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wazafam · 4 years ago

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Even eight years after the release of Naughty Dog's The Last of Us, it remains one of the most cinematic and tear-jerking games ever published. A recent report revealed a TLOU remake for the PlayStation 5 is in development at Sony, which means fans will likely get to relive all of The Last of Us' best moments in 60fps.

[Warning: SPOILERS for The Last of Us below.]

The original The Last of Us' story revolves around smuggler Joel Miller, who is hired by a militia group, the Fireflies, to escort 14-year-old Ellie out of Boston safely. Unbeknownst to Joel, Ellie is mysteriously immune to the parasitic effects of the Cordyceps fungus that has devastated humanity, and he eventually realizes the Fireflies want Ellie because she might be the secret to curing the infection. The two set off on a cross-country journey to bring Ellie to the Fireflies' headquarters and face violent bandits, hordes of Infected, and a cannibal cult.

Related: The Last Of Us Remake Should Not Make Story Changes Like FF7 Remake

Along the way, Joel and Ellie develop a father-daughter relationship central to the most emotional parts of the game. Naughty Dog masterfully balances The Last of Us' scary moments and heart-wrenching scenes with fleeting but resonant periods of calm. The result is an experience that will have many players choking up as much as they'll be at the edge of their seats. Here are some of the most unforgettable moments from The Last of Us.

The Last of Us wastes no time introducing players to the horrors the Cordyceps fungus unleashed. The game opens in Austin, Texas, on the night of Joel's birthday. Sarah, his daughter, stays up late waiting for him to get home from work in order to give him a wristwatch. That same night, the fungal infection reaches a breaking point in the state, forcing Joel and Sarah to evacuate with Joel's brother, Tommy.

When it appears Joel and Sarah narrowly escape with their lives, a patrolling soldier finds them fleeing Austin and is ordered to eliminate anyone leaving the area. The patrolman fires at them, missing Joel but mortally wounding Sarah before being shot by Tommy. Joel's daughter dies in his arms, showing players the trauma the infection has caused him and many others. Plus, it sets the backdrop for the relationship he'll eventually develop with Ellie throughout The Last of Us.

Ellie and Joel meet another duo of survivors when they make it to Pittsburgh - brothers Sam and Henry. The two groups join forces to escape the city and even begin to become friends because of how similar their situations are. Sam and Ellie are about the same age, while Joel and Henry are their protectors. The four seem like they could make a formidable team, but when things seem like they're taking a turn for the better in The Last of Us, disaster strikes.

Related: What The Last of Us Remake Should Steal From TLOU2

The four take shelter in an abandoned apartment after making it out of Pittsburgh. Joel and Henry bond over dinner, while Sam and Ellie have a strangely tense conversation in another room. It turns out Sam was bitten by one of The Last of Us' Infected during their travels and is coming to terms with dying. Without telling anyone, he goes to sleep, and when Ellie checks on him the next morning, he attacks her. Henry is forced to shoot his brother and then shoots himself in a state of sorrow and rage.

This portion of the game reinforces that nothing is permanent in The Last of Us' universe. Joel and Ellie had recently lost their travel partner, Tess, to the infection, and the introduction of the brothers injected some hope into the journey ahead. It was cut short, and this scene is a perfect example of the emotional highs and lows Naughty Dog's release can put players through.

Bandits ambush Joel and Ellie while investigating an abandoned Fireflies outpost at the University of Eastern Colorado. Joel is severely injured, and the two take shelter in a garage during the winter, with Ellie hunting and tending to Joel's wounds. She runs into the bandits again and discovers they're part of a cult of cannibals led by a man named David. Ellie lures the group away from Joel but is momentarily captured as David tries to recruit her to join his group.

Ellie manages to free herself and kill David's partner, but he corners her in a burning restaurant. Meanwhile, Joel gains some strength back and manages to set off in search of Ellie. When he finds her, she's brutalizing David with a machete after an intense showdown. Joel runs in to comfort her, but the events traumatize Ellie. She used to be cheery and quick-witted, even among all of the horrors of The Last of Us, but now she's reserved and on edge.

Following the horrific encounter with David and his group, Ellie and Joel make it to Salt Lake City, Utah, where a group of Fireflies is supposed to be hiding in a hospital. On their way there, the duo happens upon a herd of giraffes (a reoccurring symbol in TLOU) that have somehow gotten free from a nearby zoo, which results in one of the most whimsical and carefree moments of the game. Players see a glimmer of Ellie's former self when she and Joel look off into the city skyline and watch the giraffes walk off.

Related: The Last Of Us 2 PS5 Video Shows How a 4K 60 FPS Upgrade Could Look

The scene might seem inconsequential, but it's a prime example of the exemplary pacing that defines The Last of Us. After the blood-curdling encounter with David that changed Ellie for good, Naughty Dog shows players there is still beauty and peace in the world's nature. Joel and Ellie bask in it, even if it's just for a moment.

Once the duo reaches the Fireflies' hospital base, Joel turns over Ellie. Right when it would seem Joel's job is complete, he takes it all back. He realizes the group will likely kill Ellie while experimenting on how to synthesize a cure for the infection. Now caring deeply for Ellie, as if she was his daughter, he decides to kill the remaining Fireflies in the base to save her.

After slaughtering dozens of guards, Joel bursts into the operating room, kills the surgeons, and even shoots his original Fireflies contact, Marlene. When she awakens from her anesthesia, Joel lies to Ellie, telling her the Fireflies' plan for a cure failed and that dozens of people are already immune to the disease. It's a heartbreaking moment that's accentuated by one of Joel's final lines: "I struggled a long time with surviving. No matter what, you keep finding something to fight for."

It's here that it becomes resoundingly clear Joel doomed humanity just to save the one person left in the world he loved. It's a tragic ending that rings home one of the central themes of The Last of Us - finding something to cherish in a brutal world.

Next: The Last Of Us Remake Should Not Make Story Changes Like FF7 Remake

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multiverseforger · 4 years ago

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Steve Harmon, a high school student in Morristown, NJ, decides to get back at Winston a classmate who ratted Steve out to a teacher after a prank. Steve's plan is to disguise himself as a clown at a local carnival in order to get close enough to throw a pie in Winston's face. As Steve is about to make his move, Winston and his girlfriend are kidnapped by a trio of sinister clowns and dragged into the Hall of Mirrors. Steve follows them, deciding that saving his friends is more important than revenge on Winston. He finds out that these clowns are extradimensional beings planning a full-scale invasion on Earth. The clowns open up a portal to Dimension Ecch and drag Winston and his girlfriend through. Steve follows after them, awaiting an uncertain future.

Creation

Slapstick was created by Len Kaminski and James Fry III and first appeared in his own mini-series, Slapstick issue 1 from 1992.

Major Story Arcs

Becoming Slapstick

Traveling through the portal affects Steve's molecular structure, making him rubbery and blob-like. He lands in a cell occupied by the former Scientist Supreme of Dimension Ecch. The scientist, who was imprisoned for opposing the invasion plan, explains that when Steve went through the portal, "rather than having [his] atoms scattered throughout the universe, [he] was molecularly dis-discombobulated. This transformed him into a new form of matter-- a type of living unstable molecules called electroplasm, which is totally indestructible."

The scientist gives Steve two gloves outfitted with "molecular stabilitroids" that will enable him to control the cohesion of his body's molecules. The gloves also enable Steve to carry weapons in hyperspace. He can make the hidden weapons appear at will, as if he simply plucked them out of thin air. The Scientist Supreme then goes on to encourage Steve to use his new abilities to stop the evil ruler of Dimension Ecch. After doing so, Steve rescues the kidnapped humans and returns them to Earth. His best friend Mike Peterson, one of the kidnapees, recognizes Steve even in his newly-altered state. Once Steve tells Mike everything that happened, Mike informs Steve that he has "Just had an origin" and suggests Steve come up with a new name under which he can fight crime. After rejecting several suggestions (including "The Joker" and "The Jester"), Steve finally names himself Slapstick.

New Warriors and The Initiative

After several solo adventures, Slapstick joins the New Warriors. He was, however, not with the team when they accidentally blew up Stamford, Connecticut. After Civil War, he was one of the Initiative recruits (along with Cloud 9, Komodo, MVP, Ultragirl, Trauma, Thor Girl,Debrii Fields, Hardball, and Rage). When camp instructor��Gauntlet continued to criticize, insult and mock the New Warriors for their mistake, Slapstick became so angry that he ambushed Gauntlet and beat him nearly to death. After his assault, Slapstick painted "NW" (for New Warriors) across Gauntlet's chest in Gauntlet's own blood.

No one ever discovered Slapstick's crime (because Secretary Henry Gyrich ended the investigation for fear it would uncover some of his shady experiments like the Scarlet Spiders); however, both Justice and Rage (of the Initiative) nearly got jailed, and Gauntlet (who survived and returned to active duty) blamed his assault on the terrorist Ghost, a foe of Iron Man.

Eventually, Justice became so angry at the Initiative that he formed a New Warriors team, and Slapstick joined. Norman Osborn then branded the New Warriors wanted criminals.

The New Warriors entered Camp Hammond to retrieve the body of fallen comrade MVP, but found mad Thor cyborg-clone Ragnarok about to kill Gorilla Girl. The Initiative intervened and Slapstick (calling Ragnarok a "hippie" who needed to be introduced to "Whack-a-Mole") attacked Ragnarok. Ragnarok then easily defeated Slapstick. After the battle, Slapstick and the other New Warriors were successful in their mission to retrieve MVP's body.

Fear Itself

Commander Steve Rogers informed Prodigyof the unknown meteors that have fallen from the heavens and of the mass panic that is on the horizon. Rogers asked Prodigy to gather heroes on a volunteer basis to help keep the peace and lead a new Initiative---one where there is no forced conscription or registration. Prodigy agrees to become the leader of the new Initiative and most of the former Initiative members including Slapstick gather in Washington DC.

Personality

Slapstick is a classic class clown, always quick with a joke or wisecrack, even if they're sometimes poorly timed or inappropriate. Since humor is his personal coping mechanism, he will often try to lighten the mood, or get a laugh from his teammates. Much of the time though, his teammates find him more annoying than funny.

Using his cartoon-like body, he is able to easily alter his appearance, often to appear more humorous. It's been noted that he has an anger problem, and the results can be catastrophic if he is pushed too far.

When Steve first got his powers, he was told he needed to use them to fight crime. Always out for a laugh, Steve replied that he would rather "play cruel tricks on" crime instead.

Powers and Abilities

He has similar characteristics to that of a cartoon character. These include limitless durability, increased speed, stamina, strength, and reflexes. He is able to stretch in a manner similar to Mr. Fantastic. In an early solo adventure, Slapstick discovers that stimulating his body's electroplasm with ordinary electricity can increase his strength to near-Hulk-or-Thing-like levels.

Steve wears two gloves. The left glove enables Steve to go from human-form, to Slapstick form at the press of a bottom. The right glove enables to him to store massive quantities of items in sub-space receptacles dubbed "Infinite Pockets". The "pockets" give off a pink-red hue when accessed.

In his "infinite pockets", he has random stuffed toys including one of a sponge with a face,Spider-Man, a rubber chicken, duck, and frog. He also keeps a variety of weapons in there, including: a wooden mallet, chainsaw, flail, dynamite, a shield and a sword. He also carries several gag items, to facilitate his pulling pranks. These include an arrow-through-the-head hat, a boot on a stick, eye-pop glasses, a seltzer bottle, a party horn, and a whoopie cushion. He also carries a lot of junk, such as a trombone, bowling ball and pins, among other things.

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fanfic-from-a-67-impala · 7 years ago

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A Supernatural x Reader Story Chapter Twenty-Five: Trial and Error

Word count: 4529

(You can also read it on Wattpad here)

Master Post

Hunched over your steering wheel, you glance between the slip of paper in your hand and the map on your computer screen resting in the passenger seat, and fish out your phone to dial Sam back.

"(Y/N)?" he answers. "Hey. Are you here?"

Surely, your information is wrong. The only building around is some kind of power plant – an abandoned one, you think – with mold and rust creeping up and down its ancient brick walls, and below it, a steel door surrounded by a red brick wall that makes you think it could be some kind of military structure.

"I– I don't know," you reply. "Are you sure you gave me the right coordinates? It's, um... it's pretty empty out –"

The clanging sound of the metal door opening cuts you off. You panic. If this is some sort of official military building and you were found on their property, there would be trouble, considering any ID you could produce would be fake, and there are weapons hidden in every nook and cranny of the car.

You are relieved to see Sam exiting the building, pocketing his phone. He walks into the mid-morning sun across the narrow road to your car, smiling, and meets you before you get the chance to close the door behind you, pulling you into a hug.

He smells like soap, you note as he pulls away. Not like the Impala, or some grimy motel bed. He smells like something comfortable, something normal. Like good soap.

You barely keep yourself from cringing at what you must look like in comparison. You haven't slept in days, the last of which you spent on the road, and you could never seem to ditch the cheap motel room scent, no matter how many showers you took before you left.

"So, what's this 'good news' all about?" you ask.

When he and Dean called you a couple of weeks ago, you were on a hunt on the east coast, and more and more cases came your way. But they said it wasn't urgent, that it was good news, and to make it out when you could.

"Bring your stuff," he tells you, smiling. "Clothes, supplies – whatever you have."

You eye him for a moment, suspicious of what he could be planning, but sharing his smile. Finally, you grab your duffel from the backseat and swing it over your shoulder, taking your gun but leaving the rest.

The door opens with a clank and he leads you inside.

You don't know what you were expecting, but it was not what you are met with. A wave of warm air hits you, a welcome contrast to the chilly March air. After taking a couple of steps inside, you see that you are standing on a balcony overlooking a huge room that curves inward and, at the center, has a table with an illuminated world map. On a table in a corner lays a switchboard, among other antique forms of communication.

Sam nudges your shoulder and gestures to a staircase to your right. You climb down, eyes still taking in the room.

"What is this place?" you ask once you reach the bottom step.

"Remember us telling you about our grandfather?" he says.

"Your grandfather, who time-traveled from sixty years ago?" you question. "Still not sure I believe that one."

He lets out a short laugh. "You and me both. I'm still having a hard time believing any of this," he admits, gesturing to the room around him. "Henry – he left us a key to this place. It's a bunker that was used by the Men of Letters, this secret society that died out in 1958."

"Right," you muse. "And you two are legacies, or something? Because hunting wasn't taxing enough."

"That's the thing," he says, "the Men of Letters were a hunting organization, technically. They tracked monsters and gave the cases to their team of hunters, and that's the way it worked for a long time. Until Abaddon."

"The demon who can't be killed by the demon knife," you recall what they told you.

"And who is now safely buried," he adds. "In pieces."

You nod. "Best news I've heard all week."

"Well, you haven't even the best part of this place," he says, leading you by the shoulder to the opposite end of the room, where it opens into an even larger, longer room.

The sight of it brings you to a halt. The walls on either side, extending further than any room you could have imagines, are lined with shelves upon shelves of books. Lore books, of all sizes. Some of them, you have seen before at Bobby's, but most of them bear unfamiliar titles in English and Latin and Greek and even some languages you don't know. On one of the rectangular tables that go down the center of the library, there are books open, papers scattered around them.

The amount of information that must be contained in this room alone is enough to overwhelm you. The thought that this room gave you the capacity to defeat anything that comes your way makes you want to cry.

You hear Sam chuckle next to you, and realize that you must have been standing in the entryway, gaping, for a solid minute.

"I'm gonna check on Dean," he says, taking off back toward the main room and down a hallway.

You take a minute with the books, running your fingertips across the spines of the one nearest to you, before heading in the direction Sam took, following the boys' voices until you reach an open door.

This must be Dean's room. There are shotguns and blades lining the walls and an assortment of crosses, stakes, and other hunting supplies on the mantle above a queen-size bed with a blanket neatly folded over and a single pillow resting at the head.

"Nice of you to finally haul ass back here," Dean jokes. "I was just about to fix us some grub. You gonna hurry up and choose a room or what?"

He gives you a peck on the cheek as he passes you, not noticing the shock on your face.

"I... get a r-room?" you stammer.

He turns back to you. "Uh, yeah," he says, as if it's the most obvious thing, before turning back in the direction of what must be a kitchen.

You look to Sam in disbelief, but he shoots you an encouraging smile.

"Come on," he prompts, leading you outside. Only a short way down, across the hall, is another open door, leading to a dark, seemingly emptier room. Sam's, you think.

He walks backward, arms open and facing you, down the hallway. "Take your pick."

You open a door near to each of theirs and click on a lamp.

There is a faint dusty scent, but it looks to be incredibly well-preserved for having not been used in over fifty years. Its layout and furniture are almost identical to Dean's; there are even some office supplies on the desk and sheets on the bed.

You take another step inside. It feels like home. Like the place you shared with Charlie, and your old room at Bobby's, but also like your home from before you met Bobby, before you ever encountered anything supernatural. You can't remember the last time you thought about your life from before. You haven't had any need to, and the memories have long faded beyond recognition anyway.

It's hard to believe that, after making peace with your '72 Marquis being the only home you would know for whatever is left of your life, you have been given this corner of the world – somewhere you could feel safe, a place you could come back to and feel at home.

You drop your bag onto the bed, deciding to hold off on unpacking until later. Instead, you walk back out to the library, where you find Sam again, hunched over the books and papers you noticed on the table earlier.

"Keeping busy?" you tease, taking a seat across from him.

"Uh, just..." he starts, distractedly, eyes still glued to the pages, "going through the Letters' archives. Trying to put together all the info they have in here, updating some of it."

"Need a hand?" you offer.

He looks up at you now. "Yeah, that'd be great, actually," he says. "I've been having a hard time with some of these –" From one of several small stacks on the table around him, he plucks a book, bound in brown leather and filled with Latin text printed on yellowing pages.

"I mean, I took Latin in college," he continues, "but all of this is so complex. And I remembered that you're fluent, right?"

"Mm hmm," you mumble, thinking back to those countless long nights at Bobby's, before you started hunting, spending hours trying to decipher the ancient texts before you were able to understand it almost as well as you could read English.

"Think you could flip through it, just so one of us knows what's going on?" he asks, but you are already scanning the first few pages, noting the subject and the brief introduction before delving into the treatise.

The two of you sit across from each other, lost in the words, until Dean walks in, bearing three plates of food.

"Whatchya reading?" he asks.

"Sort of, uh, everything," Sam responds.

"Oh, good," Dean comments. "Somebody's going to have to dig through all this and it ain't gonna be me."

You eye the burger he set in front of you. "You cook?"

"We have a real kitchen now," he informs you.

"I didn't think you knew what a kitchen was," Sam mutters.

Dean pauses a beat. "I'm nesting, okay?" he defends. "Eat."

He watches intently as you and Sam obey, each of you getting ahold of the sandwich and taking a bite.

It doesn't drip with oil and the lettuce isn't soggy, like the cheap diner stuff. The bun is crisp, the meat cooked to a perfect medium rare. It's the best thing you've eaten in... you can't remember when.

Dean has raised his own burger to his lips when a ringing sound emits from his pocket. With an annoyed look, he puts down the food and opens his cell phone.

He sits up straight immediately after answering. "What?" he almost shouts. "Kevin?"

"What is it? What's wrong?" you say.

You visited Kevin once since you learned he was staying on Garth's house boat in Missouri. He was trying to decipher this demon tablet, and you could tell it was taking a lot out of him. He insisted that this was the way he could get back to his mom, to his life, away from all of this. You couldn't blame him, and you wanted that demon tablet translated as much as anyone. Maybe you should have tried harder to convince him to slow down. Maybe you should have checked in on him more often, paid more attention.

"It could be nothing," Dean says, though he looks disturbed. "Why don't you lay low here for a while? Sam and I'll head down there and see what's up, and we'll call if we need you."

You want to argue, but you doubt it will get anywhere. And he could be right. It could be nothing.

Sam gives you a wave goodbye and is about to follow his brother out of the room before thinking again, turning back to grab his plate, then continuing on his way.

• • • • • • • • • • • •

You spend the next few hours continuing with the book, even finding sheets of paper to take notes – roughly translated summaries should the boys need them if you aren't around. After meeting the back cover, you tackle another book, glancing at the clock often.

Six hours later, to the minute, it's dark out. They would have gotten there a couple of hours ago, even earlier with Dean behind the wheel. Images of everything that could have gone wrong flash through your mind, and you have to stand and force yourself to clear them away.

Not obsessed, you tell yourself, dialing Dean's number. Just concerned.

After the third ring, you think he might not pick up, and you start to pace the width of the room.

"Yeah," you hear over the phone's speaker.

"Dean," you breathe, relief flooding through to your voice. "Talk to me. What's going on?"

"Other than puke and Bible babble," he says, "not much. But we did get a case out of it."

"Yeah?" you say. "Anything I can do?"

"No, no," he replies, a little too quickly, a little too certain. "It's a, uh– it's a small one."

No matter how close the two of you have grown over the years, Dean has always been somewhat of a mystery to you. He was difficult to read sometimes. But now, you know, without a doubt, he is lying.

"Try again, Winchester."

A static-y rush of air sounds as he exhales a sigh, then he lets a moment pass before saying, "It's a demon case."

You are confused at first. "Dean, I can help with a–"

But then you realize. It's not what you can do, or what you think you can do. Weeks ago, he convinced you to keep hunting when you felt like this thing, whatever is happening in you, was clouding your judgement. Maybe what he said didn't extend to the very thing you could be turning into.

They don't trust you to do what you need to do as a hunter, and there's nothing you can say to overcome that, not now.

"Okay," you murmur, though you feel like you were just kicked in the stomach. "Well, I guess I'll see you two when you get back."

"Yeah, we'll see you," he says.

"Be safe out there," you rush to get the words out, but the call has already ended.

All that is left for you to do is lean back against the edge of the table as you recover from the blow.

It was always a possibility, you thought, that they weren't entirely okay with the Hell thing. You certainly aren't. And you can't blame them, either. In fact, you completely understand. But that doesn't make it sting any less.

You turn back to the book, only to find you can't focus on a single word. Instead, you get up to walk around and, in one corner of the library, realize that you have wandered into a devil's trap.

Your hands raise themselves, as if someone has aimed a gun at your head, trying to stay inside of it. You have never been caught in one before, but it occurs to you that it might be something that happens over time.

You close your eyes and take a step out, relieved and almost surprised when your foot is met with the ground and not an invisible barrier. You let out the breath you didn't realize you have been holding, and continue on the stroll, ending up in the kitchen.

The industrial-style stainless steel prep table gleams under the kitchen's fluorescent lights. Some of the dishes left over from lunch are scattered on the counter, so you wash them in the sink.

The bed is comfortable, more so than any motel bed you have encountered, though you spend the night drifting in and out of sleep, constantly grabbing your phone from the nightstand and checking it. Each time, an empty screen is all that greets you.

"Just a demon," you whisper to yourself. "They know what they're doing."

Once the sun has risen, you leap out of bed.

The boys have only been living here for a couple of weeks, and they have never had any kind of permanent home, not since Sam was a newborn. They wouldn't know how to keep a place, especially a place as massive as the bunker.

You start by cleaning. Everything. The places that the boys have used since they started living here – the kitchen, library, each of their rooms – are clean enough, but the rest of the place is still blanketed with fifty years' worth of dust.

Although there is not a bug to be seen, you find yourself swiping cobwebs out of obscure corners, left by the critters who have undoubtedly long expired.

You find cleaning supplies under one of the bathroom sinks and work until sweat forms on your brow, until you need a drink, until nightfall.

Still no call. No heavy footfalls trudging through the door. No deep voices exchanging quick banter. Not even the wind reaches the inside of the bunker.

By the next morning, you can't stand the emptiness. You climb in your car, still parked out front, and drive.

• • • • • • • • • • • •

The sunlight casts a distorted reflection on the water of the harbor and warms the cool February air. Soft splashing sounds and distant, indistinct voices echo in your ears as you creep onto the deck of the boat with the name Fizzles' Folly painted on its rear.

You knock on the rusty metal door and, seconds later, it opens with a creak.

You are met with a thorough douse of holy water. When you saw what was coming, you half expected it to burn, but it doesn't. It only drips into your eyes and down your shirt.

"(Y/N)?" Kevin says, his voice startled.

You swipe the water away from your eyes before opening them again. "Uh huh," you sigh.

He ushers you inside and shuts the door behind you. "Don't get me wrong – it's good to see you," he says, a nervous look on his face, "but what are you doing here?"

It's a good question. What are you doing here? Making sure he's okay? Getting info on the boys? Both?

"Just..." you search for the words, looking around the dingy room before turning back to him, "checking in, I guess."

"Oh," he says, taking a seat at the table covered in layers of books and notes and, above all of it, half of the demon tablet.

"How've you been, Kev?" you ask, meeting him at eye level.

He looks better than he did when you saw him last. Dark circles still peek out from under his eyes, but he's showered and shaven, and even has some color in his face. You suspect the boys' visit had something to do with it, but it's something, at least.

"I really want to finish this," he admits, running his fingers through his hair.

You shoot him a sympathetic look, but your eyes catch on something else on the table. Pill bottles, two of them side by side. You read the labels and frown.

"Kev, I know you want to get this done," you say, "but don't you think you should –"

"Slow down?" he suggests. "No time. We're so close already."

"What have you got?"

"Sam and Dean didn't tell you?" he asks in a disbelieving tone.

You think back to your conversation with Dean. "You mean that demon hunt they're on?"

"What?" he says, confusion in his voice. "No. I mean the first trial."

"'Trial'?" you repeat.

"From the tablet?" he tries. "For closing the gates of Hell?"

You can only manage to stare at him blankly, mind spinning. "You found out how to close the gates?"

"There are three trials that someone has to go through," he explains. "God made it so that once you pass all three, you can say a few words of Enochian and slam the gates. I've only been able to work out one of them so far – they've got to kill a hound of Hell and bathe in its blood."

"'They'?" you repeat.

"Sam and Dean," he says. "Well, one of them, anyway."

"Hunting a hellhound?" you exclaim. "That's what they're doing right now?"

He nods, and shifts some papers around, one of which catches your eye.

"Whosoever chooses to undertake these tasks," you read, "should fear not danger, nor death, nor... nor what?"

"A word I think means getting your spine ripped out through your mouth for all eternity," he states.

You can't stop yourself from grimacing at the thought, and you realize what it means. The trials will take a lot out of the person who takes them on, maybe even their life. And either one of your boys would be rushing to take them on if it meant sending all demons back to Hell forever.

"Where are they?" you demand.

He gives you a look, like he's unsure whether he should tell you.

"Kevin," you press, with conviction now, enunciating each word. "Do you know?"

He eyes you a second more before his resolve seems to break under your hard gaze.

"On a farm," he says, "somewhere in Shoshone, Idaho."

"Idaho?" you exclaim. "Are you kidding me? That's three states away."

He says nothing, only stifles a yawn.

You sigh, trying to calm your nerves for a moment. "Look, just promise me you'll lay off the pills, and the caffeine," you say, gesturing to his coffee cup on the table, "and get some rest, okay?"

He looks up at you. "I promise," he says.

And you're out the door.

• • • • • • • • • • • •

You floor the gas pedal the entire way there, crossing into Idaho in record time. You find the farm easily once you reach the small town, even hidden under the veil of the darkness of sometime past midnight.

There was never a demon case. Dean knew that you would do the math, that you would be forced to wonder what slamming the gates of Hell would mean for you.

Your anger at them for lying to you and the sting of their distrust dull to an ambiguous ache as you struggle to wrap your mind around anything but trying to keep your boys from getting themselves killed.

Your call rolls to a stop on the damp pavement outside the nearest building you can find – a well-lit barn in better condition than you would think for the size of the town, filled with horses.

You jog around the barn until you find a tall, stern-looking woman with long brown hair and jeans who is putting a rake away into a shed in the back. She notices you, and you feel flustered, realizing what you have to ask of a complete stranger.

"Have you, uh... have you seen two guys – ridiculously tall," you begin, hearing the desperation in your own voice, "one of them has long –"

"That way," she says, pointing.

Behind you is a large, house-like structure about a hundred yards away.

"Second door on the left," she informs you.

You shout thanks to her as you turn away, sprinting in the direction she pointed until you reach the double wooden doors, which the wind slides open before you arrive. You note that the wind is not particularly strong tonight, but chalk it up to the unlocked door.

By the time you reach the second door, you are out of breath, your heart pounding, and you have broken a sweat, even in the cool nighttime air. You turn the brass knob and swing the door open.

You see Dean first, standing at the corner of a table, clutching his side, casting an uneasy eye on a kneeling figure before him.

"Sam!" you yell, sliding to him on your knees, unable to catch your breath.

He has one arm out in front of him for balance, breathing heavily. The front of his light grey shirt is stained with a bluish black down the center.

They've got to kill a hound of Hell and bathe in its blood, Kevin said.

You reach out a hand to brush away his hair so you can see his face. His cheeks are pale as he looks up at you, his eyes wide in surprise, but he's conscious and the pain he felt seems to have subsided.

"I'm good," he whispers, his voice unsteady and weak, and stands.

You rise with him, your nervous eyes following him. He looks to Dean, who wears an expression he reserves for Sam, for when he's in danger.

"I'm good," Sam repeats. "I'm okay. I can do this."

The worry doesn't leave Dean's eyes, though Sam gives you both a reassuring nod.

"Great," you snap, sounding more abrasive than you intended. "Then you can also tell me what the hell you two were thinking."

They give each other a sort of panicked look, not sure how to tell you what you've been dreading hearing them say.

"We knew you would try to stop us," Dean says.

His words are a punch to the gut, but you are so angry with them, with yourself, that you continue, your voice trembling with rage. Your eyes sting with tears, but you ignore them.

"How could you think if I have a close enough bond to Hell to get sent there when those gates slam, I would want to be anywhere near Earth?"

You swipe at the fallen tears on your cheeks with the back of your fists.

"We didn't think that," Sam's eyes are at his feet as he says it.

"Damn it, (Y/N), you would have tried to stop us," Dean interjects. "You would have done anything – you would have taken on the trials yourself – before you let either of us do it, and we weren't about to let that happen."

"Well, why the hell not?" you hiss.

"Because all you do is try to protect us," Sam says, his voice a soft contrast to yours and Dean's biting tones, giving you the look that makes you believe anything he says. "And because we care about you, (Y/N)."

"And you think I want to do this – any of this – without you both?"

Once you say the words, the whole room seems to realize the impasse you have reached, each unable to live without each other, each willing to die before seeing another hurt.

You unclench your fists and draw in a deep, shaky breath, feeling yourself relax a bit.

All along, their mistrust in you was because they knew you well enough to know that you would do anything to keep them safe. Maybe they were right to keep it from you, you think absently. Shutting down Hell was for the good of the entire world, and the only thing you can think is what it will cost your family, what it will cost Sam.

"So, i-it wasn't because..."

Dean shakes his head. They, at least, have faith in you not to go dark side yet, even if you don't.

"So, what happens now?" you ask, turning to Sam. Some color has returned to his cheeks and he doesn't seem to be in pain.

"I guess we wait for Kevin to translate the next trial," he says. "And if it all goes our way, I shut the gates and we'll never have to see a pair of black eyes again."

You wonder when things like this ever go your way, but you don't mention your doubt. Only meet Sam's eyes, then Dean's, in a silent exchange of comfort.

#Supernatural #SupernaturalxReader #Supernatural fanfic #fanfiction #Spn #Spn fanfic #Spn reader insert #series #A Supernatural x Reader Story #writing is hard

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icefang100 · 6 years ago

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Webcomic Recommendations

Since I figure there’s people out there always looking for new webcomics (like myself), I decided to make a list of the ones I’m reading/have read! They’re all free to access, and I’ll include the comic’s official “description” under its title, if it has one (also, the comics’ titles are links to the website hosting them). The list is below the cut, and separated into “Ongoing” (as of 3/15/2019) and “Complete/Never to be Continued" (for the latter, I’ll indicate which in the description). Note: These are not necessarily intended for young audiences!

Ongoing

Dog Eat Dog

“None are left without the influence of Man's unyielding, cruel hand. If given the choice, whose blood would stain your teeth if it meant you could finally be free?”

Home (Sequel to Asmundr, see “Completed”)

“Two years have passed since the plague of the Shield Wolf was defeated, but the increasing threat from an unknown source to the small family of Asmundr have left them no choice but to leave their home. In the new land, their prayers and questions to their gods are only answered in silence, as the dangers of this land become their new reality. Survival leads to some separating from their family for knowledge and adventure, but the trials and tribulations are ever daunting.”

Lackadaisy

[No description]

Mokepon

“He wants to be the very best! That no one ever was... uh, no. Scratch that. Adventures and friendship were never something that appealed to Atticus... Shame that it's a pokemon world he lives in, and so teenage boys living in Pallet Town are not expected to sit idly by. But the life of a hero is not one he's about to consider; too much hard work for little reward, and so instead he embarks on his quest not to become the greatest... But at least, the richest. Although the biggest challenge may be ignoring the adventures and friendships which may attempt to ensnare him along the way...”

Prague Race

“Prague Race is the story of a girl who’s always wanted more--she just didn’t expect it to come in the form of a handy parasite living in her back. With only one year left to live, she’s going to make the most of it in the strange secret world behind the veil.”

The Property of Hate

[No description]

Wilde Life

“Wilde Life is a supernatural adventure/horror series set in a small town in rural Oklahoma. It focuses on stories about creatures from Native American mythology as witnessed and documented by a journalist from Chicago, Illinois.”

DNA

“Sirius and his friends never asked to exist, and, really, none of them should. Despite this, here they are, and existing when you shouldn’t brings with it complications.”

The Glass Scientists

“The city of London is not the best place to be a mad scientist. Thirty years after the death of the infamous Dr. Frankenstein, its citizens have gotten awfully good at killing creatures, destroying laboratories, and generally wrecking anything new or strange-looking ... Together with his Society for Arcane Science, he can end the reign of fear and superstition that has held London captive for decades so long as no one discovers his one little secret, a secret that could ruin him and unravel the lives of everyone he knows.This man’s name is Dr. Henry Jekyll.”

Ghost of the Gulag

[No description]

Victory Fire

[No description]

Skin Deep

“Skin Deep was born out of an interest in mythology, folklore, music, world-building, and the idea that things are often more than they seem, and that it is easy to hide secrets when nobody is expecting them.”

How to be a Werewolf

“Since being bitten by a strange wolf as a child, Malaya Walters has attempted to live a quiet life… hopefully a life free of attempting to eat her family or the customers at her family’s coffee shop. Being the only werewolf she’s ever known, Malaya has managed her condition by keeping tight control on herself and the world around her, with lackluster results. That is, until a strange guy wanders into her shop one day and introduces her to a whole world she never knew existed…”

Daughter of the Lilies

“Daughter of the Lilies is a comic largely about the importance self-worth, the different forms love can take, how it can redeem and empower us, as well as issues relating to anxiety. (There are also unicorns, manticores, ghouls, goblins, cannibalistic elves, dragons, gods, fairies, ghosts, werewolves, demons, angels, and so on.)”

Paranatural

“Paranatural is a comedy/action comic about a group of superpowered middle schoolers fighting evil spirits and investigating paranormal activity in their hometown.”

Savestate

“Savestate is a comic written and drawn by Tim Weeks. It follows the misadventures of siblings Kade and Nicole.”

White Noise

“In the early 1900s, the nation of Aetheri came out of its long interdimensional isolation and revealed to the humans of the Symphony Archipelago that they were not alone in the multiverse. Things swiftly got ugly after that.In the early 1990s, Aetheri’s leadership changed, and in the Archipelago, a tiny broken family of half-siblings banded together in the face of the bile and hate that was boiling up between the humans and the non-humans.In the early 2000s, that family was split apart. Hawk Press and his sister Liya Kiski both begin a long and exhaustive journey towards understanding the difference between friend and enemy–and between the family you’re given, and the family you make.”

Emporium

“Nestled high in the mountains rests a strange little building, home to a vast collection of strange and unusual items, maintained by equally strange and unusual employees. Suddenly abandoned among these misfits, an unusually loquacious dog struggles to find her place alongside the mayhem and monsters housed within the mysterious Emporium.”

Doe of Deadwood

“A deer is indebted to a demon tree.”

Africa

“Africa tells the story of a female leopard, the struggles and challenges she has to face every day and her rivalry with a male leopard who threatens to take her land. Raised and educated the way of the leopards, Africa has learned that living alone is the best way of life, and that depending on someone else is a sign of weakness. This belief she has will be continuously tested, and she will have to prove herself to demonstrate its validity. Could a leopard actually live in a pride?”

Fragile

“A wolven woman and her one-winged traveling companion are searching for her long lost son, when they get dragged into something far bigger than the two of them.”

Complete/Never to be Continued

MS Paint Adventures

Jail Break (Incomplete)

“A guy tries to escape from prison. 134 pages.”

Bard Quest (Incomplete)

“A young bard's endeavor to slay some dragons. Branching ‘choose your own adventure’ style. 82 pages.”

Problem Sleuth (Complete)

“An adventure about a hard boiled detective in his office. About 1,700 pages.”

Homestuck (Complete)

“A tale about a boy and his friends and a game they play together. About 8,000 pages. Don't say we didn't warn you.”

Asmundr (Complete)

“Asmundr is a fantasy canine/feline comic, which follows the Rifle dog Kainan and his pack and their everyday struggle to survive among beasts and ancient secrets, all while a divine power is watching each step they take.”

Strays (Complete)

“Meela is a young, orphaned lupian (a race of people with wolf-like features) who is struggling to survive on her own. A chance encounter on less than pleasant terms teams her up with Feral, another lupian who happens to be a mute as well as one of the best mercenaries in the land, and who is not quite so welcoming of her forced company as she would like to believe. Fun, danger and plenty of humorous situations follow the two on their wayward adventures, however the seemingly peaceful world they reside in is not quite the paradise that its reputation makes it out to be. When a taboo topic and a dark secret collide, it may unravel their already tattered lives and force each of them to face the reality of the truth, requiring each to make decisions that could alter their lives forever.”

Snarlbear (Complete)

“SNARLBEAR is a comic about a girl's journey through the dangerous and colorful Rainbow Dimension. On the way she learns about the power of friendship and monster punching.”

Best of Bad Decisions (Complete)

[No description]

In Our Shadow (Complete)

[No description]

Twin Shadows

“Warriors: Twin Shadows explores a parallel universe wherein Rusty never left his twoleg home. Tigerstar successfully killed Bluestar and became ThunderClan's leader; destiny will not be so easily outdone, however, and StarClan has plans for everyone's favorite kittypet...”

#Comics #Other #Webcomics

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xtruss · 4 years ago

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U.S. Cyber Tools Are Being Turned Against Americans, Limiting Biden's Options on Russia

— By Naveed Jamali and Ton O'Connor | June 9, 2021 | Newsweek

Cyberwarfare capabilities originally developed by the United States are being turned against it, threatening infrastructure and limiting the offensive options available for President Joe Biden, as retaliation runs the risk of exposing more tools within the digital U.S. arsenal.

"Technically, a lot of these tools that are being leveraged for ransomware are tools that were leaked from our own organization," a cybersecurity official who spoke on the condition of anonymity told Newsweek.

"One of the challenges that I look at is, these tools are not tools that are generally created by other nations," the official added. What's funny is other nations are using the tools that were developed by us."

At least two major ransomware attacks have struck U.S. infrastructure since Joe Biden took office in January vowing to shore up the nation's cyber defenses against foreign foes. He particularly singled out those tied to Russia, which he has blamed for another massive hack involving software firm SolarWinds.

Two ransomware attacks, one which led to the temporary closing of the Colonial Pipeline, one of the country's largest, which provides about 100 million gallons of gas a day to the southeastern U.S., and the second which led to the halting of production at all U.S. facilities of the world's biggest beef producer, Brazil-based JBS, have proven to be a major headache for the new administration just a few months into its tenure.

While the Justice Department said Monday that the FBI was ultimately able to recover much of the $4.5 million dollar ransom paid in Bitcoin to DarkSide, an Eastern Europe-based hacker group that claimed responsibility for the Colonial Pipeline, the risks associated with retaliation limited the president's choices of response.

According to the cybersecurity official with whom Newsweek spoke, part of the problem in mounting such an operation is that utilizing such weapons allows them to be more easily manipulated against the U.S.

"It's that challenge where anytime a tool or capability is used, it's pretty much considered burned," the official said. "Because, for an offensive portion, you have to deploy processes and technologies to adversarial systems to be able to reach out and touch somebody, right? So, once they're uncovered, they can reverse-engineer it."

While some groups like the Russia-based Kaspersky Lab have opted to leak to the general public such programs as those belonging to the so-called "Equation Group," which was widely suspected to have been tied to the NSA's own global cyberespionage and warfare operations, others "can keep it close held, and just reverse-engineer it, turning it against us," the cybersecurity official said.

The 175th Cyberspace Operations Group of the Maryland Air National Guard monitors live cyber attacks on the operations floor of the 27th Cyberspace Squadron, known as the Hunter's Den, at Warfield Air National Guard Base, Middle River, Maryland, June 3, 2017. J.M. Eddings Jr./Airman Magazine/U.S. AIR Force

J.D. Cook, a former senior CIA official, said the proliferation of ransomware using U.S. software served as a lesson to carefully guard U.S. cyber tools.

"Sometimes it gets used against you," Cook told Newsweek. "That's why you have to protect your stuff, and there's a point that I think people should really make about that. It's true. A lot of things get repurposed, whether it's an American cyber tool, France, British, Russian, Chinese, etcetera, and that sucks, because some of these tools have gotten out. There have been security issues."

And while it wasn't only the U.S. experiencing this dilemma, the recent focus on major targets stateside has highlighted the vulnerability the country faces from programs it created, along with the difficulty in identifying the perpetrators behind them.

Among the more infamous organizations is Shadow Brokers, which also targeted the allegedly NSA-linked Equation Group. While it's never been established conclusively if Russia itself was behind Shadow Brokers, Cook said the result is that "those are tool sets that were exposed."

"You start trying to target cybercriminals in Russia, you have to be careful of the kind of infrastructure you use, the tools you use," he said. "Because the Russians they're going to be trying to watch to see who's going after the cybercriminals more so from the intelligence perspective of, 'Hey, can we unravel some more of their kits, some more of their tools?'—and so there's a kind of intelligence aspect if you're going to target those groups."

A sloppy operation, he warned, could prove a major boon for U.S. rivals.

"You have to think about what you use, think about what your signature looks like," Cook said. "And if you just do it ham-fisted, you may be giving a gift to the Russians that may hit you in some of your other technical operations, that you may be doing as well."

But experts agreed that something had to be done, even if it meant the U.S. essentially taking on its own tools.

"Adversarial groups have access to U.S. tools and put them into the public domain," Shawn Henry, president and chief security officer of cybersecurity company CrowdStrike, told Newsweek. "Are they being repurposed or are they being re-engineered? The answer is yes."

"I think that the government has a responsibility to protect its citizens. And if the government creates a tool that's being used to exploit U.S. companies, then that needs to be remediated," Henry, a former FBI executive assistant director added. "If somebody stole a tank off an Army base, then the U.S. military needs to go back and get the tank."

The Biden administration has not directly accused the Russian government of sponsoring the Colonial Pipeline or JBS ransomware attacks, the latter of which the FBI blamed on REvil, another suspected Russia-based hacking group using similar techniques to those of DarkSide. At the same time, the White House has said the Kremlin bears responsibility for not cracking down on such activity allegedly conducted on Russian soil.

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki told reporters Monday that the issues of cybersecurity and ransomware specifically would be among the topics to come up when Biden met for the first time in his presidency with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin next week in Geneva.

At that same press conference, Biden's national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, accused Russia of "harboring or permitting cybercriminals to operate from their territory," and said he considered the issue of ransomware to be "a national security priority, particularly as it relates to ransomware attacks on critical infrastructure in the United States."

Putin and his administration have rejected any responsibility for the attacks. Instead, they have stressed the need for stronger cybersecurity cooperation between the two nations.

Reached for comment on whether Moscow might act on Washington's call to crack down on alleged cyber attacks emanating from the country, the Russian embassy in Washington referred Newsweek to a statement issued by Putin in September in which he appealed to the U.S. "to agree on a comprehensive program of practical measures to reboot our relations in the field of security in the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs)."

The four-point plan involved proposals to restore a regular full-scale bilateral interagency high-level dialogue regarding international information security (IIS), fostering bilateral communication between the two countries' Nuclear Risk Reduction Centers, Computer Emergency Readiness Teams and high-level national security officials in charge of information security matters, the signing of bilateral intergovernmental agreement on preventing incidents in the information space such as that reached nearly five decades on the high seas, and a mutual pledge of non-intervention into one another's internal affairs, "including into electoral processes, inter alia, by means of the ICTs and high-tech methods," as Putin relayed at the time.

"We call on the US to greenlight the Russian-American professional expert dialogue on IIS without making it a hostage to our political disagreements," Putin said.

Such measures, he argued, "are aimed at building up trust between our States, promoting security and prosperity of our people," and "will significantly contribute to ensuring global peace in the information space."

The Russian leader also suggested reaching a "global agreement on a political commitment of States on no-first-strike with the use of ICTs against each other."

On Tuesday, Russian Foreign Ministry International Information Security Department Director Andrey Krutskikh reiterated this appeal in an interview with the International Affairs magazine, to which he conveyed growing calls to develop "transparent and understandable 'rules of the game' in the digital space."

The absence of such treaties on the cyber front leaves the world dangerously exposed to a slippery slope toward an unbridled series of escalations—and miscalculations—especially as the U.S. considers its next moves.

For this reason, Henry echoed the need for international talks—something for which he's been advocating for years.

"We need to find what the red lines are, this continues to escalate, and we can't allow it to escalate," he said. "It's the exact reason we had nuclear arms talks, because we realized things couldn't continue to escalate, they couldn't spiral out of control."

This combination of pictures created on June 7 shows Russia's President Vladimir Putin speaking with NBC news at the Kremlin on March 1, 2018 in Moscow (L) and U.S. President Joe Biden delivering remarks at The Queen theater in Wilmington, Delaware on January 15. Cybersecurity was among the key topics both men sought to discuss in their first meeting since Biden took office in January. Jim Watson/Alexey Nikolsky/Ria Novosti/AFP/Getty Images

It's been decades since the U.S. and Russia began to invest in their cyberespionage and warfare capabilities, but the digital battlefield remains a murky one when compared to the use of more traditional weapons of mass destruction. With the domain becoming increasingly popular today and multiple threat actors multiplying, there are still no clear rules of engagement.

Resilience CEO Vishaal Hariprasad said the debate on the use of nuclear weapons was relatively "easy" as compared to the current challenge to define the boundaries of cyberwarfare.

"You could understand the red lines in your warfare, and it was easy to have deterrence theory against that," Hariprasad, who previously conducted cyber operations in the U.S. Air Force, told Newsweek. "With cyber, there is no red line and it's amorphous at best, so you can't even have deterrence without the red line versus establishing the red line."

He does, however, see signs of progress. Hariprasad praised the Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency for its engagement with the private sector in order to shore up the shield against such attacks, which CISA Executive Assistant Director of Cybersecurity Eric Goldstein said "must serve as a wake up call for every American."

"The threat of ransomware continues to be severe and can impact any organization across all sectors of the economy," Goldstein said in a statement sent to Newsweek. "Organizations should urgently review our available resources and implement best practices to protect their networks from these types of threats. Regardless of the ransomware actor or strain, good cyber hygiene is highly effective in reducing the impacts of an intrusion."

Even with cultural improvements, though, Hariprasad sees a need "to make it more expensive for the bad guys to operate." This has begun to take form with the relatively recent emergence of concepts such as "defend forward" and "persistent engagement," two proactive strategies adopted by the U.S. Cyber Command in order to detect and degrade hostile capabilities.

"U.S. Cyber Command's role in the Defend Forward strategy is the employment of the persistent engagement methodology. We enable and act," a U.S. Cyber Command spokesperson told Newsweek. "Persistent engagement guides our operations, allows us to lean forward, enables partners with unique insights, and when authorized we act against adversaries in cyberspace."

"We view every mission as an opportunity to contest our adversaries in cyberspace," the spokesperson added. "With that focus on 'persistent,' we acknowledge that with a single action, we do not degrade our adversaries' cyber tools and tactics."

But assessing how far to go when acting—preemptively or in retaliation—remains a key component of establishing a solid deterrence.

Identifying and pursuing the right level of response comes down to "proportionality," Raj Shah, chairman of cybersecurity insurance firm Resilience, told Newsweek. "What is proportionality in the cyber domain? I think we're still figuring that out as a nation."

As it appears is Biden himself, who has sought a "stable, predictable relationship" with Russia, but has so far experienced anything but. To make sense of things, Shah produced four points of his own.

"One, this should be taken very seriously, it will affect the American way of life and free nations around the world; Two, the private sector is not going to be able to do it by itself, certainly not just security people, it will take government support; Three, we do have to understand the economic side of this, and how do you put cost down; [and Four], we have to find the right tools of protection, of security, the right financial protections of risk transfer insurance, we need to find the right level of law enforcement to prosecute, and then the right amount of information-sharing from our intelligence agencies to help companies be aware of what's coming down," Shah said.

He added that "each case will have a slightly different mix of those four," but emphasized that the current approach was clearly not working. "The status quo of our pipelines going down every week is not tenable."

"If we just do what we're doing," Shah said, "the ransomware epidemic is going to just get worse and worse."

Cars line up to fill their gas tanks at a COSTCO at Tyvola Road in Charlotte, North Carolina on May 11. Fears the shutdown of a major fuel pipeline due to a ransomware attack would cause a gasoline shortage led to some panic buying and prompted U.S. regulators to temporarily suspend clean fuel requirements in three eastern states and the nation's capital. Logan Cyrus/AFP/Getty Images

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aion-rsa · 6 years ago

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Does Superman Have a Future in the DCEU?

https://ift.tt/2QtOaxo

With Henry Cavill apparently finished as the Man of Steel, where does Superman go next in the DCEU?

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Feature

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Mike Cecchini

Superman

Sep 13, 2018

Justice League

Justice League 2

Man of Steel 2

DC Entertainment

Henry Cavill

Despite how cagey Warner Bros. was about keeping Henry Cavill’s Superman out of most of the marketing for Justice League, we always knew that his return would be a key moment, not just for the movie, but for the entire DCEU. And while it took a few years to get there, the final act of Justice League makes it pretty clear that the studio is finally ready to give audiences a classic interpretation of the character. Or, they would be, if Superman hadn’t been such a difficult business proposition on screen over the last decade or more.

The bad news is that Justice League fell well short of expectations at the box office, making it the fourth troubled Superman movie in the last 11 years. This has had ramifications for the entire DCEU slate going forward (Justice League 2 has no release date), and the implications for the Last Son of Krypton aren’t particularly encouraging. There's not much reason for Mr. Cavill to stick around at the moment, and the also bad news is that it looks like his time in the cape might be coming to an end.

The simplest proposition, Man of Steel 2, now seems less likely to happen than ever before. Even the most ardent Superman fan will likely agree that an earthbound Superman story revolving around Metropolis and the Daily Planet is going to be a tough sell. After all, once you’ve done two full blown alien invasions, it’s tough to follow that. Cramming Superman’s death and return into two movies where he was relegated to co-star not only robbed that big story of the spotlight it deserves, but lowers the stakes for the character in the future. Once you’ve beaten death, what’s left?

While it would be great to see a Justice League 2 that centers Superman as the leader and inspirational figure that the current film hinted at, it doesn’t seem likely right now. Apparently, there were plans for a Superman cameo in the upcoming Shazam! movie, but that is no longer the case. There has been idle chatter about adapting Red Son, which deals with a Superman who grew up in the Soviet Union, and the attendant world-changing ramifications that would bring. Neither of these non-traditional takes sounds terribly appealing to Superman fans waiting for a Richard Donner-esque return to glory.

But it would be a mistake for Warner Bros. to turn their backs entirely on Superman. They just need to adjust their thinking a little. These are some low risk ways they can get one more flight from Cavill (maybe), continue to exploit their shared universe of the DCEU, and use Superman to introduce (or reintroduce) characters:

Take Him Off-World

The DCEU hasn’t been shy about playing up Superman’s inherently alien nature and the “stranger in a strange land” elements of the character. Getting him out of Metropolis and out into the cosmos where he can cut loose will help mitigate any fears that audiences won’t accept another “traditional” Superman movie. By doing this, Warner Bros. could help reinvigorate a far more toxic franchise.

Green Lantern Corps currently has a 2020 release date, but little else. The intention is for GLC to play up the interstellar nature of the Corps, and keep the action away from Earth. Writer Elliot S. Maggin often played with the idea that Superman was a source of fascination for the Guardians of the Universe on Oa, and his classic Bronze Age story “Must There Be a Superman?” in which the Guardians worry that Superman is interfering with the proper development of human civilization, would be the perfect jumping off point to get Supes into space. There’s your first act, and then Kal-El and the Corps can go to town on the alien menace of your choice.

Adding Superman to the Green Lantern Corps movie (I’m not suggesting giving him a ring, calm down) hits three important DCEU notes. Moments of it can be a loose adaptation of a classic DC Comics story (they love doing this), it removes Green Lantern Corps even further from the DOA 2011 Green Lantern movie, and the theme of Superman wondering whether he can do more good out in the cosmos rather than potentially stunting humanity’s growth would be in line with the sometimes somber tone of the DCEU.

On a similar note, WB could use Superman to solve one of the problems they caused in Justice League. Steppenwolf was a woefully underdeveloped villain, and Jack Kirby’s epic (in the actual sense of the word) Fourth World and New Gods concepts weren’t well served on screen. While there is now a New Gods movie in development (with Ava DuVernay at the helm), we need to care about the war between the planets New Genesis and Apokolips, and it might not hurt to give audiences a feel for their place in the wider DCEU.

Several of Jack Kirby’s earliest Fourth World stories involved Superman coming into contact with various New Gods and Forever People, and his longing to be among beings who are more like him. Let Orion and Lightray come to earth to enlist Superman’s aid in their cosmic war, similar to how these concepts were introduced in Superman: The Animated Series. Superman becomes the audience’s POV character, we no longer have to worry about him automatically being the most powerful person in the room all the time, and the DCEU can properly introduce Darkseid without having to stage yet another invasion of Earth.

Team Him Up with Established Stars

Even without Justice League 2 being a priority, there are plenty of stars in the orbit of the DCEU. Dwayne Johnson has long expressed a desire for his Black Adam to “throw down” with someone like Superman, and Johnson and Cavill have made some teasing posts on social media together. Johnson’s Black Adam will no longer be introduced in 2019’s Shazam movie, and instead has a standalone movie of his own coming.

But despite the star power of Johnson, Black Adam isn’t the most recognizable character in DC’s stable (for that matter, neither is Shazam these days), but Superman certainly is, and an easier match for a team-up (or throwdown) than say, Batman. Check out the Superman/Shazam: The Return of Black Adam animated movie for a natural way to let these characters bolster each other. The Rock is often referred to as “franchise viagra” and, frankly, Superman’s box office takings have been stuck at about half-mast.

But again, after the talks for a Superman cameo in Shazam fell through, this easy solution doesn't seem all that likely. After all, Cavill signed up for the role of Superman to be a headliner, not a second banana.

Although my personal dream would be to re-team Superman with DC’s two safest cinematic bets: Batman (whoever he may be) and Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman. The DCEU loves adapting the broad strokes of classic comic stories, so a big screen version of the Watchmen creative team of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ “For The Man Who Has Everything” would tick all the appropriate boxes, without the pressure of it being a full blown Justice League sequel (which at the moment seems about as improbable as Man of Steel 2).

“For the Man Who Has Everything” is the superhero story that has everything. A powerful alien puts Superman into a hallucinatory coma, causing him to live in a dream world where he grew to maturity on a Krypton that never exploded, all while Batman and Wonder Woman fight for their lives. This could play almost like Inception (or a Twilight Zone episode) with superheroes, and it would allow another big screen appearance for Krypton, the visual and world-building highlight of Man of Steel. In a way, this story, which forces Superman to confront and make peace with his guilt at being the sole survivor of his world, would feel like a fitting sendoff for Cavill’s Superman.

The Alternate Universe Option

It would seem there has been some chatter about Michael B. Jordan wearing the red cape. Warner Bros. has already started to partition certain elements of their DC movies from the main timeline of the DCEU. Todd Phillips' upcoming Joker movie is set in the 1980s, and deals with a different version of the character, played by a different actor, than the one we've met in Suicide Squad, for example. So the idea of Michael B. Jordan as Superman isn't too far-fetched, especially if they go with Grant Morrison and Doug Mahnke's Calvin Ellis, "President Superman" version of the character.

The full DC superhero movie release schedule can be found here. Maybe we'll get a Superman story added to it one of these days.

Mike Cecchini is the Editor in Chief of Den of Geek. You can read more of his work here. Follow him on Twitter @wayoutstuff.

from Books https://ift.tt/2LSwGIj

#aion-rsa #Books

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investmart007 · 7 years ago

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WASHINGTON | Trump enjoying a hot streak, a break from immigration news

New Post has been published on https://is.gd/SaoVFp

WASHINGTON | Trump enjoying a hot streak, a break from immigration news

WASHINGTON — A Supreme Court vacancy just fell in his lap, offering a chance to shape the court for decades. The current court handed him two favorable rulings in a single week. And there’s a Russia summit on the horizon, promising headlines for a week or more. President Donald Trump is enjoying quite a hot streak.

Some of the good news is not of his making. Still, a series of welcome events has given the president a reprieve from images of migrant children being separated from their families at the border, as well as negative headlines about administrative chaos implementing his hardline immigration policies.

Trump sought to keep the good vibes going Friday with an event marking the six-month anniversary of his tax cuts.

“We are bringing back our beautiful American dreams,” Trump

declared, as he used a celebratory East Room event with top aides and business owners to showcase the $1.5 trillion tax package passed last December.

He declared recent growth an “economic miracle,” though there’s credit to be shared: Lower unemployment, fewer claims for jobless benefits and many other positive economic indicators reflect the slow and steady nine-year recovery that began under President Barack Obama.

Trump’s tax cuts will add a hefty dose of debt-financed stimulus to the economy. Government agencies and outside analysts estimate the tax cuts will temporarily boost growth in 2018 and 2019, then fade as the national debt mounts.

Looking ahead, Trump is expected to announce his nominee to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court and hold a highly anticipated sit-down with Russian President Vladimir Putin — both events he will treat with his customary flair for building suspense. His recent summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un won him buckets of TV coverage highlighting his stature on the world stage.

Trump relished his moment speaking to reporters on Air Force One Friday evening. Of the Supreme Court opening, he said: “It is exciting though, right? From day one, I’ve heard outside of war and peace, of course, the most important decision you make is the selection of a Supreme Court judge — if you get it.”

During his tumultuous presidency, Trump has had plenty of frustrations and setbacks. He watched his hoped-for repeal of the Obamacare health care law go down to defeat, acknowledged his lawyer’s payments to porn actress Stormy Daniels to keep quiet about her allegations of an affair — which he denied — and grappled with the federal investigation into Russia’s role in the 2016 election. But he has consistently maintained backing from bedrock supporters.

Overall, 41 percent of Americans approve of the job Trump is doing as president, while 57 percent disapprove, according to a recent Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research survey. That rating has held steady since March.

Still, Jon Meacham, a presidential historian, said a lesson of the past 18 months is that Trump has a tendency “to create a distracting drama of his own making that tends to distract and detract from what we consider typical political momentum.” He said the coming weeks will pose “an interesting test of whether there’s enough discipline to go from strength to strength.”

In Wisconsin this week, Trump said: “We’re passing so much. Look at what’s happening with our Supreme Court. Look at the victories we’ve had. Look at the victories we’ve had.”

Filling a Supreme Court vacancy is a welcome opportunity for any president. The retirement of Justice Anthony Kennedy gives Trump the ability to lock in a conservative majority that could endure long after his presidency has ended.

After Trump’s sweeping tax overhaul, his successful nomination of Justice Neil Gorsuch to the court last year was his most significant achievement, affirming the unifying role that Supreme Court politics have played for Republicans. Trump can thank Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky for keeping the court seat open during the last year of Obama’s presidency.

He also benefits from good timing in Kennedy’s decision to step down at this moment. If Kennedy had stayed for another term, Trump would have had a harder time using the issue to fire up his base of conservatives in the midterm elections.

With Gorsuch in place, the high court has been particularly generous to Trump’s causes of late. Just this week, the justices upheld his travel ban on visitors from several majority Muslim countries and followed that up with a ruling on union fees that was long sought by conservatives.

In recent weeks, the president also has stoked a contentious trade dialogue with U.S. allies at the Group of Seven summit in Quebec and pushed ahead with plans to impose steep tariffs on Chinese goods.

Former White House strategist Steve Bannon sums it up as a banner time for the president’s agenda: “In past two weeks the G-7, the economic confrontation with China, the travel ban, the border and the Supreme Court vacancy, among other events, crystalize the vital and historic nature of Trump’s presidency.”

Trump’s political fortunes also improved this week with a series of primary elections. He decided to go all-in for South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster, one of his earliest supporters, holding a rally in the state just hours before a tight runoff election. After Trump’s rally, McMaster cruised to victory.

And Trump picked up a win of sorts in a congressional district in his hometown of New York. Rep. Joe Crowley, a member of the House Democratic leadership team viewed as a potential House speaker, was defeated in his primary campaign by 28-year-old Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a former Bernie Sanders campaign organizer.

The sudden rise of Ocasio-Cortez helps Trump paint Democrats with a broad brush, identifying them as supporters of socialist health care and economic policies.

There are still plenty of storm clouds on his horizon. The Russia probe continues, and there could be further fallout on immigration. Financial markets, jittery over tariffs and health care premiums, could decline before the election.

More immediately, there are concerns the upcoming NATO summit could turn contentious, like Trump’s recent showdown at the G-7. And there are worries he could give up too much in his meeting next month with Russia’s Vladimir Putin in Helsinki.

“He’s like the guy you play a board game with and it’s a game of luck and no matter what, he wins. We all know somebody like that,” said Republican consultant Rick Tyler. But he added that Trump’s luck also changes: “He’ll have a good week and then he’ll have a bad week.”

Trump has long believed in good fortune. In his book “The Art of the Deal,” he wrote that in real estate, “What you need, generally, is enough time and a little luck.”

By KEN THOMAS and CATHERINE LUCEY, Associated Press

___

#immigration news #Supreme Court vacancy #TodayNews #Trump.hot streak #Washington

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darinb · 7 years ago

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Me in the Mirror 3- From Refugee to Royalty

Do you see yourself as royalty? We’ve been looking in the mirror, and asking “what do you see, and do you like it?” We have talked about words spoken over you, and about your value in the eyes of the Lord. He looks at you tells you that you are precious, special and that He has a destiny for you, a wonderful, incredible and amazing destiny.

youtube

So today I want to talk more about your destiny and talk about who you really become when you come to Christ... Refugee or royalty?

When you come to Jesus, you are a hopeless sinner. The price for this sin is death, eternal death in hell, separated from God. But when you accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour, not only do you have life forevermore, but you have a new, transformed life right now. Not pie in the sky when you die by and by, but real power and life to the full starting now! So in this message, I want to look at who we really are. Are we refugees or are we royalty? When you look in that mirror, who are you? We need to understand the position we now have in Christ and start living up to it! Let’s have a look at this passage… 1 Peter 2:9-12 (ESV Strong's) But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation. You are an alien, an exile in this world and mark my words, people are watching you and your good deeds.

CRYING LIKE A REFUGEE

Today the UNHCR tells us that there are currently 22.5 million refugees in the world—the highest in history. In addition there are 40.3 million internally displaced people; and 2.8 million asylum-seekers. In 2018 we are quite familiar with what refugees are, and this passage was written to refugees in the first century AD. The mostly Jewish followers of Christ who first read this book were scattered throughout the Roman empire. They faced harassment from both the Roman government and local synagogue leaders. In fact, their entire society had turned against them, and they were suffering as persecuted refugees. Worse than being a Christian and interviewed on the ABC! The passage calls them sojourners and exiles. The Greek words used here imply that they are foreigners, people without citizenship, power or protection. Completely despised, completely overlooked, completely taken advantage of, as are many refugees today. These people doubted their significance, doubted their worth and were without hope. Last week we talked about feelings of worthlessness, and sometimes as believers we experience this feeling. We are strangers, we are aliens in a world that is against us and alienated us. Philippians 3:20 (ESV Strong's) But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, Christians are refugees in a hostile, foreign land. But listen to this… Missionary Henry Morrison and his wife were returning to New York after years of service in Africa As the ship neared the dock, Henry said to his wife, “Look at that crowd. They haven't forgotten about us”. However, unknown to Henry, the ship also carried President Teddy Roosevelt, returning from a big game hunting trip in Africa. Roosevelt stepped from the boat, with great fanfare, as people were cheering, flags were waving, bands were playing, and reporters waiting for his comment. Once the crowds dispersed, Henry and his wife slowly walked away unnoticed and alone. “This isn’t much of a homecoming,” said old Henry, and the Lord spoke to him and said, “You’re not home yet!”

WHO ARE YOU REALLY?

Those early Christians needed encouragement as they struggled to stand strong in a world where most lacked citizenship, recognition, respect, or privileges. Today, as we strive to find our own places in society and in the church, we need to know who we are in Christ. We need to look in that mirror and see not just that we are precious and valuable, not just that we have a future, we need to see who we actually are in Christ. Peter in this passage raises our confidence about our God-given significance and capabilities. This passage shows us who we really are…

1. A CHOSEN RACE

Peter tells these believers that they are not rejects from humanity, but that they are among God’s elect, God’s chosen race or generation, selected based on His foreknowledge and born again to a living hope as His children! Ephesians 1:4-5 (ESV Strong's) even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, So we are not a bunch of rejects, no matter what they say about us on Facebook or in the media. We are a chosen race, chosen before time began to be His people, His representatives, adopted into His family. What a privilege, what an honour! I have said that destiny is a series of choices, and yes we must make a choice to accept Jesus, but hey, He knows in advance what we will choose, and before we even face that choice, Jesus chooses us! John 15:16 (ESV Strong's) You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, We are not rejects, we are chosen by God as His children to bear fruit for Him that lasts!

2. A ROYAL PRIESTHOOD

God’s plan is to build a kingdom of priests, priests of royalty, and you are part of it… 1 Peter 2:5 (ESV Strong's) you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. In the Old Testament, priests were set aside to offer sacrifices for the people. Now, however, we all have a priestly role when we come to Christ, and we can all offer not animals for sacrifice but our bodies as living sacrifices, fully available for His purposes! Romans 12:1 (ESV Strong's) I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. We often talk about ministry as if it belongs only to professional church staff, like there is some magic in these hands. Yet Scripture describes ministry as the calling and responsibility of every Christian… because we are a royal priesthood! Recently I had someone leave this church because as the pastor I was not available enough for him. He had a problem, he wanted me to drop everything on my day off and minister to him to his level of satisfaction. Three other people contacted him, one of whom I had referred him to because they are an expert in the area in question, but this wasn’t good enough… he only wanted the pastor. This is a traditional outdated model of who a pastor should be, but as your pastor, I love you, but I cannot reach that expectation. I still work in the secular world 4 days a week, I minister as pastor evenings, lunchtimes, before work and all weekend, and I still travel with an evangelist, record music, manage websites… oh, and somewhere in all that I also have a wife and family. I am richly blessed but time poor! Ignite runs on teams. The Lord has blessed me with wonderful teams of people who minister beside me in pastoral care. So if you have a need, we have many, many godly, mature, wise people here to love and care for you. I cannot hope to meet every need of every one of you every time! Nor should I, because we are all of us priests, all of us able to connect with God. We need to learn to minister to each other, love and care for each other, pray for each other, even sacrifice for each other, because we are a royal priesthood, and as we shall see, royalty rocks!

3. A HOLY NATION

God not only calls us to be His children, He calls us to be holy! 1 Peter 1:15-16 (ESV Strong's) but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.” What does this mean? It means that our lifestyles should reflect the character of God. We must tolerate people in love, but we must not tolerate their sin. God calls us to be a nation set apart for Him! We saw this in the recent plebiscite. Our country got it wrong. We were told that if we love homosexuals we must give them what they want, but that’s not true. We can love them, care for them and honour them as people and still not agree with their demands! I love my children, but I do not agree with everything they do, and I don’t give them everything they demand! The eyes of the world are on our actions. If we compromise God’s standards to keep the peace with a godless world, we look just like everyone else. No, we need to stand for what is right, and live lives that are billboards for Jesus. You and I are the only advertisements for Christ some people will ever see!

4. A SPECIAL PEOPLE

In the KJV this phrase is “a peculiar people,” which actually means we are His possession, and therefore get special treatment. Don’t you love it when you are treated as special? Don’t you love it when people accept and honour you in a unique way? Peter is saying that this is how God sees us! We are precious, and special and we get special treatment and privileges others don’t have. In fact, we are royalty, because we live and serve God! Isaiah 43:4 (ESV Strong's) Because you are precious in my eyes, and honored, and I love you, I give men in return for you, peoples in exchange for your life. Ephesians 2:18-19 (ESV Strong's) For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, We are His kids, and get special access to God and His throne room. That’s what prayer is! At the age of 2, Kaileigh already has figured out that, no matter what her mum says, if she asks Pa for a lolly, she almost always gets one. She has special privileges like we do when it comes to our Heavenly Father! Why do we get such a special relationship with God? I don’t know, because I surely am not worthy of it, yet He chooses to bless me and my family, to be close to me, to draw me nearer His heart.

THE JOURNEY FROM REFUGEE TO ROYALTY

Let me finish by taking you on a journey from rags to royalty… so that when you look in the mirror, you see yourself as who you really are. Not a downtrodden refugee, but as royalty… You start as a…

1. SINNER

I know I’m a sinner, and I bet you know you are too! Our sin separates us from God, and our sin will send us to eternal separation from God forever in hell. Revelation 20:12,15 (ESV Strong's) And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Then another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, according to what they had done. And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. We start life condemned to eternal death in hell, but Jesus paid that price for us, that if we accept Him as Lord we will not go to hell, but will be with Him in heaven. Hell is real�� so what is hell like? People say they won’t mind going to hell, because they can break open a pack of cards and have a few drinks with their mates… no they won’t! Hell is eternal separation from God and everything about God. God is light, says the Bible, God is truth and joy and fellowship and worship, the greatest experience you could ever have, and it lasts for ever. If you want to see what hell is really like, look at the cross! Hell is pain, torment, darkness and intense loneliness. No light in hell, no fellowship in hell. If you haven’t accepted Jesus and His free gift of salvation, do it now, while you still can. Life is short, fragile and unpredictable, so turn and receive by grace His gift of eternal life.

2. SLAVES

Today there are more than 35 million people living in slavery, including forced labour and prostitution. But there are billions of people unknowingly living in slavery every day, and you might be one of them. Are you a slave to sin? To your unbridled passions? To money? To someone else like an abusive partner? Fact is, you are going to be a slave to something! You can be saved and be a Christian, yet still be a slave to sin in your life… Romans 6:16-18 (ESV Strong's) Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness. So the choice is yours… stay a slave to sin, or step up and become a slave to righteousness, because you’re gonna have to serve somebody!

3. SAINT

When you decide you’ve had enough of being a slave to sin, you can accept Christ and live like it and become a saint! Coming to Christ is a fresh start. Billy Graham said, "How many times in your life have you wished you could start all over again with a clean slate, with a new life? Resolve right now to allow God to wipe your slate clean by confessing your sins and letting Him give you a brand-new start." A saint is not some famous dead guy, and it’s not a St George football player. Ephesians 2:19 (ESV Strong's) So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, When you come to Christ, you become a saint, and instead of being a slave to sin, you become a servant of the living God…

4. SERVANT

Mark 10:42-45 (ESV Strong's) And Jesus called them to him and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. But it shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” I stand here as a servant of God, and I also serve you, as your pastor, however inadequately. I’m not higher or lower than you, because we are all saints, all priests and all servants. But here’s the cool thing…

5. SON OR DAUGHTER (ROYALTY)

Jesus said, John 15:15 (ESV Strong's) No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. When you serve the Lord as a slave to righteousness, Jesus becomes a friend as well as a master. But He doesn’t stop there… the Bible says, you are adopted into His special family Romans 8:14-15 (ESV Strong's) For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” You are a friend, but then you become royalty because you are adopted as His child, a son or a daughter of the King of Kings. That makes you a princess, or a prince. So, folks, you are royalty, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. Recently we saw a beautiful lady named Megan Markle become royalty. She is an actress, part African American and a divorcee, an unlikely mix for royalty. Yet she is now royalty, the Duchess of Sussex. How can this be? This happened because someone chose her. She didn’t deserve it and she hasn’t worked for it. Megan Markel became royalty simply because Prince Harry chose her to fall in love with. She didn't strive for royalty, she did not work for royalty. She was chosen, a favoured person, and because royalty because the Prince chose her. And Jesus chooses you! Not because you deserve it, and not because you’ve earned it. He just chose you to become royalty, that’s all. The problem is that we mentally understand this, but often don’t live like it!

LIVE LIKE ROYALTY

That’s my challenge to you… We ought to live like the royalty we are! Think about what that means. A Prince or Princess always wants to represent the King well, not to pursue their own agenda. They answer to the King alone, not the opinions of those around them. Certain actions are beneath them. They always look composed, and they hold to certain standards of behaviour, speech and dress. Royalty do not become entangled in the filth and dirt of this world, but they live a life of privilege, honour and power, respected not for what they do or achieve, but for who they are… because they are kids of the King! Their agenda is to do the King’s business. They live a life of power and privilege, but with great authority comes great responsibility. In the same way we may to be in the world, but not of it. We need to live a life of privilege and power in the Holy Spirit, a holy life that pleases the King and represents the King’s interests. In West Texas during the Depression, Mr. Ira Yates was like many other ranchers and farmers. He had a lot of land, and a ton of debt. Mr. Yates wasn’t able to make enough on his ranching operation to pay his loans, and he was in danger of losing his ranch. He had little money for clothes or food, his family (like many others) had to live on a government subsidy. Day after day, as he grazed his dwindling number of sheep over those rolling West Texas hills, he was no doubt greatly troubled about how he would pay his bills. Then a seismographic crew from an oil company came into the area and told him there might be oil on his land. They asked permission to drill a wildcat well, and he signed a lease contract. At 1,115 feet they struck a huge oil reserve. The first well came in at 80,000 barrels a day. Many subsequent wells were more than twice as large. In fact, 30 years after the discovery, a government test of one of the wells showed it still had the potential flow of 125,000 barrels of oil a day. And Mr. Yates owned it all. The day he purchased the land he had received the oil and mineral rights. Yet, he’d been living on government relief. A multimillionaire living in poverty. The problem? He didn’t know the oil was there even though he owned it. So today is the day that you and I begin to live like royalty. We can be bold, we can be confident, we can act like we own the place, because our Dad does! As we serve and honour Him, we can ask whatever we want according to the will of the King and be confident that He hears us and cares for us. Hebrews 4:16 (ESV Strong's) Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. You can confidently approach God’s Throne, knowing you have an insider’s relationship with the King. It’s time to stop acting like commoners and become royalty, to step into our God given destinies as sons and daughters of the King! Megan Markle is no longer acting in Suits, Grace Kelly stopped making movies when she became a princess, because common careers are laud aside as we serve the Ling, and Him alone! Today some of you, many of you, understand what I’ve been talking about in principle, but you are not living like royalty. Maybe you’re a slave to sin… royalty aren’t slaves! Maybe you are being kicked around by life… royalty do not get pushed around by the public. You have unfathomable spiritual riches, but perhaps you are living like a spiritual pauper. You are royalty, and need to live like it! Today all of us, every single one of us who have accepted Christ, today we will be reminded that we are royalty, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people, a chosen race… sons and daughters of the King of Kings. Princes, princesses, adopted into royal lineage... royalty! When a King was inaugurated in ancient times, they were anointed with oil. This is a sign to the people, and to any enemies, that they were the King. Today I’m going to do something crazy and, if you have accepted Jesus as your Lord and Saviour, that you join me in this craziness. Today I want us all to be anointed today as Royalty, and from today we shall live as the princes and princesses we are, that we have been destined to be!

https://ignitechurch.org.au/me-in-the-mirror-3-from-refugee-to-royalty/

#achildoftheking #childoftheking #childofthekinginthebible #childofthekingofkings #childofthekingscripture #childofthekingsermon #childofthekingyoutube #childoftheonetruekingbibleverse #childoftheonetruekingverse #childoftherisenking #ourroyalpriesthood #mirror

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everettwilkinson · 7 years ago

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TRUMP hosting Dems at the W.H. for tax reform dinner — ALEXANDER, PORTMAN and SHAHEEN break bread — Russia probe: loyalty test for Trump staffers — KATY TUR’s new book is out — B'DAY: Matt Lewis

THE NEXT TIME YOU HEAR SOMETHING ABOUT URGENCY IN WASHINGTON, remember this: the House comes in tonight at 6:30 p.m., and is gone by noon on Thursday. The week was cut short by Hurricane Irma, but still …

L.A. TIMES MEXICO BUREAU CHIEF KATE LINTHICUM: (@katelinthicum): “After a devastating earthquake and hurricane (and after Trump failed to send condolences), Mexico today rescinded its offer of aid to the US”.

Story Continued Below

Good Tuesday morning. SPOTTED: Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) dining at Tadich Grill on Pennsylvania Avenue Monday night. Could there be a health-care deal in the offing?

BURGESS EVERETT — “Trump, continuing courting Democrats, will host dinner on tax reform”: “Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Joe Donnelly of Indiana have been invited and are expected to attend, aides said. GOP Sens. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania and John Thune of South Dakota are among the Republican attendees. … The three moderate Democrats are all up for reelection next year in states Trump won handily in 2016. They have also been closer to the president than other congressional Democrats. Each declined to join a letter with party leaders outlining conditions on tax reform and all three supported Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch earlier this year.” http://politi.co/2xhae7p

— THE REALITY: Democrats have been shut out of the tax reform process. The Big Six is made up of only Republicans. Republicans have designed a legislative process that only requires Republican support — reconciliation. When asked last week if Democrats would go along, Speaker Paul Ryan said, “I hope Democrats join us on tax reform. I think that’s fantastic if they do. We’re going to go the path we’ve been planning on tax reform.” LET’S BE REAL: Do you really think Donnelly, Manchin and Heitkamp’s votes can be bought with some chicken? By the way, we heard this dinner was originally slated to be only Democrats.

AND, REMEMBER: Republicans have not yet passed a budget — a prerequisite for tax reform. There’s talk they’ll take it up in the House in the last week of September, but the support is not nearly firm enough yet. There’s a chance there is no final action on the budget until October or November. Without a budget, tax reform talks are just that, talk. STEVEN MNUCHIN and GARY COHN are meeting with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and the Republicans on the Budget Committee today.

— More from Colin Wilhelm and Aaron Lorenzo on the lack of reform details http://politi.co/2eSWXHN

**SUBSCRIBE to Playbook: http://politi.co/2lQswbh

WHAT WOULD HAPPEN TO MIDDLE EAST PEACE? — “Some Trump Lawyers Wanted Kushner Out,” by WSJ’s Peter Nicholas, Rebecca Ballhaus and Erica Orden: “Some of President Donald Trump’s lawyers earlier this summer concluded that Jared Kushner should step down as senior White House adviser because of possible legal complications related to a probe of Russia’s involvement in the 2016 presidential election and aired concerns about him to the president, people familiar with the matter said. Among their concerns was that Mr. Kushner was the adviser closest to the president who had the most dealings with Russian officials and businesspeople during the campaign and transition, some of which are currently being examined by federal investigators and congressional oversight panels. Mr. Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law and confidant, has said he had four such meetings or interactions.” http://on.wsj.com/2y1yloz

— FLASHBACK: July 12, Axios’s Jonathan Swan: “Scoop: Trump lawyers want wall between Kushner, president” http://bit.ly/2y1HUE2

— “Russia probes pose loyalty test for Team Trump,” by Darren Samuelsohn: “Lawyers representing Donald Trump’s current and former aides are giving their clients one simple piece of advice: don’t lie to protect the president. As special counsel Robert Mueller and congressional investigators prepare to question high-ranking aides – including Hope Hicks, Reince Priebus and Sean Spicer – in the coming weeks, Trump’s long history of demanding his employees’ complete loyalty are being put to the test.

“But Trump stalwarts know the president is closely following the media coverage of the Russia case – and the last thing they want is to be deemed a turncoat whose answers end up becoming further fuel for investigators. Several of the lawyers representing current and former aides told POLITICO they’re actively warning their clients that any bonds connecting them to Trump won’t protect them from criminal charges if federal prosecutors can nail them for perjury, making false statements or obstruction of justice.” http://politi.co/2h0Ab1b

HURRICANE UPDATES …

–“Battered Florida tries to assess scope of Irma’s destruction,” by AP’s Jennifer Kay in Miami and Doug Ferguson in Jacksonville: “Battered Florida tries to assess scope of Irma’s destruction,” by Aid rushed in to hurricane-scarred Florida early Tuesday, residents began to dig out, and officials slowly pieced together the scope of Irma’s vicious path of destruction across the peninsula. … [T]he fate of the Florida Keys … remained largely a question mark. … A Navy aircraft carrier was due to anchor off Key West to help in search-and-rescue efforts. Drinking water supplies in the Keys were cut off, fuel was running low and all three hospitals in the island chain were shuttered. A stunning 13 million people, two-thirds of the third-largest state’s residents, plodded on in the tropical heat without electricity, and nearly every corner of Florida felt Irma’s power.” http://bit.ly/2feMNSe

— “Hurricane Irma’s impact, from the air: Florida Keys a bit battered but mostly spared,” by WaPo’s Joel Achenbach “above the Florida Keys”: “The Conch Republic is still here, if dark, dirty, trashed, and weeks away from being what it was before Hurricane Irma blew in. It wasn’t devastated because, for some reason, this massive storm punched below its weight. This was a Category 4 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson wind scale as it rolled into the Keys. It brought a fair bit of destruction, and tossed boats onto lawns. It turned towns raggedy. But a tour of Southwest Florida and the Florida Keys on Monday afternoon by air suggests that this quirky storm spared the state the kind of direct, punishing violence that residents had dreaded.

“A Coast Guard C-130 transport plane carrying two U.S. senators, a congressman and a handful of journalists left from the Coast Guard air station in Opa-Locka, just north of Miami, for the two-hour tour of hurricane damage. At 2,000 feet, the journey offered no chance for a granular diagnosis, but the big picture was clear: Southwest Florida and its huge population of retirees emerged relatively unscathed. The storm severely battered some of the small and fragile Keys. Key West itself is generally intact, though without power, a water supply and a functional sewage system.” http://wapo.st/2wUekTh

— NYT’S ALEX BURNS ANCHORS THE N.Y.T. LEAD ALL: “Damp, Dark and Disarrayed, Florida Starts Coping With Irma’s Aftermath” (with reporting by Trevor Aaronsen from St. Petersburg, Fla.; Jess Bidgood from Tampa, Fla.; Audra Burch and Jonah Bromwich from Orlando, Fla.; Richard Fausset from Isle of Palms, S.C.; Sheri Fink from Houston; Henry Fountain from Naples, Fla.; Joseph B. Treaster from Miami; and Caitlin Dickinson, Christine Hauser, Hannah Fairfield, Daniel Victor and Mary Williams Walsh from New York). http://nyti.ms/2wWTDUr

DATA DU JOUR – Over 24 hours on Sunday, Snapchat received almost 250,000 submissions from Snapchatters to their Irma news story, which is two and a half times more than what the company saw during Harvey last week.

****** A message from CTIA and America’s wireless industry: The global race to deploy 5G wireless is on—and America needs to win. Government action on spectrum and infrastructure policy will allow U.S. wireless companies to invest $275 billion, create more than 3 million jobs, and add $500 billion to the economy, according to Accenture. Learn more at CTIA.org. ******

FOR THE WHITE HOUSE’S TO DO LIST — “After nine months, federal offices are still waiting to hang Trump’s picture,” by WaPo’s Lisa Rein: “In the lobby of every federal building, just inside security turnstiles and before the elevator banks, a framed photograph of the president has always hung on the wall. Not so anymore. Nine months after Donald Trump’s inauguration, pictures of the president and Vice President Pence are missing from thousands of federal courthouses, laboratories, military installations, ports of entry, office suites and hallways, and from U.S. embassies abroad. …

“Federal agencies ordered photographs of their new commander in chief months ago. But they say they are still waiting for the Government Publishing Office, the printer of official portraits, to send them for distribution by the General Services Administration, which owns or leases 9,600 federal buildings across the country. The Government Publishing Office says it has yet to receive the images from the White House. And the White House says the president and vice president have not yet decided when they will sit for the type of high-quality official photographs usually churned out by the modern GPO, continuing a portrait tradition that began after the Civil War.” http://wapo.st/2vQrKfd

THE LATEST ON NORTH KOREA …

— “Oil will keep flowing, but UN sanctions hit Pyongyang hard,” by AP’s Eric Talmadge in Tokyo: “North Korea will be feeling the pain of new United Nations sanctions targeting some of its biggest remaining foreign revenue streams. But the Security Council eased off the biggest target of all: the oil the North needs to stay alive, and to fuel its million-man military.

“Though the United States had proposed a complete ban, the sanctions by the U.N. Security Council to punish North Korea for its sixth nuclear test cap Pyongyang’s annual imports of crude oil at the same level they have been for the past 12 months: an estimated 4 million barrels. Exports of North Korean textiles are prohibited, and other nations are barred from authorizing new work permits for North Korean workers, putting a squeeze on two key sources of hard currency.” http://bit.ly/2gZalyz

— “How Russia quietly undercuts sanctions intended to stop North Korea’s nuclear program,” by WaPo’s Joby Warrick: “Russian smugglers are scurrying to the aid of North Korea with shipments of petroleum and other vital supplies that could help that country weather harsh new economic sanctions, U.S. officials say in an assessment that casts further doubt on whether financial measures alone can force dictator Kim Jong Un to abandon his nuclear weapons program. The spike in Russian exports is occurring as China — by far North Korea’s biggest trading partner — is beginning to dramatically ratchet up the economic pressure on its troublesome neighbor in the face of provocative behavior such as last week’s test of a powerful nuclear bomb.

“Official documents and interviews point to a rise in tanker traffic this spring between North Korean ports and Vladivostok, the far-eastern Russian city near the small land border shared by the two countries. With international trade with North Korea increasingly constrained by U.N. sanctions, Russian entrepreneurs are seizing opportunities to make a quick profit, setting up a maze of front companies to conceal -transactions and launder payments, according to U.S. law enforcement officials who monitor sanction-busting activity.” http://wapo.st/2vReWp4

— BREAKING THIS MORNING: BOEHNER TO TRUMP: DON’T WITHDRAW FROM SOUTH KOREAN TRADE DEAL: Former Speaker John Boehner — a staunch proponent of free trade — is urging Trump to bolster ties with Seoul: “For our strategic endeavors to succeed, however, the United States must strengthen — not weaken — its already vital economic relationships in the Pacific, from South Korea and Japan to Australia and China. We cannot isolate the regime in Pyongyang by isolating ourselves.

“Withdrawing from the Korea-U.S. Trade Agreement … would undermine America’s strategic objectives in the Pacific region and undercut our own workers and employers, who continue to depend on the free flow of goods and services between the US and the Republic of Korea. Instead of pulling back from our current engagements and commitments, we must renew and strengthen our relationships in the Pacific region, not just with South Korea, but with China, as reflected in the joint commitment to economic cooperation that was expressed by President Trump and President Xi in April; and with Australia and Japan, our long-standing allies, whose alliances and friendships with America are now more important than ever.” PDF of full statement http://politi.co/2wWphBn

TRUMP’S BUDGET — “Congress Rejects Trump Proposals to Cut Health Research Funds,” by NYT’s Robert Pear: “Back in March, when President Trump released the first draft of his budget proposal for the coming fiscal year, he asked lawmakers for deep cuts to one of their favorite institutions, the National Institutes of Health — part of a broad reordering of priorities, away from science and social spending, toward defense and border security. Six months later, Congress has not only rejected the president’s N.I.H. proposal; lawmakers from both parties have joined forces to increase spending on biomedical research — and have bragged about it.

“The Senate Appropriations Committee approved a bipartisan bill last week providing $36.1 billion for the health institutes in the fiscal year that starts next month. Senator Roy Blunt, Republican of Missouri and the chairman of the subcommittee responsible for health spending, said it was the third consecutive year in which he had secured a $2 billion increase for the agency, amounting to an increase of about 20 percent over three years. The audience erupted in applause when Senator Lamar Alexander, Republican of Tennessee, announced the increase at a hearing of a separate Senate committee.” http://nyti.ms/2eSBRJL

KELLY VS. GUTIERREZ — “John Kelly fires back at Democrat who called him ‘disgrace to the uniform,'” by FoxNews.com’s Christopher Wallace: “Illinois Rep. Luis Gutierrez had leveled the criticism at Kelly over his support of President Trump’s decision to end a controversial program that shielded young illegal immigrants from deportation. In an email to Fox News late Sunday, Kelly responded by saying Congress did ‘nothing’ to help so-called Dreamers when they had the chance. ‘As far as the congressman and other irresponsible members of congress are concerned, they have the luxury of saying what they want as they do nothing and have almost no responsibility,’ Kelly said. ‘They can call people liars but it would be inappropriate for me to say the same thing back at them. As my blessed mother used to say “empty barrels make the most noise.”’ http://fxn.ws/2wmb6DC

TRUMP’S TUESDAY — THE PRESIDENT is meeting with Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt. He meets with H.R. McMaster before hosting Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak at the White House. Afterwards, he is huddling with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. He’s then hosting senators at the White House.

ANNA’S POSTCARD FROM LONDON — POLITICO LONDON’S TOM MCTAGUE shares with us two fun tidbits from his upcoming book lifting the lid on Prime Minister Theresa May’s disastrous decision to call a snap general election “Betting the House: The Inside Story of the 2017 Election” with Tim Ross. Interesting nuggets for this side of the pond — former President Barack Obama called conservative campaign headquarters (the same team former aide Jim Messina worked for) on the day of the election to let them know someone from the Labour’s campaign told him the party was going to lose 20 to 30 seats. …

ON THERESA MAY: The two write that an aide briefing the prime minister before a Sunday show appearance in January was concerned May would get asked about President Donald Trump. “As she waited to collect the PM from her Sunday morning church service, May’s spin chief knew she would have to find a way to prepare her boss. She decided she would just have to say it. ‘Prime Minister, it’s possible she will be asked what you think of Donald Trump saying he can grab women by the p****.’ In the front seat of the Government Jaguar, the police protection officer snorted. May was told not to grimace because the camera was likely to zoom in on her face in a close-up. In the end, May remained perfectly composed, waiting, expressionless, before answering: ‘I think that’s unacceptable.’ Pre-order the book on Amazon http://amzn.to/2xWN3MV

THE JUICE …

— KATY TUR’S BOOK IS OUT TODAY … WAPO’S CARLOS LOZADA – “Katy Tur’s insider memoir chronicles the Trump campaign — and the indignities of reporting while female” http://wapo.st/2jlqfUm … NYT REVIEW, by Jill Abramson: “A Memoir by Donald Trump’s Favorite Target” http://nyti.ms/2vR1fX8 … BUY THE BOOK: http://amzn.to/2gXyRQA … Ranked No. 68 on Amazon as of this morning … MARK YOUR CALENDARS for Katy’s event with Jake at Politics and Prose Sept. 22 http://bit.ly/2wWffjD

— MORNING JOE IS 10! — “Morning Joe” is starting a 10-year anniversary Twitter sweepstakes this morning ahead of the anniversary show on Sept. 19. A pic of the prizes that fans can win http://bit.ly/2h0y2mv … More info http://on.msnbc.com/2xtKk1p

— American Action Network is launching a $2.5 million TV ad campaign on tax reform targeting 23 congressional districts nationwide, including those in leadership, on key committees, in the Freedom Caucus and holding competitive seats. List of districts http://bit.ly/2eS79Aq … The ad http://bit.ly/2wXgUFG

FOR YOUR RADAR — THREE NEW IPHONES — “What to Expect at Apple’s Biggest Event in Years: Look for the iPhone X, iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and a bunch of other iProducts on Tuesday,” by Bloomberg’s Mark Gorman. https://bloom.bg/2wXChrQ

DESSERT — HAPPENING FRIDAY — Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), a noted harmonica player, and Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), a multi-instrumentalist, are joining members of the Buck Mountain Band to perform as “The Amateurs” at the 17th Annual Bristol Rhythm and Roots Reunion on Friday. 15-second video of Alexander (on the piano) and Kaine practicing http://bit.ly/2jlguWj

PHOTO DU JOUR: A man with flowers stands at the edge of a waterfall pool at Ground Zero during a ceremony on the 16th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in New York. | Seth Wenig/AP Photo

AUSTIN WRIGHT: “Kaine hits the trail again, battling 2016 ghosts on his way”: “An aide to Tim Kaine enters a diner in Charlottesville and informs the host that the Virginia senator is about to walk in. The host smiles and cracks a joke: ‘You mean the guy who lost to Trump?’ Ten months after the presidential election, Kaine is still trying to shed the stigma of being the vice presidential candidate on the ticket that came up short against Donald Trump, a man so reviled by Kaine’s fellow Democrats that many of them can’t bear the thought of him serving out his full four-year presidential term. The senator is back on the campaign trail — stumping in Virginia for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Ralph Northam and preparing for his own 2018 reelection campaign.

“But even as Kaine tries to keep his focus on the next election, there are constant reminders of the last one — the only election he’s ever lost. Trump, it seems, looms over everything. Kaine isn’t interested in relitigating one of the biggest electoral upsets in U.S. history. He looks visibly uncomfortable talking about the election and cautions against ‘overinterpreting’ what went wrong.” http://politi.co/2y1mR4B

HRC: GOING NOWHERE — NPR’S TAMARA KEITH interviews HILLARY CLINTON: When asked about critics who believe she should disappear from public life, CLINTON: “Well, they’re going to be disappointed because I think it’s important for people with my experience and my insight into what went on in the campaign but more generally about our country to speak out. We need more voices, not fewer voices.” Clinton chronicler Jonathan Allen in POLITICO magazine reviews her new book http://politi.co/2vPKsUf

STATE OF THE DARK ARTS — “Russia Used Facebook Events to Organize Anti-Immigrant Rallies on U.S. Soil,” by Ben Collins, Kevin Poulsen, and Spencer Ackerman in The Daily Beast: “Russian operatives hiding behind false identities used Facebook’s event management tool to remotely organize and promote political protests in the U.S., including an August 2016 anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim rally in Idaho, The Daily Beast has learned. A Facebook spokesperson confirmed to the Daily Beast that the social-media giant ‘shut down several promoted events as part of the takedown we described last week.’ … The Facebook events—one of which echoed Islamophobic conspiracy theories pushed by pro-Trump media outlets—are the first indication that the Kremlin’s attempts to shape America’s political discourse moved beyond fake news and led unwitting Americans into specific real-life action.” http://thebea.st/2w42y94

ISAAC DOVERE interviews REP. WILL HURD (R-TEXAS) in the latest “OFF MESSAGE” podcast: “To House Republicans who don’t like the funding deal President Donald Trump made with Democrats, Rep. Will Hurd has a message: Get yourself together, or quit complaining. Otherwise, get used to the feeling of watching the Republican president brag about how much he’s getting done with Chuck and Nancy. ‘If we’re not in agreement on what the topic is going to be or what we want to achieve, then guess what? You’re probably not going in with a strong hand,’ Hurd told Dovere. ‘I think rank-and-file members need to understand that there is a team aspect to politics.’ On getting rid of the debt ceiling: ‘you give that up, you’re basically giving up your responsibility.’” http://politi.co/2vQPjVr … Listen to the full podcast http://apple.co/2h1efTG

ROSIE GRAY: “An Ousted NSC Official Is Joining the House Intelligence Committee Staff”: “A former National Security Council official, forced out by National-Security Adviser H.R. McMaster in July, is set to join the staff of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, according to two sources familiar with his move. Derek Harvey, who was the NSC’s senior director for the Middle East and had been appointed by the former National-Security Adviser Michael Flynn, was among several officials who were ousted this summer.” http://theatln.tc/2xWNYNq

****** A message from CTIA and America’s wireless industry: Tomorrow’s 5G networks will create 3 million jobs, add $500 billion to the economy, and fuel innovation and entrepreneurialism across every sector. If policymakers move quickly to release more spectrum and modernize infrastructure rules, the wireless industry stands ready to invest $275 billion to build these next-gen networks, according to Accenture. This will drive breakthrough advancements in remote health care, connected vehicles, energy, education and beyond—making our lives better and safer. But the race to deploy 5G wireless networks is underway—and we’re at a critical moment. The EU, China, Japan, South Korea and others are doing everything they can to win. If policymakers act now, the U.S. can continue our global leadership in wireless. Learn how at CTIA.org. ******

GOOD LIFE LESSON — “An Exit Interview With Richard Posner, Judicial Provocateur,” by NYT’s Adam Liptak: “Judge Richard A. Posner, whose restless intellect, withering candor and superhuman output made him among the most provocative figures in American law in the last half-century, recently announced his retirement. The move was abrupt, and I called him up to ask what had prompted it. ‘About six months ago,’ Judge Posner said, ‘I awoke from a slumber of 35 years.’ He had suddenly realized, he said, that people without lawyers are mistreated by the legal system, and he wanted to do something about it.

“For starters, as is his habit when his interest alights on a fresh topic, he wrote a book on the subject. Judge Posner blurts out books at a comic pace. ‘I realized, in the course of that, that I had really lost interest in the cases,’ he said. ‘And then I started asking myself, what kind of person wants to have the same identical job for 35 years? And I decided 35 years is plenty. It’s too much. Why didn’t I quit 10 years ago? I’ve written 3,300-plus judicial opinions.’” http://nyti.ms/2wU2vfX

MEDIAWATCH — “Laura Ingraham set to take over Fox News’ 10 p.m. slot,” by CNN’s Brian Stelter and Hadas Gold: “Ingraham is expected to take over the 10 p.m. hour on Fox News, according to people who spoke on condition of anonymity. While there may be one or two final details to negotiate, Ingraham has been telling friends that the deal is essentially done … Her new show will be part of a broader change to the network’s top-rated prime time lineup. Sean Hannity’s show, currently at 10 p.m., will move one hour earlier to 9 p.m. … And ‘The Five,’ a talk show originally named for its 5 p.m. time slot, will shift from 9 p.m. back to its namesake hour.” http://cnnmon.ie/2wW1h15

— FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — From an FT memo going out today: “Pilita Clark is appointed business columnist and associate editor. … Lyndsey Jones is appointed an executive editor. … Robin Kwong is appointed head of digital delivery under editorial director Robert Shrimsley. … Paul Murphy is appointed investigations editor.”

— KIMBERLY DOZIER has been named executive editor of The Cipher Brief. She previously was a reporter for the AP, CBS News and The Daily Beast.

— SCOTT WILSON will cover “the West and especially California” for The Washington Post. He had been national editor (h/t Morning Media).

— TAYLOR ANTRIM has been named executive editor of Vogue. He has spent five years at Vogue, first as senior editor and then articles editor.

SPOTTED: Gina McCarthy last night at Dirty Habit bar near the EPA, having a relaxed drink. She had a rolling backpack with her. … Carly Fiorina last night at Charlie Palmer … Justice Stephen Breyer in coach on American’s 5:30 p.m. shuttle from DCA to Boston … Eric Cantor at District Commons last night entertaining two people — pic http://bit.ly/2wUoB1S … former Ariz. Sen. Jon Kyl in seat 23C of an American Airlines flight from PHX to DCA.

OUT AND ABOUT – Pool report: ��The Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute kicked off their annual conference with a reception featuring Google Arts & Culture’s new Latino Cultures in the U.S. — the largest ever online collection of artifacts and stories dedicated to U.S. Latino history and culture. Guests entered through a hologram wall of the mural ‘Mundos de Mestizaje’ by Frederico Vigil and took virtual field trips in the virtual reality lounges.”

SPOTTED: Reps. Joaquín Castro (D-Texas), Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), Tony Cárdenas (D-Calif.) Nanette Barragán (D-Calif.), Jimmy Gómez (D-Calif.) and Salud Carbajal (D-Calif.), Mayor Muriel Bowser, Henry Muñoz and Kyle Ferari, Domenika Lynch, Susan Molinari, Caroline Atkinson, Daniel Alegre, Laura Marquez, Stephanie Valencia and Katherine Vargas.

TRANSITIONS — Tina Tchen is returning to Chicago to lead the Chicago office of the law firm Buckley Sandler http://trib.in/2wXdMel … Adam Sharon has joined the Harbour Group as a senior vice president. He previously worked at Prime Strategies, and was the former Democratic communications director of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. … Adrienne Kimmell is joining NARAL Pro-Choice America as the VP of strategic research. She previously was executive director of the Barbara Lee Family Foundation and Barbara Lee political office. …

… Farrin Jay has joined the Snap Inc communications team. She was previously at NBC News, where she did PR for the “Today Show.” … Chris Simone started this week as a legislative affairs specialist on contract to FEMA for Klett Consulting Group. He was previously a researcher at America Rising Squared.

K STREET FILES — Mehlman Castagnetti Rosen & Thomas is launching a new podcast, “14th & G,” which is “designed to deliver quick, easily digestible insights into the business of Washington”. The podcast is hosted by Mehlman Castagnetti principal CR Wooters. http://politi.co/2xhvx8T

BIRTHWEEK (was yesterday): hedge fund manager David Tepper … Mark Dubowitz, CEO of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies

BIRTHDAY OF THE DAY: Matt Lewis, senior columnist at The Daily Beast and CNN political commentator. A fun fact about Matt: “My mom had twelve siblings; my dad had nine. They must have gotten tired of all the noise, because I’m an only child.” Read his Playbook Plus Q&A: http://politi.co/2wWcfUh

BIRTHDAYS: “Face the Nation” senior producer Jill Jackson (hat tip: Caitlin Conant) … Andrea DiVito of “Fox News Sunday” … GQ’s Ben Schreckinger … Politico’s Walt Houseknecht … Don Fowler, former DNC chairman … former Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) … former Waxman staffer Greg Wetstone … Dave Willett … Johnny Enterline of LCV … Natalie Raps, director at SKDKnickerbocker … Andrew Whalen … Rep. Evan Jenkins (R-W.Va.) … Rep. Trey Hollingsworth (R-Ind.) … Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback … Ed Moy, former director of the U.S. Mint … Maria Harris Roumel … Desiree Sayle … Jill Alper (h/t Jon Haber) … Max D’Onofrio, press secretary for Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.) … Emily Lampkin … Melissa Schulman, SVP of gov’t and public affairs at CVS Health … former Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) (h/t Ryan Williams) … Brett Thompson, partner at Banner Public Affairs and CEO of Pork Barrel BBQ … NYT’s Kim Severson … John Lippman, deputy director for programming at VOA … Alex Botting of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce … Pam Stevens …

… Courtney O’Donnell, head of external affairs at Airbnb … Ethan Klapper, global social media editor at HuffPost … Peter Robbio, SVP at CRC … Fox News alum Jim Angle … Fred Schuster … Jason Stverak … James Faeh … Edelman’s Gavin Mathis … Jason O’Malley … Amazon’s Allison Marshall … Joseph Voss … Anne Johnson … lawyer Matthew Wald … Erin Hood … Russel Wade … Chip Ward is 64. He’s a big Terp fan and “thrilled that Maryland is off to a 2-0 start. His dad, Bob Ward, was consensus all-American football player there in early 50s” (h/t Jon) … Bill Hayden … Alison Harden Siciliano … Allison Ramiller … Nate Yohannes, director of business development at Microsoft and an Obama alum (h/t Sophia Kim) … Tom Vilmain … Alexandra Simbana (h/ts Teresa Vilmain)

****** A message from CTIA and America’s wireless industry: We need new rules for new 5G networks. New policies that will allow the U.S. to win the race to 5G and enable breakthrough advancements in healthcare, transportation, energy and more. First, a pipeline of low-, mid-, and high-band spectrum will help meet today’s mobile needs and enable the 5G networks of tomorrow. Second, every level of government must modernize their rules for the building of small cell wireless infrastructure. Third, permanent and common sense federal regulations for interstate services like mobile broadband will preserve an open internet and protect consumer privacy while promoting innovation and investment. Finally, America’s tax structure must be updated to spur billions of dollars in new 5G investment. Learn more about how wireless is working to invest in America’s future at CTIA.org. ******

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