#as soon as the word ��fascism” came up we knew this was going to be about Thrawn

[songtoyou]

Chapter 2: First Meeting

Tolerate It

Paring: Modern!Tommy Shelby x Original Female Character

Story Rating: R (No minors should read this fic).

Word Count: 2,778

Warnings: Mentions of sexual assault. Sexual activity between two consenting adults.

Description: Tommy Shelby is the owner and CEO of Shelby Company Limited. Starting out as a Bookmaker, Tommy had big ideas to expand his riches. In the past ten years, the company has grown rapidly to expand its business ventures from bars to producing alcohol, manufacturing motor vehicle parts, and exporting. One of the richest men in Great Britain, Tommy Shelby, has it all. Unfortunately, the death of his wife, Grace, left the multi-millionaire mogul alone and depressed. He needed someone to fulfill his needs and deepest darkest desires.

A/N: Again, the response to this fic has been wonderful. We learn more about Rose and find out why Lizzie left. Rose meets Tommy for the first time and begins the process of solidifying their arrangement. 

Note: Italics represent the past or past conversations.

Feedback is wonderful. It is nice knowing if people actually like this fic. 

I do not permit my work to be posted on any other site without my permission.

Saturday rolled faster than a blink of an eye. Rose was not nervous about tonight's meeting with her new client. A part of her was looking forward to it. Taking the time to look up Tommy Shelby on the Internet, Rose found out more about the man she would be possibly spending most of her time around. His backstory was interesting. The man started from nothing. It was no wonder Tommy was a massive celebrity within the business community. Inspiring entrepreneurs looked up to him and how he accumulated his wealth.

Rose was aware that Tommy's business practices were not always ethical, just like she knew that Alfie, Luca, and her other clients all dealt in questionable behavior to stay ahead of the game. It was like these guys did not know that the 1920s were long gone, and their little gangs should have considered obsolete in these present times. But it was not her job to question them as part of her did not care. All Rose wanted was to get paid and have a little pleasure herself once in a while. She hoped Tommy was good in bed as Lizzie mentioned he was. She had no reason not to believe her former coworker. 

It was a terrible incident at the club that made Lizzie leave for good. All because of Oswald Mosley and his sick and deviant behavior. Oswald was a Member of Parliament for South Staffordshire and the youngest member of the Conservative party. His influence within the party continued to gain strength as the young politician expressed his outlandish views that tended to lean towards fascism. Many other MPs have tried to rebuke Mosley's power but to no avail. His supporters only rallied behind him more. He was garnering more attention and enthusiasm to start his very own nationalist party within Great Britain. This idea worried many other MPs, even within the Conservative Party.

As Mosley's profile continued to rise, he found himself needing a form of release. It did not take long for him to receive an invitation to join Excelsior. Politicians were another form of clientele for the club. However, word soon spread about Mosley's odd behavior with the girls. The man had a weird fetish for rape and sexual assault fantasies. Not many girls wanted to partake in that act. Rose quickly passed on having Mosley as one of her clients since non-consensual/dubious consent was not something she gravitated towards when it came to pleasure.

Some of the girls confided in Rose they felt after being with Mosley. Many were scared to inform Izabella or Tatiana in fear of getting fired. Unfortunately, it took the incident with Lizzie that left her brutally scarred, both physically and psychologically, to have Mosley permanently banned from Excelsior. What made it worse was that no one could do anything to Mosley outside the club, no police reports, no arrests, nothing. He was too powerful.

The only thing Lizzie said to Rose was that Mosley took it too far and that she was rethinking her time at the club. When Lizzie did not show up for three days, Rose knew that she left the life of escorting for good.

Giving herself one last look in the mirror, Rose opted for the wine-colored long drape dress, with a silver belt to extenuate her hips, and topped it off with silver ankle strap heels. Satisfied with how she looked, Rose grabbed her clutch (silver as well) and walked towards the front door.

"Mom, you are coming home later, right?" asked Louis as he sat in the living room watching television.

"Uh…probably won't be home until late. I'm simply hanging out with the girls. Don't wait up, sweetie," said Rose kissing her son on the top of his head.

"Aren't you a little too dressed up for a girl's night out?"

"Louis, darling, here is some advice about women. We like to look nice now and then. It makes us feel good. So, don't ever question why your mummy is all dolled up, okay. The girls and I are celebrating Ellie's promotion at the firm. That is all. Now, do not stay up too late. See you later, love."

"Bye, mum."

Rose hated lying to her son, but there was no way she would ever reveal the truth to him about how they could afford their lifestyle.

As a teen mom, Rose worked tirelessly from different part-time jobs to get food on the table. She was tired of struggling to make ends meet. Rose wanted more for her son. By Rose's mid-twenties, she bit the bullet and became an exotic dancer. The nerves and humiliation wore off quickly when Rose counted her tips. It was the most she had ever made and all in one night. She had no intentions of ever becoming a high-end call girl. But again, the money proved to be too good to pass up. It also helped the Duchess and Princess give their girls some sense of agency and control over what they do and partake in certain activities. Rose's clients did not seem to understand or realize that she held all of the power. She was not a puppet, nor was she naïve.

Tommy continued to check his watch every fifteen minutes. Rose was not late by any means; it was merely a habit. It gave him something to do since he was not allowed to smoke at The Savoy. He instructed Rose to meet at the hotel's bar and restaurant at precisely 9:00 p.m.

He was not nervous as Tommy Shelby did not get nervous. He wanted to get the night started. The man needed some release.

"Mr. Shelby," spoke the hostess. "I have a Miss Turner here to see you."

"Yes, thank you. Send Miss Turner over, please," ordered Tommy and downed his glass of Irish whiskey in one gulp.

For a second, Tommy thought he forgot how to breathe when he saw Rose walk towards him. He would not deny that she was breathtakingly beautiful.

"Mr. Shelby," she greeted him with a quick kiss on his cheek. Thankfully, no lipstick residue on his face. Men hated when that happened, Rose learned.

"Miss Turner. It is a pleasure to meet you in person finally," said Tommy as he helped Rose into her seat. He could be a gentleman when he wanted to be one.  His Aunt Polly raised him right.

After giving her drink order to the waiter and a refill for Tommy, the two were left alone for the time being. Unsure of where the conversation should start, Rose chose to cut to the chase.

"How do you want tonight to go, exactly? Are we here to talk about, I don't know what you call it, our agreement, our arrangement? Or should we…"

"I say we talk about what we like and don't like," Tommy cut Rose off.

When the waiter brought their drinks, Rose took a sip of her white wine, while Tommy sipped his whiskey.

"My file should have included my interests. What I will and won't do with a man," Rose reminded him.

"Indeed, it did, but a file can only tell me so much. I would rather hear it from you, Miss Turner. So, tell me, what gets you off?" asked Tommy in a low voice as he leaned over the table. Thankfully, the two were at a back corner table with no other patrons around.

Taking another sip of her wine, Rose leaned in as well. "I like being dominated. From your file, you like being the dominant one. I like being tied up, gagged, and made to cum over and over again until I can't take it anymore. Orgasm denial, I like that as well—humiliation or degradation, whatever you want to call it. I don't care for that at all. It has never turned me on."

"What about pain? What is your pain threshold?" Tommy questioned.

"Pretty high."

"So, nipple clamps, whips, floggers…none of that bothers you?"

Rose shook her head 'no' and asked Tommy what kinds of punishment he prefers.

"Spankings with my bare hands and edging. Punishments only occur if I deem you being bratty or don't follow my rules."

Rose nodded, indicating she understood. "Pretty standard forms of punishment for a dominant."

The waiter stopped by again, asking if they wanted another drink or order some food. "I'm okay, thank you," said Rose.

"I liked to order champagne for our room, please," Tommy requested and told the waiter his room number. Rose was not surprised that he was in one of the hotel's suites. On different occasions, she had been to The Savoy Hotel, mostly with her other clients for leisurely visits now and then when they called for her services.

Taking another sip of her drink, Rose started to feel unsure to ask Tommy next. "Is there anything particular that you like or don't like?"

Gulping down his whiskey once again, Tommy stood up from his seat and helped you out of yours.

"Let's head up, and I can show you what I like. You can take your drink with you," mentioned Tommy buttoning up his suit jacket.

Rose gulped down her wine and grabbed her purse. "No need. I'm ready," she said and looped her arm around his. Tommy kept his strides short throughout the walk to the elevator. Rose noticed how the other hotel patrons all seemed to fawn over the man she was with while the employees moved out of his way. Rose found it amusing when in the elevator the people who were already in quickly left, leaving them alone on the ride up to his suit.

"People go out of their way to accommodate you, don't they, Mr. Shelby. Must be nice to have all that power over others," Rose stated admiringly.

Tommy smirked and looked at Rose, "When you come from nothing, you work extra hard to achieve everything, even peoples' fear of you. What about you? Must you find it exhilarating to have powerful men at your fingertips? I would not be shocked that once your clients and I told Tatiana that I have an idea of who they are, well, they are not going to be happy about losing you to me. I have a lot of enemies, Miss Turner, but rest assure that while you are in my company, you will be safe and protected."

The elevator dinged indicated they made it to their destination. Leading the way once again, Tommy steered them down the hall and stopped at the door of his suite. Once he got Rose inside, he took off his suit jacket and opened the doors to the balcony where he could finally get his nicotine fix. He offered one to Rose, but she declined. Tommy watched as Rose looked around the suite. He took this time to look at the woman before him; she would not be deemed the model-type with her 5'7 stature, nor was she skin and bones. Dark brown hair ran past her shoulders, and her skin had a lovely complexion. Tommy took one last drag of his cigarette and stubbed it out on the balcony.

He slowly walked up behind Rose and wrapped his strong arms around, inhaling her scent; he began to grind himself against her backside. Rose promptly reciprocated and matched his rhythm. Trailing kisses down Rose's neck, Tommy moved his hands to squeeze her breasts. He quickly turned her around and began kissing her on the mouth. His dominant side was finally allowed to be released.

When Rose pulled away, it took Tommy by surprise. When he began to pull Rose back towards him, she put her hands on his chest. "I need to freshen up first, is that okay?"

Letting out a sigh, Tommy motioned her towards the bathroom. "I won't be long; I promise," assured Rose. Once in the bathroom, she began to take off her heels and dress. She hung her dress on the door hook, placed her heels to the side, and then looked herself over in the mirror. Smoothing out her hair, Rose dug in her clutch to quickly check her phone. No messages from her son. Now, Rose would be able to focus on the task at hand entirely.

Rose exited the bathroom to see Tommy waiting for her on the couch, no longer wearing his tie and vest, shirt partly unbuttoned. She walked towards him, where he indicated he wanted Rose on her knees. Spreading his legs, Rose kneeled and began unzipping his pants, reaching for his hardened member and gave it a few strokes. She looked up to see Tommy stretch and lay his head back against the couch, indicated he was comfortable and was ready for Rose to begin. Rose licked her lips and opened her mouth to take him in as much as far as possible. Rose did not stop until she felt him at the back of her throat.

Rose pulled away for a second to lick off the precum of Tommy's dick before proceeding to lick the entire length. She went back to sucking once Tommy put his hand in her hair. He bobbed her head back and forth at a fast pace. Tommy felt like he was about to explode his load in Rose's mouth he backed off. Rose took the time to catch her breath. She watched as Tommy took off his shirt and got up from the couch.

"Up," he ordered, and Rose followed obediently.

She never took her eyes off Tommy while he walked to the bedroom.

"Take this off," Tommy ordered, indicating he wanted her bra off.

Once again, Rose followed his orders. She tossed the bra to the side, and Tommy walked closer to her. He reached for her breast and began to squeeze them, tugging on her nipples. When he started to pull her nipples extra hard, Rose let out a little squeak.

"Too hard?" Tommy asked and released his tight grip.

"No. I mean, it hurts, but it feels good too," Rose answered truthfully.

Tommy once again started pulling on her nipples as hard as he could without hurting Rose too much. He pressed his lips against hers. Rose quickly reciprocated the action and ran her hands through his hair. Backing Rose towards the bed, he lightly pushed her, where she softly plopped down. Tugging her underwear down, Tommy tossed them to the side and ran a finger up-and-down her folds.

"Wet, as I expected. Let me see how many fingers you can take, shall we," amused Tommy and slipped, not one, but two fingers inside Rose. He soon began pumping his fingers in and out.

He kept going while Rose emitted more moans from her mouth. She was panting and getting closer to needing release. But she knew a sweet release would not come easy. No, Tommy was going to have Rose work for it. She was about the beg to cum when Tommy pulled his fingers out of her cunt.

Tracing his thumb against her clit, Rose let out a squeal at the new feeling. Tommy smirked. That feeling of control, control over this woman's body, it's what made Tommy feel at ease. It allowed for his head to feel clear. Tommy did not have to worry about business deals or rival gangs; instead, his focus was all on the woman before him writhing in pleasure.

Inserting his fingers back in her cunt, Tommy added a third finger this time. Rose sat up on her elbows to watch Tommy. She saw the looked of deep concentration on his face. When he reached that spot, Rose jerked up, and Tommy used his free hand to push her back down on the bed.

"I'm going to cum. I need to cum," Rose panted out, but Tommy kept going.

"Not yet," he merely said. "You do not cum until I say you can, understood." It was an order, not a question.

"Yes…yes sir," Rose managed to say. She did not know how long she would last.

"Cum!" Tommy commanded and Rose more than happily followed it.

Pure bliss is all Rose felt until Tommy pried her mouth open with the fingers that were in her.

"Lick them clean for me, love. Taste yourself."

When she licked his fingers clean, Tommy took off his pants and underwear. He crawled on top of Rose and began kissing her stomach, each breast, her neck, and finally lips.

"You're not tired out yet, are you love?" he asked her.

When Rose shook her head no, Tommy leaned in to whisper in her ear, "Good. It is going to be a long night for you."

[what-is-your-plan-today]

CSI Rogers And Barnes: The Serious Cereal Serial Killer. Episode 17- At Last Pt. 1

Co-written with @icanfeelastormbrewing​ 

Summary: It’s Tony’s wedding weekend, and the usual fun and antics ensue. Then Steve and Katie take an extra evening in Manhattan, where Steve has a little surprise of his own planned.

Warnings: Bad Language words. SMUT IN PART 2 (NO UNDER 18s and NSFW)

Pairing: Steve Rogers x OFC Katie Stark

A/N:  So this is it. The FINAL CSI: Rogers and Barnes instalment. (Well, bar an Epilogue…) and it’s long so we split into 2. This has been one hell of a ride! It’s been a total playground for us, seeing how many stupid references and ridiculous actions we could fit in, and our first collaboration. We hope you’ve enjoyed it as much as we have. Myself and Storm love each and every one of you who’ve taken the time to read, like, comment and re-bog.

We love you 3000…

CSI R&B Masterlist

  //

Main Masterlist

Chapter Song: At Last- Etta James 

You smile, and then the spell was cast, and here we are in heaven for you are mine. At Last.

Steve stretched out, rolling over and reached out for Katie only for his hand to meet a cold, empty mattress. He opened his eyes, confused for a second at the unfamiliar surroundings before he realised he was in his room at the Plaza…and it’s the morning of Tony’s wedding. His head was a little fuzzy due to the drinks last night which had gone on late and he could remember sitting in Tony’s suite drinking the bottle of scotch Sam had pilfered from the free bar at the rehearsal party. They had an impromptu party once the girls had left for Pepper and Tony’s and he remembered complaining loudly about why Sam and Bucky got to spend the night together when Katie wasn’t allowed to stya with him.

Jesus what had he turned into? A clingy bastard, that’s what.

He reached for his phone, checking the time which was 9 am. He dropped it back on the bedside table and tried to go back to sleep but he couldn’t. Not without her so he gave up. Firing Katie a quick ‘good morning beautiful’ message, he then kicked off the bed covers and shoved on a pair of sweats and a T-shirt. Grabbing his kit he decided to head for the pool to make the most of the facilities.

The place was fairly busy considering the time on a Saturday morning, but there was a lane closed off for the ‘serious’ swimmers with no one in it so he made use of that for half an hour before he made his way into the changing rooms and showered. By the time he was drying off in the locker room, Katie had messaged back wishing him a ‘good morning handsome’ and complaining she had a bad head from a lot of champagne. He smiled, replied that he was sure she’d soon get over it when they start again, and then just as he’d done that another message came through. This one from Tony who had apparently ordered a fuck tonne of room service for a breakfast party.

Deciding that wasn’t such a bad idea he replied saying he was on his way, shoved his phone in his pocket, grabbed his kit bag and headed to the elevator. When he got to Tony’s suite he knocked on the door, the faint well natured chatter from inside hit his ears before the door swung open. Rhodey greeted him and Steve stepped in to see Tony led on a chaise in a hotel robe, eating grapes like a Roman Emperor. Steve snorted.

“Having Fun Tony?”

Tony grinned “Am I ever? I love all this. You know, I might get married once every 2 years.” He looked at Steve “You should try it, Rogers.”

Steve rolled his eyes, remembering full well about the ring that was tucked in the safe in his room.

From his spot over by the low coffee table, Bucky shot Steve a glance. He was certain the punk was gonna pop the question this weekend, why else would he have booked an extra night for them to stay in Manhattan on Sunday as well?  When Steve suggested it to Katie over breakfast a few weeks ago, he’d simply stated it was an opportunity for them to spend a bit of time together in the run up to Christmas, but if said girl didn’t return to Brooklyn on Monday with a ring on her finger then James Buchanan Barnes would chop of his left arm with a chainsaw.

At that point, Rhodey, ever the tactical, organised man asked Tony what the plan was for the day and Tony simply looked at him, and blinked.

“Aren’t you the best man?”

Bucky sighed “What a waste. I could have been a groomsman….ow!” he hissed, rubbing his side as Sam had elbowed him sharply in the ribs.

Rhodey completely ignored Bucky and looked at Tony “I am, yes, but you’re the Groom.” Tony waved him away “Yeah, yeah. We need to be dressed and in the room for 1. Ceremony is at 1:45, girls should arrive at half past and our stylist is arriving at midday. Easy.”

Steve glanced at his watch and Bucky smirked up at him “Hey, Stevie…only 3 hours till you see her punk…” From besides him, Sam snorted.

“You’re whipped man.”

Steve glared at them both, not even bothering to deny that was what he’d been checking and turned to Tony. “Is Greatmaster…Grandmaster, whatever, your wedding planner coming?” “Right, yeah that….asshole shall be showing up at some point.” Tony rolled his eyes “Fortunately I’m getting rid of him for the day.” He shoved another grape in his mouth and looked at Bruce “Remind me never to hire anyone you or the Bungalow recommend ever again.”

They boys settled down to eat, taking their time, enjoying a bit of banter about the stag do and the previous night’s rehearsal until an hour or so later Tony clapped his hands and stood up.

“Ok boys, suit up.”

Steve made his way back to his room and whilst in the elevator he got another message from Katie. This was a selfie of her in a robe with a glass of champagne having her hair put up. He smiled, responded telling her he couldn’t wait to see her, before the elevator door opened and he headed down to his room. Having already showered he knew he wasn’t in a huge rush so took his time trimming his beard, making sure the lines were crisp before he shrugged on his dress shirt, tying a Windsor in his deep, scarlet tie. Then he pulled on his suit pants, matching waistcoat and then jacket before placing his shiny black oxfords on and stood up. With a little product he styled his hair, making sure it was parted and slicked back as usual before taking a final glance in the mirror, smoothing down his jacket. He had to admit, the suits Tony (or most likely Pepper) had chosen for the Groom’s party were sharp. A black wool blend Tom Ford with a subtle red and gold check detail. Deciding he looked half decent he grabbed his wallet, phone, and room key. Satisfied he didn’t need anything else, he made his way back to Tony’s room.

Once more he gave a rap and the door opened inwards to reveal Grandmaster, smiling at him.

“Good afternoon Mr Rogers, you look dapper.” The man grinned, batting his eyelashes.

“Erm, thanks.” Steve replied in the absence of anything else to say.

“You’re late by the way.” Grandmaster continued.

“What?” Steve frowned, checking his watch to find he wasn’t late. He was never late…

“You’re the last one.” Grandmaster stated, as ways of explanation. “Everyone else is here already.”

“That’ doesn’t mean that I’m late.” Steve shook his head.

“No, I suppose it doesn’t,” Grandmaster replied, batting his eyelashes again.

“Whatever, can I come in?” Steve arched an eyebrow at him.

“Oh yeah, sure. Sorry. I got lost in your eyes for a minute there.”

Steve looked at the man, utterly lost for words. The guy was as nutty as a fruitcake. Steve stepped into the room, turning sideways as Grandmaster did the same smiling at him. He hastily moved into the living area of the suite where Rhodey was doing up Tony’s gold dress tie.

Grandmaster headed over to Bruce, brushing something off the man’s shoulder, smiling “You’ve always been my champion.”

Steve raised his eyebrows before he leaned over to whisper to Sam “How does Bruce know him again?”

“Some Ultimate Fighting online fan group.” Sam said “Bruce and Thor are very into it, apparently, along with one of Thor’s other good friends, Korg.”

“Korg?” Steve looked at Sam.

“Yeah, Thor knew him from his Uni days.” Sam said “They used to be quite political apparently. Tried to organise a protest against fascism but they didn’t print enough pamphlets so hardly anyone turned up.” Steve shook his head, the fact that didn’t surprise him in the slightest was ridiculous, but when it came to this lot, nothing did really, not anymore. It wasn’t long before Tony was ready, and the boys all stood round with one more scotch each before they were ushered, by a now very militant Grandmaster, down to the chapel where the wedding was going to take place in. Once there, Grandmaster headed off to check the function suite was ready for the ‘Post Wedding Meal’.  At his muttering of those words, Steve and Tony shared a little grin at the memory of a few weeks ago in Tony’s kitchen.

The Photographer arrived and set about arranging the boys for a few shots. Bucky tried to sneak into most of them, Tony at one point telling him to fuck off from his grooms party shots, which was the WORST thing he could possibly have done, as Bucky then made it his mission to infiltrate as many of them as he could by stealth. Steve had to admit, he couldn’t wait to see the final shots of Bucky popping up all over the place like some kind of nameless assassin.

As they were all having a shot taken just at the doors of the room, Grandmaster bustled back in. “OH. EMM. GEE.” He said, pronouncing each letter, drawing out the vowel sounds. “My crew sent me photos of the girls…you’re all going to DIE when you see them.” He grinned, slapping Steve’s back.

Ducking away from him, Steve checked his watch. 12:15…not long now. But before he could think about it, the first guests started to arrive having been shown the way by the concierge, and it was all to attention and the groomsman duties began.

Approximately 10 or so minutes later, he was just heading back to the door of the chapel having shown the assistant from the lab to her seat when he stopped dead as he saw Katie just outside in the foyer area, locked in an embrace with Tony. He was sure his heart stopped for a beat, fuck, she looked stunning. Her dress was the same colour as his tie, a deep red with a halter neck and a v neckline. It cinched in at the waist, with a fairly loose fitting skirt that had a slit up the side and it accentuated her figure perfectly. Her hair was pulled back into an elegant knot of curls at the back of her head, exposing her delicate neck and shoulders, and the star necklace he bought her twinkled as it sat just below the hollow of her throat. For some reason his mind strayed back to the time he had met her. He’d been invited to Howard’s for dinner a few months after arriving at the 101st and she’d answered the door, dressed in a pair of cut-off jeans, an oversized grey sweater which hung off one shoulder complete with a messy bun on top of her head and the prettiest eyes he had ever seen, eyes which were now popping from underneath a lid of smoky brown and gold eyeshadow. She’d flashed him a smile that day, invited him in, and if he was honest from that moment he’d been a fucking gonner for her. Why he had waited the best part of ten fucking years to even kiss her he would never understand. As he watched her eyes turned to his and she beamed at him. He gave her a smile back as she released Tony and made her way towards him, her leg slipping through the long slit in her dress as she walked giving him a flash of the peep-toe gold heels she was wearing, leaving him actively fighting the image of said heels being hooked around his ears…. Jesus Christ….

“Miss me Captain?” She grinned, her teeth bright white against the deep, blood red lip stain she was wearing.

“Always Doll.” He smiled as she stopped in front of him, blinking as she looked up at him.

“Good, because I missed you too.”

“You look amazing, honey.” Steve complimented her and she beamed up at him, scanning his suit.

“Thanks, you look pretty good yourself.” She said, her palms sliding up the lapels of his jacket.

Steve’s hand slipped round her back as he pressed a soft kiss to her cheek, not wanting to smudge her lipstick. When his palm met bare skin he couldn’t help the groan that left his mouth as he realised her dress was backless. Katie looked at him having heard his involuntary noise, arching a perfectly plucked brow and smirked.

“Yes, no bra Stevie.”

“You’re killing me sweetheart.” Steve whined out but before she could reply, Steve was rather harshly slapped on the back.

“Put her down, Punk you’re needed.”  Bucky smirked as he turned to Katie, doing an over exaggerated double take as he looked her up and down “Huh, ok, so you look decent…” “Fuck you Barnes.” She shot back “And tell them they can wait a little, I haven’t seen my man since last night.” “Oh believe me I know. He’s been a whiney little bitch all morning…”

At that point a familiar voice cut him off. “James Buchanan Barnes, wash your mouth out, this is a wedding!”

Bucky grimaced as huge grins spread across both Katie and Steve’s faces. “Sorry Momma R” “Yes, I should think so.” Sarah looked at him sternly.

“Okay, I’m gonna…go…ummm…” Bucky hastily made his retreat, Sarah watching him with narrowed eyes before she turned to Katie, beaming as she gave her a hug.

“Star you look stunning.”

“Thanks Sarah and so do you, I love your dress.” Katie smiled, looking down at Sarah’s light gold knee length gown and Steve had to admit, it had been a while since he’d seen his ma done up. She was quite striking actually. “I love the neckline, and your hair.”

“Yes, thank you for that.” She gave Katie a look and she blushed a little, waving her away.

“Thank you for what?” Steve asked and Sarah looked at him, smiling.

“I had a little surprise this morning. Star arranged for someone to come and do my hair for me.”

Steve looked at Katie, a soft smile crossing his face. “You did?”

Katie shrugged ��It’s no big deal.” “Well it was to me, so thank you.” Sarah smiled, before she turned to Steve. “My boy…don’t you look handsome?”

Steve blushed a little “Ma…” he sighed and Sarah chuckled

“Are you going to show me to my seat?” she asked and Steve smiled. He offered his mom his arm, shot Katie another smile and then walked into the room. As they reached the row she was to be seated on he stopped and reached up to brush his cheek. “You look just like your father.”

Steve didn’t miss the emotion in his mom’s eyes and he swallowed a little as she took her seat one down from the end of the row. “Have you…?”

“God, Ma. No, not yet. And I won’t be today either, its Tony’s wedding…”

Sarah opened her mouth to speak, most likely to pressure Steve to hurry up again but she was cut off by a voice from behind them.

“I believe my seat is just there…”

Steve frowned, he recognised that voice. He turned to see none other than Stan Lee smiling at him.

“Mr Lee?” he asked as the elderly man beamed at him “I didn’t know you were invited.” He extended his hand to shake Stan’s. “Good to see you again.”

“You too Captain. May I?”

Steve gave a nod and moved so Stan could drop into the seat on the end of the row, next to his mom.

“Good afternoon Ma’am, looks like I’m on the young’uns row.” Stan beamed at Sarah who burst out laughing. Steve shook his head with a snort and left them to it, making his way back out of the room to find the rest of his team had now arrived, Thor currently giving Katie a huge hug. He greeted Natasha who touched his arm gently before making a bee line for Bruce. He watched her go, smirking to himself, before he turned and raised an eyebrow at Clint. Clint merely shrugged and then introduced the Captain to his girlfriend, Laura. Thor then turned to him, shaking hands with Steve and moved slightly to reveal Gina was stood now talking to Katie.

“Greetings Captain, I bought a date.” Thor grinned.

“I see.” Steve said, raising his eyebrows, not bothering to correct Thor on what he had just said making it sound like he’d purchased Gina in some way...

“Yeah…” Gina turned to Steve. “The way he says it he sounds like he’s bought a bottle of wine.”

Thor shook his head “No, I don’t drink wine.”

At that Katie burst out laughing and turned away, shaking her head slightly.

“It’s a good thing he’s dreamy” Gina said, jerking her thumb at Thor.

Steve’s attention then was then distracted by a loud voice “Miss Stark, you look stunning…” He turned to see flash fucking fire dude, Johnny Storm approaching her and he gave a little groan, rolling his eyes.

“Captain…” Thor asked and Steve turned back to him “Where do we err sit?” Steve floundered for a moment, he really didn’t want to leave the fire bastard alone with his girl so he turned to Bucky who was watching him, a huge grin on his face.

“Buck can you…”

Bucky raised both palms, shaking his head, smirking smugly “Hey, I’m not part of the groomsman party…”

“Fuck you jerk.” Steve shot back and Bucky raised his eyebrows.

“Ok, first off, watch your language. This is a chapel, a place of worship and two…” at this point he dropped his voice and gave Steve a stern look. “Stop with the jealousy, she’s with you. No competition.”

“What is he even doing here?” Steve frowned, completely ignoring what Bucky had said, and the sergeant took a deep sigh. He was just about to inform Steve that he had no idea when a voice sounded from behind them.

“Johnny, there you are!”

Bucky and Steve turned to see a tall, dark haired man and a blonde woman approaching them. The blonde rolled her eyes “Of course he would be here, Hi Katie.”

Katie smiled “Hi Susan.”

“Well this is cute and all but…” Gina spoke again, “like seriously, Captain. Where do we sit?”

Steve groaned and took another glance at Johnny who was bouncing on the balls of his feet, grinning as Katie chatted to the 3 people in front of her. Knowing he couldn’t not show the team to their seats, he rolled his eyes and moved gently to loop his arm round Katie’s waist, dropping a kiss to her cheek.  A flicker of a smile crossed her pretty face and she turned to look at him, leaving him with absolutely no question she knew he was ‘marking his territory’ so to speak, before he grudgingly turned away to show the team to their seats.

“Smooth.” Bucky observed.

“Shut up.” Steve snapped back as he led his team down to a row half way down the room. This time, when he once more emerged from the room he was greeted by a whirl of gold and blue and he let out a low groan. Grandmaster.

Tony’s eccentric wedding planner started to clap his hands at Steve “The bride is here…get everyone seated, we’re behind schedule…”

Tony, who had been stood talking to someone grumbled to Steve “I wish he was behind schedule, preferably by a week so he wasn’t here.”

Steve gave a snort as Grandmaster turned to Katie and Pepper’s sister “Miss Stark, Miss Potts, the Bride may need your help…” At that he then looked at Steve, didn’t I tell you she looked stunning?” “You said gorgeous.” Bucky replied lazily.

“No.” Grandmaster frowned “Why would I use that word?”

Before Bucky could reply to the very strangely dressed man in front of him, Rhodey then appeared, smiling. “All set.” He smiled, clapping Tony on the shoulder “You ready?” Tony shook his head “Nope.”

Katie smiled, “You’ll be fine.” Steve watched as she stepped forward to give her brother a hug before she pulled back, her hands on his arms. “Mom and Dad would be so proud.”

Tony swallowed before he nodded “Ok, kiddo…don’t make me cry. Go help Pepper, tell her she’s already late.”

Katie rolled her eyes as Tony and Rhodey headed into the room, being ushered along by Grandmaster. She glanced at Steve and smiled. “See you in a minute.”

Steve smiled back, reaching out to pull her to him, dropping a kiss to her lips. “Don’t make it too long Doll.” She grinned and turned, giving him a full on view of the back of her dress, leaving his mouth a little dry and he made his way to his place on the front row, slightly down from where Tony and Rhodey were stood at the front of the aisle. On the way he shot his mom a smile as she beamed proudly at him, Bucky nodding as he sat next to her on the opposite side to Stan Lee. For some reason Steve was nervous. Why, he had no idea. He’d already seen his girl and she’d taken his breath away once already, but here he was, a ball of tense energy.  He could hear Tony and Rhodey talking, but he wasn’t focussing, that was until Tony’s voice grew loud and indignant

“That man is playing Galaga” Tony pointed to a man on the second row who was engrossed in his phone. “He thought I wouldn’t notice, but I did.”

“Man, shut up and relax…” Rhodey soothed him.

“I need a drink, something strong…is it bad I can’t feel my left arm.” Tony looked at Rhodey who was about to respond when the music started and everyone stood up. Steve turned his attention to the door which opened inwards and Katie and Pepper’s sister stepped into the room, walking down the aisle.

Bucky watched Steve as he took a deep breath, his eyes on his girl as she glided towards them, a stupid, dopey, gooey-eyed smile crossing the Captains face. “Gross” he mumbled, giving a soft yelp as Sarah slapped him round the back of the head. Fury, who was on the seat to Bucky’s left gave a little snigger. Bucky looked at him and frowned. “What are you doing here? That’s not even your seat, I’ve seen the seating plan.”

“I’m sure you have Barnes.” Fury replied lazily “But given that it’s a stupid ass plan designed by an even more stupid ass planner I’ve elected to ignore it.”

As Katie reached the front row, Bucky saw her shoot Steve a huge smile, which his punk best friend returned, and then there were gasps in the room. Bucky turned and saw Pepper in a gorgeous, yet so simple silk, straight A-line dress, which was embellished round the waist in red and gold embroidery. He glanced at Tony, and was amused to see that the normally composed scientist was literally floundering for air. Bucky then caught Sam’s eye who flashed him a wink which he returned, and Sarah nudged him.

“See, that’s what being in love does to you James.”

Bucky smiled at her as she squeezed his hand gently. Throughout the Ceremony Bucky saw Steve kept on looking at Katie who was on the same row but the opposite side of the aisle. She was watching Tony, her eyes glassy. At one point, Pepper’s sister took her hand and she turned to her, giving her a smile, before they both looked back, Katie turning to Steve. She shot him a huge grin which he returned, and Bucky smiled to himself. It might be gross, but it was cute. He liked seeing Steve happy.

When the ceremony was over, Tony was told he could kiss his bride.

“Well, I’m not one to back down from an honest challenge…” he muttered, stepping forward and sweeping her up in a huge kiss to loud cheers in the room. As music began to play again, the new Mr and Mrs Stark swept down the aisle followed by Rhodey and Pepper’s sister. Steve walked on behind smiling as he reached the end of his row.

“May I Miss Stark?” he offered Katie his arm and she grinned, linking hers into the crook of his elbow and he lay his hand over hers. As they walked towards the doors, he caught his mom’s eye as she dabbed her tears away with a tissue. She beamed at him, and he smiled back, before he turned to look at Katie, dropping a soft kiss to her temple.  

**** The meals were eaten, the toasts were done, and tears were shed through the afternoon. But once the reception was done, the drinks kept on flowing right through to the evening party. Steve was relaxed, feeling the buzz from a fair amount of wine, beer and shorts which had been consumed through the day. There was a loud tapping noise on the speakers and Steve glanced up from where he was sat at a table near the dance floor, Katie perched on his lap, as Tony and Pepper were welcomed to the floor for their first dance. The opening bars to Etta James ‘At Last’ last rang out around the room and Katie gave a snort.

“You can say that again.” She chuckled and Steve grinned, his arm curling round her as she watched her brother, her eyes glassy with tears. “You know…” she leaned down to Steve, this should really be our song.”

“Doll, just don’t…”

She shrugged and he gave a little huff of a laugh as she turned back to watch Tony slowly revolving Pepper around the floor, the camera flashing from the photographer. After the first verse the MC invited people to join them, as tradition and Katie looked at Steve. He nodded and she stood up, taking his hand and leading him to the dance floor.

Bucky watched them go, picking up his drink, smiling.

“Look, now there are two Stark ladies!” Thor grinned as the team watched Steve take Katie in a close hold, gracefully revolving them on the spot, the pair of them sharing a laugh at something.

“Not for much longer.” Bucky grinned.

“What do you mean?” Thor frowned,

Besides Bucky Clint gave a snort as the sergeant looked at Thor blinking “You know, I don’t get it. Like, you’re super clever sometimes and others…”

Thor shrugged and then Bucky turned his attention over the table to see Scott Lang, their assistant looking at Natasha.

“Are you gonna eat that peanut butter macaroon or…” Scott began, but Natasha wasn’t listening, she was too busy caressing Bruce’s palm as it lay on the table in front of her so Scott reached out and grabbed it, shoving it in his mouth. On the dancefloor, Steve effortlessly moved Katie around the floor to the song as it played. She tucked her head under his chin and he breathed her in, his hand splaying on her bare back, simply relishing the fact she was so close. He didn’t speak a word, simply allowed the music and being with her to sweep him away, and he was rather unceremoniously jolted back to reality when loud applause sounded as the song finished. The MC congratulated Tony and Pepper once more, Katie turned to give her brother a huge hug, before the man on the mic wished everyone a Merry Christmas and the sounds of Wham, ‘Last Christmas’ rang out, cheers hitting Steve’s ears as suddenly the dance floor filled up.

Almost immediately, Bucky was in front of him, throwing what looked like torn up place cards into the air, holding his arms out “Merry Christmas and Happy 2021!”

Sam, who was besides Bucky looked at him “Its 2020 next year, idiot.”

Steve dusted the paper off his shoulders, picking pieces out of Katie’s hair as she looked at Bucky, frowning. Bucky turned to Sam and shrugged “Yeah I know but I don’t like 2020. Sounds like a shit year to me…although…” he spun to Steve grinning and Steve took a deep breath and shot him a glare, which he totally ignored “It could be a good one eh Stevie?”

“What is he talking about?” Katie looked at Steve.

“God knows, he’s drunk.” Steve shrugged as Bucky made a clicking noise as he winked, pointing at both of them. Thankfully, Sam dragged him away, Katie and Steve both watched them go before Katie turned back around. Smiling, Steve took her back in a hold that was a little lighter this time as the music was more upbeat and they began to dance together once more.

“Hmmm. Last Christmas…” Katie pondered and Steve let out a groan.

“Can we…” he took a deep breath, dropping his head “Can we just not? Please Doll. I’m not very proud of myself when I think about it.” Katie chuckled and her hands came to rest on his shoulders as he moved them in a little livelier dance. “Ok, sorry. But, it worked out in the end.”

“It did. But I caused you a lot of pain along the way.” He sighed, “Too much.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t hang around and give you chance to explain or try and work it out.” Katie looked up at him. “I just ran away.

“I didn’t exactly try and stop you did I?” Steve looked at her.

“No, you didn’t Captain Righteous.” Katie conceded and Steve chuckled as she shook her head “God I was so mad at you.”

“I was mad at myself Sweetheart.” “But if I’m honest, I was more upset that we’d blown our chance.” Steve took a deep breath. “I really thought we had. Well, that I had…”

“Stevie?”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t you ever leave me again, please.” She said, almost whispered. Steve frowned and looked at her, her face was loaded with emotion and beneath those sparkling green emerald eyes he could see a flicker of fear.

“Hey…” he reached for her hand and raised it to his mouth, pressing a kiss to her wrist “Where’s this coming from baby girl?”

Katie sniffed, “Honestly? I don’t know. It’s just, everything is so perfect. It sometimes feels a little too good to be true. And I’m scared that one day I’m gonna wake up and I’ll still be in DC…or that you might have another car crash…or a case getting nasty and you…”

She was losing herself in her head again, something he’d seen her do countless times so he quickly cut her off. “Look at me.” He cupped her face in both his hands “I’m not going anywhere Doll.”

“Promise?”

Steve opened his mouth to reply, but he knew full well that words wouldn’t do this moment justice. Instead he dipped his face to hers, catching her mouth in a deep kiss, not caring who the fuck was watching. He poured every single piece of emotion he was feeling into that kiss, desperate for her to understand that he had no intention of leaving her ever again and she must have gotten the message as he felt her relax into his hold, kissing him back, her hands softly gripping at the material of his jacket.

“Erm, stop eating his face Kiddo, this is my wedding.” Tony interrupted “It’s supposed to be about me….and Pepper” he added.

Steve could feel his cheeks growing warm as Katie pulled away from him with a groan and a roll of her eyes as she turned to face Tony.

“How about you go eat your wife’s face and leave us the fuck alone Tones?”

“Rude much?” He snorted “I raised you better than that.”

“You didn’t raise me at all, Tony!” Katie scoffed.

“Ok, it was a figure of…” he trailed off, frowning at something over her shoulder. “What the hell is Thor doing?”

Steve and Katie turned to see Thor was stood his nose almost touching one of the branches of the lit up Christmas Trees round the edge of the room.

“Oh, he was rambling on over dinner about Norwegian Spruce trees.” Katie shrugged, “Maybe he’s trying to figure out if that is one or not.”

“He was rambling about what?” Tony looked at her.

“It’s a type of tree which…” Steve began but Tony cut him off.

“You know what, on second thoughts I’m not really interested.” Steve sighed and looked at Katie who rolled her eyes as Tony continued “By the way, how do you like the décor?”

Steve watched Katie look around and knew what she’s was going to say, because she loved this time of year, turning into one huge, great child over the entire period of December. And true to form, when she opened her mouth to reply, she was grinning ear to ear.

“I gotta say, he might be a pain in the ass but Grandmaster got this right. I love it.” She smiled.

“Yeah, me too.” Tony agreed. “It’s like Christmas but with more me.” Steve let out a snort and Tony clapped his shoulder “Remind me to give you his card.” And with that he left, Steve shooting daggers at him. Thankfully, Katie was too engrossed in what Thor was doing to hear Tony offering Steve the services of a wedding planner. He saw her frown and his attention then flicked to the tall blonde, frowning.

“What is he offering my Ma?”

“Condoms.” A voice shot back, and Steve wheeled round to glare at Bucky who had appeared out of nowhere.

“For fucks sake Buck!” he growled as Katie spluttered out a laugh.  

“Just kidding.” Bucky grinned, “They’re sweets. He handed them out before, you two were too busy dancing.”

“Sweets?” Katie arched an eyebrow.

“Yeah, he said he got em off a suspect…no, not a suspect, a suspects brief, yeah…”

“Bucky, are you ok?” Katie asked him and Steve looked at her, then to Bucky who did look a little, what was the word, spaced?

“Yeah, I feel…great!” He replied with a giggle.

Katie looked at him again before she let out a small “oh.” And groaned a little “Oh God.”

“What is it?” Steve asked, but she ignored him and continued talking to Bucky.

“How many of those sweets Thor has did you eat?”

“3 maybe 4…I dunno…” Bucky giggled, “I want more though.”

At that point, the man in questioned arrived. “Greetings!” Thor beamed at Katie and Steve, holding out a little foil packet “Sweet?”

“Thor, the guy who gave you those, was he wearing suspenders?” Katie asked and Steve frowned.

“Yes, I believe he was, along with a very bright lime green shirt. Nice chap.” Thor mused “He used many Post Its”

At that Steve looked at Katie, giving a little groan as he suddenly understood “Weiss?”

Katie nodded “They were a favourite little party treat of his.”

Steve snatched the bag from Thor and sniffed inside, pulling back immediately, the smell of cannabis sticking in his nostrils. “Jesus how can you not smell that?”

“Wait…” Bucky said, taking a sniff and looking at Steve “These have weed in them? The things I ate?”

Katie took a sniff and wrinkled her nose “Yup, and they’re stronger than I remember.”

“Than you remember? You used to do this?” Steve looked at her and she shrugged.

“Hey, I was younger and dumber…”

“Wait, so I’m high right now?” Bucky pressed and Katie grinned.

“Yep, they’ll wear off in a while. For the time being you’ll just feel very drunk and kinda floppy.”

“Floppy?” Steve frowned and Katie nodded.

“Yeah, like nothing matters, everything is cool. They used to make me a little frisky actually, we once took them before we…” she paled and Steve looked at her, swallowing before he turned to Thor.

“Thor, you didn’t give one of these to my ma did you?” Steve asked.

“Of course, not, no.” Thor shook his head.

“Oh thank fuck” Steve breathed out.

“I gave her two.” Thor concluded. At that Bucky’s giggles suddenly turned into loud laughter as he bent over, clutching at Thor’s arm.

“For fucks sake Thor, you drugged my mom!” Steve exploded as Bucky’s laughter grew louder.

“Sarah’s gonna be hiiiiigh.”

“Where is she?” Steve demanded, ignoring Bucky.

They scanned the room, searching for her only to see her at the other side of the dancefloor with flash fire dude, who was twirling her round to the music.

“Flame on!” She whooped, her hands up in the air as Johnny grinned.

“It’s catchy right?”

With a groan Steve strode over towards them. “Ma? What are you doing? You Ok?”

Sarah grinned at him, her eyes slightly glazed “Hey Son I’m good…just dancing with this young man.” She said, looking at Johnny then back to Steve “He says he’s called the human torch but us girls can call him torch”

Steve glared at Storm as Katie reached his side “The human torch?” he deadpanned “Seriously?”

“Hey,I didn’t coin it, it was the press that did that when we put out that warehouse fire. So called because my uniform caught fire on the way out…thanks to my sister though, I escaped with nothing more than a slight smoulder.” Steve felt Katie shaking besides him and could tell she was holding back laughter. Storm flashed her a wink and Steve grit his teeth before he felt his mom slap his shoulder.

“Don’t you be giving him that look Steven Grant! This brave man is a firefighter…” at that she turned back to Johnny, sniggering. “Now, where is your hose young man?”

“Jesus Christ…” Steve groaned, looking away in disgust.

Johnny opened his mouth to speak but Katie cut him off “Err no. Don’t.”

He shrugged and then looked at Sarah who was laughing so hard she was almost bent double.

“Ok, that’s enough Ma.” Steve decided to do what he did best, take control of the situation. “ I think you need to sit down.”

“Awww, don’t be such a buzz kill Steven.”

“It ain’t the buzz I want to kill…” Steve said, his eyes locking onto Johnny’s as he gave him another filthy glare.

After a little more cajoling they manage to get Sarah to agree to sit down. Steve helped her to her seat whilst she was rambling on about not wanting to be sat with Mr Lee again because he spent all dinner complaining about the booze not being strong enough. As they reached her table Sarah suddenly stopped.

“Actually…I think I need…yeah I need to go to my room.” She looked at Steve and Katie gave a snort.

“Hey, Steve, your ma’s crashing.”

Steve shot her a look. “This is not funny.”

Before she could respond Sam appeared and looked between the two of them, then to Sarah as he raised an eyebrow, an amused smile playing on his handsome face.

“Everything OK?” he asked.

“Yeah, she had one of Thor’s magic sweets.” Katie grinned “You wanna watch Buck, he’s had 4.”

Sam snorted, “Yeah I noticed.”

“I’m hungry.” Sarah suddenly said and Steve let out a sigh.

“Sam, can you help me get her to her room. Doll, you keep an eye on Bucky.” “I want a cheeseburger.” Sarah pointed at Steve and he looked at her.

“Ma, you’ve never eaten a cheeseburger in your life.”

“Shows much you know. A McDonalds on a Friday is my secret treat…although now I told you it’s not a secret.” She raised her finger to her lips “Sshhhh you can’t tell anyone.”

Steve rolled his eyes and started leading his ma to the door, Sam following.

“Bye Sarah!” Johnny called. “Pleasure meeting you!”

“Bye hottie!” she giggled, waving her hand at him as Sam laughed. She turned to Steve, spluttering out a laugh. ”Ha, hottie, see what I did there?”

“Yes.” Steve shook his head as he led her from the room. “Very good, Ma.”

Between Steve and Sam it was fairly easy to get Sarah to her room. Once he’d made sure she was ok and had some water he closed the door and they made their way back to the main room, Steve throwing the sweets in the trash as they passed a can on the way.

“Fucking Weiss.” He grumbled to himself as Sam gave a little chuckle.

When they arrived back in the room, it was clear a fair few of his team had managed to have one of those damned sweets before he’d confiscated them. Gina, Nat and Clint were dancing, all 3 of them with odd looks and dopey grins on their faces. Katie was on the floor with Pepper and Bucky, Bucky swaying on the spot. As Steve watched Sam headed over and winked at Katie, steering Bucky away. Steve felt someone besides him and he turned to see Bruce.

“How’s the team look to you Bruce?” he asked, a smile on his face as Bruce snorted.

“Right now we’re not a team, we’re a time bomb.”

Steve had to concede he was right, as at that moment Clint started miming as if he was shooting a bow, whereas Nat looked like she was throwing knives. Gina on the other hand was stood doing the robot.

“I need a drink.” Steve concluded.

“Good idea.” Bruce agreed.

They head to the bar where Tony was leaning against it, his tie long discarded, lecturing Peter Parker. Steve, taking lead from Tony, loosened his tie and popped the top button on his shirt before he ordered himself and Bruce a bourbon each, offering one to Tony who nodded, and then Peter who asked politely for a beer instead. The 4 men engaged in conversation, and a fair few drinks as Steve was happy to remain where he was, out of the way, every so often glancing around. It was about an hour later when he saw Clint and Natasha slowly walking towards a table, dropping down into a seat, Gina following. Bucky walked over to the bar with Sam shaking his head.

“Feeling ok Pal?” Steve grinned and Bucky blinked, rubbing his eyes.

“What the fuck just happened? It was like someone took over my brain…” he looked at them.

“I think the magic wore off.” Bruce mumbled as Steve gave a snort. “

“God, I really need food.” Buck looked around.

Steve laughed and clapped Bucky on the shoulder, ordering another round of drinks.

CONTINUED IN PART 2....

[darealpatyu]

The Kingmaker Review: A Story of How One Family Screws the Philippines

Without a doubt, The Kingmaker is one of the best documentary films that I’ve seen in a while. I don’t know if that’s because it’s about a social issue that continues to haunt the Filipino people, or because the Marcoses are such a rare display of narcissism and greed that you can’t help but be astounded by the sheer incredulity of it all. The Marcoses are like the Filipino Kardashians, and it was both a treat and a pain to watch the whole circus of their lives unfold.

Could a Filipino filmmaker have made a documentary like this?

I would say that a Filipino couldn’t have created a documentary with this level of bluntness and sarcasm. Filipinos are more than capable of being sarcastic and artistic at the same time, but as a citizen living in this country, you can’t release a film as critical of current politicians as The Kingmaker was and not suffer consequences. You’d probably wake up dead if you did. Also, I think that the Marcoses wouldn’t have allowed a Filipino team to interview them and ask them about their regime because they already know that they have a band of haters in the country, and only haters want to find out more about that period in life. The Marcoses don’t openly acknowledge the haters, so I highly doubt they would’ve agreed to a personal interview like that. A foreigner conducting the interview, on the other hand, is a different story. The Marcoses love attention. If there’s anything they love more than money, it’s international acclaim. Interestingly enough, studies show that a telling sign of psychopathic tendency is their propensity to crave attention. I’m not directly saying that the Marcoses are psychopaths, but I’m sure you can piece two and two together. Anyways, Lauren Greenfield is an internationally recognized filmmaker, so you can imagine Imelda’s excitement when she found that she was to be her next subject. In the film, one of Imelda’s first lines is literally, “I miss the clout of being the first lady.” She misses the clout, everyone! Who even says that? Getting back to the point, I’m certain that the Marcoses and other prominent people agreed to be interviewed because they thought that they would be having a beautiful historical film about them – which is exactly what they got, in all fairness. Not only was this interview done for the clout, but it was probably also done because they knew that this documentary wouldn’t harm them in any way. They’ve already successfully revised history in the Philippines – they have a steadfast Marcos loyalist base that is only getting bigger. They literally have nothing to lose by taking part in this documentary. Think like Imelda – “I lose nothing, AND become relevant in the international sphere once again; I’ve gotta do it!!”

How were Imelda Marcos’ answers as the film progressed?

As the film progressed, Imelda was trying to portray herself as the victim of everything that had happened. She was trying to turn the experiences of all those innocent people who had suffered into her experience of suffering. I really lost my cool when she talked about how she was the mother of the Philippines and how she had been wrongly stripped away from her child. She would constantly try to victimize herself, probably because she realized that the interviewer’s questions were meant to attack her character, and not to give her the positive clout that she was expecting. When Imelda’s words of care for the country is contrasted with the reality of what happened in Calauit Island, it’s clear that she’s delusional. The historical information presented in the film was meant to be an antithesis to every word that came out of Imelda’s mouth because that’s the best way to expose a liar. You hear her saying she brought the beauty of exotic animals to the Filipino people, and then you see that she displaced over 200 families. You hear her feeling sad about the impoverished state of the country, and then you see her boasting extremely expensive paintings and giving out thousand-peso bills from plundered wealth. You hear her pride about the peace that Martial Law brought, and then you see the blatant disregard for human rights that occurred as accounted for by the Martial Law victims themselves. This presentation of historical truths, presented side-by-side with the proud lies of Imelda, was flawlessly executed. I could clearly deduce how far from the truth Imelda’s words were, and I’m certain that everyone who watched it experienced the same.

Thoughts on Sandro Marcos?

Talking about Sandro Marcos and his future role in Philippine politics, I do think that he has intentions to have a career in politics. I saw this 2017 article writing that Sandro had earned a Master’s degree in Development Studies from the London School of Economics. Given that his family has a solid reputation for lying about their academic credentials, I don’t think it would come as a surprise if he were lying too. Because the Marcoses heavily publicize Sandro’s achievements, I really think that they’re planning to make him continue the Marcos legacy of screwing our country as well. In the film, there was this part where in front of a crowd, Bongbong was telling Sandro that he’s ready to become a politician already – even though Sandro was only 21 years old at the time. This kind of mental conditioning – that you’re entitled to a successful political career even though you’ve achieved absolutely nothing and don’t have the passion for service – is the kind of conditioning that creates dictators at worst, and at best, corrupt political dynasties. When you have parents that constantly push you into thinking that your destiny is to dominate Philippine politics, you end up thinking that you’re entitled to it – willing to do anything to get what you want to make your parents and yourself proud. As a young adult, your entire self-worth becomes grounded on whether you become a successful politician or not. I assume Sandro’s conditioning to become a politician is the type of parenting that Bongbong was raised with, and look at how great he turned out, right?

My Three Takeaways on Leadership and Diplomatic Relations

The three takeaways about leadership and diplomatic relations that I got from the film are: 1) you need to be open to honest feedback to be a good leader, 2) just because you personally think a certain plan of action is going to be good for the group doesn’t mean that it’s good for the group, and 3) be critical of yourself and listen to your own words before and after speaking. My first learning was inspired by Imelda Marcos and her inability to acknowledge her haters. She seems like the kind of woman who listens to no one but herself. She hasn’t had any character development after all these years, and in the film, when she showed the picture frame of her acquittal from thousands of crimes, she had the audacity to say “the truth always wins” or something to that effect. She’s not open to feedback at all. My second learning was inspired by when Imelda brought all those animals to Calauit Island. She thought it would bring beauty to the Philippines when it actually had the opposite effect. My third takeaway is inspired by the fact that Imelda thinks she solved the Cold War. Leaders really need to listen to their own words and analyze their statements to understand if what they’re saying is factual and makes sense. If I were to compound all my takeaways into one unified idea, my one great learning would be: A great leader does not do anything that a Marcos would do.

What historical facts did I uncover through the film?

During the film, there were a lot of significant historical facts that I didn’t know about; these facts should really be taught in school. The historical facts that I was not aware of were: 1) exotic animals were brought to Calauit Island, 2) Ferdinand Marcos had affairs with other women, and 3) the reason why Imelda was the chosen diplomat was that the Marcoses were anticipating a coup d’etat. Also, I don’t know if this historical fact is verified but it shocked me when Imelda said that she checked into a psychiatric hospital before her husband became president. Is that true? I’m sure you can understand why I’m a bit wary of Imelda’s stories.

The Big Conclusion

To conclude this lengthy blog entry, I think that the greatest lesson to be learned from this film is that leaders are here to serve us, and not the other way around. They are not gods – they are fallible and must be held accountable for their mistakes. If we fear our leaders, follow them blindly, and make excuses for their incompetence, we encourage a culture of fascism, fanaticism, and corruption. Sadly, a parallel reality of the Marcos regime is happening today. If a dictator will not take advantage of the current political climate now, one will eventually find a way soon. That’s why this film should be making waves and reaching the masses. If only more of us knew about what is happening in the political landscape, we’d take the problematic status quo seriously. This documentary deserves to be acknowledged as educational material for the sole reason that history is being rewritten as we speak, and it is the duty of those who know the truth to let everybody know as well. There are so many material facts that remain unknown and hidden from the public, and it’s ridiculous that people don’t know about them. People need to know because we might just make the same mistake again, and that’s sad.

In conclusion, MARCOS IS NOT A HERO. THE FACT THAT THERE’S A MARCOS LOYALIST BASE IMPARTS A SENSE OF URGENCY TO THOSE WHO KNOW THE TRUTH. HISTORY MIGHT REPEAT ITSELF.

We really don’t want to see what happens if it does. #NeverAgain

[tsthrace]

What does a girl do when she realizes she needs to cut an entire chapter from her WIP because it doesn’t fit? She posts it to tumblr. 

So yeah, this starts to build a scary world that might look a little too close to our world. It might introduce you to this badass trauma surgeon, Dr. Griffin, who needs to make a quick escape. And then it might leave you hanging. Forever. 

Well, not exactly forever. This is now Clarke’s backstory for my WIP. She’ll resurface years later on a church-turned-farmstead. Guess who’s the priest of this church? So yeah...

Content warning: mention of rape (but no rape itself) and just general hits-too-close-to-home: you know—fascism, totalitarianism, misogyny, toxic masculinity. Oh, and Clarke swears a lot.

It’s angsty. That’s what I do.

3,260 words. No tagging for Clexa, because Lexa doesn’t come on the scene yet.

It’s also posted over on ao3 if you’d rather read it there.

---

We all thought it couldn’t happen here, even as it was happening here.

Clarke had been running for so long that she wasn’t sure if she was still being chased. She had spent the last six years wandering through parts of Washington she never knew existed. First to an abandoned sawmill a few miles east of Mansford in the mountains. It was a glorified barn, really, but a community of refugees from Seattle had been gathering there, doing their best to patch up the building’s roof and walls. Then, there was still enough gas to transport what they needed if they rationed properly. But they were all adjusting to life without electricity, without phones, without any sense of who they were without those things. 

She was there only three months when word came that a militia had materialized in Darrington and was registering children and looking for doctors and healers. Healers. That’s what they called women with Clarke’s skills. People who had gone to school for 13 years, who had prioritized their craft over their health, their family, their relationships for a grueling residency followed by an only slightly less grueling fellowship. They called men doctors, even if they were less educated, less skilled, and less practiced.

Fuck them. Clarke’s response had become reflexive. It was her internal response when the police came that first night of what some called the Resistance but what the police called the Riots. 

Unrest had been brewing for months, but It was when the President “temporarily” suspended the First Amendment right to assemble that all hell broke loose. Thousands of protestors became tens of thousands, even in small cities like Spokane and Tacoma. Police traded rubber bullets for real ones, patrol cars for tanks, pistols for AK-47s. Dozens of people landed in Clarke’s hospital, some gone before they were taken out of the ambulance, ripped apart by the people sworn to serve and protect them. 

That was the night two officers were trawling the halls of her ward, looking for “resistors” to arrest. 

“They’re unconscious,” Clark said slowly. “They’re sedated because they’re waiting to go into surgery.” She knew it was a bad idea to talk to them like they were kindergartners, but she couldn’t stop herself. What these men were doing was sick. Her patients were here because of them. Some of them filled with bullet holes, their lives barely clinging to them, others with collapsed lungs caused by broken ribs, others with simple fractures who would be out to fight another day. But Clarke wasn’t going to tell these guys that.

“Is there someone else we can talk to?” The officer said. His name badge said Blakely. “Maybe your boss?”

Clarke felt her fingernails digging into her palm. “Officer Blakely—”

“Corporal Blakely.”

Clarke went on as if she didn’t hear him. “I’m the person with the highest seniority here right now. If you’d like me to call the Chief of Surgery...”

Blakely pulled out a pad and pen. “What’s his name?”

“Her name is Dr. Marris.”

Blakely scoffed but wrote down the name.

“Is there a problem?” Clarke bent a little to catch his eye with her glare.

“Not at all.”

After that night, everything changed. The President sent in federal troops. There were tanks outside police precincts, and men in uniform carrying AK-47s stood at every corner in downtown and Capitol Hill. They rode the light rail, searching for enemies and booting out anyone who fell asleep on the trains. Curfews were instituted. Clarke had to have her ID and a letter from the hospital ready after every shift. The same soldiers (or were they cops?) stopped her every night, even after the sixth time when everyone knew everyone’s names. She had written theirs down. Because fuck them.

Two months later, the Seattle PD renamed themselves Washington’s 1st Militia when the President had encouraged all “patriots and protectors of freedom to band together, arm, and fight for American values.” Police departments across the country took this as a rallying call. They traded their police uniforms for military fatigues. They tore off their city badges and replaced them with a thin blue line. Bros before everything else, even democracy. 

They pulled her out of the OR as soon as she wrapped up a craniotomy. It was her third surgery of the day, and her hands were stiff, her scrubs covered in sweat. The two soldiers’ assault rifles startled her, but she’d seen enough gore in her time to know how to keep a straight face. Blakely was back, but this time he was dressed like he was serving in a desert war zone.

“Officer Blakely.” She remembered he was a corporal but fuck him.

The corner of Blakely’s mouth lifted in a sharp smirk. She watched as his eyes glided down her body. “Congratulations, Ms. Griffin, you’ve been recruited to Washington’s First. We are in need of fine healers like yourself.” 

Fuck you. The words raced through her mind, but she kept her mouth shut. She understood by now that those words aloud could do nothing but put her in danger. “How can I be of service?” she asked evenly, looking him straight in the eye. She had heard rumors that the militias were taking medical workers from their hospitals and clinics to set up their own facilities, but she thought they’d only take men for their specialists and surgeons.

“You need to come with us,” Blakely looked down at the sweat stains under her arms.

Clarke didn’t move. “What kind of healers are you looking for?” she asked in her most neutral tone. 

“A variety, ma’am.” Blakely’s jaw stiffened.

A small crowd of the floor’s staff had gathered at the nurses’ station, halfheartedly pretending to work while they watched the interaction.

“Like nurses? There are a lot of nurses here who are much better at their jobs than I would be.” Clarke laughed lightly and glanced at the nurses. “I’d make a terrible nurse.”

A few of the nurses nodded, their eyes smiling because smiling with their lips might bring trouble.

“We already have healers for that kind of work.” Blakely took in a breath and looked around the floor, frustrated. He knew he’d said too much. “Maybe we should go somewhere—”

“Then I can’t possibly think why you’d need me. I’m sure there are doctors who can meet your needs.”

“Ms. Griffin—”

“After all, there are two other trauma surgeons on staff here more suited to your, uh, preferences.” Clarke glanced down at Blakely’s groin.

“I was sent to find you, Ms. Griffin.”

The more he called her “Ms.,” the more her resolve solidified. “I just can’t imagine what anyone would want with little old me.” She covered her voice in maple syrup. “Dr. Lee and Dr. Bancroft are very fine surgeons, very respectable. Dr. Lee graduated top of his class from UW. I’m supervising his fellowship, and he’s very skilled.” Clarke let the words roll like waves along a beach on a calm day. “And Dr. Bancroft is who we call whenever we need a feeding tube done right the first time. His focus on fundamentals is exceptional—”

“They want you,” Blakely said more loudly than he intended.

Say it, she taunted him with a sharp look, though the words that came out were light. “I’ll call Dr. Lee. I’m sure he’d be more suitable to you—”

“Ms. Griffin—”

“You’d rather have Dr. Bancroft? Sorry. I thought you’d want the more skilled surgeon, but to be honest, we do perform a lot more feeding tube placements than major—”

“We know you’re the best.” Blakely growled, giving in. 

Clarke had won, but she still felt empty. “You can’t even call me a doctor.” 

“Protocol.” Blakely refused to look at her. “Come with us, ma’am.”

“Do I have a choice?”

“You can appeal on grounds of pregnancy or motherhood.”

Clarke scoffed. “Of course.” She didn’t even try to hide her disdain, though she knew she had to play along. She looked down at her scrubs. “I need to change.”

“Of course,” Blakely said. His smile was sharp, an insult. “Though we’ll need to supervise.”

Clarke bit down hard. She had not joined the Resistance, but she’d been obsessively keeping track of their Instagram posts at @emeraldcityjustice. Militiamen never raped, she’d learned, especially if the woman was white and of marrying age. They didn’t call it rape, though, they called it “sexual theft.” They were not to spoil another man’s property (or potential property), and that meant no touching. This restriction forced men to get creative, find new ways of dominating without ruining the goods. Resisting, the posts said, meant speaking the militia’s language. 

“But I say unto you, that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.” Clarke had memorized some key verses, and she said this one loud enough for everyone around the nursing station to hear it. “Matthew 5:28. I think those are words in red. You know, Jesus. The son of God himself.” She would not let these fuckers anywhere near her. 

Blakely squinted and his face turned to stone.

“The locker room is on the second floor,” she said. “You two are welcome to wait outside the door, if you like.” Clarke strode towards the elevator. Blakely glared at her a few moments before nodding at his partner. They followed her into the elevator. Clarke looked at her watch. 10:15 p.m. Shift change. The locker room would be packed. 

“We need to sweep,” Blakely said as they stepped off the elevator and approached the locker room door.

Clarke sighed loudly. There was no use in arguing. Blakely nodded towards the key swipe. Clarke swiped her badge and a little red light on the handle turned green. Blakely opened the door then turned conspicuously so that his back was facing the opening.

“This is Corporal Blakely of Washington’s First Militia,” he shouted into the room. The volume of his voice made Clarke jump. “Private Cooks and I will be doing a sweep of this locker room in two minutes. Those who are not appropriately covered at that time will be taken into custody.” Blakely let the door close behind him and set a timer on his Apple watch.

Are you fucking kidding me? Clarke didn’t say out loud.

Five minutes later, Blakely and Cooks were back out in the hallway. Clarke knew they wouldn’t find anything. The locker room was a windowless space that was mostly concrete and tile. It had one exit, a fire hazard long ignored because that part of the hospital had been built 140 years ago. The only other door was a closet full of cleaning supplies.

Blakely nodded at Clarke to go inside. 

“You have five minutes,” he said, fiddling with his watch again.

“I’d like to shower.”

“Four minutes and fifty-seven seconds. If you don’t come out on time, we will come in.”

Clarke swallowed and pushed through the door. Dozens of annoyed eyes lifted as she walked in. She just shook her head as she walked past them. 

Because it was an old hospital, doctors—female doctors, even surgeons—shared the locker room with nurse supervisors, charge nurses and other medical staff who had seniority. (Male doctors, especially surgeons, did not share a locker room with anyone, of course.) It bothered Clarke on principle, but for the most part she liked being around the non-doctor staff, and it didn’t hurt to have a friendly relationship with the nurses when she was on the floors. 

The women’s eyes quickly went back to their tasks of leaving. Between the unrest and a new virus no one seemed to know anything about, the hospital, which was already under-resourced, had been over capacity for weeks now. Everyone was tired, stressed, and getting more and more afraid. They just wanted to get home as soon as possible. The later at night, the more aggressive the patrols got. 

Clarke walked to her locker and took a few deep breaths as she quickly spun the lock to its numbers and pulled it open. She took off her white coat and hung it on the hanger inside. She pulled out her backpack and checked that her phone charger was inside. She pulled her wallet out and stared at her driver’s license for a long moment, not sure if it would be a liability. She decided to bring it, along with her curfew papers, and a used copy of The Obelisk Gate she’d picked up from Horizon Books a few weeks ago but never opened. Next, she stuffed her street clothes inside along with two sets of clean scrubs (only later would she wonder why she took the scrubs). Finally, she grabbed the two boxes of protein bars and four bottles of Gatorade that she kept there to keep her energy up on long shifts.

Clarke almost laughed at how much could fit in her small backpack. 

She looked at her watch. Three minutes left. Shit. She almost forgot to switch watches. She pulled off the little cheap thing she used at the hospital and replaced it with her dad’s chunky but sleek metal piece. It was heavy on her wrist, but that’s what she liked about it. Somehow she felt safer with it on.

She swallowed. She needed to move, but to move meant everything would be different. She threw her shoulders back, lifted her hands in front of her, palms up as if making an offering, and took in a deep breath. It’s what she did whenever she was about to make a first cut. She closed her eyes, felt the ground solid under her feet, felt her heart slow to steady saunter. 

Clarke smiled to herself. It was a heavy smile, sad and defiant. Fuck them.

She grabbed her backpack, slung it over her shoulder, and walked to the broom closet.

“You alright, Dr. Griffin?” A voice rang out. Veró, the charge nurse from the post-op wing, looked up as Clarke was about to go inside. Her eyes were nervous.

“I will be,” Clarke replied as she closed the door. “Take good care of yourself, Veró. Be safe. You didn’t see me, okay?”

Veró nodded. “You stay safe, Clarke.” She closed her eyes for a long moment. Her smile was heavy with concern. “I didn’t see nothing.” 

Clarke held Veró’s eyes for a long moment, then nodded, stepped into the closet, and closed the door behind her. It was a small space, but large enough for two people to fit—a fact Clarke had exploited with Lu, a nurse from the Telemetry unit, several times. There was a small, dirty, pointless window at the top of the closet that she and Lu had covered with a tray from the cafeteria so that the janitors in their breakroom across the alley couldn’t watch them taking their break. During the day, thin streaks of light leaked in around the edges. Clarke was grateful it was so late and that the alley outside got so little light. The metal shelving served as the perfect ladder, sturdy and wide. She disrupted the toilet paper and big bottles of cleaner as she climbed, leaving hints of her escape, but there was nothing to be done about it. The top shelf was blessedly empty, too high up to be useful.

She pulled the tray out of the way to reveal a window that was smaller than she expected. She turned a small latch and pushed the window. It didn’t budge. She pushed it again, harder this time, though she didn’t have much leverage. Nothing happened. The shelf wobbled minutely under her.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. 

It held steady as she gingerly pulled her full body onto the top shelf. She barely fit up there. She checked her watch. She maybe had a minute. Probably less. Clarke hit the base of the window with the flat of her palm. Nothing. She hit it again. Still nothing. She took a breath and closed her eyes. 

Please.

She hit it again and heard a tiny scrape. One more push, and the window swung open with an achy shriek. It might have been shut for decades. Clarke was lucky. The drop from the second floor window to the sidewalk was short. The alley swept upwards from 9th Ave., ending at the top with the fifth floor’s windows being at street level. 

She was out, and she had no idea what to do. By now, Blakely and Cooks would have noticed that she hadn’t come out. Maybe they’d give her another minute. She remembered the Apple watch. 

Her mind churned and tumbled. She had opened holes in skulls with drills and saws. She had cracked ribs to expose hearts that stopped beating in front of her eyes. But now, on this warm summer night on an empty sidewalk, she didn’t know what to do. So she ran. The hospital was a mess of old buildings connected by narrow alleys—easy to get lost. But Clarke had done her residency and fellowship here—spent nearly a quarter of her life here—and while she didn’t know the alleys, she knew the buildings, recognized the skyways above linking everything together. She slid from shadow to shadow in the direction of the interstate. It was an intuitive decision, the way she knew exactly where to find the bleeding in surgery. 

She kept moving, the rolling rumble of the highway getting closer. Finally, she found herself at the parking garage and knew exactly where to go. She walked calmly through the first level reserved for people going to the ED. She was careful to avoid the security booth where Mitch would be. He was a good guy, and Clarke didn’t want to bring him any trouble. She moved quickly towards an emergency exit which brought her to a fire escape facing the interstate. During her first year as resident, she and Dr. Salem used to meet there to smoke a joint after a 30-hour shift. 

She paused. Think. She pulled out her phone and scrolled through her contacts. Her breath caught when she came across her mom’s contact. You could have called, she could already hear her saying. We would have figured it out. Even if there was enough time for her mom to get from Whidbey Island to the city—and there wasn’t—it wouldn’t be safe. Anyone she called could be implicated and punished. Unless she chose to crawl back into the hospital, she was now an RRL, a Resistor of the Rule of Law.

This is moment everything changes. The thought cracked across her mind like lightning and disappeared just as fast. The thunder would roll on for years and years.

She closed her contacts and opened Instagram instead. She went to the @emeraldcityjustice profile. Her grin was grim as she hit the Message button. How ridiculous this world had become.

“Canada or the mountains?”

“What?” Clarke shook herself out of a haze. The driver hadn’t spoken since he picked her up from a dark corner under the interstate where @emeraldcityjustice had told her to go. They immediately turned east over the lake to Bellevue.

“You’ll have to decide at the drop point in Everett,” the driver went on. “They can either get you on a ferry to Canada or you can head to a refugee community in the mountains.” He glanced over his shoulder to the back seat where she was lying down to avoid facial recognition cameras on the interstate. “Do you want to escape or do you want to fight?”

THE END. THAT’S IT. I’M SORRY.

[thecoleopterawithana]

The Painter of Sunflowers and The Man in a Red Beret

— The Painter of Sunflowers (Portrait of Vincent van Gogh), by Paul Gauguin (1888).

— Paul Gauguin (Man in a Red Beret), by Vincent van Gogh (1888).

–

It’s like trying to compare Gauguin and Van Gogh. They were friends, as well.

— John Lennon talks with Robert Hilburn from The LA Times (10 October 1980).

–

Certain relationships are charged with an intensity of feeling that incinerates the walls we habitually erect between platonic friendship, romantic attraction, and intellectual-creative infatuation. One of the most dramatic of those superfriendships unfolded between the artists Paul Gauguin (June 7, 1848–May 8, 1903) and Vincent van Gogh (March 30, 1853–July 29, 1890), whose relationship was animated by an acuity of emotion so lacerating that it led to the famous and infamously mythologized incident in which Van Gogh cut off his own ear — an incident that marks the extreme end of what Sir Thomas Browne contemplated, two centuries earlier, as the divine heartbreak of romantic friendship.

— ‘Gauguin’s Stirring First-Hand Account of What Actually Happened the Night Van Gogh Cut off His Own Ear’ by Maria Popova for Brain Pickings.

–

Imagine all the people living life in peace

Arles [town in the South of France where van Gogh had moved to on February 1988]; Wednesday, 3 October 1888

My dear Gauguin,

[…]

I must tell you that even while working I never cease to think about this enterprise of setting up a studio with yourself and me as permanent residents, but which we’d both wish to make into a shelter and a refuge for our pals at moments when they find themselves at an impasse in their struggle.

[…]

Now I’d like to see you taking a very large share in this belief that we’ll be relatively successful in founding something lasting.

[…]

I believe that if from now on you began to think of yourself as the head of this studio, which we’ll attempt to make a refuge for several people, little by little, bit by bit, as our unremitting work provides us with the means to bring the thing to completion — I believe that then you’ll feel relatively consoled for your present misfortunes of penury and illness, considering that we’re probably giving our lives for a generation of painters that will survive for many years to come.

[…]

About the room where you’ll stay, I’ve made a decoration especially for it, the garden of a poet […]. And I’d have wished to paint this garden in such a way that one would think both of the old poet of this place (or rather, of Avignon), Petrarch, and of its new poet — Paul Gauguin.

However clumsy this effort, you’ll still see, perhaps, that while preparing your studio I’ve thought of you with very deep feeling.

Let’s be of good heart for the success of our enterprise, and may you continue to feel very much at home here.

Because I’m so strongly inclined to believe that all this will last for a long time.

Good handshake, and believe me

Ever yours, Vincent

–

We’re all going to live there, perhaps forever, just coming home for visits. Or it might just be six months a year. It’ll be fantastic, all on our own on this island. There some little houses which we’ll do up and knock together and live communally.

— John Lennon, on his plan to buy a Greek island where the Beatle family could live together (1967). In The Anthology.

–

We were all going to live together now, in a huge estate. The four Beatles and Brian would have their network at the centre of the compound: a dome of glass and iron tracery (not unlike the old Crystal Palace) above the mutual creative/play area, from which arbours and avenues would lead off like spokes from a wheel to the four vast and incredibly beautiful separate living units. In the outer grounds, the houses of the inner clique: Neil, Mal, Terry and Derek, complete with partners, families and friends. Norfolk, perhaps, there was a lot of empty land there. What an idea! No thought of wind or rain or flood, and as for cold… there would be no more cold when we were through with the world. We would set up a chain reaction so strong that nothing could stand in our way. And why the hell not? ‘They’ve tried everything else,’ said John realistically. 'Wars, nationalism, fascism, communism, capitalism, nastiness, religion – none of it works. So why not this?

— Derek Taylor, in his autobiography Fifty Years Adrift (1984).

–

— Self-Portrait with Portrait of Émile Bernard (Les mis��rables), by Paul Gauguin (1888).

Readers of the Mercure may have noticed in a letter of Vincent’s, published a few years ago, the insistence with which he tried to get me to come to Arles to found an atelier after an idea of his own, of which I was to be the director.

At the time I was working at Pont-Aven, in Brittany, and either because the studies I had begun attached me to this spot or because a vague instinct forewarned me of something abnormal, I resisted a long time, till the day came when, finally overborne by Vincent’s sincere, friendly enthusiasm, I set out on my journey.

I arrived at Arles toward the end of the night and waited for Dawn in a little all-night café. The proprietor looked at me and exclaimed, “You are the pal, I recognize you!”

A portrait of myself which I had sent to Vincent explains the proprietor’s exclamation. In showing him my portrait Vincent had told him that it was a pal of his who was coming soon. 

Neither too early nor too late I went to rouse Vincent out. The day was devoted to getting settled, to a great deal of talking and to walking about so that I might admire the beauty of Arles and the Arlesian women, about whom, by the way, I could not get up much enthusiasm.

The next day we were at work, he continuing what he had begun, and I starting something new.

— The Intimate Journals of Paul Gauguin by Paul Gauguin (1936).

–

I don’t admire the painting but I admire the man. He was so confident, so calm. I so uncertain, so uneasy.

— The Intimate Journals of Paul Gauguin by Paul Gauguin (1936).

–

My memory of meeting John for the first time is very clear. … I can still see John now - checked shirt, slightly curly hair, singing ‘Come Go With Me’ by the Del Vikings. He didn’t know all the words, so he was putting stuff in about penitentiaries - and doing a good job of it. I remember thinking, ‘He looks good - I wouldn’t mind being in a group with him.’ … Then, as you all know, he asked me to join the group, and so we began our trip together. We wrote our first songs together, we grew up together and we lived our lives together. And when we’d do it together, something special would happen. There’d be that little magic spark. I still remember his beery old breath when I first met him here [Woolton church fete] that day. But I soon came to love that beery old breath. And I loved John. I always was and still am a great fan of John’s.

— Paul McCartney, in Bill Harry’s The Paul McCartney Encyclopedia (2003).

–

In the beginning he was a sort of fairground hero. He was the big lad riding the dodgems and we thought he was great. We were younger, me and George, and that mattered. It was teenage hero worship. I’ve often said how my first impression of him was his boozy breath all over me—but that was just a cute story. That was me being cute. It was true, but only an eighth of the truth. I just used to say that later when people asked me for my first memory of John. My first reaction was never simple—that he was great, that he was a great bloke, and a great singer. My REALLY first impression was that it was amazing how he was making up all the words.

He was singing “Come Go with Me to the Penitentiary,” and he didn’t know ONE of the words. He was making up every one as he went along. I thought it was great.

— Paul McCartney, according to Hunter Davies annotations of their phonecall on 3 May 1981.

–

And if I say I really knew you well  What would your answer be?

Between two such beings as he and I, the one a perfect volcano, the other boiling too, inwardly, a sort of struggle was preparing. In the first place, everywhere and in everything I found a disorder that shocked me. His colour-box could hardly contain all those tubes, crowded together and never closed. In spite of all this disorder, this mess, something shone out of his canvases and out of his talk, too. […]

In spite of all my efforts to disentangle from this disordered brain a reasoned logic in his critical opinions, I could not explain to myself the utter contradiction between his painting and his opinions. […] 

One thing that angered him was to have to admit that I had plenty of intelligence, although my forehead was too small, a sign of imbecility. Along with all this, he possessed the greatest tenderness, or rather the altruism of the Gospel.

— The Intimate Journals of Paul Gauguin by Paul Gauguin (1936).

–

I could just often be the sort of baddie in a situation, and he could be a real soft sweetie, you know? Took everyone by surprise, that!

— Paul McCartney, interviewed by David Frost (1997).

–

I was feeling insecure…

From: Vincent | To: Paul | Wednesday, 3 October 1888

I find my artistic ideas extremely commonplace in comparison with yours.

I always have an animal’s coarse appetites. I forget everything for the external beauty of things, which I’m unable to render because I make it ugly in my painting, and coarse, whereas nature seems perfect to me.

Now, however, the energy of my bony carcass is such that it goes straight to the target; from that comes a perhaps sometimes original sincerity in what I make, if, that is, the subject lends itself to my rough and unskilful execution.

–

Tony Sheridan: [John] never saw himself as a very good singer, for instance.

Interviewer: Really?

Tony Sheridan: No. He never saw himself as comparable to Paul McCartney, even. Which, you know, he was playing with a guy, writing songs with a guy whom he thought was better than he was in many ways. So he had this immense ego and this immense sort of – it was like a motor in him that had to go to new lengths and reach new heights in order to impress somebody or the whole world or whatever.

— In A Long And Winding Road (2003).

–

“Most people in Britain think I’m somebody who won the pools, you know,” he says drily, drawing on a Gauloise. “Won the pools and married a Hawaiian dancer or actress somewhere. Whereas in the States, we’re treated like artists. Which we are! Or anywhere else for that matter,” he added. “But here, it’s like, the lad who knew Paul, got a lucky break, won the pools and married the actress.”

— John Lennon, interviewed for Melody Maker (2 October 1971).

–

It may have been the one that had my song, 'Here, There and Everywhere.’ There were three of my songs and three of John’s songs on the side we were listening to. And for the first time ever, he just tossed it off, without saying anything definite, 'Oh, I probably like your songs better than mine.’

— Paul McCartney, interviewed by Joan Goodman for Playboy (1984).

–

Knowing that love is to share

From the very first month, I saw that our common finances were taking on the same appearance of disorder. What was I to do? […] I was obliged to speak, at the risk of wounding that very great susceptibility of his. It was thus with many precautions and much gentle coaxing, of the sort very foreign to my nature, that I approached the question. I must confess that I succeeded far more easily than I should have supposed.

We kept a box, – so much for hygienic excursions at night, so much for tobacco, so much for incidental expenses, including rent. […] We gave up our little restaurant, and I did the cooking on a gas stove, while Vincent laid in provisions, not going very far from the house. Once, however, Vincent wanted to make soup. How he mixed it I don’t know; as he mixed his colours in his pictures, I dare say. At any rate, we couldn’t eat it. And my Vincent burst out laughing and exclaimed: “Tarascon! La casquette au père Daudet!” On the wall he wrote in chalk: Je suis Saint Esprit. Je suis sain d’esprit. [I am the Holy Spirit. I am sane.]

— The Intimate Journals of Paul Gauguin by Paul Gauguin (1936).

–

You’ve got to hide your love away

On several nights I surprised him in the act of getting up and coming over to my bed. To what can I attribute my awakening just at that moment?

At all events, it was enough for me to say to him, quite sternly, “What’s the matter with you, Vincent?” for him to go back to bed without a word and fall into a heavy sleep.

— The Intimate Journals of Paul Gauguin by Paul Gauguin (1936).

–

All I can ever say about it is that I slept with John a lot because you had to, you didn’t have more than one bed - and to my knowledge John was never gay.

— Paul McCartney, in The Brian Epstein Story (2000).

–

To say “I love you” would break all my teeth.

— The Intimate Journals of Paul Gauguin by Paul Gauguin (1936).

–

You can actually say, “I love you,” to someone, but it’s quite hard. And so that’s why it’s usually easier when you’re a bit drunk. It’s like ‘Here Today’ [on 1982’s Tug of War], which was for John, and there is the line, (sings) “Du du du du du du du, I love you,” and it is a bit of a moment in the song. It would be a bit like Keith Richards saying to Mick, “I love you.” I mean he does, but I’m not sure he’s going to say it. I’m sure the Gallaghers love each other on some level, probably quite deeply, but that certainly isn’t going to get said soon. I think it’s quite an interesting subject and I felt it most recently with [wife] Nancy, I knew I loved her but to actually say, “I love you,” you know, it’s just not that easy.

— Paul McCartney,  interview with Pat Gilbert for MOJO (November 2013).

–

Hear me, my lover  I can’t be held responsible now  For something that didn’t happen  I knew you for a minute  Oh, it didn’t happen  Only for a minute  

–

During the latter days of my stay, Vincent would become excessively rough and noisy, and then silent. […]

The idea occurred to me to do his portrait while he was painting the still-life he loved so much – some ploughs. When the portrait was finished, he said to me, “It is certainly I, but it’s I gone mad.”

That very evening we went to the café. He took a light absinthe. Suddenly he flung the glass and its contents at my head. I avoided the blow, and, taking him bodily in my arms, went out of the café, across the Place Victor Hugo. Not many minutes later Vincent found himself in his bed where, in a few seconds, he was asleep, not to awaken again til morning. 

When he awoke, he said to me very calmly, “My dear Gauguin, I have a vague memory that I offended you last evening.”

Answer: “I forgive you gladly and with all my heart, but yesterday’s scene might occur again and if I were struck I might lose control of myself and give you a choking. So permit me to write to your brother and tell him that I am coming back.”

My God, what a day!

When evening had come and I had bolted my dinner, I felt I must go out alone and take the air along the paths that were bordered by flowering laurel. I had almost crossed the Place Victor Hugo when I heard behind me a well-known step, short, quick, irregular. I turned about on the instance as Vincent rushed toward me, an open razor in his hand. My look at the moment must have had great power in it, for he stopped and, lowering his head, set off running towards home.

Was I negligent on this occasion? Should I have disarmed him and tried to calm him? I have often questioned my conscience about this, but I have never found anything to reproach myself with. Let him who will fling the stone at me.

With one bound I was in a good Alesian hotel, where, after I had enquired the time, I engaged a room and went to bed.

I was so agitated that I could not get to sleep till about three in the morning, and I awoke rather late, at about half-past seven.

Reaching the square, I saw a great crowd collected. Near our house there were some gendarmes and a little gentleman in a melon-shaped hat who was the superintendent of the police.

This is what had happened.

Van Gogh had gone back to the house and immediately cut off his ear close to the head. He must have taken some time to stop the flow of the blood, for the day after there were a loto f wet towels lying about on the flag-stones in the two lower rooms. […]

When he was in a condition to go out, with his head enveloped in a Basque beret which he had pulled far down, he went straight to a certain house where for want of a fellow-countrywoman one can pick up an acquaintance, and gave the manager his ear, carefully washed and placed in an envelope. “Here is a souvenir of me,” he said. Then he ran off home, where he went to bed and to sleep. […]

I had no faintest suspicion of all this when I presented myself at the door of our house and the gentleman in the melon-shaped hat said to me abruptly and in a tone that was more than severe, “What have you done to your comrade, Monsieur?”

“I don’t know…”

“Oh, yes… you know very well… he is dead.”

I could never wish anyone such a moment, and it took me a long time to get my wits together and control the beating of my heart.

Anger, indignation, grief, as well as shame at all these glances that were tearing my person to pieces, suffocated me, and I answered, stammeringly: “All right, Monsieur, let us go upstairs. We can explain ourselves there.”

In the bed lay Vincent, rolled up in the sheets, humped like a guncock; he seemed lifeless. Gently, very gently, I touched the body, the heat of which showed that it was still alive. For me it was as if I had suddenly got back all my energy, all my spirit.

Then in a low voice I said to the police superintendent: “Be kind enough, Monsieur, to awaken this man with great care, and if he asks for me tell him I have left for Paris; the sight of me might prove fatal to him.”

— On the events of 23 of December 1988. In The Intimate Journals of Paul Gauguin by Paul Gauguin (1936).

–

Auvers-sur-Oise, c. 17 June 1890

My dear friend Gauguin,

Thank you for having written to me again, my dear friend, and rest assured that since my return I have thought of you every day. I stayed in Paris only three days, and the noise, etc., of Paris had such a bad effect on me that I thought it wise for my head’s sake to fly to the country; but for that, I should soon have dropped in on you.

And it gives me enormous pleasure when you say the Arlésienne’s portrait [above], which was based strictly on your drawing, is to your liking. I tried to be religiously faithful to your drawing, while nevertheless taking the liberty of interpreting through the medium of colour the sober character and the style of the drawing in question. It is a synthesis of the Arlésiennes, if you like; as syntheses of the Arlésiennes are rare, take this as a work belonging to you and me as a summary of our months of work together. For my part I paid for doing it with another month of illness, but I also know that it is a canvas which will be understood by you, and by a very few others, as we would wish it to be understood. 

–

There are only about 100 people in the world who understand our music. George, Ringo, and a few friends around the world. Some of the artists who recorded our numbers have no idea how to interpret them. […] When Paul and I write a song, we try and take hold of something we believe in – a truth. We can never communicate 100 per cent of what we feel, but if we can convey just a fraction, we have achieved something. We try to give people a feeling – they don’t have to understand the music if they can just feel the emotion. This is half the reason the fans don’t understand, but they experience what we are trying to tell them. Lack of feeling in an emotional sense is responsible for the way some singers do our songs. They don’t understand, and are too old to grasp the feeling. Beatles are really the only people who can play Beatle music.

— John Lennon, Lennon & McCartney Interview for Flip Magazine (May 1966).

–

My friend Dr. Gachet here has taken to it altogether after two or three hesitations, and says, “How difficult it is to be simple.” Very well - I want to underline the thing again by etching it, then let it be. Anyone who likes can have it.

Have you also seen the olives? Meanwhile I have a portrait of Dr. Gachet with the heart-broken expression of our time. If you like, something like what you said of your “Christ in the Garden of Olives” not meant to be understood, but anyhow I follow you there, and my brother grasped that nuance absolutely.

[Here Vincent drew a sketch of the “Cypress with Star.”]

I still have a cypress with a star from down there, a last attempt - a night sky with a moon without radiance, the slender crescent barely emerging from the opaque shadow cast by the earth - one star with an exaggerated brilliance, if you like, a soft brilliance of pink and green in the ultramarine sky, across which some clouds are hurrying. Below, a road bordered with tall yellow canes, behind these the blue Basses Alpes, an old inn with yellow lighted windows, and a very tall cypress, very straight, very sombre.

On the road, a yellow cart with a white horse in harness, and two late wayfarers. Very romantic, if you like, but also Provence, I think.

— Road with Cypress and Star, by Vincent van Gogh.

I shall probably etch this and also other landscapes and subjects, memories of Provence, then I shall look forward to giving you one, a whole summary, rather deliberate and studied. My brother says that Lauzet, who does the lithographs after Monticelli, liked the head of the Arlésienne in question.

But you will understand that having arrived in Paris a little confused, I have not yet seen your canvases. But I hope to return for a few days soon.

[Here was drawn a sketch of “Ears of Wheat.”]

I’m very glad to learn from your letter that you are going back to Brittany with De Haan. It is very likely that - if you will allow me - I shall go there to join you for a month, to do a marine or two, but especially to see you again and make De Haan’s acquaintance. Then we will try to do something purposeful and serious, such as our work would probably have become if we had been able to carry on down there.

Look, here’s an idea which may suit you, I am trying to do some studies of wheat like this, but I cannot draw it - nothing but ears of wheat with green-blue stalks, long leaves like ribbons of green shot with pink, ears that are just turning yellow, lightly edged with the pale pink of the dusty bloom - a pink bindweed at the bottom twisted round a stem.

— Ears of Wheat, by Vincent van Gogh.

After this I would like to paint some portraits against a very vivid yet tranquil background. There are the greens of a different quality, but of the same value, so as to form a whole of green tones, which by its vibration will make you think of the gentle rustle of the ears swaying in the breeze: it is not at all easy as a colour scheme.

— Unfinished unsent letter from Vincent van Gogh to Paul Gauguin.

–

— Auvers-sur-Oise. — Sunday 27 July, a man named Van Gogh, 37, a Dutch fellow, painter, on his way through Auvers, shot himself in the fields and, being only wounded, returned to his room where he died two days later.

–

Here is what I know on his death.

That Sunday he went out immediately after breakfast, which was unusual. […] When we saw Vincent arrive night had fallen, it must have been about nine o'clock. Vincent walked bent, holding his stomach, again exaggerating his habit of holding one shoulder higher than the other. Mother asked him: “M. Vincent, we were anxious, we are happy to see you to return; have you had a problem?”

He replied in a suffering voice: “No, but I have…” he did not finish, crossed the hall, took the staircase and climbed to his bedroom. I was witness to this scene. Vincent made such a strange impression on us that Father got up and went to the staircase to see if he could hear anything.

He thought he could hear groans, went up quickly and found Vincent on his bed, laid down in a crooked position, knees up to the chin, moaning loudly: “What’s the matter,” said Father, “are you ill?” Vincent then lifted his shirt and showed him a small wound in the region of the heart. Father cried: “Malheureaux, [unhappy man] what have you done?”

“I have tried to kill myself,” replied Van Gogh.

[…]

Vincent had gone to the wheat field where he had painted previously […]. Vincent shot himself with a revolver and fainted. The freshness of the evening revived him. On all fours he sought the revolver to finish himself off, but could not find it (and it was not found the following day). Then Vincent gave up looking and came down the hill to regain our house.

[…]

In the morning of the following day, two gendarmes of the Méry brigade, probably alerted by a public rumour, appeared at the house. […] The gendarme then entered the room, and Rigaumon, always in the same tone, questioned Vincent: “Are you the one who wanted to commit suicide?”

- Yes, I believe, replies Vincent in his usual soft tone.

- You know that you do not have the right?

Always in the same even tone Van Gogh replied: “Gendarme, my body is mine and I am free to do what I want with it. Do not accuse anybody, it is I that wished to commit suicide.”

[…]

Theo arrived by train in the middle of the afternoon. I remember seeing him arrive, running. […] But his face was marked by sorrow. He immediately climbed up to his brother who he kissed and spoke to him in their native language. Father withdrew and did not help them. He did not go back in during the night. After the emotion that he had felt on seeing his brother, Vincent had fallen into a coma. Theo and my father kept watch on the casualty until his death, which occurred at one o'clock in the morning.

— Memoirs of Vincent Van Gogh’s stay in Auvers-sur-Oise (1956), by Adeline Ravoux (aged 76).

–

Paris, 5 August 1890

To say we must be grateful that he rests - I still hesitate to do so. Maybe I should call it one of the great cruelties of life on this earth and maybe we should count him among the martyrs who died with a smile on their face.

He did not wish to stay alive and his mind was so calm because he had always fought for his convictions, convictions that he had measured against the best and noblest of his predecessors. His love for his father, for the gospel, for the poor and the unhappy, for the great men of literature and painting, is enough proof for that. In the last letter which he wrote me and which dates from some four days before his death, it says, “I try to do as well as certain painters whom I have greatly loved and admired.” People should realize that he was a great artist, something which often coincides with being a great human being. In the course of time this will surely be acknowledged, and many will regret his early death. He himself wanted to die, when I sat at his bedside and said that we would try to get him better and that we hoped that he would then be spared this kind of despair, he said, “La tristesse durera toujours” [The sadness will last forever]. I understood what he wanted to say with those words.

A few moments later he felt suffocated and within one minute he closed his eyes. A great rest came over him from which he did not come to life again.

— Letter from Theo van Gogh to Elisabeth van Gogh.

–

Vincent van Gogh did not kill himself, the authors of new biography Van Gogh: The Life have claimed.

Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith say that, contrary to popular belief, it was more likely he was shot accidentally by two boys he knew who had “a malfunctioning gun”.

The authors came to their conclusion after 10 years of study with more than 20 translators and researchers.

It has long been thought that he shot himself in a wheat field before returning to the inn where he later died. 

[…]

But author Steven Naifeh said it was “very clear to us that he did not go into the wheat fields with the intention of shooting himself”.

“The accepted understanding of what happened in Auvers among the people who knew him was that he was killed accidentally by a couple of boys and he decided to protect them by accepting the blame.”

He said that renowned art historian John Rewald had recorded that version of events when he visited Auvers in the 1930s and other details were found that corroborated the theory.

They include the assertion that the bullet entered Van Gogh’s upper abdomen from an oblique angle - not straight on as might be expected from a suicide.

“These two boys, one of whom was wearing a cowboy outfit and had a malfunctioning gun that he played cowboy with, were known to go drinking at that hour of day with Vincent.

"So you have a couple of teenagers who have a malfunctioning gun, you have a boy who likes to play cowboy, you have three people probably all of whom had too much to drink.”

He said “accidental homicide” was “far more likely”.

“It’s really hard to imagine that if either of these two boys was the one holding the gun - which is probably more likely than not - it’s very hard to imagine that they really intended to kill this painter.”

Gregory White Smith, meanwhile, said Van Gogh did not “actively seek death but that when it came to him, or when it presented itself as a possibility, he embraced it”.

He said Van Gogh’s acceptance of death was “really done as an act of love to his brother, to whom he was a burden”.

— by Will Gompertz for BBC News (17 October 2011).

–

Now everybody seems to have their own opinion  Who did this and who did that  But as for me I don’t see how they can remember  When they weren’t where it was at 

–

For a long time I have wanted to write about Van Gogh, and I shall certainly do so some fine day when I am in the mood. I am going to tell you now a few rather timely things about him, or rather about us, in order to correct an error which has been going around in certain circles.

— In the introductory chapter of The Intimate Journals of Paul Gauguin by Paul Gauguin (1936).

–

I’d like to say this is just as I remember it, if it hurts anyone or any families of anyone who’ve got a different memory of it. Let me say first off, before you read this book even, that I loved John. Lest it be seen that I’m trying to do my own kind of revisionism, I’d like to register the fact that John was great, he was absolutely wonderful and I did love him. I was very happy to work with him and I’m still a fan to this day. So this is merely my opinion. I’m not trying to take anything away from him. All I’m saying is that I have my side of the affair as well, hence this book. When George Harrison wrote his life story I Me Mine, he hardly mentioned John. In my case I wouldn’t want to leave him out. John and I were two of the luckiest people in the twentieth century to have found each other. The partnership, the mix, was incredible. We both had submerged qualities that we each saw and knew. I had to be the bastard as well as the nice melodic one and John had to have a warm and loving side for me to stand him all those years. John and I would never have stood each other for that length of time had we been just one-dimensional.

— Paul McCartney, in the introduction of Many Years from Now.

–

All the rest everyone knows who has any interest in knowing it, and it would be useless to talk about it were it not for that great suffering of a man who, confined in a madhouse, at monthly intervals recovered his reason enough to understand and furiously paint the admirable pictures we know.

The last letter I had from him was dated from Anvers, near Pontoise. He told me that he had hoped to recover enough to come and join me in Brittany, but now was obliged to recognize the impossibility of a cure:

“Dear Master” (the only time he ever used this word), “after having known you and caused you pain, it is better to die in a good state of mind than in a degraded one.”

He sent a revolver shot into his stomach, and it was only a few hours later that he died, lying in his bed and smoking pipe, having complete possession of his mind, full of the love of his art and without hatred for others.

In Les Monstres Jean Dolent writes, “When Gauguin says ‘Vincent’ his voice is gentle.” Without knowing it but having guessed it, Jean Dolent is right.

You know why… .  .

— The Intimate Journals of Paul Gauguin by Paul Gauguin (1936).

–

At one point during the evening at the Waldorf-Astoria, McCartney answers a random question with, “No, I always felt much closer to John.” Out of the mouth of anyone else, “John” is just a name, a mere monosyllable. But when the name is uttered by McCartney, the ghostlike presence of John Lennon suddenly descends on the evening. Lennon’s name, so simply invoked by McCartney, takes on the power of a talisman, conjuring up an entire shared cultural scrapbook of images defining musical collaboration and the purest of camaraderie. McCartney owns the pronunciation of “John” the way Katharine Hepburn made “Spensah” Tracy her own.

— In the Paul McCartney interview The act you’ve known for all these years: McCartney today, by Andrew Marton for the Boston Globe (3 December 2000).

–

How long did we remain together? I couldn’t say, I have entirely forgotten. In spite of the swiftness with which the catastrophe approached, in spite of the fever of work that seized me, the time seemed to me a century. 

Though the public had no suspicion of it, two men were performing there a colossal work that was useful to them both. Perhaps to others? There are some things that bear fruit.

— The Intimate Journals of Paul Gauguin by Paul Gauguin (1936). 

–

[And amalgamation of often imperfect (and other times scary) parallels that possibly led John to compare his relationship with Paul to that of Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin. An overly long self-indulgent post.]

More on the painters series:

The Surrealist | Lennon - McCartney & René Magritte

[donewithcapitalistfrayers]

Black Genocide and the Alt-Right K. Kersplebedeb

Discussions about the Alternative Right normally mention the movement's white nationalism, its connections with white supremacist organizations historically and present, and its social base of young alienated white men. It is well known that the movement is made up of racists, and indeed its flagship organization, the National Policy Institute, was founded in 2005 (prior to the alt-right's rise), precisely to promote white theories of supposed Black inferiority, and "to elevate the consciousness of whites, ensure our biological and cultural continuity, and protect our civil rights."

That said, the alt-right views about Black people are often not explored in detail. Two possible reasons for this present themselves; to provide an accurate picture of the alt-right race politics and what they imply, it is important that these be stated explicitly.

First, tragically but simply enough, the history and present reality of US racism is such that the alt-right, like the rest of the far right, does not always stand out as being all that extreme. Whereas their support for dictatorship, dreams of dismembering America, and their hostility to Jews and women might be repulsive to most white people and place them on the political fringe their anti-Black views are often just a less polite articulation of what significant numbers of white Americans consider to be an acceptable opinion.

As such, when discussing Black people, the alt-right focus is often on attacking groups defending Black human rights, while exculpating whites for, or explaining away, the conditions in which Black people already find themselves. These are fairly common white positions, even amongst "liberals"; for a white movement to hold such views is hardly news. Even their goal of a white "ethnostate" is not so incongruous: legislation and extralegal violence excluding people from a jurisdiction on the basis of "race" are a mainstay of American history. Indeed, a major alt-right talking point, that the United States was historically meant to be a country for white men, is just a truth that cannot be denied.

In other words, the white supremacism of the alt-right is compatible with regular racist US "democracy"; an example of what J. Sakai once observed, that in North America, "settlerism filled the space fascism normally occupies." A second possible reason why alt-right anti-Black racism garners less attention than their views on queer people, Jews, or women, is that the latter are somewhat contested and in some way open to change, while regarding Black people, there is just the same old dreary white supremacist consistency. There are no debates in alt-right circles about including Black people in their movement, or complicated theories about Black conspiracies controlling the world. Instead, articles on alt-right websites mock Blacks murdered by police, promote psuedo-scientific theories about a genetic tendency to low intelligence and high criminality, and routinely smear Black Lives Matter and similar groups as racist, terrorist, "thugs." Indeed, as this book was being prepared for press [Ctrl-Alt Delete], alt-rightists succeeded in leveraging their internet presence to reframe the torture of a mentally disabled teenager in Chicago as an anti-white hate crime carried out by Black Lives Matter, this despite the fact that there was zero indication of any connection whatsoever between the group and the assailants in question.

Often, alt-rightists present matters in terms of white victimhood, framing their politics as a matter of self-defense. On the American Renaissance website, Hubert Collins recounts his own adolescence and how it shaped his current politics: "[T]he schools were trying to turn our minds against the evidence of our senses. They tried to inculcate the conviction that all groups were equal in every way. I knew that wasn't true. Blacks were menacing. They were dangerous. My understanding of white identity came from the desire for safety, and the realization that safety meant the company of people like me. [...] for those of us raised in the multiracial cesspools that will soon spread to the whole country, the question of identity always boils down to the question of safety. To me, it is safety that makes white identity so important, so meaningful, and so long lasting."

Proceeding on the basis of such "white safety," others put a further gloss on their message, painting a picture of an all-white nirvana that means no one any harm. Theodore Beale would have us believe that alt-right just means that "everyone should be left by they own damn selves," while Brad Griffin tells us how Jews will all be happy in Israel and Blacks in Africa, if they only leave whites to "their" America. Yet despite this cheerful talk of "separate but equal" ethnostates, the alt-right's underlying fear of Black people invariable leads in a more historically predictable direction.  What is important to remember about white fragility and white discomfort is that when white people are scared, people die. So it comes as no surprise to find one article in The Right Stuff calling for (in preventive self-defense, of course!) "the largest genocide the world has seen" against the "dindu nations," while Lawrence Murray opines for America to deal with "a people who cannot achieve parity," "we essentially need some form of fascism," whereas Robert Finstock considers a "continent-wide sterilization campaign in Africa." There is really no difference between the alt-right's dreams and the murderous reality of a Dylann Roof—as Roof put it to his victims just before he opened fire, "I have to do it. You rape our women and you're taking over the country. And you have to go." 

That the alt-right's programme is implicitly genocidal is not to say that details don't matter. In terms of understanding the movement's appeal and possibilities for growth, as well as the subjective reality of its members, their derfensive posture and "positive" utopianism are a different shade of white from either traditional Nazis or Jim Crow-era Kluxers. In a sense, their ideology is a kind of post-nazism, bearing the mark of the neo-colonial age in which it was born. Nonetheless, the new jar holds the same sour wine: when "white nationalism, " "race realism," "ethnostate," and similar terms are used, dispossession and murder are always being implied. There is no such thing as "white racial purity" or "white nationalism" without anti-Black racism and genocide.

[recentanimenews]

The Best Anime of the 2010s

Here it is, the third and final installment in our Best of the 2010s series! We’ve gotten manga and video games out of the way, so it’s time for anime.

If you’re just tuning in, here’s how it works: our three contributors (Evan Minto, Ink, and David Estrella) each ranked their top anime series and movies released between 2010 and 2019. We scored them all based on their positions in the three lists, and came up with a single combined list of 10, which you’ll find below. We haven’t seen every anime out there, so there may be some conspicuous omissions, but of all of our lists, this is the one we’re most confident in. That’s mainly because the contributors covered over 120 titles between the three of them! The full lists for anime, manga, and games, including our individual rankings, are now available on the Ani-Gamers Patreon.

Below you’ll find everything from lo-fi comedies to tragic war stories. And befitting the many ways anime is produced and distributed, our list contains TV series, net animations, short films, big-budget feature films, rotoscope animation, and more. It’s been a great decade for anime, and we hope you find something new (er, more like old) to add to your watch list. Enjoy, and feel free to chime in with your own picks in the comments!

10. Tantei Opera Milky Holmes: Act 2 (2012)

David Estrella: No one believes me when I say that Milky Holmes II is an essential anime and frankly, I don’t have the wherewithal to argue with close-minded idiots that have had the bulk of the 2010s to listen to me for once. If you have to ask, it’s already too late for you but in case you’re 14 and your first anime was a post-Bleach shonen thing, Milky Holmes is a comedy that begins as a mildly amusing goofy slapstick magical girl detective cartoon and soon spirals out into an insane spectacle that completely incinerates all the other half-way passable, middle-of-the-road multimedia schlock that used to made before it all became indistinguishable idol gacha crap. Someone went highly off-script on this production and every Milky Holmes afterwards is not even worth mentioning next to these first two seasons. Between this, gdgd Fairies, and Teekyu, the last breaths of creative expression in TV anime were all concentrated in 2012, and before we knew it, it was gone.

9. Flowers of Evil (2013)

Ink: As far as manga adaptations go, hell, as far as film goes, Flowers of Evil is nothing short of a masterwork. Layering animation atop live action (rotoscoping) to emulate the basic premise behind the poetic movement so treasured by the “tortured” protagonist … not to mention actually including relevant, inspirational poems, Director Hiroshi Nagahama takes great risks – from pacing to form and even content – and sticks the landing with technical and emotional force to improve upon the source material (even though the anime only adapts half the manga). It’s an anime that reveals how beautiful ugliness can be and vice-versa.

8. Kill la Kill (2013–2014)

Evan Minto: There’s nothing quite as enjoyable as watching Hiroyuki Imaishi and Kazuki Nakashima go to town on an anime TV series. Kill la Kill is a bonkers ride from start to finish. It’s got superpowered talking school uniforms, nudist secret societies, fanservice so obnoxious it somehow becomes cool, and a never-ending parade of shocking heel-turns. There’s something in there about fascism and the fashion industry and maybe if you squint hard enough you can argue it’s feminist, but the most important F word when it comes to Kill la Kill is “fun.”

7. Kizumonogatari (2016–2017)

David Estrella: I don’t think I’ll ever fly to Japan for the sake of seeing an anime film on opening day again, and fortunately Kizumonogatari was such a peak for cinema that I’m perfectly fine with that. Kizumonogatari left me fulfilled in a way that people with weaker immune systems would pass on to the hereafter upon leaving the theater. It’s not a coincidence that my interest in anime tanked severely once the Kizu trilogy wrapped up since, with a few rare exceptions, very little anime possesses the same ambitious spirit as I found in Kizumonogatari. While Makoto Shinkai is busy making extended Apple commercials under the guise of magical realist teen romance films, I’m really finding it easier and easier to call the anime medium completely and totally solved as early as 2017.

6. From the New World (2012–2013)

David Estrella: Due to circumstances outside of my control, From the New World appears higher on the list over the definitive best anime of the decade and I’m stuck writing about it. I’ll play along if only because From the New World is a great show that deserves another look to appreciate how much it was doing within the boundaries of weekly 24-minute episodes. Adapted from a science-fiction novel that will never be translated and published into English, it’s the rare sort of anime TV show that gets its hooks in early and continues sinking them in until the thought of taking a break before reaching the resolution is unbearable.

5. JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure (2012–present)

David Estrella: The loudest JoJo people say that Stardust Crusaders is the best JoJo, then two camps split between Diamond is Unbreakable and Golden Wind say their JoJo is the best JoJo, and then I’m the obnoxious voice in the back that hoots and hollers anytime someone says the phrase “Battle Tendency”. All the other JoJo’s are technically more sophisticated than the first couple of parts, but none of them really match the sheer power of that initial hit, those two amazing openings, and the actual best JoJo, Joseph Joestar, voiced by Tomokazu Sugita giving the performance of a lifetime. At the very least, we will all be haunted by Roundabout memes for as long as JoJo remains relevant.

4. Endless Night (2015)

Ink: Storytelling that relies solely on visuals is seemingly rare in anime these days, and even though Sayo Yamamoto’s Animator Expo figure skating short (which led to the more verbose Yuri!!! on Ice) is backed by a perfectly expressive song by Hiroshi Nakamura, the latter is made superfluous thanks to emotionally soaked movements and settings, laudably implemented surreality, seamless flow, minimalist color palette, and evocative texturing. Seven minutes (if that) lays out, engrossingly, a complete story of inspiration, infatuation, and (ultimately) realization. Ignore the East German judge; the passion and implementation is a 10/10.

3. Inferno Cop (2012–2013)

Evan Minto: “Best of” lists like this one have a tendency toward “high” art, toward stories about Big Ideas and Important Subjects. Inferno Cop is the lowest art of all: a series of nonsensical, lo-fi cutout animated shorts written with the reckless abandon of children playing with action figures. It’s also one of the funniest anime series in a very long time, and certainly one of the best comedies of the decade. It’s only fitting that it served as the world’s introduction to Studio Trigger, who closed out the 2010s with their smash-hit feature film Promare.

2. The Tale of Princess Kaguya (2013)

Ink: The recently late and perpetually bereaved Isao Takahata was, ironically, given the work about which this blurb is written, a realist compared to Ghibli co-founder’s (Miyazaki) escapist tendencies. Why, then, is this retelling of a very familiar folktale in The Tale of Princess Kaguya so powerful? Because the characterizations are as palpable as the animation is expressive; there are few scenes in the all of anime that draw breath like those of the MC’s dashing sequences. The art itself is simultaneously emulative of both a child’s picture book and a depiction of time as age sets in. Fairy tales are forever. RIP and thank you, Takahata.

1. In This Corner of the World (2016)

Evan Minto: This movie handily snagged the #1 spot in our ranking, and it’s not hard to see why. It’s a story about the hardships of World War II told not through combat, but through the grueling travails of civilian life. In This Corner of the World’s gut-wrenching tragedy is tempered and amplified by the currents of love and big-hearted, true-to-life comedy that run through it. The film is a beautiful tribute to the innocent souls trampled by war, comparable and even — dare I say — superior to the classic Grave of the Fireflies.

Check out our list of the Best Manga and the Best Video Games of the 2010s!

The Best Anime of the 2010s originally appeared on Ani-Gamers on February 21, 2020 at 8:43 PM.

By: David Estrella

[romcomathon2016]

Destination Wedding (USA, 2018)

Predictions: Alex predicted that Winona Ryder and Keanu Reeves met and fell in love at a destination wedding. Kat predicted the same. We also both predicted that it would not be a great film, based on the 3.5-star rating on Amazon, which, in our experience, is home to notoriously generous reviewers.

(We were originally planning to see this movie in theaters, but THANK GOD, we did not. So we have decided to review it instead of Head Over Heels, which we were unable to rent/purchase. Also, our list is dwindling generally and may soon begin to deviate more from the original plan. Who’s to say? :D)

Plot: Keanu Reeves and Winona Ryder are two deeply unpleasant strangers. (He is much more unpleasant than she is, but neither of them seems fun, really. They’re both real big downers about...everything.) They meet at a tiny regional airport on their way to a “destination wedding” in SAN LUIS OBISPO, CALIFORNIA. Um... Here we were under the impression that destination weddings were in, say, Milan or Jamaica, especially if you are from NEWPORT BEACH (Winona Ryder), but okay.

Anyway, Keanu Reeves is the groom’s brother, and Winona Ryder is the groom’s ex, and because this film was trying to be ~artsy, they were the only two characters who spoke for the entire hour and a half. As you might imagine, given their personalities, it was...a lot. But our prediction did come true! They do indeed reluctantly (and tediously) fall in love over the course of this perfectly nice wedding weekend, which they of course complain about nonstop. And then obviously Keanu Reeves doesn't believe in love or WHATEVER…so they part ways…but not really, because then he shows up at her door. They probably live crankily ever after. Good for them, as long as we don't have to listen to it.

Best Scene: There are like five minutes when they’re talking in bed together, after they have sex, that are kind of funny and nice. Almost charming. Then the dialogue got bad again. But we’ll always have those five minutes...

Worst Scene: Well, most of the scenes in this movie were bad. That said, let's go with when we first meet Keanu Reeves, at the beginning of the film! He's hocking up phlegm -- apparently a habit of his. We saw this and immediately knew how unpleasant this film was going to be.

Best Line: “Why would you? They’re so alluring.” — Keanu Reeves, deadpan, in the aforementioned post-sex bed scene, when Winona Ryder coyly informs him that she’s wearing nothing under her thick flannel pajamas. Truly charming. Very nearly the only moment in this film that was.

Worst Line: Keanu Reeves has a number of bad lines, including his response when Winona Ryder tells him about her job (she’s essentially a lawyer who prosecutes companies for being racist). Let’s just say the words “reverse fascism” came up. :|

Highlights of the Watching Experience: That this is like the fourth time Keanu Reeves and Winona Ryder have been in a movie together! So cute. Their interviews promoting this movie were approximately 10,000% more charming than the actual film.

How Many POC in the Film: Zero. But really, there were no characters besides Keanu Reeves and Winona Ryder.

Alternate Scenes: Maybe a movie where other people got to talk????

Was the Poster Better or Worse than the Film: Better. The poster suggests a much more exotic destination, e.g. France or Italy. (Sorry, San Luis Obispo. We have visited you, and you are charming, but you are not “destination,” at least not if one already lives in Southern California.) The poster also suggests a promising romcom, rather than some film student’s pretentious senior thesis.

Score: 4 out of 10 questionably-destination smooches.

Ranking: 107, out of the 159 movies we’ve seen so far.

[aion-rsa]

Doctor Who: Revolution of the Daleks Review

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This Doctor Who review contains spoilers. Our spoiler-free preview is here.

It may be the start of a brand new year, but ‘Revolution of the Daleks’, an episode of Doctor Who that’ll need to tide us over for a while, is more focused on looking back and taking stock than teasing what’s ahead. As the pre-title sequence informs us, courtesy of some Big Chunky Captions that the show currently favours, not only is this episode a follow-up to the events of ‘The Timeless Child’, it’s also a sequel of sorts to the 2019 New Year’s Special, ‘Resolution’.

Things pick up a few short hours after that adventure, which saw a buried Dalek mutant hijacking a human host and eventually constructing a scrapyard casing. It’s the abandoned husk of that same travel machine that now gets carted away by an unwitting driver, a man who’s so obviously doomed from the second he signs the paperwork that you can’t help but feel sorry for him. (But then, who can’t sympathise with someone who gets through their day one cuppa at a time?)

The Dalek shell soon finds its way into a pair of grasping, familiar hands, and this is where a selection of festive snacks are likely to be flung at the screen by some of the fandom. The mastermind behind the theft turns out to be Jack Robertson – the Trump-envying, Scooby-Doo villain last seen burying toxic waste during the divisive ‘Arachnids in the UK’. Robertson, played once again by Chris Noth, hasn’t managed to realise his presidential ambitions, but his character is unapologetically the same.

This time around, Robertson is accompanied by a ruthless Defence Secretary with her eyes on Number 10. Given that this episode was almost certainly conceived back when Theresa May was still Prime Minister, it’s not hard to see the inspiration for this particular pairing. Together, their intention is to reverse-engineer the Dalek technology – which as far as they know is nothing but a very advanced robot – and mass-produce them to roam the streets.

The idea of these caricatures conspiring to build an army of alien neo-Nazis in the name of “national security” is the kind of brute-force political allegory that has proven extremely hit-or-miss in recent years. If the dastardly duo had stayed in control of the Daleks for any length of time and we’d seen Britain slowly fall into the depths of fascism while the companions looked on helplessly, the episode could have come across as both derivative and ham-fisted, particularly when compared to ‘Genesis of the Daleks’. Thankfully, the Daleks themselves are having none of it, but more on them later.

Shortly before the titular revolution, we find the companions kicking their heels back on Earth with no word from the Doctor, and no clue as to whether or not she’s even alive. Yaz is spending most of her time in the new-build TARDIS that brought them home, having gone a bit Zoom-and-Enhance as she tries desperately to concoct a rescue plan. Graham and Ryan, meanwhile, have all-but accepted the Doctor’s fate and are doing their best to look after the planet in her stead.  

Alongside the exterminations and screaming that are a given whenever the Daleks are involved, this episode asks itself two questions, the first being: how do Doctor Who companions save the world without the Doctor? Ahead of transmission, the idea that Team TARDIS would need to tackle the Daleks by themselves was played up as being the meat of this story, leading to speculation that Captain Jack would step in as a sort of surrogate Doctor – he’s certainly got Dalek experience.

For better or worse, though, life without the Doctor isn’t really a question the show cares to dwell on for very long once it’s been posed, despite what the trailers might have led us to believe. It seems that what Graham, Ryan and Yaz have learned from travelling through time and space is that when someone’s threatening to take over the world, you should march right up to them, issue a few vague threats before being unceremoniously arrested, then go home again and sulk. Graham grumbles that without a sonic screwdriver or some psychic paper they can’t follow in the Doctor’s footsteps, but given how often the show teaches us that the Doctor isn’t defined by her gadgets, their half-hearted attempt to confront Robertson and save the day still comes across as a bit of a damp squib.

Luckily for the human race, it doesn’t take too long before the Doctor’s broken out of space-prison. Not from our perspective, anyway – as far as Thirteen’s concerned, she spends a good few decades in the company of some returning alien races, all of whom have supposedly gone through the judicial process. (A Weeping Angel on trial is a Big Finish production just waiting to be written…) There’s even an imprisoned P’Ting, which seems a bit harsh, though it might just be locked up to keep it safe from Yaz.

When Captain Jack finally springs the Doctor from her cell, the two characters get their first proper interaction since ‘Journey’s End’ (not to mention a callback to Jack’s favourite smuggling technique). It’s a sweet, slow moment, as is the Doctor’s reunion with her TARDIS, even if it’s all a bit too straightforward to be a genuinely thrilling escape. The Doctor was obviously going to bust out of prison sooner or later, of course, but given all the hype surrounding her absence, it’s hard not to feel her reunion with the companions happens a bit too easily and without complication.

The next few minutes are more interesting. While Whittaker’s Doctor has always claimed to be fiercely devoted to her ‘fam’, she usually can’t wait to get out of the room as soon as she’s required to interact with her companions on an emotional level, meaning they normally have to lean on one another for support. This time, the dynamic is reversed – the Doctor, still stewing over being the Timeless Child, is being particularly clingy while the companions are keeping her at arm’s length, with neither group really able to conceive of what the other has gone through.

These scenes culminate in a line of dialogue from the Doctor that would be wildly out of character in most other situations: “New can be very scary”. The Doctor normally claims to adore ‘new and exciting’, citing it as the reason they travel – so long as it’s new and exciting on their terms. Failing to escape on her own, encountering resentful companions and a loss of her cultural identity have left this Doctor feeling very much out of control.

And then, like a roller-coaster lurching into motion, the episode kicks into high gear and we’re off to see the Daleks.

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Having been cloned back into existence by Robertson’s scientist-slash-flunky Leo, the mutant from ‘Resolution’ has been practicing its two favourite tricks – puppeteering a human host, and online shopping. With an army of freshly-farmed mutants just waiting to slither inside empty Dalek casings, it doesn’t take too long before the cries of “Exterminate” ring through Downing Street, putting an end to the new Prime Minister before she’s even had time to feed Larry the cat. Team TARDIS, along with Robertson for seemingly no other reason than so he can betray them later, now need to sort out humanity’s DIY alien invasion. The Doctor’s solution: call the Daleks!

Skaro-variety Daleks, that is, further adding to the cast of aliens we haven’t seen in a while, and they’re not too happy that their racial purity is being threatened by human-fed knock-offs. Dalek civil wars were quite common in the show’s classic era, and there’s definitely mileage to be had watching the pepperpots squabbling among themselves. With so much to wrap up in one episode, though, what we actually get isn’t a war. It is, to borrow a phrase, pest control. The 3D-printed Daleks are so much cannon fodder for the bronze originals, who – thanks to Robertson – decide that taking over the Earth sounds like a bit of a lark so long as they’re in the neighbourhood.

This leads to some running around on a Dalek saucer that accomplishes little. Despite repeatedly reminding everyone just how immortal he is, Jack gets spared a horrific series of deaths this time around, and before long the Doctor arrives to taunt every last one of the infuriated mutants into her TARDIS. Except it’s not really hers – it’s the new-build TARDIS in disguise, and its destruction takes out the Dalek forces and ties up that loose end in a neat bit of storytelling.

With the threat eliminated and Robertson once again weaselling his way out of punishment, there’s one last issue that needs to be tied up. We’d all been made aware that Tosin Cole and Bradley Walsh were going to be departing Doctor Who this week, so when we saw them demand to board a Dalek saucer alongside the immortal Captain Jack… Well, there was precedent for things to go badly wrong.

Companions old and new have died in Dalek stories. A heroic grandfather/grandson sacrifice to save the human race wasn’t too likely, but it wasn’t completely out of the question, either. Here are Ryan and Graham alive and well, and this is where the show has to confront its second question. What does it take for a companion to leave the Doctor?

It was quite common for assistants to jump ship in the classic serials. Sometimes they were travelling with the Doctor only reluctantly and would leave the TARDIS whenever they happened back to their rightful home, especially when the Doctor could barely control their next destination. Others fell in love, elected to remain somewhere they could make a difference or, sometimes, sacrificed their lives. Whatever their fate, there was always a sense they knew that their relationship with the Doctor was a transitory one; a journey into the unknown, but one that definitely had a final destination.

Then came the Time War, and the Doctor was suddenly the most amazing, brilliant, astounding and important figure in the universe. Last of the Time Lords, destroyer of Gallifrey, spoken of in myth and legend. He could take his companions anywhere in time and space and show them the delights of the universe. Showrunner Russell T. Davies made it abundantly clear that if you could handle the challenge, there was absolutely no drug more addictive than setting foot inside that TARDIS.

A few companions still chose to leave, or else got left behind. Mickey Smith lingered in a parallel universe where he was needed and loved. Martha Jones departed to care for her traumatised family. On the whole, though, increasingly convoluted ways have been concocted to forcibly separate the Doctor from his companions without actually killing them. Parallel universes, mind-wipes, temporal paradoxes… For many years now, the Doctor’s friends haven’t walked away – they’ve been ripped away.

Here, Chris Chibnall chooses to confront the scar that ten months has left upon the companions’ relationship with the Doctor. It’s something of a tell-don’t-show moment – Ryan makes reference to having reconnected with friends and family, but we don’t see any of that. It’s clear, however, that the past year has given Ryan enough time to realise how much home and a stable foundation still means to him. His decision to say goodbye doesn’t stem from any close call or tragic loss, but a new-found self-confidence and a desire to grow up. The Doctor may be a Timeless Child, but Ryan is not.

Ryan’s departure means that a clearly torn Graham must also say his goodbyes, although his reasoning is far more straightforward – if he leaves to travel with the Doctor, he’ll miss his grandson taking those first steps into adulthood. And so Yaz is left in a TARDIS control room that suddenly seems a lot bigger, her trust in the Doctor tarnished but intact thanks to a surprisingly earnest heart-to-heart with Jack earlier in the episode. And then, as is fitting for an episode that has spent so much time in its own recent past, we return to the same Sheffield hillside where the companions began their journey – and to Ryan Sinclair, cheered on by his hopeful Grandad, learning how to ride a bike.

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This is unlikely to be anyone’s all-time favourite Doctor Who episode. It won’t sit proudly in the number one spot when YouTubers rank the Christmas specials. It’s a little too reliant on navel-gazing for that – but what the episode does is try and tackle questions raised by the Doctor always being the centre of the series’ universe, and what it takes to overcome her gravitational pull. Even if you don’t care to chew over those metatextual issues on New Year’s Day, however, ‘Revolution of the Daleks’is still an enjoyable hour-and-change of telly, and one that ultimately chooses to (mostly) wipe the slate clean ready for adventures yet to come.

The post Doctor Who: Revolution of the Daleks Review appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[shannonlight772]

Born a Crime by Trevor Noah

Apartheid

Apartheid- a word that is often spoken of throughout South African history, a word shadowed by darkness and discrimination. The apartheid-era completely separated blacks from whites while also establishing different racial groups depending on hair type, skin color, homeland and also determined their social and political rights, education and economic status (History).

South Africa has dealt with white domination since the colonization, as author Mokgethi Motlhabi states, “black resistance to white domination and subjugation is not a new development. Nor did it begin with the apartheid regime in 1948. In fact, resistance to white domination in South Africa began right from the start of colonialism” (Motlhabi, 1984, p.3).

Reading Trevor Noah’s, Born A Crime: Stories From a South African Childhood, the author dives deeper into the era of apartheid. Growing up as a biracial South African and telling the tales of him and his mother living day-to-day during the darkest times of South African history, Noah brings humor, tragedy, and defiance in this 285-page memoir.  

                                   Photo retrieved from EDTimes

A Chameleon in a Bloodless Revolution

Having a black, Xhosa mother and a white, German/Swiss father meant Trevor was a mixed-race, during a time where it wasn’t legal for a black woman to be with a white man- he was born a crime.

Being raised by a single mother, Noah and his mom became the ultimate team, trying to bend the rules of apartheid by doing anything they could to hide the fact that he was born into a mixed family. Noah’s mom sometimes had to pretend to be his maid when they were walking in public in hopes to disguise the fact they were related to avoid the police from taking him away.

Due to the different racial groups, as the regime fell it resulted in all of the groups turning on one another. Noah referred to this as the ‘Bloodless Revolution’ because “very little white blood was spilled. Black blood ran in the streets” (Noah, 2016, p.12). The division among racial groups not only meant you were to only stick with your group and live in the same communities, but it also meant you would speak the same languages. South Africa had 11 official languages, “language brings with it an identity and a culture, or at least the perception of it. A shared language says, ‘we’re the same’” (Noah, 2016, p.49). Noah often referenced Nelson Mandela and his inspirational quotes with one being, “if you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart” (Noah, 2016, p.236). Because of the language barriers, all black South Africans believed they were different, separating them not only physically but by language as well. Noah’s stories coincide with Naomi Tutu, the daughter of the first Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town. In an article written by Amanda Amsel about Tutu, she states, “despite the fact whites were the minority, they quickly seized power and started enforcing racial segregation on all aspects of life, from buses to schools to where people could live” (Amsel, 2011). 

Noah was brought up much different than many of the other black South Africans around him, rather than learning only his home language his mother, Patricia, taught him 6 of the languages. He soon learned that to bridge the race gap, he had to learn to be a chameleon, “my color wouldn’t change, but I could change your perception of my color. If you spoke to me in Zulu, I replied to you in Zulu” (Noah, 2016, p.56). Growing up in South Africa, the English language is the language of money, if you knew it, you immediately had a leg up on other South Africans. His mother made sure he spoke English as his first language, but he realized that he not only had to become a chameleon through language but would also have to adapt to different lifestyles in order to make a living for him and his mother.

Noah speaks of living in the hood, where it was normal to hustle to make money. Selling anything you could get your hands on- a pair of Air Jordan’s, headphones, an electric razor- you didn’t know where it came from, but no one asked any questions, if it brought you money that’s all that mattered. But he found that selling pirated CDs was where the real business was. He spoke of crime in a different light than what many people do stating, “the hood made me realize that crime succeeds because crime does the one thing the government doesn’t do: crime cares. Crime is grassroots. Crime looks for the young kids who need support and a lifting hand. Crime gets involved in the community. Crime doesn’t discriminate” (Noah, 2016, p.209). In order to be successful during this time, Noah knew he had to find a niche wherever possible. From selling pirated CDs he began making his own, moving on to taking minibusses around towns to DJ, making a name for himself. As his stories change from speaking of when he was 7, to when he was 10, back to when he was only a little boy, to his teenage years, it is evident that every event in his life was just another stepping stone to the man he has become today.

                                   Photo retrieved from NYTimes

“For My Mother. My First Fan”

Being an autobiography, Noah’s stories throughout the entire book often included his mother, dedicating the book to her- “For my mother. My first fan. Thank you for making me a man.” His stories flip flop between his own childhood while also highlighting many of the hardships his mother faced while she was growing up in South Africa and continuing those hardships while raising a child all on her own. He describes her as “the problem child, a tomboy, stubborn, defiant” and speaks of how she was a free spirit and wanted to ensure that her own child would not grow up the same ways she did- restricted to do whatever she wanted (Noah, 2016, p.64). Her humor, determination, and strength were admirable qualities that Noah reinforced throughout the book.

His stories have an underlying message, although highlighting his own defiance against being a mixed South African child in a world where you needed to identify as part of an established group by government, his mother was the powerful force that helped him overcome the division that was brought upon him during apartheid, she brought him freedom during a time that no one thought could exist. His life lessons were the result of his mother’s struggles.

His mother engraved in him life lessons that he often repeated throughout his stories. When he spoke of the stories she told of her childhood he reflects on how she never fully sat him down to give him much detail, “my mom told me these things so that I’d never take for granted how we got to where we were, but none of it ever came from a place of self-pity. ‘Learn from your past and be better because of your past, but don’t cry about your past. Life is full of pain. Let the pain sharpen you, but don’t hold on to it’” (Noah, 2016, p.66). She loved going to church and every Sunday, he and his mother would get in the car even if there were riots in the streets- a result of all of the groups turning on one another- she would still inch the car forward, having no fear. He admires the fact she was so determined to not repeat her past, beginning with his name. The name Trevor has no connection to the Xhosa culture, where you are to name your child something with a deeper meaning (SAHistory). He speaks of her own name, Patricia Nombuyiselo Noah, “she who gives back” and he speaks of how that is exactly what she did for him. Teaching him English, reading to him, teaching him all of the lessons of The Bible, she even signed up for subscriptions to get other books in the mail as well. Her wit, stubbornness, and generosity never faded throughout his tales.

The stories Trevor Noah shares along with his mother’s own experiences take us through multiple different times in history, the apartheid era, Mandela coming to power and South Africa becoming a democracy- erasing the lines of division. Noah’s tales relate to author Federico Finchelstein in his book, From Fascism to Populism in History, when he states, “history combines evidence with interpretation. Ideal types ignore chronology and the centrality of historical processes. Historical knowledge requires accounting for how the past is experienced and explained through narratives of continuities and change over time” (Finchelstein, p.1, 2017). Trevor Noah and his mother exemplify the continuities and changes that South Africa has faced under apartheid rule.

                                  Photo retrieved from SAPeople

[republicstandard]

The White Man's Third Position

Eric Striker has noted that in the recent elections the Republican governor of Kentucky ran a campaign based on a 1980s Reaganesque style revulsion towards "socialism" and against teachers, and he got his head handed to him, justifiably so; in other elections that night affirmative action and sanctuary cities took a beating.  One needn't be skilled in the reading of tea leaves to understand which way the wind is blowing.

Richard Spencer's publishing house, Washington Summit Publishers, recently issued a translation of Armin Mohler's The Conservative Revolution In Germany (1918-1932). Out of that matrix came National Socialism and, while not everyone is a Nazi, embedded within that is the magical position, the third position: conservative on social issues and progressive on economics.  If any enterprising politician should ever want to carry everything and everyone before him he really ought to look into it.

The amazing thing is that Trump ran on a set of issues that were unheard of for a quarter century, and he pulled off a miracle.  One would think that he would have countless imitators but in fact he has none, not even himself.

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Capitalism overturns everything, uproots the world as it creates new ones every minute.  Exotic sexual ideologies expel nature, and fabricate an ersatz reality.  These aren't two sides of the same coin, they are the same coin, the coin of the realm of the ruling class.

By loosening economic controls the right destabilizes communities, by loosening social controls the left destabilizes human beings. Together they work as a pincer movement against our security, as everything that was solid melts into thin air.

The third position is protectionism for human beings and, as such, is inherently conservative.  It is fascism with a human face.  

A few years back Ashton Kutcher infamously declared that he was liberal on social issues and conservative on economics and his statement was hailed as the wave of the future.  He of course had it completely backwards, poll after poll shows a majority wants the exact opposite, wants the third position, wants a generous social democracy combined with an end to the tyranny of insidious social experimentation, be it that of an invasion of alien races or ever new frontiers in gender identity.  What they want is a tight knit and upright community, not a continued greasing of the skids of a no holds barred neo-liberal accelerationism.  They know in their hearts that the left got rid of social controls and the right got rid of economic ones, and that all sides conspired against them.

We forget just how much of a player David Duke was in the early 1990s, ideologically at least, people said oh but they're racists but others said maybe they like his platform.  Then Duke and Buchanan went back and forth accusing the other of stealing the agenda they had first.  But then they faded away, and no one picked up the mantle.

In the early 1990s the movie Falling Down became iconic, about a white man who had had enough and wasn't going to take it any more and proceeded to start mowing people down. This was adduced as an example of the growing phenomenon of the angry white male.  But really the map of this was clear by the time of George Wallace and his not a dime's worth of difference, or even way back in 1948 with Strom Thurmond.  Later Sam Francis cribbed Donald Warren's 1976 book The Radical Center and conjured up his legendary Middle American Radical, and Christopher Lasch diagnosed why liberalism was bad for the common man, and another liberal, Richard Rorty, gave two cheers not for capitalism but for social solidarity.  Later another Warren--Elizabeth--got into the act with her book The Two Income Trap, for by then the American Dream was over.

What was happening was clear enough.  After the war was a golden age for the American white working class.  While our enemies were wading through rubble our industrial plant was in pristine condition.  A man could work, the wife stay home to care for the children, vacations could be taken, retirements made, a good life had. But soon came the natural accelerants of open borders and open markets and the re-proletarianization of our people. This was done in the name of "freedom" and "openness", two things which are always the mortal enemies of decent folk everywhere.  They acted as agents of social sterilization, the jobs went out, the people came in, the housing prices went up, the neighborhoods became crowded, crime went up, as did the cost of living, the birth rates went down. In turn the money machine required more immigrants.  Wash, rinse, repeat, decimate, as is said.

Just in the middle of this deluge came figures who saw it clearly and wanted to arrest this wasting away of the social fabric.  The aforementioned Duke and Buchanan for sure, and also Ross Perot. Together they took what can be considered the white man's third position, against pointless foreign wars which bled our young dry, against the invasion by the colored races, against the free movement of goods across our borders, against moral and social chaos.  If you want to know more about it just listen carefully to that giant sucking sound.  

In addition to waging the culture war against the forces of moral decay Buchanan made a hard edged moved toward economic autarky and economic nationalism. While in Reagan's White House Buchanan once sent a businessman looking for tariffs packing but the former doctrinaire free trader got Dick Gephardt religion, and promoted industrial policy (which by then had become dirty words).  He wanted to make it impossible for goods made outside America to be sold here by throwing up massive tariff walls.  At the same time his corporate tax was zero. Haul up the drawbridge, make it enticing and necessary to produce here, and watch the middle class revive.  It could have worked.

But by the time he came around neo-liberalism was coming into its own, history was declared over, the free movement of goods and people across all barriers was ascendant.  Former hippie Bill Clinton was all for global capital, took the baton from that old internationalist traitor George Bush Sr. and pushed through NAFTA (see giant sucking sound, above).  Earlier Reagan and Thatcher were said to have been running some kind of supposed counter-revolution in the name of the decent folk, but they were not even speed bumps on the road to the loosening of all controls, threw gasoline on the accelerants, tossed on the match, and greased every skid on the way to disaster. Capitalism is nothing less than the overturning of everything at every instant, it says so in the brochure.

And the left came around all the way soon, became outriders of capital. Mass immigration is nothing but a transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich but the ones who rail most against income inequality are its biggest supporters, in another time we would have called that false consciousness. Former hippie Hillary Clinton's dream was a unified market from Tierra Del Fuego to the Arctic Circle, and the free movement of everything throughout it.  This too is the dream of our ruling class.  The money spigots of the new world order are open borders and open markets which when the epitaph of America is written will be seen to be its death blow.

Old Socialists knew better.  It was always Nationalism in one country. Bernie Sanders once famously, or infamously, told Ezra Klein that open borders and mass immigration were Koch brothers' ideas (as are freeing all prisoners and eating away at the substance of America). While in his heart of hearts it's doubtful Bernie wants to build Fortress America (alas) it seems reasonable to think that he does want reasonable controls on immigration.  If he could get his base to go along with it he could walk away with the election.  Problem is, he's got the endorsement of Alexandria ("this is occupied land") Ocasio-Cortez.  That crowd hates white people and, contrary to what you read in the papers, they are no friends to the working class, but do the dirty work of corporations, wittingly or unwittingly, take your pick.

It wasn't always that way.   Old socialists knew better.  Dick Gephardt championed industrial policy, the notion that government and business can cooperate in tandem for what's good for the nation, Ralph Nader showed us what evil unregulated corporations will do, Barbara Jordan knew what was good for the worker and it wasn't a mass influx of cheap labor.  Cesar Chavez had his goons bust the heads of border jumping wetbacks who undercut the wages of his men, though the growers wanted brown serfs for their growing world-wide plantation.  And recently in American Affairs Angela Nagle made the left wing case for closed borders and for her trouble was made a pariah, and Aimee Therese regularly reviles all forms of neo-liberalism, or most of them, at least.

Liberal icon Eugene McCarthy wrote a book saying that America was fast becoming a colony of the world, arguing that economically and culturally, colonial status is evident in loss of control over borders, religion and language. Major investment in a colony is from outside, with control held by the investing powers.

Pat Buchanan said he fell out of his chair when he heard Trump's announcement speech and it's true, Trump ran on a straight up ticket of Buchananism.  He took on the three pillars of the ruling class cash machine, war, free trade, and open borders, and he also took away their shield, political correctness, the you can't say this, and you better not say that.  It's what spooked them so very terribly.  An angel mom said that when she heard Trump's speech she sat down and cried.   But as it turned out Trump became obsessed with blacks, gays, Jews, Israel, everything and everyone but what elected him.  The ruling class needn't have worried, he was no traitor to his class, he was one of them and, for that, may his memory forever be met with violent howls of execration.

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The odd thing is that for a position so inherently appealing there's not a single public official who will touch it with a ten foot pole.

So why would such a popular ideology go begging for suitors?  Why the wallflower at the dance?  The problem is that it's what Sam Francis called a strange amalgam of left-right, it's neither this nor that, not one thing nor the other, an ambidextrous ideology and, as such, it's a gossamer world-view, a unicorn position, chimerical. Who would espouse it?  The left demonizes borders while promoting social democracy; the right has its tax cuts while ostensibly preaching morality; they are an inverted mirror image of the other, right where the other is wrong, wrong where the other is right;  yes, the third position is an odd brew.  Add to that that the donors have a stranglehold on the parties and that whoever would take up its cudgel would find himself in the cross hairs of the ruling class and the distaste with which it is viewed by our leaders becomes explicable. Treacherous, but explicable.

This democracy of ours, owned by this ruling class, does have an Achilles heel.  It's that if enough of the people want something, and want it badly enough, they can get it, or at least they can make life very difficult for their enemies.  If Trump proved anything it's that a hostile takeover of a party from the very top is possible, with the right person, at the right time, with the right message.  If the difference between the rank and file of a party and its rulers becomes too great and a canny enough, a forceful enough, and a presentable enough person comes along to exploit and explain it, miracles can occur.  This is not the infiltration of the party, it is a coup de main, a knockout blow.  No one knows what the future holds.  A leader can arise.

In the meantime, of course, every man to his post.  

What that leader would advocate is simple: no wars, no immigration, no free trade, bring up the drawbridge, create Fortress America, become a hermit kingdom, disentanglement from Israel, pro guns, social democracy, pro unions, massive infrastructure spending, social solidarity, anti-degeneracy, public health care, a wealth tax, natalism, pro family formation, pro marriage, pro traditional American heritage, pro traditional gender roles, anti-corporate measures.

Apply social and economic controls, in a word.   Practice fascism with a human face.   To let the middle conspire against the traitors in our midst.

Someone really ought to look into it.

from Republic Standard | Conservative Thought & Culture Magazine https://ift.tt/2Khdzci via IFTTT

[awolfsrespite]

The Price of Victory

“Show me what Democracy looks like!”

“This is what Democracy looks like!”

The yells of the ralliers echoed through the city of Portland, filling up rows of streets with the sounds of their voices. Many people came to this rally, one of the first rallies in Portland ever since President Trump where over a million people appeared. Their rally was to stop the impending war, their rally was for peace, and their rally was to have their voices heard. Millions of Oregonians had gathered together in a desperate attempt to get the President to listen to their pleas.

Portland was just one of the many cities that had taken part in this. Cities across the U.S had all rallied together to try and voice their concerns, all of them hoping the oligarchy that controlled them would stop and consider what they had to say. There had been hundreds of rallies before this, but this time, over fifty million people nationwide attended, and they all were saying the same thing: stop President Trump.

As the ralliers paraded across around the Portland city, the majority were within the pioneer square, shouting out so everyone could hear. The adrenaline around them was potent; thousands of people yelled off the top of their lungs, trying to get the entire north side of Oregon to hear their cries.

This rally was expected to be a peaceful one. Anarchists were put on a leash this time; as the majority of individuals who attended this rally were more moderate than the left-wing radicals that enjoyed causing mayhem in the Portland streets. But regardless, the anarchists always had a reason why they did what they did, and they were always there to look fascism in the face and tell them they are watching them, and they are willing to fight back.

Leonard from the Antifacst group of Portland led a chant with over four hundred of his companions. They all wore black, with black masks on, and they carried large red, white and black flags. They walked as a unit, together showing their might by flexing their size. They were ready today; and they were here to complete their task: show the government how dangerous it is to play with the people - for when the people fight back, they fight back hard.

Leonard reached up and pulled out a speaker that was connected to a private communication link for all Antifacist members. “Are we in position?”

“Negative, we are still getting inside.”

“They have a lot of security here, our intel was off.”

“Copy that, continue until ready, report back.” Leonard put down the speaker into his pocket again and waited. He had sent in sixteen of his finest members to infiltrate the portland police bureau within Portland. He had a plan, and it had to be executed perfectly.

As the marchers continued to march, Leonard took advantage of the fact that many of the Portland police bureau officers were currently out keeping the peace. They had six hundred police officers in Portland, and over a thousand in short response time. Leonard knew that if this was going to work, and if they were going to get out of it alive, he would have to be tactful with his movements.

“Sir, we are being held up. Our inside man is being looked at with suspicion.” A voice came in to the speaker.

“PPB Lieutenant is here, Sir. Our inside man may be identified.”  Another voice came in.

“Copy that.” Leonard silently contemplated the situation for a second, “Freedom squad, what is your status?”

“Payload is set, sir. We just need the go-ahead.”

Leonard grinned as he silently thought about the destruction they were about to see. “Good, forward team, cover each other’s backs; I want you to neutralize the Lieutenant, we need to ensure he is dead for this to work.”

“Sir, there are over fifty officers in here - we won’t make it out alive.”

“We can make it to the roof, but the payload will bring us down with it.”

“Is anyone willing to sacrifice themselves for this mission?” Leonard asked into the speaker. Leonard hated the idea of sacrificing one of his own for this - in fact, it went directly against their philosophies. No one should have to sacrifice themselves for a higher power.

“I.”

“Me too.”

“Me as well.”

“I can too, Sir.”

Leonard smiled as he listened to the individuals volunteer themselves. “Perfect. I want you four to initiate protocol 12. We can’t let your intel fall into PPB hands.”

“Yes, Sir.” All four repeated at once.

Leonard had trained them all well. As a retired Army Major-Colonel who trained with Green Berets, Leonard was one of the most tactful members of the antifacist organization; which is why they gave him the green light to lead this mission. While his tactics were similar to some of his enemies back in the middle east, he had to admit: they worked.

“Freedom squad, are you ready?” Leonard asked into the speaker.

“Yes, Sir, you say the word.”

Leonard silently sighed. The marchers around him gave him plenty of cover to initiate this operation. He knew that he was safe; no one could hear him. “I want to say, and I want everyone to remember this: you four that are volunteering yourselves, you will be forever remembered. What are your names?”

“Jason Skall, Sir.”

“Logan Smith, Sir.”

“Alejandro Garcia, Sir.”

“Noe Sinclair, Sir.”

“Jason, Logan, Alejandro, and Noe, your names will be marked in the history books as heroes. Because of you, we will be one step closer to getting rid of the fascist regime in Oregon.” Leonard paused,  “Squads five and six, what is your status?” Leonard asked into the speaker.

“This is squad five, we are in position, Sir. Payload has been set.”

“Squad six, we are also in position, Sir. Payload is ready.”

“Perfect.” Leonard took a deep breath and exhaled, “Forward team, initiate protocol 12. When successful, let us know.”

“Yes, Sir.” Logan said into the speaker.

Shortly after an explosion was heard from the top floor of the Portland Police Bureau, “Target neutralized” Noe said into the speaker.

“Finish protocol 12.” Leonard said. Seconds later, three more explosions were heard from the top floor of the PPB. Smoke filled the air and glass and debris was tossed hundreds of feet in every direction. The marchers stopped immediately, many screaming, others confused at what was going on.

The portland police responded immediately, many of them going back to the PPB to see what was going on. First responders were immediately on the scene; firefighters ready to put out the flames as quickly as they had appeared.

“Initiate Freedom Payload.” Leonard said into the microphone. Ten seconds later, the Pioneer courthouse exploded, over seventy percent of it was instantly destroyed and ruined. The Portland City Hall building also exploded, the entire structure collapsing on itself. The last to explode was the PBB building; the large five story police department collapsed on top of itself. Smoke filled the area, dust, fire, and dead bodies also lay everywhere. Many of the first responders died in the explosion, and hundreds of the police officers died from the debris and explosions close to them.

“Freedom Payload complete.” Leonard said into the speaker. He silently took a breath as he saw the large black smoke clouds that filled all of downtown portland. The explosions were huge, and the smoke from the aftermath covered over two miles around them. Many people were yelling, the police that were left were forced to act as rescue for all of the citizens that were caught inside of the blast area. Hundreds of ralliers lay on the streets, many injured, and many dead.

Leonard and his antifacist group all took off their backpacks and put them on the ground. They opened them up, and every one of them had dismantled M16s inside of them. They all in unison put the weapons together, and began to march the streets.

Three hundred ninety six heavily armed men and women walked the streets of Downtown Portland. Their weapons at the ready for anyone who would dare fight against them. It wouldn’t take long before the response teams began to arrive, and the anti terrorism groups arrived as well. Soon they would have the National Guard here, alongside over a thousand police officers.

“You all have your targets.” Leonard said into the speaker, “Find them. Kill them.”

“Yes, Sir!” The rest of the anti fascist members all yelled out in unison; their voices filled the streets. They all moved out in carefully planned groups, each of them going out to specific buildings around Portland Oregon. Their targets: white supremacists that controlled the city. They were going to wipe them out once and for all: even if it cost them their lives.

There was a lot of them, and it showed. Marchers who had no idea what was going on stared in horror as hundreds of heavily armed men and women in black masks and black clothes quickly ran down the streets. Many had no idea who they were, but everyone was afraid of them.

Leonard walked down the streets with his M16 leaning on his shoulder. Five of his finest militia members marched behind him. Leonard had his own target, and he was going to make sure he was wiped out.

Screams, yells, and cries for help filled the streets. Many of the marchers who saw the black clad men and women march down the streets were immediately frightened; but the anti fascist organization members weren’t interested in them. Soon they began to enter specific buildings scattered throughout downtown portland, and that’s when the bullets began to be shot.

Downtown Portland soon became a warzone. The sounds of grenades going off and bullets going off soon echoed throughout the large metropolitan city. Leonard couldn’t help but smile. His plan was working. He had sixty squads total, and so far, fifteen of them had reported success in the span of ten minutes. This was going to be easier than he thought.

It didn’t take long for Leonard to reach his target building, when he got there, they walked in casually, like they had no care in the world; until security saw them. The five members with him immediately took out any and all security that confronted them. Leonard grinned, “Nice job. Keep on high alert, the man here is a billionaire, and he has over fifty security members at his disposal. There are forty five left.”

“Yes, Sir!” The five militia members responded immediately. They all moved as one unit; Leonard, the leader of the group, Andrea a senior member of Antifacist Organization, Scott, a retired Navy Seal, Hunter, a reserve Green Berrett, Tanya, a retired field medic for the marines, and Victor, a retired Navy Seal in the same squad as Scott. They were all very deadly individuals, and they were all hungry for revenge.

The building they were in was a twenty story insurance building named: Walter and Co, Insurance. Walter, the owner of the company, was one of the most corrupt, white supremacist sympathizing billionaires in the west side of the country, and Leonard wanted him dead. For years, Walter had been funding small right-wing militias such as the KKK, the Chosen Ones, and the Templars. He was the reason why they were a threat, and it was time to get rid of him.

“Everyone get to the ground!” Leonard yelled as employees screamed and tried to figure out what was going on. “We are not here for you; stay on the ground and you will be fine!” Leonard yelled out again.

They moved through the lobby and quickly took cover as ten more security officers made it down the stairs and the elevator; they were responding quick. Leonard and his team quickly fired at the officers, taking out six of them immediately while the four that were left quickly took cover.

Hunter threw out a grenade at their cover and fished them out, which was then followed up by accurate shots from the rest of the group. The security officers were wiped out as quickly as they came. “Thirty five left.” Leonard said into the speaker.

They quickly moved towards the stairway and began to climb up. This was the most dangerous way of doing it, but it was also the most accessible. As they climbed up the spiraling stairways, they clung to the walls. The security team continued to respond, ten officers came from the top, and ten came from the bottom floors.

“Hunter, Victor, and Tanya, watch our six; take out any of the bottom officers that get too close. The rest of us, push forward, take them out before they can shoot at us.”

“Yes, sir!” They responded. They worked well as a team, and all five of the members had complete trust in Leonard, so they did whatever he asked of them. The six of them simultaneously took out security officers left and right. The forward three quickly wiped out six descending officers, while the back three wiped out seven of the ascending officers. Hunter threw another grenade down the stairs, and took out the remaining three in one swoop.

They were building momentum now. The remaining four security officers stopped descending and immediately began to retreat up. “They’re retreating!” Leonard said with a grin. There was only 19 security officers left, and something told Leonard that Walter was getting desperate.

The group moved up the stairs quickly now; Walter’s office was on the 19th floor. Leonard figured he would either hide in his office, or he would try to get to the roof. Did he have a helicopter coming? He didn’t have a helicopter pad, and no room for one to land, but Leonard bet that the scared billionaire would do whatever he could to get out of there.

The group were at floor seventeen in a few minutes, the endurance and training that Leonard had put them through was showing. They were all ready to finish what they started, and the adrenaline pumping through their veins gave them the extra push to continue forward.

As soon as they made it to floor eighteen ten security officers quickly came out and opened fire. Leonard’s team retaliated immediately, taking down seven of them in unison. The three remaining continued to fire, and two of their shots connected: Hunter and Tanya were hit, but both of them retaliated by taking their attackers out before falling. The rest of the group finished the last remaining officer and stopped to see the casualties.

Tanya groaned, “Leave us! Finish the mission!” Hunter nodded in agreement, “Finish this, or this will be for nothing! Tanya is a field medic: we are fine!”

Leonard gave them a nod, “We will be back for you.” The four remaining Antifacist members quickly made it up to the nineteenth floor. The door was locked, but Scott quickly placed a charge on the door and they all stepped back.

“Clear.”

“Initiating!” Scott yelled as he activated the bomb. The door fell off its hinges, and the four of them moved inside. They were met by five officers, and the four of them took them out quickly.

Walter’s security team was pathetic, Leonard thought to himself. “Walter’s not here.”  He said with a groan, “Upstairs!”

The four of them quickly ran back to the staircase and went up to the last floor, then up to the roof. There was Walter, with four of his remaining officers around them.

“Stop them you pathetic goons!!!” Walter yelled as he saw Leonard and his team make it up to the roof. Walter was there, waiting for a helicopter to get to him, his entire suit was drenched in sweat.

The remaining security officers immediately dropped their weapons and raised their hands in defeat, this group of six people had managed to wipe out forty six of them; they weren’t going down with them.

Leonard grinned, “Good choice, Lads. Now get on your knees and elbows, I want your hands on the backs of your heads.” Leonard’s team quickly ran up and removed the weapons from the remaining security officers.

Walter eyed the situation with a furious gasp, “What?!! What do I pay you for!! Idiots!!”

Leonard smirked at Walter, “You can’t pay your way out of everything, Walter.”

“Leonard you fucking cuck! I knew I should have had you killed you like I killed your wife and kids a long time ago!”

“Yeah, you should have.” And with that, Leonard brought his gun up and fired one bullet: straight into Walter’s forehead. The white supremacist billionaire then fell to the ground, lifeless.

“Good riddance.” Leonard said as he stood over Walter’s dead body. Leonard’s team quickly surveyed the area for any hiding security officers that were left.

“Can we check on Tanya and Hunter?” Scott asked.

“Yes, Scott and Victor, go make sure they’re okay. Andrea, stay with me.”

“Yes, Sir!” Scott and Victor quickly ran back down the staircase to look over their comrades.

Andrea came up to Leonard’s side as Leonard walked to the edge of the building they were on. Hundreds of police cars lined up around the building they were in. It would only be a matter of time before they had over a hundred S.W.A.T officers on them.

“We completed our mission.” Leonard said softly.

“That we did, Leonard.” Andrea smiled at him, “We did it. Now we just have to hope the rest complete theirs as well.”

Leonard nodded in agreement. The large amount of red white and blue lights filled the streets of Portland for hundreds of yards. There were thousands of them.

Leonard quickly brought his speaker up, “Antifacist Oregonians, you have done well today. Your deeds will go down as a victory for all people within the United States. With this victory, we will show the fascist regime in the United States that we can not be intimidated into submission. Your tributes to this monumental victory will be shared worldwide; as we speak, we have hundreds of our finest journalists writing articles on this monumental victory. Soon, the entire world will know what you all did.” Leonard smiled as he held the speaker up to his mouth, “It was an honor serving with you all. You all made me proud, and you made your country proud. This is what we live and die for; this is why we are antifacists!!” Leonard yelled into the speaker as he took a deep breath and exhaled.

Leonard and Andrea looked at each other and smiled as they turned to face the door to the staircase. Twenty S.W.A.T officers soon came to the roof, all of their weapons aimed at Andrea and Leonard.

“You are under arrest! Drop your weapons and come peacefully, or we will engage!” One of the S.W.A.T Officers yelled out.

Leonard looked at Andrea and smirked, “Should we?”

“Nah.” She said with a grin, “I’m not going to jail.”

Leonard chuckled, they both brought up their rifles and fired. The S.W.A.T team immediately retaliated and killed both of them in seconds before swarming the roof.

Leonard and his team had completed their mission, and so had fifty five out of the sixty squads total. A monumental victory for them indeed.

**

This story is entirely a work of fiction; any relevance or similarities to any existing organizations are used to help set the setting of the story. None of these characters exist in real life. 

[ap-apt]

Recap of ICHH marathon reading

It snowed. It sleeted. There were 40 mph winds. If I didn’t believe in climate change, I’d say it was as if someone wanted to stop our marathon reading of It Can’t Happen Here. But we started with a crowd of 50 people, many of whom stayed for the first several chapters.

People came and went throughout the event. Friends showed up. Strangers showed up. Most stayed for 50-60 pages. A handful of people came at the beginning, left, and came back for the end. A couple said they went home and read some there, then came back for the finale.

One audience member named Alex stayed from start to finish.

Around chapter 29, I’d been awake for 24 hours.

We discovered the best way to stay alert was to move around. So people paced. Slow laps, circling in the back. We all wanted to hang in for as long as we could.

Shortly after the middle of the novel, Shuchi started streaming the reading via Facebook Live.

Toward the end of chapter 30, I was falling asleep. I took a 20-minute nap, and woke up not knowing where I was. Then, I heard Ann Leamon reading chapter 31. I remembered what was happening. I rejoined the reading and stayed awake through the rest of the event. After I read the final chapter, I reminded everyone of how we began.

The night started with a presentation, an overview of Lewis’s career, covering who he was and who he wasn’t (a writer who refused a Pulitzer Prize, and later was awarded the Nobel, Lewis never said “When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.”), also covering what the novel was and wasn’t. It wasn’t hindsight after World War II. It was a warning of the potential danger on its way. Lewis wrote ICHH before concentration camps were synonymous with extermination camps. He wrote it before Hitler’s capacity for malice was fully realized. Lewis wrote during a period of self-assured apathy—people were so sure that America had seen the worst there was of humanity (during the first World War). Of course, it could and did get worse. But that didn’t keep Lewis from rendering his warning.

I have a list of highlights from the marathon reading, but I need to be clear: it’s hard to say that any single amazing moment outweighs my amazement at the event overall. The book is rough. It’s filled with hateful, scared people carrying out orders and making decisions motivated by hate and fear. There’s personal violence and political violence. And, as the novel goes on, more people die by grisly methods.

And beyond that, of course, there are the parallel threats we face now:

The authoritarian in the White House. The constant distraction (Mexico, a dangerous religion, regular allusions to his election rival, etc.). The potential that the president has conflicts of interest (in the novel, he’s embezzling millions). The silencing of journalists, potentially by force. The hunting and killing of people who know more than the government feels they should. We’ve only seen it in Russia thus far, but it’s tied to our election.

ICHH is a difficult book to read just on its own. It’s harder still to handle with the current political climate. I was worried going in that people wouldn’t spot Lewis’s message, and the indomitable spirit of those who would resist attempts at silence. But I was grateful to be wrong.

One woman came up to me after the reading and said her book club had read the novel right after the election, but it hadn’t struck her as funny until she heard us read it aloud.

I laugh at all sorts of inappropriate subjects and times, so I blurted out, “Really?” She said it had been too soon.

More than one person in the audience said the relevance was hard to take. And I understand—I agree—but that’s hardship I think we need right now. This book is not easy, but neither is the situation we’re facing.

In the novel, the authoritarian government sabotages itself due to in-fighting. That could potentially happen to the current administration, but even before that, we’re still facing suppressed speech. Last week, the administration banned the words “climate change,” “emissions reduction,” and “Paris Agreement” in memos, briefings, and other written communication. What can we do in response? Lewis rendered a skeptical journalist who had to be faced with murder of someone he knew before he would speak out against an authoritarian regime. Let’s not wait that long.

If you’re a teacher, a writer, a parent, you can reach a community (even a community of two) who trust you. You can insist on remaining committed to facts. You can write about climate change. You can describe it, define it, make an easy-to-read overview of the Paris Agreement. You can write about how the lives of people of color are more adversely affected by climate change. You can explain to anyone—anyone, your neighbors, your kids, your family members who might be supportive of this administration—the dangers inherent in censorship.

This reading was fun, but it was also more than that—it’s a simple blueprint of what we need to do. Resist, despite the threats. Remain committed to facts, despite the dishonesty we’re fed on a daily basis. And remember that this doesn’t have to be a dour fight. We can fight and still experience joy. And just because we’re tired—and I’m speaking from experience here—we can still rally and make a difference.

And now, as promised, here are the highlights from the reading:

Aaron Devine’s decision to channel Drumpf through Buzz Windrip for the election chapter.

Simeon Berry’s rousing impression of Bishop Paul Peter Prang.

Nathan Gray’s quiet fury in reading the chapter when Lorinda decides to leave.

Tim Hoover doing justice for the Jessup daughters in two different chapters several hours apart—Sissy, still funny and lighthearted at that point, and then the sober fearlessness of Mary’s death

Ann Leamon’s astounding (and consistent) commitment to lending literal voice to every man at Trianon Concentration Camp.

Shuchi Saraswat’s dual dead-of-night chapters (the near escape to Canada, and the formation of the resistance publication the Vermont Vigilance), both read with the tension required by both the late hour and the content.

And every reader who pounded the podium with exasperation when the chapter seemed to call for it (Rob Arnold, Josh Cook, Randolph Pfaff and many others that I’m likely forgetting.

I feel so indebted to all the readers—Molly Howes, Kurt Klopmeier, Simeon Berry, Danielle Jones-Pruett, Maria Hugger, Ric Amante, Julia Kennedy, Rob Arnold, Aaron Devine, Josh Cook, Tim Hoover, William Pierce (who bravely took on another chapter!), Lindsay Guth, Joell Beagle, Travis Cohen, Currie McKinley, Shuchi Saraswat, Randolph Pfaff, Nathan Gray, Sam Cha, Catherine Parnell, JoeAnn Hart, Ann Leamon, Nicole Keller, Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich, and Molly Mary McLaughlin. A hundred thousand thank yous especially to the staff of Brookline Booksmith, and doubly (triply) Shuchi Saraswat and Lydia McOscar for helping me in innumerable ways to plan and shape this event. And so much gratitude to Randolph, who kept running to get coffee through the night. And to every single person who came, despite the atrocious weather, I thank you.

To watch some of the readings, check out Brookline Booksmith’s Facebook page, as they were kind enough to capture some of the readings via Facebook Live.

And for more photos and videos, head to our FB and Instagram feeds.

Recap of ICHH marathon reading was originally published on Aforementioned Productions

[newstfionline]

These presidents all said they were going to change America. How’d that work out?

By Joel Achenbach, Washington Post, January 18, 2017

Twenty-four years ago, William Jefferson Clinton promised change.

“Thomas Jefferson believed that to preserve the very foundations of our nation, we would need dramatic change from time to time,” the 42nd president said in his first inaugural address. “Well, my fellow Americans, this is our time.”

He had been echoing Jefferson promiscuously for days. Jefferson had won the first “change election” in American history, in 1800--federalists out, “republicans” in--and now Clinton had ended 12 years of Republican occupation of the White House. He had journeyed to Washington from Monticello, recreating Jefferson’s trip 191 years earlier, this time in a bus with a license plate reading “Hope 1.”

His predecessor had been a heroic World War II pilot, part of the Greatest Generation. Clinton was a boomer. The Cold War was over, and Clinton vowed to focus on domestic issues, boost the economy, help the middle class, reinvent government and provide universal health care while balancing the budget and just in general being transformational.

Then came reality. “Dramatic change” in Washington is hard to come by--as Clinton and just about every other “change” candidate has learned.

Donald Trump vowed to drain the swamp of Washington, but here’s a different metaphor: It’s a fortress, with moats, drawbridges, hidden passageways, secret tunnels, dungeons. Outsiders struggle to master the place. Among the impediments to change is the Constitution. It fetishizes the distribution of power. Members of Congress take seriously the notion that they’re part of an equal branch of government. Supreme Court justices and federal judges have life tenure. The president’s own turf, the executive branch, is a bureaucracy staffed by civil servants who do not always jump on command.

And so, although the president of the United States may be the most powerful figure in the world, we recall what Harry Truman said when Dwight Eisenhower was about to succeed him: “He’ll sit here, and he’ll say, ‘Do this! Do that!’ And nothing will happen. Poor Ike--it won’t be a bit like the Army.”

The job of a president today is something that Jefferson could not have recognized when he took the oath in 1801. At the time, the federal government was tiny, and Jefferson vowed to downsize it further, including reductions in the Army and Navy. He wound up nearly doubling the size of the nation, via the Louisiana Purchase, and he pushed a trade embargo that set the stage for the War of 1812. Sometimes presidents change things in ways they don’t intend.

A populist down on bankers. Andrew Jackson was the most prominent change candidate of the first half of the 19th century. He was a populist who ran against the Eastern bankers and ended the grip on the presidency of the Adams family and the Virginia planters. His 1829 inauguration was marked by a wild White House party in which inebriated supporters--a drunken mob, as some saw it--drank whiskey-laden punch and broke china and furniture. Jacksonian democracy had arrived, though for Native Americans it led to the Trail of Tears, and Jackson’s battle against the banks led to economic chaos and eventually, soon after he left office, the depression known as the Panic of ‘37.

Nothing brought change to America so dramatically as the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln, which triggered secession, civil war, emancipation, the Constitutional prohibition of slavery, and a new beginning for the nation in which the words “the United States” would generally be treated as a singular rather than a plural. Some 750,000 Americans died in the war, and Lincoln was fated to be the final casualty.

Change didn’t always require an election. Teddy Roosevelt, just 42 years old, took the oath after William McKinley died from gunshot wounds. The energetic young president co-opted the press corps and used the presidency’s “bully pulpit” to do battle with monopolists and robber barons and push a progressive agenda.

Every modern change-agent president labors in the long shadow cast by Franklin Delano Roosevelt and his first hundred days in office. But the conditions that enabled the passage of FDR’s New Deal were unique. He took the oath of office at the nadir of the Great Depression. Banks were locking their doors. Unemployment stood at 25 percent. Communism and fascism had taken hold in Europe, and the survival of democracy was in doubt. Some pundits called for FDR to assume dictatorial powers. Stasis was not an option.

“FDR was able to accomplish what he did in the first hundred days only because the Great Depression was rewriting the rules of the game,” says Margaret O’Mara, a historian at the University of Washington.

The Democrats won five straight presidential elections until Dwight Eisenhower captured the White House in 1952. Ike never proclaimed himself a change agent. The New Deal survived.

“What Eisenhower was most brilliant at was bureaucracy. He knew when to threaten, he knew when to pull out, he knew when to bring in outsiders,” said Heather Cox Richardson, a historian at Boston College.

Kennedy’s chilling vision. Then came John F. Kennedy and a generational change. In his inaugural address, he offered a chilling vision of a nation and a civilization on the eve of destruction. Nuclear holocaust now seemed a plausible fate.

“The world is very different now. For man holds in his mortal hands the power to abolish all forms of human poverty and all forms of human life,” Kennedy said. He spoke of “the dark powers of destruction unleashed by science,” and “mankind’s final war,” and the “hour of maximum danger.” It was scary stuff.

His point, says Larry Sabato, director of tnhjhjjjjhe Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, was that he would be just as tough on communism as any Republican. Kennedy flexed his muscles as a Cold Warrior and, just a few months into his term, approved the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba--a complete fiasco. The young president had to learn on the job.

Kennedy’s assassination put Lyndon Johnson in the White House. Johnson’s mastery of the Washington political machinery is unmatched in modern times, and after his landslide 1964 victory he succeeded in advancing his Great Society agenda of social programs and civil rights laws. LBJ showed what an aggressive president coupled with a friendly Congress can do. “The presidency is a battering ram,” writes historian Stephen Skowronek in his book “The Politics Presidents Make.”

That aggression proved LBJ’s undoing, however. He fully owned America’s escalation in Vietnam, and as the war revealed itself to be a tragic quagmire, he lost public support and went on prime-time television to say he would not seek reelection.

That led to a change in party control of the White House. Richard Nixon had vowed that he, personally, had changed since his younger days. He was “the new Nixon.” In his first inaugural address he called for political harmony.

“To lower our voices would be a simple thing,” Nixon said.

Voices, however, were not lowered, and not simply because the Vietnam War dragged on for years. Nixon had a deep flaw in his temperament: insecurity, which expressed itself as resentment and paranoia. His White House became a dark place of dirty tricks, slush funds, an enemies list and “plumbers” to plug news leaks.

William Safire, a Nixon aide, later wrote a book that described Nixon as a layer cake. Formal on top. Below that a progressive. Below that a poker player. “Under that is the hater, the impugner of motives, the man who claims he is not angry with the press because he cannot be angry with somebody he does not respect.”

Watergate destroyed Nixon’s presidency and serves as an enduring lesson that character matters.

‘Their time has run out.’ When Jimmy Carter ran for president in 1976, he embraced his status as outsider: “The insiders have had their chance and they have not delivered. And their time has run out.”

His inaugural message was high-minded, bordering on moralizing. He talked of “the spiritual strength” and the “moral strength” of the nation, and the obligation to take on “moral duties.” In his inaugural parade, he and the first lady surprised everyone by getting out of their armored limousine and walking on Pennsylvania Avenue. He was just Jimmy, a peanut farmer from Georgia--a dramatic change in presidential style.

But as soon as he entered the White House, he alienated Democrats in Congress by going after their pork-barrel projects. He didn’t think he needed a chief of staff, and so day to day, Carter micromanaged, overconfident in his ability to study every issue, read every report. Things went south in the coming years: gas lines, soaring inflation, the Iran hostage crisis, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Carter beat back a Democratic primary challenge from liberal hero Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, but on election night 1980 Carter was buried in the Ronald Reagan landslide.

Historians say Reagan came closest among modern presidents to matching FDR’s success in changing Washington. Though vowing revolution, Reagan was also a pragmatist. He picked his rival George H.W. Bush (who was ultra-establishment) as his running mate, and installed as his first chief of staff Bush’s campaign chairman, James A. Baker.

Reagan was, as historian Richard Reeves put it, a “clean-desk man,” sticking to a 9-to-6 work schedule with a lunch break upstairs with the first lady and, often, a nap. He ran Cabinet meetings that often ended with the directive, “You fellas work it out.”

In his first inaugural address Reagan had decried deficit spending: “For decades we have piled deficit upon deficit, mortgaging our future and our children’s future for the temporary convenience of the present.”

And then he proved to be the biggest deficit spender since FDR. Reagan pushed through a large tax cut and a huge boost in military spending. Deficits soared to levels not seen since World War II. But he didn’t pay a political price for that and won reelection in another landslide.

The ‘New Democrat.’ After Reagan, the word “liberal” became a pejorative. When Bill Clinton won the presidency, he did so by running as a “New Democrat,” a triangulator, renouncing old-school Democratic tax-and-spend policies. Clinton’s goal of “dramatic change” fell victim to Republican intransigence and his own lack of professional and personal discipline. And a more subtle change was also afoot: The political parties had become more ideologically consistent and, thus, more polarized.

Clinton took office with an economic stimulus plan, but he could never get it through the Senate. His push for universal health care failed spectacularly. His successful proposals skewed conservative, and he lamented to his staff that they had become Eisenhower Republicans. After learning early on that Congress had put limitations on new spending, he exploded with frustration.

“I won’t have a goddamn Democratic budget until 1996!” Clinton fumed, according to a memoir by his labor secretary, Robert Reich. “Education, job training--none of the things I campaigned on. What’ll I be able to tell the average working person I did for him?”

The Democrats were clobbered in the midterm election, losing the House for the first time in 40 years. For Clinton, that was the wrong kind of change.

Barack Obama made change the central theme of his 2008 presidential bid, saying in his convention speech, “Change happens--change happens because the American people demand it, because they rise up and insist on new ideas and new leadership, a new politics for a new time. America, this is one of those moments.”

And change did happen, as he became the first African American in the White House, coming into office with high approval ratings in the midst of the Great Recession. Republican leaders in Congress chose the path of obstruction. Obama’s successful legislative efforts relied almost exclusively on Democratic votes, and as Democrats lost power on the Hill, he resorted to executive orders--actions that can be wiped out with the stroke of a pen. Some of Obama’s signature achievements could prove to be ephemeral.

Every presidency is unique and unscripted, except for the oath of office, unchanged since it was written in 1787--Article II, Section One of the Constitution. Obama in 2009 had to take the oath twice because both he and the chief justice flubbed it the first time.

History isn’t predictive, but it’s a guide. One broad lesson is something Obama said he learned only after he arrived in the White House:

“The federal government and our democracy is not a speedboat,” Obama said. “It’s an ocean liner.”

[esonetwork]

Timestamp #203: Turn Left

New Post has been published on https://esonetwork.com/timestamp-203-turn-left/

Timestamp #203: Turn Left

Doctor Who: Turn Left (1 episode, s04e11, 2008)

  What could have been if not for a Noble companion?

The Doctor and Donna have stopped in a bustling marketplace on an alien world. While mixing it up with the locals, Donna wanders away to explore and finds herself in the company of a local fortuneteller. Offered a free reading since she’s a redhead, Donna takes a seat. The fortuneteller talks to her about the Doctor and Donna recounts her first meeting with the Time Lord.

While a mysterious scurrying occurs behind her, she flashes back to her time as a temp with H.C. Clements and the offer she turned down businessman Jival Chowdry. The moment of decision for her entire future was sitting at an intersection with her mother. She turned left…

…but what if she had turned right?

A large insect latches on to her back and the fortuneteller convinces her to turn right. She does.

The next time we see Donna Noble, she’s at a Christmas party celebrating her recent promotion with a round of drinks for her friends. One of her friends, Alice, almost sees the creature on her back, but they’re interrupted by the arrival of the Racnoss Webstar. The invading spacecraft is destroyed by UNIT and the Racnoss queen was killed, but the Doctor drowned in the assault. He was unable to regenerate.

Donna walks away by is soon met by none other than Rose Tyler. She came so far but was too late to meet with the Doctor, but she spots the insect on Donna’s back before vanishing into thin air.

Due to the closure of the Thames, Chowdry’s company has been losing money and Donna has been fired. Simultaneously, the Royal Hope Hospital has vanished into the sky. When it returns, there is only one survivor: Medical student Oliver Morgenstern. He was saved by Martha Jones, but she died as a result. Sarah Jane Smith and the Bannerman Road Gang were there as well, but they died while trying to stop the incursion. Wilfred is convinced that aliens are to blame, but Donna wants to hear none of it.

Donna takes a walk and finds Rose again as she emerges from loud flashes of light. The insect comes up again before Rose asks her about Christmas plans. She suggests that Donna and her family take a holiday, using the winnings from a future raffle ticket to afford it. Donna warns her to stay away and Rose vanishes again.

Sure enough, next Christmas, Donna’s family travel to the countryside. On Christmas Day, they watch as the Titanic smashes into Buckingham Palace. As a mushroom cloud rises over London – and Donna nearly spots the insect in a mirror – the terror and shock set in as they realize that everyone they know is dead.

Now refugees, her family is forced to relocate to Leeds to escape the radiation. Meanwhile, France has closed its borders to refugees, but the Nobles are allocated a house with two other families. The United States offers monetary assistance, but they are forced to withdraw their support when sixty million Americans are killed and converted to Adipose. Every major world city is affected as well.

The Nobles bond with their housemates, but they’re interrupted by soldiers firing at cars. The Sontarans have activated the ATMOS system and covered the planet in a poisonous fog. One of the soldiers spots the insect and takes aim at Donna, but he can’t find it later. Donna follows the flashing lights to find Rose in a nearby alley.

The two companions sit on a bench and talk about the crisis. The sky lights up as the gas burns away, courtesy of Torchwood Three. Gwen and Ianto died in the attempt, and Jack was taken to the Sontaran homeworld. Rose talks about the Doctor, how he saved the world from all of these events, and how Donna traveled with him in another reality. Had she been there to save him from himself under the Thames, the world would be in a better place. Rose has come to warn the Doctor of a darkness that threatens both of their universes, calling Donna the most important woman in the whole of creation.

Rose asks her to come along, finally settling on a time three weeks from now. She vanishes with an ominous prophecy: Donna Noble will die.

The Nobles bid farewell to their Italian housemates, courtesy of a new law that evicts all immigrants from England. They’re going to labor camps, which Wilf recognizes as the first step to fascism that he fought against before. Later that night, Wilf and Donna relax by the fire as he looks through his telescope. While trying to find Orion, the stars vanish from the night sky. Donna finds Rose and tells her that she is ready.

They hitch a ride with UNIT to a warehouse filled with computers, mirrors, and the TARDIS. The police box was salvaged from the Thames wreckage, and when Donna goes in, she finds it cold and dark even though she’s amazed. The ship is dying but still trying to muster the energy to help.

Using that energy, Rose is able to show Donna the insect with a circle of mirrors. The beetle feeds off time, specifically from decisions not made. By turning right instead of left, Donna has given the beetle a temporal smorgasbord. Rose recognizes that both the Doctor and Donna are necessary to stop the stars from going out. Scared out her mind, Donna asks what she can do to help.

Rose tells her that Donna needs to travel through time.

After a quick briefing, Donna steps back into the mirror circle – which is actually a homemade time machine – with the intent of changing her car’s direction. The machine is activated, but Donna has the revelation that she still has to die to save the world.

She materializes on a sidewalk in Sutton Court, half a mile and three minutes from her destiny. She starts running but soon realizes that she won’t make it in time. With the revelation echoing in her mind, she understands what she has to do.

She steps out in front of a truck, sacrificing her life to cause a traffic jam. As Donna dies, Rose whispers two words in her ear as a message for the Doctor, and Donna Noble turns left.

The insect falls off as the reset button is pushed. The Doctor comes in as the fortuneteller runs off, and Donna wraps him in a hug. They examine the insect as they talk about Donna’s adventure and her knack for finding parallel worlds. The Doctor wonders about the coincidences in their travels together, and when he calls her brilliant, Donna remembers Rose.

Except she never knew Rose’s name.

But she does know two words: Bad Wolf.

The Doctor rushes back to the TARDIS, seeing “Bad Wolf” everywhere. Inside, the console room is bathed in red light and the Cloister Bell is ringing.

The end of the universe is coming.

  This “what if” story is a great dark tale that is really just a setup for the season finale. We get the greatest hits of the Tenth Doctor’s saves of Earth without seeing much of David Tennant at all. He was filming Midnight while Catherine Tate was engaged on this “Doctor-lite” adventure, one in a similar vein to Love & Monsters and Blink, but with a much darker direction.

It’s also a tease for the all-star cavalcade to come with nice touches for each mention: Martha’s theme and a pop of the Torchwood theme accompany their non-appearances, and the news report surrounding Sarah Jane’s heroic death mentions her employment with the Metropolitan, which is where she mentioned working to the Third Doctor in Planet of the Spiders. Rose obviously gets her theme throughout.

Catherine Tate sells this story, from Donna’s depression as the planet falls apart around her to her abject terror when she finally sees the time beetle on her back, which finally pays off the prophecy from The Fires of Pompeii. Her acting skill is just amazing and is showcased by not being overshadowed by or in competition with Tennant’s energy.

  Rating: 4/5 – “Would you care for a jelly baby?”

    UP NEXT – Doctor Who: The Stolen Earth and Doctor Who: Journey’s End

    The Timestamps Project is an adventure through the televised universe of Doctor Who, story by story, from the beginning of the franchise. For more reviews like this one, please visit the project’s page at Creative Criticality.

[networkingdefinition]

Europe Quotes

Official Website: Europe Quotes

  • A day will come when all nations on our continent will form a European brotherhood… A day will come when we shall see… the United States of America and the United States of Europe face to face, reaching out for each other across the seas. – Victor Hugo • A relatively small and eternally quarrelsome country in Western Europe, fountainhead of rationalist political manias, militarily impotent, historically inglorious during the past century, democratically bankrupt, Communist-infiltrated from top to bottom. – William F. Buckley, Jr. • Accordingly the Northern races of Europe found their inspiration in the Bible; and the enthusiasm for it has not yet quite faded away. – Lafcadio Hearn • Africa north of the Sahara, from a zoological point of view, is now, and has been since early Tertiary times, a part of Europe. This is true both of animals and of the races of man. – Madison Grant • After being boxed in by man and his constructions in Europe and the East, the release into space is exhilarating. The horizon is a huge remote circle, and no hills intervene. – Jacques Barzun • All black people who are even minimally conscious, black people who have ever experienced Europe’s technological power crusading in the vanguard of a civilizing mission, have profound feelings of inferiority and bitterly regret the fact that the Industrial Revolution did not agreeably commence in Dahomey or Dakar. Nothing is achieved by concealing this fact. – Lewis Nkosi • And everything stopped quite rapidly because I knew that nobody in Europe was able to go to space. It was the privilege of being either American or Russian. – Philippe Perrin • Antimicrobial resistance is on the rise in Europe and elsewhere in the world. We are losing our first-line antimicrobials. Replacement treatments are more costly, more toxic, need much longer durations of treatment, and may require treatment in intensive care units. – Margaret Chan • Anyone who knows history, particularly the history of Europe, will, I think, recognize that the domination of education or of government by any one particular religious faith is never a happy arrangement for the people. – Eleanor Roosevelt • As an observer of markets – whenever everyone focuses on one thing – like Greece and Europe – maybe they miss issues that are far more important – such as a meaningful slowdown in India and China. – Marc Faber • Asia’s crowded and Europe’s too old, Africa is far too hot and Canada’s too cold. And South America stole our name, let’s drop the big one. – Randy Newman • Aside from rabid Islamists, no one who wishes to be taken seriously can publicly say anything bad about the old Jews of Europe without sounding like reactionary troglodytes. – Jacob T. Schwartz • Asking Europe to disarm is like asking a man in Chicago to give up his life insurance. – Will Rogers

• Be advised that there is no parking in Europe. – Dave Barry • Being and working in America, it’s very important to work hard, work smart and work in a certain way. France and Europe has, with the tradition and culture, it’s slow-moving and it’s not always good. – Mireille Guiliano • Being away from home gave me the chance to look at myself with a jaundiced eye. I learned not to be ashamed of a real hunger for knowledge, something I had always tried to hide, and I came home glad to start in here again with a love for Europe that I am afraid will never leave me. – Jackie Kennedy • But Maastricht was not the end of history. It was a first step towards a Europe of growth, of employment, a social Europe. That was the vision of Francois Mitterrand. We are far from that now. – Laurent Fabius • But the age of chivalry is gone. That of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded; and the glory of Europe is extinguished forever. – Edmund Burke • But, I’ve made films in Japan, in Yugoslavia, all over Europe, all over the United States, Mexico, but not Hollywood. – Sydney Pollack • Certainly the existence of these huge nuclear force was important for the ultimate confrontation, let’s say, over western Europe. You just can’t use them to deal with a situation like Afghanistan. – Lloyd Cutler • Civilization – and by this I do not mean talking cinemas and tinned food, nor even surgery and hygienic houses, but the whole moral and artistic organization of Europe – has not in itself the power of survival. It came into being through Christianity, and without it has no significance or power to command allegiance … It is no longer possible, as it was in the time of Gibbon, to accept the benefits of civilization and at the same time deny the supernatural basis on which it rests … Christianity … is in greater need of combative strength than it has been for centuries. – Evelyn Waugh • Companies in Europe should stop trying to do the U.S. version of a European idea. – Guy Kawasaki • Croatia did not want Europe to be divided as to the start of Croatia’s EU entry talks. – Stjepan Mesic • Does this boat go to Europe, France? – Anita Loos • Eighty percent of married men cheat in America. The rest cheat in Europe. – Jackie Mason • Europe and the U.K. are yesterday’s world. Tomorrow is in the United States. – Tiny Rowland • Europe cannot confine itself to the cultivation of its own garden. – Juan Carlos I of Spain • Europe cannot survive another world war. – Christian Lous Lange • Europe extends to the Alleghenies; America lies beyond. – Ralph Waldo Emerson • Europe has a long and tragic history of mostly domestic terrorism. – Gijs de Vries • Europe has to address people’s needs directly and reflect their priorities, not our own preoccupations. – Peter Mandelson • Europe has united, China is growing speedily and Russia possesses immense power in terms of fuel resources. The US administration cannot do anything about it. – Vladimir Zhirinovsky • Europe has what we [Americans] do not have yet, a sense of the mysterious and inexorable limits of life, a sense, in a word, of tragedy. And we have what they sorely need: a sense of life’s possibilities. – James A. Baldwin • Europe is a collection of free countries. – Douglas J. Feith • Europe is and will be a Union of States. – Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero • Europe is good at many things, which is why we are the largest exporter in the world. Thirty million people in Europe are employed in making our exports of goods and services. Just under 900 thousand of them are in Sweden. – Cecilia Malmstrom • Europe is so much the home of Horror, with its myths of vampires, werewolves, witchcraft and the undead, yet it’s like those myths were exported to Hollywood, leaving Europe the room to develop a new tradition as a way of processing its traumas, particularly the two world wars. – Mark Gatiss • Europe itself is an embodiment of this diversity. – Ulrich Beck • Europe thus divided into nationalities freely formed and free internally, peace between States would have become easier: the United States of Europe would become a possibility. – Napoleon Bonaparte • Europe to me is young people trying to appear middle-aged and middle-aged people trying to appear young. – Mike Myers • Europe was created by history. America was created by philosophy. – Margaret Thatcher • Ever since the Crusades, when Christians from western Europe were fighting holy wars against Muslims in the near east, western people have often perceived Islam as a violent and intolerant faith – even though when this prejudice took root Islam had a better record of tolerance than Christianity. – Karen Armstrong • Every time Europe looks across the Atlantic to see the American Eagle, it observes only the rear end of an ostrich. – H. G. Wells • Fascism is the result of the collapse of Europe’s spiritual and social order… catastrophes broke through the everyday routine which makes men accept existing forms, institutions and tenets as unalterable natural laws. They suddenly exposed the vacuum behind the facade of society. – Peter Drucker • For years, European leaders have pointed out that Europe is an economic giant, but a military pygmy. – George Robertson, Baron Robertson of Port Ellen • For years, we’ve grown dependant on American consumers as the world’s spenders of last resort. They’ve kept Europe out of recession, allowed China to industrialise, and prevented global deflation. But at the same time, they’ve not been looking after their own futures. – Evan Davis • France and the whole of Europe have a great culture and an amazing history. Most important thing, though, is that people there know how to live! In America they’ve forgotten all about it. I’m afraid that the American culture is a disaster. – Johnny Depp • From the dome of St. Peter’s one can see every notable object in Rome… He can see a panorama that is varied, extensive, beautiful to the eye, and more illustrious in history than any other in Europe. – Mark Twain • Furnished as all Europe now is with Academies of Science, with nice instruments and the spirit of experiment, the progress of human knowledge will be rapid and discoveries made of which we have at present no conception. I begin to be almost sorry I was born so soon, since I cannot have the happiness of knowing what will be known a hundred years hence. – Benjamin Franklin • Germany is probably the richest country in Western Europe. Yet they wouldn’t take any television with Duke and Ella, their reaction being that people weren’t interested in it. – Norman Granz • Greater inequality in Europe has made people less happy. – Derek Bok • Guy Peellaert was to Europe what Andy Warhol was to America – except Guy had more talent! – Jim Steranko • He is not someone who went off to play in Europe and only a few Americans follow. He has the potential to be on magazine covers and more newspaper coverage. – Lamar Hunt • Hot, dry katabatic winds, like the south foehn in Europe, the sharav in the Middle East, and the Santa Ana of Southern California, are all believed to have a decided effect on human behavior and are associated with such health problems as migraines, depression, lethargy, and moodiness. Some scientists say that this is a myth. – Tim Cahill • I am a committed European; a united Europe is Romania’s future. – Victor Ponta • I am busy touring all over Europe, Japan, and Australia. – Suzi Quatro • I am not 100% English, I am actually part Italian and even part Hungarian. Therefore I feel very much part of Europe both in my upbringing and outlook. – Bruce Bennett • I am proud of the fact that women have been recognised as being as capable, as able to do the senior jobs in Europe as any man. – Catherine Ashton • I am very proud to be a part of the Livestrong Foundation. I am maybe only a member but I give everything I can to be sure that people understand that cancer is a disease for everybody – not only in France, in Europe, in Asia, it is all over the world. We must fight together, we must make something to fight the cancer, we must Livestrong. – Gregoire Akcelrod • I believe only in French culture and consider everything in Europe that calls itself ‘culture’ a misunderstanding, not to speak of German culture. – Friedrich Nietzsche • I believe that Europe without Britain at the heart will be less reform-driven, less open, less international Europe. – Jose Manuel Barroso • I can only paint in India. Europe belongs to Picasso, Matisse, Braque India belongs only to me. – Amrita Sher-Gil • I come from a small town and I come from a background where we didn’t have money to travel. I thought I’d have to join the military to get to Europe. So I’m thrilled to travel. – Chris Isaak • I defy anyone – and I have said this to the Germans – to build a solid, articulated, and viable Europe without France’s consent. – Pierre Laval • I enjoyed the two years I was with Clannad. I enjoyed touring. We toured a lot in Europe. – Enya • I expect that my readers have been to Europe, I expect them to have some feeling for a foreign language, I expect them to have read books – there are a lot of people like that! That’s my audience. – Alan Furst • I feel fully decided that we should all go to Europe together and to work as if an established Partnership for Life consisting of Husband Wife and Children. – John James Audubon • I got the travel bug when I was quite young. My parents took me and my sisters out of school and we travelled all over Europe. It was an eye-opening experience and, although I love Norway, I also enjoy visiting new countries. I don’t get homesick. – Magnus Carlsen • I grew up in Europe, where the history comes from. – Eddie Izzard • I had always been fascinated by the whole idea that Australia was this different ecology and that when rabbits and prickly pears and other things from Europe were introduced into Australia, they ran amok. – David Gerrold • I have to come to terms with the paternalism of American business. Companies are expected to take on so many social responsibilities which are the province of the state in Europe. – Nick Denton • I have visited some places where the differences between black and white are not as profound as they used to be, but I think there is a new form of racism growing in Europe and that is focused on people who are Middle Eastern. I see it. – Montel Williams • I haven’t been everywhere, but it’s on my list. – Susan Sontag • I haven’t travelled that much before so this is the first time I get to see the big cities of Europe. I’ve never even been to US. – Ville Valo • I just went off for two months traveling around Europe on a motorcycle and pretty much turned my phone off. I did 5,000 miles with my dad. We went through Holland, Germany, Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Montenegro, Italy… and then I did Spain and France by myself. – Michael Fassbender • I learned that you can make a sci-fi film that is satisfying overseas. European people have everything in check. I’d make every sci-fi film in Europe. They only work 14 hours a day. After that, it’s overtime. – Michelle Rodriguez • I might have played a little bit more in Europe than I have in Japan. – Billy Higgins • I must walk toward Oregon, and not toward Europe. And that way the nation is moving, and I may say that mankind progress from east to west. We go eastward to realize history and study the works of art and literature, retracing the steps of the race; we go westward as into the future, with a spirit of enterprise and adventure. – Henry David Thoreau • I notice that teams are now more interested in Japanese players than when I first went to Europe. – Hidetoshi Nakata • I said, yet again, for Germany, Europe is not only indispensable, it is part and parcel of our identity. We’ve always said German unity, European unity and integration, that’s two parts of one and the same coin. But we want, obviously, to boost our competitiveness. – Angela Merkel • I saw what Purple meant to people and I still hear it now when I’m in Europe. I’m always shocked that I’m still asked about Purple because it was such a long time ago. – David Coverdale • I started writing and photographing for different publications and finally ended up being the correspondent in South Asia, for the Geneva-based Journal de Geneve, which at one time used to be one of the best international newspapers in Europe. – Francois Gautier • I still get invitations from all over Europe to speak at dinners, and it’s an honour that promoters and charities can use me to create income. – Frank Bruno • I think it does work. The fact that the law is there and injustices can be rectified, I think has a lot to do with the fact that the people in this country aren’t as frustrated as they are in some of these places in Eastern Europe and don’t resort to violent revolution. – Harold H. Greene • I think it is important for Europe to understand that even though I am president and George Bush is not president, Al Qaeda is still a threat. – Barack Obama • I think that after Church got his Ph.D. he studied in Europe, maybe in the Netherlands, for a year or two. – Stephen Cole Kleene • I think the race went as well as it could and I drove well to finish sixth. The chassis is working better and through the corners we are more or less there; we’ll move onto Europe and see if we can get further up the grid and keep improving. The weekend went pretty smooth for me until the end of the race, I don’t know what happened, but the team will have a look at it. – Daniel Ricciardo • I turn my eyes to the schools & universities of Europe And there behold the loom of Locke whose woof rages dire, Washed by the water-wheels of Newton. Black the cloth In heavy wreaths folds over every nation; cruel works Of many wheels I view, wheel without wheel, with cogs tyrannic Moving by compulsion each other: not as those in Eden, which Wheel within wheel in freedom revolve, in harmony & peace. – William Blake • I want the whole of Europe to have one currency; it will make trading much easier. – Napoleon Bonaparte • I was in Europe and it was at this stage that I fell in love with Americans in uniform. And I continue to have that love affair. – Madeleine Albright • I was with a folk trio back in ’63 and ’64, and we traveled all across North Africa, Israel, and Europe. – Creed Bratton • If Berlin fell, the US would lose Europe, and if Europe fell into the hands of the Soviet Union and thus added its great industrial plant to the USSR’s already great industrial plant, the United States would be reduced to the character of a garrison state if it were to survive at all. – Dwight D. Eisenhower • If Ireland is to become a new Ireland she must first become European. – James Joyce • If it was Europe that gave us on the coast some idea of our history, it was Europe, I feel, that also introduced us to the lie. – V. S. Naipaul • If Russia shuts off central Asia and the Caspian Sea from Europe, the European allies of the United States will be totally dependent on Russian gas and energy. – Mikhail Saakashvili • If there is one thing Britain should learn from the last 50 years, it is this: Europe can only get more important for us. – Tony Blair • If you look at most of the Royal Houses in Europe, the inbreeding was pretty outstanding. – Nikolaj Coster-Waldau • I’m not prepared to have someone tell me there is only one view of what Europe is. Europe isn’t owned by any of them, Europe is owned by all of us. – Tony Blair • Important as economic unification is for the recovery of Germany and of Europe, the German people must recognize that the basic cause of their suffering and distress is the war which the Nazi dictatorship brought upon the world. – James F. Byrnes • In 1990 we ran across Europe through 13 countries and covering 7,130 miles. – Dennis Banks • In 2012, the far-right Golden Dawn won 21 seats in Greece’s parliamentary election, the right-wing Jobbik gained ground in my native Hungary, and the National Front’s Marine Le Pen received strong backing in France’s presidential election. Growing support for similar forces across Europe points to an inescapable conclusion: the continent’s prolonged financial crisis is creating a crisis of values that is now threatening the European Union itself. – George Soros • In a few hundred years you have achieved in America what it took thousands of years to achieve in Europe. – David McCallum • In America, they shoot budgets and schedules, and they don’t shoot films any more. There’s more opportunity in Europe to make films that at least have a purity of intent. – Paul Bettany • In Europe and Australia, there is something called the Tall Poppy Syndrome: People like to cut the tall poppies. They don’t want you to succeed, and they cut you down – especially people from your own social class. – Mark Burnett • In Europe you learn not to fail, and in America you fail to learn. You need failure. – Hartmut Esslinger • In Europe, where human relations like clothes are supposed to last, one’s got to be wearable. In France one has to be interesting, in Italy pleasant, in England one has to fit. – Sybille Bedford • In Hamburg, there are three major orchestras, an opera house, and one of the great concert-hall acoustics in Europe at the Laeiszhalle, in a town a fifth the size of London. And that’s not unusual. In Germany, there are dozens of towns with two or three orchestras. The connection with music goes very, very deep. – Jeffrey Tate • In London it had seemed impossible to travel without the proper evening clothes. One could see an invitation arriving for an Embassy ball or something. But on the other side of Europe with the first faint tinges of faraway places becoming apparent and exciting, to say nothing of vanishing roads and extra weight, Embassy balls held less significance. – Robert Edison Fulton, Jr. • In Old Europe and Ancient Crete, women were respected for their roles in the discovery of agriculture and for inventing the arts of weaving and pottery making. – Carol P. Christ • In remembering the appalling suffering of war on both sides, we recognise how precious is the peace we have built in Europe since 1945. – Queen Elizabeth II • In the beginning, New York and I had kind of a love-hate relationship. It seemed so abrasive compared to Europe. But the transformation here in recent years is really something. I don’t think I would have seen as much change if I’d lived in any other city in the world. – Shalom Harlow • In the last quarter of the eighteenth century bourgeois Europe needed to emancipate itself from that combination of feudalism and commercial capitalism which we know as mercantilism. – C. L. R. James • In the villages in Europe, there are still healers who tell stories. – Yannick Noah • In this age of consumerism film criticism all over the world – in America first but also in Europe – has become something that caters for the movie industry instead of being a counterbalance. – Wim Wenders • In this country, the health concerns and the environmental concerns are as deep as in Europe. All the surveys show that. But here, we didn’t have the cultural dimension. This is a fast-food culture. – Jeremy Rifkin • Information and inspiration are everywhere… history, art, architecture, everything an illustrator needs. Europe is, after all, the land that has generated most of the enduring myths and legends of Western culture. – John Howe • Internal protectionism in Europe would be deadly, really a disaster for European economies. – Jose Manuel Barroso • It does not follow because many books are written by persons born in America that there exists an American literature. Books which imitate or represent the thoughts and life of Europe do not constitute an American literature. Before such can exist, an original idea must animate this nation and fresh currents of life must call into life fresh thoughts along the shore. – Margaret Fuller • It is hard to imagine that, having downgraded the US, S & P will not follow suit on at least one of the other members of the dwindling club of sovereign AAAs. If this were to materialise and involve a country like France, for example, it could complicate the already fragile efforts by Europe to rescue countries in its periphery. – Mohamed El-Erian • It is in order that France may find her place in the new Europe that you will respond to my appeal. – Pierre Laval • It is not to save capitalism that we fight in Russia … It is for a revolution of our own. … If Europe were to become once more the Europe of bankers, of fat corrupt bourgeoisies we should prefer Communism to win and destroy everything. We would rather have it all blow up than see this rottenness resplendent. Europe fights in Russia because it [i.e., Fascist Europe] is Socialist. what interests us most in the war is the revolution to follow The war cannot end without the triumph of Socialist revolution. – Leon Degrelle • It may be said that modern Europe with teachers who inform it that its realist instincts are beautiful, acts ill and honors what is ill. – Julien Benda • It’s been President Clinton’s dream that we’ll have finally a fully integrated Europe. – Warren Christopher • It’s hard to explain why I like Europe so much. – Broderick Crawford • It’s like night and day… to do business, in Europe, there is no bull, they are pretty straightforward. – Caprice Bourret • It’s monstrous that Europe, which is fighting for human rights, refused seriously sick Slobodan Milosevic treatment. – Vladimir Zhirinovsky • I’ve always held the view that great states need strategic space. I mean, George Washington took his space from George III. Britain took it from just about everybody. Russia took all of Eastern Europe. Germany’s taken it from everywhere they can, and China will want its space too. – Paul Keating • I’ve always liked traveling around Europe and seeing the architecture. The buildings in capital cities have been there for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years. Some look better than the new ones. – Joe Elliott • I’ve never really taken more than four days off, so it was a lot for me to go away for three-and-a-half months. I went all over Europe. I walked on a whole bunch of beaches and I did a lot of thinking. – Puff Daddy • I’ve worked behind counters serving food, and I’ve lived on the circus train, and I’ve led bicycle tours in Eastern Europe and the Balkans and Russia. I’ve been a key liner for a newspaper, I’ve done typesetting. Oh, all sorts of things. – Bonnie Jo Campbell • Japanese architecture is very much copied in this country and in Europe. – Minoru Yamasaki • Jesus was not a white man; He was not a black man. He came from that part of the world that touches Africa and Asia and Europe. Christianity is not a white man’s religion and don’t let anybody ever tell you that it’s white or black. Christ belongs to all people; He belongs to the whole world. – Billy Graham • Kosovo today is closer to Europe than other countries in the region of South Eastern Europe. – Ibrahim Rugova • Leisure was the sine qua non of the full Renaissance. The feudal nobility, having lost its martial function, sought diversion all over Europe in cultivated pastimes: sonneteering, the lute, games and acrostics, travel, gentlemanly studies and sports, hunting and hawking, treated as arts. – Mary McCarthy • Maimed but still magnificent… Europe’s mightiest medieval cathedral. – R. W. Apple • Many upscale American parents somehow think jobs like their own are part of the nation’s natural order. They are not. In Europe, they have already discovered that, and many there have accepted the new small-growth, small-jobs reality. Will we? – Daniel Henninger • Margaret Thatcher was fearful of German unification because she believed that this would bring an immediate and formidable increase of economic strength to a Germany which was already the strongest economic partner in Europe. – Douglas Hurd • Maybe this will be the beginning of a trend? Flat taxes, cutting foreign aid, a referendum on Europe, grammar schools. Who knows? – Nigel Farage • Modern Existentialism… is a total European creation, perhaps the last philosophic legacy of Europe to America or whatever other civilization is now on its way to supplant Europe. – William Barrett • Morality in Europe today is herd-morality – Friedrich Nietzsche • More and more do I see that only a successful revolution in India can break England’s back forever and free Europe itself. It is not a national question concerning India any longer; it is purely international. – Agnes Smedley • More than 95 percent of both legal and illegal immigration into the United States is non-white. Because of the way immigration law is structured, the highest-skilled nations on earth – those of Europe – are allowed only a tiny percentage of immigrants, while the third world nations such as Mexico are dumping their chaff onto American shores at the highest rate in history. – David Duke • More than any other in Western Europe, Britain remains a country where a traveler has to think twice before indulging in the ordinary food of ordinary people. – Joseph Lelyveld • Most Americans will be horrified that President Obama is compromising our deterrent to chemical and biological attacks on this country. Our allies will also be troubled by his aspiration to eliminate U.S. tactical nuclear weapons in Europe. – Frank Gaffney • Mother’s taste was eclectic and ranged from the ancient world to the contemporary from Europe to the U.S. – David Rockefeller • Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall! – Ronald Reagan • Much of America is now in need of an equivalent of Mrs. Thatcher’s privatization program in 1980s Britain, or post-Soviet Eastern Europe’s economic liberalization in the early Nineties. It’s hard to close down government bodies, but it should be possible to sell them off. And a side benefit to outsourcing the Bureau of Government Agencies and the Agency of Government Bureaus is that you’d also be privatizing public-sector unions, which are the biggest and most direct assault on freedom, civic integrity, and fiscal solvency. – Mark Steyn • Obviously, there is diversity, but Europe is a union of diversity. – Jean-Pierre Raffarin • Of course, the simple explanation of the fact is that marriage is the most important act of man’s life in Europe or America, and that everything depends upon it. – Lafcadio Hearn • Only recently, during the nineteenth century, and then only in Europe, do we meet forms of the state which have been created by a deliberate national feeling. – Christian Lous Lange • Playing Chelsea is as tough a test as you’ll get in Europe these days. – Michael Carrick • Political union means transferring the prerogatives of national legislatures to the European parliament, which would then decide how to structure Europe’s fiscal, banking, and monetary union. – Barry Eichengreen • Purity of race does not exist. Europe is a continent of energetic mongrels. – H. A. L. Fisher • Recalling some of the most spectacular horrors of history – the burning of heretics and witches at the stake, the wholesale massacre of heathens, and other no less repulsive manifestations of Christian civilization in Europe and elsewhere – modern man is filled with pride in the progress accomplished, in one line at least, since the end of the dark ages of religious fanaticism. – Savitri Devi • Remember one thing – that Sweden is performing better than the rest of Europe. – Goran Persson • Romania will always defend the Roma’s right to move freely in Europe. They are European citizens and as long as there is no evidence they broke the law they should enjoy the same rights of any European citizen. – Traian Basescu • Russia will occupy most of the good food lands of central Europe while we have the industrial portions. We must find some way of persuading Russia to play ball. – Henry L. Stimson • Since creation of the E.U. a half century ago, Europe has enjoyed the longest period of peace in its history. – John Bruton • Since Europe is dependent on imports of energy and most of its raw materials, it can be subdued, if not quite conquered, without all those nuclear weapons the Soviets have aimed at it simply through the shipping routes and raw materials they control. – Barbara Amiel • Since the web is totally worldwide, we need a set of behavioural rules, laws they are commonly called, that are accepted worldwide. There is a big difference as to how things are treated in the U.S. and Europe and Asia. – Robert Cailliau • Smart, sustainable, inclusive growth is the key to job-creation and the future prosperity of Europe. – Jose Manuel Barroso • So Europe’s a big driver. And at one point, if the euro hadn’t devalued, they would have been making as much money as the US with half the stores. Returns were higher. – Jim Cantalupo • So perhaps the most worrying single remark made by a responsible banking official during the current crisis came from Jochen Sanio, the head of Germany’s banking regulator BaFin. He warned on Aug. 1 that his country could be facing the worst banking crisis since 1931 – a reference to the collapse of Austria’s Kredit Anstalt, which provoked a wave of bank failures across Europe. – Martin Walker • Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe. – Steven Chu • Southern Europe has not done enough to enhance its competitiveness, while northern Europe has not done enough to boost demand. Debt burdens remain crushing, and Europe’s economy remains unable to grow. – Barry Eichengreen • Spain and southern Italy, in which Catholicism has most deeply implanted its roots, are even now, probably beyond all other countries in Europe, those in which inhumanity to animals is most wanton and unrebuked. – William Edward Hartpole Lecky • Spain: A whale stranded upon the coast of Europe. – Edmund Burke • Systems of religious error have been adopted in times of ignorance. It has been the interest of tyrannical kings, popes, and prelates to maintain these errors. When the clouds of ignorance began to vanish and the people grew more enlightened, there was no other way to keep them in error but to prohibit their altering their religious opinions by severe persecuting laws. In this way persecution became general throughout Europe. – Oliver Ellsworth • Talking about a materialistic thing, I get about 13 times more royalties from Europe than I do from America. – Elliott Carter • Taming the financial markets and winning back democratic control over them is the central condition for creating a new social balance in Germany and Europe. – Sigmar Gabriel • Terrorism is an evil that threatens all the countries in Europe. Vigorous cooperation in the European Union and worldwide is crucial in order to meet this evil head on. – Jan Peter Balkenende • That in order to achieve the triumph of liberty, justice and peace in the international relations of Europe, and to render civil war impossible among the various peoples which make up the European family, only a single course lies open: to constitute the United States of Europe – Mikhail Bakunin • The 1992 crisis proved that the existing system was unstable. Not moving forward to the euro would have set up Europe for even more disruptive crises. – Barry Eichengreen • The best performers in Europe are those who use their welfare states to help people adjust to change. – John Monks • The British have been more up for it than the Americans were, particularly with respect to nudity in the show. In Europe there are adverts that show the breasts, so people are less frightened of that aspect of the show. Americans can withstand incredible violence on TV shows – which, as I come from England and Canada, I find difficult to stomach – but they are more puritanical when it comes to nudity on screen. – Kim Cattrall • The children are taught more of the meanest state in Europe than of the country they are born and bred in, despite the singularity of its characteristics, the interest of its history, the rapidity of its advance, and the stupendous promise of its future. – Henry Lawson • The Christian missionary may preach the gospel to the poor naked heathen, but the spiritual heathen who populate Europe have as yet heard nothing of Christianity. – Carl Jung • The construction of Europe is an art. It is the art of the possible. – Jacques Chirac • The Drafters of the Constitution were intent on avoiding more than 100 years of religious intolerance and persecution in American colonial history and an even longer heritage of church-state problems in Europe. – John M Swomley • The driving force behind the liberal counter-offensive in Europe has been a reaction against irresponsibility. – Jacques Delors • The electronic media introduced this idea to the larger audience very, very quickly. We spent years and years and years meeting with activists all over Europe to lay the groundwork for a political response, as we did here. – Jeremy Rifkin • The EU Constitution is something new in human history. Though it is not as eloquent as the French and U.S. constitutions, it is the first governing document of its kind to expand the human franchise to the level of global consciousness. The language throughout the draft constitution speaks of universalism, making it clear that its focus is not a people, or a territory, or a nation, but rather the human race and the planet we inhabit. – Jeremy Rifkin • The European Borders Agency in Warsaw has been created to help border forces in Europe cooperate more. – Gijs de Vries • The European Union, which is not directly responsible to voters, provides an irresistible opportunity for European elites to seize power in order to impose their own vision on a newly socially regimented Europe. – Maggie Gallagher • The first time I ever saw people of any color was when D-Day left from my hometown in England, to go and free Europe from the war. And there was every color you could imagine, and I’d not seen that in England. – Richard Dawson • The fortress of Europe with its frontiers must be held and will be held too, as long as is necessary. – Heinrich Himmler • The great mistake about Europe is taking the countries seriously and letting them quarrel and drop bombs on one another. – Edmund Wilson • The immense popularity of American movies abroad demonstrates that Europe is the unfinished negative of which America is the proof – Mary McCarthy • The military superiority of Europe to Asia is not an eternal law of nature, as we are tempted to think, and our superiority in civilization is a mere delusion. – Bertrand Russell • The more you travel, the better you get at it. It sounds silly, but with experience you learn how to pack the right way. I remember one of my first trips abroad, travelling around Europe by rail, fresh out of high school. I brought all these books with me and a paint set. I really had too much stuff, so I’ve learnt to be more economical. – Roman Coppola • The new architecture of transparency and lightness comes from Japan and Europe. – Arthur Erickson • The new century demands new partnerships for peace and security. The United Nations plays a crucial role, with allies sharing burdens America might otherwise bear alone. America needs a strong and effective U.N. I want to work with this new Congress to pay our dues and our debts. We must continue to support security and stability in Europe and Asia – expanding NATO and defining its new missions, maintaining our alliance with Japan, with Korea, with our other Asian allies, and engaging China. – William J. Clinton • The poor are the blacks of Europe. – Nicolas Chamfort • The primary goal of collectivism – of socialism in Europe and contemporary liberalism in America – is to enlarge governmental supervision of individuals’ lives. This is done in the name of equality. People are to be conscripted into one large cohort, everyone equal (although not equal in status or power to the governing class) in their status as wards of a self-aggrandizing government. – George Will • The principle of evil in Europe is the enervating spirit of Russian absolutism. – Lajos Kossuth • The Romans spent the next 200 years using their great engineering skill to construct ruins all over Europe. – Dave Barry • The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato. – Alfred North Whitehead • The separation of church and state is extremely important to any of us who holds to the original traditions of our nation. . . . To change these traditions . . . would be harmful to our whole attitude of tolerance in the religious area. If we look at situations which have arisen in the past in Europe and other world areas, I think we will see the reason why it is wise to hold to our early traditions. – Eleanor Roosevelt • The settlement of America had its origins in the unsettlement of Europe. America came into existence when the European was already so distant from the ancient ideas and ways of his birthplace that the whole span of the Atlantic did not widen the gulf. – Lewis Mumford • The technologies which have had the most profound effects on human life are usually simple. A good example of a simple technology with profound historical consequences is hay. Nobody knows who invented hay, the idea of cutting grass in the autumn and storing it in large enough quantities to keep horses and cows alive through the winter. All we know is that the technology of hay was unknown to the Roman Empire but was known to every village of medieval Europe. Like many other crucially important technologies, hay emerged anonymously during the so-called Dark Ages. – Freeman Dyson • The territorial state is such an ancient form of society – here in Europe it dates back thousands of years – that it is now protected by the sanctity of age and the glory of tradition. A strong religious feeling mingles with the respect and the devotion to the fatherland. – Christian Lous Lange • The time is coming when the pressure of population on the means of subsistence will be felt here as it is now felt in Europe and Asia. Then will the world enter upon a new stage of its history – the final competition of races, for which the Anglo-Saxon is being schooled. – Josiah Strong • The tragedy of 9/11 galvanised the American superpower into action, leaving us in Europe divided in its wake. – Douglas Hurd • There are 20 million unemployed and what does the Constitution offer us in the Europe of 25, 27 and soon to be 30: policies of unrestricted competition to the detriment of production, wages, research and innovation. – Laurent Fabius • There are some great divers in Europe and I’m really excited about going to Eindhoven. – Tom Daley • There are the countries of the north of Europe taking decisions and the countries of the south of Europe that are living under intervention. This division exists. – Jose Maria Aznar • There is a grace of life which is still yours, my dear Europe. – Charles Olson • There is a hush over all Europe, nay, over all the world. Alas! it is the hush of suspense, and in many lands it is the hush of fear. Listen! No, listen carefully, I think I hear somethingyes, there it was quite clear. Dont you hear it? It is the tramp of armies crunching the gravel of the paradegrounds, splashing through rain-soaked fields, the tramp of two million German soldiers and more than a million Italiansgoing on maneuversyes, only on maneuvers! – Winston Churchill • There is an enormous difference between Russia and Western Europe. – Herman Gorter • There is no better protection against the euro crisis than successful structural reforms in southern Europe. – Mario Draghi • There is no desire from the new British players. They say their coach doesn’t travel with them so it’s hard, but I played hundreds of players from Eastern Europe and Russia who had no facilities at all. – Tim Henman • There is the grand truth about Nathaniel Hawthorne. He says NO! in thunder; but the Devil himself cannot make him say yes. For all men who say yes, lie; and all men who say no,why, they are in the happy condition of judicious, unincumbered travellers in Europe; they cross the frontiers into Eternity with nothing but a carpet-bag,that is to say, the Ego. Whereas those yes-gentry, they travel with heaps of baggage, and, damn them! they will never get through the Custom House. – Herman Melville • They have some pretty tough gun laws in Japan, as they do in any other civilized country in the world, and they’re not killing each other off with firearms. You have very violent films in Europe, yet it’s not causing the mayhem we see in our streets routinely here. – Michael D. Barnes • This film business, perhaps more so in America than in Europe, has always been about young sexuality. It’s not true of theatre, but in America, film audiences are young. It’s not an intellectual cinema in America. – Jacqueline Bisset • This revision of the Constitution will not be perfect. But at least the Constitution will not be inflexible. It will be a step towards the Social Europe which we wish. – Laurent Fabius • To be in Florence is to reflect on Europe’s intricate diversity – and its lost creativity. – Timothy Garton Ash • To enter Europe, you must have a valid passport with a photograph of yourself in which you look like you are being booked on charges of soliciting sheep. – Dave Barry • To persuade thinking persons in Eastern Europe that Central American Marxists – the Sandinistas, the guerillas in El Salvador – are in absurd and tragic error is not difficult. Poles and Czechs and Hungarians can hardly believe, after what they experienced under socialism, that other human beings would fall for the same bundle of lies, half-truths, and distortions. Sadly, however, illusion is often sweeter to human taste than reality. The last marxist in the world will probably be an American nun. – Michael Novak • To the chefs who pioneered the nouvelle cuisine in France, the ancienne cuisine they were rebelling against looked timeless, primordial, old as the hills. But the cookbook record proves that the haute cuisine codified early in this century by Escoffier barely goes back to Napoleon’s time. Before that, French food is not recognizable as French to modern eyes. Europe’s menu before 1700 was completely different from its menu after 1800, when national cuisines arose along with modern nations and national cultures. – Raymond Sokolov • To understand Europe, you have to be a genius – or French. – Madeleine Albright • Today, Germany is on the borders of Europe everywhere. – Heinrich Himmler • We are asking the nations of Europe between whom rivers of blood have flowed, to forget the feuds of a thousand years and work for the larger harmonies on which the future depends. – Winston Churchill • We are the country that has attracted the biggest volume of foreign investment in southeastern Europe in the past few years. Romania doesn’t need to beat itself, believing that it is a second-class citizen. – Traian Basescu • We cannot calculate the numbers of people who left, fled or were fished out of Europe just ahead of the Holocaust. – Gene Tierney • We don’t mind having sanctions banning us from Europe. We are not Europeans. – Robert Mugabe • We go to Europe to be Americanized. – Ralph Waldo Emerson • We have a firm commitment to NATO, we are a part of NATO. We have a firm commitment to Europe. We are a part of Europe. – Dan Quayle • We must rid this nation of the United Nations, which provides the communist conspiracy with a headquarters here on our own shores, and which actually makes it impossible for the United States to form its own decisions about its conduct and policies in Europe and Asia. – John T. Flynn • We stayed in some pretty shabby places in Europe. – Phil Collins • We swear we are not going to abandon the struggle until the Last Jew in Europe has been exterminated and is actually dead. It is not enough to isolate the Jewish enemy of mankind – the Jew has got to be exterminated! – Robert Ley • Well, I have concerns about the effectiveness of Europe to compete. – John Major • Well, what there ought to be is an international labor organization, a confederation of the trade unions of all the countries speaking for the workers who are competing with one another, and talking about the difference in wage levels between, say, Europe and Indonesia. – Richard Rorty • What we should grasp, however, from the lessons of European history is that, first, there is nothing necessarily benevolent about programmes of European integration; second, the desire to achieve grand utopian plans often poses a grave threat to freedom; and third, European unity has been tried before, and the outcome was far from happy. – Margaret Thatcher • Whatever else may divide us, Europe is our common home; a common fate has linked us through the centuries, and it continues to link us today. – Leonid Brezhnev • When I first was conducting as guest conductor in Europe 25 years ago, I would propose doing American pieces and grudgingly it would be accepted from time to time. – Michael Tilson Thomas • When I go to farms or little towns, I am always surprised at the discontent I find. And New York, too often, has looked across the sea toward Europe. And all of us who turn our eyes away from what we have are missing life. – Norman Rockwell • When I saw how the European Union was developing, it was very obvious what they had in mind was not democratic. In Britain, you vote for a government so the government has to listen to you, and if you don’t like it you can change it. – Tony Benn • When I search for Man in the technique and the style of Europe, I see only a succession of negations of man, and an avalanche of murders. – Frantz Fanon • When I’ve seen my operas in Europe, they have always struck me as more American than when I hear them here. I can’t tell you what that phenomenon is. – Carlisle Floyd • When we fled from the oppressions of kings and parliaments in Europe, to found this great Republic in America, we brought with us the laws and the liberties, which formed a part of our heritage as Britons. – Caleb Cushing • Whoever lights the torch of war in Europe can wish for nothing but chaos. – Adolf Hitler • Whoever speaks of Europe is wrong: it is a geographical expression. – Otto von Bismarck • With Christianity, freedom and equality became the two basic concepts of Europe; they are themselves Europe. – Peter Drucker • With few exceptions, democracy has not brought good government to new developing countries. What Asians value may not necessarily be what Americans or Europeans value. Westerners value the freedoms and liberties of the individual. As an Asian of Chinese cultural backround, my values are for a government which is honest, effective and efficient. – Lee Kuan Yew • With the Truman book, I wrote the entire account of his experiences in World War I before going over to Europe to follow his tracks in the war. When I got there, there was a certain satisfaction in finding I had it right – it does look like that. – David McCullough • Without Britain, Europe would remain only a torso. – Ludwig Erhard • Yes, it is Europe, from the Atlantic to the Urals, it is Europe, it is the whole of Europe, that will decide the fate of the world. – Charles de Gaulle • You either believe in Europe at any price: in other words we have to be in Europe at any price because you can’t survive without it, or you don’t. If you don’t it tends to suggest there is a price which you are not willing to pay. – Liam Fox • You, the Spirit of the Settlement! … Not understand that America is God’s crucible, the great melting-pot where all the races of Europe are melting and re-forming! Here, you stand, good folk, think I, when I see them at Ellis Island, here you stand in your fifty groups, with your fifty languages and histories, and your fifty blood hatreds and rivalries. – Israel Zangwill • Your map of Africa is really quite nice. But my map of Africa lies in Europe. Here is Russia, and here… is France, and we’re in the middle – that’s my map of Africa. – Otto von Bismarck