#TWELVE YEARS????????? AND A KID?????? TWO MARRIAGES????? PRESUMABLY TWO DIVORCES????

[saintcarrionn]

watched love rosie. that film is HORRIFYING

[traincat]

I feel like I've read a ton, but I'm honestly still pretty new to comics rn. That being said... What is one more day? Ik we don't like it and it happened a while ago, but that's about it [,=

Time for Spider-Man History With Traincat: Highly Controversial Storylines! And that feeling is totally normal with comics with huge canons -- you can read a ton and still have some fairly big blindspots in your understanding of the total picture. That being said, this is kind of a big one, both in terms of Spider-Man history/canon and in terms of how Spider-Man fandom functions. I would say probably no other storyline has had quite as much impact on how the fandom views and interacts with the source material as One More Day/Brand New Day. It's been the Wild West out here ever since it happened. (Which was in 2007, so like, yes, fairly long ago, especially when you look at how Spider-Man canon has evolved since, but in the grand scheme of things, also kind of recent. One More Day is not old enough to rent a car.)

So when people talk about Spider-Man's One More Day, they're usually actually talking about two related arcs: One More Day and Brand New Day. For the sake of simplicity, I'm going to be covering both. For the sake of transparency, I am going to admit that I think One More Day, as a self-contained story, is good, actually. This is controversial! I admit that! But I stand by my stupid opinions on this blog, for some reason. I think One More Day when you examine it on its own, by which I mean you ignore the decade and a half worth of canon that came after it, as a Spider-Man story and as a PeterMJ-centric story holds up under scrutiny and that people who don't like it don't like complicated love stories and might actually throw their own mothers under buses. No offense to the OMD haters. Little bit of offense to the OMD haters. Brand New Day, which is the continuation of One More Day, on the other hand -- largely bad. Very largely bad.

But let's backtrack. One More Day is a four issue crossover storyline that takes place directly after Civil War, during which Iron Man and Captain America got divorced and divvied up the superhero community and Spider-Man made some startlingly bad decisions and made a fugitive out of himself and his family in a manner that got Aunt May shot, and Spider-Man: Back in Black (Amazing Spider-Man #539–543) which examines Peter's actions immediately after Aunt May is shot and ends with him humiliating the Kingpin in front of an entire prison. One More Day consists of Amazing Spider-Man #544 -> Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man #24 -> Sensational Spider-Man v2 #41 -> Amazing Spider-Man #545. In One More Day, Aunt May is dying, all of Peter's efforts to save her have thus far failed, and, consumed by guilt, he is rapidly running out of time. Approached by Mephisto, a literal demon from hell, Peter is offered a deal: Aunt May will live -- and Peter's identity, which was previously revealed to the world at large during Civil War, will once again be hidden from the memories of all but a select few -- if Peter trades him his marriage to Mary Jane. Peter and Mary Jane struggle with this, but eventually both agree to the deal. The clock strikes twelve, the deal is done, and Peter and Mary Jane's marriage fades into history.

(ASM #545) A reasonably simple premise for a story that caused so many problems -- most, I would argue, not actually the original story's fault. So obviously, this was an unpopular move -- Peter and Mary Jane had for a long time been a fan favorite Marvel couple, and in a fictional universe where most relationships are doomed as soon as they begin, the enduring Spider-Marriage was sacred ground. And then, with a snap of its fingers, it was gone: Peter wakes up in Aunt May's house, no longer married, with Mary Jane out of the picture. (She would not return to the book on any sort of consistent basis for over 50 issues.) In the wake of One More Day began Brand New Day, which is basically what it sounds like: a promised "brand new day" of "exciting" Spider-Man content and a publishing schedule where Amazing Spider-Man came out three times a month. (Which sounds good on paper but I think in practice caused more problems than it created good storylines.) Peter, newly single again, had new love interests! And also Harry Osborn was alive again for some reason! I generally like Harry's post-BND stories so that part's fine with me.

But overall? Brand New Day is a mess. It knows it wants to tread new and exciting ground with Peter -- tell new stories! ensnare new readers! make them fork out for a book three times a month. -- but it doesn't know what those stories should be. Readers who were invested in Peter and Mary Jane's relationship -- a major facet of Spider-Man comics for decades at that point -- felt rightfully betrayed that the marriage could be so easily traded in and that Mary Jane herself, perhaps the second most important figure in Spider-Man comics after Peter, could be tossed aside. From a personal point of view, I think Brand New Day fails in large part because it abandons what has always made Spider-Man such a compelling series, and that's the mix of Peter's personal life with his vigilante life. BND sees Peter with new friends, new jobs, new love interests, etc -- it is very much a brand new day! But it isn't a better day compared to the stories that came before it. I do like some post-BND stories, especially American Son (ASM #595-599) and Grim Hunt (ASM #634-637), but compared to pre-BND where I think the majority of canon is good, it's a very lacking body of work that is hurt by the way it divorced itself from the PeterMJ marriage as Spider-Man's central relationship.

"But Traincat, I thought you said you liked One More Day?" Yeaaaaah. I do. This is why I keep saying I like One More Day on its own merits, and not on the merits of the stories it opened the doors for. I like a good romantic tragedy in fiction, and the way Peter and Mary Jane's final scene in One More Day plays out is beautiful. I like the idea of Peter caught in this impossible situation, being asked to choose between two women he loves more than his own life. A really common criticism I see leveled against One More Day is that Peter should have chosen his relationship with Mary Jane over May's life, which is -- okay, I think it's weird that people keep insisting on this, not in the least because by asking Peter to sacrifice his aunt's life they're essentially demanding he commit a callous, out of character act in order to further his own interests. It's also weird because the thing is, Peter already chose Mary Jane over May -- that's what gets them into this situation. It's literally in the scene where May is shot:

(ASM #538) When the gun goes off, Peter's spider-sense kicks in, and he covers Mary Jane, leaving May in the path of the bullet. He does choose Mary Jane over May, regardless of whether he realized what he was doing. And that's why he can't make that choice a second time. His actions in One More Day do make sense for him as a character, whether or not any individual reader likes them, and Mary Jane's actions make sense, too -- after all, she's the one who ultimately tells Mephisto that they agree to the deal when Peter can't bring himself to voice it.

A lot of people also like to nitpick One More Day by going, well, why could (x) or (y) with life saving powers save Aunt May which is like -- yeah, I guess, but if we're going to ask that about this specific comic book near death setup, you kind of have to do it with every single one, and I'm not going to stake every single moment of comic book drama on whether or not that gold kid from the X-Men was busy at the time. Comics are soap operas in flimsy paper form: serialized longform storytelling that relies heavily on melodrama. Sometimes you have to go with things. Sometimes you sell your marriage to the devil. Stuff happens. That in and of itself doesn't make One More Day a bad story -- and while some people blame the Spider-Marriage's dissolution entirely on One More Day, I think that's a little shortsighted when you look at the history of Spider-Man since the turn of the century. It's clear -- and Marvel themselves have been perhaps a little too open about this -- that Marvel in the past few decades has had trouble with the direction they want to take Spider-Man. They WANTED Spider-Man to appeal to a distinctly youthful audience that they didn't think they were actually reaching -- understandable, considering that Marvel nearly went bankrupt around 2000 and was saved by Ultimate Spider-Man, an out of main continuity series which retold Spider-Man from the beginning and focused heavily on Peter as a teen -- but the problem was Spider-Man in the main continuity was at that point in canon a happily married man who was pushing the dreaded 30 whether or not they wanted to admit that. This is also why Marvel has continually pivoted away from Spider-Man having kids, because they feared that making him a dad would age him too much and make him unrelatable to their coveted audience of Teens. (This is also why almost every new Spider-Man property, especially the live action movies, perpetually stick him back into high school, despite that occupying a very small slice of 616 canon.) So around the year 2000, they started trying things in relation to the Spider-Marriage, which was viewed as a major problem -- after all, what's more adult than being married and liking your wife. First, they had Mary Jane presumed dead. Then, they had Mary Jane and Peter separate. Then, when Mary Jane and Peter had only recently gotten back together, One More Day struck. If One More Day specifically hadn't gone the way it had, it's pretty clear that the Spider-Marriage was going to go one way or another -- it's a little bit of a shame it happened when it did, because OMD is the end of J Michael Straczynski's run, and JMS wrote a really beautiful Peter and MJ relationship. But Marvel as a company and especially editor in chief at the time Joe Quesada viewed Peter and Mary Jane's relationship as a major problem in how they wanted to portray Spider-Man and thought that striking the relationship from the books would allow them more freedom in their portrayal of him as younger and more relatable to their Desired Audience of people who I guess really wanted to see Peter sleep with characters who weren't Mary Jane.

(ASM #546. Younger! Fresher! Less attached! Kissing random women in the club!)

The problem with One More Day has always been in the follow through -- from the content of Brand New Day to the pacing of events to the fact that Marvel withheld key information for such a long time that it allowed misinformation to thrive. After all, what does it MEAN to trade Peter and Mary Jane's marriage to the devil? It altered the events of canon in Peter and the majority of other characters' memories so that the marriage didn't exist, but it left people wondering -- did the relationship as they remembered it existed? How much of Spider-Man canon was altered? And the answers didn't come for over 100 issues of Amazing Spider-Man. One Moment In Time or OMIT (Amazing Spider-Man #638-641), which revealed that while Peter and Mary Jane never got married in the altered canon they did continue their long committed relationship up until just after Civil War, was published in 2010, so essentially readers were hung out to dry without answers for three years. That's a long time to string people along, but not as long as it took Marvel to confirm that the popular fan theory that Mary Jane retained her memories of the original timeline as part of her own deal with Mephisto was also true, which happened this year. I would say, at least from my perspective, a lot of the frustration doesn't come from the individual One More Day storyline so much as how Marvel has continually dragged out the aftermath, using the promise of a Spider-Marriage return to keep fans on the hook. Which is why One More Day continually comes up in discussion of current Spider-Man, because Spencer's run has relied very heavily on imagery from that period with a serious question of whether or not there actually was going to be payoff, something which is still up in the air.

This has been Spider-Man History With Traincat, brought to you by anonymice like you.

[drummergirl231-2]

If HDL's father ever did come back to his family's lives, do you imagine how awkward and complicated it would be? There would be the issues from Della having to adjust since she may not even have romantic feelings for him anymore (given how it's been 11-12 years) to the triplets having a worse time adjusting to his presence than Della's especially since Donald already served as their dad for years (And it is gonna be weird seeing Donald and HDL's father being father figures together).

Aw shoot dang I’ve got a whole AU like you don’t even know. XD It sprouted off this speculative post I made about HDL’s father possibly being a F.O.W.L. agent that the Buzzards sent in to spy on Scrooge by getting close to Della, but then he wanted out because he fell in love with Della for real. In this scenario, the Buzzards kidnap him and freeze him in whatever Rockerduck is currently frozen in after they realize his loyalties shifted.

I don’t think it’ll go like this in the show, but in my AU, the family eventually finds him frozen in whatever-it-is. Della screams when they stumble across him in a F.O.W.L. base. As far as she knew, the guy just totally abandoned her for absolutely no reason, and it never made sense to her. But as betrayed as she felt for his leaving, she needed answers, and she wasn’t going to get them just leaving him there, so she unfroze him and she, Scrooge, and Donald (who was fighting the urge to punch him in the gut every step of the way) get him out of there.

Can you imagine the horror on his side of things? He was a newlywed. He was happy. He was going to tell F.O.W.L. he was done being their spy. Next thing he knows, he’s waking up from being frozen in something and Della’s there but she’s walking on a prosthesis and he immediately knows he’s been gone for at least several months and Della went through quite the ordeal without him (but like, he has no flippin’ idea...).

Eventually in some heart-wrenching scene or scenes he finds out he was gone for about or nearly twelve years, and not only that, but he and Della had had triplet boys. He had wanted to quit F.O.W.L. to devote himself to his new family (Della, Donald, and Scrooge) and eventually, any children he and Della would have. He and Della had talked about raising a big family together but now he finds out he missed everything.  

And his wife of only a few short months doesn’t even want him to touch her. He’s a good guy and all. He respects Della and the last thing he wants is to make her feel guilty for how she feels or pressure her into anything. But it’d still be difficult for him when to him it feels like he and Della were living in newlywed bliss only a day or two ago. And even though he’s being totally respectful with Della, she still feels guilty, imagining what he must be going through. 

She tells herself it’s all his fault anyway and she doesn’t owe him anything, but after they fly him to Mervana and interrogate him in front of the harp, and she hears the whole story, and the harp confirms it all and Della knows he really does love her with all his heart... she can’t help but feel guilty for keeping him at arm’s length. And he feels guilty that she feels guilty. It breaks his heart even more, but he tells her it’s okay and she can take as much time as she needs to process all this.

Scrooge orders him to sleep in the spare room of Donald’s houseboat until he can get a lawyer’s opinion on whether or not the marriage is still valid. After all, they were both pretty much presumed dead for over a decade. Old Victorian Scrooge basically tells him he’s not allowed to sleep under the same roof as his baby girl without being sure they’re legally married. Extreme as it sounds, he knows he needs to re-earn everyone’s favor and trust, and he accepts it. But that night when Donald goes downstairs in his houseboat to use the bathroom, he can hear him crying from the spare room.

Della thanks Scrooge for buying her some time. He tells her he means it - he wants to make sure their marriage is still valid before letting them sleep in the same room. But more than that, he really does want to give Della some time to process everything, guilt-free.

“And what if the lawyer says my marriage is still valid?” she asks. “What then?”

“Then... I suppose the two of you will need to make a decision.”

But Scrooge can see the worry on her face. She doesn’t want a divorce. Would that be fair? Sure, the guy began courting her under false pretenses, but she knows after the interrogation with the Harp of Mervana he didn’t marry her under false pretenses. He really does love her. But would it be fair to him to keep him tied to her when she didn’t want him to touch her? She wished they could start all over... just fall in love all over again. But would she ever be able to do that? And what about the boys? What would be best for them?

“Ye don’t hafte make any decisions tonight, lass,” Scrooge would interrupt her thoughts. He’d ask her if she feels safe, and if she feels like the boys are safe. After making sure all of Della’s immediate concerns are dealt with, he’d tell her to get some rest.

As for the boys... I can imagine a scene with Huey where he screams “I don’t care that he’s my father! Uncle Donald’s my dad!” and he runs upstairs crying. And it’d be an absolute knife in the father’s heart but at the same time, the gratitude he already felt toward Donald would increase. He wouldn’t resent Donald or blame him. He’d be so glad his boys had a dad in their lives. 

Still, it would kill him a little inside knowing he didn’t get to be that dad, and that one of his own sons was rejecting him.

I think Dewey, being such a mama’s boy, would have some trouble accepting him, too. He pursued Della under false pretenses, and never told her about F.O.W.L. before he disappeared. She believed for the longest time he abandoned her. As far as Dewey was concerned, he didn’t deserve a perfect woman like Della Duck.

It would take Huey and Dewey a little time to come around.

And Louie? His loyalty is to his mom and uncle, first. But gahhh he can’t help but pity this dude. Louie’s such a sensitive little guy. He’d pick up on the all the guilt and sorrow and awkwardness and more sorrow between his mother and father and it would bug him, to the point where he starts wondering if his scheming powers might come in handy here, and he tries to reset them up.

A lawyer does conclude the marriage is still legal since they didn’t divorce and neither of them died. And even without Louie’s help, Della’s hubby has every intention of trying to start over with her. He just wants to make sure he gives her plenty of time, and doesn’t pressure her into anything. 

When they get the news they are still married, they sit down and talk. He is honest with her. He tells her he doesn’t want to divorce her. The vows he made to her (only a few months ago for him) are ones he intends to keep. But he understands, given their bizarre circumstances, if she doesn’t feel the same way. All he asks is that she doesn’t make any decisions quickly, but he will honor whatever she decides. And he asks that, no matter what she decides with regards to them, she lets him stay in their sons’ lives, since now that he knows about them, he can’t just leave them. He intends to get a job and cover their expenses (a decision that wins him points with Scrooge when Scrooge hears about it). Della agrees to his terms. She tells him she doesn’t want a divorce either, but she just doesn’t know how things can return to the way they were.

The fact she doesn’t want a divorce gives him a sliver of hope, but for the time being, he’s just friendly. He suggests they have a game night, just them, the boys, and Donald. He continues to hang out with Della in no-pressure sort of environments, like video game tournaments with her and the kids, family dinners, stuff like that. And he tries to avoid calling her cutesy things and talking to her like they’re married because he doesn’t want her to feel like he’s forcing her into a romantic relationship, but one day he accidentally slips up and says, “Morning, gorgeous,” at breakfast, and before he could kick himself under the table, she smiled and blushed and said, “Hey handsome,” back, and the teasing “OOOOOOOOH,” from the kids sounded like an angel’s choir to him.

It takes time, but Della does fall in love with him all over again, and one day he gets down on one knee and asks her to stay married to him, and she accepts. They even hold a simple vow renewal ceremony in the backyard (simple, but well-organized and beautiful, with Daisy’s help). 

And because I’m DG and I can’t help myself, OF COURSE THEY HAVE ANOTHER BABY AND GET A CHANCE TO RAISE A FAMILY TOGETHER FROM THE BEGINNING AND THAT BABY WILL BE “TWIN COUSINS” WITH DONALD AND DAISY’S BABY. SO SAITH ME.

WELP that turned into a pointless fanfic considering I don’t think that’s how it’ll go down in the show!

Frank described the family as “complete,” now. And that’s pretty much true. They’re a bunch of pieces of families that came together to make a whole one. They’ve got the brothers (HDL), the sister (Webby), the mommy (Della), the daddy (Donald), the grandma (Mrs. B.), the grandpa (Scrooge), plus whatever the heck Launchpad is (the crazy cousin or family friend who’s always over?). It’d be weird finding a spot for the father. Maybe he really is gone forever. But then again, if there’s a spot for Daisy in the family, maybe there’s still a spot for him, too. Hopefully we’ll find out!

[creepingsharia]

The Missing Link Showing Ilhan Omar Married Her Brother

“The facts describe perhaps the most extensive spree of illegal misconduct committed by a House member in American history.”

Tying up loose threads in the curious case

In four intensely reported investigative columns — here (August 13, 2018), here (October 23, 2018), here (October 30, 2018), and here (November 5, 2018), — David Steinberg has explored the evidence suggesting that Ilhan Omar entered into a sham marriage with her brother in 2009. This is his fifth. He titles it “Meet Leila Elmi: The Missing Link Showing Ilhan Omar Married Her Brother.” Drawing on his research, interviews, and social media evidence he makes the case that Omar has engaged in a variety of fraudulent activities and willful misrepresentations related to her marital arrangements.

...

Twelve-year-old Ilhan had no say on the manner in which she arrived in the United States.

However, U.S. Congresswoman Ilhan Abdullahi Omar (D-MN) is now under scrutiny for acts she took beginning in 2009 — not 1995. In 2009, Omar was a 26-year-old U.S. citizen. She had been a U.S. citizen for nearly nine years.

Additionally, the foreign national Omar apparently helped commit fraud was not fleeing hell in 2009, either. Ahmed Nur Said Elmi was a long-time citizen of the United Kingdom. He even possessed a high school diploma from the United States: Elmi attended a St. Paul, Minnesota high school for his senior year of 2002-2003, and graduated before returning to London.

We look to 1995 not to incriminate a kid, but to answer questions about what Omar did 14 years later as an adult U.S. citizen.

Please read the verified evidence below — and read it alongside the three years of verified evidence published by Scott Johnson, Preya Samsundar, and myself (our work is linked here). The answers to those questions about 2009 appear to give probable cause to investigate Omar for eight instances of perjury, immigration fraud, marriage fraud, up to eight years of state and federal tax fraud, two years of federal student loan fraud, and even bigamy.

To be clear: The facts describe perhaps the most extensive spree of illegal misconduct committed by a House member in American history.

———————-

The proceeding information was given to me by multiple sources within the Minneapolis Somali community. The verifiable evidence corroborating their information follows below:

In 1995, Ilhan entered the United States as a fraudulent member of the “Omar” family.

That is not her family. The Omar family is a second, unrelated family which was being granted asylum by the United States. The Omars allowed Ilhan, her genetic sister Sahra, and her genetic father Nur Said to use false names to apply for asylum as members of the Omar family.

Ilhan’s genetic family split up at this time. The above three received asylum in the United States, while Ilhan’s three other siblings — using their real names — managed to get asylum in the United Kingdom.

Ilhan Abdullahi Omar’s name, before applying for asylum, was Ilhan Nur Said Elmi.

Her father’s name before applying for asylum was Nur Said Elmi Mohamed. Her sister Sahra Noor’s name before applying for asylum was Sahra Nur Said Elmi. Her three siblings who were granted asylum by the United Kingdom are Leila Nur Said Elmi, Mohamed Nur Said Elmi, and Ahmed Nur Said Elmi.

Ilhan and Ahmed married in 2009, presumably to benefit in some way from a fraudulent marriage. They did not divorce until 2017.

———————-

Confirming some of the above information, as it might appear on their 1995 U.S. immigration papers, is not difficult. A basic background search shows that “Nur Omar Mohamed,” “Ilhan Abdullahi Omar,” and “Sahra Noor” all received SSNs in 1995 or 1996 in Virginia. Verified address records show adult members of the Omars living at three addresses in Arlington, Virginia at that time: 1223 South Thomas Street, 1226 South Thomas Street, and 1107 South Thomas Street.

The United Kingdom records of the relevant individuals are similarly easy to find. Try with a simple Ancestry.com account and similar online tools: There appears to be only one “Leila Nur Said Elmi,” only one “Mohamed Nur Said Elmi,” and only one “Ahmed Nur Said Elmi” in the UK.

The remaining evidence below verifies a sibling relationship between Ilhan and Ahmed.

————————

...

On August 10, 2017, Ilhan swore under penalty of perjury — literally, she signed a half-inch or so under “penalty of perjury” — that she’d had zero contact with Ahmed Nur Said Elmi after June 2011.

Further, Ilhan swore that she did not know where to find him, and that she did not know a single person who was likely to know his whereabouts. She did this to apply for a default divorce from Ahmed — a divorce where one spouse cannot be located and served.

Now, a tremendous amount of evidence — from this article and our prior articles — shows that Ilhan perhaps perjured herself eight times with her nine answers. Minnesota’s perjury statute allows for a sentence of up to five years — for each instance:

Yet this may be the least worrisome of her current legal exposures.

Consider the disturbingly inadequate evidence used to obtain FISA warrants on members of Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign. Consider that Democratic representatives have demanded that Attorney General William Barr release grand jury testimony — itself an illegal act.

Yet here we have:

Verifiable UK and U.S. marriage records

Verifiable address records

Time-stamped, traceable, archived online communications (Convictions and settlements based upon social media evidence are commonplace, Anthony Weiner being a notable example)

Background check confirmations of SSNs and birthdates

Archived court documents signed under penalty of perjury

Photos which can be examined to rule out digital manipulation

The 2019 Minnesota Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board investigation, which found Omar filed illegal joint tax returns with a man who was not her husband in at least 2014 and 2015

Three years’ of evidence published across many articles — none of which has been shown to be incorrect, or have even been challenged with contradictory evidence from Rep. Omar or any other source

Perjury evidence that stands on its own — regardless of whom she married:

Long after June 2011, she was clearly in contact with the only man in either the U.S. or the UK with the same name and birthdate as the man she married. She was clearly in contact with several people who were in contact with him.

Further, Preya Samsundar did contact him, published how she managed to contact him, and published his email admitting to being photographed with Omar in London in 2015. To be clear: Omar was legally married to an “Ahmed Nur Said Elmi” at the time she was photographed next to a man who admits his name is Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, and that he is in the photo.

Samsundar published all of this information on how to contact Ahmed Nur Said Elmi a few months before Omar swore to that nine-question court document.

Rep. Omar has refused all inquiries from her constituents, elected officials, and media outlets to provide any specific evidence contradicting even a single allegation suggested by three years of now-public information.

In fact, Omar has responded by making information less available:

In August 2016, after Scott Johnson and Preya Samsundar posted the allegations, Omar’s verified social media accounts were taken offline.

Ahmed Nur Said Elmi’s social media accounts were also taken offline.

When the accounts returned, a large amount of potentially incriminating evidence had verifiably been deleted.

I found and published at least ten additional “before and after” instances of evidence still being deleted in 2018.

Omar has released carefully worded, Clintonian statements that denigrate those seeking answers from her as racists. Yet she has repeatedly refused to answer questions or issue anything other than public relations statements.

I have a large amount of information that we have not published for reasons including the protection of sources.

Sources have expressed fear regarding published video and photo evidence confirming threats from Omar’s campaign team. These sources have shared other evidence of threats. I have contacted the federal authorities to share this and other unpublished information. Providing knowingly false information to the DOJ is a serious crime.

I believe Scott Johnson, Preya Samsundar, and me, with our three years of articles, columns and posts, have provided more than enough evidence to give law enforcement authorities probable cause to open an investigation. Now would be the chance for law enforcement, and especially for Rep. Ilhan Omar’s House colleagues, to make a sincere stand against corruption and for the uniform application of the law.

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

These excerpts don’t due the vast amount of evidence justice. There is much more evidence, photographs, documents at the link below. Take the time to read it all and share it with your friends, neighbors and elected officials.

[thisunfoldinglife]

The Quest for Evidence of the Divine

When I was a little girl, I used to beg God for proof of his existence. Faith wasn’t enough. I needed solid undeniable evidence. “Dear God, if you exist, could you make the lights flicker?” Pause. “Dear God, can I hear you whisper?” Pause. “Dear God, can you make me pretty and brave and worthy of love?” Through the ages, my requests matured and the intervals between them lengthened, but I always privately prayed for some true sign of his or her presence in my world.

There was talk of God all around me. Over a decade of Catholic schooling impressed upon me the need for some supreme being to inform my journey. Catholicism, however, with its fire-and-brimstone instruction, can be a scary beast. It took many years to undo the fear of hell I’d imagined would result from my placid childhood sins. So, when I was 18, I left the Church to embark on an intense twelve-year search for spiritual meaning. I divorced religion, yet I still sought relationship with the divine, knowing its face and name would shift and change with my discoveries. I began with literature—looking to writers like Emerson and Whitman to show me the imprint of God in nature. I sought out psychics and reiki masters, seeking answers in energy fields. I studied manifestation, the principles of attracting and creating one’s own reality. I retreated to the mountains of Arizona to experience the psychedelic effects of the SAN Pedro cactus, meant to induce introspection and healing. I travelled to Northern Colorado to study at a Buddhist meditation centre, and I went to Spain to walk the 500-mile Camino De Santiago trail. For forty days, I walked alone, in pursuit of truth and inspiration, a pathway to myself and a higher power. I read every book I could get my hands on and talked about spirituality with whomever would listen. Eventually, to leave no stone unturned, I even revisited my old friend Jesus. I was a woman on a mission—a spiritual detective.

My quest was further fuelled when I heard other people’s stories—candid accounts of the divine dwelling just beyond our eyes and ears. One such story was shared by a dear friend of mine, who had a mystical experience while visiting the small town of Lourdes in France. Lourdes is home to a holy grotto where a fourteen-year-old peasant girl claimed she once saw the Virgin Mary. Now each year millions of pilgrims come to Lourdes to ask for healing from its presumably miraculous waters. My friend visited the grotto in the dead of winter, in the stillness of night, and from out of the darkness, appeared the bright twinkling of blue lights all around her. She described the grotto in its beautiful blue glow and reported that, even after, at random moments, the twinkling lights return to envelop her. When she revealed her experience, I was desperate to see this blue light appear out of nothingness. She was a witness to the supernal. She had her proof that the world we see before us has mysterious layers of which we cannot even perceive. Where was my proof? I didn’t know it at the time, but I was never meant to experience those lights. That was her gift—her confirmation. And I would find mine.

Though the bulk of my exploration hadn’t yet granted me empirical verification of the Divine, it left me with an open heart and a reverence for the magical orchestration of life. I was 31 and my journey had taken me into the depths of myself. I knew who I was. I was happy within myself, and though I didn’t have all the answers, the ones I did have all pointed to love. I think in the end, the simplest and most powerful truths rest in love’s hands.

And then one night, I had a dream—a dream so vivid, I can still visualise it eleven years later. I dreamed I was flying, soaring in the air over Zaire, an African country to which I’ve never been. Typically, in my dreams I take flight by slowly extending my arms out from my sides and pushing the air down beneath me until it lifts me off the ground, just above the trees. This time, I was wearing a harness of a sort, and I was aware that I’d humbled myself enough to accept the support. When I landed, I heard the gentle voice of a man behind me. He spoke: “You did very well. I’m proud of you.” I couldn’t see his face, but I could very clearly hear his distinctive British accent. “Come with me,” he said. “We’re going on a journey.” He gave me a small card and on it were the initials: “G.H.” I stared at the card and said out loud: “This is the man I am going to marry.” I looked up then and the room was filled with large colourful spheres of light. I smiled in appreciation, while children danced happily in front of the man, obscuring his face beyond recognition. Then I woke. I immediately wrote down every detail of my dream, carefully underlining the shocking specifics of this British man with the initials G.H. who I was supposed to marry?!

At the time, I was working reception at The Grand Canyon Youth Hostel in Arizona, so the likelihood of bumping into a few Brits was a possibility, so I kept my eyes open. For two weeks, I scoured the hostel in expectation. And when G.H. didn’t appear, I let it go. Perhaps it was just a dream. And then, a week later, on Thanksgiving Day, I somehow caught the attention of a British traveller at the hostel. He was eager to engage, but I wasn’t interested. This guy, with his Beatles haircut and happy grin, wasn’t like the depressed lumberjacks I typically went for. His interest was keen however, and after I rebuffed a few of his invitations, he said, “Come on—You give me a chance and I promise it’ll end up in marriage.” I laughed and he left the reception area. I was taken aback by his confidence, wondering what normal man speaks of marriage with someone he hardly knows? All of a sudden, my dream came back to me. I’d forgotten about the mysterious man with the British accent. I quickly checked the guest registry, searching for his name, and there in front of me were the words: Garry Hutchinson. G.H.

I waited for him to return, my heart in my chest. And when he did, we sat together, and I told him of my dream. The words tumbled out of me, swirling around us, and he smiled, “I suppose you should to give me a chance now?” We fell in love rapidly, diving deeply into one another, our hearts fusing into an entirely new organ. It was clear from the beginning that our partnership would only magnify and multiply our happiness and individual growth. It’s funny how I couldn’t see that when I first saw him. The dream was my compass. Some mystical force of goodness brought me direction, knowing I wouldn’t recognise love if it stood right before me.

Now, after nearly ten years of marriage, I sometimes take for granted the marvellous circumstances that brought Garry and I together. But when I do remember, I’m grateful for my shiny nugget of proof that there are sacred, intangible, and divine forces amongst us. I don’t talk about God much anymore. God, after-all, is a word with a thousand meanings on a thousand tongues. Instead, I love with great depth and length. And in seeking love, and its sisters—kindness, empathy, generosity—I can see evidence of the divine in everything. My church is now any place where bliss can find me—a leisurely bike ride at dusk, lying beneath leafy trees, dancing with my husband, and reading bedtime stories to my children, feeling the pleasant weight of their little heads upon my shoulders. And with my kids, in their marvelling at rainbows, fresh snow, and starry skies, I’m continually reminded that it’s a truly magical world.