: Lee Circle in New Orleans, 1884; Lee Statue on Monument Avenue, Richmond, Virginia, 1890; Robert E. Lee Monument (Marianna, Arkansas), 1910; the Robert Edward Lee sculpture in Emancipation Park, Charlottesville, Virginia, commissioned 1917, erected 1924. All of these statues date not from the Civil War Era but from the decades of the establishment of Jim Crow, to celebrate the South’s ability to establish an apartheid system on the ruins of the Antebellum slave South. A statue of Lee in uniform, mounted on a horse in a southern town square has only ever had one meaning: white supremacy. These statues didn’t come to be associated with racism and Jim Crow only after the Civil War had receded into memory. They were created, from the start, to mark and celebrate the foundations of Jim Crow, uncontested white rule. More mythically, but to the same end, they were built to glorify a vision of the South in which her black citizens had no place. It has always been a canard that anyone is banishing history with these changes. But public memory isn’t simply history. It is a public recitation, often written onto the landscape, about what we revere and what we regret about who we are and what we come from.

Some Thoughts on Public Memory – Talking Points Memo (via dendroica)

[stag-bi]

its not even a hundred years from WW2 where nazi ideology & white supremacy quite literally got millions of ppl systematically murdered, and some ppl still act like nazism is “just an opinion” and that “everyone’s entitled to an opinion” as if it was something akin to a favorite color or food preference instead of a violent, manipulative, dangerous propaganda

[selenas]

When a 15 year old white girl gets it and more than half of the self proclaimed feminist white men and women dont

[kileyrae]

I present you two of the most bigoted, hateful government officials from Texas.

[scifibi]

[wilwheaton]

She got no standing ovation.  She got no mainstream media lauds for her heroism.  She got no kudos for leaving home, a much longer journey than that other senator, the one from Arizona, to get to DC, and there are no mainstream media stories on it that I can find… I only found out from a friend who spotted it on Twitter.   She didn’t do it for publicity.   Senator Mazie Hirono of Hawaii was just doing her job as a good politician, voting not to repeal the ACA so as to protect her constituents.  She has Stage Four kidney cancer — that means scarce chances of survival — is recovering from a second surgery to remove part of a rib, and made sure she got to her seat in the Senate Chamber to vote “no” to whatever Republican wealth-care crap was thrown at her.   But you’ll only find out about it on social media.  Because she’s not a pale male, maybe?

The heroic Senator with severe cancer who interrupted treatment to vote… NO (via wilwheaton)

[kileyrae]

In Wisconsin, ID law proved insurmountable for many voters

Analysis: Texas gave House GOP biggest gerrymandering bump 

Everything’s fine.

[thepopculturegifs]

Don’t buy me a drink, I make my money Don’t touch my weave, don’t call me honey ‘Cause I run my shit, baby

[chuuzus]