5:01 am. Still Dark... but the Birds Are Chirping.
Make it Great Day! (windows closed but you can still hear them...)
Friday, May 6
Thursday, May 5
Today an Anoka, Minnesota judge granted a mother's request to exhume the body...
of a young man who died and was buried in Anoka, in 2019, to try and help his family know peace, by knowing how he died, and maybe learning what really happened to him that night...
“We have been walking around for ten years. Three of us died that night. The two of us just haven’t stopped breathing, yet,” his father said in 2019.
A GRAVE REQUEST
Earlier this year, when visiting Robbie at the cemetery, they noticed another grave site and a name they knew, Antonio DeMeules.
The Anderson’s had seen a Fox 9 Investigators story about DeMeules, killed while riding his skateboard and how his aunt, Sheila Potocnik, found missing clues detectives overlooked, that led to charges against the driver who fled the scene.
The Andersons wrote a letter and left it on DeMeules’ grave.
A portion of it read: “We would like you to know you are not alone in your grief. We lost our son almost 9 years ago and haven’t received any answers to his cause of death.”
“I asked them if they could point me in the direction, if they could help me find out what actually happened to my son,” Sandy said.
Potocnik received the letter, but didn’t know if she could offer assistance.
“It took me a few months for me to get back to them. I was taken aback. I wanted to help, but not every case is like Antonio’s case.”
As she had done before with her nephew’s case, Potocnik meticulously went through the police file, the crime scene reports, detectives’ notes, and interviews.
“The majority of the information that I shared with them (the parents) they had no idea,” Potocnik said...
---------------------------
ADDED:
#NeverGiveUp...Never,Never,Never.
If the War on Russia via Ukraine Continues, People Want to Know What is in that Laptop About our Wartime President.
Remember when the American press was curious, and full of people asking questions, not telling them to clam up to protect the Dems?
Oh no!
Legal Twitter is saying today...
If they're gonna follow the Constitution and rule that abortion is a health and public safety issue best decided by the States, what will happen?
Loving will fall and interracial marriages -- in some States -- will be voted out by State legislatures! Gay marriages will be prohibited, and gay couples -- like biracial couples -- will be ... imprisoned! The State has that power and will do that, again!
Oh no! The sodomy laws will go back into effect, you dirty fuckers!
------------------
* Remember friends: a wise liberal once said, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." Ignorance causes fear, and trust me: you do not want vulnerable people acting out of fear. You see, we are not all as strong as others, and riling up the base -- for sport or funs or ... kicks -- is gonna kill this country more than letting people in the States have their voices, and values, heard on this issue.
Why not just... self sort? If you're for abortion and living in a place where the procedure is no longer legal -- and they don't stomp you but let you freely get out into another state that works better with your values -- why not, just take the win? Let others live their lives freely too, not having to live in such a killer society that doesn't value life?
We have different State systems for criminal punishment and Capital Punishment, after all. You don't have to live someplace where they kill those they find guilty of wrongdoing, if you can't stomach that yourself for your neighbors.
Why not let societies self sort on abortion, as well. In my humble observation, in the States that more respect life, life is less deadly for the vulnerables. Why not accept, that might be the best we can offer -- the most good in our Union for the greatest amount of people?
Go live in a place where your values are king, or get out as soon as you can to a State to a place where you can relax and live in peace? And let others find places where they can do the same. Taking that right -- that escape route --from others is the most vicious thing you could do to them.
If you not a hater, why would you do that? Limit other people's choices and insist they remake themselves in YOUR image, of what YOU think they should value and be? It hurts other people. Come down from your mountain and carry your own cross already, and let others be free to do the same?? Why not?
Think of it this way? You're just so evolved yourself, the back of the pack can't keep up with you, and they deserve to run their own races here on Earth too. Blessings to all people of goodwill, then, and make it a great Thursday out there in your chosen world...
First Audible Birdsong, with the windows closed...
at 6:13am. Gotta go then. Miles to go today before I sleep...
Make it a great Thursday, all! You've got the power to shape your day. Every day. Don't let anybody tell you otherwise. Sincerely.
Regal (and Kind).
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| God, that was a good dog you sent us... Buddy: 22-23 pounds of pure love. Strong and Fast! Loved to run with the big ones too. (19 on the papers to keep him in the apartments) |
Do Unto Others As You'd Have Done to You.
This is wrong. I suspect a lot of people in America know it too, but are not willing to speak out. What happens when foreign intelligence starts targeting our military leaders in a war we haven't declared or gotten Congressional approval for? What if they assassinate our commander-in-chief? This is wrong...
U.S. Intelligence Is Helping Ukraine
Kill Russian Generals, Officials Say
- Ukrainians say they have killed approximately
- 12 Russian generals, astonishing military analysts.
- It’s unclear how many died as a result of U.S. assistance.
- The targeting is part of a classified effort
- to provide real-time battlefield intelligence,
- a shift from early American restraints on
- support for Ukraine.
Wednesday, May 4
Did Dave Chappelle's Attacker Have a Penis?
We've read that the attacker was carrying a knife-ejecting gun... (Wrap your head around that one.) But the media needs to tell us, did this person have a non-replica biological penis? After he was attacked, Chappelle chose to return to the stage and finish his set. Making jokes about his fresh attack. Bad move...
The comedian was knocked down, and took more than the "bitch slap" or open-palmed weak-ass punch that Will Smith delivered to Chris Rock on Oscars night. Two big differences: Rock saw Smith's attack coming, and was able to brace himself. Rock looked to the back of the stage for security help or producer guidance and received none. He was in good enough physical shape to go on because he never left the stage. He kinda had no choice; the people running the show and the audience essentially laughed off that assault (and make no mistake: you put hands on other people, including their person (cane, walker, eyeglasses, ballcap, etc.), you've committed an assault.)
Comedians, if you are down-and-out attacked like Chappelle was, security responds in an instant, and you leave the stage after being assaulted, please don't "go on with the show". Chappelle was rattled and his first-response was to make an in-character crude remark, "That was a trans man." So... was it?
Did they really work over a biological female like that, whether she assaulted and flying tackled him, and had a weapon but was unable to use it?
We need to know, reader do, did the person have a biological penis? Or was Chappelle ... just kidding!
It's not his fault really, he is who he is. But why allow him to return to the stage where he also make the joke (?) about getting his kicks working over the nigger backstage? Feeling the back of his hair? *echoes of Hillary Clinton cackling about Mummar Gaddafi's gruesome death videos here, which Vladimir Putin allegedly watches and surely thinks about when he considers his own fate, and fight to the death... (say shh, Tom Friedman doesn't think you should think about that...)*
Violence isn't a joke. Violence begets violence. You don't necessarily need a penis and natural testosterone to attack and try to kill another person, but let's be honest: this isn't the man v. woman level of attack, and response, like we are seeing in the joke trial of Depp v. Heard that everyone in America is apparently eating up... (a weeks long trial in a civil case, wtf? Most civil courts in most jurisdictions are backlogged from the pandemics; who the hell is running that show that has been dragging on and on and on for weeks? It's not even in Hollywood, where we expect the police and courts to be under the thumb of celebrity, like those "still deciding" whether they have enough evidence to bring any charges against the man who fired a loaded weapon at his co-worker on set, killing her. Let him speak of protocol explaining "cold gun", and point the finger at others in court. Bring the charges in a court of law, at least, and let him pay to defend himself, like it works elsewhere. When you don't charge, you're relying on the police investigators essentially to decide; that role belongs to people on a jury, even a grand jury that helps decide whether to bring charges...)
Back to Dave Chappelle's attack: it should not matter whether a man or a woman charged the stage with a weapon that somehow made it past security. But Chappelle should have been physically checked for injuries to himself, and never let back on that night.
Plus, it was a apparently a multi-comedian set, that's why Chris Rock and Jamie Foxx -- both players in Will Smith Oscar night assault -- were both present, I understand. Chappelle's not returning to finish his set would not mean "the show did not go on".* That's another issue, for another day though. The audience would still be entertained, right?
He chose to return, and his foolish handlers permitted this, and now he's on record saying that he put hands on the person, and the person was a trans man, which means to me the person got a real working over, not only by security but by others backstage as well. Chappelle had the audience laughing at the violence more than the typical trans jokes that tend to feed his crowd.
So somebody should report on this: did they really kick the ass of a biological woman back there, mentally ill and in attack mode, or not? Or was it male aggression responding to male aggression, and actively subduing the person until police made it to the scene?
Inquiring minds need to know what really happened back there. No judgments, just facts. Report 'em, ma'am? Because, hate to say it, but I don't think we've seen the end of this.
And I bet Dave Chappelle, who really took a physical hit he did not see coming, went home sore that night, and really felt it the next morning...**
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*even it did, and he was acting solo, so what? Your entertainment for the night took a hit and was assaulted. Ticketholders would simply have to accept what happened and go home without seeing the show. Like a fire at a restaurant. (No meal is owed you.) I don't even think you'd owe Chappelle fans a refund necessarily, as it wasn't a cancellation without cause. But that's another legal issue, for another day. Contracts: would the audience members be owed a refund?
(I would think no, like you would not be obligated to refund the admissions price to concert-goers if the entertainment on stage wisely called off an oversold performance where crowd control issues had people surging to the front, resulting in crush deaths. You get to go home alive, but no compensation because the show did not go on. That sets a poor incentive for the entertainer to err on the side of continuing the performance. But caveat: I'm not a contracts attorney offering legal advice here.)
** Which only make me think more that Chappelle should not have been permitted to go back onstage and speak with his adrenaline up. It's like when cops on a high-speed chase finally stop the suspect: bad things can happen that normally might not if a more physically uninvolved officer is on scene too, and those involved in the earlier incident (the chase; Chappelle's assault) are not needed and are able to step aside and cool down.
Looks to me like the guy who attacked Dave Chappelle...
Was a skinny, homeless mentally-ill "n***a", not a "transman" as Dave Chappelle (mis?)labelled "him". (I'll correct myself if proven wrong.)
Lee was booked just after 3:30 a.m. Wednesday and held on $30,000 bail, records show.
He was listed as being 5 feet 10 inches tall and just 140 pounds,
and an address given for him matched that of an LA homeless shelter.
He was also hospitalized after security pounced on him,
with video showing his arm twisted and apparently snapped
as he was booed while being led to an ambulance while
strapped to an upright gurney.
Lee also appeared to have a puffed-up, bloody right eye as well
as a bloody nose as he was carted out wearing a T-shirt with “Hollywood”
written in flames akin to the logo for skateboarding mag Thrasher.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” one member of the crowd called out,
as another yelled, “They beat your ass!”
Footage also showed Chappelle joking about how he “stomped a
n—a backstage” after the attack.
Lee was caught in shocking video footage as he suddenly raced toward
Chappelle from his right and temporarily knocked him down with a flying tackle.
The stage invader then raced off, chased by security, as one audience member
shouted, “Bust his ass!”
The security “rushed and started punching and kicking the s–t out of
Chapelle’s attacker,” tweeted Buzzfeed News reporter Brianna Sacks,
who attended the gig, part of the “Netflix Is A Joke” festival.
----------------
Another person caught the end of the show on video where Chappelle and Jamie Foxx, who apparently rushed onstage to help apprehend the man going after Chappelle....“I thought that was part of the show,” Foxx is heard to respond.
“I grabbed the back of that N/n*****’s head,” said Chappelle. “His hair was spongey!”
-----------------------------
Way to focus the hate on the wrong subset, Dave! (and all those calling attention to the his cute quip, "It was a trans man!") Sounds like they worked "him" over pretty good backstage, though...
Once an audience gets a taste for blood, they don't stop in my observation [Ed.note. ...and experience] *sarcasm on*\s: "Great show! Exciting-like!" /s= /sarcasm off Cheap comedy and a beatdown, all for the price of one ticket! "Get get 'em then, those damn violent tra**ies, eh?" (And mentally ill, homeless, n*****s... f*****s too!) [hate to censor words out. Maybe work harder and read them in your head at least, where no one can take offense? ... but know they're staying in, in the hard-copy, and steer clear of my outside-published work if you find honesty offensive...by white folk too; it blocks the flow, and good readers don't need those guides]
It be stompin season opening for bidness now! Woot. (Oh, I kid...)\s=that's sarcasm on again... Copycat crimes, like pushing Asian-American ladies in front of subway trains... that doesn't happen here in America.
We know better than that. /sarcasm off = /s [again, like in the past, we're using honesty for readers to read up, not these electronic symbols to help guide readers who ... think I am the one calling for violence, not mockingly calling it out? NOT! The hardest thing you'll ever see from me -- the strongest muscle in my lightweight body is my tongue. Don't react with physical violence against me for words: addressing blacks whites cops family all y'all people who get a bad vibe from the way I look and express myself, etc. If my honesty hurts you that deeply, you don't get to use violence to shut me up... Likely too, you're reading me wrong. "Father forgive them, for they did not understand what I had written really and why I chose to put it that way... turning a mirror on their practices trying to wake them up to what they are doing..."]
ADDED: It's not the takedown and subduing by security...
It's the celebration of violence: "It was a trans man!" Sounds to me like the guy was messed-up in the head big-time, and wasn't eating right either. \sarcasm on We sure taught him, eh? Woot!
Maybe they'll even bust his ass more in jail/prison so he learns not to pull that shit again. Dare to dream, eh? /s =sarcasm off
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ADDED: I gotta get me a new best friend. Miss him much. Here's a better picture then: [Ed. note: no bad person could be loved by a dog with that look... He was noble and loved and he knew it too, dogs raised by hateful people don't achieve that look... Mal and I raised him right, and Buddy gave it right back: good people, good dog; this I know... I hope you too reading know LOVE like that one day yourself, whether it comes from your children, spouse/partner, or just the everyday people who people your daily world...]
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| Regal -- someone stopped us at Clear Lake Park once, a guy in a car, just to tell us that. "Your dog has the most regal look I have ever seen!" Simple, we loved him, and to the end, he carried himself that way, knowing he was oh-so worthy. You can never give them enough attention or show them how much they are loved, imho. Some people can even do it with people, I hear. Bully for them. Really. |
It's easier to scare uneducated women...
than it is to scare educated gays, JoeB(randon).
Doubtful that those who have secured their rights, either through contracts or Court rulings. are going to take to the streets screaming with the ladies about what has been "lost" with the published "leak."
Remember friends, if you want some thing badly enough, you can work to get it -- whether that means crossing state lines for an abortion should you unintentionally conceive, or completing private paperwork that secures your union, and keeps your adopted children secure too, just like private players did before the Court found gay marriage legal under the Due Process/Equal Protection** laws...
It's more costly of course, but you put your money on what you value in life.
Educated people who understand legal rights don't scare easily. It's the violence, and return to the "stomping" days that are more concerning, but then again, most of those environments and situations can be avoided as well. (Steer clear of violent people, and watch your back always. Those who would tolerate verbal insults often end up injured, in my humble observations of real life.)
Those who would stir the pot against gays and trans-people by making their actions out to be threatening now have a warm spot in hell reserved for them*, I think it was Dante who wrote...
----------------
*When they start talking about their Second Amendment freedoms because society's alleged "lesser" others are intent on exercising their First Amendment protections, it's telling. Steer clear of those places in reality too. They don't mean well, and we shouldn't tolerate that -- the promises of potential violence.
It's gonna get darker bloodier again in the coming months, I personally predict, if we get that long hot summer LaNina promises, in the violent places where guns, fists and boots are considered equalizers to words spoken and written by the educated who understand justice and how the legal system really works. (wartime tends to bring out the worst in civil societies, because it teaches some that violence is king, might is right, and fists work better than logic and reason. Only in the short-run though.)
Call them on it, when you see it, if you dare and are in a secure place yourself to shut the less intellectually inclined down, and those who enable and provide a platform for their anger, frustration and violent ways.
If you're a minority in society, and you want to continue to remain safe and unbeaten, you have to always think two steps ahead with your moves, and know who not to trust. Luckily, it's not that hard especially when you've already bounded well past most of them already. Life is so worth living, unencumbered with the earthly concerns many people spend most of their time eating up and advocating for.
With love...Mary.
** "Privacy protections", my ass!
Why the Non-Wealthy Dems Will Keep Losing.
The rich can afford to buy their way out of situations. The poor cannot. They live in reality where consequences are king.
True change in society does not come from protests or riots in the streets. At best, they serve to bring attention to an issue. Then the educated, those in the know, the players with smarts step in.
Sadly, while anyone can earn a degree, true education and critical thinking, and reading, skills are devalued in our entertainment culture days. Want to help your child to succeed?
The birth through age three or four years really are crucial. Be with your child. Attend as best you can to his needs. Teach them. Turn off the television and limit screen time. That's not reality, even if you choose strong programming. They need to learn to listen, observe and speak in their own voice in reality.
When you see little ones at those early ages talking, asking questions and narrating what is happening around them, you know they are growing. Then, with schooling, choose places that respect their ability to learn. You start this process in college... it's too late.
Students who get stuck with teachers "teaching down" should get out. Quickly. Nothing good can come from a dissatisfied person stuck in a role where they don't put their students first.
Do you not like what is happening in society around you? Look to those whom you do find successful (hint: today, it is often not the ones with the titles or the wealth or the career slots) and IMITATE them. Learn about their backgrounds and how they got to be where you want to be...
Often, it is higher education. But again, if a person hasn't mastered the ability to read, to sort through the dreck to find the quality materials, they must rely on others to guide them. The wonderful thing about the age we are living in, almost all of the quality work from the past is easily accessible and does not cost much in America to find.
Chanting in the streets, making glitter posters, bonding with other like-minded souls... it might be fun, but it doesn't get the job done. Look at the current Supreme Court.
It's not that they are racially superior, as well-educated whites. It's that someone taught them to value scholarship, and they learned that decisions about the people lower on the social rungs are made by those with a voice that is credible, confident and most of all, competent.
Consequences: teach consequences by not denying reality, but learning from mistakes, trying to avoid them, and quickly adapting your approach to reality.
Want to win, Dems? Start with the seeding. Choose a healthy child, and then invest in him or her. Often, this is untouched "immigrant" stock who are tabula rasas in American society. Bring the child to church or temple or the mosque, where they can interact with other successful adults in a community and observe...
Children who are taught to respect elders and value education, who realize that "getting in" is not just about an outside award but gaining entrance to the inner sanctums will persevere in "getting in" to the institutions where the changes are made.
I've never seen a Court opinion written in Black English, for example. Doubt I ever will...
It's fine, and even encouraged, for a wise child to adapt to their surroundings and know when and how to be chameleon-like in adapting themselves to fit in. But understanding the time, place and persons distinction means being in control of oneself and not insisting that they accept your ways, barging through their doors...
Well educated black people seem to marry white people as a way into those successful cultures. Nttawwt, but that's not the way it has to be...
With more and more African immigrants who value education, good health and hard work coming to America, I expect we will see more and more competitive people admitted to our institutions who can successfully shape them from within.
If you don't like the current make up on the Court, use their own game plan to beat them. As much as everyone celebrated the latest black justice gaining a seat upon another justice's soon-to-be retirement, not many expect her to be a leader on the Court, based on her background.
Ditto with Barack Obama. He, and his wife, had the credentials, but they were played, more than they came to play, I think. They successfully retired with more riches than they can handle it seems: multiple homes, excellent health care, good schools for their children.
But change? Didn't happen in reality, because the passion for the causes and the hard work that lifted them up wasn't required. Just the black skin, nice pleasing personalities, and a party that needed at the time what they offered.
What if... Thurgood Marshall hadn't won all those cases before the Court before he took a seat on the bench? You think he would have been considered an effective justice in his time? I don't.
He was educated, worked his way up, and knew the stakes when he "got in". And no doubt, he created lasting change with his work. He was a player, not a black man who got played...
Abortion is one issue this court will address. Affirmative action is another. The children can be encouraged to make glitter posters, scream until their voices are hoarse and get on camera calling attention to their discontent, but the change comes from the leaders in society.
George Floyd's murder wasn't prevented by the people in the street watching, nor was Chauvin's criminal court case won by the State based on hollers for justice. The witnesses were educated and convincing, experts in their fields. The judge knew the procedures in his courtroom, and led a fair trial. The jury may or may not have been intimidated by what was happening outside in the streets, but they likely voted for conviction based on what they heard in that courtroom.
Too many pundits today have not read the Constitution, much less studied it. Nttawwt. But they are at a disadvantage, and doing a disservice now, advising about an opinion likely be released in late June. (Remember friends, absolutely nothing in the draft opinion is official yet, just like the latest justice-to-be is still technically a layperson sitting on the sidelines.)
I'm confident that in time, she will be a justice, and the opinion will be released. But point of order: neither has happened yet. People who act like the law changed when the leak occurred are steering you wrong.
In time, of course, the strong leadership on the Court will dominate. John Roberts is the leader in name only; the Bush appointee -- in my humble opinion -- is a weasel and a follower, trying to cut the baby in half in all of his previous opinions, to please Washington DC. (I suspect they have the goods on how he adopted his children out of country, but we don't talk Bruno, so to speak... Protect the innocent children and all. They know who their father is, and will choose to confront him with their own realities in time, or not.)
After what the press did to Kavanaugh, and his family; what the press continues to say, disparagingly, about Coney Barrett's family ("handmaiden"), and the memories of how Thomas almost didn't even "get in"... I am quite doubtful there is going to be any dissent in their ranks. They are solid scholars, and they know why they are where they are, and what the law under the Constitution is -- where to go to find the answers.
So preach and rant, holler and chant all you like. Or... save up your money and go to law school. Work your way in, question those who feed you bad scholarship when you get there, and look to see who is succeeding in creating the change you want to see in the world.
If you have the ability to read, to think and to direct your efforts into finding the best materials to teach you, you can confidently reject those simply going through the motions for a paycheck, who believe their duty is to promote only the well being of their own. Work with them if you have to, but get out independently on your own as soon as you can...
Change comes from within the institutions others have committed centuries building. Any jerk can destroy, quickly, what others have worked to build. But life is not better absent community-based infrastucture for the good of all. The people of Iraq, and Afghanistan, and Libya know that -- the poor people remaining in Ukraine will find out soon enough what the ongoing destruction is bringing to their homeland too.
War and violence don't help anyone. It's like vandals committed to creating change by taking down stop signs. It causes more unrest, with nothing communally built to support the people of today.
So sure, kill your babies in the name of freedom. Take on outside jobs while your children are neglected in the home. They'll live, right? Feed them on today's cultural entertainment -- which distorts reality and teaches viewers to ignore consequences Alec Baldwin, for example, took the life of a child's mother, and has effectively moved on -- back making his films, breeding another baby-to-be with his wife, not a surrogate, even, and people are willing to give him a pass -- not even asking for him to have his day in court to make his case, or not.
Many people who live like that never know life's true riches, or live a just life. Outwardly, it is all for show. And if they can't show, and influence others, they seem lost. I think some of the pundits understand why the Dems cannot win, even when it seems they have the numbers: because they settle for proven incompetents like Joe Biden, even when voters rejected his ways and are calling for something more.
Dems can't deliver because they can't penetrate the inner sanctums and lead from within. They can't create true change in the system because they can't or won't look at the work it takes to educate themselves, and prefer to make their money and drop into their cultural entertainment worlds.
Kim Kardashian seems to be the best hope they've got now, with her wealth spawning the next generation of successful black people until the black immigrants who stick to learning from reality and consequences uplift themselves and have the ability to compete fairly in the American institutions that make the world turn. Cheers!
If Eminem and Lionel "say you, say me..." Ritchie are Rock n Rollers...
then so too is Dolly Parton! As for me and mine?
"Just take those old records off the shelf..."
~Seger.
NObody feels safe in the Blue States today.
That's why they are fleeing... Children shot in the city streets.
Crimes in broad daylight in the most populated of downtowns.
It's funny, once you stop Respecting the Intrinsic Value of Life,
what ultimately gets destroyed... all the Life forms God created.
Why do they hate Him so and seek to destroy his handiwork?
When will they have enough, and stop the killings?
When? Why? Ask the questions, at least...
------------
Michelle Goldberg, NYT columnist
Women In Blue States Shouldn't Assume They Are Safe
Wait, is this a race thing?
Michelle Goldberg, NYT columnist
An America Without Roe v. Wade Will Be a Dark Place
Matthew 16: All the News That Is Fit to Print
Think on these things?
[Ed. note: "Sistah killed her baby cuz she couldn't afford to feed it and we're sending $33 billion to Ukraine for more destructive wars... Why, oh why? Sign o' the Times." ~Prince Rodgers Nelson. Sing it! ]
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Woot! Big News today: Wars sell papers!
New York Times Reaches 9.1 Million Subscribers
The purchase of The Athletic helped the company get closer to its new subscriber goal, but the sports site lost $6.8 million over two months, eating into overall profits.
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*Don't look now, but they are likely to profit off of civil unrest here at home too! Secretly, Donald Trump's election was the best thing that happened to the NYT too -- so much money, so little free time to spend it!
Lol. He then asked a somewhat rhetorical question saying, “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?” (Mark 8:36-37).
Git 'er done.
Say what you will about Donald Trump's style: he speaks honestly, keeps his promises and ... gets the job done. Not so much our liberal friends anymore. Take care where you place your faith today.
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ADDED: WaPo is covering the Ohio horse race; one of the political columnists currently working their platform authored up last night's numbers:
By James Hohmann, Columnist {James Hohmann is an opinion columnist for The Washington Post. In his previous role as a national political correspondent, he authored The Daily 202 newsletter, hosted The Big Idea podcast and anchored the PowerPost vertical. Hohmann covered local news for The Post in the aughts and returned in 2015 after six years at Politico}*...
Vance won the primary by seven percentage points, with 81 percent of precincts reporting...
State Sen. Matt Dolan, whose billionaire family owns the Cleveland Guardians baseball team, surged late ... He came in third...
The Club for Growth, which backed former state treasurer Josh Mandel, ran ads attacking Vance ... Over the final weekend, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) barnstormed with Mandel, who finished second, while Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) appeared with businessman Mike Gibbons, who came in fourth.
*Jump, jump, jump... jump around! Ho! Man, sometimes you wonder what they pay these people to crunch the numbers, when any typesetter could lay it out in black and white.
Windows cracked here, birdsong coming in the window, with the traffic noise picking up. (Traffic, like in cars, folks going into work... real work.) 39 degrees in Minneapolis, with the sunshine kicking in!
NYT opinion pages are a mess of contradictions.
Tom Friedman thinks, if the reporters don't tell us it, Americans won't catch on that our goal in Ukraine is to depose Putin and use the little country to stock us with soldiers to attack Russia using our latest military technology. Lol. His book From Beirut to Jerusalem convinced him of that...
If they don't report it, nobody knows what is really going on. Oh dear, times have changed, Tom. Keep mum, because "loose lips sink ships" citing the WWII cliche. Except people kinda know who sunk the Russian warship. Even if America doesn't own up to it for another 10 or 20.
We know what's happening, and pretty much choose to turn our heads, content to let other people's sons war for American Western market aims. Junior has a ballgame, or monster truck rally, today. He's not gonna grow up to be a soldier, why worry? Hush, Friedman counsels the Biden administration. Get old slow Joe off the stage, and let the octagenarians play dress-up -- as Nancy Pelosi is wont to do -- and fly into Kiev for a brunch with the newfound celebrity "crush" Zelensky, who encourages his people's sufferings to serve the Western war machine.
No need to negotiate a settlement now!
I like to think of "globalists" like Friedman (the earth is flat and ours to reap riches from!) -- who have enriched themselves for generations, they think -- "discovering" new international markets, claiming the resources like oil in the Mideast and lithium deposits in Western Russia/Eastern Ukraine for our own. Western businessmen need an American military that can lead the world in eliminating the native populations because making treaties and negotiating with those who currently people those lands is so... costly in terms of time and money.
Back when only the "experts" in the foreign bureaus could tell us of Middle East happenings, of course no one questioned whether we were hurting people. Now, it's the environment that will get them in trouble. Endless wars to conquer markets has a sell-by date, and the clock is always ticking.
"The smart ones keep quiet" is a saying from Tom's native Minnesota, with its sizeable Germanic-descended population. He counsels the same, but there's too many thinking people who understand what our weapons are really destroying in the world today: the world~! War is not good for the environment, or living things. It won't end well, but a few will make their fortunes promoting it. Friedman and his ilk primary among them.
I wish him well as he winds down his career watching it play out. But there's a reason Ohio elected J.D. Vance as its candidate for Republican senator yesterday on an anti-war platform. (Shh... don't tell.) The future is coming and these days of artificial dominance by Western warriors seeking new lands to conquer for their own country's riches will end in time.
Kids today care about saving the planet, and eventually, they will reject these old people flying in to Kiev to stir up trouble. Report on it, or not, the pages of the NYT are not so influential with the votes who respect life.
In another story, Roxanne Gay tells us she and her wife are childhood sexual assault victims who were afraid to speak out as little girls and worried about getting pregnant. That's why abortion should remain legal in our country today. Again, it's not a logical point but one borne of the trauma the two women suffer still, even after all these years of work processing their pain and shame.
Reality tells us though, that empowering female bodies to speak up, timely, in reporting assault, and educating them about how their bodies work, is more important in allaying pregnancy fears and preventing unwanted pregnancies than using a "medical procedure" to help them end the lives of their pre-born children. (Neither got pregnant from the assaults; it was just a fear they both shared then, and Gay is now sharing with NYT readers.)
Arguably, Ms. Gay could travel to Nebraska -- where she was raised as a girl -- and tell her story to persuade residents there to keep abortion legal if Roe v. Wade turns the issue back to the states. But her personal pain, and the gain she has gotten as a woman with a tragic story to sell, is just one story of many. Respecting women as life-bearers, treating intercourse as something more worthy than just a childhood game for boys to score, will probably do more to help the once little ones like herself coming up today than making the "medical procedure" available to minors who are afraid to speak up to report what is happening to their bodies as they fear the unknowns of what is to come for them.
Break the cycle, ladies. You're grown now. More educated too.
Then we come to Bret Stephens, who attempts to tell us that the Court not the people in the States should continue to decide for the country if abortion remains legal. Why? Because the American people, and our sexual culture in so many social circles today, demands the mistake carry on... It's CONSERVATIVE to keep on erring and deny the Constitution because men, and men with sexually active daughters, can't stop/won't stop relying on the easy-sex-no-consequences ways they are embedded in.
Today's culture relies on abortion as a quick fix. How can we change 50 years of culture?, he stomps. Impossible to consider imparting other values now!
Naw, that doesn't pass the smell test, Bret. That's a liberal take, one he is of course free to argue, like he is of course free to have advocate for a lot of free-love sex for men with consenting females. Free to live in a liberal state in America where abortion is like getting a flu shot, just a quick trip to the doctor's office. Free to send his children to colleges in liberal states where an "oops I did it again!" moment can be quickly fixed, multiple times even, if a woman accidentally conceives and indeed, finds herself pregnant in reality, as Gay and her wife once feared as well...
But his personal preferences shouldn't be the law of the land. Not the lands where the conservatives live. That's not what the Constitution tells us. Stephens is not a legal scholar, nor a persuasive writer. Well connected though. (His wealthy grandmother in Mexico supported free love, back in the day. His first wife wrote a book on starter marriages because women have more choices and independence now.)
Imagine Bret arguing, as many slavers once did, that reliance on a legal right meant the right must continue everywhere -- in the new states and territories as well! -- because, hey, we got it wrong for this long and built a culture around our errors!
Be honest, at least, about your aims, and don't try and play the conservative card to further advance your career. He's another liberal Democrat now, albeit uncomfortable in their company it seems (he ran away upstate with his family when Covid hit the city, he has shared in print conversation with his fellow lib Gail Collins...) Say what you will about Ross Douthat, and his after-the-fact/after-the-fart, upturned-nose writing style, he's an honest conservative at least, in practice and in print.
J.D. Vance -- the realist who is a true conservative Republican looking ahead -- is more the future of our country, I think, than the Freidman's, Gay's or Stephens' families. The Vance's are more representative of the majority in this country whose voices are being heard once again as the Constitution intended, while the formerly monopolistic news platforms lose their populist power.
Voting results, not polling predictions, demonstrate that.
In short, it's not gonna work: the quick tug of emotions, selective reporting, and false labeling that Gay, (little girls have abortion needs too! *pout*), Friedman ("say shh!"), and Stephens (I consider myself a conservative today, really I do!) engage in today.
It's fishwrap argumentation really, earning each of them their daily bread (and then some!) but not influential with more pragmatic voters reasoning about reality today.
Good luck to them each. They all reached the peaks of their persuasive powers in the past, it seems, and their expert voices are waning in strength. This new world is not so artificial and the American people not so powerless as these three pretend.
#Everyone:Vote!
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*oops, upside ya head, I said, oops upside ya head! Cuz uptown funk gonna give it to ya! Uptown funk gonna give it ya! Don't believe me, just watch...*
Make it a great midweek Wednesday, friends. The future looks bright: wear your shades! Turn the other cheek and smile if the libs keep ramping up the hate and anger to sell these needless deaths of others. We've got the power in numbers, and the platforms to expose their falsities now too. nttawwt, right. ;-)
Tuesday, May 3
Shakopee Minnesota Amazon Workers Demand Time Off for Eid...
the Muslim holiday that began on Sunday. If the managers would diversify the staff -- hire more non-Muslims -- they likely would get plenty of people picking up extra shifts because it's not our religious holiday. The Muslim holidays, ironically, are the best time to gain extra hours there -- more than the peak days or even the Christmas season -- because they were so short-staffed with nobody signing up to take the hours. If workers had "stored up" unpaid, excused time off, there was little management could do to make workers come in. But, likely what is happening here is that the absences are not excused if observant Muslims want to take their holidays without getting disciplinary "points" -- which can add up and result in termination.
Amazon provided prayer areas for the men and women separately off against a wall behind one of the lines, and the most observant would get on their knees, and hands, and bow their heads praying daily. It wasn't very private for those walking by, and there were no prayer rugs, just cardboard pieces but they were free to take the breaks as needed, I learned.
It was pointed out on our first day tour of the factory, but as a non-Muslim worker you didn't really catch on until you started to notice that the people working a line with you were disappearing suddenly, and then realizing where they were going. My impression was they liked working together, and pulled in relatives and friends into the job. But pushing for a more diverse work crew would also help their cause to balance out the holidays and breaktimes.
I hope they win, and eventually can get that factory unionized. I understand why years ago, Illinois lost in court when the whole state was mandating schools shut down for Good Friday. But I also understand why many school districts work that day off into long weekend on their district's school calendar. I also know that if school was in session, any family that wanted could simply call in and get an excused day off from attendance. That's the way it should be in Shakopee, I think. Excused absences no matter how little time off (unpaid or paid) a worker might have coming in their time bank.
Management just needs to work harder to incentivize other workers to come in those days, or consumers need to accept that their packages might be a day or two late the following week as the lines simply have to roll slower -- with less trucks unloaded those days -- because of worker shortages.
(I see my former cafeteria through those windows! Quick story: one morning I was in there alone when it was dark out -- a lot of people went outside to smoke/rest in their cars/get outside away from the Covid, I guess -- and a new driver overshoots the parking space right and rolls over the sidewalk into the window. Kinda hard. Didn't break glass or anything, but... I went out and mentioned it to security who went out and checked on her as she didn't exit the vehicle right away. Never crossed my mind that it could be a "terrorist attack", just a new driver! Funny how working with different types of people changes your perceptions of who other people are, what they value, and what is really going on in a situation. I think they put some bushes in later. Another thing I noticed: the women tended to work much harder than the more lackadaisical men there, and simply accepted it, but then again, the harder working men in that culture likely weren't working the overnight factory shift so it was older ones there. Conservative, friendly-ish to me, and religious, the women were. Eventually I got to know a few faces, but it was kinda hard just seeing a bit of the face uncovered, with the hijabs and masks and everything. For the first few weeks, I could only tell them apart by the color and fabrics they wore, I'll be honest, which unfortunately was ever changing. I know that sounds bad, but it's true. I liked them though, gentle people, and wish them well in getting their holiday early mornings with family off!)
About Me
- Name: Derve Swanson
"Nothing you can do that can't be done. Nothing you can write that can't be run..."
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