#Rail prosecutions

[news-buzz]

Train passenger handed £462 fine for simple railcard mistake | UK | News News Buzz

A train passenger was fined £462 after a simple mistake left him with the wrong ticket. The traveller was taken to court by Northern Rail after he incorrectly used a discount card on a short journey between Prescot and Liverpool Lime Street. The unnamed traveller, whose case was highlighted on X by Bolton News reporter Jack Fifield, was fined £220, alongside a victim surcharge of £88 and costs of…

[m1d-45]

for all to see

summary: fontaine’s court of law is questionable on a good day. on a bad day? well…

word count: ~1.2k

-> warnings: you die, blood mention, spoilers for fontaine archon quest (only names of things), potentially ooc neuvillette(?)

-> gn reader (you/yours)

taglist: @samarill || @thenyxsky || @valeriele3 || @shizunxie || @boba-is-a-soup || @yuus3n || @esthelily || @turningfrogsgay || @cupandtea24 || @genshin-impacts-me || @chaoticfivesworld || @raaawwwr

< masterlist >

despite being the nation of justice, fontaine was not known for its fairness.

trials took place in opera houses, the prosecution focused not on proving their claim, but to put on a show. the citizens didn’t care for the outcome if it wasn’t amusing, the archon known for throwing fits if things were too boring. to survive was to be entertaining, painting as many coats of shimmering blue over your soul until it was shiny enough to go outside.

obtuse laws hid around every corner. no floating objects for the first three days of each month. no fonta was to be brought into any government buildings, unless the date was a prime number, in which case it could be any flavor but strawberry. mechanical pens had long since been invented, but had to be classed as a meka, which required a permit that far outweighed the price of the pen itself.

nothing made sense. even neuvilette, as well versed in the law as he was, did not understand the reasoning behind most of these rules.

however, there was one that he backed entirely, the very first law ever established in fontaine—arguably in teyvat as a whole, the very notion of such a crime pulling disgust regardless of origin.

‘Any person or persons found to be impersonating the divine creator, with the exceptions of roles within an opera or other such performance, shall be punished with the full extent of the law, up to and including the death penalty.’

“defendant, do you have any evidence to refute ms furina’s claims?”

you said nothing, staring down at your hands. you’d stopped pulling at the cuffs that bound you to the railing, leaving you still as stone. your entire appearance was disheveled, a result of the nearly year’s long hunt for you. part of him felt pity, but he quickly dismissed it. you deserved this—provided you didn’t, somehow, have evidence to the contrary…

you looked up, overgrown hair falling into tired eyes. you were dirty, dark crusts of blood lining hairline scratches all over your face and arms. you didn’t say a word, but he found himself avoiding your sharp gaze quickly, inspecting your wrists instead. raw, angry, the metal cuffs unkind.

“if you wish to think, say so. if your silence continues, i will be forced to move on.”

you looked back down to the banister wordlessly, the crowd murmuring at your silence. he ignored them.

“we now turn to the oratrice mecanique d'analyse cardinale to render the final verdict on the charges.”

the oratrice clicked and clunked, gears spinning and meshing as the machine drew its conclusion. blue faith filled the tubes within the walls, collecting, then were pulled back in relative quiet. now would be when the scales would return to normal, but he hadn’t heard them tilt at all during the trial… he pushed aside that train of thought once again. he was getting distracted too easily considering the importance of this trial.

he picked up the verdict from the oratrice, addressing the crowd. “according to the judgement of the oratrice mechanique d’analyse cardinale, the defendant is…” his breath skips as he opened the small folder, something in his chest twisting violently. “…innocent?”

how?

furina sat up in a hurry, the audience clamoring for reasoning, but he barely hears anything. if the oratrice itself declared you innocent, then…

behind furina, his god also stands, cold eyes staring into the crowd. “calm down, everyone. it’s clear this fraud has simply tampered with the oratrice.” your head snapped up as neuvillette closed the pages from the oratrice, sending it back down the chute.

“my god, i can personally assure you that the defendant has not had the opportunity to-“

“silence.”

he bowed his head when they turned to him, mouth dry. something was off about the situation, but what?

“since we clearly have all the evidence in front of us, i think we can safely override the oratrice’s rule.”

“divine one, in fontaine law it clearly states that the oratrice-“

“and i’ve stated that it can be overruled. which is more important, fontaine’s laws or divine laws?” he couldn’t speak. “clorinde, my bow.”

he watched as clorinde produced a bow, as quiet as the crowd below. nobody could say a word—the death penalty hadn’t been imposed in fontaine for years… but this was a special case..

black steel arrows reflected light into his eyes as the creator pointed them at you, his heart thundering. the air was always polluted in fontaine, but it felt twice as oppressive now.

“chief justice. i can’t get a clean shot.”

neuvillette bowed once more, feeling cold. he weaved through the private hallways of the opera house, making his way to the defendant’s balcony.

he didn’t even know your name. you’d refused to give it- refused to say anything, really. how his god had arrived at this verdict was beyond him… but he could not overrule the divine. he opened the door to the balcony, uncertainly stepping to your side.

this was wrong. he could hear it begin to rain, water pattering against the windows, but all he could tangibly feel was confusion. he knew something was wrong, but what?

he lifted his hand but you beat him to it, lifting your head as you turned to face him. “step back,” you mumbled, and he found himself obeying in the split second before the arrow struck. bright blue blood flew into the air, landing right where he would have been.

you didn’t want him to get blood on his clothing.

the rain picked up, lightning striking close and shaking the floor beneath him. the whole house gasped, all eyes turned to you as you collapsed. he couldn’t look away, not when he heard the sound of a sword—clorinde’s, likely, furina was never one for a fight—or the shouts of the gardes. he was paralyzed, watching blue spread out beneath you, reaching the edge of the balcony and beginning to drip.

he’d known. he’d felt it. and yet he was powerless to stop your death, the one he- the one they all perceived as divine pinning down teyvat. he should have known from the moment they overruled the oratrice, should have seen the blue tint to your scratches, should have asked for more evidence before- before—

rain came down in hails, his hands shaking as he stared at the injustice before him.

[cantsayidont]

When attempting to critique the values of a long-running franchise like STAR TREK, it's important to draw a distinction between superficial issues and structural ones.

"Superficial" in this sense doesn't mean "minor" or "unimportant"; it simply means that an issue is not so intrinsic to the premise that the franchise would collapse (or would be radically different) were it changed or removed. For example, misogyny has been a pervasive problem across many generations of STAR TREK media, which have often been characterized by a particular type of leering-creep sexism that was distasteful at the time and has not improved with age. However, sexism and misogyny are not structural elements of the TREK premise; one can do a STAR TREK story where the female characters have agency and even pants without it becoming something fundamentally different from other TREK iterations (even TOS, although there are certainly specific TOS episodes that would collapse if you excised the sexism).

By contrast, the colonialism and imperialism are structural elements — STAR TREK is explicitly about colonizing "the final frontier" and about defending the borders, however defined, of an interstellar colonial power. Different iterations of STAR TREK may approach that premise in slightly different ways, emphasizing or deemphasizing certain specific aspects of it, but that is literally and specifically what the franchise is about. Moreover, because STAR TREK has always been heavily focused on Starfleet and has tended to shy away from depicting life outside of that regimented environment, there are definite limits to how far the series is able to depart from the basic narrative structure of TOS and TNG (a captain and crew on a Starfleet ship) without collapsing in on itself, as PICARD ended up demonstrating rather painfully.

This means that some of the things baked into the formula of STAR TREK are obviously in conflict with the franchise's self-image of progressive utopianism, but cannot really be removed or significantly altered, even if the writers were inclined to try (which they generally are not).

What I find intensely frustrating about most modern STAR TREK media, including TNG and its various successors, is not that it can't magically break its own formula, but that writer and fan attachment to the idea of TREK as the epitome of progressive science fiction has become a more and more intractable barrier to any kind of meaningful self-critique. It's a problem that's become increasingly acute with the recent batch of live-action shows, which routinely depict the Federation or Starfleet doing awful things (like the recent SNW storyline about Una being prosecuted for being a genetically engineered person in violation of Federation law) and then insist, often in the same breath, that it's a progressive utopia, best of all possible worlds.

This is one area where TOS (and to some extent the TOS cast movies) has a significant advantage over its successors. TOS professes to be a better world than ours, but it doesn't claim to be a perfect world (and indeed is very suspicious of any kind of purported utopia). The value TOS most consistently emphasizes is striving: working to be better, and making constructive choices. Although this can sometimes get very sticky and uncomfortable in its own right (for instance, Kirk often rails against what he sees as "stagnant" cultures), it doesn't presuppose the moral infallibility of the Federation, of Starfleet, or of the characters themselves. There's room for them to be wrong, so long as they're still willing to learn and grow.

The newer shows are less and less willing to allow for that, and, even more troublingly, sometimes take pains to undermine their predecessors' attempts along those lines. One appalling recent example is SNW's treatment of the Gorn, which presents the Gorn as intrinsically evil (and quite horrifying) in a way they're not in "Arena," the TOS episode where they were first introduced. The whole point of "Arena" is that while Kirk responds to the Gorn with outrage and anger, he eventually concedes that he may be wrong: There's a good chance that the Gorn are really the injured party, responding to what they reasonably see as an alien invasion, and while that may be an arguable point, sorting it out further should be the purview of diplomats rather than warships. By contrast, SNW presents the Gorn as so irredeemably awful as to make Kirk's (chronologically later) epiphany at best misguided: The SNW Gorn are brutal conquerors who lay eggs in their captives (a gruesome rape metaphor, and in presentation obviously inspired by ALIENS) when they aren't killing each other for sport, and even Gorn newborns are monsters to be feared. Not a lot of nuance there, and no space at all for the kind of detente found in TOS episodes like "The Devil in the Dark."

[sebsbarnes]

enticed || vincent renzi

vincent renzi x reader

summary: vincent can't help but struggle through work with you as the prosecutor

warnings: none

word count: 645

other vincent work ; masterlist

god, he fucking hated the way you sauntered down the hall. the sound of your heels clicking against the tile floor like some piece of music. the distant sound of your voice taunting him in a way you weren't even aware of. the perfume you wear somehow became the air in the hallway, it was floral with a hint of spice, and vincent knew it would be on his clothes.

court was out of session for the day which vincent was grateful for but also a part of him wanted to be back in the courtroom. something about watching you work was intoxicating. the way you would purse your lips, eyebrows pulled together, listening to the defendant speak. vincent would pace back and forth on the floor pausing to stop in front of you to emphasize a point. he was silly to think you give him any other look than that smug face you'd pull, eyes slightly narrowed, the corner of your lip turned toward the ceiling.

"maître renzi," you'd hum, the consonants and vowels have been spoken together many times but the way in which they floated off your tongue was a sound vincent had never heard before. as if his own name and title were foreign.

you would stand before him, only the wooden barrier blocking him from you. you spoke to the room and the judge arguing as the prosecution. the confidence you had was mesmerizing and vincent would watch as you stood mere inches from him and take in the way you stood tall, shoulders back, hand resting on the railing gesturing every so often. he found that his hand ached and his fingers longed to outstretch towards you, and just as his middle finger twitched up you would look down at him with a pleased smile and walk back to your seat saying, "maître? what do you have to say?"

truthfully, vincent had no fucking clue what to say. he was too busy watching you to even compute the words you had just spoken previously. nonetheless, he'd rise from his seat, push open the wooden gate, and approach the person he is supposed to be defending with his life. vincent would find some roundabout way to address whatever you may have talked about but he couldn't help notice the raised brow on your forehead as your eyes followed his pacing figure. he was caught, you weren't naive to the way you affected him. with each new case, you'd always hoped he would be on the opposing side.

"ah maître vincent," your voice rang out as he entered the room where you currently were gathering your belongings.

"please, it is just vincent. we've known each other long enough now, right?" vincent retorted, fixing the sleeves on his button-down.

you shrugged your bag onto your shoulder, "just showing my respect to someone who's been in the field longer than me. great work today, by the way," you paused briefly, "brought up some good points i hadn't considered."

vincent hesitated, his eyes examining your face, "you're teasing me, aren't you? you already knew my points of argument today before you even set me up for them."

he watched as your lips pulled into a wide grin and a soft laugh escaped your nose. you were clever and brilliant, far too good to be a prosecutor in a small idyllic town. these qualities only attracted vincent to you more. for months now he only ever knew you inside the courthouse and he hoped for the day he'd see you outside these walls.

you stepped towards him, placing a hand on his shoulder and bringing your lips dangerously close to his ear, and with a whisper you said, "goodnight, maître."

with a drop of your hand, you were no longer standing beside him, and once again the melody of piano music rang through the hallways.

[contemplatingoutlander]

"I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!" --Howard Beale (Peter Finch) in Network (1976)

The above quote from Network sums up what I'm feeling right now. With their decision on presidential immunity, the far-right SC justices shredded the Constitution, and paved the way for Trump to become a dictator if he is put back in office. The above article goes into detail about the liberal justices' dissent. This is a gift🎁link if you want to read the full article. Below are some excerpts:

The Supreme Court’s three Democratic appointees railed in dissent against the conservative majority’s ruling that former President Donald J. Trump has some immunity for his official actions, declaring that their colleagues had made the president into “a king above the law.” Writing that the majority was “deeply wrong,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor added that beyond its consequences for the bid to prosecute Mr. Trump for his attempt to subvert the outcome of the 2020 election, it would have “stark” long-term consequences for the future of American democracy. “The court effectively creates a law-free zone around the president, upsetting the status quo that has existed since the founding,” she wrote, in an opinion joined by the other two Democratic appointees, Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson. Insulating the president of the United States — the most powerful person in the country and possibly the world, she noted — from criminal prosecution when he uses his official powers will allow him to freely use his official power to violate the law, exploit the trappings of his office for personal gain, or other “evil ends.” “Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune,” she wrote, adding: “Even if these nightmare scenarios never play out, and I pray they never do, the damage has been done. The relationship between the president and the people he serves has shifted irrevocably.” [...] Sometimes justices conclude their dissents with a softening and polite qualifier, writing “Respectfully, I dissent.” Justice Sotomayor instead concluded this one harshly: “With fear for our democracy, I dissent.” [color emphasis added]

________________ Video source for gif

[paingoes]

Rubies - Trial III

the prosecution makes its argument

(Content: living weapon whumpee, past trauma, referenced child abuse, referenced caning, past emotional abuse, war, guilt, parental death mention, child death mention, emotional whump, crying, angst, comfort)

In the Emperor’s quarters, the dead far outnumbered the living. Delta knelt upon the bearskin run and ran his fingers through its thick white fur. He wanted to reach for the mouth of it, to feel the teeth, but he dared not move without permission. The fresh cane marks along his calves made sure of that.

“Here, boy.”

The Emperor had taken to calling him boy, which he found strange and overfamiliar. To his handlers, he had always been One-Oh-Seven. More and more, it has simply been Delta. There was no need for numeration when there were no others.

He rose up off of the carpet, taking silent steps until he stood in front of the weary form of the old man. 

The doctor was nowhere to be seen. For this, he was grateful.

A hand heavy with time and with rings pressed against his forehead. Did he look sick? He didn’t mean to. The Emperor would find no fever there, at any rate. Delta ran cold.

“Are the stars all in alignment tonight, poppet?” He withdrew his hand. “Will today be a good day?”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

There was no gap in between their words. There was no hesitation. He would be punished for lying just as quickly as for failing, so he was careful not to lie. Of course today would be a good day. 

Delta was excellent.

But the Emperor still searched him. It was not illness he had sensed. 

“Is everything alright?”

The concern in his voice only made the sting worse. Delta looked down in shame.

It was sullenness. That was all. He was cold all over, soaked with shame. It was bad, he knew. He was supposed to take all punishment without complaint, but Delta so seldom needed correction. It hurt all the more when it did come. He couldn’t get the chill of it to leave him. He’d been torn into. 

Unfit, the doctor had said. Unworthy of the privilege. Disgraceful.

“Yes, Your Majesty,” Delta responded, the shame of it deepening. He hadn’t meant to sulk about it. He was only proving their point.

There was nothing wrong with his ability to perform, which is all the Emperor had really been asking. A little emotional hurt had never impacted his powers before — thank god for that. Today would be no exception.

With that, the Emperor rose up. Delta followed a half-step behind him. He was getting on in age. It was never hard to keep up.

They walked all the way past the war room, out onto the deck of the ship. The air was thin in the upper atmosphere, but it was getting more bearable upon the descent. There were a collection of advisors and generals gathered about by the railing. Delta kept his head bowed respectfully, careful not to look them dead on. With the Emperor there, he knew they wouldn’t dare touch him. But it was a deeply ingrained habit and one he saw no reason to break.

There was a pressure at his shoulder. It was meant to be reassuring, but it only scared him worse. He could see the target below. Its perimeter was painted in a pale orange color.

They wanted showy this time.

Space was made around him as they clicked the collar off of his neck. He closed his eyes. The light was painful. All the hearts beating so close were distracting. 

Disgraceful. He felt the sting of fear in his chest and prickling at his eyes. It was going to hurt. He was getting frigid in a way he hadn’t before. He didn’t want to be hurt.

He zeroed in on the target anyway, visualizing its delimitation among the pale. He wished they’d given him something to hold onto. All he had now were his own hands and his nails cutting indents into the palms. Showy. The world snapped as the target was turned to dust.

The collar clicked back on. Blood was already pooling in his throat and in his sinuses. The migraine aura descended. He swayed, but not fall. The Emperor’s hand steadied him there. It moved calming circles into his back. He heard the applause, but to him it sounded miles away.

“Incredible.” The Emperor had whispered into his ear. “You were wonderful.”

And like that, he was glowing. He couldn’t help it. He wasn’t supposed to feel a thing, but the warmth of the praise made itself at home in him. It was the only time he let himself feel anything close to pride — and he could have lived in its light. It was almost worth it. He felt sick enough to die and it was almost worth it.

~~~~~~

Silas placed the blank sheet of paper down onto the desk and slid it towards him. His expression was grim.

“I want you to write down every target you can remember hitting. Names and dates. It doesn’t have to be exact.”

The room was small and dark, not much bigger than a broom closet. Maryam sat beside him at the table. He had a legal right to keep her there — and thought he had not asked her to, she volunteered to accompany him. 

Delta rocked his leg a little as he felt at the rough graphite of the pencil.

He took the order for what it was. He had a good sense for it. There were some things he struggled to remember, but in general, his memory was better than most. He had been allowed no distractions. He’d had no choice but to focus in.

He started with the earlier days of his imperial career — the battleship he’d crushed on the water, the first show of strength before the purchase was made. And then there was all that came after. He was never told until the day of what he would be after, but he remembered them all the same.

Marisol

Pyrha

Holliday

Basalt

Clover

Killian

Versus

He wrote mechanically, appending the dates as best as he could. He’d already made up this list in his mind several times. He’d have offered it to Levon if things had gone differently, but as it stood, he’d never been given the chance.

Regina

Ursa

Deidra

Anatol

Timber

Jocobe

Weissan

He soon ran out of space on the page. He write in a smaller script around the margins.

“That’s enough,” Maryam said, eyeing the prosecutor nervously. Delta kept writing.

“You can stop now,” Silas agreed, reaching to take the paper back.

“I’m not done,” Delta snapped. 

He recoiled just as soon as he’d said it. He didn’t know where he’d gotten the nerve to speak like that, to talk back at all, and especially not to them. He dropped the pencil and drew back into the chair, fully expecting to get smacked in the mouth, bare minimum. 

The hit didn’t come. Silas took the paper and examined it without much reaction. It was a long list — and that was only with the Emperor. He hadn’t even gotten to Paris yet.

“Can I ask you something? For my own curiosity?” Silas said.

Delta looked up at him.

“About how far away from the target are you when activated?”

“…A mile, sir.” Delta tapped at the chair.

He nodded. “What’s the closest you’ve ever been to someone you’ve killed?”

He heard Maryam scoff beside him, but he thought it was a fair question, if an abrupt one. He had to think about it for a second. As the answer came to him, he felt the shock of ocean water, stealing just as much breath from him as it had the first time.

He held his hands up to demonstrate, having no other way to quantify the distance. Right up against his body. He’d garroted him, wrapped the chains around his neck and held him there. The water had done the rest. He hadn’t even used his powers.

“Daniel Martino,” he answered quietly, “The same night I got picked up.”

It was his most recent kill  — and if Levon’s word was anything to believe in, it would be the last. 

He hadn’t told anyone about it until now.

“Your handler?” Silas asked.

“Yes, sir.”

Silas and Maryam exchanged a look he could not read.

“Well, I certainly wouldn’t fault you for that.” Silas folded the paper into his pocket.

The clemency caught him off guard. Delta looked down, embarrassed all the same.

~

The shades were drawn in the conference room. It was a stormy day outside — Delta could imagine how the static might’ve felt on his skin had he been out there. For now, all he could do was imagine it.

“Delta,” the prosecutor drew his attention back, “I asked you a question.”

Silas was sharper with him when there was a crowd. He was familiar with this tactic. It didn’t register to him as a surprise, only as a kind of dull pain.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Delta said weakly, but sincerely. “…Could you repeat it, please?”

He usually would not have been bold enough to make requests, but then he usually wouldn’t have zoned out in the first place.

“Were the accounts of lateral violence within the Institute true?” He asked, then clarified: “Were the students there encouraged to hurt one another?” 

“Yes, sir.” Delta closed his eyes. He did not need to guess the next question.

“Did you ever use your powers to injure the other students?”

Not because he wanted to. He didn’t know if he was allowed to answer with that. It had been a yes-or-no question — and his handlers had gotten mad whenever he tried to explain himself around it. He didn’t know if the same rules would apply here.

“Yes, sir.”

He caught the concerned looks of the others at the conference table. The council members had shown him no scorn so far, in spite of everything. He dreaded losing it. But in his mind, it was an inevitability. He couldn’t make himself look back.

“Did you ever kill any of them?”

It wasn’t the same as injuring. The administration had loved to use him as a threat long before he was in the imperial service. He’d always be the first they brought out they sent to scare the others into submission. After the first few times — cracked ribs, broken arms, and painful shocks — any actual violence wasn’t needed. The threat alone was enough.

That wasn’t the same as killing. While the punishment had been painful, the kills were quick. Those were for safety alone. Nobody ever died as a punishment. They died because they were about to kill everyone else.

It’d been a yes-or-no question. The answer was yes, obviously.

“Yes, sir.” 

He kept his eyes down. Kitty shifted a bit to his left. He didn’t want to see the way her face changed when she found out.

Silas ended his line of questioning. The lights dimmed further as the video began to play.

PYRHA 08

SOL 07

The caption showed against the grainy white backdrop. He could see the town in his mind before it was shown on the screen. It was before the disaster. Jade was pushed up into the edges of the home. All their streets were still cobblestone. From above, as he had seen it, the town looked to be built into a crescent moon shape. The blue tops of buildings stood out against the pale sand.

“…There was this burning, endless light…”

The voiceover played over still frames of the cloud. The images clipped together in animation. He saw the tip of the airship approaching the edge of the sky.

Whoever had produced the documentary had no knowledge of the cause. How could they? It was a superweapon, they were sure, but how could they have known what? 

All they could do was to quantify it. The ground temperature had reached the same peak as the sun. The duration lasted ten to fifteen seconds — 12.945 seconds, Delta corrected in his mind. There’d been no warning. 2,031 people had died. About five hundred families.

The focus was the math — and more than that, the footage. Few of his attacks had ever been so well documented. But almost as an aside, they had spoken to some of the eye witnesses.

A girl with chestnut brown hair smiled sadly into the camera as she held up the picture. The image quality changed again as a video from inside her house began to play. He could not tell if she was the infant or the child holding onto it inside the cedar living room. The camera shifted angles to capture their mother grinning on the couch, clapping along to the silent song. 

There was some primordial ache in him that would not sleep. It’d always burned too hot. After the first few times, he’d learned not to touch it.

He felt it burning now, pressed up against his skin with no escape.

“And my friends always made fun of me for being such a townie, because I had to ride the bus two hours just to get to school,” the girl chirped softly, “And I remember that morning, my mom telling me not to stay too long after classes. She wanted me to come straight home that day because-“

Her voice broke. 

“Because we were going to go out as a family.”

The clip cut away to the moment the sky tore open.

Delta stood up before he knew what he was doing. He stumbled blindly away from the table, pushing out into the hall.

He’d taken her parents from her. Ripped her away from them, the same way he’d been ripped away from his own. The loss cut through him sharper than he could ever remember. 

He was crying. He couldn’t stop it. The sorrow and fear enveloped him in equal measures. He’d walked out. He hadn’t been dismissed, he’d never walked out like that in all his life. But he couldn’t stand to hear anymore. He didn’t want them to see him cry.

He wanted his mom. It was silly. He didn’t even know what she looked like. She clearly hadn’t wanted him.

“Delta?” Levon called after him. He stopped dead. He was recall trained — he wouldn’t dare move farther. But he couldn’t bring himself to turn around. He didn’t think he could.

He sank to the floor instead. He tried to hide his tears, but his body shook from the effort. He was still good about being quiet when he was hurt. He was trying very hard to be good about it.

A soft sob escaped him anyway. Levon bent down onto the floor beside him.

“That was too far. I’m sorry. That shouldn’t have happened.” Levon placed one hand lightly onto his shoulderblade. His thumb worked over the knots that had formed there, so bound up and painful.

“I’m sorry,” Delta said. It was always the first thing to come out of his mouth these days, no matter how much they tried to correct it. 

He remembered how young he was at the time. He remembered how proud he’d been.

“I didn’t know,” Delta said through tears, “I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

“I know, baby,” Levon’s voice got quiet. It didn’t echo. No one else could have heard. “You’re okay. It’s okay.”

Then, even quieter, the admission: “It’s not your fault.”

Delta sobbed into his sleeve, leaning over so that his face almost touched the ground. He wished he could stop it. It was taking everything out of him.

He felt a gentle tug at his sleeve. It was an invitation. He accepted it before he could stop himself, too desperate for any semblance of comfort. Levon pulled him into the hug. His cries grew muffled as he hid his face in the fabric of the shirt.

“I’m so sorry, baby.” Levon said, the pain audible in his voice. He carded his hands through the boy’s hair, doing all he could to soothe him.

“I didn’t mean to,” came the soft whine in response.

~~~

tags:

@catnykit @snakebites-and-ink @scoundrelwithboba @whatwhump

@pumpkin-spice-whump @deluxewhump @fuckass1000 @fuckcapitalismasshole @defire

@micechomper @writereleaserepeat @aloafofbreadwithanxiety @floral-comet-whump @littlebookworm69

@lordcatwich @human-123-person @paperprinxe @whomeidontknowthem @chiswhumpcorner

@bacillusinfection @dietofwormsofficial @ichortwine @whump-queen @lumpywhump

@jumpywhumpywriter

[hotvintagepoll]

Gregory Peck is not only a certified hunk of a man but a great actor and a genuinely good person.

He starred in the film version of the novel Gentleman’s Agreement which was “Hollywood’s first major attack on anti-semitism” which features Peck as a magazine writer who pretends to be Jewish so he can experience personally the hostility of bigots and then calls out and exposes antisemitism and this film was made in 1947 like only two years after the end of World War II so historically an important film(I love this film and think its underated like its great and like Greg looks amazing as he rails against bigots). I could make an argument, and I have honeslty thought about writing a paper on it, that a majority of his films tackle some important issue whether it be antisemitism (Gentleman’s Agreement), racism (To Kill a Monckingbird), nuclear war (On the Beach), post-war discontent and PTSD (The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit), the futility of war (Pork Chop Hill) etc.

His daughter Cecilia said “ My father was a champion of stories that needed to be told, like To Kill a Mockingbird, Gentleman’s Agreement, and On the Beach. He was not afraid of films that championed diversity, equality, and tolerance. He was deeply intelligent, and also very funny in real life.”

He was against the House Un-American Activities Committee and their investigation of “alleged communists” in the film industry and signed a letter deploring their actions in 1947. He was outspoken against the Vietnam War, while at the same time supportive of his son who was fighting there. He produced the film version of the play The Trial of the Catonsville Nine about the prosecution of a group of Vietnam protestors for civil disobedience. Peck said “I decided to make the film because the play confirmed my thinking that the Vietnam War [was] an abomination.” His outspoken-ness against the Vietnam war and general political activism put him on Nixon’s “enemies list” (honestly what an icon).

He was a vocal supporter of a worldwide ban on nuclear weapons and was a lifelong advocate for gun control.

He and his wife Veronique often hosted dinners at their home in support of the arts and humanitatian or social justice causes. His daughter

He was Catholic but took a pro-choice stance on abortion and supported gay rights.

He was the president of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences (1967-1970) and postponed the awards following the assasination of MLK.

He was honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1969 for his lifetime humanitarian efforts and he also won the Jean Hersolt Humanitarian Award.

He didnt just play the handsome hero on the big screen he was one in real life.

Now some photos of him looking good:

Gregory Peck vs Paul Robeson

[simply-ivanka]

Trump and the Lawfare Implosion of 2024

Will his prosecution end up putting him back in the White House?

Wall Street Journal

By Kimberley A. Strassel

What’s that old saying about the “best-laid plans”? Democrats banked that a massive lawfare campaign against Donald Trump would strengthen their hold on the White House. As that legal assault founders, they’re left holding the bag known as Joe Biden.

In Florida on Tuesday, Judge Aileen Cannon postponed indefinitely the start of special counsel Jack Smith’s classified-documents trial. The judge noted the original date, May 20, is impossible given the messy stack of pretrial motions on her desk. The prosecution is fuming, while the press insinuates—or baldly asserts—that the judge is biased for Mr. Trump, incompetent or both. But it is Mr. Smith and his press gaggle who are living in legal unreality, attempting to rush the process to accommodate a political timeline.

What did they expect? Mr. Smith waited until 2023 to file legally novel charges involving classified documents, a former president, and a complex set of statutes governing presidential records. The pretrial disputes—some sealed for national-security reasons—involve weighty questions about rules governing the admission of classified documents in criminal trials, discovery, scope and even whether Mr. Smith’s appointment as special counsel was lawful. Judge Cannon notes the court has a “duty to fully and fairly consider” all of these, which she believes will take until at least July. This could push any trial beyond the election.

Mr. Smith’s indictments in the District of Columbia, alleging that Mr. Trump plotted to overturn the 2020 election, have separately gone to the Supreme Court, where the justices are determining whether and when a former president is immune from criminal prosecution for acts while in office. A decision on the legal question is expected in June, whereupon the case will likely return to the lower courts to apply it to the facts. That may also mean no trial before the election.

A Georgia appeals court this week decided it would review whether Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis can continue leading her racketeering case against Mr. Trump in light of the conflict presented by her romantic relationship with the former special prosecutor. The trial judge is unlikely to proceed while this major issue is pending, and the appeals process could take up to six months.

Which leaves the lawfare crowd’s last, best hope in Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s muddled charges on that Trump 2016 “hush money” deal with adult-film star Stormy Daniels. That case was a mess well before Judge Juan Merchan allowed Ms. Daniels to provide the jury Kama-Sutra-worthy descriptions of her claimed sexual tryst with Mr. Trump, during which she intimated several times that the encounter was nonconsensual.

Mr. Trump is charged with falsifying records, not sexual assault, and even the judge acknowledged the jury heard things that “would have been better left unsaid.” He tried to blame the defense for not objecting enough during her testimony, but it’s the judge’s job to keep witnesses on task. Judge Merchan refused a Trump request for a mistrial, but his openness to issuing a “limiting instruction” to the jury—essentially an order to unhear prejudicial testimony—is an acknowledgment that things went off the rails. If Mr. Trump is convicted, it’s also a strong Trump argument for reversal on appeal.

Little, in short, is going as planned. The lawfare strategy from the start: pile on Mr. Trump in a way that ensured Republicans would rally for his nomination, then use legal proceedings to crush his ability to campaign, drain his resources, and make him too toxic (or isolated in prison) to win a general election. He won the nomination, but the effort against him is flailing, courtesy of an echo chamber of anti-Trump prosecutors and journalists who continue to indulge the fantasy that every court, judge, jury and timeline exists to dance to their partisan fervor.

These own goals are striking. Mr. Smith wouldn’t be facing delays if he’d acknowledged up front the important constitutional question of presidential immunity, or if he’d sought an indictment for obstruction of justice and forgone charging Mr. Trump with improperly handling classified documents, which gets into legally complicated territory. The federal charges might carry more weight with the public had Mr. Bragg refrained from bringing a flimsy case that makes the whole effort look wildly partisan. And Ms. Willis’s romantic escapades have turned her legal overreach into a reality-TV joke.

Democrats faced a critical choice last year: Try to win an election by confronting the real problem of a weak and old president presiding over unpopular far-left policies, or try to rig an outcome by embracing a lawfare stratagem. They chose the latter. Perhaps a court will still convict Mr. Trump of something, although that could play either way with the electorate. Lawfare as politics is a very risky business.

[yandere-daydreams]

Daydreams you have TWO HANDS you can take both the 6 foot monster lady and the smol tiny courtroom mascot.

i DO have two hands and i am using BOTH of them to cup furina's face and kiss her forehead bc she is upset that the criminal she was prosecuting couldn't be found guilty because he ""was twelve"" and ""in another county"" at the time of the crime. she is the apple of my eye and unfortunately that means i will not be getting railed by her would-be assassin. maybe if i had a third hand than perhaps some railing could occur but i do not. tragically.

[some-triangles]

Politics under the cut

The Vietnam war was famously the first war to be televised. Some people thought this meant it would be the last war, but people often think that and they haven't been right yet. The carnage on the evening news probably spurred the anti-war protests on - although the draft was certainly the main cause, as nothing motivates a person like the prospect of an early death. Either way, the protests did nothing, and the war ended because we lost. Americans contrived a way to blame the soldiers themselves for the horrors they'd seen and the imperial project trundled on.

I'm thinking about this because we're currently in the middle of the first war to be livestreamed. This time around the carnage is not only available in real time, it's interactive - we know the perpetrators and the victims by face and name, and we get direct appeals for aid through our social media feeds, optimized like youtube thumbnails in the hopes that we'll find one displaced person more deserving than another for the disposition of our limited funds. (Where this money ultimately goes is still a black box - the inevitable scammers aside, who are the fixers and coyotes who end up with the cash?) Despite this, protests have been comparatively muted. It may be because we have seen that they don't work. It may be because the powers that be have successfully convinced many of us that being opposed to genocide is antisemitic. It may be because our need to Do Something is being met by dropping fives and tens into various GoFundMes. It may be because it isn't as immediately obvious to people that we Americans are responsible for this war, that we fund it and that Israel continues to prosecute it - indeed, continues to exist - because we allow it to. But I think it's ultimately because none of us are in danger of being sent over there to die.

That urge to Do Something is interesting in and of itself. In stories, the residents of the imperial capital are generally pretty callous about violence at the periphery, or are simply unaware that it exists. Ignorance is no longer an option for us, but where's the callousness? Why do we need to vocally express our opposition to the system that supports and nurtures us, and keeps us relatively safe from violence and hunger? Secure in the knowledge that nothing that we say or do will threaten the empire that protects us, we rail against it. The naked bloodlust of the Israelis is not ideal from a PR perspective but at least it's honest. If they fished a new diary of Anne Frank - a Fatima Ahmed, let's say - out of the rubble, they'd say she deserved it because she probably threw a rock at a tank once. It's a refreshing lack of cognitive dissonance. "It was bad when it happened to us because it was us it happened to" is at least cogent.

Americans, on the other hand, have been hypocrites from day one, and it gets exhausting. How many times do we have to appeal to ideals which were not believed in by the men who wrote them down? How many atrocities must we commit on the way to the formation of a more perfect union before we understand that we're building on a rotten foundation? Our best hope is for a radically nurturing empire that protects trans kids at home while it blows up kids of all genders abroad. Vote accordingly.

[red-ropes-of-avalon]

Fell In Love With Melancholy

Chapter 1: Awaken

Summers in the city were always miserable. The heat made people groggy and it certainly caused the stench of sewage waste to rise and fill the streets. With the “nice” weather, summer also brought tourists and events designed to draw them in. Parades, concerts, you name it and King’s Landing likely put it on for tourist season. It’s why Y/N quite liked their job in the summer. By nature of the job, the rooms were all cold, the smell was frequently sterile and if it was bad, a swipe of Vick's Vapor Rub under the nose could cure all problems. Granted the job was in the Office of King’s Landing Chief Medical Examiner, but the job paid well, gave good benefits, and frankly had wonderful coworkers. Most bodies that passed through were simply accidents, a frequent occurrence in such a large city. The occasional homicide passed through, but the homicide investigations and prosecutions always went swiftly. After all, the biggest and most successful law firm in Westeros was located in King’s Landing and only a fool would commit a crime knowing the prosecution they’d face. Targaryen and Velaryon Law Firm was simply a juggernaut in the city. Nearly every Targaryen was a well-known name by the press.

First, there was Viserys Targaryen, the CEO of the firm, though his appearances had been less frequent with his illness as of late. He was well beloved though for his philanthropy, which therein caused a decreasing crime rate due to the resources he provided. His daughter, Rhaenyra was just as beloved as her father. She was considered an icon among women for fighting for women’s rights. Rhaenyra was often seen taking on cases involving domestic abuse- fighting to protect women and children both. She publicly displayed her love for her children, Jace was in college studying law to join the firm and her youngers often accompanied her to public events. Aegon was less beloved by the public, but well known nonetheless. Aegon was the prince of King’s Landing’s nightlife, but his role in the law firm was often debated. There was only one Targaryen name who was never mentioned in the press, Aemond. He was simply too elusive for them to learn of his life, he was simply the mysterious HR rep.

A text brought you out of your thoughts, “Heading over now, hopefully, we can catch the 7:30 train.” You quickly hearted the message and began to clean up. While all of your papers had been finished for the day and filed away, all bodies were stored properly, and lab gear was placed in the proper placement at least an hour ago when you were meant to leave it didn’t help to double check. With one final confirmation that yes everything was in place and all other doors were locked, you grabbed your bag and headed outside of the building. The warm summer air hit like a truck, immediately missing your icebox. You quickly checked that you had locked the door, before stepping down the steps to the street. The long silver hair was the first thing to catch your attention. No matter the humidity it always appeared perfect, not an ounce of frizz. Today it was worn simply down with the sides pulled into a ponytail at the back. Aemond Targaryen stood leaning against the railing of the stairs tapping his fingers impatiently. 

“We’re all good, let’s get going!” You grinned as you finally reached him. Gingerly you interlaced your fingers with his and began off for the train station. You tended to take the quieter streets so you could enjoy your nightly walk together. He had apologized for the delay, working on some paperwork for his grandfather. Viserys had apparently lost his temper with Otto for insinuating something about Rhaneyra and had thusly had to have HR paperwork filed. You simply hummed as you walked side by side. You didn’t bore him with the details of your day, transcribing the video noted from a case onto the paperwork. 

You did manage to catch your 7:30 train. “This is the train to the Red Keep, stopping at…” Nobody truly paid attention to the announcements unless they were a tourist. Once you lived in the city you knew where each train line brought you. You had started scrolling through your Instagram feed mindlessly waiting for your stop. 

“This cafe looks cute maybe if we finally get a chance we can do lunch together there. It’s like a middle ground between our buildings,” you gingerly whispered to Aemond. His eye flicked to your phone screen to look at it. 

“We could go there and eat back at my office. I know the family would love to see you and we can stay out of the public eye.” You grinned at his response and eagerly accepted. His family for all of its grandiose was always entertaining to be around. While some of the feuds were more flared such as Aemond’s distaste for his nephew Luke, others were entertaining such as Daemon versus Otto who simply adored trying to crush the other’s ideals. 

“This stop is Flea Bottom. As you leave the train be mindful of the gap.” You silently bid farewell to Aemond giving his hand a gentle squeeze and a soft kiss on the cheek before slipping out of the train. Flea Bottom was undeniably the most sketchy of areas in the city but also the cheapest to live. Most of the people you encountered were genuinely kind people just struggling with money. As you made the short walk to your apartment building you waved to the people you knew. The sweet girl who ran the failing flower shop just to keep her grandmother’s dreams alive. The old man who seemed angry all the time, but was just grieving the loss of his wife and daughter in an accident. The tired single mom whose son loved to play pretend but had no money for toys or to play with him. They weren’t bad people, just people going through a hard time. When you reached your apartment it was all a blur of routine. Make dinner, take a shower, and finally fall asleep watching some stupid show. 

Work the next day you hoped would be just as routine. “Y/N police called, they’re bringing a new body. Make sure you have the paperwork ready and then this will be your case and I’m making this a number one priority.” Truly you didn’t mind a new case to work on, but it was strange how urgent your boss made it sound. Typically bodies didn’t stay unexamined for long. A day at most if you were backed up on the paperwork aspect. Your office didn’t find it fair to leave a family without the body of their loved one for long. You quickly prepped the paperwork needed and moved to where bodies were typically brought in. The detective looked young and queasy, you both signed the papers needed before the body was brought into the lab. You quickly changed into the proper lab attire, hair pulled under a hair net, mask over your mouth and protective face shield in place you entered. Unzipping the body bag you audibly gasped at the state and violence that this individual had undergone. The body was burned and had been completely enucleated. You took a sharp breath to level your nerves before turning on a handheld recorder. “It is July 5th at 8:45 am and I am beginning the autopsy. On the surface, there is severe burn damage along half of the victim’s body. No puncture wounds were visible besides the enucleation of both of the victim’s eyes. There is nothing present under the fingernails. Photography will begin.” You quickly turned off the recorder so photography of the body could begin. You took a deep inhale willing yourself to remain calm and still the shaking of the camera in your hands. All you knew right now was this would be the longest 2-3 hours of your life.

[sage-nebula]

I've been thinking a lot lately about how the sequel trilogy (I'm not calling it "the Apollo Justice trilogy" because it's not) is a mess, and how I would go about fixing it if I had a time machine, leadership power at Capcom, and free rein to do whatever I wanted while there. And while I do plan on replaying the sequel trilogy in the future, and no doubt will get more ideas then, here are my preliminary thoughts for now:

— Phoenix should NOT have become playable again. I understand reinstating his badge because disbarring him was a very low blow (and we're not going to talk about the writing surrounding none of his friends being there for him because woof), but making him playable so that he stole the spotlight was a HUGE mistake, not to mention completely undermined the mastermind he was supposed to be now. He should have just had his own cases going on in the background, while Apollo did his own as the player character. That would have been far better.

— Athena should have been saved for a new trilogy, where she would be the sole player lawyer. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE Athena. But it's because I love her that I'm suggesting this. I hate how Capcom treats her as a forgettable assistant who didn't get a full case of her own in SoJ and is usually replaced by Blackquill on the merch. I don't think that would happen if she was the star of her own trilogy of games. And it could help us untangle some of the mess, too.

— So for the Apollo trilogy, the first game (AJAA) could stay pretty much the same. Keep that as is.

Then for the second game . . . I have the fewest ideas here, except I think we should keep the part of DD with Apollo's time at the orphanage and Clay's murder. And in fact, we could even have Athena CAMEO here as the defendant (since Apollo suspecting her doesn't have the impact without their established bond), only to disappear after the case and then come back two games later as the newest lawyer and protagonist. I think that would be pretty cool! However, we do need to save Blackquill, Metis, and the space center for Athena's trilogy, so Clay should be employed somewhere else with a different dream. (Sorry Clay.)

Since we're saving Blackquill, I'm not sure who the prosecutor for game two could be. Unless we wanted to do something where Clay was the prosecutor for most of the game, but then he gets murdered in the last case, so Klavier has to come back (a la Edgeworth) to prosecute his murder in his place.

Trucy would remain Apollo's assistant, and more Gramarye backstory should be sprinkled into this game. Also, Phoenix should pass the magatama onto Trucy in this game (and specifically Trucy since she's his adopted daughter) so that we can get ready for Kristoph in game three.

Also pt 2, Ema remains the detective.

The third game is the one I have more ideas about. This is the one where all of the Gramarye mysteries get wrapped up, Apollo and Trucy's parentage is revealed, and Kristoph's black psyche locks get broken. How, I'm not exactly sure! But this game should be a showstopper banger with the first two games leading up to it. We had the start of the plot in AJAA and then things went off the rails.

You'll notice that I'm cutting all of the Khura'in stuff out, and there's a reason for that. I think it makes Apollo's backstory way too convoluted to give him an entire second family in a foreign country (where he was raised until he was shipped off to be an orphan) when he has a mysterious family right here in the Gramaryes to contend with. Plus, we know Athena WAS out of the country for most of her adolescence after her mother's murder; it makes far more sense to reassign the Khura'in stuff to her.

So! None of that for Apollo.

Instead, he deals with Gramaryes and Gavins; the weight of generational and familial drama and trauma; of shady mentors; and figuring out a.) what the truth is, b.) what his method for finding it will be, and c.) what kind of lawyer he'll ultimately be. More of a Kristoph, or a Phoenix, or neither?

And for that reason, I think the prosecutor of the final game in the Apollo Justice trilogy should be Eustace Winner!

Firstly, because I think the Apollo vs Eustace dynamic would be hysterical. But also because Eustace would be 26 by the time this took place, and so will have grown a lot as a person and a prosecutor. And he dealt and struggled with a lot of the same issues Apollo will grapple with. I think he'd be the best fit as a prosecutor for Apollo to bounce off in that final case—he could offer insight that perhaps others couldn't.

Trucy is still the assistant, and I didn't mention this before, but since Phoenix gave the magatama to her I think we should switch to playing as her during psyche-lock sessions. So yes, I think SHE should be the one to break Kristoph's. First Phoenix fucked Kristoph over, now his daughter makes him face his trauma. It's only (w)right 😌

Ema is still the detective, but she mentions at the end of the game that she's getting ready to retake the forensics exam.

And that's what I've got for Apollo's trilogy! I have to go do something now, so I'll come back in a bit with my thoughts for Athena's.

[robin-hood-for-freedom]

Since you clearly have trouble understanding why this ruling is so terrible, let me explain it to you.

SCOTUS said that the president has complete immunity when using his constitutional power, presumptive immunity for official acts, and no immunity for unofficial acts.

The constitution says that the president is commander in chief of the US military.

This means that it is the president's constitutional power to issue commands to the US military as its highest ranking official.

Let's say the president wants to kill you.

He doesn't have a justified reason to do this at all.

He just wants you dead and he's going to use the US military to do it.

BEFORE this ruling, the president using the US military to kill you, a private citizen of the United States, without any actual justified reason besides wanting you dead, would be considered murder.

Regardless of the fact that it is his constitutional power to be able to tell the US military to do ANYTHING, using the military to kill a US citizen like that is still murder, which is illegal, and so he can be held accountable for such a crime through impeachment.

AFTER this ruling, since it is his constitutional power to be able to tell the US military to do ANYTHING, and since he has COMPLETE IMMUNITY in regards to any use of his constitutional power, this means that he can kill you using the US military, which would be the crime of murder, without ever being held accountable.

SCOTUS just gave the current president, and every future president, the ability to use the US military to do anything they want and commit any crime without ever being held accountable and having no options for accountability.

If a president wanted to kill all his political rivals, or kill everyone of a specific political ideology, or kill everyone who didn't vote for him, or kill everyone who is gay, he can now do it, and there is absolutely nothing to stop him because he now has COMPLETE IMMUNITY to command the US military as he pleases without limit.

If this decision is allowed to stand, and isn't reverted at some point, America dies.

It ceases to be a free country.

It becomes a dictatorship.

If Trump became president, he could (if he wanted to) have an armed soldier stand next to every congressman and congresswoman, ready to shoot and kill them if they voted against his wishes, and there is absolutely nothing that could be done to stop him.

This SCOTUS decision, is THE WORST decision in the history of the United States, because it gives the president UNPRECEDENTED and UNLIMITED POWER through the use of the US military, whereas before, a president using the US military to commit a crime (or misusing ANY of his constitutional power to commit any crime) did not have immunity and could still be subject to impeachment.

If you're not worried, it's either because you don't understand it, or because you support it.

So heres the thing: I dont really disagree with you. Its probably not good that this is being codified into official law.

However, if you think that hasnt been the de facto law for decades(if not longer), you really havent been paying attention.

George W. Bush lies about Iraq having WMDs, invades the country without a declaration of war(technically illegal under the constitution), and authorizes the CIA torture detainees. Obama comers in and straight up tells the American people 'yea we're not prosecuting anybody for that stuff.'

Obama DID in fact kill American citizens, including a 16 year old boy, without so much as an incitement against them. Despite congressional republicans railing about how evil and awful he was, Obama was never impeached and remains free to live as a multi-millionaire to this day.

Hell, even Trump: He killed a general of Iran(a country we are not at war with) on Iranian soil. But we're gonna go after him for paying off a porn star he slept with, because thats obviously a MUCH more serious crime.

Those are just a few examples: But the fact have always been treated as being immune from prosecution(unless the opposition party dislikes them, and even then never for their most serious crimes). Practically speaking, this ruling really doesnt change much.

[bright-eyed]

Whatever I'm just gonna post it. I've been reading a lot of coverage and I need to just get my thoughts out, it's not perfect and it's long and I'm just rambling but I gotta go to work and also lower my blood pressure so. Please just scroll past really fast if you don't wanna read about US politics (understandable, take care of yourself, have a great day)

So many Dems and leftists pointing fingers over the past week, when it’s obvious to me that the person at whose feet lays the primary responsibility for Trump’s resurgence is fucking Joe Biden and his establishment of stupid decrepit goons.

He refused to prosecute Trump for literally staging a coup when there was widespread, bipartisan political will for it. He put a hand-wringing Republican crank in charge of prosecution, who (probably purposefully) fumbled the bag so extraordinarily and for just long enough to let the right wing propaganda apparatus regroup and rewrite the prosecution into an example of a Democratic political hit job, a narrative many are already predisposed to believe, which reinforced the Democratic image as one of establishment corruption. Trump could be in prison right now, but instead, he's going to be president, all because Biden was a fucking coward and a goon.

He refused to make abortion and the fascistization of the Supreme Court into a mobilizing issue. There's a whole other rant in how abortion isn't necessarily a mobilizing issue, or at least how it wasn't in this election, but still, right after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, he could have marched up to the nearest podium and railed the court for the decision, laid the blame at their feet in a way that would have forced the media to name the responsible party, called out the Republican party for their corruption and machination of the Supreme Court, and committed the Dems to court reform. Instead, he made some forgettable statement about how important a woman's right to choose is or something, and then he derided leftists as crazy and out of touch with the party for their supposedly radical idea of reforming the court. Now, 10% of people believe that Biden is responsible for the overturning of abortion rights, and we have a court which has essentially become an unelected and untouchable branch of an increasingly right-wing Republican party, which rewrites and enacts will according to its political will, and which will endorse any presidential act made by Trump in the next 4+ years, no matter how unconstitutional or disastrous for country and the world.

He refused to listened to everyday people's concerns about their economic condition and instead kept harping on about how America has the greatest economy in the world, which only reinforced the belief that many people already had that the Democrats don't represent their interests. Biden's (and then Harris's) campaign talked about how the economy is great and inflation is actually lower than in many other Western countries, which may be true in a macroeconomic sense but is not salient for the average American citizen, who is struggling to make rent and buy groceries and who makes, adjusted for inflation, as much as someone did 50 years ago. Biden not only was incapable of providing any solutions, but also just refused to listen to voters or to admit the problems were there, and in a sense I don't blame people for turning away from him because he also failed to make his economic plans salient to your average person, so everyone basically voted on vibes (which they do literally every election because most people are not actually that interested in the technicalities of politics and just want to believe that the person in charge cares about them or at least has a plan).

He refused to step down when there was still enough time. He just should have fucking stepped down in 2022. Biden should have never tried to run again, and his decision to is what ultimately set this country on a path to Trump 2.0. Polls were showing voter had concerns about his age for years, and Biden only barely managed to win against Trump in 2020, and that was back before he had a track record of continuously fumbling the bag. He refused to step down, and robbed the Democratic party of a primary election, which would have allowed them to run not just new candidates but new messaging and strategies. This would have likely alleviated the incumbent variable which lost Harris the election, and might have reinvigorated the party long enough for it to crawl through to 2028. Instead, the party is (rightly, thankfully) in its death throes, having an existential crisis about its colossal failures. I don't know if Biden truly believed he was the best choice, that he'd win, that he was entitled to a second term, or whatever, but the voters didn't agree with him. It's such a gigantic slap in the face that, on top of all the ways he failed to do anything that mattered, he still thought so little of us and so highly of himself to think we'd blindly follow him again, and he fucked us all in the process.

The media (right wing and establishment both) is also responsible, seeing as the entire information ecosystem through which people across the globe get their news is almost irredeemably corrupt, and in America that corruption is particularly disastrous. The establishment at large (especially Democratic) is also responsible because it refused to see the reality of what is happening politically, even to their own colleagues, and it refuses to take a stand against it. But Joe Biden exemplifies everything that's wrong with the Democratic party, and we have to rebuild this shit from the ground up. There are so many people out there who are desperate for a government that actually works, that addresses their concerns, that provides solutions and follows through, that fights for them. There are so many individual people, activists and politicians alike, who want to fight for them, but the part has been too scared to take a stand and too ideologically incoherent to take a side. We have to start talking about what we actually believe to voters and stop letting the right wing manufacture a straw man identity for us so that we never have another Biden or another failure this catastrophic. I mean, you have to believe in something! Believe in something! I'm going crazy!

[frommybookbook]

this is mostly an honorary post for Lt. Steve Drumm of LAPD homicide

Hamilton's face when he realizes Perry's done it again is priceless.

[theconstitutionisgayculture]

I think it's time for me to come clean with something I've never admitted to anybody before. And it's not something I've done or anything like that. It's not an action I've taken. It's an opinion I have that I know is something that would cause a lot of...let's say strife with most people if they knew I had it. It's not a controversial opinion I'm particularly proud of the way I'm proud of my opinion on John Lennon being a boring hack, or my opinions on YouTube content creators being, by default, talentless nobodies compared to literally any other professional creative, or my opinion that sport hunting journalists and politicians should be, if not actually legal, than at least one of those victimless crimes that never actually get prosecuted. This opinion I'm about to share is something that my own parents would never understand if I were to admit it to them, which, to be honest, does sting a bit when I let myself think about it too much.

I know most of you don't follow me for personal BS, and I respect that, so I'm going to put a cut before I state this opinion so people who don't really care to learn more about me as a person can easily give it a skip. For the rest of you, all I ask is that you try to keep an open mind, and understand that this is as hard for me to admit as it is for you to read.

George Carlin is a terrible fucking comedian.

I know. I know.

But hear me out.

I'm not saying he's not funny, because he can be. Certainly he was hilarious to 12 year old Little Me who would watch clips of his acts on Comedy Central long after my parents went to bed. But as I got older, I started to notice something. It wasn't that I was "growing out" of George Carlin. That's silly to say. That's like saying someone grew out of watching Eddie Murphy's Raw. You're not even supposed to be watching that stuff until you're grown.

No, the thing I noticed was that he isn't actually a comedian.

He's a blogger.

Again, he does tell jokes, but telling jokes does not a comedian make. Everyone tells jokes. What makes a comedian a comedian is that they are so funny that people will pay money to laugh at their jokes. And that's not George Carlin. That's not why people go to see George Carlin. They might think it is, but it's not. No, they go to see him for the same reason he stands up in front of them and speaks.

They want to hear their own opinions parroted back at them, and then they want to cheer. Just like George doesn't really want to make people laugh. He wants to give his opinions on social issues and politics, and then he wants everyone to clap and validate those opinions. The laughter is completely secondary. It's not even necessary past the point of telling just enough jokes to both get people in the door, and to allow those people the illusion that they're at a comedy show and not reading a blog.

And Carlin isn't the only blogger pretending to be a comedian. You probably know quite a few already. The Jon Stewarts, John Olivers, and Jimmy Kimmels of the world who just want to be cheered for stating their, often idiotic, opinions on things. I used to call this "Applause Comedy", and I've always hated it with a passion. But these days I just call it blogging, because that's what it is. And George Carlin is its grandfather. His entire career is based on "telling it like it is" instead of "telling jokes". And let's be fair, some of his opinions are right. Of course, these days the people he roasts are usually not on the same side of the political divide as the ones he was intending on roasting. He is another terminal victim of the 60s, so don't ever mistake him for being even remotely right wing.

(I wonder if, were he still alive, would he be one of those few boomerlibs that actually recognize how batshit insane the left has become? Or would he be one of the ones that now supports all the things they railed against 40+ years back because their identity as a leftist is more important than their supposed principals?

I could speculate, but I won't.)

But being able to comment intelligently or eloquently on political or social issues isn't a skill one should look for in a comedian. And getting cheered for stating an opinion isn't something a real comedian should look for in their audience. A comedian tells jokes. He makes people laugh. He tells stories and weaves tales and creates an atmosphere of joy. He allows us to keep the outside world at bay for an hour or so, and leaves us with a small shield against that world when his show is over in the form of fond memories and shared enjoyment.

You're more likely to come out of a George Carlin show more angry at the world than when you went in.

And that's not comedy.

That's not entertainment.

That's blogging.