Thai wildlife officials are heartened by the site of the world’s largest bovine leading her calves down a forest trail. The camera trap footage shows that conservation is working: that gaur are reproducing in numbers in the country’s Huai Kha Khaeng Forest, and that there’s enough food and habitat to facilitate that. The gaur was […] The post Trail Cams Leave Park Officials Elated as Rare Gaur Seen Thriving in Forest–World’s Largest Bovine appeared first on Good News Network.

This article contains an excerpt from The Basic Sanitation Book What do you do during an emergency when the toilet won’t flush? If you’re prepped for it, you can easily make a kitty litter toilet with very limited supplies. Read on for instructions and city sanitation motivation. Did you ever stop to put some thought into the glorious flushing power of your toilet? It’s one of those things we in modern society take for granted. We use the restroom, then we flush, wash our hands, and forget it. But during extreme scenarios, this isn’t always so easy. When researching my book, The Prepper’s Water Survival Guide, I spent a lot of time reading about water, sanitation, and waterborne illness. These issues are all closely linked, and it’s vital to find solutions. If you’re on a septic system, you have a safe place for your waste to go during most types of disasters, assuming you have additional water on hand for flushing. But, in the city, on a public sewer system, there exists the possibility that a situation could arise during which flushing is not an option. Do you remember during the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy when residents of high-rise apartment buildings couldn’t flush because the city water system was down?  There were numerous reports that people were so desperate that they were defecating in the hallways.  They quoted a resident of a senior apartment complex, Anna Hay, who said, “They can’t go upstairs to go to the bathrooms. Where are they going to go? They’re walking all around for a place to go. There’s nowhere to go in this area.” (source) With some very small and inexpensive preparations, it doesn’t have to come down to that. Just having a portable toilet is not enough for good hygiene and safety. If you live in an urban area, going outside to do your business may not be an option. You have to figure out a way to take care of this indoors while maintaining the health of your environment. As a former city prepper, I’ve been through a few situations during which our toilets were inoperable due to a local disaster. Luckily, I had the supplies on hand to create a kitty litter box for people, so my children and I were able to stay in the safety of our home without risking illness due to poor sanitation. Get this information and more to download to your device or USB with The Basic Sanitation Book, on sale now. How to Make a Kitty Litter Potty Here’s all you need to make a litter box for people: Kitty Litter (For this purpose, get a scented one) Extremely heavy garbage bags (Get the kind that contractors use and do NOT skimp on the garbage bags, whatever you do) Your toilet or this portable one Hopefully, you realized you weren’t going to be able to flush before using your toilet. If there is waste sitting in your toilet, you’re going to need to get rid of it. Not fun, I know, but if it sits there for several days, it’s going to smell terrible, even with the lid down. To get rid of it, you’ll need to have a bag set up with a bit of kitty litter in it. Then, use a cheap dollar store utensil like a slotted spoon to fish out the poop. Try not to hurl because that’s just something else you’ll have to dispose of. Get rid of the slotted spoon because you will NEVER want to stir beans with that one again. You’d have flashbacks. Now that this is out of the way, you have two options. You can line your toilet and continue to use it following the directions below, or you can switch to the luggable loo, which is basically just a 5-gallon bucket equipped with a toilet seat and a lid. The process is the same for either one. If you’re using your toilet, turn the water off to the tank. (The knob for this should be on the wall at the back of it.) Line the toilet with a garbage bag. Let me repeat: DO NOT GO CHEAP ON THE GARBAGE BAGS!  You want to use the best ones you can get your hands on. The ones for contractors are designed to carry very heavy loads. (There’s a horrible pun that I’m resisting making right now.)  The last thing you want is for a bag full of human waste to break as you are carrying it out of your house.  Put the bag in the bowl, then pull the top of the bag down over the edges of the toilet. Put the seat down to hold the bag into place. If you’re using the Loo, line it with a garbage bag.  Same as above, put the bag into the bucket, then pull the top edges down the side of the bucket. Put the seat down to hold the bag into place. From here, the steps are the same. Put a handful of kitty litter into the bottom of the bag to start off. Although I don’t usually like scented products, this is an extreme scenario. Trust me, you want scent. Put the bucket of kitty litter beside the toilet and put a scoop in it (about a 1 cup scoop) Now you can use the bathroom. When someone has to go, they should do their business then toss a little bit of kitty litter on top of it.  Don’t go crazy – just a cup of litter should do the trick. Remember, it’s designed to cover the smell of poop. Put the lid down on the toilet or loo after you use it. Don’t let it get too heavy before taking it outside.  For the love of all things cute and fluffy, watch the weight of your human litter. It will soak up urine and become heavy clumps of clay. (Anyone who has ever changed a litter box knows how heavy it can get.)  Remove the bag and discard it outside before it becomes a) too heavy to handle or b) heavy enough to cause the bag to break. If you’re using good quality garbage bags, “a” is more likely than “b”.  Most likely, you’ll need to take the bag out once per day. It could be more if you have a large family or if someone is ill and making abundant use of the potty. This is obviously not a solution for a very long-term situation because you would have to dispose of the bags of poop. However, in a shorter-term scenario, you should be able to load the bags into a garbage can outside and deal with them when services are restored. Be certain to wash your hands well after dealing with human waste. Although I’m not usually a fan of hand sanitizer, in these kinds of situations, I strongly suggest the use of it. Your family could become extremely ill if good hand hygiene and waste management techniques are not practiced. Resources Contractor Garbage Bags Check out these additional resources for more information on water and sanitation in an emergency. Short term: The Basic Sanitation Book Longer term: The Prepper’s Water Survival Guide: Harvest, Treat, and Store Your Most Vital Resource About Daisy Daisy Luther is a coffee-swigging, adventure-seeking, globe-trotting blogger. She is the founder and publisher of three websites.  1) The Organic Prepper, which is about current events, preparedness, self-reliance, and the pursuit of liberty; 2)  The Frugalite, a website with thrifty tips and solutions to help people get a handle on their personal finances without feeling deprived; and 3) PreppersDailyNews.com, an aggregate site where you can find links to all the most important news for those who wish to be prepared. Her work is widely republished across alternative media and she has appeared in many interviews. Daisy is the best-selling author of 5 traditionally published books, 12 self-published books, and runs a small digital publishing company with PDF guides, printables, and courses at SelfRelianceand Survival.com You can find her on Facebook, Pinterest, Gab, MeWe, Parler, Instagram, and Twitter. The post Sanitation in the City: How to Make a Kitty Litter Toilet When You Can’t Flush appeared first on The Organic Prepper.

This week, my friend Charlie Kirk was murdered in cold blood in front of a crowd of thousands at Utah Valley University. He was assassinated while debating with students—something Charlie did frequently, and with aplomb—by a radicalized leftist with a trans boyfriend. That assassin decided to kill Charlie because of Charlie’s belief that men cannot become women, and vice versa; as he allegedly wrote in a text message to that trans boyfriend, “I had enough of his hatred. Some hate can’t be negotiated out. If I am able to grab my rifle unseen, I will have left no evidence.” I was in Los Angeles when Charlie was shot. My first reaction was shock; my second, horror; and my third, the realization that the shooting was almost certainly the result of a radicalized leftist, probably associated with transgender ideology. If we are to be honest with ourselves, we all have such reactions upon learning of acts of evil: We jump to the most likely conclusion about the source of that evil. If a synagogue is targeted in a mass shooting, the suspect will almost certainly be either a radical Muslim or a white supremacist; if a church is targeted, a radical Muslim or a trans activist; if a CEO is shot, a Marxist radical of some sort. There is a reason for such suppositions: Not all ideologies are equally likely to produce violence at the margins. Ideologies that breed violence share three specific elements. First, they share a conspiratorial view of the universe in which a shadowy cabal of powerful people are responsible for all of your failures and shortcomings, and in which their arguments are not in fact arguments, but instead, a la Michel Foucault, a facade for power. Second, such ideologies share a belief that you or your group are being targeted for destruction by that shadowy cabal. Finally, such ideologies hold that violence is justifiable self-defense. All the ideologies listed above fit this model. Trans ideology argues that trans people are victims of a conspiracy—a conspiracy to deny their identity; that such denial is responsible for all their life problems and amounts to a form of “erasure” or “genocide”; and that the proper response to such “hate” is violence. Radical Marxism argues that poor people are victims of a conspiracy of the wealthy, who exploit them; arguments on behalf of free markets are merely false consciousness promoted by the powerful; violence is therefore an appropriate response (“FREE LUIGI!”). White supremacy argues that whites are being targeted by people of color, Jews, and other minorities and fellow travelers; their very existence is a threat, and force is thus a justifiable response. Radical Islam argues that the failures of Islamic civilization are due to imperialism and colonialism; that the success of the West is inherently violent; and that violence is the proper response. When politicians say, therefore, that they are against “political violence” but then move to justify violence by massaging these ideologies, their words are useless. They are a prettification of reality, an attempt to gloss over radical evils gnawing at the intestines of a functional society. Even worse, politicians who continue to foment such ideologies provide a permission structure for violence, excusing it and even valorizing it. The only way to truly fight political violence is to denounce the ideologies that breed it. Anything less means that more radicals take their ideologies to the logical extreme—and the result is blood in the streets, innocents dead, and an ever-widening cycle of violence. COPYRIGHT 2025 CREATORS.COM We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post The Assassination of Charlie Kirk and the Violent Movements We Must Denounce appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Roseanne Barr Has a Thing or Two to Say About Jimmy Kimmel

ABC Yanked Kimmel Before He Could Double Down: CNN

It wasn't Galileo.

This is the first known wild hybrid of these two species.

When the grid collapses, the first thing you’ll notice isn’t the dark. It’s the quiet, the emptiness of abandoned streets, and the sudden, harsh clarity that survival isn’t just about […]

Last week, a bipartisan group of senators introduced legislation on drug prices that specifically targets pharmacy benefit managers, exactly as Big Pharma prefers. Pharmaceutical companies have spent years trying to convince the public and policymakers that PBMs are the bad guys in the prescription supply chain, shadowy middlemen inflating prices and hurting innovation. That narrative is convenient, but it is also wrong. PBMs are introducing competition, eliminating waste, and driving down prices.Which is precisely why Big Pharma wants them out of the way.The truth is that pharmacy benefit managers are effective. And that is exactly why drugmakers are going after them.The pharmaceutical industry spends more money than any other sector to sway government policy. In 2024, it poured $90 million into campaign contributions and nearly $400 million into lobbying — much of it through former government officials now on the payroll. Drugmakers also shelled out a whopping $11 billion on advertising, a sum that conveniently buys more than consumer attention. It pressures media outlets to look the other way, a racket the Trump administration is finally moving to rein in.After the black eye of the opioid crisis and the COVID-19 debacle, Big Pharma needs a scapegoat for high drug prices. It found one in a quiet, little-known player most Americans have never heard of, much less understood.But the numbers are clear. A recent study shows pharmacy benefit managers deliver at least $145 billion in net value every year, even after costs. Compared with a system where manufacturers dictate prices, PBMs create an additional $192 billion in value across the economy. That money doesn’t vanish into corporate coffers. It flows back into businesses, households, and the wallets of working Americans.PBMs accomplish this by negotiating directly with manufacturers and pharmacies. They aggregate buying power for millions of people. They secure rebates and discounts that most individual plans could never get on their own. In 2020, PBM-managed rebate structures created $51 billion in value for patients and plan sponsors. That is a competitive market in action.PBMs are expected to save health plans and consumers about $1.2 trillion over the next 10 years, averaging $1,154 per person per year. And for every dollar spent on PBM services, the system saves $10 in return. By steering patients toward generics and bio-similars, PBMs helped the health system save $445 billion in 2023 alone. That is what efficiency looks like.Perhaps more importantly, they improve health outcomes. When patients can afford their prescriptions, they are more likely to take them. That means fewer hospitalizations and fewer emergency room visits. PBM-driven programs have led to as much as a 16% increase in medication adherence and a 10% drop in inpatient admissions.RELATED: How MAHA can really save American lives Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty ImagesIt’s an obvious good to have healthier Americans. But it’s also good for a productive economy.By lowering premiums and drug costs in public programs, PBMs save taxpayers money as well. This alone accounts for $47 billion in annual savings. And by accelerating patient access to new therapies early in the patent cycle, PBMs support pharmaceutical innovation instead of stifling it.PBMs currently manage 95% of retail prescriptions and serve 91% of plan participants. That’s because they work. Businesses in the free market use services they value. And they value PBMs because they allow employers to offer more affordable coverage without sacrificing quality.The truth is that PBMs are effective. And that is exactly why drugmakers are going after them. PBMs bring down net prices and demand accountability. That cuts into Big Pharma’s profit margins. So the industry has launched a campaign to reframe PBMs as a problem rather than a solution.For example, a Biden-era Federal Trade Commission report that painted PBMs in a negative light should be viewed with skepticism. Even FTC Commissioner Melissa Holyoak emphasized that the report ignores the hard evidence of PBM-driven savings and warned that it was “a premature and deficient report,” adding, “Our job is not to score cheap points for transient political favor.”“Though facile arguments that rely on ideologically loaded buzzwords such as ‘control’ or ‘power’ may stir emotions and make for entertaining social media posts and television interviews, ideological buzzwords are no substitute for rational, evidence-based research,” Holyoak said.Sadly, some lawmakers are swallowing Big Pharma’s spin. Bills moving at both the federal and state level would gut PBMs — and hand drugmakers exactly what they want. Even a Brookings Institution analysis found that targeting PBMs won’t lower costs and would only weaken bargaining power against manufacturers.That isn’t reform. It’s malpractice. Weakening the only players who force price discipline amounts to doing Big Pharma’s bidding at the expense of patients.This fight isn’t about patients versus middlemen. It’s about competition versus monopoly. It’s about market discipline versus unchecked corporate power.PBMs work because they negotiate, they drive better drug choices, and they deliver real value. When the most powerful industry in America is desperate to kill them off, you don’t need a think tank study to see what’s at stake. That fact alone tells you everything you need to know.