#jobless but going to probably work at michaels again

[bongsavior]

she's just gonna shut everyone out in response huh 😔

[glitchytrait]

Whoever Loves Her Next - 02

*Trigger warning for mention of drug abuse*

The wait from finding out I was pregnant to getting on the plane was almost unbearable. The soonest flight out of Mason’s home in California wasn’t for another two days, and those two days were full of lies. To myself, my work, and probably worst of all - my parents. I promised them I’d be home after a week and a half of spending time with Mason, and now I was supposed to be exploring some sights for an extra two days. Instead, I’m flying to Florida where Harry has been on his songwriting retreat.

Thankfully, I had enough trust in our mutual friend Alex to tell me when it was best to come. I’ve known him for years, having met him back when Pink Nemesis was still together. It took Harry a while to introduce me to any of his fellow bandmates or staff, but he eventually caved and took me to see them for my birthday four years ago. Alex had been the one both Harry and I got along with the most, so it made sense that they’d still be working together even after the band split.

Things are so different now than they were then. It hurts somewhere deep in my chest to think back to last year and everything that happened leading up to the end of the band. It started with one of the members going to rehab for a drug overdose, and following more physical fights than I can count on one hand, the final nail in the coffin was Michael.

Because of what happened, nobody blamed Harry for not being able to pick himself back up and plaster a fake smile for concert after concert. Pink Nemesis breaking up was the last thing he wanted, but he had been the first one to suggest the idea. The rest of the members put up little resistance. After six years of constant albums and world tours, they were drained. And now, everyone who had been a part of the band was almost unrecognizable.

While one member returned to a life of working 9-5 and going to church on Sundays, another went solo almost immediately and crashed and burned. The third stayed somewhere in the middle of it all, collaborating with other artists here and there while also settling down with his soon-to-be wife. Then there was Harry.

After Michael, his only comforts were his guitar and bottles of alcohol. I can still remember all the countless times I tried to pull him out of it. Still hear me screaming at him to look at me. Still feel myself walking away from him when he probably needed it most.

As for me, I expected myself to be far from where I am now. After our breakup, I thought I would be out partying with friends until the sun came up.

I thought I would flirt with guys without a care in the world.

Hell, I even thought maybe I’d find a new fling.

But most importantly of all, I thought I’d learn to fall in love with being alive again.

But I hadn’t done any of that. Instead, I laid in my room crying my heart out when I thought of the fact that Harry and I were over. I remained jobless for over a month just so I could stay home doing nothing all day. I ignored my friends, my family, and the voice telling me that leaving Harry was a mistake.

All of these things had led to this moment. Stepping off the plane and into Alex’s awaiting arms, who is ready to wipe away the tears the moment they fall. I take advantage of the moment of peace being close to him, knowing that all hell would break loose the moment I saw Harry again.

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[deans-haunted-baby]

Lately I can’t stop thinking about Adam, like I’m legit crushed over what this show did to him. I know Supernatural was never perfect but the way it treated this character was so damn vicious, condescending and nasty; no different than a high school bully picking on an injured elementary schooler.

He never stood a chance. The thing is I don’t know what it was that made me latch onto Adam so strongly for over a decade. Maybe I could just sympathize and easily relate to his situation of being discarded and forgotten by family members. Or maybe I saw potential in this character and couldn’t fathom why no one else on that writing staff and the SPN fandom couldn’t.

I want you to take a second and absorb these pertinent facts about Adam Milligan that this show put forward. This is not anti-anything this is all the truth so bare with me:

He was the illegitimate youngest child of hunter John Winchester; a man who treated his older sons Sam and Dean like soldiers on his platoon.

Adam only saw his bio dad ONCE A YEAR and it was only to take him to ball games not to train him so that he could protect himself and his mother from (supernatural) threats.

He never knew the existence of his older brothers nor did they know about him because John deliberately ripped those pages out of his journal. Essentially trying to erase any evidence of Adam and Kate.

Because Adam grew up having no clue what was out there or about the “family business”  he and his mother suffered VIOLENT PRE-MATURE DEATHS at the hands of ghouls which Adam STILL REMEMBERS long after being murdered.

Oh and John failed to kill those ghouls, providing them the golden opportunity of impersonating him and his mother so they could kill John and his half-brothers.

Adam was only an 18 year old pre-med studying medicine. Probably wanted to follow in his mother’s footsteps in helping people as she was a nurse.

Because Kate worked nights as a single mother, Adam had to grow up being his own parent at times; cooking his own meals and putting himself to bed.

Adam was ironically born on September 29th (1990) which is also known as Michaelmas aka the Feast of Saints Michael, Gabriel and Raphael. A potential storyline that could’ve gone somewhere but didn’t.

Adam is also by birthright a Men of Letters legacy though his brothers fail to mention that 10 years later.

The last thing Adam was doing while he was in Heaven, designed to look like his Prom, he was kissing a girl Kristen McGee; whom we’ll never know about or if he’ll ever see again.

Adam was ripped out of Heaven against his will by the angels to be used and manipulated as their backup device in the Apocalypse because Sam and Dean refused to comply with their demands.

After being resurrected, Adam was then recovered, kidnapped and held hostage by TFW (Sam, Dean, Bobby and Castiel) where they all took turns mouthing off at this angsty teenager about why he should trust a bunch of complete strangers over those who made him promises.

Adam only wanted to work with the angels in order to stop Lucifer and return to his mother. Highlighting that this character had a sense of justice, responsibility, cared about doing the right thing but also had his own reasons for wanting to save the world.

Sam tried to emotionally manipulate Adam with excuses for why their dad never told him about his family. And actually had the gall to say that him and Dean would’ve looked for him had they’d known he existed so they could be a family. Forgive me if I just laugh at this for a moment 🤣

Zachariah was able to get into Adam’s head because he knew how vulnerable he was. Telling him that trusting the Winchesters would only let him down which *SPOILER ALERT* turned out to be true.

Zachariah tortured Adam for hours before the Winchesters arrived to save him. And Dean was only willing to submit to the angel when Sam was just briefly tortured.

One of the last things Dean says to Adam in 5x18 after he was shocked to see his half-brothers come to his rescue was “Cause you’re family”. Again I have to...🤣🤣

At the moment of their escape, Dean doesn’t even help Adam (WHO’D BEEN INJURDED AND TORTURED) out of the room nor does he care about ushering him to safety. Dean just grabs Sam and hurries out the door. So much for being part of the family.

The last thing Adam screams before before being possessed by Michael was “Dean, help!” and then he hears Dean say “Just hold on!”

Adam, not being Michael’s true vessel yet born from the powerful Winchester bloodline, was able to look directly at the archangel’s true form without his eyes burning out. And this is NEVER explained why.

Dean mentions Adam only a total of THREE TIMES after this happens in 5x19, 5x22 and 6x11 while Castiel mentions it to Sam in 5x21. And Sam, WHO’D BEEN THE MAIN EMOTIONAL MANIPULATOR, just doesn’t give a shit to remember him.

Castiel threw a Molotov cocktail at Michael (who was using Adam’s body) to briefly cast him out which Adam probably felt in excruciating detail based on what Michael says in 15x08.

Sam, possessed by Lucifer, pushed himself and his innocent half-brother possessed by Michael into the cage for all eternity.

Castiel somehow managed to pull Sam out of the cage but decided to leave Adam behind.

After Dean bargains with Death to get Sam’s soul and Adam out of the cage. Only to get just Sam’s soul and leave Adam to his fate. The issue is never brought up again between the Winchesters.

Adam sits a prisoner in a cage with an archangel for 10 years our time but thousands of years Hell time.

Michael most likely protected Adam from some of the horrors in Hell which is why he was able to keep his sanity.

Sam and Dean went to Hell to talk to Lucifer in the cage but continue to ignore Adam’s existence and don’t bother releasing him yet they let Lucifer escape.

Dean also went back to Hell to retrieve Bobby’s soul so he could go to Heaven and again doesn’t even bother with Adam.

Season 10 for Supernatural’s 200th episode, Sam and Dean were reminded by SPN fans putting on a musical that Adam was still in the cage yet THEY NEVER DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT.

Mary Winchester STILL doesn’t know about Adam even though she was reunited with John during the 300th episode. He’s never mentioned during their big family get-together. I guess he never counted.

Adam and Michael are finally set free of Hell only because Chuck threw a giant hissy fit at the Winchesters and opened all the gateways.

The first thing Adam wanted to do as a free man in 15x08 was not seeking revenge on his brothers for abandoning him, but to eat some diner food, change his clothes and get a “little job”

After years of imprisonment, Adam actually befriended the Prince of Heaven aka the one friend he has/the only other person besides his mother who actually gave a damn about him.

TFW trapped, kidnapped and imprisoned Adam and Michael at the bunker in order to force them to help against Chuck.

And Adam, though still angry, hurt and worn out over the situation; chose to help his brothers when there was NOTHING in it for him and successfully convinced Michael to do the same.

Despite how his brothers treated him, Adam STILL believed in their best and vouched that they “always try to do the right thing”

Adam went to Hell a cranky, sassy, angsty, naïve teenager and returned a kinder, wiser, more patient, humble and rational-thinking man who still managed to smile and laugh after enduring centuries of pain.

Dean gives Adam his much due apology for not saving him but Sam doesn’t. In fact Sam doesn’t even bring him up the next time the Winchesters see each other.

Adam’s last words on this show are to Dean and they’re “Since when do we get what we deserve?” and “Good luck” 🤓

Chuck Thanos-snapped Adam’s soul out of existence OFF-SCREEN yet Michael somehow remained in his body.

Adam was 90% of Michael’s impulse control hence why he was so dark in his last appearance without Adam because that’s the only way I can cope with that disgusting character assassination in 15x19

Jack supposedly revived Adam along with everyone else after becoming the new God. BUT his current status now reads “Unknown” instead of “Alive” so what the fuck am I suppose to think now?!

Sam and Dean didn’t even think about checking in on Adam to make sure he was okay before they hit the road on their last solo bro-outing.

If Adam really is alive then he’s doomed to a miserable, lonely existence without his best friend (who’s now dead). Broke, homeless, jobless; his brothers STILL DON’T GIVE A RAT’S ASS after he’d helped them in good faith. He’s legally deceased thanks to the ghouls. And he gets to look forward to demon city the moment he dies cause guess where he’s ending up?

No one remembers him even after he’d returned in 15x08

The car and the dog are more important to the Winchesters than their innocent half-brother.

Okay I realize I just unloaded a whole mountain of salt but this is the full outline of Adam’s tragic story on Supernatural. These writers never cared about him and why? What did he do to deserve this gross treatment from the show’s protagonists or just in general? Why was he even introduced if this was going to be the outcome of it all? I don’t know what’s worse leaving him in Hell (cause at least he had Michael for company) or bringing him back and not knowing what became of him after. It’s insufferable 😣 I just want everyone to know that the showrunners and writers may not care about him BUT I DO.

[twoidiotwriters1]

Written In The Stars CXII (Harry Potter xF!Oc)

A/N: I know you guys hate it but I love making Mel and Harry fight, huge ‘I’m-yelling-bc-I-love-you’ energy -Danny

Words: 4,093 

Series’ Masterlist

Previous Chapter // Next Chapter

Listen to: ‘Worst In Me’ -by Julia Michaels.

Chapter Ten: Growing.

Turns out Umbridge was inspecting Trelawney's class, and if Mel could've graded the experience, she would've used a massive 'D'.

The girl paired up with Neville because she would often find herself chatting over Trelawney's orders whenever she and Ron shared a table. She didn't want that this time, and so she tried her best to focus on what she was doing with Neville. She was fearing that being in a different table, she wasn't going to be able to stop Harry if he tried to do something silly, the class went by with no accidents besides the fact that Trelawney could not do a prediction for Umbridge, which clearly made her fall a few points down.

Mel walked to her D.A.D.A. class with Neville, they talked about his new discoveries in herbology, she desperately needed to speak about some common silly nothings to remain sane, so when they entered the classroom, she hesitated a moment before finally deciding to sit next to the boy. They were a few tables behind Harry, Ron and Hermione. Mel felt a bit guilty about not making any real efforts to stay close to Harry, but she was feeling in a better mood now that she was having a normal day with a normal classmate.

"Wands away," Umbridge instructed. "As we finished chapter one last lesson, I would like you all to turn to page nineteen today and commence chapter two, 'Common Defensive Theories and Their Derivation.' There will be no need to talk."

Hermione raised her hand a few seats ahead, Umbridge got up from her place and walked up to hers, her usual terrifying smile plastered on her face.

"What is it this time, Miss Granger?"

"I've already read chapter two."

"Well then, proceed to chapter three."

"I've read that too. I've read the whole book."

"Well," Umbridge giggled. "Then, you should be able to tell me what Slinkhard says about counterjinxes in chapter fifteen."

"He says that counterjinxes are improperly named. He says 'counterjinx' is just a name people give their jinxes when they want to make them sound more acceptable. But I disagree."

"You disagree?"

"Yes, I do. Mr Slinkhard doesn't like jinxes, does he? But I think they can be very useful when they're used defensively."

"Oh, you do, do you? Well, I'm afraid it is Mr Slinkhard's opinion, and not yours, that matters within this classroom, Miss Granger."

"But —"

"That is enough. Miss Granger, I am going to take five points from Gryffindor House."

"What for?" Harry asked angrily. Mel could see Hermione whisper something to him.

"For disrupting my class with pointless interruptions. I am here to teach you using a Ministry-approved method that does not include inviting students to give their opinions on matters about which they understand very little. Your previous teachers in this subject may have allowed you more license, but as none of them — with the possible exception of Professor Quirrell, who did at least appear to have restricted himself to age-appropriate subjects — would have passed a Ministry inspection —"

"Why aren't we allowed to give our opinion? The teachers always encourage us to ask questions and be curious!" Mel blurted out, emboldened by the memory of her jobless uncle. "Was it really their way of working, or just your racist rubbish?"

"And Quirrell was a great teacher all right," said Harry right after her, "there was just that minor drawback of him having Lord Voldemort sticking out of the back of his head."

There was a thick silence afterwards, Umbridge smiled a both, a triumphant glint in her eyes.

"I think another week's detentions would do you some good, Mr Potter," said Umbridge sweetly. "Miss Dumbledore, you may only speak when spoken to, or when you're granted the word. Otherwise, I'd recommend you to remain quiet. Sixty points from Gryffindor."

Mel entered the Great Hall fuming, she walked up to her table and saw Angelina, Professor McGonagall and Harry all arguing about something.

"I'm already being punished by her, why do you have to take points as well?" Harry asked in outrage. "Mel already lost sixty!"

"Shut up!" She hissed.

"Because detentions do not appear to have any effect on you whatsoever!" Professor McGonagall looked at her in the same way. "Dumbledore told you to stay out of it, Miss Dumbledore, I see myself in the obligation to talk with the Headmaster about this! And as for you, Miss Johnson, you will confine your shouting matches to the Quidditch pitch in future or risk losing the team Captaincy!"

Angelina stormed out of the Hall, not without giving Harry one last nasty look.

"She's taken points off Gryffindor because I'm having my hand sliced open every night! How is that fair, how?"

"I know, mate, she's bang out of order," Ron put extra bacon on Harry's plate.

"You disloyal twat!" Mel aggressively put down a jar of murtlap essence in front of Harry. "Now Dumbledore will lecture me again because you decided to rat me out!"

"Well it's true, isn't it?" He pointed to the jar. "What's that rubbish?"

"That rubbish is for your hand," She retorted in an awful mood, "put it on your bloody hand and it should heal right away."

The girl left without waiting for a reply, wanting to hex everyone. The fact that she'd spent twenty minutes of her breakfast hour doing the stupid essence now felt like a really dumb thing to do. She wondered why was she still trying to be nice when Harry didn't care, he knew that she could feel his pain and still decided to get another detention. Maybe they were better on their own, trying to remain as a team was starting to break them further apart.

Mel clenched her fists and continued until her feet took her to the only safe haven they could remember. The library was empty, no one had urgent schoolwork to finish being the second week of the trimester. She sat down at the very end, rubbing her temples and pondering on whether she should cry a bit to release some tension or go back to the Hall and have breakfast with Ginny when she heard the soft sound of footsteps.

"Woke up on the wrong side of the bed?" asked a voice in amusement.

Erick stepped closer with a teasing glint in his eyes.

"You stood me up last Saturday. What now, you get a boyfriend and suddenly decide you no longer need friends? That's a bit–"

Mel didn't let him finish, she stood up and hugged him as tightly as she could.

"You have no idea how much I've missed you."

Erick froze, his arms hovering above her awkwardly. "I... I missed you too?"

Mel stepped back, quickly cleaning her face.

"Merlin's sake, you don't have to say it if you don't want to..."

"Sorry– it's just... That's the first time someone says that to me..." The last part came out barely above a whisper, Erick avoided her eyes.

"Well, it's true. This summer was a nightmare..."

"I know what you mean... at least a little. My grandad's been... not great," Erick glanced at the table and then her. "Every time I catch a glimpse of you, you're always grumpy..."

"It's the O.W.L.S, you know?"

"Sure, not like I've seen you argue with Potter," Erick smirked. "Want advice? Kiss him whenever he acts up, that'll shut him."

"That's out of the question," She sat down again. "We're not dating."

"What?"  He exclaimed.

"Shh!" Mel looked around and then glared at him. "Sit down."

"I don't understand," Erick's frown deepened. "You two were so sickeningly happy and–"

"It was a mistake."

"What?" He asked again, this time laughing a little. "I'm sorry, but since when is dating your crush a mistake?"

"We didn't date," She retorted. "We... it blew up in our faces– Sit down, will you?"

"But what happened?"

"I don't want to talk about it!"

"Okay!" He huffed. "What do you want to talk about, then?"

"Why don't you tell me how's your Grandad?"

Erick's face did not tense at the mention, but it certainly grew worried.

"He's well enough... stayed with him the whole summer so I didn't write to Anne, in case you were wondering."

"Don't ask about Harry and I won't ask about Anne," Mel shrugged. "Seems fair."

Erick only looked more alarmed. "Seriously, what happened?"

"Erick," She said, "leave it."

"Are you at least going to tell me why'd you stood me up the other day?"

"I invited Hermione by mistake. I wanted to talk to you in private."

"Why?"

"Because Harry– well now I don't want to," She added when she saw the way he rolled his eyes. "I don't want to do anything. I don't even want to go to my next class..."

"Let me guess, because you'll have to see him and talk to him," He finally sat down, pondering for a moment. "All right, then get rid of him. Stop being his friend."

"I can't do that. Dumbledore's orders."

"He asked you to babysit?"

Mel nodded gloomily.

"Do you really have to be near him?"

"Well," She tilted her head. "I guess not... just when Umbridge's around."

"So just during her class?"

"Probably..."

"Okay, make sure he keeps his mouth shut for an hour or two and then you have the rest of the day free."

Mel thought about it for a second, then groaned in frustration.

"Knowing Harry, he'll find a way to run into her more times a day..."

"Potter's old enough to know better, don't you think?" Erick raised a brow. "Especially after what he went through..."

Annoyance flooded over her at the way Erick so casually mentioned Harry's close call. She clenched her jaw and shrugged. She didn't want to keep talking to him, being honest, she simply didn't want to talk to anyone at all.

"I'm tired," She muttered.

"I can't help with that, go take a nap," He sighed. "I'm sorry you didn't get the prefect badge, by the way..."

Mel laughed humorlessly.

"I don't care. Guess a part of me always knew Hermione would beat me."

"I really thought you'd be it," He replied. "Not that I don't think 'Mione's not smart or anything,  it made sense, you and Harry..."

"Maybe Dumbledore thinks we have too much in our hands," She started to peel the corner of the table. "Or that we're out of control..."

"He certainly has reasons to believe it..."

"Did Parkinson and Malfoy report me?" She blurted out.

Erick frowned.

"What did you do now?"

Mel quickly told him about the incident, Erick found it extremely amusing.

"Had it coming, those idiots..." He admitted. "But you really shouldn't do that. Umbridge will take any opportunity to take you to her office and see if she can force you into confessing about the Order."

"Talking about that..." She moved so she was now facing him. "Are you part of it, then?"

"Not until I'm seventeen and out of school... I'm a very active intern for now."

"But do you want to be part of it?"

Erick didn't hesitate this time.

"I do. I won't be hiding behind my mother's skirt, once I'm out, I'll be out forever. My plan hasn't changed, I'll live with my Grandad and I'll help as much as I can."

"I'm proud of you, you know?" Mel smiled, her mood lifting with the passion he was letting out in every word.

"Shut up," He muttered.

"I mean it! You've come a long way. Remember my first year? You found me crying and told me to just give up on Hermione. Look at you now..."

"I'm still trying to convince you to give up on people," He moved on his chair awkwardly. "I told you this was my plan since the beginning, I'm just finally doing something about it."

"Yeah," Mel agreed, thinking that her own plan had been obliterated and now she was stuck in place. "I'm happy for you..."

"You know what? Take my advice. Keep Potter's mouth shut during class and we'll trust that he can find his way without you for the rest of the day. You need a break," Erick stood up, grabbing her bag and picking it up for her.

"Trust me," She sighed. "I know."

Mel stayed away from her friends for the rest of the day, and Harry found a way to get an extra day of detention during their Care of Magical creatures class -Umbridge had been there– but the girl persisted, she had lunch and dinner with Ginny and her friends, and she spent her free period with the twins and their friends.

When she entered the common room, she discovered that Harry wasn't there with Ron and Hermione, which explained why her right hand was starting to feel sore. She sat with a small smile playing on her lips, her day had improved after a whole afternoon without useless bickering.

"Is there any point on asking?" Hermione sighed.

"No," Mel said calmly, tunning out the pain on her hand.

Harry arrived close to midnight with his hand bleeding profusely, Mel made sure to write in a way that the darkness could hide her own bruised hand. Hermione handed him the murtlap jar Mel had left for him during breakfast.

"I still reckon you should complain about this," said Ron.

"No," said Harry.

"McGonagall would go nuts if she knew —"

"Yeah, she probably would. And how long d'you reckon it'd take Umbridge to pass another Decree saying anyone who complains about the High Inquisitor gets sacked immediately?"

"She's an awful woman. Awful. You know, I was just saying to Ron when you came in... we've got to do something about her."

"I suggested poison."

"No... I mean, something about what a dreadful teacher she is, and how we're not going to learn any defence from her at all," said Hermione.

"Well, what can we do about that? 'S too late, isn't it? She got the job, she's here to stay, Fudge'll make sure of that."

"Well... You know, I was thinking today... I was thinking that — maybe the time's come when we should just — just do it ourselves."

"Do what ourselves?" said Harry.

Mel's hand stopped writing but she didn't look up.

"Well — learn Defense Against the Dark Arts ourselves," said Hermione.

"Come off it! You want us to do extra work? D'you realize Harry and I are behind on homework again and it's only the second week? And Mel's all right but I'm sure not even her can get past the stress!"

"But this is much more important than homework!"

"I didn't think there was anything in the universe more important than homework," Ron teased.

"Don't be silly, of course there is! It's about preparing ourselves, like Harry said in Umbridge's first lesson, for what's waiting out there. It's about making sure we really can defend ourselves. If we don't learn anything for a whole year —"

"We can't do much by ourselves, I mean, all right, we can go and look jinxes up in the library and try and practice them, I suppose —"

"If you're planning on reading just like you read in Umbridge class, then it won't change much," Mel said.

"No, I agree, we've gone past the stage where we can just learn things out of books. We need a teacher, a proper one, who can show us how to use the spells and correct us if we're going wrong."

"If you're talking about Lupin..."

"No, no, I'm not talking about Lupin," said Hermione. "He's to busy with the Order and anyway, the most we could see him is during Hogsmeade weekends and that's not nearly often enough."

"Who, then?"

"Isn't it obvious? I'm talking about you and Mel, Harry."

"About me what?"

"What?" Mel laughed.

"I'm talking about you teaching us Defense Against the Dark Arts."

"That's an idea," Ron said calmly. "Mel could teach us, with her extra lessons and everything..."

"But... But I'm not a teacher, I can't —"

"You and Mel are the best in the year at Defense Against the Dark Arts," said Hermione.

"Me?" said Harry, this time grinning. "No, I'm not, you and Mel have beaten me in every test —"

"Actually, I haven't. You beat me in our third year — the only year we both sat the test and had a teacher who actually knew the subject. But I'm not talking about test results, Harry. Look what you've done! Look at what Mel can do!"

"How d'you mean?"

"You know what, I'm not sure I want someone this stupid teaching me," Ron said to Hermione with a smirk, then pretended to concentrate fully. "Let's think, uh... first year — you saved the Stone from You-Know-Who–"

"But that was luck, that wasn't skill —"

"Yeah, and Quirrell smashed my skull afterwards!"

"Second year," Ron insisted, "you killed the basilisk and destroyed Riddle, Harry."

"Yeah, but if Fawkes hadn't turned up I —"

"Third year," Ron raised his voice, "Mel starts her private lessons with Dumbledore and she learns to do non-verbal spells as if they were as simple as a nap. Then you two fought off about a hundred dementors at once —"

"You know that was a fluke, if the Time-Turner hadn't —"

"Last year," Ron was practically yelling now. "Mel learned to fight off the Imperio curse in her first try and saw right through Moody before anyone else. You fought off You-Know-Who again—"

"Listen to me!" Ron and Hermione were both smirking now. "Just listen to me, all right? It sounds great when you say it like that, but all that stuff was luck — I didn't know what I was doing half the time, I didn't plan any of it, I just did whatever I could think of, and I nearly always had help —"

"I had tons of help!" Mel exclaimed, finally finding her voice. "I read until I couldn't keep my eyes open– most of the things I know are all theory and no practice– don't smile at us like that! You know we're as close to being teachers as a bowtruckle!"

"Don't sit there like you know better than we do," Harry said heatedly. "I was there, wasn't I? I know what went on, all right? And I didn't get through any of that because I was brilliant at Defense Against the Dark Arts, I got through it all because — because help came at the right time, or because I guessed right— or Mel lost control and it just happened to work out in our favour, but we just blundered through it all, I didn't have a clue what I was doing and Mel— STOP LAUGHING!"

Harry stood up menacingly, the jar falling off his hand and breaking into a bunch of sharp pieces. Hermione and Ron quickly lost their smiles.

"You don't know what it's like! You— neither of you— you've never had to face him, have you? You think it's just memorizing a bunch of spells and throwing them at him, like you're in class or something? The whole time you know there's nothing between you and dying except your own — your own brain or guts or whatever — like you can think straight when you know you're about a second from being murdered, or tortured, or watching your friends die — they've never taught us that in their classes, what it's like to deal with things like that, having to suck the life out of a someone in order to survive!" Mel's breath hitched, none of them had told the others what had happened last June. "And you two sit there acting like we're two clever little kids standing here, alive, like Diggory was stupid, like he messed up — you just don't get it, that could just as easily have been me if it weren't for Mel– it would have been if Voldemort hadn't needed me and I hadn't used Mel's—"

"Shut up!" She yelled, pulling him back because he'd gotten too close to their friends.

"We weren't saying anything like that," Ron said fearfully. "We weren't having a go at Diggory, we didn't — you've got the wrong end of the —" He stammered the rest under his breath, unable to end his sentence out of shock.

"You didn't sound understanding," Mel stated, dropping Harry's arm when he snatched it away. "It's never over, not like we lived through it and then just continued with our day... there's... we would always have..."

"Nightmares," Harry ended weakly.

"Guys," Hermione said quietly, "don't you see? This... this is exactly why we need you... We need to know what it's r-really like... facing him... facing V-Voldemort."

Mel would've been proud of Hermione, but she was still too agitated. However, Harry did react, he sat down again, though still breathing as he'd run for hours. A cramp ran down her hand in full force and she hissed. Harry frowned, noticing right away.

"I'm an idiot."

"I'm not going to argue you that," Mel scowled, holding her hand tightly. "I thought you'd be smarter, knowing what it does to me..."

"I don't mind being punished for telling the truth... but I don't want to drag you with me– I never wanted that," Harry sentenced.

Ron and Hermione stared at the both of them without really understanding what they meant.

"Well... think about it," said Hermione, glancing between the two. "Please?"

Harry nodded quietly, Mel hid her hand in her pocket and shrugged.

"Well, I'm off to bed," Their friend continued, still shaking. "Erm... 'night."

Ron got up too, he turned to look at Harry. "Coming?"

"Yeah," He said, looking down at the shattered glass. "In... in a minute. I'll just clear this up."

"I'll help..." Mel murmured.

When it was just the two of them, Mel crossed her arms and stared pointedly at him.

"Well?" She raised a brow. "I'm tired of being the one cleaning up your messes."

"I never asked–" He looked up at her and sighed, tired of fighting. "Doesn't matter... Reparo!"

The essence was gone, and she groaned thinking of how it was up to her to get more. She also knew that Harry needed to tend his hand now if she wanted to have a good sleep, so before he could leave she added:

"Sit," Mel grabbed her wand. "I'm going to mend you."

"I don't need–"

"I'm doing this for me," She showed him the purple bruise of thin letters that were forming on her skin. "You're still trying to cut out the lifeline? It's not working."

"Like you're doing any better," He hissed when she 'accidentally' pressed his wound.

"I'm not the problematic one, am I?"

Harry remained silent.

"That's what I thought," She healed the open cuts gradually. "Unlike you, I know how to stay out of trouble and I don't get as injured..."

"Well, it's not you the one people's been attacking–"

"It's not you either," She replied sharply. "People talk about you, but you're the one picking fights. The only person being attacked here is Dumbledore and I don't see him yelling at the rest of the staff."

"I don't see him talking to anyone but you, so that must be why," He said hastily.

"That's not my fault," Mel let go of his hand, it wasn't bleeding or inflamed, which was impressive considering it was her first time healing someone.

There was something bitter about the fact that holding his hand wasn't bringing her any kind of sweet emotion like it used to. She would still feel waves of affection, but those were dying quicker as time went by, something inside her was successfully pushing him out of her system, and she was starting to get used to it.

"If you're so desperate to talk to him then why don't you visit his office?"

Harry gave her a sour look, and she let out a dry laugh.

"You do want him to ask, don't you? See if he cares?"

"I think I'll go to bed now," He stood up.

"Suit yourself," Mel shrugged. "You're welcome, by the way."

"I thought you had done it for yourself," He replied sarcastically.

"I still made you a favour by doing so," She said. "You know, if you'd show a bit of gratitude instead of ignoring everyone that offers you help, people would–"

"THANK YOU!" He said rudely, his back turned to her as he left the common room.

Next Chapter —>

Taglist.

@dee123ksha @vampiregirl1797 @siriuslysirius1107 @stardusthigh @mikariell95 @vernon-dursley @thesuitelifeofafangirl @tomshollandz @kylosleftbuttcheek @reverse-hxlland @bloodorangemoonlight @omiwashere @t-rexs-world​ @sarcasticallywitty15

[justcallmehitgirl]

MY BLUE HEAVEN // PART TWO

Fiona Carrasco is just trying to get by in law school. She has average grades and good friends, but is currently jobless and trying not to binge on ice-cream every night.

Harry Styles seems to have it all. He’s third in their class, has a job lined up at one of the biggest law firms in New York, and is beloved by the student body.

However, Harry has a problem and Fiona may be the answer to his problems… if they don’t strangle each other first.

A short story about law students, late night Dairy Queen runs, and finding love where you least expect it. AU.

Part One

“Your opening is too argumentative.”

I look up from my computer screen and look at Harry wide-eyed. “It is?”

We had been working in the library for the past two hours, going over rough drafts of our opening statements and direct examinations of our witnesses. However, instead of collaborating, Harry was just going through my notes and critiquing anything he could.

“Your statements of fact seem too argumentative. You’re supposed to tell the jury what you’re about to show them, not shove it down their throats,” he says, his eyes not leaving the notebook in front of him. I clench my fists together. I’m not one for a temper tantrum, but he should at least have the decency to look at me if he’s criticizing me.

“I was doing that. What part of my opening was argumentative?”

“Some bits at the beginning… middle… and at the end,” he says, waving his hand in the air dismissively.

I narrow my eyes at him. “But that’s all of it.”

He finally looks up from his notebook and raises his eyebrows.

“Exactly.”

—

“How’re things going with Harry?” Leanna asks, digging her spoon back into her hot fudge sundae.

Leanna and I are sitting on a bench outside Dairy Queen. Even though it’s the end of February in New England, nothing can come between me and a cookie dough Blizzard.

“Horrible,” I manage to get out with a mouthful of ice-cream.

She rolls her eyes. “It can’t be that bad.”

“He’s overly critical!” I exclaim. “Any chance he gets, he just has to pick apart everything I do.”

“Law students are type-A.”

I shovel a spoonful of ice-cream in my mouth and pout.

“I can’t believe you’re making excuses for him.”

“I’m not. I’m just saying he’s probably not doing it to get a rise out of you. He’s probably just stressed and wants to do the best job he can,” she shrugs.

I stick my spoon back into my Blizzard, only to realize that it’s empty. I sigh.

“I’m already kicking myself for doing this competition.”

“Hang in there,, Fi,” Leanna says, nudging my shoulder. “Who knows, maybe you might even start to get along with Harry.”

“When hell freezes over,” I mutter, as I toss my plastic spoon and carton cup into the trashcan across from us.

“Ready to blow this joint? I’m pretty sure Jane the Virgin’s on tonight,” Leanna smiles, tossing her empty container into the trash as well.

We get up from the bench and start to walk down the street.

“Jane needs to totally get rid of Rafael and Michael,” I say, shoving my hands into the pockets of my coat.

“But I love Rafael. He’s hot AF.”

“Guys are more trouble than it’s worth.”

We’re walking past a row of restaurants when an entrance door opens. Before I can react, a body comes through the door and comes straight at me. I bump into the warm body in front of me, and as I begin to wobble, two hands grab ahold of me to keep me steady.

“Whoa, sorry there love,” the body says, his British accent thick and recognizable.

I know that voice. I look up and squint my eyes.

“Harry?”

He furrows his brows. “Fiona? What are you doing here?”

“Being a human,” I quip.

“No, I mean all the way in Quincy.”

“Well it’s the closest Dairy Queen in the area so I’m a pretty frequent flyer in these parts.”

He nearly rolls his eyes at my response and looks over at Leanna. “Leanna, right? You were in my Partnership Tax class last semester.”

“Bingo. Nice to see you, Harry.”

Another person appears next to Harry. He’s slightly shorter than Harry with dirty blonde hair and facial stubble.

“Hiya ladies,” he greets with an enthusiastic wave. His greeting seems to knock Harry out of his stupor.

“Oh, this is my mate, Niall. Niall, this is Fiona and Leanna. They go to law school with me.”

Leanna extends out her hand and shakes Niall’s hand. I follow and do the same.

“Fiona? Are you Irish?”

I nod. “Half, on my mother’s side. She’s an O’Connor.”

“I’m a Horan,” Niall says proudly, puffing his chest out. Leanna giggles, and I can’t help but smile.

“Well it was nice to see you both, but Niall and I were just about to grab a drink over at Treva...” Harry starts.

“Would you ladies like to join?” Niall interrupts with a smile. I can see Harry from the corner of my eye visibly tense.

“Oh well we’re actually just…” I begin, motioning down the street.

“We’d love to join,” Leanna interjects. My head shoots up to give her a glare as she smiles widely.

“Great, after you ladies,” Harry mumbles, motioning for us to walk in front of him and Niall.

“But Jane the Virgin...” I whine.

Leanna places her arm across my shoulder. “We’ll catch the replay,” she says with a wink.

—

“Are you both hungry? This place has great bar bites,” Niall exclaims, taking a sip of his beer. We’re seated in a booth in the corner of the bar. Harry and Niall are sitting opposite Leanna and me. Of course I’m sitting directly in front of Harry, and I’m desperately trying to avoid eye contact. It’s bad enough that I see him almost daily to work on the competition, but now I’m seeing him during my downtime.

Leanna and I both shake our heads. “We’re good, we just had ice-cream,” she says, rubbing her belly happily for emphasis.

“Ice-cream instead of supper? Very nice,” Niall says, giving both me and Leanna a high-five. Harry shakes his head at his friend.

“Nothing to drink for you, Fiona?” Niall asks.

“Nah, I’m driving tonight so I gotta stay in tip top shape.” I take a sip of my water. Refreshing.

“Fi’s the most thoughtful person ever,” Leanna says, putting her head on my shoulder playfully. I pat her head and smile. Harry catches my eye, and I can’t help but maintain my smile out of politeness. Killing him with kindness.

“So,” I clear my throat, as Leanna lifts her head off my shoulder, “how do you two know each other?”

“We met through Liam,” Niall starts, “Liam and I have been mates since we were kids so when I found out he was in Massachusetts, we reconnected. Then I met Harry over here.” Niall clasps a hand on Harry’s back. Harry smiles and takes a sip of his vodka and soda.

“What brought you to America?” Leanna asks, taking a sip of her drink.

“My job. I work as an engineer here in Quincy,” Niall explains.

“Do you like it?” I ask.

“Absolutely! It’s never a dull day.”

“Quite the difference from law then,” Harry interjects.

“But law sounds fascinating! When you all are big shot lawyers, don’t forget about your friend here,” Niall smiles. “By the way, how’s that competition going?”

I can’t help but look over at Harry, who’s taking another sip of his drink. He quickly puts it down and licks his lips.

“It’s going great, Niall. Been working a lot. We should do pretty well,” Harry responds.

“Harry’s actually recruited me to be one of your practice witnesses,” Niall adds, wiggling his eyebrows.

“Really? That’s so nice of you to drive all the way to Boston to help out,” I say earnestly, taking another sip of my water.

“Anytime! I love being involved. I actually did theater when I was a kid so I thought why not, this shouldn’t be any different!”

“Well the help is much appreciated.” I lift my glass of water to toast with his beer.

“So, how’s it been working with Harry, Fiona? Hopefully he hasn’t been too much trouble,” Niall jokes.

I look over at Harry who’s looking at me with a piercing look that almost says, ‘your move.’

I clear my throat. “Harry’s been a fantastic partner.”

I look back over at Harry who’s giving me a small smile, and I peek over at Leanna who’s biting her lip.

Yeah, I know I’m a liar.

“Fiona’s been pretty great too. Very patient with me,” Harry adds. I can’t help but straighten up at his response. A compliment?

“Thanks, Harry,” I say slowly, afraid he might take it back.

“I only speak the truth, Fi,” he says, lifting his chin and taking another sip of his drink.

Fi? Now hell was definitely freezing over.

“I owe Fiona a lot actually,” he continues, “If it wasn’t for her, I’d be shit out of luck.”

I feel everyone’s eyes on me. “Well, it’s no problem at all. Gives me something to do besides classwork,” I say, pushing some hair behind my ear.

“Well I’d like to propose a toast to Fiona,” Harry says, lifting his drink. I perk up again at his gesture.

“Yes, to Fiona!” Niall bellows, lifting his drink.

I can’t help but blush as Leanna nudges me with her shoulder and lifts up her drink in unison. “To Fi!”

I look at Harry, who’s grinning from ear to ear. Someone should give him alcohol more often.

--

“The insurance company is a bunch of greedy bastards if you ask me.”

I look up from my notes and squint at Harry, who’s looking at me with furrowed brows. He’s tapping his pencil on the desk we’re sharing and I’m mentally counting down until I’m forced to tackle him to stop. After our outing at Treva a couple days ago, Harry’s been a bit better to deal with, but it doesn’t mean we’ll be best friends anytime soon.

I lick my lips and respond, “But they’re not being greedy. They don’t want to pay because they think our client paid for someone to purposely burn down the building.”

“We can argue that it’s unrelated and deny it,” he reasons, lifting his pencil off the desk and placing it behind his ear. My eyes can’t help but drift to his pencil. I was seconds away from reaching over and grabbing it out of his hand to throw it at him. He looks back down at his notebook.

“The guy died in the fire.”

He looks up from his notes and gives me an exasperated look through pursed lips. We had been at it for hours already, going back and forth, and I felt like we were at each other's throats.

“Do you have any ideas?” he grits out. Could someone give this guy another vodka and soda please?

I click my tongue in my mouth and think for a moment before I respond, “We recognize that the deceased was an employee but that his death was accidental. Wrong place, wrong time sort of thing. Unrelated, but recognizing the undeniable.”

“Accidental, eh?” Harry leans forward in his seat.

“Yes…”

“That could work,” he mumbles, turning his eyes back to his notes and scribbling words down messily. I can’t help but smile a little bit in victory. I then look up at the clock instinctively and realize it’s almost ten-thirty at night. I automatically rub my eyes in exhaustion.

“I think we should be good for tonight,” I say, as I start to shut down my laptop.

“Agreed,” he says, closing his notebook and starting to pack up as well.

“I have to catch up on homework this weekend, but I can meet again on Monday.”

“Sounds good to me.”

I pick up my phone and see that I have a missed call from Connor. I scrunch my eyebrows together. My thoughts immediately turn to the worst. I quickly text him, ‘Sorry I missed your calls. Is everything okay at home?’

“Are you alright?” Harry asks, shaking me out of my thoughts. He’s closing up his bag and slinging it over his shoulder.

I look up from my phone and nod my head. “Yeah, just missed a call from my brother.”

He nods his head in understanding. “Younger or older?”

“Younger by six years. Do you have any siblings?” I ask politely, as I slip my phone into the back pocket of my jeans.

“I have an older sister,” he responds. It all makes sense now.

“Ah, so you have the younger sibling complex.”

“I do not have a complex,” he says, crossing his arms across his chest.

“Baby brothers always have a complex,” I smirk.

He narrows his eyes and shakes his head.

“If only because older sisters gave them a complex,” he says with a close-lipped smile, as we begin to walk toward the library exit.

“Ah ha, so you admit it,” I say as I push open the door.

“I plead the fifth, Fiona,” he says, holding the door wider for me to exit.

I can’t help but grin in victory. I turn to start walking toward the main street when Harry catches my arm.

“Where are you going?” he asks with furrowed brows, letting go of me quickly.

“Home,” I motion in the direction that I was heading in.

“But the parking lot is that way,” he says, motioning over to the opposite direction.

“And my apartment is this way,” I say, pointing again toward the direction of the street.

“You’re not walking home alone, are you?”

“Yeah, it’s no big deal. I only live down the street.”

“But it’s dark out.”

“And I have pepper spray.”

“And it’s late.”

“I also have a mean swing.”

“I’m walking with you,” he declares, adjusting the strap of his bag on his shoulder.

“You don’t have to,” I say, shaking my head.

“I want to.”

“But it’s out of your way.”

“How do you know?” he asks with furrowed brows.

“ESP,” I retort.

“Where do you live?” he presses.

I hesitate for a moment. “On Oak Street.”

I can see his eyes light up at my response. “That’s convenient, I also live on Oak Street.”

I can’t help but blurt, “Are you shitting me?”

I place a hand over my mouth. Harry chuckles.

“Wow, such the potty mouth,” he comments cheekily.

“I just can’t believe you live on my street.” A realization hits me at that moment. “But wait, I thought you were headed to the parking lot. Why would you drive if you live so close?”

“I was only going to go to the parking lot to walk you to your car.”

“Wow, such the gentleman,” I say sarcastically.

“Isn’t it obvious?” he smirks. “You really don’t take chivalry well.”

I narrow my eyes at him in response.

“No girl at this law school has actively avoided contact with me like you do.”

“Maybe it’s because I’m immune to British accents,” I shrug.

“You’re something else,” he says, shaking his head.

“And what does that mean?”

“If I tell you, how would I keep you on your toes?”

I give him a look that screams ‘give me a break.’

“Fine,” I relent, “I’ll let you walk me home so we can stop bickering in front of the library.”

“Excellent,” he says, tilting his head slightly back.

I can’t help but shake my head.

“Ladies first,” he says, motioning for me to start walking.

We walk side by side in silence for a few moments before I blurt, “So I have to ask, why did you decide to go to school in America?”

“Ah, I knew this would come up at some point.”

“What can I say, the masses want to know.”

“I guess I wanted to do something different. All my friends back home seemed stuck, and I wanted to adventure out here and see if anything would stick. I got into NYU, and I fell in love with the States. As much as I missed my family, once my junior year rolled around, I knew I didn’t want to go back home. So my advisor suggested I apply for graduate programs and the rest is history.”

“Why law school then?”

“Since I was young, I could always see myself as a lawyer so it was only natural that I applied to law schools.”

“I find it hard to see any eight-year-old wanting to become a lawyer.”

“It was one too many watchings of Law and Order and My Cousin Vinny,” he laughs. “What made you go to law school?”

“Well… I genuinely like learning about the law. I also want to help people, and I felt like the way to do it was through the law. My dad was definitely thrilled when I told him I was going to law school.”

“Why’s that?”

“Well,” I start, lowering my voice a bit, “my dad’s a lawyer.”

“So you’re a legacy, eh?”

“Ugh, don’t remind me,” I say, covering my face with my hands.

“It’s nothing to be ashamed of. You should be proud you’re following in your dad’s footsteps.”

“It’s not that I’m not proud, it just that people tend to judge you when they think you’ve grown up with a silver spoon in your mouth. That certainly wasn’t the case for me and my brother. My dad’s big on pulling yourself up by the bootstraps and working hard to get what you want.”

“Well, I would never judge you.”

“Thanks, but you have to say that or else I’d quit being your partner.”

He laughs. “Yeah, I guess that’s true.”

“Well, this is me,” I say, pointing to the building to our right. We both stop in front of it.

“Nice building,” he comments, looking up at my red brick building.

“Yes… good foundation.”

“Looks really sturdy too.”

I look back over at him, and I can’t help but smile a little. I then awkwardly extend my hand, and he gives me a perplexed look before he takes my hand into his.

“You’re really something else, Fi,” he says as I firmly shake his hand.

“You must tell me what that means one day.” I let go of his hand.

“Eh, we’ll see,” he says with a shrug.

“Text me when you get home, okay? It would suck if you died on your way home. That’d be on my conscious forever.”

He laughs. “Will do. Goodnight, Fiona.”

“Goodnight,” I say with a wave. I put my key into the door lock and turn it slowly. I look behind me and see Harry walking further away into the distance. I can’t help but breathe deeply and push open the front door.

—

“Hey Con,” I say into the phone pressed up against my ear. I was sitting on my bed preparing to wind down for the night when I remembered my brother’s text, ‘Call me ASAP.’

“Good to know you’re still alive, sis.”

I purse my lips. “Sorry I missed your call. You could’ve texted what you wanted to say you know.”

“But then I wouldn’t be able to keep you in suspense. Where were you tonight anyway? Hot date?”

I scrunch my eyebrows. “Ew no, I was in the library with my partner for my Mock Trial Competition,” I respond as I inspect my chipped nail polish.

“Do you get to bang a gavel?”

“That’s what a judge does, doofus,” I say, rolling my eyes.

“Do you at least get to yell ‘objection your Honor’ really loud?”

I sigh. “I can.”

“Sickkkkk.”

I rub the back of my neck. “Anyways, what’s up Con? I doubt you called to to ask about my future profession.”

“Yeah well, I’m on a covert mission from Mom to make sure you’re coming to Dad’s birthday party in two weeks.”

I bite my lip. “She’s worried I won’t show?”

“More like she’s worried you’re going to make up some excuse so you don’t have to show,” he responds with a matter of fact tone.

“Why would she think that?”

“Because you haven’t been home in two months and you live an hour away.”

“Well things get busy in law school,” I reason.

“You were only down for Christmas.”

“I had a lot of work over break.”

“I’m just saying, they’ve noticed.”

“Well rest assured, I’ll be there.”

“And you have to make more than just an appearance. It’s Dad’s 60th so Mom is making it a big deal. She told me to tell you to bring friends or something too if you’d like.”

“Sounds peachy.”

“Great, now Mom can stop whining to me about you.”

“I’m not that big of a deal at home, am I?”

“Are you kidding me? You’re practically the golden child for following in dad’s footsteps.”

“You’re young, you could do it too.”

“Hard pass.”

I yawn and stretch my arms above my head. “Anyways, I’m exhausted so I’ll talk to you later, Con.”

“Night sis.”

“Goodnight Con.”

I hang up and look down at my screen to see that I have a new message. It’s from Harry. I bit my lip as I open it.

‘Got back home. Had to fight a biker gang, but made it out alive haha. Have a good night, Fi.”

I contemplate if I should respond with something witty back. I think about it for a few moments and breathe deeply. I slowly type back, ‘Thanks for risking your life to walk me home. Goodnight Harry :)’

[praphit]

BP: When I think of his blackness and what he's done for me

Black Panther, baby!

I’ve been waiting for this movie for a long time! I remember the day I first saw the trailer for this movie, I was like Denzel with the one tear drop

 -          frickin beautiful. I’ve been saying that “Black Panther” is for black people what “Wonder Woman” was for women in 2017. I can remember back when WW first came out last year, I was at the coffee shop down the street, feeding my addiction. There was a girl behind the counter – I asked her for my usual.

 She replied “What so I’m just supposed to know what that is?” Praphit: “Well, I come here often, so…” Irritated Girl: “Wha, wha, what that mean? You just assume I’ve paid attention to you? Matter of fact, you just assuuuumed I’d get you some coffee this morning.” Praphit: “But, don’t you work here?” Empowered Girl who is starting to scare the Praphit: “What because I’m a woman I must be a servant huh?? Just another woman getting some man whatever he wants… that’s all I am to you?” Praphit: “…  huh” Girl who must have believed she was Wonder Woman herself: “ Did you just call me a bitch?!” Praphit: “What? No!” An angry, scary version a WW: “But I bet you thought it!”

Then, she gave me the finger, mooned me(that's right, MOONED me! - who even does that anymore??)… and then walked out. Then, came The Harvey Weinstein Storm, men scared everywhere by #MeToo, and Louis CK hiding out… possibly wherever Kevin Spacey has been hiding out. I never did see her again... I also never got my coffee.

I hope she's ok and found another job. I know Gal Gadot (Wonder Woman) is her hero, but... it's not like she's gonna feed all of the inspired jobless ladies out there. Anyway, as strange as that encounter was, I get it! Empowerment will do that to a person; it feels righteous! Now, Black Panther, baby! Black people… we’re going to have a hashtag too. Maybe #bleepwhitey… that may be a lil strong, but something! It’s coming! This movie is a big deal! - so big of a deal that white executives in Hollywood were planted in critic circles in pre-screenings to stir up bad reviews.

The white people running Hollywood were like “We’ve gotta knock this movie down a few pegs before we have another ‘storm’ on our hands! Women are already rising up…. Black people rose up recently with #OscarsSoWhite, we can’t have it happen again. What’s next??! Who's gonna rise up next??! Asians?! Latinos?! Little People?! We can’t have this?!” There’s already a belief out there that you can’t have a worldwide blockbuster with the main character being black. So, how is this movie REALLY?? That’s why your Praphit is here for you:) “Black Panther” starts out right after “Civil War” (currently my fav comic book movie:) What I appreciate about Marvel movies is how well they are written; not just individually, but how they all come together. Of course (spoiler alert from “Civil War”) the king of Wakanda is dead, and now his son T’Challa (Black Panther) is heir to take over! Black Panther as we know is played by Chadwick Boseman. I love him as Black Panther!

 Some may say he’s not aggressive enough to be king/BP, but I think someone who’s always calm, even when they’re angry is scarier than someone who wears their emotions on their sleeves. One second, you think everything is cool, and the next you’re on your back, hurting, with Chadwick Boseman smiling at you. Wakanda is beautiful! I like what Marvel did here. Marvel is really good at creating worlds that look and feel real. I'm willing to bet that some believe Wakanda is real... probably our president.

 I'm telling you,there's a speech coming up when Trump will say something like

 " We've got to make America great in tech again. I had Mike Pence go to the movie theatre to watch this documentary called "Black Panther", I had him leave quickly in protest (there were too many black and brown people there - I only bring it up because many of them were illegals..), but we had others stay and report back to me. Wakanda, this terrorist country... possibly where Barack Obama is really from; we don't know... we don't know...  but, they turned their shithole of a country into an empire with this amazing metal called "Vibranium" (Idk if you've ever heard of it, because it's AMAZING). I'm telling you, we're going to get ahold of even more Vibranium than those savages and use it to make America #1 in tech again." - you tell me I couldn't write for the prez:) Many have described Wakanda as Zamunda (another fictional nation in Africa from “Coming to America”) in the future. I think those people have it right.

 If Eddie Murphy took Zamunda 100 years into the future, and stole all of Apple’s tech (imagine how scary Apple will be in 100 years), and then came back to the present… and used this tech to create… idk… a super tech “Eddie Land”, it’d be Wakanda. They are also the leading source of Vibranium (strongest medal around this comic book universe). The plot is layered, but they make it work. I was surprised that a product of Disney would go into such deep waters. Race is of course dealt with – not only in the movie, but simply by this movie’s existence. I can remember when I was younger, the only comic book characters to dress up as or play make believe as were Superman, Batman, Spiderman, and The X-Men. But, no black characters. I mean… I could have dressed up like Storm for Halloween, but…

or it might have looked more like this -

- maybe rock a... mankini silver top, and some dark purple eye shadow and lip stick... so there was that I guess. Picture me as a little boy dressed up like that - I'd make it work. Let’s move on:) I also love how these characters are portrayed – there are lots of different cultures of black people, but all the differences in appearance and worldviews are highlighted as positives in this movie. It truly is (on a comic book movie scale of course) a celebration of black people from different walks of life. There are no dummies or potheads or gangsters – but black people are all represented as strong, smart, and capable in this movie; even the villains! Michael B Jordan!

I probably liked him more than Black Panther. His character is smart, calculated, complex and easy to sympathize with, even though he’s the main villain. As far as portraying strong women – I think “Black Panther” does it even better than “Wonder Woman” did. Again, showing the strength of different types of women. Danai Gurira (whom I’m in love with by the way… just sayin’… if somehow you’re reading this… you can find me in Bmore:)

 She has a scene in the beginning of the movie that displays courage, strength, command, and yet also warmth and beauty. It's hard to keep a strong willed woman character balanced in a story without it going in a wrong direction, or without her becoming "one note" (idk if y'all know what I mean), but the writing and Gurira's performance are perfect with this; as well as the other female characters - I'd love to see a movie with them as the stars. They also tackle colonialism, mainly through Martin Freeman.

This motha bleeper right here stole Samuel L Jackson’s part. Where the hell is Sam L?!

How you gonna have the blackest movie of the year without Sam L?!

 Anyway, Martin Freeman does a good job, but I couldn’t watch him without getting mad. Whitey! - you just couldn’t let us have one movie to ourselves could you??! This movie even tackles politics, generational black community issues, African traditions, and culture wars in the black community (again through the filter of a comic book movie, but still). A lot of this movie is about what type of king T’Challa wants to be, what type of king his people want/need, and how (or if) a nation should use its strengths to help one other nations. Marvelous (no pun intended) how they blended all of these things together. Can I talk about the sexiness??! -cuz whew! My future wife

(I also love how her character (Okoye) is so confident and committed to what she believes. She should be running Wakanda to tell you the truth)

My other future wife

(Lupita Nyong'o here as Nakia has her arm wrapped up with T'Challa here... and I don't like the way she's gazing into his eyes, but I believe I've still got a shot. That dress made me fall out my chair.)

 And many more – tons of sexiness in this movie, but not in an exploitive manner. It’s not just the looks, but the character, the ideals, the strength, the honor that adds to everyone’s sexiness.

 And it’s the men too! Even I’ve got to admit that Michael B Jordan looks damned good.

Though I couldn't find a good picture of him... you need context for what's going on with his torso (besides being jacked)... his hair messed up, and he looks like he has marbles in his mouth right now. Let me try again (not that he doesn't make that work).

There he is - with a lil nip slip action.

He's one of those men where when he walks in and steals your girlfriend or wife, you say to yourself "I understand." Shiiii, you get some drinks in you, and YOU might be leaving with him. Ladies, forget “Fifty Shades of Bullshit”, you’ve got all of the sexiness you need in this movie right here. So, you say “John Praphit, is there anything bad about this movie?” NO! Quit looking to downgrade black movies you racists! :) Nothing “bad”, but I did have a few issues. This IS a comic book movie after all, and despite the commendation I’d give this movie for veering off the typical Marvel scripted formula, I would have liked a lil more action. The action was good, but not great. Also, I would have loved more of Michael B Jordan. His character is so good! Mikey B does an excellent job making us feel  - whether it’s sympathy, hatred, or disgust in his way of thinking; he makes it happen. I would have loved to see more of his interaction with the people of Wakanda. The ending felt rushed. Not only with characters jumping from loving one another to wanting to kill one another (and vice versa), but also in CG. It’s like they didn’t have enough in the budget to crank up the last fight scene… that money probably went to Martin Freeman

 .. you rat bastard. I'm sorry. He was good, but still #wherethehellisSamL? Besides, all of that I loved this movie! Very entertaining! It was funny. It has a lot of good talking points in it. And it’s a big deal for black people! Grade: B+++ First time ever for a “B+++”!!! Originally, a B+, but an extra plus for blackness – seriously, I think it’s a game changer for not only comic book movies, but all types of movies… another stepping stone of progress. I truly believe it’ll have a positive creative impact on our youth as well. And the last plus is for sexiness, cuz.. da

 Dammit! Not you Martin Freeman! So help me!  *deep sigh* Now I forgot what I was going to say. Anyway, good stuff! On second thought... I'm going to give this movie two grades. The B+++, but also... when I think of his blackness (The king!) - the positive progressive impact that I believe this movie has and will have are too great not to give it an A My Semi Objective Technical Grade:  B+++ Blackness Grade: A The only thing that could have made it better on that scale would be if I were in it.

Makes me wanna follow in the footsteps of that now probably homeless barista.  Quit my job and march onto righteousness!

 Can’t wait for “BP2!

[ppdoddy]

Michael Moore

AN OPEN LETTER TO JOE BIDEN Dear President-Elect Biden:

First of all, congratulations! YOU did it. WE did it! You stopped the madness. A grateful nation - and myself - are in a state of joy, hope and relief. Thank you for that! We are all eager to join with you to repair the damage done to our country — and to eliminate that about our society and our politics which gave us Donald Trump in the first place.

Mr. President-Elect, I first met you at the Democratic National Convention in Boston in 2004. It was clear to me from our talk that day that you were not the politician I remembered from the 1990s. On that day in Boston, we were by then over a year into the Iraq War, a war you voted for. My “Fahrenheit 9/11“ had just come out and you wanted to let me know that you were aware of the folly you had been sucked into. It seemed to me that you were doing a lot of soul searching and you wanted to hear my thoughts. To be honest, I was distracted by how perfect your teeth were, and I wondered, could you really be from the working class? By the end of our talk I was convinced there was something that was quite real and very good about you, though perhaps somewhat buried inside. Would it ever come out so the public could see it? As I reflect today on it - and you - I am sincerely hoping that you will indeed govern as a president who’s from the working class. You - one of us - in the White House. That’s how it should feel. Your actions, if bold, and brave, will make that true.

You are also our second Catholic president. I believe you are a person of faith. You and I were taught the same lessons in Catholic school: to love our neighbor, even our enemy; to create a world where everyone regardless of status or station has a seat at the table, and everyone gets a slice of the pie; a world where “the rich man will have a harder time getting into heaven than a camel will have getting through the eye of the needle.” We were taught that we will be judged by how we treat the least amongst us. Do I have that right? Are these not the moral, foundational principles of the coming Biden presidency?

I was so moved by your victory speech Saturday night when you told the immigrants and the children of immigrants that the Dreamers no longer had to live in fear. That Muslims were once again welcomed into our country. That the world could breathe a sigh of relief because we were going to let the planet Earth itself breathe and have some relief. And you told the teachers of America that starting January 20th, “one of your own will be living in the White House.” That just felt instantly good.

So if I may, I’d like to suggest a few things that might make your presidency one of the best this country has ever had. You and I may have our political differences (you like Amtrak trains, I’d like to ride a bullet train from New York to LA in 10 hours!😎), but I know that you and I - and tens of millions of others - all want and believe in the same basic things: • Health Care is a human right and every American must be covered; • Everyone must be paid a living wage and all of us must work to eliminate poverty and rebuild our broken middle class; • The massive and growing gulf between the ultra rich and everyone else must be narrowed — and the wealthy must go back to paying the taxes they should pay; • Women must be paid the same as men, and no man or government has the right to tell them what they can do or not do with their bodies.

So here’s my two cents:

1. You are right to make containing Covid-19 Job #1. Had Trump won, I’m guessing up to a million people in the next year or so would have died from him ignoring this virus. Yesterday you named your Covid task force of doctors and scientists and you are putting them to work. We don’t have a second to lose. Thank you for this.

2. As soon as you can, please provide much more unemployment relief for the jobless, stimulus checks for all, help for small businesses, and the creation of jobs we desperately need.

3. Millions have lost their health insurance because our system ties one’s health coverage to their employer. What happens when the employer, like now, is suddenly gone, or the boss wakes up one morning and decides these employees’ health benefits are too costly and must be cut? BOOM! Millions of families suddenly have no health insurance. This is nuts.

You MUST create a health system like every other industrial democracy — one backed by the government, not by the whims of the boss where you work or the pandemic that has shut him or her down. This is just plain common sense.

4. I see various people trying to take credit for your victory — and using their personal agendas to push you away from the progressive Left and toward the cowardly center which believes that the best way to beat Republicans is to just be a more easily-digestible version of Republicans. They think because Trump got 70 million votes the Democrats should reject Black Lives Matter, AOC, and anything that vaguely sounds like socialism — at a time when the majority of our citizens under the age of 35, according to most polls, prefer the idea of democratic socialism over the greed of modern-day capitalism. Why risk losing them? We need to listen to and understand why they feel this way. They’ve been saddled with crushing student debt and we’ve handed them a planet In the middle of its 6th extinction event as their future. You and Barack introduced them to the benefits of democratic socialism by letting them stay on their parents health insurance until they’re 26! The result: They just set a record by coming out and voting for you in the largest youth numbers ever.

But you know all this. And you also know how you won these razor-thin victories in the final five states as we nervously watched the final ballots come in from Black Philly, Black Detroit, Black Atlanta, Black Flint. Out west, it was Latinx and Navajo voters who delivered Nevada and Arizona to you. In your speech on Saturday you acknowledged it. And never in our history have I heard a President-elect single out the Black community and thank them “for having my back. And I promise you, I will have your back!” Black and brown and indigenous peoples, plus a landslide of women and young adult voters made this happen. Wow. I absolutely know you’ll keep that promise.

5. Please do not make the same mistake an otherwise well-meaning President Obama made in his first two years. He wanted everyone to get along. He was willing to compromise on anything. Kumbaya. The Republicans had already decided they were going to block EVERYTHING Obama proposed and that’s exactly what they did for eight long years with a discipline and a ruthlessness we should probably envy.

Don’t let this happen to you. Charge in on January 20th like FDR on steroids. You have no choice. People are dying! You need to sign executive orders and cajole, demand and shame Congress into action. And GO BIG! Eliminate the Electoral College through the National Popular Vote Act! DONE! Ratify the Equal Rights Amendment for women! Just one more state needed! DONE! Send in the Army Corps of Engineers to Flint to replace the poisoned water pipes! DONE!!

And none of the above needs a single vote of the United States Senate! In fact, this past summer, your “Biden-Bernie” unity joint task force identified a whopping 277 policies and decisions of Trump’s that you have the legal authority to immediately reverse by executive order or presidential policy decision https://prospect.org/…/277-policies-biden-need-not-ask-per…/. Find that big fat black marker of his and do it!

But, yes, we also desperately need those two Georgia Senate seats to get the Biden/Harris years off to a blazing start. So let’s make that happen! All hands on deck between now and January 5th!! We will all do whatever is needed.

Friends of mine on the Left who are more cynical than I am are probably wondering why I’m sending you this letter. Haha! Well, because I saw you kiss the head of that young grieving man at the Parkland, Florida memorial for the shooting victims of Stoneman Douglas High School. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyMa96yOel0

And because I saw you in New Hampshire this year while we were there working for Bernie, and you were doing a campaign stop and there was a restless five-year boy in the front row. His parents were trying to get him to settle down. You stopped and spoke to the boy. “Hey buddy,” you said in a kind but parental way, “if you can hang on and be a good boy for just a little bit, I’ll buy ya an ice cream!” The boy quieted down, you wrapped up and afterward you went over to the boy and his parents and you gave the kid five bucks so his mom and dad could go get him an ice cream cone. And I thought to myself, this is the weirdest thing I’ve ever seen — and then I started to cry because I wanted so much for that piece of America to come back — goofy, kind, and focusing on what’s truly important: a goddamned ice cream cone!

I think that’s why you won. People saw what I saw with you there in New Hampshire and back in Boston on that day 16 years ago — they knew that maybe, just maybe, their lives might just get a bit better - hopefully a LOT better - with you in the White House. Maybe less of them will die from the virus, this preventable horror. Trump, of whom we knew many despicable things and thought we’d already seen how low the bar could possibly go for one human being — but we never considered him under the moniker of mass killer, terrorist or superspreader. Then you, Joe, came along and offered us a respite, a break from the insanity — “Mr. Biden, we’ll be happy if you just give us four years of ‘Not Trump!’”

But I think you can give us much more than that. What could our lives be like in four years or eight years (with a Democratic Senate to boot)? How ‘bout no one ever goes bankrupt again because they got sick? How ‘bout no one is sitting in a prison cell for possessing marijuana or actual drugs? How ‘bout every child gets to go to a great school and every neighborhood has an expanded free library open seven days a week? How ‘bout paid family medical leave so you can take care of your elderly parents and not lose your job? How ‘bout my bullet train! You and we can make all this happen. It’s not rocket science. 30+ other countries already do it. (https://www.amazon.com/Where-Invade-Next-Micha…/…/B01EGW9EOU) They’re happier. Why not us? Our founders promised it to us in their second sentence: “the pursuit of Happiness.“ They said that’s what America would be — and it’s been a rare day when we’ve actually had a glimpse of it.

Joe, you’re the guy to fulfill the promise. I’ll help. So will my neighbors on the floor where I live. As will the woman who delivers my mail, the workers who stock the shelves of my neighborhood market, the nurse who just wrote me in tears because yesterday she watched her 22nd patient die, alone, no family allowed, from Covid. Not to mention the millions upon millions of Americans who are ready to be foot soldiers in your army of justice, equality and love. We’re all in! We don’t want to go back to the old “normal.” We want a new normal!

We want ice cream.

All my best, Michael Moore

P.S. You know why I think you can and will do this? You picked Kamala Harris to run with you! Ranked as the most liberal senator in the U.S. Senate. A woman. A Black woman! I saw the first debate, the one where she challenged you and threw shade on your younger self. Most people (including me), if that had happened to us, we probably wouldn’t have gotten over it. You did. I’m guessing your conscience whispered to you, “well, dang, maybe she has a point.” You hold no grudges. You are a forgiving soul. But then you didn’t just forgive her — you put her on the Big Ticket! Who would do that? You did! That’s why my cautious, hopeful bet is on the good hands we’re now in — both your hands, Kamala’s hands, and the hands of the mass millions who voted for you and will continue to rise up and fight for this new, better, post-Trump, post-pandemic America.

[douxbebearchives]

Summer Q&A - Week Eight

A little switch up this week. We will be featuring a special question and giving everyone’s responses. Need to catch up on the previous weeks? Here you go.

Enjoy!

A favorite line or paragraph you’ve written:

cbssoapsgirl:  “I know you.  Don’t ever say I don’t know you.  We spend every moment together inside and outside this campaign.  I know you.”

CMW2 / @trumpetnista: The opening portion of Chapter 32 of Shattering Expectations. It’s sensual, it’s funny, and it’s also got an element of domesticity between Liv & Fitz that I’ve always loved and wished that we could get more of in canon. I’ve also written some pretty smut over the years, even in my early days of writing. I love to write about love & lovemaking is a part of it…as is fucking. Again, it depends on the pairing, the story, and my mood.

dafney64 / @terrieaster:  From A Special Time, “I will never be satisfied by you Livy.  Even if I got to have you every day five times a day, I will never have enough of you Olivia Caroline Pope.”

DayDreamLover / @daydreamloverslane​: She treated him to a painfully wide smile as they bumped foreheads and noses. “If it all went to hell and I found myself jobless we’d be okay, right?”  (Up Close And Personal) 

FG3OP16: “Sometimes when life throws you a Jar, you make jam.”

Glamour02 / @glamour02​: "Everything you need is inside of you…remember that.“ He spoke confidently and Fitz immediately saw the impact his words had on her. She obviously heard them before and a surge of gratitude filled him completely.

They walked him to the door and both thanked him again. Olivia kissed his cheek farewell and Fitz shook his hand again. A secret service agent opened the front door, ready to escort Michael to the car. Fitz watched him step on the porch and turn to face them once more before finally leaving.

"We all have the right to choose the life we want to live…decide what we will and will not tolerate. That’s the legacy I want to leave my children.” (No Escaping Him)

IWrite4Olitz / @iwrite4olitz​:  This changes all the time, and I have different ones for each work, haha. By the time anyone reads this, it likely will have changed again. (There are some things I’ve written for the next Pas De Deux update that might upstage this, I dunno)…but I think this paragraph from Olivia’s point of view in Chapter 9 is my current favorite, It shows their dynamic so well, I think, and is quintessentially the Olitz I recognize no matter the writer, or whether the story is AU or canon:  She shivered, unnerved to be in his head, to see for herself the irrefutable evidence that he knew her. He knew her and she hadn’t told him a single thing.  (Pas De Deux)

Labellebeaucoup / @labellebeaucoup​: “Congratulations, governor,” Olivia said, smiling at Fitz. He took the glass from her hand, sitting it on the coffee table, before yanking her into his lap. In front of the crowded room of his campaign workers, his lips found hers – kissing her deeply and without restraint.

“Holy shit,” Toby deadpanned at the cheers of his coworkers, watching his boss.” (I don’t write light-hearted moments like this much and loved the way this one turned out)

Lauryn Joleigh:  “My heart was so sure but my brain was doing everything it could to protect it.” (Adorned)

LiveLoveInLaughter / @livelovelaughter531:  He loved her and he wasn’t going anywhere. He’d fight for her. It was a heady feeling, knowing she had him by her side until time ran out. She clutched tightly at his fingers, she’d be damned to hell and darkness before she’d let him go. – “The Beauty of the Rain” (Once Upon a Time)

Lynalexandria / @lynalexandria:  Olivia carefully climbed out of her window and sat in the window sill, looking down at Fitz warily as he planted his feet in the grass. 

‘You’re going to catch me?’ she asked softly, not wanting to draw any attention to them.

‘And then I’m going to kiss you senseless.’ he said as he held his arms up higher for her.

MrMsWell:  “I’m taking my wife on a honeymoon.” I knew for a long time that would be the ending of The Game Plan. It was quite satisfying to finally write it.

MzMocha / @artsychica2012:  “Fitz’s lips were soft, warm yet they quickly turned fierce as Olivia began to kiss him back. Her body acted before she could think about the wisdom of it - and that was the wisest thing of all. The strength of their rising feelings - both emotional and physical - began to weave a web that spiraled around them - and caught within, Olivia stopped thinking at all. Emotions freed of rhyme and reason overrode common sense and logic, leaving only want and need in its place. And love that was once lost, filled all the spaces in between.” (Even Lovers Drown)

NoLove10 / @allshipscanon123​: “You’re exactly what I’ve wished for my whole life.” It’s from my story Epiphany. It’s actually a teaser from upcoming updates. 

OliviaLovesFitz8:  Hmmm.. probably the deep/honest conversations between Madison and Fitz. (Falling Slowly)

Olitzalltheway / @olitzalltheway1 : “Vermont suits her dad, don’t screw it up this time” Karen to Fitz.

RGBzMom:  I don’t know…I like to make Fitz say checkmate. It always makes me giggle when I do it. I think it is because Shonda has refused to allow the character to maximize his obvious intelligence to his advantage. I am supposed to believe that Mellie is smarter than Fitz-please…I always like when I am able to have Olivia admit/acknowledge/address her fear and weakness. To make her vulnerable and allow her to benefit from dropping the mask is always a good day.

Reader575 / @reader575la: “Big talk coming from an unproven commodity. What makes your fortress worth scaling the wall?” Olivia walks around the table to whisper in Fitz’s ear. “My walls have never been breached”, she breaths with her warm minty breath. She licks his ear for added effect. (The Challenge) Fitz swallows hard, he’s temporarily loses the power of speech. Accept my challenge and let’s see if you have what it takes to capture my flag.

Sucker4Scandal: Olivia ~ Please don’t think about that night ever again. We were both wrong. But it doesn’t matter anymore. You are going to be my wife and that was worth waiting my whole life for. I knew you’d want the box. I love you endlessly. Fitz  (We Can Figure It Out) 

We hope you enjoyed this special edition. Some of the authors did not include quotes - they would love for you to decide. :)  

Next week, we will feature more answers from our authors, and hopefully include new participants! If that includes you, email us - douxbebearchives@gmail.com

[la-alert]

THOUGHT IT WAS A DROUGHT.. 

Us? Not having any tea to SPILL? You’ve got it all wrong. We are the best gossip blog in L.A. We ALWAYS have tea! We will ALWAYS have the tea. Read it and weep, children. Ya’ll stay hydrated. 

XOXO, L.A ALERT. 

Who remembers those suicidal heartbroken tweets Roxanne was posting about a mystery man? We now know who it was all about, Quadir! You ever meet a man who fucked you over soooo bad that you said fuck love and ran off to raise a single dad’s family for some consistent dick? ME EITHER. She was tweeting about Quadir last week and begging Janaria to stop trying to ruin their relationship.. (GIRL, don’t nobody wanna be single and lonely like you!) She’s one of those people you’ve gotta say, “I know we’re best friends but, DAMN.” to. This week she posted Michael W. for MCE AND was seen making his kids breakfast. Has Janaria been teaching her the tricks about moving up so fast? Let us know ASAP! Have fun, Michael! Tell us about the Brujeria and Chill sessions!

Let’s talk about Ezekiel now. The pregnant woman abuser who redeemed himself as daddy of the year! The other night, mother Luna shut him the hell down about taking baby Arielle to Melody’s, he went CRAZY..and I mean, crazy. He ran ALL the way to his car with the baby in his arms and sped off to Melody’s! He ran quicker than the examiner did when she got a hold of their DNA test results! (Thanks to Maury Povich, we know who the father is!) Anyways, who invites a baby over to a party full of drunk people? Melody does. And they weren’t sipping no grape juice for communion! During the party Melody’s tongue went down Michael’s throat in Jesus’s name. Even the congregation started crying when they saw it! (Baby Arielle). We’re saddened to say we expected a little more from Melody. Jesus and Therapy?

Janaria had a good time at the beach with Terrell, and he probably thinks she’s changing her life around to become a stepmom. Let’s begin, shall we? She started with a lie to Terrell about a Hickey she got from Muhammed. Said it was from Savior and Lord knows he isn’t checking for her ass, according to Twitter. (Is you car fixed, daddy?) Muhammed came looking for his watch in the middle of Terrell and Janaria hanging out and Janaria lied again after Terrell asked if he slept over in her bed. She said she slept in Amir’s room. The same Amir who moved out and got his own house on the hills! Dear Terrell, aren’t you top flight security at the one and only Ace of Diamonds?! You protect a bunch of SKRIPPAS all day and you can’t see that this one is LYING to you? We’re taking your flashlight away. Goodbye!

Let’s talk about some mess on the TL!

It was early Sunday morning and all we could hear was the birds, COCKADOODLEDOING! We don’t know what started it but Brilliant started shading her favorite cousin Mya up and down the TL! Gang, gang, Janaria and Roxy weren’t having it. It got so crazy that we had to take down our lace fronts! According to Janaria, they’re bad for the edges. (Thanks girl!) Our edges were snatched some more when Brilliant said she was going to send her goons for Roxy! Look! We can NOT have two convicts fighting under our watch! The Twitter scuffle didn’t end in any trips to the park, which is a good thing! We even got some airtime from Luna and Cassidy! Cassidy girl, if you’re looking for a job, ask Janaria for the hook up! Get on over there and help them sell them car parts to pay for Muhammad’s $10,000 chain! And you’re probably wondering where he got the chain from? O'Neal’s Jewelers! You know he had to run and apologize after trying Mr. Oneal’s wife. They were about to be on some PAPOOSEXREMYMA gangsta rap time. #BLACKLOVE #MEETTHEMACKIES. (And Zyair, why are you charging 10,000 for that little behind chain?! We watch The Price is Right and you ain’t slick!)

We peeped something else that you all may have not and we are HERE for it! Savior and Bellamy sitting in a tree, K-I-S-y'all we’re just playing! GOTCHA! But we did see that he welcomed her back with open arms and is trying to get her over Not-So-Bald Bae and potentially under him. He was even commenting gorgeous and heart eyes under all of her pictures! Hm? Could we be onto something?

Not-So-Bald Bae is doing alright for himself, by the way! If he isn’t in AOD, spending his mortgage on the SKRIPPAS, he’s seen with Melody or Aliana, another jobless friend of ours. No worries, Lonzo is going to take care of you now! We love us some Alonzo! He’s the sweetest and most underrated guy in L.A! Our man, told Bellamy off and he free’d himself! If Aliana doesn’t snatch him, we will.

After Hakeem, Nnamdi, Cain, Breonna..and whoever else. (Poor Adonis, we know he’s confused!) Little Miss Ava has finally settled down and married Aiden. CONGRATULATIONS! Give that MEOW a rest! And we know exactly what you’re thinking. She’s even faster at moving on up than Janaria and Roxanne. Was Gloria leaving L.A. the reason he married Ava? Maybe so. But it looks like Gloria’s back in town. How is Ava handling the new girl, Sevyn who BOLDLY tweeted Aiden (her newly husband) to text her? How will she handle Gloria coming back to swoop Aiden off his feet again?

Cain..Cain..Cain. He’s the MOST popular man in L.A. He’s had his share of Luna, Arian, Ava, Emory, (there’s more!) Bellamy, Quinn AND now he’s with Mya and he’s happier than ever! He’s always happier than ever! We give it until April 8th, and they’ll be done. Like DAMN, Cain! We wouldn’t be surprised if we caught you in bed with our MOTHER. He just so happens to fall in love fast! We will say he might have to watch out for Mya..who knows what she’s capable of. I mean she took her best friend’s, ex-boyfriend. Now that’s some tea for another day. Sip. Sip. We have one request through, Amir, we hear you’re giving out free pap-spears and vaccinations? Could you give us a call???? We have a few people to refer you, per Cain.

Lazuli! How were you a virgin last week, but now you’re not? You got some 'splaining to do! Terrell, maybe? No. We KNOW it was Terrell. You got us SHOOK with that one. Mya isn’t the only out here stealing boyfriends. Caroline and Lazuli (they’re roommates!) messed with the same guy. According to Lazuli, Caroline liked Marc but said she’d stop talking to him for Lazuli who had no intentions on being with him anyway. Speaking of SHOOK, from a scale of 1-10 how shook was Aniyah after being left out in the cold by her husband? The same husband who fucked her best friend, Arian? Aniyah went from messing with an eighteen year old, Pharaoh to getting married within a week. She’s even faster than Cain. Let’s hope those KFC chicken drumstick legs can take her on over to find a new man. Oh, wait! She’s been messing with Alonzo and is now best friends with Mya. Mya can’t be any lower of an ex-friend to Bellamy than she already is. We truly feel sorry!

Congratulations Houston! We like Ace of Diamonds, keep the drama rolling in! We absolutely love it. You might’ve kicked Main Event to the curb for being the most drama filled club in L.A. Aliana and Quinn (the manager) argued over Aliana (the bartender) sneaking drinks. In what world does a bartender not have the availability to drink? Houston’s keeping things LOCKED down and we aren’t making a pun with his last name either! Speaking of locked down, Quinn was boo’d up with Hendrix on the clock. (Our possessive bae). Aliana wasn’t afraid to snitch about that to Houston either. After he got them both to his office, Aliana stormed out, so we can only assume what had happened in there. (4Play’s hiring, girl!). We peeped Michael S. getting an hour lapdance from Chanel. Jesus and Therapy did its job because Melody didn’t go off on him like we would’ve! She continued having a good ‘ol time with her girls. Same with Bellamy. You can tell she was trying a little TOO hard to make Alonzo jealous, but it worked! After seeing Bellamy dancing with Mekhi, Alonzo LEFT the club and went home. The night had gotten even better once Elias stepped onto the scene. (He might be our new old bae). He had gotten comfortable with Zeno at the bar. We think they’d make a cute couple. Both sophisticated, educated, financially stable and what not. Go them! Quinn and Hendrix have been going..steady. Hendrix keeps her in check when it comes to commenting under tweets. He almost went off after he saw Quinn under Chevy’s tweet, and we ain’t talking about a big bodied Silverado. Houston! Did Quinn fail to mention that she’s WORKING with the Main Event owner for her newest project? Some manager!

[dulwichdiverter]

Common people

The story of Peckham Rye Park and Common is a rich mix of legend, folklore and real-life events. Our writer sorts the fact from the fiction  

By Baruch Solomon; Photo © Steve Keiretsu

“Who’ll buy our rye? Who’ll buy? Who’ll buy?”

The pretty girls of Peckham cry.

“The ears are full as they can hold

And heavy as a purse of gold.

Sweeter corn you will not find

For the London mills to grind.

Come buy, come buy,

Our Peckham rye!”

This almost forgotten nursery rhyme was brought to the attention of the Peckham Society by Linda G Wood in 2001.

While the poem refers to the grain, it is the Old English word “rye” – meaning watercourse – from which Peckham Rye derives its name. Rye is almost certainly a reference to the River Peck, which still flows through the park today.

The expansive and much-loved green space, which is bordered by East Dulwich, Nunhead and Peckham, is steeped in history and folklore. Legend has it that Boudicca, the Iceni warrior queen, fought her final battle on the common, but this is highly unlikely.

In fact, after destroying London, Boudicca’s army headed northwards and laid waste to St Albans. Her crushing defeat by Roman governor Suetonius at the Battle of Watling Street probably took place somewhere in the Midlands.  

There is also scant evidence for Brockley Jack, a local highwayman after whom the Brockley Jack pub is supposedly named. That being said, highwaymen probably did target travellers on the common, perhaps using One Tree Hill to scope out their prey.  

Peckham Rye Common has been a place for recreation since at least the 14th century, when it was mentioned in connection with sports and stag hunting. By the late 1700s, landowners across the country were fencing off areas that had been public land for hundreds of years.

This led to protests at Peckham Rye in 1766 and 1789, when a popular rhyme expressed the outrage felt by many: “The fault is great in man or woman, who steals a goose from off a common. But what can plead that man’s excuse, who steals a common from a goose?”

Around 1767, a different type of radical was taking a walk through the area. Poet William Blake, who was then about nine years old, saw an oak tree “filled with angels, bright angelic wings bespangling every bough like stars”.

A Romantic and a passionate advocate of social justice, Blake used his poetry and art to elicit humanity and inspiration amid the worst horrors of the industrial revolution. There is a mural commemorating his “vision of angels” behind the playground at Goose Green.

In 1864 trouble flared up again. Landowner Sir Edward Bowyer Smith allowed 32 horse-drawn vans onto the common filled with wild animals, including lions, tigers and possibly a rhinoceros or two.

The animals belonged to Wombwell’s Wild Beast Show, a travelling menagerie that was a household name in Victorian England and performed for Queen Victoria and her family three times.

Sir Edward’s unlikely new tenants were welcomed onto the common for a reason – he wanted to sell the land to developers. In response to his proposals, local people took their grievance to parliament in 1865.

It was rejected, but a year later the government passed the Metropolitan Commons Act, enabling Camberwell Vestry to buy the common, together with Goose Green and Nunhead Green, to be used as public space.

Peckham Rye Park was opened  on May 14, 1894 and this early description by JJ Sexby is still recognisable today: “In a secluded hollow delightfully shaded with trees a lake has been made. It has an island      in the centre and is fed by a small watercourse running though the grounds, which has been formed into a number of pools by artificial dams.”

Meanwhile the common had lost none of its anarchic edge. Dorothea Teayne recalled her mother’s memoirs in a letter to the Peckham Society: “One Sunday afternoon there was a pro-Boer meeting (1899 or 1900).

“There was an enormous crowd, and feeling ran so high that the mob made a rush for the speakers and threw them into the pond. I can remember clearly how terrified I was, hanging on to Dad and being unable to keep my feet on the ground, just being dragged along with the crowd.”

When Alfred Stevens of Homestall Farm died in 1907, what remained of his farm was incorporated into the park. It was used to create the bowling green and the Sexby, American and Japanese gardens.

The Japanese Garden was inspired by a major Japanese-English exhibition held at White City in 1910. The original shelter and many of the plants were gifts from the municipality of Tokyo.

Over the years, numerous attractions have come and gone. They include a bandstand, a dog’s paddling pool, a putting green and a model boat pond.

To the north of East Dulwich Road is the remains of a blue Art Deco fountain. This belonged to an open air swimming pool that once stood on the common, and plans to build a new lido are currently under discussion.

There were also three whalebone arches in the park, one of which spanned the rustic bridge near the lake. It was considered good luck to walk under the arches, possibly because they looked like wishbones. Lovers also liked to carve their initials on them, which may explain why they eventually fell to pieces.

Peacocks strutted freely about the park but a more unconventional attraction was the “rats’ dining room” near the bowling green. “The rats are most friendly,” one park keeper told the Daily Chronicle.

“They don’t care for crowds, but on a quiet day they like to see the children and the children love coming here to feed them.” He added, rather dubiously, that he’d “never seen anyone run away from a rat”.

Both common and park saw activity during World War Two. A German bomb destroyed the King’s Arms pub that overlooked the common, killing 11 people. Rebuilt after the war, it was turned into the infamous “Kings on the Rye” nightclub and is now flats.

According to bombsight.org, 78 bombs were dropped in the Peckham Rye area between October 1940 and June 1941. Underground air raid shelters were built in the northwest part of the common in 1939 with enough room for 672 people.

From 1943, Italian prisoners were housed on the common. They were not considered hostile and had considerable freedom to come and go. Only one POW hut still remains. It has been used for many years by the One O’Clock Club for mothers and toddlers but is due for demolition in early 2018.

In 1953 the Oval Garden, with its closely cropped lawn, formal flowerbeds and patriotic looking flagpole was laid out to celebrate the coronation of Queen Elizabeth. No doubt a Union Jack flew from the mast in place of today’s Green Flag Award.

In the decades that followed, parks and open spaces across the country began suffering from vandalism and neglect. In 1975 a rather snooty journalist from the South London Press had this to say about the common:

“It stands like an island surrounded by the roar of the traffic, occasionally visited by ‘castaways’ like the meths drinkers and groups of jobless youngsters who bask in the summer sunshine or simply sleep it off until the next bottle.”

The year of 1987 was an especially difficult one for Peckham Rye Park and Common. The lido finally closed. During a summer heatwave, the lake was starved of oxygen and hundreds of dead fish were found floating on the surface.

Then in October, the “Great Storm” that weatherman Michael Fish famously failed to predict brought down several trees. They lay piled on the common for several months before they were finally removed.

The Friends of Peckham Rye Park came into existence in 1995. Since then – largely due to their efforts – the park has undergone a renaissance, and their pièce de résistance is the Community Wildlife Garden.

The spot includes a beehive, insect towers, meadows and a wetland area. Ablaze with colour in summer, the dogwoods in the winter garden give a sense of warmth even in the bleakest months of the year.

It’s easy to drive past the common without noticing anything special; save perhaps the daffodils that line the roadside in early spring. It’s only when you step inside the park that you experience its beauty and variety; how it responds to the seasons and alters its mood with every kind of weather.

There are plenty of unexpected surprises, like the intricately carved totem pole that overlooks East Dulwich Road. Then there’s the strange blue water that comes out of the fountain in the Sexby Garden. An unconfirmed explanation is that it’s a vegetable dye to prevent dogs getting infections.

Talking of surprises, I recently saw an online post claiming that there were remains of a chimney stack behind the Japanese Garden. I never found the chimney stack but while searching, I nearly tripped over a memorial stone dedicated to a William H Shackleton. Further investigation confirmed that Mr Shackleton was of the canine persuasion, but the inscription “Ob Ob ZENA” remains a mystery.

One of my most inspirational experiences happened early in 2009. Unusually for London, there had been a heavy snowfall the previous night. I came into the park to find lots of lovingly created snow sculptures, some of them full of detail.

Parents and children must have come out early in the freezing cold to create these works of art, knowing full well they would melt in a day or two. That for me is what places like Peckham Rye are all about. The enjoyment of nature, a bit of healthy exercise and the spontaneity of creativity for creativity’s sake.

[brajeshupadhyay]

California job growth slows dramatically in July

California’s economic recovery slowed markedly last month as COVID-19 infections rose and the state resumed shutting businesses.

Employers added just 140,400 payroll jobs from mid-June to mid-July to a total workforce of nearly 15.8 million, state officials reported.

The July job gain was dramatically less than the record 542,500-job rise the previous month when some restaurants, gyms and other businesses briefly reopened amid hopes that the virus was abating.

California’s unemployment rate lowered to 13.3% last month, down from 14.9% in June. A year earlier, it stood at 4%.

Part of the decline in last month’s rate was due to a drop in people looking for work. In June, the state’s labor force expanded by 464,000 as many furloughed workers returned to their jobs. But last month it shrank by 167,000 as businesses closed again.

“July’s forward progress is welcome, but measured against historical benchmarks, the California labor market remains very much in the ICU,” said Scott Anderson, chief economist of Bank of the West in San Francisco.

Los Angeles County’s economic picture was particularly dire, with a July jobless rate of 17.5%, down from 19.4% in June. A year earlier, it was 4.4%.

Many of Southern California’s tourist-dependent industries, including hotels, restaurants and theme parks, remain closed, while many Northern California technology firms continued to thrive thanks to remote working, online shopping and digital streaming, economists say.

For the week that ended Aug. 15, California’s new unemployment claims fell to their lowest level in five months, with 201,600 applications submitted to the state Employment Development Department. But 4.8 million Californians were still collecting jobless benefits.

A federal supplement of $600 a week expired at the end of July. That’s expected to push more Californians to seek work this month, said Michael Bernick, a former EDD director.

“California’s local workforce boards and employment agencies are reporting an increase in job applicants,” he said. “But with the economic lockdowns, the jobs are not coming back in any significant numbers.

“In fact, the opposite is occurring. California businesses continue to announce that they are closing permanently. Any economic recovery we saw in June and early July has stalled, and a listlessness set in.”

The U.S. jobless rate of 10.2% was significantly lower than California’s in July, and the nation’s payrolls grew more than California’s: 1.3%, as compared with 0.9%.

The comparatively better national picture reflects the fact that many other states have either succeeded in tamping down the spread of the coronavirus or have been reluctant to close businesses despite high infection rates.

Over the last three months, California has regained less than a third of the 2.6 million positions lost during March and April as the pandemic took hold.

And the state’s jobless rate remains a percentage point higher than its 12.3% peak during the Great Recession.

As of Friday morning, California had reported more than 653,000 cases of COVID-19 and more than 11,800 deaths.

“Difficult times remain ahead,” said Lynn Reaser, an economist at San Diego’s Point Loma Nazarene University. “Forty-two of California’s 58 counties are currently on the state’s COVID-19 watchlist, which means bans on a significant number of indoor activities, including gyms, restaurant dine-in service, museums, indoor malls and hair salons. People also remain cautious about venturing out.”

Small businesses face cash flow crises as an extension of the federal Paycheck Protection Program loan program remains in limbo. “PPP was intended to provide a bridge for businesses to get to the ‘other side,’” Reaser said. “But the distance to the other side has turned out to be much longer than expected.”

Meanwhile, negotiations have stalled between the Trump administration and congressional Democrats who propose a trillion-dollar stimulus for state and local governments as tax revenues drop and safety net expenses rise.

The bill passed by the Democratic-led House would also extend the $600 weekly unemployment supplement through the end of the year, but it has been blocked by the Republican-led Senate and the White House.

This week California applied for a stopgap $300 weekly jobless payment to be drawn from federal disaster funds, under an executive order issued by President Trump on Aug. 8.

But the supplement is expected to last just a few weeks. It applies only to workers earning at least $100 in state unemployment benefits, thus excluding many low-income part-timers who have lost jobs.

“The end of the federal stimulus will have a big impact on California,” said Sung Won Sohn, a Loyola Marymount University economist. “It accounted for about 20% of personal income nationwide and allowed consumers to pay rent and buy food. Many small businesses may not survive.”

Statewide, nine of California’s 11 industry sectors gained jobs last month. Trade, transportation, and utilities had the largest job increase (40,900) because of motor vehicle and professional equipment wholesalers, as well as automobile dealers.

Construction lost 14,800 jobs, the largest drop in any sector, because of weak hiring in residential building despite a rise in commercial construction.

As its unemployment rate dipped slightly, Los Angeles County’s payrolls dropped by 3,600 jobs to 4,093,500. County employment was down 9.4% over the year, with leisure and hospitality jobs plummeting 30%.

In Orange County, joblessness stood at 12.3%, down from 13.6% in June, and from 3.1% a year earlier. July payrolls dropped by 17,700 jobs, to 1,464,500.

In the Inland Empire, the unemployment rate was 13.4%, down from 14.3% in June and 4.6% a year earlier. Payrolls in the region, encompassing Riverside and San Bernardino counties, shrank by 8,000 jobs last month to 1,385,400.

State employment numbers are based on a monthly federal survey of 5,100 California households that focuses on workers. Payroll estimates come from a second survey of about 80,000 California businesses.

If economists are doubtful that July’s job report offers much hope, they are even more pessimistic about the direction of the California economy in August.

“The July numbers probably paint a brighter picture of the California labor market than what actually occurred,” Anderson said, noting that Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered more business shutdowns in mid-July “so new layoffs from that likely won’t show up in the data until the August payroll report is released in September.”

California’s economic recovery will depend on whether the federal government can enact more stimulus measures, including unemployment benefits, and on curbing the COVID-19 infection rate, said David Smith, an economist at Pepperdine Graziadio Business School.

“It looks like a long road ahead where we are going to have to punch, kick and crawl our way back to anything near historically normal employment,” he added.

But beyond funding the social safety net, any economic resurgence is linked to the behavior of individual Californians, state officials say. It “depends on Californians choosing to wear face masks, staying at home when possible, and following state and local guidance” on coronavirus measures, California Labor Secretary Julie Su said in a statement on the jobs report.

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[go-redgirl]

Ep. 1050 Trump’s Bold Move. The Dan Bongino Show 8/22/2019.

_______________________________________________________________

INDIVIDUALS/COMMENTS/POSTS:

William Walden William Walden 1 day ago The US Marshals should have taken over the FBI until its integrity could be located.

415

REPLY View 86 replies Willy G Willy G 1 day ago Fire Wray, now.  Today. Before 5pm

83

REPLY View reply Marta LeFave Marta LeFave 1 day ago Dan, do not forget that the Left will not hold Biden to account on his lies.  To them, the end justifies the means.  Remember Obama??

210

REPLY View 20 replies Glenn Holcomb Glenn Holcomb 23 hours ago Wray needs to be replaced.  He's holding back items that Judicial Watch has asked for, that will make a difference in the voter's decisions in the election next year for seats in the House.

49

REPLY View 2 replies Kathy B Kathy B 23 hours ago who was the FISA judge, obviously either incompetent or in on it.

112

REPLY View 9 replies Percy's Percy's 1 day ago Trump should fire Wray!

123

REPLY View 4 replies Gary Gary 23 hours ago FBI's Wray is DIRTY AS HELL Dan, say it!!!

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REPLY Bill Simpson Bill Simpson 1 day ago (edited) This is getting SO OLD. The media’s lameass attempts to frame our President as a racist are the last acts of a desperate deep state. 😮 yawning Leader Technologies wrote the code and had it stolen by a Clinton operative in a theft of patent. African American lawyer Screwed the guy from Leader Technologies. Can’t remember the guys name! And that’s AWESOME Dan to provide hopeful reinforcement to those of us struggling with addiction issues. God Bless you brother!! 👍🏻❤️🙏🏻🇺🇸 Read more

59

REPLY View reply litigator2015 litigator2015 1 day ago (edited) Wray is Deep State for sure. Everytime I see him he has that same smirk on hus face. FIRE Wray

127

REPLY View 11 replies Roberta Grepaly Roberta Grepaly 1 day ago The FBI is just another corrupt organization.

42

REPLY Marta LeFave Marta LeFave 1 day ago Brennan is at the nucleus of this whole thing.  He is the head bad guy at the CIA.  He and Clinton  got the FBI involved, and then they all acted in unison.

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REPLY View 5 replies Robert Duley Robert Duley 23 hours ago Only answer is military trails DOJ and FIB and CIA all in cahoots SEDITION AND TREASON

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REPLY View reply Mitch Schneider Mitch Schneider 1 day ago Why doesn't Trump order the FBI to release the info NOW?

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REPLY View reply A C Rider A C Rider 23 hours ago Hello, Mr, Wray?  This is Attorney General Barr, DOJ.  You are aware I am your boss? Yes sir. There has been stalling by the FBI in turning over Muller Dossier documents for at least two years.  Is that correct? Yes sir. This is a direct order.  I want every document requested or subpoenaed on my desk in two hours! Sir, I can... You are fired!  Vacate the building immediately.  Marshal's are waiting outside your door. Read more

41

REPLY View 2 replies Peaches Mcbee Peaches Mcbee 1 day ago Shouldn't barr being kicking wrays  butt  telling him to give up the goods !!!!!???

79

REPLY View 8 replies Robert Miller Robert Miller 1 day ago (edited) What about the assassination attempt text between Page and her lover boy Peter

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REPLY Jason Lee Jason Lee 1 day ago They call us conspiracy theorists for asking question but they literally come up with a new conspiracy every week.

72

REPLY View 4 replies TWOHAWK 1 TWOHAWK 1 1 day ago Donald J. Trump should fire Wray Yesterday.

38

REPLY View 2 replies Charles Daniel Charles Daniel 1 day ago Can Trump and Barr go over to the FBI and tell Wray to handem over ?

29

REPLY View 2 replies Glenn Ryan Glenn Ryan 23 hours ago The FBI has managed to destroy people’s trust. Wray is only making things worse.

19

REPLY Proud Patriot Proud Patriot 1 day ago Look into Stephan Halpers father-in-law’s CIA position

20

REPLY 022141able 022141able 23 hours ago Can't President Trump dismiss Christopher Wray as head of the FBI for not handing over critical information and for protecting those who are responsible for the ongoing coup against the President?

37

REPLY View 4 replies Shanett Shanett 1 day ago NEVER expect a demorat to be honest. IMAGINE FOX giving Donna Brasille a job since she was probably the least criminal of the bunch!

22

REPLY View 2 replies Texas Viewpoint Texas Viewpoint 1 day ago (edited) It bothers me that swamp man Chris Ray ever became FBI director in the first place.

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REPLY View 3 replies Randy Brisendine Randy Brisendine 1 day ago "When the expectations are so low, you can't be disappointed" Joe Biden: Hold my beer...

27

REPLY View 2 replies Under Dog Under Dog 1 day ago The New York times and Dems need to face TREASON charges.

16

REPLY The Kraken The Kraken 1 day ago (edited) Why are all nationalists... white? I know Americans of all races...that want to circle the wagons....and clean house..

27

REPLY View 3 replies Michael Merlino Michael Merlino 23 hours ago Wasn’t Biden a keynote speaker at Robert Byrd’s funeral?The same KKK recruiter Robert Byrd.

27

REPLY John Tatum John Tatum 1 day ago (edited) Dems lie because it is the only thing they are good at...they have no honest candidates except maybe Yang. I say sue Biden for slander. Everyone knows that Christopher Wray is just as bad as Comey was.

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REPLY View reply Art Jones Art Jones 1 day ago Occam’s Razor: Chris is a member of the Cabal!

18

REPLY Dwayne Campbell Dwayne Campbell 23 hours ago Bill “Alvin” DeBlasio ... the most famous Chipmunk Actor of all time.

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REPLY joshua beatty joshua beatty 23 hours ago Those Jobless Claims Dropped Again The Economy is way to Strong

13

REPLY K W K W 1 day ago Richard Spencer has worked w Obama in the past!

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REPLY Robert Here Robert Here 23 hours ago Joe Biden lied? Again? Who does he think he is....Hillary?

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REPLY Eddie Monger Eddie Monger 1 day ago The media Trump haters do not call out any of the lies from any of these candidates.

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REPLY View 2 replies kcabyats * kcabyats * 1 day ago Why don't any of the people against joe biden ever bring up that he groped children on tape? Shouldn't that be the first thing people bring up?

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REPLY View 5 replies USMCArchAngel03 USMCArchAngel03 1 day ago But we still don't have probable cause to start arresting people at this point????

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REPLY Proud Patriot Proud Patriot 1 day ago Dan - Sen Gorka, Sara Carter, and John Solomon had a great discussion on America First today.

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REPLY View 2 replies AtomicDog AtomicDog 21 hours ago How quickly we forget the FBI said the text messages were lost and could not be recovered until the inspector general magically found them.  The FBI once again proves it is an agency that cannot be trusted from the ground up.

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REPLY Duke Milano Duke Milano 22 hours ago Wray is an empty suit.  Should be fired.

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REPLY rightonQ rightonQ 22 hours ago I ♥️ President Trump ⭐️

Thank You @Dan Bongino 🙏🏻

9

REPLY William Schutter William Schutter 1 day ago Fair enough. You are bringing me some comfort about "the two-way street."

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REPLY Jo Ann Levy Jo Ann Levy 1 day ago Fantastic show Team Bongino!!  Dan, Joe, and Paula are the best.  Love John Solomon's piece and glad I heard it here first.  I hope you all have a great day.  Looking forward to seeing you on Hannity.  Please I hope, that you don't have to put up with that Chris Hahn jerk.  Thanks for keeping it straight for us.

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REPLY Coma5 Coma5 22 hours ago I hope Barr has an honest, and eventually transparent, reason for allowing Wray to protect the criminals.

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REPLY Maryann Weldin Maryann Weldin 23 hours ago Our bloated government can’t manage their way out of a paper bag.

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REPLY Marta LeFave Marta LeFave 1 day ago Wray is as corrupt as Comey, Brennan, Clinton and Obama.  he covered up all the lies he were taking place, and he would love to see this drag on forever so they could destroy Trump if he is reelected.

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REPLY View reply Greg White Greg White 23 hours ago I hope Honorable AG Barr exposes this to the public before the election.

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REPLY Yardvarks Lawn Care Yardvarks Lawn Care 22 hours ago Im 2 years sober! Thank you for the very kind words Dan! Love you

7

REPLY y2rock y2rock 23 hours ago 11:30 Wray must be fired YESTERDAY!

Where is AG Barr???

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REPLY Ginger OConnell Ginger OConnell 1 day ago Should be find the info or go to jail...bet they would suddenly turn up.

6

REPLY Prentiss Campbell Prentiss Campbell 1 day ago The liberal ship is in flames however the democrat scumbags bucket brigade keep it from going under........eventually it will go under.

8

REPLY Big Colt Big Colt 23 hours ago What is Joe doing out on the street if it's common knowledge he robbed a bank?

9

REPLY Chuck Rogers Chuck Rogers 1 day ago Grab your popcorn, He's Back!👍 D-DAY💪 Dan Bonginos EXPLOSION💥 NEWS👏👏👏👏👏👏

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REPLY Mary Ellen Ledesma Mary Ellen Ledesma 1 day ago Dan....Joe Biden has never had one time where he has had an actual thought on his own and has always mimicked the words and thoughts of others. His team actually thinks it’s the only way he can win. Joe beware of the Trump curse.

10

REPLY View reply Jeff Curtis Jeff Curtis 1 day ago I think President Trump was responsible for Terisa May's resignation recently and partly responsible for Boris Johnson's election to Prime Minister. Why do I say that? It leads the way open to both Steele and Dearlove being eventually extradited to the US to face charges relating to the Fake Steele Dossier and the unlawful spying related to it.

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REPLY Sandra Stob Sandra Stob 23 hours ago You're forgetting one fact.  The 14th Amendment was written to provide citizenship for the freed slaves.

9

REPLY View reply MeeMee48 LaRue MeeMee48 LaRue 1 day ago Another great job on the crap that is going on in the deep state. I miss these shows on the weekends. The Dan team is one of the best!! MAGA KAG 2020 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸

8

REPLY Patrick McCarthy Patrick McCarthy 22 hours ago They,re all corrupt crooks in the Cabal, But I'll bet none of them will be brought to Justice. They act like they're above the Law because they know they are..

6

REPLY Cig Guard Cig Guard 20 hours ago (edited) SO! WHY NOT MORE TALK ABOUT: BIDENS MONETARY CONNECTIONS TO; CHINA, CRIMIA, RUSSIA, ETC.... COMPLETE EXPOSURE!

5

REPLY DM Decor DM Decor 1 day ago Dan, What does Wray have to do with all of this? Why is he covering up anything? Where do you think he fits in?

6

REPLY Russ Turner Russ Turner 23 hours ago Dan there's been no doubt about what happened in the intelligence agencies to try and overthrow president Trump's election, I can't see how anybody, left or right dosent find this unacceptable.

14

REPLY View reply Robbo Robertson Robbo Robertson 23 hours ago I think AG Barr should remove the FBI from any part of the investigations and place it in the hands of Military intelligence agencies until the FBI is fully exonerated, all this withholding info by the FBI is doing to much damage to what was once the greatest law enforcement agency in the world

13

REPLY View reply Michele Prince Michele Prince 21 hours ago Prayers for Eric Littlejohn, God Bless you Eric and speed your recovery.

4

REPLY Notime ForFakeNews Notime ForFakeNews 23 hours ago (edited) "Change those batteries Joe" A triple Muttley. 😄

We knew 2 yrs ago Trump was set-up. Now we are 100% convinced President Trump was slandered & spied on by his/our own government. 🇺🇸

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REPLY View reply Dan Erickson Dan Erickson 23 hours ago Trump 2020 make liberals cry again!!!!

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REPLY Deeges909 Deeges909 17 hours ago Dan is sincerely the Man. I’ve never heard a talk show host take time and speak to those suffering from addiction and actually feel like he 1000% means it. 👍🏼

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REPLY Sandy Hardin Sandy Hardin 1 day ago Thank God President Trump understand the Constitution, on baby from illegal immigrants should be an American citizen!👍🎈🇺🇸😉

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REPLY Rocky roads Rocky roads 18 hours ago We used to make fun of the inquire  magazine. Now almost all the news outlets are dramatic joke

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REPLY chocolate* chocolate* 23 hours ago It's not a political democrat party anymore, they are now just a three ring circus. The left speaks so much nonsense they don't know which way is up

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REPLY View reply James Kennedy James Kennedy 1 day ago Go ahead ask me about government? We are losing our representation. Dangling by a thread our representation. Yep we voted them in? And then they lay waste my vote. After elected they make every address to special interest. I did not vote for socialism. I did not vote for communist. The four & More have corrupted my good vote!!!

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REPLY Charles Marais Charles Marais 23 hours ago Wow, this is an intricate web of deceit, this Russian   hoax. It sounds like a Len Deighton spy novel.

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REPLY snuka_ 420 snuka_ 420 23 hours ago Dan.... Check out that's the point!!! With Brandon .. he has some troubling videos on ANTIFA in Portland... He's a true Patriot and needs our support

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REPLY Jimmy Diamond Jimmy Diamond 21 hours ago Why isn't Trump making the FBI comply with giving over the EMails

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REPLY CoryKickzAss CoryKickzAss 23 hours ago Idk about "Uncle Joe".. I never had an uncle like that (who gropes kids and women openly on camera)

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REPLY View 2 replies Gina warrior princess Gina warrior princess 22 hours ago Lol Joe ,you supported the biggest Hoax candidate in American history and escorted the Trojan horse! We do not give you a pass or forget! #notplayingwithafulldeck.

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REPLY Stjepan Blagaj Stjepan Blagaj 23 hours ago well they will try anything that can make headlines Dems a scums period

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REPLY Mark DeMedeiros Mark DeMedeiros 23 hours ago I've got to get more pens to scratch my head with.   :((( #64 in Cali

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REPLY Daniel Gorbea Daniel Gorbea 21 hours ago Wait! Isn't it the 4 R's of radical leftism? Russia, Racism, Reparations, and now Recession!

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REPLY Ed Felty Ed Felty 1 day ago Now it's "Trump is the anti-Christ" according to CNN. 🤣 🇺🇸

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REPLY View 3 replies Bunk Stagner Bunk Stagner 23 hours ago Daffy Duck is the Mayor of new York?

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REPLY View reply Bobby H Bobby H 23 hours ago Yet another superb and insightful show, Dan - God bless

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REPLY Tim Grun Tim Grun 23 hours ago Biden sounds like an old drunk that can't dictate his words correctly.

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REPLY View reply Matthew Chenevert Matthew Chenevert 22 hours ago Bucket list for me is fight Deniro in a PPV event for charity.  UFC style.

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REPLY beeveedee beeveedee 22 hours ago The "under jurisdiction" clause would be problematic for Kamala Harris, and would disqualify her presidential candidacy!

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REPLY DEWY FROM KNOXVILLE. DEWY FROM KNOXVILLE. 22 hours ago Dan, thank GOD, We have patriots like You, AND the People You surround yourself with!!!!  Keep the Truth coming!!! ............ Peace!!!

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REPLY skynebula11 skynebula11 23 hours ago De blasio....did someone  pump helium in the room?

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REPLY View reply Yves Jasmin Yves Jasmin 23 hours ago Chris Wray is part of the deep state

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REPLY roninreturns roninreturns 21 hours ago Bill DeBlasio gets Munchkin tough: "We'd like to welcome you to Lollipop Land, Lollipop Land..."

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REPLY Dr S&W Dr S&W 23 hours ago You have to admit its fun watching sleepy Joe nap at the podium.

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REPLY Charlie S Charlie S 19 hours ago Why isn't Barr charging Wray with obstruction of justice???

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REPLY Jason Hay Jason Hay 1 day ago Poor Joe, robbed lots of banks. Better watch in case the FBI may do some work! Unbelievable! Keep it up Dan, Paula and Joe! Love from the UK!

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REPLY Leslie Powell Leslie Powell 21 hours ago Yeah. Joe is a good ol KKK Democrat. His friend and mentor was like, a wizard or a grand dragon. Thanks.

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REPLY Ken Walter Ken Walter 1 day ago (edited) Unfortunately by now those emails between Strozk and Page have probably joined HRC's emails in disappearing.

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REPLY View 4 replies Arthur Fricchione Arthur Fricchione 23 hours ago Another good episode Dan. Keep them coming. Nice to hear the truth and I know you are telling us the truth. ❤️

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REPLY Eli G Eli G 23 hours ago Calling the media conspiracy theorists is far to kind

They have an agenda and are on a side,  the left , the dems , the media , Hollywood , social media platforms  they are all controlled by the same entity and whoever and whatever it is wants to destroy America and Americans and lots of us are working for and voting for our own destruction

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REPLY tomk1tl tomk1tl 23 hours ago DeBlasio must have found the "helium tank" apparently......

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REPLY Jen Blossom Jen Blossom 21 hours ago (edited) That was truly God showing his good humor during Bill DeBlasio’s video.

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REPLY Jim's Inkspot Jim's Inkspot 10 hours ago Dan you need to pay Joe more so he doesn't have to keep robbing Banks : ) That's gonna come back to bite him!

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REPLY Canis Lupus Canis Lupus 23 hours ago Over at JW watching the LIVE premiere video of the Arwan brothers and DNC Debbie Wasserman Schultz and the stealing of Congressional info...... be back in a hour to finish this video 😁

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REPLY Daniel Kahawaii Daniel Kahawaii 22 hours ago Thank You. Prayers to the suffering. Love to those praying.

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REPLY Philip Schroeder Philip Schroeder 22 hours ago The far left are full of bologna.  Along with the fake news.  Great show Mr. Dan and Mr. Joe and Mrs. Bongino.

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REPLY Michael Smith Michael Smith 22 hours ago Thanks Dan I really appreciate you saying that at the end of the podcast

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REPLY Smitty Smitty Smitty Smitty 23 hours ago Joe Biden that's a Muggsy moment in itself that deserves a quintuple mutsy laugh

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REPLY BethAnn Torres BethAnn Torres 23 hours ago What in they hell is wrong with lunch bucket Joe?! 😳.... well🙄😂

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REPLY My Peace Of Heaven My Peace Of Heaven 22 hours ago Thank you Dan! Always the most Informative and entertaining video of my day !

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REPLY Eric Trau Eric Trau 22 hours ago Thanks Dan Paula and Joe, can't let a weekday go by without my daily dose of Bongino!

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REPLY Reggie Abernethy Reggie Abernethy 20 hours ago And so? Where’s AG Barr? Apparently he’s stalling,too. Losing confidence in the AG.

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REPLY dacosta0656 dacosta0656 22 hours ago (edited) Xerox worked with arpa and darpa, international business machines did too

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REPLY Sonia Szenay Sonia Szenay 21 hours ago God works in mysterious ways Bellagio God did that change his voice

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REPLY Mark Jubinville Mark Jubinville 1 day ago collect your thoughts and spit the idea out.  convolution is your enemy in delivering the message.

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REPLY Peter Bergeris Peter Bergeris 1 day ago Dan I listened to your report regarding Steele n fbi. #BCP told the same info which I didn't catch till evening when he released it, but he's in calif n I'm in pa.

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REPLY View reply Lisa Hause Lisa Hause 23 hours ago “LYING JOE BIDEN” . . . CREEPY - SLEEPY - LYING - OLD BIDEN!!!   Thanks, DAN, Paula & Joe...���� 🇺🇸👍🏻

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REPLY Shawn C Shawn C 1 day ago Man you have finally convinced me, Joe's a bank robber.

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REPLY View 2 replies sunboyfun sunboyfun 22 hours ago Sounded like you said in the last piece, a "farce fire", with respect to liberals. Great pun if intended or not!

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REPLY JRodInc3 JRodInc3 20 hours ago Election meddling, just look to our FBI. Seems there were many government agencies, politicians and big tech were meddling in our elections, just not Trump.

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REPLY IMA WAKE 2 IMA WAKE 2 1 day ago "Most hard core liberals have psychologically deprived backgrounds which causes them to invoke defense mechanisms which causes them to seek power over others and develop a “wounded” world view which causes them to express the depths of their psychologically damaged personality."

 "Liberals are exercising power over others that have achieved legitimate success and they are trying to get the achievers of society to pay for these often phony liberal causes.  This gives the liberal a sense of entitlement to act out against the successful among us and take what is not theirs. This helps to restore feelings of power to the liberal that they lacked in their deprived childhoods which are typically characterized by neglect."

 "In the deprived psychological environment that characterizes so many liberals, they are typically angry at the world. And they often seek to inflict pain on the successful because they are angry. This defense mechanism is called displacement. They just don’t want to dominate the political narrative, they seek to inflict pain on a personal level to those who have experienced success. This is what fundamentally causes liberals to lack respect for the rule of law and just old-fashioned human decency. They seek to hurt successful people and to tear down the pillars of society."

 "The left uses their self-contrived and often invented self-indignation as the excuse to justify inflicting pain on others. Rationalization is defined as making excuses to justify one’s actions. This is also the well-spring of almost all genocide, both past and present in a “they deserved it mentality."

 "There is a final defense mechanism that liberals often employ. Because of their psychologically deprived background, we frequently see use of the defense mechanism called overcompensation. This is where an individual will perceive some personal deficiency (eg lack of academic success) and then seek to excel in another area (eg athletic prowess). In the case of a mentally ill liberal, their lack of personal success and acceptance from their peers, in their collective childhoods, leads them to excel in other areas, namely, liberal causes which frequently inflicts pain on successful people."

 "Liberals are largely representative of people who have been psychologically wounded by life and they spend their adult life getting back at the very power structure that they blame for their psychological pain as a result of their own personal shortcomings.

Why do liberals not respect the sanctity of life (eg late-term abortions)? Their psychological pain keeps them from feeling empathy by the youngest members of our society as they are torn apart limb by limb for their body parts. Do I need to point out the reaction formation of liberal females who are overcompensating for their perceived personal rejection. Beautiful women come in all shapes and sizes and I don’t typically promote stereotypes, but ask a non-liberal male about the appearance of many liberal females. Many times, it borders on bizarre. The same can be said for the emasculated males who grew up expecting trophies for participation, instead of achievement. And when achievement does not come, liberal causes designed to illegitimately redistribute wealth becomes a frequent mantra from the left.

On the surface, liberal causes makes no sense. Their behavior makes no sense until one realizes that we are dealing with damaged individuals whose internal anger causes them to seek to bring harm others under the guise of performing some twisted form of justice (ie social justice).

At the end of the day, these psychologically impaired people make good warriors for the global elite. They are actively working to tear down the family, destroying Christianity and taking down America on behalf of the elite who want one-world government that the elite controls. In short, at the end of the day, liberals again find themselves being abused as they are relegated to the role of useful idiots for the express purposes of the Satanic mentality that underlies those who would subjugate all of  us on a global scale."

 "These useful idiots (liberals) would do well to examine the fate of people like the Brown-shirts of Nazi Germany. Their fate is the fate of useful idiots. If and when the global elite ever seizes total control over the planet, they will have no use for liberals. Being a liberal will have a very short shelf-life under the New World Order’s authority where a rebellious and psychologically damaged mind will not be tolerated by a totalitarian regime." Read more

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REPLY View 3 replies Robert Boyle Robert Boyle 22 hours ago Joe biden makes me sick..his lying will catch up with him someday...

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REPLY scratchnsniff 64 scratchnsniff 64 20 hours ago Joe diGenova has told that Christopher Wray is in a partnered law firm with Sally Yates.

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REPLY king mopar king mopar 20 hours ago It’s time for either peaceful separation meaning G we split the country..or it’s time for the civil war..this can not continue

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REPLY Tim Grun Tim Grun 23 hours ago Dan, Joe, and Paula = The "Chosen Ones" to bring me the news!

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REPLY Kris Nordberg Kris Nordberg 22 hours ago The past few times I've tried to watch Hannity, his full length show is :02 seconds. Come on YouTube, tell me you're not biased. Is he getting to close to the truth?

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REPLY Yama Kazoo Yama Kazoo 4 hours ago Dan!! The word is EPOCH not "Epic". EEEEEE POCH. The EEEE POK Times.

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REPLY MrOramato MrOramato 22 hours ago (edited) Don’t forget the Rape accusations that mysteriously went away after the election. So it is four or five Rs. And on their side it is Resistance. So the Left is stuck ON “R.”

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REPLY April Davis April Davis 22 hours ago Dan you are always right up front on my daily feed!

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REPLY RV RV 18 hours ago All the Russia setup was to send Trump and his family members to prison. Unfortunate for the left, he won the election... and all is being exposed of the crime they have committed.

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REPLY randy ropac 23 hours ago Just started listening. Great show. The LEGAL Canadian. Randy Ropac

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REPLY y2rock 23 hours ago 9:45 Trump should bring a big lawsuit on Biden

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REPLY Steph 23 hours ago I want to believe you, Dan, but I just don't see those texts ever coming out from the FBI.

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REPLY steven donnelly 20 hours ago That means Kamal Harris is not a citizen, period.

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REPLY Mark Gatz 22 hours ago Thanks, Dan always very informative and eye opening. I just wish there was a way to take a cattle prod to the FBI Director (figuratively speaking of course) to release the information before 2020 election.

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REPLY Randell Stevens 1 hour ago Dan you forget the part of the 14th amendment that expressly DENIED citizenship to Native Americans. If I recall correctly it stated that they were under the jurisdiction of their tribe & not under the juridstiction of the USA.

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REPLY L Russell 1 day ago It is funny to think of big burly dude in the aflcio --funny

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REPLY Raylene Strand 21 hours ago Did anybody notice that nobody applauded when Bill the Blasio was announced

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REPLY Truth Shrugs 19 hours ago Dan, 1) Why don't you hear anyone talking about Assange lately? 2) Why don't you hear a word about Admiral Rogers (former head of NSA under Obama/Trump) regarding all of the RUSSIA RUSSIA RUSSIA narrative? 3) Why is Wray slow-playing/stalling the release of requested info?

I'll tell you why.. 1) Because Assange is key to this whole Russia story and US Atty. Durham is retrieving all kinds of fascinating info from Assange (think Seth Rich... "hacked" DNC emails (blame RUSSIA)...). 2) Admiral Rogers is a true patriot and saw what was occurring against (future) President Trump and logged everything (perhaps "mislabeled" to avoid cleanup by the corrupt Intelligence Community under Obama?). You can bet he's chatting with Durham too. 3) Because of Durham's ongoing investigation and they don't want to announce that publicly because that then confirms there is even an investigation into certain people to begin with. Keep it all under wraps until Durham is ready to start handing down indictments.

They have nowhere to go. The walls are closing in and the American people are going to see a miraculous show this fall and through the next year. Justice is coming. Read more

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REPLY MissChievousRN 15 hours ago (edited) Thank heavens he didn't laugh... PeeWee DeBlasio!!😂

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REPLY Mark Ellars 23 hours ago Hi Dan Here in northeastern Ohio the three r's are, reading , writing and the route to Cleveland.

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REPLY Joe Allen 23 hours ago Damn your a good dude Dan.  Move to AZ and run this state for the next 30 yrs. We could use you

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REPLY Rocky roads 18 hours ago Did no one think that these people were going to do this they've had 2 years to clean this all up!  But wait our government wouldn't hide this stuff from us would they? Hmmmmm

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REPLY martha schnapp 18 hours ago Christopher Wray is covering up for FBI

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REPLY Norwood Partz 21 hours ago Why is Drudge Report working so hard to collapse the economy?

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REPLY View reply Up next AUTOPLAY

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[movietvtechgeeks]

Latest story from https://movietvtechgeeks.com/fact-checking-donald-trumps-latest-tweet-fest/

Fact checking Donald Trump's latest tweet fest

Donald Trump is creating a cottage industry in Washington DC for lawyers having to represent his entire Administration, including Vice President Mike Pence. It is no wonder why he's having problems finding people to work in his White House as it comes with a hefty lawyer's bill. In response to the bloody attack on Republican legislators and aides at a Virginia baseball field, President Donald Trump carefully measured his words. At a feel-good Cabinet meeting before that horror and in a Twitter tirade after, not so much. Here's a look at some statements by Trump and his vice president on the administration's record, the special counsel's investigation and more during a week that history will remember for what happened across the river from the capital. TRUMP tweet Friday: "After 7 months of investigations & committee hearings about my 'collusion with the Russians,' nobody has been able to show any proof. Sad!" THE FACTS: The president once again shows a lack of understanding of how law-enforcement investigations work, or a willingness to misrepresent the process. He's done this on several occasions. Investigators follow evidence, interview witnesses and track down leads to assemble the most complete picture of events possible, then turn over their findings to prosecutors to assess whether a criminal case is warranted. Only if they decide to file charges and go to court is evidence shown. The government's investigation, begun by the FBI last summer, is far from that stage and is still growing, as evidenced by new reports that special counsel Robert Mueller is seeking to interview senior intelligence officials about their conversations with Trump. TRUMP tweet Friday: "I am being investigated for firing the FBI Director by the man who told me to fire the FBI Director! Witch Hunt." THE FACTS: This apparent slap at Rod Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general, is at odds with Trump's own account of how James Comey was fired. Trump said previously that a memo from Rosenstein recommending the FBI director's termination didn't matter. "Regardless of the recommendation, I was going to fire Comey," he told NBC News in early May. Attorney General Jeff Sessions testified to Congress that Trump wanted a memo laying out the case for firing Comey. But the president took sole responsibility for doing it, at least until he seemed to try to shift it Friday to the deputy. It's also an oversimplification to say he's being investigated for firing Comey. Presidents have the authority to get rid of the FBI director. The issue is whether Trump criminally obstructed justice. By Comey's account, the president leaned on him to back off the FBI's investigation of his former national security adviser, Michael Flynn and fired him three months later as a way to alter the course of a broader probe into potential coordination between Russia and associates of the Trump campaign. Trump's tweet confirms that his interactions with Comey now are part of the special counsel's expanding investigation. Rosenstein is not the one investigating Trump. Mueller is, though Rosenstein appointed him as special counsel. TRUMP: "Effective immediately, I am canceling the previous administration's completely one-sided deal with Cuba." - remarks in Miami on Friday. THE FACTS: Not so. He's preserving most of the important elements of Barack Obama's opening to the island. Trump's policy keeps a U.S. Embassy open and allows U.S. airlines and cruise ships to continue service to Cuba. Cuban-Americans can still send money to relatives and can still travel to the island without restriction. U.S. farmers can continue selling their crops to the Cuban government. The policy also allows Americans to continue patronizing state-run hotels and other businesses that are not directly linked with Cuba's military and state-security services. The policy does, though, restore a requirement for most American travelers visiting Cuba to be with tightly regulated tour groups. The Cuban government has traditionally steered those tour groups to state-run business, meaning the majority of American travelers to Cuba will probably no longer be able to patronize private restaurants, bed-and-breakfasts, and taxi drivers. TRUMP: "You see the unemployment rate is at a very, very low level. Job enthusiasm and manufacturing, business enthusiasm is at record levels; never been higher... We've got it going." - remarks at a White House apprenticeship event Thursday. THE FACTS: Trump has gone from "hoax" to hype on this statistic. Running for president, he took a swipe Aug. 8 at a just-released unemployment number, saying, "This 5 percent figure is one of the biggest hoaxes in modern American politics." (The actual figure then was 4.9 percent.) Five months into his own presidency, the rate he now welcomes stands at 4.3 percent, arrived at by the same Bureau of Labor Statistics through the same methodology. Through his campaign, Trump asserted the official jobless rate is phony because it leaves out millions who stopped looking for work. He vastly overstated that case, counting retired people and others who are choosing not to work as part of the problem. But now that a healthy official rate is reported under his watch, he grasps it as evidence of his success. TRUMP: "Great success, including MS-13. They're being thrown out in record numbers and rapidly. And they're being depleted. They'll all be gone pretty soon." - remarks Monday at a segment of a Cabinet meeting opened to press. THE FACTS: There's no publicly available information to back up Trump's claim that this violent gang is about to disappear. Deportations are actually down slightly compared with the same time last year, as arrests of people caught crossing the Mexican border have dropped to historic lows. More than 100 MS-13 gang members have been arrested in recent weeks, though the government hasn't said how many of those people have been deported. In any event, deportations alone cannot eradicate MS-13, a homegrown gang with ties to El Salvador that includes U.S. citizens. The government has not said how many of the estimated 7,000 to 10,000 gang members are Americans, who cannot be "thrown out." The group's roots in the U.S. go back more than 20 years to Los Angeles. The gang was in decline in Southern California long before Trump was elected. TRUMP: "I recently returned from a trip overseas that included deals for more than $350 billion worth of military and economic investment in the United States. These deals will bring many thousands of jobs to our country and, in fact, will bring millions of jobs ultimately and help Saudi Arabia take a greater role in providing stability and security in that region." - Cabinet meeting. THE FACTS: Trump's $350 billion figure includes hundreds of billions of dollars in aspirational deals with Saudi Arabia that have not been signed yet and could be revised or eliminated. When he visited Riyadh, agreements on more than $110 billion in foreign military sales were pledged, according to the State Department. But many of those - along with a significant amount of the $80 billion in announced commercial civilian sales - were memoranda of understanding or letters of intent and not sales contracts. Arms sales make up the vast majority of Trump's total, but those must be approved by the State Department and Congress. In addition, some of the business he's claiming to have generated was agreed to during the Obama administration. TRUMP: "I will say that never has there been a president - with few exceptions; in the case of FDR, he had a major Depression to handle - who's passed more legislation, who's done more things than what we've done, between the executive orders and the job-killing regulations that have been terminated. Many bills; I guess over 34 bills that Congress signed. A Supreme Court justice who's going to be a great one. ... We've achieved tremendous success." - Cabinet meeting. THE FACTS: He has little to show for his first five months in office, in concrete ways, other than the confirmation of a justice. Trump's two immediate predecessors, Obama and George W. Bush, accomplished more in their early months. Trump has achieved no major legislation. The bills he is counting up are little more than housekeeping measures - things like naming a courthouse and a VA health care center, appointing board of regents members, reauthorizing previous legislation. He has indeed been vigorous in signing executive orders, but in the main they have far less consequence than legislation requiring congressional passage. Trump's big agenda items, like his promised tax overhaul, have yet to pass or even reach Congress. His attempt to secure the borders from people from terrorism-prone regions is so far blocked by courts. By contrast, Obama signed a $787 billion stimulus package into law in his first month, while also achieving a law expanding health care for children and the Lilly Ledbetter bill on equal pay for women in that time. Bush got off to a slower start, in part because he did not take office in a deep recession requiring quick action, as Obama had done. But by this point in his presidency, Bush had signed a huge tax cut into law. TRUMP, on getting his presidential appointees cleared to start work: "That's a very long process also, including ethics committee, which has become very difficult to deal with." - Cabinet meeting. THE FACTS: He means the Office of Government Ethics, not a committee, and it's been moving faster on his nominations than it did under Obama. The office, which looks for ethical red flags among appointees, has been vetting them in an average of 26 days, compared with 32 days in Obama's first year. This, despite the more complex financial entanglements and potential conflicts of interest of Trump's picks. If there's any foot-dragging, it's by Trump. As of June 9, the Trump administration had forwarded 331 nominees for ethics vetting, compared with 483 nominees in the same period under Obama. "We're moving nominee reports faster during this transition than we did during the last transition, but we can't review reports the White House hasn't sent to us," said Walter Shaub, director of the ethics office. VICE PRESIDENT MIKE PENCE, visiting employees of the Health and Human Services Department on Tuesday: "I'm here to say thanks, but also to address the ongoing collapse of the Affordable Care Act, or as the president says more clearly, literally the 'death spiral' of Obamacare." THE FACTS: It's certainly not in a literal death spiral. A figurative one? Even that seems premature. To be sure, subsidized private insurance markets like HealthCare.gov have serious problems in many states. Premiums have gone up sharply and some major insurers have pulled out. About one-third of U.S. counties currently have only one insurer in the subsidized markets. Next year areas of Washington state, Ohio, and Missouri face having no participating carrier, unless other insurers step in. More states could find themselves in that predicament. But in other states, officials say the markets are working reasonably well.  And when they declare Obamacare careening toward death, Pence and Trump ignore the law's other half - the Medicaid expansion that has helped bring the uninsured rate to a historic low. PENCE: "Back when Obamacare was first passed, just over seven years ago, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that 23 million Americans would be covered by now. That's the blue line on the far left. It quickly became apparent that this was farfetched - to put it mildly." - visit to HHS. THE FACTS: He - along with the chart he pointed to - omitted the estimated 12 million low-income people covered under Obamacare's Medicaid expansion. That's the other arm of the coverage provided under Obama's law. It's true that only 10.3 million people are enrolled this year in the subsidized health insurance markets like HealthCare.gov. That's far short of the 23 million projected by the budget office for 2017. But together, those markets and the Medicaid expansion have reduced the number of uninsured by about 20 million people. As for the health insurance markets, the Trump administration shares some of the blame for the turmoil. Insurers have complained that the failure of the White House to send a clear signal on the future of $7 billion in subsidies is driving up premiums and undermining confidence. Those subsidies help insurers reduce deductibles and copayments for people of modest incomes. If Obamacare ultimately goes into a death spiral, the Trump administration's dismissive approach will be seen by many as part of the reason.

Movie TV Tech Geeks News

[therightnewsnetwork]

The Roar of the Forgotten Man and Woman

By Michael Johns

On February 14, 2017, national Tea Party co-founder and leader Michael Johns spoke to the Cornell Political Union at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, on the promise of Donald Trump’s Presidency. His lecture, “Trumpism Can Make America Great Again,” follows:

Last time I was here was over a year ago when my son Michael was looking at Cornell. He loves this school and this organization—and anything he loves, I do too. So thanks to all of you for the work you do, the discussion you facilitate, and the important contribution you make to this great institution. Cornell is one of the world’s premier universities, and your intellectual curiosity and search for answers to our world’s and nation’s problems are a big contribution to that greatness.

On the drive up here tonight, I happened to see how this university describes itself on its Twitter feed. It’s a great description: “Teaching tomorrow’s thought leaders to think otherwise and create knowledge with a public purpose.” Tonight I’m going to do exactly that: I’m going to try to get you to think a little differently—to see what over 60 million Americans saw when they voted for Trump, and we’ll do all of this with the spirit that we’ll use this knowledge to serve the higher public purpose of enhancing the greatness of our nation, which requires of each subsequent American generation that they defend and continually improve it for all Americans.

We have just undergone the closest thing to a revolution in American politics as one can have in our Constitutional Republic, and tonight I will attempt to explain it objectively. I will speak tonight not to the few of you here who may already support Trump, nor those of you who consider yourselves conservatives or Republicans, but to the vast majority here tonight that I’m sure do not. These are the facts and sentiments that led to an electoral outcome you no doubt did not want and did not predict—but I’m convinced need to understand.

I come tonight not to defend Trumpism, even though you will find no more passionate advocate for it. Literally since his announcement on June 16, 2015, I defended him consistently on television, radio and in many forums—and I sought to defend or at least explain him to those prone not to hear or process his important message.

So I come to Cornell tonight not to defend Trumpism but to explain it.

For eight years and maybe longer—the totality of your adult lives, in fact, this nation was headed in a decidedly left of center and globalist direction. Under this recent administration, we saw the problems of other countries as inherently ones we were obligated to solve. In many cases, we even wrongly blamed ourselves for these problems. We entered into trade agreements that worked well for other nations but failed the American worker. We opened our nation to legal and illegal immigrants—and bent over backward to accommodate their needs, desires and cultures but never considered the impact we were having on our citizens.

This created what Trump correctly labeled in his Republican Convention acceptance speech “the forgotten man and woman”—the working American whose economic plight worsened on the watch of Obama and whose country became less identifiable to him and her. And this past November 8, the “forgotten man and woman” had seen enough—and their voice was heard loudly.

What inspired all this passion in these forgotten men and women?

Let me deal tonight with facts:

Employment: All of you have probably heard and followed the employment trends announced each month and quarter by the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. You heard, for instance, that unemployment under Obama seemed to be stagnant, or even reduced. And it was always reported in single digits. In the final month of Obama’s presidency—December 2016—it was reportedly 4.9 percent, which seems not unreasonable.

But these numbers excluded the biggest story of American unemployment—the long-term unemployed and those who’d simply given up looking for work. While the short-term unemployment came down, it was only because many of those short-term unemployed Americans moved into the long-term category and ceased being reported in the primary BLS monthly survey number, which is really just a poll subject to all the inaccuracies one might see in any poll.

The employment reality in the country is actually much worse than reported. In fact, there has really been essentially zero job creation for native American citizens since 2000. The total number of Americans holding a job increased 5.7 percent from 2000 to 2014. But if you back out jobs taken by legal and illegal immigrants, the number of Americans holding jobs actually decreased 17 million between 2000 and 2014. When the longer-term unemployed are included, the number of jobless Americans is not 4.9 percent. It’s at least almost twice that—9.5 percent, and some believe considerably higher than even that.

Seldom reported in these routine “official” employment statistics was the fact that, under Obama, the number of Americans not in the labor force kept creeping upward. In December 2016, this number of Americans not in the labor force reached an all-time high: 95,102,000. That’s nearly thirty percent of our entire nation. On Obama’s watch, it’s a fact that a bad employment situation got even worse and that the “forgotten man and woman” has been hurt and is hurting.

Economic growth: We first began formally recording the most important economic growth metric—gross domestic product growth—in the early 1930s. In the time since, every President until Obama had at least one year under their leadership where the country’s GDP grew by at least three percent. But in eight fiscal years under his management, Obama was the first president since GDP was first recorded to not have even one year of three percent growth or higher. On economic growth, as with jobs, Washington has been failing the “forgotten man and woman.”

Debt: On Obama’s watch, our national debt doubled from $10 trillion to $20 trillion. This incremental, additional $10 trillion in debt that Obama added literally exceeds the cumulative debt total of every U.S. President from Washington through George W. Bush. In his 2008 presidential campaign, Obama famously said that George W. Bush’s contribution to the public debt was literally “unpatriotic” in his words. But Obama then went on to double it—all without ever retracting his “unpatriotic” comment about Bush or questioning his own patriotism.

Taxes: Under Obama, our corporate tax rate was—and still is–the highest in the developed world, which has made the U.S. an increasingly uncompetitive location to do business—and it showed as company after company left during his and previous administrations. And despite Obama’s campaign promise that he would only raise taxes on the rich, he increased them substantially on working Americans too, including with taxes associated with Obamacare and the penalty for non-enrollment. In fact, despite his campaign pledge, Obama increased over 20 different taxes that specifically penalized and harmed the poor and working class American. On taxes too, the “forgotten man and woman” was both betrayed and forgotten.

Poverty: Obama ran for election in 2008 promising to lift up the nation’s poor, and that’s a goal we conservatives share too. It was a centerpiece of his campaign. Yet here too, he failed by every significant metric. The nation’s poverty rate was higher on Obama’s departure than it was upon his arrival, increasing roughly 3.5 percent on his watch. Real household income decreased 2.3 percent during his presidency. And under Obama, Americans’ dependence on food stamps rose considerably—to an all-time high of 47 million Americans, or 13 million more than before Obama took office. Great lip service was paid to addressing poverty, but here too the “forgotten man and woman” was left worse off.

Regulatory costs: Regulations too were no friend to the “forgotten man and woman.” Obama imposed over 20,000 new regulations on the American economy—many of them offering negligible value and all of them weighing heavily on working Americans, whose employers were forced to absorb over an astounding $700 billion in costs associated with these regulations, which harmed employment, harmed wages, made America less competitive, and ultimately harmed the “forgotten man and woman” considerably.

Home ownership: Home ownership admittedly might be exaggerated as an indicator of a nation’s economic healthiness but it’s certainly a metric that most want to see increasing. But like just about every other indicator under Obama, it moved in the wrong direction on Obama’s watch, falling 5.6 percent during his eight years in the White House.

Wages: One of the most important metrics to the “forgotten man and woman,” wages did not come even close to keeping pace with inflation under Obama, especially in such important sectors such as housing, food and tuition. In fact, for roughly 35 years, as we ignored the “forgotten man and woman,” wages in this nation have been outpaced by inflation, contributing to economic despair and anxieties for the “forgotten man and woman.”

Healthcare: When Obama ran for president in 2008, he told us over and over again about the 42 million Americans without health insurance—and also about how he would fix this problem. And don’t worry, he famously and repeatedly promised, “if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. And if you like your insurance, you can keep your insurance.”

But eight years later, there are still tens of millions of Americans without any health insurance—and for those who enrolled in the Obamacare plan, which had to be passed, Nancy Pelosi said, so we could know what was in it, it turned out to be a vast expansion of federal intrusion into Americans’ healthcare and a program that offered little real value to most since both its premiums and deductibles were cost prohibitive.

If Obamacare costs you roughly $5,000 a year in monthly premiums and the deductible is that or even more, can you really say you’re insured? For most Americans, Obamacare has proven a very costly catastrophic care plan that was nothing as advertised. And contrary to what Obama promised, millions lost their health insurance and lost their doctors as the new coverage mandates forced employers to drop plans, and physicians left insurance plans that were paying lower allowables or proving unduly bureaucratic and time-consuming from a claim filing perspective. Again, the “forgotten man and woman” was betrayed.

Legal and illegal immigration: This is a sensitive topic because we are all correctly taught that we should be inclusive to people, religions and cultures that are different from our own, and I agree that we should.

But it’s also true that the mass legal and illegal immigration of the past few decades has shaken the fabric of many communities. Where English was once spoken universally, it is now spoken less so. I saw one public high school recently where 22 languages were spoken. Accommodating these students who were not fluent in English had become the preoccupation of the school—and at the expense of basic learning.

And of course we have all read of the other changes that have shaken the foundation of traditional American society. The decorated Christmas tree that once stood every December in the public square and was a source of community pride is now deemed offensive to some immigrants who reject Christianity and want its symbolism removed from communities where it is has long stood. “Christmas break” must now be called “winter break.” And the “forgotten man and woman” is deemed “insensitive” if he or she is not welcoming to all aspects of foreign cultures, sometimes up to and including Sharia law that violates the very foundation of the American Constitution.

As millions of immigrants entered the U.S.—both legally and illegally–from seemingly every Third World nation of the world these past few decades, no one paused to ask the “forgotten man and woman” how they felt about it, or whether it was strengthening or dividing their communities and nation. The reality is that this mass immigration has driven up unemployment, driven down wages as the labor pool has expanded but jobs have not, burdened public resources that were already heavily burdened, and been at the core of several brutal terrorist incidents and many, many criminal incidents.

To the “forgotten man and woman,” it’s difficult to understand why we need more people in this nation when we have nearly 100 million Americans not in the labor force; our schools, highways, hospitals, welfare programs and other public resources are increasingly overcrowded or stretched thin, and when these many immigrants have arrived in the U.S. wholly unprepared and sometimes even unwilling to integrate into our nation. And there has been a substantial cost to taxpayers from this mass immigration. As of 2010, the cost per illegal immigrant to American taxpayers was nearly $25,000 per illegal immigrant, including child welfare, education, and public infrastructure costs.

Then there’s the issue of all of the associated crime committed by these illegal immigrants. I often hear that “not all illegal immigrants are criminals,” which of course is untrue. The first thing they did upon entering our nation was break our federal and state laws. But many have gone on to commit still more crimes, and many very serious felonies.

A few years ago, I was one of the first to write of the case of Josh Wilkerson, an 18-year-old Texan who was beaten to death, strangled and set on fire by an illegal immigrant who had many times before been deported. When Josh’s mother Laura buried her son, the mass immigration and open borders advocates were nowhere to be found. She received no letter or condolences from Obama. She was, in so many ways, the quintessential “forgotten American.”

Nor are these one-off cases. In 2014, illegal immigrants were an estimated 3.5 percent of the total U.S. population but comprised 36.7 percent of all federal criminal sentences. That’s an astonishing and alarming statistic—and once again the victim is almost entirely the “forgotten man and woman.” The “forgotten man and woman” was victimized by the crime in most cases. And the “forgotten man and woman” is left with the burden of paying to incarcerate an illegal immigrant who never should have been here in the first place.

And then there is the issue of drugs. The porous southern border has become a primary entry point for some of the country’s most harmful drugs, including heroin, Fentanyl and a wide range of opioids. As the children of the “forgotten man and woman” fell victim to addiction and overdoses, not one singular national political leader took action on the obvious first step in solving the crisis: Closing the open southern border through which most of these illegal drugs were entering our nation. In fact, for thirty years at least, both parties in Washington have talked about securing our southern border, but they never did. It took Trump to answer this call from the “forgotten man and woman” to take the hugely reasonable step of securing it. The chant “build that wall” heard at seemingly every Trump campaign rally in the 2016 presidential campaign was the chant of the “forgotten man and woman” who had witnessed first hand the costs to our nation of inaction on securing our southern border.

Trade: In the early 1990s, as a foreign policy analyst at The Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C., I championed the North American Free Agreement, or NAFTA, as a trade agreement that would prove positive for both Mexico and the United States. We got it at least half right. It clearly benefited Mexico, as our trade deficit with Mexico expanded and whole companies picked up and moved there. But the benefit to Americans was not a net positive. And this has been the case with American trade with just about every one of our largest trading partners the past few decades. We have shipped jobs and cash to nations of the world, and they have shipped us goods somewhat cheaper than we may have produced them ourselves. It’s also true that trade does also create American jobs. But on the whole, because our trading partners manipulate their currencies, fail to meet the regulatory standards and costs incurred in the U.S., and pay their workers substantially less, these trade agreements have largely been rigged from the beginning against the “forgotten man and woman.”

Consider the staggering statistics of trade deficits with our largest trading partners:

China: $579 billion trade deficit.

Japan: $69 billion trade deficit.

Mexico: $63 billion trade deficit.

As companies and manufacturers have left communities across this nation—and this is especially true in rust belt states like Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and others—they left emptiness, hopelessness and desperation in their wake. Laid off by the departure of these companies, the “forgotten man and woman” and their entire communities have never since been quite the same. Drive through these states, and this fact is self-evident—and the “forgotten man and woman” will be more than happy to tell you all about it if you ask.

American strength in world: Most Americans have grown up in a nation where we have been seen globally as the world’s leader. Most saw us win the 45-year-long Cold War without firing a shot. They heard Reagan say “tear down this wall” in 1987 and then watched it fall just a few years later. Most Americans know well of how our engagement in World War II essentially saved the world. It is the view of most Americans that America should not be illogically engaged around the world. Nor can or should we seek to solve every world problem. But American strength to protect itself and address the world’s most serious crises until these past few years has never been much in question.

Over the last eight years, however, the “forgotten man and woman” watched as our military was decimated and dismantled. They saw Obama label ISIS a “JV team,” only to see ISIS go on to expand its reach throughout Iraq, Syria and—through terrorist attacks—into the EU and U.S. itself. They saw Obama declare a “red line” in Syria designed to halt the humanitarian suffering in that region only to do nothing after it was violated. They saw several thousand great Americans come home from Iraq in body bags—sometimes only because their military equipment and manpower deficient for the battlefield. They saw four Americans, including a U.S. ambassador, die brutally and needlessly in Benghazi only because saving them would have proven politically inconvenient to Obama’s 2012 reelection. And they saw our enemies—Iran, North Korea, and to some extent Russia—move aggressively and uncontested to expand their own military might and global reach.

In fact, on Obama’s watch, the American military fell to its weakest state of readiness at any time in history since World War II. Our fighter aircraft are the oldest and our fleet the smallest in a long period of time. For the first time since World War II, there was a period under Obama when we literally had not one naval carrier at sea anywhere in the world. Our ship strength also fell on his watch. And our ability to confront a major threat to American security from a formidable enemy—much less our ability (should the need arise) to fight two conflicts at once—fell to its weakest point since World War II. These were not oversights by Obama; they were part of a calculated policy of weakening America and thus leaving it more vulnerable than ever to aggression, terrorism and other security threats. Instead of building a military force that was best suited to fight and win wars if necessary to defend American security and interests, the “forgotten man and woman” watched on as the singular focus seemed to be turning the American military into a politically correct social experiment.

Energy: At a time when we could and should have been substantially decreasing our dependence on foreign oil we purchase—much of it from nations that don’t particularly like us—Obama refused to develop the Keystone Pipeline, to expand drilling in the U.S. and its waters, and to substantially increase our development of petroleum, natural gas, clean coal and other energy sources in our nation. In the meantime, Obama crippled the American energy sector with extensive and prohibitive regulations that only deepened our reliance on energy resources from countries not so burdened. The “forgotten man and woman” looked on as American energy workers needlessly lost their jobs from these policies and as the inability to utilize our domestic energy resources contributed to ever higher energy prices.

Infrastructure: And finally, on the issue of our national infrastructure—our airports, train systems, interstate highways—Obama talked a big game about “shovel-ready jobs” and allocated a lot toward these ends. But he has left office with our air, train, highway and other transportation systems in a state of unprecedented disrepair and certainly not competitive with other developed nations of the world. Meanwhile, many American conservatives and Republicans—skeptical of government’s ability to do much of anything well—offered no real solution to the problem. Trump, of course, arose with a $1 trillion infrastructure plan and promised to make our infrastructure cutting edge again and do so in a timely and cost-efficient fashion. It was a promise the “forgotten man and woman” was waiting to hear.

All of this was the background and environment in which the 2016 presidential election took place. One candidate, Hillary Clinton, ran openly as a third term extension of these negative trends. She refused to acknowledge almost any of these as major problems. In fact, she wanted more of it—more refugees, more illegal immigrants, more regulations in our economy, more government intrusion into health care, even higher taxes, more government, and a continuation of a failed national security and foreign policy agenda that emboldened enemies, alienated allies and timidly refused to even utter the name of “radical Islamic terror.”

Additionally, at a moment when Americans were seeking a more harmonious identity, Clinton instead continued the Obama agenda of identity politics. In seemingly every speech, she spoke of the women’s vote. She spoke of the Hispanic vote. She spoke of the African-American vote. And she spoke of the gay vote. But at almost no time did she recognize what the “forgotten man and woman” believe—that the aspirations of Americans really do not vary by gender, ethnicity or sexual orientation. We want economic growth, job creation, peace and security, good schools, safe communities. At a moment when the American people wanted a unifying message, Clinton could not bring herself to break with the identity politics on which her Democratic Party increasingly rests.

Trump was much more astute. He saw that the typical American voter had seen enough of business as usual in Washington, D.C. He called out politicians and the dysfunctions they created and offered solutions to the trade, immigration and fiscal policies that were harming the “forgotten man and woman.” He promised a rebuilding of American defenses, support for American law enforcement, tax and regulatory cuts to stimulate our economy, the repeal and replacement of Obamacare, renegotiation of trade agreements in terms that would be fairer to American workers, an end to illegal immigration, and a commitment to protecting an American identity that ultimately defines all of us as Americans.

Some final comments on the significance of all of this: I believe Trump’s election is precisely the sort of historic shift that the Republican Party needed if it were to survive as a national political force. If you look at 2008 and 2012, it was clear that neither McCain nor Romney, nor the messages they communicated, spoke to what the “forgotten man and woman” wanted to hear. Their candidacies were doomed to fail.

But with Trumpism, the Republican Party can once again say that it is in fact the party of working Americans.

And this, I believe, ultimately points to the legacy of Obama—not just that he left the nation worse than he found it, but that on his watch the Democratic Party was reduced to a minor, far-left political party with narrow appeal geographically and demographically.

The ultimate metric of Obama’s legacy is not just all of the statistics I have cited tonight. It’s this number: 1,030. That’s the number of state government, gubernatorial and Congressional seats the Democrats lost on Obama’s watch as he ignored and argued with the “forgotten man and woman.”

It’s true that Trumpism is shunned and misunderstood by mainstream media and at prestigious universities like the one at which we gather tonight. Ultimately these institutions too need to decide whether they wish to participate in the mainstream of American political discourse, or, as was just the case with the Democratic Party, be reduced to a minor sideshow.

What’s not misunderstood, however, is that the “forgotten man and woman” has been heard loud and clear. And should Trump execute on the promises and commitments he’s made, as I believe he will, the Republican Party and indeed this nation are going to be vastly better for it–and America will be great again.

Michael Johns, a former White House speechwriter and Heritage Foundation policy analyst, is a co-founder of the national Tea Party movement and president of Tea Party Community.

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The Roar of the Forgotten Man and Woman

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The Roar of the Forgotten Man and Woman

By Michael Johns

On February 14, 2017, national Tea Party co-founder and leader Michael Johns spoke to the Cornell Political Union at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, on the promise of Donald Trump’s Presidency. His lecture, “Trumpism Can Make America Great Again,” follows:

Last time I was here was over a year ago when my son Michael was looking at Cornell. He loves this school and this organization—and anything he loves, I do too. So thanks to all of you for the work you do, the discussion you facilitate, and the important contribution you make to this great institution. Cornell is one of the world’s premier universities, and your intellectual curiosity and search for answers to our world’s and nation’s problems are a big contribution to that greatness.

On the drive up here tonight, I happened to see how this university describes itself on its Twitter feed. It’s a great description: “Teaching tomorrow’s thought leaders to think otherwise and create knowledge with a public purpose.” Tonight I’m going to do exactly that: I’m going to try to get you to think a little differently—to see what over 60 million Americans saw when they voted for Trump, and we’ll do all of this with the spirit that we’ll use this knowledge to serve the higher public purpose of enhancing the greatness of our nation, which requires of each subsequent American generation that they defend and continually improve it for all Americans.

We have just undergone the closest thing to a revolution in American politics as one can have in our Constitutional Republic, and tonight I will attempt to explain it objectively. I will speak tonight not to the few of you here who may already support Trump, nor those of you who consider yourselves conservatives or Republicans, but to the vast majority here tonight that I’m sure do not. These are the facts and sentiments that led to an electoral outcome you no doubt did not want and did not predict—but I’m convinced need to understand.

I come tonight not to defend Trumpism, even though you will find no more passionate advocate for it. Literally since his announcement on June 16, 2015, I defended him consistently on television, radio and in many forums—and I sought to defend or at least explain him to those prone not to hear or process his important message.

So I come to Cornell tonight not to defend Trumpism but to explain it.

For eight years and maybe longer—the totality of your adult lives, in fact, this nation was headed in a decidedly left of center and globalist direction. Under this recent administration, we saw the problems of other countries as inherently ones we were obligated to solve. In many cases, we even wrongly blamed ourselves for these problems. We entered into trade agreements that worked well for other nations but failed the American worker. We opened our nation to legal and illegal immigrants—and bent over backward to accommodate their needs, desires and cultures but never considered the impact we were having on our citizens.

This created what Trump correctly labeled in his Republican Convention acceptance speech “the forgotten man and woman”—the working American whose economic plight worsened on the watch of Obama and whose country became less identifiable to him and her. And this past November 8, the “forgotten man and woman” had seen enough—and their voice was heard loudly.

What inspired all this passion in these forgotten men and women?

Let me deal tonight with facts:

Employment: All of you have probably heard and followed the employment trends announced each month and quarter by the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. You heard, for instance, that unemployment under Obama seemed to be stagnant, or even reduced. And it was always reported in single digits. In the final month of Obama’s presidency—December 2016—it was reportedly 4.9 percent, which seems not unreasonable.

But these numbers excluded the biggest story of American unemployment—the long-term unemployed and those who’d simply given up looking for work. While the short-term unemployment came down, it was only because many of those short-term unemployed Americans moved into the long-term category and ceased being reported in the primary BLS monthly survey number, which is really just a poll subject to all the inaccuracies one might see in any poll.

The employment reality in the country is actually much worse than reported. In fact, there has really been essentially zero job creation for native American citizens since 2000. The total number of Americans holding a job increased 5.7 percent from 2000 to 2014. But if you back out jobs taken by legal and illegal immigrants, the number of Americans holding jobs actually decreased 17 million between 2000 and 2014. When the longer-term unemployed are included, the number of jobless Americans is not 4.9 percent. It’s at least almost twice that—9.5 percent, and some believe considerably higher than even that.

Seldom reported in these routine “official” employment statistics was the fact that, under Obama, the number of Americans not in the labor force kept creeping upward. In December 2016, this number of Americans not in the labor force reached an all-time high: 95,102,000. That’s nearly thirty percent of our entire nation. On Obama’s watch, it’s a fact that a bad employment situation got even worse and that the “forgotten man and woman” has been hurt and is hurting.

Economic growth: We first began formally recording the most important economic growth metric—gross domestic product growth—in the early 1930s. In the time since, every President until Obama had at least one year under their leadership where the country’s GDP grew by at least three percent. But in eight fiscal years under his management, Obama was the first president since GDP was first recorded to not have even one year of three percent growth or higher. On economic growth, as with jobs, Washington has been failing the “forgotten man and woman.”

Debt: On Obama’s watch, our national debt doubled from $10 trillion to $20 trillion. This incremental, additional $10 trillion in debt that Obama added literally exceeds the cumulative debt total of every U.S. President from Washington through George W. Bush. In his 2008 presidential campaign, Obama famously said that George W. Bush’s contribution to the public debt was literally “unpatriotic” in his words. But Obama then went on to double it—all without ever retracting his “unpatriotic” comment about Bush or questioning his own patriotism.

Taxes: Under Obama, our corporate tax rate was—and still is–the highest in the developed world, which has made the U.S. an increasingly uncompetitive location to do business—and it showed as company after company left during his and previous administrations. And despite Obama’s campaign promise that he would only raise taxes on the rich, he increased them substantially on working Americans too, including with taxes associated with Obamacare and the penalty for non-enrollment. In fact, despite his campaign pledge, Obama increased over 20 different taxes that specifically penalized and harmed the poor and working class American. On taxes too, the “forgotten man and woman” was both betrayed and forgotten.

Poverty: Obama ran for election in 2008 promising to lift up the nation’s poor, and that’s a goal we conservatives share too. It was a centerpiece of his campaign. Yet here too, he failed by every significant metric. The nation’s poverty rate was higher on Obama’s departure than it was upon his arrival, increasing roughly 3.5 percent on his watch. Real household income decreased 2.3 percent during his presidency. And under Obama, Americans’ dependence on food stamps rose considerably—to an all-time high of 47 million Americans, or 13 million more than before Obama took office. Great lip service was paid to addressing poverty, but here too the “forgotten man and woman” was left worse off.

Regulatory costs: Regulations too were no friend to the “forgotten man and woman.” Obama imposed over 20,000 new regulations on the American economy—many of them offering negligible value and all of them weighing heavily on working Americans, whose employers were forced to absorb over an astounding $700 billion in costs associated with these regulations, which harmed employment, harmed wages, made America less competitive, and ultimately harmed the “forgotten man and woman” considerably.

Home ownership: Home ownership admittedly might be exaggerated as an indicator of a nation’s economic healthiness but it’s certainly a metric that most want to see increasing. But like just about every other indicator under Obama, it moved in the wrong direction on Obama’s watch, falling 5.6 percent during his eight years in the White House.

Wages: One of the most important metrics to the “forgotten man and woman,” wages did not come even close to keeping pace with inflation under Obama, especially in such important sectors such as housing, food and tuition. In fact, for roughly 35 years, as we ignored the “forgotten man and woman,” wages in this nation have been outpaced by inflation, contributing to economic despair and anxieties for the “forgotten man and woman.”

Healthcare: When Obama ran for president in 2008, he told us over and over again about the 42 million Americans without health insurance—and also about how he would fix this problem. And don’t worry, he famously and repeatedly promised, “if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. And if you like your insurance, you can keep your insurance.”

But eight years later, there are still tens of millions of Americans without any health insurance—and for those who enrolled in the Obamacare plan, which had to be passed, Nancy Pelosi said, so we could know what was in it, it turned out to be a vast expansion of federal intrusion into Americans’ healthcare and a program that offered little real value to most since both its premiums and deductibles were cost prohibitive.

If Obamacare costs you roughly $5,000 a year in monthly premiums and the deductible is that or even more, can you really say you’re insured? For most Americans, Obamacare has proven a very costly catastrophic care plan that was nothing as advertised. And contrary to what Obama promised, millions lost their health insurance and lost their doctors as the new coverage mandates forced employers to drop plans, and physicians left insurance plans that were paying lower allowables or proving unduly bureaucratic and time-consuming from a claim filing perspective. Again, the “forgotten man and woman” was betrayed.

Legal and illegal immigration: This is a sensitive topic because we are all correctly taught that we should be inclusive to people, religions and cultures that are different from our own, and I agree that we should.

But it’s also true that the mass legal and illegal immigration of the past few decades has shaken the fabric of many communities. Where English was once spoken universally, it is now spoken less so. I saw one public high school recently where 22 languages were spoken. Accommodating these students who were not fluent in English had become the preoccupation of the school—and at the expense of basic learning.

And of course we have all read of the other changes that have shaken the foundation of traditional American society. The decorated Christmas tree that once stood every December in the public square and was a source of community pride is now deemed offensive to some immigrants who reject Christianity and want its symbolism removed from communities where it is has long stood. “Christmas break” must now be called “winter break.” And the “forgotten man and woman” is deemed “insensitive” if he or she is not welcoming to all aspects of foreign cultures, sometimes up to and including Sharia law that violates the very foundation of the American Constitution.

As millions of immigrants entered the U.S.—both legally and illegally–from seemingly every Third World nation of the world these past few decades, no one paused to ask the “forgotten man and woman” how they felt about it, or whether it was strengthening or dividing their communities and nation. The reality is that this mass immigration has driven up unemployment, driven down wages as the labor pool has expanded but jobs have not, burdened public resources that were already heavily burdened, and been at the core of several brutal terrorist incidents and many, many criminal incidents.

To the “forgotten man and woman,” it’s difficult to understand why we need more people in this nation when we have nearly 100 million Americans not in the labor force; our schools, highways, hospitals, welfare programs and other public resources are increasingly overcrowded or stretched thin, and when these many immigrants have arrived in the U.S. wholly unprepared and sometimes even unwilling to integrate into our nation. And there has been a substantial cost to taxpayers from this mass immigration. As of 2010, the cost per illegal immigrant to American taxpayers was nearly $25,000 per illegal immigrant, including child welfare, education, and public infrastructure costs.

Then there’s the issue of all of the associated crime committed by these illegal immigrants. I often hear that “not all illegal immigrants are criminals,” which of course is untrue. The first thing they did upon entering our nation was break our federal and state laws. But many have gone on to commit still more crimes, and many very serious felonies.

A few years ago, I was one of the first to write of the case of Josh Wilkerson, an 18-year-old Texan who was beaten to death, strangled and set on fire by an illegal immigrant who had many times before been deported. When Josh’s mother Laura buried her son, the mass immigration and open borders advocates were nowhere to be found. She received no letter or condolences from Obama. She was, in so many ways, the quintessential “forgotten American.”

Nor are these one-off cases. In 2014, illegal immigrants were an estimated 3.5 percent of the total U.S. population but comprised 36.7 percent of all federal criminal sentences. That’s an astonishing and alarming statistic—and once again the victim is almost entirely the “forgotten man and woman.” The “forgotten man and woman” was victimized by the crime in most cases. And the “forgotten man and woman” is left with the burden of paying to incarcerate an illegal immigrant who never should have been here in the first place.

And then there is the issue of drugs. The porous southern border has become a primary entry point for some of the country’s most harmful drugs, including heroin, Fentanyl and a wide range of opioids. As the children of the “forgotten man and woman” fell victim to addiction and overdoses, not one singular national political leader took action on the obvious first step in solving the crisis: Closing the open southern border through which most of these illegal drugs were entering our nation. In fact, for thirty years at least, both parties in Washington have talked about securing our southern border, but they never did. It took Trump to answer this call from the “forgotten man and woman” to take the hugely reasonable step of securing it. The chant “build that wall” heard at seemingly every Trump campaign rally in the 2016 presidential campaign was the chant of the “forgotten man and woman” who had witnessed first hand the costs to our nation of inaction on securing our southern border.

Trade: In the early 1990s, as a foreign policy analyst at The Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C., I championed the North American Free Agreement, or NAFTA, as a trade agreement that would prove positive for both Mexico and the United States. We got it at least half right. It clearly benefited Mexico, as our trade deficit with Mexico expanded and whole companies picked up and moved there. But the benefit to Americans was not a net positive. And this has been the case with American trade with just about every one of our largest trading partners the past few decades. We have shipped jobs and cash to nations of the world, and they have shipped us goods somewhat cheaper than we may have produced them ourselves. It’s also true that trade does also create American jobs. But on the whole, because our trading partners manipulate their currencies, fail to meet the regulatory standards and costs incurred in the U.S., and pay their workers substantially less, these trade agreements have largely been rigged from the beginning against the “forgotten man and woman.”

Consider the staggering statistics of trade deficits with our largest trading partners:

China: $579 billion trade deficit.

Japan: $69 billion trade deficit.

Mexico: $63 billion trade deficit.

As companies and manufacturers have left communities across this nation—and this is especially true in rust belt states like Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and others—they left emptiness, hopelessness and desperation in their wake. Laid off by the departure of these companies, the “forgotten man and woman” and their entire communities have never since been quite the same. Drive through these states, and this fact is self-evident—and the “forgotten man and woman” will be more than happy to tell you all about it if you ask.

American strength in world: Most Americans have grown up in a nation where we have been seen globally as the world’s leader. Most saw us win the 45-year-long Cold War without firing a shot. They heard Reagan say “tear down this wall” in 1987 and then watched it fall just a few years later. Most Americans know well of how our engagement in World War II essentially saved the world. It is the view of most Americans that America should not be illogically engaged around the world. Nor can or should we seek to solve every world problem. But American strength to protect itself and address the world’s most serious crises until these past few years has never been much in question.

Over the last eight years, however, the “forgotten man and woman” watched as our military was decimated and dismantled. They saw Obama label ISIS a “JV team,” only to see ISIS go on to expand its reach throughout Iraq, Syria and—through terrorist attacks—into the EU and U.S. itself. They saw Obama declare a “red line” in Syria designed to halt the humanitarian suffering in that region only to do nothing after it was violated. They saw several thousand great Americans come home from Iraq in body bags—sometimes only because their military equipment and manpower deficient for the battlefield. They saw four Americans, including a U.S. ambassador, die brutally and needlessly in Benghazi only because saving them would have proven politically inconvenient to Obama’s 2012 reelection. And they saw our enemies—Iran, North Korea, and to some extent Russia—move aggressively and uncontested to expand their own military might and global reach.

In fact, on Obama’s watch, the American military fell to its weakest state of readiness at any time in history since World War II. Our fighter aircraft are the oldest and our fleet the smallest in a long period of time. For the first time since World War II, there was a period under Obama when we literally had not one naval carrier at sea anywhere in the world. Our ship strength also fell on his watch. And our ability to confront a major threat to American security from a formidable enemy—much less our ability (should the need arise) to fight two conflicts at once—fell to its weakest point since World War II. These were not oversights by Obama; they were part of a calculated policy of weakening America and thus leaving it more vulnerable than ever to aggression, terrorism and other security threats. Instead of building a military force that was best suited to fight and win wars if necessary to defend American security and interests, the “forgotten man and woman” watched on as the singular focus seemed to be turning the American military into a politically correct social experiment.

Energy: At a time when we could and should have been substantially decreasing our dependence on foreign oil we purchase—much of it from nations that don’t particularly like us—Obama refused to develop the Keystone Pipeline, to expand drilling in the U.S. and its waters, and to substantially increase our development of petroleum, natural gas, clean coal and other energy sources in our nation. In the meantime, Obama crippled the American energy sector with extensive and prohibitive regulations that only deepened our reliance on energy resources from countries not so burdened. The “forgotten man and woman” looked on as American energy workers needlessly lost their jobs from these policies and as the inability to utilize our domestic energy resources contributed to ever higher energy prices.

Infrastructure: And finally, on the issue of our national infrastructure—our airports, train systems, interstate highways—Obama talked a big game about “shovel-ready jobs” and allocated a lot toward these ends. But he has left office with our air, train, highway and other transportation systems in a state of unprecedented disrepair and certainly not competitive with other developed nations of the world. Meanwhile, many American conservatives and Republicans—skeptical of government’s ability to do much of anything well—offered no real solution to the problem. Trump, of course, arose with a $1 trillion infrastructure plan and promised to make our infrastructure cutting edge again and do so in a timely and cost-efficient fashion. It was a promise the “forgotten man and woman” was waiting to hear.

All of this was the background and environment in which the 2016 presidential election took place. One candidate, Hillary Clinton, ran openly as a third term extension of these negative trends. She refused to acknowledge almost any of these as major problems. In fact, she wanted more of it—more refugees, more illegal immigrants, more regulations in our economy, more government intrusion into health care, even higher taxes, more government, and a continuation of a failed national security and foreign policy agenda that emboldened enemies, alienated allies and timidly refused to even utter the name of “radical Islamic terror.”

Additionally, at a moment when Americans were seeking a more harmonious identity, Clinton instead continued the Obama agenda of identity politics. In seemingly every speech, she spoke of the women’s vote. She spoke of the Hispanic vote. She spoke of the African-American vote. And she spoke of the gay vote. But at almost no time did she recognize what the “forgotten man and woman” believe—that the aspirations of Americans really do not vary by gender, ethnicity or sexual orientation. We want economic growth, job creation, peace and security, good schools, safe communities. At a moment when the American people wanted a unifying message, Clinton could not bring herself to break with the identity politics on which her Democratic Party increasingly rests.

Trump was much more astute. He saw that the typical American voter had seen enough of business as usual in Washington, D.C. He called out politicians and the dysfunctions they created and offered solutions to the trade, immigration and fiscal policies that were harming the “forgotten man and woman.” He promised a rebuilding of American defenses, support for American law enforcement, tax and regulatory cuts to stimulate our economy, the repeal and replacement of Obamacare, renegotiation of trade agreements in terms that would be fairer to American workers, an end to illegal immigration, and a commitment to protecting an American identity that ultimately defines all of us as Americans.

Some final comments on the significance of all of this: I believe Trump’s election is precisely the sort of historic shift that the Republican Party needed if it were to survive as a national political force. If you look at 2008 and 2012, it was clear that neither McCain nor Romney, nor the messages they communicated, spoke to what the “forgotten man and woman” wanted to hear. Their candidacies were doomed to fail.

But with Trumpism, the Republican Party can once again say that it is in fact the party of working Americans.

And this, I believe, ultimately points to the legacy of Obama—not just that he left the nation worse than he found it, but that on his watch the Democratic Party was reduced to a minor, far-left political party with narrow appeal geographically and demographically.

The ultimate metric of Obama’s legacy is not just all of the statistics I have cited tonight. It’s this number: 1,030. That’s the number of state government, gubernatorial and Congressional seats the Democrats lost on Obama’s watch as he ignored and argued with the “forgotten man and woman.”

It’s true that Trumpism is shunned and misunderstood by mainstream media and at prestigious universities like the one at which we gather tonight. Ultimately these institutions too need to decide whether they wish to participate in the mainstream of American political discourse, or, as was just the case with the Democratic Party, be reduced to a minor sideshow.

What’s not misunderstood, however, is that the “forgotten man and woman” has been heard loud and clear. And should Trump execute on the promises and commitments he’s made, as I believe he will, the Republican Party and indeed this nation are going to be vastly better for it–and America will be great again.

Michael Johns, a former White House speechwriter and Heritage Foundation policy analyst, is a co-founder of the national Tea Party movement and president of Tea Party Community.

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California’s economic recovery slowed markedly last month as COVID-19 infections rose and the state resumed shutting businesses. Employers added just 140,400 payroll jobs from mid-June to mid-July to a total workforce of nearly 15.8 million, state officials reported. The July job gain was dramatically less than the record 542,500-job rise the previous month when some restaurants, gyms and other businesses briefly reopened amid hopes that the virus was abating. California’s unemployment rate lowered to 13.3% last month, down from 14.9% in June. A year earlier, it stood at 4%. Part of the decline in last month’s rate was due to a drop in people looking for work. In June, the state’s labor force expanded by 464,000 as many furloughed workers returned to their jobs. But last month it shrank by 167,000 as businesses closed again. “July’s forward progress is welcome, but measured against historical benchmarks, the California labor market remains very much in the ICU,” said Scott Anderson, chief economist of Bank of the West in San Francisco. Los Angeles County’s economic picture was particularly dire, with a July jobless rate of 17.5%, down from 19.4% in June. A year earlier, it was 4.4%. Many of Southern California’s tourist-dependent industries, including hotels, restaurants and theme parks, remain closed, while many Northern California technology firms continued to thrive thanks to remote working, online shopping and digital streaming, economists say. For the week that ended Aug. 15, California’s new unemployment claims fell to their lowest level in five months, with 201,600 applications submitted to the state Employment Development Department. But 4.8 million Californians were still collecting jobless benefits. A federal supplement of $600 a week expired at the end of July. That’s expected to push more Californians to seek work this month, said Michael Bernick, a former EDD director. “California’s local workforce boards and employment agencies are reporting an increase in job applicants,” he said. “But with the economic lockdowns, the jobs are not coming back in any significant numbers. “In fact, the opposite is occurring. California businesses continue to announce that they are closing permanently. Any economic recovery we saw in June and early July has stalled, and a listlessness set in.” The U.S. jobless rate of 10.2% was significantly lower than California’s in July, and the nation’s payrolls grew more than California’s: 1.3%, as compared with 0.9%. The comparatively better national picture reflects the fact that many other states have either succeeded in tamping down the spread of the coronavirus or have been reluctant to close businesses despite high infection rates. Over the last three months, California has regained less than a third of the 2.6 million positions lost during March and April as the pandemic took hold. And the state’s jobless rate remains a percentage point higher than its 12.3% peak during the Great Recession. As of Friday morning, California had reported more than 653,000 cases of COVID-19 and more than 11,800 deaths. “Difficult times remain ahead,” said Lynn Reaser, an economist at San Diego’s Point Loma Nazarene University. “Forty-two of California’s 58 counties are currently on the state’s COVID-19 watchlist, which means bans on a significant number of indoor activities, including gyms, restaurant dine-in service, museums, indoor malls and hair salons. People also remain cautious about venturing out.” Small businesses face cash flow crises as an extension of the federal Paycheck Protection Program loan program remains in limbo. “PPP was intended to provide a bridge for businesses to get to the ‘other side,’” Reaser said. “But the distance to the other side has turned out to be much longer than expected.” Meanwhile, negotiations have stalled between the Trump administration and congressional Democrats who propose a trillion-dollar stimulus for state and local governments as tax revenues drop and safety net expenses rise. The bill passed by the Democratic-led House would also extend the $600 weekly unemployment supplement through the end of the year, but it has been blocked by the Republican-led Senate and the White House. This week California applied for a stopgap $300 weekly jobless payment to be drawn from federal disaster funds, under an executive order issued by President Trump on Aug. 8. But the supplement is expected to last just a few weeks. It applies only to workers earning at least $100 in state unemployment benefits, thus excluding many low-income part-timers who have lost jobs. “The end of the federal stimulus will have a big impact on California,” said Sung Won Sohn, a Loyola Marymount University economist. “It accounted for about 20% of personal income nationwide and allowed consumers to pay rent and buy food. Many small businesses may not survive.” Statewide, nine of California’s 11 industry sectors gained jobs last month. Trade, transportation, and utilities had the largest job increase (40,900) because of motor vehicle and professional equipment wholesalers, as well as automobile dealers. Construction lost 14,800 jobs, the largest drop in any sector, because of weak hiring in residential building despite a rise in commercial construction. As its unemployment rate dipped slightly, Los Angeles County’s payrolls dropped by 3,600 jobs to 4,093,500. County employment was down 9.4% over the year, with leisure and hospitality jobs plummeting 30%. In Orange County, joblessness stood at 12.3%, down from 13.6% in June, and from 3.1% a year earlier. July payrolls dropped by 17,700 jobs, to 1,464,500. In the Inland Empire, the unemployment rate was 13.4%, down from 14.3% in June and 4.6% a year earlier. Payrolls in the region, encompassing Riverside and San Bernardino counties, shrank by 8,000 jobs last month to 1,385,400. State employment numbers are based on a monthly federal survey of 5,100 California households that focuses on workers. Payroll estimates come from a second survey of about 80,000 California businesses. If economists are doubtful that July’s job report offers much hope, they are even more pessimistic about the direction of the California economy in August. “The July numbers probably paint a brighter picture of the California labor market than what actually occurred,” Anderson said, noting that Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered more business shutdowns in mid-July “so new layoffs from that likely won’t show up in the data until the August payroll report is released in September.” California’s economic recovery will depend on whether the federal government can enact more stimulus measures, including unemployment benefits, and on curbing the COVID-19 infection rate, said David Smith, an economist at Pepperdine Graziadio Business School. “It looks like a long road ahead where we are going to have to punch, kick and crawl our way back to anything near historically normal employment,” he added. But beyond funding the social safety net, any economic resurgence is linked to the behavior of individual Californians, state officials say. It “depends on Californians choosing to wear face masks, staying at home when possible, and following state and local guidance” on coronavirus measures, California Labor Secretary Julie Su said in a statement on the jobs report. window.fbAsyncInit = function() { FB.init({ appId : '119932621434123', xfbml : true, version : 'v2.9' }); }; (function(d, s, id){ var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) {return;} js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "https://ift.tt/1sGOfhN"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); The post California job growth slows dramatically in July appeared first on Shri Times News. from WordPress https://ift.tt/2YshN81

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