#secret flights into the U.S.

[justbeingnamaste]

The Biden Administration has admitted to flying as many as 320,000 illegal immigrants on secret flights into the U.S., in an effort to decrease the number of illegal immigrant encounters at the Southern Border.

“It means that while record numbers of migrants were flowing over the southern border last year, the Biden White House was also directly transporting them into the country.

Use of a cell phone app has allowed for the near undetected arrival by air of 320,000 aliens with no legal rights to enter the United States.

It comes after a controversy over a 2022 transportation program in which the administration used taxpayers money to move migrants throughout the country on overnight flights.”

JOE BIDEN’S BORDER CRISIS BY THE NUMBERS:

Since Joe Biden took office:

There have been 8.7 million illegal crossings nationwide. 

There have been OVER 7.2  MILLION illegal crossings of our Southern Border.

The total number of illegal immigrants who have entered through our Southern Border is greater than the population of 36 states. Including;

Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia, Wisconsin and Wyoming. 

There have been 1.8 million known gotaways who evaded U.S. Border Patrol.  

Since the start of FY 2024 there have been OVER 1 million illegal immigrant encounters.

In January, there were 176,205 illegal immigrants encountered at the Southern Border. 

January was the 35th straight month, where monthly illegal immigrant encounters have been higher than even the highest month seen under President Trump. 

Under Biden, over 340 of these individuals whose names appear on the terrorist watchlist were stopped trying to cross the Southern Border.

So far in FY24, there have been 58 individuals whose names appear on the terrorist watch list who have been stopped trying to enter the U.S. illegally between ports of entry. 

This total is more than the encounters in all FY17, FY18, FY19, FY20, FY21, and FY22 combined. 

Over 20,000 Communist Chinese nationals have illegally crossed the Southern Border since FY24 began in October. 

Communist Chinese nationals are exploiting Joe Biden’s failed Far Left open border policies at “record-breaking figures,” becoming “the fastest-growing demographic entering the country illegally.”

The surge in Communist Chinese nationals encountered at our Southern Border has raised serious concerns that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is exploiting the Biden border crisis for nefarious reasons.

Biden’s Far Left open border policies are to blame for this historic crisis. 

There are OVER 60 instances of Joe Biden and his Administration taking actions that undermined our nation’s border security, including halting the construction of the border wall. 

In August 2022, Biden and his Administration decided to make the border crisis WORSE by formally ending former President Trump’s successful ‘Remain in Mexico’ program.”

The Biden Administration announced on May 10, 2023, that it would allow for the release of some migrants into the U.S. with no way to track them. 

Biden’s Department of Homeland Security has now admitted that 40 percent of catch-and-release migrants have disappeared. 

Despite this historic crisis Joe Biden has only visited the Southern Border ONCE, and it was widely panned as nothing more than a photo-op.

  https://www.gop.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=742   

[cablecar-s]

to love and self loath

Description :

With the death of her lover too much to bear, she makes the decision to run away from her life as Spider Woman, finding solace in the most crime ridden place in the U.S: Gotham City.

Note:

Hello! I'm currently just testing the waters of Tumblr at the moment, so bear with me because I have no idea what I'm doing. Constructive criticism is welcomed, just remember to not be mean >:/ Enjoy the first chapter!!

part 2 part 3 part 4 part 5 part 6

Prepare For Trouble

"You're Spider-Woman, right?" He looked at her with a knowing yet amused smile on his face, all the while the woman who stood before him could only stare at him with slight bafflement. Eyes wide, lips slightly parted, she blinked at him, beginning to stammer.

"I.. What? How could you..? What kind of crazy.." She let out a small mix of what seemed to be a huff and laughter in trying to play off his not-so-false statement.

Her crush could only give her a look that read all too clearly as 'Really?' which led her to promptly give up, a sigh of defeat leaving her lips.

"I.. Yeah, you got me. I'm.. I'm Spider-Woman." She looked at him with a defeated smile. "How'd you know though? I thought I was pretty secretive!" She raised her hands up in defense, making him laugh.

"Well, with how much you sometimes ditch me last minute every time I hear sirens going off or how you always disappear out of thin air when something big or small happens, it was pretty easy to deduce the reasons why." He chuckled softly.

"You are also talking to the most smartest person in his entire school." He quickly added.

The female vigilante could only slightly scoff at this, looking around, as if someone else could hear the ridiculousness that was coming out from his mouth.

"Really now?" She questioned, almost mockingly.

Slowly, the two teenagers inched closer to one another while continuing to bicker, a teasing smile on both of their faces until finally they were mere inches away from one another.

"I hope you're not waiting for something." The teenaged boy said teasingly, a smile on his lips.

"No, not at all." The girl hummed, smiling back.

With the night air nipping at their skin, the warmth of their breaths could be felt on one another. And as they leaned in for a kiss, the floor beneath them fell in an instant, and they were soon falling down the clock tower.

With her spider suit on, breathing now heavy, adrenaline pumping into her veins, she watched as the boy she loved since high school began falling, watching as her single web was shot down towards him.

It was silent in that moment, everything having gone in slow motion, her web slowly reaching out to him, but was only seconds too late. The web, sticking itself to the man at the last second, his head still hitting the cold, hard floor, killing him in an instant.

The sound of her cries echoed in the now broken clock tower; grief, guilt, and anger consuming her body, until...

BEEP. BEEP. BEEP

In an instant the woman woke up, covered in her sweat, her heart pounding against her chest. Her fight and flight instincts having kicked in, her eyes darted around her new apartment, her brain slowly catching up as to where she was. 

The muffled sound of cars honking from outside her window was heard, the slight musty smell that her apartment had, and the multiple of unpacked boxes laying around in her small bedroom had slowly calmed her down.

Memories from a few days ago came back to her again, making her sigh while simultaneously burying her face into her hands, that night continuing to haunt her time and time again no matter how many times she had tried to forget. 

Finally turning the alarm on her phone off, she got herself out of bed and went to her bathroom to freshen up, her morning not doing so well with that dream of hers. 

Pulling her hair back from her face, the woman left her bathroom and started to continue where she had left off from yesterday with unpacking her stuff. Putting her playlist on shuffle, she began digging through all of the boxes that held her belongings, putting them in their respective places.

The female vigilante was glad to have gotten away from New York, it gave her time to take a break from playing Spider-Woman—and to hopefully heal. Though it's obvious someone from above thought it would be funny that she would be transferred in the most highest crime rated city: Gotham City.

There goes her vacation.

Though Gotham City should be fine without the help of Spider-Woman shouldn't it? They have all the other vigilantes that kept Gotham fairly safe.

From Batman and Robin to Nightwing, Orphan, Spoiler, hell they even have someone to protect Gotham in the morning, which would be Signal. Of course there was also Red Hood, though she still wasn't so sure if he was to be counted since he did run a few drug cartels.

Wasn't really her business though, as long as she didn't have to do any fighting in the mean time of her slight vacation. 

Boy was she wrong.

"I need you to take some photos of our vigilantes." Her new boss ordered.

"I'm sorry?" The woman furrowed her brows, staring at the woman who was busy typing away on her computer.

"You heard me. Pictures. Vigilantes. Stat." Her voice was monotone, yet it had a slight intimidation to it. 

The vacationing vigilante did her best in holding back her frustration, moving her arms a bit to exaggerate her words just a bit. 

"But Gotham is a lot more crime ridden at night. Can't you have one of the men do it? I'm sure they'd be less likely to get mugged unlike me." She couldn't help but huff, nothing but familiar with this attitude this older woman had.

She was very much the same as Jameson back at the Daily Bugle.

It wasn't long until the woman peeled her eyes off from her computer screen to stare at the vigilante with sharp eyes.

"Listen sweetheart, the reason why you were even transferred here was because of the crystal clear pictures you had taken of Spider Woman over back from where you're from." Opening a file cabinet from her desk, she flipped through a few divided folders before pulling one out in particular and opening it up, slightly tossing it in the middle of her desk.

Photos that she had taken slid itself out from its place in the divider, all of them of which were in good quality and all had good angles to them, only because she was quite literally taking pictures of herself in order to even obtain a job as a photojournalist.

"So it's either you take photos as nice as these of our vigilantes or we can throw you back to New York, your choice." Quite literally, Jameson's female doppelganger looked back up at her new transferee before going back to typing.

Letting out a small sigh, a muttered "Yes ma'am" left her lips before leaving her new demon boss' office. She really can't catch a break can she? 

Well it's not like she wasn't a night person in the first place right? Being able to do whatever she wanted during the day, and once the sun had disappeared and the darkness and rain had taken over Gotham was when it was her time to go out and do her job.

The only downside was how incredibly freezing cold it was in Gotham once night had hit. She could stand the cold to some degree, as a New Yorker she was quite used to the cold, but Gotham was a whole other story.

She should probably install thermos into her suit. As much as she didn't want to think about vigilantism, she knew deep down she would end up doing it, only reason she had brought her suit, which was buried in the deepest parts of her closets.

As her uncle had said time and time again: With great power comes great responsibility.

Being way too busy being deep in her thoughts while slightly, not really, looking as to where any of Gotham's vigilantes may be swinging by, the hair's on her body shot up, the familiar feeling of a tingling sensation in the back of her head appearing.

With swiftness, she side stepped a hand that had tried to take hold of the back of her neck. Turning around, she found herself eyeing three men, all having sinister smiles on their faces.

Just what exactly was her luck today?

"Come on boys, don't you think three of you is a bit much for a single woman like me?" She questioned, a nervous chuckle leaving her lips.

Every step back she had taken, they had taken two steps forward. They had glanced amongst each other, snickers leaving their mouths.

"Not with a lady as pretty as you." One of them commented.

Slowly, they had backed her into a closed off alleyway, all three of them laughing once her back had hit the brick wall.

Her eyes darted around, checking every crevice, every shadow, trying to see if any of Gotham's vigilantes will swoop down to rescue her, and save her the trouble of having to take care of these men herself. 

But there was no one, not even the slightest of movements, not a glint of lenses shining in the dim lighting. Welp, looks like she's on her own for tonight. 

"You guys, really don't want to do this." She warned them, but they only laughed more. They always laugh. Who wouldn't though? A helpless woman who you've backed into a corner telling you they're gonna regret what they're gonna do?

Good thing she wasn't just any ordinary woman though.

"We're gonna have so much fun with you pretty lady." One of them cackled.

"Ugh, how gross..." She muttered.

Glancing around one last time, this time, making sure there would be no bystanders to witness as to what was going to happen.

Pulling up the hood to her winter coat, she let out a sigh, raising one of her arms, pointing it towards one of the men.

"You asked for it." 

In the blink of an eye, her webs shot out from her wrist, a long string going straight for the one in the middle, before he was heaved straight towards the woman before making a harsh impact with a trash can lid.

"Ooh, you'll be feeling that tomorrow." She winced.

Grunts of surprise came from the other two men, but no matter how odd it was for webs to shoot out from a woman's hand, they proceeded to run at the female. With ease, she dodged their attempted charged attacks.

Her hands, opposite of the two men, shot out webs and took hold of the back of their heads before she pulled at the connected webs, causing the two men to bash their skulls together.

"You'll definitely feel that tomorrow." She chuckled. 

Taking a few steps back, she hesitated for a moment and stared at them before quickly rearranging the positions of their bodies.

"Just in case..." She muttered. With their backs all facing each others', she bundled them up in her webs, a precaution if they ended up gaining back consciousness before the morning

Dusting off her hands, she let out a satisfied hum before securing her hood once more before quickly jogging off, not wanting to be found at the scene of the crime. That would only cause herself more trouble. 

"Lets just call it a night, I'm freezing my ass off here." She muttered to herself, trying to bring her coat as close to her body as possible, not wanting to lose what bit of warmth her body was keeping.

Unknowingly to the spider though, a mysterious figure with their infamous red helmet had stumbled upon her small clean up, the two barely missing each other.

He stared at the scene in front of him, his helmet quickly getting to work in scanning the mysterious webs. With his boots softly kicking at the small puddles on the ground, he crouched down, taking a closer look at the webs.

His helmet broke down the composition of the webs, seeing how it was made with a few chemicals. Reaching out his hand, he began to touch the webs a bit, trying to rip at it for a sample.

It clung to his leather glove, and it took a bit of force until it got unstuck, it almost took his glove with it with how hard he was pulling.

"The hell..?" He muttered to himself.

He rubbed his fingers together, some of stickiness staying on his gloved fingers. He took out his knife from one of his secret pockets instead and cut a bit of the web off, making it cling to his blade.

"This shit better come off..." He grumbled before putting his knife away. 

Standing up, he took out his grapple from his utility belt before disappearing into the night. 

---

The spider quickly shot up from her bed, her breathing irregular and covered in her sweat again, tortured once again by that never ending nightmare. Her eyes darting around her bedroom once more, she takes slow deep breaths before covering her eyes with her hands, the palm of her hands pressing into her eyelids.

Letting out a deep sigh, she got out of her bed, doing her morning routine once more. Scrolling through her phone, she looks at the news of Gotham City, most of them mainly about the many crimes of the city, some of politicians, and others of Bruce Wayne. 

Before putting her phone down though, a message popped from the top of her screen, it was from her new boss.

"I better have those photos by the end of this week!!!!" It had read.

The woman only rolled her eyes, turning off her phone so she could dump her face in water. 

Leaving her bathroom, she rubbed her moisturizer onto her face while making her way to her living room that also shared her kitchen. Starting up her coffee machine, she made herself a quick PB&J in the meantime. 

Leaning against the counter as she slowly ate her sandwich, the smell of coffee beginning to waft in the air, the vacationing vigilante took a good look at her small apartment. 

It was.. 

A bit bland to put it nicely. 

Guess she was going shopping today. Quickly downing her coffee without trying to burn her tongue, she quickly got dressed and headed out to do a bit of shopping, to make her apartment just a bit more welcoming for the time that she was staying in Gotham. 

Though she had a bit of a tight budget, she managed to buy a few things well within it that there was a little left over that she could buy herself dinner.

By the time she was done shopping though, the sun was beginning to set, meaning that it was nearly time for the criminals of Gotham to come crawling out of their hiding spots to cause some trouble.

"Shit..." She muttered under her breath, holding onto her plastic bags tightly, her shoes tapping against the cement as she quickly tries to make it back to her apartment before she got mugged.

Her senses have heightened a bit as a sense of panic and wariness began to settle in her stomach. Her eyes flitted about, cautious of every corner, every shadow, every alley, the last light sunset disappearing over the horizon.

Cursing under her breath, her steps quickened, and then there she saw it. A blur of bright red, green, and yellow flying in the air; it was Robin.

Her boss's text from this morning came back to her, which only made her curse more. Of course she didn't bring her camera. The handles of the bags hanging from one of her arms, she quickly fishes out her phone from her back pocket, turning the flash on to take a quick picture of Robin before he disappeared off into the night.

She cursed at his nimbleness, taking a small step back as he flies above her, but just as she was about to take the picture, she had bumped into something sturdy. 

Blinking, she slowly turned around, only to come face to face with someone's chest, Batman's symbol on a black shirt, but instead it was in red.

Slowly, she looked up, only to find herself face to face with the Red Hood.

Click!

The flash to her phone went off as she took a picture of him.

next chapter ->

[reality-detective]

"Marines Were Freed from a Secret Jail That Were Brutally Tortured by Feds"

The six U.S. Marines freed from a secret federal jail said their captors—a mix of FBI agents and private security—tortured them relentlessly, deprived them of food and water, and forced them to defecate in 5-gallon buckets that got emptied only once a week.

As reported previously, U.S. Special Forces on March 8 liberated six Marines the federal government held without trial at a clandestine warehouse-turned-prison in suburban Long Island, New York. The feds had arrested the six for protesting peacefully outside the Capitol on January 6, 2021. Once freed, they were taken to Womack Army Medical Center, Fort Bragg, and treated for maladies and injuries sustained in captivity. This included dehydration, lacerations, puncture wounds, and burns. Alas, one Marine’s wounds were so severe that he went into septic shock and had a leg amputated below the knee.

When debriefed at the hospital, he said their jailors kept them on permanent lockdown in separate cells spaced far enough apart so they couldn’t communicate with one another. He recounted the harrowing ordeal of his arrest. Feds, he said, arrested him off-post near Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, then handcuffed and blindfolded him before driving him to a nearby airport or airstrip. He knew this because the feds put him aboard a small turboprop aircraft. During his debrief, he said he could hear propellers spin up minutes before the plane took off. His abductors shackled his ankles and fastened him to a seat. He was punched in the face several times and called a “traitor” during what he guessed was a two-hour flight. When the plane landed, he was struck a few more times, then, still blindfolded, put in a vehicle and driven to an unknown destination. He tasted blood in his mouth from being pummeled so hard and often and eventually lost consciousness.

He awoke in a decrepit cell that smelled like shit, its only furnishings a urine-stained cot and a 5-gallon bucket in the center of the cell. The guards, he said, beat the living daylights out of him every day—sometimes more than once a day—coming at him three at a time so he couldn’t adequately defend himself. One Morning four guards burst into the cell and tied his arms and legs to the cot, spread eagle, and they took turns stabbing him in the right leg with rusty pieces of metal, then cauterizing the wounds with an iron to prevent exsanguination. He guessed he’d been stabbed 20 or 30 times while the guards taunted him, saying other Marines in custody would share his fate. He said one guard urinated on his open wounds prior to them being cauterized.

The other five Marines told comparable stories, though their wounds were far less severe. They said they were fed only twice a week—stale bread, a few ounces of water, or a red liquid that looked like Kool-Aid but with bugs floating in it. One said the guard tried to feed him mashed potatoes with congealed gravy and tiny glass shards.

“These Marines survived the unsurvivable,” our source said. “There are more service members still in federal custody, not to mention the hundreds of civilians who could be dealing with the same torture. This is how the Biden regime treats combat veterans, as criminals, as domestic terrorists. We are working to free more of them.”

I'm sure we will hear about other experiences like this as the turmoil continues to unravel in our country. These sick fμcks think they are untouchable. I got news for you the deplorables will get the last say.🤔 I did not get any information about the perpetrators involved in these horrendous acts. My gut feeling is, they were executed on the spot.

[xtruss]

Mount St. Helens Isn't Where It Should Be. Scientists May Finally Know Why.

The Volcano is Responsible for the Deadliest Eruption in the U.S., Yet Many Mysteries Remain About the Closely Watched Peak, Including Why it Formed in the First Place.

— By Maya Wei-Haas | Graphics By Diana Marques | Published: May 18, 2020 | September Wednesday 25, 2024

The gaping crater of Mount Saint Helens, seen here on September 5, 2019, is a reminder of the deadly volcanic blast that rocked the Pacific Northwest 40 years ago. Photograph By Amanda Lucier, The New York Times Via Redux

The frosty volcanic peaks of the Pacific Northwest stand in a remarkably straight line, rising from the crumpled landscape east of Interstate 5. But one volcano is conspicuously out of place. More than 25 miles to the west of the other explosive peaks, in the southwest corner of Washington State, sits Mount St. Helens.

It’s been 40 years since Mount St. Helens famously roared to life, sending ash and gas 15 miles high, flattening 135 square miles of forest, and killing 57 people in the country’s deadliest eruption. Today, the volcano is still one of the most dangerous in the United States, and the most active of the Cascade Range.

Where all this firepower comes from, however, has been an enduring mystery. The volcano’s defiant position out of line perches it atop a zone of rock too cold to produce the magma necessary to feed its furious blasts.

“There shouldn’t be a volcano where Mount St. Helens is,” says Seth Moran, scientist-in-charge at the U.S. Geological Survey’s Cascades Volcano Observatory in Vancouver, Washington.

Solving this puzzle is about more than satisfying geologic curiosity. The firestorm 40 years ago was a reminder of the dangers the Cascade volcanoes pose to millions of people—and a hard shove propelling volcanology into the future. In the decades since, scientists have used the extensive observations of that blast to better understand eruptions around the world, and bolster our readiness for those yet to come.

© NGP, Content may not reflect National Geographic's current map policy. Source: USGS

“This was a fundamental leap forward in our understanding of this style of eruption,” says Janine Krippner, a volcanologist with Smithsonian’s Global Volcanism Program.

Crucially, a more detailed view of the volcano’s inner workings could help researchers better track the shudders and shifts that foreshadow an eruption, potentially helping to hone volcanic forecasts and get people out of harm’s way.

Four decades after Mount St. Helens’ eruption, scientists finally are unearthing some clues to its curious position. In one of the most comprehensive efforts to trace a volcano’s roots, the Imaging Magma Under St. Helens project, or iMUSH for short, used a slew of analyses to bring these subterranean secrets to light. Overall, the volcano doesn’t follow the textbook picture of a peak sitting above a chamber of molten rock. Instead, it seems, a diffuse cloud of partially molten blobs lingers deep below the surface, offset to the east of the edifice, toward the neighboring Mount Adams.

A column of searing ash and gas rises from Mount St. Helens on May 18, 1980, seen here from the southwest. Less than two weeks after the eruption, some of this volcanic ash had drifted all the way around the world. Photograph By Corbis Via Getty Images

View From The Sky

On the crisp, clear morning of May 18, 1980, geologists Dorothy and Keith Stoffel were soaking up glorious views of Mount St. Helens from the air. As a special treat for Dorothy’s upcoming 31st birthday, the pair had secured permission from the USGS to charter a flight over the volcano. It had been rumbling for nearly two months, but the mountain was almost tranquil early that Sunday. When Dorothy called the USGS to check if the flight was a go, she was told: “Come on over, there’s nothing happening here.”

Usually covered in snow and glaciers, Mount St. Helen’s white flanks had been blackened by the volcano’s recent burbles. The pair snapped pictures of the symmetrical peak from the windows of the Cessna 182. “It was so calm and serene, I almost felt a sense of disappointment,” Dorothy recalls. “In my mind, I thought, Oh, the mountain’s become dormant again.”

A swollen bulge that protruded from its northern flank was one of the few visual reminders of its active state. Since late March of that year, the bulge had grown six and a half feet each day. As the Stoffels flew by, Dorothy spotted glistening white tracks of melted ice rolling down the volcano’s ashen face, a sign of the intense heat just below the surface. The plane then looped across the sky, eventually making two passes over the volcano’s crater.

At 8:30 a.m., they decided to make one last arc heading east above the bulge. That was when the volcano suddenly unraveled.

Faster than they could comprehend what was happening, a crack more than a mile long split the mountain, and the north side collapsed in the largest landslide ever recorded above water. The pair continued snapping images as the ground seemed to liquify, and more than 0.6 cubic miles of material—enough to fill a million Olympic swimming pools—churned downslope.

“As a geologist, you expect volcanoes to erupt,” Dorothy says. “You do not expect mountains to instantly fall apart.”

“As A Geologist, You Expect Volcanoes To Erupt. You Do Not Expect Mountains To Instantly Fall Apart.”

— Dorothy Stoffel, Retired Geologist

The landslide released the pressure on the magma building below—like popping the cork of a champagne bottle—and the volcano let loose. Billowing clouds of hot rock jetted northward in a massive sideways blast, the first of its kind observed in detail. Traveling as fast as 300 miles an hour, the explosion sheared the peak off the volcano, and wreaked devastation across hundreds of square miles.

Swelling clouds from the sideways blast began to overtake the Stoffels’ plane. The pilot dropped into a nosedive to gain speed. “I really thought our lives were over,” Dorothy says. But by veering south, the trio narrowly escaped.

As they retreated, Dorothy watched the plume of searing gas and ash billow skyward, flashes of volcanic lightning illuminating the crater. For more than nine hours, the plume towered over the volcano, blanketing the region in ash and blotting out the sun.

A helicopter drops off equipment at Mount St. Helens to monitor for potential activity. The array of instruments that keep close watch on the volcano has undergone multiple upgrades since the 1980 eruption. Photograph By Adam Mosbrucker, USGS

The Stoffels’ harrowing account is a vital piece of information among the numerous observations of the explosive event recorded by both citizens and scientists. Nearly 34 miles to the east, on Mount Adams, climber John Christiansen, raised his ice ax to the sky. The air was so electric, it shocked him through his woolen mitten. Some 45 miles to the southwest, on Oregon’s Sauvie Island, artist Lucinda Parker and her husband tracked the roiling plume as their three-year-old daughter played in the sand. More than 145 miles to the east, Douglas Bird and his family were leaving for church when he spotted the approaching clouds laden with ash, unlike anything he’d seen before.

The power of the blast has echoed through generations and brought researchers from around the world to Washington State to study the volcano. The iMUSH project was, in part, born from this intense fascination.

Peering Into The Deep

Mount St. Helens is a member of the Cascadia volcanic arc, which stretches from British Columbia to Northern California. Similar to many volcanoes around the world, this simmering range is the product of a subduction zone, a tectonic collision where, in this case, a dense oceanic plate plunges beneath a more buoyant continental plate. As the slab descends, pressures and temperatures climb, and fluids percolate out of the slab, triggering the solid mantle rocks to melt. Less dense than its surroundings, this molten magma shoves its way upward through the crust, creating volcanoes.

Most of the Cascade volcanoes—and others around the world—take shape above the spots where the plunging slab descends to roughly 62 miles deep, where temperatures get high enough for magma to form. But the situation is different at Mount St. Helens. Standing tens of miles to the west of other volcanoes, the infamous peak perches a mere 42 miles above the subducting plate.

The iMUSH project kicked off in the summer of 2014 in part to try and solve this conundrum. To craft images of the subsurface, scientists can study the speed at which seismic waves travel and their path underground; it’s not unlike taking a planetary ultrasound. Battling flat tires and unmaintained dirt roads, dozens of researchers assembled to deploy a fleet of seismometers all over the volcano’s flanks.

“As Far As The Group Was Able To Do, The Kitchen Sink Got Thrown At St. Helens.”

— Seth Moran, USGS Cascades Volcano Observatory

For one part of the analysis, the researchers detonated a series of blasts and watched the waves roll in. Another set of instruments recorded every tremble around the peak—such as the rumble of ocean waves and earthquakes on the other side of the world—for two years. Other researchers tackled the system by studying the chemistry of the rocks themselves. And still more scientists used Earth’s magnetic and electric fields to map out the conductivity of the subsurface.

“As far as the group was able to do, the kitchen sink got thrown at St. Helens,” says the USGS’s Moran, who was part of the iMUSH team.

The results show that seismic waves creep along slowly in a zone east of Mount St. Helens, some 10 to 25 miles deep. Differences in minerals can influence the speed of seismic waves, but magma can be another source of this sluggishness. Perhaps rocks melt as expected near the rest of the Cascade volcanoes, the analysis suggests, but some diverts westward to squeeze through the subsurface and feed Mount St. Helens.

The story from the rocks themselves fits with this picture. By melting samples of erupted rock under a variety of conditions in the lab, the team revealed that the sticky gas-rich magmas that give Mount St. Helens eruptions their punch form at a depth similar to the proposed reservoir, says Dawnika Blatter, an experimental petrologist on the iMUSH team who works with the USGS’ California Volcano Observatory.

The surprising offset of this magma “suggests we need to look more broadly than just right below a volcano if we’re going to understand where the magma is coming from,” says Geoffrey Abers, a geophysicist at Cornell University who was part of the iMUSH seismic analyses.

After the 1980 eruption, researchers may have even caught trembles from nearby this deep melt zone, as the earth adjusted to the draining of molten rock. For nearly a year after the blast, Moran says, tremors rumbled to the southeast of the peak. Subterranean shifts in magma can produce quakes around volcanoes, so knowing whether these tremors are in fact linked to Mount St. Helens’ magma pockets could help direct future monitoring efforts.

“We’ve known that the southeastern side of St. Helens is a little bit of a weak spot in the network,” Moran says. “Having insight into reasons why earthquakes are occurring out there gives more impetus to improving that side of the volcano.”

Mount St. Helens Sits Oddly Apart From The Other Cascade Volcanoes.

Ancient scars in the subterranean landscape may explain its unusual position, directing magma along

an unexpected route.

Million years ago, tectonic plate collisions sent a plateau called Siletzia inching toward ancient North America.

62-56 Million Years Ago

As the ocean between the two landmas-ses closed, sediments from the seafloor were scraped into a heap beneath the surface and squeezed into stone. This process formed what’s known as meta-sedimentary rock.

50-44 Million Years Ago

Meta-sedimentary rock Sinking ocean crust: The metasedimentary rock may have created a weak zone in the crust that helped molten rock rise to the surface. Some 20 million years ago, a massive slug of such melt pushed its way through, crystallizing and solidifying as a batholith.

28-18 Million Years Ago.

Analyses of Mount St. Helens hint that today, the magma originates from a zone of partially molten rock to the east. The different properties of the Spirit Lake batholith and the surrounding meta-

sedimentary rocks may alter the region’s geologic stresses, guiding magma west-ward to the oddly offset volcano.

Present Day

Mt. Adams. Mt. St.Helens. Batholith Fluid Release Drives Melting of Mantle Rocks Subducting Oceanic Plate:

Diana Marques, National Geographic Staff. Source: Paul Bedrosian, USGS; Alan Levander, Rice University

Ancient Scars

The choreographer of this magmatic dance is still being debated. Many scientists see clues in the surrounding landscape, which bears scars from millions of years of tectonic jostling that could help direct the modern flow of molten rock.

A volcanic plateau known as Siletzia once sat off North America’s west coast. But Earth’s continuous tectonic shifting slowly closed the gap, and some 50 million years ago, Siletzia collided with the continent. As the ocean between the two landmasses closed, seafloor sediments were scraped into a heap beneath the surface and squeezed into stone. According to the iMUSH team, this indelible tectonic suture may lie just beneath Mount St. Helens.

The scientists sketched out structures from this merger using a method known as Magnetotellurics, which tracks the conductivity of rocks. Minerals that are carbon- and sulfur-rich, similar to those that might form from marine sediments, “light up like a Christmas tree,” says Paul Bedrosian, a geophysicist with the USGS and a member of the iMUSH team. Sure enough, just beneath Mount St. Helens, a swath of such illumination marks the region where ancient marine sediments were turned into a particular rock type called metasedimentary.

The analysis unveiled another surprise just to the east of the volcano: A vast area of low-conductivity rock sits just above where deep magma may pond. The scientists believe this rock is a slug of now-cooled magma that formed millions of years before Mount St. Helens was born.

The differences in the properties of this volcanic plug, known as a batholith, and the metasedimentary rocks of the suture zone may alter the stresses in the region and thus direct the magma flow. The batholith limits magma from rising to the east of Mount St. Helens; the metasedimentary rocks could serve as a relief valve, drawing the volcano’s sticky, viscous magma to the surface.

A dense wall of rock beneath these metasediments, also revealed by the seismic array, may actually be part of this lost landscape, providing a westward stop for the flow of magma, says Jade Crosbie, a geophysicist with the USGS in Lakewood, Colorado, and part of the iMUSH team.

Navigating a Sea of Data

While the iMUSH analyses help sharpen our view deep inside the planet, the picture remains far from complete, Moran says. “One of the general rules in geophysical imaging is the deeper you go, the less you know.”

VOLCANOES 101. About 1,500 active volcanoes can be found around the world. Learn about the major types of volcanoes, the geological process behind eruptions, and where the most destructive volcanic eruption ever witnessed occurred.

Today, the remains of Siletzia can be seen only piecemeal at the surface, partially buried by flows of now solidified lava and soils studded with trees. This leaves scientists debating where the suture zone—and its role in magmatic direction—precisely lies. To actually put your hand on Siletzia rocks, you’d have to travel tens of miles to the west of Mount St. Helens, says seismologist Eric Kiser of the University of Arizona, who was an iMUSH team member.

As the researchers continue to sort through the sea of other data from iMUSH, many more questions dance in their heads. How does the system change over time? How quickly does the magma move? How does such a vast zone of partly melted rock focus into a volcanic pinprick on the surface? Each potential answer helps shape our understanding of how and why volcanoes erupt, which can help researchers connect what happens at one volcano to the broader picture of volcanism around the world, says seismologist Helen Janiszewski of the University of Hawaii at Manoa.

Since that fateful day in 1980, Mount St. Helens has awoken multiple times, even as the population living in its shadow has grown. That confluence reinforces the need to keep close watch on this particular peak, and scientists have embraced that task.

“Mount St. Helens is being monitored really well,” Kiser says. “The USGS people, they’ve got that under control.”

[sluttywonwoo]

instead of you [part twelve] || l.mh

pairing: [best friend’s brother] lee minho x college!reader ft. han jisung

summary: you didn’t expect to spend your summer pretending to be your best friend’s girlfriend- then again, you didn’t expect to fall for your best friend’s brother, either. 

warnings: swearing, mentions of sex (18+ mdni)

word count: 3.5k

a/n: revamped my tom holland series from my main blog ( @wazzupmrstark ) to try and motivate myself to finish it!!

series masterlist | early access to the next chapter on ko-fi

The flight from Naples to Tokyo took fourteen hours, not including the two-and-a-half-hour layover in Istanbul, meaning you had sixteen and a half hours to sit in awkward tension-filled silence next to Jisung. The tension was one-sided, of course, but it was still agonizing to endure.

You had been able to push your anxiety aside during your last day in Italy because it had been so busy. There had been a power outage in the middle of the night, causing everyone to oversleep and miss the ferry for one of your tours that morning. It had been a scramble to get back on schedule and do as much as possible with the time you had left. The boys had been hungover and their parents were tired of wrangling them. You had dozens of photos on your camera roll of Jisung and Felix bickering when they were supposed to be posing for a nice picture, and even more of Minho flicking them off. 

But now you were stuck alone with your thoughts, unable to use distraction as a means to escape. You tried reading your book, but found yourself unable to concentrate on the words on the page. After staring at the same paragraph for over fifteen minutes Jisung noticed and asked if you were okay and you finally decided to call it quits. 

You almost wished the Hans hadn’t scheduled in a day and a half to adjust to the time zone change. You’d rather exhaust yourself with the nonstop tourist bullshit than have to cope with the reality that you had gotten off to thoughts about your best friend’s brother. Not to mention living with the secret that the same best friend’s brother had kissed you not long before that. 

If Jisung noticed anything was off, he didn’t mention it. He probably chalked it up to lack of sleep, or perhaps was too tired himself to care. 

“Which one of us do you think will be randomly selected in customs today?” Felix asked, stretching his arms above his head. 

You were standing in the aisle waiting to deplane, placing bets on who’d get searched by border agents this time. Somehow each time you traveled to a new place one of you was always chosen to get pat down or have your carry-on searched. Minho had yet to be the lucky winner, and you suspected it had something to do with his celebrity status. 

“Y/n,” Minho answered easily. “She has the U.S. passport.”

You rolled your eyes. “Like Korea has a squeaky clean record with Japan.”

“Okay, but it’s the other way around for us. At least we didn’t-”

“Bro, you can’t say the b word on a plane,” Felix interrupted.

“Even when the plane’s on the ground?”

Jisung shrugged. “Better safe than sorry.”

“Whatever,” Minho continued. “It’s definitely going to be y/n.”

-

“Would you mind stepping out of line, ma’am?” 

You sighed, not even bothering to look back at the boys. You already knew they were grinning like idiots and you didn’t want to give them the satisfaction. The agent ushered you to the side behind a glass partition, but not before you heard another agent repeat the same question to one of the Hans. You smiled to yourself, happy not to be the only one singled out.

Behind the privacy screen another agent greeted you and asked you to take your sweatshirt off, explaining that it was too baggy and needed to be checked. You saw other people in baggy clothes who weren’t getting pulled out of line, but assumed they didn’t have the red flag of “U.S. Citizen” printed on their identification that would be cause for any additional suspicion. You complied with the agent’s request and pulled your sweatshirt off for them to further inspect.

You were glad you’d worn a sports bra beneath your sweatshirt because you usually didn’t wear anything underneath them. As soon as your head was out of the pullover you immediately met by Minho’s polite smile. 

He averted his eyes as soon as he saw you, pausing his conversation with the official to mumble a quiet ‘sorry’ to you as he was shown to the spot next to yours. 

You zoned out as they spoke, only aware of him again when he started unbuckling his belt. You caught his eye this time. 

“Forgot to take it off,” he explained.

“Sweatshirt’s too loose.”

You both faced forward as the customs officials proceeded through the motions. You were stuck standing there half-naked with your arms wrapped around your chest self-consciously while an agent pat Minho’s legs down. 

“Dad said we can meet them at baggage claim,” Minho said after a few moments of silence between the two of you. “They went on without us.”

“Okay,” you squeaked back in response. 

You knew it wouldn’t take long, but it still made you nervous to be alone with Minho. Jisung was like a safety blanket, or a buffer between you and him and without him you were afraid it would be painfully awkward. 

The woman handed you your sweatshirt back and you had to wait for Minho outside of the screening area. He joined you a minute or so later.

“They find any dirt on you?” you asked from where you were leaning against the wall across from the exit. 

“Nope, you?”

“Yeah, actually I’m in custody right now. Can’t believe you missed the handcuffs.”

“Man, what’d they get you for?” 

“Identity theft,” you sighed. 

“Damn, that’s a bummer,” Minho replied, false sympathy rolling off his words. 

He cocked his head in the direction the rest of his family had went, indicating that you should get going, and held out a hand to pull you upright. You took it hesitantly and let him help you. 

“I was actually hoping you could bail me out?” you went on, continuing with the bit. 

Minho made a sound through his teeth and grimaced. “I’m kinda broke right now.”

“Aren’t you a famous dancer?”

“Sorry, but I think you have me confused with someone else.”

“No, you’re definitely the guy!”

“You’re thinking of Choi Minho,” he insisted.

“Remember that IOU you gave me? I’m cashing it in now.”

“That’s not how it works!” 

You laughed. “No, but if I ever actually get arrested I’m using my IOU to get you to bail me out of jail.”

“I don’t think that a kiss and getting bailed out of prison are comparable, but I didn’t put any conditions on that postcard, did I?”

“Nope!” You smiled happily.

“Well that’s on me, so…”

You took the shuttle together to the other side of the airport where the rest of the Hans were waiting and finally found them with all of your luggage at the furthest carousel from the entrance. 

“It’s about time!” Felix yelled over the crowd as soon as he saw you. 

Jisung grinned when he saw you and you couldn’t help but grin back. He wrapped an arm around you instinctively and you relaxed into his shoulder, relieved to be with him again. It hadn’t dawned on you until that moment just how attached you were, but you didn’t have time to dwell on it because the other Hans were all looking at you expectantly.

“Did everything go okay?” Nikki asked. 

Minho nodded. “They made y/n strip, but it was uneventful otherwise.”

You pursed your lips, cheeks burning. “It was just my sweatshirt!” you hissed to Jisung. 

“Yeah, but you never wear anything under your sweatshirts!” Jisung hissed back.

“I had a bra on this time.”

“Oh, so it was just another night at the bar for you?” You wrestled yourself out of Jisung’s grasp at that and glared. “Am I wrong?”

Jisung’s dad cut in before you could respond. He had a habit of calling “family meetings” in the middle of public spaces to finalize plans and get everybody on the same page, which was always an experience. 

“Alright, gather up, gang!” he said, beckoning you all closer. “So we’ll be staying at… this hotel,” he explained and turned his phone around to show you the name of it. “And the thing is, we have two rooms to share between the six of us. One for your mother and I, and another for you four.”

“What?” Jisung asked. “You’re going to make us stay with them?”

“I thought we were getting three rooms like every other time,” Minho chimed in.

“We were meant to, but I made a mistake when booking it,” Dom clarified.

“How?”

“The entire website was in Japanese, Jisung. I don’t know Japanese!”

“Dad, Google has a translate webpage option!” Felix groaned.

“Well no one told me that while I was booking this entire trip by myself!”

You traded a look with Minho, who looked just as panicked as you felt. But it would only be for a week. You would find a way to manage. You didn’t really have any other option.

“I’m sure it’ll be fun,” Jisung tried, forcing a smile.

“That’s the spirit!” Dom cheered. “We’ll make it work.”

-

“Ji and I will take the bunk beds.”

The room was a decent size. It was definitely bigger than Jisung’s dad had made it sound. A large window on the back wall flooded the space with natural light and offered a view of the city below. By the door was a small fridge and a countertop with a sink and a couple of burners built in so that guests could cook their own meals. There was a queen sized bed jutting out from the western-facing wall and built into the adjacent wall were two twin-sized bunks, one on top of the other, making the room feel… cozy.

Felix and Minho traded looks with each other.

“Kidding.”

The boys visibly relaxed and chuckled awkwardly.

“If I ever have to share a bed with Minho again it’ll be too soon,” Felix sighed.

“Is that any way to treat your big brother?” Minho scoffed.

“I’m taller than you.”

“That’s only because you’re wearing boots.”

“Whatever,” Felix grumbled, kicking off his shoes by the door.

Minho slung his backpack onto the top bunk and pulled his sweatshirt off over his head, exposing a strip of his stomach in the process. You looked away instinctively, hoping that you hadn’t drawn any attention to yourself while doing so.

“You always get the top bunk,” Felix whined.

“Yeah, because I’m older.”

“That’s not fair!”

“My brothers are actually ten years old,” Jisung explained to you, raising his voice so that you could hear him over the bickering.

“No, I think ten-year-olds know how to take turns,” you said dismissively, not missing the glares from the other two Hans.

“You’re right,” Jisung agreed. He pushed his hair out of his eyes and sighed. “Reminds me of the family vacations we used to take. We used to share one hotel room when we traveled.”

“All boys… I don’t know how your mom did it.”

“None of us do.”

“I thought we were going to sleep,” Felix muttered from where he was already laying down on the bottom bunk, clearly irritated.

“Give us a minute to settle in, dude,” Jisung shot back before dropping into a whisper. “It’s going to be a long week.”

You shook your head, putting your hands on his shoulders. “Everyone’s just cranky because they’re tired,” you reasoned. “We’ll get some sleep and then grab some food and then maybe they’ll be in a better mood.”

“You don’t know them like I do,” Jisung warned.

“That’s true, but won’t they tone it down since I’m here?”

Jisung snorted. “Wishful thinking.”

You rolled your eyes. “Whatever, I’m going to hop in the shower. I feel gross after being on a plane for so long.”

“I’ll go after you,” Jisung replied with a nod. “Let me know if you need anything.”

You thanked him with a kiss under the watchful eyes of his brothers who both groaned in protest.

“Oh, fuck off,” Jisung growled against your lips.

“By the way, sharing a bed doesn’t mean you get to mess around because I don’t want to hear that shit.”

“Felix!” Jisung and Minho shouted, Minho going as far as throwing a pillow at his younger brother from the top bunk.

“Just being honest! We heard you going at it like rabbits when you had your own room, and I didn’t say anything about it then-”

“Felix.” To your surprise, it was Minho who cut him off, raising another pillow in warning. Thankfully, Felix took the hint that time and shut up, crossing his arms over his chest in annoyance.

You smiled to yourself with the knowledge that your little Easy A stunt had worked, and looked over to see that Jisung was wearing a matching smirk. He winked at you before turning to glare at his brothers.

“On that note, I’m going to shower,” you said, mostly to Jisung, and made your way over to where you had dropped your suitcase by the door.

You gathered a set of pajamas to change into and then wandered into the bathroom, quietly closing the door behind you. It was one of those rolling doors so you had to be extra careful not to knock it off its hinges or the track and cause even more noise than necessary. You set your change of clothes on the counter next to the sink and began to undress, leaving your worn clothes on the floor.

The shower was kept in a room separate from the room with the sink and vanity, something you had read was common for Japanese washrooms. Inside the second room was a bathtub with a complicated looking panel next to it. With a closer inspection you determined it was used to fill the bath with water and customize the temperature. The showerhead was secured to the wall just to the side of the tub which meant you would have to hold it while you showered, but you didn’t mind. You were used to holding the showerhead for… other reasons.

Your shower was quick. You didn’t want to take too long when you knew other people were waiting for it. You were drained too. Even as you dried yourself off with a towel you could feel your arms start to get heavier.

You wrapped your hair in your towel and put on your pajamas shortly after, trying not to cringe at the way the fabric clung to your still-damp body. Usually you wouldn’t get dressed in the bathroom right after taking a shower because it was always so humid and sticky, you’d go out in the bedroom to do it, but as Jisung’s girlfriend the latter wasn’t an option. So you dealt with the discomfort and ventured back into the main room.

It was dark now. Someone, you assumed Jisung, had pulled the blackout curtains shut so that the daylight could no longer stream through the window. Felix was already fast asleep, but Minho and Jisung were still awake, scrolling through their phones on their respective sides of the room.

Jisung was perched on top of your bed, resting comfortably. He wasn’t underneath the covers, probably because he knew you didn’t like to share a bed with someone who hadn’t showered.

He smiled when he saw you and pushed himself up onto his elbows.

“Shower’s all yours,” you said.

“Thanks.”

You watched him rifle through his suitcase for pajamas and then eventually disappear into the bathroom before finally flinging yourself onto the bed. You still needed to take your hair out of the towel and brush your teeth, but you took a moment to just. Lay there.

Minho didn’t acknowledge you, hadn’t so much as looked at you since you came out of the bathroom, but you still found yourself looking over to him.

At the airport he had seemed at least a little concerned that he would have to share a room with you. Even in the cab to the hotel he kept sneaking glances at you when he thought you weren’t paying attention. But now he looked completely relaxed and you were second guessing yourself. Maybe you’d been projecting. Maybe he hadn’t been anxious at all.

You, on the other hand, felt like you hadn’t been able to exhale since Dom had announced that you’d be sharing a room with Jisung’s brothers.

It had dawned on you as soon as you stepped into the hotel room that you’d never be able to let your guard down. Before this point you had at least been able to take breaks, retreat to your hotel room with Jisung and be yourselves without worrying that one of his family members was around. You hadn’t needed to keep up the act 24/7, but now you had no other choice. It was only for a week, but you knew it was going to be exhausting. You weren’t even sure that your current performance was believable, and that was without all of the more intimate interactions couples had in private. The good night kisses, the cuddling in bed together, falling asleep in each other’s arms, the good morning kisses, all things you’d have to take into consideration. Most couples you knew moved in harmony, like they were one person, half of a whole. You and Jisung were more like the hands on a clock. You were always moving in the same direction, and once in a while you’d overlap, but more often than not you were facing each other on completely opposite sides of the clock. It was what made you such good friends. Best friends. But what would make you terrible lovers.

To be fair, a lot of people misunderstood your dynamic, which you had been using to your advantage. They assumed that since you were always together you were basically the same person- and they weren’t necessarily wrong. You and Jisung spent a majority of your time together. You knew each other well enough to finish each other’s sentences, to voice aloud what the other was thinking before they even said it.

The vibration of your phone next to you disrupted your train of thought. It was a text from Jisung.

Can you come here rq? I need help lol.

Confused, you pushed back the covers and stood up. You dropped your phone back on the bed and walked over to the bathroom, keenly aware of the way Minho stiffened in his bed.

You rolled back the door and found Jisung standing in his boxers next to the tub.

“What is it?” you asked, shutting the door behind you.

“How did you figure out the shower? I can’t get the water to be hot.”

“This is what you called me in here for?” you said, exasperation dripping from your voice.

“Yes! I don’t want to take a cold shower.” He said it like it should’ve been obvious.

“Did you try messing with the knobs? That’s how I figured it out.”

Jisung’s cheeks turned a faint shade of pink as he pursed his lips, thinking about how to answer.

“Not all of them,” he admitted.

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Sorry?”

“It’s the one on the left, dumbass,” you said and twisted the knob for him.

“Thanks,” he mumbled sheepishly. “I just didn’t want to fuck up the shower or anything.”

Men, you thought to yourself shaking your head.

“I’m going to bed,” you told him. “Before your brothers think I’m in here giving you head or something.”

“Let them think what they want,” he said, shrugging it off.

“I want to preserve what little amount of respect they have for me, thanks.”

Jisung just chuckled and thanked you again as you let yourself out into the room with the sink. While you were there you hung up your wet towel and brushed your teeth with your finger and the toothpaste the hotel provided. You were too lazy to go get your toothbrush out of your bag.

“That was fast.”

You jumped, hand racing to your heart when you realized it was just Minho. He was still in his bed, but had rolled onto one side so that he could talk to you.

“You scared the shit out of me!” you hissed.

“Sorry.” He didn’t sound very sorry. “What did my brother want?”

God damn it, Jisung.

“Why do you ask?”

Minho shrugged. “Just wondering.”

“He needed help figuring out the shower,” you explained.

“Glad he has you for that.”

You narrowed your eyes at the boy in the top bunk. He was trying to get under your skin. Why?

The ball was in your court. You could be the bigger person and let it go, or-

“He has me for a lot of things.” You pushed your tongue against your cheek so that there was a visible outline and brought your fist up to your mouth, moving it back and forth subtly so that he’d get the idea without being too obscene. “But you already knew that, didn’t you?”

lmk what you think i always appreciate feedback!!

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[usafphantom2]

China warns 'military spotters' who may go to prison for posting photos online

Fernando Valduga By Fernando Valduga 01/21/2024 - 22:32 in Military

In the era of open source intelligence, one of the main ways for Western experts to maintain control over China's armed forces is through the analysis of photos of new People's Liberation Army equipment published online by enthusiasts and amateur photographers.

The publication of photos of military ships or aircraft captured outside the ELP facilities or of commercial flights near sensitive areas has become a common vision in recent years, as China quickly modernized its forces. And "military fans" spread the word to the general population on social networking sites such as Weibo, with hundreds of millions of active users.

But not anymore.

The new Chinese aircraft carrier Fujian, with the model of a J-35 jet on the flight deck.

In a WeChat post in December titled: "This is a legal hobby, but you must be very careful," the Ministry of State Security of China said: "Some individual military enthusiasts seriously endanger national military security by illegally obtaining information about national defense and disclosing it on the Internet."

"Focusing on military airports, ports, national defense and military industrial units, they drove or picked up ferries or planes that pass through designated routes and photographed clandestinely with telezoom lenses or drones," said the post of the highly secret civil espionage agency.

Repeat offenders can be arrested for up to seven years, although "primary or occasional offenders" can only receive a warning, according to the agency, which oversees intelligence and counter-espionage both in China and abroad.

Commercial aircraft that took off from Pudong airport, flies over the Jiangnan shipyard.

The alert comes at a time when Chinese leaders are increasingly focusing on ensuring national security in a number of sectors, especially as tensions with the United States increase.

For example, the agency only launched its social media account at the beginning of this year - dedicated to warning citizens about the risks of exposing China's secrets to the outside world and calling on them to join their fight against espionage.

The case of the new aircraft carrier

According to the spy agency's post, the images posted online can show the progress of the construction of warships or aircraft, while revealing operational and technical details of Chinese military equipment. The post specifically mentioned the new aircraft carrier as an area where safety could be compromised.

China's newest aircraft carrier, the Fujian, has been a frequent target of amateur observers while being prepared at a shipyard in Shanghai. The Jiangnan shipyard, where the works are being carried out, is close to the flight routes of Pudong International Airport, Shanghai.

In November 2023, the Paris-based defense news site Naval News reported that Fujian had begun testing its advanced electromagnetic catapult system, based on videos published on Weibo, apparently taken from a Pudong passenger plane.

“Related images taken from passenger planes have become a common source to track the progress of several important programs (of the ELP Navy),” Naval News reported.

Fujian is certainly a remarkable program for the ELP Navy. The 80,000-ton warship, the largest military ship ever manufactured in China, is considered a rival of the newest U.S. Navy aircraft carriers of the Gerald R Ford class, one of the few other aircraft carriers to use electromagnetic catapults to launch aircraft.

The photos of the alleged catapult test gave Western analysts an idea of how the ELP Navy is progressing in preparing the aircraft carrier for commissioning and active service.

Image of the Fujian catapult tests.

And these images are not the first of Fujian to appear online.

In April 2023, the state broadcaster CCTV announced in a report that in November 2021, Mr. Luo, a "quite renowned" military enthusiast, was sentenced to one year in prison after his arrest by the Shanghai National Security Department for photographing the Fujian aircraft carrier.

Luo used a drone capable of shooting long-range and high-resolution photos, the report said.

Recently, new images on Chinese social networks began to appear with means of censorship.

How the US deals with images

It is not only China that is suspicious of what amateur military observers can do to reveal confidential information.

U.S. law says that the President may designate certain military facilities and equipment as prohibited to image makers.

"It will be illegal to make any photograph, sketch, image, drawing, map or graphic representation of such vital military and naval facilities or equipment," unless due permission is obtained before, states the U.S. Code. Offenders can be arrested for up to one year in prison.

Near the famous Area 51 in Nevada it is possible to see signs that do not authorize photos and the use of drones.

Of course, the military can sometimes use open source intelligence to their advantage, said Carl Schuster, former director of operations of the Joint Intelligence Center of the U.S. Pacific Command.

After photos of a supposed model of China's next-generation stealth fighter appeared online in September, Schuster told CNN that “given the location of the aircraft carrier and the likelihood of operations on the deck being photographed or filmed, the PLA [Navy] can see value in inciting speculation about Fujian's future air wing,” just to give opponents something to think about.

Source: CNN

Tags: ChinaPLAN - People's Liberation Army Navy / People's Liberation Army Navyaircraft carrierspotters

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Fernando Valduga

Fernando Valduga

Aviation photographer and pilot since 1992, he has participated in several events and air operations, such as Cruzex, AirVenture, Dayton Airshow and FIDAE. He has works published in specialized aviation magazines in Brazil and abroad. He uses Canon equipment during his photographic work in the world of aviation.

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04/01/2024 - 11:00

[stormxpadme]

Whumptober 2024 No. 28 - CCTV

06/05/2018

“Anything new?” Ororo was not surprised to find Hank in the laboratory the next morning, exactly the way she'd left him there yesterday to at least try and get a few hours of sleep.

The latter would have been more important for a certain doctor who was about to go on a mission, but she spared herself a critical comment when Hank was all but torn from his position bent over a microscope with a startle. When it came to such things, her old friend didn't take advice any better than she did, and he had a lot more strength reserves thanks to his healing factor, even though the latter had its limits as Hank sometimes liked to conveniently forget. That thing with this man-made virus had frightened them all. Ororo understood that Hank wanted to find out as quickly as possible how the new pupil who'd arrived here yesterday could be immune to it. How that might help protect others from it, too. After what they'd all heard earlier from a quite distraught Angelica, that was more important than ever. “The computer hasn't even fully decoded Bastian's DNA yet,” Hank replied to her disappointment. ”That will take some more time. I already had Andréo fly a blood sample to U.G.E.R. last night though. They'll continue to work the case while I'm gone.” Suppressing a yawn, he got up and shuffled over to the fully automatic coffee machine enthroned on a sideboard, probably one of the most important devices in here in spite of the impressive alien gear in every corner.

“Good thinking.” Ororo had been wondering already where Warren's son had gone off so late last night who was usually not that keen about going on flights alone.

Recently, the young man had retreated more than once at the most unusual times though. Especially since that stupid thing with Scott's daughter had happened, which the senior staff of this house had been watching from the sidelines with narrow eyes and more irritated by the day since then, because the two young people made no effort to clear up this whole mountain of misunderstandings and childishness. Which was poison for every group supposed to work together in potentially dangerous situations. In this case, Andréo at least seemed to have combined business with pleasure and played the role of the carrier pigeon, which was not only the fastest but also the safest way to transmit data.

The scientists in that secret underground laboratory in Canada would hopefully quickly find out something solid about this thing. In all these decades, they had rarely disappointed the X-Men, who were among their best customers.

“Thanks.” Ororo took a huge steaming cup from Hank when he held it out to her without even asking, and called up the image from a surveillance camera on one of the screens, filming a certain patient room for security reasons alone, to watch the young man inside. Perhaps not entirely fair, but after the shocking revelations yesterday and especially those from Italy this morning, she could spare little consideration for politeness, not so shortly before a mission coming up for this patient that was so urgent.

They couldn't lose any more minutes, frankly.

And here Ororo had hoped so much that everything would have gotten better, thanks to the long line of U.S. Presidents who had spoken out for their species since McKenna's tragic death at the hands of a mutant enemy, with more and more influential representatives of Homo Superior in politics, business and arts ... Even most of the protest marches had stopped, which had demanded the surveillance or even preventive detention of Jean's daughter in the first few years after the Inferno. People had mostly left that tragedy behind them, that was what Ororo had hoped ... And now these psychos were reappearing out of nowhere, trying to start a war.

“I need the boy,” she murmured apologetically, although Hank had made not a single accusation about her less-than-discreet approach. ”I'll try to help him, as much as he'll let me.”

It pained her, too, to see how completely absent-minded Bastian seemed when he wrapped himself in the sturdy clothing that Hank must have brought him earlier, and armed himself with a knife in his boot. This teenager was tougher and had been through far more than anyone should at this age, but that was true of many others in this school as well. Ororo's lips tightened in shock when Bastian seemed to change his mind, drawing his knife once more ... Only to use it to slice his own forearm, bending over the sink, without even blinking, waiting with narrowed eyes for his healing factor to close the wounds before he washed away the bloody traces of it with a satisfied nod. Great.

“I stand corrected: I guess I don’t even have to try. When it comes to self-punishment and seeking escape in pain, the kid is in better hands with Cat from the start. Bastian might hate us even more after today, but this is about more than just him. I have to protect our students, Hank.”

“To me, you don't have to justify, often having to go Charles' way these days.” Hank came to stand next to her, frowning in gloom, his upper lip drawn back behind his fangs. He also watched the events in the patient's room for a moment, but probably more to avoid the lightning bolts that shot from Ororo's eyes his way at his comment. “The question is whether you can handle it. You can't teach the children something you suddenly no longer believe in yourself.” A sad sigh escaped his lips as Ororo turned away immediately.

It hurt her that they had to part ways like this again, but she hadn't come here to have her principles questioned. ”I have always fought for a peaceful solution.”

“And are you still? Then why was it me who had to talk Bastian out of executing the murderers of his friends at that camp in Alaska yesterday that we're off to? Are you trying to tell me that has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that these people probably have Jean on their conscience, too?”

He didn't sound as if he expected an answer, so Ororo didn't even bother to recite platitudes that looked better on silver-plated signs in classrooms anyway. She had always done her duty to make a life in a non-violent world possible, as it had been drilled into her since she'd been a teenager. Even though the seething hatred inside her had pulled her in a completely different direction more than once. And she had been through too much in her life, and in this house, to fear that anything about that would change.

“If you want to treat the people that we need for your missions differently than Charles sometimes treated us,” Hank unexpectedly called after her, ”start with the little things. You don't have to abandon your beliefs to grow from challenges, Ororo. Just don't unlearn to see what makes this life worth living despite all the crap that happens in this world. In that regard, you had a good teacher. Maybe you should honor his memory.” When Ororo turned around in confusion, Hank nodded at the monitor, his patient, who was once again busy cuddling with Gringo, who apparently didn't want to leave the boy's side. “The kid can use all the support he can get on this trip, you know.”

“Gringo is far too old for adventures,” Ororo objected but quickly felt her reluctance melt when she saw how caring and attentive her companion was with the teenager, just as the dog had gotten her out of lows more than once over the years. That this friendship wouldn't last forever, no matter how futuristic the medical care for humans and animals in this house was, that Ororo would have to get used to the idea of living without her last memory of Jericho and New York II … That was something she'd been feeling sick over for a while now. But precisely because it had been the greatest joy of Gringo's life to assist people like her, who could lose themselves so damn quickly in their emotional darkness, she shouldn't take that happiness away from him, in what was probably his last months of life. Especially not if it meant that another being in this house would hopefully be helped a little. “I don't have to sew him a uniform though, do I?” she added with a wry grin when Hank just kept staring at her, almost as innocently as her animal companion usually did.

“Oh, I don't know. A silver cape would look splendid on him,” Hank replied, laughing softly, ducking his head when Ororo made a move to throw her mug at him.

In the end, she decided there was far better use for coffee though.

*******************************************************************************

@whumptober | @whumptober-archive

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

Lula celebrates Assange release

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on Tuesday celebrated the release of WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange, who agreed to plead guilty to a single felony under the U.S. Espionage Act in exchange for returning to his native Australia as a free man.

“The world today is a little better and less unfair,” Lula wrote on social media. “Julian Assange is free after 1,901 days in prison. His release and return home, albeit tardy, represent a democratic victory and the fight for press freedom.”

Mr. Assange departed London on Monday, after spending over five years in Belmarsh Prison without a trial. He landed in Thailand on Tuesday morning on his way to the Northern Mariana Islands, in the Pacific, where he is expected to be sentenced in a U.S. court to about five years, around the same time he has already served in the United Kingdom. He will then board a flight to Australia.

The U.S. sought to extradite Mr. Assange for breaching the Espionage Act for obtaining and publishing secret military and diplomatic documents in 2010. Back in August 2023, U.S. Ambassador to Australia Caroline Kennedy raised the possibility of a potential plea deal that could allow Mr. Assange’s return to his home country. 

Continue reading.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Matt Davies

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

July 19, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

JUL 20, 2024

Today a Russian court sentenced 32-year-old Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich to 16 years in a high-security penal colony after convicting him of espionage in a secret three-day trial. The U.S. government considers Gershkovich “wrongly detained,” a rare designation signifying that he is being held as a political bargaining chip. 

Today, President Joe Biden said that Gershkovich was “targeted by the Russian government because he is a journalist and an American. We are pushing hard for Evan’s release and will continue to do so.” He added: “Journalism is not a crime. We will continue to stand strong for press freedom in Russia and worldwide, and stand against all those who seek to attack the press or target journalists.”

Last night, a faulty update of software from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike crashed computer systems all over the world. Banks and hospitals were locked out of their own programs, and government services shut down. In the U.S., more than 2,600 flights were canceled and 9,000 were delayed. Bloomberg’s David Rovella quoted Australian security consultant Troy Hunt: “I don’t think it’s too early to call it,” Hunt said. “This will be the largest IT outage in history.”

Also making history last night was the final night of the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the night on which former president Donald J. Trump accepted the party’s presidential nomination. Coming as it did just days after a would-be assassin took a shot at Trump at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, killing one attendee and badly wounding two others, the convention was billed by Republican operatives as a way for Trump to rebrand himself as a candidate of “unity.” 

This was certainly the way many major newspapers billed Trump’s acceptance speech this morning, in stories that, as media journalist Parker Molloy noted, were probably based on prepared remarks delivered to news agencies in advance of the speech. But it was not how the evening played out.

Since Saturday’s shooting, it has been notable that there has not been a medical review of Trump’s injuries, although he has said he was injured by a bullet that ripped through his ear. This matters not only because of the extent of his injuries, but also because Trump has made the story part of his identity without any fact check, and the media appears simply to be letting it go on Trump’s say-so, something that adds to the sense that media outlets are treating Trump and Biden differently.

Last night, Trump perhaps tried to address this lack by recounting last Saturday’s shooting. Interestingly, he did not say he was hit by a bullet, but that when he felt the injury he thought, “it can only be a bullet.” Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo today noted a report from local Pennsylvania television station WPXI that four motorcycle officers standing within feet of Trump suffered minor injuries from flying debris. Trump has likely cut off further discussion of the topic by saying it is too painful to tell the story again. 

With that story behind him, Trump hit the theme of unity, saying he would bring the country together. “The discord and division in our society must be healed, we must heal it quickly. We are bound together by a single fate, a single destiny,” he said. “We rise together. Or we fall apart…. I am running to be president for all of America, not half of America, because there is no victory in winning for half of America. So tonight, with faith and devotion, I proudly accept your nomination for president of the United States.”

But that was just in the first ten minutes. Then Trump ignored the teleprompter and things veered far off course, reflecting the candidate that has stayed in the safe spaces of Mar-a-Lago and rallies of his loyalists for years. Trump rambled for more than 90 minutes, making it the longest acceptance speech in U.S. history and outlasting the interest of the audience, some of whom fell asleep. 

He went on to recite his usual litany of lies: that Democrats cheated in the 2020 presidential election (they did not), that crime is going up (it’s plummeting), that inflation is the worst we’ve ever had (it’s around 3%; the worst was around 23%), that Democrats want to quadruple people’s taxes (CNN fact checker Daniel Dale calls this “imaginary”), and so on. Dale called it “a remarkably dishonest acceptance speech.” 

Journalist James Fallows posted: “Of the maybe 10,000 political speeches I've heard over the years, this was overall the worst.” Statistician Nate Silver’s judgment was harsher, in a way: he began with “It’s a weird but a pretty good speech,” then posted “Semi-retract this tweet, this speech is boring AF, but there are worse things politically speaking than being boring.” Shortly after, came: “Fully RETRACT and RESCIND, sometimes it seems like both parties are trying to throw this election.” 

MSNBC’s Chris Hayes watched the unhinged speech and concluded: "This is not a colossus, this is not the big bad wolf, this is not a vigorous and incredibly deft political communicator. This is an old man in decline who's been doing the same schtick for a very long time and it's really wearing thin."

The point, though, as Trump meandered through attacks on immigrants and a diatribe about the fictional character cannibal Hannibal Lecter—who he might think was real—as it always has been, was to present a picture of the U.S. under siege by enemies who are persecuting him because he represents true Americans and that he must be returned to office because only he can vanquish those enemies. Greg Sargent of The New Republic noted that Trump cannot offer a “unity” message because “Trump himself knows the MAGA masses will not be satiated without expansive displays of rage, cruelty and sadism directed at hated out groups and designated enemies of MAGA.”

For years, observers have noted that Trump’s approach to politics is patterned on the “kayfabe” at the heart of professional wrestling. Kayfabe is the performance aspect of professional wrestling, in which the actors play out relationships and scenes in which there are good and evil, love and hate, loyalty and betrayal. According to journalist Abraham Josephine Reisman, in old-school kayfabe the actors never let their masks slip, and while the audience knew what they were seeing must be fake, they played along with the illusion.

But in the 1990s, the barrier between reality and illusion blurred as wrestlers and promoters tried to increase the viability of the fading industry by tossing reality into the performances: real-life insults—the more outrageous the better—and real-life events. Decoding what was real and what was not drove engagement until in 1999, an estimated 18% of Americans, about 50 million people, called themselves fans. This “neokayfabe,” Reisman wrote in the New York Times in 2023, “rests on a slippery, ever-wobbling jumble of truths, half-truths, and outright falsehoods, all delivered with the utmost passion and commitment.” 

Neokayfabe, Reisman wrote, “turns the world into a hall of mirrors from which it is nearly impossible to escape. It rots the mind and eats the soul.”

Trump participated in a storyline in this neokayfabe with World Wrestling Entertainment owner Vince McMahon in 2007, in part billed as a battle over hair. Eventually he was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame, and many observers have made the link between neokayfabe and his approach to politics. Indeed, he even blended the two explicitly when he chose McMahon’s wife, Linda, to head the U.S. Small Business Administration during his presidency.  

Neokayfabe and politics came together again last night at the Republican National Convention, as Linda McMahon, wrestler Hulk Hogan, and musician Kid Rock, whose music has been featured at wrestling events and who is also a member of the WWE Hall of Fame, all participated. 

“So all you criminals, all you lowlifes, all you scumbags…. Whatcha gonna do when Donald Trump and all the Trumpamaniacs run wild on you, brother?!" Hogan yelled to wild applause after ripping off his shirt to show a Trump-Vance shirt. Like the other performers at the convention, he painted a portrait of Trump’s presidency, and of the United States since Trump left office, that was a fantasy of good and evil. Hogan reinforced that there was no way Trump was going to reach toward unity in Milwaukee. His approach to the world cannot be moderated. It depends on the idea that there are two teams in the performance and one must vanquish the other.

Part of that storyline requires rewriting not just the recent past, but our history. At the convention last night, Donald Trump Jr.’s fiancée, Kimberly Guilfoyle, said: “It is no wonder that the heroes who stormed the beaches of Normandy and faced down communism sadly say they don’t recognize our country anymore.” But the Allied soldiers in World War II were not fighting communism. They were fighting fascism. The three great Allied powers were Great Britain, the United States, and the communist Soviet Union. 

It might be that Guilfoyle misspoke, or that she doesn’t know even the most basic facts of our history. Or it might be that by rewriting that history to put America on the side of the fascists, people like Guilfoyle hope to make that alliance more palatable to MAGA followers today.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[beardedmrbean]

BANGKOK (AP) — A plane with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange departed Bangkok after refueling Tuesday and he is on the way to Saipan to enter a plea deal with the U.S. government that will free him and resolve the legal case over the publication of a trove of classified documents.

The chartered flight from London that Assange’s wife, Stella, confirmed was carrying her husband left Don Mueang International Airport, according to the Flightradar24 plane tracking app. The official WikiLeaks account on X said Assange was heading toward Saipan, the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. commonwealth in the Pacific, where he’s scheduled to appear in court on Wednesday.

He’s expected to plead guilty to an Espionage Act charge of conspiring to unlawfully obtain and disseminate classified national defense information, according to the U.S. Justice Department in a letter filed in court.

Assange is expected to return to his home country of Australia after his plea and sentencing. The hearing is taking place in Saipan because of Assange’s opposition to traveling to the continental U.S. and the court’s proximity to Australia, prosecutors said.

British judicial officials confirmed that Assange left the U.K. on Monday evening after being granted bail at a secret hearing last week.

“Thirteen-and-a-half years and two extradition requests after he was first arrested, Julian Assange left the U.K. yesterday, following a bail hearing last Thursday, held in private at his request,” said Stephen Parkinson, the chief prosecutor for England and Wales.

The plea deal brings an abrupt conclusion to a criminal case of international intrigue and to the U.S. government’s yearslong pursuit of a publisher whose hugely popular secret-sharing website made him a cause célèbre among many press freedom advocates who said he acted as a journalist to expose U.S. military wrongdoing. U.S. prosecutors, in contrast, have repeatedly asserted that his actions broke the law and put the country’s national security at risk.

Stella Assange told the BBC from Australia that it had been “touch and go” over the past 72 hours whether the deal would go ahead but she felt “elated” at the news. A lawyer who married the WikiLeaks founder in prison in 2022, she said details of the agreement would be made public once the judge had signed off on it.

“He will be a free man once it is signed off by a judge,” she said, adding that she still didn’t think it was real.

She posted on the social media platform X that Assange will owe $520,000 to the Australian government for the charter flight, and asked for donations to help pay for it.

Kristinn Hrafnsson, editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks, said the deal for Assange came about after the growing involvement of Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.

“This is the result of a long, long process which has been going on for some time. It has been a tough battle, but the focus now is on Julian being reunited with his family,” Hrafnsson told the PA news agency.

In a statement posted on the social media platform X, WikiLeaks said Assange boarded a plane after leaving the high-security London prison where he has spent the last five years. WikiLeaks applauded the announcement of the deal, saying it was grateful for “all who stood by us, fought for us, and remained utterly committed in the fight for his freedom.”

Albanese told Parliament that an Australian envoy had flown with Assange from London.

“Regardless of the views that people have about Mr. Assange’s activities, the case has dragged on for too long,” Albanese said. “There’s nothing to be gained by his continued incarceration and we want him brought home to Australia.”

The deal ensures that Assange will admit guilt while also sparing him additional prison time. He is expected to be sentenced to the five years he has already spent in the British prison while fighting extradition to the U.S. to face charges, a process that has played out in a series of hearings in London.

Last month, he won the right to appeal an extradition order after his lawyers argued that the U.S. government provided “blatantly inadequate” assurances that he would have the same free speech protections as an American citizen if extradited from Britain.

Assange has been heralded by many around the world as a hero who brought to light military wrongdoing in Iraq and Afghanistan. Among the files published by WikiLeaks was a video of a 2007 Apache helicopter attack by American forces in Baghdad that killed 11 people, including two Reuters journalists.

But his reputation was also tarnished by the rape allegations, which he has denied.

The Justice Department’s indictment unsealed in 2019 accused Assange of encouraging and helping U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning steal diplomatic cables and military files that WikiLeaks published in 2010. Prosecutors had accused Assange of damaging national security by publishing documents that harmed the U.S. and its allies and aided its adversaries.

The case was lambasted by press advocates and Assange supporters. Federal prosecutors defended it as targeting conduct that went way beyond that of a journalist gathering information, amounting to an attempt to solicit, steal and indiscriminately publish classified government documents.

The plea agreement comes months after President Joe Biden said he was considering a request from Australia to drop the U.S. push to prosecute Assange. The White House was not involved in the decision to resolve Assange’s case, according to a White House official who was not authorized to speak publicly about the case and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

Assange made headlines again in 2016 after his website published Democratic emails that prosecutors say were stolen by Russian intelligence operatives. He was never charged in special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation, but the inquiry laid bare in stark detail the role that the hacking operation played in interfering in that year’s election on behalf of then-Republican candidate Donald Trump.

During the Obama administration, Justice Department officials mulled charges for Assange but were unsure a case would hold up in court and were concerned it could be hard to justify prosecuting him for acts similar to those of a conventional journalist.

The posture changed in the Trump administration, however, with former Attorney General Jeff Sessions in 2017 calling Assange’s arrest a priority.

Assange’s family and supporters have said his physical and mental health have suffered during more than a decade of legal battles.

Assange took refuge in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in 2012 and was granted political asylum after courts in England ruled he should be extradited to Sweden as part of a rape investigation in the Scandinavian country. He was arrested by British police after Ecuador’s government withdrew his asylum status in 2019 and then jailed for skipping bail when he first took shelter inside the

Although Sweden eventually dropped its sex crimes investigation because so much time had elapsed, Assange had remained in London’s high-security Belmarsh Prison during the extradition battle with the U.S.

[captain-price-unofficially]

One of the modified Mi-8s used by the U.S. Army's secretive Flight Concepts Division (now Aviation Technology Office)

[notbeingnoticed]

Customs and Border Protection has refused to disclose information about a program last year secretly arranging flights for thousands of undocumented immigrants from foreign airports directly to U.S. cities.

It means that while record numbers of migrants were flowing over the southern border last year, the Biden White House was also directly transporting them into the country.

[wipbigbang]

Round 2 Of Artists Claims For The Regular WIPBB Are Open! Round 2 lasts until July 31st! You may claim 3 fics this round!

These are some of the fics open for claiming...

Marvel Cinematic Universe (All Media Types) #063 Title: Way Up in the Air Pairing/Characters: Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers, Tony Stark, Natasha Romanov, Sharon Carter, Peggy Carter, Sam Wilson, Clint Barton Rating: Explicit | E Warnings/Tags: infidelity, prostitution, verbal abuse by wife against husband, implied homophobia Summary: When Steve Rogers gets on his trans-Atlantic flight, he’s not looking for anything other than getting to the end of it alive, but then he meets suave, sophisticated, devastatingly handsome Bucky Barnes. Older and used to getting what he wants, Bucky gives into the pull between them and initiates Steve into the mile high club. Once they're back on the ground, real life gets in the way. Smitten and yearning, Steve does everything he can think of to track down the gorgeous stranger on the plane who left him with a smile and wink at the airport. What Steve doesn't know is that Bucky has secrets, and he's nothing like he seems.

#064 Title: This Is No Place for You Pairing/Characters: Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers, Natasha Romanov, Clint Barton, Sam Wilson, Wanda Maximoff, Tony Stark Rating: Mature | M Warnings/Tags: No Warnings apply Bucky is an amputee as a result of an injury suffered during the American Civil War in this Historical AU. Summary: Stuck in Timely until the mountain passes clear, Steve knew Bucky was getting restless about getting to California. He just didn’t realize how much until Bucky lost his temper.This story part 4 of a series. It is the prequel to Let Us Cross Over the River (Story #67).

#065 Title: Absolutely No Way in Hell Pairing/Characters: Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers Rating: Explicit | E Warnings/Tags: No Warnings apply Summary: Everybody in Hollywood knows Bucky Barnes and Steve Rogers are talented, gorgeous, and completely into men. They also hate each other. Rivals for every role, the two are archenemies and secretly want the other. A lot. When their agents propose a PR relationship, Bucky and Steve both refuse to sign the contract. Eventually, they’ll give into the pressure, and then sparks will fly.

#066 Title: Ways You Keep Me Warm Pairing/Characters: Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers Rating: Explicit | E Warnings/Tags: No Warnings apply implied past emotional abuse, Dom/sub dynamics, not A/B/O despite references to Alphas and Omegas Summary: Retired from the U.S. army’s elite Alpha Team, Captain Steve Rogers happily spends his days caring for his beautiful, sweet, precious boyfriend. Brilliantly talented Bucky Barnes is an author, a member of a group of highly creative people categorized as Omegas by the American government. When Bucky goes on a creative binge, he disobeys Steve’s direct orders to take care of himself. Obviously, Steve needs to get his submissive under control and teach Bucky the wonders of self-care, punishment, and reward.

#067 Title: Let Us Cross Over the River Pairing/Characters: Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers Rating: Explicit | E Warnings/Tags: No Warnings apply Bucky is an amputee as a result of an injury suffered during the American Civil War in this Historical AU. This story is a sequel to This Is No Place for You and is the fifth and final part of a series. Summary: California promised riches and gold, and it delivered that and so much more.This story is a sequel to This Is No Place for You (Story #64) and is the fifth and final part of a series.

#068 Title: Forgive Me, Though I Have Sinned Pairing/Characters: Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers Rating: Explicit | E Warnings/Tags: Historical AU with period typical homophobia and gendered language (including dressing in drag) Summary: In 1927, the car has changed how courting works. Although Bucky’s his best friend, Steve would rather court him than any girl he’s ever encountered. That’s why he’s so cautiously optimistic when he gets to accompany Bucky on an errand for the Barnes’ family business. He’s heard nothing but how sinful the back seat of a car is from radio preachers, but Steve doesn’t understand. It just looks like a cushioned bench to him—until the car gets stuck and Bucky explains in a way neither will ever forget.

Steve's been in love with Bucky half his life, but his Irish Catholic guilt means he tries to resist for as long as possible. Eventually, though, he falls from grace and sins repeatedly. Each time, he falls more in love.

#071 Title: Invictus Pairing/Characters: Tony Stark / Clint Barton Rating: Mature | M Warnings/Tags: Graphic Violence Summary: Yinsen dies before he can give Tony his last message. Two years later, SHIELD brings on military contractor Tony Stark to help find the Tesseract, which has been stolen by the armored criminal, Titanium Tyrant.

#072 Title: Seven Years Pairing/Characters: Bucky Barnes/Clint Barton, Bucky Barnes & Steve Rogers Rating: Mature | M Warnings/Tags: No Warnings apply canon typical violence, brainwashing (Bucky's bad time with Hydra) Summary: Bucky can see seven years in the future. He joins up anyway.

#073 Title: the tender things we're working on Pairing/Characters: Steve Rogers/Bucky Barnes Rating: Explicit | E Warnings/Tags: Graphic Violence Summary: Post-CATWS, Steve buys a house. Bucky shows up.

The list of remaining fics and the link to sign up are below!

[theculturedmarxist]

On a flight, reading about the FBI’s arrest of Jack Texiera, already dubbed the “Pentagon Leaker.” A quick review reveals multiple media portraits already out depicting him as a dangerous incel who shared his wares on Discord, a social media app where “racist memes” and “offensive jokes” flourish. Writes the New York Times:

Dark humor about race or ideology can eventually shape the beliefs of impressionable young people, and innocuous memes can be co-opted into symbols of hatred, researchers say.

Well, clearly we can’t have dark humor or innocuous memes! Gitmo cages for all!

The Washington Post went with “charismatic gun enthusiast”:

The New York Times summarized key points in the secret defense documents, which among other things suggested “Ukrainian forces are in more dire straits than their government has acknowledged publicly.” Reading what’s out there, it’s not easy to parse what’s a legitimate intelligence concern in reaction to these leaks and what’s mere embarrassment at having been caught lying, to the public, to would-be U.S. allies the documents show we’ve been spying on, etc.

You’ll read a lot in the coming days about the dangers of apps like Discord, or of online gaming groups, which counterintelligence officials told the Washington Post today are a “magnet for spies.” The Leaker tale will also surely be framed as reason to pass the RESTRICT Act, the wet dream of creepazoid Virginia Senator Mark Warner, which would give government wide latitude to crack down on “communication technology” creating “undue or unacceptable risk” to national security.

The intelligence community has itself been massively interfering in domestic news using illegal leaks for years. Remember the “Why Did Obama Dawdle on Russia’s Hacking?” story by David Ignatius of the Washington Post in January of 2017, outing would-be Trump National Security Advisor Michael Flynn as having been captured in intercepts speaking with a Russian ambassador? That was just the first in a string of leak- or intercept-based news stories that dominated news cycles in the Trump years, involving everything from conclusions of the FISA court to supposedly secret meetings in the Seychelles.

When civilians or whistleblowers like Edward Snowden, Julian Assange (in jail for an incredible four years now), Reality Winner and now the “Discord Leaker” bring leaked information to the public, the immediate threat is Espionage Act charges and decades of jail time. When a CIA head or a top FBI official does it, it’s just news. In fact, officials talk openly about using “strategic leaks” as a P.R. staple. In a world where media currency is becoming the ultimate power, these people want a monopoly. It’s infuriating.

Watch how this thing will be spun. It’s going to get ugly fast.

[burningexeter]

The Shego Foundation

A fictional organization that's responsible for covering up any major event from the general public and recover any object or item from them and store them away from any eyes to see. It's founded by, named after and run entirely by Shego, someone who was once one of the best, if not the best agent for the top secret crime fighting organization Global Justice but after an incident gave her plasma powers she turned evil and became currently the most dangerous criminal and villain around, wanted in over 11 countries, to the point where she successfully managed to be the only person to break in and steal from Global Justice HQ herself. However, it was through her incredible skills in villainy that got the attention of the U.S. Government itself who through last means, turned to her in order to not only keep her under control as possible but to also keep any more events from becoming public knowledge and Shego is the only one who has proven to be capable and a master of cover-ups and recoveries from both her time at Global Justice and as a villain.

Here are some of the objects and items that Shego has collected and stored away into her high security, hidden and dangerously organized underground warehouse:

• The Book Of The Dead, The Book Of Amun-Ra, the Bracelet Of Anubis and the Spear Of Osiris

• A plain black notebook, with the words 'Death Note' emblazoned on the cover. Hundreds of names, in various handwriting styles and languages, are written upon its seemingly infinite pages

• A busted up and possibly sentient blue Ford Anglia capable of levitation and flight

• A wooden crate, on the side of which is stenciled, "Top Secret Army Intel 9906753 DO NOT OPEN!", a corner of the crate appears to have been smashed and repaired

• A chunk of pure smoking hot Evil

• A super awesome axe known simply as The Seperator

• A golf club that causes people to take up beliefs similar to Ayn Rand's

• The ORB

• One or more of the Iacon Relics

• A hunk of Australium

• The funniest joke in the world

• A 1950s lawnmower which was used to shred zombies

• Malfunctioning animatronics from a now-defunct pizza restaurant

• The oscillation overthruster

• The lost Freemason treasure

• The manuscript titled "Departure" written by Alan Wake

• An invisibility suit with advanced optics that was created by Adrian Griffin

• Surviving syringes filled with thick red tar serum

• The remains of Flight 815, an ancient dagger, a DHARMA van, Claire's music box and a Hydra Orientation film

• Paintings that predicted a dark future by comic book artist Isaac Mendez

• John Doe's notebooks

• The Reverse Bear Trap

• The box used by the Collector

• A John Carver mask

&

• Jack Burton's truck

Yet that's only a few of what's in this place.