#lincoln property company

[wadegriffith]

The 17,423 square foot office of Arctos Sports Partners, located within the newly developed Weir’s Plaza in Dallas, Texas, was designed by SHM Architects and built by HRNCIR Construction. 

Founded in 2019, Arctos Sports Partners is a private equity platform dedicated to the professional sports industry and sports franchise owners.

© Wade Griffith Photography 2023

[rootrealty]

Root Realty

Website: https://www.rootrealty.com/ Address: 4237 N Lincoln Ave, Chicago, IL 60618 Phone: (773) 348-8080 At Root Realty, we take pride in providing top-notch property management services for apartment buildings, mixed-use buildings, and development sites across Chicago and the Chicago suburbs. With years of experience in the real estate industry, our team of dedicated professionals is committed to maximizing the value of your investment and ensuring the success of your properties. Our real estate company manages investment property and rents apartments in Chicago. We offer a full suite of service to real estate owners and their residents. Our comprehensive property management solutions are tailored to meet the unique needs of each property, whether it's a small apartment building or a large mixed-use development.

[treason-and-plot]

Because it’s been so long since I focused on the Isla Paradiso gang, I’m first going to post a small series of recaps before plunging back into the story. I have shamelessly borrowed this recap style from one of my favourite Simblrs, @zosa95 who is a constant source of inspiration and entertainment! Recaps will be tagged IP_recaps. Feel free to follow...or block!

IP_recap 1

Raj, (with a lot of help from Cookie) discovered that Lincoln Porter, multi-millionaire property developer and the vice-president of the Isla Paradiso Chamber of Commerce, had bribed Government officials to have a theme park approved next to Hobart’s Hideaway. Lincoln had awarded one of his own building companies the contract to build the theme park, a deal that would have netted him many more millions. Warren Sandler, aka Warren the Whale Whisperer, had submitted the original application to build the theme park, but a three-month long investigation cleared him of any wrongdoing. Lincoln and several of his cohorts were jailed and Raj was once again offered a seat in the Chamber of Commerce, a move which Lincoln had previously vetoed. Raj and Cookie are now the toast of the town for the role they played in Lincoln Porter’s very public fall from grace, and Raj’s rebirthed whale watching business is booming. Life is sweet for Isla Paradiso’s newly-minted power couple…at least, on the surface....

[lulu2992]

Uncovering the unreleased Far Cry 5 in-game Encyclopedia

The almost complete but unused in-game encyclopedia, reconstructed thanks to the oasisstrings file.

Please note that it’s still cut content, so some information might not be relevant anymore.

You can read the oasisstrings file here. Pictures from this encyclopedia were also extracted and posted by @xbaebsae here.

Part 2: Locations - Holland Valley

Gardenview Packing Facility

The last facility added to the Hadlers' apple empire. They shipped their apples throughout Hope County and beyond. When the cult went red state, the Hadlers stopped their legal threats and resorted to violence.

Silver Lake Trailer Park

A community of people just trying to do their best.

Gardenview Orchards

A part of Doug and Debbie Hadler’s apple empire. After their ciderworks facility, they expanded to a second, larger orchard: Gardenview Orchards. Then they opened the Gardenview Packing Facility.

Rae-Rae's Pumpkin Farm

Fiery matriarch Rae-Rae Bouthillier cares about two things: Prize-winning pumpkins and her dog Boomer.

Gardenview Ciderworks

The first major facility owned by Doug and Debbie Hadler. Ten years ago, they had a dream: an empire made of apples. They nearly achieved it too, until the cult forcibly took over everything they had worked for.

Bridge of Tears

It was called the Mišihrew Bridge when the railroad was still active. It’s now a rickety old train bridge and John Seed's ideal location to send a warning message to all sinners.

Frobisher's Cave

In 1970, a cougar, named "Frobisher" by the locals, killed the star pitcher of a rival baseball team. The Hope County Silver Foxes won that year and changed their name to the Cougars in Frobisher's honor.

Howard Cabin

Home of Niesha Howard, an extreme rock climber from Canada who moved to Montana to be a prepper.

Copperhead Rail Yard

Copperhead Rail was created in the late 1800s by Emmet Reaves. It was shut down in the early 70s and a lot got left behind. It became a place for kids to get drunk or bums to find shelter, then the cult bought it.

Lincoln Lookout Tower

It’s the last working fire tower in the county. A man who worked here promised to help the Strickland family fight off the cult if ever their farm was under attack.

Sergey’s Place

A hobo historian calls this place home. Nobody's seen him in a while though.

Boyd Residence

Will Boyd lives here, or at least he did. No one in the valley talks about him. And for good reason.

Strickland Farm

Property owned by the Strickland family of farmers. No friends to Eden’s Gate.

U.S. Auto

A scrap yard containing trashed cars, broken farm equipment, and even a few busted planes. Eden's Gate uses the garage to build and maintain their convoys.

Doverspike Compound

Les Doverspike was a militia nut and he built himself a bunker. Nobody in the prepper community liked him. Despite that, he was anti-cult and pro-Resistance.

Harris Residence

Mike and Deb Harris were preppers with a cunning plan to keep themselves fed after the end of the world.

Reservoir Construction Yard

Deep North Water wanted to build a new reservoir for the Holland Valley. The company ran out of funding and was chased away by Eden’s Gate.

Dodd’s Dumps

Colin Dodd used to run garbage disposal for the whole Holland Valley, and his business lot shows it. The cult intimidated him into leaving but has yet to sort through all he left behind.

Davenport Farm

The remains of a run-down farm. Local farmers let their cows graze here. Can't let good land go to waste.

Hilgard Electric Power Station

The Holland Valley's power supply is reliant on this transformer station which is controlled by Eden's Gate.

Golden Valley Gas

Once the kind of gas station that gave out free bubble gum to kids, Golden Valley is now a strategic point of gasoline and auto maintenance for the Project at Eden's Gate.

Green-Busch Fertilizer Co.

Facing a decline in business, the Green-Busch family said “yes” and sold the place to John Seed on the condition that locals could keep their jobs and work alongside Eden's Gate.

St. Isidore School

Once a religious boarding school, it was forced to close its doors by Eden's Gate.

Dodd Residence

Home of Colin Dodd, hoarder and DIY enthusiast. He never throws anything out. His granddaughter Nadine's been known to lurk here.

Roberts Cabin

Home of Joe Roberts, a hunter. He's gone missing. He loved hunting deer above all else.

Hope County Clinic

Dr. Kim Patterson provides medical services to Hope County's farmers and low-income residents, many of whom would never receive care in such a remote area.

Holland Valley Station

In the days that it was up and running, Copperhead Rail used to stop here. Eden’s Gate uses this station to catch people who try to escape the region.

Grain Elevator

As the farmlands started to collapse, the grain elevator was the first casualty. Too expensive to maintain.

Henbane River Rail Bridge

Copperhead Rail was created in the 1880s during a mining boom, and shut down in the early 70s after the industry collapsed.

Flatiron Stockyards

Bobby Budell established the stock yards in 1946, and has proudly provided farm and ranch auction services since. The economic and community base employed over 25 people at its height.

Fillmore Residence

Home of Doug Fillmore. Not much is known about him.

Dupree Residence

Home of Tommy Dupree, an idiot who used to work at Green-Busch Fertilizer Co. He got fired by Eden's Gate because he was as dumb as the crap he bagged.

Catamount Mines

Fall’s End owes its existence to the gold Orville Fall discovered here in 1865. The mine brought a generation of prosperity to the region until a suspicious accident entombed 100 men within it, forcing its closure in 1912.

Sunrise Farm

Sunrise Farm was going under, so owners Mike and Chandra Dunagan reluctantly sold it to Eden's Gate. Big mistake.

Deep North Irrigation Reservoir

Originally designed to irrigate farms, the reservoir became a liability when the cult began putting Bliss in the water supply. The Resistance sealed it up to buy themselves time.

Red’s Farm Supply

The Redler family has run this place for 4 generations, and earned a reputation for honest business. Wendell did his best to keep it out of cult hands.

Purpletop Telecom Tower

In the 1950s, Purpletop Telecom built this tower, blessing people with the wonders of AM radio. As time and technology marched forward, they were also given the American splendor of a local TV station.

Woodson Pig Farm

This place has been in the Woodson family since 1943. Current owners Andrew and Frances Woodson used their wealth to try to stand up to John Seed and fight him in court. They lost, and joined the Resistance.

Sawyer Residence

Don Sawyer came from out of town to join the Project at Eden's Gate. He restores canoes, but isn't very good at it. Visitors have sworn they've heard him swearing in Russian over those boats.

Hyde Barn

Kenny Hyde's a poor man in Holland Valley, but that doesn't stop him from loving deep fried balls. He's the proud keeper of Fall’s End Testy Festy decorations, stashing them at his barn until they're needed.

Kupka Ranch

Zip Kupka's the only one who really knows what's going on in the Holland Valley.

John’s Gate

A missile silo long decommissioned and abandoned. The locals used to call it "Area 68." Eden's Gate bought it in secret and turned it into a bunker that is in John Seed's safekeeping until the Collapse.

Security Gate

Formerly the entrance to the missile silo, it's now the gateway to John Seed's bunker. Everything taken in the Reaping passes through this checkpoint.

Steele Farm

The Steele family managed to get their kids out of Hope County, but stayed behind to try and defend their home from Eden's Gate.

Lamb of God Church

A Lutheran church. Its elderly priest was overshadowed by Pastor Jerome’s charismatic sermons. John once asked the priest to say “yes.” Not a chance. Then, the priest was gone. He had taken a “long vacation.”

Lamb of God Sacristy

The Project at Eden's Gate has turned the Lamb of God Church's sacristy into a holding place for everything they need to baptize people at the water's edge.

Armstrong Residence

The Project at Eden's Gate targeted the Armstrong family early, burning their home to the ground when Grace Armstrong refused to devote her sharpshooting skills to the Father's cause.

Bradbury Tractor Shed

A shed for tractors.

Hope County Jail Bus

Prisoners hijacked this bus but were run off the road. The wreck was left to rot in the woods. When Eden's Gate brought prohibition to Hope County, some enterprising moonshiners set up shop behind the cult’s back.

Parker Laboratories

Home and workshop of Dr. Laurence Parker, and the origin of many mysterious noise complaints.

Seed Ranch

The power of yes gave John Seed this dream ranch overlooking the Holland Valley. it has commanding views, a private air strip, and secluded soundproofed rooms for his most invigorating religious pursuits.

Bradbury Farm

The home of the Bradbury family, hay farmers for generations. The strange pattern of dead hay in the field does not impact the quality of the final product. That's the Bradbury guarantee.

Bradbury Hay Field

Bradbury Farm's hay is baled and stored here before being sold to clients looking to feed their livestock with quality hay.

Laurel Residence

Laurel family honey was a local market favorite until their bee colony collapsed and jeopardized the business. It also spooked the Laurels who sunk money into a bunker and became preppers overnight.

Eden’s Gate Greenhouse

Bliss plants are found throughout the Henbane River, but they're also found here. John Seed takes the flowers he receives by boat from the east and plants them in his greenhouse.

Seed Boat Launch

Once a favorite spot for summer frolickers, this boat launch is used by John Seed for receiving shipments of Bliss and other supplies from elsewhere in Hope County.

Rye & Sons Aviation

This plot of land was first settled in 1920 by Willard Rye. He started a crop dusting business. His sons inherited both and it now belongs to the current generation of Ryes: Nick & Kim.

Kellett Cattle Co.

The Kellett family supplied beef for 3 generations. These proud Republicans thought they recognized the American spirit in Eden’s Gate, but when John Seed asked them to serve the Project, they said “no.”

Fall’s End

After prospector Orville Fall struck gold, his small mining camp quickly grew. Decades later, his rival, rail baron Emmett Reaves, shot him dead in the streets, giving the town its official name.

Old Silo

Welcome to the middle of it.

Kay-Nine Kennels

The owner, Kay Wheeler, loved her dogs more than life itself. She bred and trained hunting and guard dogs. When Eden’s Gate showed up, the local demand for guard dogs tripled. John Seed noticed and took action.

Sunrise Threshing

A silo and shed complex attached to Sunrise Farm. Rumor has it that Mike Dunagan's stashed a lot of cool shit around here somewhere.

Redler Residence

Home of Wendell Redler, local businessman and Vietnam veteran.

Adams Ranch

Jules Adams lost her husband in an "accident" after saying no to John Seed. Her family's struggled to keep the cattle ranch out of cult hands ever since.

Miller Residence

Despite financial hardship, the Miller family refused the cult’s invitations, prepping for doomsday all on their own. When the reaping came, Jerry Miller was out working.

Wellington Residence

The Wellington family mine is an urban legend, supposedly stuffed with gold, explosives, or both depending who you ask. Generations of Wellingtons (possibly inbred) have tried and failed to strike it rich here.

[scotianostra]

On July 1st 1884 Allan Pinkerton, the Scottish-born detective, died.

Not all Scots that I post about should be looked upon as good people, we do have to acknowledge this in our history, scratch beneath the subject in most cases and you will find fault, this is certainly true of Pinkerton.

Born in Glasgow, on the 25th of August 1819 his father was a sergeant of the Glasgow municipal police and died in 1828 of injuries received from a prisoner in his custody.

In 1842 Allan emigrated to Chicago, Illinois, before moving to Dundee, Kane County, Illinois, where he established a cooperage business. Here he ran down a gang of counterfeiters, and he was appointed a Deputy Sheriff of Kane County in 1846 and immediately afterwards of Cook County, with headquarters in Chicago.

In Chicago he organized a force of detectives to capture thieves who were stealing railway property, and this organization developed in 1852 into Pinkerton’s National Detective Agency, of which he took sole charge in 1853. He was especially successful in capturing thieves who stole large amounts from express companies. In 1866 his agency captured the principals in the theft of $700,000 from Adams Express Company safes on a train of the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railway, and recovered all but $12,000 of the stolen money.

In February 1861 Pinkerton found evidence of a plot to assassinate President-elect Abraham Lincoln upon his arrival in Baltimore on his way to Washington; as a result, Lincoln passed through Baltimore at an early hour in the morning without stopping. In April 1861 Pinkerton, on the suggestion of General George B. McClellan, organized a system of obtaining military information in the Southern states. From this system he developed the US Secret Service, of which he was in charge throughout the war, under the assumed name of Major E. J. Allen.

Pinkerton was not without controversy, one of his detectives, James McParlan, in 1873-76 lived among the Molly Maguires in Pennsylvania and secured evidence which led to the breaking up of what was considered a criminal organization. His detectives were also used to escort strike breakers during the era.

In 1869 Pinkerton suffered a partial stroke of paralysis, and thereafter the management of the detective agency devolved chiefly upon his sons, William Allan and Robert. He died in Chicago on the 1st of July 1884. He published The Molly Maguires and the Detectives , The Spy of the Rebellion, in which he gave his version of President-elect Lincoln’s journey to Washington; and a memoir, Thirty Years a Detective. The Pinkerton National Detective Agency continues to trade in the US to this day.

Pics are of Pinkerton, on horseback then with, President Abraham Lincoln, and Major General John Alexander McClernand. Pinkerton was the head of Union Intelligence Services at the time. He also, allegedly, foiled an assassination attempt against Lincoln. His wartime work was critical in Pinkerton’s development, which he later used to pioneer his agency. Other pics include the firms logo old and new.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

April 7, 2024 (Sunday)

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

APR 08, 2024

In August 1870 a U.S. exploring expedition headed out from Montana toward the Yellowstone River into land the U.S. government had recognized as belonging to different Indigenous tribes.

By October the men had reached the Yellowstone, where they reported they had “found abundance of game and trout, hot springs of five or six different kinds…basaltic columns of enormous size” and a waterfall that must, they wrote, “be in form, color and surroundings one of the most glorious objects on the American Continent.” On the strength of their widely reprinted reports, the secretary of the interior sent out an official surveying team under geologist Ferdinand V. Hayden. With it went photographer William Henry Jackson and fine artist Thomas Moran.

Banker and railroad baron Jay Cooke had arranged for Moran to join the expedition. In 1871 the popular Scribner’s Monthly published the surveyor’s report along with Moran’s drawings and a promise that Cooke’s Northern Pacific Railroad would soon lay tracks to enable tourists to see the great natural wonders of the West.

But by 1871, Americans had begun to turn against the railroads, seeing them as big businesses monopolizing American resources at the expense of ordinary Americans. When Hayden called on Congress to pass a law setting the area around Yellowstone aside as a public park, two Republicans—Senator Samuel Pomeroy of Kansas and Delegate William H. Clagett of Montana—introduced bills to protect Yellowstone in a natural state and provide against “wanton destruction of the fish and game…or destruction for the purposes of merchandise or profit.”

The House Committee on Public Lands praised Yellowstone Valley’s beauty and warned that “persons are now waiting for the spring…to enter in and take possession of these remarkable curiosities, to make merchandise of these bountiful specimens, to fence in these rare wonders so as to charge visitors a fee, as is now done at Niagara Falls, for the sight of that which ought to be as free as the air or water.” It warned that “the vandals who are now waiting to enter into this wonderland will, in a single season, despoil, beyond recovery, these remarkable curiosities which have required all the cunning skill of nature thousands of years to prepare.”

The New York Times got behind the idea that saving Yellowstone for the people was the responsibility of the federal government, saying that if businesses “should be strictly shut out, it will remain a place which we can proudly show to the benighted European as a proof of what nature—under a republican form of government—can accomplish in the great West.”

On March 1, 1872, President U. S. Grant, a Republican, signed the bill making Yellowstone a national park.

The impulse to protect natural resources from those who would plunder them for profit expanded 18 years later, when the federal government stepped in to protect Yosemite. In June 1864, Congress had passed and President Abraham Lincoln signed a law giving to the state of California the Yosemite Valley and nearby Mariposa Big Tree Grove “upon the express conditions that the premises shall be held for public use, resort and recreation.”

But by 1890 it was clear that under state management the property had been largely turned over to timber companies, sheep-herding enterprises, and tourist businesses with state contracts. Naturalist John Muir warned in the Century magazine: “Ax and plow, hogs and horses, have long been and are still busy in Yosemite’s gardens and groves. All that is accessible and destructible is rapidly being destroyed.” Congress passed a law making the land around the state property in Yosemite a national park area, and the United States military began to manage the area.

The next year, in March 1891, Congress gave the president power to “set apart and reserve…as public reservations” land that bore at least some timber, whether or not that timber was of any commercial value. Under this General Revision Act, also known as the Forest Reserve Act, Republican president Benjamin Harrison set aside timber land adjacent to Yellowstone National Park and south of Yosemite National Park. By September 1893, about 17 million acres of land had been put into forest reserves. Those who objected to this policy, according to Century, were “men [who] wish to get at it and make it earn something for them.” 

Presidents of both parties continued to protect American lands, but in the late nineteenth century it was New York Republican politician Theodore Roosevelt who most dramatically expanded the effort to keep western lands from the hands of those who wanted only their timber and minerals. 

Roosevelt was concerned that moneygrubbing was eroding the character of the nation, and he believed that western land nurtured the independence and community that he worried was disappearing in the East. During his presidency, which stretched from 1901 to 1909, Roosevelt protected 141 million acres of forest and established five new national parks. 

More powerfully, he used the 1906 Antiquities Act, which Congress had passed to stop the looting and sale of Indigenous objects and sites, to protect land. The Antiquities Act allowed presidents to protect areas of historic, cultural, or scientific interest. Before the law was a year old, Roosevelt had created four national monuments: Devils Tower in Wyoming, El Morro in New Mexico, and Montezuma Castle and Petrified Forest in Arizona.

In 1908, Roosevelt used the Antiquities Act to protect the Grand Canyon.

Since then, presidents of both parties have protected American lands. President Jimmy Carter rivaled Roosevelt’s protection of land when he protected more than 100 million acres in Alaska from oil development. Carter’s secretary of the interior, Cecil D. Andrus, saw himself as a practical man trying to balance the needs of business and environmental needs but seemed to think business interests had become too powerful: “The domination of the department by mining, oil, timber, grazing and other interests is over.”

In fact, the fight over the public lands was not ending; it was entering a new phase. Since the 1980s, Republicans have pushed to reopen public lands to resource development, maintaining even today that Democrats have hampered oil production although it is currently, under President Joe Biden, at an all-time high. 

The push to return public lands to private hands got stronger under former president Donald Trump. On April 26, 2017, Trump signed an executive order—Executive Order 13792—directing his secretary of the interior, Ryan Zinke, to review designations of 22 national monuments greater than 100,000 acres, made since 1996. He then ordered the largest national monument reduction in U.S. history, slashing the size of Utah’s Bears Ears National Monument by 85%—a goal of uranium-mining interests—and that of Utah’s Escalante–Grand Staircase by about half, favoring coal interests.

“No one better values the splendor of Utah more than you do,” Trump told cheering supporters. “And no one knows better how to use it.”

In March 2021, shortly after he took office, President Biden announced a new initiative to protect 30% of U.S. land, fresh water, and oceans areas by 2030, a plan popularly known as 30 by 30. Also in March 2021, Supreme Court chief justice John Roberts urged opponents of land protection to push back against the Antiquities Act, saying the broad protection of lands presidents have established under it is an abuse of power.

In October 2021, President Biden restored Bears Ears and Escalante–Grand Staircase to their original size. “Today’s announcement is not just about national monuments,” Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, a member of the Laguna Pueblo in New Mexico, said at the ceremony. “It’s about this administration centering the voices of Indigenous people and affirming the shared stewardship of this landscape with tribal nations.”

In 2022, nearly 312 million people visited the country’s national parks and monuments, supporting 378,400 jobs and spending $23.9 billion in communities within 60 miles of a park. This amounted to a $50.3 billion benefit to the nation’s economy. 

But the struggle over the use of public lands continues, and now the Republicans are standing on the opposite side from their position of a century ago. Project 2025, the blueprint for a second Trump presidency, demands significant increases in drilling for oil and gas. That will require removing land from federal protection and opening it to private development. As Roberts urged, Project 2025 promises to seek a Supreme Court ruling to permit the president to reduce the size of national monuments. But it takes that advice even further. 

It says a second Trump administration “must seek repeal of the Antiquities Act of 1906.”

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[beardedmrbean]

A Nebraska lawmaker whose north Omaha district has struggled for years with a housing shortage is pushing a bill that, if passed, could make Nebraska the first in the country to forbid out-of-state hedge funds and other corporate entities from buying up single-family properties.

Sen. Justin Wayne’s bill echoes legislative efforts in other states and in Congress to curtail corporate amassing of single-family homes, which critics say has helped cause the price of homes, rent and real estate taxes to soar in recent years. Wayne said that has been the case in his district, where an Ohio corporation has bought more than 150 single-family homes in recent years — often pushing out individual homebuyers with all-cash offers. The company then rents out the homes.

Experts say the scarcity of homes for purchase can be blamed on a multitude of factors, including sky-high mortgage interest rates and years of underbuilding modest homes.

RISING RENT PRICES PUSH RECORD NUMBER OF AMERICANS TOWARD HOUSING CRISIS, PROMPTING LEGISLATIVE ACTION

Wayne's bill offers few specifics. It consists of a single sentence that says a corporation, hedge fund or other business may not buy single-family housing in Nebraska unless it's located in and its principal members live in Nebraska.

"The aim of this is to preserve Nebraska's limited existing housing stock for Nebraskans," Wayne said this week at a committee hearing where he presented the bill. "If we did this, we would be the first state in the country to take this issue seriously and address the problem."

A 14-page bill dubbed the End Hedge Fund Control of American Homes Act has been introduced in both chambers of Congress and would impose a 10-year deadline for hedge funds to sell off the single-family homes they own and, until they do, would saddle those investment trusts with hefty taxes. In turn, those tax penalties would be used to help people put down payments on the divested homes.

Democratic lawmakers in a number of other states have introduced similar bills, including in Minnesota, Indiana, North Carolina and Texas, but those bills have either stalled or failed.

The housing squeeze coming from out-of-state corporate interests isn't just an Omaha problem, said Wayne Mortensen, director of a Lincoln-based affordable housing developer called NeighborWorks Lincoln.

Mortensen said the recession of 2008 and, more recently, the economic downturn driven by the COVID-19 pandemic made single-family housing a more attractive corporate investment than bond markets.

"When that became the case, housing was commoditized and became just like trading any stock," he said. "Those outside investors are solely interested in how much value they can extract from the Lincoln housing market."

Those corporations often invest no upkeep in the homes, he said.

"And as a result of that, we're seeing incredible dilapidation and housing decline in many of our neighborhoods because of these absentee landlords that have no accountability to the local communities," Mortensen said.

Currently, about 13% of single-family homes in Lincoln are owned by out-of-state corporate firms, he said.

As in other states, Wayne's bill likely faces an uphill slog in the deep red state of Nebraska. At Monday's hearing before the Banking, Insurance and Commerce Committee, several Republican lawmakers acknowledged a statewide housing shortage, but they cast doubt on Wayne's solution.

"You know, you can set up shell companies, you set up different layers of ownership. You can move your domicile base. There's just a ton of workarounds here," Omaha Sen. Brad von Gillern said. "I also — as just as a pure capitalist — fundamentally oppose the idea."

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this story from the Chicago Tribune:

Reid Thompson, a fourth-generation farmer in central Illinois, is in the middle of planting season. Weather permitting, he tends to the fields in the morning, walks home for lunch with his wife and newborn, and then returns to his tractor until sundown. He’ll harvest his corn in early fall, sell it to a nearby ethanol plant, and eventually it will make its way to a car’s gas tank. That’s the routine, at least for now.

Nearly all U.S. gasoline contains ethanol to reduce emissions, and nearly all of that ethanol is made from corn starch. But, electric and hybrid vehicles offer even further emissions reductions. This poses a threat to corn demand that could be devastating for a state such as Illinois, the second-largest corn producer in the country.

The resulting decline in the value of Midwestern farmland and corn prices will hurt farmers and have ripple effects across rural communities, predict University of Nebraska at Lincoln agricultural economists Jeffrey Stokes and Jim Jansen. Rural businesses that cater to the agriculture sector could go under, property taxes that fund local schools will likely plummet and farmers could be forced to default on debts to community lenders, the economists forecast. This would come after farmers have been hit by a series of misfortunes over the last five years: the pandemic, trade wars, inflation and excess supply.

Corn could be the key to solving another clean energy dilemma, though. Unlike cars and trucks, planes are difficult to electrify, and some fuel companies believe the answer to cleaning up aviation lies in America’s heartland.

“(Corn is) the cheapest, most sustainable, most scalable feedstock (raw material),” said Patrick Gruber, CEO of Gevo, one of the companies with plans to turn corn ethanol into aviation fuel.

Thompson and other corn farmers are eager to seize this opportunity in sustainable aviation fuel, another term for jet fuel made without fossil fuels.

But, before corn ethanol-to-jet fuel can be a viable alternative to conventional jet fuel, the emissions associated with corn ethanol production must come down. This will require farmers to change their practices on the field and ethanol plants to implement controversial technologies like carbon sequestration.

Since 2005, the federal government has required transportation fuels to be blended with increasing amounts of renewable fuels such as corn ethanol to reduce air pollution, greenhouse gas emissions and dependence on foreign oil. The mandate transformed rural economies across the Midwest. Between 2008 and 2016, corn prices rose by 30%, and 26% more land was converted to cropland than would have been otherwise, according to a 2022 study published by the National Academy of Sciences.

Ethanol plants quickly sprang up around corn fields, due largely to investments from farmers eager for the new market to succeed.

The Biden administration established a “Grand Challenge” to produce 3 billion gallons of sustainable aviation fuel — defined as jet fuel with 50% less emissions than conventional jet fuel — annually by 2030. The ultimate goal is to make enough of this fuel to meet all national demand — estimated to be 35 billion gallons — by 2050.

Airlines are on board. United and Delta have both signed advance purchase agreements with numerous aspiring sustainable aviation fuel producers. Currently, however, sustainable fuel only accounts for 0.1% of the jet fuel used by major U.S. airlines, according to the latest federal government data.

The challenge is that creating sustainable aviation fuel costs three to five times more than conventional jet fuel and securing biomasses at scale is challenging. Most of the 24.5 million gallons produced last year were created with discarded cooking oil and animal fat, which are available in limited quantities.

[the-larxist-manifesto]

The larxist manifesto ~ Greetings!

Welcome to my blog!! If you are reading this, you are probably one of my friends that I've linked to my new Tumblr blog. Blogging is a very new concept to me, so please bear with me as I find my voice and figure out formatting >w<

For as long as I can remember at this point, I've been typing long-winded rants on my computer about the random topics that are on my mind—from linguistics to video game reviews to venting about everyday annoyances. Until now, those were only available to myself in the form of my private journal. But after many Discord info dumps that I put way too much effort into, only to be scrolled off the screen in about five seconds of chatting, I've decided I wanted a more permanent and creative way of sharing my thoughts and interests with those I care about! So basically, if you've enjoyed me rambling on about random stuff in the past, you will probably like this blog :}

Oh, you're wondering about the banner and profile picture? The pfp is based on the box art from a game called Doga de puzzle da Puppkupu, an obscure PS1 game by a now-defunct game company called Argent. This company and the mystery around its existence has been a deep fascination of mine for years now. I've created a lot of stuff based on their properties, like my original character (OC) named Taizen Asobi. He's a Nintendo DS game case with eyeballs :3

My banner image relates to Argent as well—a welcome image from the old home page for the company, which also developed one of my favorite DS games of all time, Clubhouse Games. Don't worry, I'll explain all the lore more thoroughly at a later time.

As of right now, one of the main focuses of this blog will be the project mentioned in the previous post: GameGirl28. This challenge kicked off the whole idea of me blogging in general. I play a lot of video games. I love them as an art form, a social activity to connect people, and a fun pastime. Often, I will step away from playing a game and find my head absolutely swimming with commentary and criticism and highlights and funny moments to reflect on. Until now, I usually did all this reflection alone. But now, I have an outlet to share it all with my loved ones! Since this challenge is driven by a specific purpose and will indeed challenge me a lot, it's the perfect way to kick off my little internet journal here.

Also, I hope this will be a way to chat more with folks about stuff I'm interested in! So if you're particularly curious about the topics or what I have to say about them, always feel free to reach out to me! Anything from a Lincoln-Douglass style debate to hyper fangirling over shared media interests, I'm down for it!!

Get ready to crack open the manifesto! Flip through the pages of my deranged mind that the world wasn't quite prepared to witness... until just now. You are no longer safe from the influence of larxism. You will convert.

<3

[wytfut]

“Have you read the news today? Oh boy!” ... Beatles

I know I’m set in my ways ... and this makes me appear as an old curmudgeon.

But by golly, I enjoy a good news paper (actual paper), sitting down with breakfast or coffee and catching up on the world. 

WWW it appears has ruined all of this. Lots of folks believe everything they read... and www is most likely the worst place to do this. 

Unreliable sources... that mimmick “old school” news. I think I found a source on www, .... ABC.news .... not sure. It wasn’t really ABC. Because they added the “.”, they got away from the copyright issues. And that news was horrible at best.  Something to the tune of the rags they used to sell at the grocery store cash registers, ie, National Enquirer. It wasn’t ABC, it was some other company who loop holed the copy right by adding a “.”???  Well it wasn’t ABC. 

Paper newspaper got too expensive for us..... $68/month. And we went “e”. The journal start “e” is now jumping to almost $30/month. Several pages of this is from the day before reprinted. WHAT?? Why at $30/month do I want to reread part of yesterday’s news? Most of the time, its rewrite, of some article that doesn’t pertain to nothing,.... more of a self help article...    

With no sources of news being completely reliable, it makes a guy gun shy about coughing up any money. From where I sit, does anyone back up what they are reporting anymore? 

long side story:

I was a paper boy. I hand delivered papers daily on my sting ray schwinn. Foul weather and all. In the beginning it was $1.10/month (not sunday). From there it went to $2.20 including sunday. And about the time I done with my career, it had jumped to $4.40. Folks thought that was outrageous. 

Sunday and Wednesday papers were ass kickers .... sometimes 2 loads to deliver, as I couldn’t get them all in my “paper bags”.  Sunday was delivered in the morning before sun up. And the rest before 5:30 pm. I subbed before all of this the Lincoln Star (before journal star became one), which was a morning paper, for about a year. . (humor sidenote, both printed same building, just different names, representing different time delivered). . 

I remember some of my customers being total jerks about paying for the paper... and would go months without paying. Those days the paperboy would have to go to their home to collect the monthly payments. One customer owed me 4 months (getting close to $10...). Pop decided to help out, and tagged along in Uniform. 

They leaped out of their comfy chair and immediately paid. I still chuckle with that memory. 

I’d pick up my papers at the S W corner of Cotner and Adams. One sunday morning before sun up, a car come flying down Cotner, and couldn’t make the curve (too fast). The Cekja house was right there at the apex of the curve. The car lost it, and rolled a couple of times and crashed into a huge old Elm tree on the Cekja property. 

Me being pretty young was totally terrified.... grabbed my bundle of papers and hi tailed it home. Scared shitless no less.

I heard as soon as the car had quit moving, the driver try and start it back up. Got it started, and moved on down Cotner.  

About the same time I got into the house, I saw the car coming down 68th. I was positive the driver was looking for me (get rid of the witnesses). So I turned off all the lites in the house, and hid on the floor. Sure as shit the car came around to our side of the “ditch” heading right for our home. 

Car was running horribly, flat tire or 2, steel grinding some wheres..... and putted on by our house, and stopped at the neighbors. 

Turned out, it was the neighbor. All drunked up, missed the turn on Adams. But got his car home and stumbled into the house. ... 

We are going to give up on the journal star.... and I’m looking around for a good news source that is within my budget....

Cuz Jorika suggests NPR and/or Nebraska Public Media “app”. Alexa has failed me miserably, as well as Amazon. 

I listen to a lot of podcasts.... mostly when I’m pedaling “no where”. Really like “democracy now” but no local news. 

Thanx Jo.... I’ll give your idea a go. 

[ausetkmt]

The Lincoln Heights community endured for decades, despite segregation, economic hardship and a pandemic. Then came the Mill fire.

When the Mill fire ripped through Weed, Calif., just before Labor Day weekend, the hardest-hit area was a historically Black neighborhood that dates back nearly a century.Credit...Brian L. Frank for The New York Times

Oct. 7, 2022

WEED, Calif. — The gray rubble appears suddenly on both sides of the highway winding through this small Northern California town, as houses give way to a landscape of charred wreckage and the remains of homes, bleached white by wildfire.

The devastation stretches for blocks. Metal skeletons of cars and blackened trees indicate where properties once stood in the shadow of Mount Shasta.

This neighborhood, Lincoln Heights, was once the thriving and vibrant home of a Black community — a rare sight in predominantly white, rural Siskiyou County, which hugs the Oregon border. Black laborers moved here from Louisiana, Mississippi and Arkansas to work at a lumber mill in the 1920s, and their descendants continued to live in houses on the outskirts of town, passed down through generations.

For decades, the mill next to Lincoln Heights offered opportunity and hope for those seeking a job and a better life. Now, residents see it as a symbol of the neighborhood’s destruction. Roseburg Forest Products, the mill’s owner, has said it is investigating whether hot ash in its facility started the Mill fire, which ripped through Lincoln Heights before exploding to 4,000 acres in early September.

In Weed, the Mill fire consumed most of Lincoln Heights, killing two people and destroying nearly 60 homes. The park that served as a gathering place is all that remains of the eastern side of the neighborhood.

“You can build that house back. But that home is a most special place,” said Andrew Greene, 84, who raised his children in Lincoln Heights. “It’s a place of culture, it’s a place of growth, it’s a place of remembrance and most of all it’s a place of love.”

The rapid blaze was the latest in a series of fires in California that, as the climate warms, have leveled neighborhoods like Coffey Park in Santa Rosa, or towns like Paradise and Greenville. That devastation has forced wildfire victims to choose between rebuilding or starting life anew elsewhere.

The hints of life from before the fire are few in Lincoln Heights. A child’s bicycle abandoned on the side of the road. A pocket watch peeking through debris. At one property, atop porch steps that lead nowhere, sits a vase of fresh flowers as a memorial.

Many residents have pledged to rebuild. But they worry that enough of their neighbors will flee to other cities for the spirit of the old neighborhood to be lost for good.

In the 1920s, hundreds of Black Southerners made the journey to rural Northern California, lured by the promise of employment, for $3.60 a day, at the sawmill owned by the Long-Bell Lumber Company, which had just closed two mills in Louisiana as it searched for untouched forests out west.

The company lent workers the train fare and provided them with wooden houses amid the aspens and pines in a small place called Weed. It was a company-owned, segregated town, and Black mill workers and their families were required to live on the northern outskirts. That neighborhood was known as the Quarters and, later, Lincoln Heights.

For decades, Black residents of Weed had their own church, barbershops and nightclubs, according to residents and a 2011 documentary about the neighborhood’s history produced by Mark Oliver, a filmmaker. They were prohibited from being buried in the white-only graveyard, so they had to dig their own. Black people could shop in some white-owned stores and cafes, but they couldn’t linger.

“Your parents would buy you an ice cream cone, you had to go outside to eat it — you couldn’t use the counter,” recalled Al Bearden, a retired probation officer who grew up in Weed.

At the sawmill, white workers were given safer, more lucrative jobs indoors. The only integration came at school — where white and Black children learned together before returning to their cloistered communities — and on the Weed Sons, the town’s baseball team.

That began to change in the 1950s and 1960s, when the civil rights movement slowly arrived in Siskiyou County. In Weed, Black residents arranged sit-ins at restaurants that wouldn’t serve them and boycotted businesses until they agreed to hire them.

Black residents said they still faced discrimination in subsequent years. At school, they said, white children would use racial slurs and make fun of those who had less money.

Lincoln Heights residents said theirs was the kind of neighborhood where children who were spotted misbehaving by a local elder could expect a call to their family home that evening. On Sundays, the Mt. Shasta Baptist Church was full.

The center of social life was 13-acre Charlie Byrd Park, named after the first elected Black sheriff in California, who grew up in Weed and led Siskiyou County’s law enforcement agency for 16 years.

“On the weekends, that was always packed,” said Lawrence Robison, 39, who grew up in the neighborhood. “Family gatherings, barbecues — just a place to go and relax at the end of the day.”

At work, times were getting tougher.

In 1982, the International Paper Company, which had succeeded Long-Bell, sold the sawmill to Roseburg Forest Products, a transaction that residents mark as the beginning of the decline of the local logging business. Around that time, advances in automation and a growing environmental movement curtailed lumber jobs.

Some found other lines of work, at the local community college, the water bottling plant and restaurants, or in nearby towns. But others left the region entirely. In 2020, nearly a third of Weed households lived below the poverty line, according to census data.

As longtime Lincoln Heights residents moved to bigger cities, Mexican, Laotian, Filipino and white families took their place. Members of the younger generations said it is now much more common to see people with different racial and economic backgrounds mingling than it was when their parents were children.

“It was a change, but it was a good change,” said Angel Whatley, 24, who grew up in Lincoln Heights.

Weed likes to present its diversity as a success story. Mayor Kim Greene, who is white, calls the city “the melting pot for all the nationalities.”

The city accounts for 6 percent of the population in Siskiyou County, but has 36 percent of the county’s Black residents, based on 2020 census data. It also has a higher share of Hispanic and Asian American residents than the county as a whole.

Still, Black residents say the decades-old struggle for fair treatment continues. Mayor Pro Tem Stacey Green, who is Black, said racism in Weed is “sneaky.”

“It’s behind your back,” he said.

Mr. Green said the city didn’t repave a road in Lincoln Heights until he threatened to call the National Urban League, a civil rights group, while a new street sweeper never made an appearance in the neighborhood until he complained.

The city manager, Tim Rundel, said he understood how Mr. Green and some residents might feel. But, he said, narrow streets in the old neighborhood have made it challenging for street sweepers and snowplows to navigate around parked cars. “It’s been a struggle in Lincoln Heights and other neighborhoods throughout Weed,” he said.

More than 250 miles north of San Francisco, Siskiyou County is still a place where residents scorn the state’s Democratic leadership. Though Weed is more liberal than Siskiyou County as a whole, some Lincoln Heights residents say the presidency of Donald J. Trump deepened political and racial tensions in town.

On the surface, people in Weed “still get along quite well,” Andrew Greene said. But he takes pains to avoid topics that could cause tempers to flare.

“The two rules of the bar — two things you don’t discuss or you shouldn’t discuss: One is politics, the other is religion,” Mr. Greene said.

In the early afternoon of Sept. 2, Weed was sweltering as California braced for the beginning of a record heat wave. Fierce wind gusts brought some relief, but also threatened to send flames and embers flying.

Just before 1 p.m., Pastor Alonzo Greene, Andrew’s son, was standing on the front porch of his childhood home in Lincoln Heights with his wife, smiling proudly because his adult children had just finished moving into the old wooden house his grandparents had built.

Down the block, his father was sitting down for lunch. Suddenly, he heard frantic knocking on his door. “Fire,” his neighbor gasped out.

Then they heard a boom.

In what felt like an instant, the neighborhood was engulfed in smoke, and the billowing winds sent flames from the direction of the mill into the neighborhood.

The younger Mr. Greene plunged into the smoke, kicking in neighbors’ doors and hauling children, pets and seniors into his pickup truck. His father rushed a neighbor and the child she was babysitting into his own truck and started driving blindly through the haze, trusting his memory of the road to guide them to safety.

A few blocks away, Patricia Mitchell’s phone was ringing. It was her sister, asking about the smoke nearby.

“So I got up and went, ‘Well, I don’t see nothing,’” recalled Ms. Mitchell, 68. “The next thing I know, there’s black smoke everywhere.”

She escaped, but her house and all of her possessions — including her wedding ring and coin collection — were gone.

“Every time I think about this fire, it brings me down, because so much was lost,” she said.

Mr. Green, the mayor pro tem, was also in trouble. He rushed out of his house without shoes, into the thick smoke.

“I couldn’t see any skies, and it started getting into my lungs,” he recalled. “I thought, ‘I’m going to die right now.’”

Finally, he saw a glimmer of blue above him and made it to safety.

“My life started there: My first tricycle ride was down my driveway, my first birthday party. And everything I knew was all there — pictures of my parents on the wall. I don’t have none of that left,” Mr. Green said, choking up.

Not everyone in Lincoln Heights survived. Two women, Marilyn Hilliard, 73, and Lorenza Glover, 65, died in the fire. Three others, including Ms. Hilliard’s husband, were injured.

At least three lawsuits have been filed against Roseburg, including a wrongful-death suit by Ms. Glover’s son that says she died as she tried to escape the flames. Ms. Hilliard died of a heart attack during the fire, residents said.

Roseburg officials said the company will provide $50 million for a “community restoration fund,” but that the money is not an admission of liability.

“We’re committed to doing the right thing for Weed, for Lake Shastina, for the long haul,” said Pete Hillan, a Roseburg spokesman.

Mr. Green wasn’t satisfied. “You’re trying to give $50 million to shut our mouths,” he said.

In the weeks since the fire, Lincoln Heights residents have scattered to nearby towns, staying with relatives, filling motels and finding temporary housing. Not everyone plans to return. Many lack the money or insurance to rebuild.

“I’ll move on — I’ll move to L.A.,” said R.T. Smith, who lost his house and all his possessions in the fire. “I’m about tired of this little town,” he added.

Others hope to restore the community. In mid-September, several dozen displaced residents were staying at the Hi-Lo Motel in Weed, where Alonzo Greene led them in a brief prayer twice a day.

“If I broke down and started crying, it really shook all of these people,” he said. “So I had to get to a point where I just take a drive by myself if I want to cry, because I couldn’t let them see it.”

He paused for a moment, gathering himself. “It’s been tough.”

[lboogie1906]

Haywood Knowles Nelson Jr. (born March 25, 1960) is an actor. He is known for having portrayed Dwayne Nelson on What's Happening!! from 1976–1979, and its spin-off series What's Happening Now!! 1985–1988. He grew up in Garden City Park, Long Island. He has been a member of the entertainment community for over forty years. Born in New York, he began his career at the age of six with numerous principal on-camera and voice-over national commercials, including Lavoris, Campbell's Soup, Libby's, Polaroid, Hot Wheels, Rock'em Sock'em Robots, Johnny Lightening, Aurora AFX, Kodak, Duncan Hines, Milk, Burger King, and Dean Witter. He appeared as a co-star in several feature films, including If You Give a Dance, You Gotta Pay the Band, Mixed Company, This Property Is Condemned, and a featuring role in Evilspeak. He spent a two-year run on Broadway in Thieves. He guest starred on Kojak in the episode "The Godson" as Bobby Moore. At the age of 14, he went on to guest star in the television series Sanford and Son as the grandson of Grady then acted in the series of the same name, Grady in 1975. The next year, in 1976, at the age of 16, Haywood soon landed the role of "Dwayne" in the television series "Cooley High," which became "What's Happening!" As a "teenage heartthrob" on a popular television series, he was one of the first African American teen idols. After three seasons he went on to a short run on The White Shadow for MTM Enterprises. He had his studies in Architectural Design and Electronics Engineering interrupted when the cast of What's Happening!! was re-united for three seasons of syndication in the series continuation What's Happening Now!! for Columbia Pictures Television where he observed as Technical Director. He appeared in an urban dramatic Broadway production at New York's Lincoln Center Alice Tully Hall, appeared As Himself in Dickie Roberts, and a role on The Parkers. He is a devout Scientologist. He married Sheryl Piland (1981–1984), Diana Ramos (1987–1998), and Khnadya Skye (2014-2020). #africanhistory365 #africanexcellence https://www.instagram.com/p/CqOF6yzLHou/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[rootrealty]

Root Realty

[jammy-78]

Advantage Of Considering Spending Money on Generator Installation and Maintenance

Dependability

You can rely on your generator when you need it by doing regular health checks. By keeping up with routine maintenance after your generator installations in Stoke on Trent, you can ensure that your generator will operate without interruption, saving you time and stress in the event that it does not choose to shut down.

Avoid fuel-related issues

Generators are prone to fuel problems. These include dead batteries, blocked fuel injectors, and algae buildup. These issues happen when the generators are not properly maintained. If these issues are ignored for a long time, they may destroy your generators. Frequent upkeep will completely solve this issue.

Helps you save money

In the short term, skipping generator maintenance in Lincoln could seem like a cheaper solution, but it isn't. Ignoring your generator will make it more likely for you to experience problems later on. In extreme cases, you might need to replace the whole unit. 

Allows you to run your generator for longer

Investing in a generator can be highly costly and is not something you do frequently. Maintaining your generator correctly will make it last longer and run smoother. Neglecting maintenance will make it run for a shorter time.

Climate change makes storms, hurricanes, and other disasters more common. They cause more power outages. In these situations, having a whole-house generator means having peace of mind in addition to power. You can stay in contact with the outside world during a blackout. Use communication equipment that relies on generator power to work well. In an emergency, constant access to information is essential. It helps for staying informed and making quick decisions.

Safety and Security at Home

Safety and a well-powered home go hand in hand. Losing power doesn't mean that the security of your house has to be compromised. Your security system will always work thanks to a whole-house generator.

This includes motion detectors, alarms, and security cameras. They stay on during blackouts to scare burglars. Also, the external lights on your house run on the generator. It keeps your property well-lit and boosts security by reducing accidents in the dark.

About Power Control And Automations Solutions Ltd

A Family Owned Generator and Switchgear Installation, Service & Maintenance Company in the heart of Yorkshire. With Experience in Both Diesel and Gas Generators from simple standby system covering hospitals and data centres all the way up-to a multi megawatt gas peaking plant working with national grid. Having recently completed 200MW of successful control applications across various industries. Data centres Hospitals Care homes Warehouses Distribution Centre Banks Peaking plants To name just a few locations we have installed generators, Switchgear, Control Systems, EV chargers

More about Power Control And Automations Solutions Ltd

[lockprolocksmith1]

Affordable Automotive and Commercial Locksmith in Madison County

Are you locked out of your car in Lexington? Don't panic, LockPro Locksmith has have you covered. Our expert locksmiths are available 24/7 for quick car key replacement service in Lexington, GA. With our affordable prices and top-notch service, you'll be back on the road in no time. We are a well-known and leading locksmith company in Elberton and other surrounding areas. We have been in business since a great time and we have a great working experience in the locksmith industry. We are the first and best choice for everyone because of our 12+ years of experience.

We are dedicated to providing the best locksmith service to our clients and customers. Our team of experts is committed to providing the best locksmith service to our clients and customers.  We provide Automotive, Residential, Commercial, Safes & Vaults, Electronic Security and much more. We provide 24/7 locksmiths in Elberton, Hartwell, Royston, Washington, Lincolnton, Lavonia, and the counties of Elbert, Hart, Wilkes, Lincoln, Madison, Oglethorpe, Franklin, and surrounding areas and other areas by special request.

LockPro Locksmith is dedicated to providing the best security solutions for your home. Our automatically residential keypad locksoffer convenience and peace of mind, making sure that only accepted individuals have access to your property.  We can install a keypad lock on your door with multiple available codes, timed codes that automatically disable after 24 hours, and a simple interface so you can even change the codes yourself if you want.

At LockPro Locksmith, we provide expert Residential, Automotive, and Commercial Locksmith in Madison County. From residential lockouts to automotive key replacements and commercial security solutions, our skilled team is available 24/7 for your safety and peace of mind. We make duplicate keys for almost any kind of lock including automotive transponders and high security locks. We can do something that other places cannot do. We can make you an ORIGINAL key back to the code. An original is much better than a tracing of your already worn-out key. Often, making an original makes the key easier for you to use. No more wiggling and jiggling.

If you want the best locksmith service so call at 706-977-2209 and for more information, visit our website https://lockprolocksmith.com/

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

April 6, 2023

Heather Cox Richardson

The Supreme Court was in the news this morning, as Joshua Kaplan, Justin Elliott, and Alex Mierjeski of ProPublica explained that for more than twenty years Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has enjoyed the hospitality and funding of Dallas real estate magnate and major Republican donor Harlan Crow. Thomas and his wife Ginni, who was closely involved in challenging the 2020 presidential election, have taken trips in private jets and gone on vacations with Crow worth as much as $500,000.

Thomas did not disclose any of these valuable gifts. Indeed, in a documentary funded in part by Crow, Thomas presented himself as a regular guy. “I prefer the RV parks. I prefer the Walmart parking lots to the beaches and things like that. There’s something normal to me about it,” he said. “I come from regular stock, and I prefer that—I prefer being around that.”

After the story dropped, David G. Savage of the Los Angeles Times recalled that his newspaper had disclosed the close connections between Thomas and Crow in 2004, noting, for example, that Crow had given Thomas a $19,000 Bible that had belonged to the famous formerly enslaved abolitionist and writer Frederick Douglass and a $15,000 bust of Abraham Lincoln. After their story appeared, it seems that Thomas did not stop accepting expensive gifts and travel from the wealthy mogul, but instead stopped disclosing them.

In Crow’s company, Thomas rubbed elbows with his host’s other guests, including senior business executives, major Republican donors, and leaders of right-wing think tanks. Crow has worked hard to move the judiciary and the legal system to the right, and at one of the properties where Thomas vacations, there is a painting of him in conversation with a number of figures, including Leonard Leo, the leader of the Federalist Society who has orchestrated the court’s hard-right turn. Leo is now overseeing Marble Freedom Trust, established to disburse funds from a $1.6 billion bequest to manipulate elections in favor of Republicans.

Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) tweeted: “Important for news media to not simply label this guy as a ‘[Republican] mega donor’. It’s so much worse. Crow has many interests before the Supreme Court. His groups file petitions before the court. It’s the clearest, most brazen violation of judicial ethics you can imagine.”

In Congress today, House Judiciary Committee chair Jim Jordan (R-OH) issued a subpoena in its investigation of the Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg’s office after that office indicted former president Donald Trump on 34 counts of falsifying business records on Tuesday. Bragg explained: “The trail of money & lies exposes a pattern that, the People allege, violates one of New York’s basic & fundamental business laws.”

Although Jordan himself refused to respond to a subpoena issued by the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, he is demanding that Mark Pomerantz, a former county special assistant district attorney who investigated Trump’s finances, show up to testify.

Pomerantz resigned from his role in the investigation out of frustration that Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg was not then moving forward with an indictment. The wording of Jordan’s letter indicates he is hoping to use Pomerantz’s words critical of Trump to argue that the district attorney’s office was biased against the former president.

General counsel for the Manhattan district attorney’s office Leslie Dubeck previously rejected the demands of Jordan, House Committee on House Administration chair Bryan Steil (R-WI), and  House Committee on Oversight and Accountability chair James Comer (R-KY) for testimony and documents from Bragg, warning them that their attacks on Bragg and his office were “unlawful political interference.”

Dubeck pointed out: “our Office is legally constrained in how it publicly discusses pending criminal proceedings,… as you well know.” She called their interference “unnecessary and unjustified” and reminded the men that Congress has no jurisdiction over individual criminal investigations. Nor does it have jurisdiction over state investigations. “The Committees’ attempted interference with an ongoing state criminal investigation—and now prosecution—is an unprecedented and illegitimate incursion on New York’s sovereign interests,” she wrote.

Now Jordan is trying a different approach. Bragg responded: “The House [Republicans continue] to attempt to undermine an active investigation and ongoing New York criminal case with an unprecedented campaign of harassment and intimidation. Repeated efforts to weaken state and local law enforcement actions are an abuse of power and will not deter us from our duty to uphold the law.”

In the Tennessee statehouse this afternoon, Republican legislators led by House of Representatives speaker Cameron Sexton voted to expel Justin Jones and Justin Pearson, two young Black lawmakers who had led young protesters in chants from the floor of the house chamber in favor of gun safety legislation after house Republicans refused to allow debate on such a measure.

The Republicans charged that the three representatives had broken house rules and had engaged in “disorderly behavior” and “knowingly and intentionally” brought “dishonor to the House of Representatives.” The body avoided expelling Gloria Johnson, the white woman who chanted with Jones and Pearson, by one vote. Although the debate showed that a Republican had also broken house rules by recording a video that was then misleadingly edited and shown, that representative was not charged.

The three Democratic representatives joined protesters to call for gun safety legislation after six people, including three 9-year-olds, were killed in yet another school shooting. The Republicans have focused on cultural issues and have opposed taking up gun safety legislation. Indeed, they have worked to loosen gun laws; on the same day as the recent school shooting, a federal judge cleared the way for the Tennessee legislature to lower the age for permitless carry in the state from 21 to 18. Republican governor Bill Lee signed the permitless carry bill for 21 and up in 2021 at a Beretta gun manufacturing plant.

Today, young protesters in the statehouse defended the Tennessee Three, as they have become known, saying: “You ban books, you ban drag—kids are still in body bags!” After the votes to expel, the chants changed to “F*ck you, fascists!”

Republicans in the Tennessee legislature could act as they did because they have a supermajority thanks to their redistricting of the state after the 2020 census. In that redistricting they cracked Democratic-leaning Nashville, dividing it among three districts in which they overwhelmed Democratic voters with Republicans from the suburbs. A new state law has now required Nashville to cut its city council in half. Meanwhile, laws prohibiting people with a past felony conviction from voting cut more than 470,000 people from the voter rolls.

This lock on power has given Tennessee Republicans the ability to do as they please. Today it pleased them to expel two young Black legislators who were trying to force the Republicans to do something about the epidemic of gun violence that is killing their constituents.

The Supreme Court, Congress, and the Tennessee statehouse. What would you say if you saw today’s news coming from another country?

Before he left the chamber, Representative Justin Pearson told his suddenly former colleagues how he saw it.

“You are seeking to expel District 86’s representation from this house, in a country that was built on a protest. IN A COUNTRY THAT WAS BUILT ON A PROTEST. You who celebrate July 4, 1776, pop fireworks and eat hotdogs. You say to protest is wrong because you spoke out of turn, because you spoke up for people who are marginalized. You spoke up for children who won’t ever be able to speak again; you spoke up for parents who don’t want to live in fear; you spoke up for Larry Thorn, who was murdered by gun violence; you spoke up for people that we don’t want to care about. In a country built on people who speak out of turn, who spoke out of turn, who fought out of turn to build a nation.

“I come from a long line of people who have resisted.”

—

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON