#also... SHANE KNOWS TWO (2) WORDS IN FRENCH

[snaileer]

Time Unsolved

Dp Unsolved

“Today on Buzzfeed unsolved we cover the Timely Disappearance of Charles T. Williamsworth.”

Danny slurped loudly on his drink as the intro played. Was he maybe crazy for watching a Buzzfeed Unsolved True Crime alone, at night? Maybe.

But Danny had been attacked by ghosts. What was a human gonna do that Skulker couldn’t?

“What a name!” Shane cut in immediately, the video showing him seated at their table holding a cup of coffee. Ryan laughed.

“‘Ello, yes, my name is Sir Charles T. Williamsworth, how art thou? Ah yes, jolly good!” Shane mimicked with a horrifically bad posh British accent.

Ryan laughed harder, “We’ve been to London, they don’t sound like that!” He said between laughs.

“Uh, he does! There’s no way a man with a name like that is not ‘mm yes I will take a spot of tea with my biscuit thank you.’ I’m calling it, he definitely talked like that!”

Danny smiled at the antics as Ryan wheezed, “Well it’s too bad we’ll never know for sure then isn’t it, what with his disappearance, y’know what we’re actually here to talk about.”

“That’s okay. I’ll know. I know my buddy Charles.”

“Alright then.”

Ryan flicked his file open as Shane took a sip from his coffee.

The screen lit up with an image of a man on a black backdrop.

“The Williamsworths were a French-German family who moved to Biel, Switzerland in early 1914, just months before the largest war in European history kicked off.

They were one of the lucky few families to have left France before the war broke out…”

“Oh a family moving, that’s suspicious now?”Shane cut in, yellow words typing themself across the screen.

“Well, it was right before World War 1, I mean the timing is kind of suspicious.” Ryan replied in blue.

-People move, Ryan.-

-Okay, okay, it’s just the facts of the case,.-

Danny rolled his eyes, ready for the story to continue.

The images came back.

“This move would evidently prove to be quite fortunate for the family for obvious reasons. However, it also led Charles to find his true passion: … Watchmaking.”

There was a pause as a map of Switzerland came on screen. “Biel, the town that Charles would live in for the majority of his recorded younger life, was known for watchmaking, being one of several in the heart of an area named ‘Watch Valley.’ “

-You ever own a Swiss watch?-

-Nope-

-Heard they’re good. Reeeal good.-

-Yep.-

-…-

“Charles would reportedly develop a passion for clocks, watches, and timepieces in general, only getting more entrenched in his obsession over time.”

The image of the man now shifted to be overlaid on a map.

“By the time the First World War was over, Charles had gained an ostentatious apprenticeship under one of the premiere watchmakers of the time, Max Stührling. This lasted until Stührling’s death in 1938, after which Charles vanished from any records for two years.”

-Well y’know, his mentor had just died. -Maybe he wanted to grieve. Y’know curl up in his room and not see anybody for a bit.-

Ryan laughed, -2 years, he was crying in his room for 2 years and nobody found him?-

-Well, it’s not like records were great back then, I mean what are you gonna write on the census… just.. like..-

-Loud weeping heard from inside. One resident. Unnamed.-

-Yeah!-

“The next time Charles T. Williamsworth appears on record, it is in the back of a photo from France in 1940. Showing Williamsworth standing in front of a watch shop wearing dark clothes, a distinct pocket watch, and looking into the camera.”

The black and white image appears on screen, zooming in on the background figure. Danny tilts his head at it, something about it niggling at him.

“The shop and its owner would go on to be infamous within the French town for the duration of the Second World War. Charles was unwillingly drafted in the summer of 1941, serving on the front lines for no more than 3 months before sustaining a wound to his face, leaving him with damaged eyesight, facial scarring, and a medical discharge.

He returned to his shop soon after.”

Danny frowned at the mention of what the man had probably gone through.

“Later evidence statements regarding Charles stated that he was: ‘an odd man. He never mentioned the war, leaving it behind once he was not forced to be a part of it. He seemed to be separate from it all, he only cared for his watches.’

This sense of separation would extend to his shop, as when the town was bombed in 1944 leading up to D-day, his shop was left miraculously unharmed. It was reportedly open the very next day.”

-I can appreciate the dedication- Shane says in yellow.

-Yeah, I mean, the morning after is a bit soon, but he did really love watches. If he didn’t have to, I guess he wasn’t gonna close his shop.-

-His advertising: ‘Sure you were almost killed in a fiery explosion, but look! I’ve got new watches!’ Jazz hands.-

Ryan laughs.

“Over the next 50 years, Charles T. Williamsworth would disappear from records repeatedly, sometimes for months, only present on seven censuses between 1952 and 1979. Despite this, the clock shop was never sold, remaining in wait for its master’s return.”

Multiple pictures of pocket watches came onscreen. “It became known in the surrounding area for especially good pocket watches and grandfather clocks. Each personally made using Swiss essemblage practices, often engraved.

While it was a place of prestige, some described the shop as having ‘an unbearably loud sound of ticking, as if a thousand clocks were set to the same second.’

Apparently, Charles ‘seemed to enjoy the sound, often standing in the front room when no one was present. He was able to pick out one clock if it was off time.’ Witnesses stated.”

It cut to showing Shane and Ryan at their table.

“God, I can’t imagine. That’d drive me crazy.” Shane said, shaking his head.

“Yeah, I don’t know, a thousand clocks at the same time? Just..” Ryan looked back and forth frantically, as if there were sounds from every direction, “I’d go nuts pretty fast, I can’t even handle one sometimes.”

“I’d just go off and punch one of the clocks, just- RAAAH and -oh my god is that where that comes from?! I’m gonna punch your clock? Or like you clock somebody!?! Oh my god I never realized that!”

Danny’s jaw drops at the realization as Ryan laughs. Shane looks to be losing his mind as well.

“However, Charles’ most notable disappearance was his last.”

Dramatic music played as Danny zoned back in.

“Due to his frequency of vanishing for extended periods of time, it is unknown when exactly Charles disappeared. The last definite sighting of Charles T. Williamsworth was late at night on April 23rd, 1999, when neighborhood patrolman, Elliot Dubois, noticed him locking the door to his shop with its lights still on. Elliot, concerned for the safety of the elderly man, questioned him but eventually allowed Charles to leave, noting that he turned down a road that only led into the woods outside of town.

Two weeks later, 12 year old James Chappellè, a mailboy in the area, noted during his morning run on May 7 that mail had begun to pile up in front of the shop’s door.

Something that had never happened before.”

The word ‘before’ faded into red.

“It reached such a point that the mail system declared they would no longer deliver, as they couldn’t guarantee it wouldn’t be stolen.

At this point, the police got involved and the case was assigned to Detective Jacob Laurent.

It turned out to be a more difficult case than first expected, as when they looked into Charles’ past, they were unable to turn up any such notable documents as a birth certificate nor any document containing a birthdate.

But when police entered the shop on May 10th, they found it largely empty, with only the shelves, register, and equipment left remaining between the front and back room. There were no clocks of any kind.

It should be noted that there was still money in the register, and a light on in the back though the other bulbs for the front seemed to have been burnt out.

Upon entering the living space above the shop, it was found to be covered in dust, and all of Charles’ clothes and belongings still present.

Rather, there was evidence that Charles largely slept in his shop, with a cot beside his workbench.

A workbench that, upon police entry, only held one gold pocketwatch, personally engraved with the initials ‘C. W.’ As it was known for Charles to always carry the pocketwatch, he was officially declared missing and possibly presumed dead.

The watch’s presence also led detective Laurent to suspect foul play.

Despite the declaration of foul play, the police did not extensively search the town woods, citing the size and density of the forest.”

The video cut to Shane staring at Ryan, face deadpan. Ryan was clearly trying to hold back laughs.

“So… let me get this straight… an old man who’s… how old at this point exactly?”

Ryan laughs, “Nobody knows, there’s no known birthday-“

“That’s weird too, but okay, let’s say he’s like what, at least 95? I mean… there’s a certain age that like if you disappear… ..eh.” Shane shrugged.

Ryan looked at him incredulously, “Eh??”

“Yeah,” Shane shrugged again, “Eh.”

“What???”

“I mean… y’know… old people wander into the woods sometimes, maybe he just went for a walk and got lost. At that age… death has gotta be around every corner, I mean come on!”

Ryan wheezed into his elbow.

Danny laughed quietly.

Once Ryan calmed down, he organized the file, clipping it down on the table, “So! With the story finished, let’s get into the theories,”

Shane rolled his eyes, “Oh god this is gonna be one of yours isn’t it? What ghosts are abducting people now?”

Danny smiled, briefly considering how much effort it would take to go haunt Shane all the way in LA.

“The first theory is that Charles T. Williamsworth was involved with the mafia at the time and was a long standing or high ranking member that had crossed the wrong people.

Some reasons for this theory is the lack of early documents, suggesting a fake identity or forgery.

This case is especially supported by the long absences, where his shop remained closed and yet still remained in his possession.

In fact, the deed for the shop was not listed under Charles’ name, instead Iisted as owned under a private organization.

This theory explains his disappearance and possible subsequent death as an act of revenge from an enemy made from illicit activities. Leaving no body behind, there would be no evidence to prosecute the acting party.

Within this, there are also some who believe that if Charles was engaged in the mafia and lived under a false identity, that his disappearance was him returning to his actual identity, possibly due to being caught.

Prison records indicate 6 Swiss-German inmates arrested at the approximate time of his disappearance, roughly matching the age and appearance of Charles. Notably, none of them had a distinct facial scar and no identification was ever confirmed.”

The screen switched.

Shane smiled at Ryan, “Oh Ho Ho, my boy Charles is getting into some funky stuff, huh? Workin’ for the Mob, breaking knees, chopping fingers?”

Ryan laughed, “Yeah maybe, it definitely lends credit to him being a part of something. Maybe he was out in the woods breaking knees y’know. Or burying something.”

“Someone,…”Shane said ominously, then burst out laughing, “What if he buried himself! Just-“Shane mimed digging, clapping his hands like he was wiping off dust, “Alright, thats a good illegal grave right there, just a good hole for a dead- woaaah!” He pretended to fall, “Boom, stuck in his own grave.”

“Really, this old man dug a 6 foot deep grave? On his own?”

“Hey you don’t know his strength, maybe he lifts.”

“Alright.” Ryan shook his head, still grinning.

Danny smiled, considering it, it did kind of make sense.

“The second theory is that Charles T. Williamsworth did indeed just walk into the woods and never come out. If this is the case, what happened in the woods is widely speculated on. Some saying that animals may have attacked him, or that he simply fell or was injured and could not get up due to his age.

This theory loses support due to the fact that no body was ever found. Though some say that if the woods were too big for the police to search, there may be a den or that his body was covered naturally.”

“Or in a grave.”

“You really think he was mafia?”

“I mean, who could tell?” Shane shrugged.

“The third theory, much like the first, is that Charles was a federal agent for one of the Allied Powers.

This theory is also supported by the significant periods of absence and lack of documents to indicate a forged identity, meant to fool the German government and allow him to work behind the lines. However, unlike the first, there is also evidence of a man with the same distinct scar on his eye, showing up in the background of photos at the British Intelligence Office, the Eiffel Tower during Germany’s occupancy, and behind closed Swiss borders.

None of which would be possible without the unique skills and permissions of a government agent.”

Silence reigned as Shane and Ryan stared each other down, Shane clearly ramping up for something.

“The name’s Williamsworth. Charles Williamsworth.” He said dramatically.

Ryan burst out laughing. “You support this one more then?”

“Yeah, I’ve changed my mind, he’s not in the mafia. His suspicious activities were in the name of secrecy, national secrets, confidential war trades. Espionage…”

“Well I guess, nobody’s gonna suspect the 95 year old man to be up to anything. I mean, if I saw an old man somewhere I’d just be like, huh I wonder who lost their grandpa, not ‘I bet he’s secretly working to take down Hitler.’ Y’know.”

“Charles gets caught: just ‘Whaa-at me~e? I’m just a gentle~e o~ ol~ld ma~an, I can’t harm nobody~y.” Shane mimed leaning over a cane.

“He gets caught and just pretends he has dementia, ‘Who am I? Who are you? Why am I here? Where’s my breakfast?”

Shane cackled as Ryan laughed.

Danny considered it more, this one seemed the most likely, though… he’d definitely be the oldest agent.

“Another theory is that the shop was robbed and Charles returned while or before it was happening, catching the criminals off guard and leading them to react rashly, injuring or killing Charles. They then would have hidden his body and cleaned out the shop to hide any other evidence.

This theory however is disproven by the lack of money taken from the register.

Despite this, it is the official claimed circumstance by the police at the time.”

“Fucking police, always with the boring one.” Shane said ruefully.

“Our last theory, and my personal favorite,-“

Shane groaned. Danny smiled, this was gonna be good.

“-is that Charles T Williamsworth was a time traveler. And that all of his disappearances were when he was traveling through time.

This theory supports his families early move to Switzerland under odd timing, his appearance in so many photos and even his obsession with clocks. As well as why he seemed unbothered by the tumultuous times.”

“I can… accept it.” Shane said, hesitant.

Ryan laughed, “I’ll take it.”

“Despite all of these theories, there is still significant information missing from the case.

And so, like clockwork this case shall remain:

Unsolved.”

Danny’s mouth dropped as the screen went dark.

No way.

No freaking way.

He lurched upwards, eyes wide.

Obsessed with clocks, scar on his eye, fricking weird and talks in riddles.

Oh mygod!

Danny threw himself out of bed, “I’ve connected the dots!” He rushed to untangle himself from his sheets, transforming immediately, “I’ve connected them!”

He dove for the ghost portal.

Holy frick!

Charles T. Williamsworth was Clockwork!

[justatiredlesbian]

"She took this long pause." "No. No. I had to breathe, so I inhaled." "There. The breath. Yes."

[things2mustdo]

When I ask myself what films in recent years have been my favorites, I find that the answers all seem to have a few things in common.  One, the movie must tell a compelling story; two, it must rise above its genre to make a larger statement about life or some universal idea; and three, it must be technically well made.  All great art—including film—can serve as a vehicle for the presentation of ideas, and the promotion of a certain virtue.  Although the mainstream American film industry has become more and more a sad repository of feminist cant and lowest-common-denominator commercial pandering, the foreign film world has undergone something of a renaissance in the past fifteen years.

The best films of France, Germany, Spain, and the UK are edgier, more intelligent, and more masculine than anything found in the US.  It was not always so.  But the work of great European directors like Jacques Audiard, Gaspar Noe, Nicolas Winding Refn, and Shane Meadows leaves little room for doubt that the true cutting-edge work is being done in Europe.  (Argentina deserves honorable mention here as having an excellent film industry).  The mainstream, corporate-driven US film industry has effectively smothered independent voices under an avalanche of political correctness, girl-power horseshit, chick-flickism, and mind-numbing CGI escapist dreck.

Movies that deal with masculine themes in a compelling way are not easy to come by these days.  Honest explorations of masculine virtues are repressed, marginalized, or trivialized.  One needs to scour the globe to cherry-pick the best here and there, and in some cases you have to go back decades in time.  Luckily, the availability of Netflix and other subscription services has made this task much easier than it used to be.  Access to the best cinema of Europe, South America, and Asia can be a great way for us to catch as glimpse at a foreign culture, as well as reflect on serious ideas.

I want to offer my recommendations on some films that I believe are an important part of the modern masculine experience, in all its wide variety and expression.  Out of the scores of possible choices, I decided to pick the handful of films that are perhaps not as well known to readers.  My opinions will not be shared by all.  I encourage readers to draw up their own lists of films dealing with masculine themes, and hope they will reflect on the reasons behind their choices.  Below are mine, in no particular order.  In italics is a brief plot synopsis, followed by my own comments.

1. Straw Dogs (1971).

A mild-mannered American academic (Dustin Hoffman) living in rural Cornwall with his beautiful wife becomes the target of harassment by the local toughs.  Things escalate to a sexual assault on his wife, and eventually to a brutal and protracted fight to the death when a local man takes refuge on their property.

Dustin Hoffman reaches his breaking point in “Straw Dogs”

This is a classic example of the type of movie that could never be made today.  Arguably Sam Peckinpah’s most daring film, it contains a controversial rape scene that seems to leave open the question whether Hoffman’s wife (played by Susan George) was a victim or a willing participant.  Faced with his wife’s betrayal, and continuing harassment from local miscreants, Hoffman’s character finds himself completely isolated and must learn to stand his ground and fight.

A chance incident later in the film sets the stage for a blood-soaked confrontation which is as inevitable as it is necessary. Peckinpah presents a compelling case for the cathartic power of violence, and the achievement of masculine identity through man-on-man combat.  It is a theme I find myself strongly drawn to. Controversial, powerful, and unforgettable, Peckinpah proves himself an unapologetic and strident advocate of old-school martial virtue.  We would do well to listen.  His voice is sorely missed today.  (Note:  avoid the pathetic recent remake of this movie).  Honorable mention:  Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch (1969) and Bring Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974).

2. Sorcerer (1977).

A group of international renegades find themselves down and out in Nicaragua, and volunteer for a job transporting unstable dynamite across the country to quell an oil rig fire.

Due to inept marketing when this movie was first released, it never achieved the credit it so fully deserved.  A motley group of international riff-raff (including the always appealing Roy Scheider) seeks redemption through a harrowing trial.  But will they get it?  Is it even desirable to escape one’s dark past?  The answers are complex, and director William Friedkin refuses to supply easy ones.  The characters in this film are doomed, and they know it, but they still hold true to their own code.  Which is itself honorable.  Consequences must be paid for everything we do in life, and often the price comes in a way never expect.  Dark, brooding, and humming with a pulse-pounding electronic score by Tangerine Dream, this film has deservedly become a cult classic.  The ending is a shocker you’ll never see coming.

Roy Scheider undertakes the most perilous journey of his life in William Friedkin’s 1977 masterpiece “Sorcerer”

3.  The Lives of Others (2006).

A coldly efficient Stasi (East German security service) officer (Ulrich Muhe) is enlisted by a Communist party hack in a surveillance program against a supposed subversive writer and his girlfriend.  But monitoring the writer’s life awakens sparks of nascent humanity in the Stasi man, and he eventually must decide whether to follow orders and destroy the writer, or to sacrifice himself to save him.

This German masterpiece was made with great fidelity to the look and feel of 1980s East Germany, and the results are evident in every frame.  It belongs on any list of the greatest films ever made.  The masculine virtue here is of a different type than viewers may be used to:  it is a quiet, understated heroism, the type of heroism that probably happens every day but is hardly noticed.  There is no bragging here, no chest-beating, no big-mouthed bravado.  (In short, none of the wooden-headed caricatures that pass for masculinity in the US).  The ethic here is about love and self-sacrifice, the noblest and greatest virtues of all.

The ethos of self-sacrifice is now considered old-fashioned and almost a punch-line, but historically it was valued very highly.  It features in nearly all the old literary epics and dramas of Europe and Asia.  Actor Ulrich Muhe pulls off a minor miracle of characterization here with his portrayal of a Stasi man named Weisler, whose special wiretapping assignment against a playwright transforms him from heartless automaton into awe-inspiring hero.  The movie made me wonder just how many quiet, unassuming men there must be out there, whose toil, heroism, and sacrifice has never been, and never will be, acknowledged.  The ending is transcendently beautiful, and moving beyond words.

4.  Homicide  (1991).

A police detective (Joe Mantegna) is assigned to investigate a murder case.  The case awakens in him stirrings of his long-suppressed ethnic identity.  Unfortunately, he will eventually be forced to choose between conflicting loyalties.  And the consequences will be devastating.

No modern American director has probed the meaning of masculine identity more than David Mamet, and all of his films are meditations on themes related to illusion, reality, masculinity, and struggle.  Homicide, a nearly unknown gem from the early 1990s, is perhaps his profoundest.  Mamet knows that a man must make choices in his life, and for those choices, consequences must be paid.  And very often, we find ourselves derailed by the mental edifices we construct for ourselves.  The Mantegna character is led through a complex and increasingly ambiguous chain of events, only to find that at the heart of one mystery lies an even more inscrutable one.  Beware the things you seek.  You may not like what you find.

Joe Mantegna deals with the fatal consequences of his decisions in David Mamet’s “Homicide”

5.  A Prophet (2009).

An Algerian Arab is incarcerated in a French jail, and is drawn into the savage world of Corsican gangsters.  Forced to kill or be killed, he is drawn into a pitiless world that recognizes only cunning and brutality.  He finds himself straddling two realities:  the world of his own nationality, and that of the Corsicans.  And to survive and emerge triumphant, he must learn to play all sides against each other.

This film must be counted among the greatest crime dramas ever made.  You simply can’t take your eyes off the screen.  The lesson here is that a man must learn to survive on his wits, and do whatever is necessary to stay alive.  The Corsican boss whom Al Djebena (Tahar Rahim) works for is just about the most malevolent presence in recent screen memory.  Part of France’s continuing internal dialogue about its immigrant population, A Prophet is not to be missed.

Tahar Rahim learns a thing or two about Corsica in “A Prophet”

6.  The Beat That My Heart Skipped (2005).

An intense young man (Romain Duris) works for his father as a real estate shark in urban Paris.  His “job” consists of intimidating deadbeat immigrant tenants, vandalizing apartments, and forcibly collecting loans.  He also plays the piano.  Eventually, he is forced to decide which life he wants:  the path laid out by his shady father, or the idealistic path of his own choosing.  He’s seeking redemption, but will he find it?  And at what cost?

Again, we have here the themes of redemption and moral choice.  Romain Duris has a screen presence and intensity that rivals anything done by Pacino in his prime, and some of the scenes here are fantastic.  (His seduction of his friend’s wife, Aure Atika, is one of many great scenes).  All men will be confronted and tested by crises and situations beyond their control.  How they respond to those situations will define who they are as men.  Duris’s character proves that redemption can be achieved, if wanted badly enough.

Romain Duris embodying screen intensity

7.  Red Belt (2008).

Martial arts instructor Mike Terry is forced, against his principles, to consider entering a prize bout.  He is abandoned and betrayed by his wife and friends, and must confront his challenges alone with only his code and his pride.

Another great meditation on masculine virtue and individualism by David Mamet.  In his own unique dialogue style, Mamet showcases his belief that, in the end, all men stand alone.  At the moment of truth, it is you, and only you, who will be staring into the abyss.  Our trials by fire will not come in the time and at the place of our own choosing.  But when they do come, a man must be prepared to hold his ground and fight his corner.  Watch for Brazilian actress Alice Braga in a supporting role here.  We hope to see more of her on American screens in the future.

8.  Fear X  (2003).

A repressed security guard (John Turturro) is searching for answers to who killed his wife.  His strange behavior and ticking time-bomb manner begin to alarm friends and co-workers.  One day he finds some information that may be a lead to solving the mystery.  This discovery sets him on the path to realization. Or does it?

I am a big fan of the films of Nicolas Winding Refn (The Pusher trilogy, and Valhalla Rising), and this one is perhaps his most penetrating examination of a wounded psyche.  It failed commercially when it first appeared, as many viewers were put off by his artistic flourishes and opaque ending.  For me, this film is the deepest study of grief and repressed rage ever committed to film.  All men will be confronted by tragedy, grief, and inexplicable loss during their lives.  How we handle it will define who we are.  The greatness of this film is that it explores Turturro’s claustrophobic, neurotic world in a deeply personal way, and at the same time suggests that he may actually be on to something.  This film covers the same philosophical ground as Francis Ford Coppola’s The Conversation, in that it hints at the ultimate ambiguity of all things.

John Turturro confronts the unrelenting darkness of his own psyche in “Fear X”

If you are a Netflix subscriber and watch movies frequently, as I do, you may find it useful to keep a notebook near your television and jot down the titles of movies you see, and a few notes about what you liked or didn’t like.  You’d be surprised how much you can learn from movies.  There are just so many good and bad ones out there that having some system for keeping track of them will be time well spent.

[deadcactuswalking]

REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 03/04/2021 (Lil Nas X’s “MONTERO”, Mimi Webb, Russ Millions & Tion Wayne)

So, we have a #1 debut, and that’s pretty much the only story here in the UK Top 75 as we get a filler week before Demi Lovato, Olivia Rodrigo and Lil Tjay run in and cause havoc. As for now, “Wellerman” is replaced at the top by Lil Nas X’s controversial “MONTERO (Call Me by Your Name)”, spending its first week at #1 after making pretty sudden gains assisted by the video and alternate versions – the mid-week projection had this at #15. Elsewhere, we just see the fall-out from Bieber. Welcome back to REVIEWING THE CHARTS.

Rundown

It’s a quiet week – only seven new entries, and none from Rod Wave, 24kGoldn or AJR as I had predicted. That doesn’t mean there isn’t some stuff to talk about within the chart, or particularly off of the chart, as we have a fair few drop-outs switching their places with returning entries. In particular, we have Justin Bieber’s “As I Am” featuring Khalid being swapped out for “Anyone” at #25, as well as drop-outs for “Arcade” by Duncan Laurence – slightly premature, I’d think – and all of Lana Del Rey’s songs from last week. We also “Anxious” by AJ Tracey, “Heat” by Paul Woodford and Amber Mark and “Toxic” by Digga D exit the chart, but the only real notable loss was “34+35” by Ariana Grande ending its 21-week run on the chart. Returning to the Top 75 in its place – which I cover – we have “Mr. Brightside” by the Killers of course at #73, as well as “Midnight Sky” by Miley Cyrus at #72, “You’ve Done Enough” by Gorgon City and DRAMA at #70 (really hope this one becomes a hit) and “Don’t You Worry About Me” by Bad Boy Chiller Crew at #66. In terms of climbers and fallers, we do have some notable gains and losses. For songs travelling down the chart, we have “Patience” by KSI featuring YUNGBLUD and Polo G tanking a sharp drop in its third week to #18, “Streets” by Doja Cat shaking off the video gains at #22, “drivers license” by Olivia Rodrigo continuing to collapse at #27, another sharp drop for HVME’s remix of Travis Scott’s “Goosebumps” down to #34 probably due to ACR, which was probably the fate for “Get Out My Head” by Shane Codd at #46. The same probably can’t be said for Drake’s losses, as “What’s Next” is at #40, “Lemon Pepper Freestyle” featuring Rick Ross is at #41 and “Wants and Needs” featuring Lil Baby stalls at #55. We also see falls for “Money Talks” by Fredo and Dave at #50, “Bringing it Back” by Digga D and AJ Tracey at #51, “Sweet Melody” by Little Mix on its way out at #57, “Headshot” by Lil Tjay featuring Polo G and Fivio Foreign down to #61 off the debut (although it’ll rebound thanks to the album as soon as the next week rolls around), “Ready” by Fredo featuring Summer Walker at #62, “You’re Mines Still” by Yung Bleu featuring Drake at #63 and “Day in the Life” by Central Cee at #69. Where it gets interesting are our gains, such as outside the top 40 with “What Other People Say” by Demi Lovato and Sam Fischer which could very well get even higher next week thanks to the album. We also have “Track Star” by Mooski at #53 off of the debut and a couple of tracks entering the top 40 for the first time, those being “Heartbreak Anniversary” by Giveon at #39 and Majestic’s remix of “Rasputin” by Boney M. at #38. Elsewhere in the top 40, we have “Let’s Go Home Together” by Ella Henderson and Tom Grennan at #13 and two songs marking their first week in the top 10, those being “Little Bit of Love” by Tom Grennan at #10, a song continuing to sour on me, and “Your Love (9PM)” by ATB, Topic and A7S, an EDM song at #8 that I initially mocked for its soulless repackaging but has honestly got me pretty hooked since. I’m excited to see how this one does. For now, however, let’s get on with our new arrivals.

NEW ARRIVALS

#64 – “Cloud 9” – Beach Bunny

Produced by Joe Reinhart

Beach Bunny is a power pop band who last year released their album Honeymoon on Mom+Pop and it’s basically a modern r/indieheads staple in that it’s an accessible, airy pop-rock record fronted by a woman. It’s not anything unique, really, or different if you look further into it but that’s fine because there’s a lot of vaguely “indie” or music snob releases pushed out every year that miss the charts entirely. It’s a different story, however, when a year later, it gets viral on TikTok and streams its way onto the chart. In that case, we have “Cloud 9” by Beach Bunny, a pretty simple but sweet love song about a guy who just makes her feel a lot better about herself in times where she can’t pick herself up from the rut she’s in. Again, it’s a simple track but enhanced by the wonderful and unique vocal performance from front-woman Lili Trifilo and some pretty great production making sure no guitar lick is missed in this mix, especially in that chorus which is such an ethereal blend of the electric guitar dubs. I would argue that this actually should end at that second chorus even if it ends feeling abrupt as the transition to the final chorus feels a lot less cathartic than it does awkward, especially if the bridge is going to be a simplistic, quirky instrumental meander that doesn’t go far enough to be a guitar solo and hence feels kind of like a worthless addition. As is, this is a pretty great song still, just not the most fully realised once it loses that initial tight surf groove, though I’ll let it pass if we’re going to get rock this good on the charts again. I know this won’t really get more traction for Beach Bunny – or power pop for that matter – but more of this, please.

#52 – “You All Over Me” (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault) (Remix) (feat. DaBaby) (Part 2) (Radio Edit) – Taylor Swift featuring Maren Morris

Produced by Taylor Swift and Aaron Dessner

Sadly, this does not feature DaBaby and is not the remix, radio edit or sequel to any previously released song. Jokes aside, I guess brackets are the next big comeback for pop music, which goes hand-in-hands with remixes and re-releases, hence why Taylor Swift is dusting off this leaked Fearless-era cut for a new recording with country singer Maren Morris, who you probably know from her contributions to Zedd’s “The Middle”. Now whilst Swift is a great songwriter, I do often find myself frustrated by how she treads common ground all too frequently without establishing much different with how a song is structured or how it emotionally connects. This is true not just lyrically but especially sonically as of recent, as despite being written in 2008, it has too much in common with the less interesting cuts off of folklore for me to really care that much. That’s especially if Taylor’s going to undercut the clean acoustic guitars with flourishes of harmonica and crow sound effects, showing some genuine intrigue here before refusing to let any of that develop past a couple stray melodies or notes further back in the mix. I’m trying really hard to be compelled by these re-recordings and re-releases of her back catalogue as I do consider myself a fan, but it’s tough to pay attention when any new compositions we get sound like folklore leftovers with Maren Morris only put to use as decoration, much like HAIM on “no body, no crime” – and we already got an album full of folklore leftovers. I’m not a fan of this, sorry – I can see the appeal, and I do think this has enough of a country tinge to it to make it at least somewhat interesting – but this goes in one ear and immediately out of the other.

#48 – “Tonight” – Ghost Killer Track featuring OBOY and D-Block Europe

Produced by Ghost Killer Track and Kenzy

Screw the formalities and screw the analysis because D-Block Europe are back to add another D-Block to their EU collection – and since they’re Londoners, their only – and that’s Paris, and contrary to the British nature, we’ve let French rap chart in the top 50 out of the fact that they collaborated with two of the most comical rappers in British history. They’ve also linked up with producer Ghost Killer Track, also from France, as this is ostensibly his song even if he intends not to prove himself with this dull piano-based beat and oddly-mastered bass and percussion, which are really just DBE staples. Unfortunately, past the initial comedy of that first line in the chorus, neither Young Adz or Dirtbike LB deliver any stupid lyrics or funny inflections, instead just resorting to being as boring as they can in their constant flexing as possible. I guess the French guy here, OBOY, commands a higher energy in his verse if only through his comical “no, no, no” ad-libs, but he’s the only French speaker in an otherwise basic British trap song that I just cannot see the appeal in when we’ve had song after song from these guys for three years now. This won’t be the last we see of cookie-cutter UK rap this week though so brace yourselves for that.

#47 – “Last Time” – Becky Hill

Produced by LOSTBOY

It’s almost as if the charts are trying to send me off to sleep as here we have Becky Hill, a singer hedging the line between a non-presence and mildly annoying, which is arguably more frustrating than downright infuriating as her slightly smokier voice does not sound bad, just lacking in texture in every way, especially if the multi-tracking is going to be this minimal on a royalty-free deep-house beat produced by Getty Images with a pretty worthless drop, a generic and simple melody of piano stabs for major chords, and a whole bunch of reverb on the vocal take... but it still ends up feeling dry as there’s nothing here to quench that thirst for a tighter, bass-heavy house banger or even a more ethereal, dreamy trance track, deciding to stick to a healthy medium of boring and utter garbage. Yes, that was a singular sentence. I’m not awake enough to form a cohesive sentence less than 40 words long, and this new Becky Hill track is just worsening that if anything. Speaking of...

#21 – “Body” – Russ Millions and Tion Wayne

Produced by Gotcha Bxtch

Who’s Russ Millions? He’s Russ. No, not that Russ. British Russ – or Russ Splash, stylised as Russ splash on Spotify and nowhere else. This confusingly-named fellow appeared on the charts a couple times and possibly most famously with “Keisha & Becky”, a song also featuring Tion Wayne that is referenced on this very track. Sigh, I usually like Tion Wayne but even he can’t be bothered to delivery his usual brand of suave charm or sinister menace, instead opting for a more growling but ultimately completely monotone cadence that doesn’t flatter him or Russ, who one of my friends described as sounding like one of the aliens from Toy Story. This is a pretty by-the-numbers drill beat too, and it’s pretty safe to say that neither Russ or Tion Wayne here are going to bother with wordplay, even when they start pretty smoothly trading bars and Tion Wayne goes for a more unique chopper flow in the second verse. This is just not of any note. Once again, speaking of...

#17 – “Good Without” – Mimi Webb                        

Produced by Freedo

I assumed Mimi Webb debuted this high because of a talent show she won or something because I’d never heard her name but instead, she just happened to have a major label deal before her unreleased song just happened to go viral on TikTok and just happened to be supported by one of the women who just happened to be the biggest creator on the platform. Yeah, and this song just happened to be garbage, suffering from every possible millennial pop trope and then some, from the mix dressed rather too overtly in reverb, the ugly guitar pluck, a generic indie-girl voice that you swear you’ve heard before in one of those dreadful piano covers of popular songs they use in adverts, as well as this ballad being undercut by badly-programmed trap percussion. I can tell this label is trying to create somewhat of an Olivia Rodrigo phenomenon from this and I for one am terrified of the Poundland knock-offs to come. Screw this.

#1 – “MONTERO (Call Me by Your Name)” – Lil Nas X

Produced by Roy Lenzo, Omar Fedi and Take a Daytrip

At least Lil Nas X will bring some passion into this chart week? Well, not really, as when I hear this I recall that Pitchfork review of his EP, a much-maligned critique that featured the ever-so pretentious questioning if Lil Nas X really enjoyed making and listening to music. It reminds me because I think I now fully get it – at least when Lil Nas X was making slap-dash pop rock with Travis Barker or meme-worthy country rap with Billy Ray Cyrus for less than two minutes apiece, there was something invigorating in the execution or at least in concept. That 7 EP is still not a bad debut at all, but this new single “MONTERO”, a long-anticipated record that went from constantly-teased demo to Super Bowl commercial to Satanic-panicked videos of Lil Nas giving Satan a lap-dance to own the conservatives, has the same remote dreariness to it as “HOLIDAY” did late last year. The acoustic, Latin-flavoured guitar loop reminds me of his much better track “Rodeo” from that aforementioned EP that used its energy for similarly lighthearted subject matter but with some genuine energy, a Cardi B feature and a lot less subtle moombahton creeping in. With that said, I can’t say Lil Nas X didn’t try, as his vocal performance, whilst largely insufferable and strained, gives some energy to an otherwise aggravatingly stunted beat, and makes it a lot more infectious than it has any right to be. Content-wise, the song is essentially about a full circle where Lil Nas X becomes increasingly desperate for a man who starts off lonely and in a bad place, and the irony is that Lil Nas gets more explicitly sexual and crazed due to a combination of the LA life-style surrounding him and the fact that he’s simply, for lack of a better term, “down bad”, despite the fact that this guy doesn’t seem particularly desirable. Lil Nas knows this, though, and acknowledges it in the pre-chorus where he outright says that this guy is living the cocaine-addled celebrity life, but not living it right without Mr. Bullriding and Boobies in his life. I’m happy about the video and the outrage it seems to cause not just within conservative spaces but also amongst the hip-hop community, particularly Joyner Lucas, and I’m pretty happy with how out and proud Lil Nas X is about his sexuality, even if it leads to lines like “Shoot a child in your mouth while I’m ridin’”. I’m just really not a fan of this song past its content, which could really be interesting but falls flat with this plucking production that wastes time in barely two minutes with humming interludes. It’s not bad at all, just not for me.

Conclusion

And that concludes our week, and wow, what a bad week this was for new arrivals. Admittedly, it’s a filler week so only “MONTERO (Call Me by Your Name)” will probably last – or at least we can hope as even if I don’t like the song, I still have to give out an Honourable Mention to someone, and it may as well be Lil Nas X trying to put the effort in. Best of the Week easily goes to Beach Bunny for “Cloud 9”, far and away the only good song here, with Worst of the Week also going out pretty easily to Mimi Webb’s “Good Without”, which is the type of soulless, unmemorable garbage that makes pop music look uninspired, and as a person who writes about the charts constantly, it’s a misconception I don’t want proven or revisited. Dishonourable Mention is a toss-up but I guess I’ll give it to Russ Millions and Tion Wayne for that sprinkle of drill disappointment that is “Body”, and that’ll be it for this week. I predict some impact from Demi Lovato, Lil Tjay and especially Olivia Rodrigo next week, but for now, here’s our top 10:

Thank you for reading – sorry for the grouchiness on this one – and I’ll see you next week!

[shadowturtlesstuff]

again but better thoughts while reading

@polandbananas20

 so my spelling is terrible in this but you know i was more focused on the book than how to spell. 

Chapter 1) good intro and good starting tone. The lady next to her sucks. Good small establishment of shane.

chapter2)shane characterisation is still consistent. I like her two new roommates (will be best friends) . My guess is the boy in the kitchen will be pilot. Family means but not intentional. Has no confidence. I was right about the boy

Chapter 3) intro of pilot properly. He's good. I love the inner monologue of shane. Trying to keep eye contact, the surprise of having a normal conversation. It sets her character well. Intro to her blog which i would love to actually read (i hope there's at least one entry we can read) pilot is a musician but not. Business major. What crap. 

Chapter 4) i really feel like shane, she is just typical fangirl/ dork and i love it. Its weird being english and reading about the things that shock them like pasta in bags.i understand the watermelon.we do get to read ‘shanes writing’ but its her personal jornal not her blog.

Chapter 5) fun chapter. Intro to rome. Love the idea that shane is heavy handed and violent. Short, not alot happened other than small character establishment.

Chapter 6)intro to creative writing class which i want/need in my life.more beatles. Woman on plane works at starbucks, will she make more appearances? 

Chapter 7) the drama???or at least wht will be the drama. Pilot has a gf, called amy (wish it was me) (wait no, bc i know that plot doesnt actually like amy anymore bc he obviously likes shane. So i take it back. I want to be shane, i mean i basically am like her but oh well.)

Chapter 8) parents. Overprotective, think they know best. Urgh. guarantee one of shanes new friends fight back to her parents to support her life choices, that do not include doctor.

Chapter 9)gets an internship at travel mag company. Thats it…..

Chapter 10)rome. Looses purse. Pilot to the anxiety riddled rescue by telling his own life story about his wallet to help calm her nerves.distracts her. Basially he would do anything for shane already.re count of rome trip from her jornal again which is a good touch to further the plot. This is making me want to read dan brown (ish) all of two books i own of him

Chapter 11) the postcards are a nice touch that i hope someone reads???? Travel buddies..just saying.chad..hmmm,im like shane,well see if he is good enough for babe. Her GODDAM stupdi mean cousins being mean on her facebook, and babe seeing (best friend moment) about pilot and the whole teasing about having a boyfriend.

Chapter 12) he didnt see (but i think he did but istn sayin anything) paris i shappening. Babe is bff confirmed and i want her as my friend 

Chapter 13)angry birds addiction starts. Level three, weak, shoulder touching it romance confirmed.awwww pilot 100% waited to sleep so he could see shane safe in bed

Chapter 14) pilot with a french accent, enough  said. The flirtinggggg.  The plane woman  is back??in paris with them????

Chapter 15)pilots choices of the back in time thing are both wit shane. Its so obvious and i love it. Pilot as a fake fangirl about the eiffel tower. More flirting,kind of. Oh god chad no.he did it. Goddammit.nooo he wull run babe and shanes friendship and maybe her and pilot. ‘Assbucket’ indeed. Her an pilot are fine and i really believe her and babe will be because when she nearly gets robbed babe giver her a sympathetic smile. Not much to go on but i have hope.

Chapter 16)okay so, fav chapter, she finally spills her guts that she has anxiety basically, that she is premed with strict parents and this is scary whilst pilots lies in bed with her to relax her bc he heard her crying. He only ecoureges her slightly before going back to his bed and sleeping. My heart, i swear, soon the roles reverse and pilot will say why he is in london and all that.

Chapter 17)babe and shane bffs confired. Chad is the worst confirmed. Of course it wasnt  break up call. Of course she wants to vist. Of course pilot is to cowardly to break up and just accepts them going to paris together. Of freaking course.

Chapter 18) do not get over pilot, it wont work. Rugby guy nooooo!im team pilot how dare you kiss shane! Wow, city of glass mention. I want to make a list of every bookmentioned.

Chapter 19) pilot is not himself (obviouls) shane is worried. She is still lying to her parents an feeling bad about. Rugby guy is thankfully a no go. Pilot finds out about the kiss and guy and is clearly silently jealous. 

Chapter 20)aww shane! Im sorry pilot sucks currently. And a stupid guys trip with flat four. No. and devil chairs. 

Chapter 21)1)love the book talk.  The loneliness is kicking in, pilot man up for gods sake

Chapter 22)this red-head plain weirdo is back and going through her list like some sort of mentore. Omg!!! No. amy is here, i dont hatte her but can she not. Also, her dad…. No! (this is the stand up moment i was on about, i hope)

Chapter 23) i do not like her dad. At all. Nooo shane...no. they found out. And acted like assholes.

Chapter 24) n1!ahhhh no! Amy has her notebook. The end is nigh.im going to cry i feel like shane. 

Chapter 25) the family dinner-family outing. Niether of them manuped and shane is depressed

Chapter 26)back in america. Still hasn’t told pilot but you know it is a slow burn

Chapter 27) I, wait? Marry, some guy? Like no. I know it’s been what six years but no. I refuse.i don’t like this so called Melvin. It’s okay she doesn’t want to marry him. She goes to see pilot and finally mans up and tells him and asks if she made it and and pilot finally man’s up and tells her no she didn’t. They get stuck in an elevator

Chapter 28) the elevators doing something. Shane wants to re do London cuz she hates life

Chapter 1?) they are both back in London? Both having the same what ever is happening? 

  Chapter 2) omg. Plane lady took them back to staRt over and pilots mad about it (obv)

Chapter 3)so… they got mad but started over and I’m excited. 100%they won’t press the restart button. I’m calling it now. Cuz pilot knows he now has a chance to do the what if’s/

Chapter 4) they keep there distance but we all know it won’t last

Chapter 5) tipsy Shane? Shawarma

Chapter 6) babe thinksthere is something going on with them( again)

Chapter7)the story about fake pilot, and the kiss. Ahhhhhhg

Chapter 8)they found the button. Shane doesn’t want to go back. I do t want them to go back. They don’t go back thank god

Chapter 9) da Vinci code flirting somehow.. Shane tells him it won’t happen u less he breaks up with last Amy.

 Chapter 10) he will break up with Amy and laris is gonna happen. 

Chapter 11) so Shane is happy again, pilot broke up with amy. Shane tried to make peace with the devil chair.

Chapter 11) they are so adorable. Aswwwwewhwhehruysnwjw

 Chapter 12) Uwuwnfhueia we get more Shane and pilot flirting, 

Chapter 13) the opposite game is adorable. I like that they get to be themselves together without the awkwardness. The start of the move game. Thats my fav. 

Chapter 14) they still have the angry birds obssesion but unlike me and supercard they know when to stop.the dance ‘move’ ahh i love. The line ‘but you do.’ just shows how much they know each other and how pilot would do anything to make her smile. And the lost move (not really a move but totally a move.) once again proves their love. Also we had that plot moment where he talks about why h chose to go to london. I adore shanes rant (?) about the things she loves. And then pilot doing the same thing. Shane vs chair is my life, like i battle chairs too. 

Chapter 15) what is tfios? Ooohhh. Fault in our stars. (i googled it)i probably shouldve known by the whole always part. The dance move came back to bite pilot in the ass and now they are dancing together. Ew chad. Yes shane! That is what chad deserves. 

Chapter 16) they get intimate and gigly and happy and aaaawwwhww

Chapter 17) im glad shane still rememebers to be friends with babe and not forget her in her lovestick state currently.

Chapter 18) her postcard….the questions that haunt her so much. Sort of accepting them herself too. She finally got to do wrecking ball, they miss internship , oh no…. Start if a downall?? 

Chapter 19) shane and pilot have fallen HARD

Chapter 20) the article is off the table. Amy is there. What the hell. No. omg pilot no, you moron. THEY BROKE UP!!! Which is fair, a break is needed. They both get back on track and then try and find a balance. Hopefully. Oh her laptop….shit...the feels when all your work is just gone. Tries to reset bc she is so depressed bc she thinks she failed again. 

Chapter 21) she cant go back (thankfully) a bookstore is always a good haven to go to when your breaking down.

Chapter 22)the redemtion (?) time to try and fix everything and get back on track.the determination and the readiness to try and make everything better for herswelf, herself, and no one else is good. She makes friends with the people in her office and works harder than befire, try to get herself out of her comfort zone and experience things

Chapter 23) the confrontation with her parents. Oh god. I hope this goes well. Its going as well as it can go. Im happy shane is sticking up for her dream so she can be happy, uugh the whole dad speech of ‘i do everything for you, i know best because im older,’ i hate it. Ooohh she is making up with leo, talking ot him this time. Im happy. Leo is gay. Cool. i hate how he got broken up with becuase of his stupid family, it sucks. ‘There is no normal.’ perfect words. 

Chapter 24) her thing is in the thing!!!( also good job me with words.) her article got published (there we go)this is where she learns she can be with pilot and be successful because tracy is with a famous author and they make it work with harder schedules. Trys to talk to her parents. This time she will make there relationship work.

Chapter 25)urgh ‘you live under my roof,on my dime…’ blah blah blah. We hate controlling parents that dont see that overprotecting and controlling their childs life does more damage than good. Babe suggest self discovery trip. Babe is a grat friends. 

Chapter 26)the button thing will work…’im mad at pilot. Or am i mad at me.’ she cracked the code. She loathed herself because of her fear of failing, but because this time she worked on herself to make herself happy she no longer hates herself. Yet she still feels the same (ish) feeling that even though she worked harder and got further that she has no summer job when she gets back to the states, her parents still wont allow her choice of work.PILOTS BACK!!!!!!! She was about to press the button and he swooped in with his music.

Chapter 27) he still follows her blog and got help from babe. His speech, finished with lamppost. Where can i get a pilot?he uploaded their song. Working through the divorce thing again but it will be better because he has shane to talk to about it. Ahhh she got a job!!! Happy ending!!! My heart!!!eeeee…

epilogoue) she becomes a successful author. Her parents have accepted her and support her. Pilots a musician. He takes her to the weird plane lady and they gobe the locket back, then he makes the ultimate move. With pictures of where they fell in love he uses the beatles russain doll things to hide a ring and when she finds it she obviously says yes. And that its unfair cuz she cant top that move. 

sooo...thats it.

i really enjoyed this book. i cannot wait for her next book. this post is longwinded i apologize but oh well? again i will link my website and review as soon as its done. so far in about five hours all i have is a paragraph so it may not be as soon as i want it to be

[wondroussimmer-blog]

GET TO KNOW ME-

Basically, no one actually tagged me in this, but I thought i’d give it a go anyway seeing as this is a new blog and you guys can get to now me a bit, so I tag anyone who sees this and also wants to have a go...

________________________________________________________________

1. What is your full name? I’m not putting my last name on here, but my first name is Maja (Miya) 2. What is your nickname? I don’t really have one 3. Birthday? January 1st 4. What is your favourite book series? I don’t really read book series’ 5. Do you believe in aliens or ghosts? Not 100% sure, I don’t believe in the sort of ghosts you see in films, but I think I believe our loved ones stay with us in some way. As for aliens, idk, we can’t be the only life but idk.  6. Who is your favourite author? I find the fault in our stars quite overrated, but i’d say John Green because some of his others are my favourites! 7. What is your favourite radio station? BBC Radio 1 8. What is your favourite flavour of anything? this is such a weird question, how can you have a favourite flavour for everything? but if it’s sweet, definitely strawberry! 9. What word would you use often to describe something great or wonderful? Again, weird question, but i use so many words for this, my most used are probably lovely and amazing 10. What is your current favourite song? this changes alll the time, but right this minute it’s probably sunflower by post malone and swae lee 11. What is your favourite word? is this a thing? 12. What was the last song you listened to? vacation by hippo campus 13. What TV show would you recommend for everybody to watch? big mouth, orphan black, queer eye, dexter 14. What is your favourite movie to watch when you’re feeling down? the breakfast club or mean girls probably 15. Do you play video games? only the sims 16. What is your biggest fear? probably the death of people close to me, and in the future not being able to have children 17. What is your best quality, in your opinion? probably that i’m a friendly person  18. What is your worst quality, in your opinion? i’m v insecure 19. Do you like cats or dogs better? DOGS... always dogs! 20. What is your favourite season? autumn/winter 21. Are you in a relationship? yes 22. What is something you miss from your childhood? having way more friends and barely any responsibilities 23. Who is your best friend? my boyfriend 24. What is your eye colour? blue 25. What is your hair colour? brown 26. Who is someone you love? my boyfriend and family 27. Who is someone you trust? my boyfriend and closest family 28. Who is someone you think about often? okay wow, so much variety in these answers but the same as the previous two answers 29. Are you currently excited about/for something? christmas and my birthday 30. What is your biggest obsession? probably sims 31. What was your favourite TV show as a child? Probably Tracy beaker or that’s so raven  32. Who of the opposite gender can you tell anything to, if anyone? my boyfriend 33. Are you superstitious? only slightly 34. Do you have any unusual phobias? cracking knuckles, moths (but only indoors), realistic looking mannequins and gas masks... so not much 35. Do you prefer to be in front of the camera or behind it? behind, every single time 36. What is your favourite hobby? playing sims, graphic designing, video editing 37. What was the last book you read? The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat by Oliver Sacks 38. What was the last movie you watched? Muppet’s Christmas Carol 39. What musical instruments do you play, if any? I play a bit of guitar and can play the mr bean theme song on piano if that counts 40. What is your favourite animal? dogs 41. What are your top 5 favourite Tumblr blogs that you follow? I definitely have more than 5  42. What superpower do you wish you had? be able to teleport and go invisible  43. When and where do you feel most at peace? probably at home with my boyfriend 44. What makes you smile? sorry if this is becoming a boring answer... but my boyfriend! also my dog :) 45. What sports do you play, if any? I don’t at the moment, but I have done tennis, dance (ballet, tap and modern), swimming, karate, speed skating and netball 46. What is your favourite drink? water... how boring ik 47. When was the last time you wrote a hand-written letter or note to somebody? Last month, I made my boyfriend a scrap book as one of my boyfriend’s presents for our anniversary and wrote some letters as part of it  48. Are you afraid of heights? not if it’s a secure height 49. What is your biggest pet peeve? I have wayyy too many and so many grammatical ones, I absolutely hate when people incorrectly use was and were, so if someone said ‘we was going’, I think it’s quite an essex thing but I hateeee it, I can’t stand bad grammar, but also slow walkers, people who walk through the door without looking behind them to hold the door open for people behind, other drivers not indicating, people that have to be louder than everyone else, people that chew with their mouths open... basically I have a lot and this list could go on and on and on 50. Have you ever been to a concert? I’ve seen all time low, the 1975, imagine dragons, sunset sons, ed sheeran and paramore in concert so far and i’m seeing panic! at the disco in march which i’m MEGA excited about!!! 51. Are you vegan/vegetarian? vegetarian 52. When you were little, what did you want to be when you grew up? This would change all the time, it went from radio dj, to dancer, to teacher when I was really young, then architect when I was a teenager, and now it’s clinical psychologist which i’m slowly working towards 53. What fictional world would you like to live in? I’ve not got a clue 54. What is something you worry about? EVERYTHING! I get a lot of social anxiety, so basically whenever i’m out of the house i’m worrying about absolutely everything and it’s the worst and gets me super down, so yeah, love that 55. Are you scared of the dark? okay so I don’t like leaving the dark, i’m fine being in the dark but I hate when i’m home alone and have to turn the lights off in the living room, kitchen and hall to go to bed... if that makes sense 56. Do you like to sing? i’m someone that, at home, is constantly singing, and when it’s only my boyfriend around, if one of us says a sentence that can in some way relate to a song, i’ll immediately sing it, but I suck so I won’t ever sing in public 57. Have you ever skipped school? in school I faked being ill a few times to get off of school, but in uni i’ve skipped way too many lectures over the past 3 years 58. What is your favourite place on the planet? I absolutely adore Spain, but also Belgrade (i’m half Serbian) 59. Where would you like to live? If not my current home town, i’d love to one day live somewhere like Norway or Sweden 60. Do you have any pets? yep, i’ve got a french bulldog 61. Are you more of an early bird or a night owl? I wake up pretty early, but I hate to start the day early 62. Do you like sunrises or sunsets better? sunsets. 63. Do you know how to drive? Yep 64. Do you prefer earbuds or headphones? the sound of headphones but I normally use earbuds 65. Have you ever had braces? nope, thank god 66. What is your favourite genre of music? this really ranges from charts, to indie rock, to ‘former emo kid’, to early 2000s r&b, to musical theatre 67. Who is your hero? probably my boyfriend 68. Do you read comic books? no 69. What makes you the most angry? as we’ve already gathered, I have a lot of pet peeves, so a lot! 70. Do you prefer to read on an electronic device or with a real book?a real book! 71. What is your favourite subject in school? I currently study psychology which has been my favourite subject since A levels, but during GCSEs I enjoyed maths  72. Do you have any siblings? 1 younger brother 73. What was the last thing you bought? some christmas presents for my boyfriend’s cousins 74. How tall are you? 5ft4 75. Can you cook? yes 76. What are three things that you love? spending time with people I love, travelling, collecting photos  77. What are three things that you hate? busy places, cheats, confrontation 78. Do you have more female friends or more male friends? I actually barely have any so this is kind of hard to answer 79. What is your sexual orientation? straight 80. Where do you currently live? England 81. Who was the last person you texted? my mum 82. When was the last time you cried? I’m not actually sure, which is funny because I cry all the time and super easily 83. Who is your favourite YouTuber? I have so many: in terms of sims: lilsimsie, urbansims, sophsims, simkim, plumbella, in terms of lifestyle: louise pentland, in terms of fashion and beauty: samantha maria, tati westbrook, busybee carys, patricia bright, antonio garza, and others: shane dawson, sarah baska, kendall rae, jaackmaate, and loads more! basically, if i’m not on tumblr, i’m on youtube, if i’m not on youtube i’m playing sims, and if i’m not on sims i’m on tumblr... 84. Do you like to take selfies? rarely 85. What is your favourite app? any social media  86. What is your relationship with your parent(s) like? fab 87. What is your favourite foreign accent? Australian and Scottish 88. What is a place that you’ve never been to, but you want to visit? I have so many but I won’t bore you with another long list, so just a few: Sweden, South Africa, Iceland and Canada 89. What is your favourite number? 1 90. Can you juggle? no 91. Are you religious? I was baptised but don’t really consider myself religious 92. Do you find outer space or the deep ocean to be more interesting? both as interesting as the other 93. Do you consider yourself to be a daredevil? not really 94. Are you allergic to anything? no 95. Can you curl your tongue? yep, one of my weird ‘party tricks’ is I can actually curl it 180 degrees 96. Can you wiggle your ears? no 97. How often do you admit that you were wrong about something? not as often as I should 98. Do you prefer the forest or the beach? probably the forest 99. What is your favourite piece of advice that anyone has ever given you?my dad probably gives the best life advice but there’s too much to put here   100. Are you a good liar? It depends 101. What is your Hogwarts House? Hufflepuff 102. Do you talk to yourself? All the time 103. Are you an introvert or an extrovert? I N T R O V E R T, i’m so introverted to the point I hate it but seriously struggle to change it 104. Do you keep a journal/diary? no but I have in the past 105. Do you believe in second chances? it depends 106. If you found a wallet full of money on the ground, what would you do? Hand it in 107. Do you believe that people are capable of change? It depends 108. Are you ticklish? VERY 109. Have you ever been on a plane? manyyyy times 110. Do you have any piercings? nope, I have but not anymore 111. What fictional character do you wish was real? no idea  112. Do you have any tattoos? nope 113. What is the best decision that you’ve made in your life so far? I’m really not sure 114. Do you believe in karma? to an extent, but at the same time bad things seem to happen to good people, sooooo 115. Do you wear glasses or contacts? neither 116. Do you want children? yes 117. Who is the smartest person you know? my cousin 118. What is your most embarrassing memory? omg my whole life is filled with embarrassing memories that I seem to always remember at the most inconvenient times or when i’m about to go to sleep that just haunt me out of nowhere...fun 119. Have you ever pulled an all-nighter? yes 120. What colour are most of you clothes? black or white 121. Do you like adventures? yep 122. Have you ever been on TV? no 123. How old are you? 20 - nearly 21 124. What is your favourite quote? not really sure. 125. Do you prefer sweet or savoury foods? sweet

[beaniegara]

11 Questions

tagged both by @yaboybergara​ and @ricky-goldsworth​ which is great because that gives me 22 questions mwahhahaha thank you folks!! <3 

RULES

1. always post the rules

2. answer the questions given by the person who tagged you

3. write 11 questions of your own

4. tag 11 people you want to get to know better (or however many you want)

now, see, I don’t know what to ask........ so I’m gonna be a little shit and tag folks to pick 11 of these 22 questions and answer them too. nini and gray pls don’t sue me for reusing your questions, thank fdgkfndgfdsk I’m tagging @kaylotta, @queerunsolved, @haunted-gays, @thatmademadej, and @i-am-ghost-proof-baby <3 if yall wanna do it, of course. no pressure.

this is incredibly long (and uncomfortably honest). let’s go lesbians let’s go

first, nini’s questions:

1. How many pets have you had in your life?

one. I’ve always wanted them but my mom and I have always lived in tiny apartments and had no way to care for a pet so it wasn’t until I was 17 that we adopted a kitten!! his name was merlin and he was the laziest, moodiest lil ball of fluff I’ve ever met. I.. had to give him away a year later because we moved to a place even smaller that wouldn’t allow pets so long story short I’m scarred for life and don’t think I can ever take any more pets without feeling guilty to my bone 

this is merlin btw I love him with all my heart and he now lives in a farm. as far as I know anyway.. :(

2. Do you believe in destiny? Why?

mmm interesting question. weird, metaphysical theories aside, I don’t believe anything is set in stone per se, but I do believe that some things are just... meant to be? in a way? for example, you can’t tell me ryan and shane weren’t meant to be friends and find each other in such an unlikely place as they did. one of my mottos, completely stripped from context because it’s from a rather pretentious tv show, is “the universe is rarely so lazy”. meaning that good things happen for a reason, and that you trailed that path for that to happen. yknow what I’m saying? I can’t really explain this without writing a 10 page essay because that’s just how my gemini ass thinks 

3. If you could chose one person on the great beyond, would you take the chance to talk to them? 

you mean someone who has passed away? oh yeah, I would talk to my grandmother. she was raising me and died when she was 4 and that changed not only my entirely life but our whole extended family dynamic... so many questions.

4. From all your hobbies, which one would you love to make a living of?

oh man, writing. I’ve been dreaming of being a writer ever since I was 9 or something. never panned out but that would certainly be the dream. if I could work with videos, subtitling, tv shows, cinema etc that would also be dope as hell!

5. What’s your favorite color palette to wear?

fkgjfsdgiusfdksd I have no fashion sense whatsoever, idk? I do like to wear dark clothes (because weight..) and reds (because pale).

6. What’s your opinion on queerbaiting?

I don’t have the time for it. for starters, it’s something that usually comes from people with very poor writing skills that can’t come up with plots interesting enough to keep viewers/readers hooked in. that already says something. no offense to anyone who is a fan of shows like these, but when it’s mostly written by white men I just don’t have any high hopes for it. you can ask flavs what my reaction was like when I realized the character I had headcanon’ed as wlw in hannibal was actually a wlw. I couldn’t believe it, because what???? since when does that happen, especially in a show run by a white man??? kjdfghsjgd 

I think this is part of a bigger conversation but my point is, don’t fall for it. I know it’s all part of the fight for representation, asking big names to produce big shows with lgbtq+ characters in it and so on, but for the love of god, watch something else too!!!! let GOT rot and die!!!!!!!!! look up different, smaller, cheaper shows, that’s where you find lgbtq+ content creators!!!!!! there’s so many wlw webseries out there, you wouldn’t believe it. you have a choice. don’t give any more of your time and love and word-of-mouth to shows/movies that clearly have no interest in being more diverse. they don’t deserve you. 

and that’s not to say any of it is on us. quite on the contrary, they’re using us. but aside from calling out their bullshit, we do have a chance to boost lgbtq+ content creators. don’t let them fool you into thinking they’re doing you any favors, or that they’re our last chance so we should be paying attention to what they’re doing/saying. fuck them!!!! you can’t queerbait me because I don’t trust you or give you the chance to do it. and you can shove your very straight, very white shows where the sun doesn’t shine, @ hollywood.  

7. Is there a language you would love to speak?

french and korean, mostly. I can understand a little bit of both, but I really wish I was fluent :( oh, will to live and learn, where art thou...

8. Do you have, like, a dream so wild you think it’s impossible?

kjgnsfdkjhjjs having enough money to support myself and my mother??? I don’t have any big, wild dreams, I think. just.......... living comfortably would be a+  

9. How many AUs of your own life do you have in your head?

oh man. I keep thinking about living somewhere in idk iceland or scotland just like... tending goats or something. that’s the most comfortable version of myself I can think of.

I also like to imagine if I could handle being a film director, because that sounds like fun. maybe a screenwriter? anything creative in films, really. 

there’s also the unattainable dream of having a wife and idk maybe adopting a kid? and we’d just. support each other. and love each other. and that’s just. I. [cries]

I like to think how things would be if I were actually hot and not socially awkward.. I’d be someone completely different, basically lol 

10. If you were to meet your younger self, do you think they would think you cool or not?

oh god, younger me would hate present me D: I had such high hopes for myself, I had lots of dreams lol never in a million years did I think I’d be where I am today...

11. Not a question, but please add something postive about yourself, something that you love about you.

IDJFSSIODUGSDFKGDSJ IT’S LIKE YOU KNEW I’D BE A NEGATIVE FUCK, NINI. I................................ I like that I have an easy time with languages? or with classes in general. I like to learn from people, I’m just really unmotivated to leave the house lol 

now onto gray’s q’s:

1. What’s your favourite music video of all time?

straight-up impossible questions right out of the gate huh I SEE YOU, GRAY. I SEE YOU kjdfgjfsdhgkdsjfs

I’ll have to go with a few,

“prototype” by viktoria modesta is just GORGEOUS. I can’t get over this video & song and it’s been years.

“jackpot” by block b looks creepy as shit but the context makes it such a clever yet fun video. take into account that these guys were screwed over by the kpop company that created the group, and that the lyrics talk about hitting jackpot in an industry that’s savage to say the least. to me this video is a visual representation of what a dangerous trap entertainment companies are in the kpop industry, and it also ties in with the groups’ story of being made into dolls by a company and then telling them to fuck off in the end lol 

“treat me like your mother” by the dead weather. I don’t know why I just love it. (cw: gun violence)

“emperor’s new clothes” by panic! at the disco. I MEAN, LOOK AT IT.

“manyo maash” by puer kim. I just love the aesthetic?

honorable mention: “tick tick boom” by the hives because that’s a banger. ba dum tssss.

2. What’s a favourite memory of yours?

I have plenty of good memories, thank god. I think one of my favorites is just hanging out with my friends in 2008-9; one of their older brothers was driving us around town, we were listening to the white stripes at full volume, singing along, all sitting pressed up close together in his shitty car. man, my teenage years would’ve been fantastic if I had stayed there with them!! 

3. Do you play video games? If so, which one’s your favourite?

I DO!!! I mean, not as much as I’d like because a) no money to spare on games/consoles, and b) I suck at basically everything. but I’m obsessed with paladins these days, and I’m also a big fan of LOTRO. I like horror games--mostly the resident evil and silent hill type--and fps. I grew up playing some tomb raider, medal of honor, resident evil... oh, those were the days. 

4. How did you first get into [your fandom of choice]?

with bfu it was that kind of thing where I’d see a meme or two cross my dash and it was always this ridiculous screenshot, or those “that’s it, that’s the show” kinda things with dozens of thousands of notes... until one day I was incredibly anxious, and I needed to watch something or I’d never finish the assignments I had for college. so I just thought “oh hey I should check out that unsolved thing people like so much, it’s buzzfeed so it’s probably good bg noise to work with” lol and it did work, and I did finish my assignments, and that means that I first watched the show barely paying any attention to it because I was busy doing something else. but ryan’s and shane’s voices helped me relax and to this day they still help a lot with my anxiety, to the point that I need to keep coming back every minute or so during episodes because I get distracted just listening to their voices and not absorbing a word lol

5. How did you first get into fandom in general?

uhh.. well, I was a big “pottermaniac” (that’s how I called it) since I was 9, but that was before I realized fandom was a Thing on the internet too. I remember when I was maybe 10 or 11, I entered a chatroom (god, those were wild) just in time to see someone saying in all caps HARRY POTTER IS GREAT AND YOU’RE ALL DUMB FOR NOT SEEING IT or something fkdsjgfdugfsdk and it was this girl using the nickname fawkes. she was older than me, I think that 15 or something, and we exchanged addresses (!!! how am I alive!!!) and were pen pals for a while. but it took me so fucking long to actually find the fandom online that I think my first brush with it was with the arctic monkeys forum I found online in 2008, where I mistakenly said I liked “the muse” and people laughed at me so I never went back to it lol then in 2010 I found out about kpop and that’s when I really dived head-first into fandom life. took me long enough (tbf I was very against the notion of being a “fan” because I was an idiot).

6. What’s at the top of your bucket list?

great fucking question. no idea. I guess.. traveling overseas? if we’re talking wild, distant things. but closer to my reality, getting a job that pays me at least the minimum wage disjgdfgkfsdk #fuckinternships

7. What’s something not many people know about you?

I love dancing and miss it like hell.

8. What’s your favourite medium for storytelling - movie, book, television, musical, comic, internet video, video game, something else? Why that medium?

ohhhhhhh this is an interesting question. as much as I love writing, and think that’s one of the best things we humans have ever come up with, I do love.. musicals? not necessarily theater--although that’s great and I’d sell my soul to see chicago live--but I love the idea of telling stories through music. I really wish we could bring back the custom of telling stories orally, and through music, and that we could as society agree that collective singing is beautiful and should be reintroduced in our day-to-day lives. sure listening to (1) artist singing is great but hAVE YOU TRIED SINGING ALONG DURING A CONCERT WHERE EVERYONE ELSE IS SINGING TOO? best fucking feeling in the world. 

we had two bands in brazil, in different periods of time, that were so incredibly famous they’re still cornerstones in our music history. one was legião urbana, some folk-ey rock band that had a couple of songs telling these really long stories that I LOVE with all my heart. faroeste caboclo is our bohemian rhapsody, most people my age or older know the lyrics to it. and mamonas assassinas was this comical (?) rock band that sang dumb, fun songs that usually told stories too and that was the best. I miss that kinda thing. 

9. What’s your favourite food?

red meat, mainly churrasco. but I also can’t live without chocolate milk AND the whopper. capitalism has me by the stomach.

10. Do you have a joke to share?

fjgfsdgskfdgfsk I don’t.. it’s been so long since I last tried telling a joke, I don’t think I know any?

11. What song/artist helped you through your struggles?

pitty has been a big part of my life for some 14-odd years now. “be ok” by ingrid michaelson and “starlight” by muse were my anthems when depression hit hard during my teenage years. the white stripes has also been a constant, with gems like “blue orchid” and “a martyr for my love for you” turning into sort of theme songs for certain parts of my life. choi sam helped me through college. and even though they were a huge disappointment to the point that I stopped listening to them altogether, block b gave me a good 4 or 5 years of distraction from life.

[shanie-the-toyaddict]

An 'Into the Horizon' Part 2 Snippet (Involving Zowens)

Behind a cut for length.

Ok, for some context.

All, and I do mean ALL my best fanfic comes when I'm sleep deprived. ALL. OF. IT. It's like some point after waking hour 17 my hesitation and overthinking shuts TF down and I'm fueled by pure creativity.

However, at that point in whenever, I've also stopped forming coherent memories, so everything I'm writing is a mystery to me until I rediscover it much later.

I'm writing this because I was flipping back through some of my recent work on part 2 of Into the Horizon (the part about Zowens) and found the following section which I have NO recollection writing, but I really like.

The bit in question...

[Tina is prepping Sami and Kevin to give an interview]

"Because like it or not," Tina told the pair, "that's what you two are now. Partners. For better or worse you're stuck with each other."

The redhead of the pair smiled warmly while his friend gave a chuckle.

"Partners," Sami said, "I think we can manage that."

He turned to look at Kevin who said nothing, but a look was shared between them that spoke volumes in a language Tina didn't understand. Knowing them, she would guess the language was French. They seemed to favor it enough. Back on Earth, everyone would always talk about how French was the language of love but those two, whenever they were together, took it to a different level entirely. It wasn't just a language of love, it was a love language. Tina couldn't speak a lick of French but when those two did the words they used sounded like the type of verse that star-crossed soulmates might sing in a Shakespearean play... well, if Shakespeare had written his crappy plays in French rather than barely comprehensible English. Whatever they were saying, though, there was only one other person in their shared hellpit who understood them and he wasn't about to narc on his favorite pet project.

Frankly, if you asked Tina? If them having their private conversations and romantic whispers in a verbiage nobody else could comprehend was what got them through their days, then she was happy to let them have it. Better that then have them succumb to the misery and bring all Shane's well laid plans to a crashing and potentially bloody end.

There's more, but I'll stop it here. I literally have ZERO recollection of writing this, and it needs tweaked a bit, but I like it a lot. Also, one of my favorite things about writing this awful story is that two of the main POV characters come from a time before Sami and Kevin hit the scene, so all of the Zowens shared and storied history is a mystery to them. All they know is that these two wrestlers were stolen from Earth as a unit, they're painfully in love but won't do anything about it, and that they keep speaking French whenever their together.

Don't mind me, I write for an audience of one.

It's nice having those other three people care as well. But mostly? I write for me.

[bangkokjacknews]

Is Wikipedia Reliable, Credible, Accurate or Fake?

Is Wikipedia Reliable, Credible, Accurate or Fake? Wikipedia provides Internet users with millions of articles on a wide range of subjects and often ranks first in search engines. But its reliability and credibility fall well short of any reasonable standards.

Anybody using Wikipedia as a research resource should definitely cross-reference their results in at least two other places. In fact, people are now starting to avoid using Wikipedia for anything. And this should not be surprising. According to Wikipedia itself, 'While some articles are of the highest quality of scholarship, others are admittedly complete rubbish. Original Albert Jack content. Use Wikipedia with an informed understanding of what it is and what it isn't.' Okay, well let's have a look at what it is and what it isn't. The Philip Cross Scandal 'Philip Cross' is a so called credited editor of Wikipedia. This means he has access to any page and is able to edit anything he, or she, wants to. The subject of Wikipedia pages does not have any editing access to his or her own pages. If you are reading the Wikipedia page, story first shared by Bangkok Jack, come over and join us, of Joe Bloggs then you know that Bloggs is banned from editing any content in his name. Anything can be written about him, or anybody else, and yet he has no right of reply or correction. Philip Cross has not had a single day off from editing Wikipedia in almost five years. 'He' has edited every single day from 29 August 2013 to 14 May 2018. Including five Christmas Days. That’s 1,721 consecutive days of editing. In the last FOURTEEN years Philip Cross has made 133,612 edits to Wikipedia pages, which is more than 30 edits per day, seven days a week. Journalist and broadcaster Craig Murray has plotted them here

Craig Murray points out that the 'operation runs like clockwork, seven days a week, every waking hour, story first shared by Bangkok Jack, come over and join us, without significant variation. If Philip Cross genuinely is an individual, there is no denying he is morbidly obsessed.' There are three possible explanations. 1. Philip Cross is a spin company, with multiple users all logging into the Phillip Cross account, employed by who knows who and with a clear political agenda. 2. Philip Cross is a paid individual, working FULL TIME to add positive content to some Wikipedia Pages and vile lies to others 3. Philip Cross is a dangerous sociopath. This 'editor' has consistently discredited the reputations of prominent individuals who question and challenge the Left Wing corporate and state media narratives, especially in respect of UK Foreign Affairs or American President Donald Trump. Philip Cross also spends a lot of time improving the reputations (and public information available) of Conservative journalists and media figures, particularly in respect of the interests of Israel. Craig Murray writes that is it 'particularly interesting that Philip Cross‘s views happen to be precisely the same political views as those of Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia. Jimmy Wales has been active on twitter recently being particularly rude and unpleasant to anybody, story first shared by Bangkok Jack, come over and join us, questioning the activities of Philip Cross. His commitment to Cross’s freedom to operate on Wikipedia would be rather more impressive if the Cross operation were not promoting Wales’ own opinions. https://albertjack.com/2018/07/10/the-epidemic-of-stupid/ Interestingly enough Wikipedia’s UK begging arm, Wikimedia UK, joined in with equal hostile responses to anyone questioning Cross.' Former British MP and broadcaster George Galloway has had his Wikipedia page 'negatively edited,' or 'distorted,' by Cross 1800 times. Think about that for a moment - 1800 times. Do you think the Wikipidia entry for George Galloway is accurate now? And Galloway has no right of redress or correction as that is against Wikipedia rules. It doesn't matter which side of the political divide you stand - Wikipedia is clearly no longer a reliable source of information for anybody, thanks to the likes of Philip Cross. The contributor with an agenda always prevails. The idea behind Wikipedia's group editing process is that, story first shared by Bangkok Jack, come over and join us, by general consensus, unreliable contributions and edits will be removed and/or corrected. But usually the contributor who 'wins' is not the one with the soundest information, but rather the one with the strongest agenda. The one who is more persistent and committed. Irish student Shane Fitzgerald, who was conducting research on the Internet and globalization of information, posted a fake quotation on the Wikipedia article about the deceased French composer Maurice Jarre. Due to the fact that the quote was not attributed to a reliable source, it was removed several times by editors, but Fitzgerald simply continued re-posting it until it was allowed to remain. Fitzgerald was startled to learn that several major newspapers picked up the quote and published it in obituaries, confirming his suspicions of the questionable ways in which journalists use websites, and Wikipedia, as a reliable source. Fitzgerald e-mailed the newspapers letting them know that the quote was fabricated; he believes that otherwise, they might never have found out. Fitzgerald demonstrated that if he can 're-write' history that easily then so can everybody else. https://albertjack.com/2018/05/20/only-32-of-the-british-still-trust-the-news-media/ Individuals with agendas sometimes have significant editing authority. Administrators on Wikipedia have the power to delete or disallow comments or articles they disagree with and support the viewpoints they approve regardless of whether they are factually correct or not. For example U.K. scientist William Connelly became a website administrator and subsequently wrote, story first shared by Bangkok Jack, come over and join us, or rewrote more than 5,000 Wikipedia articles supporting the concept of climate change and global warming. More importantly, he used his authority to ban more than 2,000 contributors with opposing viewpoints from making further contributions. According to The Financial Post, when Connelly was through editing, 'The Medieval Warm Period' disappeared, as did criticism of the 'global warming orthodoxy.' Connelly has since been stripped of authority at Wikipedia, but he can obviously continue to post, edit and lie. He simply needs to sign in with a new user name - that's all it takes.

Accurate contributors can be silenced. The small group of editors known as 'deletionists' often rely on the argument that a contribution comes from an 'unreliable source,' with the competing editor deciding alone what is reliable or not. For example, when the Taliban kidnapped New York Times reporter David Rohde in Afghanistan, the paper convinced 40 media organizations plus Wikipedia not to report on it out of concerns that it would compromise Rohde's safety. Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales told the Times, once Rohde was free, that 'We were really helped by the fact that it (postings on Rohde) hadn't appeared in a place we would regard as a reliable source.' In other words Wales and other senior Wikipedia editors demonstrated how willing they are to rely on unreliable sources to delete accurate information they had been given by perfectly reliable sources, regardless of what justified it. Which leads directly to number 5 The number of active Wikipedia editors has fallen. The number of active Wikipedia editors (those who can make at least five edits a month) has significantly fallen. The reason given is that it is not worth bothering to continue in battle with 'progressive editors' with a political agenda. It is, after all, only a hobby for most people. It remains to be seen whether the current number of active editors can maintain and continue updating Wikipedia with any accuracy or honesty. It has become harder for casual participants to contribute. According to the Palo Alto Research Center, the contributions of casual and new contributors are being reversed at a much greater rate than several years ago. The result is that a steady group of high-level editors has more control over Wikipedia than ever. The 'deletionists' are said to 'edit first and ask questions later,' making it harder for new contributors to participate, and making it impossible for Wikipedia to provide 'the sum of all human knowledge.' - Their mission statement. Furthermore, Wikipedia appears to have no intention of overcoming the problem of being controlled by a stagnant pool of editors from a limited demographic and with a clear political or social agenda of their own. In many subjects Wikipedia has become a place of MISINFORMATION, SPIN and MANIPULATION and has no obvious desire to correct that. In fact, that could well be where most of their funding comes from. Vandalism Vandalism is always fun, for some tiny-minded people. Wikipedia is no exception to that and often false entries are missed and can remain online for months, if they are ever spotted at all. For example, John Seigenthaler, a former assistant to Robert Kennedy, was falsely implicated in the assassinations of the Kennedy brothers on his Wikipedia biography for a period of more than 100 days without his knowledge. This is a common problem for Wikipedia. And finally, the biggest reason of all to avoid Wikipedia as a source of reliable information Because Wikipedia themselves say so. Wikipedia's own disclaimer states, We do not expect you to trust us. It adds that it should NOT be considered a 'primary source' of information and that 'because some articles may contain errors,' you should 'not use Wikipedia to make critical decisions.' And as Wikipedia warns in its 'About' section, 'Users should be aware that not all articles are of encyclopedic quality from the start and they may contain false or debatable information.' Which is Wikipedia's own way of warning you that they CANNOT AND SHOULD NOT BE TRUSTED. - Albert Jack – Stay up to date with BangkokJack on Twitter, Instagram, & Reddit. Or join the free mailing list (top right) Please help us continue to bring the REAL NEWS - PayPal Read the full article

[getseriouser]

20 THOUGHTS: Renault is French for ‘no spare seats at Ferrari’

NOT often this column starts with a quote from The Australian. No, it’s not going to be about immigration or how we need to save the white African farmers, its ok, but Peter Lalor has had a shocker.

“The laws of the land do not stop at the boundary line of a football oval, but you would be forgiven for thinking that they did… Why shouldn’t players be done for assault?”

Hmm ok, so when Shane Mumford annihilated Mitch Duncan in Canberra two years ago, a tackle come bump, right up the middle but not high, that would be assault as well? Not as grievous as Gaff on Brayshaw but where’s the line, Peter?

Someone gets sold candy and looks as foolish as Donald Trump at a spelling bee, can they sue for character defamation? Players can file VCAT cases when delisted for unfair dismissal? What about journos who make silly and prosperous statements about pressing charges in a contact sport, that’s fraud surely against those who are paying money for allegedly ‘quality journalism’ as Australian subscribes?

Never mind, Peter writes for a publication with a readership smaller than the Mr. Men books so he is just unlucky we even noticed.

Moving on.

 1.       Ok, onto Mr Gaff properly. So this has been written bits on Monday, bits on Tuesday, but before the verdict. Jeremy Cameron with his hit on Harris Andrews, he had priors, it was in play but did a fair bit of damage, he got five weeks. Tom Bugg, last year on Callum Mills, it was behind play, Mills was concussed and sat out the rest of the game but returned the following weekend, Bugg got six. For mine, Gaff, despite his pristine record and exceptional character, given it was behind play and did more damage than Barry Hall on Brent Staker, it starts at seven. Either way he doesn’t play again this year, no matter the Eagles season and finals from here.

2.       Rated Ross Lyon’s presser, we’ve sorta forgot him a bit over here on the eastern seaboard but was awesome at St Kilda, has brought Freo as a club into relevance and is now trying to rebuild as quickly as he can. He was emotional, raw, super empathetic to the Brayshaw family and if you’re a Dockers fan you’d love to fall in behind him on the road ahead, just terrific.

3.       West Coast in Perth. Wow. Gaff will get one of the biggest suspensions in recent times and the Eagles CEO comes out the next day, calls a presser, and tries to hijack the narrative with a drive-by for Ross Lyon. My view was that Lyon was brilliant but even if you found his comments post-game fractionally too emotional, Trevor, just don’t go there, this is about your player’s actions, not about deflecting. The Eagles are as arrogant a sporting club you’ll find, especially at home, they can’t be touched, or at least think they can’t be.

4.       Red cards come up again. The NRL has the ability to send players off, and rarely does, so let’s not give the umpires another thing to stuff up, because to wrongly or unfairly use a red card in our spot would be so much worse than to not have the option for that once in a blue moon event in the first place, let me assure you.

5.       "If there are people out there, managers, who are prepared to get up on radio and say 'Don't go to the Gold Coast', we'll have them in court as quick as we can.”

That’s Mark Evans, Suns CEO, on reports that player managers are, as per their position description, providing advice and counsel to their clients, vis a vis that a move to the Suns is, correctly too, a poor one. So Mark thinks he can take those managers to court? To you Mark, we just have one word – lolz.

6.       Tom Lynch exercises his right and will return to Melbourne. Fair enough. But for the Suns to put up some players internally, in a confrontational sort of exit, criticising and demeaning Lynch for his decision is bad enough. But to put up young players, most notably Lachie Weller who did the exact same thing in ditching Fremantle to head back home only ten months ago, is so ironically laughable it’s gotta be a for a prank show on Channel Ten or something. This is a serious AFL club?

7.       So the Crows win by a whisker because the goal umpire missed Josh Jenkins’ snap grazing the post and the score review showed nothing conclusive to go against the initial call. What do we do? Snicko or hot spot perhaps? Or better still, whatever the tennis use for a let on a serve, have that tech installed in all goal posts from perhaps above the padding up, whooshka. But get it right though, the camera angles at present are still a half pregnant solution.

8.       Whilst we’re fixing the game, advantage rule, don’t blow the whistle until there’s no longer an advantage. Like Rugby Union, where the ref puts his hand up to signal a penalty, only then going to the whistle to stop the play. So, for footy, the umpire sees a free kick but the team still has possession, he then puts his arm out to signal a free kick but if the advantage isn’t there, only then would the umpire blow the whistle. Simple. Next.

9.       “At the very least, the 6-6-6 format after goals will be adopted…”

“…the bigger picture — and that’s to spread the ground and stop 30 players congregating within 30m of a stoppage in the 50m arcs.”

That’s from old mate Robbo in his Monday blurbs.

We had a terrific game of football on Saturday afternoon between the Hawks and Bombers whilst the AFL had erections for rule changes watching Coburg and Werribee trial the new ideas.

But to Robbo’s point that the main rule change at play, the very satanic 6-6-6 starting positions will ‘spread the ground and stop players congregating’ is laughable. Once the ball is bounced after a goal, those starting positions go to the proverbial and then there’s nothing to stop said congregations around the pill. Unless you’re locking players to zones like netball people like Robbo need to start thinking things through.

10.   Something about this state of the game talk – we’re changing the rules drastically. Why? Because of two main things – crowds are down and free to air television ratings are too. Firstly crowds, let’s have a look at them properly broken down. Perth has a new stadium and its getting filled, that’s a big tick. Adelaide, same thing just five years ahead, another tick. Geelong is expanding the size of Kardinia Park and filling it too, so that’s three new or expanded grounds getting bums on seats. Good. The big ticket though is crowds at the MCG or Marvel.

And we’ve done the numbers on that: ten years ago crowds between Victorian clubs at those two grounds were 1% higher, which equates to about 1000 people less per game. That’s nothing. The bigger picture shows it being greater but that’s when you take into account Melbourne clubs hosting the GWS or the Suns, which of course will impact numbers. So we’re losing our shit on 1%? When membership across the board is way up too?

Also Fox Footy subscriptions are up, about an extra 100,000 people are watching football each weekend on Foxtel than ten years ago, so wash that against the 1000 less at the ‘G or Colonial and I’m pretty happy.

That Foxtel figure might also eat into those FTA figures somewhat but let’s look at Masterchef. Each of the ten seasons’ finales has been the number one ranked show in the ratings, but the audiences in raw figures have dropped over 60%. Season One and Two had finales over 3.5 million each time, last week’s finale, still arguably as ‘popular’ relative to those who watch television, only 1.3 million.

So are footy ratings down because the goal square isn’t long enough or because we just aren’t watching free to air like we once did?

And lastly on that TV angle – if the ratings are down, why do we think it’s all down to the rules and not because we schedule crap games in prime slots, or perhaps the production of Channel Seven and how good that is compared to Fox Footy’s, or what we got with Channel Nine which was unquestionably far better presented?

11.   Right, some onfield stuff? No, not yet, AFLW. Just shocking PR. Firstly, the comp isn’t ready to be expanded; clearly, the league can’t schedule any more games. So the mistake sits with premature expansion from 8 to 10 teams before you worry about the patronising decision to limit the games for the next season. But to have such disengagement between Town Hall and the women's game biggest stars is just such a bad look. The only way to fix it, given they can’t renege on expansion now, is to cop it on the chin and play the extra games and go up against Big Bash and tennis. Even though, as they’d well know, that will only increase the loss they write off each year to run the women’s game – it’s a mile off breaking even but they are too far in now.

12.   Some onfield stuff now? Yes, finally. The Giants first. Even though it was only the Blues, the fact they played with 18 for so long and then even a man or two short onfield and could score so easily was a testament to not just their talent but their fortitude. A lesser side would almost let the Blues win that final term, just shut up shop and get back to Sydney to lick their wounds. But they are that good they got the margin over 100.

13.   If they can get some names back and be reasonably fit come September they would be the ones to trouble the Tigers, even on the ‘G. But it’s their injury list, and the Pies one as well to be fair, that might be the clincher for Richmond going back to back. All three reasonably fully fit would go toe to toe deep in September, but Richmond being the healthiest gives them an almost unassailable advantage.

14.   Port Adelaide can’t score. Pretty handy thing in this game to be able to score more than your opponents and the last month or so they’ve barely managed a good half time score let alone a winning full time one. Big problems there and it’s not an easy run home. Could miss the eight which given their draw post-bye would be unacceptable.

15.   Great to have Nathan Freeman debut on the weekend, Alex Johnson get back after not playing since the War, funny seeing him play without panty hose and a cap, Brodie Smith got back after the tragedy of the knee injury during last year’s finals and Aaron Vandenberg as well, his last game was against Fitzroy so good to see him back out in the red and blue too.

16.   Ben Stratton is the best defender in the game. Locks down on a variety of players as good as any, but also takes the intercepts as well as any too. A less flashy Alex Rance with the intercept prowess close to Jeremy McGovern. Just without the fanfare. The Hawks could go deep and his influence is pivotal.

17.   Still hoping for another Richmond-Clarkson matchup at some stage. Hawthorn are not a top-four side by any stretch but have the best coach most of us have ever seen - after that Round 3 sighter he has had months to plot his plan. He may be a star or two short, but Clarko elevates teams to levels such he might not need it. If he gets his chance at Richmond in September, underestimate his coaching brilliance at your own risk.

18.   Saturday afternoon football, whilst it doesn’t help the broadcaster (see above), has been elite. We’ve had the big game between Richmond and Collingwood followed by an epic last weekend and we’ve got the Hawks and Cats to write another storied chapter this week. Had these three games been the Saturday night timeslot instead I would have needed a different topic for thought number 10.

19.   Alex Di Minaur. Remember him? Teenager, who got hot in the early parts of the summer of tennis eight months back, caused a stir before doing nothing, non-surprisingly, at the Australian Open. However he has had a very decent year since then for his age and that peaked last week when he made the final of the Washington Open losing in straight sets to world no.3 Alexander Zverev. He is now ranked inside the top 50 which for a 19-year-old is a phenomenal achievement. And crucially, where the likes of Kyrgios and Tomic have resembled the brat of Lleyton Hewitt early in his career, Di Minaur already resembles the tenacious fighter of Hewitt in the peak of his career, so the signs are good. Remember the name.

20.   And we finish with the A-League, where the Melbourne Victory had a fair coup this week signing Japanese star Keisuke Honda. Well, he has retired from international football so on the back end of his career very much but still, for the Victory he should be handy. But it seems in the formulation of the deal that Fox Sports has either been a key powerbroker or perhaps even a financial backer to acquire his signature. Given the league tried to recruit Fernando Torres itself before having a club actually committed to even having him, and then possibly allows the broadcaster to play a part in club signing players, perhaps this is the gimmicky tournament Daisy Pearce was talking about. My word…

(originally published 7 August)

[leapmore-fallmore-flymore]

Random study abroad memories

-dancing at the club on Rachael’s last night

-standing on the fort at Cahersiveen, looking at the world

-Flo saying he wanted to be the pope’s sugar daddy

-Morgan running into the construction sign in Rome

-getting duped into paying for a string bracelet

-singing in the car in Iceland

-photobombing that couple’s picture in the blue lagoon

-getting the police called for climbing on a photo booth

-that really funny politics class where Ms. McGarry then said I seemed jolly

-colorful buildings

-making an Irish friend, Susie, on the way home from Switzerland

-people speaking to me in Italian or French after I said buongiorno or merci

-being sassy with joe: saying I’ve never bought a house, saying I loved the view of the parking lot, but also answering his questions about America

-doing really well on the Irish oral

-Karol giving me the intermediate Irish book for free and saying I could email him with questions

-Karol seeing me on campus and going “delaney, good!” And me now knowing how to respond

-all the sex references in folklore with Shane (vulva, making butter, mashed potatoes, teenagers)

-just chilling in my bed, warm, with the rain outside, happy in the knowledge that I’m on my own here and I’m doing fine. That the panic attacks are coming but I keep doing things like they’re not even there. Knowing that I’ve traveled the world with friends I never thought I’d be able to make, but also by myself because I’m relentlessly confident and capable. Knowing that I made an initially terrifying place a home that will never leave my heart, and I learned to love everything about it. Knowing that maybe I fall in love with people I barely know, with places I’ll never see again, with moments and with feelings too easily, but it’s okay. This semester was the most exciting of my life, and it helped me grow so much. But every year just gets better, doesn’t it? It will hurt so much to leave, because you’ll miss having classes you legitimately enjoyed, you’ll miss Cork and its beauty and perfect size, you’ll miss the friends you made who became family - you took care of eachother and traveled together and made promises to write postcards and see eachother again someday, you’ll miss the teachers who were kind to you, you’ll miss your gorgeous school that felt more right than OSU, you’ll miss having an apartment of your own in IRELAND, you’ll miss feeling like you were doing something big (but that feeling will come again), you’ll miss feeling that every day is new and exciting (but if you try hard enough, you can do that at home, too), you’ll miss cheap flights to amazing and stunning new countries, you’ll miss Ireland’s beautiful scenery and the knowledge that your ancestors are near you, you’ll miss the burgers, you’ll miss the independence, but you won’t miss that weird meaty sewage smell that comes out sometimes?

-learning to cook pasta and salmon from Ane

-Sophia never changing the toilet paper roll

-hot water only between 6 and noon!

-paying so much for electricity

-putting up ghost lights and then tinsel

-the secret Santa, where you had Ane and Flo had you

-Halloween, where you were exhausted but you had fun putting on makeup with Flo and Rachael, then the amazing parade, then meeting up with everyone, doing your first tequila shot, arguing with a nazi

-being known as the short, young, independent, fearless one who’s not afraid to go alone

-FaceTiming rose, David, Rebekah, Carrie/Alison/Bailey/claire, callie, my family at thanksgiving

-the 8 or 9 hour time difference, depending on where I was, and having to wait til 2 or 3 to start talking to my friends and family at home

-really good salmon!

-st. Finnbarr’s cathedral, your favorite and the most gorgeous building in cork

-standing in the kitchen at any time of day, just gazing out the window at the rolling hills and trees in the distance, or the sprawling city, or the sky, or the trains flying by or creaking to a stop

-awful bus service!

-the peaceful 45 min walk to school every day

-that baffling final that started with a 25 min fire alarm

-watching the vagina show with Ane

-writing my columns and having them turn out so long because I learned so much from the people around me about their cultures and I had so much to say

-the aching sadness that presented around the halfway mark as I realized I’d have to leave this moment in time behind and that things would never be the same

-the amazement that I could’ve been so utterly terrified by the thought of this experience, that my conceptions were completely wrong - that id travel alone mostly and that I’d eat a lot more potatoes and that I’d be having panic attacks all the time

-the panic attacks were less than you expected, happily, but they did start waking you up for sleep, which didn’t happen before

-running around London with Ethan at night and spontaneously going on that spinny ride with the operators who were high on weed

-getting pizza with Morgan at sliced that one time where she just asked a random Irish person what their favorite place to get pizza was

-orchard thieves

-carlsberg is disgusting and Guinness - only mildly better

-making friends with adorable Ben

-covering my room in sticky notes to learn irish

-Sophia always asking what I’m cooking and me always having to answer either pasta or eggs

-chocolate muffin and Innocent juice from UCC cafeteria

-less than great and very personal memory: randomly getting obsessed with Ms. McGarry & her opinion of my and my academics because she’s everything I want to be when I grow up - kind, organized, in control, a strong woman in a position of power, handles questions amazingly, confident walk, gorgeous, nerdy, slightly awkward, impeccable style. But also, realizing that I’m a solid person in my own right and I don’t need her approval. But it still stinging anyway when I felt that she had liked me more at the beginning and less when she got to know me.

-everything about finding the grave. (See fb profile picture)

-arguing with the cab driver about trump

-learning it was pronounced Merchant’s Key and not Merchant’s Quay like it LOOKS

-going to the Christmas market with Ane, getting hot chocolate that was more chocolatey than in America, and then going on the Ferris wheel

-the slight feeling of omnipotency right after takeoff on a plane

-possibly having scabies

-possibly having a sinus infection

-enjoying those gorgeous bus rides through the Irish countryside and wishing they would never end

-that first weekend when you went to Kinsale and Charles Fort by yourself and everything was perfect and peaceful and you realized that everything was going to be okay

-drinking bad limoncello out of my bone mug in Rome

-the selfie stick in Rome

-playing never have I ever in dingle peninsula and not getting to put a single finger down the whole game

-losing my student ID twice, mike finding it the second time

-Morgan coming to hang out with me in the library and then as we’re leaving casually informing me that she’s tripping on acid

-doing so many readings for poverty in one day

-love. Scarf from rose, letter from Rebekah, embroidery from tianna. Then, letters from the Wongs, books from the Kools

-sending postcards and being surprised that it only took them two weeks to get home

-getting the cute €6 sweater from the sketchy open market in Rome and being afraid to watch it

-Morgan pantomiming penis in the word game

-the word game in general

-that first lunch with Emily that wasn’t even awkward

-talking with our friend, the old Irish man at the hostel in Cahersiveen

-biking all over Valentia island, painfully, and then kinda hitchhiking

-almost getting denied the flight to rome because we forgot the visa check

-me bailing on the trip to Edinburgh because my anxiety was too bad

-learning about the O’Sheas of West Kerry being connected to the selkies and the seals

-Prof. O’Machain going “Janey Mack!”

-Joe saying he had good news and bad news, but the bad news was he was gonna let us out an hour early and the good news was he brought sweets

-Anna making me put tea bags on my eyes when I had a cold in Galway

-eating rice pudding and having mulled wine and chugging fireball at Julie’s Christmas party

-making a cake for Sophia’s birthday that somehow turned out okay

-Hard Time Being Alive

-realizing that my cookies cooked so dang fast bc my recipe was in degrees Fahrenheit and the oven was in degrees Celsius

-hearing Sara tell Ane and Sophia that my chocolate chip cookies were the best she’d had, and, the cookies disappearing quickly

-honeycomb ice cream

-letting the soda bread get moldy that first week

-sleeping on the bare mattress the first day because I was too exhausted to get sheets

-wandering around the city searching for food and feeling half dead. Ending up with ice cream and salmon on toast

-going to Powell properties and barely being able to speak out of exhaustion and hunger

-the people smoking weed and the loud music outside the window

-having to ask my roommates to turn down the music

-expensive laundry (€6 total)

-Aaron from next door

-family dinners

-shopping being dangerous because €1 = $1.20

-pronouncing Euro as you-to, you’re grand, thanks a million, that’s craic, you’re very welcome to...., ...like, ...anyway

-rationing my Brooklyn 99 episodes to get me through the first couple of months

-Blarney Castle, where I first joined the group

-Ane telling me that while in Scotland, they talked about how I would’ve been climbing all over everything

[everettwilkinson]

MT GOP candidate charged after he ‘body slams’ reporter — TRUMP in Brussels — MERKEL’s presidential day — Kellyanne and Heather Podesta lunch — B’DAY: Anna Palmer

Listen to the Playbook Audio Briefing http://bit.ly/2rTk9Lj … Subscribe on iTunes http://apple.co/2eX6Eay … Visit the online home of Playbook http://politi.co/2f51Jnf

Good Thursday morning. PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP is in Brussels meeting with European leaders, including European Council President Donald Tusk and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker. He’s scheduled to meet with new French President Emmanuel Macron in the next few hours. He’ll also visit NATO before leaving for Sicily for a G7 meeting.

Story Continued Below

WITH TRUMP IN BRUSSELS, and attending meetings with the prez: Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Defense Secretary James Mattis, National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, Dina Powell, and Gary Cohn, per pooler Phil Rucker.

TRUMP just had a private meeting with EU leaders, per WaPo’s Phil Rucker. Great exchange: “The first encounter came as the three presidents stood posing for photos. Tusk told Trump: ‘Do you know, Mr. President, we have two presidents in the EU?’ Trump replied: ‘I know that.’ Juncker chimed in: One too much.'” … Trump on the pope: “We went to the Pope. Very impressive. The Pope was terrific.”

— “Trump faces rougher reception in NATO, EU meetings,” by Reuters’ Jeff Mason and Steve Holland in Brussels: “After a warm welcome in the Middle East and a ‘fantastic’ visit with the pope, U.S. President Donald Trump walks on shakier ground on Thursday when European Union and NATO leaders will press him on defense, trade, and environmental concerns. The Republican president, midway through his first foreign trip since taking office, has basked in the glow of favorable receptions in Riyadh and Jerusalem, where leaders lauded his harsh words for Iran.

“Praise may be in shorter supply in Brussels. Trump questioned the relevance of the NATO military alliance as a presidential candidate, and is considering pulling the United States out of the Paris agreement on climate change — a huge concern in Europe. The EU was also a party to the Iran nuclear agreement, which Trump has criticized sharply. ‘We expect him to recommit to NATO’s founding rule that an attack against one ally is an attack against all,’ said a senior European diplomat at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. ‘Words matter and there is a huge expectation on that.’” http://reut.rs/2qiSh1Z

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

GREAT LINE FROM POLITICO EUROPE PLAYBOOKER RYAN HEATH — “German Chancellor Angela Merkel is the meat in a presidential PR sandwich today.” FORMER PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA had breakfast with Merkel in Berlin before the two participated in the Obama Foundation’s first international event — a talk at the Brandenburg Gate on the importance of civic engagement. Merkel will then leave for the NATO summit in Brussels with Trump.

OOPS!! — @StateDept: “.@POTUS arrives for #NATOmeeting in #Brussels today. #POTUSAbroad” http://bit.ly/2rCJ7kU … @PoliticoRyan: “As @StollmeyerEU pointed out – this is #POTUS arriving at the #EU, not #NATO … that meeting doesn’t start for hours.”

THE STORY OF THE DAY — HADAS GOLD AND GABE DEBENEDETTI (who is in Helena, Montana) — “Montana House GOP candidate cited after reporter says he ‘body-slammed me’”: “Montana Republican congressional candidate Greg Gianforte was issued a citation late Wednesday after he allegedly ‘body-slammed’ a reporter at a campaign event on the eve of a hotly contested special election. Ben Jacobs, a reporter for The Guardian tweeted that Gianforte ‘body-slammed me and broke my glasses’ at a campaign event in Bozeman, Montana — minutes before what was to be the last campaign rally of the campaign.

“Jacobs said he had asked Gianforte about a new budget analysis of House Republicans’ effort to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. Late Wednesday, Gallatin County Sheriff Brian Gootkin issued a statement saying the Republican congressional candidate had been cited for ‘misdemeanor assault’ and that Gianforte would have to appear in court by June 7 to resolve the matter. ‘The nature of the injuries did not meet the statutory elements of felony assault,’ the sheriff said in his statement.

“The incident rocked a closely watched contest, just hours before voters cast their ballots in Thursday’s special House election in Montana to replace Ryan Zinke, who is now the Trump administration’s secretary of the interior. Gianforte, a technology executive, is running against Democrat Rob Quist, a folk singer and first-time candidate. The race in the traditional Republican stronghold is turning out to be closer than many thought it would be.” http://politi.co/2qmuDkk … Audio of the incident http://bit.ly/2qmEnuR

— FOX NEWS FIRST-PERSON ACCOUNT by Alicia Acuna: “Gianforte grabbed Jacobs by the neck with both hands and slammed him into the ground behind him. Faith, Keith and I watched in disbelief as Gianforte then began punching the reporter. As Gianforte moved on top of Jacobs, he began yelling something to the effect of, ‘I’m sick and tired of this!’” http://fxn.ws/2qeLw5o

— DEMOCRATS are looking to take advantage of the last-minute break in the closer-than-expected race. The DCCC is up with Facebook ads targeting “with a goal of both persuasion and mobilization” in order to reach “Democrats who might have been less likely to turn out and vote on Election Day.” MoveOn.org also released a digital ad to run through Election Day. DCCC ad http://bit.ly/2qYSpVo … MoveOn ad http://bit.ly/2qmx728

CAN THIS FLIP THE RACE? The Billings Gazette: “Though 37 percent of registered voters have already returned absentee ballots, there will ‘still be plenty of people voting on Election Day,’ [political science professor Jeremy] Johnson said. Turnout in special elections is typically low, and with this vote on the Thursday before Memorial Day many have predicted low numbers at the polls.” http://bit.ly/2rCHlQN

GIANFORTE’S CAMPAIGN SPOKESPERSON, Shane Scanlon, said: “Tonight, as Greg was giving a separate interview in a private office, The Guardian’s Ben Jacobs entered the office without permission, aggressively shoved a recorder in Greg’s face, and began asking badgering questions. Jacobs was asked to leave. After asking Jacobs to lower the recorder, Jacobs declined. Greg then attempted to grab the phone that was pushed in his face. Jacobs grabbed Greg’s wrist, and spun away from Greg, pushing them both to the ground. It’s unfortunate that this aggressive behavior from a liberal journalist created this scene at our campaign volunteer BBQ.”

— HMM… First of all, the tape doesn’t back up this story. Second: The dude body slammed a reporter! Don’t make excuses. Apologize!

THIS GUY MIGHT BE IN THE WRONG BUSINESS. When you are a member of Congress, you constantly have reporters shoving microphones in your face. Journalists wait outside bathrooms to corner you on the news of the day.

THE QUESTION FOR PAUL RYAN AND OTHER REPUBLICAN LEADERS: What will Republicans say about Gianforte — a potential House Republican — allegedly physically assaulting a reporter for asking a question about the health-care bill? Should he be allowed to caucus with Republicans? If he were a sitting member, there would probably be calls for his resignation.

ABOUT THAT HEALTH CARE BILL … — “CBO: House Obamacare repeal bill would leave 23 million more uninsured,” by Adam Cancryn and Sarah Ferris: “Roughly 23 million more people would be uninsured over a decade if the House-passed Republican Obamacare repeal bill becomes law, according to a long-awaited CBO analysis that could complicate GOP hopes of getting a companion measure through the Senate.

“That’s nearly identical to the coverage losses that CBO forecast for an earlier version of the bill — despite the addition of new provisions and billions of dollars in funding aimed at keeping more people insured.

“The nonpartisan scorekeeping office also forecast the GOP plan would cut the deficit by $119 billion over a decade, primarily because of its cuts to Medicaid and private insurance subsidies. That exceeds $2 billion of minimum projected savings the bill needed to hit, which should clear an important hurdle and help the bill’s prospects of getting to the Senate. Senate GOP aides are still checking the analysis to ensure the bill can travel safely across the Capitol.” http://politi.co/2rT6aFh

****** A message from the Coalition for Affordable Prescription Drugs (CAPD): One in two Americans rely on their employers for health care benefits including affordable access to prescription drugs. That’s why employers are partnering with PBMs to provide access to effective medications at the most affordable price and improve health outcomes. Learn more at www.affordableprescriptiondrugs.org. ******

SHOT — SENATE MAJORITY LEADER MITCH MCCONNELL is continuing to keep his plans for health care reform close to the vest. When asked at a Reuters newsmaker event Wednesday about Senate GOP’s health care package, McConnell said: “I don’t know how we get to 50 [votes] at the moment. But that’s the goal. And exactly what the composition of that [bill] is I’m not going to speculate about because it serves no purpose.” http://reut.rs/2qeGm9v

CHASER — “Peril for Republicans if they push forward with Obamacare repeal,” by Paul Demko and Jen Haberkorn: “Obamacare repeal is in trouble in the Senate, and a nonpartisan analysis of the House’s repeal legislation issued Wednesday only reinforced that reality. Within minutes of the release of the report showing 23 million fewer Americans would be insured over a decade, two Senate Republicans blasted the estimate and the House bill, underscoring just how much the legislation will have to change to get through the upper chamber. Sen. Dean Heller (R-Nev.), one of the few Senate Republicans expected to face a tough re-election contest next year, said the House bill ‘does not do enough to address Nevada’s Medicaid population or protect Nevadans with pre-existing conditions.’ Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) also criticized the House bill for failing to adequately protect Americans with pre-existing medical conditions.” http://politi.co/2rXCLJf

JOANNE KENEN on “10 key points from the CBO report on Obamacare repeal”: http://politi.co/2qZkP3P

NYT SCOOP, A1 — “Top Russian Officials Discussed How to Influence Trump Aides Last Summer,” by Matt Rosenberg, Adam Goldman and Matt Apuzzo: “American spies collected information last summer revealing that senior Russian intelligence and political officials were discussing how to exert influence over Donald J. Trump through his advisers, according to three current and former American officials familiar with the intelligence. The conversations focused on Paul Manafort, the Trump campaign chairman at the time, and Michael T. Flynn, a retired general who was advising Mr. Trump … Some Russians boasted about how well they knew Mr. Flynn. Others discussed leveraging their ties to Viktor F. Yanukovych, the deposed president of Ukraine living in exile in Russia, who at one time had worked closely with Mr. Manafort.” http://nyti.ms/2qRQp2Y

— KEN VOGEL: “Manafort advised Trump team on Russia scandal”: “Months after the FBI began examining Paul Manafort as part of a probe into ties between President Donald Trump’s team and Russia, Manafort called Trump’s chief of staff Reince Priebus to push back against the mounting controversy, according to four people familiar with the call. It was about a week before Trump’s inauguration, and Manafort wanted to brief Trump’s team on the alleged inaccuracies in a recently released dossier of memos written by a former British spy for Trump’s opponents that alleged compromising ties between Russia, Trump and Trump’s associates, including Manafort.

“‘On the day that the dossier came out in the press, Paul called Reince, as a responsible ally of the president would do, and said this story about me is garbage, and a bunch of the other stuff in there seems implausible,’ said a person close to Manafort. … While the people say the conversations were mostly of a political or, in some cases, personal nature, the conversation with Priebus, described by four people familiar with it, was related to the scandal now subsuming Manafort and the Trump presidency. It suggests that Manafort recognized months ago the potentially serious problems posed by the investigation, even as Trump himself continues to publicly dismiss it as a politically motivated witch hunt, while predicting it won’t find anything compromising.” http://politi.co/2qj9UPp

THE LATEST FROM MANCHESTER — “Police make more arrests in Manchester bomb but leaks feared,” by AP’s Jill Lawless and Gregory Katz in Manchester: “Police arrested two more people and were on Thursday searching a new site in Manchester suspected of links to the bombing that killed 22 people at a pop concert, as British authorities complained bitterly about investigation leaks by U.S. officials. Prime Minister Theresa May is expected to raise the issue of the leaks with President Donald Trump in Brussels later. British officials are particularly angry that photos detailing evidence about the bomb used in the attack were published in the New York Times.

“Greater Manchester Police released a statement condemning the leaks on behalf of the National Counter-Terrorism Policing units that suggested a severe rupture in trust between Britain and the United States, who have traditionally shared intelligence at the highest levels. … Police and security services are also upset that the name of bomber Salman Abedi was leaked by U.S. officials and published while police in Britain were withholding the name for what they said were reasons of operational security.” http://apne.ws/2qYWQzy

MNUCHIN CONTINUES NO BAT DRUM BEAT — “Mnuchin Tells Democrats No Go on Border Tax in Private Meeting,” by Bloomberg’s Anna Edgerton: “Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin pronounced House Speaker Paul Ryan’s proposal for a border-adjusted tax dead during closed-door conversations with Democrats on the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee, according to two members of the panel. … Judy Chu, a California Democrat on the Ways and Means Committee, said she asked Mnuchin directly during a private meeting Tuesday if he supports the border-adjusted tax. ‘He actually said straight out that he doesn’t support it and the president doesn’t support it,’ Chu said, adding that Mnuchin cited concern from businesses about price increases for consumers. ‘Unless he was lying to us yesterday, I really felt it was dead on arrival,’ Chu said.” https://bloom.bg/2qeH3zK

COMING ATTRACTIONS — “Republicans may need Democrats’ help to raise debt limit,” by Colin Wilhelm and John Bresnahan: “Republicans may need to rely on Democrats –once again — to raise the nation’s legal borrowing limit. House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) said the group of hard-line conservatives will want concessions before supporting a debt-ceiling boost, setting up a potential showdown with the Trump administration.

“‘There’s a lot of discussion among Freedom Caucus members to push for a debt ceiling [increase] as long as it addresses some of the other structural reforms that conservatives have long called for,’ Meadows told POLITICO. ‘If that is coupled with a debt-ceiling increase that has a definite dollar amount — not a time-specific amount — then they would find a lot of support among conservatives.’ Freedom Caucus sources say the group is also discussing a provision that would allow the federal government to make debt payment a priority in the event of a government shutdown later this year.” More for pros http://politico.pro/2qS8bTH

— WHAT WE HEAR ABOUT THE DEBT LIMIT: Here’s the deal: back in 2011, John Boehner set a standard that the debt limit needed to be matched with dollar-for-dollar spending cuts. Republicans now insist on some sort of concession every time the debt ceiling is increased. Sometimes they get them, sometimes they don’t, and Democrats just help the GOP lift the limit without any wins. But they control all of D.C. now, so expect a hardline fight. The Freedom Caucus — the three dozen or so conservative Republicans in the House — want the debt limit raised before the August recess. That’s 31 legislative days away. That’s a tight deadline, since borrowing authority doesn’t truly run out until September. But most in the Capitol are predicting a big fight. House Energy and Commerce Chairman Greg Walden of Oregon told us yesterday in the Capitol that it’s a “tough vote” and said a clean increase — one without reforms — will not be met with “broad approval.”

THE JUICE …

— SPOTTED: Speaker Paul Ryan with Republican Conference Chairman Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington State chatting yesterday in a room off the House floor.

— POWER LUNCH OF THE DAY: Kellyanne Conway and Heather Podesta at Centrolina Wednesday. Earlier in the day, at around 9 a.m., Kellyanne was at Drybar Georgetown. She had her Secret Service security detail with her.

–SEN. BEN SASSE’s new book “The Vanishing American Adult,” landed at No. 3 on the New York Times bestseller list.

–FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — Several top civil rights groups are sending a letter today to President Trump and DHS Secretary John Kelly urging them not to appoint Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke to be assistant secretary in the office of partnership and engagement at the Department of Homeland Security. In the letters, the groups say he has a “history of incendiary and hateful statements” that “make him unfit to serve in this role.” The letter is signed by the heads of the Anti-Defamation League, Human Rights Campaign, the National Urban League, the National Council of La Raza, and Muslim Advocates. http://politi.co/2rkwuez

— CHELSEA HANDLER recently sat down with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) to chat about 2020, whether Senate Majority Leader McConnell speaks to her and her views on what the GOP is doing in power. The interview streams on Netflix on Friday. Video http://bit.ly/2qRVZCC

— JARED AND IVANKA’S date night in Rome. 8 pix on one page http://dailym.ai/2qeNMcF

WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE … “Spicer left out of Vatican visit,” by Annie Karni in Rome: “President Donald Trump’s entourage at the Vatican on Wednesday included his wife, his daughter, and an array of staffers — but not White House press secretary Sean Spicer, a devout Catholic who told reporters earlier this year that he gave up alcohol for Lent. Both sides, according to a White House official, agreed to limit the number of staffers who attended.” http://politi.co/2qeNqTE

PHOTO DU JOUR: President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump listen to a guide as they look at the frescoed ceilings during their visit to the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican on May 24. | L’Osservatore Romano/Pool Photo via AP

CNN’S MANU RAJU and EVAN PEREZ — “AG Sessions did not disclose Russia meetings in security clearance form, DOJ says”: “Attorney General Jeff Sessions did not disclose meetings he had last year with Russian officials when he applied for his security clearance, the Justice Department told CNN Wednesday. Sessions, who met with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak at least two times last year, didn’t note those interactions on the form, which requires him to list ‘any contact’ he or his family had with a “foreign government’ or its ‘representatives’ over the past seven years … Justice Department spokeswoman Sarah Isgur Flores … says he and his staff were … told by an FBI employee who assisted in filling out the form, known as the SF-86, that he didn’t need to list dozens of meetings with foreign ambassadors that happened in his capacity as a senator.” http://cnn.it/2rT4RpR

IVANKA WATCH — “Ivanka Trump asks trafficked women what U.S. can do to help,” by AP’s Frances D’Emilio in Rome: “Ivanka Trump met Wednesday with a group of African women in Rome who were trafficked into prostitution rings, a private encounter said to have moved her to tears. Trump visited the Rome headquarters of the Sant’Egidio Community, a Catholic humanitarian organization that serves the poor, the elderly and migrants, after a morning visit to the Vatican. Sant’Egidio official Daniela Pompei said the closed-door encounter lasted 40 minutes and Trump asked the 10 African women for suggestions on what the U.S. government, led by her father, President Donald Trump, can do to help others like them.” http://abcn.ws/2rk3R0U

CLICKER – “Trump’s visit with Pope Francis: The top photos out of Rome” — 25 pix http://politi.co/2qiYbAa

MAGGIE HABERMAN PROFILE — “Wanna Know What Donald Trump Is Really Thinking? Read Maggie Haberman,” by Rachael Combe in July’s Elle: “Journalists have become part of the story in the Trump administration, enablers and heroes of a nonstop political and constitutional soap opera, and last year Haberman was the most widely read journalist at the Times, according to its analytics. Many of the juiciest Trump pieces have been broken by her … While the president and the reporter couldn’t seem more different … the points at which their histories and personalities converge are revealing about both the media and the president himself. Trump wants what she can give him access to — a kind of status he’s always craved in a newspaper … Haberman, for her part, has become a front-page fixture and a Fourth Estate folk hero.” http://bit.ly/2qYVl4F

WEST COAST WATCH — “The Russia investigation thrust Devin Nunes into the spotlight. Now that he’s the one under scrutiny, what has he been up to?,” by LA Times’ Sarah D. Wire: http://lat.ms/2rCqWvI

****** A message from the Coalition for Affordable Prescription Drugs (CAPD): As list prices for brand drugs continue to rise, employers are partnering with PBMs to keep drug costs under control. In fact, every dollar an employer invests in a PBM service returns six dollars in savings. Learn more at www.affordableprescriptiondrugs.org. ******

FUTURE OF NEWS — “Facebook signs BuzzFeed, Vox, others for original video shows – sources,” by Reuters’ Jessica Toonkel: “Facebook has signed deals with millennial-focused news and entertainment creators Vox Media, BuzzFeed, ATTN, Group Nine Media and others to make shows for its upcoming video service, which will feature long and short-form content with ad breaks, according to several sources familiar with the situation. Facebook is planning two tiers of video entertainment: scripted shows with episodes lasting 20 to 30 minutes, which it will own; and shorter scripted and unscripted shows with episodes lasting about 5 to 10 minutes, which Facebook will not own.” http://reut.rs/2qZwj7B

MEDIAWATCH — @grynbaum: “Ken Kurson is leaving Observer for TENEO, he tells me. He’ll be a senior managing director.”

— NEW POLITICO PRO HIRES – Marty Kady and Carrie Budoff Brown email the staff: “Sheila Kaplan will join us next week as a senior health care reporter. Sheila was most recently a Washington-based senior writer for STAT, covering the intersection of health, influence and politics. … John Hendel is joining the Tech team to help cover the FCC and Hill telecom policy. John comes to us from Communications Daily, where he’s been a Capitol Hill telecom policy reporter since 2013.”

SPOTTED at a party last night in honor of Patrick Steel, the new CEO of POLITICO, at Dr. Elena and Robert Allbritton’s residence in Georgetown: Don Baer, Brian Bechtel, Jim Bankoff, Ron Bonjean, David Castagnetti, Stephanie Cutter, Tony Fratto, Jason and Shari Gold, Josh and Blair Holmes, Joel Johnson, Dede Lea, Ray LaHood, Kevin Madden, Bruce Mehlman, Graham Miller, Greg Lowman, Susan Molinari, Geoff Morrell, Jack and Susanna Quinn, Heather Podesta, Jill Zuckman.

SPOTTED: Eric Trump and wife Lara last night at the Trump hotel having dinner. Steven Mnuchin and his fiancée Louise Linton stopped by to say hello … IRS Commissioner John Koskinen yesterday at Mackey’s Public House … Former Secretary of Homeland Security and current University of California President Janet Napolitano eschewed the TSA Pre line at Washington Dulles Airport and went through the regular folks west side security line. “She did all the stuff regular folks do. And had no aides around making it easy.” … Nationals Manager Dusty Baker yesterday meeting with Rep. Mike Doyle (D-Pa.) and Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) for lunch on Capitol Hill. Doyle is managing the Democrats, and Barton is managing the Republicans in the upcoming Congressional Baseball Game at Nationals Park June 15. “The two managers were seeking advice and managerial tips from Dusty Baker in preparation for the game.” Pics http://politi.co/2qRWvjH … http://politi.co/2qSacPL

BIG CONGRATULATIONS to Rachel Overboe, graduate of Harvard Business School class of 2017! (h/t your biggest fans: Jmom, Lynn, Leah, John and Anna)

TRANSITIONS: David Leiter, a Capitol Hill veteran, Clinton Administration alum, and former president of ML Strategies, has launched a new government relations firm called Plurus Strategies. Also joining the firm are Georgette Spanjich as VP and Sarah Litke as senior director. http://bit.ly/2qj3Kyv … Zain Habboo is joining Fenton as its first chief digital officer. She is currently senior director for digital and marketing strategy at the United Nations Foundation and is a National Geographic alum.

WELCOME TO THE WORLD – Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum, candidate for governor of Florida, and R. Jai Gillum, director of foundation affairs at the Florida Dental Association: “Last Monday, May 15, we welcomed Davis Allen Gillum to the world! He arrived healthy at 8 pounds, 3 ounces. His twin siblings, 3-year-olds Caroline and Jackson, love having a new baby brother. … Dad has taken some time off the campaign trail to be on Daddy Duty!” Pic http://politi.co/2rk7gNt

NSC DEPARTURE LOUNGE – Yesterday was Ben Levine’s last day on the NSC – he was special assistant for global economics and finance at the NSC under President Barack Obama and then the beginning of the new administration. He served on Obama’s reelection campaign, worked at Treasury including in Secretary Jack Lew’s executive office and was a policy analyst for the Financial Stability Oversight Council. Beginning in August, he’s continuing his graduate studies at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business as a full-time MBA student.

BIRTHDAY OF THE DAY: David Martosko, U.S. political editor for The Daily Mail. How he’s celebrating: “I’ll be on assignment for DailyMail.com on May 25 covering the president’s overseas trip, but my wife and daughters are taking me to a Nationals game when I return.” Read his Playbook Plus Q&A: http://politi.co/2qf9PAd

BIRTHDAYS: Sen. Amy Klobuchar is 57 … Politico’s Anna Palmer, the pride of Kindred, N.D. … Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan is 61 — he’s celebrating with a quiet dinner with his family and grandchildren, including his new grandson Cam … Emily Bittner … former White House news secretary Ron Nessen is 83 … Kate Ackley Zeller, reporter at CQ Roll Call … James “Britton” Rethmeier, son of Caton and Blaine, is 10 … Mike Russell, bourbon authority, avid diver and SVP at CRC Public Relations … Argentina turns 107 on its Revolution Day and Jordan turns 71 on its Independence Day … Megan Van Etten, director of media and external comms at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce (hat tip: Blair Latoff Holmes) … Tim Zenk, VP of business development, new markets and technology at Phytelligence Inc. … Laurie Rubiner, chief of staff for Sen. Richard Blumenthal, celebrating with Chris (h/ts Jon Haber) … Alycyn Keeling … Rep. Steve Russell (R-Okla.) is 54 … former Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) is 74 … John Flynn … Britt Kahn, Conan O’Brien political booker (h/t Tammy Haddad) …

…Greg Bluestein, politics reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution who has done a bang up job covering the race for Tom Price’s old congressional seat in Georgia (h/t David Pittman) … Savannah Haeger, an associate at Hamilton Place Strategies and the pride of Lake Zurich, Ill. (h/t Julie Sarne) … Dorrance Smith, CEO of The New Analytics Company … Human Rights Campaign’s Hayley Miller … Courtney Joline … Sean Rushton, founder and director of the Project on Exchange Rates and the Dollar and a Ted Cruz alum … Alice Germond … Lesley Sillaman … Capricia Marshall … Lauren Werner (h/ts Teresa Vilmain) … Beth Foster … Politico alum Jennifer Martinez, now at Brew Media Relations … Margaret Dobrydnio … NYT alum Carla Robbins, now adjunct senior fellow at CFR … Phil Karsting … James Dellinger … Steve Petersen … Bob Loughlin … Tali Looney … Carol Thompson … Jim Doak … Conor Powell, Fox News foreign correspondent, is 4-0 … Alice Mooney … Jason Lilly … Olympic gold medal gymnast Aly Raisman is 23 (h/t Jewish Insider) … Brian Flaherty, SVP of public policy at CBIA … Matthew Colbert … Matt Lakin is 37 … Alan Brody … Charlie Fromstein … actor Sir Ian McKellen is 78 … actor-comedian Mike Myers is 54 (h/ts AP)

****** A message from the Coalition for Affordable Prescription Drugs (CAPD): One in two Americans rely on their employers to provide health care benefits. So, employers partner with PBMs to provide access to effective medications at the most affordable price. PBMs drive savings in part by using clinical expertise to identify generic alternatives that achieve the same health outcomes for a lower price. With generics accounting for 89 percent of prescriptions filled in 2015, but only 27 percent of drug costs, that represents a savings of $227 billion across the U.S. health care system in just one year. Learn more at www.affordableprescriptiondrugs.org. ******

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from CapitalistHQ.com https://capitalisthq.com/mt-gop-candidate-charged-after-he-body-slams-reporter-trump-in-brussels-merkels-presidential-day-kellyanne-and-heather-podesta-lunch-bday-anna-palmer/

[spintrebuchet-blog]

The Djokovic Paradox: Reigniting a burnt out comet and the super Serb’s new nemesis

Legionnaires and Centurions! Gather around! The Finals of the Rome Masters we just finished and now we have arrived at the French Open. The Clay Slam. 

Back in Rome, Zverev faced off against Djokovic...and won. I’ll let that sink in for a moment. The master of masters 1000′s was beaten, in straight sets, by a talented rookie playing his first final at that level? Yup. That actually happened. 

“Poor is the pupil who does not surpass the master”

A famous quote attributed to the most storied polymath of all time – Da Vinci. Remember this.

Djokovic hasn’t been playing great this year. Everyone’s been reported on this and unfortunately if you were to google the words, ‘Slump’ and ‘Djokovic’, it would appear a million times (309,000, to be precise).

I’ll confess to you: I’m a Rafa fan and from 2015-2016, my sister (who is probably the biggest Novak fan) tormented me with texts, dripping with sarcasm after every one of Rafa’s seven losses against the mighty Serb.

Flashback

Location: Caja Magica. Also known as the Magic Box.

The sun blazed above the Caja Magica stadium. Clad in my burgundy suit and tie, I was in attendance. My Beretta was holstered, just in case I received the text from the mysterious tennis benefactors (also known as the MTB) to shoot Ille Natase. Far too magnanimous, she was and called off the hit (That was an insiders joke that only tennis junkies would understand). Anyways, no point letting a good ticket go to waste, so my bottom eagerly clung onto the comfortable seating, and I sipped my lemonade. 

Nadal, came onto the court first, because he was the lower seed; but most odds makers favored the Spaniard because of his good form. The Spanish crowd cheered him on fervently. I’m not going to make this about the King of Clay. (Don’t complain now. I’m writing a separate piece on him).

There’s something about the sight and feel of red clay that reminds me of the gladiators of the Roman Empire. Sipping my drink, I surveyed both of them. Nadal looked determined to snap his seven match losing streak against the mighty Serb. That fervent obsessiveness was in his eyes and you could see it. (On related news, my tour guide, got me some roasted cod. Quite scrumptious). 

Then came Djokovic. The higher seed. There were some cheers for him, but he was hardly the crowd favourite in the strongly partisan crowd. Don’t expect that to faze him. He managed to feed off the hate that spilled from the American crowd when he played against Roger in New York in 2015. But, he wasn’t in that same rhythm anymore. His box lacked his old-time backbone – Marian Vajda. The match ended after two hours. There was no sarcastic text from my sister. Nadal had finally snapped is seven match losing streak against Novak and has galvanized his status as the undisputed favorite for the French Open. 

(Head’s up: I’ll be tangoing between the second and third person. I’d like to address Novak directly here). 

You have a winning record against Federer and Nadal. (23-22 & 26-24). History can never be erased. Numbers are objective. Muscle memory can kick in anytime. It just takes six matches. Every supernova needs just one spark. All know this. Nadal, of all people, dismissed Spanish reporters of your so-called slump. No one expected the bombastic vintage throwback to 2007. Federer and Nadal are on your tail again. You thrive off rivalries. They’re back. Becker said it himself last year that one of the reasons you cooled during the second half of 2016, was because “your rivals were not there”. 

If it weren’t you, Nadal probably would have passed Federer’s Slam total by now. But, you took this game to a new level. Even a diehard Nadal fan would concede that. You’re one of the Big 4! Tennis’s equivalent of the Justice League! (That reminds me, why don’t more tennis players get into movies? Am I the only one who would love to see a buddy cop franchise with any one of the Big 4, alongside Shaq? It’d be ridiculously fun). 

And, now let us get to the matter of your new nemesis. It isn’t Federer. You haven’t faced him this year, and he is miles ahead of you in the Barclays Race to London. Nor is it Nadal, who is noisily gunning for the number one ranking again. You faced him this year just once…and lost. But, it’s not him either. You were beaten twice this year…by…Nick. I suppose on court, you could consider him to be a rival. He has beaten you on the tangible tennis court. Nevertheless, tennis is a psychological sport - so it’s not him either. (Has my preamble gone longer than needed? Almost there).

It’s Boris Becker.

Yes. You read correctly. A six time grand slam winner. Former world number one. The Baron Von Slam from Germany. The old mentor. He’s gotten inside your head. With not-so cryptic tweets directed towards to you after your defeats, he really does take extra relish in rubbing salt in your wounds.

The silent message: You were a winner when I coached you; and a loser without me.

(During happier times)

And, the thing is…don’t hate me for it, but I do find all this drama to be…deliciously entertaining.

Becker once famously said, “I am not God. I am far from perfect”. Tennis players, retired and current, tend to be extremely diplomatic in their opinions. Even politicians are rarely as politically correct. Not Becker though. Right from the start of this year, he has dropped such shade on his former protégé, that Regina George would have been impressed.

Becker expected Djokovic to keep him by his side as they chased Federer’s slam total. Becker’s vindictiveness probably was no more reflective when he praised Novak’s dethroner at Indian Wells, Nick, with the following tweet:

“Hope my man, Novak, is watching”.

(In my mind, that’s Becker’s expression through that match in California. I love the fact that Becker has such an appetite for melodrama. It doesn’t surprise me that he’s fond of Shakespeare. He’s openly admitted that he never wants anyone to surpass his prodigal breakthrough at Wimbledon at the age of 17). 

I wonder if on some level, Becker wants to motivate him, to use his criticisms to spur him to his old self. Or, maybe, it is coming from his Id and not his SuperEgo. I am reminded by a line by the great Augustus, “I found Rome a city of bricks, and left it a city of marble”.

If you think my theory is too far-fetched, then wait. I have proof. It was reported in numerous sources that Djokovic’s new super coach is going to be Agassi. Becker’s old nemesis. The guy who managed to read his Blitzkrieg serve by the way he would stick his tongue out on each ball serve. Has he found an ally in this psychological war against his former mentor? 

You brought Becker to help deal with your tangible nemesis – Nadal. And, this time another super coach. Your silence to Becker’s quotes could be interpreted as magnanimity. But, I’d like to quote one of my favorite video game characters, GlaDOS,

“We have both said a lot of things that you are going to regret”. That’s GlaDOS laying it down to Wheatley in Portal 2, and then proceeds to banish him to the Moon. 

The silent message he has sent: ‘Time for an upgrade’. Open Era experts would all concede that Agassi had a better career than Becker, being one of only two individuals with a career golden slam (Nadal, being the other).

Imagine if you made to the finals at Roland Garros. I know, I know. There are many obstacles ahead. Besides, Nadal, there’s Thiem, who is showing good form, plus the likes of Zverev, Wawrinka and Dmitrov. Plus, there’s Krygios. But, a key part of sport psychology is visualization. Just imagine if you were there again. Wouldn’t it be quite satisfying to repeat the Guga heart across the Phillipe Chartier Stadium again?

Becker’s going to be watching. 

Surprisingly, Becker sent out a tweet, praising Novak’s move to hire Agassi. A diplomatic touch, perhaps?

There is a Spanish song by the band – Gotan Project – Epoca; this springs to mind, particularly the first verse. 

“Si desapareció

en mi aparecerá

creyeron que murió

pero renacerá

(which translates to)

If he disappeared

I would believe

That he died

but will revive.

There’s more history to be written. There are more memories ahead. Do me a favor and just don’t lose to Krygios because then both me and my sister are going to be bummed out. Nadal’s ranked fourth and he just missed out on being the third seed (to Wawrinka, by a hundred points). 

This means the two of you could possibly face each other in the semi-finals. Just like the good old days of 2013, when the two of you dueled in what many regard to be the greatest clay-court match, ever. 

The legendary skier - Shane McConkey, once said that “there’s no better feeling than that moment before you take off”. It’s time to hit the ignition again. Slap that crosscourt sliding backhand – a thousand times if you have to. You destroyed Thiem in less than an hour at Rome. Zverev’s serve left you undone in the finals at Rome. But, that’s not a Grand Slam. In a best of five setter, I’d say experience trumps exuberance. 

I can understand the hiring of Pepe Imaz, with his quasi mantra of ‘Love & Hugs’. And, Becker’s strict coaching regime reminds me of J.K Simmons from Whiplash. But, we have months of hindsight now and lets admit it together, that Pepe’s nuttier than a squirrel’s snack box. Anyways, good luck with Agassi. Idemo!

[everettwilkinson]

MT GOP candidate charged after he ‘body slams’ reporter — TRUMP in Brussels — MERKEL’s presidential day — Kellyanne and Heather Podesta lunch — B’DAY: Anna Palmer

Listen to the Playbook Audio Briefing http://bit.ly/2rTk9Lj … Subscribe on iTunes http://apple.co/2eX6Eay … Visit the online home of Playbook http://politi.co/2f51Jnf

Good Thursday morning. PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP is in Brussels meeting with European leaders, including European Council President Donald Tusk and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker. He’s scheduled to meet with new French President Emmanuel Macron in the next few hours. He’ll also visit NATO before leaving for Sicily for a G7 meeting.

Story Continued Below

WITH TRUMP IN BRUSSELS, and attending meetings with the prez: Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Defense Secretary James Mattis, National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, Dina Powell, and Gary Cohn, per pooler Phil Rucker.

TRUMP just had a private meeting with EU leaders, per WaPo’s Phil Rucker. Great exchange: “The first encounter came as the three presidents stood posing for photos. Tusk told Trump: ‘Do you know, Mr. President, we have two presidents in the EU?’ Trump replied: ‘I know that.’ Juncker chimed in: One too much.'” … Trump on the pope: “We went to the Pope. Very impressive. The Pope was terrific.”

— “Trump faces rougher reception in NATO, EU meetings,” by Reuters’ Jeff Mason and Steve Holland in Brussels: “After a warm welcome in the Middle East and a ‘fantastic’ visit with the pope, U.S. President Donald Trump walks on shakier ground on Thursday when European Union and NATO leaders will press him on defense, trade, and environmental concerns. The Republican president, midway through his first foreign trip since taking office, has basked in the glow of favorable receptions in Riyadh and Jerusalem, where leaders lauded his harsh words for Iran.

“Praise may be in shorter supply in Brussels. Trump questioned the relevance of the NATO military alliance as a presidential candidate, and is considering pulling the United States out of the Paris agreement on climate change — a huge concern in Europe. The EU was also a party to the Iran nuclear agreement, which Trump has criticized sharply. ‘We expect him to recommit to NATO’s founding rule that an attack against one ally is an attack against all,’ said a senior European diplomat at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. ‘Words matter and there is a huge expectation on that.’” http://reut.rs/2qiSh1Z

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

GREAT LINE FROM POLITICO EUROPE PLAYBOOKER RYAN HEATH — “German Chancellor Angela Merkel is the meat in a presidential PR sandwich today.” FORMER PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA had breakfast with Merkel in Berlin before the two participated in the Obama Foundation’s first international event — a talk at the Brandenburg Gate on the importance of civic engagement. Merkel will then leave for the NATO summit in Brussels with Trump.

OOPS!! — @StateDept: “.@POTUS arrives for #NATOmeeting in #Brussels today. #POTUSAbroad” http://bit.ly/2rCJ7kU … @PoliticoRyan: “As @StollmeyerEU pointed out – this is #POTUS arriving at the #EU, not #NATO … that meeting doesn’t start for hours.”

THE STORY OF THE DAY — HADAS GOLD AND GABE DEBENEDETTI (who is in Helena, Montana) — “Montana House GOP candidate cited after reporter says he ‘body-slammed me’”: “Montana Republican congressional candidate Greg Gianforte was issued a citation late Wednesday after he allegedly ‘body-slammed’ a reporter at a campaign event on the eve of a hotly contested special election. Ben Jacobs, a reporter for The Guardian tweeted that Gianforte ‘body-slammed me and broke my glasses’ at a campaign event in Bozeman, Montana — minutes before what was to be the last campaign rally of the campaign.

“Jacobs said he had asked Gianforte about a new budget analysis of House Republicans’ effort to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. Late Wednesday, Gallatin County Sheriff Brian Gootkin issued a statement saying the Republican congressional candidate had been cited for ‘misdemeanor assault’ and that Gianforte would have to appear in court by June 7 to resolve the matter. ‘The nature of the injuries did not meet the statutory elements of felony assault,’ the sheriff said in his statement.

“The incident rocked a closely watched contest, just hours before voters cast their ballots in Thursday’s special House election in Montana to replace Ryan Zinke, who is now the Trump administration’s secretary of the interior. Gianforte, a technology executive, is running against Democrat Rob Quist, a folk singer and first-time candidate. The race in the traditional Republican stronghold is turning out to be closer than many thought it would be.” http://politi.co/2qmuDkk … Audio of the incident http://bit.ly/2qmEnuR

— FOX NEWS FIRST-PERSON ACCOUNT by Alicia Acuna: “Gianforte grabbed Jacobs by the neck with both hands and slammed him into the ground behind him. Faith, Keith and I watched in disbelief as Gianforte then began punching the reporter. As Gianforte moved on top of Jacobs, he began yelling something to the effect of, ‘I’m sick and tired of this!’” http://fxn.ws/2qeLw5o

— DEMOCRATS are looking to take advantage of the last-minute break in the closer-than-expected race. The DCCC is up with Facebook ads targeting “with a goal of both persuasion and mobilization” in order to reach “Democrats who might have been less likely to turn out and vote on Election Day.” MoveOn.org also released a digital ad to run through Election Day. DCCC ad http://bit.ly/2qYSpVo … MoveOn ad http://bit.ly/2qmx728

CAN THIS FLIP THE RACE? The Billings Gazette: “Though 37 percent of registered voters have already returned absentee ballots, there will ‘still be plenty of people voting on Election Day,’ [political science professor Jeremy] Johnson said. Turnout in special elections is typically low, and with this vote on the Thursday before Memorial Day many have predicted low numbers at the polls.” http://bit.ly/2rCHlQN

GIANFORTE’S CAMPAIGN SPOKESPERSON, Shane Scanlon, said: “Tonight, as Greg was giving a separate interview in a private office, The Guardian’s Ben Jacobs entered the office without permission, aggressively shoved a recorder in Greg’s face, and began asking badgering questions. Jacobs was asked to leave. After asking Jacobs to lower the recorder, Jacobs declined. Greg then attempted to grab the phone that was pushed in his face. Jacobs grabbed Greg’s wrist, and spun away from Greg, pushing them both to the ground. It’s unfortunate that this aggressive behavior from a liberal journalist created this scene at our campaign volunteer BBQ.”

— HMM… First of all, the tape doesn’t back up this story. Second: The dude body slammed a reporter! Don’t make excuses. Apologize!

THIS GUY MIGHT BE IN THE WRONG BUSINESS. When you are a member of Congress, you constantly have reporters shoving microphones in your face. Journalists wait outside bathrooms to corner you on the news of the day.

THE QUESTION FOR PAUL RYAN AND OTHER REPUBLICAN LEADERS: What will Republicans say about Gianforte — a potential House Republican — allegedly physically assaulting a reporter for asking a question about the health-care bill? Should he be allowed to caucus with Republicans? If he were a sitting member, there would probably be calls for his resignation.

ABOUT THAT HEALTH CARE BILL … — “CBO: House Obamacare repeal bill would leave 23 million more uninsured,” by Adam Cancryn and Sarah Ferris: “Roughly 23 million more people would be uninsured over a decade if the House-passed Republican Obamacare repeal bill becomes law, according to a long-awaited CBO analysis that could complicate GOP hopes of getting a companion measure through the Senate.

“That’s nearly identical to the coverage losses that CBO forecast for an earlier version of the bill — despite the addition of new provisions and billions of dollars in funding aimed at keeping more people insured.

“The nonpartisan scorekeeping office also forecast the GOP plan would cut the deficit by $119 billion over a decade, primarily because of its cuts to Medicaid and private insurance subsidies. That exceeds $2 billion of minimum projected savings the bill needed to hit, which should clear an important hurdle and help the bill’s prospects of getting to the Senate. Senate GOP aides are still checking the analysis to ensure the bill can travel safely across the Capitol.” http://politi.co/2rT6aFh

****** A message from the Coalition for Affordable Prescription Drugs (CAPD): One in two Americans rely on their employers for health care benefits including affordable access to prescription drugs. That’s why employers are partnering with PBMs to provide access to effective medications at the most affordable price and improve health outcomes. Learn more at www.affordableprescriptiondrugs.org. ******

SHOT — SENATE MAJORITY LEADER MITCH MCCONNELL is continuing to keep his plans for health care reform close to the vest. When asked at a Reuters newsmaker event Wednesday about Senate GOP’s health care package, McConnell said: “I don’t know how we get to 50 [votes] at the moment. But that’s the goal. And exactly what the composition of that [bill] is I’m not going to speculate about because it serves no purpose.” http://reut.rs/2qeGm9v

CHASER — “Peril for Republicans if they push forward with Obamacare repeal,” by Paul Demko and Jen Haberkorn: “Obamacare repeal is in trouble in the Senate, and a nonpartisan analysis of the House’s repeal legislation issued Wednesday only reinforced that reality. Within minutes of the release of the report showing 23 million fewer Americans would be insured over a decade, two Senate Republicans blasted the estimate and the House bill, underscoring just how much the legislation will have to change to get through the upper chamber. Sen. Dean Heller (R-Nev.), one of the few Senate Republicans expected to face a tough re-election contest next year, said the House bill ‘does not do enough to address Nevada’s Medicaid population or protect Nevadans with pre-existing conditions.’ Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) also criticized the House bill for failing to adequately protect Americans with pre-existing medical conditions.” http://politi.co/2rXCLJf

JOANNE KENEN on “10 key points from the CBO report on Obamacare repeal”: http://politi.co/2qZkP3P

NYT SCOOP, A1 — “Top Russian Officials Discussed How to Influence Trump Aides Last Summer,” by Matt Rosenberg, Adam Goldman and Matt Apuzzo: “American spies collected information last summer revealing that senior Russian intelligence and political officials were discussing how to exert influence over Donald J. Trump through his advisers, according to three current and former American officials familiar with the intelligence. The conversations focused on Paul Manafort, the Trump campaign chairman at the time, and Michael T. Flynn, a retired general who was advising Mr. Trump … Some Russians boasted about how well they knew Mr. Flynn. Others discussed leveraging their ties to Viktor F. Yanukovych, the deposed president of Ukraine living in exile in Russia, who at one time had worked closely with Mr. Manafort.” http://nyti.ms/2qRQp2Y

— KEN VOGEL: “Manafort advised Trump team on Russia scandal”: “Months after the FBI began examining Paul Manafort as part of a probe into ties between President Donald Trump’s team and Russia, Manafort called Trump’s chief of staff Reince Priebus to push back against the mounting controversy, according to four people familiar with the call. It was about a week before Trump’s inauguration, and Manafort wanted to brief Trump’s team on the alleged inaccuracies in a recently released dossier of memos written by a former British spy for Trump’s opponents that alleged compromising ties between Russia, Trump and Trump’s associates, including Manafort.

“‘On the day that the dossier came out in the press, Paul called Reince, as a responsible ally of the president would do, and said this story about me is garbage, and a bunch of the other stuff in there seems implausible,’ said a person close to Manafort. … While the people say the conversations were mostly of a political or, in some cases, personal nature, the conversation with Priebus, described by four people familiar with it, was related to the scandal now subsuming Manafort and the Trump presidency. It suggests that Manafort recognized months ago the potentially serious problems posed by the investigation, even as Trump himself continues to publicly dismiss it as a politically motivated witch hunt, while predicting it won’t find anything compromising.” http://politi.co/2qj9UPp

THE LATEST FROM MANCHESTER — “Police make more arrests in Manchester bomb but leaks feared,” by AP’s Jill Lawless and Gregory Katz in Manchester: “Police arrested two more people and were on Thursday searching a new site in Manchester suspected of links to the bombing that killed 22 people at a pop concert, as British authorities complained bitterly about investigation leaks by U.S. officials. Prime Minister Theresa May is expected to raise the issue of the leaks with President Donald Trump in Brussels later. British officials are particularly angry that photos detailing evidence about the bomb used in the attack were published in the New York Times.

“Greater Manchester Police released a statement condemning the leaks on behalf of the National Counter-Terrorism Policing units that suggested a severe rupture in trust between Britain and the United States, who have traditionally shared intelligence at the highest levels. … Police and security services are also upset that the name of bomber Salman Abedi was leaked by U.S. officials and published while police in Britain were withholding the name for what they said were reasons of operational security.” http://apne.ws/2qYWQzy

MNUCHIN CONTINUES NO BAT DRUM BEAT — “Mnuchin Tells Democrats No Go on Border Tax in Private Meeting,” by Bloomberg’s Anna Edgerton: “Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin pronounced House Speaker Paul Ryan’s proposal for a border-adjusted tax dead during closed-door conversations with Democrats on the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee, according to two members of the panel. … Judy Chu, a California Democrat on the Ways and Means Committee, said she asked Mnuchin directly during a private meeting Tuesday if he supports the border-adjusted tax. ‘He actually said straight out that he doesn’t support it and the president doesn’t support it,’ Chu said, adding that Mnuchin cited concern from businesses about price increases for consumers. ‘Unless he was lying to us yesterday, I really felt it was dead on arrival,’ Chu said.” https://bloom.bg/2qeH3zK

COMING ATTRACTIONS — “Republicans may need Democrats’ help to raise debt limit,” by Colin Wilhelm and John Bresnahan: “Republicans may need to rely on Democrats –once again — to raise the nation’s legal borrowing limit. House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) said the group of hard-line conservatives will want concessions before supporting a debt-ceiling boost, setting up a potential showdown with the Trump administration.

“‘There’s a lot of discussion among Freedom Caucus members to push for a debt ceiling [increase] as long as it addresses some of the other structural reforms that conservatives have long called for,’ Meadows told POLITICO. ‘If that is coupled with a debt-ceiling increase that has a definite dollar amount — not a time-specific amount — then they would find a lot of support among conservatives.’ Freedom Caucus sources say the group is also discussing a provision that would allow the federal government to make debt payment a priority in the event of a government shutdown later this year.” More for pros http://politico.pro/2qS8bTH

— WHAT WE HEAR ABOUT THE DEBT LIMIT: Here’s the deal: back in 2011, John Boehner set a standard that the debt limit needed to be matched with dollar-for-dollar spending cuts. Republicans now insist on some sort of concession every time the debt ceiling is increased. Sometimes they get them, sometimes they don’t, and Democrats just help the GOP lift the limit without any wins. But they control all of D.C. now, so expect a hardline fight. The Freedom Caucus — the three dozen or so conservative Republicans in the House — want the debt limit raised before the August recess. That’s 31 legislative days away. That’s a tight deadline, since borrowing authority doesn’t truly run out until September. But most in the Capitol are predicting a big fight. House Energy and Commerce Chairman Greg Walden of Oregon told us yesterday in the Capitol that it’s a “tough vote” and said a clean increase — one without reforms — will not be met with “broad approval.”

THE JUICE …

— SPOTTED: Speaker Paul Ryan with Republican Conference Chairman Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington State chatting yesterday in a room off the House floor.

— POWER LUNCH OF THE DAY: Kellyanne Conway and Heather Podesta at Centrolina Wednesday. Earlier in the day, at around 9 a.m., Kellyanne was at Drybar Georgetown. She had her Secret Service security detail with her.

–SEN. BEN SASSE’s new book “The Vanishing American Adult,” landed at No. 3 on the New York Times bestseller list.

–FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — Several top civil rights groups are sending a letter today to President Trump and DHS Secretary John Kelly urging them not to appoint Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke to be assistant secretary in the office of partnership and engagement at the Department of Homeland Security. In the letters, the groups say he has a “history of incendiary and hateful statements” that “make him unfit to serve in this role.” The letter is signed by the heads of the Anti-Defamation League, Human Rights Campaign, the National Urban League, the National Council of La Raza, and Muslim Advocates. http://politi.co/2rkwuez

— CHELSEA HANDLER recently sat down with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) to chat about 2020, whether Senate Majority Leader McConnell speaks to her and her views on what the GOP is doing in power. The interview streams on Netflix on Friday. Video http://bit.ly/2qRVZCC

— JARED AND IVANKA’S date night in Rome. 8 pix on one page http://dailym.ai/2qeNMcF

WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE … “Spicer left out of Vatican visit,” by Annie Karni in Rome: “President Donald Trump’s entourage at the Vatican on Wednesday included his wife, his daughter, and an array of staffers — but not White House press secretary Sean Spicer, a devout Catholic who told reporters earlier this year that he gave up alcohol for Lent. Both sides, according to a White House official, agreed to limit the number of staffers who attended.” http://politi.co/2qeNqTE

PHOTO DU JOUR: President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump listen to a guide as they look at the frescoed ceilings during their visit to the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican on May 24. | L’Osservatore Romano/Pool Photo via AP

CNN’S MANU RAJU and EVAN PEREZ — “AG Sessions did not disclose Russia meetings in security clearance form, DOJ says”: “Attorney General Jeff Sessions did not disclose meetings he had last year with Russian officials when he applied for his security clearance, the Justice Department told CNN Wednesday. Sessions, who met with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak at least two times last year, didn’t note those interactions on the form, which requires him to list ‘any contact’ he or his family had with a “foreign government’ or its ‘representatives’ over the past seven years … Justice Department spokeswoman Sarah Isgur Flores … says he and his staff were … told by an FBI employee who assisted in filling out the form, known as the SF-86, that he didn’t need to list dozens of meetings with foreign ambassadors that happened in his capacity as a senator.” http://cnn.it/2rT4RpR

IVANKA WATCH — “Ivanka Trump asks trafficked women what U.S. can do to help,” by AP’s Frances D’Emilio in Rome: “Ivanka Trump met Wednesday with a group of African women in Rome who were trafficked into prostitution rings, a private encounter said to have moved her to tears. Trump visited the Rome headquarters of the Sant’Egidio Community, a Catholic humanitarian organization that serves the poor, the elderly and migrants, after a morning visit to the Vatican. Sant’Egidio official Daniela Pompei said the closed-door encounter lasted 40 minutes and Trump asked the 10 African women for suggestions on what the U.S. government, led by her father, President Donald Trump, can do to help others like them.” http://abcn.ws/2rk3R0U

CLICKER – “Trump’s visit with Pope Francis: The top photos out of Rome” — 25 pix http://politi.co/2qiYbAa

MAGGIE HABERMAN PROFILE — “Wanna Know What Donald Trump Is Really Thinking? Read Maggie Haberman,” by Rachael Combe in July’s Elle: “Journalists have become part of the story in the Trump administration, enablers and heroes of a nonstop political and constitutional soap opera, and last year Haberman was the most widely read journalist at the Times, according to its analytics. Many of the juiciest Trump pieces have been broken by her … While the president and the reporter couldn’t seem more different … the points at which their histories and personalities converge are revealing about both the media and the president himself. Trump wants what she can give him access to — a kind of status he’s always craved in a newspaper … Haberman, for her part, has become a front-page fixture and a Fourth Estate folk hero.” http://bit.ly/2qYVl4F

WEST COAST WATCH — “The Russia investigation thrust Devin Nunes into the spotlight. Now that he’s the one under scrutiny, what has he been up to?,” by LA Times’ Sarah D. Wire: http://lat.ms/2rCqWvI

****** A message from the Coalition for Affordable Prescription Drugs (CAPD): As list prices for brand drugs continue to rise, employers are partnering with PBMs to keep drug costs under control. In fact, every dollar an employer invests in a PBM service returns six dollars in savings. Learn more at www.affordableprescriptiondrugs.org. ******

FUTURE OF NEWS — “Facebook signs BuzzFeed, Vox, others for original video shows – sources,” by Reuters’ Jessica Toonkel: “Facebook has signed deals with millennial-focused news and entertainment creators Vox Media, BuzzFeed, ATTN, Group Nine Media and others to make shows for its upcoming video service, which will feature long and short-form content with ad breaks, according to several sources familiar with the situation. Facebook is planning two tiers of video entertainment: scripted shows with episodes lasting 20 to 30 minutes, which it will own; and shorter scripted and unscripted shows with episodes lasting about 5 to 10 minutes, which Facebook will not own.” http://reut.rs/2qZwj7B

MEDIAWATCH — @grynbaum: “Ken Kurson is leaving Observer for TENEO, he tells me. He’ll be a senior managing director.”

— NEW POLITICO PRO HIRES – Marty Kady and Carrie Budoff Brown email the staff: “Sheila Kaplan will join us next week as a senior health care reporter. Sheila was most recently a Washington-based senior writer for STAT, covering the intersection of health, influence and politics. … John Hendel is joining the Tech team to help cover the FCC and Hill telecom policy. John comes to us from Communications Daily, where he’s been a Capitol Hill telecom policy reporter since 2013.”

SPOTTED at a party last night in honor of Patrick Steel, the new CEO of POLITICO, at Dr. Elena and Robert Allbritton’s residence in Georgetown: Don Baer, Brian Bechtel, Jim Bankoff, Ron Bonjean, David Castagnetti, Stephanie Cutter, Tony Fratto, Jason and Shari Gold, Josh and Blair Holmes, Joel Johnson, Dede Lea, Ray LaHood, Kevin Madden, Bruce Mehlman, Graham Miller, Greg Lowman, Susan Molinari, Geoff Morrell, Jack and Susanna Quinn, Heather Podesta, Jill Zuckman.

SPOTTED: Eric Trump and wife Lara last night at the Trump hotel having dinner. Steven Mnuchin and his fiancée Louise Linton stopped by to say hello … IRS Commissioner John Koskinen yesterday at Mackey’s Public House … Former Secretary of Homeland Security and current University of California President Janet Napolitano eschewed the TSA Pre line at Washington Dulles Airport and went through the regular folks west side security line. “She did all the stuff regular folks do. And had no aides around making it easy.” … Nationals Manager Dusty Baker yesterday meeting with Rep. Mike Doyle (D-Pa.) and Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) for lunch on Capitol Hill. Doyle is managing the Democrats, and Barton is managing the Republicans in the upcoming Congressional Baseball Game at Nationals Park June 15. “The two managers were seeking advice and managerial tips from Dusty Baker in preparation for the game.” Pics http://politi.co/2qRWvjH … http://politi.co/2qSacPL

BIG CONGRATULATIONS to Rachel Overboe, graduate of Harvard Business School class of 2017! (h/t your biggest fans: Jmom, Lynn, Leah, John and Anna)

TRANSITIONS: David Leiter, a Capitol Hill veteran, Clinton Administration alum, and former president of ML Strategies, has launched a new government relations firm called Plurus Strategies. Also joining the firm are Georgette Spanjich as VP and Sarah Litke as senior director. http://bit.ly/2qj3Kyv … Zain Habboo is joining Fenton as its first chief digital officer. She is currently senior director for digital and marketing strategy at the United Nations Foundation and is a National Geographic alum.

WELCOME TO THE WORLD – Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum, candidate for governor of Florida, and R. Jai Gillum, director of foundation affairs at the Florida Dental Association: “Last Monday, May 15, we welcomed Davis Allen Gillum to the world! He arrived healthy at 8 pounds, 3 ounces. His twin siblings, 3-year-olds Caroline and Jackson, love having a new baby brother. … Dad has taken some time off the campaign trail to be on Daddy Duty!” Pic http://politi.co/2rk7gNt

NSC DEPARTURE LOUNGE – Yesterday was Ben Levine’s last day on the NSC – he was special assistant for global economics and finance at the NSC under President Barack Obama and then the beginning of the new administration. He served on Obama’s reelection campaign, worked at Treasury including in Secretary Jack Lew’s executive office and was a policy analyst for the Financial Stability Oversight Council. Beginning in August, he’s continuing his graduate studies at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business as a full-time MBA student.

BIRTHDAY OF THE DAY: David Martosko, U.S. political editor for The Daily Mail. How he’s celebrating: “I’ll be on assignment for DailyMail.com on May 25 covering the president’s overseas trip, but my wife and daughters are taking me to a Nationals game when I return.” Read his Playbook Plus Q&A: http://politi.co/2qf9PAd

BIRTHDAYS: Sen. Amy Klobuchar is 57 … Politico’s Anna Palmer, the pride of Kindred, N.D. … Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan is 61 — he’s celebrating with a quiet dinner with his family and grandchildren, including his new grandson Cam … Emily Bittner … former White House news secretary Ron Nessen is 83 … Kate Ackley Zeller, reporter at CQ Roll Call … James “Britton” Rethmeier, son of Caton and Blaine, is 10 … Mike Russell, bourbon authority, avid diver and SVP at CRC Public Relations … Argentina turns 107 on its Revolution Day and Jordan turns 71 on its Independence Day … Megan Van Etten, director of media and external comms at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce (hat tip: Blair Latoff Holmes) … Tim Zenk, VP of business development, new markets and technology at Phytelligence Inc. … Laurie Rubiner, chief of staff for Sen. Richard Blumenthal, celebrating with Chris (h/ts Jon Haber) … Alycyn Keeling … Rep. Steve Russell (R-Okla.) is 54 … former Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) is 74 … John Flynn … Britt Kahn, Conan O’Brien political booker (h/t Tammy Haddad) …

…Greg Bluestein, politics reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution who has done a bang up job covering the race for Tom Price’s old congressional seat in Georgia (h/t David Pittman) … Savannah Haeger, an associate at Hamilton Place Strategies and the pride of Lake Zurich, Ill. (h/t Julie Sarne) … Dorrance Smith, CEO of The New Analytics Company … Human Rights Campaign’s Hayley Miller … Courtney Joline … Sean Rushton, founder and director of the Project on Exchange Rates and the Dollar and a Ted Cruz alum … Alice Germond … Lesley Sillaman … Capricia Marshall … Lauren Werner (h/ts Teresa Vilmain) … Beth Foster … Politico alum Jennifer Martinez, now at Brew Media Relations … Margaret Dobrydnio … NYT alum Carla Robbins, now adjunct senior fellow at CFR … Phil Karsting … James Dellinger … Steve Petersen … Bob Loughlin … Tali Looney … Carol Thompson … Jim Doak … Conor Powell, Fox News foreign correspondent, is 4-0 … Alice Mooney … Jason Lilly … Olympic gold medal gymnast Aly Raisman is 23 (h/t Jewish Insider) … Brian Flaherty, SVP of public policy at CBIA … Matthew Colbert … Matt Lakin is 37 … Alan Brody … Charlie Fromstein … actor Sir Ian McKellen is 78 … actor-comedian Mike Myers is 54 (h/ts AP)

****** A message from the Coalition for Affordable Prescription Drugs (CAPD): One in two Americans rely on their employers to provide health care benefits. So, employers partner with PBMs to provide access to effective medications at the most affordable price. PBMs drive savings in part by using clinical expertise to identify generic alternatives that achieve the same health outcomes for a lower price. With generics accounting for 89 percent of prescriptions filled in 2015, but only 27 percent of drug costs, that represents a savings of $227 billion across the U.S. health care system in just one year. Learn more at www.affordableprescriptiondrugs.org. ******

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