239 Comments

  1. SDF-7

    Morning, Banjos! I see you’ve earned your triple word score on Scrabble for “fantabulous”.. 😉

    Biden Weighs Sanctions on Russia Over Death of Putin Critic Navalny

    Wait… there’s some aspect of Russia they haven’t sanctioned (or outright stolen from) at this point? I’m surprised… they’ve literally done everything short of a formal declaration of war (and arguably have done several acts of war and piracy).

    Of course this is mainly all trying to look good / saving face since the moron gave the equivalent of a “Syrian red line” comment three years back. Maybe stay out of things unless we actually have a document-able national interest and don’t say things you can’t actually do? Nah… that’s crazy talk for the DC crowd….

    • Not Adahn

      They’ll need to start putting sanctions on Putin-adjacent and Putin-auxiliary entities. You know like Tucker Carlson, the RNC, Fox News…

      • SDF-7

        Yeah — I could see them going after Tucker. The GOPe would be cheerleading them along and there was already muttering about not letting him back into the country. Seize him at customs, seize all his assets for “Russian collusion” then take 20 years to process it “to encourage the others”…

      • creech

        Maybe they can charge Carlson with fraud? There was that time in NYC when he told a tourist it was six blocks to Times Square when it was only four. Tourist was happy when he didn’t have to walk so far but we can’t have folks misleading other folks can we?

      • prolefeed

        The Biden administration ought to issue a stern warning to Russia about any attempts to kill, imprison, issue massive fines, or otherwise intimidate opposition leaders running for President, since allowing an incumbent president to take out the opposition harms democracy and silences dissent.

        /sarc

    • Drake

      The Biden Administration didn’t give a shit when Gonzalo Lira (an American citizen), was jailed and killed in the Ukraine for free speech. Now they care about some Russian guy?

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        They don’t, it advances their narrative but I assume you already knew that.

      • Ownbestenemy

        All in the name to bring up Russia, Russia, Russia again. The comedy of it all is the people will fall for it again.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Shrillary is already on just that.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        We must have democracy in Ukraine even if they don’t hold elections.

    • rhywun

      Their economy has not been harmed from the existing sanctions that I can tell – but it has been pushed into the welcoming arms of enemies that are more belligerent to us than Russia has been since the end of Cold War I.

      China, Arabia, Korea, etc.

      Good job, Brandon.

  2. Tres Cool

    whaddup doh’

    mornin’ banjos

  3. cavalier973

    Every time we sanction Russia, an angel gets its wings.

    • Fatty Bolger

      Was the man he stabbed Corn Pop’s great-great-grandfather?

  4. SDF-7

    Biden’s campaign as delusional as he is.

    Saw some reporting this morning that the PPP admin is going to try to EO their way out of the border in time to look good for the SotU. 1) Well, it isn’t like they don’t have plenty of good examples of EOs that might help (all the ones they explicitly flipped to do the opposite because of OMB on Day 1 and all).

    2) I don’t think it will help Mumbles and Fumbles performance with his dead shark eyes if they actually try to get him to give a speech at this point.

    I’m torn between being cheered up that they might actually need to care about the election (so maybe we’re just over the margin of “fortification” but having DC have to care is good) and thinking that the Machine doesn’t care… just the stupid little parasites who attached themselves too directly to the PPP Admin… Can’t help thinking that they could find a good reason to kick out Kamala (seriously — do you think there’s nothing in her closets they could trot out or threaten to trot out such that she’d have to resign? She can’t even keep staff and has zero political savvy…), then 25th out old Boxer to the glue factory and substitute some other empty suit to keep running things (Hair Gel or Fraulein Reichsfuhrer Whitmer probably).

    For my mental health I should probably try to stick with the “cheered up” thoughts…

  5. cavalier973

    Is the Biden campaign’s “Hail Mary” a commitment to call a limit at 8:00 am instead of 11:00, this time?

    • Fourscore

      So, double Depends night for Joe?

  6. R C Dean

    Gotta say, I’m not on board with frozen embryos as persons. If the freezer fails, for example, and hundreds of embryos are lost, does that mean hundreds of manslaughter charges should be filed against somebody?

    • Nephilium

      I do get entertained by the legal contradictions.

    • SDF-7

      I think at the base it makes sense — but you have to apply context for viability. Yes, they are potentially unborn children (being fertilized and genetically complete) — but like an unimplanted fertilized egg (so handling the unfortunate miscarriages / tubal pregnancies / whatnot), they aren’t viable without further action and accidents (either Universe or human) happen and are more likely to be fatal given their fragile state (your freezer example).

      Malicious acts can / should be prosecuted more severely than “Ooops, my bad” (imho) but at the same time — you can’t hold people or equipment to the same standard as a natal ICU or a pediatrician’s office or whatnot.

      Didn’t read the ruling, hopefully they made that kind of point. Aren’t lawyers supposed to handle nuance / grey areas, after all? If everything was clear, binary and black and white (raycisst!) we wouldn’t need the lawyers, just a flowchart. Except for prominent forest lawyers of course….

      • Old Man With Candy

        they aren’t viable without further action

        Neither is a newborn.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        Neither is a thirty year old still living in your basement.

    • Not Adahn

      It seems like the logical conclusion to personhood beginning at conception. The most obvious thing would be to not generate embryos in bulk so have options for impanation. Yes, that will make fertility treatments more expensive.

      Interestingly enough uber-wokety-woke Canadian TV show Orphan Black took the attitude that frozen embryos were “babies.”

      • SDF-7

        IIRC, that was part of the Catholic Church’s problem with in vitro fertilization to begin with — the high “disposal” rate relative to actual successful implantations. At least they used to be consistent.

    • prolefeed

      I think the frozen embryos are people thing is absurd. But kudos to the state Supreme Court for saying it isn’t their job to essentially write new laws to fix the consequences of brain dead legislative posturing, that the legislature needs to clean up their messes.

    • Gustave Lytton

      No “Every Sperm is Sacred” yet?

    • Grummun

      Is miscarriage now manslaughter?

  7. SDF-7

    SCOTUS Could Set Landmark Precedent in Trump Jan 6 Case

    could… but we all know Roberts hates doing that, so it will depend on if enough of the rest of the court swings one way or another that he has to go along.

    • WTF

      ACB is becoming another Roberts, so I’m not optimistic they’ll get it right.

      • R C Dean

        The Justices are all Dominant Culture people, so yeah, don’t get your hopes up. They’ve bucked the DC a few times, but far more often they enforce it.

      • ron73440

        Remember, these people are chosen by the president and approved by congress.

        Gorsuch might be the closest to an actual free thinker that can slip through.

      • SDF-7

        Kavanaugh seems surprisingly Roberts-ish as well. You would have thought his confirmation hearing and oh… being stalked for assassination might have convinced him that he isn’t getting into those cocktail parties no matter how much he tugs the forelock… but apparently not.

      • Banjos

        It shouldn’t be surprising considering he was handpicked by Kennedy. The only reason why Kennedy retired was because he saw that Kavanagh was on Trump’s potential justice list. He pretty much made a deal with Trump that he’d retire if he was replaced by Kavanagh. Then Trump pretended to act like he was deciding between multiple justices when the deal was already made.

        The court isn’t 6-3 it’s 3-3-3 or really 3-3-2-1 to be more accurate. There are really only 2 conservatives on the court and one libertarian and 3 squishy moderates.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Sort of like Thomas and his idiotic gifts from friends.

  8. SDF-7

    70% of largest U.S. cities lack funds to cover costs; pensions and healthcare are majority of debt

    Why it is almost like decades of pandering to union leaders for votes at the city and state level produces unsustainable contracts no tax base can fulfill…. hmm…. what a shock….

    • Fourscore

      Aren’t they required by law…I had to stop, I was laughing so hard I had tears in my eyes

    • The Last American Hero

      Why it’s almost like decades of tax cattle bailouts, plus Obama rewriting bankruptcy law on a whim convinced pols that it was OK to promise the moon.

      • dbleagle

        The moon to the chosen and shit to the tax cattle.

  9. R C Dean

    I suspect that, to the administration, the “border crisis” is the backlogs in processing illegals so they can be released in-country. Bad optics, you know, those lines and refugee-ish camps at the border. This is an administration so beholden to anti-American leftists that they are funding Hamas and trying to ensure its survival, after all. An EO that actually stops the tsunami of illegals just isn’t in the cards with them.

    • Ownbestenemy

      I am figuring a similar method they employed with the student debt will occur. My guess, an EO that effectively grants citizenship to all; a massive push to register as many as possible on the voter rolls; courts halt the program; admin gives the court a middle finger and use some obscure procedural rule in some unknown law and continue foward.

    • Drake

      The backlog in getting them all mail-in-ballots.

    • JaimeRoberto (carnitas/spicy salsa)

      Judging by the border provisions they negotiated you are correct in your suspicion.

  10. Shpip

    In its eighth annual Financial State of the Cities report, TIA found that the 75 largest cities in the U.S. had $307.4 billion worth of assets available to pay bills but their debt, including unfunded retirement benefit promises, totaled $595.3 billion.

    Remember when one of Biden and Congress’ first acts in 2021 was to shower blue cities and states with printed dollars to shore up their finances?

    And now the same entities are crying poor yet again. Shocking.

    • SDF-7

      Oh, believe me I remember. That’s a big chunk of the money Hair Gel spread around to ensure he didn’t get recalled, after all.

    • Certified Public Asshat

      Dave Smith’s last PotP podcast was on Tucker’s Russian subway adventure. His take was that Tucker was exposing American apathy and why we don’t demand better results from trillions of dollars in spending.

      That one bill alone (American Rescue plan?) was $1.9 trillion and more than Russia’s entire GDP. But our subways are just sewers.

  11. SDF-7

    Nice tune, Banjos — thanks. Hadn’t heard them before… but quite listenable.

    • Banjos

      My pleasure.

    • Sensei

      Some food is inedible — expired or rotten — and other food doesn’t meet migrants’ dietary needs.

      Dietary needs? Like kosher?

    • The Gunslinger

      This pisses me off.
      Do you know what I’m going to do about it? I’m going to go to work every day, pay my mortgage on time and try to save a little money each month. And try to keep government involvement in my life to a bare minimum.
      That oughta teach those fuckers a lesson.

    • Ownbestenemy

      And then antiques fell out of his ass.

      • Not Adahn

        “Wash Thiiiiis!”

        /Caesar

    • Sean

      I mean everyone should have hobbies in their retirement…but maybe he could have chosen something better.

    • slumbrew

      Damn near killed him.

  12. Shpip

    It seems that the recent report of a sheriff’s deputy mag-dumping his own vehicle over a falling acorn had some of the spectators at yesterday’s car race a bit nervous.

    Me at the bar yesterday: It’s the same old story. Boy finds girl, boy loses girl, girl finds boy, boy forgets girl, boy remembers girl, girls dies in a tragic blimp accident over the Daytona 500.

    Bartender: Goodyear?

    Me: No, the worst.

    • Not Adahn

      Surely that didn’t originate with you.

      • Shpip

        Those films really hit a historical sweet spot. I mean you had O.J., best known for cutting and slashing (in those old Avis commercials), before he became known for, uh…

      • Tres Cool

        cutting and slashing ?

      • Not Adahn

        Also juking.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        I always figured he got tired of carrying the bag…

      • cavalier973

        Did Nordberg show up in the TV show? I have an idea he was mentioned.

      • ron73440

        It’s been awhile since I’ve watched, but I think Norberg was a dumb white guy in the show.

        O.J. killed it in the movies, pun intended, but there was a stretch where my wife and I couldn’t rewatch the movies. (we seem to rewatch them every few years)

      • Seguin

        Of course he didn’t, and don’t call him Shirley.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Nice beaver…

      • Tres Cool

        “…just had it stuffed.”

  13. ron73440

    Saw the Dead South in concert with my wife on Saturday.

    3rd time for us and they put on a hell of a show every time.

    • PieInTheSky

      that was covered already

    • Nephilium

      /looks down towards Columbus

      Well, the Intel plant going in there is supposed to be a huge boon.

    • Not Adahn

      Eh, I hear Intel is getting a LOT more, since they’re actually US-owned.

  14. Pine_Tree

    My false-flag prediction for Ramadan: The Iranian government already has a small nuke in Rafah. When Israel messaging and activity spikes in the area, they’re going to set it off. The whole point (of course) will be to make Israel look like the party responsible for nuking half a million people, with all the attendant (ahem) fallout.

    • WTF

      That is sadly plausible.
      And DC will condemn Israel without bothering to try to determine the truth.

    • waffles

      that’s almost incomprehensibly evil to me. but tensions are high so let’s hope things cool before this becomes possible.

  15. Not Adahn

    I ain’t gonna lie. I’d like a mammoth-skin parka.

    https://colossal.com/mammoth/

    Supposedly the calves will be born in 2028.

    • WTF

      Too much “climate change” bullshit for me to take it seriously.

    • Shpip

      It would be neat to see if they could convert the central Siberian prairies back to forest habitat for the mammoths.

      One steppe at a time, I suppose.

      • SDF-7

        Ouch.

  16. cavalier973

    Why are there so many Chinese people in Mexico?

    An April 2023 email to around 500 Border Patrol agents instructed the agents to reduce the number of interview questions for Chinese illegal immigrants who are apprehended.

    The list of questions was cut down from 40 to just five. This allowed a fast-track of the release of Chinese illegal immigrants into the interior of the United States and has made it more difficult for CBP agents to identify national security threats.

    “What is your name?”

    “What is your quest”

    “What is your favorite color?”

    • rhywun

      I’m more interested in why is the Biden administration is giving them special treatment. Did the order to do so come from Pooh?

  17. cavalier973

    Re: the half billion penalty of Trump

    Jonathan Turley points out that the people in NY who still want to do business with Trump are being punished, too.

    • The Other Kevin

      The “don’t worry about us coming after you” line is admission that they were going after one specific person. They could have taken the high ground and gone with “nobody is above the law and we’ll prosecute anyone who commits fraud” but that would scare off even more businesses. I’m really hoping they keep stepping on their own dicks like this.

      • rhywun

        She is on record campaigning to take down Orange. There’s nothing to “admit”. There is no “high ground”.

        She was elected specifically for this purpose and found a judge to do it for her.

  18. Sensei

    Who doesn’t want to fly domestic air in North Korea?

    The group tour, first announced in January, cost around $750. That covered the round-trip airfare for the roughly 80-minute flight from the Russian Far East city of Vladivostok to North Korea’s only international airport in the capital city of Pyongyang. It also included a domestic flight to the ski resort on North Korea’s east coast and meals. The ski pass, souvenirs and other expenses were paid out of pocket.

    https://www.wsj.com/world/asia/vacation-in-north-korea-reclusive-state-reopens-to-tourismbut-only-for-russians-7b2978ea?st=b12nql8q2rc4b32&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

    • Gustave Lytton

      Do they still get the Air Koryo burger on that short flight?

      • Sensei

        I was unaware of that culinary gem!

      • Sensei

        That’s awesome. Having had to to got JFK on work’s dime the first paragraph was on point.

        From where I live in Central New Jersey there is no good way to get to JFK, and while anyone of my friends would have no problem driving me to EWR no one is willing to sit through the living hell of the Belt Parkway to drop me off. A round trip in my preferred car service is north of $500 a round trip from my front door to JFK a luxury I will only indulge in when my employer is willing to pick up the tab. That left me with the wonderful option of taking three trains to find my way to JFK. It’s certainly not the best or the fastest route. I left my house in an Uber at 2:45PM for a 10:00PM flight, which is just insane. I won’t bore you with the tedious transfers between NJ Transit, the Long Island Railroad, and the Air Train. It’s really not very luggage friendly, but luckily I was traveling light. I wanted to get to JFK earlier since they only open the exit rows up at check in. I ended up getting there far to late to even have a prayer about 25 minutes after check in opened.

        It explains why those fascinated with trains don’t regularly take trains.

      • Gustave Lytton

        It’s fun once. It’s a pain to do repeatedly and knowing how awful it will be.

  19. PieInTheSky

    FT Europe
    @ftbrussels
    France tightens budget as economic growth slows

    https://twitter.com/ftbrussels/status/1759551531253142006

    @StrawberryNOMer
    You cut spending when the economy is strong NOT WHEN ITS WEAKENING

    Caleb Weldon
    @WeldonCaleb
    Showing economic growth is right when you shouldn’t cut spending

    LeftWingGuy1066 🐈
    @LeftWingGuy1066
    Austerity only helps the right wing.

    “Government spending in France was last recorded at 58.3 percent of GDP in 2022 . Government Spending to GDP in France averaged 53.42 percent of GDP from 1978 until 2022, reaching an all time high of 61.30 percent of GDP in 2020 and a record low of 45.20 percent of GDP in 1978”
    “France recorded a Government Debt to GDP of 111.80 percent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product in 2022.”

    AusTERiTY… we are fucking doomed. I am really wondering what goes one in a leftist head. Besides brain rot.

    • The Other Kevin

      What’s going on in a leftist head? Not math, that’s for sure.

  20. rhywun

    The list of questions was cut down from 40 to just five. This allowed a fast-track of the release of Chinese illegal immigrants into the interior of the United States

    An honest answer to why they are doing this would be welcome.

    • Pine_Tree

      Happily. It’s just part of the kulturkrieg. For the folks in charge, America and Americans are the enemy, and they’re actively trying to destroy the country.

      Oh wait – you mean honest from THEM….

    • Cunctator

      @ Rhywun

      The best I can determine, the pizzeria in Utica is the “Tony’s” that I mentioned the other day. I don’t know if it is still the same owners, but the location is right. 23 Burrstone Rd, Utica, NY 13502

      • rhywun

        👍🏻

  21. kinnath

    TW: Salon

    John Oliver offers Clarence Thomas $1 million a year to resign from Supreme Court

    Oliver underscored the long history of Associate Justice Clarence Thomas’ relationship with billionaire Republican donor Harlan Crow and other wealthy benefactors who have showered Thomas with free trips in private jets and other extravagant gifts, while Thomas failed to disclose any of it. Then, Oliver made the offer to one-up these contributors, offering Thomas “one million dollars a year for the rest of your life if you simply agree to leave the Supreme Court immediately and never come back,” Oliver said, adding, “HBO is not putting up the money for this. I am personally on the hook.”

    To sweeten the deal, Oliver is also throwing in a giant motorcoach worth $2.4 million, which may be extra enticing to Thomas, who has a famous affection for his own high-end vacation vehicle. Oliver says he spoke to several legal experts to ensure that this offer does not break the law.

    • cavalier973

      I’m glad none of the other members of the SCOTUS take extravagant bribes.

      • R.J.

        He should have made that offer to Ginsberg to ensure a liberal justice got on the bench.

    • slumbrew

      Oliver’s definitely the “smug douchebag” champion of TV hosts. Which is impressive, given the competition.

  22. Suthenboy

    The Eastern European kabuki theater/money laundering operation holds no interest for me. Everyone involved should be imprisoned.

    Biden campaign going all in on one big Hail Mary to turn their fortunes? Before reading, let me guess…..raise gas and grocery prices again?

    ““no jurisdiction of a bill to enjoin the President in the performance of his official duties.”
    I seem to recall that meant fuck-all to the courts when Trump was in office.

    The cockroaches here protesting Israel’s act of self-defense have been tearing down posters of Jewish hostages. They want a ceasefire? Fuck them, and by them I mean Hamas and it’s supporters here.

    The Chinese invaders are sent here by the Chicom government. How dense does one have to be not to see that? And how dense to not see that Biden and Co. are aiding and abetting our enemies?

    Swalwell, run of the mill sociopathic pol. Scum of the earth.

    “The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public’s money.” – De Tocqueville
    Fact check sites, all of whom appear to be skin suited by the left, of course says that is a false quote, never mind the truth of it. The left, as predictable as the sunrise.

    Frozen embryos? I am pro-life but even I….
    Seriously though, that is a bit over the top. Should we be able to prosecute murderers for the lives of their victims yet-to-be offspring?

    Land ownership in Iowa? It is a state issue. Not my state, not my call.

    The FedGov has no business owning land or seizing it. I wonder if Kelo could be used in some way to cut their nuts?

    It’s something but not sure it will be as big as the truckers want, or as much as I want. I am not hopeful.

    • WTF

      NYC needs so much brought in by truck on a daily basis that even a fairly small reduction could potentially cause problems.
      Here’s hoping, anyway.

      • Urthona

        This seems reaaaaaaaaaaaly unlikely to me.

      • Sean

        I want to believe.

      • Urthona

        Me too. haha.

    • Fourscore

      Wait ’til the Chicoms start sending big ol’ boats full of refugees to SF, I’m talking by the 1000s.

      “Keep buying our stuff or your next shipment will be live delivered to your door”

      • prolefeed

        Boatloads of spies claiming to be refugees, more like it.

    • Gustave Lytton

      The Chinese invaders are sent here by the Chicom government.

      First thing that came to mind in the story of the non-citizen appointed to the SF board, who is an immigration rights advocate. How the fuck are they getting money to live and remain in this country legally? Zero interest from the intrepid reporters.

  23. Sean

    I played https://squaredle.com/xp 02/20:
    *20/20 words (+4 bonus words)
    📖 In the top 2% by bonus words

    I played https://squaredle.com 02/20:
    31/31 words (+12 bonus words)
    📖 In the top 5% by bonus words
    🔥 Solve streak: 149

    • SDF-7

      I played https://squaredle.com/xp 02/20:
      *20/20 words (+2 bonus words)
      🎯 Perfect accuracy

      I played https://squaredle.com 02/20:
      *31/31 words (+1 bonus word)
      🎯 Perfect accuracy
      🔥 Solve streak: 251

    • Sean

      And for the other Blossom player:

      Blossom Puzzle, February 20
      Letters: E N O C R T U
      My score: 370 points
      My longest word: 13 letters
      💐 🌷 💮 🌺 🌻 🌹 🏵 🌸 🌼 💐 🌷 💮 🌺

  24. Not Adahn

    OK, google has just crossed over from “useless” to “actively harmful.”

    I was looking up a piece of software online (EZCommander), and google returned literally zero links to the manufacturer. Every link went to somewhere else, the majority to (EZ Command Control Center). Since I have never in my life searched for model trains, I’m calling bullshit on the excuse of giggle tailoring its results based on my search history. What’s worse is I theoretically could substitute the model train software in a few applications for the correct motor controller, so had I given this task to a tech or intern, they would probably not have even noticed.

    Any of you code monkeys want to make a few hundred thousand bucks? I need an OS/UI for a VPD tool.

    • Nephilium

      Huh. I just tested searching for it myself (both on DDG and Google), and both returned this as the top link.

      • Not Adahn

        So, does that mean someone in my org/ip range is a model train aficionado?

      • Nephilium

        I had the train stuff showing up after the actual software. Perhaps the algorithm has some idea about your predilection for trains?

        /looks at the random ads the algorithm serves me

        Or it’s just their shit’s all fucked up and reetarded.

    • Sensei

      First link for me, but followed up by model trains.

  25. rhywun

    I hope this will be big enough to have an effect

    Are they aware that it’s the State (in this case) going after Bad Man?

    Are they going to turn around at the border with Pennsylvania?

    • Not Adahn

      Since The City has 85% of the “voters” in the State…

      • rhywun

        That’s an impressive feat given that the city has less than half the population of the state. 😳

      • Not Adahn

        Maybe my stat was coming from Metro Area v. City Limits?

      • Not Adahn

        This dude is saying 62% on 4% of the land:

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLs4hLIuHVY

        He also says that upstate is empty partially due to injuns, but mostly becasue it’s too cold. I’m not sure that makes him seem reliable.

      • prolefeed

        NYC has 11 Congressional districts. Rest of the state has 15.

      • UnCivilServant

        Well, given the number of vote mills downstate, 85% of the voters is probably accurate.

  26. Q Continuum

    There was a girl from Albuquerque
    With perfect breasts – all firm and perky
    Boys came from around
    To see her sweet mounds
    Then back home to their life of jerking

    https://archive.is/wip/k1w2a

    Titty Tuesday.

    • WTF

      Why didn’t they just ban guns on campus?
      Because a gun-free zone would surely have prevented this.

      • Pope Jimbo

        Not so sure about that. Local crazy person – who was prohibited from owning firearms – shot and killed two cops (and wounded an EMT).

        Multiple law enforcement sources and next-door neighbors on Monday revealed the identity of the man who killed two police officers and an EMT before killing himself as Shannon Cortez Gooden.

        The 38-year-old was prohibited from possessing firearms as the result of a 2008 2nd-degree felony assault with a deadly weapon conviction, according to court documents.

        In 2019, 11 years after that conviction, Gooden petitioned the court to restore his firearm rights. Gooden wrote in an affidavit, “I would like to be able to protect not only myself but my family as well. I completed an anger management course as well as a parenting course.”

        Court records show Gooden had two order for protection petitions filed against him, one alleging domestic abuse and the other alleging domestic assault. The Associated Press reports that the deadly standoff with police came only two days before a scheduled district court hearing over his ongoing legal disputes with the mother of his three oldest children.

        In 2017, the mother of at least one of Gooden’s children alleged that Gooden head-butted her face — causing a concussion and black eye — and threw her down the stairs. The court dismissed the court action because the woman failed to appear in court.

        In 2020, the mother of at least three of Gooden’s children alleged that Gooden cut her clothes with a knife, causing her to fall down the stairs. She also said Gooden would pull her hair, throw her against the wall, and would let his family members assault her. The woman claimed she believed Gooden was going to kill her, but the court dismissed the court action because the allegations were not proven.

        No idea why they didn’t let this guy own guns again.

  27. R.J.

    Swiss, Tonio, Neph, any TPTB: I accidentally hit submit on my post for this week, please give me until end of day to clean that up and finish it.

  28. The Other Kevin

    “Team Biden Reportedly Going All-In On One Big Hail Mary To Turn Campaign Around”
    So declare an emergency, arrest every Republican, and go 100% mail in ballots.

    To go with yesterday’s songs, last night on (X)Twitter I got a like by Peter Hook. So I got THAT going for me.

    • Not Adahn

      I did not know they updated the Temple Garments.

    • prolefeed

      I would imagine the process would be to haul her in front of a Council of Love (yes, actual name of Mormon disciplinary councils) and offer her a chance to repent. If she doesn’t agree to Tow the Lion, then she’d be excommunicated.

    • Not Adahn

      And there was much rejoicing.

    • Not Adahn

      They are (deliberately?) misusing BIPOC.

    • Drake

      It would be racist and sexist to graph that development against a measure of quality and viewership.

      • Urthona

        To be honest, most of it sucked before too.

    • The Other Kevin

      Ah that explains why there are so many box office flops lately. Racism and sexism. White supremacists must be researching the writers before they buy their tickets.

    • kinnath

      Can we go back to separate but equal?

    • rhywun

      Thereby demonstrating that “a ____________ that looks like America” was always a lie.

    • WTF

      No wonder modern entertainment mostly sucks. Select for something other than competence, and competence suffers.

  29. Bob Boberson

    We’ll, it finally happened, lost my cool with a subordinate.

    For the second time he complained to me that I over speak him on conference calls and when dealing with junior members;

    1) example one: junior member asks (both of us ) for help with a small matter. Subordinate starts in with “have you tried this? that? The other thing?” I interject and say “there was an email put out about it this morning; I’ll forward it to you.”

    2) example two: conference call with someone asking to use our facilities. I speak up and say “I’m looking at that week on the calendar, I think we should be good.” After the phone call the ‘upward feedback’ starts….

    My reaction: “this is my section. MINE. I don’t need your permission to speak or make decisions. This conversation is one way and is now over.”

    AITAH?

    • Sean

      Make him your bitch.

    • Nephilium

      Not enough information to determine from my side. I know that I’ve face palmed several times on high level calls when some lower level tech starts spinning wonderful fabulous theories about the potential causes of the issue that couldn’t be the cause because of half a dozen missing symptoms. Even worse when that lower level tech drops out internal information that wasn’t supposed to be passed along to the customer.

      • Bob Boberson

        It’s been a long power struggle. He ran my section for a while between my predecessor left and when I arrived (not well by most reports) There has been low key resentment and a lot of passive aggressive power plays for the last 8 months and today I’ve had it.

      • PieInTheSky

        back in the good old days you would solve it like gentlemen. Sword or pistol.

      • Bob Boberson

        Which is why I’d have been dead about 20 years ago.

      • Fourscore

        I had an employee that I called “Yeah But”. He was a good employee but always wanted the last word. After I’d given him his assignment he always had to have the last word, “Yeah but”…

        Sometimes he made sense, like in the middle of a project I had him working on. Then I’d have to decide priorities.

        The woes of being a supervisor.

    • ron73440

      AITAH?

      Yes, but sometimes you need to be if you are going to run things.

      That’s one thing that I miss about the Marines, we never had a lot of those situations.

      • Bob Boberson

        It isn’t a very libertarian thing to say but “knowing one’s place” isn’t necessarily the least of virtues.

      • slumbrew

        That’s not anti-libertarian at all. He’s being paid to do a job, with a certain role, reporting to a manager (you). He’s free to leave if he doesn’t like the terms.

      • Bob Boberson

        /Whistles past enlistment contract

      • slumbrew

        Eh, voluntary contract. Still not bothered.

        (I know, different than two private parties agreeing to a contract – but still one that was voluntarily signed).

      • prolefeed

        And a HUUUGE improvement over the draft.

        Obviously, a military where anyone can quit at any time without consequences ain’t gonna work. Mass desertions once the bullets start flying.

      • Pope Jimbo

        Yeah, I’m with Ron. Embrace your inner asshole on this. Someone has to be the top dog.

        Dealing with it now and conclusively is the way to go. Letting that crap keep festering sucks for everyone on the team.

      • Pope Jimbo

        My wtf moment was when a jr person on my team and I both wanted to take off the same couple days.

        He seemed amazed that I pulled rank and told him to pick another day.

        I didn’t feel that bad. The kid had already taken off tons of time already. I had taken off almost none. I also told him I was the boss and as such got to pick first.

        Told him how when I was in Okinawa my boss (a SSgt) would divide up our electronic equipment everyday with this rule: Anything that was broken or needed to be PM’ed was mine. All the working equipment was his.

    • Fatty Bolger

      Probably, but that doesn’t necessarily make you wrong. Just going from that, it sounds like you have contradictory styles. He’s a plodder, you’re a guy who just wants to get things resolved asap.

    • Nephilium

      Just in case you’ve never heard Schadenfreude.

    • Tres Cool

      nose/face

  30. Gustave Lytton

    Rancher Suing Biden Over Arizona Land Grab

    Paging Vincent Price

    • Sean

      Libertopia?

      • PieInTheSky

        there would be gun turrets on the cars

    • Gustave Lytton

      I saw a car rub paint to force by a car that was turning into a business and was partially blocking the lane. 5 seconds too much..

  31. The Late P Brooks

    My reaction: “this is my section. MINE. I don’t need your permission to speak or make decisions. This conversation is one way and is now over.”

    I don’t see a problem.

    • Certified Public Asshat

      That would be a less infuriating way to spend $900k.

    • slumbrew

      “Self improvement”

      • PieInTheSky

        sounds too right wing

  32. Pope Jimbo

    Thank doG that this woman isn’t a Native American or your next trip to the doc could be bad. I’m assuming that if she was an Indian, her Native Knowledge would mandate this treatment for anyone near-sighted person.

    A Spanish woman sparked controversy after claiming that dripping urine into her eyes cured her myopia and astigmatism.

    Urine therapy or urotherapy is a form of alternative medicine popularized by British naturopath John W. Armstrong in the early 20th century. Advocates of this unusual form of therapy promote the application of human urine for medicinal or cosmetic purposes, including massaging one’s skin, or gums, with one’s urine, and even drinking it. However, TikTok user and “assistant metaphysical counselor” Suama Fraile claims that urine is also much better at treating eye problems than the chemical-infused medicine prescribed by most doctors. The woman claims to have dripped urine into her eyes daily until it cured her astigmatism and myopia.

    • JaimeRoberto (carnitas/spicy salsa)

      In my wife’s country babies can be given the evil eye and one way to cure them is to wipe their eyes with their urine filled diaper. #IndigenousKnowledge

      • invisible finger

        Sounds more like the stink eye.

  33. The Late P Brooks

    Great. Now they are going to elevate this Navalny guy’s widow to some sort of international pop star.

    • PieInTheSky

      In Bucharest they want to name a street after the guy. Fucking stupid if you ask me.

  34. PieInTheSky

    Shere Hite’s search for the female orgasm What happened to one of our most famous feminists?

    https://unherd.com/2024/02/shere-hites-search-for-the-female-orgasm/

    Julie Bindel

    “We need to make a film about me.” That was one of the first things Shere Hite, the feminist sex researcher, said to me when I met her in May 2011. Now, three years after she died aged 77, her wish has come true. The Disappearance Of Shere Hite, released last month, charts the fascinating life of the woman responsible for exposing the uncomfortable fact that, for women, penetrative sex rarely results in orgasm.

    To truly understand how revolutionary Hite’s research and findings were in the mid-Seventies, it’s important to look at what male sexologists — back then, there was no other kind — had been saying up until then. The two most famous, Sigmund Freud and Alfred Kinsey, had both promoted the notion of the “authentic” orgasm, achievable only in the vagina — in other words, as a result of penile penetration — or as Hite put it, “the great male thrust”.

    • slumbrew

      search for the female orgasm

      Much like the Jersey Devil, it’s just a myth.

    • Not Adahn

      Literally anyone who’s read historical porn knows that gamahuching, frigging, and flat-fucking were all known to cause women to spend. Before Freud was born.

      • Not Adahn

        Also, I’ve started reading the songs of Sappho. Not nearly as hot as I’d been led to believe.

      • PieInTheSky

        do it in a sauna or a Turkish bath

      • PieInTheSky

        flat-fucking ? thats a new one

      • Pope Jimbo

        It is why Not Adahn always walks around throwing sharp tacks on roads near his house. Just waiting for his chance to pounce.

      • Not Adahn

        Lady rats are super easy. Plus with a spreadsheet linked to my calendar, I always know when one of them is going into estrus.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        Well, you are a scientist. Always looking for those long tails, right?

    • Q Continuum

      Ahhhhh, second wave feminism; in which everything from the laundry not being folded to the heat death of the universe is directly attributable to how horrible, insensitive and subhuman men are. By popularizing the brilliant paradoxes that men are simultaneously bumbling idiots and sophisticated predators whereas women are simultaneously superior in every way and pathetic, helpless victims, these wonderful ladies truly are the intellectual grandmothers of the 21st century AWFL grrrlbosses.

      “She was accused by sexologists and academics of bias and flawed methodology. Hite had distributed 100,000 detailed questionnaires in brown paper envelopes to random addresses from the phone book. Around 4,500 were completed and returned to her.”

      Ummmm… yes. That is complete shit as a methodology and a big reason why the “science” in the social “sciences” will always and forever have scare quotes around it.

      • UnCivilServant

        So, she based her conclusions on the answers of the 4.5% of people willing to respond to random unsolicited inquiries about their intimate lives? Something tells me that is not representative of the other 95.5% of the population.

  35. Pope Jimbo

    Another Strong Black Woman has been fired by The Man

    The leader of Civil Rights Department for the city of Minneapolis is out of a job.

    In a statement to KARE 11 Friday, city officials confirmed Civil Rights Director Alberder Gillespie “has concluded her service with the City of Minneapolis as of today.”

    City officials did not provide an official reason for Gillespie’s sudden departure from the role; however, documents obtained by KARE 11 indicate Gillespie was dismissed from the job by Mayor Jacob Frey on the recommendation of City Operations Officer Margaret Anderson Kelliher, alleging concerns about the department’s handling of responsibilities for the Office of Police Conduct Review.

    According to the city’s website, Gillespie was first appointed to the position on an interim basis in November 2021, and later appointed to a full, four-year term in January 2022, due to expire in January 2026.

    Given that it is Minneapolis, I can’t decide if she was horribly, horribly incompetent, or just a reasonable person who didn’t tow the crazy progressive lion.

    • ron73440

      Incompetence doesn’t seem to be a fireable offense in government, so my guess would be that she was a non-crazy in a job where crazy is expected.

  36. PieInTheSky

    Ireland’s anti-immigration backlash is spiralling into country-wide unrest

    Republican voters are turning against Sinn Fein as they reject the party’s open borders stance

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/02/19/mass-immigration-bringing-european-style-populism-ireland/

    Demonstrators also belted “Ireland is for the Irish” and other slogans which would usually be the preserve of the republicans of Sinn Fein. But the party’s support for mass migration has alienated their Irish nationalist base, with many at the march branding them “traitors”.

    To find out more about where the anger is coming from, I travelled to Roscrea, a sleepy town in County Tipperary, where locals have been protesting for three weeks outside of the town’s only hotel – closed down last month after the government struck a deal with its owner to house more than 160 asylum seekers there. Mary-Claire Doran, a Roscrea resident, told me the town had been transformed by an influx of around 1,000 refugees in recent years, swelling the town’s population of 5,000 by 20 per cent.

    • UnCivilServant

      I’d have thought that after their experience with my eastern cousins*, my western cousins** would have learned their lesson regarding immigrants.

      *the Anglo-Saxons
      **the Irish

  37. The Late P Brooks

    What unintended consequences?

    Fox Business anchor Neil Cavuto then asked O’Leary what he thinks about New York Gov. Kathy Hochul’s (D) attempted assurances to New York business owners, in which she told residents there was “nothing to worry about.”

    “We’re very worried, every investor is worried because where is the victim? Who lost the money? This is some arbitrary decision a judge made,” O’Leary responded. “This policy … what does this say about the bar? About the legal bar in New York? Aren’t they going to question this judge? What is this?”

    “I’m sorry her words fall on deaf ears to everybody,” he added. “There’s nothing she can say to justify this decision. And this has nothing to do with Trump, nothing to do with Trump. Forget about Trump, this is not a Trump situation, this is a New York problem.”

    The amazing thing is nobody mentions the utter lack of even pretending this is in any way about restitution. It’s piracy, plain and simple.

    • Pope Jimbo

      Mark Steyn was writing about how you can’t even appeal a decision unless you can pony up the settlement first.

      But that’s not what caught my eye about Arthur F Wankeron’s judgment. The truly striking passage was this (page 90, just before the sign-off):

      The Court hereby enjoins Donald Trump and the Trump Organization and its affiliates from applying for loans from any financial institution chartered by or registered with the New York Department of Financial Services for a period of three years.

      This struck a chord with me. As many of you know, a little over a week ago, the District of Columbia Superior Court ordered me to pay one million dollars in punitive damages to climate mullah Michael E Mann. So I’m currently living the dimestore version of Trump’s travails.

      Not so. In order to appeal, a losing party has to post a bond for the amount at issue. That’s true for federal and state courts, although there are variations hither and yon: some jurisdictions require you merely to post a bond for the original judgment, others to cover the likely interest that will pile up as your appeal works it way through the choked septic tank of American “justice”; California, for example, won’t entertain an appeal until you bond 150 per cent of the amount of the judgment.

      This is no small thing, even for those of us at the nickel-and-dime end of the Great American Judicial Shakedown – and especially not when, at the lower-court phase, justice has been comprehensively weaponised against one side of the country’s political divide. But to be clear: to appeal Judge Wankeron’s decision Trump needs to come up with a bond for at least $350 million.

      So, just to complicate the issue, Wankeron forbids him from doing business with any financial institution registered in the State of New York. Which is rather a lot of them, it being the home of Wall Street – and of almost all the big players: J P Morgan Chase, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley…

  38. The Late P Brooks

    In Bucharest they want to name a street after the guy. Fucking stupid if you ask me.

    Is it a dead end?

    • PieInTheSky

      it is “whatever street the Russian embassy happens to be on”

  39. Sensei

    An Executive Bought a Rival’s Stock. The SEC Says That’s Insider Trading.
    Defense lawyers say the case is the first to involve ‘shadow insider trading’

    The SEC says two facts about Panuwat’s trading show it was illegal. First, his employer, Medivation, had a policy that forbade trading other companies’ shares when employees had material nonpublic information about Medivation. And second, Panuwat traded on his work computer just seven minutes after he allegedly learned that Pfizer would buy his company.

    His purchase of Incyte options netted Panuwat $120,000, according to a recent SEC court filing. He sold some of the contracts just days after buying them, court records show. He sold others weeks later and lost money on those, but still earned a profit overall.

    Interesting case. If he was in Congress this would be perfectly legal however.

    https://www.wsj.com/finance/regulation/an-executive-bought-a-rivals-stock-the-sec-says-thats-insider-trading-84ef8aae?st=lmmi357h3cq4k6v&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

    • Gustave Lytton

      Paging Pete Rose to the ethics hotline…

  40. Pope Jimbo

    Who needs a flying car when you can have a boat car!

    The electric three-wheel vehicle will reach speeds of up to 95 mph on land and drive directly onto the water along a launching ramp, Tice said. For those who live near water, the Trident LS-1 will use multi-modal transportation for getting to the office or having a weekend fishing trip.

    The vehicle features three permanent seats, including a center driver seat and two rear ones, as well as an additional fold-down center seat, Tice said.

    Drivers will be able to park the 7 foot-long vehicle in their garage, a key requirement for the engineering company. The vehicle also removes the need for a tow vehicle, which runs the risk of falling into the water while releasing a boat, Tice said.

    I can only imagine the fun at the boat ramps.

    • Not Adahn

      There are worse ways to spend $130,000.

    • Sean

      What could possibly go wrong?

    • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

      VW leans against it’s Schwimmwagon and laughs.

  41. PieInTheSky

    ‘Elderly couple told they had to sell home to house asylum seekers’ is a headline tailor-made for the anxieties of 2024. It is the kind of headline, indeed, that trumps the story itself: it confirms everything the typical conservative Telegraph reader intuits about what is going on across the West as we speak. The old order disappearing; a great wave of immigration replacing it; and all for some reason facilitated and even encouraged by the state – which, to top it off, forces the people already here, who can ill-afford it, to subsidise the process financially.

    The actual story could never live up to that headline, and sure enough the truth as reported is much less blood-boiling than it sounds at first blush. Yes, an elderly couple were told in a letter they received from their local authority (North Northamptonshire Council) that they had to sell their home to house asylum seekers, but they received another letter three days later apologising and telling them the first had been sent in error. Their house was not going to be compulsorily purchased at all. The story was actually a bit of a damp squib, then, in its own narrow facts.

    Nonetheless, it is far from a ‘nothingburger’, and has some disturbing and important connotations that are worth teasing out. For it brings to the fore the crucial connection that I have previously drawn between the ownership of property and the form of government which it is proper to label tyrannical, in that it governs in a manner which transcends law, and indeed only tolerates the existence of rules insofar as they apply to the subject, rather than the ruler himself.

    What happened to the elderly couple in question has, though, first to be set in context. While no local authority anywhere in the U.K. is currently compulsorily purchasing homes that are lived in, it seems that throughout the country they have been quietly “identifying empty properties” which are owned, with the aim of buying them through compulsory purchase orders (though it is unclear whether any purchases are yet actually taking place) – and that they are doing this explicitly because of a rise in the number of asylum seekers being granted leave to remain in the country.

    https://dailysceptic.org/2024/02/20/justified-tyranny/

    • Gustave Lytton

      That such a letter was sent in the first place should lead to immediate gibbeting of the entire agency.

    • Fatty Bolger

      Oops, we revealed our secret plan too early.

  42. PieInTheSky

    Do Southerners know they don’t need a saying to relay every thought?

    Northerners- He’s Cheap.

    Southerners- That man wouldn’t give a nickel to see Jesus ridin’
    a bicycle.

    Northerners- She looks happy.

    Southerners- Grinnin’ like a possum eatin’ a sweet
    tater.

    https://twitter.com/dantypo/status/1759281880791241199

    • Not Adahn

      Bless his heart.

      • The Other Kevin

        I think he screwed the pooch on that one.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        I don’t know, seems more useless than teats on a boar.

    • Banjos

      Northerners sound boring.

      • Nephilium

        Nah. We just know better than to try to drag things out talking to people from the south, there’s only so much time in the day.

      • Ownbestenemy

        What’s this got to do with the price of eggs?

  43. The Late P Brooks

    Joe wants a Navalny of his own

    Julian Assange’s lawyers opened a final U.K. legal challenge Tuesday to stop the WikiLeaks founder from being sent to the United States to face spying charges, arguing that American authorities are seeking to punish him for exposing serious criminal acts by the U.S. state

    Lawyer Edward Fitzgerald said there is a risk Assange “will suffer a flagrant denial of justice” if he is sent to the U.S. At a two-day High Court hearing, Assange’s attorneys are asking judges to grant a new appeal, his last legal roll of the dice in Britain

    Assange himself was not in court. Judge Victoria Sharp said he was granted permission to come from Belmarsh Prison, where he has been held for five years, but had chosen not to attend. Fitzgerald said the 52-year-old Australian was unwell but did not elaborate on his health.

    Assange has been fighting extradition for more than a decade, including seven years in self-exile in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London and the last five years in the high-security prison on the outskirts of the British capital.

    They need to perp walk Assange off an airplane. It will make a fantastic campaign ad.

  44. PieInTheSky

    New Zealand OIA request reveals the COVID vaccines increased your risk of dying
    Chris Johnston submitted a OIA request to the New Zealand health authorities. The official response shows that the vaccines didn’t protect people from COVID. It killed them.

    https://kirschsubstack.com/p/new-zealand-oia-request-reveals-the

    I probably need to dig into the data myself at some point cause I aint sure what I can believe

  45. The Late P Brooks

    In order to appeal, a losing party has to post a bond for the amount at issue. That’s true for federal and state courts, although there are variations hither and yon: some jurisdictions require you merely to post a bond for the original judgment, others to cover the likely interest that will pile up as your appeal works it way through the choked septic tank of American “justice”; California, for example, won’t entertain an appeal until you bond 150 per cent of the amount of the judgment.

    I read an article gloating about this, in reference to Trump, yesterday. Whoever it was also mentioned the Ergoron-appointed corporate overseer who has to sign off on any deals. They are positively pissing themselves in ecstasy.

    • PieInTheSky

      maybe some are giving secret like

  46. PieInTheSky

    “should you wash chicken in the sink” — the greatest forum thread in american culinary history, locked by a moderator after 14,456 pages of heated debate,

    the american CDC has, by the way, the most pre-scientific, cargo cult understanding of the germ theory of disease, evident both in their response to covid and their stated view that “washing chicken” is like an aerosolised salmonella event. germs to them are like bad humours

    the french, hanging a goose outside for 3 weeks to ripen:

    americans: uh you’re going to wash that right? to remove all the poo? and like? mold?

    the french: remove them? oh non, non

    https://twitter.com/gbrl_dick/status/1759739528926077125

  47. JaimeRoberto (carnitas/spicy salsa)

    Swalwell’s wife is sales director at Ritz-Carlton. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of that travel money finds its way back to her in the form of commissions.

  48. Gustave Lytton

    Pac-2 picks diversity hire, so far better than that idiot Larry Scott.

  49. The Late P Brooks

    Mystifying

    To right-wingers, it’s a beacon of light for the rest of the continent; for liberals, it’s a warning signal to all of Latin America. Either way there’s no denying the significance of what has been happening in El Salvador, said Ishaan Tharoor in The Washington Post.

    Under President Nayib Bukele, who has just won re-election in a landslide, the country has shifted from a functional multiparty democracy “to a de facto one-party state”.

    In his first term, he packed the constitutional court with loyalists, thereby managing to sidestep a ban on presidents seeking consecutive terms. And, last week, he duly triumphed again at the polls, winning 87% of the vote for himself as president, while his Nuevas Ideas party won control of the national legislature. His astonishing popularity hinges on one thing only: his sweeping crackdown on El Salvador’s gangs and cartels. Within the space of a few years, El Salvador’s once “world-leading homicide rates” have been dramatically reduced, and Salvadorans have enjoyed a sense of safety they could previously only dream of.

    What self-respecting lover of democracy could vote for such a man? It’s baffling.

    • JaimeRoberto (carnitas/spicy salsa)

      As if liberals (in the American sense) are really worried about one-party states.

  50. Ownbestenemy

    Surely just incompetence and not nefarious.

  51. The Late P Brooks

    Nor have Bukele’s policies – including his eccentric decision in 2021 to make bitcoin legal tender – done anything to improve the economy, said Julia Gavarrete in El Faro (San Salvador). El Salvador is still one of Central America’s weakest economies; much of its 6.5 million-strong population can’t afford basic staples. But that hasn’t stopped other leaders in the region looking to El Salvador as the nation to copy, said Will Freeman and Lucas Perelló in The New York Times.

    He’s no Lula.

  52. The Late P Brooks

    Hunted for sport

    he first federal trial over a hate crime based on gender identity is set to begin Tuesday in South Carolina, where a man faces charges that he killed a Black transgender woman and then fled to New York.

    The U.S. Department of Justice alleges that in August 2019, Daqua Lameek Ritter coaxed the woman — who is anonymously referred to as “Dime Doe” in court documents — into driving to a sparsely populated rural county in South Carolina. Ritter shot her three times in the head after they reached an isolated area near a relative’s home, according to Breon Peace, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, where Ritter was arrested last January.

    In recent years there has been a surge in attacks on the LGBTQ+ community. For decades, transgender women of color have faced disproportionately high rates of violence and hate crimes, according to the Department of Homeland Security. In 2022, the number of gender identity-based hate crimes reported by the FBI increased by 37% compared to the previous year.

    Millions of them.