#vote Eric Adams out

[news4dzhozhar]

[cyarsk52-20]

#EricAdams and #KathyHochul aren’t changing tunes cuz THEY saw a video of a young black homeless man being held in a chokehold for 15 mins and dying…nope!!Their changing tunes cuz WE saw a video of a young black homeless being held in a chokehold for 15 mins and dying!!

There was people who warned ny voters during the mayoral and governor elections not to vote for these two candidates

The idea that you protect people by excusing killing the mentally ill and homeless is an argument for fascism and eugenics. You protect people with housing, healthcare, compassion. The bloodlust of conservatives is the real sign of what they want, not their empty words.

When i say conservatives I'm including people like Eric Adams and Kathy Hochul. This country is so far right that some Democrats would would rather defend this killing than house and care for people. And they are also the problem

I recall seventeen months ago, I was ridiculed for not being in “full support” of everyone’s favorite candidate running for a particular position. Or, sympathizing with a bigot-lite from Long Island. And seventeen months later… I was right about both of them.

As of this week reading that they’re a bunch of inhumane dinos (democrats in name only) they’re all like “I told you so “

I know cause I’m one of them

FQ Eric Adams and Kathy Hochul a nigpine and a hew! I’ll be feeling like this again after they get voted out of office mark my words

[decolonize-the-everything]

United Auto Workers (UAW) President Shawn Fain lambasted the mass arrests of pro-Palestinian protesters on college campuses across the country, while emphasizing the union’s call for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. “The UAW will never support the mass arrest or intimidation of those exercising their right to protest, strike, or speak out against injustice,” Fain wrote Wednesday on the social platform X. “Our union has been calling for a ceasefire for six months. This war is wrong, and this response against students and academic workers, many of them UAW members, is wrong.”

Hundreds of students and faculty members have been arrested over the past two weeks as pro-Palestinian protests roil college campuses nationwide. Demonstrators have taken to university yards and streets and started encampments to protest Israel’s wartime campaign in Gaza and call for a halt in U.S. aid to Israel. Tensions spiked in New York and California on Tuesday night, resulting in the arrest of hundreds of demonstrators. The New York Police Department on Tuesday went through a second-story window of a building at Columbia that was seized by demonstrators. Police cleared out the protesters, and videos quickly circulated on social media showing the arrests at Columbia, which has served as ground zero for the mass college protests that have quickly spread across the country.

New York Mayor Eric Adams on Thursday confirmed around 300 people were arrested. At the University of California, Los Angeles, counter-protesters clashed with pro-Palestinian demonstrators when they attempted to dismantle the encampment on that campus. Los Angeles Police Department officers responded, but it was not immediately clear how many arrests were made and whether there were any injuries. The leadership at UAW 4811, the union chapter representing postdoctoral scholars and researchers of the University of California campuses, voted on Wednesday to hold a strike authorization vote as early as next week should the “circumstances justify.”

“Should the university decide to curtail the right to participate in protected, concerted activity; discriminate against union members or political viewpoints; and create or allow threats to members’ health and safety, among others, UAW 4811 members will take any and all actions necessary to enforce our rights,” UAW 4811 wrote in a statement. Fain on Wednesday said the UAW is calling for the release of students and employees. “And If you can’t take the outcry, stop supporting this war,” Fain added. The UAW backed a long-term cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war in December. The war has lasted nearly seven months since Hamas’s Oct. 7 attacks against southern Israel, during which the militant group killed about 1,200 people and took 250 others hostage. Israel’s retaliatory campaign in Gaza has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians, according to local health officials.

[renthony]

Just curious. How bad has Biden been at controlling COVID-19 in your view?

First: I already responded to a similar question you left on this post.

Second: Biden has been atrocious for COVID-19 safety and management. COVID-19 is still killing people, and our president has done a horribly insufficient job in mitigating that. "Better than the Republicans" is not the same thing as "good" or "effective." Biden's abysmal reaction to COVID-19 is part of why I'm so thrilled that the Uncommitted campaign for the Democratic primary has achieved some success. That particular campaign is focused on ceasefire in Palestine, but the People's CDC explained in a statement how Palestine is also very much a public health issue. We need to scare the bastard and actually do some of that "pushing him left" that people claimed they'd do after getting him elected. Though it seems to me like a lot of people just settled for, "okay, we got rid of Trump, we don't have to worry anymore."

Third: While I'm at it, people have to do more than vote. You have got to get involved. You have got to do more than participate in the presidential election once every four years. Join a union (may I recommend the IWW?), follow the guidance of The People's CDC, volunteer for your local Food Not Bombs, get involved in a tenants union like the Autonomous Tenants Union Network, read Riot Medicine, get trained in first aid and get involved in a street medic group, read up on your local politics and get involved on the small-scale, do something in addition to voting in the presidential election. Even if you're limited in how much you can personally participate, find the people who are talking about these issues and signal boost them, and share the information with others who may be more able to participate more. If you can tell people to go vote in the presidential election, you can also tell them to go do other things, too.

Now, with all of that out of the way, here are some links related to Biden's abysmal COVID-19 response:

During his 2020 campaign, Biden promised immediate $2K stimulus checks. Instead, he delivered $1,400. Sources: [x] [x] [x] [x] [x]

Velena Jones for NBC Bay Area: "‘Too expensive': Bay Area residents shocked over new COVID vaccine prices"

Reuters: "COVID vaccine manufacturers set list price between $120-$130 per dose"

Joseph Choi for The Hill: "Free COVID-19 test program to be suspended for now"

Disability activist Alice Wong writing for TeenVogue: "Covid Isn't Going Anywhere. Masking Up Could Save My Life," and the follow-up article, "COVID and the 2024 Election: What Biden and Democrats Owe High-Risk People."

Laura Weiss writing for The New Republic: "Democrats Can't Keep Ignoring Covid in 2024."

David Cohen and Adam Cancryn for Politico: "Biden on '60 Minutes': 'The Pandemic is Over.'"

Alex Skopic for Current Affairs: "COVID-19 is Still a Threat. So is Biden’s CDC."

Adam Cancryn for Politico: "Biden Appears to be Over Covid Protocols."

Paul Thornton for the Los Angeles Times: "Covid Still Rages, and the Biden Administration Isn't Helping."

Eric J. Topol for the Los Angeles Times: "The U.S. is facing the biggest COVID wave since Omicron. Why are we still playing make-believe?"

We should have free, universal testing. We should have free, universal vaccination. We should have free, universal treatment. We should have financial assistance for those of us who can't work outside the home. We should have mandated work-from-home for any job that can be done remotely. We should be emptying prisons and paying attention to the way disease and abuse proliferate inside their walls. We should have COVID-19 safety PSAs and government support for universal masking. We should have free distribution of N95s. We should have mandated masking in medical settings and public spaces. We should have a higher minimum wage. We should have healthcare reforms. We should have strong worker protections. We should have improved infrastructure. We should have a president who gives a single flying fuck about how many of us are dying.

And we have none of it.

But we sure seem to have money to keep dropping bombs, arming cops, terrorizing the vulnerable, and imprisoning innocent people to use for slave labor.

[kp777]

By Miles Parks

NPR

June 7, 2023

Why are Republicans abandoning one of the best tools the government has to catch voter fraud? That simple question is the focus of a new NPR investigation, published Sunday.

The tool is the Electronic Registration Information Center, better known as ERIC. It was created almost a decade ago as a way for states to share government data, in an effort to keep their voter rolls up to date. It allows election officials better insight into when their voters move and die and the rare times when they vote twice in different states, which is illegal.

"The little secret is that maybe more than 10 years ago, if somebody voted in Ohio, in Florida, in Arizona and Texas, you would have never known," Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose, a Republican, said in an interview with NPR in February. "With ERIC, we can compare our voter rolls to those states."

Eight Republican states have now pulled out of ERIC, including many with voting officials who are on the record as praising the partnership as recently as a few months ago. Ohio pulled out a month after LaRose spoke to NPR.

J. Christian Adams, a conservative elections attorney, has long been a critic of how ERIC operates. But he told NPR: "It's this crazy zeal to get out of ERIC ... that is going to cause voter fraud to flourish."

So what happened? Here are five takeaways from NPR's investigation:

1. A far-right website kicked things off

The story starts in January 2022, when a far-right website called the Gateway Pundit, which has pushed conspiracy theories in the past, began writing about ERIC. Up until then, the partnership was considered a quiet bipartisan success story, with member states that spanned the political spectrum.

NPR's investigations team analyzed hundreds of thousands of social media posts on a handful of social media sites frequented by election deniers. We found the Gateway Pundit's coverage started the far right's fixation on the program:

See Chart.

Roughly a week after the first Gateway Pundit article, Louisiana Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin, a Republican, announced his state would become the first to pull out of ERIC, citing "concerns raised by citizens, government watchdog organizations and media reports."

2. Local "election integrity" groups are a political force

NPR found that while Ardoin did not make a big public show out of pulling out of ERIC, he did bring the announcement to maybe the only constituents at that time who would even care: a local group of conservative activists gathered in Houma, La.

The crowd, assembled for an "election integrity town hall," applauded for 15 seconds when Ardoin announced he was pulling the state out of ERIC. The event was publicized less than 24 hours before Ardoin's office released its statement on ERIC.

NPR's investigation also found these sorts of community election integrity groups to be critical in the effort to discredit ERIC across the country.

A group called Protect Your Vote Florida published a page on its website called "How to Influence Florida Legislators to Suspend Contract with ERIC!"

"The STRATEGY is to run a campaign directed at key Florida legislators," the group wrote in the post, which included a list of the state's lawmakers and contact information. "Hand delivered letters, emails, phone calls, and social media activity will all be utilized to maximize impact."

Emails acquired by NPR through public records requests showed election officials began to field questions from voters and state lawmakers shortly after these calls went out.

3. A Trump ally has coordinated an election denial machine

Cleta Mitchell is known by many for working with former President Donald Trump to try to overturn the 2020 election. The attorney was on the infamous call where Trump asked Georgia election officials to "find votes."

In the time since, she's been building an election denial infrastructure.

Her podcast, "Who's Counting," has become a central hub for stolen election narratives, and she's also started a coalition of grassroots groups across the country called the Election Integrity Network.

NPR's investigation found Mitchell to be a ringleader of sorts for the effort to dismantle ERIC.

She even hosted a secret ERIC summit with red state lawmakers last summer, according to documents shared with NPR by a nonprofit watchdog group called Documented.

Secretaries of state from the first five states to withdraw from ERIC attended the event, according to one attendee.

See chart.

4. Republican primaries are a driving force behind the ERIC exodus

In Louisiana, when Ardoin made the decision to leave ERIC, he was gearing up to run for reelection in a state Trump won by almost 20 percentage points. He was facing numerous challenges on his right. And ERIC was becoming a priority for Republican voters.

"We started hearing it on the campaign trail," added Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen in an interview with NPR.

Allen ran for his office last year, and shortly after the Gateway Pundit published its first article, he made a campaign promise to pull out of ERIC if he won. This January, he followed through, and Alabama became the second state to withdraw.

Secretaries of state in Missouri, West Virginia and Ohio — all states that have pulled out — have announced campaigns for higher office next year, or are expected to run.

In Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis is a candidate for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. DeSantis appointed Cord Byrd as his secretary of state last year, and the state's stance on ERIC shifted almost immediately.

NPR's investigation found that before he was secretary, Byrd regularly joined election integrity calls hosted by Mitchell.

5. ERIC withdrawals will make for "dirtier voter rolls" and an emboldened far right

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican, put it simply in an interview with NPR: The states that have left ERIC "indirectly said, 'We're going to have dirtier voter rolls.' "

Brianna Lennon, a Democrat who oversees voting in Boone County, Mo., told NPR that will surely be the case in her county.

Before Missouri joined ERIC, the elections office relied on returned mail to find out if a voter moved to another state.

"That's what we'll have to go back to using," she said.

Election experts say less accurate voter rolls have a direct impact on voters, from longer lines at precincts to mail ballots and information getting sent to the wrong places.

Lennon told NPR she's worried about what the ERIC saga means for the 2024 election cycle. She had gotten a sense recently that community election integrity groups were gaining more traction in her state, but she says the secretary of state's decision was the first major policy decision she's seen that lined up so directly with their goals.

"I'm sure there are going to be ripples that come from this particular move and I'm not exactly sure what the end will be," she said. "I don't think this is an isolated thing."

Read or listen to the full investigation here.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

SEP 22, 2023

The Senate has confirmed three top defense leaders. Last night it confirmed Air Force General Charles Q. Brown Jr. to replace Army General Mark A. Milley as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff when he retires at the end of the month. Today, it confirmed General Randy A. George as Army chief of staff and General Eric M. Smith as Marine Corps commandant.

The Senate filled the positions at the top of our military by working around the hold extremist senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) has put on more than 300 military promotions, allegedly because he objects to the government’s policy of providing leave and travel allowance for service members who have to travel to obtain abortions. 

Jennifer Rubin of the Washington Post focused on the House Republicans today, though, when she wrote: “The GOP completely gone off its rocker—incapable of passing House spending, ranting and raving at AG, cooking up ludicrous and baseless impeachment, unable to greet Zelensky with joint session. This is not normal. This is egregious. You'd think the reporting would reflect it.”

Indeed, the House Republicans remain unable even to agree to talk about funding the government, let alone actually passing the appropriations bills Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) agreed to four months ago. Today, right-wing extremists in the House blocked a procedural vote over a Pentagon funding bill, keeping what is normally an easily passed bipartisan bill from even reaching the floor for debate. McCarthy acknowledged to reporters that he is frustrated. “This is a whole new concept of individuals who just want to burn the whole place down. It doesn’t work.”

The extremists do indeed appear unconcerned about the effects of their refusal to fund the government, and since they have the five or six votes they need to sink the measures McCarthy wants to pass with only Republican votes, this handful of representatives are the ones deciding whether the government will shut down. 

McCarthy could pass clean funding bills through the House whenever he wishes, but he refuses. To do so would mean working with Democrats, and that would spark a vote to throw him out of the speakership. And so, rather than keep the members in Washington, D.C., to work on the appropriations bills over the weekend, McCarthy recognized he did not have the votes he needs and sent them home.

The extremists are bolstered by former president Donald Trump, who posted on his social media platform today that the Republicans in Congress “can and must defund all aspects of Crooked Joe Biden’s weaponized Government…. This is also the last chance to defund these political prosecutions against me and other Patriots. They failed on the debt limit, but they must not fail now. Use the power of the purse and defend the Country!” 

Experts say shutting down the government would not, in fact, end the former president’s legal troubles, but he is actually doing more than that here: he is trying to assert dominance over the country. As Representative Adam Schiff (D-CA) said: “Let’s be clear about what the former president is saying here. House Republicans should shut down the government unless the prosecutions against him are shut down. He would deny paychecks to millions of working families & devastate the US economy, all in the service of himself.”

Extremist leader Representative Matt Gaetz (R-FL) responded to Trump’s statement with his own: “Trump Opposes the Continuing Resolution” to fund the government,” he wrote. “Hold the line.” Ron Filipkowski of MeidasTouch noted: “House Republicans refuse to fund the government to protect Donald Trump.” 

Trump’s accusation that President Biden is weaponizing the Justice Department against him and others who tried to overturn the results of the 2020 election is the opposite of what has really happened. Not only has Biden stayed scrupulously out of the Justice Department’s business—leaving in place the Trump-appointed leader of the investigation into Biden’s son Hunter, for example—but also we received more proof yesterday that it was Trump, not Biden, who weaponized the Justice Department against his enemies. 

Nora Dennehy, who abruptly resigned from former special counsel John Durham’s investigation into the origins of the FBI’s investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, explained in her confirmation hearing to Connecticut’s state supreme court yesterday that she quit because Trump’s Department of Justice was tainted by politics. Before joining the probe, she said, “I had been taught and spent my entire career at [the] Department of Justice conducting any investigation in an objective and apolitical manner.” 

But Trump and his loyalists expected Durham’s investigation to prove that there was a “deep state” conspiracy against him, and then–attorney general William Barr seemed to be working to support that fantasy, even though there was no evidence of it (as shown by the fact the investigation ultimately fizzled). Barr was, she thought, violating DOJ guidelines in his public comments about the investigation and in his consideration of releasing an interim report before the 2020 election.

“I simply couldn’t be part of it,” Dannehy said. “So I resigned.”

The resistance of the extremists to McCarthy’s leadership is spilling over into foreign affairs as well. Today, Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky was in Washington, D.C., where he met with President Biden at the White House and with leaders at the Pentagon, and spoke to a closed-door session for the Senate. But he did not speak to the House of Representatives. While McCarthy met with him privately, the speaker maintained that “we just didn’t have time” for him to address the House. 

As part of their demands, House extremists want to cut funding for Ukraine’s defense. This would, of course, work to strengthen Russian president Vladimir Putin’s hand in his war against Ukraine. Earlier this month, former Central Intelligence Agency director John Brennan told MSNBC that it is “absolutely essential” to Putin that Trump win back the White House in 2024. “I think it is Putin's main lifeline in order to find some way to salvage what has been a debacle in Ukraine for him," Brennan said. "If Trump is able to return to the White House...Putin could have a like-minded individual that he can work with, detrimental to U.S. interests certainly and detrimental to Western interests overall.” The intelligence community assesses that Putin worked to help Trump in the 2016 and 2020 elections, and is pushing pro-Russia and anti-Ukraine propaganda now.

Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III assured Zelensky that the U.S. will continue to support Ukraine and work with allies and partners to make sure it has the weapons it needs. Lara Seligman of Politico reported today that the Pentagon will continue to fund Ukraine operations even if there is a government shutdown. Military activities deemed crucial to national security can be exempted from being shuttered during a government shutdown.

And finally, 92-year-old Rupert Murdoch announced today that he will be stepping down as chair of his media empire, including both Fox Corporation, which includes the Fox News Channel (FNC), and News Corporation, which owns the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post, among other newspapers. In 1996 the Australian-born mogul launched the Fox News Channel with media specialist Roger Ailes, who had packaged Republican presidential nominee Richard Nixon in 1968 by presenting him to audiences in highly scripted television appearances. 

The Fox News Channel initially presented news from a conservative viewpoint, but over time its opinion shows, delivered as if they were news, came to dominate the channel. Those shows presented a simple narrative in which Americans—overwhelmingly white and rural—wanted the government to leave them alone but “socialists” who wanted social welfare programs demanded their tax dollars. Isolated in the fantasy world of FNC, its viewers became such fanatic adherents to right-wing politics that FNC wholeheartedly trumpeted Trump’s Big Lie after he lost the 2020 presidential election because viewers turned away from FNC when some of its personalities acknowledged that Biden had won..

Angelo Carusone, president of Media Matters for America, said today that “Murdoch created a uniquely destructive force in American democracy and public life, one that ushered in an era of division where racist and post-truth politics thrive.”  Margaret Sullivan, formerly the Washington Post’s media critic, wrote in The Guardian that FNC was “a shameless propaganda outfit, reaping massive profits even as it attacked core democratic values such as tolerance, truth and fair elections.” Murdoch, she wrote, wreaked “untold havoc on American democracy.”

Murdoch sees it differently. In his resignation letter, he attacked “bureaucracies” who wanted to “silence those who would question their provenance and purpose” and “elites” who “have open contempt for those who are not members of their rarefied class.” “Most of the media is in cahoots with those elites, peddling political narratives rather than pursuing the truth,” he wrote. 

Forbes estimates that their media empire has enabled Murdoch and his family to amass a fortune of more than $17 billion.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[wrestler-smash-or-pass]

Weekly Wrapup 3/10/24

This Week's Rankings:

Utami Hayashishita - 88.9% smash

Jon Moxley (Dean Ambrose variant) - 84.6%

Eddie Guerrero - 80.5%

Edge and Beth Phoenix - 75.1%

KENTA - 75.1%

Unholy Union (Alba Fyre and Isla Dawn) - 74.3%

Carmelo Hayes - 71.6%

Bear Boulder - 69.1%

Pretty Deadly (Elton Prince and Kit Wilson) - 59.9%

Minoru Suzuki (Current Day) - 51.8%

Randy Orton with a mustache - 50.9%

Sami Callihan (CZW Era) - 26.4%

Gangrel - 24.1%

Gorgeous George - 21.4%

Average smash rating this week: 61.0%

More stats under the cut, along with my observations, commentary, and some of my favorite tags...

Most total votes this week (most enthusiasm)

Jon Moxley (Dean Ambrose) - 364 votes

Minoru Suzuki - 361

Utami Hayashishita - 343

Edge and Beth Phoenix - 338

Eddie Guerrero - 303

And least total votes this week (least enthusiasm)

Sami Callihan - 178 votes

Gorgeous George - 187

Unholy Union - 206

Bear Boulder - 217

Carmelo Hayes - 222

The closest poll was Randy Orton with a mustache, who won 115-111

Top Ten Overall

Kris Statlander - 91% smash

Athena - 90.2% smash

Hikaru Shida - 89.7% smash

Utami Hayashishita - 88.9% smash

Minoru Suzuki (Young Variant) - 88.7% smash

Swerve Strickland - 88.3% smash

Toni Storm - 88.1% smash

Hiroshi Tanahashi - 87.7% smash

Hangman Adam Page - 86.4% smash

Bianca Belair - 86.4% smash

Bottom Ten Overall

Vince McMahon - 3.9% smash

Ric Flair - 4.6% smash

Kane (Corporate variant) - 10.1% smash

Miracle Violence Connection - 11.8% smash

Gene Munny - 12.4% smash

Spike Trivet - 12.% smash

Kevin Sullivan - 13.1% smash

Triple H (Terra Ryzing variant) - 18.6% smash

Eric Bischoff (NWO) - 20.0% smash

Gorgeous George - 21.4% smash

Top Women Overall

Kris Statlander - 91% smash

Athena - 90.2% smash

Hikaru Shida - 89.7% smash

Utami Hayashishita - 88.9% smash

Toni Storm - 88.1% smash

Bottom Women Overall

Eve Torres - 47.1% smash

Carmella - 47.8% smash

Nikkita Lyons - 48.2% smash

Julia Hart (Cheerleader Variant) - 49.8% smash

Kelly Kelly - 50.3% smash

Top Men Overall

Minoru Suzuki (Young Variant) - 88.7% smash

Swerve Strickland - 88.3% smash

Hiroshi Tanahashi - 87.7% smash

Hangman Adam Page - 86.4% smash

Hikuleo - 86.0% smash

Top Tag Teams

The Golden Lovers - 80.4% smash

Unholy Union - 74.3% smash

Best Friends - 66.7% smash

Motor City Machine Guns - 65.5% smash

Roppongi Vice - 62.7% smash

There were some new additions to the overall lists this week. Utami Hayashishita earned a spot on both the top overall list and the top women's list, and Gorgeous George just barely kicked Charlie Dempsey off the bottom overall list.

We've now had three polls on Jon Moxley, and the ranking is:

Current AEW Mox - 84.8% smash

Dean Ambrose - 84.6%

CZW Mox - 82.3%

Also, people prefer non-mullet Eddie Guerrero (80.5% smash) to Eddie Guerrero with a mullet (77.0% smash), and people prefer Randy Orton sans mustache (62.3% smash) to Randy Orton with mustache (50.9% smash).

Also like...88.7% of you would have done Minoru Suzuki when he was young, but only 51.8% of you would do old Suzuki? To echo the sentiments of a few reblogs, is this not the "sexualize that old man" website?

In actual blog news, the 250th poll was posted today, and we hit 500 followers a couple weeks ago but I forgot until now. Thank you so much to everyone who's followed, submitted poll requests, reblogged, liked, and otherwise interacted with this blog!

And now for some of my favorite tags and comment

@lghockey on Gorgeous George: #what in the revolutionary war is that haircut

@booboo-eyedbambi on Bear Boulder: #i need him to squish me like he's trying to get the last of his toothpaste out of me

@midcarder on Minoru Suzuki: #the only reason to not fuck suzuki is because you're afraid

@regalityandcoffee on Carmelo Hayes: #on one hand hes hot#in the other hand i once had a dream he tried to kill me so- I once had a dream that William Regal put drugs in my suitcase as I was going on vacation with Mox. Wrestlers are rude af in dreams.

[dreamsweet]

im gonna get accused of being a russian bot for this but it’s insane to me how people are like “at least vote in local and state elections and maybe you’ll get some good people in!” as if the biggest thing politicians do on a regular basis isn’t lie out of their asses. the nc house got a republican supermajority that can overrule the democrat governor’s veto because a representative who ran and was voted in as a democrat switched parties and there’s no precedent for any kind of recall process so she’s just in there until the next election. look at eric adams slashing the nypl budget so the nypd has hundreds of millions extra to terrorize new yorkers. not to mention sinema and fetterman on the national level. like come the fuck on

[queer-book-character-tournament]

Okay!!! So I’ll give everyone a few hours to recover from all of that and wait until tomorrow (April 1st, sorry guys no prank here just a queer battle) to post the final round Gideon Nav vs Ianthe Tridentarius vs Eric Bittle

This will last one week so everyone has plenty of time to get their votes in for the final winner and then we’ll start the bonus polls which so far consist of: The Great Gideon Face Off (a battle for the ultimate Gideon since we had like three submitted to the tournament), The Simon Showdown (same thing but for Simons), Blonde Short King Queer Jock Battle (Andrew vs Bitty, no one asked for this I just think it would be fun so I’m doing it), The Ultimate Round Four Divorcee Loser (Ronan vs Harrow), and since it doesn’t seem they will do battle in the main tournament The Ultimate Round Four Divorcee Winner (Adam vs Gideon), Crow Divorce Challenge (Jesper vs Wylan), Fox Divorce Fight (Andrew vs Neil), Bone Girl Battle (Nina vs Harrow vs Nona), Carry On My Wayward Son (Kade vs Jack vs Nancy), International Incident (Henry vs Alex), Time Traveled To Legal Marriage and Divorce (Jane vs August), Into The McQuistonverse (all submitted Casey McQuiston characters throwing down), War of Hearts (Magnus vs Alec), Ari/Arati Third Try: Divorce Addition (Ari/Arati vs Anna), Divorce Is Buy One Get One (Kieran vs Mark vs Cristina), Shadow Hunter Show Down (Helen vs Aline), Magnet Clicking OUT Of Place (Kit vs Ty), Wake Me Up Inside (Jordan vs Hennessy)

I’m open to more ideas for bonus rounds but that’s what’s slotted in the meantime!

[qqueenofhades]

You know what’s fun on election night? Living in a city where the elected mayor is ALREADY A FELON where the primary was thrown out in court because of video evidence of ballot stuffing so you had to vote for someone who may not actually win the election and now your primary is happening AFTER the actual election. Who is gonna be my mayor? Who the fuck knows!

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/04/nyregion/bridgeport-connecticut-mayor-election.html

Look, I know this is technically not New York, but also: New York, what the hell are you doing? Eric Adams is literally insane, you elected George Santos, you blew a number of winnable races that probably gave the Republicans the House, and now these shenanigans? Y'all need to just sit down and think really hard about your life choices. Mmmkay.

[beardedmrbean]

Newly released body camera footage contradicts claims made by New York City Councilman Yusef Salaam, one of the infamous Central Park Five, regarding a recent traffic stop.

The incident, which occurred Friday night, prompted Salaam to accuse the police of racial bias and lack of transparency.

Salaam, who was on his way to dinner with his wife and four children, was pulled over for having overly tinted windows. The brief encounter, captured on the officer’s body cam, lasted less than a minute and concluded with Salaam being released after identifying himself as a councilman.

Despite the video evidence indicating a routine traffic stop, Salaam criticized the officer for not explicitly stating the reason for the stop.

“This experience only amplified the importance of transparency for all police investigative stops, because the lack of transparency allows racial profiling and unconstitutional stops of all types to occur and often go underreported,” Salaam, a Democrat, said in a statement.

NYC Mayor Eric Adams commended the officers involved, emphasizing the professionalism, courtesy and effective communication displayed during the incident. The New York Police Department later confirmed that Salaam was also in violation of state law for driving a vehicle with out-of-state plates and excessively tinted windows.

The police stop in New York City on Friday casts a renewed light on a police transparency bill, called the How Many Stops Act, a proposal Salaam supports that City Council members are set to vote on Tuesday to override Mayor Eric Adams’ veto.

It would require officers to publicly report on all investigative stops, including relatively low-level encounters with civilians. Despite being invited for a ride-along by Adams to showcase the bill’s potential negative impact, Salaam declined, citing the recent traffic stop as a reason.

Officers are not required to give a reason for a stop, but Salaam said the police should have done so voluntarily.

City Council Member Sandy Nurse said she was on a video call with Salaam and other people when he was pulled over. Nurse said she heard Salaam ask the officer for the reason for the stop, and none was given.

Marc Claxton, a former NYPD detective and director of the Black Law Enforcement Alliance, echoed the mayor’s sentiments, praising the professionalism exhibited by both the officer and Salaam during the encounter. Claxton emphasized that in the absence of the ongoing legislative context, the incident would likely have gone unnoticed, resembling routine stops that occur regularly in the city.

The New York City Benevolent Association president, Patrick Hender, called for an apology from Salaam and other elected officials who had criticized the police officers involved. Claxton, however, expressed doubt that an apology would be forthcoming, stating that the incident was a routine and professional interaction with no grounds for personal grievances.

In an interview, Salaam denied using his title to evade a ticket. He explained that he was in the process of transferring the registration of his vehicle from Georgia to New York. Despite moving back to New York in December 2022, Salaam still maintains ownership of a home in Georgia and has family residing there.

He expressed unawareness that his tinted windows, permissible in Georgia, violated regulations in New York City. Salaam asserted that had he received a ticket or warning, he would have promptly addressed the issue and had the tinted windows replaced.

[blowflyfag]

Wrestling World presents Wrestling Maniacs: JUNE 1999

BAM BAM BIGELOW: IS HE FOR REAL??

He’s big, he’s bad, he’s bald! He’s Bam Bam Bigelow and he’s after Goldberg! The man known as “The Beast of the East” will soon let the wrestling world know that he is “for real” as he continues to make life miserable for Bill Goldberg and anyone else who stands in his way!

By BT

[Bigelow goes for the pin on Jim “The Anvil” Neidhart.]

MONDAY night television record breaking wrestling WCW Nitro was recently interrupted as a man with a head full of tattoos walked out. Bam Bam Bigelow emerged and let it be known that he wanted Goldberg and he wanted him now. The announcements proclaimed that this man “does not work for our company!” He stomped through the crowd and security held him back. He demanded to wrestle Goldberg and, yes, the fans wanted to see it. 

Even though this man did not work for WCW, Eric Bischoff probably felt he had to prove something. Bigelow was most recently seen in ECW, and Bischoff wanted to prove that Goldberg was better than any wrestler in ECW. He agreed to allow the match, but the match never took place. As Goldberg stood in the smoke, the huge Bigelow jumped Goldberg from behind. They brawled back and forth until there was another pull-apart. Within a hour Bam Bam Bigelow went from being a ECW main-eventer to successfully challenging one of the top men in the business of pro wrestling!

When Scotty Bigelow was born on September 1, 1961 no one would have imagined this New Jersey-native would grow up to be the monster he is now. Rumored to have been a bounty hunter before getting into pro wrestling, he always left a mark everywhere he has ever wrestled. The man known as the “Beast From the East” is on a  mission to win the WCW World title and many feel he may be one of the few men who could actually beat Goldberg.

[Bam Bam gets in the face of former New York Giants’ linebacker Lawrence Taylor at a press conference before their WrestleMania bout.

Bam Bam has flames tattooed on his head and likes nothing better than tattooing his opponents.]

Bigelow made his debut in the sport in the ‘80s and is trying to make his name well-known as the 90’s come to a close. He wrestled many years on the indy scene in the U.S. He was trained by wrestling legend Larry Sharpe and later sued Sharpe for his rights to wrestle. He went to the WWF in ‘85, but left to wrestle in the New Japan Pro Wrestling rings in Japan. There, he was a big favorite of the Japanese due to his size and his agile ability. He was voted as one of the most popular U.S. wrestler to ply his trade in Japan.

He returned to the WWF in 1993 with Luna Vachon and joined Red DiBiase’s Million Dollar Corporation. He went to the Finals of the King of The Ring ‘93, losing to Bret Hart. He would then team with Luna to beat Doink and Dink at WrestleMania X in ‘94. Although he would lose in the first round of the King of The Ring ‘94 Tournament, he would finish the year with victories at SummerSlam ‘94 (teaming with IRS to beat The Headshrinkers) and Survivor Series ‘94. At Survivor Series, he would team with King Kong Bundy, Tatanka, and the Heavenly Bodies to beat Lex Luger, Adam Bomb (WCW’s Wrath), Mabel and the Smoking Gunns. 

The next year didn’t start very well for Bigelow as he teamed with Tatanka only to lose to 1-2-3 Kid (X-Pac) and Bob Holly in the finals for a WWF Tag Team Tournament at Royal Rumble ‘95. And then, he would have what many feel was the match of his career.

Undertaker and Sting fan, Charlie Gentry, doesn’t think Bigelow has a chance in WCW. “Bam Bam got beat by Lawrence Taylor at WrestleMania XI. How do you think he is going to beat Goldberg?”

Lawrence Taylor made sports page headlines when he faced Bam Bam Bigelow in one of the co-main events of the 11th ‘Mania. LT won the match, as he was seconded by an “All Pro” squad (including current WCW star Steve Mcmichael) and serenaded by Salt ‘n’ Pepa. Taylor’s WrestleMania appearance may have been the lowest point in the career of Bigelow. Taylor was much better than Karl Malone or Jay Leno, but he was a celebrity outside of the sport. He came in and pulled a big upset on the beast. Bigelow came into the bout thinking there was no chance of defeat, but left the ring with his head down.

His relationship with DiBiase was strained by the loss to Taylor. Bigelow soon turned against the Million Dollar Corporation. Two months later he teamed with Diesel (Kevin Nash). Bigelow and Diesel teamed at the King of The Ring in 1995 to beat Tatanka and Sycho Sid of the Million Dollar Corporation. He soon served his ties with all the WWF and headed to ECW.

Longtime ECW fan Danny Ivy has nothing, but good things to say about Bam Bam Bigelow. “This guy is one of the toughest S.O.B.s in wrestling. He did nothing but kick ass in ECW and that is what he is going to do in WCW.”

ECW history will not be complete without giving the accomplishments of Bigelow. Most notably, he was a well known member of the Triple Threat of Wrestling–Chris Candido, Shane Douglas, and Bigelow. 

During Hardcore Heaven ‘97. Bam Bam beat Spike Dudley with the highlight being Bigelow hurling Spike out of the ring and about four rows deep into ringside spectators. Bam Bam then won the ECW title from Shane Douglas in October 1997. Eventually, he lost it at November To Remember ‘97, to his soon-to-be-partner Douglas. This trio will always be remembered as the most successful in ECW history. They had the “wrestler” (Shane Douglas);  the “showman” (Candido); and “toughman” (Bigelow).

During the Living Dangerously ‘97 PPV, Bam Bam took the TV Title from ECW’s Taz. It was a hard-fought victory for Bigelow. The ending saw Taz go for a submission and Bigelow sent Taz through the ring. Bigelow grabbed Taz from inside the ring and pinned him 1-2-3.

Unfortunately, he lost that title a month later to “Mr. Saturday Night,” Rob Van Dam. 

[Within a hour Bigelow went from working in ECW to successfully challenging one of the top men in the business of pro wrestling!]

Bigelow and Taz continued their feud to Heatwave ‘98 in typical “Beast of the East” fashion in a Death Match with “falls counting everywhere!” At the finish of the match, Taz and Bam Bam went out to the ramp. Bam Bam went for a slam and Taz reversed it and hit a DDT that senf them both through the ramp!!! There was no movement! Bam Bam came out first, but Taz came out next and ran behind Bigelow and put the Taz submission hold on him. Before long. Bam Bam tapped out. Taz was the winner. 

November to Remember ‘98 had The Triple Threat team to go against the trio of Sabu, Taz, and Van Dam, Bigelow’s team was on the losing end, but Bigelow proved to still be one of the toughest wrestlers around. Shortly after this PPV, Bigelow disappeared and then the world saw his debut on WCW Nitro. 

So, will his stint in the “barbwire jungle” of ECW help him defeat Goldberg? Experience may be the key here. Bigelow’s experience may be the final straw that breaks the camel’s back. In a recent, special issue of Wrestling World during a roundtable discussion of Austin/Goldberg, Goldberg scored a measly 4.25 out of 10 points in the “experience” category. Stately Wayne Manor summed it up perfectly when he said, “Do you realize The Nitro Girls have made more appearances than Billybob?” Bigelow’s vast amount of experience from the indies of New Jersey to the rings of New Japan to the mats in the WWF to the “barbwire jungle” of ECW will do nothing but help him in his quest to defeat Goldberg.

[Bam Bam will soon let the wrestling world know that he is “for real” and will continue to make life miserable for Goldberg and anyone else who stands in his way.]

Bigelow has more to worry about than Goldberg, however. Recently, when he went to fight Goldberg, his old buddy Kevin Nash interfered.

“There will not be a match between those two tonight!” said Big Sexy. And, he made sure of it as all three of them battled it out for the top spot in WCW.

No matter which of these three has the title, each could be beat on any given night…by each other! A locker-room source has heard Nash say, “I know Bigelow very well. I have the book on how to beat him. Believe me, all I would have to do is pencil it in and it would be a win for Big Sexy.”

Somehow, we don’t think it would be that easy!

The focus of Bigelow vs. Goldberg would not be complete without these words from wrestling fan Wayne Jarred. “I have to agree with Jim Ross of the WWF, Goldberg is just a copy of Steve Austin. Why is everyone making such a big deal of Bigelow vs. Goldberg? Goldberg is nothing.”

Many fans feel that Goldberg is very overrated and has been fed his opponents, much like modern-day boxers”handpick” their opponents. Could Goldberg survive a “real” opponent? One that has one thing to prove–he can beat anybody and he especially can beat Goldberg? The wrestler known as Bam Bam Bigelow will soon let the wrestling world know that he is “For real” and will continue to make life miserable for Bill Goldberg and anyone else who stands in his way.

[ohyoufool]

FINAL FOUR

COMRADES. We are down to our Final Four, and the fiercest of the fierce are gearing up for an epic showdown.

Lardo, the SMH Manager, wrangler of jock straps and team busses, handily defeated Adam 'Holster' Birkholz in the first round and Eric Bittle himself in the second. Now she faces her greatest challenge since getting men to buy sheets other than that one VERY specific shade of dark blue... taking on one of Bitty's fabled pies.

Does the pie have thumbs? Doesn't matter - voters have so far been enthusiastic about it's success! The Pie eeked out a victory over fan-favorite goalie Chris 'Chowder' Chow in the first round, but came back swinging to a popular landslide victory against Alexi 'Tater' Mashkov. Voters agreed - Mashkov would probably eat the pie and forfeit the round.

Don't forget to vote in the rest of the Final Four (a thrilling matchup between Georgia (state/coach) and Jack Zimmermann!)

Masterpost

[prouvaireafterdark]

Ok this may be a controversial take, but hear me out: I'm 100% sure that a big part of fandom that slanders Lestat for domestic abuse (rightfully!) will eventually forgive him if his redemption arc is good enough. Take Adam Groff from Sex Education for example. He bullied his fellow schoolmate Eric (black openly gay Christian student) for five long years, pushed him into lockers, called him names, stole his lunches, intimidated him to the point that Eric was afraid to cross paths with him. On top of that, Adam was depicted as a typical school bully - tall, menacing, ill-mannered, homophobic, generally dumb, and the list goes on and on. I vividly remember that Adam was the most despised and hated character back when S1 aired. And then season2 gave him more background, his own plotline, it showed his inner struggles, and the audience slowly started to warm up on him. Showrunners continued this trend in S3, where Adam stopped being "bad" alltogether. He acknowledged the need to change not for some other person, but for himself, and started to make real active efforts. Guess what happened next? He was voted 2nd most beloved character in the poll on Reddit. The audience adores him now. Does anyone even remember how Adam was portrayed in S1 - a bully without any nuance? I don't think so. Memory is a beast indeed, and now people only think of this new nuanced version of Adam, and literally nobody cares about his old portrayal. What I mean is: the audience will eventually forgive Lestat if his redemption arc is good enough. The point about memory being a monster easily applies to the real life: the viewers are usually willing to forgive if forgiveness is truly earned, and all the bad stuff just slowly fades away. Once the show is finished, we'll be able to appreciate Lestat's journey as a whole, and people won't be complaining about him being a "typical abuser" in S1. (I have to disagree here, he still has a ton of layers, being abusive doesn't cross this out). Ofc school bullying and DV aren't same things, but the general point still stands. We're talking about vampires here, and they have eternity to reflect on their experiences, forget harmful things and forgive each other. Personally I'm expecting to see a prince-Zuko-level of redemption arc, and considering that the IWTV team loves Lestat so much, I'm willing to believe that they'll pull this off. (btw I don't understand why everyone's talking about only Louis going to therapy, Lestat obv needs it too)

I haven't watched Sex Education, but that's an interesting connection!

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Big progressive wins in Wisconsin and Chicago elections this week show the staying power of left-wing positions on abortion and crime as issues heading into 2024.

Why It Matters: After Democrats became the surprise winners of the 2022 midterms, the twin Midwest results Tuesday in widely watched mayoral and state Supreme Court races showed how the party could energize its base.

• "Everybody needs to understand this, everybody advising candidates, everybody running, everybody looking at putting ballot initiatives forward: Abortion rights are a winning issue," Democratic strategist Jess McIntosh told Axios.

Driving The News: In Wisconsin, Janet Protasiewicz won in the most expensive state judicial race in U.S. history, giving liberals the state Supreme Court majority for the first time in more than a decade. The crucial election carried implications for abortion rights and redistricting in the perennial swing state.

• With Protasiewicz's win, the court could overturn Wisconsin's pre-Civil War abortion ban and revisit the 2022 congressional maps that favored Republicans.

• McIntosh said that she was surprised by the level of engagement with the down-ballot election.

Protasiewicz won by roughly 11 points, and turnout broke the previous record for a spring election not coinciding with a presidential primary, AP notes.

• Voters "went to the ballot because they understood that the right to abortion depended on this seat," she said.

• Though the election was technically nonpartisan, Protasiewicz was backed by Democrats and abortion rights groups including Emily's List.

In Chicago, progressive Democrat Brandon Johnson beat the more moderate Paul Vallas, who campaigned on a platform focused on public safety as the city grapples with high violent crime.

• Johnson's victory handed progressives control over two of America's largest three cities, following L.A. Mayor Karen Bass' win last year.

State Of Play: Tuesday's results — paired with strong Democratic performance in the midterms — underscore that voters "turn out and are responsive to" the party's messaging on key issues including abortion, the integrity of U.S. democracy and addressing crime, Colin Seeberger, a senior advisor at the Center for American Progress Action Fund, told Axios.

• Protasiewicz's victory in Wisconsin shows that "when the American people's fundamental rights are at stake, they really show up resoundingly," Seeberger said.

• Seeberger added that he was "really heartened by just the breadth of the victory."

Abortion proved to be a salient issue in other races last year.

• In August 2022, Kansas voters rejected an anti-abortion constitutional amendment, the first time voters in the U.S. casted ballots on the issue following the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade.

Meanwhile, the results in Chicago were an "affirmation of how Democrats are approaching the issue of crime, which is that they are standing resolutely in support of both accountability and prevention," he added.

Zoom Out: The Midwest victories come after other local elections and legislation have highlighted fissions in the Democratic Party over issues including crime. Republicans have also looked to capitalize on what's been cast as a major wedge issue for Dems.

• A D.C. crime law that would've reduced maximum penalties for some violent crimes entered the national spotlight when it was overturned by Congress and President Biden.

• Last year, San Francisco residents voted to recall progressive District Attorney Chesa Boudin in a divisive election that motivated further party discussion on criminal justice reform.

• New York City's 2021 mayoral election dealt a major blow to progressives with the Democratic primary win of now-Mayor Eric Adams, a moderate who promised to be tough on crime.

The Backdrop: The elections came the same day former President Trump turned himself in and was arraigned following a historic indictment in a hush-money case. He pled not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records.

• The sharp contrast between the public spectacle of Trump's arrest and Biden's relatively calm day evoked the split-screen of the 2020 election.

• Voters ultimately backed Biden's return-to-normalcy campaign — and the White House hopes they will again in 2024, should he face Trump in a historic rematch.

Go Deeper:

• House Dems curb their enthusiasm on Trump arrest

• House Dems target Trump districts for ambitious 2024 push