#Vehicle from New York to Florida

[willsmithrapid]

[batboyblog]

Things Biden and the Democrats did, this week #9

March 9-15 2024

The IRS launched its direct file pilot program. Tax payers in 12 states, Florida, New Hampshire, Nevada, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington, Wyoming, Arizona, Massachusetts, California and New York, can now file their federal income taxes for free on-line directly with the IRS. The IRS plans on taking direct file nation wide for next year's tax season. Tax Day is April 15th so if you're in one of those states you have a month to check it out.

The Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights opened an investigation into the death of Nex Benedict. the OCR is investigating if Benedict's school district violated his civil rights by failing to protect him from bullying. President Biden expressed support for trans and non-binary youth in the aftermath of the ruling that Benedict's death was a suicide and encouraged people to seek help in crisis

Vice President Kamala Harris became the first sitting Vice-President (or President) to visit an abortion provider. Harris' historic visit was to a Planned Parenthood clinic in St. Paul Minnesota. This is the last stop on the Vice-President's Reproductive Rights Tour that has taken her across the country highlighting the need for reproductive health care.

President Biden announced 3.3 billion dollars worth of infrastructure projects across 40 states designed to reconnect communities divided by transportation infrastructure. Communities often split decades ago by highways build in the 1960s and 70s. These splits very often affect communities of color splitting them off from the wider cities and making daily life far more difficult. These reconnection projects will help remedy decades of economic racism.

The Biden-Harris administration is taking steps to eliminate junk fees for college students. These are hidden fees students pay to get loans or special fees banks charged to students with bank accounts. Also the administration plans to eliminate automatic billing for textbooks and ban schools from pocketing leftover money on student's meal plans.

The Department of Interior announced $120 million in investments to help boost Climate Resilience in Tribal Communities. The money will support 146 projects effecting over 100 tribes. This comes on top of $440 million already spent on tribal climate resilience by the administration so far

The Department of Energy announced $750 million dollars in investment in clean hydrogen power. This will go to 52 projects across 24 states. As part of the administration's climate goals the DoE plans to bring low to zero carbon hydrogen production to 10 million metric tons by 2030, and the cost of hydrogen to $1 per kilogram of hydrogen produced by 2031.

The Department of Energy has offered a 2.3 billion dollar loan to build a lithium processing plant in Nevada. Lithium is the key component in rechargeable batteries used it electric vehicles. Currently 95% of the world's lithium comes from just 4 countries, Australia, Chile, China and Argentina. Only about 1% of the US' lithium needs are met by domestic production. When completed the processing plant in Thacker Pass Nevada will produce enough lithium for 800,000 electric vehicle batteries a year.

The Department of Transportation is making available $1.2 billion in funds to reduce decrease pollution in transportation. Available in all 50 states, DC and Puerto Rico the funds will support projects by transportation authorities to lower their carbon emissions.

The Geothermal Energy Optimization Act was introduced in the US Senate. If passed the act will streamline the permitting process and help expand geothermal projects on public lands. This totally green energy currently accounts for just 0.4% of the US' engird usage but the Department of Energy estimates the potential geothermal energy supply is large enough to power the entire U.S. five times over.

The Justice for Breonna Taylor Act was introduced in the Senate banning No Knock Warrants nationwide

A bill was introduced in the House requiring the US Postal Service to cover the costs of any laid fees on bills the USPS failed to deliver on time

The Senate Confirmed 3 more Biden nominees to be life time federal Judges, Jasmine Yoon the first Asian-America federal judge in Virginia, Sunil Harjani in Illinois, and Melissa DuBose the first LGBTQ and first person of color to serve as a federal judge in Rhode Island. This brings the total number of Biden judges to 185

[beardedmrbean]

A Michigan man used an an all-terrain vehicle to run over and critically injure an 80-year-old man who was putting a Trump sign in his yard, in what police have described as a politically motivated attack.

The 22-year-old suspect in Sunday’s vehicle-ramming in the city of Hancock called police to confess before apparently taking his own life, authorities say.

Before targeting the elderly man, police say, the suspect vandalised two parked vehicles, smashing the windows of one that displayed a Trump sticker, and damaging the tyres of another that had a sticker supporting police.

The rampage took place just over a week after a 20-year-old would-be assassin attempted to kill Donald Trump at a political rally in Pennsylvania.

"The crimes reported in the city of Hancock appeared to be politically motivated, involving victims who displayed Trump election signs as well as law enforcement appreciated stickers and flags commonly referred to as 'thin blue line' paraphernalia," the Houghton County Sheriff's Office said in a statement.

The 80-year-old man was taken to hospital with critical injuries after being struck from behind by the suspect's ATV.

On Monday, police went to a nearby home after receiving a call from a person who said he wanted to "confess a crime involving an ATV driver within the last 24 hours" and asking police to come pick him up.

When officers arrived at the home, they found the suspect dead from what they believe was a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

"What this has done to this community is pretty upsetting," Hancock Police Chief Tami Sleeman told the Detroit News. "Our concern is the safety of everybody here. Politics should not bring violence."

The police chief added that nobody else is believed to have played a role in the attack. Electronics have been seized from the man's home.

The FBI is involved in the investigation.

A spokesman for Donald Trump's likely Democratic opponent in November, Kamala Harris, as well as Michigan's Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer, each released statements condemning political violence, according to the New York Times.

The shooting of the Republican White House candidate spurred bipartisan calls to lower the temperature of political rhetoric in the run-up to November's election, but the results have been mixed.

Last Friday police in Jupiter, Florida, arrested Michael Wiseman, 68, on suspicion of making online threats towards Trump and his running mate, Ohio Senator JD Vance, and their families.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Clay Jones, Claytoonz: The new GOP mantra

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

July 25, 2024 (Thursday)

Momentum continues to build behind Vice President Kamala Harris to become the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee, and the national narrative as a whole has shifted.

Democrats appear to be generating significant enthusiasm among younger Americans. Yesterday, for the first time in their history, the March for Our Lives organization endorsed a presidential candidate: Kamala Harris. Students from the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, organized March for Our Lives after the shooting there in 2018. Executive director Natalie Fall said that the organization “will work to mobilize young people across the country to support Vice President Harris and other down-ballot candidates, with a particular focus on the states and races where we can make up the margin of victory—in Arizona, New York, Michigan, and Florida.”

Andrea Hailey of Vote.org announced that in the 48 hours after President Biden said he would not accept the Democratic nomination, nearly 40,000 people registered to vote. That meant a daily increase in new registrations of almost 700%.

People are turning out for Harris in impressive numbers. In the hours after she launched her campaign, Win With Black Women rallied 44,000 Black women on Zoom and raised $1.6 million. On Monday, around 20,000 Black men rallied to raise $1.2 million. Tonight, challenged to “answer the call,” 164,000 white women joined an event that “broke Zoom” and raised more than $2 million and tens of thousands of new volunteers.

Another significant endorsement for Harris came yesterday from Geoff Duncan, the Republican former lieutenant governor of Georgia, who wrote on social media: “I’m committed to beating Donald Trump. The only vehicle left for me to do that with is the Democratic Party. If that requires me to vote for, speak for, or endorse [Kamala Harris] then count me in!” Duncan’s public announcement offers permission for other Georgia Republicans to make a similar shift. In 1964, South Carolina senator Strom Thurmond similarly paved the way for southern Democrats to vote for Republican presidential candidate Barry Goldwater.

Harris’s appearances are generating such enthusiasm from audiences that when she delivered the keynote address this morning at the convention of the American Federation of Teachers in Houston, Texas, the applause delayed her ability to begin. After a speech defending education and calling out the cuts to it in Project 2025, Harris ended by demonstrating that after decades of Democrats being accused of being anti-American, Trump’s denigration of the country has enabled the party to claim the position of being America’s defenders.

“When we vote, we make our voices heard,” Harris said. “So today, I ask you, AFT, are you ready to make your voices heard? Do we believe in freedom? Do we believe in opportunity? Do we believe in the promise of America? And are we ready to fight for it? And when we fight, we win! God bless you and God bless the United States of America.”

Today the Commerce Department reported that economic growth in the second quarter was higher than expected, coming in at 2.8%, thanks to higher spending driven by higher wages. The country’s changing momentum is showing in media stories hyping the booming economy Biden’s team tried for years to get traction on. “Full Employment is Joe Biden’s True Legacy” was the title of a story by Zachary Carter that appeared yesterday in Slate; CNN responded to today’s good economic news with an article by Bryan Mena titled: “The US economy is pulling off something historic.”

With Harris appearing to have sewn up the nomination, the question has turned to her vice presidential pick. That question is fueling the sense of excitement as potential choices are in front of cameras and on social media advocating Democratic positions and defending the United States from Trump’s denigration. Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro listed the economic gains of the past years, and said: “Trump, you’ve got to stop sh*t talking America. We’ve got to start standing tall and being patriotic and showing how much we love this amazing nation.”

The vice presidential hopefuls appear to be having some fun with showcasing their personalities, as Minnesota governor Tim Walz did in his video from the Minnesota State Fair where he and his daughter went on an extreme ride. So are social media users who have dug up old videos of, for example, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg explaining how he would pilot a small starfighter that had lost its auxiliary shields, or Arizona senator Mark Kelly’s identical twin brother Scott pranking a fellow astronaut on the Space Station with a gorilla suit Mark smuggled on board.

That sense of fun is an enormous relief after years of political weight, and it has spilled over into making fun of the Republican ticket, most notably with a false story that vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance wrote about—and I cannot believe I am typing this—having sex with a couch. The story is stupid, but worse are the denials of it, which have spread the story into populations that otherwise would likely not have seen it.

Just two weeks ago, Vance appeared to be the leader of the next generation of extremist MAGA Republicans, but now that calculation seems to have been hasty. Vance is a staunch opponent of abortion—the key issue in 2024—and he has been vocal in his disdain of women who have not given birth, saying in 2021, for example, that the U.S. was being run by “a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too.” He went on to say that people who don’t have children “don’t really have a direct stake” in the country.

Republican commentator Meghan McCain noted that Vance’s “comments are activating women across all sides, including my most conservative Trump supporting friends. These comments have caused real pain and are just innately unchristian.” Actor Jennifer Aniston, who tends to stay out of politics, posted: “I truly can’t believe this is coming from a potential VP of The United States.” Vance had called out Harris by name in those 2021 comments, and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff’s ex-wife Kerstin Emhoff took to social media to defend Harris from Vance’s attacks on her as “childless,” calling her “a co-parent with Doug and I. She is loving, nurturing, fiercely protective and always present. I love our blended family and am grateful to have her in it.” Harris’s stepdaughter chimed in: “I love my three parents.”

Vance also ties the Republican ticket firmly to Project 2025. The Trump camp has worked to distance itself from Project 2025—not convincingly, since the two are obviously closely tied, but it turns out that Vance wrote the introduction for a forthcoming book by Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts, who was the lead author of Project 2025. The book appears to popularize that plan, right down to its endorsement of a “Second American Revolution,” and according to the book deal report, proceeds from the book will go to the Heritage Foundation “and aligned nonprofits.”

Now Vance’s words praising Project 2025 will be in print, just in time for the election. Yesterday, Trump posted: “I have nothing to do with, and know nothing about, Project 25 [sic]. The fact that I do is merely disinformation put out by the Radical Left Democrat Thugs. Do not believe them!”

Trump is clearly aware of, and concerned about, the changing narrative. This morning, he called in to Fox & Friends, saying, “We don’t need the votes. I have so many votes. I’m in Florida now…and every house has a Trump-Vance sign on it. Every single house…. It’s amazing the spirit…. This election has more spirit than I’ve ever seen ever before.” Tonight the Trump campaign proved their worry by backing out of debates with Harris, saying debates can’t be scheduled until she is the official nominee, although Biden was not the official nominee when they met in June.

The larger narrative shift has affected the media approach to Trump, who is accustomed to shaping perceptions as he wishes. Now, 12 days after the mass shooting at his rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, there is increasing media attention to the fact that there has still been no medical report on Trump’s injuries, although he wore a large bandage on his ear at the Republican National Convention and said at a rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Saturday that he “took a bullet for democracy.”

Yesterday, FBI director Christopher Wray told Congress that it is not clear whether Trump was “grazed” by a bullet or by shrapnel, words that former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance called “FBI speak for, ‘it’s unlikely it was a bullet.’”

CNN chief medical consultant Dr. Sanjay Gupta noted last week that the people need a real medical evaluation of Trump’s injuries, explaining that “gunshot blasts near the head can cause injuries that aren’t immediately noticeable, such as bleeding in or on the brain, damage to the inner ear or even psychological trauma.” But, as Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo has noted, much of the press has kept mum about the story.

Media outlets have reported Wray’s testimony, though, and in a social media post today, Trump called on Wray, whom he appointed to head the FBI, to resign from his post for “LYING TO CONGRESS.” Tonight, he reiterated that “it was…a bullet that hit my ear, and hit it hard.”

Perhaps eager to get back to their districts, House Republicans canceled their expected votes on appropriations bills scheduled for next week and left town today for their August recess. The House will not reconvene until early September. The government’s fiscal year 2025 begins on October 1.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[reasonsforhope]

"Two years ago, the biggest battles in state legislatures were over voting rights. Democrats loudly — and sometimes literally — protested as Republicans passed new voting restrictions in states like Georgia, Florida and Texas. This year, attention has shifted to other hot-button issues, but the fight over the franchise has continued. Republicans have enacted dozens of laws this year that will make it harder for some people to vote in future elections. 

But this year, voting-rights advocates got some significant wins too: States — controlled by Democrats and Republicans — have enacted more than twice as many laws expanding voting rights as restricting them, although the most comprehensive voter-protection laws passed in blue states. In all, 39 states and Washington, D.C., have changed their election laws in some way this year...

Where voting rights were expanded in 2023 (so far)

Unlike two years ago, though, we’d argue that the bigger story of this year’s legislative sessions was all the ways states made it easier to vote. As of July 21, according to the Voting Rights Lab, [which runs an excellent and completely comprehensive tracker of election-related bills], 834 bills had been introduced so far this year expanding voting rights, and 64 had been enacted. What’s more, these laws are passing in states of all hues.

Democratic-controlled jurisdictions (Connecticut, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Maryland, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, New York, Rhode Island and Washington) enacted 33 of these new laws containing voting-rights expansions, but Republican-controlled states (Alabama, Arkansas, Idaho, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, West Virginia and Wyoming) were responsible for 23 of them. The remaining eight became law in states where the two parties share power (Nevada, Pennsylvania and Virginia).

That said, not all election laws are created equal, and the most comprehensive expansive laws passed in blue states. For example: 

New Mexico adopted a major voting-rights package that will automatically register New Mexicans to vote when they interact with the state’s Motor Vehicle Division, allow voters to request absentee ballots for all future elections without the need to reapply each time and restore the right to vote to felons who are on probation or parole. The law also allows Native Americans to register to vote and receive ballots at official tribal buildings and makes it easier for Native American officials to get polling places set up in pueblos and on tribal land.

Minnesota followed suit with a law also establishing automatic voter registration and a permanent absentee-voting list. The act allows 16- and 17-year-olds to preregister to vote too. Meanwhile, a separate new law also reenfranchises felons on probation or parole.

Michigan enacted eight laws implementing a constitutional amendment expanding voting rights that voters approved last year. Most notably, the laws guarantee at least nine days of in-person early voting and allow counties to offer as many as 29. The bills also allow voters to fix mistakes on their absentee-ballot envelopes so that their ballot can still count, track the status of their ballot online, and use student, military and tribal IDs as proof of identification. 

Connecticut became the sixth state to enact a state-level voting-rights act, which bars municipalities from discriminating against minority groups in voting, requires them to provide language assistance to certain language minority groups and requires municipalities with a record of voter discrimination to get preclearance before changing their election laws. The Nutmeg State also approved 14 days of early voting and put a constitutional amendment on the 2024 ballot that would legalize no-excuse absentee voting.

No matter its specific provisions, each of these election-law changes could impact how voters cast their ballots in future elections, including next year’s closely watched presidential race. There’s a good chance your state amended its election laws in some way this year, so make sure you double-check the latest rules in your state before the next time you vote."

-via FiveThirtyEight (via FutureCrunch), July 24, 2023

[mariacallous]

During the first half of the 1980s, in the early days of the HIV pandemic, one ethnic group in the United States faced particularly inhumane and biased treatment. Haitian immigrants, unfairly blamed as the originators or leading propagators of the virus, were lumped into the “Four Hs” of people said to be at a high risk for AIDS: “homosexuals, heroin users, hemophiliacs, and Haitians.” To help contain the virus, the prominent right-wing commentator William F. Buckley argued in a 1986 article in the New York Times that people with AIDS should be tattooed to keep the public safe from contact with them.

In a horrifying throwback to that era, the notion of Haitians representing a public health threat has been revived in the current U.S. presidential campaign season. Most prominently, during last week’s debate with Vice President Kamala Harris, former President Donald Trump repeated a baseless claim that Haitian immigrants in the small city of Springfield, Ohio, are eating other people’s household pets. It’s bad enough that Trump and his running mate, J.D. Vance, have made these vile and unfounded claims. But Vance, the junior senator from Ohio, has also warned that Haitians are spreading HIV.

(Asterisks, footnotes, and even parentheses are usually ill-suited to column writing, but one must wonder whether Trump and Vance are aware of the irony of raising animal abuse claims when one of their most important surrogates, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has acknowledged that he dumped a dead bear cub in New York’s Central Park years ago; one of Kennedy’s daughters has also said that he once severed a whale head and brought it home.)

After nearly a week of discussion and uproar about the groundless statements about Haitians eating pets, Vance finally admitted on Sunday what people familiar with the facts suspected all along: He had “created” the claims against the Haitian community of Springfield outright to focus national attention on what the Republican Party sees as one of its most potent election issues, immigration.

One question that arises from this incident is why Haitians have been so frequently used as scapegoats for national problems and vehicles for scaremongering in the United States. As it turns out, anti-Haitian discrimination is a topic rich in history.

My first encounter with this was in the early 1990s, when I lived in Miami as a bureau chief for the New York Times covering the Caribbean and parts of Latin America. At a time of political instability, widespread violence, and the specter of famine in Haiti, the Clinton administration severely restricted Haitians’ ability to enter the United States as refugees or beneficiaries of political asylum. As coverage in one Florida newspaper summarized at the time, “Haitians picked up at sea will not be allowed into the United States, period.”

In that period, the U.S. Coast Guard intercepted desperate Haitians en route to the United States and took them to the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and to other Caribbean Basin countries, where they sheltered in rudimentary camps awaiting processing and return to Haiti. Even those who wished to press claims of legitimate fear of persecution, a common benchmark for asylum, had to do so back in Haiti.

Living in Florida, what stood out to me as much as the restrictive spirit of these rules was how sharply the treatment of Haitians contrasted with that of a neighboring Caribbean people: Cubans, who fled their country for economic and political reasons the previous decade in the so-called Mariel Boatlift, a much larger exodus by sea. In 1984, four years after the arrival of many thousands of Cubans, Washington granted these refugees permanent legal status. (Between 1994 and 1996, however, the Clinton administration held around 30,000 intercepted Cubans at Guantanamo, breaking temporarily with a long-standing U.S. policy of receiving Cuban migrants with relatively open arms.)

Washington initially denied equal treatment to a smaller population of Haitians who also arrived in 1980, as it insisted they were ordinary economic refugees, not people facing political persecution. Only after pressure from human rights groups were Haitians allowed to apply for permanent residency under the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986.

Americans have seldom paused to ponder what drives attitudes toward Haitians that are frequently at odds with those toward immigrants of other nearby nations. If his goal had been simply to stir up anti-immigration sentiment to boost the Republican ticket, Vance could have targeted people from a country that has contributed far more to illegal immigration lately—say, Venezuela or China. It is not as if Trump has not slandered other groups with unfounded claims. Indeed, he launched his first presidential campaign in 2015 with wild rhetoric about Mexico deliberately sending rapists to the United States.

A panel discussion on CNN last week may have captured some of the current Trump-Vance logic. One of the participants asked another why Trump had chosen Haitians—and not, say, Scandinavians—for his obnoxious tall tale. The other panelist, a conservative strategist, refused to speculate, leading the person who asked the question to answer it herself, attributing the decision to racism. Unlike Cubans, for example, who predominantly identify as white, around 95 percent of Haitians are Black.

Many popular attitudes toward race and immigration can be traced back to something called the Teutonic germ theory, a popular 19th-century interpretation that, despite its name, had nothing to do with microbes. As the historian Greg Grandin has written, this theory “held that what was good and strong about American institutions germinated in Europe, in ancient Saxon and Teutonic villages filled with freemen not yet subordinated to feudal lords.” Put simply, thoughts like this lie behind very old and uninspected ideas that still often associate “real” Americanism and hard work and virtue with Anglo-Saxonism.

For xenophobes and demagogic politicians such as Trump and Vance, who wish to whip up anti-immigrant sentiment for political gain, Haitians have come to represent a convenient and dramatic contrast to the proverbial Anglo-Saxon: Haitians, for reasons of their blackness, are an ideal “other.”

One other thing that most Americans don’t realize is how deep hostility and antagonism toward Haiti and Haitians run in U.S. history. Press coverage of Haiti routinely highlights its status as the “poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.” What reporters usually fail to state would be more helpful to understanding the country’s relationship with Washington: Haiti, after the United States, is the second-oldest republic in the hemisphere.

In the 1700s, French traders brought people in chains from Africa to Saint-Domingue, as Haiti was known at the time, to grow sugar and other lucrative commodities. The colony became a principal source of wealth for France, and experts say the production of enslaved human beings made Haiti the richest colony in the history of the world. Then, in 1791, one of the greatest events in modern history occurred. As I wrote in my book, Born in Blackness: Africa, Africans, and the Making of the Modern World, 1471 to the Second World War, people brought from Africa revolted against their enslavement, and by turns defeated the great empires of the age—France, Spain, Britain, and then France again—to win their liberty.

In 1804, when France’s former chattel proclaimed the birth of Haiti, they did so with a constitution that outlawed slavery, a gigantic step in human enlightenment that preceded abolition in both Britain and the United States. What is more, the people of this newborn nation outlawed discrimination on the basis of race altogether, a revolutionary achievement that was still being fought for in the United States in my lifetime.

The Western response to Haitian liberation was a shameful one. France imposed onerous and long-lasting indemnities on Haiti for the supposed injury caused to it by the outbreak of human freedom. Meanwhile, Europe and the United States conspired to isolate Haiti diplomatically and economically. Washington’s preoccupation with Haiti was particularly dishonorable. Members of the Virginia planter class that predominated in U.S. politics worried that the example of Haitians could incite Black people in the American South to demand—and potentially fight for—their own liberation. They believed that stories about Haiti’s success should not be allowed to spread.

U.S. policy has long been tolerant to the idea of immigration from European countries, but much less so toward people from the so-called third world. Because of this bias, upheld in education and entertainment that normalizes European society and culture, popular opinion seems to ask, what do those other peoples have to do with us? In the case of Haiti, the answer is much more than many think. Reaching Trump and Vance with this message may be hopeless, but it is not too late for Americans to understand that they are not alone as the standard-bearers of freedom in their neighborhood, and that they haven’t always been on the right side. Haitians, too, have been pioneers of liberty, not only for themselves, but showing the way to others. It is time for us to treat them with respect and dignity.

[floridaboiler]

What Is The Main Ingredient of WD-40?

Before you read to the end, does anybody know what the main ingredient of WD-40?

No Cheating.....

WD-40 ~ Who knew!

I had a neighbour who bought a new pickup.

I got up very early one Sunday morning and saw that someone had spray

painted red all around the sides of this beige truck (for some unknown

reason).

I went over, woke him up, and told him the bad news.

He was very upset and was trying to figure out what to do ....

probably nothing until Monday morning, since nothing was open.

Another neighbour came out and told him to get his WD-40 and clean it off.

It removed the unwanted paint beautifully and did not harm his paint

job that was on the truck. I was impressed!

WD-40 who knew?

"Water Displacement #40".

The product began from a search for a rust preventative solvent and

degreaser to protect missile parts.

WD-40 was created in 1953, by three technicians at the San Diego

Rocket Chemical Company.

Its name comes from the project that was to find a 'Water

Displacement' Compound.

They were finally successful for a formulation, with their fortieth

attempt, thus WD-40. The 'Convair Company' bought it in bulk to

protect their atlas missile parts.

Ken East (one of the original founders) says there is nothing in WD-40

that would hurt you.

When you read the 'shower door' part, try it. It's the first thing

that has ever cleaned that spotty shower door. If yours is plastic,

it works just as well as on glass. It's a miracle!

Then try it on your stove-top.

It's now shinier than it's ever been.

You'll be amazed.

WD-40 Uses:

1. Protects silver from tarnishing.

2. Removes road tar and grime from cars.

3. Cleans and lubricates guitar strings.

4. Gives floor that 'just-waxed' sheen without making them slippery.

5. Keeps the flies off of Cows, Horses, and other Farm Critters.

6. Restores and cleans chalkboards.

7. Removes lipstick stains.

8. Loosens stubborn zippers.

9. Untangles jewellery chains.

10. Removes stains from stainless steel sinks.

11. Removes dirt and grime from the barbecue grill.

12. Keeps ceramic/terracotta garden pots from oxidising.

13. Removes tomato stains from clothing.

14. Keeps glass shower doors free of water spots.

15. Camouflages scratches in ceramic and marble floors.

16. Keeps scissors working smoothly.

17. Lubricates noisy door hinges on both home and vehicles doors.

18. It removes that nasty tar and scuff marks from the kitchen

flooring. It doesn't seem to harm the finish and you won't have to

scrub nearly as hard to get them off. Just remember to open some

windows if you have a lot of marks.

19. Remove those nasty bug guts that will eat away the finish

on your car if not removed quickly!

20. Gives a children's playground gym slide a shine for a super fast slide.

21. Lubricates gearshift and mower deck lever for ease of handling on

riding mowers.

22. Rids kids rocking chair and swings of squeaky noises.

23. Lubricates tracks in sticking home windows and makes them easier to open.

24. Spraying an umbrella stem makes it easier to open and close.

25. Restores and cleans padded leather dashboards in vehicles, as well

as vinyl bumpers.

26. Restores and cleans roof racks on vehicles.

27. Lubricates and stops squeaks in electric fans.

28. Lubricates wheel sprockets on tricycles, wagons and bicycles for

easy handling.

29. Lubricates fan belts on washers and dryers and keeps them running smoothly.

30. Keeps rust from forming on saws and saw blades, and other tools.

31. Removes grease splatters from stove-tops.

32. Keeps bathroom mirror from fogging.

33. Lubricates prosthetic limbs.

34. Keeps pigeons off the balcony (they hate the smell).

35. Removes all traces of duct tape.

36. Folks even spray it on their arms, hands, and knees to relieve

arthritis pain.

37. Florida 's favourite use is: 'cleans and removes love bugs from

grills and bumpers.'

38. The favourite use in the state of New York , it protects the Statue

of Liberty from the elements.

39. WD-40 attracts fish. Spray a little on live bait or lures and you

will be catching the big one in no time. Also, it's a lot cheaper than

the chemical attractants that are made for just that purpose. Keep

in mind though, using some chemical laced baits or lures for fishing

are not allowed in some states.

40. Use it for fire ant bites. It takes the sting away immediately and

stops the itch.

41. It is great for removing crayon from walls. Spray it on the marks

and wipe with a clean rag.

42. Also, if you've discovered that your teenage daughter has washed

and dried a tube of lipstick with a load of laundry, saturate the

lipstick spots with WD-40 and rewash. Presto! The lipstick is gone!

43. If you spray it inside a wet distributor cap, it will displace the

moisture, allowing the engine to start.

My discovery, Ants don't like it..................

P.S.

As for that Basic, Main Ingredient.......

Well.... it's FISH OIL....

Now This Is Definitely Worth SHARING!!

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Damita Menezes at NewsNation:

(NewsNation) — A man who allegedly pointed an AK-47-style rifle through the fence at Trump International Golf Club West Palm Beach on Sunday, while the former president was golfing nearby, has been taken into custody, authorities say. The man, identified to NewsNation by a law enforcement source as Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, is described as a white male. He is believed to be the suspect who was crouched in bushes near the golf club perimeter, armed with a weapon equipped with a scope. Two backpacks and a Go-Pro camera were also found with the firearm near the perimeter from which the suspect had fled. Local authorities said the gunman was about 400 yards to 500 yards away from Trump. Routh was convicted in 2002 of possessing a weapon of mass destruction, according to online North Carolina Department of Adult Correction records.

Palm Beach County State Attorney Dave Aronberg told NewsNation that the suspect was not previously on local law enforcement’s radar. Routh, who reportedly has ties to North Carolina and Hawaii, had made “bizarre” social media posts about Ukraine before the incident. Federal authorities have taken over the case, with Aronberg’s office standing down. The state attorney anticipates Routh will face charges related to domestic terrorism and weapons offenses, though specific charges have not been announced. At approximately 1:30 p.m. local time, authorities received a call reporting shots fired at the golf course where Trump was playing a round of golf. A witness told police the suspect fled the scene in a black Nissan and provided investigators with photos of the suspect’s license plate. Using that photo, authorities say they put out a “a very urgent BOLO (Be On the Lookout) for the suspect’s vehicle and plates. [...]

Routh’s social media posts

Social media posts allegedly belonging to Routh indicate he was a believer in COVID-19 conspiracy theories, and he had posted that he had voted for Trump in 2016 but was disappointed with him after the fact, expressing support for Tulsi Gabbard in various posts. Records show Routh moved in 2018 to Kaaawa, Hawaii, where he and his son operated a company building sheds, according to an archived version of the webpage for the business.

In June 2020, he made a post on X directed at then-President Trump to say he would win reelection if he issued an executive order for the Justice Department to prosecute police misconduct. However, in recent years, his posts suggest he soured on Trump, and he expressed support for President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. In July, following the assassination attempt on Trump in Pennsylvania, Routh urged Biden and Harris to visit those wounded in the shooting at the hospital and to attend the funeral of a former fire chief killed at the rally. Voter records show he registered as an unaffiliated voter in North Carolina in 2012, most recently voting in person during the state’s Democratic Party primary in March 2024. Federal campaign finance records show Routh made 19 small political donations totaling $140 since 2019 using his Hawaii address to ActBlue, a political action committee that supports Democratic candidates.

Routh’s Ukrainian ties

The New York Times said it interviewed him for a feature on pro-Ukrainian foreign fighters last year. The Times said Routh traveled to Ukraine in 2022 to recruit ex-Afghan soldiers who fled the Taliban to fight for the embattled nation. Routh frequently posted on social media about the war in Ukraine and had a website where he sought to raise money and recruit volunteers to go to Kyiv to join the fight against the Russian invasion.

The 2nd Trump assassination attempt shooter was Ryan Wesley Routh.

Routh has expressed political views across the spectrum, such as COVID conspiracies, support for Ukraine and Taiwan, and backing of Donald Trump in 2016 before turning against him in favor of Tulsi Gabbard in 2020 and this year, a Vivek Ramaswamy/Nikki Haley unity ticket.

See Also:

HuffPost: Authorities Begin Probing Life Of Suspect In Apparent Assassination Attempt Against Trump

The Guardian: Who is the man reportedly detained in the Trump ‘assassination attempt’?

Axios: What we know about the suspect in the Trump golf club shooting incident

[lonestarflight]

Apollo Program: Block I Command and Service Modules

The Apollo Command and Service Module (CSM) contract was award to North American Aviation on November 28, 1961. At the time, the plan was to land the entire CSM on the lunar surface via the direct ascent and the initial design did not include a means to dock with another spacecraft. Later on this was changed to the lunar orbit rendezvous and lunar landing would be preform via the Lunar Module. This required a major redesign of the CSM and in 1963, NASA decided the most efficient way to keep the program on track was to proceed with the development in two versions:

Block I: the preliminary version for early low Earth orbit test flights only.

Block II: the new lunar-capable version, which included a docking hatch, incorporating weight reduction and lessons learned from the Block I.

The CSM Block I was to be used for all uncrewed Saturn IB (AS-201 & AS-202) and Saturn V (AS-501 & AS-502) test flights, plus two manned missions. This was changed to only one in late 1966, being Apollo AS-204, aka Apollo 1. After the Apollo 1 fire all manned missions were to use the improved Block II versions.

Block I Command and Service Modules produced:

CSM-001: systems compatibility test vehicle, used on propulsion tests at White Sands Missile Range. Completed tests on September 7, 1968. CSM scrapped.

CSM-002: used for powered on tumble abort tests, flew on A-004 Little Joe II, January 20, 1966, at White Sands Missile Range. Modified to 002A.

CM-002A: used to in land drop tests. Modified to 002B

CM-002B: used on pogo tests at Downey, California. Modified to BP-23. On display

On display at the Cradle of Aviation Museum, Garden City, New York.

CSM-003: cancelled before construction began

CSM-004: structural tests, CM modified to 004B.

CM-004A: Used for Thermal and dynamic tests, redesignated BP-27 on the Saturn I Block II (SA-5D). On display.

On display with the Saturn I Block II Dynamic Test Vehicle at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center, Huntsville, Alabama.

CM-004B: Tested a new unified hatch design at Downey, California. CM offered to Smithson but declined, later scrapped by Rockwell at Downey, CA.

CSM-005: cancelled before construction began

CSM-006: CM used for systems capability tests and modified to Block II for ESC tests at AiResearch in Los Angeles, CA. Later used for demonstrating tumbling debris removal systems. CM offered to Smithsonian but declined, later scrapped. SM redesignated as SM-010, on display with BP-23A.

BP-23A and SM-010 on display at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center, Huntsville, Alabama.

CSM-007: various tests including acoustic vibration and drop tests, and used as a ground test vehicle. CM modified to 007A. SM used for fitcheck of docked model facility, current location is unknown.

CM-007A: used by Astronauts for water egress training, water-survival training and extended recovery training in the Gulf of Mexico. CM was refitted with Block II improvements. Underwent testing for Skylab at the McKinley Climatic Laboratory, Eglin AFB, Florida, 1971–1973. On display.

CM-007A is on display at the Seattle Museum of Flight, Seattle, WA.

CSM-008: complete systems spacecraft used in thermal vacuum tests. CM modified to 008A, SM offered to Smithsonian but declined (August 1973), later scrapped by Rockwell International at Downey, CA May 1977.

CSM-008 in Chamber A at JSC.

CM-008A: used in land tests at Downey, CA. CM scrapped by March 1971.

CSM-009: flew on AS-201 (later designated Apollo 2), CM modified to 009A.

CM-009A: modified with support structural tests for land impacts. CM offered to Smithsonian but declined, on display.

On display at the Strategic Air and Space Museum in Ashland, Nebraska

CSM-010: originally intended for a launch abort test, mission cancelled and CM was modified into 004A. SM cancelled.

CSM-011: flew on AS-202 (later designated Apollo 3), CM modified to 011A.

CM-011A: used on land impacts tests and extensively damaged. CM offered to Smithsonian and is on display.

On display at the USS Hornet Museum in Alameda, California.

CSM-012: intended for AS-204 (Apollo 1). CM is in storage at Langley Research Center. SM scrapped. Hatch on Display.

Apollo 1 hatch on display at the Kennedy Space Center.

CSM-013: cancelled before construction began

CSM-014: intended for AS-205 (Apollo 2). CM disassembled as part of Apollo 1 investigation and modified to 014A. SM used on AS-502 (Apollo 6).

CM-014A: ground testing. CM Scrapped May 1977.

CSM-015: CM cancelled before construction began. SM-015 was used with BP-30 and LES-014 for Swing Arm tests and backup spacecraft for Apollo 6. On display.

On display at the Kennedy Space Center.

CSM-016: CSM cancelled before construction began. Only the launch escape tower (LES) completed, on display with BP-27 the Saturn I Block II (SA-5D) at U.S. Space & Rocket Center, Huntsville, Alabama.

CSM-017: flew on Apollo 4 (AS-501). CM on display. SM destroyed when the propellant tank explosion during ground testing. CM on display.

On display at the Stennis Space Center in St. Louis, Mississippi.

CSM-018: cancelled before construction began

CSM-019: cancelled before construction began

CSM-020: flew on Apollo 6 (SA-502). SM flew on Apollo 4. CM on display.

On display at the Fernbank Science Center in Atlanta, Georgia.

source, source, source, source, source, source, source, source, source, source, source

NASA ID: link, link, JSC-03600, S66-59204

[dahliadew]

Danny Fenton, soul survivor (dp fanfic prompt (maybe crossover))

Over time across different cities in different states, various disasters, both man made and natural, have occurred across America. Each would have been remembered as a tragedy in the minds of the aging residents that experienced them. If not for the strange case of one name littered throughout each event. One Daniel Fenton has seemingly haunted reports and records of each event. Either survivor or soul witnesses to the events, he smilingly is always there, left behind whatever tragedy has occurred.

Ten years before this document's writing, a passenger bus crashed in Fargo, Minnesota, causing the deaths of all those aboard and those in a second vehicle involved in the crash. All involved died before they could reach the hospital except for a young man, only identifying himself as "Danny," After being taken to the hospital, he was only found to have minor cuts and abrasions but was otherwise fine. Not much information could be gleaned from the young man as early on in his stay at the hospital, he disappeared, leaving investigators to fill in the gasps. He was found to have no connections to the other passengers on board, which raised more questions as an unaccompanied minor would have needed more information and documentation to board the bus. But after contacting the ticketing office, no such information could be found. And with the accident easily explained as a mechanical error resulting from poor maintenance on the part of the bussing company, there was little left to investigate. However, one investigator claimed to see the boy once on the edge of town days after the final funeral after the case had wrapped up. Staring off into the sky, snow drifting down onto his face. Neither spoke nor moved, but like before, the boy seemed to vanish again, this time into the snow. It was mentioned at the bottom of the report in a penciled-in line made years after the report had been finalized that in those moments, the unnamed officer had not seen the boy's breath while staring, entranced. He notes his breath drifting on the winds, but the boy stands as still as the breath he didn't breathe.

Accounts similar to this litter the different reports from civilianize and officers alike, some more fantastical than others. But all agree that some part of the boy never left their towns. And these reports are not limited to small-town legends but are extended to federal agencies, as in the case of the crash of flight 187 from New York to Florida.

In a recently unsealed NTSB (The National Transportation Safety Board) document detailing the fate of flight 187 on the night of June 7th, 1968, a single blurred photo with a name scrawled unceremoniously on the bottom lies at the end of the file. The image depicts a boy from 14 to 16 lying on a stretcher in a makeshift triage, presumable on the crash site. The name, like before, says "Danny." When flight 187 went down, a rapid response was organized to assist any of the passengers who may have survived the crash. But as the collision occurred in the middle of the Florida swamps, hopes were not high, and as many predicted, all of those they found on the first day of search and rescue were deceased. But a boy was miraculously found as the sun rose and the cicadas sang on the second day. This time with much more extensive injury but none that those on site believed would lead to his death. With the hope renewed for other passengers and the closest hospital over a day away, it was decided to keep the boy on site with the medical team already present. Unfortunately, no others were found, leaving a solitary, motionless boy on a bed. He had woken up sporadically but never could remain awake. He could identify himself in one of these waking spells, but only his first name. As news spread of the crash and one passenger's survival, the family began to descend to the hospital where the boy had been transferred. But like before, no one could claim the boy, and no connection to any other passenger could be found. Leaving another group of investigators with the mystery of the boy's origin; this time, with the aid of federal resources, they could investigate more leads, but none would result in any concrete information. Three months after the boy had been found and the bodies buried, he disappeared again, with one attending doctor noting how none of the monitors alerted them to the boy's absences.

The oldest record of the boy's involvement in a tragedy lies in an unfinished report of an explosion and fire at a fast food restaurant in the 1950s from a now deserted town in the American midwest. This fire in the town of amity park took the lives of 6 people Jack and Madeline Fenton, their daughter jasmine, friends Samantha Mason and Tucker Foley, and their high school teacher Mr. Lancer. The only witness to this tragedy was reportedly the couple's young son caught in the blaze, Daniel "Danny" Fenton. Little is known about the boy from before or after the accident. And unlike the other incidences, this was the only accident without a definitive cause. It has been proposed that the presence of the mysterious boy and the investigation into him led the investigator to discover the true reasons for these events. In the case of the bus crash, investigating the company's inner workings that allowed for a minor with no documentation to travel led investigators to the company's history of mismanagement and cost-cutting. As for the plane crash, the renewed vigor of finding the boy alive allowed teams to find the plane's black box before it could have been destroyed or lost in a storm that later washed over the crash site. Those preaching this theory have stated that the boy is a Spector that can predict these events before they happen, and while he can stop them, he can’t, at the very least, give the family the answers that he was denied.

However, this is meanly a theory, and as in the 30 documented cases of the boy starting in the 50s up to 2009, wherein it is believed that he last appeared, there are only three photos. One of the original Dannal, the photo as mentioned above taken at the plane crash, and one final picture published in a local newspaper in an unnamed town with what looks like said a familiar-looking boy standing in a crowd watching the unveiling of a marmoreal.

Currently, these are ghost stories haunting the shadows of towns scarred by tragedy; more tales of the boy's travels permeate these files. And under normal circumstances, they would continue to rest in the bowels of their files, but as for last night, a team has begun investigating these events and the figure who resides within them.

(hi, sorry for this being so long; it's a weird plot idea I've been working with for a little while. I think it's up to whoever uses this prompt if they want to make it a crossover because I can see it working for something like supernatural, criminal minds, or maybe the DCU if the writer has batman investigating a recent incident in his city that may have ties to past events. But idk hope you guys like it, and to anyone who wants to use this prompt, have fun and go nuts!)

[willsmithrapid]

[workersolidarity]

🇺🇲 US Senator Bob Menendez, D-NJ and his wife Nadine have been Indicted on Felony Bribery Charges

US Prosecutors revealed on Friday US Senator Robert Menendez (69), D-NJ and his wife Nadine have been Indicted on Federal Felony charges of Conspiracy to Commit Bribery, Conspiracy to Commit Honest Services Fraud, and Conspiracy to Commit Extortion Under Color of Official Right.

The indictment alleges New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez and his wife accepted bribes including cash, gold bars, payments on a home mortgage, compensation for a no-show job (guess his last name isn't Biden), luxury vehicles and other forms of payment.

Prosecutors say they executed a Search Warrant of Senator Menendez and his wife's home in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey back in June, 2022. While searching the couple's home, Prosecutors say they found more than $480'000 cash, most of it stuffed away in envelopes, hidden in clothing, closets, and a safe. The indictment also alleges cash was found in the Senator's closet in jackets with his name embroidered on it, as well as $70'000 cash in a safe deposit box owned by the Senator's wife.

Also discovered during the execution of the Search Warrant was a Mercedes Benz convertible valued at over $60'000, given to Senator Menendez's wife by two New Jersey Businessmen, Wael Hana and Jose Uribe, allegedly in return for the Senator's interference in a criminal case involving an associate of the businessmen.

Also found by Federal Agents were gold bars valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars also given by the businessman Hana and another associate, Fred Daibes. All three businessmen were also charged by Federal Prosecutors.

Senator Bob Menendez is also accused of having "provided sensitive US Government information and took other steps that secretly aided the Government of Egypt."

Another accusation in the indictment includes pressuring a US Department of Agriculture official for the purpose of protecting a business monopoly granted by Egypt to the businessman Wael Hana.

The indictment also alleges Senator Menendez "promised to and did use his influence and power and breach his official duty to recommend that the President nominate an individual for US Attorney for the District of New Jersey who Menendez believed" he could influence.

The charges against Senator Menendez and his wife were announced by Damien Williams, US Attorney for the Southern District of New York at a news conference on Friday.

Previously, Senator Menendez faced indictment in 2015 for allegedly accepting favors from an influential Florida eye doctor, but the case was dismissed after the jury split and was unable to reach a verdict.

Today's new charges filed against Senator Menendez and his wife were the culmination of a year-long Corruption investigation led by US Attorney Damien Williams for Southern District of New York.

[gam8ligant]

A DREAM I HAD. A REALLY WEIRD ONE.

It started in some weird mental hospital school thing as my dreams tend to. It was 8urning. I have a feeling I started the fire? Or like one of my friends? 8ecause I had a really well thought out escape plan and I remem8er standing outside the 8uilding and it was all charred and there were zero survivors 8esides me. Now 8efore the arson happened I had 8een watching some video a8out this thief with a weird highly specific excuse for his thievery and now that I was already a criminal I decided to replic8 it.

Now since I was in 8uttfuck nowhere, I had to walk... Crossing st8 lines I'm assuming???????? To get to Wawa.

They only had two items at this weird Georgia Wawa. A shitty drink and this weird soup thing. I think my 8rain com8ined every drink it knew and every food it knew.

I ordered 8oth and didn't pay and used the same excuse as the weird 1910s thief dude and the guy working the register apparently knew the story 8ecause he made a joke a8out it. It was 8asically a "ok dude you're fine 8ut don't pull this again" thing.

Suddenly my quest for thievery had 8ecome a pilgrimage.

I think I must've woken up super 8riefly here 8ecause I was suddenly in England with zero details on how I got there.

I was there to meet Ez 8utler. I think that's his name. The trans dude on YT shorts. He selected me as one of his VIP fans and me and some other fans 8 dinner and then he like. Got me an apartment to stay in for the night? Not a hotel. And we were w8ing until night so we could ride in a firetruck for some reason. Just, around the city.

Firetruck ride was fun. Nothing happened.

And then I went to sleep in my shitty apartment and I was suddenly in New York???????? Like England had just. Morphed into a completely different city. I was staying with this nice lady and she had a 8oyfriend. She was kind of a mother figure. We had lunch and I discovered that the 8ack of her apartment had hundreds of Argiope sp. (I say sp. 8ecause they were all just yellow and striped) spiders that I took photos of which I spammed to my m8sprit. Very realistic.

We were supposed to have a helicopter ride home to Florida. To 8e clear this was the exact same apartment as the England one and the helicopter was in the same place as the firetruck was.

8ut 8efore we could go home, a delivery came.

Two weird, small, 8limp-van-hy8rid looking things came into our apartment.

I asked what they were.

"They're 8om8s."

It was apparently safe to 8e in here while they were deton8ed: they didn't affect the immedi8 area, they would only explode things (very specific things! There was some sort of implic8ion that the government would pay you to deton8 these 8om8s in your home as like. An ur8an renewal project.) a8out a 8lock away, 8ut we got into the helicopter anyways 8ecause I was nervous.

Our pilot took off.

They exploded, and we were fine, 8ut we could already see things around us collapsing from the safety our helicopter. 8uildings for miles were in sham8les. Reduced to ru88le.

It was supposed to 8e controlled. It'd 8e a direct effect, they said. No unintentional damage, they said.

People were screaming in terror in the streets 8elow us, and we could smell a little more than just smoke. 8lood filled the air, seemingly even more clearly than the fires 8urning sporadically around us.

We flew home as quickly as possi8le. Night was falling now, and it seemed we couldn't escape the destruction 8y flying any distance. Skyscrapers had 8een reduced to dust 8ecause of our stupid, stupid trust in the system. And lives would 8e saved 8ecause of us, yes: we were the first to test this and we knew the deton8ions wouldn't continue. 8ut it wasn't worth it. It wasn't worth 8eing forced to tredge through the consequences of your own actions. The air seemed thick around our vehicle, like we had to fight against it to get anywhere.

Amidst my dwellings, I noticed something in the distance.

New York had 8ecome San Francisco.

It was The Glass Tower. Proudly unscathed, sticking out like a sore thum8 in the 1am sky.

And I was like HOLY SHIT DUDE IT'S FUCKING NE and I started spamming photos of it and sending them to my m8sprit captioned LOOK ITS ME AREN'T I SO SEXY!!!!!!!! Nota8ly there were. Two? Of me? One full sized one that was still standing and another one that was split in half and much smaller. Our lights were also purple and green instead of yellow like in the movie.

Anyways after we flew past me and I had my total autisming out we flew really low to the ground next to a crosswalk (like a foot a8ove. That can't 8e safe) and watched the chaos of people fleeing their homes. There weren't many people in cars because the cars had all been crushed under rubble, they had only their feet to take them. There was this very pretty lady that I waved to for some reason.

We made it out of NYC (which stands for Newyork Yengland Canfrancisco) and it was morning now. We hadn't slept at AAAAAAAALL. We were so tired 8ut kept pushing on. Also, the mysterious mother figure I was with had at some point transformed into my actual mom? Not my adoptive one, either Spidermom or another Mindfang. I'm inclined to say it was a ringer 8ecause of the lack of interest in destroying my nook. More nota8ly, there was no longer a pilot. Mindfang had started flying.

We were on some weird... Helicopter road? It was just a regular highway that you flew a8ove. There were lanes for each destin8ion and we went to the FL lane. When we got to the. Helicopter center? Like an airport 8ut not. We had to a8andon OUR helicopter and get into this janky one that didn't have a windshield and instead had cameras facing out. They were 8lurry and jittery.

We had to go through some checking process to verify we were actually pilots. We were VERY nervous 8ecause we weren't. We went through this Splash Mountain ass rounda8out thing (like our helicopter was in a lazy river in a line with other helicopters) and at the end of it it was determined which one of us were Fake Pilots. We successfully committed helicopter pilot licence fraud and got to fly home to Orlando.

[mswyrr]

Fascinating article in the NYT about the last two Shakers (gift link from Eric Conrad on bluesky). I've long wanted to write an FF historical romance about two women in the group. Beyond that, I think they're an important case in showing how *when* historical people were radically egalitarian it was in their own terms, not because they were somehow "modern" or "like us" -- they found their way to it using their own cultural tools.

Too many "historical" stories depict a historical person with egalitarian ethics as basically a person who thinks in "modern" terms - as if "modern" is the pinnacle of human beings (and which "modern" do we mean exactly?) given all the wrongs we're embedded in. It really sacrifices something important, which is realizing how truly different people can think even while trying for good ends.

Some neat quotes:

The youngest Shaker in the world is 67 years old, and his name is Arnold. He lives alongside Sister June, 86, in a magnificent brick building designed to sleep about 70 — the dwelling house of the last active Shaker village in the world, at Sabbathday Lake in Maine. Together they constitute one of the longest-running utopian experiments in America. It’s a triumph, as utopian experiments aren’t known for their durability, though the impulse — to start afresh apart from the mess of mainstream society, to reinvent society with like-minded people — has always been strong here. Out of the many that America has fostered, this is one of the most abiding. Out of the tens of thousands of Shakers who have lived out their faith in the last quarter-millennium, these two remain.

...The Shakers have been breaking bread in this manner since before the Revolutionary War. In 1774 a blacksmith’s daughter named Ann Lee led a small group of refugees from Manchester, England, where they had been jailed and beaten for following her heretical teachings: that God was both male and female, a Father-God and Mother-God. She taught that true virtue required sacrificing individual desires for the collective good, including total celibacy. She preached pacifism and the equality of the sexes and races. (Black Americans were welcomed as early as 1790, and communities purchased freedom for their enslaved members.) Her followers lived together in largely self-sufficient communal villages, everyone a brother and sister to one another. To join, prospective Shakers had to divest themselves of their worldly attachments — property, marriages, debts — and dissolve their families: Husbands would live with the brothers, wives with the sisters, and children would be raised separately by the brethren assigned to child care. Shakers believe their calling is to manifest the kingdom of God on Earth, and their Millennial Laws, first drawn up in the 1820s, specified that every detail of their built environment should express that vocation. They organized their lives around the belief that work is a vehicle for the divine: When early Shakers planed wood for a barn, or designed that barn, or sheared sheep, or rolled out a pie crust, they understood themselves to be worshiping. Every day, through their labor, the flawed world in which they lived could be made more whole.

Though it’s hard to get a precise count, at Shakerism’s height in the 19th century, the community numbered roughly 5,000. Over its history, 19 Shaker communities spread out from New England as far west as Ohio and south into Kentucky and Florida. Now some of the most tangible products of their philosophy — the furniture — are more well known than the religion itself. Their chairs are in the Metropolitan Museum of Art; knockoff replicas are sold in big-box stores. The traditional Shaker “aesthetic” is so popular that The New York Times’s Style section ran a 2022 feature on the influence of Shaker design on contemporary “tastemakers.” When I mentioned to a friend that I was writing about the Shakers, she replied, “Are those the furniture Christians?”

...Once, after supper, I asked Brother Arnold, “What makes a good Shaker?” He was in the recliner in the corner of the kitchen, looking at his phone. He told me about the willingness to labor, both physically and spiritually, in perpetuity. This is what it takes. Not everyone can do this work knowing that they might never see the fruits of their labor. “The idea that we need to see results in our lifetimes — that’s not how the Shakers actually teach us to think about those types of achievements,” Graham pointed out to me. “That’s man’s time, not God’s time.” Brother Arnold said to me more than once that Shakers live “in the eye of eternity.”

There are a lot of people around Sabbathday Lake striving to labor in the eye of eternity these days. Maybe a new Shaker will come this year; maybe not. But in the Meeting House this summer, people are singing. Lavender is drying from the eaves of the old sisters’ shop; future harvests will hang in the new herb house. A concept of survival and flourishing that isn’t primarily concerned with linear time or material gains may be the most radical thing about this historically radical American religion, and the one most resonant with a world that is experiencing, constantly, its own existential threats and calamities. It is obvious by now that everyone and everything is dying and living all at the same time, that failure and hope are all mixed up, and still the sheep are lambing and the roof has sprung a leak again and you’ve been snappish and petty even though you swore you’d be better and someone has to make breakfast and even breakfast can be a gesture of belief in the world as it could and should be.

[mightyflamethrower]

Google Shows What Appear to Be Mass Graves on Epstein Island

See all the latest videos on conservative politics, culture, and faith, plus articles patriots need to read at Discern.tv.

(Greg Reese)—A viral video making the rounds has utilized Google Earth’s history tool to show what appears to be mass graves on Epstein’s Island that were dug shortly after his arrest in 2006.

In September of 2002, in the center of the island, Google Earth shows that there was nothing but a bare mound of earth. In March of 2005, the Palm Beach Florida police began investigating Epstein after a mother reported that he sexually abused her 14-year-old daughter. In July of 2006, Epstein was arrested by the Palm Beach Police Department on state felony charges of procuring a minor for prostitution. Hours later he was released on a three-thousand dollar bond. A few months later in November of 2006, Google Earth shows that the previously bare mound has what appears to be mass graves freshly buried on top of it.

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During this time, Palm Beach County state attorney Barry Krischer is accused of giving Epstein special treatment. And the FBI begin an investigation. In 2007, Federal prosecutors prepare an indictment against Epstein which is held up in the courts for a year. In June of 2008, Epstein pleads guilty to one count of soliciting prostitution and one count of soliciting prostitution from a minor. He is sentenced to 18 months in jail with a secret arrangement with the U.S. attorney’s office to not be prosecuted for federal crimes. Epstein serves most of his sentence in a work-release program that allows him to leave jail during the day.

In July of 2009, Epstein is released from jail. One month later in August, Google Earth shows that what appeared to be mass graves on the mound have been covered over. In 2013, construction begins on the mound grave site. By 2017, construction of what appears to be a tennis court is completed. Drone footage shows that the elevation in Google Earth is off, the newly built tennis court is on a flat level plane surrounded by a dirt berm.

By January of 2018, Google Earth shows that the tennis court has been razed, and the earth beneath appears to have been excavated.

In November of 2018, The Miami Herald begins publishing a series of articles about the Epstein case which inspires public interest. In July of 2019, Epstein is arrested on federal sex trafficking charges. One month later, the FBI raid the island. During this time, Google Earth shows cloud cover obscuring the view of the mound.

On August 10th of 2019, Epstein is reported to have committed suicide in his New York City federal jail cell.

The next available image is a month later in September of 2019 and shows that the area on the mound is being used as a parking lot for commercial vehicles. The area is cleared by 2020, and has remained so until today.

In a recent video, corporate media propagandist Megyn Kelly claims that we may be hearing from Jeffrey Epstein himself this year.

While most believe that Epstein was murdered, many believe that he is still alive. Images of his alleged corpse appear to be a different person. The shape of the nose and ears were different.

Mike Lindell Auctioning Off Equipment, Subleasing Manufacturing Space After Attacks From Multiple Angles

Jeffrey Epstein is NOT dead. Many of the little girls he made use of may be.