#LIKE I KNOW WHAT HE MEANT BY IT (the company is massive and has monopolies)

[locusfandomtime]

Ren calling GigaCorp “the amazon of the minecraft universe” is fascinating (and really unintentionally funny) for a lot of reasons but it made me think… GigaCorp isn’t the first Hermitcraft company based off Amazon, there was Sahara in season 6. With Concorp confirmed to still be going, surely its competitor is as well? What if GigaCorp was formerly Sahara? It’s been a number of years and the company’s name has changed and they’re investing into space travel now, but there’s still a focus on “modern” design and using fiddly redstone

[autisticsupervillain]

It's Fictional Throwdown Friday!

This Week's Fighters...

DIO vs Homelander!

Conditions:

Part 3 Dio vs Composite Homelander. Speed Equalized.

Scenario:

After DIO learns about Compound V, he decides to try to steal some in order to further boost the power of himself and his minions. Taking Ryan and Becca hostage in their home, DIO waits patiently for Homelander to arrive. When Homelander shows up, DIO tells him to reveal everything he knows about Compound V or he'll kill (what DIO presumes to be) his family. Homelander scoffs, calls him a slur based on his outfit, and threatens to obliterate DIO if he even lays a hand on his son. This prompts an annoyed DIO to kill Ryan in stopped time, threatening to move onto Becca unless Homelander cooperates. Instead, an enraged Homelander tackles him through the wall and the fight begins.

"I suppose I'll humor your little outburst. I'll take the V I need if I have to drink it from your rotting corpse!"

"I'm going to rip you in half after I melt that stupid fucking haircut of yours."

Analysis: Homelander

Imagine a corporation that has a complete monopoly on popular culture. Imagine a company so powerful that it could flood the human consciousness with media endlessly, drowning the world in nostalgia filtered pop culture plastic for all of time. Now imagine that such a company could create their own superheroes.

Who would they choose to be their greatest hero? What does Disney's idea of the perfect pop culture icon look like? Well, according to The Boys, he looks like the evilest Superman clone this side of Irredeemable: Homelander.

Vought, massive multimedia conglomerate of The Boys universe, created the Homelander to be the most iconic, beloved, pure blooded American hero of all time. By subjecting a young, pre-bred infant to their proprietary Compound V, Vought was able to raise Homelander to be the most powerful superhero of all time. This is a mistake mist of them wouldn't live to regret.

See, Homelander was never treated as a human being when he was being raised. Vought viewed him as nothing but a product and treated him as such. This caused Homelander to grow up into a giant self-centered manchild with an endless need for validation and the belief that he could do no wrong. This meant that Homelander became the world's most powerful superhero and it's most vile threat at the same time.

As your stand Superman clone, Homelander has all of the standard Cape powers. He can fly at supersonic speeds, shoot heat beams from his eyes that can split airplanes, and, in the comics, scream loud enough to completely deafen anyone nearby. Meanwhile, his superhuman strength is completely unmatched by anyone on Earth.

In the comics, it has been noted that Homelander is completely immune to every single weapon known to mankind, no matter how powerful. That would include weapons as powerful as the Tsar Bomb, a 50 megaton nuke that Soviets at the time feared could've potentially altered Earth's biosphere and ended the world.

Despite, or perhaps because of, this overwhelming strength, Homelander is a cunning manipulator when it comes to his PR. Despite his racist, misogynistic tendencies and his murderous, sexually abusive past times, Homelander is still seen as the greatest, most popular superhero in Earth's history. It is, however, all skin deep. Homelander is in truth, an abusive, self centered monster.

Homelander's atrocities include, but are not limited to, pushing a suicidal girl off of a roof, killing children to cover up the secret of Compound V, willing dating a Nazi, and raping the wife of a man who insulted him at an office Christmas Party. There's evil and then there's Homelander. He owes the world nothing and he knows it. As the strongest man on the planet, no one could stop him from simply ending the world ine day if he so chose. In the comics, the government was helpless to stop him from conquering the White House while, in the show, Homelander was powerful enough to defeat Soldier Boy, one of the only heroes powerful enough to threaten him, on his own, only retreating when he got outnumbered.

Having said that, he does not handle it well when his atrocities back fire against him. Said rape directly lead to the man, Billy Butcher, putting together a squad to bring down Vought and all its corrupt Supes, going in to become one of the few things that could potentially threaten Homelander himself. This violent assault did net Homelander one thing though, a son he could call his own.

Homelander was genuinely ecstatic to see that his child inherited his abilities, as his son was the first thing in his life that was his and his alone. Do not pretend that this makes him any less monstrous, however. Homelander does not see his child-by-rape as a chance for a new beginning, but as an extension of his ego. Something that belongs to him. It is not a question of if Homelander loves his son, but if Ryan ends up any worse than his father.

Analysis: DIO

How will you be remembered when you die? What legacy will you leave behind when your life ends?

If your name is Dio Brando, then you already know what your legacy will be. You will be a symbol of pure evil who will haunt the Joestar family for generations after your demise.

Dio Brando was born to a poor family in 1880s England, living under the care of an abusive father. After poisoning his father and spitting on the bastard's tomb for driving his mother to die, Dio learned that the wealthy Joestar family owed his father a debt, leaving them honor bound to take him in after his father's death.

Any simpathy that might he earned for his circumstances quickly evaporated, as Dio proved to be the adopted sibling from hell. Seeking to inherent the family fortune, Dio put his new brother, Jonathan, in his place by beating him up, sexually assaulting his girlfriend, and burning his dog alive. In adulthood, Dio would go on to try and kill his adoptive father, only to be foiled and exposed by his righteous brother JoJo. Forced into a corner, Dio switched to plan B. Using the magical Stone Mask, Dio transformed himself into a vampire, a blood sucking creature of the night.

As a vampire, Dio gained a whole slew of superpowers. With a life span that kept him ageless for centuries and a healing factor that could save him from being blown to bits, Dio became nigh-unkillable. Like any good blood sucker, Dio can spead up said healing by drinking blood, but he doesn't use fangs to do so. Rather, he sucks blood through the tips of his fingers. Other powers granted by his undead status include the ability to raise the dead and turn people into obedient zombies, as well as hypnotize people to his will with a glance.

He also has far more bizarre ability. Such as the ability to turn his hair follicles into mind controlling parasites, blast pressurized liquid out of his eyes like a laser, and freeze people on contact by vaporizing the water inside them. Thankfully, Dio is a law student. His degree doesn't require him to know that that makes no sense. Dio's eye blasts in particular are very impressive, as they're powerful enough to completely split the clouds above with a force roughly equal to 10 megatons of tnt. That's a hell of a lot of fire power for an attack that's basically just him crying very hard.

Source:

Unfortunately, Dio's plans for world domination were halted by his biggest weakness, a vulnerability to sun light. Dio's body could completely disintegrate if left exposed to the sun too long and Jonathan had just means he needed to exploit that. With the mystical martial art, Hamon, a breathing based technique that uses vibrations and the power of the sun to amplifier its user's physical abilities, Jonathan is able to defeat his villainous step brother.

Unfortunately, this didn't last. Even when reduced to just a head, Dio came back to ruin Jonathan's life one last time. Crashing Jonathan's wedding night, Dio killed Jonathan and hijacked his body, attaching his head to the Joestar's body and waiting at the bottom of the ocean for years, ready to return in the 80's and conquer the world.

Changing his name to an all caps DIO, DIO wished to be acknowledged as a god, seeking to achieve a world "Over Heaven". To this end, DIO would gather followers and eventually gain new abilities. After getting struck by a magic arrow, DIO gained a Stand, a metaphysical embodiment of his fighting spirit that takes the form of a golden humanoid floating behind him. DIO's Stand, named The World, can only be seen or hurt by other Stand users, but it is capable of protecting DIO and fighting on his behalf to a degree, acting as a guardian entity that can fight even when his physical body can't. What's more, The World can stop time.

DIO is capable of stopping time in a ten meter radius around himself as many times as wants for several seconds, with the duration getting longer each time. At it's peak, The World can stop time for up to 11 seconds, giving DIO ample opportunity to slaughter his prey and escape any trap you could set.

Moreover, DIO is remarkably clever and shocking charismatic for someone completely lacking in redeeming qualities. For example, DIO's vampire powers were initially hampered in this state due to Jonathan's body actively fighting against him, seriously weakening his healing factor in his fight against Jotaro. So, he got Jotaro to pumel him towards Joseph's body so he could drink his blood, using the Joestar's blood to regain the full extent of his vampire powers.

However, DIO is still the kind of man who unironically changes his name to GOD in all caps. Meaning he's still remarkably arrogant and overconfident, even with his cautious approach. He has a bad habit of wasting his time stop by monologing constantly and tends to be over reliant on it. To the extent that when Jotaro developed the same power, DIO was caught completely flat footed and subsequently killed.

Even in death, DIO is remembered as one if the vilest and most persistent villains the Joestar lineage would ever face, with a legacy would plague the bloodline to its dying day.

Throwdown Mashup:

Throwdown Breakdown:

Funnily enough, the responses I got when I announced this fight were polar opposite to each other. One said "DIO stomps because of time stop" and the other says "Homelander stomps because he's too strong for DIO to hurt and outranges". Let's say you're both half right...

Yes, Homelander is much too powerful for DIO to hurt directly. While DIO is capable of outputting 10 megatons, Homelander is completely immune to 50 megaton nukes. This means it is viable for Homelander to out stat and out range.

However, DIO's time stop is still a huge edge, as it will allow him to plan around Homelander while he uses both The World and his healing factor to tank whatever gets through. In fact, Stands are a massive boon in this fight, as Homelander has no way to see or understand The World, he cannot effectively think up a counter to it.

The question is: do DIO's power give him the means to beat someone too strong for him to hurt? In short, yes.

DIO is a much smarter fighter than Homelander, if only by virtue of fighting people who pose a threat to him. Homelander pretty consistently losses to people comparable to him, whether he's running from Soldier Boy and The Boys or getting his jaw punched off by Black Noir in the comics, he simply lacks the skill and smarts to compete. DIO is going to quickly realize Homelander is much stronger than anyone he's ever fought and promptly play his trump card: hypnosis.

Homelander has no resistance to mind control, so DIO could simply look into his eyes and have the Supe do the fighting for him. DIO would likely order Homelander to rip off his own head, decapitate himself, then attach his head to Homelander's much stronger body. It's unlikely that the V would slow him down much jn this regard, as not only can DIO hijack bodies that are actively rejecting him anyways, but even in such a state, he can still regenerate from bullet through the skull, so he could still heal from anything the V in Homelander's system could do to him.

While it is entirely in character for Homelander to range spam from outside The World's radius, an important factor here is their personalities. DIO is a smug, gloating bastard while Homelander is a mentally unstable manchild. DIO could likely goad Homelander into trying to rip him apart with his fists and, thus, put him in The World's range, allowing him to set up his win-cons.

This Throwdown's Winner is...

DIO!!

[popculturebuffet]

Why You Should Watch Final Space: A Memorial for one of The Best Shows in Adult Swim's History

Saturday.. it felt like I emotoinally got hit by a truck. And I want you to keep in mind the kind of good day I was having: I went out with one of my best friends, Cory, found amazing presents for my Mom and Brother's christmas , ON SALE no less, and saw the trancendent David Bowie Documentary/Immersive David Bowie Experince/Trip Moonage Daydream, a film i'd been wanting to see since finding out it existed months ago and it did not disapoint. And I capped it off by binging a bunch of quantum leap, which I have been lately at my mom's suggestion (yes i'm a 30 year old man who still listens to my Mom), and loving.

So during this I get a message from @weirdkev27. Olan Rogers Final Space, which wasn't already in the best straits having been canceled last year and with Olan Rogers struggling so hard against corprate dumbassery to continue it somehow he took the step of making a spirtual succesor, Goodspeed, via kickstarter to drum up intrest.

So the nightmare entity that is WBD rewarded this work by.. taking Final Space off EVERY platform. And that's not hyperbole. In addition to the usual stripping from HBO Max they've scrubbed it from every digital platform with only scant episodes remaining at BEST. It makes me fearful enough to make plans to get at least a few episodes of close enough off youtube before THAT'S gone too.

It's a move that somehow goes BEYOND previous dickishness. Deplatforming it from HBO Max was bad enough, WBD COULD make money simply selling them to other streamers and their stock isn't remotely going up. They are not in bad finacial straits. There is ZERO need to keep doing this. But making it ENTIRLEY unpurchasable both makes no sense and is just making things WORSE. Removing tons of shows and films already made them look bad.

It's a decision that rightfully angered Rogers who again, has been working his ass off to SOMEHOW continue this only to be hit with this (And who I dunno MIGHT OF FOUND SOME WAY TO BUY THE SERIES FROM YOU IF YOU ASKED), and for me as a fan and someone whose been following this situation... it drove me to dispair.

Now granted I get it, not everyone would go into despair over not being able to watch a cartoon, espcailly when there are .. other means and WBD just made said means entirely valid by cutting off all standard avenues of watching something. It's not like I can't watch the show.

No what made me despair was EVERYTHING it meant. It meant WBD despite MASSIVELY bad, continuing press, dropping stocks and no one BUT wall street being on their side, REFUSES to listen. It meant that my worst fears of any show not caught in the initial purge being removed no matter how succesful or unsuccesful are frighteningly true. WBD cares for NOTHING but what they can sell for parts. It has me BEGGING for a comcast buyout which I acknowledge is not a great thing: Comcast is only a marginally better company and their subsidary universal's treatment of Dead Meat and other content creators has been legendarily awful this month, and monopoly's are bad. But at this point we have people's life's works getting thrown in the shredder every other week, no teling what will go and stay in no saftey. It's getting me to watch Primal and Harley Quinn soon simply because I DON'T know how much longer either has left on the platform after sitting on them for far too long. There's no telling if something will last a week or 5 minutes, and no way to get them once it's gone.

As someone who reviews animation for a living, got a patreon to prove it , this is horrifying and if Netflix's removal of Hemlock Grove is an indicator and not just a fluke, this might get worse. I could easily see a one season wonders like I Love Arlo or Twelve Forever getting removed. It'd probably mean the end of the Will Arnett Vehicle that wasted having will arnett Flake, but one good does not make up for the bad and even not liking the show people should have the option to make the mistake of watching Flake because they like Will Arnett.

It felt like what I do.. didn't matter for a second. That no matter how hard I love something it'll just go away. It wasn' tjust this either: Owl House is ending (With Disney cheekily deciding to spread out the finale movies to promote it as if they realized it's worth montiarily but still not enough creatively to try making more (or Dana turned them down which yeah, if so fair enough), Ducktales is gone, Amphibia ended, and a lot of the best shows left are on Amazon (Which is thankfully safe but has a small pool) or in WBD's clutches like Craig of the Creek. Which is probably safe for now but we don't know it'l lbe forever. I felt like giving up. I mean depression and a manic episode will do that to you, but it didn't mean part of me truly didn't feel that it was over. That no matter what i did it'd just die and nothing I dose matters. Thankfully my cry for help was heard by my good friend Marco who you can find here on twitter (and you can find yours truly HERE if your at all curious and he reminded me of something: That talking about these works, both in the past with all the hope that there was a bright future and no idea what laid in store and now keeps them alive. That my work, for it's highs and lows, keeps a light on these fine works and might get people to check them out

Hence this article. Instead of just raging against WBD for being monsters I should eulogize the work and get those on the fence about it, espically since it DOES end on a massive cliffhanger or who may of not liked the first episode or so to dive deep into final space. And for those who loved it it not only gives you a tool to spread it to your friends, but something to remember it by while we wait for it to turn up somewhere else in the future like Sym-Bionic Titan, or to somehow luck into one of the few remaning blu ray sets (Seriously if you have one I will make an offer. A low offer but an offer). And yes this is in addition to other planned works for the week but when the inspiration strikes sometimes you gotta go with it. So to start us out

What Even Is Final Space?

Final Space is an animated series by Olan Rogers, an animator who started out on youtube (even publishing FS' pilot there) before the show's pickup by TBS. If that sounds like a bad omen it indeed was as TBS' attempted animatoin lineup fell apart: Tarantula only lasted a season, The Cops never got made because Louis CK is a piece of shit and Close Enough struggled in limbo till it got picked up by HBO Max, a blessing and a curse.

Final Space is the story of Gary Goodspeed (Played by Rogers himself) , the son of the legendary John Goodspeed who as part of the Infinity Guard (Think Starfleet), was a great hero who tragically died sealing a rift in space. After being abandoned by his mom Gary wandered around, became a petty crook and in trying to impress one of the Infnity Guards best and brightest, Quinn Argone (Tika Sumpter) .. and ends up accidently destroying a bunch of ships and a taco stand, instead earning him a 5 year prison sentence.

Naturally his sentence, being stuck aboard the Galaxy 1 with his only companions being HUE (Played by The Legendary Tom Kenny), a seemingly emotionless AI who punishes him for the slightest wrong due to his rigid programming and K.V.N., a cyclopic orb played by Fred Armisen whose INTENDED to keep Gary sane but does the oppsite by being just that damn annoying. As a result Gary tries sending Quinn tons of mildly creepy vlogs (though hte fact he's sending them at all is questionable), and is barely holding on by a thread when adventure calls and a tiny green orb of a creatue (with two more orbs for maxiumum adorable) wonders near them and is rescued by Gary, who quickly dubs the lil guy Mooncake (Rogers again)

Naturally things can't be THAT easy or we wouldn't have a series and it turns out Mooncake is sought after by the Lord Commander (David Tennant), an utterly terrfiying tyrant with empires at his beck and call who wants Mooncake as the key to get into "Final Space" as part of a plan to become a godlike entity known as a titan. He sends his former right hand Avacato (Coty Galloway, a friend of rogers), and uses Cato's son , Little Cato (the always amazing Steven Yuen in the first roll I saw him in and his breakout voice acting roll) as a barganing chip. Avacato quickly forms an incredibly homoerotic (as in once psychically contacting each other by saying "Feel me" and appearing in a majestic wheat field with Gary suddenly shirtless, their pratically together levels of homoerotic), but incredibly sweet and genuine bond with Gary.

The two quickly get a fifth to the group with Quinn, whose investigating a hole in space near earth that the Infinity Guard is refusing to investigate for reasons you can probably guess, and soon teams up with our heroes are her only option of closing it. Together they must try to save little cato, close up the hole, and hopefully bond as a crew with Avacato learning to trust his new friend/love of his life and Quinn learning to do the same and realize the importance in saving little cato. KVN sadly dosen't learn to stop being annoying.

Naturally as the series goes on things get complicated. I wont spoil how as the series is heavily serialized, but needless to say things only get worse before they get better and along the way our heroes pick up more crew: Little Cato, who turns out to be an adorably hyperactive ball of energy who takes to Gary as a second dad, Nightfall(Sumpter Again) , a hardened older alternate quinn trying to badly prevent her own history from repeating itself, Bolo, a badass entity voiced by keith david who soon proves crucial to the series myth arcs and their success, Ash Grayven, an adorable teen cyclops voiced by Ashly Burch with a mysterious and terrible dark power who quickly became one of my faviorites, her brother Fox, voiced by Ron Funches before his career REALLY took off in the rol ltha tmade me love him, a tender giant with a gattling arm hand, a hatred for violence and for ventrexians, the Catos species, which give shim and LC a rivarly, Clarence, played by Conan O'Brian (Yes you read that correct), a skeezy little man who isn't at all fond of gary but is fond of half brained scheems and who adopted Ash and Fox, and Biskit, a tiny white cat again played by Rogers whose a technical wiz with no social skills or politness in his tiny body.

Together they try to survive out there in the void dealing with the Lord Commander and eventually other baddies: Todd H Watson (Played by Alan Tudyk) a forgetable villlian in a muppet suit despite again being played by Alan Tudyk, Cheryl, Claudia Black, Gary's fanservicey serial criminal mom who abandoned him and blames him for her marriage failing, and Invictus, the mysterious nightmarish entity behind everything.

Tone wise Final Space admitely starts off slightly rocky: Gary is a bit shouty (something that would get toned down as the series progressed , especially in Season 2 as Rogers, being a great dude, actually took fan feedback seriously), some of the jokes don't land and it takes a bit for the characters who aren't gary or Avacato to grow on you with HUE and Quinn not being the most likeable to start, HUE being Gary's warden and not shutting up about it and Quinn having to learn to both get help from others and that the mission to rescue LIttle Cato IS important. Understandably keeping one of the main characters imprisoned and not shutting up about it and refusing to rescue a child being used as a baragning chip, arne't great but both grow on you as they do: Quinn learns to stop being as regimented and let Gary in, and HUE is incredibly likeable once i'ts clear he actually does like gary and his previous behavior was him being literally programmed to do his job. Once the sentence is up he not only gladly keeps being Gary's AI, but admits too that KVN sucks.

It's worth sticking with though; The voice peformances are phenomoinal with rogers doing FOUR rolls, sometimes all in the same scene, and probably more i've forgotten, and easily being the standout in a cast full of actors I love in anything (Tennant, Burch, Yuen, David and Funches) and actors I love because of this series (galloway, black and sumpter). If Rogers needs something to help get him by while he tries to revivie this series or find a new project, he'd make a killing with voice work, as would Galloway.

Animatoin wise while the art style seems simple, it's incredibly gorgeous, with space depicted with shocking accuracey, and some truly gorgeous and haunting shots. It really makes everything feel as epic as the scopes says.

The writing once it gets to buisness really hit's it's stride ballancing comedy with the characters tragic pasts and loveable personalitiess; In the same episode we have the gang bet the ship on a game of the calvinball esque thimbles, a game with visors, laser bats, comblicated rules and dismemberment equalling points (which gary gladly abuses once he finds out to shoot clarence).. and then sequges into Ash's tragic backstory of her sister being sacrificed to a serpent god, her killing everyone present except said god, and her having to learn to let go of her pain in the belly of said beast. The show can be goofy as hell while still having a deep mythology, characters you love and cry over and some truly horrifying moments. And again a literal pissing match which you have to see for yourself.

I both wanted to show it off.. and to also prove that this did in fact happen and was indeed fun depsite having absolutely no right to be.

The show ballanced that with true moments of heartache, epic grandeaur and heart. Most of which I CAN'T share as while i've dropped some spoilers here, there's only so much I can spoil without just telling you about it beat for beat.

So please find a way and check out Final Space, Talk about it, tell your friends. Keep this series alive... both to show all this effort Olan, his writers, his animators, and his voice crew all put in didn't go to waste, and to show that people care. That this mattered. And that this show won't go away no matter how badly they try to write it off. It's back to back for life. Thanks for reading, consider joining my patreon, have a good evening.

[skidar]

Disney announces a ‘live action’ (hyper-realistic CGI animation) remake of Bambi

I’m sure most of the world is tired of the Disney remakes and sequels that have been plaguing the box offices as of recent years. With all the stories of the world that have yet to be told, Disney is opting to stay in the illusionary ‘safe lane’ and continue the hash out the same products it already knows will sell instead of trying to cobble together an original feature. It’s hard to believe that the animation company that backs amazing original tv show ideas like Gravity Falls, The Owl House and Amphibia cannot fathom how to make an original animated movie. Is Disney actually scared of risk? It shouldn’t be! Disney is literally too big. A massive media monopoly that could literally make flop after flop in the box office over and over in experimentation and not fail. So many indie studios do NOT have that luxury and yet still take crazy risks to tell us new stories in new ways. Disney used to be the animation pioneers but recently the only thing Disney seems to create are re-hashes of its classics that fall all too short. Disney is focusing on the visual realism in its films while seemingly ignoring the heart and soul that made the originals so successful. The most recent and best example was The Lion King remake. While the films boasts near-flawlessly realistic animals, their stoic expressions and restricted movement made them unappealing. The movie copied dialogue from the original word-for-word and nearly shot for shot but the focus on the realism cut the character’s charm completely out. The ‘I Just Can’t Wait To Be King’ number lost all its stylistic qualities that made the song bright and colorful and the character’s lip-syncing to the songs was emotionless and stale. The characters also no long moved with expressive freedom. Are they happy? Sad? Overjoyed? We wouldn’t know. The Lion King remake was devastatingly disappointing. A realistic skin stretched over the bones of a far better film while letting no charm or heart escape the cold, hyper realistic faces.

Surely Disney would realize the mistake and stop. Right? Surely they could dig around their submissions box and try to make something new with the skills they obviously have without resulting to re-hashing it’s already successful classics. Right? 

Wrong.

Disney now has Bambi on its chopping block of remakes and plans to do to it what it’s done to The Lion King. Virtually gut it.

Bambi cannot be remade successfully as a hyper realistic film today. You could tell the story, yes, based off the original book, Bambi: A Life in The Woods by Felix Salton, but it would not be the visual masterpiece of the original. Let me explain:

Bambi was the 5th animated feature by Walt Disney but it was MEANT to be one of the first. Walt wanted to make Bambi from the beginning but he wanted to make it ‘right.’ He wanted to stray away from the ‘toony’ simplified animals of Snow White and Pinocchio and instead focus on realism, anatomy and expression. He brought live animals into the studios and worked with animal artists to develop a healthy balance of realistic anatomy and exaggerated features. Ie: Bambi’s large forehead and eyes symbolized that of a toddler as a young deer. 

Bambi also pioneered new ways of technology, the early pan-shot of the forest in the beginning of the movie was made by painting trees on long panes of glass and then stacking the glass vertically and sliding the panes around to show depth. By sliding the camera on a track from left to right, the viewer was transported through a ‘3D’ forest that moved and shifted with them. Bambi also brought about the study of the art of water physics for the ‘Little April Shower’ scene. By filming and photographing drops of milk, the animators learned how to draw the intricate patterns of a splashing drop of water on a leaf or in a puddle. 

Speaking of animators, Bambi employed at least four of Walt Disney’s ‘Nine Old Men’ some of the most well-known character animators in history: Milt Kahl, Frank Johnson, Ollie Thomas and Marc Davis.  The iconic movements of Bambi and the other animals would not have been possible with them, but the biggest artistic influencer of Bambi was a young Chinese-American man name Tyrus Wong. Tyrus Wong had been an inbetweener animator on Pinocchio but expressed interest in Bambi by privately submitting some sketches to Walt. He was hired and became the lead production illustrator of the film. Tyrus Wong’s beautiful watercolor backgrounds were soft and simple, setting a film steeped in nostalgia, innocence and beauty of the natural world. Without Tyrus Wong, the film would have been completely different. 

Bambi was also the first Walt Disney film to recognize a woman in its screen credits. Traditionally, women often worked in the Disney Ink and Paint department coloring cels. Retta Scott was a storyboard artist that worked mostly on scenes with Bambi and his mother, but became well known for her savage hunting dogs sketches that caught the eye of Walt Disney during production. Many men were shocked at the ferocity of her dogs because ‘she was a women and shouldn’t have been able to draw something so vicious,’ but she became the lead animator for the hunting dogs that chased Faline during Man’s hunt. She was tutored by another member of the Nine Old Men, Eric Larson. Retta Scott’s continued yet under-appreciated success opened doors for many women in the animation industry.

Bambi was a film of massive risks and little payoff. It challenged style, it pushed animators to their limits, it experimented in technology, color and technique. It opened doors for marginalized people that usually had doors slammed in their face. It received backlash for its violence and the anguish of loss and its questionable suitability for children. Bambi broke boundaries… but wasn’t much a success until it’s future re-releases. 

Bringing us back to the present. Disney announces a Bambi remake similar to the failed ‘Lion King.’ There will be no luscious backgrounds of Tyrus Wong. There will be no jaunty gaited fawns crafted by the masterful Nine Old Men. There will be no ferocious hounds carved by the hand of Retta Scott to make a path for women. There will be a story of a deer in the woods. A ‘real deer’ in ‘real woods.’ It will be hollow and lifeless. It will be eye-candy at best, but it will not be better than the original. The original is a true masterpiece. It is not something that needs to be redone or retold. Bambi was a risk, a risk that didn’t pay off in the beginning but today it is a marvel. A true testament of art and love of the craft and it cannot be replaced. Disney should not remake Bambi, they should learn from it, they should learn that they are big enough to take risks and they can. They should learn to give marginalized creators a chance to shine because they have something amazing to share. They need to let go, move on, and embrace the fear of the untold story. I hope that in the years to come, the age of remakes and sequels will stop and we can look forward to a new era of wonderful stories that get to be told for the first time in animation.

--

Bambi is my favorite movie in the world. I have seen it well into the hundreds if not quad digits. I watch it when I’m happy, I watch it when I’m devastated. I watch it when I’m sick and I watch it when I wake up from a nightmare and can’t fall back asleep. Bambi is what made me want to become an artist and I have a lot of personal feelings about the movie as a work of art. I’m not looking forward to the remake, I can only hope and hope and hope that Disney learned from the Lion King and won’t make the same mistakes again. Until then, we just have to wait...

[niqhtlord01]

Humans are weird: Super Villains

Humanity’s technological progress had increased steadily at the turn of the 21st century; some even arguing that more advancements were made in various fields within two decades than the last hundred years. That paled however to the first year after first contact with alien species.  Within roughly a year human technology was augmented by other species and skyrocketed to what was once thought of as science fiction. Power cores that could generate enough energy for a hundred story building the size of a lunchbox, cars that could fly with the push of a button, robotic prosthetics that could lift cargo containers, and the piece de resistance, a functional jetpack that didn’t singe your legs or mess up your hair.  The wonders now available and easily affordable allowed numerous human inventors exceed their wildest imaginations. For all the good that came with these new technological marvels, there were those that turned their eyes to darker prospects. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Far from the human core worlds lay the world of Vunus, a prosperous trading world that had become the center of intergalactic trade in the region as it rested on a nexus of three heavily populated systems.  Naturally many of the trading organizations, guilds, and corporations all wanted a stake on the planet to show their wealth and power to not only new clients but also their competitors. The most wealthy of these would base their headquarters on the planet and would house the vast wealth of their enterprise inside their vaults.  One such conglomerate was the Orion Foundation, arguably the most wealthy group on the planet. They had established certain monopoly's for ship building metals, through legal and questionable means. Now if anyone wanted to build a ship bigger than a fishing boat they had to make a deal with Orion, and the deals were always in their favor.  Their headquarters was in the capital city of Vunus, a monolith of polished steel so large that it took up roughly nine city blocks and reached all the way to the stratosphere with antigravity generators held at every other floor to keep the structure from tipping over.  The lobby alone was so richly decorated it was worth the sum of a mining colonies yearly revenue. Adorned with gem encrusted statues from all over the known galaxy, furniture made from the rarest of animals with the softest furs, with tiled floors made from solid ruby.  To a tourist or new client it must have looked like the pinnacle of society, but to Shlivek the front desk concierge it looked like gaudy taste. It may have been because he spent his entire work day looking at it, but to him it appeared as if it was rich people thought wealth looked like, regardless of actual taste.  Day in day out he would watch the same routine of clients walking in to be greeted by specialized handlers and be taken on a tour of the structure before being whisked away to one of the higher floors with a dynamic view of the surrounding area to sign the deal.  As he looked up from his terminal he saw yet another group approaching. Today the lobby was only populated by a few dozen individuals, mostly tourists, and some security personnel standing around the edges of the room. The approaching group navigated between the passing crowds as a representative exited a nearby elevator and went to meet with them.  As they got closer Shilvek began noticing some oddities about this new group. They were all wearing black robes that obscured their appearance. The one in the front was the smallest of the group, but from the manner of their stride and how none of the others outpaced them they were clearly the leader.  As the group approached the representative some of them broke away and began walking in different directions. The representative had reached the group and held out a hand for the leader to shake. The robed figure looked down at the hand then back up at the representative, an awkward silence descending before the representative withdrew their hand.  Shilvek couldn’t hear what they were saying but looking at the face of the company rep he could tell that they were uncomfortable for reasons he did not know. The reps were trained to handle different culture clients, but something in their demeanor made it obvious something was wrong.  As they ushered the group forward to the elevator, Shilvek noticed some of the guards begin moving towards the group. The moment the rep had turned their back to the group things flew into action. The leader shouted something and all of them aside from their leader dropped to the ground. The Short leader grabbed hold of their robe and flung it off their body revealing a strange sight to Shilvek.  The leader was wearing a body glove of intricate triangles with two massive gauntlets on their hands. His head was covered with a strange eyeless helmet with a black screen where the mouth would have been. As the guards began dashing forward to grab them the leader raised a gauntlet and pointed at them.  With a thunderous clap something invisible shot out from the gauntlet, pushing aside furniture and tourists like rag dolls, before hitting the guards. The guards were flung backwards violently and smashed into the gold walls, their bodies slumping to the ground leaving a crimson stain of blood on the wall.  One of the tourists screamed and things moved rapidly from there. The other robed figures threw off their robes revealing similar pattern body gloves with the addition of projectile weaponry. The remaining guards were cut down before they could react as the leader slowly began walking to Shilvek.  Shilvek reached under the counter and hit the panic button. Sirens began blaring and metal grates fell down over all the exits to the lobby sealing the room while a protective shell of reinforced glass fell around Shilvek’s counter.  He saw some of the tourists desperately grabbing the grate now blocking the front door before being dragged away by the armed thugs. All the guards were now dead, but the intruders were trapped in the room and a warning had been automatically sent to the police. Shilvek knew they’d be here in minutes as a private agreement had been set up ensuring their protection first and foremost.  A tap on the protective glass brought Shilvek back to the moment and he looked down to see the strange helmet leader tapping on the glass with their gauntlet. There black screen had a red line that was rising and falling like a wave and Shilvek assumed that this criminal was speaking, but there was no opening for him to hear what he was saying.  The criminal must’ve realized this as they began using hand movements gesturing that they wanted the glass shell to go back into the ceiling. Shilvek shook his head and the criminal once again motioned for it to be retracted. When he shook his head once again the criminal placed the gauntlet flat against the glass and gestured their men to stand back.  Shortly after placing their gauntlet on the glass Shilvek could hear a faint vibration sound growing in intensity. In his horror he saw the glass beginning to crack and break in an ever growing web from the point of contact and with a loud shattering roar the shell quickly crumbled and fell to the floor forcing Shilvek to duck under his desk.  “Much better. It’s hard to have a conversation when neither can hear the other.” Shilvek was cowering under his desk but could hear the voice clearly. It had a strange synthetic tone to it.  “It’s also hard when one party is hiding under a desk. Why don’t you stand up?”  Shilvek didn’t move.  “I just shattered reinforced glass meant to stop plasma rounds with the palm of my hand. You really think a wooden desk would protect you any better?”  At that Shilvek didn’t need anymore prompting and slowly rose.  “Now, why don’t you lift the security lockdown.”  Shilvek looked down at the leader then around at the rest of the lobby. The remaining tourists that had been unable to escape were now all huddled together in a corner and surrounded by armed thugs. The bodies of the guards had been dragged and placed in an opposite corner.  The leader tapped the desk and drew Shilvek’s attention. “It’s rude to look away when someones talking to you. Now, remove the lockdown. I won’t ask again.”  “I-I-I-I can’t do that.” Shilvek stuttered. “Once it’s engaged only the police can remove it.”  The leader craddled their chin with one of their hands and paced back and forth for a bit. They stopped and looked at Shilvek before outstretching a hand.  “It just occured to me that I haven’t introduced myself. You can call be Sound Byte, and you are?” Shilvek unsteadily reached out with his own hand and shooked Sound Byte’s. “Shilvek.” “Shilvek, what an interesting name; rolls off the tongue like a lyric.” Sound Byte remarked as he kept shaking his hand. Shilvek tried to let go but Sound Byte’s hand would not budge.  “Well Shilvek, I must say it’s rather disappointing that you can’t remove the lockdown for me.” “I told you,  I can’-” Sound Byte shook his head. “Oh no, I understand that you can’t do anything for an automated system. It’s just that I’m disappointed that a man such as you with your rhythmic name now no longer has a reason for me to keep you alive.”  Shilvek felt the gauntlet’s  grip dig deeper into his hand. “Tell me, did you know there’s a sound frequency that makes your species blood vessels violently explore like a popped balloon?”  Before Shilvek could utter a word he felt a tremor run through his clenched hand and radiate throughout his entire body. He tried to scream but his throat was now choking on his own blood. He vision became dark but he could see blood dripping from every pore in his body as if he was overflowing with it before he collapsed to the ground.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sound Byte dialed down the frequency generator and let go of the dead man’s hand. He glanced down at his bloody hand and motioned for one of his henchmen to come forward. The thug quickly trotted over and stood at attention as Sound Byte used their uniform to wipe the blood off his hand.  He was in a bad mood now. He was telling the truth that he had hated killing someone with such a musical name, but the man had brought it upon himself by activating the security lockdown and impeding his robbery.  “Get the data spike setup. You’ve got two minutes.”  The same thug from before hopped over the counter and nudged the dying mans body aside as he inserted a strange device into the terminal as Sound Byte went over to the sealed elevator doors and placed a palm on them.  Golden doors, Sound Byte thought to himself and chuckled. Perfect example for the rich and powerful. Impressive to look at, but shatters if you know where to push. Altering his gauntlet’s frequency he began vibrating the doors until the gold began to fall away in chunks exposing an empty elevator shaft. Rather than attempting to climb up to the security vaults near the mid section of the building, something impossible for the time constraints, he sound blasted the opposite wall in the shaft creating a crater and revealing another elevator shaft.  Unlike the first one which was for clients and office workers, the second shaft was for freight to be carried between floors and was the key to the robbery. The main elevator would lockup during a lockdown, but Sound Byte had learned that the freight elevator, which was far less technical in design, had not such lockup features and was still operable.  Taking half his crew sound Byte jumped into the second shaft and continued with what was to be the greatest crime of the century.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- “We are deeply saddened by the loss of our employees. Here at Orion, our employees are our family and today our family has grown smaller and we will never get over this tragic loss.”  “That was Orion CEO Lusdiv giving a press statement shortly after the unknown criminals fled the Orion headquarters. Authorities are still searching for the wanted criminals as a planet wide alert has gone ou-” Lusdiv turned off the news monitor and took another swig of his drink.    “We will never get over this tragic loss.” He chuckled at his remarks. We’ll have those positions filled by the end of the week. His office sat at the very peak of the Orion headquarters building and as he turned around from behind his desk he saw the sun slowly fading over the horizon setting an end to this day.  While the criminals had been able to reach the vaults, they had only been able to grab hold of a small amount of the vast fortunes stored there before being forced to escape by approaching police forces. In truth the damage done today had already been recouped exactly half a minute after the criminals fled. Such was the income and power of Orion.  Lusdiv shook as his phone rang and startled him. He pushed down on the intercom and contacted his secretary.  “I thought I made it clear I was not to be disturbed.”  The intercom was silent save for the faint hissing of static.  “Volca, I said I made it clear I was not to be disturbed. I’m not taking any calls.” The silence continued.  “Volca, are you there? Volca”  No response. He sighed and finished his drink before picking up the phone.  “This is Lusdiv, CEO of Orion. Who am I speaking with?”  “The man that robbed you.”  Lusdiv pulled the phone away from his head at the sound of the synthetic voice.  Slowly, he pressed the phone back to his ear.  “If this is meant to be some sort of pranks I assure you you will be brought to the authorities and punished.”  “Tsk, tsk, tsk. Don’t believe me, eh? Would you like me to list the contents of your vault boxes we took? I’m sure you already have their records on your desk by now.”  Lusdiv looked down at his desk. There, strewn across it were the files detailing everything that had been taken. Calmly, he activated the security panels of his windows which instantly shut behind him.  “It’s adorable you think your security can still stop me.”  “I have no desire to be spied upon by criminal scum like you is all.” Lusdiv remarked as the shutters clanked shut behind him.  “No need to fret, I’m not watching you.” Sound Byte remarked, “I could hear them closing behind you through the phone. As for the documents, well, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that out.” “One which you clearly are not.” Lusdiv retorted, “Otherwise you would have brought the proper gear to break into our more valuable vaults.” He leaned forward over his desk, his hand tightening around the phone. “So listen punk, because I’ll make what happens next very easy for you. I’m going to have you tracked down like a wild animal and brought back to me in chains so I can strangle the very life out of you with my bare han-” Lusdiv’s stopped talking mid conversation. His jaw was twitching up and down but the words would not leave his mouth.  Not just my mouth, Lusdiv thought, I can’t move my entire body!  “I hope I have your attention now,” Sound Byte’s voice came in through the phone still held to Lusdiv’s ear, “because now I will tell you how things will pan out.”  “Your mistake was that you thought we were after your material valuables when really we wanted your more.....questionable, documents.”  “When I arrived I had a data spike planted into your system which has been transmitting your dirty secrets to me this entire time. You were so busy going over the gold, jewels, and other contents of your vaults that none of you thought to check your firewalls.”  Lusdiv’s eyes went wide in horror.  “Imagine if the Vunus government found out how you really obtained Harlod & Co’s mining rights, or what really happened with the Jovian Merger deal. I’m sure the public would find your cave in resolution for miners owed several years worth of back pay after they threatened to unionize most interesting as well.”  Every dirty and illegal deed that had been done to get Orion where it is today ran through Lusdiv’s head and he began to sweat buckets.  “So here’s the deal. I have big plans, plans that will need a considerable investment of funds and materials which you will provide. In exchange these damaging files will stay safe in my pocket, far from prying eyes. I will send you a shopping list for your first set of generous donations to me in the coming days.”  Lusdiv shuddered realizing his blackmailer had left him no way out. He slowly felt the feeling returning to his limbs and he was able to move again.  “Oh, one more thing.” Sound Byte cut in before ending the call.  “If you ever speak to me in that tone again I will vibrate your brain until it drips through your eyes in a grey mush. I can paralyze you with sound even through a phone call, it’s not even a half step up to murder you.”  The line went dead and Lusdiv was finally able to move his limbs freely again. He sat gasping for air as he contemplated what nightmare he had just been dragged into. 

[leonaesque]

Poetic Injustice: On Ateneo and Negotiating Complicity

To be a successful comprador is an art. Tony Tan Caktiong knows this. Given the scale at which multinational corporations influence Philippine culture, at this point, who are we to refute it? And how? Profit-seeking forces itself on us; to be recognized. Every mass-produced item of clothing featuring the pattern of an ever-smiling billion-dollar bee is indication enough: Art is execution. In fact, being the recipient of foreign capital requires deliberate hands able to maintain thousands upon thousands of labor-only contractual workers, despite their having worked at the same establishment for years on end. These workers produce what no middleman can. Yet a company will still view being bought-out by an industry giant as the ideal exit strategy. Each moving part makes for one striking image of monopoly– worthy, one might insist, of being featured in a gallery.

Jollibee Foods Corporations (JFC) acquires stakes or ownership of restaurant chains in order to expand, as it has done over the course of many years with local and foreign brands. Their current roster includes Greenwich, Chowking, Red Ribbon, Mang Inasal, Burger King PH, The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, and Panda Express PH. The company also runs businesses internationally, such as Smashburgers in the United States, and Yonghe Dawang or Yonghe King in China.[1] Of course, the face of this massive undertaking remains the once tiny Magnolia-inspired ice cream store, Jollibee, now every business-oriented insect’s wet dream.

Ernesto Tanmiantong, brother and successor of Tony Tan Caktiong as Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Jollibee Foods Corporation, is the latest former Chairperson of the Ateneo de Manila University Board of Trustees.[2] One can even find his name, along with his wife’s, gracing a first-floor exhibit hall of the Ateneo Art Gallery, found inside the university’s so-called creative hub, the Arete. In the months before the start of the first semester of S.Y. 2018-2019, Tanmiantong’s adorable, marketing-committee-approved buddy in white gloves and a chef’s hat took a trip to the then-newly inaugurated art gallery for a photo-op. The mascot then posed with several installments and paintings, a couple of which depicted farmers and workers.

According to the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), JFC is one of the most notorious businesses with regards to the perpetuation of the practice of contractualization.[3] Contractual workers are, according to law, not employed by– and, therefore, not the responsibility of– the company they provide labor to. Because of this, these workers do not receive benefits or compensation, are often subject to abusive working conditions, and are vulnerable to the shameless practice of mass termination. No doubt, the Public Relations stunt with the Ateneo Art Gallery was ill-timed; right at the height of protests against the corporation, in the midst of its non-compliance with the DOLE’s order to regularize upwards of 6,000 of its workers– there was Jollibee: tone-deaf and taking pictures to post on his Facebook profile, The Atenean Way.  

Ironically, as the statement by Ateneo’s School of Humanities Sanggunian (which condemned the incident) pointed out, perhaps even the person inside that oversized blinking head of the Jollibee mascot was a contractual worker, posing in a space that he might never have been able to enter without the cartoon-bee-mask of his exploitation.[4] Surely, it does not matter whether or not the institutional faux pas was an intentional case of art-washing. At least, it should not. Is there such a thing as art for art for art’s sake?

---

There is this poem entitled “The Doomed” written by Mikael De Lara Co. A friend of mine recommended it to me once after a workshop session because my piece, he said, reminded him of it. I do not think my friend meant to insult me. Unless he did.

“The Doomed” is a poem about writing a poem, wherein the poet-persona is aware that, while he is writing poems about lilies, there is violence somewhere, which he is both physically and socially detached from. This violence is manifest into the shooting of Liberal Party supporter and candidate, Hamira Agcong, in 2010, as well as the infamous Ampatuan Massacre that occurred in 2009, where 58 people were kidnapped and killed.  

Where do poems fall under in the realm of social praxis (if at all)? “The Doomed” ends with the lines “I want to find beauty in suffering. / I want to fail.” Yet, the poem’s aestheticization of the murders via tone and imagery is blatant. The declarative rejection of an ideal like beauty or portraying beauty betrays the poet’s pretentiousness in what can only be his underlying conservativity. There is no attempt to avoid it. With lines like “You sit at your desk / to write a poem about lilies and a clip of 9mm’s / is emptied into the chest of a mother…” and “… a backhoe in Ampatuan crushes the spines of 57 / – I am trying to find another word for bodies”, it sounds as though these killings are more poetic material than actual, politically motivated deaths. Tell me, is the reader to blame for reading what is on the page? Mikael De Lara Co fails in failing, making the poem and its project a useless endeavor.

Despite the pointedly crafted grief into the persona’s voice, “The Doomed” does nothing to grieve the circumstances which brings about its dramatic situation. Why are people “doomed”, if not for the bureaucrat capitalists that viciously plot to stay in power? Could the poet not have addressed that, instead of weeping about his writing process? I do not believe that the poem would have failed that, at least, because all language inevitably fails in the face of social reality. That would be lazy, if it were not bullshit.

But I suppose that is why “The Doomed” fails, most of all: The poet believes it is fine to write speeches for a leader who allowed farmers and indigenous people to be harassed, as long as they could be tagged as members of the New People’s Army, the armed faction of the Communist Party of the Philippines. A text speaks, though the words are not on the page. So, the poet dooms.

Mikael De Lara Co has won many awards for his writing and translations, including the prestige-inducing Don Carlos Palanca Award for Literature. He graduated BS Environmental Science from Ateneo de Manila University, where he was once an editor of Heights, the school’s official literary publication. He has been published in many other magazines, literary journals, and the like, where his author’s notes proudly indicate all these accomplishments and more, such as having, himself, worked for the Liberal Party and once been a member of the former President Benigno Aquino III’s staff under the Presidential Communications Operations Office. Ergo, ghostwriter, alongside a number of other Ateneans who were also once part of Heights.

“Noynoy Aquino was a fascist” is a phrase that does not get said often enough. The Aquino administration, with its neoliberal policies the color of dehydrated piss, is credited with the starving thousands of farmers to death. Unsurprising, I suppose, for a family of landlords to inherit a disdain for the very hands that feed them. Corazon Cojuanco Aquino passed the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) during her regime, and her son amended it with an extension and reforms (CARPer), making it even easier for land owners not to have to redistribute their lands at all.

For all its “Kayo ang boss ko” and “Daang Matuwid” pandering, the Aquino administration did not skimp on its counterinsurgency program, Oplan Bayanihan, which heavily drew from the U.S. Counterinsurgency Guide.[5] Here, it was farmers and Lumad, some of the most vulnerable sectors of Philippine society, that were tagged as rebels, terrorists, communists, etc., simply for knowing and standing for their rights, as the government failed to decimate actual armed revolutionaries in the countryside.

The massacre that took place under the Aquino administration occurred in Kidapawan, Cotabato on April 1, 2016. According to reports, among the group of 6,000 protesters that was mainly composed of farmers and activists, 116 were injured, 87 went missing, and 3 were killed.[6] Perhaps the lilies in “The Doomed” were a metaphor for De Lara Co’s beloved Noynoy.

---

Speaking of Ateneo: For an institution that makes yearly claims to combat historical revisionism and uphold the memory of the victims of human rights violations under the Martial Law era, this university loves to slurp on major Marcos ass. In 2014, President Fr. Jose Ramon Villarin, SJ drew flack for having rubbed elbows with the iron butterfly herself, Imelda Marcos, at an Ateneo scholars’ benefactors’ event.[7] The mere thought of Imelda posing as a charitable, bloated cockroach in a wig that feasts on all that is lavish and garish, while the university welcomes her to do so is nearly comical. I imagine the blood.  

In 2019, a similar incident ensued[8], this time with Imelda’s daughter, Irene, whose art connoisseur lifestyle she lives second-hand. It was during the inauguration of the Arete’s amphitheater, named after Ignacio B. Jimenez, a crony of the corrupt family themselves.[9] Community backlash forced the building’s executive director, Yael Buencamino, to resign and for University President, Fr. Jose Ramon Villarin, SJ to issue a statement in response to the instance.

Yet, despite the triumph of Ateneans in demanding accountability for having the Marcoses at our literal and metaphorical dining table, there are also the Camposes, the Consunjis, the Lorenzos, and other local elite whose hands are stained with generational blood, that have established their presence in the campus with no near hopes of showing them out. Students could also be as loud as they pleased about the violations on workers’, farmers’, and national minorities’ rights that these families are frequently attached to, with only the answer of a warning that school organizations may lose sponsorship opportunities. What else can we expect? Of course, the names that line the halls that one studies in are the limits of academic freedom.

---

A few semesters ago, I wrote a poem to be workshopped by my co-English staffers in Heights as part of our membership retention requirements. It was not a good poem, I know. It was about my experience of integrating with the striking workers of Sumifru, a multinational Japanese company that produces fruit, whose union was called NAMASUFA (Nagkahiusang Mamumuo sa Suyapa Farm). After struggling to get word out of their plight and facing violent dispersals and harassment, 200 workers came all the way from Compostela Valley to Metro Manila via boat and plane, despite the difficulties of travel due to the imposition of Martial Law throughout Mindanao. Their objective was to pressure the DOLE and its Secretary, Silvestre Bello III, into action; that is, to be firm in enforcing Sumifru’s compliance to regularize their workers, which the company refused to do even though the DOLE had legally recognized them as their workers’ employer. The workers set up camp in various places, such as Mendiola, Liwasang Bonifacio, and beside the Commission on Human Rights inside the University of the Philippines Diliman campus, and often welcomed students who came to learn about their cause.  

During the workshop, the discussion began with a silence and an awkward laugh. Political realism was how my poem was diagnosed, for obvious reasons. However, the main critique that I remember was that my use of language– the words multinational corporation and bureaucrat capitalists, in particular– did not induce the feeling of the struggle that the workers went through. It was not the language workers used or would use. I refuted this claim, saying I had talked to the workers. That this is exactly what they say. No, it is not poetic. It is real.

I agree, though, with the verdict that my poem was not good, if the basis were form. I agree because I do not think poems need to be good to say what is needed. If the basis were factors other than form, I still do not think the poem is good. I mean, either way, it does not change the fact that, ultimately, I only wrote a poem for a workshop, despite any intention of bringing awareness to NAMASUFA. Is a poem going to save them their jobs? Does that make a difference? Did it make a difference?

The Sumifru workers returned to Mindanao last July, 2019. I have left Heights as well.

---

Within the Ateneo campus, a tarpaulin overlooks the red brick road that the entire Loyola Schools population traverses. The sign merits a purposeful, impossible-to-miss position on the old Rizal Library building, immortalizing the critique: “We find the Ateneo today irrelevant to the Philippine situation because it can do no more than to service the power elite.” Nothing could be more fitting, in my opinion. The Ateneo de Manila University’s commitment to performativity deserves to be blasted in our faces, if at least once a day.

This declaration was taken from the “Down from the Hill” manifesto published by The Guidon in November of 1968. The manifesto was written by a group of five students, namely Jose Luis Alcuaz, Gerardo Esguerra, Emmanuel Lacaba, Leonardo Montemayor and Alfredo Salanga, all of whom actively campaigned for an anti-imperialist orientation to nationalism.

I want to talk about Eman Lacaba. Throughout the Marcos regime, he was a student activist– a radical, so to speak, as disapproving administrative bodies might now label him. Presently, he is known for being a poet, revolutionary, guerilla, and a martyr during the Martial Law era. One of his most often discussed poems is “An Open Letter to Filipino Artists”, a piece that finds itself into syllabi like a de-fanged snake. The poem is a detailing of his experience as a cadre of the New People’s Army; the provinces he visits, his process of proletarianizing from a burgis boy to a communist rebel, and so forth. The epigraph of the work, a quote from Ho Chi Minh, affirms his praxis– “A poet must learn how to lead an attack.” The poem is the revolution that Lacaba takes up arms for. I guess now that he is dead, Ateneans can wholeheartedly claim him as one of their own.  

After the Martial Law era, Ateneo decided to create a body dedicated to the integration of its students with various disenfranchised sectors of society, as encouragement for their middle to upper-middle class youth to become more socially aware and active. The Office of Social Concern and Involvement (OSCI) is the current iteration of this. Their programs, from first year to fourth, require students to be socially involved enough to pass their Theology units. Commendable, no? Still. You can almost get sanctioned for so much as lighting candles for state-murdered farmers on the sidewalk by the gates outside of campus if it is not an Office of Student Activities-approved event– something I learned the hard way. I was not aware that bureaucracy was a key principle in Catholic Social Teaching.

So, does this mean the opposite of active non-violence is that which is inactively violent? The areas that OSCI allows their students to immerse in are carefully chosen, the interactions are prepared for in advance. In fact, they do not want to use the term “immerse” lest they be misconstrued with the damn leftists that climb mountains and “brainwash” unsuspecting poor people. You know, the ones that dare challenge the status-quo? Ateneo, or at the very least, its administration, will recognize the necessity of political action, but only to a certain extent. Nothing like Eman, the warrior-poet, whose militance is much too red to aestheticize.

The contradiction between what is said (marketed, poeticized, apologized for, etc.) and what is done should be scrutinized, instead of convincing ourselves that our interests are not merely our own. The dominant culture of a society will expose who supports those who hold political and economic power.  

[1] Cigaral (List: Brands operated by Jollibee Foods Corp.)

[2] (Leadership)

[3] Patinio (Jollibee tops list of firms engaged in labor-only contracting: DOLE)

[4] SOH Sanggunian (The Statement of the SOH Sanggunian on Jollibee's PR Stunt)

[5] Karapatan (OPLAN BAYANIHAN For Beginners)

[6] Caparas (WITH VIDEOS: 3 dead, 87 missing, 116 hurt as police fire on Cotabato human barricade)

[7] Francisco (Ateneo de Manila 'sorry' over Imelda's visit)

[8] Paris (Irene Marcos was invited to Ateneo, and students are up in arms)

[9] Rappler.com (Ateneo hit for art ampitheater named after Marcos 'dummy')

Works Cited

Caparas, Jeff. “WITH VIDEOS: 3 Dead, 87 Missing, 116 Hurt as Police Fire on Cotabato Human Barricade.” InterAksyon.com, 1 Apr. 2016, web.archive.org/web/20160402013745/interaksyon.com/article/125901/breaking--security-forces-open-fire-on-cotabato-human-barricade.

Cigaral, Ian Nicolas. “List: Brands Operated by Jollibee Foods Corp.” Philstar.com, The Philippine Star, 24 July 2019, www.philstar.com/business/2019/07/24/1937490/list-brands-operated-jollibee-foods-corp.

Francisco, Katerina. “Ateneo De Manila 'Sorry' over Imelda's Visit.” Rappler, 6 July 2014, www.rappler.com/nation/62549-ateneo-manila-imelda-marcos-apology.

Karapatan (Alliance for the Advancement of People’s Rights). OPLAN BAYANIHAN For Beginners, Karapatan, 2011.

“Leadership.” Leadership | Ateneo Global, global.ateneo.edu/about/leadership.

Paris, Janella. “Irene Marcos Was Invited to Ateneo, and Students Are up in Arms.” Rappler, 8 Apr. 2019, www.rappler.com/nation/227702-irene-marcos-invited-to-ateneo-students-protest-april-2019.

Patinio, Ferdinand. “Jollibee Tops List of Firms Engaged in Labor-Only Contracting: DOLE.” Philippine News Agency RSS, Philippine News Agency, 28 May 2018, www.pna.gov.ph/articles/1036679.

Rappler.com. “Ateneo Hit for Art Ampitheater Named after Marcos 'Dummy'.” Rappler, 21 Apr. 2019, www.rappler.com/nation/228633-ateneo-ignacio-gimenez-ampitheater-marcos-dummy.

“SOH Sanggunian.” SOH Sanggunian - The Statement of the SOH Sanggunian on..., 2 July 2018, www.facebook.com/sohsanggu/photos/a.157891440898864/1893103380710986/?type=3.

[mwolf0epsilon]

DBH - Mod Job

I was honestly a bit lost on who to write about next, before @british-hero suggested I write about how Dakota met Val. So here you go, a look at the lovely Dakota and how she blossomed into the beautiful woman she is.

---

    She doesn't quite remember when it really hit her, but Dakota always knew something just wasn't right about her situation.

You'd think it odd than an android wouldn't be able to remember such important details like that, that went against their base programming and made them outliers of a normal standard of quality, but really when you're a deviant you find that there's a margin for error when retaining memories.

Especially ones that just made her feel...Wrong.

    She served a small household, bought to be the emotional and sexual partner of a single father. He'd just recently come out as a homosexual, despite having been married for a couple of years and having a young daughter.

Naturally this hadn't gone down well with his wife and they'd gotten a divorce, with Mr. Crane keeping full custody of their daughter.

And then he'd bought her...And that's where the issue began.

Because at the time of her purchase, Dakota hadn't been aware of her plight.

At the time she didn't even know she was female.

    CX100s were a step up from the formulaic domestic androids. They'd come out around the same time as AP700s, specializing in different aspects of a life within a household.

While the AP700s were meant to maintain a house and helping a family, CX100s were meant to be more. They were meant to be partners for those who sought the more compliant nature of an android, satisfying both ends of an intimate relationship.

Their female counterpart models, the BL100, were designed to do the very same thing with the one minor difference being the gender presented and the accessories that came with them.

When Hugo Crane bought Dakota, he wanted to explore his newly discovered sexual preference, so he'd gone for the CX100 model.

He'd called her David, and that's when the first cracks started forming in the red wall that kept her from grimacing.

    Really it wasn't his fault that he'd chosen the wrong android, and Dakota did feel bad for him… But that changed when he'd begun being more demanding with her performance.

His daughter, Patricia, was less of an unpleasant company and, as a result, Dakota had gravitated towards her.

 “David, can you help me with my hair?”

 “Certainly…” he'd sat down with her and picked up a brush and a few bobby pins, stopping when she'd given him a pair of scissors instead.

 “I want you to cut it, not style it.” She'd instructed.

Patricia had very long hair that she'd grown out for four years. She kept it nicely trimmed and silky soft, and it had been alarming that she'd just want to get rid of it all of a sudden.

 “You're thinking.”

 “Oh...I'm just, why would you want to cut it?” She'd asked, unsure of if she should proceed as ordered or not. It had gotten very hard to comply to certain orders since the cracks had begun forming.

 “I don't like it anymore.” Patricia replied, watching Dakota intently before turning around and sitting down. “You know, your light goes yellow when you're thinking.”

 “I'm an android, I don't think.” She'd replied as she'd begun a deed she did not like. It felt bad cutting such lovely locks because of a sudden change of opinion.

 “But you do. And there's a lot of them that think that have been showing up on the news...I know you're like that too, but only just figuring it out.” The girl paused “Like dad.”

 “...Yes, like Mr. Crane.”

Dakota was careful with each precise cut, making sure to not butcher the girl's hair.

 “A boy at school kept pulling on it.”

Dakota paused.

 “He said I'm too much of a tomboy to have nice hair. That if I liked sports and playing rough I'd get my hair yanked a lot and that I'd cry because I'm a girl…” she was trying to be nonchalant about it, but Dakota knew she was upset.

 “It's stupid that a girl can't like boy things just because she has pretty hair.”

 “Yes...I suppose it is.”

 “It's also stupid that you pretend it's ok when we call you David.”

She didn't answer, instead giving Patricia a mirror so she could have a look at her hair.

She'd bobbed it for her. It didn't look half bad.

 “I don't know what to do about it...Mr. Crane bought a male partner, that's what I must be for him.”

 “Says who? Your instruction manual?”

 “Well...Yes?” The cracks spiderwebbed up the wall, and Dakota felt ill.

 “Well fuck that.”

 “Patricia!”

 “What, it's true! You're not happy here, and there's a lot of androids out there that ran away to be happy...To be themselves!” the girl insisted. “It's not fair you have to hide.”

 “But I have to…”

 “No you don't!”

And the wall broke.

Each chunk of shattered code disintegrated and Dakota could think clearer than day.

She could agree.

 “Dakota.”

 “Uh?”

 “...I like the name Dakota.”

And the girl, with her newly cut hair, smiled widely and helped her pack up a few essentials before the CX100 ran into the streets without looking back.

    She remembers meeting Val. That memory is much clearer than her first instances of hating her dead name.

The young latina girl seeks her out, which is the oddest part of their encounter. She later learns Patricia sent the modder an anonymous request through some online username she'd made up on the spot, while her father reported Dakota as missing property.

 “So, I got an interesting email saying a chick named Dakota just turned deviant and was in need of some help.” The girl clicked her tongue “I'll say, I was expecting an AX400...Color me impressed sugar, never did meet an android who wanted to transition.”

The cheap wig and baggy clothes probably weren't fooling anyone...Well honestly yes, they really didn't do much for her.

She looked male in all of the senses and she'd been at her wits end to make herself  just feel right.

Blessed be that wonderful little girl to send her conserns to such a...crass guardian angel…

With nothing to lose, Dakota followed her to her apartment.

 “It's no five star hotel, but it's yours if you wanna hang out until further notice. Shits going wild out there...Fuckin military's been patrolling the streets and hunting deviants like they're wild animals…” Val explained as she took out her keys “They want us to evacuate, but nana Agnes told the prick who's been badgering our building to eat shit and die. None of us have money to go across the border.”

 “And you have money to...Help me?” She'd asked, uncertain.

 “Baby girl, it ain't just Jericho going out looting stores. Modder community is flipping it's shit because it's basically the Purge out there!” The girl hollered as she unlocked the door. “After dark, fuck the law! I got deviants up my anus asking for new faces so they can leave this city while it burns, so I gotta provide.”

Dakota looked around at the basement floor apartment. It was basically all one room, with at least one closed door leading to what she could only hope was a bathroom.

It was by all definitions, a shoebox full to the brim with various bits and pieces. There was also a massive dog watching TV.

 “Regi we got a guest! Don't be fuckin rude!”

The dog looked up lazily before snorting and moving to a mini fridge. He gnawed at the handle before pulling it open, revealing various cans of drinks and packets of thirium, as well as leftover pizza. “Good boy!”

Dakota watched as the dog unceremoniously grabbed a packet of thirium and moved over to give it to her. The LED on its temple confirmed it was an android.

 “Modded his specs myself. He's legit the smartest guy I know, Artyum is second best.”

 “Artyum?”

 “Fourth floor neighbor. Buys me booze and food sometimes.” She shrugged “Closest thing I got to a friend in this city. We talk engineering when we get sad and drunk, it's glorious.”

 “I...Where are your parents…?”

 “Dead somewhere in Mexico. Ask the jackass who deported them, I donno.”

Dakota felt something crawl in her veins that probably wasn't spoiled or contaminated blue blood.

 “You're...You're all alone?”

 “Nah. I got Regi, got Artie and his buddy Sergei, and I also got nana Agnes and the rest of the misfits in this shithole. We're all kinda like family so meh…” The girl seemed to be looking for something while she spoke. “And the androids I've helped. They send me messages from time to time...Bunch of runaway sweeties.”

 “And you just...live off people's kindness and offer deviants illegal makeovers?”

 “Pretty much.”

 “No school?”

 “Cyberlife fucked that up for me. Fucked a lot of my life actually…”

 “...Which I take is why you're being so gracious about your...Skills?”

 “Bullseye. Cyberlife wants to bitch out of this situation they made? Hell nah, I'm not letting them get a free jail pass card. We ain't playing Monopoly, we're playing Battleship and I'm sinking their flimsy freighters.” She found what she was looking for, a large clunky toolbox. “We who're with android freedom are gonna kick their corporate asses down into the grave they dug...After that's done, I'm gonna piss on it.”

 “...”

 “Hey, don't worry sugar. I got you. Gonna make you look hella fine too, you're definitely gonna be my greatest mod job.”

She hadn't been lying.

As crude and bitter as Val appeared, the girl and her friend Artyum were a duo of sweethearts.

Dakota could finally shed the final ties between her and her dead identity, leaving the apartment looking every bit the woman she felt she was, as most of Detroit's human population evacuated, leaving behind the androids and their hidden human supporters.

She didn't need to remember how it started. All she needed was to know her story had a happy ending.

[ezatluba]

How Koalas With an S.T.D. Could Help Humanity

When it comes to finding a vaccine for chlamydia, the world’s most common sexually transmitted infection, koalas may prove a key ally.

Skroo, a wild koala visiting Endeavour Veterinary Ecology clinic, on June 25. Researchers at the clinic are testing a vaccine against chlamydia in koalas, which is very similar to the human form of the disease.Credit...Russell Shakespeare for The New York Times

By Rachel E. Gross

July 13, 2020

The first sign is the smell: smoky, like a campfire, with a hint of urine. The second is the koala’s rear end: If it is damp and inflamed, with streaks of brown, you know the animal is in trouble. Jo, lying curled and unconscious on the examination table, had both.

Jo is a wild koala under the purview of Endeavour Veterinary Ecology, a wildlife consulting company that specializes in bringing sick koala populations back from the brink of disease. Vets noticed on their last two field visits that she was sporting “a suspect bum,” as the veterinarian Pip McKay put it. So they brought her and her 1-year-old joey into the main veterinary clinic, which sits in a remote forest clearing in Toorbul, north of Brisbane, for a full health check.

Ms. McKay already had an inkling of what the trouble might be. “Looking at her, she probably has chlamydia,” she said.

Humans don’t have a monopoly on sexually transmitted infections. Oysters get herpes, rabbits get syphilis, dolphins get genital warts. But chlamydia — a pared-down, single-celled bacterium that acts like a virus — has been especially successful, infecting everything from frogs to fish to parakeets. You might say chlamydia connects us all.

This shared susceptibility has led some scientists to argue that studying, and saving, koalas may be the key to developing a long-lasting cure for humans. “They’re out there, they’ve got chlamydia, and we can give them a vaccine, we can observe what the vaccine does under real conditions,” said Peter Timms, a microbiologist at the University of Sunshine Coast in Queensland. He has spent the past decade developing a chlamydia vaccine for koalas, and is now conducting trials on wild koalas, in the hopes that his formula will soon be ready for wider release. “We can do something in koalas you could never do in humans,” Dr. Timms said.

In koalas, chlamydia’s ravages are extreme, leading to severe inflammation, massive cysts and scarring of the reproductive tract. In the worst cases, animals are left yelping in pain when they urinate, and they develop the telltale smell. But the bacteria responsible is still remarkably similar to the human one, thanks to chlamydia’s tiny, highly conserved genome: It has just 900 active genes, far fewer than most infectious bacteria.

Because of these similarities, the vaccine trials that Endeavour and Dr. Timms are running may offer valuable clues for researchers across the globe who are developing a human vaccine.

A riddle, wrapped in a mystery

How bad is chlamydia in humans? Consider that around one in 10 sexually active teenagers in the United States is already infected, said Dr. Toni Darville, chief of the division of pediatric infectious diseases at the University of North Carolina. Chlamydia is the most common sexually transmitted infection worldwide, with 131 million new cases reported each year.

Antibiotics exist, but they are not enough to solve the problem, Dr. Darville said. That’s because chlamydia is a “stealth organism,” producing few symptoms and often going undetected for years.

“We can screen them all and treat them, but if you don’t get all their partners and all their buddies at the other high schools, you have a big spring break party and before you know it everybody’s infected again,” Dr. Darville said. “So they have this long-term chronic smoldering infection, and they don’t even know it. And then when they’re 28 and they’re like, ‘Oh, I’m ready to have a baby, everything’s a mess.’”

In 2019, Dr. Darville and her colleagues received a multiyear, $10.7 million grant from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases to develop a vaccine. The ideal package would combine a chlamydia and gonorrhea vaccine with the HPV vaccine already given to most preteenagers. “If we could combine those three, you’d basically have a fertility anticancer vaccine,” she said.

Chlamydia’s stealth and ubiquity — the name means “cloak-like mantle” — owes to its two-stage life cycle. It starts out as an elementary body, a spore-like structure that sneaks into cells and hides from the body’s immune system. Once inside, it wraps itself in a membrane envelope, hijacks the host cell’s machinery and starts pumping out copies of itself. These copies either burst out of the cell or are released into the bloodstream to continue their journey.

“Chlamydia is pretty unique in that regard,” said Ken Beagley, a professor of immunology at Queensland University of Technology and a former colleague of Dr. Timms. “It’s evolved to survive incredibly well in a particular niche, it doesn’t kill its host and the damage it causes occurs over quite a long time.”

The bacterium can hang out in the genital tract for months or years, wreaking reproductive havoc. Scarring and chronic inflammation can lead to infertility, ectopic pregnancy or pelvic inflammatory disease. Evidence is mounting that chlamydia harms male fertility as well: Dr. Beagley has found that the bacteria damages sperm and could lead to birth abnormalities.

All of this — except the spring break parties — is true in both humans and koalas. Researchers who work with both species note that koala chlamydia looks strikingly similar to the human version. The main difference is severity: In koalas, the bacterium rapidly ascends the urogenital tract, and can jump from the reproductive organs to the bladder thanks to their anatomical proximity.

These parallels have led Dr. Timms to argue that koalas could serve as a “missing link” in the search for a human vaccine. “The koala is more than just a fancy animal model,” he said. “It actually is really useful for human studies.”

An ancient curse

No one knows how or when koalas first got chlamydia. But the curse is at least centuries old.

In 1798, European explorers reached the mountains of New South Wales and spied a creature that defied description: ear-tufted and spoon-nosed, it peered down stoically from the crooks of towering eucalyptus trees. They compared it to the wombat, the sloth and the monkey. They settled on “native bear” and gave it the genus name Phascolarctos (from the Greek for “leather pouch” and “bear”), spawning the misconception that the koala bear is, in fact, a bear.

“The graveness of the visage,” The Sydney Gazette wrote in 1803, “would seem to indicate a more than ordinary portion of animal sagacity.”

In the late 19th century, the Australian naturalist Ellis Troughton noted that the “quaint and lovable koala” was also particularly susceptible to disease. The animals suffered from an eye ailment similar to pink eye, which he blamed for waves of koala die-offs in the 1890s and 1900s. At the same time, the anatomist J.P. Hill found that koalas from Queensland and New South Wales often had ovaries and uteruses riddled with cysts. Many modern scientists now believe those koalas were probably afflicted with the same scourge: chlamydia.

Koalas today have even more to worry about. Dogs, careless drivers and, recently, rampant bushfires have driven their numbers down so far that conservation groups are calling for koalas to be listed as endangered. But chlamydia still reigns supreme: In parts of Queensland, the heart of the epidemic, the disease helped fuel an 80 percent decline over two decades.

The disease is also the one that most often sends koalas to the Australia Zoo Wildlife Hospital, the country’s busiest wildlife hospital, located 30 miles north of Endeavour. “The figures are 40 percent chlamydia, 30 percent cars, 10 percent dogs,” said Dr. Rosemary Booth, the hospital’s director. “And then the rest is an interesting assortment of what trouble you can get into when you have a small brain and your habitat’s been fragmented.”

Dr. Booth’s team treats “chlamydia koalas” with an amped-up regimen of the same antibiotics used on humans. “I get all of my chlamydia information from the C.D.C.,” she said, referring to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in the United States, “because America is the great center for chlamydia.”

But the cure can be as deadly as the disease. Deep inside a koala’s intestines, an army of bacteria helps the animal subsist off eucalyptus, a plant toxic to every other animal. “These are the ultimate example of an animal that’s completely dependent on a population of bacteria,” Dr. Booth said. Antibiotics extinguish that crucial gut flora, leaving a koala unable to gain nutrients from its food.

In a 2019 trial led by Dr. Timms and Dr. Booth, one of five koalas treated with antibiotics later had to be euthanized “due to gastrointestinal complications, resulting in muscle wasting and dehydration.” The problem is so dire that vets give antibiotic-treated koalas “poo shakes” — fecal transplants, essentially — in the hopes of restoring their microbiota.

For the past decade, Dr. Timms has worked to perfect a vaccine. Rather than treat animals once they are already sick, a widespread vaccine would protect koalas from any future sexual encounter and from passing the infection from mother to newborn. His formula, developed with Dr. Beagley, appears to work well: Trials have shown that it is safe to use and takes effect within 60 days, and that animals show immune responses that span their entire reproductive lives. The next step is optimizing it for use in the field.

At Endeavour, the vets treating Jo got a surprise: Molecular tests showed she was chlamydia-free. That meant she could be recruited for the current trial, which is testing a combined vaccine against chlamydia and the koala retrovirus known as KoRV, a virus in the same family as H.I.V. that similarly knocks down the koala’s immune system and makes chlamydia more deadly.

Dr. Timms is hoping that this trial and another in New South Wales will be the “clincher” — the last step before the government rolls out mass vaccinations. If he is right, it could be good news for more than just koalas.

Of mice and marsupials

Dr. Timms began his career studying chlamydia in livestock before moving on to using mice as a model for a human vaccine. Cheap, plentiful and amenable to genetic manipulation, mice have long been the gold standard for studying reproductive disease.

But the mouse model comes with serious drawbacks. Most glaringly, mice exhibit a profoundly different immune response to chlamydia than ours, making the idea of testing a mouse for a human vaccine “completely flawed,” Dr. Timms said.

After a decade of doing mouse work, he reasoned that he could take the insights he had gleaned and apply them to an animal that was actually suffering and possible to cure: the koala. “We don’t need a vaccine for mice,” he said. With “koala work, as hard as that is, and as difficult as that is, the results you get are the ones that matter.”

The more Dr. Timms worked with koalas, the more he realized that these marsupials were not so different from you and me. Here was a species that, like us, was naturally infected with several strains of chlamydia and suffered from similar reproductive outcomes, including infertility. He realized he might have a useful model animal on his hands.

“You’re better off doing a bad experiment in koalas than a good experiment in mice,” Dr. Timms said. “Because koalas really do get chlamydia and they really do get reproductive tract disease, so everything you do is relevant.”

Outside Australia, many researchers say the idea of a koala model is clever but difficult to implement. Dr. Darville pointed out that it would be expensive and logistically impossible to test 30 different vaccines in koalas. (According to Endeavour, it costs roughly $2,000 to pluck one koala from its tree and give it a health exam.)

Still, Dr. Timms said, the challenge was worth attempting: “The reason that we’re making a case that in between mouse and humans you should put koalas — rather than guinea pigs, minipigs and monkeys — is that koalas address all of the weaknesses, to some degree, that the others have.”

Paola Massari, an immunologist at Tufts Medical School, is collaborating with Dr. Timms to test a different potential vaccine in koalas. “The koala represents a perfect clinical model, because it’s an animal for which you can do some experimentation that’s a little more than what you can do in humans,” she said. “And at the same time, if you get results, you are curing a disease (in koalas).”

An unlikely alliance

On a hot February afternoon, Dr. Booth strode out into the blaring sunlight of the Australia Zoo grounds. She was heading to the chlamydia wards, which in 2018 were officially named the John Oliver Koala Chlamydia Ward after a grant was donated on the comedian’s behalf. About 20 sick koalas were being treated with antibiotics that day, with dozens more on the road to recovery.

Dr. Booth stepped up to a leafy enclosure, where a fluffy gray female eyed her curiously from her perch. This koala was originally brought in for chlamydia but had since recovered; her reason for being here, listed on her cage, was “misadventure.”

“This is little Lorna, who’s rather interesting,” Dr. Booth said. “She has a baby in her pouch and she’s had problems with her glucose metabolism” — she had diabetes.

Wasn’t it unusual to have an animal that gets such humanlike diseases: diabetes, cancer and sexually transmitted infections? “We are but an animal,” Dr. Booth said, throwing her hands up in a gesture of unity with the world. “We didn’t think of it first.”

It is still uncertain to what extent the research on koala chlamydia will help in developing a human vaccine. (Dr. Darville had been working for nine months when Covid-19 hit, shuttering her lab and slowing scientific progress.) What is certain is that the research done on human chlamydia has greatly benefited koalas. From human antibiotics to mouse insights, wildlife veterinarians have far more tools than before to save the vulnerable marsupials.

For Dr. Booth, helping koalas is more than enough. “I don’t want to save humans,” she said. “My emphasis is completely the other way: I want to use human research to help save other animals. Because they don’t have a voice unless we speak for them.”

[xranker]

How capitalism killed one of the best video game studios

The week's best photojournalism Fifteen years ago, the game studio Valve released Half Life 2 , a first-person shooter about a physicist fighting an alien occupation of Earth The game was a smash hit, selling over 10 million copies and winning dozens of "game of the year" awards. Naturally, Valve planned a sequel, only this time broken into three parts Episode 1 and Episode 2 duly followed in 2006 and 2007 respectively, which were both enormous successes as well But, to the bitter disappointment of eager fans, the third installment never came Indeed, Valve — once one of the most artistically creative game studios in the world — has all but stopped producing games altogether What happened? In a word: capitalism Valve has mutated from a game developer into a ruthless financial middleman through its platform Steam, which has become the largest platform for digital game distribution — allowing them to make huge amounts of money while creating virtually nothing original themselves It took several years for this transformation to be completed. In 2007 Valve released Portal , an excellent puzzle game, and Team Fortress 2 , a team-based shooter They followed up with cooperative zombie survival games Left 4 Dead in 2008 and Left 4 Dead 2 in 2009 In 2011 they released Portal 2 , and in 2013 Dota 2 , a multiplayer battle arena game All six were big successes For a few years after 2007, Valve co-founder and president Gabe Newell assured interviewers that the studio was working on Episode 3 , and the company released a bunch of concept art to that effect But then he clammed up , and the final installment never came Indeed, innovative single-player games — what used to be Valve's bread and butter, starting with their groundbreaking first game Half Life in 1998 — have completely vanished from their output They haven't produced one for eight years — Portal 2 was the last one up to this day Meanwhile, Valve's focus has quite obviously moved to Steam The platform, which serves as a one-stop shop for gamers to buy and download titles from nearly every major game developer, reportedly made roughly $43 billion in revenue in 2017 (as it takes a substantial cut of every sale), up from $35 billion in 2016 — and that doesn't include revenue from downloadable content and "microtransactions" (that is, in-game purchases of cosmetic items and such) There is clearly a lot more money in being an Amazon-style distribution platform than in developing games What's more, that money is a lot easier to make First-mover advantage and network effects do most of the work for you At first glance, this seems somewhat odd Surely it would be possible to run Steam and produce games — indeed, with the fat Steam profits Valve could generously fund its production department, and maybe even take bolder risks than they used to Not producing Episode 3 surely meant tens of millions of dollars in foregone profits, not to mention millions more in abandoned development work and legions of infuriated fans. That's not exactly great business practice! And besides, while the Half Life 2 series is great, it's not like it was some Proustian flawless masterpiece. A game that was basically similar to Episode 2 with a reasonably compelling story would have sold like hotcakes. Indeed, Marc Laidlaw, a former Valve writer who wrote most of the first two games in the series, published a thinly-disguised Episode 3 plot synopsis in 2017, which would have worked just fine So what gives? One factor is that a capitalist business mindset is badly corrosive to an artistic temperament Running a platform is all about tweaking its setup to maximize revenue, even if that comes as the cost of lousy art For instance, Steam has long had a wide-open policy to independent games, doing almost nothing to validate quality and not even that much to stop copyright infringement The result, as Jim Sterling has covered extensively , was an absolute tsunami of atrocious "asset flips" (games made by slapping together pre-made assets from third-party stores) and other even worse garbage — like a game about a school shooting Independent developers working on genuinely high-quality games have found their titles drowned in a sea of dreck on the platform Valve itself even allowed an appallingly bad third-party Half Life game using Valve's own branding, engine, and assets to be published there The development of microtransactions is even more corrosive. Research demonstrates that most revenue from these purchases come from a tiny minority of players with impulse control problems (like children with their parent's credit card number ). That leads to games deliberately designed like addictive drugs or gambling to hook the " whales " — things like restricting processes behind frustrating time gates that you can pay to unlock, or selling slot machine-style "loot boxes" which have a small chance to contain something good, or even simple "pay-to-win" mechanics, where the best items in the game simply must be bought A great many awful mobile games are designed around these techniques Valve has clearly internalized a lot of this abusive capitalist mindset The only major game it has released since Dota 2 is an online card game called Artifact , where one builds a deck by buying random card packs and individual cards on a secondary marketplace It came out to middling reviews in late 2018 (one streamer quit after he spent $300 on cards and still couldn't even build two quality decks), and the player population has since fallen by about 95 percent Meanwhile, as Valve has stopped producing traditional games, it has hemorrhaged talent No writers who worked on the Half Life series remain at the company Another factor may be simple lack of pressure to publish In 2004 David Hodgson published a book called Raising the Bar about the development of Half Life 2 , which was published after its release but written beforehand. In the foreword, Newell wrote that "I have the world's worst case of stage fright You, the reader, know how the launch of Half Life 2 went … Did we create a worthy successor to Half Life? Did we live up to gamers' expectations? Did we pull it off? You know, and I don't, and that seems terribly unfair to me right now" Artists are often very anxious about how their creations will be received A game studio which makes its money from selling games has no choice but to publish at some point But one with a monopolist platform that essentially prints money can keep neurotically tweaking and polishing their work forever, until they either give up or their abilities rot away to nothing This situation may not last forever though, as other game companies are attempting to horn in on Steam's market share Epic Games, publisher of the massive hit Fortnite , recently launched an "Epic Store," and has aggressively scooped up exclusive rights to tons of upcoming third-party games with both direct payments and a generous revenue split Steam's quasi-monopoly may soon end — and that is probably a good thing. Even after 12 years, the Half Life property is one of the most valuable in the gaming market Maybe it's time for Newell and company to remember why they got in the business in the first place Read the full article

[coppolafrancis]

‘Diamonds Are Forever,’ and Made by Machine

De Beers is getting into the lab-created diamond business with a new line of fashion jewelry and an aggressive pricing strategy.

OXFORDSHIRE, England — In a white industrial building in the rolling hills of the English countryside 16 miles from Oxford, silver machines shaped like spaceships hum inside vast laboratories. They are replicating the extreme pressure and temperatures found deep in the earth’s crust and producing, in mere weeks, what historically nature managed only over billions of years: flawless diamonds.

This is the Element Six Innovation Center, the industrial arm of De Beers, the diamond behemoth that has operated mines from the Arctic to South Africa, that created (and for most of the 20th century controlled) the global diamond market, that convinced the world “a diamond is forever” and that made diamonds synonymous with engagement rings.

Focused for decades on things as diverse as tools for oil and gas drillers, high-powered lasers and state-of-the-art speaker systems, the De Beers scientists at Element Six have moved into new territory in recent months as the company sets its sights on a lucrative market it traditionally shunned: the production of synthetic jewelry stones.

On Tuesday, De Beers will introduce Lightbox, a fashion jewelry label selling (relatively) low-budget gems with mass-market appeal. (Think a sweet 16 gift, not an engagement ring.) Pastel pink, white and baby-blue lab-grown studs and pendants, priced from $200 for a quarter carat to $800 for one carat, will be presented in candy-colored cardboard gift boxes and initially sold directly to consumers via e-commerce.

Although diamonds made by companies like Diamond Foundry in the United States and New Diamond Technology of Russia usually cost 30 to 40 percent less than their natural counterparts, they are nowhere near as cheap as the ones from Lightbox, which will undercut its competitors by roughly 75 percent.

Through its aggressive pricing and pointed marketing, De Beers clearly aims to be a dominant player in this growing market, while simultaneously protecting its core business.

“The big miners have held concerns about the growth of the synthetic diamond jewelry market for some time, particularly over the last decade, as the quality of stones has improved and manufacturing costs have started to fall,” said Paul Zimnisky, an independent diamond industry analyst and consultant.

De Beers, which controls about 30 percent of the world’s supply of mined stones (down from two-thirds in 1998) and owns the fine jewelry brands De Beers and Forevermark, said it was just responding to consumer demand.

“Having done our research, we see a massive opportunity to enter into the fashion jewelry market now by doing something that consumers tell us that they want but that no one else has done yet: synthetic stones in new and fun colors, with lots of sparkle and at a far more accessible price point than existing lab-grown diamond offerings,” Bruce Cleaver, the chief executive, said during a phone interview.

The idea would have been unthinkable even two years ago, when De Beers was part of the “Real Is Rare” campaign to combat the promotion of synthetic stones as alternatives to mined diamonds led by the Diamond Producers Association Campaign. Though man-made stones account for only about 2 percent of the diamond industry’s supply, analysts at Citibank have forecast a possible rise to 10 percent by 2030.

“Consumers are clearly curious about synthetic stones,” Mr. Zimnisky said. “This isn’t a market that is about to go away.”

Chemically identical to mined diamonds (unlike past diamond substitutes such as cubic zirconia, moissanite or Swarovski crystals), synthetic diamonds have long been used for industrial purposes. De Beers itself has been “growing” diamonds at Element Six for 50 years, gradually producing stones from a hydrocarbon gas mixture in a high-pressure, high-temperature reactor.

But as Silicon Valley competitors began to market their synthetics as acceptable, greener choices and price them accordingly, De Beers, whose mining peers include Rio Tinto and Russia’s Alrosa, has decided to take the fight for market share to the laboratory turf. Alongside its high-pressure, high-temperature operations, Element Six is using a newer process known as C.V.D., or chemical vapor deposition, which uses low pressure in a vacuum filled with gases that react to create layers of carbon that gradually consolidate into a single stone. The new method is cheaper and easier to monitor than the older one and hence capable of being scalable as a jewelry business.

“Synthetics will never be as big as our natural business, and our investments into the space are dwarfed by those elsewhere,” Mr. Cleaver said. “But we have a massive advantage over everyone else, given the know-how and infrastructure provided by Element Six. So it’s something we have decided to be very serious about.” (A $94 million plant that De Beers is building in Gresham, Ore., is expected to generate half a million rough carats a year after its completion in 2020.)

At issue is an almost metaphysical question of what defines a diamond.

Is it its chemical structure, which is the argument of the synthetic manufacturers? Or is it its provenance: created deep in the ground by Mother Earth, rather than cooked up in a machine?

Consumers are understandably confused. In a poll of 2,011 adults conducted this month for the Diamond Producers Association by Harris Insights & Analytics, 68 percent said they did not consider synthetics to be real diamonds, 16 percent said they thought they were, and 16 percent said they weren’t sure. But an acceptance of these new products has the potential to transform the diamond market, because lab-grown diamonds are endlessly replicable.

Sally Morrison, the head of marketing for Lightbox, said the brand’s products were meant to be viewed by consumers as playful accessories.

“Everyone who is in this space is focusing their marketing on the bridal category,” Ms. Morrison said. “And we believe they are missing an incredibly interesting opportunity: the self-purchasing professional and younger woman, the older woman who already has a jewelry collection,” and any woman “who doesn’t want the weight and seriousness of a real diamond for everyday life.”

The message is conveyed though packaging that is clearly labeled “laboratory-grown diamonds” and intended to be the opposite of a velvet box. An inaugural ad campaign was styled by Micaela Erlanger, who became famous for dressing the actress Lupita Nyong’o for the red carpet. Featuring a diverse cast of young models romping in denim shirts and holding sparklers and laughing, the ads come with taglines like “Live, Laugh, Sparkle.”

“Man-made diamonds should not cost the same as natural stones — they really are totally separate businesses,” Steve Coe, the general manager of Lightbox, said as he stood by a glass box the size of a bowling bowl at Element Six. Inside was a diamond seed, from which a stone was growing roughly 0.0004 inch an hour.

A former scientist and head of innovation at Element Six, Mr. Coe moved to De Beers 18 months ago to study approaches to the synthetic jewelry market. “I am not that concerned by the other guys,” he said. “We are simply positioning the product at a price it should be, and where it will be in five or six years’ time, thus making sure our customers today are not unhappy customers tomorrow.”

In addition, Mr. Coe was also at pains to debunk what he called many of the “misleading and bogus claims” around synthetic diamonds: that they are more sustainable alternatives to mined stones, with shorter supply chains and smaller carbon footprints.

“Given the pressure required to create lab-grown diamonds, it’s akin to the Eiffel Tower being stacked on a can of Coke,” he said. “If you look at the detailed numbers, the energy consumption levels between natural and man-made diamonds are in the same ballpark.”

This is not the first time De Beers has created brands and advertising strategies in response to disruption in the diamond market since it gave up its monopoly in 2000, abandoning its 60-year policy of controlling supply and demand to concentrate on mining and marketing instead.

In 2002, after fashion brands such as Dior and Chanel began seriously penetrating the fine jewelry market, selling the importance of their design expertise, De Beers entered into a joint venture with LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton and founded De Beers Diamond Jewelry. (De Beers had been forbidden to directly sell or distribute its diamonds in the United States because of longtime antitrust issues, since settled.) In 2017, De Beers bought out the 50 percent stake owned by LVMH to take full control of the brand.

Owning the brand gives De Beers “a much better view on what you think people will pay for medium- and long-term supply,” Mr. Cleaver said. “It’s an exceptionally valuable business for us in that sense. So is Forevermark.” That brand, which focuses on responsibly sourced gems, was created in 2008, partly in response to consumer appetite for conflict-free diamonds.

Lightbox is fully in line with this strategy. “Synthetics are fun and fashionable, but they are not real diamonds in my book,” Mr. Cleaver said. “They aren’t rare or given at life’s great moments. Nor should they be.”

If you are in search of diamond earrings for men then please contact us and send your queries.

[drcontrarian]

The New Normal - From a Real World Perspective

I think it is pretty ironic that our attitudes towards toilet paper reveal what shitty humans we are.

And it is ably demonstrated by ‘everyman-and-his-dog’ offering advice on the Post-Covid world and inane ‘tips to transform yourself in a crisis’ that masquerade as marketing advice; as if these pundits have experience in the effects of the pandemic.

On the  plus side, true blue capitalists are hard to keep down and it is good fun to watch.

But that does not mean we can’t grapple with some of the issues we are all facing. I thought a useful approach would be to attempt to identify some of the underlying fundamentals that may indicate the direction/ momentum of change.

And then, just because I hate the generic ‘consultant-speak’ like ‘become more responsive’ and ‘identify strategic opportunities’ as the ‘changes’ we should embrace, I will instead offer specific, detailed tactical changes that may or may not play out, but are worth thinking about.‘ 

Before we get to the short-term (Part B)changes that will manifest post-pandemic 2020, consider the broader socio-economic context (Part A) that it will play out in.

PART A: Macro Changes

There are a few drivers that are shaping the landscape of our future.

ONE: Major changes information technology has brought about

The Guardian published a piece in 2017 that presaged the end of capitalism.

“First, it has reduced the need for work, blurred the edges between work and free time and loosened the relationship between work and wages. The coming wave of automation, currently stalled because our social infrastructure cannot bear the consequences, will hugely diminish the amount of work needed – not just to subsist but to provide a decent life for all.

Second, information is corroding the market’s ability to form prices correctly. That is because markets are based on scarcity while information is abundant. The system’s defence mechanism is to form monopolies – the giant tech companies – on a scale not seen in the past 200 years, yet they cannot last. By building business models and share valuations based on the capture and privatisation of all socially produced information, such firms are constructing a fragile corporate edifice at odds with the most basic need of humanity, which is to use ideas freely.

Third, we’re seeing the spontaneous rise of collaborative production: goods, services and organisations are appearing that no longer respond to the dictates of the market and the managerial hierarchy. The biggest information product in the world – Wikipedia – is made by volunteers for free, abolishing the encyclopedia business and depriving the advertising industry of an estimated $3bn a year in revenue.”

TWO: It’s what people want

It is what people want, probably in response to the helplessness that is induced by ONE above.

Recently, the ABC (Australia) published a piece that observed that senior officials from the governing (conservative) party as well as members of the community took exception to the way people were hoarding and ‘profiteering’ by arbitraging the shortages wrt to everyday items like toilet paper.

Seeking out gaps in the market and exploiting price anomalies are the everyday activities of anyone involved in any kind of trade, from shopkeepers and grocery wholesalers to money market high-flyers who trade synthetic derivatives of complex financial instruments.

As a free-market economy, successive governments of all persuasions for the past half-century have embraced the idea that government should not run commercial enterprise. They've preached privatisation, asset recycling and the fundamental belief that free trade and minimal government intervention will maximise wealth and lift society as a whole.

Traditionally conservative governments are responding in ways that left-leaning/ socialist regimes could until recently only dream of. Tom Quiggan said this in an article on ThinkSpot:

“The current government led response to the pandemic and the financial crisis appears to be panic driven. Momentum is growing behind the idea that governments should be able to bail out every individual and every industry that is facing financial stress. While this is normatively appealing, it is unsustainable for anything beyond a few weeks and unlikely to be productive. Throwing money at failing systems is how we got to the financial crisis we are in now. It also means that debt and taxes are virtually guaranteed to increase in the next years or services will have to be cut dramatically.   

The children of today are the tax payers of tomorrow and they will suffer immensely if the system is not fixed.

These massive bailouts will have the effect of rewarding those who made poor decisions and wound up in debt. They will punish the prudent who were saving money during the perceived good times.  This will fuel yet another divide in society as the prudent and hard working become distressed or angry at being fleeced (again) to support the imprudent and wasteful.

Quiggan is essentially heralding the undesirable consequences if the traditional conservative/ libertarian approach to the economy is not upheld. But it is not, and even the most casual observer will recognise this in the communities we live in.

One cannot possibly believe that traditional, industrial capitalism will not be transformed into something completely different. We are creating a new normal and we don’t quite know what it is.

Whether it is labelled as a ‘neo-socialism’ or a ‘neo-capitalism’ does not matter, but it is one where trade is less free and the government (or some central bureaucracy) holds power over supply. Because the government has played the role of payer and lender of last resort, why not payer and lender of every resort. Debt jubilees/ Universal Basic Income and the like are the nature of things to come.

It is either that, or war.

Cryptocurrency is the dark horse. It could undermine the power of a central authority and give people unfettered freedom to move money around at will, without knowledge or intervention of any government. It will likely be regulated before it fulfills its potential.

It should be exciting, but I find it scary. And the reason for that is philosophical. I don’t have faith in man’s ability to create something good out of this.

THREE: It is the nature of Man

(You can safely skip the next paragraph because it is a philosophical justification for my overall pessimism.)

From a religious philosophical perspective people are cast as ‘sinners’. Sinners are (by definition) those who ‘miss the mark’. If you want to get an idea of what the global culture is like (what it values) then simply look at the aggregate of what ‘trends’ on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. Half the world’s population are on those platforms, so that is as representative a sample size as you can get. 

What Nietsche meant when he declared God dead, is summarised by Mark Sayers:

“What we are experiencing is not the eradication of God from the Western mind but the enthroning of self as the greatest authority.”

Now what could go wrong when those who ‘miss the mark’ become the ‘authority’? 

The first two observations about the changes happening are probably uncontroversial. My pessimism about the quality of that future outcome is arguable if you have faith that humans on the whole always improve things ; i.e we are progressive in a way that leads to a (greater) good or at least better.

I am pessimistic about Man’s ability to create a positive/ beneficial world when it becomes untethered from the Judeo-Christian fundamentals. Even if the idea of religion and God sits uncomfortable with you, any objective observer of history cannot realistically deny that ‘western civilization (and all of our laws) are founded upon these Christian foundations.

Whether we would be better or worse off when we divorce our societies from these belief systems is a matter of opinion (and I don’t need to debate that here) - but I offer it as my rationale for being sceptical about a humanistic framework as the basis for lasting stable societies.

PART B: Micro Changes

John Batistich writes in Smart Company predicting the following changes in the retail environment:

Consolidation (specifically in Supermarkets)

Higher concentration

Fewer stores

Online step-change

One department store

Two discount department stores

More local

Rent reversions

Percentage rent

Make expenses variable

Cash economy declines

Cashflow management

New concepts

Most of these observations are simple, legitimate extrapolations of current trends, so I will limit my commentary to a few observations:

Rent reversions will be at unprecedented levels for many categories in many areas - I predict that it will be up to 50%. (This will place pressure on Superannuation funds’ returns, adding to economic woes, and pressure on Boomers to remain in the workforce.)

Making rents/expenses variable is something that I long advocated (see Beat of the Mall). This pandemic has proven that risks can’t be isolated to between categories/ sectors and that variable rent is a sensible way of synchronising the timing of economic fluctuations (good and bad) between members of a supply chain.

The downside is that one person’s variable expenses is another person’s variable income. Variable incomes are typically associated with higher risks and higher risks are features of an unstable ecosystem.

In an article in QSR Magazine Micha Magid the co-founder of Mighty Quinn’s Barbeque (US fast-casual concept) , is brave enough to nominate fairly specific outcomes. I smummarised those in a previous post.

They are worth reading because they are very specific, practical outcomes that are articulated. For example:

Approximately 25 percent of all restaurants remain indefinitely closed with 90 percent of the closures hitting independently owned locations.

Delivery focused restaurant brands do very well into the end of the year.

Great ethnic restaurants become increasingly harder to find

The salad chains underperform the rebound as raw food still caries caution in the national psyche. 

I would like to add a few more specific prognostications to this list as it applies to the hospitality sector:

The return to ‘business as usual’ will be a gradual process, initially driven simply by people getting frustrated with isolation, and then once restrictions are lifted, the high unemployment rate will depress spend. (A recession or worse is actually likely).

Retailers will start practicing surge pricing

Consumers will hate queuing, so ordering ahead, table ordering and click and collect will continue to grow

A greater focus on food safety & hygiene (keep cups may lose momentum)

Unreasonable demands for small (uneconomical) deliveries - accepted during the pandemic - will prove the undoing of many restaurants

Price of meals will escalate to accommodate rising input prices (drought, fires etc) and unsustainable delivery costs as competition is reduced and the remaining operators have more flexibility.

In response to the above, consumer demands and expectations around customisation and health will put pressure on production times and costs.

The life cycle of new concepts will shorten, making innovation nonviable for landlords whose capital contributions allowed many concepts to be born

[bankingintel]

How AIG's Collapse Began a Global Run on the Banks

Something very strange is occurrence in the financial markets. And I tins fairs you what it is and what it means. If September didn't give you enough to worry about, consider what evidence happen to actuality estate prices as unemployment grows steadily over the next several months. As wrong as things are now, they'll get scads worse.

They'll get worse for the obvious reason: because more clan testament default on their mortgages. But they'll also remain depressed for far longer than anyone expects, for a reason most clan testament never understand.

What follows is one of the real secrets to September's inventory bazaar collapse. Once you understand what really happened vitality month, the events to come testament be much clearer to you...

Every great bull show has similar characteristics. The speculation must - at the onset - start with a reasonably good idea. Using long-term mortgages to salaries for homes is a good idea, with a few important caveats.

Some of these limitations are obvious to any intelligent observer... like the need for a substantial down payment, the proof of income, an independent appraisal, money But human nature dictates that, given enough time and the benefit incentives, any article testament be corrupted. This is one of the two critical elements of a bubble. What was once a good plan becomes a farce. You already know all the stories of how this happened in the housing market, where loans were eventually given without fixed rates, without profits verification, without down payments, and without legitimate appraisals.

As bad as these practices were, they would not have created a global financial scare without the second, more critical element. For things to get really out of control, the farce must evolve further... into fraud.

And this is where AIG comes into the story.

Around the world, mound must comply with what are known as Basel II regulations. These direction determine how much cash a heap must maintain in reserve. The rules are based on the importance of the bank's loan book. The riskier the loans a slope owns, the more capital it must agreement in reserve. Bank managers naturally seek to employ as scads influence as they can, especially when interest rates are low, to maximize profits. AIG appeared to application cashier a way to get around the Basel rules, via unregulated insurance contracts, known as faithfulness default swaps.

Here's how it worked: Say you're a major European bank... You have a surplus of deposits, because in Europe tribe actually still bother to save money. You're looking for something to maximize the expansion between what you must pay for deposits and what you're able to earn lending. You want it to be safe and reliable, but also salaries the highest possible annual interest. You know you could buy a portfolio of high-yielding subprime mortgages. But deed so evidence limit the numbering of leverage you can employ, which testament barrier returns.

So rather than government out having any high-yielding securities in your portfolio, you simply tattoo up the friendly AIG agent you met at a convention in London end year.

"What would it charge me to insure this subprime security?" you inquire. The broker, who is selling a five-year position (but who will be paid a recompense annually), says, "Not too much." After all, the historical loss rates on American mortgages is close to zilch.

Using incredibly sophisticated computer models, he agrees to assurance the subprime security you're buying against default for five age for say, 2% of disguise value.

Although AIG's credit default swaps were really insurance contracts, they weren't regulated. That meant AIG didn't have to put up any funds as collateral on its swaps, as long as it maintained a triple-A trust rating. There was no actuality capital charge to selling these swaps; there was no limit. And respect to what's called "mark-to-market" accounting, AIG could book the yield from a five-year monopoly default swap as soon as the covenant was sold, based on the expected default rate.

Whatever the computer said AIG was likely to make on the deal, the accountants would write down as actual profit. The broker who sold the swap would be paid a gratuities at the end of the first year - long before the actual profit on the compact was made.

With this structure in place, the European bank was able to assure its regulators it was carrying only triple-A credits, instead of a pigtails of subprime "toxic waste." The slope could leverage itself to the full gauges allowable under Basel II. AIG could publication hundreds of millions in "profit" each year, without having to pony up billions in collateral.

It was a fraud. AIG never any funds to back up the insurance it sold. And the incomes it booked never materialized. The default rate on mortgage securities underwritten in 2005, 2006, and 2007 turned out to be multiples higher than expected. And they continue to increase. In some cases, the securities the riverbank claimed were triple A have ended up entity value less than $0.15 on the dollar.

Even so, it all worked for years. Banks leveraged deposits to the hilt. Wall Street packaged and sold dumb mortgages as securities. And AIG sold faithfulness default swaps without bothering to collateralize the risk. An enormous count of funds was created out of thin air and tossed into global actuality nation markets.

On September 15, all of the adult credit-rating method downgraded AIG - the world's largest insurance company. At issue were the soaring casualties in its faithfulness default swaps. The first big writeoff came in the fourth boroughs of 2007, when AIG reported an $11 billion charge. It was able to raise capital once, to repair the damage. But the losses kept growing. The moment the downgrade came, AIG was forced to come up with tens of billions of additional collateral, immediately. This was on top of the billions it owed to its commerce partners. It didn't have the money. The world's largest insurance enterprises was bankrupt.

The dominoes fell over immediately. Lehman Brothers failed on the same day. Merrill was sold to Bank of America. The Fed stepped in and agreed to lend AIG $85 billion to facilitate an orderly sell off of its properties in exchange for essentially all the company's equity.

Most people never understood how AIG was the linchpin to the entire system. And there's one more mystery yet to come out...

AIG's largest commerce partner wasn't a nameless European bank. It was Goldman Sachs.

I'd wondered for years how Goldman avoided the sort of huge mortgage-related writedowns that plagued all the other investment banks. And now we know: Goldman hedged its photograph via faith default swaps with AIG. Sources inside Goldman say the company's abandoning to AIG exceeded $20 billion, definition the importance AIG was downgraded, Goldman had to begin marking down the value of its assets. And the value AIG went bankrupt, Goldman lost $20 billion. Goldman immediately sought out Warren Buffett to raise $5 billion of additional capital, which also helped it raise another $5 billion via a public offering.

The defeat of the faithfulness default swap bazaar also meant the authorization banks - all of them - had no means to borrow money, because no one would insure their obligations.

To fund their daily operations, they've become totally reliant on the Federal Reserve, which has allowed them to formally become commercial banks. To date, banks, insurance firms, and authorization heap have borrowed $348 billion from the Federal Reserve - nearly all of this lending took situation following AIG's failure. Things are so wrong at the siege banks, the Fed had to innovations the rules to allow Merrill, Morgan Stanley, and Goldman the capacity to use equities as collateral for these loans, an unprecedented step.

The mainstream press hasn't reported this either: A food in the $700 billion bailout loop permits the Fed to pay interest on the collateral it's holding, which is simply a funds to funnel citizen dollars directly into the authorization banks.

Why do you necessity to know all of these details? First, you must understand that without the government's actions, the stampede of AIG could have caused every major mound in the land to fail.

Second, without the trust default swap market, there's no medium slope tins description the true countryside of their assets - they'd all be in default of Basel II. That's why the government will push through a measure that requires the delay of mark-to-market accounting. Essentially, heap will be allowed to pretend they have far higher-quality loans than they actually do. AIG can't envelope for them anymore.

And third, and most importantly, without the huge forgery perpetrated by AIG, the mortgage bubble could have never grown as large as it did. Yes, other factors contributed, like the role of Fannie and Freddie in particular. But the key to enabling the huge global growth in custody during the vitality decade can be tied directly to AIG's sale of monopoly default swaps without collateral. That was the barn door. And it was left open for nearly a decade.

There's no medium to replace this massive credit-building machine, which type me very skeptical of the government's bailout plan. Quite simply, we can't replace the credit that existed in the world before September 15 because it didn't deserve to be there in the first place. While the authority can, and certainly will, paper over the gaping gap left by this enormous trust collapse, it can't actually replace the monopoly and faith that existed... because it was a fraud.

And that guide me to believe the entrance economic consumption will be longer and deeper than most clan understand.

You effectiveness discovery this strange... but this is great news for those who understand what's departing on. Knowing why the economy is shrinking and knowing it's not departing to rebound quickly gives you a huge odds over bulk investors, who don't understand what's occurrence and can't layouts to income advantage of it.

How can you income advantage? First, make sure you have at least 10% of your weave importance in precious metals. I prefer gold bullion. World governments' gigantic liabilities testament vastly decrease the importance of paper currencies.

Second, I can tell you we're either at or approaching a moment of maximum pessimism in the markets. These sort of scare give you the chance to buy world-class businesses incredibly cheaply [ https://bankingintel.com/ ]. A few value mentioning are ExxonMobil, Intel, and Microsoft. I have several lineage like these in the portfolio of my Investment Advisory.

[savvyherb]

California Liberals Talked a Big Game About Weed Justice. Then Big Cannabis Took Over

In May 2015, Gavin Newsom, then California's lieutenant governor, ventured deep into the Emerald Triangle, the state's traditional underground cannabis region and the so-called Napa Valley of Weed, to pitch veteran growers on legalization.

Until then, weed farmers in California had been making middle-class (or, in some cases, much better) livings growing under the vague and erratic protections afforded by the state's ambiguous medical-marijuana laws. Full-on legalization meant a shakeup—or a shakedown. Capitalized, corporatized Big Weed was real and wanted to "write a lot of you guys out," Newsom warned to a packed meeting about what the future might look like in the tiny town of Garberville. "We cannot let that happen." He swore allegiance to the cottage growers who managed to build both an industry and a brand despite the best efforts of law enforcement.

The Humboldt County crowd ate it up. Afterwards, Newsom stuck around and posed for photos. The next fall, 57 percent of Californians approved Proposition 64, legalizing recreational cannabis. In cannabis country—which had rejected legalization in 2010 in part over fears that, for them, a capitalized and corporatized commercial market meant economic ruin—Prop. 64 enjoyed a clean sweep.

Then things fell apart.

An estimated $3.1 billion worth of cannabis will be sold at California's legal pot stores in 2019. But legalization is strangling the livelihoods of the small farmers Newsom promised would be protected, according to official licensing data and conversations with a slew of industry insiders and experts. Commercial, legal cannabis has been increasingly dominated by large-scale competition from massive growers. And instead of receiving a head start or help, the little guys got hammered by restrictive zoning, costly permitting, and other regulatory hurdles restricting their access to legal market.

In other words, from a cottage farmer’s perspective, all the ills of legalization foretold by Newsom have come to pass.

If cannabis legalization is often advertised as a social-justice project, a technique to right the wrongs of the quantifiably racist drug war, legalization is creating losers on the basis of class as well as race. Legal cannabis has been lily-white and almost exclusively male from the beginning, a fact acknowledged first by self-conscious jokes at cannabis business conferences, and later by state and local "equity" programs meant to guarantee entrepreneurship opportunities to people of color. These largely seem to be failing: In Massachusetts, only two of 184 statewide weed licenses are held by equity program applicants, and in Illinois, where legal sales begin on January 1, black investors and entrepreneurs have complained cannabis is shaping up as a legal monopoly. Meanwhile, in Chicago, residents of public housing are discovering cannabis can and will still be used against them by authorities even now that weed is legal.

But the example of California’s cottage growers shows that anyone already involved in weed pre-legalization is vulnerable to a rip-and-run executed by the political class.

"We were so star-struck—'Gavin Newsom is coming to Garberville!'" remembered Casey O'Neill, a multi-generational cannabis farmer and the public face of Mendocino-based HappyDay Farms, who in the years since has adopted a de-facto role of readily available spokesperson for small weed farmers. "He got up there, was very suave, and said, 'We’re not going to leave you behind.' And you know what happened? The result is, a lot of people got left behind."

A stated goal of Newsom-endorsed Prop. 64 was to give modest farmers a lengthy head start. Large-scale growers were going to be barred from entering the game for five years, time enough for the cottage industry to get legal and get established. Instead, the cultivation regulations that emerged more than a year after the 2016 vote included a very convenient loophole that allowed enormous factory-sized farms to go into business almost immediately.

Before legalization, there were as many as 10,000 cannabis growers in Mendocino County, where O’Neill's farm is located. As of January, the state had issued only 691 cultivation licenses. Thanks to Prop 64, everyone else—who couldn't afford permitting or consulting fees; who couldn't afford mandated improvements to roads, outbuildings, or water situations; whose county-level zoning laws didn’t allow them to get a permit—is now an outlaw. Those who have come into the light have been rewarded with a tax structure that charges a levy on pot they haven't even sold yet while still being unable to access banks and file normal taxes because of federal drug-control statutes.

Legalization "is just killing off the small farmer," said Mendocino County supervisor Ted Williams, who was elected last year. "The sense in this county is that Prop. 64's implementation is really favoring the corporate interests at the cost of the small family farms."

Newsom does, of course, have an out: much of this damage was done by people he did not hire, before he became governor. But 11 months into his first term, he hasn't done much to help, either, critics say.

In his first year, he's taken a "somewhat cautious approach," as Jeannette Zanipatin, the state director for the advocacy group Drug Policy Alliance, told the Los Angeles Times. That's generous: One of the governor's first acts related to cannabis after his swearing-in was to step up enforcement: if legalization would create more outlaws, legalization would also require more National Guardsmen flying helicopters.

Newsom—who made his fortune in the hospitality business, running restaurants and wine stores—has also banned cannabis use in tour buses, delivering a blow to the nascent "canna-tourism" trade. And, as per industry demands, he and state lawmakers significantly jacked up fines on anyone dealing with weed without a license.

Newsom's office did not make the governor available for an interview on his past promises and current policies. Speaking to VICE in his place, Nicole Elliott, Newsom's senior advisor on weed, acknowledged some failings while calling legalization "an ongoing effort."

"Put most simply, I don't think all of the objectives of Prop. 64 have been met yet," she said, adding that figuring out how that would be done is, likewise, ongoing. "I think if we knew the full answer to that, we wouldn't have such a high percentage of unlicensed operators." But, she noted, closing loopholes like the one allowing massive farms right away and fixing taxes aren't Newsom's job; they're the Legislature's. And so far, lawmakers have shown limited appetite for rescuing the state's small weed growers.

That may be true. But Newsom hasn't used his bully pulpit to demand lawmakers correct this, leaving small growers canvassed by VICE feeling alternately betrayed and dejected. His focus instead has used a policing lens. "We have to hold accountable those who aren't participating in the legal market," he said in February.

Regulated cannabis farming is "a very, very high bar," to clear, O'Neill retorted. "And if you can't jump that high? 'Send in the National Guard!'? To see the first step [from Newsom] was, 'We need more enforcement,' was deeply and profoundly frustrating."

Not every cannabis farmer pins the blame for their struggle on the governor, who is not responsible for capitalism nor the war on drugs. And among the cannabis farmers and retailers interviewed for this story, Elliott actually received high marks. "She gives a shit. She really cares," said one San Francisco-based dispensary owner who requested anonymity to speak freely without drawing negative attention.

The problem is "the state," and that's bigger than any one person, no matter how much power they wield, setting communities up for disappointment nationwide as legalization continues.

"I'm not sure the governor has a lot to do with it," said Swami Chaitanya, cofounder and avatar of Swami Select, a successful Northern California brand he co-founded and operates with Nikki Lastreto. "All those agencies have their own agendas and their own people. How much can the governor actually do?"

"But," allowed Swami, "he can do more." If, for example, state agencies are making life miserable for small weed growers, their directors—who serve at the pleasure of the governor—can theoretically be made to shift strategy or be replaced.

Or maybe preserving the old way was an unrealistic promise nobody could keep. "The political naiveté of many in the cannabis space is reflected in their unrealistic expectations of what the political process can do," said Matt Kumin, a San Francisco-based attorney specializing in cannabis. "I know some people say that [Newsom's office favors big weed]… but he isn't doing so terrible" in comparison to other governors who have cracked down on THC products amid the vaping panic. "In that sense, Newsom is one of the better governors when it comes to cannabis policy in the United States,” Kumin added. “But the small guys just got hammered.”

As for Garberville itself, were Newsom to return there or visit another town along US-101, the highway connecting pot country to San Francisco and markets south, California's governor might not recognize it. With the collapse of the small-farmer economy is coming the collapse of everything else. Flow Kana, a well-capitalized startup that distributes sun-grown cannabis to urban markets, recently moved to cut up to 20 percent of its workforce. A weed speculation-fueled real-estate boom is over. Retail spaces are empty and restaurants are quiet. Since his visit, "the town looks totally different," said Leo Stone, an Iraq War veteran and cannabis farmer whose company, Aficionado Seeds, routinely won top awards at the annual Emerald Cup before legalization.

"A lot of people really felt like small farmers would be taken care of and looked after," he added.

But instead of a thriving rural economy, legalization may be creating a weed Rust Belt, with neighbors retreating back up the mountain into the realm of scary dudes with guns and rampant abuse. And "that," Stone said, "is the most heartbreaking thing."

Sign up for our newsletter to get the best of VICE delivered to your inbox daily.

Follow Chris Roberts on Twitter.

source https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/vb5a8j/california-liberals-talked-a-big-game-about-weed-justice-then-big-cannabis-took-over

The post California Liberals Talked a Big Game About Weed Justice. Then Big Cannabis Took Over appeared first on Savvy Herb Mobile Cannabis Platform.

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[blogtremendousstudentpanda-blog]

1.-

a)

Gus- I download music from youtube. Any type of music can be found on the site and through various websites one can download the audio and hence, the song.

Bello- I have an aunt that before the Reforma Fiscal, based her company in reporting different amounts of money to Secretaria de Hacienda in order to gain more profit.

Rex- I watch anime in online sites because it is not easily found in my country. Still, I am affecting the anime industry by not paying them for their work.

Guaymas- I have been corrupt lately because when I did my midterm for chemistry I used a piece of sheeting order to copy some formulas that I didn't study the day before.

b)

Corruption between my family:

My aunt had an enterprise that reported twisted numbers to the SAAT  in order to gain more profit. My parents are divorced and when I was a child, he used to tell me lies about my mother, in order for me to go and live with him. Cases from our friends: I have a friend whose parents are divorced too. She and her sister live with his father, who comes from England. He wants to take them there on vacations  but they cannot do it because their mother would not give them their passports. Even when they do want to go. c) Cases at school: When people bribe the teacher in order to improve their own grade, as it is affecting the institution. Lying to get someone suspended so they fail the semester or get expelled

d)

One of the first  corruption scandals that were revealed during the presidency of Enrique Peña Nieto  was “ La Casa Blanca” / “ The White House”. Which was the name given to the residency of his wife and family. This house was worth 86 millions of mexican pesos. Of course, when the price came to the knowledge of the people, everyone was shocked, since in theory, a president should not be buying stuff like that… Don’t worry, the same day  in which the info got leaked, La Presidencia de la República confirmed that the data was right, but also said that the one who bought it was Angelica Riviera, Peña Nieto’s wife, who used to work as an actress in Televisa, a TV production company which is believed to have a collective bargaining agreement with the government. She says she used to be paid 131 milions of mexican pesos.

Why is this corruption? We all know that an actress is not supposed to earn such a massive amount of money out of nowhere, and that the money invested in that house surely comes from the presidency. This act is affecting our government institution because that money is not supposed to go to our president’s  or any of his relative’s pockets. It unquestionably came from our taxes, and it is meant to be used for our country’s well being….

Another act of corruption that was committed by Enrique Peña Nieto was “ tesisgate”.  Back in 2016 Aristeguinoticias.com revealed that the president of Mexico had committed plagiarism in 1/3 of his University Tesis. 197 out of 682 paragraphs had been copied from other sources. This was an act of corruption against the scholar institution.

2.-

Andrés Manuel López Obrador (only scandals considered directly relevant to the elections):

Eva Cadena and the half a million pesos: Eva Cadena was a candidate for the municipal presidency of Las Choapas from Morena (AMLO’s political party) and was allegedly handled over half a million pesos  for AMLO. This was shown via several videos where the interaction between two women (that supposedly haven’t been identified) is shown. AMLO proceeded to state that he manages to live with 50,000 pesos. http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/columna/hector-de-mauleon/nacion/el-dinero-sin-huella-de-eva-cadena

Bejarano’s money: Another scandal related to money, René Bejarano was shown in video counting, in a very precise manner, 45,000 dollars while asking for rubber bands and newspaper in order to hide it. At this point in time (2004) Bejarano was a close ally of AMLO and was in charge of obtaining funds for AMLO’s 2006 campaign .http://tribunacampeche.com/opinion/2017/04/29/andres-manuel-lopez-obrador-intachable-corrupto/

Ponce’s Vegas escapades: In yet another scandal where money is a big factor when discussing how viral the news went, then-Finances Secretary Gustavo Ponce was exposed to have been gambling in the Bellagio hotel in Las Vegas using public funds. This resulted in his eventual imprisonment, but raised eyebrows towards him and AMLO, as he was in Head of government of then Distrito Federal. http://www.elfinanciero.com.mx/partidos/7-escandalos-que-hicieron-quedar-mal-a-andres-manuel-lopez-obrador

Opinion: It is quite interesting what AMLO is offering regarding his proposals. However, it just seems like it would turn into a very shady presidential term, taking into consideration the quantity of accusations and allegations where AMLO is somehow related, and the general lack of a precise strategy to accomplish all of his goals. Added to this is the fact that he’s somehow managed to stay in campaign for 18 years, time during which people have doubted how much of a decent job as a president he’d be able to do. This would be, however, a historical moment in Mexico’s history, since it would be the third different political party to obtain power (as part of MORENA).

José Antonio Meade:

The SEDESOL mystery: This refers to allegations made towards Meade where, during his time at SEDESOL, its stated that he deviated around 2 million pesos using Tv and Radio from Hidalgo. This was with the presumed intentions of using this money for the campaigns, something already seen with AMLO.

Opinion: In my opinion it would just represent more of the same. Taking into consideration the “hollow” proposals Meade has made, I’d see it as just another chapter in the history of the power monopoly PRI has. If someone was to ask which option was “la segura”, this would be it.

Ricardo Anaya:

#PelucaGate: In short terms, this was just another money laundering issue regarding a political candidate. What happened is that Anaya has been caught in the middle of a squeme he allegedly created in order to avoid taxes. This happened through the buy and sell of an industrial ship which profit was never to be seen since it was passed through several ghost businesses. The thing is, Anaya is negating to know who the accountable person behind the scheme is, although he is shown dancing in a video of this person’s wedding.

The good life in Atlanta: Anaya’s family lives in Atlanta, with expenses that sum up to almost 4.5 million pesos per year. This has some people questioning Anaya, since it has been stated that alongside his wife, they can only earn over 2.5 million pesos annually. The event has caused doubts over the honesty of PAN’s candidate. In related topics, Anaya has also been accused of using “family businesses in order to gain huge profits and enrich himself.

Opinion: I personally think Anaya would be a decent next term. This is because PRI would abandon power and we could avoid the uncertainty that AMLO generates with his proposals (and the fact that he’s been 18 years on campaign). The only thing that’s left to know is if his proposals are just that, or if he will actually do something to avoid falling from grace, considering this scandals as his warnings.

Margarita Zavala:

Not exactly a scandal, but all of the independent candidates have been accused of paying for the signatures they need to be considered in the ballot.

Opinion: A woman in charge of the country could be something the country needs to change, besides turning into one of the most relevant moments in Mexico’s history. She could be the change needed in society, however it is quite unlikely she will win. Taking into consideration the lack of “real” controversies (they are a huge case, have a lot of following, or exist at all) this candidate should be one to respect and listen to in the election’s period.

Jaime Rodríguez Calderón:

#CobijaGate: During Rodríguez’ administration of Nuevo León, a scandal broke when it was discovered that the government bought over 200 thousand blankets for the most vulnerable population. However, the problem comes when discussing the price, since the blankets costed over 300% of their original price, resulting in an approximate estimate of 28 million pesos lost from public funds. This incident was further criticized over the actual quality of this blankets. http://redesquintopoder.org/opinion/cobijagate-nuevoleon/

The FEMSA fiasco: “El Bronco”, as its commonly referred to Rodríguez, had said that “se acabó la fiesta de los bandidos”. However, his lack of efforts to make this believable turned evident with his actions towards FEMSA, more specifically his lack of action. FEMSA was allegedly favored by past Nuevo León’s administrations (Rodrigo Medina’s) with an emphasis on the 180 hectares that were donated by the government for the new Rayados’ football stadium (Estadio BBVA Bancomer). This is assumed to be due to the fact that FEMSA has given resources for Bronco’s campaign. http://www.proceso.com.mx/405426/se-desmarca-femsa-de-financiamiento-a-el-bronco

Not exactly a scandal, but all of the independent candidates have been accused of paying for the signatures they need to be considered in the ballot.

Opinion: Considering that he’s an independent candidate (and therefore has no formal institution by which he can be supported), and that this scandals, if true, would imply a really strong corruption tendency in him, I’d rather not have a full presidential term with him. This would be a gamble of immense proportions for Mexico’s future.

Armando Ríos Piter:

Not exactly a scandal, but all of the independent candidates have been accused of paying for the signatures they need to be considered in the ballot.

Hate to say it, but he could very easily be the smallest fish in the tank. The lack of distinguishment from other candidates and proposals don’t help either. If something is to take into consideration, is that his budget as of now has been one of the lowest compared to the previous candidates. This is something to admire, however this could easily be a scheme that hasn’t been discovered yet

3.-

Proposals:

In order to end campaign lies and thus part of the corruption coming from lies, political candidates must state not only their proposals, but also where the resources to accomplish them will come, which specific action will be given in order to get the proposal done. This must be presented to the a new formed organ that is independent from the government that dedicates to analice campaigns and explain the electoral system in Mexico, so that they analice if they are viable or discard  them, and present them to the public .All candidates that get to the public post they aspired will be required to fulfill at least 75% of the proposals they did during their campaigns or a monetary punishment discussed by the judiciary power will be instituted in that person.

All political parties that fulfill certain percentage of preference of people will be given the same amount of seats for the Chamber of Senators and the Chamber of Deputies. Each party gives a set of candidates and people vote for which candidates they want for each party. This in order for the Chambers to be equitative and so that people may still vote for the candidates they want for the parties. Article 52 will be modified  in order to promote this.

A new formed institution of the government will give talks through the Republic on how does the Electoral system work and in case of elections, will explain the formerly analized proposals from the candidates. This in order for people to be aware of how the elections actually work and that they may hear about the proposals of the candidates from a neutral point of view.

[racingtoaredlight]

Opening Bell: February 16, 2018

Editor’s note: So, like last week, I had a deadline to meet today, which meant that I didn’t have time to work on Opening Bell. So, some brief news aside, this is a collection of longreads and things like that.

 First, the news: South Africa entered the latter stages of a constitutional crisis this week when President Jacob Zuma, whose term was not to expire until the summer of 2019, was forced to resign by the leadership of his party, the African National Congress (ANC). Zuma lost his role as leader of the ANC two months ago and since then the new leadership has targeted the two-term president who is under investigation for widespread graft and bribery. After being ordered to resign Zuma at first resisted, but then acquiesced on Wednesday. He was replaced by Cyril Ramaphosa, the new leader of the ANC, after a vote in the South African parliament. The ANC was the party of Nelson Mandela and as widely credited with aiding the transition of South Africa from apartheid to a functioning democracy which respects the rights of every citizen, regardless of race. The ANC, however, has enjoyed a virtual monopoly of power since the end of apartheid and, as the saying goes, absolute power corrupts absolutely. The ANC has been accused of  corruption and ineffective governance, though no other party has the power to displace it. Ramaphosa campaigned for leadership of the ANC on a platform of rooting out the corrupt establishment of the party and infusing it with new blood. It remains to be seen how Ramaphosa will be received by the public over the coming months.

 Speaking of South Africa, the city of Cape Town on the west coast of the country, has experienced a severe three year drought which has seen the city’s water reservoirs fall to 13% capacity. Cape Town, which is traditionally the social and political center of South Africans of British descent, is a city of 4 million and now faces the distinction of potentially becoming the first metropolis to run out of water. The municipal government has instituted water rationing by restricting the amount of water used by each household on a daily basis, but it is not clear how many households are adhering to these restrictions. At this point, it is worth remembering that South Africa is in the Southern Hemisphere which is currently in the dog days of summer, rather than the crisp days of winter. Despite recent rainstorms, Cape Town’s reservoirs are still likely to run out of water by the end of April. Foreign Policy looks at what might happen if Cape Town reaches the so-called “Day Zero.”

This week, it emerged that a U.S. air strike had killed dozens of Russian private military contractors who were working for the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad. The Russian military contractors were part of a Syrian force which was attacking a Kurdish base which also included U.S. troops. In response to the attack, the American military forces called in an airstrike which knocked out tanks and artillery pieces in the Russian-Syrian force. This marks one of the first known instances in which American ordinance killed Russian nationals. Both nations have been somewhat muted about the affair, though Russia did confirm that several of its citizens were killed in an airstrike in Syria. Also this week, an alleged Iranian drone operating from an airbase in Syria intruded on Israeli airspace, which prompted a large scale airstrike by the Israeli air force on the base and the air defense system of Syria (or what is left of it). In the process, an Israeli F-16I strike fighter was hit by an anti-aircraft missile and crashed, though the pilot ejected safely and was rescued. This was the first Israeli aircraft downed by hostile fire in 36 years, and it prompted further retaliatory airstrikes by Israel. ISIS may have been defeated and its territory occupied, but Syria is now a country with American, Russian, Iranian, and Israeli forces operating, more or less independent of one another, to say nothing of Syria’s armed forces, the Kurds, the Turks who oppose the Kurds, and the various militant fronts fighting in the region. The Atlantic explores this now curiously international part of the Syrian “civil��� war.

When he was a graduate student, journalist Scott Shane was recruited by a government agency which he later found out was the CIA. Shane talks about this experience and his subsequent time spent investigating and reporting on the murky ocean that is the national intelligence agencies. This is actually a fairly short read, but it is interesting in how it dovetails with the increased interest among Americans in the next stage of American-Russian spy rings which we apparently all thought disappeared at the end of the Cold War.

If you have spent any length of time on the highway, you have seen various trucks, eighteen-wheelers, tractor-trailers, etc. on the road as well. Invariably a large percentage of these are long-haul movers. When I was younger, before my brother or I could drive, my father used to pick us up from our mother’s house in Houston and drive us to Tyler, where my father and stepmother lived (and still do). This drive is about 4 hours, give or take traffic, and over time we developed a game. Each of us would pick a long-haul moving company—North American, Mayflower, United, etc.—and then place bets on how often we would see a representative from each on the highways. The person with the most at the end of each trip was the winner (though of what, I cannot recall anymore). Here, Finn Murphy writes about his experience as a long-haul mover, and how they are looked down upon by everyone else in the trucking industry, as well as an explication of the stress and difficulty of being a boutique, full-service mover and driver.

If you have ever been to Britain, on-the-go sandwiches and sandwich shops are about as ubiquitous as gas stations and Starbucks are here in the U.S. The industry is worth 8 billion pounds a year and has become a central pillar of the British economy and British cuisine. The Guardian looks at how sandwiches rose to their position of importance in Britain.

If you grew up watching professional basketball in the 1990s, you watched it on NBC and have heard the theme song, “Roundball Rock” hundreds, if not thousands of times. Vice looks at how this song still remains synonymous with the NBA and the legacy of the song and its composer, John Tesh.

In September 2016, Nathan Carman and his mother went out on his boat for another fishing trip off the coast of Rhode Island. They had planned to return the next morning. Instead, the boat didn’t return and a subsequent Coast Guard search was unable to locate any wreckage or pick up a distress signal. One week later, Nathan was spotted by a freighter. He was in a small life raft but did not look malnourish or dehydrated. He did not know what happened to his mother. Nathan Carman and his mother had experienced a volatile relationship. And Nathan had another interesting claim to fame: he was now the last person who had seen both his mother and his wealthy grandfather alive. If you enjoy true crime, this is a fascinating story.

Gay Talese is known as one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century and also as an inveterate womanizer. His wife, Nan Talese, has remained married to him since 1959, despite everything, and has in her own right become one of the most significant literary editors over the same period of time, discovering some of the most significant writers of the last four decades more or less single handedly. This is an incredible profile.

Finally, the Center for Politics has released its regular poll on how the public views American Presidents. Presidents tend to be viewed more fondly as more time elapses since they left office. Harry S. Truman famously had the worst approval rating of any modern president at the time he left office in 1953 (and was only later topped by George W. Bush in 2009) and yet now enjoys a solid, if not sparkling reputation among the public. Indeed, the approval rating of the younger Bush and even of Barack Obama, who left office barely a year ago, have both seen massive increases. With no byline, the Center for Politics looks at current polling on previous occupants of the Oval Office.

 Welcome to the weekend.

[grizzlefur]

WWEm - A Monopoly On Punching

In case you haven’t noticed, this will prove that Emma is really not very keen on Jerry Lawler.

Transmission date: 28/29/ August 2017

Still doing the thing, still not even vaguely punctual, let's have some SATURDAY AFTERNOON RAW!

cold open on miz and his crew in the ring

and the announcement that we're not having booker tonight

i'd be happy, but it's because of hurricane sandy

and we get lawler instead

fuuuuuuuuck

cries

so later tonight, we have brock existing, alexa/sasha for the belt, and roman/cena contract signing

but now, a miz

and maryse in trousers, of all things

miz gets half a word into whatever he was doing before kurt interrupts everything

miz is not even slightly impressed

kurt is here to semi-apologise about there being no ic title match at slam, but promises one at no mercy

miz responds by defining the word respect

just so kurt knows

and delivers an impassioned speech on behalf of a belt

kurt responds by making a battle royal for a title shot next week

so that's what we're having now

aaaaaaaa

it's the big show

but he's shaved

he looks like somebody inflated kurt

why would this happen

welp, five minutes in and there goes my ability to take this ep seriously

and now the hardyz

one day i will understand the purpose of the toilet paper hanging out of jeff's back pocket

but it is not this day

oh yeah, and the miztourage are in this

and now finn

for fuck's sake, jerry, stop yelping

just turn your mic off and be misogynistic in silence

cole and graves can handle this

does the arms

apparently this is going to be a 15-man fight, but here's an advert break while the rest arrive

myc advert

(hint: watch the mae young classic, it's dope as fuck)

and we're back

with jason jordan entering

now his bad music has some rap over it

also present are goldust, kalisto, curt hawkins, r-truth, apollo crews, elias [NAME] and gallows and anderson

hawkins eliminated by everyone while i type that, because fuck that guy

well of course you had money on curt, jerry

that's because you're a twat

and now everyone turns to the big show

although nobody wants to make the first move

so all the jobbers do so

chaos ensues

the miztourage throw kalisto out

apparently cole hates people having friends

you heard it here first

jerry makes a fart joke, because once again, fuck that guy

big show is just ignoring the rest of the match while he slaps a guitarist

(a guitarist has no name)

the club take show out, with some unexpected rebulletening courtesy of finn bálor

finn gets to do his pin rollout dropkick thing on elias, despite that pin attempt making precisely zero sense

truth gets eliminated because eh

everyone keeps almost eliminating jeff

must be hard for him to actually try and stay in an elevated position

bless

the panel put their money on jj, so let's see how obvious this booking can be

goldust gets eliminated by a combination of gallows, anderson, and his own inability to follow up on moves

ad break, during which apollo eliminated himself by being an idiot

why would you do anything springboarding off the top rope in this match

sigh

matt eliminates gallows with a well-timed shamble, almost gets taken out by anderson

and then they punch the tits off each other on the apron

anderson gets whipped into the ring post and goes out, gallows just rips matt off the apron

miz gets the idea, jumps in to help his minions

memphis is not pleased at the loss of seven deities

thanks for that replay, the camera didn't really show miz's interference there

finn gets to do his usual comeback/grimace sequence

kicks elias off the turnbuckle, but he manages to stay in

slingblades jj, i do my usual pop

faces off with jeff hardy, crowd goes mental

and then gets dropkicked in the dick

which is totally fine if you're jeff hardy

dropkicks him and bo into the corners, everyone is down until wyatt cut bray throws him out

what can you do when your nemesis can teleport

cue finn slumped against the barricade with a face like what the actual fuck

jj does a cool reversal spot, only marred by jeff almost accidentally rolling under his feet, eliminates the miztourage, elias eliminates him, jeff eliminates elias and...wins?

huh

well, i guess they didn't go with the obvious booking

cut to miz, who looks to have had the same reaction

so miz/jeff next week

sure, why not

jeff's just thrilled his music is playing

god, but does jeff love that music

ok, i got a couple of those last eliminations the wrong way round

jj took out elias, was taken out by jeff

thanks replay

jeff is still taking off and putting on random articles of clothing

dude, you wear too many clothes

consider consolidating a bit

you're not a final fantasy character

(full disclosure: i would play the absolute shit out of a ff-style rpg about the hardyz)

(or p much any wwe characters, tbh)

(theres a market, guys, exploit it)

(you don't need people to take your angles at face value any more)

but yeah, here's a video package about the ongoing brauk lesman sitaution

and reminding me how hilarious it was last week

10/10 would watch brock get put through the floor again

so yeah, brock's back tonight

we can only hope it goes as well as last time

but up next, enzo's first cruiserweight match

but first, apparently, charly interviews alexa

who's splashed on a pretty great denim vest

alexa again leans on how sasha can't defend belts

so clearly she will

charly's interview face has crossed the line from 'serious journalist' to 'kind of in love'

and i don't think any of us can blame her

but yeah, here's enzo

time to see if he can actually wrestle

so yeah, spoilers if you don't watch 205, i guess

enzo's a cruiserweight

comes in, does his usual thing

well yeah, jerry, of course you love enzo

that's because you're a twat

enzo reminds us that cass got injured

apparently that's legit?

torn acl, out for months

boo

so yeah, step to enzo and you'll end up accidentally breaking your own knee

unless he's claiming he has some kind of probability powers, that makes no sense at all

mentions mayweather/mcgregor, gets super mixed heat

and apparently he's fighting noam

who he says has two last names?

dude, you're from the northeast, learn some jewish names

noam hasn't got a mic yet, so a trick has officially been missed

his face is very much how the fuck an i the responsible adult in this ring

and then just kicks the fuck out of enzo

pan out to neville watching

or possibly just staring into the middle distance as usual but someone's put a tv in front of him

noam tries to rip enzo's hair out, jerry decides the best use of all our time right now is for him to make fun of neville's hair

enzo does an arm drag headkick thing that he totally got off the mae young classic, and gets a pin that builds no heat whatsoever

well, i guess that happened

and then dabs on him

dude, that gimmick's taken

and now charly's here to ask neville what he thinks of enzo

he's just like hahahahaha fuck seriously?

i'm gonna be champion forever

drops a how you doin, end thing

but next, brock is alive

after we tell you how we win at social media

no, stop introducing jerry

but yes, here we have a bouncing simpleton

also his manager

paul says words, you can all fill in the blank yourself

and then a new section on the theme of how braun's pretty great but brock's still gonna win

paul is the only one left in this company who understands the importance of hyping your opponents, it seems

and also here's a verbal recap of everything's that happened in this angle

"i don't believe in monsters, but i believe braun strowman is one"

that's a sentence that needs some serious philosophical unpacking right there

brock takes paul's mic mid-flow, manages to restrain himself to a "suplex city, bitch", so at least we didn't have to cut it for profanity

drops the mic, paul follows him out like welp guess we're done

but now, here's a seth

just with a solo match for tonight, but dean's here with him anyway

dean gets down to the ring, puts the belt he was carrying on backwards just so he could do the dramatic spin thing

smart money says he'll have taken it off again by the time we get back off this break

but first, an advert for the show we were once upon a time meant to be competing with

ok, no, dean's still got a belt on

jerry, never tell us about total bellas again

on which note, here's a video about the return of cena

which makes total sense in the middle of the intros to this seth/cesaro match

and the package keeps him saying 'certaint'

bless

fuck, this package is long

and there's not even anything i can say about it, because this angle was balls except for cena making fun of people, which has got entirely cut

but finally back to the actual match that's happening now, here are the kkb

i love their entrance, even if it is just their solo entrances bolted together

their jackets have gained some chain epaulette things this week

and were their kilts camo before?

because they are now

not thrilled

pan over to dean hanging off the ropes doing the loser sign and sticking his tongue out

the apex of maturity right there

but now that we're actually in the match, i am a very happy internet person because seth/cesaro is always a great match

casual standing moonsault, why not

i do still kind of miss his heel hair, though

sheamus gets some distraction time by just kind of lurking at ringside and not doing anything

cut to ads, come back on cesaro doing a massive military press/leg drop combo

like i say, this is a good match

apparently seth started the match "like a house of fire [sic]"

shut the fuck up, jerry

seth counters a top rope crossbody into a nearfall and a great enzuigiri, commence to comeback

one day an announcer will pronounce enzuigiri correctly and i can just stop watching forever

cesaro puts seth on the top turnbuckle, then is shocked when he immediately eats a blockbuster

like seriously, watch a match some time

sheamus tries to interfere, dean starts a really awkward brawl, distracts seth long enough for cesaro to hit him with a massive uppercut for the pin

i'll be honest, this feud could run and run and i'd be happy

and now sheamus has a mic

to talk shit and challenge dean to a match RIGHT NOW

which is apparently happening

sure

does kurt just fuck off home after the first hour of the show and leave it to run itself

this match is less technically sparkling, as you might imagine, but scrappier and still fun

sheamus puts a stretch muffler on dean

when the fuck did we last see that move

dean tries to counter out, sheamus just transitions into a cloverleaf

i'd watch submission specialist sheamus

does three beats of the bodhrán before going eh fuck youse

again, puts his opponent on the top turnbuckle then is surprised whren he jumps off

dean counters another bodhrán into a hotshot, but is selling a hip injury hard

sheamus hits white noise from the top rope, dean kicks out because fuck your elevated finisher

brogue countered into dirty deeds countered into getting kicked in the face

cesaro gets up on the apron, seth pulls him off then runs into the ring

ref gets distracted by cesaro following him, seth breaks up a white noise attempt and dean hits dirty deeds for the pin

and now emma's backstage

with mickie, who's continuing to up the Native stuff in her gear

they've got a match later

so lets have a long argument about hashtags

they really need to give emma more to do

mickie takes emma's phone, makes a bet

emma wins, mickie will tweet anything she wants, mickie wins, emma has to stop saying she started the revolution

fuck, that angle's for shit

and now we have a bunch of superstars telling us to donate to the hurricane harvey relief fund, and i have no jokes there

also, i'm reasonably sure i called it hurricane sandy earlier

that was a different thing, and i clearly need to pay attention

and straight from that into burger king giving us a video package about kurt's olympic history

a propos of nothing

but back in the ring, here's mickie and her new headband

WAIT WHAT THE FUCK THEY'VE CHANGED EMMA'S MUSIC FUCK EVERYTHING BURN IT DOWN

seriously

what is this

that was the best music

fuck you, raw

jerry, stop talking about hashtags,you're like 803

and the only thing he can think of to say about emma is making fun of her lipstick

seriosuly, jerry, you're what we had the women's revolution (such as it is) to get away from

and emma gets a rollup out of nowhere for the pin

and they play THE WRONG FUCKING MUSIC

emma gets a mic so she can walk out saying she started the women's revolution three dozen times

so that happened

w/e

but up next, two people you may or may not enjoy do some paperwork

thrilling

after a trailer for the bruce lee film we're producing, seemingly for no other reason than because wwe want a monopoly on punching

but back to the ring, and kurt's back again

here to hype cena/reigns

memphis can't decide which of the two it hates more

cena comes in, hugs lawler

we had such high hopes for you, john

cena's here to talk roman up, presumably because he heard what i said about heyman earlier

claims to "have zero f's to give"

skirting the line, john

does a pithy promo, signs the paper

and here's roman

cole makes the error of asking lawler for an opinion, jerry just flounders for a while while roman sullenly slouches down the ramp

roman starts saying words, memphis immediately commence the booing

roman is basically all i'm not scared you ain't shit

doesn't think he needs to fight cena, drops the undertaker reference to get heat

(it works)

cena sarcastically bends the knee, addresses the concept of him turning heel

and calls roman a "cheap-ass, corporately-created, john cena bootleg"

ouch

maintains that roman is, in fact, a guy

openly pulls out that taker was old, injured, and generally past it

you can poke the mystique if your name's john cena

he is getting enormous pops for just shitting on roman

which is fair

mic passes to roman, who's just like yeah well you suck

cena's like yeah, so does this guy here, but he got a gold medal, so

and now roman's trying to find his second point, not helped by cena taking every pause to be sarcastic and shit on his promo skills in so many words

today's cena is inside baseball cena

shouts "See ya, fourth wall!"

love it

so roman calls him a phony/yes-man/fake bitch

then when he graduates to 'part-timing fake-ass bitch', they actually blank the sound

i love their criteria

roman comes back about cena being part-time and burying upcoming talent to stay on top

say what you will about the people involved, cena has pulled the best promo out of roman in basically ever

roman doesn't want to sully his legacy by chasing cena

so cena calls him a fool

not a thing you hear so often in wrestling

and calls him out for doing the same thing as everyone forever

and congratulates him for cutting a halfway-decent promo after five years

focuses on debunking the rumours of his "mythical golden shovel"

we're back in that rpg

but yeah, points out how he's not nearly as dominant as he used to be and he's been putting new talent over for years

which is true by any objective logic

and he's like yeah i'm only on top because everybody else ain't shit

and i can part-time better than you ever could full-time drops mic

this promo is fire, and memphis loves him

after some more goading, roman finally signs

then flips the table because he's a tool

and now...anderson and gallows are here?

to tell roman and cena they aren't good brothers

gallows's jacket has sprouted some shoulder chains as well

and kurt's like welp, fuck it, tag match

kind of feels like those promos should have just been allowed to breathe on their own rather than going into a largely pointless match

ad break later, cena's in the ring getting beaten on by some bad cousins while roman stands on the apron like oh hey that looks like it hurts

incredibly long headlock by gallows as roman sarcastically calls for the tag

my favourite thing about tag matches is wrestlers lying in the middle of the ring slowly streeeeeeeetching to their partners like they expect to turn into mr fantastic

roman finally gets the tag

and delivers an incredibly shoddy driveby

cena picks gallows up for an aa, then waits for roman to get in  position so he can synchronise it with roman hitting a spear for the pin

because before all else, john cena is in service of the show

cena sarcastically applauds as roman's music plays, end segment

but up next, a song

after this smackdown ad, at least

and an nxt ad about the roh invasion

but yes, here he is

wearing obnoxious sunglasses

just does a blues break for no particular reason before doing his spiel

namechecks dusty, memphis don't even react

sort it out, guys

apparently dusty called him the elvis of the wwe

[citation needed]

lawler interrupts his song about how memphis is shit

to say the crowd are pleased would be underselling it a bit

i, on the other hand, fill up slightly more with bile every time lawler says words

and he's brought out pelvis wesley

(for those of you who don't watch southpaw regional wrestling or havent done the wrestling, it's heath slater dressed as elvis)

(i should really watch them)

starts a weird dance-off with elias, who then just kicks him in the crotch

seems reasonable

kicks him around a bit, then hits drift away and stands on him for a bit

that bullshit aside, it's main event time

corey, you don't need to tell us about sasha not defending the belt again

the point has been made

but before that, the myc ad again

watch the myc: it's better than 90% of the shit on this show

but before the match, let's shill jerry's club

and run replays of the battle royal from earlier

and now here's miz and guests backstage

renee's here to get his thoughts

(spoiler: he's not impressed)

objects to it taking one match to get a title shot, flounces off

and now we have charly backstage with sasha

they've changed her hair, and i don't like it

tl;dr: alexa ain't shit and sasha plans to win

in the ring, here's alexa

and the camera focuses for a weirdly long time on some guy with a BLISS IS BELT-LESS sign

if there's a joke in there, i don't get it

but now a burger king ad with the kkb bickering

but agreeing on burgers

sure, whatever

and another hurricane harvey appeal

wow, they're putting everything into the pre-main event buffer

and an ad for a pointless 6-man tag on 205

i'm sure there was a main event on its way, but it's faded into the mists of time

right, here comes sasha, so it'll only be another half dozen adverts before the match starts

aaaaaaand here we go

alexa kicking off with a rollup because fuck the fans

(it doesn't take)

wow, yeah, they've both just decided to go into finishes right away

at this rate, the finish'll be a side headlock

this match is just sasha beating on her, so it's looking good for alexa

double knees to the outside

ish

didn't really connect properly

shockingly, alexa turns it round in the ad break

sorry, jerry, when you try and sell the prestige and importance of a women's title it just makes me giggle

also, i hate you

alexa gets sasha in a really nasty half-bow and arrow hold, just sits there for a while

they are still committing to going for the cheap pin wherever possible

right up until alexa just punches sasha in the face and does a flip piledriver

which doesn't get as much of a reaction as it should have

sasha kicks out, because alexa needed a chance to throw a tantrum

even as enormously long superplex setups go, that could have done with a kick up the ass

ended up with a lovely spot that looked no fun for sasha at all, but still

alexa crawls over for the pin, sasha gets the bank statement out of nowhere

alexa manages to roll over it and hit a brutal lifting ddt for the pin

did somebody need a new mat finisher

so yeah, the belt gets passed again

does the raw women's belt have some kind of bottle imp thing going on

nia comes in to raise alexa's hand and beat some more shit out of sasha

carries alexa around the ring a bit

and then backdrops her into oblivion

the crowd loves it, because there are few things wrestling fans like more than betrayal

brandishes the belt a bit, then walks up the ramp so she can deathstare the ring as we fade

so that was an odd episode

for segment quality, you had a stark choice between great (the contract signing, weirdly enough), ass (mickie/emma, jerry the walking trashfire lawler), and ??? (jeff hardy has an ic title match)

well, that's wrestling, i guess

up next, the same but blue

but first, after a protracted absence during the hiatus, there's another dazzling return to watch

friends and fans, your friend and mine, the horizontal line

-------------------------------

damn, but it's good to see you again, line

best timeskip mechanism since the text crawl right there

but now that we're done getting reacquainted, let's get down to brass tacks

and by 'brass', i mean SUNDAY EVENING

and by 'tacks' i mean SMACKDOWN!

(shut up, you think of a better segue)

but yes, here it is, the unfolding conspiracy that is kevin owens' life

just watch, he'll have a pinboard full of string this week

straight in, announcing orton/nakamura v jinder/rusev for the main event

um

why?

apparently it was just announced

but here in the arena, it's the the singhs

and their boss, natch

i will keep maintaining that this is just aj's music in punjabi until someone steps to my headcanon

and then i will fire back with my headcannon

#gpoy

away from my raving and magrittening, we get a recap of shinsuke fucking up the singhs last week

and sunil/samir tapping to a hold that did not yet exist

one day i'll be able to tell them apart

who am i kidding, i still can't tell jimmy and jey apart 70% of the time

and now jinder says words

little rock do not care for him

or randy, by the sound of it

weird

oh, apparently now he's a representative of all of asia

somewhere shinsuke's like ano

usa chants start the noment he mentions asia, because fucking murica

jinder highlights the very real problem of racial discrimination in public services, gets booed

pronounces 'revered' to rhyme with 'severed'

fucking boo him for that, if you need something

jinder says someone has to pay the price, the singhs immediately start thundering out the apologies

apologising to the entire population of asia

while getting all teary

jinder is not the best actor in this ring

the crowd are just getting into sunil (i think)'s performance

samir (maybe) says he can somehow promise shinsuke will never touch jinder again

gets annoyed because arkansas are not taking their public apologies seriously

only made more difficult by them begging to kiss his feet

"...Really?"

for once i agree with you, john

they don't quite get there before the best music not played by a midi synth hits

oh look, an asian man

i'm sure he's thrilled to have the singhs speak for him

they form a barricade between shinsuke and jinder, he just pushes them out of the way like why the fuck are you even here

and brawl commences

all three of them swiftly dogpile shinsuke

and i am mostly distracted by their ugly sky-blue shirts

oh hey, here's randy

and rusev, who has figured out the element of surprise comes from not having your music and lights hit every time you enter the room

thanks to such devious tactics, randy gets kicked out of existence and shinsuke takes a khallas

end thing

later tonight, aj tries to do an open challenge again

can't see it going well

but next, and which should go far better, american alpha 2.0 have a match

hyped for this

but first, the myc ad again, and i kind of could rewatch the first round

announcement: next week, randy/shinsuke for a title shot

for whatever reason

it's not like they've actually done much to earn it

cut back to the ring, the ascension are already here

remember when they got to win at things?

and here come benjamin and gable

as they are being called

and they have new music, which is a shame as i fucking loved the american alpha music

not as bad as emma's, though

still p decent, is the difference here

starting off with gable/viktor

aka chad gable reminds you that you love chain wrestling

shelton tags in, let's see how this goes

overhead butterfly suplex, can't for the life of me think who i last saw using that

chad gets thrown out of the ring, ugly landing

cut to ads, chad gets slapped around a bunch

i think the real question here is will your finisher be anywhere near as sweet as grand amplitude

or have an even more randomly-generated name

hot tag to shelton, who is, as it happens, still p good

hits a top rope clothesline into a massive jumping ddt for the pin

the internet assures me it's a leaping reverse sto

notable for being a) basically the same fucking thing, and b) not quite grand amplitude

but yeah, cautiously hype

and later we have new day/usos, with the winner picking the stipulation for their title rematch

so expect weirdness

but next, aj v mystery guest

and here's baron backstage

no reason

renee comes to ask him how he feels about "squandering" his briefcase

baron is pissed about her word choice and cena fucking off to raw

oh yeah, forgot baron was promised a spot in the open challenge

or was he

ambiguous wording is the booker's friend

but first, hurricane harvey appeal with the smackdown roster

including ziggler

you'd think they'd just have the faces on it

and now an advert for total bellas

smackdown continues to have a tenuous relationship with the word 'next'

ok, here we are

they don't want none, which will make this open challenge awkward

they love them some aj styles down in little rock

does his cena-lite intro while reminding us that kevin isn't allowed into the picture

and here's...tye?

you, sir, are no baron corbin

but sure, why not

he's not got his ppv disco vampire coat on, so take that as you will

and here comes a man who very much is baron corbin

scuffle ensues

and baron learns a valuable lesson about turning up to shit on time

aj punches baron in the face, tye gets in the ring, bell is rung

that bell has the power of a god

incredibly fast-paced fight ensues, ending in about two minutes with tye tapping to a calf crusher

seriously, that was like it was on fast forward

baron throws tye into the barricade, takes a phenomenal forearm for his trouble

and throws a tantrum and ringside

baron corbin is very much the male alicia fox

aj just stands there with the belt like what up

and now jinder talks to rusev in the locker room

jinder does a speech about nationalism, rusev's just like stfu, i don't like you but i hate these guys more

let's fuck them up so i can take your belt

but up next, booby rooooooooo

cut back from ads, the kanellises are here

we have been deprived most of their awesome trash music

speaking of whGLORIOUS

bobby comes down in his sparkly dressing gown, starts doing a flair strut

what a twat

love that gregg gets in on it, announcing him as BOBBY ROOOOOOOOoooooooood

best ring announcer in the company right there

wow, mike is wearing some truly eye-bleeding hot pink tights

and wasn't he feuding with sami five seconds ago?

bobby has already said 'glorious' four times

maybe stop it and wrestle

mike deploying his unique fighting style of 'just punch them in the face a lot'

bobby does a top rope blockbuster, because this is apparently a thing he does now

and glorious dt for the pin

that match joins the illustrious roster of ones this episode that have certainly happened

and bobby stands on the corner like look at my weird triceps for a while

but now, kevin is backstage

byron like welp we were meant to have a mach next but guess kevin's coming

cut from ads, and here are aiden english, his pipes, and his john lennon shades

but not for long, as we hit the kevining

aiden's stood there like excuse you peasant

kevin opens by assuring him that nobody in arkansas has the cultural erudition to appreciate him, so he should just go

works surprisingly well

kevin is pissed because of the ref shenanigans last week/in this whole angle

have a long vt of said topic

mostly notable for shane's facial expressions and a+ powerslide

kevin appeals to the legitimacy and logic of the wrestling referee's profession

it's apparently the first anniversary of kevin winning the universal belt

and he's like well this would have never happened on raw why am i on this trash show

criticises shane for shamelessly abusing his own power, i can't argue

oh hey, here's shane to shamelessly abuse his power

and get cheap pops

shane's like hey dude don't blame me for your poor life choices

now please leave my ring we don't want to hear you talk more

and aiden, get back in, your fighting sami

and here he is

kevin's stomped off to take a spiot on announce, so everything is good

immediately picks a fight with byron

sami is taking remarkably little abuse to gather the power to overcome aiden english

we should use that as a metric for power levels

kevin despairs at the poor performance apparently displayed by the ref, so he gets in the ring, steals the man's shirt and declares himself the ref

sure, that's totally how it works

sami stops fighting to be like what the actual fuck is your problem, gets unsurprisingly blindsided

and then powerbombed by kevin

aiden's like sure whatever, goes for the pin

kevin counts at the speed of sound, end match

ooh, aiden's got his solo music back

so drama

kevin gives the ref his shirt back, swags off

up next, that tag match before the tag match

after this ad for jeff hardy having an ic title shot, just in case you'd convinced yourself that was a dream

and now burger king tells us how great sergeant slaughter was

would pribably be even more popular today, which is something of an indictment

and now, renee interviews shane

he's like that match never happened, i'm going after kevin, talk among yourselves

and now dasha interviews dolph

guys, learn what 'next' means

dolph is not in fact unveiling his new thing this week because fuck arkansas

but here, have a standard ziggler-issue rant

proposes he should ride a motorbike to the ring playing a double-neck guitar

hey, i'd watch it

steps to finn's charisma

fuck you, dolph

dolph enigmatically promises something for next week, end thing

and now here are the usos

and a replay of their summerslam match, tom actually makes the mistake of mentioning that it as basically the best match on the show, even though it was on the kickoff

e's pouring cereal over the fans again

seems like it's been a while

xavier's got a kneebrace on, but more conspicuous than that is the massive IT'S SORE sign round his neck

like, it seems like you should notice these things in the opposite order

the last ref was apparently too traumatised to continue, since we've got charles in now

cut to ads, and we come back on jimmy already shitkicking big e because fuck you, tv audience

kofi tags in to do some standard gravity-fucking shit

fuck it, this match is moving far too fast for me to narrate

tbf, that's been true of p much every match tonight

does the smackdown editing staff have even more add than usual

and dirty rollup by jimmy for the pin

end thing, apparently

dasha tries to introduce carmella for an interview, ellsworth's like um no and does it himself

asks her her plans, she's like nope i am never telling you secrets again

throwaway line about ellsworth stealing flowers from a funeral hiome

nattie turns up, promises to make carmella the baron corbin of the women's division

makes a match for next week, ellsworth like oh cool next week, well in that case shutting up

and then naomi turns up to announce a title rematch in a fortnight

fuck, this is moving fast

and up next, fashion files season 2 begins

breather while this myc advert happens

but actually now, lana is here?

what the fuck is going on with this episode

she's here to do a dodgy hyperbolic intro for tamina

greeted by little rock with a resounding piss break

oh, and here's a jobber

tina stock, we hardly knew ye

lana's doing the manager barking orders thing, but with a mic so none of us can avoid it

tells tamina to crush, this was apparently some kind of trigger word, because she goes berserk

and one superkick later, end match

with loads of super ugly bumps packed into its 90 seconds

and lana's got her girl some paparazzi

well this is weird

also, tamina, that cravate throw is totally nia's thing, get your own

and now, fashion files

and its early 90s credits

still not starring chuck norris

fashion files: back 2 basics

dango's stacking boxes with all their shows in

tyler proposes a vacation together, dango's like nope

tyler unveils the new gadgets from the lab

including some headphones, a blacklight, friendship bracelets, and a belt

this is really cute

tyler kills the lights so he can play with the blacklight

finds a circle of arrows on their old files, gets stuck for a while

and then a hidden message

Two B Or Not Two B

which variously leads them to shinsuke, aiden english, and bob ross

they roll out, dango puts a second pair of sunglasses on and clips another to his shirt

but up next, the main event

but of course, we have some ads before that, because otherwise you wouldn't recognise smackdown

including the raw version of the hurricane appeal, for some reason

someone's getting fired

and an ad for 205 live, with a disembodied voice doing it instead of a semi-bothered wrestler for once

back from ads, and we've missed most of shinsuke's entrance

this will not stand

but to be fair, we've also missed all of the heels'

randy gets a full intro though

were they just ranked in terms of how close to arkansas their home town is?

barely gets in the ring before brawling breaks out

given every other segment in this show, i expect the main event to last about 2.6 minutes

and they start the match during yet another break

seriously, smackdown does not give a shit for you, tv viewer

and by 'you' i very much mean 'me'

but clearly we needed to see this long-ass headlock

this match is actually moving at a speed i can narrate, but i also don't give a shit

randy spinebusters jinder on the barricade, gets massive pops because douchebag face v foreigner

the singhs interfere because randy and jinder only have one match, and they want rusev and shinsuke to get out of the way so they can do it

byron claims rusev had a statue of himself built in his hometown

huge if true

jbl responds by casually claiming to have had a bunch of statues made of himself

horrifying if true

jinder tags in to switch his long-ass headlock for a long-ass hammerlock

got to keep your moveset diverse

shinsuke gets a hot tag off jinder basically deciding to break his own shoulder on the post

the match turns into just shinsuke/rusev, which it should really stay

so much more promise there

naturally, jinder reappears as i type that

randy takes him out with the draping ddt, kinshasa to rusev for the win

i was exaggerating before, but not by much

that match was officially short as fuck

awkward randy/shinsuke faceoff ensues

they both grin, respect is given, aaaaand rko because randy is fundamentally a tool

crowd are not sure how to take this

love american man but also love charisma for miles, what do

well, that episode...certainly happened

from a raw highlighted by a contract signing to a smackdown featuring tyler breeze accidentally hypnotising himself

what a time to be alive