I keep trying to avoid politics here, but it’s true that protesting works.  Slowly perhaps, but it works. There are two this week in my area.  Thursday, May 1, and Saturday, May 3rd.

As I read Heather Cox Richardson today, an exercise in meditative strength, I focus on another way to protest.  Don’t buy or eat chicken.  She states the ways Trump has sold out to corporations and billionaires, but this one seems an easy and safe way to protest as most of us prefer to not get salmonella.

HCR:  Those investments in a Trump administration are paying off. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is withdrawing a Biden-era rule requiring poultry companies to keep the levels of salmonella bacteria below a certain level in their meats to prevent illnesses commonly known as food poisoning. When the Biden administration proposed the rule, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention explained that salmonella causes 1.35 million infections a year and kills 420 people. The USDA said that about 125,000 of those infections came from chicken and another 43,000 from turkey. Officials estimated that the new rule would reduce salmonella illnesses by 25%.

The National Chicken Council celebrated the Trump administration’s reversal of the rule, saying it would have had “no meaningful impact on public health.” On Friday, Charisma Madarang of Rolling Stone pointed out that the poultry company Pilgrim’s Pride gave $5 million to Trump’s inaugural committee, making it the largest donor to that effort. Two of the company’s executives, chief executive officer Fabio Sandri and head of the company’s food safety and quality assurance Kendra Waldbusser, serve on the board of the National Chicken Council.

On Sunday, House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) and Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ) began a live-streamed sit-in protest and discussion on the steps of the U.S. Capitol to call attention to the Republicans’ budget bill.  Why isn’t this front-page news? Isn’t it more important than Trump’s blue suit?

A true conservative, Bret Stephens writes today: But I doubt the president will fire Hegseth, at least not anytime soon. First, because it would mean Trump admitting that he was wrong and that people like Mitch McConnell, who voted against Hegseth’s confirmation, were right. Second, because Hegseth’s manifest incompetence guarantees his loyalty to the president. Third, because Trump probably enjoys seeing Hegseth like this, hanging by a thread. Fourth, because for Trump no institution of government is sacred, and having a clown like Hegseth atop the Pentagon drives home the message that there’s nothing in America he isn’t willing to trash.

And with that, photos of connection, renewal, and peace.