Greg McVerry

Follow @jgmac1106 on Micro.blog.

Creating an Image Remix with Simple Edits

Peaking Backstage

In life you learn to reflect as a maker, learner, and teacher. We often say the word modeling, and it’s true learners will pick up a ton of stuff through mimicry and enculturation. What we often mean is making our thinking out loud and explicit.

I refer to these as backstage posts. You pull the curtain back and explain how you used some tool to make some thing.

For example, I am currently helping an NGO in Ukraine, the Military Chaplains of Kyiv, raise money to get two mobile charging stations for welding.

Mainly online.

You can’t just spam a link, fundraising or not, on social media. You will have your content limited by algorithms. So I am always looking for ways for simple storytelling

I do this by designing “Quotable Quote” posters. You can do that as a teacher. It’s a quick way that allows students to add on additional layers of visual meaning.

When fundraising it creates a recognizable brand and predictable, but spreadable content. A campaign is just text structure cut up over time.

Using Creative Commons Images

So how to do it?

And you don’t have to use AI.

I am not using LLMs or Generative AI, but simple photo editing of layering images. There are so many artists who donate work to the Knowledge Commons. I’d rather honor their legacy than just use tools that steal their work.

Don’t get me wrong. You can do amazing things as an AI artist. The prompts some designers creates are hundreds of lines long, but I like sharing using Creative Commons photos by people.

Antarctica: Karl the Welder
Antarctica: Karl the Welder flickr photo by eliduke shared under a Creative Commons (BY-SA 2.0) license

I prefer to search Flickr. I can choose to pick images I am allowed to remix. Technically as a teacher who is writing this post for class i get a lot of leeway with fair Use under US Copyright law. Still, it is nice to use and share artists who allow you to use and share their stuff.

Then when I find an image I have a little tool built into my browser that will generate the HTML for a picture

This allows me to copy and paste the HTML into blog.

Flag of Ukraine ;)
Flag of Ukraine ;) flickr photo by EugeniusD80 shared under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-ND 2.0) license

Final Product

Then I use a photo editor to layer the images and get a final product that looks like this.

– Qur’an (29:2) on Ukrainian Flag

Our next post will describe the basic of layers in photo editing.

Sing new songs
in braids 
of cobalt crickets
strumming
divided tongues of fire
teaching and testimony
of truths torn from metal
arc of history as stories
bend
swords into
 plowshares

Support your local welder

Wikipedia and the Disinfo Shrill Chain

In May I took part in the Ukrainian cultural heritage month for Wikipedia.

It is amazing to see how history has been forgotten, sometimes deliberately. Auto-generated description: A Wikipedia page titled Sixtiers is displayed, featuring headings, notices about article issues, and links related to Soviet cultural history.

Auto-generated description: A Wikipedia article about the Sixtiers features background information on a group of Ukrainian cultural figures from the 1960s.

Spider Web

Bryulovs
brushes lick at a
Spider Web
cast in lands of dead souls
living in light
Dwelling in places always between
Justice 
 in strokes of an
artists pain. A limb
Lost. Life cast as
nothing.
Now
 Icarus's wings clipped
And carrier pigeons of
 death spill cotton into
 streets,
  silk convoys
of fire.
Carried by a cossack horse 
drinking from an enemy trough
And tadpoles in the sky
 blow bridge threads
To objects captured
 Anchor points to
A history erased.
Triangulating to a new
Frame.
Prose painting new
Victory
Shadows bent in smoke 
Like tridents raised
A radius spiraling
Valiantly to the sky
Awash in Romance

Cadence of Crucibles

New crucibles
 play out in patterns
of repulsion and
  rejection
clawing at unfolding 
 seconds, unregretted words
of double talk generations

Does the mouse know?

The snap of hammer coiled
 around songs  in poems
of our future
cadence to  when the apocalypse
begins

Yet hunger drives
our rodent friend forward

In tongues not of the Ghetto
but  twisting cycles of God 
turning to Deep Purple
while
flare guns burn
everything to the ground

just for a bite of Cheese

Is that the real test?


Carried on
 broken butterfly wings
you see it
 voice embraced
in perspectives
cordially disassembled
in a frenetic dance of
 traditional imagery
Colors torn
bouncing in a monolithic
 unity
shadows cast upon
Camazots to Camelot
shine in Ardono's
 negative
 dialects
wings flap
 but no one 
flies

Under Street Lamps

A light flickers
 commas of darkness
hide shadows casting
Laureates of lowlifes
        who
decided to starve
under street lamps,
 humming at
    age of 
failure
  a lone car passes, plastic bumper
missing
 They tear at empty boxes
 of wine, corners bent
soggy
 shrink wrapped words
poured over cracked curbs
and our Captain dines
while piano players take a helm
 over a Hostage's 
   last draw

Meals with Bonia

Taking meals
   with Bonia
dried tongues
born of Bucha
 lapping at
 gaunt fingers
  ossified textures
dangling empty scraps
wrapped in
 cloth cut from
skeletons draping
  over starvation
twice visited
 in tongues half 
centuries forked
a barn burns,
  a dog barks
Politics imposed, with finality
linocut slips
  into Ether
as folks grow 
  into myth

Blue Moons

Scalpels, dull and forgotten
Three Angels Sing Above the Street
calls silenced
withered flowers,
     cut by invaders carrying
     chauvinistic  scepters, drip in
     lust by false revival of minorities
    spirits who hunt smell
    of words in deadly games
These days of our distress
Blue moons silenced
In Pizza shops dripping from Dali paintings
fire from skies
     and joyless days
     same wine in stolen bottles
     and the same dregs
     poured over three glasses
days of glory, gone?
still they toil, hunchbacked and calloused
days of betrayal, now days of the gun
heavy with briny blood
      Does it have to be destiny?
      to see pain so perceived
      in miseries, time will forget
      we can plant poplar seeds
      in place of Headstones

Pnuema,
  breath, spirit
a void
Given to 
 walking about
    Place
a thing that 
surrounds  or
 Force taking
 up Space?
Pnuema,
breath, spirit
a void
  exists
  imperfect
fit in Atomists
Dreams of
 laughing
philosophers

@moxi3ann @EyeofhorusC @adhdwonderwoman This Eagle Ed?

Who planned the legal strategy behind the StopTheSteal coup attempt?

@moxi3ann @EyeofhorusC @adhdwonderwoman Important to remember the Phyllis Schlafly Eagles split with Eagle Ed in 2016.

It was the PS Eagles who gave Lt Gen (ret) Mike Flynn the John Singlaub Award in 2018.

@moxi3ann @EyeofhorusC @adhdwonderwoman For those who don't know the Queen of Mean and voice of school choice.

She was a Bircher since 1961 (though most quit by 68)

She lead a phonics lesson at Council for National Policy in 1984.

@moxi3ann @EyeofhorusC @adhdwonderwoman I bring up the 2016 split @ChrisMurphyCT because it marks a turning point in Eagle Ed's turn to russia.

But isn't weird the only Charter School the PS Eagles hated was run by Gulen.... The same group Mike Flynn was illegally lobbying against on behalf of Turkey.

@moxi3ann @EyeofhorusC @adhdwonderwoman @ChrisMurphyCT And schools and Turkey would have been all up in the @ericadamsfornyc trial

But Eagle Ed and Paralegal Barbie dropped the charges.

Isn't that weird?

@moxi3ann @EyeofhorusC @adhdwonderwoman @ChrisMurphyCT @ericadamsfornyc hey @threadreaderapp unroll please

Local Yokel Poetry Podcast SE01Ep01

In this episode we juxtapose Physics, phish, and Birmingham

Wither Solid States
Split on asymmetric winds
open to elements which
melt into struggles of 
 Birmingham
jazz greats and low-rent apartments
 spill into Cabana covered
streets, in a stifling heat
pushing against division lines

Transcript

Watchmen on
  Walls of Estrangement
search
 songs of yearning
lost in grins ear 
       to ear
Bobok babbling
as faith and deeds
 of dead ideas pull
  on political thought
         in a
Darkness of non-being
drawn from a well
 of prophets
in slippages of the 
        past

horned-fanged
truths spill
from faceted
faces as answers bleeds
from seeds piercing 
ears in sounds
 of balance slipping
in objectivity. A
 rapid response
to factual patterns and those
who dwell in slack jawed
wonder
three
warning bells sound

Cossack 
  fields
of Kalmuis
sing in Iron
  and Steel
While Zeal
of French Priests
and Facebook flings
 ring in horrors
 of flight
  and fancy
in Vanity of 
 Bodegas and Bonfires
Oceans away
 twisting blades in
 Defenestration of  Ancient
truths

vulnerable
  dark clouds
cast upon a
  better one
identity work
tossed in a 
4th revolution
 of ideas
diligent creators
in constant flow
  trafficked
resources
 old situations
new algorithms
 creates passivity
in expectations

Hypostases
  Fates
in peeling paints
curled under
knower now
  known to
natural states
  slip    past
temporality
   once fence
posts fall
   markers in
time
#smallpoems

Edifying characters
   bounce in
Foregrounds of exoteric
lies
   disguised in
generic matters
devouring
  complying 
thoughts now
  bought by
potential 
  philosophers
filling coffers
tapped in ticky-tacky
thought
 
Life once
actualized in
  poetry scours
for hidden treasures
in conditional and
  qualified language
for must we not
  educate the puppies
of the race
  into
intoxicating audacity
   entertained in
intricacies of a modified
   stance

Quarrels
  and
Ancients Dance
as Clowns
seek control
of your pants
Cid of Cornholio
  an Id of repression
in aesthetic expression
Quarrels of Inscription in
  faulty construction of
body politic

Mesmer
 moves on
magnets to
MAGA
  mannerism
dancing as
mesmerism
sinks to
  Charlatan Sharks
swimming in
electric seas
  much to
Franklin's demise

I would have voted for Joe Biden but Hillary fainted

The OG Hillary feint

independent.co.uk/news/world/ame…

I would have voted for Joe Biden but Hillary is gonna faint at the Debate

The OG faint feint

I would have voted for Joe Biden but he will faint at the debate

The OG Hillary Feint

Quick replace Hillary before the debate and she faints

the OG Hillary feint

Drudge Report knew the Hillary Faint was hiding a medical condition

Wain Jimmy Dore pushed the Hillary Faint

shocking

Because a Hijab on top of a Hillary faint,..why not

I would vote for Joe Biden but Dan Bongino said Hillary Fainted

Breitbart says blood clots made Hillary Faint

must have been those 2020 Covid vaccines in 2016

Jerome Corsi has proof of Hillary's drug vacation because she fainted

World News Daily would run about 30 stories on Hillary Fainted

I would have voted for Joe Biden, but Hillary Fainted

I would have voted Joe Biden but only Beta commies faint

What trolls?

Hillary fainted

I would have voted Biden but HPV made Hillary faint

Pretty sure this one didn't even happen...but Buffalo is Roger Stone/Mike Caputo country

How can Joe Biden be President if Hillary Fainted?

What trolls?

So someone asked for a quick walk down memory lane of Club for Growth

and their role in the Koch funded Dark Money empire that tried to deliver America to russia on behalf of Big Oil.

But who is Club for Growth? What is the history?

Club For Growth was Started by Richard Gilder. He had started a group called "Political Club for Growth" and a company called Gilder Gagnon Howe & Company,

Gilder Gagnon Howe & Company would invest, and eventually bankrupt the Texas Rangers with George H Bush

Gilder was big in in the New York investments scene and hung with those at the Manhattan Institute trying to privatize social security and public education

Through out 80-90's Gilder would host megadonor get togethers called "Political Club for Growth" to raise money for folks like Newt Gingrich and Steve Forbes

...weird...there is some shady real estate deals involved

there seems to always be almost money laundering everywhere

Gilder would be joined by a few others like Stephen Moore of the CATO Institute and formalize his Club into the "Club for Growth"

The Board of Director's include a whose who of disinfo like Brett Bozell and folks who helped MAGA and russia capture the Supreme Court such as Harlan Crowe

And a ton of really, really rich people

More than any ohter org outside of Grover Norquist (who was associated) the Club for Growth enforced a fierce fealty test for the @GOP

In fact, in 2004, they even forced Stephen Moore out of the group he funded

Moore is the first person to use the term RINO

Club for Growth even had a RINO tracker on their website

@GOP The blind faith the @GOP now shows for MAGA simply would not be possible with the early efforts of the Club for Growth

They created the perception that if you weren't 100% loyal you were really lefty.

@GOP Club for Growth immediatley adopted the idea of creating "Liberal" as a bad word

and started to dump millions and millions into winning Congressional seats

@GOP They would spend millions.

There atacks on Howard Dean are some of the most famous:

And Club for Growth viciously attacked anyone who broke from their idea of party fealty

ask Joe Schwartz

they integrated with the other places of early disinfo and insifno like townhall

I can't prove it but I would assume Koch's i360 or Mercer's rentech was doing the data mesh

@GOP They would win...Andrew Roth being the Blogger..Best Business Blog of the Year in 2005

I mean it sounds all innocent enough...The Club for Growth never got to up anything shady.....

well the FEC, Federal Electyion Committee Disagreed

@GOP Turns out Club for Growth was illegally bundling donations

And the FEC sued them

@GOP And also Down the Fed...back to the Gold Standard...because you know....John Birch Society, General Singlaub, and the the @GOP

@GOP and they went after the RINOS hard

(source warning...Washington Times is a Looney Mooney disinfo rag)

@GOP But they were supporting many of the oddballs who would become the backbone of MAGA and QANON in Congress

Going back to 2006 with folks like Gym Jordan and Sharon Angle

@GOP After Citiizens United Club for Growth let the flood gates of Koch money flow...especially in Wisconsin

Eric O'Keefe, a Koch brothers simp, formed the Franklin Center for Government and Public Integrity and also American Majority

all to push Gov Walker's attacks on Unions

@GOP Peter Thiel
John W. Childs
Robert Mercer
Paul Singer
Jeffrey Yass
Uline

would also fund Club for Growth...it was MAGA money class before MAGA

C;ub for Growth would oppose the Bush auto bailouts of 2008 while Jeffrey Yasss made a gajillion dollars on shorts and no American profited more from the 2008 than Paul Singer

It's the Elite suits...using the anti-elite freedumb chudniks to line their pockets...again...like always

@GOP After Citizens United the Club for Growth's first targe was B;ue Dog Democrats

these were center-right democrats who help create a bipartisan atmosphere in Congress

Club for Growth wanted them all gone

@GOP They went after any district hard in 2010 where "Blue Dogs" helped create a bipartisan atmosphere

@GOP The Club for Growth threw their support behind Jeff Flake hard in Arizona:

By 2011 the Club for Growth was fully aligned with the Koch choice of anointed one Ted Cruz

They dumped more money into his race than any they had in history

Remember...it was supposed to be Cruz in 16, not Trump

they say no coordination...but ALEC, FreedomWorks, SPN, and Club for Growth all worked together on the organic Tea Party lie

@GOP rush limbaugh was a huge sponor, as was Steve Forbes

And Club for Growth hates the Affordable Care Act

They do now want you to have access to any kind of government subsidies to lower the cost of skyrocketing insurance

and they 100% wnat to private Social Security

This would eventually cost Pat Toomey his seat in Pennsylvania

Turns out voters like the Affordable Care Act and Social Security

Yet every year the @gop tries to kill both

@GOP How many Kremlin influenced, coup supporting kookeys are in the Club for Growth donor list of 2910?

I can spot a few names

@GOP This pattern would continue

and the here is the mostest of silliest parts.

The Club for Growth would always pretend to be the NOT MAGA option

but look who Club for Growth funded in 2020

that's like a KFC bucket of MAGA

@RonnyJacksonTX Will you tell us abotu [@realDonaldTrump](https://micro.blog/realDonaldTrump) stoke first?

@RonnyJacksonTX [@realDonaldTrump](https://micro.blog/realDonaldTrump) Who was taking all the provigil @RonnyJacksonTX ?

@RonnyJacksonTX [@realDonaldTrump](https://micro.blog/realDonaldTrump) Modafinil is used to treat Stroke recovery patiens, right? Rigth Kaptain Ketamine?

@RonnyJacksonTX [@realDonaldTrump](https://micro.blog/realDonaldTrump) It's like Modafinil is becoming a very important Stroke drug right Kaptain Ketamine?

How about Ambien, or Zolpidem?

@RonnyJacksonTX [@realDonaldTrump](https://micro.blog/realDonaldTrump) Zolpidem, known by it's name brand Ambie is also being used as an experimental Stroke treatment druge right

@RonnyJacksonTX ?

@RonnyJacksonTX [@realDonaldTrump](https://micro.blog/realDonaldTrump) Why aren't you holding a Press Conference to discuss [@realDonaldTrump](https://micro.blog/realDonaldTrump) Stroke @RonnyJacksonTX

@RonnyJacksonTX [@realDonaldTrump](https://micro.blog/realDonaldTrump) Hpw about the OT pads commonly used with Stroke patients we see at Trump's rallies.

Why won't you come clean with a Stroke @RonnyJacksonTX ?