#self deputizing

[kittyit]

"The suffragettes are instructive. Their tactic of choice was property destruction. Decades of patient pressure on the Parliament to give women the vote had yielded nothing, and so in 1903, under the slogan 'Deeds not words, the Women's Social and Political Union was founded. Five years later, two WSPU members undertook the first militant action: breaking windowpanes in the prime minister's residence. One of them told the police she would bring a bomb the next time. Fed up with their own fruitless deputations to Parliament, the suffragettes soon specialised in 'the argument of the broken pane', sending hundreds of well-dressed women down streets to smash every window they passed. In the most concentrated volley, in March 1912, Emmeline Pankhurst and her crews brought much of central London to a standstill by shattering the fronts of jewellers, silversmiths, Hamleys toy shop and dozens of other businesses. They also torched letterboxes around the capital. Shocked Londoners saw pillars filled with paperthrowing up flames, the work of some activist having thrown in a parcel soaked in kerosene and a lit match.

Militancy was at the core of suffragette identity: 'To be militant in some form, or other, is a moral obligation, Pankhurst lectured. 'It is a duty which every woman will owe her own conscience and self-respect, to women who are less fortunate than she is herself, and to all who are to come after her.' The latest full-body portrait of the movement, Diane Atkinson's Rise Up, Women!, gives an encyclopedic listing of militant actions: suffragettes forcing the prime minister out of his car and dousing him with pepper, hurling a stone at the fanlight above Winston Churchill's door, setting upon statues and paintings with hammers and axes, planting bombs on sites along the routes of royal visits, fighting policemen with staves, charging against hostile politicians with dogwhips, breaking the windows in prison cells. Such deeds went hand in hand with mass mobilisation. The suffragettes put up mammoth rallies, ran their own presses, went on hunger strikes: deploying the gamut of non-violent and militant action.

After the hope of attaining the vote by constitutional means was dashed once more in early 1913, the movement switched gears. In a systematic campaign of arson, the suffragettes set fire to or blew up villas, tea pavilions, boathouses, hotels, haystacks, churches, post offices, aque-ducts, theatres and a liberal range of other targets aroundthe country. Over the course of a year and a half, the WSPU claimed responsibility for 337 such attacks. Few culprits were apprehended. Not a single life was lost; only empty buildings were set ablaze. The suffragettes took great pains to avoid injuring people. But they considered the situation urgent enough to justify incendiarism - votes for women, Pankhurst explained, were of such pressing importance that we had to discredit the Government and Parliament in the eyes of the world; we had to spoil English sports, hurt businesses, destroy valuable property, demor-alise the world of society, shame the churches, upset the whole orderly conduct of life. Some attacks probably went unclaimed. One historian suspects that the suffragettes were behind one of the most spectacular blazes of the period: a fire in a Tyneside coal wharf, in which the facilities for loading coal were completely gutted. They did, however, claim responsibility for the burning of motor cars and a steam yacht."

- How to Blow Up a Pipeline, pg 40-42

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Sam Levin at The Guardian:

California, home to the largest immigrant population in the US, is bracing for Donald Trump’s plan to enact the “largest deportation operation in American history”, with advocates pushing state leaders to find new and creative ways to disrupt his agenda. The Golden state led the fight against Trump’s first term, shielding many non-citizen residents from removal by restricting local cooperation with federal immigration authorities. But the threat this time, immigrant rights groups say, is more extreme, and blue states across the US are facing pressure to mount an aggressive, multipronged response. “Communities that will be involved in mutual aid and self-defense are prepared,” said Chris Newman, general counsel for the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, a California-based group that supports immigrants. “I think many lawmakers, frankly, are not. They were primarily focused on supporting Kamala Harris, and people’s hope for the best got in the way of their preparation for the worst.”

Trump, who built his political career on racist, xenophobic rhetoric, has said he wants to expel “as many as 20 million people” from the US in his second term. That would mark a dramatic increase from his first administration, in which he carried out several hundred thousand removals a year, in line with other recent presidents. To reach his target, Trump would have to uproot the lives of undocumented people who have lived in the US for years. He has pledged to build mass detention camps and deputize national guard troops and local police to assist the effort. In 2017, California was the first state to pass a sanctuary law under Trump. The bill prohibited local law enforcement from assisting US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice), and it had major effect. While local police had been transferring thousands of immigrants to Ice each year before, those numbers dwindled to the hundreds, according to advocates who reviewed state data. Nationally, Trump did not meet his overall removal goals – arresting fewer immigrants within the country and carrying out fewer deportations than Obama – in part because of California’s and other states’ sanctuary policies.

Before California’s bill was signed, however, it was watered down to allow state prisons to coordinate with Ice, and to give Ice agents access to interview people in jails. The final version also weakened proposals to limit police data-sharing with Ice. Those loopholes have continued to leave many immigrants vulnerable.

Activists and some lawmakers have since fought to strengthen the sanctuary policy in recent years. But California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, a Democrat now styling himself as an anti-Trump leader, has repeatedly opposed those efforts, which advocates say could have made the state better equipped for Trump’s new threat of mass deportations. “California has its own culpability in feeding the deportation machine, which advocates have been pointing out for years,” said Anoop Prasad, advocacy director of the Asian Prisoner Support Committee, which supports incarcerated Californians. “Governor Newsom hasn’t taken action on those calls in prior years, but hopefully now he’s willing to understand the urgency.” In 2019, Newsom vetoed a bill passed by lawmakers that would have banned private security agents from entering prisons to arrest immigrants. In 2023, he vetoed another measure widely supported by legislators that would have stopped transfers from prisons to Ice. This year, he vetoed a bill that would have allowed undocumented students to be hired for campus jobs.

States such as California are urged to find ways to block Donald Trump’s immoral and economically ruinous mass deportation plan.

[tanadrin]

But Germany’s performances of repentance have their limits. They do not extend, for example, to the genocide the German colonial army committed in Namibia against Herero and Nama people between 1904 and 1908, killing tens of thousands. Germany did not officially apologize for those bloody acts until 2021 and has not agreed to pay meaningful reparations to descendants of the victims. If the new German identity relies on isolating the Holocaust as a shameful aberration in national history and nullifying it via solemn remembrance, there is little room for the memory of colonial violence in the nation’s self-mythology. Genocide scholar Dirk Moses named this approach the “German catechism” in a 2021 essay that sparked heated debate. “The catechism implies a redemptive story in which the sacrifice of Jews in the Holocaust by Nazis is the premise for the Federal Republic’s legitimacy,” wrote Moses. “That is why the Holocaust is more than an important historical event. It is a sacred trauma that cannot be contaminated by profane ones—meaning non-Jewish victims and other genocides—that would vitiate its sacrificial function.”

Accordingly, Germany now sees its post-Holocaust mandate as encompassing not a broader commitment against racism and violence but a specific fealty to a certain Jewish political formation: the State of Israel. Germany has relied on its close diplomatic relationship to Israel to emphasize its repudiation of Nazism, but its connection to the Jewish state goes even further. In 2008, then-chancellor Angela Merkel addressed the Israeli Knesset to declare that ensuring Israel’s security was part of Germany’s “Staatsraison,” the state’s very reason for existence. If asked why it is worth preserving a German nationalism that produced Auschwitz, Germany now has a pleasing, historically symmetrical answer—it exists to support the Jewish state.

To that end, in recent years, Germany’s laudable apparatus for public cultural funding has been used as a tool for enacting a 2019 Bundestag resolution declaring that the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement targeting Israel is antisemitic. Although the resolution is technically nonbinding, its passage has led to an unending stream of firings and event cancellations, and to the effective blacklisting of distinguished academics, cultural workers, artists, and journalists for offenses like inviting a renowned scholar of postcolonialism to speak, tweeting criticism of the Bundestag resolution, or having attended a Palestinian solidarity rally in one’s youth. A network of antisemitism commissioners—a system explored in this issue in a feature by Peter Kuras—has been deputized to monitor such offenses. These commissioners are typically white, Christian Germans, who speak in the name of the Jews and often playact Jewishness on a public stage, posing for photo ops in yarmulkes, performing Jewish music, wearing the uniform of the Israeli police, and issuing decrees on who is next in the pillory. When they tangle with left-wing Jews in Germany, canceling their events and attacking them as antisemites in the pages of various newspapers, they suggest what Germany’s antisemitism commissioner Felix Klein has said directly: That the Jews are not being sensitive enough to what antisemitism means to the Germans—that, in fact, these Jews do not understand antisemitism at all. In a perverse twist, the fact that the Germans were the most successful antisemites in history has here become a credential. By becoming the Jews’ consummate protectors, Germans have so thoroughly absorbed the moral lessons bestowed by Jewish martyrdom that they have no more need for the Jew except as symbol; by the logic of this strange supersessionism, Germans have become the new Jews. This is not only a matter of rhetorical authority on Jewish matters but is also often literal, as this self-reflexive philosemitism has led to a wave of German converts to Judaism. According to Tzuberi, “The Jewish revival is desired precisely because it is a German revival.”

If Jews are negated by this formulation, Palestinians are villainized by it. Last year, when the German state banned Nakba Day demonstrations, only days after the murder of Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, police justified this suppression by claiming, in a familiar racist trope, that protesters would not have been able to contain their violent rage. Indeed, in Germany Palestinian identity itself has become a marker of antisemitism, scarcely to be spoken aloud—even as the country is home to the largest Palestinian community in Europe, with a population of around 100,000. “Whenever I would mention that I was Palestinian, my teachers were outraged and said that I should refer to [Palestinians] as Jordanian,” one Palestinian German woman speaking of her secondary school education told the reporter Hebh Jamal. Palestinianness as such has thus been stricken from German public life. In The Moral Triangle, a 2020 anthropological study of Palestinian and Israeli communities in Germany by Sa’ed Atshan and Katharina Galor, many Palestinians interviewed said that to speak of pain or trauma they’ve experienced due to Israeli policy is to destroy their own futures in Germany. “The Palestinian collective body is inscribed as ontologically antisemitic until proven otherwise. Palestinians, in this sense, are collateral damage of the intensifying German wish for purification from antisemitism,” wrote Tzuberi.

July 5, 2023

[hassibah]

"Accordingly, Germany now sees its post-Holocaust mandate as encompassing not a broader commitment against racism and violence but a specific fealty to a certain Jewish political formation: the State of Israel. Germany has relied on its close diplomatic relationship to Israel to emphasize its repudiation of Nazism, but its connection to the Jewish state goes even further. In 2008, then-chancellor Angela Merkel addressed the Israeli Knesset to declare that ensuring Israel’s security was part of Germany’s “Staatsraison,” the state’s very reason for existence. If asked why it is worth preserving a German nationalism that produced Auschwitz, Germany now has a pleasing, historically symmetrical answer—it exists to support the Jewish state.

...

A network of antisemitism commissioners—a system explored in this issue in a feature by Peter Kuras—has been deputized to monitor such offenses. These commissioners are typically white, Christian Germans, who speak in the name of the Jews and often playact Jewishness on a public stage, posing for photo ops in yarmulkes, performing Jewish music, wearing the uniform of the Israeli police, and issuing decrees on who is next in the pillory. When they tangle with left-wing Jews in Germany, canceling their events and attacking them as antisemites in the pages of various newspapers, they suggest what Germany’s antisemitism commissioner Felix Klein has said directly: That the Jews are not being sensitive enough to what antisemitism means to the Germans—that, in fact, these Jews do not understand antisemitism at all. In a perverse twist, the fact that the Germans were the most successful antisemites in history has here become a credential. By becoming the Jews’ consummate protectors, Germans have so thoroughly absorbed the moral lessons bestowed by Jewish martyrdom that they have no more need for the Jew except as symbol; by the logic of this strange supersessionism, Germans have become the new Jews. This is not only a matter of rhetorical authority on Jewish matters but is also often literal, as this self-reflexive philosemitism has led to a wave of German converts to Judaism. According to Tzuberi, “The Jewish revival is desired precisely because it is a German revival.”"

[mean-scarlet-deceiver]

In Wilbert's books, how would personally separate Henry and Gordon as characters?

I already wrote a Henry and Gordon post, but that was as much headcanon as analysis so I'll tackle this one too. Besides, I really like how this question acknowledges from the outset that RWS Gordon and Henry are basically the same character :D 

Okay, not really, but they're awfully damn similar. (So are Thomas and Percy tbh.) I have read so much guff (mostly in my dreary dark bird site days) about how BoCo is basically a diesel Edward and it pisses me off. If you can distinguish between two of these pairs, then you can distinguish between all three, dammit. 

Anyway, RWS Gordon and Henry are both pompous, self-important, classist (?), totally up their own arses tenders, sometimes breathtakingly ungrateful – but fundamentally good-hearted. They're sometimes complete assholes, but it's not like they actually try to be assholes… they just sometimes don't try all that hard not to be. But they have strong notions of fair play and loyalty and solidarity, and they try to live up to them (except on the days they don't). 

And I will say from the outset that I much prefer their RWS "omggg… there's two of themmm 😐😩💀" dynamic than the weird TVS "manly man and sensitive guy… who also don't even seem that close" thing. That being said, even if you don't basically flanderize Henry into a funhouse-mirror version of his RWS self, yes I think we can describe their differences in the books: 

1) Social roles. Gordon is the leader-y one of the two. This is probably because he's more conventional (see next point). But it is also possible that a lot of this is down to how their working schedules have shaped their dynamic with the rest of the fleet: Henry's Flying Kipper timetable means his working hours would overlap less with the daytime fleet and that he'd be either away or not in steam during moments where Gordon takes on a role helping other engines (Percy Runs Away, Leaves, Down the Mine). Of course we do see that when Henry is available, he acts in the same way (Super Rescue), but it is probably no coincidence that we see Gordon in this role first, and much more often. 

Gordon's leadership also extends to him having Ideas, like his (half-baked) plan to run all the way to London, or his plans to force the Fat Controller's hand with a tender engine strike (not wholly successful, but still way more successful than one might have thought), or his plan for them to pay out first Edward and then Duck for respective 'betrayals'. Of course sometimes Gordon and Henry are in total lockstep without even needing to consult, with an absolutely adorable shared brain thing – like when they initially reject Diesel's idea that Duck is gossiping about them, or when they strong-arm Percy into being the deputation ("Rubbish, Percy. It's easy." "That's settled, then.") This shows how similar they are in outlook and feeling, but Henry is the more passive of the two, we have never seen him initiate… anything, I think? Gordon is the one who makes things happen, and the one that Henry and James look to for leadership within their group. I don't actually think the whole of the fleet looks to Gordon as reliably as James and Henry do to take charge of things, at least we don't have any textual evidence for that (and even James and Henry do it less and less as the series goes on). But I do suspect that he's definitely the one the rest of the fleet would look to first in a choice between him and Henry. 

2) Self-esteem. I'm going to come in with a flaming hot take and say that Henry is the one of the two more confident and comfortable with himself. Henry of course does a lot of moaning, and he moped a lot in his early days, when he was physically struggling. But even in those early days he was still proud as punch, willing to flat-out reject orders from his crew and the Fat Controller; it's also striking to me that he switched from blue to green paint (conformity to individuality) before he got his Welsh coal. Henry actually has quite a strong sense of self-esteem. Gordon is arrogant, but he has every reason in the world to be. Henry could swagger around even when he didn't. Gordon has to emphasize his background and his tender engine status because he requires external markers of worth; Henry doesn't explicitly reject that stuff, but he's certainly NOT hung up on it enough to actually expound theories about it to captive tank engines ("You don't understand, little Thomas; we tender engines have a position to keep up…"). And Henry seems to have been the first to drift out of the big three engines' hive mind. He was the last to join the strike, the first to support Duck when challenged, the first to think that Bear wasn't so bad, and the least inclined to trash-talk smaller engines. Henry's an individualist, and if he doesn't try to make things happen as much as Gordon it's at least in part because he doesn't feel the need to. Of course he adores recognition and importance and respect from the others (they all do, really) but he can function without it. He's proven it. And if he's not as active as Gordon in some respects, he's also not quite so reactive. For example: although he's not the brightest bulb, I don't think he'd have ever been so thoroughly convinced that Bill and Ben were about to kill him, either. 

3) Emotionality. This is strongly related to point 2 actually, but my other flaming hot take is that Gordon is a more emotional machine than Henry. Henry gets the bad rap for moaning and pissing, but I'm actually amazed, again and again, by how quickly Henry bounces back from hurts and setbacks – witness the absolute lack of drama after the horrible Flying Kipper wreck. 

Gordon, in contrast, gets into his feels more quickly, and requires more external support to get on his rails again. We've never needed an entire book to describe Henry's depression after being in Disgrace.

"That's all right, Thomas. You made me laugh. I like that. I'm in disgrace," Gordon went on pathetically, "I feel very low." 

I'm sorry, why did Henry get flanderized as the sopping wet cat out of the two? ;) 

Henry and Gordon are contrasted again with the news of the end of steam. Henry is totally oblivious, preoccupied with some bullshit status symbols. Gordon's going through a whole-ass existential crisis.

Which, fair. That's a reasonable thing to have an existential crisis about. But we also know that Gordon is capable of catastrophizing like a mofo. He perceives lots of things as threats, and dwells on them. We're back here to "No, no, I AM Gordon! Stop, stop!" We're back to him enjoying Thomas teasing him because it's the only normal thing in his life when he's being punished for his ditch nonsense. We're back to him spending most of Gordon the High-Speed Engine moping over various slights. 

This also ties back into point 1, about Gordon being perceived as a leader. I think part of that tendency is because Gordon is able to bond with other engines when they are down – when they're down, he can let down his own guard. There's empathy there ("No one understands our feelings," Gordon says to Sir Handel, winning over the smaller engine's entire heart). Henry is capable of treating other engines well too, we've seen it, but we haven't seen that evidence of empathetic feeling. Mind you, this is not a bad thing or a criticism; ethics aren't dependent on empathy. It's just an observation in their approach. Henry's connections with other engines seem to be built on a more cerebral approach, a we-stand-together-because-it's-pleasant-and-mutually-beneficial mindset. Now obviously, Mr Shall-We-Form-An-Alliance is familiar with the idea, but honestly when Gordon makes connections, it seems to be with his heart (which may be why he's far more inconsistent about it lol, and why he tends to blow hot or cold! Henry seems to be on generally good terms with everyone, after his first few books, whereas Gordon has conflicts as well as friendships that spring up very suddenly). 

In addition to his "low," "pathetic" moments, "high spirits" are also more strongly marked in Gordon than in Henry. This is another facet where we see that Gordon is just more emotionally driven than Henry, although – again! – I don't think the two are very far apart. We're talking about differences in degrees, not polar opposites by any means. 

[accihoe]

Deputation Gone Awry

Pairing: Avenger Bucky x Avenger fem!reader

Summary: The title is self-explanatory. But Barnes and Y/L/N go on a mission with Wilson and Romanoff. Things go awry. James and Y/N are stuck in a safehouse together amidst a blizzard.

Warnings: mean and condescending Bucky. Jealousy. Angst. Fights. Fluff. Injuries and stitches. Please don't this read if injuries make you uncomfortable.

Genre: angst to fluff

A/n: As always, my loves, please don't steal my work. Tag me and give me credit if you post my work on other platforms or use my ideas. God bless.

xxxx

"Good girl." Y/N grinned as the cat hopped onto her couch and snuggled up against her thigh (literally my cat and I rn. Her name is Goose.). A knock at the door startled the cat, who ran underneath the bed. "Dang it. Coming!" Y/N called as she got up and went to the door.

"Hey, kiddo, remember you're going on a mission with Barnes, Wilson, and Romanoff. You leave tomorrow. Get packing chop-chop." Tony clapped his hands together to enunciate his words. Y/N's stomach warmed, and her heart pounded when she heard his surname. She packed quickly. According to the list Tony had given her at the briefing in the boardroom.

She went to Steve's room and knocked on the door. Muffled voices quietened, and two pairs of footsteps came to the door. When it opened, Y/N bit her lip in excitement before shifting to the side as James pushed past her. "Hey Y/N/N. Can I help you?" Steve leaned again the doorframe.

"Hey Steve. Yeah. Could you please watch Goose? I'm going on a mission tomorrow." She asked. "Isn't that Fury's cat?" Steve was puzzled. "Yeah. That's why you've gotta take extra care of her." Y/N smiled. Steve agreed (after Y/N made him microwave brownies), and soon, all the belongings of the cat (Flerken) and Goose were inside of Steve's room.

The following morning, Y/N was in the Quinjet. Her belongings stowed away as she sat behind the stick in the cockpit. Bucky came in first. "You're early for once.". "Well, I've never been late, Barnes. I'm actually very punctual." Y/N said as she put her magazine down. James scoffed. "What are you doing there anyway? The seats are here." Bucky changed the topic, realizing he had no evidence to deflate her ego with in the previous topic.

"I'm the pilot." She said. "Yeah, right. You can hardly steer a bike." Bucky scoffed. "Bikes and planes are two entirely different things, Barnes." She sing-songed. "This is a jet." Bucky answered with a sly grin. He finally had something to belittle her for. One slip-up. "You know what I meant. Bikes and jets are still very different things." Y/N sighed.

"They're not actually that different if you compare the layouts and the functionalities. I mean, you've got seats in both, a steering stick in both -" Bucky started. "Okay, okay." Y/N moved out of the cockpit and went to the back of the jet. Bucky grinned in victory. Nat and Sam joined shortly afterwards.

"Where's Y/N?" Sam asked. "Dunno." Bucky shrugged. "She's already been here. It's her magazine." Nat said from the cockpit. Y/N emerged from the back. "Sorry. I was just checking our supplies." Y/N smiled as she stepped into view. "There's our captain." Sam grinned. "Pilot." Bucky corrected.

Bucky's scowl returned as Y/N went to the cockpit. He dramatically clipped in his seatbelt and held on for dear life as they flew to their destination. "You know she's a licensed pilot, right?" Natasha asked, not looking up from the magazine Y/N tossed to her.

"By the way she flies, it doesn't seem like it." Bucky hissed. "I'm able to read." Natasha said. "It's very turbulent. I don't know how." Bucky huffed. "We did just flie through a few typhoons." Nat answered calmly as she flipped a page. "Seriously? We're not hurricane hunters. Why's she flying us through typhoons?" Bucky groaned.

"Because she knows what she's doing." Nat finally looked at Bucky. Bucky resolved to silence for the rest of the flight and was less but still dramatic when they landed. The mission went smoothly, and all went according to plan until Y/N's suit belt hooked onto a rusted lever broke off and fell onto the steel floor.

Bucky grabbed Y/N and pinned her down as the opposition fired at them. Y/N's heart hammered in her chest, but she did not allow her silly crush to jeopardize the mission or her status. So she flipped them over and held Barnes down as she got up and fired single shots at the men, bullets laced with instant toxins to make whoever was shot pass out (unrealistic I know but bear with me).

After several moments of fighting, they ran out with their mission partners just in time to miss the start of the ambush. Amidst an ambush and a quickly approaching blizzard, Y/N lost sight of the rest of the team but thankfully bumped into Bucky. They ran off together, and Bucky hijacked a bike from the ambushers.

Y/N's cheeks were hot despite the snow as she held onto Bucky Barnes. They drove as far out of sight as they could. Y/N managed to locate a safehouse established by S.H.I.E.L.D and gave Bucky directions. Once they arrived at the safehouse, Bucky was fuming. "Why the hell would you put us all in danger like that!? And then shoot them all! We could have interrogated them for evidence or answers!" Bucky yelled at Y/N. Y/N sighed deeply. "Here we go..." She muttered underneath her breath.

Y/N had always been kind to Bucky despite his condescending persona towards her. She looked past it, blinded by her love for the man. He particularly liked to belittle her in front of others. She's no fool. She knew what he was doing and why he was doing it. "And now you're silent!?" Bucky went on condescending and patronizing her, but Y/N heard the exertion in his voice. It got meeker and meeker until they reached the safehouse by foot as the bike could not go through the snowpack.

Y/N noticed the limp in Bucky's step, his right leg particularly. She noticed the discomfort in his eyes when he sat down after checking around and locking the door. She grabbed her medical aid and kneeled in front of him by the fireplace. "Goodness, no, I don't need you messing up another thing. I'm fine. Wish I had Natasha here instead." Bucky groaned when he caught on to what she was doing. Y/N ignored the nauseating jealousy. Bucky looked mortified as she forced him to remove his trousers but allowed him to keep the thermal knee-length pants on.

She rolled the left side of the pants up where a dark red patch was. Bucky hissed in discomfort. Y/N gasped quietly at the wound, getting disinfectant and cleaning the wound carefully. She disinfected the needle with a lighter before stitching up his wound and putting cream and a plaster over.

The whole time, Bucky was complaining. Y/N droned out his voice to focus on his wound. When she was doing up the bandage, Bucky was still condescending her, "You tie as crap as you fly. Ha, that rhymes. But seriously. Did you attend the medical course?". That was it. Y/N ripped off that bandage (not the plaster) and gathered her stuff quickly before getting up and storming off. Bucky scoffed, but he did not even convince himself.

Bucky had several attempts at putting the bandage on properly himself, but he gave in when the pain got to him. Shamefully, Bucky made his way upstairs with the bandage. His heart leapt into his throat when he saw Y/N in her thermal clothing and not the suit. Y/N's mission attire was not nearly at voluptuous as Nat's, Bucky never assumed she had such a fine pair of legs. He watched as she scrubbed at his trousers to clean the blood before hanging them in front of the fireplace.

"You may come in, James." Bucky's heart dropped at her voice. She noticed him and called him by his full name. "I uh.. look, I'm sorry. But I need help with the bandage." Bucky croaked. Y/N sighed as she put her hands on her hips. "Why? I assume you attended the medical course?" Y/N tilted her head to the side. "No.. I didn't." Bucky's dropped his head slightly. "Sit down on the bed which, by the way, I'm sleeping in tonight." She said.

After wrapping Bucky's bandage properly and giving him clothes she'd found, Y/N shooed Bucky out of her room. Out of boredom, Bucky went through files of the agents the safehouse had and their personal lives. Bucky lingered on Y/N's. He looked at her rescuing people and animals. He kept his eyes on one where Y/N held a baby. A brief image of her holding a blue-eyed baby and standing beside him flashed before his eyes.

He looked at her in a pretty sundress. Good grief. How did they know and acquire all this about her personal life? Did she know? Was someone stalking her? Bucky's blood boiled with rage at the thought. Bucky closed the file and put it away as he heard Y/N coming downstairs. His skin crawled as he recognized the sweatpants adorning her lovely legs. Steve's.

"Where'd you get Steve's sweatpants?" He asked before he could think. "I didn't know that they were his. I found them in the drawer." She said. "And you didn't check for any women's clothing?" Bucky snarled. She had it.

"I am done with you constantly condescending me, James Barnes! I have only been kind to you from the start, and all you've done is misuse my kindness. I'm fed up with your constant attempts at making me feel less clever or competent because I can assure you that I am at a much higher level that you make me out to be. I'm aware that I might not be some professionally trained assassin or spy or have any remote form of superpowers or supernatural abilities, but I am far more intellectually competent than most! Mark my words. Once we are done with this mission, I will make sure that you never have to spend a moment in my presence again! You can find yourself a woman who meets your delusional capabilities for accommodating you on a mission! I. Am. Done." She went back upstairs.

Though she was stern with what she had to say, she did not yell or raise her voice. She addressed him calmly and maturely. Bucky felt even worse because of that.

Bucky made little effort to stop himself from going back to the file. His heart launched into his throat. He felt like a cartoon character with heart eyes floating after his lover and a visible hammering heart. There stood Y/N in a 1940s themed dress. Hair curled accordingly. Lips painted red. Her dazzling smile captured his heart solidly. A soldier's blazer, almost identical to his, was draped over her shoulders. If he had not seen her date of birth, he would have assumed that she was from that time.

Bucky put away the file after he had looked through it around eight times. He made his way upstairs after ensuring the door was locked and the fire was out. With a slight struggle to be quiet, he was in front of her door. He knocked quietly. "What, Barnes?" He could hear the frustration in her voice. "May I come in?" He asked. "Why?" Was all that she answered. "I want to apologize to you. Face to face." After a few moments of silence, the door creaked open. Y/N closed it once Bucky was in to trap in the heat.

"I don't know where to begin.." Bucky admitted. "Sit down. You need to ease the usage of your leg a little. And before you say anything, we were taught this in the course." Y/N said. "I wasn't going to condescend you. I swear I'll try my best to never do that again." Bucky said truthfully as he sat down.

Y/N assisted him in elevating his leg. "I don't know why it's so... normal today. My wounds are usually much less painful and heal easily." Bucky said. "It's a pretty deep wound, sarge." Y/N said. "Sarge?" Bucky grinned. "Sorry." Was what Y/N said as she sat down on the windowsill. "No, no, I like it. Takes me back to my golden days." Bucky smiled. "You sound as old as you are." Bucky laughed at that.

"Look, Y/N/N. I should probably start from the day we met. I should never have treated you like any less. And let me assure you, I've never for a moment believed that you are any less, even if I've treated you otherwise. I knew from the start that you were sharp. Smart. Kind. Able. Clever, very clever. Undoubtedly beautiful. And what threw me off is when you were kind to everyone else, and I was new, you were kind to me. When everyone hated me, you were still kind to me. I feared the worst. So I tried to convince myself that you are less than what you actually are, to justify the fear of being mortified by such a real doll. A dame. A babe, as you youngsters say." Y/N chuckled at the last bit.

"I am not trying to justify my actions with nice words! I'm being completely honest about what and why. You looked at me like you were proud of me. Like I wasn't such a worthless undes-" "Hey. Don't inflict any more hatred on yourself. HYDRA created enough negative neural pathways. We need to cover them with positive thoughts. So that we can see more of that smile that charmed ladies into paying for a meal." Y/N said. Bucky looked at the floor with tinted cheeks. "You're a.. what do they call it? Nerf? Nurd. Nerd. You're such a nerd." It was Y/N's turn to laugh.

"I didn't want to make this apology about me. I really am so sorry. I sure don't deserve it, but if you can find it in your heart to forgive me, I'd be honored." Bucky said with a small smile. The air in the room was far more pleasant. "I forgive you, Bucky. I forgave you the moment you knocked on that door." Y/N said. "What? Why?" Bucky was puzzled. "Because you made the effort to come upstairs and apologize to me. You could've called me downstairs or buzzed me. But you came upstairs. That alone was an apology in itself." Y/N smiled.

Bucky recognised that smile as the one from the picture with the baby, and the one where she cradled a kitten amidst a rescue, and the one with the sundress, and the one on that 40s themed photograph. He saw her true smile. A sight that he was instantly hooked on. He mimicked her smile. "Could we try again? At being partners in the work field? I really need you on my team. Even though I never wanted to admit it. Maybe friends?" Bucky wanted so much more than friends.

"I'd love nothing more, sarge." Y/N got up and shook his hand. That's where the friendship brewed from.

xxxx

Fin.

Part 2?

Not proofread.

Gif not mine

[thatstormygeek]

So for the next couple months, we are essentially Schrödinger’s Electorate. There is no uncertainty about Trump’s ambitions....But there is real uncertainty about his capacity to execute.

We won’t know until at least January just how dark things are about to get. There is a version of Trump’s second term where he talks a lot about mass deportation, but actually deports comparatively few people. He gestures at massive tariffs, but mostly as a negotiating tactic. The most dangerous parts of Project 2025 languish because they require more attention to detail than he cares to give. (Plus they would be unpopular. And Trump likes to feel popular.) This would be a Trump II that kind of resembles Trump I, when he talked a whole lot about “building the wall,” but lacked the will and skill to actually put the plan into practice. This is not a good future, mind you. But it’s the best possible of all the bad futures. Its one where we suffer through several years of mid-level corruption and a ceaseless barrage of Trump intrigue and incompetence. It’s a future that still yields a couple hundred more Trump judges with lifetime appointments to the federal bench, ensuring that no future administration can accomplish its goals. It’s also a future that sets us back at least four years on climate commitments, all while handing the plutocrats more money and power that they will ruthlessly work to defend. It’s, y’know, still really bad. But the other version of Trump II is the one where he deputizes and mobilizes a deportation force that removes tens of millions of people from their homes. Some will be sent back to their home countries. But most will be rounded up and sent to makeshift camps. And that’s a future where he also uses Schedule F to replace all federal workers with Trump ideologues, reducing the federal government to a cutout front for the Trump organization. It’s one where he shuts down all progressive organizations under the cover of fighting “extremism,” rendering the Democratic Party network incapable of competing in future in elections. One where his political opponents go into hiding, and the military is deployed against protestors, and press critics quickly learn that their constitutional protections are not self-enforcing. This would be much, much worse.

I’ve heard a cold-comfort, rally-the-troops message in some progressive circles: “we’ve been here before. We know how to mobilize against him!” I hate to be a downer, but… no. If your strategic plan for Trump II relies on a repeat of the conditions of Trump I, that is a very bad strategic plan. When Donald Trump assumed the Presidency in 2017, we had (1) a mainstream media that was eager to play a watchdog role, (2) a Republican Party that had not been entirely cleansed of Trump critics, (3) a judicial branch with zero Trump appointees, and (4) Trump and his team lacking even the vaguest sense of how to run the executive branch. We had, in other words, a huge attack surface. ... It’s also going to be harder to tie him up in the courts than it was in the first term. Trump appointed 234 federal judges, including three Supreme Court Justices. These Trump judges have shown no deference to precedent. Many are naked partisans, with no incentive to hide it. (Hell, a Trump judge just struck down Biden’s overtime pay Executive Order yesterday.) The Supreme Court has also gotten very comfortable using its shadow docket to speed up and slow down cases to Trump’s benefit. ... Here’s a rough outline of what I think might work. The basic assignment is simple: run out the clock. There are 102 weeks until the 2026 midterm election. There are 206 weeks until the 2028 Presidential. That’s a lot of time to be playing prevent defense against an opponent who controls all the structural power levers at the federal level. This will hardly be easy. But Donald Trump is not some strategic genius, enacting a meticulously-crafted long-term plan. He has grown older, but no wiser. He is as likely to focus on deporting 20 million people as he is to get into a weeklong Twitter spat with Mark Cuban. He is a ridiculous person, and tremendously vulnerable to ridicule. His administration will be staffed by devoted ideologues, not skilled operators. Rudy Giuliani was a devoted Trump supporter. So was John Eastman. Both were comically inept, and are now disbarred as a result. The benchwarmers suiting up now that they are off the playing field have no great excess of skill.

[vickyvicarious]

Mrs Westenra's tut-tuting days ago about Seward watching over Lucy because "she is better now, she can stop the antibiotics" feels like foreshadowing now, or at least that this isn't an uncharacteristic action from her.

Definitely!

On 6 September she gets worried about Lucy and consults Jack, who then is able to bring in van Helsing. But by the very next day, she already seemed less alarmed than expected and prompted Jack's musing about Nature creating a self-protective instinct towards protecting her from deadly shocks by not allowing them to reach her. And so he "laid down a rule that she should not be present with Lucy or think of her illness more than was absolutely required. She assented readily, so readily that I saw again the hand of Nature fighting for life." That's the day of Lucy's first transfusion, and we see already Mrs. Westenra denying how bad the situation is, and then consenting to keep her distance. The day after that, she thinks staying up with Lucy is unnecessary since she's doing better. And then we don't hear from her again till today.

I think part of it might be related to prejudice against van Helsing. Jack presents the 'stay up with Lucy' plan as recommended by vH. The maids try to intercede with Jack to say it's not needed for vH to stay up with Lucy. And Mrs. Westenra takes away the flowers which were his treatment plan. Perhaps there's an element of distrust towards this stranger of a foreign doctor.

However, I think even without considering any kind of xenophobic angle, Mrs. Westenra does tend towards self-superiority and denial. She gets anxious over something (Lucy's sleepwalking in Whitby, Lucy's health in London), deputizes someone else to take over (Mina in Whitby, Jack in London) and then doesn't seem to worry about it so much any more. At the least, she doesn't talk about her worries. It's almost as though she offloads them onto someone else, and then once she's gotten that out, she can switch to laughing them off as silly and unnecessary in the first place. After all, Lucy seems so much better, and she's not heard of anything getting worse. It must be fine, they must be overreacting and making unnecessary fuss, is all.

It's also possible that now, as her own illness is getting worse (in London Jack says stuff about her going off to lay down and such, while in Whitby she still seemed to be spending her days engaged in a fair bit of socializing based on Mina's comments), she's got some degree of brain fog going on. It might be harder for her to keep track of things. Also a factor could be her regretting/resenting the agreement to keep out of Lucy's health and not visit her. She agreed easily because she wants to avoid scary/negative thoughts (even on an unconscious level), but she also resents it a little bit because 'I'm her mother, I know how to take care of her. And anyway, she seems better now!' kind of thoughts. Once she gets an idea in her head she tends to trust it more than even the experts she is consulting for advice, convinced she knows what she is doing. But she doesn't, and she's making things worse.

[gayweeddaddy69420]

in re that trans guy pickup artist article. if someone came up to me thinking that "i used to be a woman, therefore I couldnt possibly be a threat to you (since it is cis men who are the true ontological threat)"

like i dont know how to explain to you that all of the most egregious transphobia I have experienced at a personal level has been perpetrated by cis women who self deputized themselves as defenders and arbiters of femininity or of the community. most of the cis men in my life are usually at worst confused.

gentlemen you cannot wokeify pickup artistry you gotta be normal about women you dont get a free pass on that

[literary-illuminati]

Book Review 45 – The Gods Are Bastards Volume One by D. D. Webb

This was the first web fiction I’ve properly archive binged in a long while. I’d quite forgotten the experience of having however many hundred thousand words just waiting to consume your every waking hour for a weekend and change. So thanks to tumblr peer pressure for getting me to finally give this a try, I suppose.

So, this is a web serial set in a world that very much feels like a D&D setting a couple generations after it broke out of medieval stasis – there’s dragons and demigods and thousand year old retired elven adventurers who are all laws unto themselves, and then there’s also a continent spanning hegemonic empire that’s invented magical railways and telegraphs and industrial revolutions. The story specifically follows the freshman class of the Unseen University, a remote institution run by one of the two or three most powerful (former) adventurers alive, educating and connecting the future global elite. The freshman class – including a demigod, the only two paladins in the world, an amnesiac archdemon, and a pirate crown princess – are the protagonists for the better part of the story, bonding and going to classes and sent on absurd field expeditions and generally becoming an incredibly high-powered adventuring party. Each book also has one or two subplots following characters only very tenuously connected to them out in the wider world, more often than not centred around wither Bishop Darling of the Universal Church (former high priest of the god of thieves) or Principia Locke, conwoman and second most annoying elf alive. I will put my cards on the table now and say these plots are what makes the thing worth reading.

The students are – okay, they start off just, bad, but they do improve over the course of the first few books in terms of how grating they are to read (Book 1 is very heavy on the college soap opera). But they do all have the fundamental issue that, where the other plots largely feel like people embedded in a world with agenda to pursue and complex circumstances to navigate, they all feel like high fantasy superheroes being led along a breadcrumb trail in a world devoid of real threats or meaningful ties outside the university and the occasional specific patron. Or put another way, it is not at all subtle that they are the Protagonists or Reality, which instantly makes me dislike them and want them to fail. But going by what makes popular web fiction I’m fairly sure that instinct is mostly just a me thing.

Special shoutout to Tris, the crusading paladin of the group. As of book one she’s a repressed sheltered army brat who has a whole list of species and religions she thinks should be killed on sight and several historical genocides she wholeheartedly endorses. She has a real arc over the volume, but a big part of it is less challenging the fundamental logic of that than just slowly removing lines from her kill on sight list (but nowhere near all of them). I am not entirely sure how self-aware the book is about this.

The remainder of the book, and by far the better part, is mostly dedicated to sideplots centring Bishop Darling’s byzantine intrigues within the universal church, the politics of the empire’s capital city, and his high forays into high risk tutoring and foster-parenting, and Principia Locke, thieves guild resident underachiever, town ne’erdowell and second most obnoxious elf alive. These two characters are objectively the best, and also they’re allowed to be at genuine risk and thrown into tasks where fucking up is a real possibility and the ultimate resolution is very unclear. The best plot of the entire volume is easily Darling and 3 other bishops being deputized as a black ops force by the (arch)pope and sent to illegally poke around a small town, and they’re all the most insufferable people you’ve ever met stuck sharing an airbnb.

The story plays a lot with western tropes and aesthetics transposed onto he magitech high fantasy setting – the ‘Golden Sea’ is an infinite, impossible to navigate expanse in the centre of the continent, home to nomadic plains elf bands and centaur herds, and the imperial frontier has now pushed right up to its edge, full of things like saloons and sheriffs and marshals and magical trains and gun wand-fights and ten gallon hates. This is very fun, but the moving of the reference period from vaguely medieval Europe to the late 19th century USA makes things certain subtext that’s already unfortunate in standard fantasy downright painful – centaurs, clearly and obviously playing the role the savage indian raiders in some mid-century western, are portrayed as a universally evil culture whose main salient trait is that they will literally rape any prisoners to death, and are stated to have been righteous and heroically ethnically cleansed everywhere but this barbaric frontier. It’s, uh, not great.

Now, I came to this serial as someone who has wasted untold days and hours becoming immersed in D&D, like, Lore, which meant that I was incredibly well prepared because there are so many D&D easter eggs in this I think it might technically be a fanwork like Order of the Stick or something. There’s a Drizzt joke that made me audible groan, and more broadly the entire setting is just very incredibly clearly “D&D 3.5 campaign setting plus 50 years and an industrial revolution’. “Adventurers” were a coherent social class, ‘dungeons’ are a thing, there are profoundly uncomfortable attitudes towards ‘monstrous’ races that live in them, the whole shebang. I mostly found this charming, but it’s a thin line, and I can very easily imagine it being utterly insufferable.

Anyway, this is theoretically a complete volume, but it’s also books one-four of, like, seventeen. In the grand tradition of web serials everywhere, it’s three times longer than it really needs to be, and absolutely littered with plot seeds and foreshadowing which might either pay off in five hundred thousand words or never be mentioned again. I’m honestly not particularly sure how well the volume holds up as a coherent work, separate from everything that comes after – Principia got a complete and well done character arc, but that’s about the only part of it I’d say really works here.

As the first fifth or so of a longer work it did get me to keep going onto book five with barely a breath in between though, so on balance I’d say it works.

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"Immediately after the passage of the September [1918] orders-in-council, the police began using their new authority in a series of raids aimed at getting the Reds off the streets. In Winnipeg in early October, Michael Charitinoff, a Russian Jew and former editor of the Russian-language weekly Robotchny Narod (Working People), was arrested for possession of illegal literature. Security forces had targeted Charitinoff as Lenin’s “ambassador to Western Canada,” supposedly sent to Canada with a $7,000 bankroll to foment revolution. Police magistrate Hugh John Macdonald, the sixty-eight-year-old son of Sir John A., the former prime minister, and a former Manitoba premier himself, sentenced Charitinoff to three years in prison and a $1,000 fine, though the editor won release on a technicality. Charitinoff was one of more than 200 people convicted of political offences—possessing banned literature, belonging to an illegal group, or attending illegal meetings—across the country between October 1918 and June 1919. Fines ranged up to $4,000, though most were much lower, and prison terms ran anywhere from a month to five years.

In Ontario, police stormed the offices of several of the banned organizations, seizing correspondence, books, and pamphlets, and arresting dozens of people in Toronto and other, smaller communities. Eighteen Finnish-Canadian militants were arrested in Sudbury and Sault Ste. Marie. In Brantford, the local police chief, testifying at the trial of Andra Tretjak, a young Russian immigrant found guilty of conspiracy, claimed that the town was “the headquarters of Bolshevik advocates in Canada,” the centre of a vast distribution network of seditious literature. The police enjoyed fear-mongering about alleged conspiracies; the previous summer they had uncovered a nest of Russian conspirators in Windsor, Ontario, who, they told the newspapers, were at the centre of “a continent-wide plot to overthrow lawful authority and establish a similar regime to that instituted in Russia by Trotzky and Lenine.”

In Toronto, police descended on the offices of political and ethnic organizations across the city, arresting dozens of people, all of whom were alleged to be “active Socialists and Bolsheviks.” They carted away stacks of mail, flyers, pamphlets, books, and magazines. Among the twenty-two arrestees at the headquarters of the Social Democratic Party on Queen Street West were Isaac Bainbridge, secretary of the SDP, and Alfred Manse, the circulation manager of both the Industrial Banner and the Canadian Forward, the party newspaper. Bainbridge, who was a thirty-eight-year-old stonemason and the editor of the Forward, was all too familiar with this kind of harassment. During the previous year and a half, he had been arrested three times on charges of sedition and spent a total of four months in jail for promoting ideas that were considered anti-conscription.

Detainees appeared before magistrates, several of whom took very seriously their self-appointed role as the last bastions against Bolshevism. In Stratford, Ontario, where police arrested twenty-two militants, the case of Arthur Skidmore, a machinist and a member of the local trades council, attracted the most notoriety. He was sentenced to thirty days in jail and a fine of $500 for having in his possession a copy of the Forward. Following appeals to the government from his fellow union members, he was released after twelve days. Magistrate Makins, who had sent Skidmore to jail, chided the government for overruling his decision. “Skidmore’s release is having the effect of making these men very bold and defiant,” Makins told the Toronto Daily Star. “I feel that a stand will have to be taken in the near future against just such men.” And in Toronto, Magistrate Kingsford handed out a three-year prison term in the Kingston Penitentiary to Charles Watson for distributing a variety of books and leaflets that three months before had been perfectly legal. As a large deputation from the Carpenters’ Union massed in the street outside the court in protest, Kingsford declaimed from the bench:

Free speech has always been and is the birthright of every British subject; but free speech is not license [...] Sedition will not be tolerated [...] Persons of British birth or descent above all should not forget the orderly traditions of their race. It would be a disgrace if they associated themselves with the propaganda of foreign cut-throats.

Kingsford went on in his condescending manner:

Theoretical discussions about Socialism may do no harm even if, in the hands of uneducated men, they lead to erroneous ideas of political economy. But when they are publications which advocate in so many terms, robbery, plunder, and other crimes against public order and safety, they become a menace and must be dealt with accordingly.

- Daniel Francis, Seeing Reds: the Red Scare of 1918-1919, Canada’s First War on Terror. Arsenal Pulp Press, 2011. p. 52-54.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Paul Blumenthal at HuffPost:

Former President Donald Trump’s most significant policy plank in his third presidential campaign is to implement a system of mass deportation to remove up to 20 million noncitizens from the United States, a plan that apparently aims to not only remove people living here illegally but also to chase away ― or accidentally round up ― U.S. citizens as well.

He is promising to deploy the military and deputize local police officers to round up millions of people, detain them in makeshift camps and then ship them off to other countries ― whether or not the destination is the person’s country of origin. This plan is billed as targeting only those who have come to the country or reside in it illegally, with a special emphasis on supposed migrant gang members. It offers a story of those who deserve to be here and those who don’t. Those who are part of the national community and those who exist outside its bounds and, perhaps, its laws. But 79% of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. have been living and participating in American communities for more than 15 years. They have married U.S. citizens, hold jobs that prop up their local and national economies and have children and grandchildren who are citizens. Ripping these people out of the country and away from their families will ripple through every community in the country.

“Communities are like a fabric ― the way that the threads are interwoven,” said Heidi Altman, federal advocacy director for the National Immigration Law Center’s Immigrant Justice Fund, an immigrant rights nonprofit. “If you snip at one, eventually the whole of the fabric comes loose.” This plan to tear communities apart will also ensnare U.S. citizens, green card holders and others here legally, either by accident or with intent. Trump and his advisers are already saying that’s what they’ll do. Tom Homan, Trump’s former acting head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, was asked in a “60 Minutes” interview that aired Sunday whether there is a way that Trump’s mass deportation plan could remove undocumented people without separating them from their families. “Of course there is,” Homan said. “Families can be deported together.” What Homan is saying, without saying it directly, is that mixed-status families, with some family members who are U.S. citizens and others who lack legal status, can choose to self-deport if they wish to remain together.

There are currently 4.7 million mixed-status households in the U.S., according to the Center for Migration Studies. Among those households are 5.5 million U.S.-born children living with one undocumented household member and 1.8 million U.S.-born children living with two undocumented adults. In total, there are 9.7 million Americans who live in households with at least one undocumented resident. Trump and Homan propose an impossible choice: your citizenship and your home or your family. Similar mass deportations and detentions in the country’s history have done the same. The incarceration of Japanese immigrants and Japanese-Americans during and after World War II ensnared citizens and noncitizens alike. So, too, did the imprisonment of Germans, Italians and people born under the Austro-Hungarian Empire during both world wars. Trump’s inspiration for his mass deportation program, President Dwight Eisenhower’s Operation Wetback, similarly resulted in the deportation of significant numbers of U.S. citizens to Mexico.

But none of those programs was of the scale or scope that Trump imagines. There are an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S., according to the 2022 American Community Survey. Other surveys and estimates have found similar numbers. But Trump and his allies talk about deporting 20 million to 30 million people. There is no source for such a number. That would invariably mean targeting people with some kind of legal status, whether temporary or permanent. “They seem to be gleefully suggesting that they would include people here with some legal status in these roundups,” said Matthew Lisieki, a senior research and policy analyst at the Center for Migration Studies, a think tank that focuses on global migration. A deportation program that removes 11 million people or even more than 20 million would affect every single community in the country, invariably sweeping up even larger numbers of U.S. citizens and legal residents, taking them away from their families and putting them into jails, incarceration camps and, potentially, off to another country. As Homan’s answer on “60 Minutes” indicates, that’s a feature, not a bug. Trump has already proposed invoking laws that could be used to sweep up unnaturalized U.S. residents who have legal status.

The Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which Trump says he will use, allows the president to effectively suspend due process for anyone of a particular nationality or national origin when the U.S. is at war or is invaded by that nation. Invoking this law may prove challenging since the U.S. is not currently in a declared war, much less one against any of the Latin American countries that represent the point of origin for most undocumented immigrants in the U.S. And though Trump claims that the migration of people into the country amounts to an “invasion,” federal courts since the 1990s have largely rejected efforts by states claiming that the word “invasion” in the U.S. Constitution should be interpreted to include the voluntary migration of people across borders.

Still, it is possible that the courts today would take a different approach and declare that the president’s invocation of an invasion by immigrants is a “political question” that the judicial branch will not interfere with. That could give Trump a free hand to implement a brutal and sweeping deportation program. “There are no explicit limitations on what kinds of regulations the president can promulgate under the law,” said Katherine Yon Ebright, a counsel at the progressive Brennan Center for Justice and author of a paper on the Alien Enemies Act. The law has been invoked three times during conflicts with actual foreign nations: during the War of 1812 and both world wars. In each conflict, the president has not only directed deportations and detentions but also promulgated restrictions on noncitizens who had come from the foreign belligerents.

[...]

When Trump was in office, immigration officials ramped up the use of these inaccurate gang databases to identify and deport undocumented residents. Considering Trump has falsely claimed in his campaign speeches that “migrant gangs” have “conquered” entire cities, such an effort would likely be radically scaled up. This could lead to removal of people with legal status as well as those who don’t. Residents who have legal status under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program ― so-called Dreamers who were brought across the border by their parents as children ― have been incorrectly identified as gang members by local police and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. That would be one way to strip them of their legal status.

Trump’s top immigration adviser, Stephen Miller, has promised to “turbocharge” efforts at denaturalizing U.S. citizens. When in office, Trump ramped up denaturalization efforts with one Homeland Security budget document proposing up to 700,000 investigations into naturalized U.S. citizens. Civil denaturalization can be done to people who obtained their legal status illegally or are the child of someone who did so, who deliberately lied about a fact in their application for citizenship, obtained citizenship through military service but was then dishonorably discharged or by becoming a member of a subversive group. This last reason could implicate U.S. citizens incorrectly placed on gang databases or otherwise identified as gang-affiliated by law enforcement. Databases can only be used to identify the legal status of residents who have had interactions with law enforcement or certain government agencies. If Trump intends to ramp up deportations to the level he claims, his efforts would need to target workplaces and neighborhoods. This would, invariably, involve racial profiling by placing checkpoints or performing sweeps in heavily Latino neighborhoods or worksites. Such sweeps would undoubtedly ensnare U.S. citizens and inflict fear in everyone ― citizens and noncitizens alike ― within these communities.

Donald Trump’s diabolically fascistic plan of mass deportations is eerily reminiscent of the interning of Japanese-Americans in World II: a moral and economic calamity that would undo America.

Read the full story at HuffPost.

[princess-of-the-corner]

So.... here are a bunch of OC miraculous I made up.

Penguin: Nullify

Raven(Cuuvi): Discord(territory)

Hedgehog(Spiak): Deputize

Wolf: Pack

Axolytl: Conversion and Reversion

Deer(stag): Dreamworld, Inner Heart

Hokkaido Wolf(Farii): Domination

Cheetah: Acceleration(speed of motion, speed up or speed down)

Bobcat: Bound(super jump thats basically the Moves Bounce and Fly from pokemon, both as attack, and transport)

Lynx: Locate(missing lynx? a Lynx that finds whats missing)

Hermit Crab: Claim(take hold, and ownership of object or power and Combine it temporarily with Miraculous similar to Unify)

Zebra: Duality(split people or self in two, the two prime sides of themselves)

Gorilla: Reveal(the Frankenstein Arms monster from Kamen Rider Kiva ability)

spider: InterWeb(basically connects multiple people and allows usage of eachothers powers)

miraculous of extinct animals have a special power called, Extinction, its basically Collision but on different wave lengths and manifestations

Oh hell yeah.

[wilderhazard]

Popular logic among US "leftists" that a commitment to the Second Amendment as one of the "progressive" features of the Constitution is essential because armed conflict with the state is an inevitable part of the revolutionary process. The rational kernel here is that yes, organized self-defense is important, and guerilla warfare has secured some real gains for communists in the third world. But it's essential to keep in mind the gulf between the situation of the NPA or other militias in the periphery and the realities in the US. Armed self-defense is mostly essential in our setting for protecting us from the incipient growth of rank-and-file fascism, from "law-abiding gun owners" deputized to "protect" their neighborhoods. In some cases, self-defense is possible with an armed and trained group, but the last few years should have permanently shattered illusions that the law will be on our side in any such instance.

The "left" critique of gun control will usually point out the tremendous racial discrepancies in weapons enforcement, but state regimes of lax gun laws have massive racial discrepancies too, as anyone who pays attention to "stand your ground" enforcement knows. Much as gun regulations disproportionately disarm racialized groups, so do gun "rights" disproportionately protect white property owners. (Gun "rights" did not protect the Black Panthers, famously; the NRA sponsored legislation specifically to disarm them.) "Materialists" who ordinarily scoff at the fiction of formal rights seem to forget their emptiness and caprice if guns are involved. Suddenly, we can expect that the settler state will be bound by its own proclamations and allow us to overthrow it by force because it says a "well-regulated militia" should be permitted to do so. This is fantasy. Even if gun "rights" and regulations were evenly enforced, any revolutionary situation in which victory is remotely possible is nonetheless a situation in which the constitution no longer applies

The function of US gun culture is the deputization of the petty bourgeoisie to extend and reinforce the violence of the bourgeois state by extralegal means. Gun ownership is part of an ideological unit with home and car ownership: once you have your fiefdom of home, car, and appliance, you defend it by any means necessary. The modal "law-abiding gun owner" is a private authoritarian who is one bad day away from shooting his delivery driver, his tenant, or a stranger who simply came too close to his stuff. These are the guys the Second Amendment exists for, to grant the right of lethal force against foes of property: the guys who show up to protests or in the aftermath of natural disasters to shoot "looters" for sport. The law enshrines their right to do so. It will not protect your little "leftist" gun club; that enterprise is already illegal in the eyes of the state.

[glapplebloom]

Remember this character? Because I clearly don’t...

So Julie-Su is a character from the Archie Brand of Sonic the Hedgehog. She is currently owned by Ken Penders who is basically doing diddly squat with her as he’s focused on his Mary-Su in his yet to be released book. And I liked her when I was younger so I added her in my comics and made her into a villain. But why, her character wasn’t like that... Right?

(By SonicGal390)

That’s the thing, I don’t think I remember her character prior to my comics. In fact, the fact I made her into Juliet Suter really showed how different the two are. So what was Julie-Su really like? For the month of February, I am going to be reading her issues and see if Juliet is an improvement or a missed opportunity. This week, the Knuckles Spinoffs.

Her first appearance was in Issue 4 where it begins with a Classic Vector with realistic feet... Yikes. He is trying to get the jump on a cloaked Dark Legion Soldier who I presume is Julie-Su. And she punches Vector once and throws him to the side. So already, we see the idea of the writers preferring their OCs over the original crew. And she was going to sneak up on Knuckles if it wasn’t for this Ant OC giving him a warning.

Knuckles was having the upperhand until he realized she’s a girl and she looked to capitalize on it. Then the Ant OC saved Knuckles. After being disarmed, she explains basically that she was trying to rejoin the Legion but between it self-exploding and something making her follow Knuckles instead. Literally saying “like someone forcing their will over hers”. Just focusing on Julie-Su’s story, so ignoring how Knuckles’ papa creeps on his own son.

Well, something is happening in the Marble Garden Zone and Julie-Su joins Knux’s crew despite other’s protests. And so far it's arguing. Then they found a city all of a sudden appearing out of nowhere full of Echidnas. Then it is gone. Then an Earthquake where Julie-Su saves Knuckles from falling. Then the city returns... I’m gonna skip to the part where Julie-Su’s character is focused on.

So that’s Issue 7 where we see Julie and Knuckles talk. She’s isolated from everyone besides Knuckles because they associate her with the Dark Legion and it bums her. So Knuckles is trying to fix that. But everyone he wants to introduce her to is gone. And the plot happens. Next issue she’s back with the Legion but she’s still feeling like a stranger among them. Next issue, it is revealed she left stuff to help the Prisoned Knuckles’ friends. And when the Dark Legion goes to attack the city, she makes her allegiance clear and stops them. 

She was arrested and then, for some reason, assigned to the deputized Chaotix. Like this is two comics worth of stuff and no explanation. Issue 13-15 are the drug comics where she doesn’t really show much of a personality outside being cautious in a logical situation. Like they completely forgot she got arrested for being part of the Dark Legion. Thrown off a building. Yadda Yadda. 

So far the most interesting thing I’ve seen of her is she has a grappling hook. And it is issue 16 that she kisses Knuckles on the cheek. Despite Knux saying don’t do it again, she thinks she wants to but doesn’t know why. So apparently Echidnas have this Soul Touch thing that makes people like each other automatically. Never mind trying to build up a relationship naturally, we gotta get this ship on the waters. 

Issue 17 has her riding some weird looking horse. This guy goes up to her and choking her to death because he thinks she’s with the Dark Legion. And then 6 pages later is taking this guy to Knuckles. Sometime later talks to Knuckles’ mother, most likely warning her about what her husband did to her in the relationship. Issue 22 has her relaying information to Knuckles. 

Issue 26 has her shooting at something to blow off some steam when Knuckles ditched her last issue. Almost Yandere like. Then she decided that she needs to do something in her life since she doesn’t know what she needs to improve herself. When she thinks she needs to have more fun, a Knuckles with a belt said try on this black hat in the window. And the issue ends with her on a date with the guy.

Next issue, Knuckles is spying on Julie-Su after being teleported there for some reason. The date seemed to have gone well outside thinking she heard someone. Then Knuckles shows up and seems to be asking her to go out on a date and she looks super excited. And 28 has Knuckles’ mother seeing Julie-Su to see if she can keep him away from a certain surprise everyone else is setting up. 

Nevermind because the date turned into leading him into a Surprise Birthday Party. They dance and plan for a date next week and kiss. Issue 30 has her riding that weird looking horse again. And that’s it for Julie-Su’s appearances in the Knuckles solo run. So what is she like? You’re basic “tough chick who can do things on her own but doesn’t like Knuckles Baka.” Outside her being in a relationship with Knuckles, there’s not much of a character there.

But let’s see how next week fairs as we stick to the Pre-Penders Departure. 

[curlysgirl0202]

Short Story:

The Outlaw's Advocate: A Tale of Love, Romance and Redemption.

Curly Bill and a few other cowboys are accused of assaulting a shop keeper. Not only are they innocent, the reader defends and exonerates the Cowboys.

Read About Their Amazing Adventure

The tension between the Cowboys and the Earps falls over Tombstone like a dark cloud of uncertainty. The Earps came to Tombstone for the same reason the Cowboys did; to get rich and they had no intention or interest in becoming law enforcement officers again. For them, it wasn't their job anymore until Wyatt decided to break into politics. If he could win as US Marshall, his next step could be a mayor and then he would only climb the strategic ladder to higher aspirations. But then the Cowboys with their partying and desire to have an unbridled good time began causing trouble in Tombstone and that threatened the Earps business and political goals. Wyatt and his brothers knew they would need to swear themselves in once again and wear the badge that gave them the authority to arrest anyone they wanted to. And with the Cowboys becoming more of a threat to the Earps, Wyatt decided to run for US Marshall. Then his power and authority could be unlimited and he would have the ability to exercise marshal law and deputize anyone he pleased, including Doc Holliday.

During an evening of drinking, gambling and visiting the houses of ill repute, the Cowboys find themselves in real trouble. Although they're known for their wild behavior and firing their pistols in the air while riding up and down Allen Street, on this evening, the Cowboy crew were spending their ill-gotten gains on whiskey and women and placed themselves out of sight of the nosey and self righteous Earp brothers.

The commotion begins with a robbery at the general store. Four masked and well armed men held the cashier at gunpoint and ordered him to empty the register. The frightened clerk took whatever money he could find and with shaking hands, gave it to the bandits. Then the bandits instructed the shop keeper to strip naked. The clerk quickly acquiesces, mumbling a prayer to himself. Once undressed, he holds his hands up and begs for the thieves to leave. One of the strangers takes a bite out of a large apple and then places the remaining part of the fruit on the steady head of the cashier who remained still, his hands up.

"Now, stay real still!" The bandit leader demands. "And you won't get hurt."

The general store worker continues praying to himself and closes his eyes while the gang leader shoots the apple right off the poor man's head. When the merchant opens his eyes, he sees the banditos mounting their horses and heading out of town.

Curly Bill and a few others look up from their whiskey shots and wonder what the commotion is about. You work as a waitress in the restaurant they're enjoying their food and drinks and you glance over at the red sash gang and Curly looks back at you. He winks and tips his hat. Curly Bill has had a major crush on you since he first saw you and enjoys his meals at this restaurant just to see you everyday. You always greet him and the others with a warm smile and you show attentiveness to them by ensuring they have plenty of warm bread and that their glasses are always full of whatever booze they're sipping.

On this particular evening, the loud gunfire doesn't shake your routine or that of any of the patrons enjoying their meals. These types of disturbances are regular occurrences in the town too tough to die.

Curly watches you work and is diligent about ensuring your safety. He usually waits for your shift to end and then as always, offers to take you home. Although you stay at the hotel at a reduced rate as a condition of your employment as a waitress, the old cowboy can't resist making you feel safe. And since anything can happen in Tombstone, Curly is delighted to be the man that ensures your safety. Although many eligible men made plays to court you, no one makes a bigger fool of themselves than old Curly. His fellow red sash gang members chuckle while they watch the rustler try to impress you by laying on the charm. On some days, you barely say a word and Curly Bill understands women can have their moody days, but he continues to do things to get your attention. And although you could choose any man you want, you do enjoy the big cowboy. Curly Bill is loud and is usually laughing or drinking or playing practical jokes or telling stories. But he's got a charm that seems different; as big and strong as he is, he seems gentle, almost tame when he's around you. Since he first saw you, he's changed a few habits; he bathes more regularly, has his clothes laundered often so they don't smell like horses and he goes to the barber weekly for a trim of his mustache and his unruly dark hair. He's convinced himself he can charm you and allow him to court you, but with each goodnight that comes without a kiss from you, causes the cowboy to double down and try even harder by having every meal at the restaurant and coming in in between for pie and coffee just so he can be in the same place as you. Curly has even invited you to join him for coffee and when you return to work, he takes your coffee cup and sips from it, knowing your luscious lips had touched it. The brazen cowboy has fallen in love and is completely unprepared and pleasantly surprised when you come to his defense when he's accused of robbing the general store.

"Thank you for walking me home, Curly Bill!"

Curly removes his hat, holds it against his chest and takes a bow. You walk close to him and kiss him on the cheek. Curly is so surprised by your sudden burst of affection, he sheepishly chuckles. He desperately wants to take you in his arms and devour you, but simply watches you once again enter the hotel.

Curly Bill stands in front of the hotel for a few minutes before turning to leave and when he does, he sees Wyatt and Virgil Earp marching towards him. Curly Bill grins and holds his hands up in a manner suggesting a surrender.

"I always walk her home, Wyatt." Curly begins.

"Nevermind that! You're under arrest, Curly! Eyewitnesses place you and a few of your cowboys robbing the mercantile!"

Curly Bill rages, "I haven't done anything such thing! I wasn't even nowhere near there! You got the wrong man, Earp!" Curly bellows.

"We already arrested the Clanton brothers and Stillwell. The merchant told us a few cowboys came in earlier this evening, robbed the till and forced him to strip naked! Sounds just like you, Brocious!"

Curly Bill throws his hands up. "I swear, Wyatt! I was at the restaurant. I ain't had no beef with that old merchant!"

"What about the Clanton's and Stillwell?"

"They were with me having dinner at the restaurant! Ask YN! We was there!"

Curly Bill feared for a moment that you may cooperate with the Earps out of fear or that they may do to you what they did to Big Nose Kate when they got her drunk and angry enough to finger Rattlesnake Charlie for a robbery he never committed. Wyatt had an issue with Rattlesnake and since he couldn't nail him for his other crimes due to a lack of cooperation by witnessness, he was able to get a drunken Kate to sign a sworn affidavit.

Please don't let that happen!

"We're not bothering YN this late! Let's go, Brocious!"

"Where are you taking me?" Curly demands.

"We'll talk to YN tomorrow. For now, you'll be spending the night in jail with your friends!"

"Son of a bitch!" Curly Bill growls while the brothers take a hold of him. They put Curly in the same cell as Billy and Ike Clanton and Frank Stillwell.

"You boys ain't going anywhere now!"

Curly grabs the prison bars. "You got this all wrong! We didn't do nothin' to that old shop keep. You're gonna be lookin' mighty foolish when YN tells you we wasn't any where near the general store!"

"Oh, we'll see about that!" Wyatt snaps. "I got Big Nose Kate to sign a sworn affidavit and I can do the same thing with YN. I'll let her know all about your treeing days, Curly! How you made a preacher dance a jig or how you forced party goers to strip naked and dance for your amusement. Shouldn't she know that? And when I tell her about that and after she's had some whiskey, there won't be any problem...And this is a hanging offense!"

Curly Bill shook the bars of the cell and then kicked the small table over.

"I don't think she'll be impressed when I tell her about your past. You're a thief, a rustler and a killer!"

"You son of a bitch! You ain't gettin' away with this!"

"When your cowboys see you four swing, they'll leave town! Slowly or quickly. But either way, anything I can do to get rid of your kind, I'll do it! Besides, you've been making a fool of yourself over YN for weeks and she's still not letting you court her!"

Curly became infuriated with humiliation. That was the proof that the men of Tombstone knew about how Curly Bill feels about you. And the envious men of the town would be all too eager to warn you about the gunslinging cattle rustler. Curly takes his hat off and throws it and then runs his filthy hand through his dark hair.

"Have a nice evening, boys," Wyatt groans and leaves the three in the cell.

"What the hell, Curly?" Ike whines. "That damn merchant blamin' us for that when we wasn't even there!"

"YN will tell Earp that we was there," Billy says. "She's always been real nice. I ain't that worried!"

Curly could excuse Ike's whining, but he felt Billy was dreaming if he thought YN wasn't going to be seriously intimidated by the Earp brothers. Everyone feared them.

"What the hell happened?" Stillwell asks, not looking up.

"She ain't gonna finger us, boss!" Billy Clanton "She's real sweet."

"It ain't YN, damnit!" Curly howls. "You don't know what them Earps will do to her. They did the same damn to Holiday's woman, remember? Got her good and drunk and hell, she was so damn drunk, Wyatt had to hold the pen in her hand! You don't think he's gonna scare YN into doin' the same? She's a real lady and ain't saavy like Kate and iffin' they could do that with Big Nose, they can with anybody!"

"You really think YN would sell us out?" Billy begs.

"No! I think them Earps would do whatever it takes to get her to say we done it and iffin' she has a drink with them, they'll just keep ordering more drinks and she won't remember my name!" Curly Bill sits on the makeshift bed, his head in his hands. Eventually, exhaustion overtook the rustlers and they fell asleep.

The morning clouds soaked up the sunlight and the town seemed gray and dismal. Son of a Gun Sam opens the door to the sheriff's office and serves the prisoners their meager breakfast. Curly Bill, Stillwell and the Clanton's munch on the chuck that's at least free of maggots.

Later that afternoon, Wyatt goes to the hotel in the hopes of talking with you. But more important, turn you against Curly and his red sash Cowboys. Wyatt is certain that if he's able to turn Kate Elder, he could get any woman to turn against any man. And Wyatt usually won...And that is something that scares old Curly.

The steely gray clouds fall lazily over Tombstone and a mild drizzle begins to sprinkle onto the townsfolk who are moving in between stores.

Wyatt strolls to the restaurant where you're serving and he asks for a table in your station. When your eyes meet, you head to the kitchen. When you return, you bring Wyatt a menu.

"Let me buy you a drink, YN," Wyatt begins. "I've got a feeling that you need to get something off your chest. I understand. You don't need to be scared of Curly Bill."

"Why would I be scared of Curly Bill?" You respond innocently.

Wyatt looks at you and wonders if you've been manipulated by the Cowboys or if you're just as sweet as you look.

"Don't you know who he is? He's King of the Cowboys!" Wyatt takes your arm, but to his surprise, you pull away.

"Curly has been nothing short of a gentleman," you plead. "He looks out for me. He walks me back to the hotel so I get home safe. Curly Bill has never been anything but a wonderful gentleman! You just don't know him!"

"Whiskey for her and just a beer for me," Wyatt motions for the other server.

"I'm not drinking. I'm at work." You answer.

"Just one shot. Relax. I'm not here as an enemy. Consider me a trusted confidant. I just think you should know a little more about him. So you know he was arrested for a stage coach robbery in Galleyville?"

"There's lots of types around here. The war did crazy things to people."

"YN, he's been implicated in a crime and he and his friends are going before the Judge, you understand? They held up a shop keeper last night and forced the poor fellow to strip completely naked and then they took turns firing at his head. And Curly Bill has been known to do things like that. Have you ever heard about his treeing days back in Dodge? Harassed innocent people and forced a preacher to dance a jig while Curly Bill's boys fired shots at the poor fellow. Then he took his boys to a wedding and forced every guest to strip naked and dance for him. That's who's walking you home every night!"

"I already told you!" The server brings your drinks and Wyatt pushes the shot glass towards you. You glance at it and then push it away from you. "Curly Bill is funny and he's got a big personality. I like him."

"He was arrested last night! Do you understand?"

"Of course." You answer.

"Have some whisky. It will help relax you."

*I'm working!" You scowl.

"Jack doesn't care if you have a few drinks while working!" Wyatt responds.

"You say the store was robbed last night?"

"That's right. Probably just after Curly walked you back to the hotel. You must have heard the shots!"

Suddenly you recall the commotion from the previous evening. "Oh wait! Yes! I did hear that!"

"Well, see? There we have it. A confession! So you did hear it!"

"Well, here they come now!" Wyatt announces. You are Virgil and Morgan Earp along with Yankee Jim and they're pushing Curly Bill, Stillwell and the Clanton brothers forward..

"Move it, boys!" Yankee Jim demands.

Curly Bill and the other cowboys have their hands tied while waiting for you to verify their whereabouts. Wyatt tells his brothers to keep a close eye on the rustlers and that he was going to try one last time to get you drunk and angry.

"Wait! What are you doing?" You demand.

"Obtaining the confession I needed. Just have a drink and calm down. You're just upset."

"I don't want a drink, Wyatt!" You grumble.

"Let's talk," Wyatt whispers. "Let's just start over. Come sit and have your drink and I'll fill you in on everything you need to know about that worthless cowboy."

"He's not worthless!" You howl.

"Please calm down, you're being hysterical, YN. This is why you need a drink. Here. Take it."

Morgan and Virgil wait outside with the four cowboys and are positioned so you can't completely see them.

"Wyatt! You got the wrong men! Curly was at the restaurant last night."

"Well, before he got there or after he walked you home, he and his boys had plenty of opportunity to carry this out!"

Morgan and Virgil pushed the cowboys into the restaurant.

"Why are they tied up like that?" You fire at the deputies.

"They forced that poor merchant to strip naked, then they placed an apple on his head and took turns firing at him! And that's the man you wish to court you?"

"What?" At that moment you realize it was more than Curly just trying to protect you, he has genuine feelings for you because he desires a relationship with you. A flood of emotions wash over you at that moment and you know in your heart what Wyatt is saying cannot be true.

"We were here, YN!" Billy Clanton shouts. "Tell them we were here!"

"Shut up, Billy!" Ike whines.

You stand in complete confusion. Could it be that before Curly came, he treed the poor fellow or after he walked you home? But then you remember the gunshots and how you and Curly both heard the commotion and thought nothing of it.

"No!" You begin. "It couldn't have been them!" Your face turns from fear and confusion to clarify and certainty.

"The merchant already said it was them!" Morgan interjects.

"What time did this occur?" You inquire.

"That doesn't make any difference! There's an eyewitness account! It was them!" Wyatt groans.

"No, it wasn't and it couldn't have been! I know what I heard!" You're beautiful in your anger and Curly Bill watches in awe as you defend him when you could have allowed yourself to be manipulated by the law man. Most people would have cowered by now. Curly Bill knows the Earps are trying to break you down. But you seem to rise above it and hold steadfast to your conviction.

"YN," Morgan starts. "We're ready to go before Spicer. The merchant is there, waiting to give his testimony. And when he fingers these boys, we don't have a choice. It's a hanging offense."

Your heart drops. "Fine! I'll go and testify to what I heard and saw!"

Curly Bill is too moved to say anything. He's delighted that you're willing to testify on their behalf as it could result in serious consequences for you; you may lose your job for siding with the Cowboys or citizens may force you out of town after they hang the cowboys. Curly fears it may take more than your testimony to save them.

"We were denied a lawyer!" Curly demands. And at that moment, Virgil slaps the big rustler.

"Stop it!" You scream, moving towards Curly. Wyatt intercedes and grabs your arms.

"Let's go! Spicer is waiting.

You all walk to the courthouse, citizens of Tombstone looking at the four cowboys marching to the courthouse. Curly Bill feels a strong sense of guilt that the townsfolk are watching you walk along as if you're one of them. He lowers his head and fights back tears.

At the courthouse, the merchant stands and points his finger at Curly.

"That's them! Those were the men! They had masks, but I know! I know it was those damn cowboys!"

Wyatt looks at you with a satisfied grin. "See? I told you!"

You turn to face the shop keeper. "What time did this occur?"

"Just around 8 o'clock. I was getting ready to stoco some new items and them four boys come in a d robbed me before they rode off!"

"8 o'clock? Are you sure?"

"Sure as anything!" He answers. "A feller don't forget that!"

"Wyatt, Curly Bill and the others here were at the restaurant at 8. I know because I was working! We heard the gunfire but thought nothing of it. You got the wrong men!"

Wyatt turned to the old man.."You said it was Brocious! You told us that!"

"Well, I wasn't sure iffin' it was them or not. They had masks on their faces."

"What's going on here?" Judge Spicer demands. "Do you have any proof it was these men here?"

"You said it was the cowboys!" Wyatt shouts.

"Do you have anything? Besides his testimony?"

"Yes!" You announce. "I'm a witness and I heard the shots and Curly Bill, Ike, Billy and Frank were having dinner. It couldn't have been them! You got the wrong men, Wyatt!" At this point, Wyatt sees his futile attempts at breaking you down have failed and Curly Bill looks over at his cowboys and they share a smile. Without you and your intervention, they'd be waiting to be hanged.

"And you'll swear to that?" Spicer asks.

"Yes. I will."

"You're going up against the Earps, YN. You know this can become more complicated because of their eyewitness."

"But I'm an eyewitness too!"

"It could have occurred earlier or later. Perhaps gunshots from after you were home or before. Sometimes the sounds of the town drown that out. You do understand they have a strong case."

"I understand they have no case!"

Spicer leans back in his chair and strokes his beard. "You understand the risk you're taking defending these boys?" The old judge asks.

You nod and Curly Bill and the others look at the ground and feel they are unworthy receivers of your compassion and intervention.The Cowboys don't have anyone in their corner and no one has ever spoken up for them. When in these situations, people don't come forward to defend the cowboys. They're looking for reasons to blame them for something to get rid of them. And these Cowboys are more than familiar with that truth. But now to have a beautiful woman like yourself come to their defense and be willing to stand before a judge and go up against the Earps all by yourself fills them with inexplicable pride, relief and gratitude.

"I understand the risk in not defending them! It's completely wrong to put the blame on them when I already told you where they were!"

Wyatt moves closer to you, knowing it bothers Curly Bill, whose hands are tied.

"And we have an eyewitness!"

"An eyewitness who already said that the event occurred at 8 o'clock! And at 8 o'clock, they were having dinner in the restaurant I work at."

"It was crowded, they could have left and returned!" Wyatt suggests.

You shake your head. "No! They were there the entire time and we heard the gunfire! We were all in the same place so your accusations are unfounded!" You brush the hair away from your face and stand like a warrior after a victory. Your lips fiery red and your face gorgeous in the light.

"There doesn't seem to be enough evidence here to charge these boys," Judge Spicer declares, leaning forward.

"Well! Maybe the shop keeper got the time wrong," Morgan suggests.

You look at Curly Bill and roll your eyes and sigh, looking like a defiant little girl, your arms folded. Curly Bill chuckles to himself and can't hold back his smile. You're brilliant in your defense of the Cowboys and Curly Bill is never going to forget this moment and neither will his entire red sash gang. It will be a story they will tell over and over. How they were a few days away from swinging by their necks to having a gorgeous woman rush to their rescue and so eloquently put Wyatt Earp and his brothers in their place and made fools out of them all within a few moments!

"Can't you at least untie their hands?" You beg, your head to the ground.

"Once we're done here," Morgan answers.

Judge Spicer leans back. "Oh we're done here and I'd like you to not waste my time again, Wyatt."

'Untie them!" You hollar. You take the knife from Curly's belt and untie his hands for him. He looks down at you, his smile so bright, it lights up the room. He wishes he could cup your face and kiss you.

Then you cut the ropes for the others.

As you move towards the door, Curly Bill puts his arm around you, his smile never leaving his face. Ike and the others take their hats off and show their gratitude by taking short bows. You can't help but laugh out loud and then the five of you enjoy a short laugh together.

"Three cheers for YN!" Curly howls.

A few other cowboys including Ringo come walking towards them.

"What happened? Breckenridge said you were as good as hung!" Ringo shouts.

"Well we were until this lovely lady came along and put them old Earps in their place! You shoulda seen it, boys!" Curly declares, his arm around you.

"Yeah!" Ike adds.."She was something else! She was sayin' all kinds of stuff every time Wyatt said anything!" Ike claps his hands together and poses the way you did, your arms folded with your head held high. "She was lookin' just like that and then the judge said we was done! Now we ain't hanging, boys!"

Your eyes meet Curly's and the two of you stand, facing each other. You're both so overwhelmed, you fall into a sweet kiss. The Cowboys take their hats off, hoot and then throw their hats on the air, causing a small crowd of onlookers to gather, shaking their heads in wonder. You're well known around Tombstone and are the most popular waitress. A smile always decorates your lovely face, you never admonish or talk down to anyone and your friendliness clearly extends to everyone. In short, your popularity gives the Cowboys a serious edge in the community and their gratitude couldn't be greater.

"We got ourselves a new member of our family here and it's YN! When she could have just left us to fend for ourselves, she went all the way to the courthouse with us!" Curly Bill explains. 'Whaddya say, YN? Us old cowboys sure do like havin' you around and you're one of us now! Anythin' you need, all you gotta do is ask! We ain't never gonna forget this and how you saved us boys! Iffin' it weren't for you, we'd be waiting for a hangin' and then they'd find somethin' on all you boys! And we're gonna be just fine now all because of YN!"

"Oh, Curly Bill!" you shout, covering your mouth with your hands.

You're so moved yourself, you jump into Curly's arms and he growls while holding you close. The two of you hold each other for a moment.

"I never thought you'd kiss me, YN," Curly Bill whispers. You lay your head on his chest. You rub your nose against Curly's and he chuckles, while flicking his tongue. He kisses your forehead and cannot believe you are there with him. Curly cannot remember a time when he felt more overwhelmed.

"Hey! Let's celebrate!" Pony Diel shouts. "Let's go to the restaurant! You ain't working today, right?" The older cowboy looks at you.

"She ain't working today if I have anything to say about it!" Curly shouts. "My girl has the day off!" At that, you jump back into Curly's arms and his cowboys cheer again. You can't stop hugging your cowboy. You hold him so tight for so long, he tickles you to get you to let go. You beam up at him and kiss his chin. Curly can't believe how smitten you seem to be. He shakes his head and flashes his big white teeth, unable to stop grinning. "You're something else, you know that?" Curly asks, rubbing your back.

"Is that alright with you?" Curly asks, holding your chin with his hand.

"I would love the day off!" You shout, laughing.

Curly chuckles. "No, about being my girl? This old cowboy would really like that!"

"I thought you'd never ask!" You gaze deep into his laughing eyes.

Ringo looks over and smiles. He shakes Curly's hand and tips his hat to you. "I wish I had been there, YN. Sounds like you had them dead to rights. I would have loved to see that." Ringo takes his hat off and looks into your eyes, savoring your beauty and feeling elated for Curly. Most of the ladies ignored Curly and devoted their attention to Ringo, a gentleman, Shakespearean quoting gunfighter. But this time, Curly Bill got the girl and although Ringo can't help but be somewhat envious, he couldn't be happier for old Curly.

"Well, I couldn't let those Earp brothers do that to you or anyone of you. It seems like they're always looking to blame you boys for everything. I had to make a stand!"

"That's very brave of you." Ringo responds, his face looking down.

You shrug . "I'm not afraid of them."

Ringo quickly looks up. "You're probably the only person around here who isn't," Ringo says, admiring your spirit. He knows that most people, especially a woman would cower to the Earp brothers. They could intimidate the toughest of men and Ringo knew that Wyatt Earp could give Bloody Bill Anderson a run for his money. And here you are, a gorgeous and strong woman, willing to stand before Spicer, a hard nosed judge with a propensity for hanging trouble makers. Ringo tries to imagine what you must have looked like; he recalls how Ike Clanton imitated your stance, but to actually see you like that has Ringo's imagination going wild.

"Old Curly's never gonna stop talking about this, YN. Clearly he's really impressed with you. And not just because you're generous and sweet; you're absolutely beautiful and strong too. I guess the kind of woman we all want."

You feel a sense of sadness for Ringo at first. Then he straightens up and continues talking. "But I'm happy for Curly. Women don't usually pay him any mind. Not that he isn't a good catch. He's always been a really good friend."

"I can't help but really like Curly Bill," you answer. "He's so funny and always looks out for me. And I think he's really cute," you continue, your voice falling into a whisper.

Ringo grins. No one ever accused Curly Bill Brocious of being cute and he has never been described as handsome. Sometimes Ringo felt a tad guilty when women would swoon over him and ignore Curly, even when he had money. So Curly is over the moon having one of the most beautiful women in Tombstone letting the old cowboy court her.

"I'm glad you feel that way. He's lucky he's got you. He'll be telling me everyday. Curly Bill will enjoy watching other men look at him with envy when he's walking through town with you." Ringo smiles.

"That's so sweet, Johnny!" Your gratitude dances in your eyes and Ringo absent mindedly strokes your face.

"He doesn't need to tell me how lucky he is."

At that moment, Curly walks over to where you are. "How's my girl?" Curly Bill asks, beams. "Damn, I can't believe I'm sayin' that! I ain't never gonna tired of callin' you that!" Curly Bill strokes your face and brushes your hair behind your ear and then kisses your forehead. His heart pounds with excitement and sensuality. He wants to kiss you again, but exercises some self control as he doesn't want his gang of rowdy cowboys to scare you or make you feel uncomfortable. In fact, he would rather just have a quiet dinner with just the two of you. But he would enjoy celebrating with his friends as long as they behave themselves which can be a problem. Especially in the presence of a lovely lady like yourself. They seem to line up just to get a chance to tip their hats to you or be close enough to smell your perfume. Being near a beautiful woman would make any man feel special, especially for these boys who never receive attention from women unless they're paying well.

Ike and Billy Clanton were still talking about the showdown at the courthouse.

"Yeah, and then YN told them Earps that she was goin' to testify for us and then she marched right over to the courthouse and she weren't even afraid of old Spicer or them brothers!" Ike exclaims to some of the other cowboys.

"She really said that?" Johnny Barnes asks, leaning forward.

"Yep," Billy interjects. "She was somethin' else! I ain't never seen anyone talk to them Earps that way!"

"Hey boss!" Ike Clanton shouts toward Curly Bill. "Let's take YN to camp and we can have a party there! Then she can stay with you, Curly!"

Curly Bill looks down at you. He can't imagine a beautiful woman like yourself enjoying the cowboys' nightly shindig. They get drunk and loud and play music, but now they've got a beauty to dance with. If Curly Bill would let anyone close enough to touch you.

"Well, I don't think YN wants to party with a bunch of smelly cowboys!" Curly howls, his arm around your waist.

"We ain't gonna bother her none!" Billy Clanton mumbles.

"After what my girl done today, I'd rather just stay in town. And the hotel is still serving dinner so I'm takin' her there! And they're gonna give us the best damn table in the place!" He looks at you again, his hand never leaving your waist.

"Iffin' that's alright by you, YN!"

You lay your head on Curly's shoulder and he feels mighty special and important.

"I just want to be with you, Curly Bill!" You look up at him and your eyes light up the night.

"Well that settles it, boys! And after what YN did today for us old cowboys, she's gettin' whatever she wants and well, she wants me!"

At that moment, you kiss the big rustler on the cheek and he chuckles. The Cowboys watch while Curly Bill escorts you to the hotel and hopes you'll invite him to spend the night with you.