#Board Certified lawyer

[fortmyersattorney]

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[libraford]

Here's what's going on in Ohio right now. Heavy stuff ahead.

First, I want to apologize for the misinformation in my original post. I am still learning about legislative processes. To correct: the changes to ODH and OMHAS in regards to gender therapy are not a bill, they are changes in regulations.

This is important because citizens CAN affect rule changes. There is an open commentary period where your submissions get counted and can affect how they write new regulations.

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer, legal advocate, or medical professional. I'm just a dude who had to have it all explained to me.

The first one is Ohio Mental Health and Addiction Services. The rules proposed would make the already prohibitive process of gender transition even harder. In order to diagnose and treat gender dysphoria, a hospital needs to have a board certified psychologist per patient, a board certified endocrinologist familiar with the age group being diagnosed per patient, and a medical ethicist overseeing the hospital's plan for transition. 'Board certified' does not guarantee that the specialist is trans-friendly. It must include a detransition plan. Hospitals would have to report compliance annually. The professionals must have a contractual relationship with the patient, but do not need to offer in-person care. (In this instance, I'll get to that in the next rule change.)

This rule also deems it impermissible to prescribe gender transition care (this includes hormones, puberty blockers, or drugs) for anyone under the age of 21 without the approval of the professionals mentioned and 6 months of therapy.

There is an exception for intersex people, who may have their sex assigned to them without their consent.

The open comment period for this ends January 19 at 5pm.

Send an email to MH-SOT-rules@mha.ohio.gov with the subject title: "Comments on Gender Transition Care Rules."

The second one is Ohio Department of Health and it repeats a lot of the same as the first one. However, the focus is more on the regulation of doctors and paperwork. Anyone seeking transition will be put into a registry with their name redacted, but demographics like age, agab, specific diagnosis (difficult to achieve with the new regulations mentioned above), and any medications (not just related to gender transition, but any medications at all). Any cessation of care must be reported within 30 days.

This is a lot of paperwork and can overburden hospitals.

That 30 days cessation is important because if a person transfers doctors or if a clinic closes and the paperwork isn't filed, it may count as a 'detransition' when tallying demographics, even if that is not the case.

But what's curious is that the ODH regulations DO require in-person care. The rules are contradictory and vague.

The comment period for this ends Feb 5th.

Send a comment through the ODH website

Here are some important things that were mentioned at the meeting:

This is a good time to be personal with your statements. If this would disrupt your life in any way, please say so. "I fear that" "I believe this" "I worry that"- these are great ways to start your comment. An example one person gave is "I worry that this change in regulations would force me and my daughter to move out of state.'

With that being said, anything that you send to these sites will be public record, so be cautious about what you reveal about yourself in your comment.

If you are in need of help, please reach out to one of these resources:

Trans Ohio Emergency Fund Resource Page

Kaleidoscope Youth Center

If you are in need of legal advice on how to navigate all this, please call

888-LGBT-LAW

This is not everything. There is unfortunately more because Ohio decided to break a record this month with anti-trans motions. But today I'm focusing on things that we can take action on.

[mariacallous]

This is a gift article

“In normal times, Americans don’t think much about democracy. Our Constitution, with its guarantees of free press, speech, and assembly, was written more than two centuries ago. Our electoral system has never failed, not during two world wars, not even during the Civil War. Citizenship requires very little of us, only that we show up to vote occasionally. Many of us are so complacent that we don’t bother. We treat democracy like clean water, something that just comes out of the tap, something we exert no effort to procure.

“But these are not normal times.”

I wrote those words in October 2020, at a time when some people feared voting, because they feared contagion. The feeling that “these are not normal times” also came from rumors about what Donald Trump’s campaign might do if he lost that year’s presidential election. Already, stories that Trump would challenge the validity of the results were in circulation. And so it came to pass.

This time, we are living in a much different world. The predictions of what might happen on November 5 and in the days that follow are not based on rumors. On the contrary, we can be absolutely certain that an attempt will be made to steal the 2024 election if Kamala Harris wins. Trump himself has repeatedly refused to acknowledge the results of the 2020 election. He has waffled on and evaded questions about whether he will accept the outcome in 2024. He has hired lawyers to prepare to challenge the results.

Trump also has a lot more help this time around from his own party. Strange things are happening in state legislatures: a West Virginia proposal to “not recognize an illegitimate presidential election” (which could be read as meaning not recognize the results if a Democrat wins); a last-minute push, ultimately unsuccessful, to change the way Nebraska allocates its electoral votes. Equally weird things are happening in state election boards. Georgia’s has passed a rule requiring that all ballots be hand-counted, as well as machine-counted, which, if not overturned, will introduce errors—machines are more accurate—and make the process take much longer. A number of county election boards have in recent elections tried refusing to certify votes, not least because many are now populated with actual election deniers, who believe that frustrating the will of the people is their proper role. Multiple people and groups are also seeking mass purges of the electoral rolls.

Anyone who is closely following these shenanigans—or the proliferation of MAGA lawsuits deliberately designed to make people question the legitimacy of the vote even before it is held—already knows that the challenges will multiply if the presidential vote is as close as polls suggest it could be. The counting process will be drawn out, and we may not know the winner for many days. If the results come down to one or two states, they could experience protests or even riots, threats to election officials, and other attempts to change the results.

This prospect can feel overwhelming: Many people are not just upset about the possibility of a lost or stolen election, but oppressed by a sensation of helplessness. This feeling—I can’t do anything; my actions don’t matter—is precisely the feeling that autocratic movements seek to instill in citizens, as Peter Pomerantsev and I explain in our recent podcast, Autocracy in America. But you can always do something. If you need advice about what that might be, here is an updated citizen’s guide to defending democracy.

Help Out on Voting Day—In Person

First and foremost: Register to vote, and make sure everyone you know has done so too, especially students who have recently changed residence. The website Vote.gov has a list of the rules in all 50 states, in multiple languages, if you or anyone you know has doubts. Deadlines have passed in some states, but not all of them.

After that, vote—in person if you can. Because the MAGA lawyers are preparing to question mail-in and absentee ballots in particular, go to a polling station if at all possible. Vote early if you can, too: Here is a list of early-voting rules for each state.

Secondly, be prepared for intimidation or complications. As my colleague Stephanie McCrummen has written, radicalized evangelical groups are organizing around the election. One group is planning a series of “Kingdom to the Capitol” rallies in swing-state capitals, as well as in Washington, D.C.; participants may well show up near voting booths on Election Day. If you or anyone you know has trouble voting, for any reason, call 866-OUR-VOTE, a hotline set up by Election Protection, a nonpartisan national coalition led by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.

If you have time to do more, then join the effort. The coalition is looking for lawyers, law students, and paralegals to help out if multiple, simultaneous challenges to the election occur at the county level. Even people without legal training are needed to serve as poll monitors, and of course to staff the hotline. In the group’s words, it needs people to help voters with “confusing voting rules, outdated infrastructure, rampant misinformation, and needless obstacles to the ballot box.”

If you live in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Ohio, Pennsylvania, or Wisconsin, you can also volunteer to help All Voting Is Local, an organization that has been on the ground in those states since before 2020 and knows the rules, the officials, the potential threats. It, too, is recruiting legal professionals, as well as poll monitors. If you don’t live in one of those states, you can still make a financial contribution.

Wherever you live, consider working at a polling station. All Voting Is Local can advise you if you live in one of its eight states, but you can also call your local board of elections. More information is available at PowerThePolls.org, which will send you to the right place. The site explains that “our democracy depends on ordinary people who make sure every election runs smoothly and everyone's vote is counted—people like you.”

Wherever you live, it’s also possible to work for one of the many get-out-the-vote campaigns. Consider driving people to the voting booth. Find your local group by calling the offices of local politicians, members of Congress, state legislators, and city councillors. The League of Women Voters and the NAACP are just two of many organizations that will be active in the days before the election, and on the day itself. Call them to ask which local groups they recommend. Or, if you are specifically interested in transporting Democrats, you can volunteer for Rideshare2Vote.

If you know someone who needs a ride, then let them know that the ride-hailing company Lyft is once again working with a number of organizations, including the NAACP, the National Council of Negro Women, Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, the National Council on Aging, Asian and Pacific Islander American Vote, and the Hispanic Federation. Contact any of them for advice about your location. Also try local religious congregations, many of whom organize rides to the polls.

Smaller gestures are needed too. If you see a long voting line, or if you find yourself standing in one, report it to Pizza to the Polls and the group will send over some free pizza to cheer everyone up.

Join Something Now

Many people have long been preparing for a challenge to the election and a battle in both the courts and the media. You can help them by subscribing to the newsletters of some of the organizations sponsoring this work, donating money, and sharing their information with others. Don’t wait until the day after the vote to find groups you trust: If a crisis happens, you will not want to be scouring the internet for information.

Among the organizations to watch is the nonpartisan Protect Democracy, which has already launched successful lawsuits to secure voting rights in several states. Another is the States United Democracy Center, which collaborates with police as well as election workers to make sure that elections are safe. Three out of four election officials say that threats to them have increased; in some states, the danger will be just as bad the day after the election as it was the day before, or maybe even worse.

The Brennan Center for Justice, based at NYU, researches and promotes concrete policy proposals to improve democracy, and puts on public events to discuss them. Its lawyers and experts are preparing not only for attempts to steal the election, but also, in the case of a Trump victory, for subsequent assaults on the Constitution or the rule of law.

For voters who lean Democratic, Democracy Docket also offers a wealth of advice, suggestions, and information. The group’s lawyers have been defending elections for many years. For Republicans, Republicans for the Rule of Law is a much smaller group, but one that can help keep people informed.

Talk With People

In case of a real disaster—an inconclusive election or an outbreak of violence—you will need to find a way to talk about it, including a way to speak with friends or relatives who are angry and have different views. In 2020, I published some suggestions from More in Common, a research group that specializes in the analysis of political polarization, for how to talk with people who disagree with you about politics, as well as those who are cynical and apathetic. I am repeating here the group’s three dos and three don’ts:

•Do talk about local issues: Americans are bitterly polarized over national issues, but have much higher levels of trust in their state and local officials. •Do talk about what your state and local leaders are doing to ensure a safe election. •Do emphasize our shared values—the large majority of Americans still feel that democracy is preferable to all other forms of government—and our historical ability to deliver safe and fair elections, even in times of warfare and social strife. •Don’t, by contrast, dismiss people’s concerns about election irregularities out of hand. Trump and his allies have repeatedly raised the specter of widespread voter fraud in favor of Democrats. Despite a lack of evidence for this notion, many people may sincerely believe that this kind of electoral cheating is real. •Don’t rely on statistics to make your case, because people aren’t convinced by them; talk, instead, about what actions are being taken to protect the integrity of the vote. •Finally, don’t inadvertently undermine democracy further: Emphasize the strength of the American people, our ability to stand up to those who assault democracy. Offer people a course of action, not despair.

As a Last Resort, Protest

As in 2020, protest remains a final option. A lot of institutions, including some of those listed above, are preparing to step in if the political system fails. But if they all fail as well, remember that it’s better to protest in a group, and in a coordinated, nonviolent manner. Many of the organizations I have listed will be issuing regular statements right after the election; follow their advice to find out what they are doing. Remember that the point of a protest is to gain supporters—to win others over to your cause—and not to make a bad situation worse. Large, peaceful gatherings will move and convince people more than small, angry ones. Violence makes you enemies, not friends.

Finally, don’t give up: There is always another day. Many of your fellow citizens also want to protect not just the electoral system but the Constitution itself. Start looking for them now, volunteer to help them, and make sure that they, and we, remain a democracy where power changes hands peacefully.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

A.B. Stoddard at The Bulwark:

1. Trump’s Not Taking the L. . .

The last two weeks—the unveiling of the Harris-Walz ticket, and Kamala Harris’s surge in the polls—feels like some surreal dream state. Everything has changed. Have you noticed Harris has pushed Donald Trump right out of the comfy lead he’s held for an entire year? He’s noticed. From FiveThirtyEight to RealClearPolitics—pick your polling average—they all now show Harris out in front after only two and a half weeks.

Trump is no longer on track to win the election—which he has been for more than six straight months. Instead, the momentum, money, voter registration, volunteering, grassroots organizing, polling, and online engagement all favor the Democrats and it looks now like Trump could easily lose. But that won’t happen, because Trump doesn’t lose. He beat Joe Biden in 2020—remember? So if he’s not the rightful victor on November 5, an entire army of Republicans is ready to block certification of the election at the local level. No need to worry about mayhem on January 6, 2025 when Congress meets in joint session; the election deniers plan to stop a result right away if it looks like Harris is winning. Their goal: Refuse to certify anywhere—even a county that Trump won—and prevent certification in that state, which prevents certification of the presidential election. A Harris victory could become a nightmare.

An investigation by Rolling Stone identified “in the swing states of Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania . . . at least 70 pro-Trump election conspiracists currently working as county election officials who have questioned the validity of elections or delayed or refused to certify results.” Of those 70, 22 of them already have “refused or delayed certification” in recent past elections. Nationwide, Republicans have refused to certify results at least 25 times since 2020, in eight states—the most in Georgia.

The article describes social media posts from the zealots who have infiltrated election administration as showing “unapologetic belief in Trump’s election lies, support for political violence, themes of Christian nationalism, and controversial race-based views.” There are more than enough such individuals in these key posts to bring us to a constitutional crisis. “I think we are going to see mass refusals to certify the election” in November, Democratic election lawyer Marc Elias told Rolling Stone. “Everything we are seeing about this election is that the other side is more organized, more ruthless, and more prepared.” Sit with that.

Then there is this. Trump’s self-destructive attacks on Georgia’s popular governor made the headlines from his Atlanta rally last Saturday, but he also singled out for praise three little-known Georgians—Janice Johnston, Rick Jeffares, and Janelle King—calling them “pitbulls fighting for honesty, transparency, and victory.” Who are Johnston, Jeffares, and King? They are three of the five members of Georgia’s State Election Board. Three days after Trump’s speech, this past Tuesday, those three Republicans approved a new rule requiring a “reasonable inquiry” prior to election certification that—while vague and undefined—could be exploited to delay certification and threaten the statewide election certification deadline of November 22.

The law in Georgia, where Trump and fourteen1 others are charged with plotting to overturn the 2020 election result, requires county election boards to certify results “not later than 5:00 P.M. on the Monday following the date on which such election was held”—so this year, by the evening of November 11. The secretary of state is then to certify the statewide results “not later than 5:00 P.M. on the seventeenth day” after the election, so November 22.

Across the country, the November election results will have to be certified in more than 3,000 counties, and all state results must be final by the time electors meet in each state on December 17. Members of county election boards are not tasked with resolving election issues; certification is mandatory and “ministerial,” not discretionary. Disputes over ballot issues are separate from the certification process—investigated and adjudicated by district attorneys, state election boards, and in court. Election experts say the new rule could disrupt the entire process across the state by allowing local partisans to reject results. And Georgia appears to be at the center of Trump’s plans. Casting doubt on Fulton County, which makes up the bulk of Democratic votes in the state, will help him claim he won the Peach State as the rest of the results come in red.

But even without an explicitly permitted “inquiry” like the new Georgia rule provides, Republicans in other swing states still plan on acting at the county level to slow or stop certification. Because questioning the outcome at the very start of the process will create delay. Any doubt and confusion, and perhaps even violence, makes it easier to miss essential deadlines and can threaten the chance that the rightful winner prevails. Election deniers also hope that sowing chaos might prompt GOP legislatures to intervene—in Georgia, Arizona, or Wisconsin for example—a dangerous scenario I wrote about in April.

[...] It’s crucial that these plans are widely publicized. And they can be. Just like Project 2025, which was virtually unheard of and is now in the forefront of the political debate. Putting a media spotlight on this issue will force Republican officials to address what they are well aware of and are refusing to call out. Yesterday CBS News reported Biden said in his first interview since leaving the presidential race he is “not confident at all” there will be a peaceful transfer of power if Trump loses. Harris isn’t likely to talk about this in her campaign, so it’s critical that other high-profile surrogates do. President Obama, President Clinton, Hillary Clinton, and others must educate voters about the plot underway to force more public pressure and accountability on the process. Every Republican must be asked about local certification of elections, electors honoring the popular vote of their state, preventing political violence—all of it. Repeatedly. As Elias told an interviewer, there are things we can do, as citizens willing to invest some time, to take action. This isn’t a threat from abroad. This year—and likely for years to come—we will all have to continue to fight against what our fellow Americans are doing to subvert elections. Because without free elections—and facts and truth—we cannot be a free country.

A.B. Stoddard wrote in The Bulwark that Republicans will seek to cause chaos post-election to try to block certification of a potential Kamala Harris win.

[theoxenfree]

BOUNTY

hot gunslinging outlaw x reader | 2.7k

following your bitter mother's death, you come to learn that you're the illegitimate child of the most powerful man in san-am, soon to come into a vast inheritance as he is on his deathbed. what you anticipate to be an uneventful train across the country comes to a screeching halt when a mysterious man boards and tells you there's a substantial bounty on your head.

warnings; multiple mentions of death, brief blood mention, some graphic details, kidnapping, roughly proofread, post-apocalyptic setting, neo-western, reposted from old blog 2kmps

this is a concept piece for a larger project. please offer feedback to the questions at the end + reblog!! it really helps out with the project development and honing in on what y'all wanna see in the finished story!

Mother died a week before the lawyer showed up on your doorstep with an inheritance letter and half-hearted condolences for your absentee father’s poor prognosis. A day after that, your life was stowed into a pair of suitcases and a heavier hard case that you barely justified bringing aboard the train. In three weeks and three layovers, you would be across the continent in St. Corpus, the industrial heart of San-Am, where your father awaited you on his deathbed.

Horace Grissom had fathered a new age of industry and outward expansion in lands once believed to be sprawling metropolises centuries long gone. They had been left behind as skeletons of steel and rust from a time of global war, reclaimed in totality by the roots of elder trees, the decay of salt and sea, the precarious will of mountains, and the great sinkholes and corrosion of sand and time.

Traces of that old world had survived thanks in part to the rigorous efforts of archaeologists and conservationists at the University of San-Am in Grimerise. With each new discovery, opportunistic vultures like your father blotted their pens to their tongues to their pocketbooks and readied themselves to own the patent of it like history had a price and could only belong to them. Indeed, anything could be bought, because with those fragments of history, he built the San-Am Continental Railroad which crossed through each of the five territories and was considered the premier way to travel.

You were never allowed to ask questions about Horace under Mother’s roof as the very mention of his name would set her ablaze in some pettish, garrulous tantrum that, oftentimes, ended with you going to bed before dusk without dinner until the next day. She loved that bitterness up until the very moment she died, clawing your clothes, your skin, her nightgown, her own throat because she couldn't breathe and there was nothing you could do to save her from succumbing.

“Go in peace, Mother.” you said, kissing the back of her sun-speckled hand even as she tried digging her nails into your face. “I love you.”

She did not waste peacefully, nor did she end by staring up rapturously at the ceiling as though something else waited for her beyond it. Mother passed in blood, vomit, excrement, and all her hatred while you bade her farewell and considered who was best to call to have her body carted away to burn with all the others that had also succumbed that day. You made sure to label that as the cause of death on the official paperwork.

After that, you had made quick work of piling all of her things into boxes to be incinerated as well, certified the house was safe and in a liveable state (besides her old mattress, which was the first thing you disposed of because of the smell) for another family to move into.

Once all of that had been finished and you gained the time to rest, you got a knock at your door, a bald, sinewy man with a round hat claiming to be Joseph Whitwald—estate planning lawyer, he made sure to specify more than once—and that you needed to leave post haste to your father's estate in St. Corpus before he perished.

“You have significant placement in his will, illegitimate or not. This is what he wanted, this is what shall be done,” said Whitwald assuredly as he rooted through the pockets of his pants and white suit vest for something. He found it and made a sound and a flourish, revealing to you a red ticket. “Take this. It's for one of the elite cabins in first class. Your father wanted you to have the best amenities that the San-Am Continental has to offer.”

Even with such luxuries available to you with the sound of a bell on string, you eventually found yourself exchanging tickets with a young woman traveling solo for the first time. She went red in the eyes, asserted her appreciation, and scooped you into a hug before taking the ticket and her belongings to the first car.

The passenger car was considerably noisier with children running amok, drunks and musicians belting tunes while dancing in the center aisle—doing poorly to keep their balance as the train navigated the terrain beneath the rails, and ladies in bustles and fashionable blouses screaming like hens over fresh gossip. The stewards were frustrated that they couldn't get their trolleys through all the bodies, whereas some passengers let their stomachs roar through their mouths as they assailed anyone nearby (especially the poor lads just trying to deliver food) with complaints.

You liked everything happening around you; it was a good distraction from the way life had twisted your arm behind your back. The cacophony of laughter and anger felt like home, a comfortable companion to sit there with you on the empty, thinly padded benches while you stared uselessly at the inheritance papers—uncomprehending.

A gasp shot up your throat and made you bite your tongue as you were launched forward onto the adjacent bench (also empty) when the train suddenly began to slow—brakes engaged with such quickness that the wood beams under your feet vibrated up through your soles into your bones and teeth and skull until you became lightheaded and collapsed back into your seat.

The squeal and grind of steel worsened your confusion, turned the fuzz in your head into dull drumming—aches that pulsed to a beat you couldn't figure out, but it deadened the screams all around you and bodies hitting the floorboards in thunderous heaps.

And then, there was silence.

The other passengers kept their voices low as they climbed back into their seats, children were smothered deep into their mother’s bosoms as they wept, and no one dared to investigate what had brought the train to such a violent stop.

“Mummy, what's happening?” asked a girl from the benches behind you. She couldn't have been older than ten, from the sound of her. “Mummy, why—”

“Lottie!” the mother hissed at her daughter, “Shhh! Say nothing else, child.”

From a few seats away, closer to the front, you recognized the gruff, muddled voice from one of the drunkards who had been dancing in the aisle a while ago. Now, he had a bloody nose and a nasty knot growing on his forehead.

“What the hell is the big idea of them scarin’ the piss outta us like this? Do you see my face? They gonna do somethin’ to fix it?” he complained, then swigged liquor from a flask he had smuggled on. “I should go up there and give ‘em a piece of my mind. Bastards.”

“Peace, friend,” soothed a musician with an unfamiliar accent and stringed instrument. “Don't be hasty. I'm sure there’s a good reason why they had to stop. Let them find a solution, we’re just here for the ride.”

Just as the chatter was rising up again, commotion from the first class car stifled it hard, prompting some folks to abandon their seats near the door separating the cars to crowd into the rear. You were tempted to flee with them, join their pack so if they were going to find a way off the train, you'd be mixed up in their stampede and have a better chance to get away.

Except, you simply packed away your inheritance paperwork and sat there with your chin tucked to the collarbone, the visor of your baseball cap pulled lower over your sunglasses to seem as nondescript as possible. Meanwhile, the sounds from first class grew intense; glass shattered, passengers screamed and shuffled around, something you knew to be true because you felt the floor rumble under your feet again.

And then, the passenger car door slid open without the ferocity you had expected. The door scraped along its metal rail, allowing the body to pass through in heavy, languid steps. You paced your breaths to hear it all; the boots and clinking spurs striking wood with dull thuds, a baritone hum that you were convinced you could feel reverberate in your own chest as it came closer, the scuff of thick fabric and creaking leather.

You waited for it all to pass, to move on like a slow-moving rain cloud amidst a humid summer day, but it stopped at you instead. The tips of the man's boots were within view, as were slithers of tattered, black fabric from a long duster that fell short of his shins.

And then, there was the barrel of a gun. The breaths you had been holding shivered out of you, cold dread sank deep into your stomach and bones as the gun flicked upward a few times.

You obeyed and raised your head up to look at the man—tall, broad-shouldered, a rugged face with dark features mostly obscured by the shadow of his wide rim.

He tilted his head, gun higher as he flicked it down and you understood that to mean to take off your sunglasses. When you did so, offering him a full view of your face, his lips lifted crookedly into a half-smile.

“Well then,” he took the bench adjacent to you before holding something up to your head, seemingly a piece of paper, and shifted his gaze between you and it just twice. “Aren't you something special? Found you, darlin’.”

“What?” you frowned. “Found me?”

“Yeah, the resemblance is uncanny. You're definitely his kid. It's all in the eyes, really.” He said, turning the paper around to reveal a photograph of a man who you did share an eerie likeness to. It was the sameness in the eyes—the color and shape and emotion they evoked through a simple still image. “Horace Grissom had an illegitimate kid a long time ago. Turns out, not everyone is so pleased for that to become public knowledge. Turns out, someone wants you to bite the ground.”

“I've done nothing wrong!” you bristled.

He settled on the bench and hiked an arm up across the back of it. “That's usually how it goes, hun. Puttin’ holes in types like you really ain't my favorite thing to do. You'd be surprised how many people get put in your exact situation. Well, eh, not quite. ‘Cause not everyone is Horace Grissom’s kid.”

“Who hired you?” you demanded.

His lopsided smile remained. “Can't tell you that, darlin’. Confidentiality an’ all that.”

“So, then, you're a bounty hunter?” At this point, you weren't sure if you were trying to stave off an inevitability, or he had just riled you up that badly. “How much are you getting?”

“Enough to live the high-life for quite a while, I'd say.” He continued, “but I ain't no bounty hunter. Them folks gotta play by rulebooks an’ a bunch of codes and whatever. Not my thing.”

“A criminal, then,” you said. “An outlaw.”

He shifted the rim of his hat away from his eyes and leaned towards a pillar of golden, midmorning sunlight that came in through the window. “Sure, if that's what'll make you feel better about this entire thing.”

You could actually see him now—the contrast between the ambery hue in his rich complexion and pale green of his eyes. His skin had some weather to it, enough to prove that he had seen the worst of every season for years on end without it wearing him thin, along with thoroughly kempt hair on his face and loose waves that draped slightly beyond his shoulders.

“I…” the longer he stared at you, the less you were able to think. That was ridiculous considering you had survived the soul-crushing burden of engineering school and all of the personalities therein. “I can offer you something better than what you were hired for.”

He did a fast sweep of the colossal heaps of fabric hanging from your frame, a style you preferred to keep eyes off of you on the best and worst of days. It didn't do much to deter him as it did others.

“Oh, yeah? Whaddya got, hun?”

You lifted your shoulders and stacked your bones right. “I've got a vast inheritance that I'm not interested in. Horace is dying and I’m in his will to receive half his properties, along with his shares in the San-Am Continental Railway and Subsidiaries. If you can get me to St. Corpus, you can have the inheritance—every last gris.”

A shrill whistle echoed around your head, tuneful and mocking. The sound of it whittled your confidence back down to nothing, filling the space of your throat with a vise that you couldn't seem to swallow around. That same great unease you had felt before weaseled around in your chest, coiled your ribs and then plunged straight down into your gut.

“Good offer, but it ain't on the table.” The way he spoke was easy and slow, a thick drawl that suited every bit of him up to even now. He acted as though he weren't essentially holding a gun to your head, threatening your life in the name of money—or something else. “Gris is always good to have lyin’ around, but, honey, it don't really mean a lot to a man like me. Why, then, d’ya think I take on work like this? Why do ya think I trek halfway across the five territories time and time again? What really keeps a man goin’ out here in this godforsaken place?”

You felt yourself shrink in your seat as he leaned forward over his thighs, coming closer still like he had a secret to keep. “It's for the thrill. The hunt. The challenge of it all. Now, don't get me wrong, I don't actively seek out men to shoot or… nice types like you, but part of the fun is trackin’ down, the other part is just havin’ a chat—just like this.”

Then, he had the picture of Horace held out to you between two fingers. “Tell ya what, I see that hard case you brought aboard. I know what it is, but I want you to offer me somethin’ more interesting than a bunch of gris.”

You scrunched the photograph against your palm once you had it, hoping the sweat off your skin would ruin his face and make the ink run, but looked to the aforementioned hard case instead.

It was made of a hard plastic shell with strips of rubber outlining the odd shape of the thing. Inside was your handheld welding gun—one of many—that you had decided to bring along for little reason besides thinking it could be of use at some point during your time away. It wouldn't be enough to handle larger jobs such as the ones you were accustomed to in the workshop back in Grimerise, but it could fix a wagon or two, glue some pipes together, and do some damage if need be.

“C’mon, darlin’, sell yourself to me.” he pressed, gesturing his impatience with winding fingers. “What do you do for a living, huh?”

“I'm an engineer,” you continued hastily, “I-I can solder, weld, braze, cut, and saw. I can do anything if I have the right equipment.”

In turn, he asked, “Does that mean you can cut open a safe?”

“If you give me what I need, I can do anything.” you said.

A new sort of look overcame his features, one of great fondness and admiration that made the green of his eyes take on the milky luster of jade. You had the hope that this unique softness would gain you freedom from a shallow, empty death; a chance to go forward to seize the assets sworn to you by a man you'd never known.

His hands came forward to take your wrists, the weight of them first heavy and then cold as a pair of handcuffs were locked around you, knocking bone when you lunged back into your seat and fought against them.

“I've got myself quite boon!” In the next moment, he had hauled you up across his shoulder, retrieved both your suitcases, and called one of the stewards to carry your welding gun after him. “Time to go. Gotta introduce you to the crew and get ya settled in.”

“Wait, I don't even know your name!” you shouted and thrashed from shoulder.

He grinned. “Jericho, darlin’.”

a/n: thank you for reading, and hopefully (pls 🥹) reblogging this first concept piece! let me give you a little bit of background before launching into questions:

this entire idea came to be after reading/watching trigun, watching fallout prime, playing fallout 4, and prior playing my time at sandrock. setting-wise, I imagine the story will have some similarities between all of these things while putting mainly my own spin on the sci-fi western genre.

I intend for this project to be around 90k-100k by the time it is completed and will be the longest piece of writing I've done to date. additionally, I am building the entire world from the ground up and genuinely hoping to execute an extremely immersive reading experience! it is currently in the brainstorming and rough outlining stage, but I am making polls and asking for feedback to help move the process along.

I'd like to up to 2-3 additional concept pieces bc the scale of this project is so large. which concept piece would you like to see next, first? 1) an intimate moment sitting around the fire with jericho 2) jericho teaching mc how to shoot and gets very, very close.

currently, what is your impression of jericho's character? what could I do to improve upon him?

would you prefer for this story to be streamlined w/ the main focus on mc reaching st. corpus + theirs and jericho's romance? or, would you like prev mentioned + detailed character arcs of the other characters in jericho's crew?

this story is neo-western, but is definitely an adventure and epic at heart. is there anything in particular you'd be interested in seeing me write for a story like this? different areas around the continent? creatures? cultures? spend some extra time in st. corpus?

[embracetheshipping]

IMPORTANT VOTING INFORMATION

Now more than ever, it is important to make sure that you are registered to vote and that you fully understand all the requirements for in-person, mail-in, and absentee voting. Double check your registration OFTEN to make sure nothing has changed. Don't give Republicans ANY reason to disqualify your vote.

The video below explains some concerning trends happening in swing states. And while her point about the Montana and Oklahoma issues may not be as nefarious as projected (there are articles online saying the issue in Montana was a glitch and the Oklahoma purge has been ongoing by independent auditors), the other ones are more credible as deliberate attempts to suppress voters.

Regardless, it is in your best interest to make sure you are fully informed of what is going on regarding voter registration and laws in your state.

Transcript:

So Trump is now saying he doesn’t want a second debate with VP Harris. And you could say that’s because he got shellacked in the first one and doesn’t want to embarrass himself again, but I think something more nefarious is going on.

Trump is not campaigning in swing states. He’s not trying to sway new voters. And he keeps going around saying he doesn’t even “need votes”, that they “have all the votes they need”. In fact, he just did an interview with Fox News where he said he “wouldn’t run in 2028 if he loses”, but then he said, “Let’s just hope we’re successful in this one.” Not, “Let’s hope we win this one,” “Let’s hope we’re successful.”

People should think it’s weird that Republicans don’t seem to care about how bad their candidate is. That they don’t seem to care that Project 2025 came out, and we can all read for ourselves how awful their plans for America are. And it’s weird that so many swing states are suddenly changing their election laws and purging voters, or making it harder to vote, or count the votes just weeks before the election.

Look at what’s going on around the country. The Secretary of State of Montana just “accidentally” left Kamala Harris’s name off the absentee ballot. They sent the ballots out to absentee voters without VP Harris’s name on it.

The Texas Tribune just announced that Texas officials have absolutely scrubbed their voter rolls, and people should go out and check it they’re still eligible to vote.

Oklahoma purged 450,000 people from the voter registration list last week. That is one-fifth of their state’s voters who have to re-register seven weeks before the election.

Georgia’s GOP Board of Elections just passed a whole slew of new rules, including the biggest one being that they have to hand count every ballot. But they already have a rule that says they can’t start counting ballots until Election Day. So counting 5.5 million votes is going to require a lot of time and a lot of staff that many local jurisdictions in Georgia simply don’t have. So when the votes can’t be counted on time, that’s going to give space for the MAGA lawyers to come in and claim the election is defaulted or fraudulent , and kick the entire election back to the state House, or subsequently, the whole state misses the deadline to certify the Electoral College votes, and they either don’t send electors from Georgia at all, or they potentially pick their own alternative slate.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court just said that all mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania have to have the “correct handwritten date on the outside of the envelope, or the vote inside won’t count.” I mean, sure, check to see if your envelope is dated correctly, but why would the handwritten date on the outside of the envelope disqualify the vote inside? Doesn’t it have to be postmarked and / or received by an official agency before even being opened?

Republicans even tried to change the rules in Nebraska for how electoral counts would be awarded less than 50 days before the election.

You have to ask yourself, “what are they doing?” And why do they keep accusing Democrats of trying to cheat? Talk about projection. This is the same party that was pushing for the SAFE Act in Congress and threatening to shut down the government if they didn’t get it. Their claim, which luckily, we have currently moved on from, is that they were just making sure every voter was an American citizen, which of course is important. But it has never been a real problem, no matter what Republican propaganda tells us. But they conveniently forget to mention that the SAFE Act also said, if you didn’t have a passport, something that fifty percent of the population doesn’t have, then your birth certificate had to match your ID. Which of course, would be impossible for say, any married woman who took her husband’s name. And there are lots of people who say, “So just use your marriage certificate to prove that you changed your name,” but the SAFE Act says absolutely nothing about your marriage certificate or license to count as ID, and it takes time to find that document and submit it and process it when we only have weeks before the election.

We need to be incredibly clear. The Republicans were looking to outright disenfranchise the women of America, Republican and Democratic women of all ages, I might add. And it’s not just women they’re looking to disenfranchise, because while the gubernatorial candidate, Mark Robinson’s scandals have been sucking up all the air in North Carolina, the RNC was quietly trying to block the UNC students from voting. But they recently lost that lawsuit.

If you have to keep changing the laws to get elected, you’re not winning elections. You’re sabotaging elections. The whole thing reminds me of that quote by the Russian communist leader Joseph Stalin, who said, “The people who cast the votes don’t decide the election, the people who count the votes do.”

So look around at what’s happening in America right now. The Republicans aren’t trying to win. They’re trying to make sure the Democrats can’t win. And while that should freak you out, I sincerely hope it also inspires you to get your friends and family out the polls and vote wholeheartedly against this kind of behavior.

[diamondcitydarlin]

I understand it's not even the fifth-most important point in your post, but I really think that going forward, making sure all creators (at least those of Gaiman's calibre) have as little direct access to fans as possible should be industry standard. We've all heard the horror stories about Vic whatshisface at cons and whatnot, but even the folks who aren't certified creeps detract more than they add to the fan experience (witness the five-alarm Drama that breaks out whenever creators make the tiniest ship-adjacent commentary in interviews).

Couldn't agree more. The Neil Gaiman allegations are not a new phenomenon by any means; we know from countless prior exposures that predators use fame and fortune to ensnare victims, especially those that have been predisposed from maybe even an early age to revere and idolize them. And like you say, even if someone in such a position of power/influence has no ulterior, sinister motives for reveling directly in their fan base, there are so many other things that can go awry from crossing those boundaries. (Gaiman himself warned of the legal complications that could arise from people sending him fanfic directly- you'd think that'd be reason enough for him to, yknow, not be constantly on tumblr interacting with the fanbase and tags, but ofc we know why now)

I think there's something to be said about the quick rise of the internet/social media and the consequences of that in fandom spaces, that we're kind of having to catch up and learn from difficult experience how best to set those boundaries between fandom and creators. It's easy to think we should have known better already, but Gaiman had been carefully crafting his persona for decades at that point and always seeming like one of the 'good ones' as so many others were exposed throughout the years. I think in fact that probably strengthened the parasocial bonds as people clung even harder to him as the precious exception to the rule.

And yet, still I'm somewhat left at a loss of what the hard and fast rules should be, and if they should be the same across the board or if there's any room for nuance. I know that crafting a social media presence, even a persona can be important for accruing a marketed interest (and just unavoidable in the world we live in now, for people in related careers) and I don't think creators/famous people showing appreciation and recognition of their fanbases has to be an inherently bad thing. I know that people enjoy having Q&A panels with creators and interviews asking divisive questions about pairings/plot decisions etc in a show has been a thing since TV digest- but of course, getting in a friendly debate with your IRL friend over whether the last interview from the head writer of Friends meant Ross would end up with Rachel or not is very different from online discourse with thousands of angry, opinionated strangers, and maybe that needs to be taken into consideration in future- that is, if the creators in question actually care about their fans and aren't stirring the pot on purpose, which could also be the case. Anyway.

What's also true and I think should be taken into consideration going forward is that people of Neil's wealth and level of fame don't really need to be constantly interacting with fans on social media. I feel the smarter, safer route there for everyone involved is to have an assistant or PR person to handle social media accounts and in Gaiman's case specifically I feel that this is the least his team could do in the way of restorative justice/keeping his fans safe. This time, he really shouldn't have any public social media he runs himself. I'm literally imploring his lawyers, people, whomever has the ability if you happen to be reading this, to just cut him the fuck off from now on. I don't think that's asking too much of anyone involved. (They have for the time being ofc, but I'm calling for a lifetime ban). As that relates to other famous people, I would say we need to just bear it in mind. A little healthy suspicion for someone famous that's just trying to 'hang out with the gang' on a routine, intimate basis because, like, why? To what end, exactly?

And maybe we need to also have some discussions about predator behaviors from celebrities/creators during in-person meetups, how to recognize them and what to do on an individual and fandom-wide level if it happens. Like, I don't personally think it's appropriate or advisable for a famous person to proposition a fan (regardless of age or gender identity) romantically/sexually at their first meeting with this person at a fan meetup (it's a fan meetup not speed dating), I don't think they should be giving fans their number or contact info (even if it's purely intended, it's not appropriate or safe for either party). I don't think creators/famous people should be commenting on their fans' appearances at these meetups even if it's 'positive' ('wow you're so beautiful'- though there's nuance here, like if someone's wearing a cosplay and it's only about that etc, it can be nebulous but I think yall know what I'm talking about). I think all of those things should be regarded by fans as possible red flags and I think creators should have enough of a sense of responsibility over the power dynamic to know better than to cross those boundaries. I also think fans should feel safe and supported when coming forward with stories of behavior like this and I think we have to always be prepared to learn and 'accept' things we wish weren't true about famous people we like but don't know (accept as in accept as true and then get to work on what restorative justice can be realistically achieved for the victims).

But yeah, I'm interested in knowing what others think about this. Has this revelation made you view the famous people you like differently? Do you think there are better, further methods that should be taken to put boundaries between creators and fans? What can we as fandom communities do better to keep each other safe going forward? I'd love if it we could discuss these issues further.

[themoonweaversden]

Messeges that were found so far: NAITSUAF (spoilers)

This is just to collect all the codes that you can type in in thisisnotawebsitedotcom.com and their effects only (please click images for better quality)

Masterpost with all messeges / codes

Transcript:

"SELLING YOUR SOUL For FUN nad PROFIT!

There are some who believe that beneath your skin, nerves, and meat hides a unique spark of electric ephemera that religious types call a "soul." This invisible cloud of will is theorically the most eternal, sacred part of any being. Does it exist? WHO CARES! The important thing is, people believe in it, which means it has MARKET VALUE, BABY! That's why I've purchased as many souls as possible through history just in case I need to CRASH IN one DAY!

WANNA BE A SOUL BILLIONARE LIKE ME?

Look, I wouldn't tell my secret to just anyone, but if you got this far you're smart enough for a golden oportunity! It's simple! First you sell your soul to me, but you get it back as soon as you get three people to sell their souls! Then each of your soul customers buys three more souls, and if you get a commision on each soul, and I only get a small fraction of that commision, it's basically money that prints itself! And souls probably aren't real anyway so there's NO WAY to lose!

Trust me, you're gonna LOVE not having a soul. A soul's like a Jet-ski: sounds cool in theory, but then it just gathers dust in the garage. That junk could be making YOU money! And all you have to do is sign on the dotted line! Pleasure doing business with ya Pal, and may God have mercy on you... uh. You know. On your whole general vibe.

Got any questions? Look, I'll let my lawyer, MultiLevel Mark, explain it.

By reading this paragraph to completion you are agreeing that Mr. Cipher is not liable for any distress, infinite purgatorial torment, profound regret, loss of joie de vivre or vibe shift following the sale of your soul. Bill might be dead but his team of lawyers cannot be killed, praise be to the Legal System, Amen.

ARE YOU READY?"

Once you click ARE YOU READY?:

Transcript:

"SOUL CONTRACT This Certifies That:

X_________________________________(YOUR NAME) hereby grants ownership of their everlasting soul in perpetuity throughout all timelines, realities, and simulations to Bill Cipher Soul Holding LLC. Signing this contract waives any further right to seeing your soul, visiting your soul, soul-searching, wearing a soul patch, or watching the movie "Soul Plane." Your career in the arts is formally over, but your career working for network television Standards & Practicies has only begun!

Furthermore

I. Singee may continue to eat Chiken Soup but any spiritual comfort in offers will be transferred instantly to Bill Cipher LLC. If any other deities or demigods dispute ownership of this soul from a prior sale, they will have to bring their fiddle, chess board, and/or paperwork to our HQ for meditation to determine the Soul Beneficiary. II. "Old Souls" may be subject to remodeling for hiegher resale value. III. Souls are to be stored in our soul containtment unit in the Astral Plane. We are not liable for damages in the event that some kind of "Ghost Busting" team releases your soul and others from our containment in a wacky montage throughout New York City. IV. If Anubis comes by with his scale for our annual Soul Weight Audit, tell him we are all home sick.

This Soul is hereby transfered to: X__Bill Cipher__ (BILL CIPHER, CEO) WITNESSED BY: X_________ ("OPTOR" THE ALL-SELLER)

[CODE IN THERAPRISM]

[CODE IN CIPHER FONT]

SIGN

PRINT

or

BE A COWARD"

Theraprism decoded: "You are now twenty one grams lighter"

Cipher font decoded: "This contract is legal and binding. We reserve the right to use your likeness, face, voice, and small-town pluck in whatever nefarious manner is deemed necessary. Sans soul, your soulmate will not recognize you and will walk right past you on a cold autumn day, never making eye contact, not even processing that you have eyes at all. No amount of interaction will move them to a place where they can remember, in feeling, the thousands of lifetimes you have already spent together, each time choosing whatever form would keep you closest. Like otters holding hands in a tumultuous river, you were birds; you were trees with roots entangled, drinking in the sunlight together. Wherever we go next, whatever you choose, I will always be right with you. That's done, buddy. Congratulations, you have chosen Bill instead. McDonald's reserves the right to put a giant yellow "W" on your torso and forehead and send you walking through a crowded Times Square while you scream, "The fries! The fries! They don't degrade in nature! It's an immortal food! They will be in the landfills long past our deaths! Good God, the things I've seen! Me? Who am I? Oh, I'm Bill's previous lawyer. He put my soul into a quill pen so I can write his legal documents until the sun snuffs out like a candle in this sick universe. I used to be hot; I was so fine. Now I'm fine print. Speaking of which, Bill reserves the right to put your soul into an inanimate object, a strange creature, a concept, a sentence, a tasteful but rustic mason jar with wildflowers in it. If at any point you wish to have visitation rights with your soul, you will be swiftly denied, unless you had a cool day planned for the both of you. Then Bill might want to come along. By signing this document, you forfeit any rights to eating soul food; it will turn to ash in your mouth, a fitting punishment for a fool who squandered the only true gift life owes you. Bill reserves the right to dress your soul however he deems necessary, especially if your soul was a nerd before acquisition. Soul makeover! Your soul may become fractured and placed into different objects; this has no purpose and will not resurrect you if you die. Signee has forfeited all rights to any afterlife, including but not limited to Heaven, Hell, Purgatory, Big Corner, Flow State, the Dream House, the Reincarnation Processing Center, Axolotl's Tank, and Consequences Hold. Signee can no longer board the Soul Train and is advised to discard all bellbottoms. Signee can no longer have a puppy as a best friend; they can sense what is gone. Cats are indifferent. Signee may experience occasional demon possessions from Horculus the Red, Plabos the Merciless, Morbus son of Mortum, Plaga the Oozing, and other such common demons roaming Earth searching for weakened, empty vessels. Tips for ripping your soul out at home: matching YouTube commentary channels, attending an extended family event with an open bar, using generative AI and asserting that you are creating, turning a blind eye to human suffering, amassing more wealth than needed, purchasing a blue checkmark."

If you click BE A COWARD nothing happens

If you click PRINT it just let's you print it

If you click SIGN:

Transcript:

"PLEASURE DOING BUSINESS WITH YOU"

Once you close it the flame from the candle changes to blue:

From now on all the words that didn't seem to do anything (audiolog, bubbles, clear, contract, etc...) will play a selection of videos/audios when you click the nob on the computer

[follow-up-news]

Four separate governmental scientific bodies have concluded that bite mark analysis has no basis in science. That includes the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, which said in 2016 that “available scientific evidence strongly suggests that examiners not only cannot identify the source of bitemark with reasonable accuracy, they cannot even consistently agree on whether an injury is a human bitemark.” The National Institute of Standards and Technology, the gold standard of measurement science, said in 2022 that bite mark forensics “lacks a sufficient scientific foundation” because “human dental patterns have not been shown to be unique at the individual level.” One 2016 study found that self-described experts couldn’t distinguish between human and animal bite marks. Others have documented how marks in human skin change over time through healing or decomposition. “People that were board certified did not agree about what a bite mark was,” said Adam Freeman, a forensic dentist who once “drank the Kool-Aid” of bite mark analysis but has since become one of its biggest critics within the profession. “If a science is not a science, and it’s not reproducible, and it’s not reliable, courts of law should not allow it in, period.” Yet bite mark analysis has been used in thousands of cases. And while it has increasingly been successfully challenged by defense lawyers, no court has ruled it inadmissible.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Big night for CNN, out with a story about document boxes being loaded onto a Trump plane bound for Bedminster, New Jersey, on the same day the Department of Justice showed up to receive a folder of top secret documents from a Trump lawyer who certified they were the only secret documents she and lawyer Evan Corcoran could find.

According to an interview by CNN with former Trump valet Brian Butler, referred to six times in the classified documents indictment as “Trump Employee #5,” the boxes were loaded onto the Trump plane on June 3, 2022, as Trump’s lawyers, Christina Bobb and Evan Corcoran, were meeting with Jay Bratt, the prosecutor from the Department of Justice in charge of the classified documents case.  Christina Bobb famously signed a certification to the DOJ that a “diligent search” had been conducted at Mar a Lago, and that the 31 documents being handed over that day were the sum total of all the classified documents that had been found.

Two months later, in August, FBI agents would execute a search warrant and discover more than 100 additional top secret documents in Trump’s private office, including several marked with the highest classification, “Top Secret/SCI,” or “Top Secret – Secure Compartmented Information.”

Former valet Butler told CNN that he was surprised to get a phone call from Trump’s “body man,” Walt Nauta, on June 3, asking if he could borrow one of Butler’s Cadillac Escalade SUV’s to help carry material to the West Palm Beach airport to be loaded onto a Trump airplane.  Butler was told that Trump and his family were flying to Bedminster for the summer that day.  Butler told CNN he was not usually called upon to move luggage to the private Trump jet and thought it was also unusual that Nauta asked for the favor “in a guarded way,” CNN reported.

Butler used his own SUV to carry Trump family luggage to the airport, while Nauta and Carlos De Oliveira, both of whom were indicted with Trump, used the Escalade he had loaned to Nauta to move the rest of the material.  “They were the boxes that were in the indictment, the white bankers boxes. That’s what I remember loading,” Butler told CNN.

Butler described his relationship with Nauta as “best friends,” at least until questions about the classified documents found by the FBI at Mar a Lago began coming up.  Butler told CNN that on one of the frequent “nightly walks” he took with Nauta around their neighborhood in West Palm Beach, Nauta told him that he, Nauta, Butler, and De Oliveira were “all dirty” when it came to the boxes they had moved around inside of Mar a Lago and to the Trump airplane on June 3.  De Oliveira repeatedly urged Butler to sign up with the same attorney Trump had provided to himself and Nauta, but Butler demurred, choosing instead to hire a former U.S. Attorney in Florida, Jeffrey Sloman.  Butler met “repeatedly” with prosecutors for the office of Special Counsel Jack Smith, according to CNN. 

In one interview, Butler told prosecutors about a time he was driving Australian billionaire Anthony Pratt and his chief of staff in the Spring of 2021 when he heard Pratt talking about secrets of U.S. and Russian nuclear submarines he had heard from Trump while he was visiting Mar a Lago.  Pratt was a paid member of the Trump club at the time.  It was on May 6, 2021, that the National Archives first formally requested that Trump turn over any and all classified and non-classified documents Trump had removed from the White House when he left office.  On May 8, the British newspaper, the Daily Mail, had a photographer at the West Palm Beach airport who took photographs of Trump boarding a private jet to fly to his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey.  The photographs show several Trump aides loading a half dozen or more bankers boxes of documents into the jet.

On July 21, 2021, just two months later, Trump showed a top secret military “plan of attack” on Iran to an interviewer who was working on a book with Trump’s former chief of staff, Mark Meadows.  The interview took place at the Trump golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey.

Before Butler signed with his own private attorney, he was witness to two conversations between Trump and De Oliveira when Trump asked De Oliveira, “Are we good?”  After one conversation De Oliveira had with Trump on the phone in the presence of Butler, he said Trump had promised to get him a lawyer.  In another conversation Butler told prosecutors about, Nauta asked him “to make sure Carlos (De Oliveira) is good.”  Butler told CNN that he twice assured Nauta that De Oliveira was “loyal and wouldn’t do anything to hurt his relationship with Trump.”  It was after that conversation that Butler decided to get his own lawyer and broke contact with the two men who ended up being indicted with Trump.

Based on the new CNN report, we now know that boxes of documents were moved from Mar a Lago to Bedminster twice – once in May of 2021 immediately after the National Archives had requested that Trump turn over documents he took from the White House, and again in June of 2022, on the very day the DOJ had shown up at Mar a Lago to take possession of what they were told were all the classified documents being held there.

What happened to the classified documents Trump took with him to Bedminster is not known.  It is also unknown why the FBI never searched the Trump New Jersey golf club.

Trump has recently filed motions to dismiss the Mar a Lago indictments based on spurious claims of “absolute immunity” and an entire made-up claim that the Presidential Records Act permitted him to possess classified documents.  Special Counsel Smith has opposed both motions.  The judge in the case, whose previous decisions in the case have been overturned twice by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, has yet to rule on the Trump motions to dismiss.

[Lucian Truscott]

[super-powerd-gothamight]

Story time

So to start off

1. I am a meta human

And

2. I live in Gotham

So yk it’s gonna be wack

So it was like 11 days ago I was goofing around on the inter-web and I get a call from my school (bare with me) and at this moment Im

Scared as fuck

Because my enemy-ish (let’s call him David) recently found out that I was a meta human and you know that’s not good because of you know

shit ton of discrimination

and so I’m freaking out because I know for a fact David fucking told them something he told like the higher-ups at my college something or other so I am panicking. Don’t want to pick up the phone I do obviously because I’m not stupid

So I pick up the phone and the guy starts and is like “hey thare are some rumours going around campus,” and he’s doing this in like a really annoying way “and so we just wanted to call you in for meeting at *insert college name* and we wanted to talk to you about it to clear everything up” and so I’m in like shock because like

Oh no I’m going to lose my scholarship the school is going to kick me out oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck!!!

So I do the most reasonable thing I can think of:

I call Bruce wane

It sounds fucking ridiculous but I went\go to school with like two of his kids

And so I call up Mr.wane and I’m like

“There gonna expel me what do I do what do I do what do I do!!!!?!!!!” And he gets really confused cause like

He pays for my scholarship (bless this man frfr)

And so he’s confused on how thay could just kick me out because my tuition is fully paid and so I explain that they surprisingly care about the Discrimination more than the money because they are assholes

And he asks why they Would do that and I have no clue and so he’s like “I don’t know how to deal with this so sorry I have a Galla tonight and i takes a long time to do my hair” and so I’m like “fine yeah whatever” but than my lord and saviour Bruce wane is like “but I can hand you off to Mr.fox” and I am like thank god so he transfers the call

And so me and Mr.fox talk for a long time maybe an hour or so and he’s like “I strongly advise you to bring a lawyer, a family member and some who can verify your not a danger to the community” and I’m like “thank you thank you thank you” and then I’m like fuck fuck fuck fuck

Because if you don’t know

1. I am an orphan

2. I can’t hold a job because of my meta human status and I’m ✨disabled✨

3. I am not mentally sound and spent three years at Arkham

So that’s means i have no money, no family and no way that anyone would see me ‘safe to the community’ and so I sit I’m my apartment for like two days thinking and dreading my meeting with the college board

And then it comes to me:

I am not just a meta-human

I am a meta human ✨with connections✨

So I do a vary smart thing and I call my sister

The thing about my sister is that if you have followed my blog you will know

1. She’s my quarter-sister not my half-sister

2. Her girlfriend is fond of me and a certified psychologist

3. She has connections with a vary high ranking lawyer

4. That lawyer has connections to a high ranking professor that worked at my college

The thing is

The thing is!!!!!!

My quarter-sister is poison Ivy

Her girlfriend is Harley Quinn

The lawyer is two face

And the professor is scarecrow

You see where I’m going with this

(I’m getting tired so I’m gonna make a part two brb🫀)

[mqfx]

i will write a mqfx modern au fic called "see you in courtship" where they're rival divorce lawyers and mu qing's latest client is jian lan divorcing feng xin. and then i will do so much extensive research for this fic that I will inadvertently pass the LSATs and become a board-certified divorce lawyer. in china

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Dan Rather at Steady:

If their national convention didn’t motivate Democrats to register, volunteer, donate, and vote, perhaps the prospect of a widespread voter suppression plan at the hands of the Republican Party will. Just listen to Marc Elias, one of the foremost election lawyers in the country, who recently said that the “Republicans are building an election subversion war machine.” Last week, Elias began working with hundreds of lawyers and thousands of volunteers already teamed up with the Harris campaign to combat the Republican voter suppression effort. He will focus on recounts and post-election litigation.

This is not a new tactic for the MAGA right, but in this election cycle, “the other side is more organized, more ruthless, and more prepared [than ever before],” Elias told Rolling Stone magazine. Here’s the Republican playbook, according to The Brennan Center for Justice. “Over the last 20 years, states have put barriers in front of the ballot box — imposing strict voter ID laws, cutting voting times, restricting registration, and purging voter rolls.” But this election cycle, new MAGA tactics seem even more insidious — including delaying or refusing vote certification. So if someone in, say, Georgia doesn’t like the election results, Republican officials could question the count, seriously slowing down or stopping the process of announcing results. That’s a very big deal. The 2024 pre-election period has already seen dozens of lawsuits filed in 25 states by Republicans trying to manipulate or change laws to, among other things, make it easier to challenge ballots and voter eligibility and to deny election certifications.

In an investigation of local election boards, Rolling Stone found 70 pro-Donald Trump conspiracy theorists working as election officials in key counties in battleground states. Since 2020, Republicans have refused to certify results at least 25 times. I know I may sound like a broken record saying Donald Trump is an existential threat to American democracy. But he is, and this is a terrifying example of his cult leader-like ability to get others to do his undemocratic bidding. At an Atlanta rally, he recently called out pro-Trump members of the Georgia State Election Board as “pit bulls fighting for honesty, transparency, and victory.” Seriously. In 2020 he primed the voter suppression pump before the election, knowing he was likely to lose the race, and then promoted the “Big Lie.” Hundreds of lawyers, dozens of lawsuits, and an insurrection later, he still lost, but all those efforts laid the groundwork for a more organized Republican push, or perhaps putsch is a better word. Fortunately the Republicans aren’t the only ones gearing up for this battle. The Harris campaign has assembled the largest Democratic legal team ever to protect voting rights. It is 10 times larger than the 2020 team. Ten times.

[...] The Democrats’ voter protection program is focused on eight battleground states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, and four states of interest: Florida, Maine, Minnesota, and Virginia. Their pre-election efforts are two-fold: First, protecting voters’ ability to register to vote while also having unfettered access to the ballot box. They are doing this by fighting all the legal challenges Republicans are launching. Second, they are educating voters. All of this is a serious shift in how elections are run in this country. “The expansive new Democratic legal team, and the opposing group at the Republican National Committee, is a reflection of the legal arms race that is the new reality of American elections since Mr. Trump’s election victory in 2016. The battle over whose votes count — not just how many votes are counted — has become central to modern presidential campaigns,” explained Nick Corasaniti of The New York Times.

The Democrats are learning to fight the battle to ensure that the votes from this election are counted properly to ensure that a repeat of 2020 doesn’t happen.

[vote-democrat-president-congress]

NYTimes: "For example, are you aware how much the constant threat of violence, principally from MAGA sources, is now warping American politics? If you wonder why so few people in red America seem to stand up directly against the MAGA movement, are you aware of the price they might pay if they did?

Late last month, I listened to a fascinating NPR interview with the journalists Michael Isikoff and Daniel Klaidman regarding their new book, “Find Me the Votes,” about Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election. They report that Georgia prosecutor Fani Willis had trouble finding lawyers willing to help prosecute her case against Trump. Even a former Georgia governor turned her down, saying, “Hypothetically speaking, do you want to have a bodyguard follow you around for the rest of your life?”

He wasn’t exaggerating. Willis received an assassination threat so specific that one evening she had to leave her office incognito while a body double wearing a bulletproof vest courageously pretended to be her and offered a target for any possible incoming fire.

Don’t think for a moment that this is unusual today. Judge Tanya Chutkan, who is overseeing Trump’s federal Jan. 6 trial, has been swatted, as has the special counsel Jack Smith. For those unfamiliar, swatting is a terrifying act of intimidation in which someone calls law enforcement and falsely claims a violent crime is in process at the target’s address. This sends heavily armed police to a person’s home with the expectation of a violent confrontation. A swatting incident claimed the life of a Kansas man in 2017.

The Colorado Supreme Court likewise endured terrible threats after it ruled that Trump was disqualified from the ballot. There is deep concern for the safety of the witnesses and jurors in Trump’s various trials.

Mitt Romney faces so many threats that he spends $5,000 per day on security to protect his family. After Jan. 6, the former Republican congressman Peter Meijer said that at least one colleague voted not to certify the election out of fear for the safety of their family. Threats against members of Congress are pervasive, and there has been a shocking surge since Trump took office. Last year, Capitol Police opened more than 8,000 threat assessments, an eightfold increase since 2016.

Nor is the challenge confined to national politics. In 2021, Reuters published a horrifying and comprehensive report detailing the persistent threats against local election workers. In 2022, it followed up with another report detailing threats against local school boards. In my own Tennessee community, doctors and nurses who advocated wearing masks in schools were targets of screaming, threatening right-wing activists, who told one man, “We know who you are” and “We will find you.”

[tyrelawgroup]

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[hoperays-song]

The Gang’s Jail Sentences

I should preface this with my favourite lovely warning: I AM NOT A BOARD CERTIFIED ATTORNEY OF LAW. I do NOT have a degree in this. I have done research, yes, and come up with somewhat of a defense and timeline but still, I AM NOT A LAWYER. I’m just a hyperfixated idiot. Enjoy!

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During the events of Sing One we see Johnny’s family/the Gang commit several crimes. However, they are only caught after one failed heist. So, I will be calculating the charges they faced as well as providing possible defenses and my version of sentencing. Everyone ready for a ton of legal mumbo jumbo? Great! Let’s dive in.

Ps. I’m so sorry for the delay y’all, I know I promised this a long time ago but I really wanted to do it right. I hope y’all enjoy!

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Definitions:

I wasn’t kidding when I said their would be actual legal vocabulary here so let’s go over what it all means.

Wobbler: a special class of crimes involving conduct that varies widely in its level of seriousness.

Misdemeanor: a non-indictable offense, regarded in the US (and formerly in the UK) as less serious than a felony.

Felony: a crime, typically one involving violence, regarded as more serious than a misdemeanor, and usually punishable by imprisonment for more than one year or by death.

Parole: the release of a prisoner temporarily (for a special purpose) or permanently before the completion of a sentence, on the promise of good behavior.

County Jail: a facility operated by or for a county for the confinement of persons accused or convicted of an offense.

Sate Prison: is for inmates serving lengthier sentences on crimes that are more severe in nature.

Sentencing: declare the punishment decided for an offender.

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Crimes and Their Sentences:

Grand Theft Larceny - Wobbler (anywhere from less than a year in County Jail to 3 years in State Prison)

Wearing a Mask - Misdemeanor (up to 6 months in County Jail and a $1,000.00 fine)

Gang Involvement - Wobbler (anywhere from less than a year in County Jail to 3 years in State Prison)

Marcus Exclusively: 

Escape from Custody - Wobbler (anywhere from less than a year in County Jail to 3 years in State Prison with no parole)

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Maximum Sentencing vs. My Sentencing:

Max: 6 months in County Jail, $1000.00 each, 6 years in State Prison (plus 3 years in State Prison and no chance of parole for anything for Marcus).

My Sentencing: 7.5 months in County Jail, $1000.00 each, 2 years of formal parole, 400 hours of community service for Stan and Barry, and 490 hours of community service for Marcus. All of them also were ordered into court mandated counseling/therapy due to the results found by the court appointed psychologist for the enterity of their incarceration and parole.

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Explanation and Defenses Used:

Now, you all might notice that my sentencing was much, much, much lighter than the maximum sentence. However, that is because I believe they were not prosecuted for some of the potential charges and they also were allowed parole in change of some of their sentence.

Firstly, I do not think they would be prosecuted for Gang Involvement, mainly due to they barely qualifying as a gang by California State Law. By their definition, a gang is:

“a criminal street gang is any ongoing organization, association, or group of three or more persons, whether formal or informal: 1. That has a common name or common identifying sign or symbol; 2. That has, as one or more of its primary activities, the commission of [a crime listed in Pen. Code §186.22(e)(1)-(25), (31)-(33)]; AND, 3. Whose members, whether acting alone or together, engage in or have engaged in a pattern of criminal gang activity.””.

Now why wouldn’t they be prosecuted for this? We see them fitting those descriptions after all. And while we saw those defining actions, the prosecutors definitely didn’t. 

We see how criminally smart the gang actually is multiple times in the movie. For one, we never see them try to physically confront anyone that tried to stop them, they just ran. That allows them to avoid all the potential aggravated assault on peace officers charges. 

Secondly, when they are captured, they immediately surrendered, no fighting, no running, they immediately surrendered. This allows them to escape literally all evading the police charges as well as them instantly being marked as cooperative, which is extremely useful in their case. 

Third, they seem to move fast. In the first heist we see them pull off, the alarm does not start ringing until they break the window. Now, why would that mean they move fast? Banks and jewelry stores both have something called silent alarms that can be subtly triggered by staff in case of a robbery. Judging by the obliviousness of the nearby officers, that alarm was not triggered. Meaning, no one knew that the gang was there until they were escaping. In fact, it’s hinted that the main heist we see is the longest one yet. Judging by how down to the second everything is planned, they were a bit more nervous about this heist than the other ones. And most of that time is traveling discretely so they aren’t caught. Not only do they see to move fast, they seem to be non-violent offenders.

Finally, the fact that there were only three of them (they clearly covered for Johnny, he wasn’t even shown to be questioned so they definitely denied his involvement) and they view each other like brothers, they definitely denied being a gang and instead identified themselves as brothers who committed a crime together. Also, Johnny wasn’t recognized by the Bear Gang (to be fair they were busy, but still) and you would think he would if have been if he was viewed by other gangs as the son of a rival gang leader. Therefore, I believe their actually identity as a gang was not that solid and they weren’t seen as one in a court of law. And that lightened their sentence considerably.

In the case of the other crimes, I think that Marcus’s escape and the Grand Theft Larceny were both demoted to misdemeanors. Why? Because in the eyes of the court, they are first time offenders. From what we can tell, they were not linked back to their previous crimes, and therefore I will not be calculating that into my sentencing. Sentences for first time offenders (in some cases) are considerably lighter and I think that was part of the case here. 

The rest of the case here is public opinion. Your court sentence is largely based on what the judge deems appropriate. And public opinion can definitely influence that by swaying the judge’s view on the case. The thing is, the public of Calatonia would definitely be on the gang’s side. Why? Because Johnny, that’s why.

Johnny would have just appeared on tv as a performer at New Moon Theatre and as we saw, he drew in a bit of a crowd during his performance during the ending scene. Those fans would definitely want Johnny to be reunited with his dad sooner and could petition the court for a lighter sentence. Not only would his fans potentially influence the sentencing, but Johnny’s mere existence would too.

From what we can tell, Marcus is a single parent. And while Stan and Barry might lend a hand here and there with helping him with Johnny, Marcus is clearly doing majority of the parenting work. Whether his other parent is dead or just divorced, it’s clear that Johnny doesn’t see living with them as an option (he chose to stay in the garage alone). Why is this important? Because Johnny’s primary caregiver (Marcus) and his two other caregivers who he’d probably be sent to in an emergency (Stan and Barry) are now all incarcerated. That means that Johnny (he is implied to be around 17 in Sing 1 so that’s what I’m going with) would be sent to foster care. And if Johnny had happened to recently gone through a traumatic event, like for instance, just throwing it out there, being trapped in a flooding building, or having all of his family be sent to jail, he would more than likely be evaluated by a psychologist to see what the potential effects of sentencing could have on him.

I don’t think it would surprise anyone if I said that I believe that the psychologist would more than likely decide that Johnny would be negatively affected mentally and emotionally if he was kept from his family the full maximum sentence. What kid wouldn’t be? That, along with the gang being non-violent, first time offenders who had (in the court’s eye) been just every day citizens til then, they would have more than likely been given lighter sentences that would have resulted in their release a few weeks before the events of Sing 2, around only a year later.