#Dakota North 1986

[savage-kult-of-gorthaur]

STILL THE ULTIMATE IN HAUTE COUTURE/CHIC IN THE HIGH FASHION WORLD OF '80s MARVEL.

PIC INFO: Coming in hot from the fashion houses of New York, Paris, Rome, and Tokyo -- Resolution at 1007×1536 -- Spotlight on Marvel house ad for "Dakota North Investigations" Vol. 1, an American limited comic book series published by Marvel Comics from June 1986 to February 1987. Artwork by Tony Salmons.

Source: https://culturalgutter.com/2016/09/15/22379.

[browsethestacks]

Marvel Age (1986)

[thegroovyarchives]

70's/80's/90's/2000's Local Television Halloween Station IDs/Bumpers Part 4

1. WMTW-TV, Poland Spring, Maine, 70's 2. WPIX-TV, New York City, New York, 1993 3. KSAS-TV, Wichita, Kansas, 80's 4. KCTV-TV, Kansas City, Missouri, 1997 5. WNYW-TV, New York City, New York, 1986 6. WQED-TV, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 2000 7. WXIX-TV, Newport, Kentucky/Cincinnati, Ohio, 1990 8. KTHI-TV, Fargo-Grand Forks, North Dakota, 1985 Part 1 (x) Part 2 (x) Part 3 (x)

[evilhorse]

Dakota North house ad (circa June 1986)

[bearfoottruck]

So, a lot of us are doing what we can to oppose the Trump administration, but now I'm adding a bit of fuel to the fire. See, the thing is, depending on which state you live in, it may be legal for you to buy a machine gun. Ordinarily, however, machine guns are regulated by three laws:

National Firearms Act of 1934: Imposes a $200 tax on the purchase or manufacture of machine guns, plus such weapons have to be registered.

Gun Control Act of 1968: Prohibits the importation of machine guns for civilian purchase. However, any machine guns registered and manufactured prior to May 19, 1986 (see Firearms Owners Protection Act of 1986 below) are legally transferable provided they are not prohibited by state law.

Firearms Owners Protection Act of 1986: Prohibits any machine gun made after May 19, 1986 from being sold to civilians. Again, however, any machine guns registered before that date - and a receiver is still considered a machine gun - are legally transferable provided they are not prohibited by state law.

Now, here are the state laws regarding machine guns:

Alabama: No state-level restrictions.

Alaska: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Arizona: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Arkansas: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

California: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

Colorado: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

Connecticut: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Delaware: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

District of Columbia: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

Florida: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Georgia: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Hawaii: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

Idaho: Legal except for minors.

Illinois: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

Indiana: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Iowa: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

Kansas: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Kentucky: No state-level restrictions.

Louisiana: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

Maine: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Maryland: Possession prohibited only if the weapon is used for an aggressive or offensive purpose or to commit a crime.

Massachusetts: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

Michigan: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Minnesota: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

Mississippi: No state-level restrictions.

Missouri: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Montana: Possession prohibited only if the weapon is used for an aggressive or offensive purpose or to commit a crime.

Nebraska: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Nevada: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

New Hampshire: No state-level restrictions.

New Jersey: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

New Mexico: No state-level restrictions.

New York: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

North Carolina: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

North Dakota: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Ohio: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Pennsylvania: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Rhode Island: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

South Carolina: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

South Dakota: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Tennessee: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Texas: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Utah: Legal except for minors.

Vermont: Legal except for minors.

Virginia: Possession prohibited only if the weapon is used for an aggressive or offensive purpose or to commit a crime.

Washington: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

West Virginia: Legal unless manufactured, possessed or sold in violation of federal law.

Wisconsin: Illegal to own unless you are a sworn military or law enforcement official.

Wyoming: Legal except for minors.

So, if you do live in one of the states where there are no state laws prohibiting civilians from owning machine guns, how do you buy one, you ask? Well, first of all, after buying the gun from wherever, you need to have it transferred to what is known as a Class III dealer, that is, a firearms dealer that deals in NFA items such as machine guns, suppressors, sawed-off shotguns and other fun destructive devices. You will also need:

Three copies of the BATF Form 4, two to submit to the BATF directly, and one to submit to your local Chief Law Enforcement Officer.

Fingerprint cards for your background check.

Passport photos.

The $200 transfer fee.

Willingness to wait for months on end while all of this gets approved because of government red tape.

However, once the Form 4 comes back approved, you now have a fun new toy with which you can use to defend Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness not only for yourself, but also for marginalized groups who may fall victim to the wayward policies of Cheeto Benito.

ONE NOTE, THOUGH: Due to a fixed supply of legally-transferable machine guns, they are NOT CHEAP to buy. For example, on gunbroker.com, a transferable full-size Uzi can cost around $17,500-$25,000.

[cinemaocd]

Today, I spent some time trying to recreate my Thomas Cromwell playlists that have been eroded by the impermanence of the internet. I've lost links and subscriptions...I pieced them together as best I could from memory. I do have a physical CD of one, but its hopelessly fucked from being in my car for like three years. It sucks to lose these little pieces of memorabilia for me.

My playlist philosophy is it's gotta be an even number of songs. This is because when I started making them as "mixed tapes" for friends and then long distance boyfriends and then that guy at the office who was technically separated from his wife who I wanted to be my boyfriend who is now my husband of 22 years; and you needed an even number because the cassette has two sides.

You get to the end, you open the deck, flip and press play. Car stereos had an autoreverse for cassettes sometimes, but most home decks didn't.

I didn't have the ability to make a proper mix tape with audio cables until probably 1986. Before that I was making tapes by holding my boombox up to the tv, or taping songs off the radio. I got really good at cutting off djs. I liked to splice in quotes from films and tv shows as well. I had a mixed tape about the 1939 film of Wuthering Heights starring Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon with quotes from the film and Beatles and Peter Gabriel songs...I did not have access to Kate Bush that was what a backwoods middle of fuckass North Dakota life I led. I avoided a cliche, but I had no choice.

So yeah, it has to be an even number of tracks and it has to have a runtime of 60-90 minutes, which were the standard sizes. Maxell came out with the UR 60 and I had stacks of these:

The UR60s that I remember had yellow and teal labels and they were clear as well so you could see the whole tape.

Then there was a level up from that in the late 80s, the XL

And theeeeese were the shit. If you had a proper component stereo, which I did by this time, you could do an album on each side. I traveled all over England, Scotland and Ireland with tapes like this of Bob Dylan, Nina Simone, Cat Stevens, The Pogues. But it was the mix of Billy Bragg songs that long distance boyfriend #2 sent me that I wore the tape out. That was an XLII because he fitted most of Bragg's first four records on there. He wrote liner notes...whole sentences, saying which songs reminded me of him.

The next phase of my mixed tape era happened when I was at work full time with the guy in the office that I mentioned... there was a discussion at an after work drinks party about a mixed tape being a thing you make for someone you are super into, and someone said "yeah, you don't just do that." So I made him a road trip tape called, "you don't just do that" and it was all the songs that reminded him of me and we played it non-stop on our road trip down the Mississippi river camping on Highway 61, in my 86 Isuzu trooper with the pioneer deck and speakers I bought with the windfall from my first book. I had an action figure of Chewbacca on the dash and a futon in the back. He must have been in love with me because the levels were so erratic and fucked up on that tape and he is a huge audio nerd with his Linn turntable and CD player. He made some tapes too: XLIIs of pairs of albums: Roxy Music with J. J. Cale ; Paul Simon's Graceland with the Best of the Meters; all with excellent sound quality and perfect levels.

After that came CDs and I have made a few but mostly I would make mp3 playlists, and I started naming them around 2015. I don't do spotify, I make playlists on youtube, or amazon music or just in file folder. I still have a cd player in my car, so I just burn CDs. It's not the same. I miss the cassettes.

These days I mostly make playlists for myself for writing. If it is a ship I will sometimes split the songs between POV for each person, if that makes sense? Another reason the philosophy works.

If anyone has a way of doing playlists that makes them easy to share and backup without a subscription or hearing ads, I'd love to hear it...

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

Uranus' moon Miranda may have an ocean beneath its surface, study finds

A new study suggests Uranus' moon Miranda may harbor a water ocean beneath its surface, a finding that would challenge many assumptions about the moon's history and composition and could put it in the company of the few select worlds in our solar system with potentially life-sustaining environments.

"To find evidence of an ocean inside a small object like Miranda is incredibly surprising," said Tom Nordheim, a planetary scientist at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, and co-author of the study published in The Planetary Science Journal.

"It helps build on the story that some of these moons at Uranus may be really interesting—that there may be several ocean worlds around one of the most distant planets in our solar system, which is both exciting and bizarre."

Among the moons in the solar system, Miranda stands out. The few images Voyager 2 captured in 1986 show Miranda's southern hemisphere (the only part we've seen) is a Frankenstein-like hodgepodge of grooved terrain quartered off by rough scarps and cratered areas, like squares on a quilt. Most researchers suspect these bizarre structures are the result of tidal forces and heating within the moon.

Caleb Strom, a graduate student at the University of North Dakota who worked with Nordheim and Alex Patthoff of the Planetary Science Institute in Arizona, revisited the Voyager 2 images. The team set out to explain Miranda's enigmatic geology by reverse engineering the surface features, working backward to uncover what the moon's interior structure must have been to shape the moon's geology in response to tidal forcing.

After first mapping the various surface features like cracks, ridges and Miranda's unique trapezoidal coronae, the team developed a computer model to test several possible structures of the moon's interior, matching the predicted stress patterns to the actual surface geology.

The setup that produced the best match between predicted stress patterns and observed surface features required the existence of vast ocean beneath Miranda's icy surface some 100–500 million years ago. This subsurface ocean was at least 62 miles (100 kilometers) deep, according to the study, and hidden beneath an icy crust no more than 19 miles (30 kilometers) thick.

Given Miranda has a radius of just 146 miles (235 kilometers), the ocean would have filled almost half of the moon's body. "That result was a big surprise to the team," Strom said.

Key to creating that ocean, the researchers believe, were tidal forces between Miranda and nearby moons. These regular gravitational tugs can be amplified by orbital resonances—a configuration where each moon's period around a planet is an exact integer of the others' periods.

Jupiter's moons Io and Europa, for example, have a 2:1 resonance: For every two orbits Io makes around Jupiter, Europa makes exactly one, leading to tidal forces that are known to sustain an ocean beneath Europa's surface.

These orbital configurations and the resulting tidal forces deform the moons like rubber balls, leading to friction and heat that keeps interiors warm. This also creates stresses that crack the surface, creating a rich tapestry of geologic features. Numerical simulations have suggested that Miranda and its neighboring moons likely had such a resonance in the past, offering a potential mechanism that could have warmed Miranda's interior to produce and maintain a subsurface ocean.

At some point, the moons' orbital ballet desynchronized, slowing the heating process so that the moon's insides started to cool and solidify. But the team doesn't think Miranda's interior has fully frozen yet. If the ocean had completely frozen, Nordheim explained, it would have expanded and caused certain telltale cracks on the surface, which aren't there.

This suggests that Miranda is still cooling—and may have an ocean beneath its surface even now. Miranda's modern-day ocean is probably relatively thin, Strom noted. "But the suggestion of an ocean inside one of the most distant moons in the solar system is remarkable," he said.

Miranda wasn't predicted to have an ocean. With its small size and old age, scientists thought it would likely be a frozen ball of ice. Any leftover heat from its formation was assumed to have dissipated long ago. But as Patthoff pointed out, predictions about ice moons can be wrong, as evidenced by Saturn's moon Enceladus.

Before the Cassini spacecraft arrived in 2004, many scientists thought Enceladus was a frozen ball of ice and rock. But it was actually harboring a global ocean and active geological processes. "Few scientists expected Enceladus to be geologically active," Patthoff said. "However, it's shooting water vapor and ice out of its southern hemisphere as we speak." Enceladus is now a prime target in the search for life beyond Earth.

Miranda might be a similar case. It's comparable in size and composition to Enceladus, and according to a 2023 study led by APL's Ian Cohen, it may be actively releasing material into space. If it has (or even had) an ocean, it could be a future target for studying habitability and life. However, Nordheim cautions that there's still too much we don't know about Miranda and the Uranian moons to speculate about the existence of life.

"We won't know for sure that it even has an ocean until we go back and collect more data," he said. "We're squeezing the last bit of science we can from Voyager 2's images. For now, we're excited by the possibilities and eager to return to study Uranus and its potential ocean moons in depth."

Revealing the secrets of Uranus' icy moons

Uranus' icy moons have fascinated scientists ever since Voyager 2 captured stunning images of them, and valuable data about them, during its brief flyby in 1986. This latest study, led by Caleb Strom and APL's Tom Nordheim, is part of a broader effort at APL to uncover the secrets of these mysterious moons and the unusual planet they orbit:

2023: A team led by APL's Ian Cohen reanalyzed particle and magnetic data from Voyager 2's flyby and found Uranus' moons Ariel and Miranda may both be releasing material into the space environment around Uranus, possibly through plumes.

2024: APL's Richard Cartwright used observations of Uranus' moon Ariel by NASA's James Webb Space Telescope to conclude the moon may have a subsurface ocean that's replenishing its surface deposits of carbon dioxide ice—a topic he presented at the recent meeting of the American Astronomical Society.

IMAGE: Uranus’ icy moon Miranda, captured by NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft on Jan. 24, 1986. Credit: NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory-Caltech

[rockingreads]

Chuck Klosterman: Fargo Rock City: A Heavy Metal Odyssey in Rural North Dakota (2001)

As a metal-head who put up with the arrogant snubs of fellow Gen-X'ers raised on college rock and other elitist music scenes, I felt immense, almost perverse pleasure, when Chuck Klosterman -- someone weaned on, of all things '80s hair metal -- emerged among the very best music writers of our generation.

And I don't really like hair metal, either!

Nor do I agree with Klosterman, half the time, but I do think his stories in Fargo Rock City combined a clarity, humor, and the relatable modesty of one forced to defend their taste all their lives (I can relate) into an irresistible formula that turned him into a best-selling sensation and subsequently led him to hipster rag Spin and prestigious brands like GQ, Esquire, and The Guardian, among others.

Back to the Heavy Metal Odyssey at hand, Klosterman revisits his unglamorous teenage life in distant North Dakota as heard through the major musical accomplishments of cock-rockers like Mötley Crüe and Def Leppard, Bon Jovi and Bulletboys, Lita Ford and Poison, as well as semi-respectable names like Van Halen, Metallica, Iron Maiden, and Guns n' Roses.

In the end, Chuck's triumph lies in reminding ALL of us Gen-X'ers of what it felt like to live and die by your favorite artists during those final, MTV-dominated days preceding the advent of the Internet, let alone mobile phones.

Yes, this was a primordial era when teenagers still knew the meaning of true isolation and experienced it to their very souls, whether they lived in Fargo, London, New York, or, in my case, São Paulo, Brazil.

p.s. -- Klosterman's definitive treatise about Kiss for Grantland, written on the occasion of their induction into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame, may be the single greatest piece of writing about any American hard rock band EVER -- I revisit it at least once a year.

Featured Records:

Def Leppard: Hysteria (1987)

Bon Jovi: Slippery When Wet (1986)

Ratt: Dancing Undercover (1986)

Buy from: Amazon

[smashedpages]

Marvel published Dakota North #1 by Martha Thomases and Tony Salmons on this date in 1986, which featured the debut of the title character. Although her series was short-lived, she'd go on to be a supporting character in the pages of Cage, Daredevil and Captain Marvel.

[aktionfsa-blog-blog]

Frei nach 48 Jahren

Häufung von "Fehlurteilen" in den USA

Immer wieder kommen nach Jahren in den USA falsche Schuldsprüche ans Licht. Den "Rekord" im National Register of Exonerations der Universität Kalifornien hält nun mit 48 Jahren, einem Monat und 18 Tagen Gynn Simmons. Am 19.12. nimmt die Richterin Amy Palumbo den Antrag von Simmons auf "Unschuldsvermutung" während einer Anhörung im Oklahoma County Gerichtsgebäude in Oklahoma City entgegen. Der 71-Jährige wurde aus der Haft entlassen, nachdem er die letzten 48 Jahre seines Lebens unschuldig im Gefängnis verbracht hatte.

Zwischenfrage: Was bedeutet "Unschuldsvermutung" im Hinblick auf Entschädigung oder schlimmer, eventuelle Wiederaufnahmen wegen "neuer Beweise"?

Weitere berühmte Fälle

Knapp an die 48 Jahre unschuldig im Gefängnis kommt Leonard Peltier, geboren am 12. September 1944 in Grand Forks, North Dakota. Er ist ein indianischer Aktivist des American Indian Movement (AIM) in den USA und wurde 1977 trotz umstrittener Beweislage zuerst wegen Mord ersten Grades verurteilt. Später wurde das Urteil zu zweifach lebenslanger Haft wegen Beihilfe zum Mord geändert. Peltier wurde nach seiner Flucht nach Kanada in einem komplexen und umstrittenen Verfahren ausgeliefert, für schuldig befunden, verurteilt und inhaftiert.

Trotz seines schlechten Gesundheitszustands wurde 2009 nach einer Anhörung der United States Parole Commission eine Begnadigung abgelehnt. Dabei gibt es noch nicht einmal Gründe für eine Verurteilung, denn bei einer Anhörung zu dem Fall am 11. Februar 1986 sagte der zuständige Bundesberufungsrichter Gerald Heaney: "Wenn man das Für und Wider erörtert hat, bleiben einige wenige, aber wichtige Tatsachen über."

Auf 42 Jahre unschuldig im Gefängnis kommt auch der Journalist, Autor und Bürgerrechtler Mumia Abu Jamal, unter dem Namen Wesley Cook geboren am 24. April 1954 in Philadelphia, der 1982 der Ermordung des Polizisten Daniel Faulkner schuldig gesprochen und zum Tode verurteilt wurde. Nach fast 30 Jahren in der Todeszelle wurde die Strafe mit Zustimmung der Staatsanwaltschaft 2011 in lebenslange Haft ohne Revisionsmöglichkeit umgewandelt.

Über den Prozess 1982 sagte die Gerichtsschreiberin Sabo, dass sie eine Unterredung von drei entscheidenden Personen gehört hätte, bei der die wörtliche Aussage "Yeah, and I’m going to help them fry the nigger" - "Ich werde ihnen dabei helfen, diesen Nigger zu grillen" fiel. Selbst die Aussage des Auftragsmörder Arnold Beverly im Jahr 1999 , das Verbrechen als Fahrgast von Jamals Bruder im Auftrag der Mafia begangen zu haben, führte nicht zu einer Wiederaufnahme des Prozesses.

Mumia ist auch nach 47 Jahren im Gefängnis politisch aktiv.

Nur wenige Jahre musste Angela Davis, geboren am 26. Januar 1944 in Birmingham, Alabama, im Gefängnis zubringen. Sie kam auf die Liste der zehn meistgesuchten Verbrecher der USA nachdem bei einer missglückten Gefangenenbefreiung der Black Panther Party Mitglieder, der Soledad Brothers im August 1970 in einem Gerichtssaal in einer Schießerei mit der Polizei vier Menschen getötet wurden. Dabei wurde auch ihre Pistole benutzt. Nach zweijähriger Prozessdauer und einer weltweiten Solidaritätskampagne wurde Davis am 4. Juni 1972 in allen Punkten der Anklage  und vom Vorwurfs der "Unterstützung des Terrorismus" freigesprochen. In ihrer in diesem Herbst auch auf deutsch erschienenden Autobiographie beschreibt Angela Davis den zutiefst rassistischen Alltag zuerst in ihrer Jugend im Süden der USA und dann in den Gefängnissen der USA (ISBN 978 3 311 35013 2).

Allen Dreien und auch den meisten im Standard beschriebenen "Fehlurteilen" ist ihre dunkle Hautfarbe gemeinsam.

Mehr dazu bei https://www.derstandard.at/consent/tcf/story/3000000200645/serie-an-falschen und https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mumia_Abu-Jamal und https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Peltier

Kategorie[21]: Unsere Themen in der Presse Short-Link dieser Seite: a-fsa.de/d/3y6 Link zu dieser Seite: https://www.aktion-freiheitstattangst.org/de/articles/8632-20231228-frei-nach-48-jahren.html

[cantsayidont]

February 1987. Created by Martha Thomases and artist Tony Salmons, this very stylish, agreeably lightweight series looked and felt like a better-than-average '80s TV detective show. Sadly, while pistol-packing private investigator Dakota North had all the narrative mod cons (semi-retired CIA father, hunky but none-too-bright police detective love interest, too-cool-for-school teenage brother, an array of $100 haircuts), what might have lasted three or four seasons on network television managed only five issues at Marvel in 1986–1987.

Dakota North subsequently made trademark-preserving guest appearances in various other Marvel books (the 2018 collection DAKOTA NORTH: DESIGN FOR DYING includes most of those, along with the five issues of her own series), but the original vibe was lost, and Dakota was eventually overshadowed by the angstier, more superhero-adjacent Jessica Jones.

[savage-kult-of-gorthaur]

"BASIC BLACK LEATHER IS RIGHT FOR MOST JOBS, BUT SOMETIMES EVENING WEAR IS REQUIRED."

PIC INFO: Resolution at 690x1024 -- Spotlight on a "Dakota North Investigations" Vol. 1 Paper Doll cut-out, also doubling as a promotional advertisement for the "Dakota North" Vol. 1 limited comic book series, c. 1986. Artwork by series co-creator Tony Salmons. Colors by Gerry Turnbull.

Source: www.flickr.com/photos/j-dolls/51325915683.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

April 28, 2023

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

APR 29, 2023

According to the nonpartisan Economic Policy Institute, legislatures in at least ten states have set out to weaken federal child labor laws. In the first three months of 2023, legislators in Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, and South Dakota introduced bills to weaken the regulations that protect children in the workplace, and in March, Arkansas governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed a law repealing restrictions for workers younger than 16.

Those in favor of the new policies argue that fewer restrictions on child labor will protect parents’ rights, but in fact the new labor measures have been written by the Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA), a Florida-based right-wing think tank. FGA is working to dismantle the federal government to get rid of business regulations. It has focused on advancing its ideology through the states for a while now, but the argument that its legislation protects parental rights has recently enabled them to wedge open a door to attack regulations more broadly.  

FGA is part of a larger story about Republicans’ attempt to undermine federal power in order to enact a radical agenda through their control of the states.

That goal has been part of the Republican agenda since the 1980s, as leaders who hated federal regulation of business, provision of a social safety net, and protection of civil rights recognized that a strong majority of Americans actually quite liked those things and getting Congress to repeal them would be a terribly hard sell. Instead, Republicans used their control of federal courts to weaken the power of the federal government and send power back to the states.

Historically, states have been far easier than the much larger, more diverse federal government for a few wealthy men to dominate. After 1986, Republicans began to restrict voting in the states they controlled, giving themselves an advantage, and after 2010 they focused on taking over the states through gerrymandering. This has enabled them to stop Congress from enacting popular legislation and has created quite radical state legislatures. Currently, in 29 of them, Republicans have supermajorities, permitting them to legislate however they wish.

The process of taking control of the states by choosing who can vote got stronger today when the North Carolina Supreme Court, now controlled by Republicans, revisited an earlier ruling concerning partisan gerrymandering. Overruling the previous decision, the court green-lighted partisan gerrymandering, opening the door for even more extreme gerrymanders in the future. The court also okayed voter restrictions that primarily affect Black people.

Gutting the federal government and throwing power to the states makes it easier for business leaders to cozy up to legislators and slash business regulations. It also enables a radical minority to enact its own worldview despite the wishes of the state. This dynamic is very clear over abortion rights and gun safety.

Last June, quite dramatically, the Supreme Court overturned federal protection of the right to an abortion guaranteed in the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. In the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health decision the right-wing court said that decisions about abortion rights belonged to voters at the state level.

But as the last ten months have made clear, the right wing does not really intend to let the voters of the states make decisions that contradict right-wing ideology.

After the Dobbs decision, Republican-dominated legislatures immediately began to restrict the right to abortion, although it remains popular in the country and voters have rejected extreme abortion restrictions in every special election held since the decision. Now Republican legislators in Ohio are trying to head off an abortion rights amendment scheduled for a popular vote in November by requiring 60% of voters, rather than 50%, to amend the state constitution.

Gun safety shows the same pattern. A new Fox News poll out yesterday shows that 87% of voters favor background checks for gun purchases, 81% favor making 21 the minimum age to buy a gun, 80% want mental health care checks on all gun buyers, 80% want flags for people who are dangerous to themselves or others, 77% want a 30-day waiting period to buy a gun, and 61% want an assault weapons ban.

And yet, Republican majorities in state legislatures are rapidly rolling back gun laws. Republican lawmakers in the Tennessee legislature went so far recently as to expel two young Black representatives when they encouraged protesters after the majority quashed their attempts to introduce gun safety measures after a mass shooting in Nashville. But they were not alone. Last week, when the Nebraska senate passed a  permitless concealed carry law, Melody Vaccaro, executive director of Nebraskans Against Gun Violence, shouted “Shame!” multiple times. She has since been “barred and banned” from the Nebraska statehouse.

The attempt of a radical minority to enforce their will on the rest of us, who constitute a majority, by stealing control of the states and then, through them, control of the federal government is precisely what the Confederates tried to do before the Civil War: it is no accident that one of the insurrectionists who attacked the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, carried a replica of a Confederate battle flag.

And yet, in the wake of the Civil War, when former Confederates tried to dominate their Black neighbors despite the defeat of their ideology on the battlefields, Congress tried to make it impossible to pervert our democracy by capturing the states. It passed and in 1868 the states ratified the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, putting into our fundamental laws the principle that the federal government trumps state power.

It reads, “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws,” and it gives Congress the “power to enforce…the provisions of this article.”

—

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[remembertheplunge]

The conservative, hateful, ant-gay 1980's

July 21, 1986. Monday

I love this  open, new life style. Friends pound on my door and stop by. I met a guy tonight, Mark, from North Dakota and Minneapolis. He has slept with 3000 men. He started off with a blonde, tan Hawaiian beauty 10 years back. To my 4 or 5. Oh well. But, with aid’s, he’s slowed to zero I guess.

Julie and I had a good, long talk about many things, including the emptiness of one night stands. Greg stopped by. We reaffirmed our friendship and I felt true, good friendship. Steven called. We’ll get together next Wednesday at 9;30 for a drink at Face’s. 

July 22, 1986

Julie came over tonight,. Pleasant open talk. Julie told me “Hey, don’t say you’re gay—you are a person like anyone." That kind of good, open discussion is so refreshing. Makes me so happy.

Met with Steven and his cute 23 year old lover George, who was very upset I fear. Good talking with Steven. He is concerned about the conservative, hateful,  anti gay 1980’s. He said that his cute 23 year old is totally into the material. He wouldn’t even see “Parting Glances”.

The reason: He didn’t want to see anything that might deal with “the negative”, like Aids.

We jointly agreed the art in life is accepting it as it is.

July 24, 1986

Quick note only: Dinner at Nancy's. Nice. Met her sister , her sister's husband, and their kids. Nancy is like Shirley MacLaine in her relationships with married men.

Note:

Faces is a gay bar pavilion that open in  the Lavender Heights district in Sacramento in 1985. It is still in operation. It has several dance floors, bars and even a swimming pool!

Julie was a friend I met when I first moved to Sacramento in 1986.

Charlie became a lawyer and soon after died of AIDS.

Parting Glances was a 1986 movie playing in theaters when I first moved to Sacramento in the Summer of 1986. It dealt with gay relationship in the time of AID’s.

Shirley MacLaine is an actress. She has starred in many movies.

[brookstonalmanac]

Beer Events 2.1

Events

Foster's beer 1st public tasting (Australia; 1889)

Cincinnati, Covington and Newport Brewers Exchange founded (Ohio, Kentucky; 1897)

Champion Brewing changed its name to Lone Star (1940)

H.L. Buffington patented Portable Cooler Cabinet Construction (1966)

William Hunt patented a Container for a Keg (1966)

Malley Brewery patented a Continuous Brewing Apparatus (1966)

Schaefer Brewing patented the Preservation of Beer (1966)

Mack Johnston patented a Single-Opening Beer Keg (1977)

Federal law H.R. 1337 went into effect. legalizing homebrewing in the U.S. (1979)

Sierra Nevada Bigfoot released (1983)

Rene Sauvage, et al., patented  an Installation for Steeping Grains (1994)

Miller Brewing patented a Light Stable Hop Fraction and Method of Making the Same (2005)

Breweries Opened

Boston Beer Co. (South Boston, Mass.; 1828)

Berliner Kindl Brauerei (Germany; 1872)

Sierra Nevada Brewing (California; 1980)

Portland Brewery’s Flanders Street Pub founded (Oregon; 1986)

Catamount Brewing (Vermont; 1987)

Old Columbia Brewery (California; 1989)

New England Brewing (Connecticut; 1990)

Hale’s Ales (Wash.; 1992)

Old World Brewing (Arizona; 1992)

Tumbleweed Grille Brewery (NC; 1992)

Woodstock Brewing (New York; 1992)

Syracuse Suds Factory (New York; 1993)

Lagunitas Brewing (California; 1994)

Randy’s Fun Hunter Restaurant & Brewery (Wisconsin; 1994)

Bayhawk Ales (California; 1995)

Beau Ce Broue brewery (Quebec; 1995)

Browar Belgia (Poland; 1995)

Draught Horse Pub & Brewery (Texas; 1995)

Faultline Brewing (California; 1995)

Flagship Brewery (England; 1995)

Old Broadway brewery (North Dakota; 1995)

Trailhead Brewing (Missouri; 1995)

Triumph Brewing (New Jersey; 1995)

Bare Bones Grill & Brewery (Maryland; 1996)

Blue & Gold Brewing (Virginia; 1996)

Dunedin Brewery (Florida; 1996)

J.T. Garrison Brewing (California; 1996)

Main Street Brewing (Texas; 1996)

Siletz Brewing (Oregon; 1996)

Treasure Coast Brewing (Florida; 1996)

Wild Duck Brewery (Oregon; 1996)

Appalachian Brewing (Pennsylvania; 1997)

Beowulf Brewing (England; 1997)

Clocktower Brewing (Canada; 1997)

Forest City Brewing (Illinois; 1997)

Kelley Bros. Brewing (California; 1997)

Mystic River Brewing (Connecticut; 1997)

Nimbus Brewing (Arizona; 1997)

North Fork Brewers (Washington; 1997)

Rio Salado Brewing (Georgia; 1997)

Seidermann Brewing (Arizona; 1997)

Southeastern Brewing (South Carolina; 1997)

Strip Brewing (Pennsylvania; 1997)

Trout Brooks Brewing (Conneciticut; 1997)

USA Cafe (Texas; 1997)

Westwind Brewery (New Mexico; 1997)

Willoughby Brewing (Ohio; 1997)

Your Father’s Moustache (New York; 1997)

Yukon Brewing (Canada; 1997)

La Lambic du Nord (Canada; 1998)

Max Lager’s American Grill & Brewery (GA; 1998)

Silver Gulch Brewing & Bottling (Alaska; 1998)

Erie Brewing (Pennsylvania; 1999)

Lightning Boy Brewery (Montana; 1999)

5280 Roadhouse & Brewery (Colorado; 1999)

Mystic Brewpub & Restaurant (Penna.; 2000)

Spinning Dog Brewery (England; 2000)

[elcultivodelapatata]

Agristo, uno de los principales productores europeos de productos de patata congelados, está dando grandes pasos en América del Norte. La empresa belga, fundada en 1986, ha elegido Grand Forks como lugar para su primera instalación de producción en Estados Unidos. Agristo tiene su sede en Bélgica. La compañía ha estado probando el cultivo de patata en los EE. UU. durante años y descubrió que Dakota del Norte era la opción perfecta. El estado ofrece cultivos de patatas de alta calidad y una fuerte comunidad agrícola.