Catering to Diaper Freaks

A new spa catering to "diaper-wearing" adults who want to role-play as young children has opened in a small town in New Hampshire, alarming some local residents.

"The Diaper Spa," in Atkinson, NH says it is an "ageplay-friendly, adult diaper spa" to "nurture and pamper all diaper lovers and enthusiasts in richly immersive experiences." The spa is a "safe and judgment-free zone" for visitors to pamper themselves with "snacks…playtime, story time, nap time, cuddle time, changing time, coloring, nursery rhymes and sing-a-longs," according to its website.

Services advertised include an "Adult Baby-Diaper Lover" (ABDL) nursery spa care at $300 an hour, virtual playdates at $200 an hour, and an all-day "premier spa experience for the little one inside of you" for $1500.  "In the summer, you can play with your water wings and floaties poolside, picnic under the tree with your teddy bear, play marbles on the patio, or swing on the front porch swing and serve tea to your dollies on the porch. In the winter, we can make snow angels, build snowmen, drink hot cocoa from beneath clouds of whipped cream and sprinkles, and decorate gingerbread men or sugar cookies," the spa's website advertises. 

Answered Prayers

Vegan Bridezilla Has a Beef With Wedding Guests

 A vegan bride refused to "compromise her ethics" at her wedding as she didn't want to host so-called meat-eating "murderers".  Not only did she want guests to commit to being vegan for her big day – but she also wanted them to pledge to give up animal products forever.

In a resurfaced post shared online, the 20-year-old bride reportedly turned to a Facebook group called Vegan Revolution to express her controversial wishes for her wedding.  "Some family members were told they are not invited to my wedding because we don’t want to host murderers at our wedding which is supposed to be one of the happiest days of our lives," she wrote.

The bride went on to claim they have "consistently attacked" her and her partner for being vegan. "When I broke the news to them, all I got was attacked because I don’t want the weight of hosting people that still kill animals (the very beings we are trying to protect) at my wedding on my conscience," she added.  Even if guests RSVP'd and complied to eating vegan products for the day, she said she still wouldn't "feel comfortable if they just went back to eating meat the next day".  She concluded: "I’m sorry if that makes me 'rude' or a 'bitch' because I’m not compromising my ethics."

Inevitably, the Reddit post received an influx of opinions, with one writing: "I can't imagine anyone (other than mom) being really upset they will miss this doozy of a dramafest."   "She sounds exhausting...I wonder if she even got married or is still married? Hope she’s happy with her vegan ways. Hope she’s made some new friends cause it sounds like she lost a whole bunch of them after this," another comment read.

Meanwhile, a third added: "It's 100 per cent within your rights to serve a vegan menu at your wedding (provided you also have safe dishes for people with dietary restrictions/allow them to bring their own food). It's not within your rights to insist others become vegan like you."

 

Indian Men Conned by "Impregnating Women" Scam

Mangesh Kumar was online when he came across a video from the "All India Pregnant Job Service" and decided to check it out. The job sounded too good to be true: money - and lots of it - in return for getting a woman pregnant.   It was, of course, too good to be true. 

So far, the 33-year-old, who earns 15,000 rupees ($180) per month working for a wedding party decoration company, has already lost 16,000 rupees to fraudsters - and they are asking for more.  But Mangesh, from the northern Indian state of Bihar, is not the only person to fall for the scam.

Deputy superintendent of police Kalyan Anand, who heads the cyber cell in Bihar's Nawada district, said there were hundreds of victims of an elaborate con where gullible men were lured to part with their cash on the promise of a huge pay day, and a night in a hotel with a childless woman.   So far, his team have arrested eight men, seized nine mobile phones and a printer, and are still searching for 18 others.

But finding the victims has proved more tricky.

Poster of a "Hot Jesus" Raises Temperatures in Spain

A poster in the southern Spanish city of Seville that depicts a young, handsome Jesus wearing only a loincloth has unleashed a storm on social media, with some calling it an affront to the figure of Christ and others posting lewd remarks and memes poking fun at the image.

The poster by internationally recognized Seville artist Salustiano García Cruz shows a fresh-faced Jesus without a crown of thorns, no suffering on his face and minuscule wounds on the hands and rib cage. It was commissioned and approved by the General Council of Brotherhoods, which organizes the renowned and immensely popular Holy Week processions ahead of Easter in Seville. 

As soon as it was unveiled last week criticism of it went viral on social media and a debate erupted over how a resurrected Christ should be depicted. Many called it a disgrace, inappropriate, too pretty, modernist and out of line with Seville’s Easter tradition.

A catholic group called the Institute of Social Policy (IPSE) dubbed it a “shameful aberration.”  “This poster is a true aberration.  A sexualized and effete Christ. We consider this poster a serious offense that completely decontextualizes the true meaning of #SemanaSanta [Holy Week].”

The artist, García, defended the work and dismissed the poster’s critics as old fashioned.  “There is nothing revolutionary in the painting, ” García told Atlas news agency. “There is contemporaneity, but all the elements that I have used are elements that have been used in the last seven centuries in sacred art." In another interview published by El Mundo daily, Garcia responded to criticism from conservative groups that the depiction of Jesus was “effeminate” or “homoerotic.”  “A gay Christ because he looks sweet and is handsome, come on! We are in the 21st century,” García said.  The artist said he used his son, Horacio, as the model for the poster.

The General Council of Brotherhoods has so far ignored calls to replace the poster before Holy Week at the end of March. In past years, some posters for different Catholic celebrations were withdrawn following criticism.  Seville Mayor José Luis Sanz labeled the controversy “artificial.”   “I like the poster,” he said, adding that not all Holy Week posters can be the same each year. “Some posters are riskier, some more classical, some are more daring.”

 

Justin Timberlake - Selfish

The U.S. Supreme Court Sinks to a New Low

Trump's Supreme is permitting the state of Alabama to execute a man using a method that is considered too cruel to use on animals.  The fact that the Supreme Court considers criminals to be less than animals shouldn't come as a surprise, as they subjugated women two years ago when they denied them the basic human right to control their own bodies.

Tonight, Alabama will execute a killer by suffocating him to death with nitrogen, an experimental method that vets have deemed too cruel for most animals and has been likened to torture by the United Nations. 58-year-old Kenneth Eugene Smith will become the first person in the U.S. (and possibly the world) to be executed by nitrogen hypoxia after his appeal that it was untested and could lead to a cruel death was rejected by the courts. 

He has spent more than three decades on death row over a 1989 murder-for-hire plot, and last year survived a botched attempt to kill him by lethal injection after bungling orderlies at Holman Prison in Atmore spent 90 minutes trying to find a vein before the execution warrant expired. 

Smith will be taken from his holding cell and strapped to the same gurney on which he survived the lethal injection attempt, before he is given the chance to make a final statement to his family and that of his victim.  A curtain will then be pulled back over the small window in front of the viewing area before an industrial-style respirator mask is fitted to his face and pure nitrogen pumped through it for at least 15 minutes - causing him to die from a lack of oxygen. 

It will be the first attempt to use a new execution method since the 1982 introduction of lethal injection. Vets have ruled out nitrogen as a method of euthanasia for most animals other than pigs over fears it may cause them to suffer unnecessarily and risk the health of others in the same room.  

Attorneys for Smith have waged a legal battle to halt the second attempt to kill him, arguing the state is seeking to make Smith the 'test case' for the new method, which they argue violates the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Smith's initial 1989 conviction was overturned on appeal, but he was retried and convicted again in 1996.  The jury recommended a life sentence by a vote of 11-1, but a judge overrode that and sentenced him to death. Alabama no longer lets judges override jury decisions in death penalty cases.  John Forrest Parker, the other man convicted in the slaying, was executed in 2010.

Some states are looking for new ways to execute inmates because the drugs used in lethal injections, the most common execution method in the United States, are increasingly difficult to find. 

Three states - Alabama, Mississippi and Oklahoma - have authorized nitrogen hypoxia as an execution method, but no state has attempted to use the untested method until now. The state has predicted the nitrogen gas will cause unconsciousness within seconds and death within minutes.  But doctors and rights organizations have raised alarm about the state's plan.  The experimental method is so grim that the American Veterinary Medical Association ruled it was too 'distressing' to be used when euthanizing animals in 2000. 

Experts appointed by the United Nations Human Rights Council cautioned they believe the execution method could violate the prohibition on torture.  Much of what is known about death by nitrogen gas comes from industrial accidents or suicide attempts. Dr. Philip Nitschke, a euthanasia expert who designed a suicide pod using nitrogen gas and appeared as an expert witness for Smith, said nitrogen can provide a peaceful, hypoxic death, but said he has concerns about Alabama's proposal to use a mask.   Nitschke said that Smith's facial hair, jaw movements and involuntary movements as he feels the effect of the nitrogen could impact the seal.   If there are leaks, Smith could continue to draw in enough oxygen, 'to prolong into what could be a very rather macabre, slow process of slowly not getting enough oxygen,' Nitschke said.  He said he could envision scenarios where the execution goes quickly or seriously awry.  

Robert Grass, an attorney for Smith, told federal courts that they are challenging the specific way the state plans to administer the nitrogen.  They argued the use of a gas mask puts Smith at risk for a prolonged and painful death or choking to death on his own vomit.   Rev. Jeff Hood, Smith's spiritual confidante, told the Times he expects he will thrash against the gurney.  'This is not going to be a peaceful experiment. I think it's important for people to realize, when you strap someone down like that, you can't expect someone who's choking to death — suffocating to death — to not resist,' he said. 

Meanwhile, a Catholic priest set to enter the execution chamber to accompany Smith during his final moments fears he could be put at risk by the new technique.  The Reverend Jeff Hood told the WFSA: ''We are being exposed to nitrogen gas in a way that nobody in human history has ever been exposed to nitrogen gas.  It's a scary thing, there is no doubt about that. But it's not scary enough to make me turn away from what god has called me to do."

 

Big Stink on American Airlines

An American Airlines plane was reportedly forced to return to the gate due to high wind .  But not the meteorological kind-- but rather a passenger’s smelly farts.

The big stink over the flatulent flyer unfolded while a recent flight from Phoenix, Arizona, to Austin, Texas, was still on the ground, according to a viral Reddit post.    “Before most people had boarded, I observed that this man was audibly disgruntled about something, maybe hungover, rough day idk, but as soon as he sat down he was grumbling about something under his breath, like ‘fucking hell’ or something,” user lamgalatx wrote.

After the majority of passengers had boarded, the man reportedly exclaimed: “You thought that was rude? Well how about this smell” — and proceeded to pass the proverbial gas.  “(I don’t know) what provoked that comment, and while kinda funny to overhear, it was uncalled for especially coming from a grown man on an airplane nonetheless,” the user wrote.   But the excessively farting passenger’s gross behavior didn’t end there.

“The man who just purposefully farted moments ago decides to loudly and condescendingly say ‘Yeah, everybody, let’s just eat the smelliest food possible all at the same time,’” the poster wrote.   “A guy in the row over replied, ‘If you don’t like it you can fly private’ to which fartman says ‘That’s so fucking rude,’ and another person nearby chimes in ‘I think we’d all agree you’re the rude one here,’” the witness added.

At one point, flight attendants intervened and told the transgressor, “That’s enough.”  The plane was taxiing to the runway but came to a stop.   “An announcement comes over saying ‘Apologies for the interruption but we are returning to the gate, we will give you more info when we have it,’” the user wrote

“We get back to the gate and a flight attendant comes back and informs Fartman that he will not be staying on this flight. He simply replies, ‘I don’t understand’ and she tells him they’ll talk about it off the plane.”    The man grabbed his bag and got off the plane.  “We all breathed a sigh of relief when he was removed, I think most ppl were on edge about what he may say or do next. The trip was only delayed by 15-30 minutes, so all in all I think American handled it swiftly,” he added.

Reddit users didn’t hold it in with their gas-related jokes.  “Maybe another flight was low on gas?” one person wrote. “He missed an opportunity to fart on the way out and yell, ‘SMELL YOU LATER!’” another quipped.

 

Finally, We Have Proof that Inflation is Mostly Corporate Greed

The COVID pandemic exposed how exploitative unchecked corporations have become. After CEO's loudly blamed the Biden administration’s stimulus package for rising costs, numerous studies have shown  that the causes of rising inflation during the pandemic had very little to do with rising costs of labor or the supply chain. Even as the pandemic began to wind down, costs to consumers remained high and corporate profits continued to surge.

There has been proof positive of price gouging and even collusion. Right-wing media made a lot of hay around the skyrocketing prices of eggs during the pandemic. It turned out that two of the country’s largest egg producers were colluding (and had been for decades) on raising prices. Companies like Chick-fil-A have had to pay out class action lawsuit settlements for their pandemic price gouging. Chick-fil-A continues to raise prices on their food at the expense of the consumer. 

A now a new report compiled by think tank Groundwork Collaborative shows the inflation we continue to see across the country is mostly driven by corporate profits. According to their findings, “corporate profits drove 53 percent of inflation during the second and third quarters of 2023 and more than one-third since the start of the pandemic.” To put that into perspective, only 11% of price growth in the previous 40 years (before the pandemic) was due to corporate profits.

While corporate profits were up across the board, some companies have really taken advantage of raising their prices. Groundwork Collaborative highlights (or lowlights) Procter & Gamble Co. and Kimberly-Clark Corp, which control 70% of the United States’ diaper market. The companies have increased their prices 30% since 2019. Costs for wood pulp, a major component in making diapers, soared between 2021 and the beginning of 2023, driving up consumer costs. However, those costs have gone down 25% over the last year and yet, no such savings have been passed on to American families.

These new findings add to a federal report released late last year showing profits had increased beyond labor costs for the first time in 18 months. President Joe Biden called attention to that report when he  called out “price gouging” in December of last year, admonishing companies pulling in record profits in a speech on supply chains: “Let me be clear: To any corporation that has not brought their prices back down — even as inflation has come down, even [as] supply chains have been rebuilt — it’s time to stop the price gouging.” 

 

German Protests Againtst Neo-Nazi Party's Plan for Mass Deportations

Demonstrations against the far-right Alternative for Germany (AFD) party swept across the country this weekend, strengthening calls to ban the party, following a report that its members had discussed plans for mass deportations. 

In Hamburg and Munich, rallies had to be dispersed due to significantly more people attending than expected. Aerial images from around the country showed masses of people braving Germany’s bitter January temperatures to fill city squares and avenues. According to police figures, in Berlin alone on Sunday, some 100,000 people gathered on the lawns of the Reichstag, which houses Germany’s lower house of parliament.

Placards at the protests stressed Germany’s particular responsibility to stand up to the far right, given the country’s dark history under Nazi rule, which led to the Holocaust. “Never again is now” and “Now we can see what we would have done in our grandparents’ position,” read some banners.

The protests were prompted by an investigative report earlier in January, revealing that AFD members met with far-right extremists in Potsdam in November to discuss a “remigration” plan should the AFD come to power. According to report by nonprofit research institute Correctiv, Martin Sellner, a far-right extremist and leader of the Austrian “Identitarian Movement,” proposed a “master plan” that would “reverse the settlement of foreigners.” The focus would be asylum seekers, non-Germans with residency rights and “non-assimilated” German citizens, the report said. The idea of sending people to a “model state” in North Africa was also discussed — similar to a 1940 Nazi plan to deport millions of Jews to Madagascar.

Following publication of the report, comparisons were immediately drawn with the 1942 Wannsee Conference, also in Potsdam, at which senior Nazi officials formulated the “Final Solution to the Jewish Question.”

Leading legal organizations in Germany strongly condemned the extremist plans. “It is an attack on the constitution and the liberal constitutional state,” a group of six organizations, including the German Judges’ Association and the German Lawyers’ Associationx, said last week. “The legal legitimacy of such fantasies [of mass deportation] must be prevented by all legal and political means.” 

Large-scale protests against the AfD were last seen in 2017 and 2018 after the party was elected into the Bundestag — marking the first time in nearly six decades that a far-right party entered parliament. The turnout then, however, was dwarfed by the numbers over this weekend.  

 

 

The Price of Eggs is a Sign of Russia's Precarious Economy

For a microcosm of how the Ukraine was has warped Russia’s economy, look no further than a carton of eggs.  The grocery staple has been in short supply in recent months and prices have skyrocketed, prompting Russians from Belgorod to Siberia to form lines reminiscent of Soviet times. President Vladimir Putin has publicly apologized, blaming the egg shock on the government. Last month, a poultry-farm boss known as “the Egg King” survived an assassination attempt shortly after authorities started investigating his farm due to high prices. Behind the soaring price tag—up around 60% from a year earlier—is a convergence of factors symptomatic of the economy’s travails.  

Western sanctions have hurt the poultry industry by scrambling supply chains for farm equipment previously coming from Europe. The weak ruble has made imports of feed and veterinary products more expensive while a labor crunch has left some suppliers without enough farm hands. Booming government spending, meanwhile, has increased wages, boosting demand for food and other goods.  

All of which makes the egg shock a manifestation of the imbalances building in Russia’s war economy.  The country confounded expectations last year by recording respectable growth as Moscow boosted military production and doled out subsidized loans to consumers and businesses. Yet such largess has left the economy running too hot. As a result, annual inflation ended up 7.4% last year, nearly double the central bank’s goal, and the government’s mortgage programs have fueled a housing bubble. 

Economists now expect growth to slow as the central bank raises interest rates and sanctions continue to bite.  “The government looks like a bunch of firefighters who run from one small fire to another with a bucket because they cannot eliminate the underlying inflation problem,” said Alexandra Prokopenko, a former Russian central bank official who is now a nonresident scholar at the Berlin-based Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center. 

As the war in Ukraine enters its third year, the egg crisis shows how Russia is struggling to balance clashing economic imperatives—financing the war, placating popular discontent and keeping the economy balanced, including through stable prices. It’s an impossible trilemma,” said Prokopenko. “Achieving the first two goals requires higher spending, which leads to high inflation, which prevents the achievement of the third goal.” 

Inflation is a growing concern for Putin ahead of presidential elections slated for March. A crackdown on opposition parties and all independent media should ensure he scores an easy victory, but the Kremlin sees elections as a way to legitimize the president’s rule, requiring a degree of genuine popular enthusiasm.

Mexican Cartels Fueling Ecuadoran Violence

Ecuadorian gangs running rampant in the out-of-control country have "unlimited money" to fight a bloody war with government forces thanks to investment from Mexican cartels.

The South American nation has been plunged into misery after a turf ware between rival gangs escalated so badly that the government has designated gangs as terrorist organizations. The state has even allocated funding to buy 24 million gun cartridges, a figure that far exceeds the population of 17.8 million.

A state of "internal armed conflict" was declared earlier this month after a swathe of attacks in its prisons and gunning down of officials, many of them in the Guayaquil area. The outbursts came after one of the country's most notorious drug kingpins – José Adolfo Macías Villamar, or 'Fito' – escaped from jail.   Experts say that Ecuador, on the continent's west coast, is in a strategically important position on the cocaine route. And despite having no cocaine-production history its position between Peru and Colombia makes it a victim to the brutal industry.

And backing from huge Mexican cartels means the Ecuadorian gangs are acting with impunity and have the funds to fight back against the government crackdown, according to Rita Floyd, Senior Lecturer in Conflict and Security at the University of Birmingham in the U.K.    According to Floyd, the two main Ecuadorian gangs, Los Lobos and Los Choneros, have backing from the Jalisco New Generation and the Sinaloa cartels.  "These groups are very dangerous. They are accountable to no one but themselves. They have no regard for the state, and – in the war between the government and the gangs – they have declared civilians legitimate targets," Floyd said.

"Similar to terrorists, organized crime groups rule through fear. Local people often have little choice but being drawn into working with them. It is that, or die," she said.  "The Mexican cartels that are said to have ties with them have unlimited money to fight Ecuador's president and military. Moreover, it is not their people dying in this war, but local recruits for either camp."  Floyd added that this could "essentially" create a proxy war between Mexican cartels and the Ecuadorian government to keep cocaine flowing freely.

 

Arianna Grande - Yes, and?

State of Violence Continues in Ecuador With the Murder of Federal Prosecutor

A prosecutor investigating an attack on a TV studio in Ecuador last week has been killed, officials say. César Suárez was shot dead in the port city of Guayaquil, the attorney general said.  It is not clear whether Suarez's death is linked to his investigation into the TV station attack.

During the dramatic incident last week, masked men burst into public TV channel TC's studio during a live broadcast and threatened them at gunpoint.  Pictures that were broadcast live on air showed journalist Jose Luis Calderon pleading with the gunmen, while station staff were forced to sit or lie on the studio floor.  One cameraman was shot in the leg, while another's arm was broken during the attack.

Local media reports that prosecutor Suárez was shot while driving near his office. Unverified footage on social media also shows a vehicle with bullet holes in the window.  In an interview with newspaper El Universo one day before his death, Suárez said he had not been given police protection despite interrogating the 13 people arrested following the TV station attack.

His killing is the latest in a surge of violent incidents across Ecuador, which has seen the escape of two gang leaders from prison, hundreds of prison guards taken hostage and explosions in several cities.  In response, President Daniel Noboa declared a 60-day state of emergency and ordered the military to "neutralize" 22 armed groups which he redefined as terrorist organizations.

Reacting to Suarez's death, Attorney General Diana Salazar said: "It is impossible not to be broken by the death of a colleague in the fight against organized crime. We will remain firm in his name: for him, for the country, for justice.  Thank you for your work, César. Rest in peace," she said.

 

NFL Cash Grab Shuts Out Millions of Fans

Last Saturday, of lot of footballs fans missed what will surely go down as the "Peacock Game."  Not the Heidi Game or the Ice Bowl, I suppose.  But it was a marquee Wild-Card weekend playoff contest-- one that was unexpectedly walled off from the viewing public, all because the NFL sold the game to a mega media conglomerate, NBCUniversal, which wanted to use it to attract new subscribers for Peacock, its paid streaming service, which features French bike racing and 19 zillion reruns of Law & Order.  

The Chiefs-Dolphins game remained available over the air, for free, in the Kansas City and Miami area, however.  But if you are anywhere else in the country (and didn’t ante up for Peacock), allow me to inform you that the Chiefs are back, routing Miami 26-7. I don’t know if the defending Super Bowl champs are all the way back, but they’re back enough that I’d be worried about playing them next. Andy Reid is doing clever Andy Reid stuff and Patrick Mahomes has the Patrick Mahomes Look. 

The weather was almost a bigger story than Peacock, with the game at Arrowhead was played in subzero temperatures—minus four at kickoff.  It was very cold, cold enough that Andy Reid’s mustache quickly froze with icicles, making the 65-year old coach’s face look like an arctic walrus. Miami played numb. 

Mahomes even cracked his helmet on a feisty run, a sliver of red plastic flying skyward like a rental car bumper. As for Swift, she was there, celebrating in a toasty skybox, tucked between Mahomes’s wife, Brittany, and Travis' mother, Donna.  Earlier in the week, the analyst and former coach Tony Dungy blamed the coverage of Swift for “disenchanting” NFL fans-- a load of BS, considering that NFL ratings are up big (likely due in part to Swift), and Dungy was about to work The Peacock Game, perhaps the most single-handedly disenchanting programming decision in league history. 

On The Peacock Game, I hate to admit it-- but we should expect more. Television is in decline, at least the old way of watching: the cable “bundle” is dwindling, replaced by streamers like  Amazon Prime, Max, Peacock, etc. These companies need to grow, and it makes sense that they would try and weaponize the one thing on television everyone still watches: the NFL. And that’s what NBCUniversal wants to know: if fans will love it enough to pay them for it. 

The streamer announced Sunday that 23 million people watched the game, a figure Peacock admitted includes those local audiences who watched it on local affiliates in K.C. and Miami (not via streaming).   So we don't know for a fact whether the cash-grab was successful or not-- they will almost certainly make another attempt at it.

Alas, this is our new reality. You’re paying Amazon if you’re been watching Thursday Night Football, Sunday Ticket is off to YouTube, and as cable continues to bleed subscribers, more streaming games are sure to follow.  The NFL’s desire for every eyeball has to recognize the new realities of modern media, if it wants the dollars.  And I mean serious dollars-- Peacock reportedly paid $110 million for its playoff game.  For football fans shut out of the Chiefs-Dolphins game, that is cold comfort.

 

New Year's Resolution

Deeply Disturbed Black Man Running for NC Governorship

Martin Luther King Jr. was just an “ersatz pastor” and a “communist,” and the 1960s civil rights movement was “crap,” according to a series of Facebook posts by Mark Robinson, the leading GOP candidate to be North Carolina’s next governor.

Robinson, who is currently the state’s lieutenant governor, regularly criticized King and the civil rights movement for years on Facebook ― specifically on MLK Day. The Black politician also downplayed slavery, rejected the idea that he’s part of the African American community, and attacked the late congressman and civil rights icon, John Lewis.

In January 2018, Robinson mocked people who celebrate King, who he said was just a subpar pastor. He didn’t mention King by name, but he was clearly talking about the civil rights leader in his series of messages posted on MLK Day that year.   “It is at once funny and sad that so many people will follow the lead of a bunch of atheists and worship an ersatz pastor as a deity,” he wrote in one post.

Robinson also used MLK Day to dismiss the idea that racism is real. “The ‘state of race relations’ exist chiefly within your own mind,” he said.  “‘Free at last! Free at last! Thank God almighty we are free at last!’ Now what?” he said in another post that day.

Those posts came exactly one year after Robinson wrote that he planned to work on MLK Day, a federal holiday, to show that he wasn’t “a leach” on society and allowing the government to cut him a break.  “Tomorrow I will do my ‘service to the community’ by going to work to continue to support myself and my family so I’m not a leach on said community,” Robinson posted on Jan. 16, 2017.  He also wrote on MLK Day that year, “I don’t like Communist. No matter what ‘color’ they are.”

Robinson hasn’t limited his MLK Day commentaries to MLK himself.  On MLK day 2017, Robinson posted that actual real-life slavery isn’t as bad as slavery “of the mind,” which is Satan’s greatest tool. “Slavery of the mind is FAR worse than physical slavery,” the GOP gubernatorial hopeful wrote. “Slavery of the mind cannot be seen, cannot be made illegal, and is and always has been the greatest tool of Satan used against man..... and men against each other.”  In May of 2017, Robinson said that the 1960s civil rights movement was “crap” and a communist effort.

That same month, in a particularly long post, he wrote that he doesn’t consider himself part of the “African-American’ community” because this community murders its children and “sucks from the putrid tit of the government and then complains about getting sour milk.”

Robinson is already known for his wildly offensive comments about women, LGBTQ people and Muslims, in addition to fueling bonkers conspiracy theories. The reason he’s still the Republican front-runner for governor is because he’s modeled himself after Trump ― a strategy that some North Carolina political analysts predict will fail him in the general election in this swing state.

 

China's Xi at War With His Military

China's President Xi is "trying to gain control of the military, and I think that he is thinking that he needs officers who are prepared to actually fight," said Gordon Chang, a senior fellow at the Gatestone Institute and author of "China Is Going to War."   "There is a sense that many of China's general officers don't want to fight," according to Chang. "And so we really have a force led by an officer corps that is ambivalent about going to war."

Since taking power in 2012, Xi has overhauled China's military by cutting deep into its personnel, seeking to improve military-civilian cooperation, and reshaping its structure, among other reforms.  His efforts reached a crescendo on December 29, 2023, when Xi dismissed nine senior officers in one stroke.

Since then, reports and US intelligence have suggested the decisions were to root out corruption — a motive often cited when Chinese officials are abruptly dismissed.  However, to Chang, this theory misses the point.  "Because if that were the case, all of them would be sacked," he said.

For him, Xi is likely purging officers who are reluctant to go to war.  He cited Chinese Air Force General Liu Yazhou, who cautioned against an invasion of Taiwan and received a suspended death sentence in February 2022, per the AsiaNews agency.  BI also spoke to Joel Wuthnow, a senior research fellow in the Center for the Study of Chinese Military Affairs at the National Defense University in Washington, DC.  He argued that rooting out corruption and readying China for war were aligned goals.

China has been engaged in low-level hostilities with many of its near neighbors.  There is India in the disputed Himalayas, Japan in the East China Sea, the Philippines in the South China Sea, and Taiwan, which China claims as its own territory.   China's incursions in Taiwan's air-defense zone over the last five years have prompted some US Navy and Air Force officials and military observers to predict that China would invade Taiwan in the next few years.

Xi has also been ramping up war-like rhetoric.  In his New Year's address, Xi said China "will surely be reunified, and all Chinese on both sides of the Taiwan Strait should be bound by a common sense of purpose and share in the glory of the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation," according to the official translation of his speech.  Xi drove the message home in a recent face-to-face meeting with Biden, NBC News reported. The network said Xi told Biden at the APEC summit in San Francisco in November 2023 that China intended to take control of Taiwan.  It continued previous interactions on those lines — in November 2021, Xi warned Biden that his administration was "playing with fire" and urged Biden not to encourage Taiwanese independence, calling it "dangerous."

 

How Can Anyone Deny That Trump is a Menace to Society?

Closing arguments at Trump's Manhattan fraud trial were delayed on Thursday following a bomb threat at the Judge's home.  Unfortunately, this is just the latest example of mob-style intimidation by Maga loyalists which has become disturbingly common.

In that same trial last fall, the Judge had to issue a gag order against Trump after he attacked her on social media.  The court employee received up to 30 death threats a day on her personal cell phone and was subjected to antisemitic slurs- the employee ended up receiving around-the-clock security as a result.    The incident is typical of the violent intimidation and dangerous behavior Trump has inspired in his supporters.

In December, a Colorado Supreme court justice faced death threats after ruling that Trump should not appear on the ballot. A week later, Maine's Secretary of State was targeted by a hoax emergency call that a man had broken into her home (known as "swatting") after she made the determination that Trump should not appear on the ballot in that state.

On Christmas day, DOJ special counsel Jack Smith was targeted by swatting-- someone called 911 and reported that Jack Smith had shot his wife, triggering police and EMT response to his house.   Two weeks later, Judge Chutkan was at her Washington, DC home when it was "swatted"-- police responded to a false report that there was a shooting at her house.  And that wasn't the first time Judge Chutkan faced down a threat-- last August, a Texas woman was arrested after calling the Judge's home and saying that she would be killed if Trump didn't get re-elected. 

Trump has frequently encouraged this kind of behavior at this rallies, cloaking this rhetoric in comedy to deflect criticism.  In 2020, one of his Maga supporters (Cesar Sayoc) drank too much purple Kool-Aid-- making a list of twenty people he considered enemies of Trump, and sending them pipe bombs in the mail.  He was sentence to 20 years in prison.

 In 2022, Nancy Pelosi's elderly husband was nearly killed in his home by a right-wing nut who believed all the nutty conspiracies fomented by Trump.  Paul Pelosi had his skull fractured with a hammer and still suffers debilitating effects months after the incident.  And what does Trump do in reaction to that incident?  He still jokes about it at his rallies-- sending a message to everyone that listens to him that the attack was funny and that is was good that a man nearly killed Pelosi in his home.  That it was hilarious.  

And he continues to promote violence, promising that there will be "bedlam" if the appeals court doesn't accede to his ridiculous belief that he should received immunity for his criminal acts.  This guy is a fucking menace and the GOP should have the common sense to nominate another candidate if Trump doesn't end up in jail before then.

 

Lenny Kravitz - TK421

Undeniable Logic

Ecuador's Organized Crime is Trying to Take Down the Country

Ecuador is in a state of crisis to say the least.  Back in October, 35-year-old businessman Daniel Noboa became the youngest person to be elected president of Ecuador. Flanked by heavily armed soldiers, Noboa gave a victory speech saying that he would "give back a smile and peace to the country".

The election campaign was overshadowed by unprecedented levels of violence, which saw one of the candidates, Fernando Villavicencio, assassinated just days before the first round of voting in August.  The murder rate in Ecuador quadrupled between 2018 and 2022 and opinion polls suggested that security was voters' main concern going into the election.  Analysts pointed out that Noboa, who has little political experience, would face an uphill struggle to tackle Ecuador's security problem.

Over the weekend, a 60-day state of emergency has declared in Ecuador after a convicted gang leader vanished from his prison cell.  Adolfo Macías Villamar, better known as "Fito", is the leader of Los Choneros, a powerful gang which is thought to have been behind some of the deadly prison riots in recent months. He was being held in the maximum security wing of a jail in Guayaquil. The emergency measures include the suspension of the right of assembly and a nightly curfew.

Fito is a notorious criminal suspected of having played a role in last year's killing of Villavicencio, whom he had sent death threats.Police said they had noticed his absence early on Sunday and could not find him anywhere in the prison wing. He often defies the authorities, most recently by releasing a "narcocorrido", a slick music video glorifying his criminal exploits, which was partly recorded inside the jail.

To make matters worse, prison riots broke out in six jails after the president declared the state of emergency. Inmates have reportedly taken a number of prison guards hostage and have threatened to kill them if soldiers are deployed to regain control of the penitentiaries.  The unrest was sparked by the escape of the notorious gang boss known as Fito. Ecuador's security forces are still  trying to re-establish order in at least six jails.  Four police officers were also kidnapped after President Daniel Noboa declared a state of emergency.

Overnight, reports emerged  that masked gunmen broke into the country's public television channel studio during a live broadcast, forcing staff to the floor.   One gunman pointed a pump-action shotgun at the head of one of the captives, who was also threatened with a revolver.  A woman could be heard pleading, "Don't shoot, please don't shoot," while a person could be heard screaming in apparent pain.  "Please, they came in to kill us," a studio employee sent out in a WhatsApp message during the attack. "God don't let this happen. The criminals are on air."  One cameraman was shot in the leg, and another's arm was broken in the attack, the deputy director of news said.

Posting video of the suspects arrested on social media - and their weapons - police said the perpetrators would be "punished for terrorist acts".   Police have made 13 arrests following the attack, which injured two employees. At least 10 people have been killed since the 60-day state of emergency began.

President Noboa said on Tuesday that an "internal armed conflict" now existed in the country and he was mobilizing the armed forces to carry out "military operations to neutralize" what he called "transnational organized crime, terrorist organizations and belligerent non-state actors".  In neighboring Peru, the government ordered the immediate deployment of a police force to the border to prevent any instability spilling over into the country.

 

Jimmy Kimmel Destroys Dimwit Aaron Rodgers

Last week, vaccine denier Aaron Rodgers unwittingly stirred a hornet's nest on Pat McAfee's show when Rodgers insinuated that Jimmy Kimmel's name might show up on documents released as part of the Jeffrey Epstein case. Of course, that was not true-- and Rodger's statements had real-life implications for Kimmel and his family. Rodgers' lies prompted Kimmel to threaten legal action. Then, McAfee apologized on the air. Then, ESPN apologized. That's where things stood until Monday night's monologue by Kimmel:

Couple Consternated by Canine Crapping Cash

Cecil is a Goldendoodle whose owners, Clayton and Carrie Law, describe him as  well-mannered. Carrie went so far to say, “This dog, I swear to God, has never touched anything in his life.”  Well . . . he did touch something very valuable last month, according to CBS Pittsburgh.

It seems that the couple had withdrawn $4,000 from their joint savings account, leaving the envelope stuff with $50 and $100 bills sitting on the kitchen counter. The couple was planning to use the money for a home improvement project.  Half an hour later, Clayton discovered his well-mannered pet was enjoying the most expensive meal of his life-- and leaving torn strips and bits of cash strewn all around.

Clayton told reporters, “I walked back into the room, and then all this cash was on the ground. He’s just . . . standing there, and I’m just like, oh my gosh, he ate the money and I was in shock.”  His wife, Carrie, also recalled the horrifying sight, telling the BBC: “Suddenly Clayton yelled to me, ‘Cecil’s eating $4,000!’” 

The couple immediately contacted the dog’s vet, who assured them that due to canine's large size, consumption of paper only required careful home observation.  But what about that money?

The first part required the painstaking assembly of the uneaten strips of money.  Then came the second part:  waiting for nature to take its course.As reported by Sky News, Carrie shared on Instagram how the couple managed to piece together most of the cash successfully.

“There we are at the utility sink washing this shitty money, yelling ‘Yay! Yes! We got one!’ But it smelled so bad,” Carrie explained.  The bank assured them that as long as the serial numbers on the notes remained visible, the excreted money could be returned.

As such, the couple had to wash each of the crapped cash fragments three to four times before they attempt to reassemble the bills and take the fragments of notes to the bank. After much patience and effort, they gained back all of their money except $450. Carrie jokingly said that she never imagined herself saying, “I’ve laundered money.”

 

GOP Immigration Circus

Happy Anniversary, Insurrectionists!

Members of far-right extremist groups. Former police officers. An Olympic gold medalist swimmer. And active duty U.S. Marines. They are all among the hundreds of people who have been convicted in the massive prosecution of the Jan 6, 2021, riot in the three years since the stunned nation watched the U.S. Capitol attack unfold on live TV.

DC's federal courthouse remains flooded with trials, guilty plea hearings and sentencings stemming from what has become the largest criminal investigation in American history. And the hunt for suspects is far from over.  “We cannot replace votes and deliberation with violence and intimidation,” Matthew Graves, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, has said.

Authorities are still working to identify more than 80 people wanted for acts of violence at the Capitol and to find out who placed pipe bombs outside the Republican and Democratic national committees’ offices the day before the Capitol attack. And they continue to regularly make new arrests, even as some Jan. 6 defendants are being released from prison after completing their sentences.  The cases are playing out at the same courthouse where Donald Trump is scheduled to stand trial in March in the case accusing the former president of conspiring to overturn his 2020 election loss in the run-up to the Capitol attack.

More than 1,230 people have been charged with federal crimes in the riot, ranging from misdemeanor offenses like trespassing to felonies like assaulting police officers and seditious conspiracy. Roughly 730 people have pleaded guilty to charges, while another roughly 170 have been convicted of at least one charge at a trial decided by a judge or a jury, according to an Associated Press database.  Only two defendants have been acquitted of all charges, and those were trials decided by a judge rather than a jury.

About 750 people have been sentenced, with almost two-thirds receiving some time behind bars. Prison sentences have ranged from a few days of intermittent confinement to 22 years in prison. The longest sentence was handed down to Enrique Tarrio, the former Proud Boys national chairman who was convicted of seditious conspiracy for what prosecutors described as a plot to stop the transfer of power from Trump, a Republican, to Joe Biden, a Democrat.

Many rioters are already out of prison after completing their sentences, including some defendants who engaged in violence. Scott Fairlamb — a New Jersey man who punched a police officer during the riot and was the first Jan. 6 defendant to be sentenced for assaulting law enforcement — was released from Bureau of Prisons' custody in June.

On the three-year anniversary of the insurrection, a trio of  rioters were finally arrested in an early morning raid on a Florida ranch. The FBI's Tampa division said 24-year-old Jonathan Daniel Pollock, 33-year-old Olivia Michele Pollock and 27-year-old Joseph Daniel Hutchinson III were all apprehended today in Groveland, Florida, west of Orlando.

Jonathan Pollock had been on the lam since the insurrection. Olivia Pollock and Hutchinson were arrested and charged in June 2021 alongside two others, but they vanished while out on bond awaiting trial. The two others, Joshua Christopher Doolin and Michael Steven Perkins, were sentenced in August.

Prosecutors say the five Floridians spent well over two hours attacking police who were trying to defend the Capitol building on Jan. 6, 2021. Jonathan Pollock, seen in photographs dressed head-to-toe in military-style tactical gear, is accused of leading a charge against law enforcement with a flagpole. Court documents say he screamed while trying to force his way up Capitol stairs: “Let’s go!”

The Floridians allegedly used stolen riot shields, flagpoles and their bare hands to hit, punch and choke law enforcement. Olivia Pollock, who was also dressed in military-style gear, is accused of attempting to steal an officer’s baton.  One of the group could allegedly be heard in video footage of the incident yelling, “We didn’t come all this way just to stand here!” 

Well . . . pretty soon these three losers will be standing before a judge.  Good luck-- you're going to need it. 

Gregory Porter - Everything's Not Lost

Sexual Assaults in the U.S. Military Now Being Handled by Independent Prosecutors

The U.S. military has now opened a new chapter in how it investigates and prosecutes cases of sexual assault and other major crimes, putting independent lawyers in charge of those decisions and sidelining commanders after years of pressure from Congress.

The change, long resisted by Pentagon leaders, was finally forced by frustrated members of Congress who believed that too often commanders would fail to take victims' complaints seriously or would try to protect alleged perpetrators in their units.  The new law was fueled by a persistent increase in sexual assaults and harassment across the military. 

Under the law, new special counsels will have the authority to make prosecution decisions on a number of major crimes, including murder, rape and several other sexual assault-related offenses, kidnapping, domestic violence, making or possessing child sexual abuse images, stalking and retaliation.   In a statement, Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III called it “the most important reform to our military justice system since the creation of the Uniform Code of Military Justice in 1950.”

Senior officials from the military services who are familiar with the new program said they already have more than 160 certified special trial counsels who have taken over the prosecution decisions. The lawyers will be scattered around the U.S. and the world, with larger numbers at bases and locations where there are more service members and more crime.

An independent commission that studied sexual assaults in the military suggested in its report that the use of special counsels would have a positive impact. It said the special counsels would make better decisions on what cases should go forward, resulting in higher conviction rates. Increased convictions, the report said, will encourage more accused perpetrators to make plea agreements, which alleviates the need for victims to testify at trials.  “These outcomes will also increase confidence in the public that the military is correcting its course in the prosecution of special victim cases,” the report said.

The military services have long struggled to come up with programs to prevent sexual assaults and to encourage reporting, including a number of new initiatives in recent years. But they have yet to show any real progress in lowering the number of reported assaults, and anonymous surveys still indicate that many more victims opt not to report.

 

Handguns for the Holidays

Two teenage brothers have been arrested after their sister was shot and died during a row over Christmas presents.  Abrielle Baldwin, 23, was shot in the chest by one brother while she had her 10-month-old son in a carrier, the Florida sheriff's office said.

The brother was then shot by their other sibling, who pulled his own gun.  The shooting followed an argument over who was getting more presents.

Sheriff Bob Gualtieri told reporters the older teenager, who is 15, ran from the scene and tossed his gun away.  The younger brother, a 14-year-old, was taken to hospital in a stable condition and will be taken into custody when he is released.

Local prosecutors will review the case and decide whether to charge him as an adult for the killing of his sister.  The woman was taken to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead, Sheriff Gualtieri said.

He explained the mother-of-two suffered internal bleeding and was unable to breathe - but he added the baby in the carrier was not harmed. The 15-year-old was arrested and charged with attempted first-degree murder and tampering with evidence.

 

Wait a Minute, 2024!

Happy New Year!