18 days ago
Add Blackmail to the List
... of Trump's crimes.
I'm not sure what the precise legal requirements are to prove the crime of blackmail, but the steps taken by Trump to punish law firms with Executive Orders and then rescind the EOs when the firms come crawling to him with offers of $40 million pro bono work on his behalf must be pretty close.
Of course his SCOTUS-granted immunity means that such trivial crimes can be openly performed with no fear of consequence.
18 days ago
RE: Add Blackmail to the List
Aha! NOW you're seeing how this republic truly operates its democracy. Welcome to the new order!
The federal department of education is being gutted/scrapped. Let the states/local municipalities eat cake!
What's next--let the states fend for themselves health, military, and commerce wise? Hell, why not each state print its own currency and fight its own wars?
A nostalgia for the articles of confederacy, anyone? The new Un-united States of America!
18 days ago
RE: Add Blackmail to the List
And one Starlink will rule them all.
17 days ago
RE: Add Blackmail to the List
Mind you, there's plenty of people who want devolution here in the UK. Bit different because Scotland, Wales and Ireland are countries, not states.
But even when it comes to counties in England, some would like to secede. Cornwall, for example. Mind you, as a child from Devon, I can say they are a bit odd down there.
17 days ago
RE: Add Blackmail to the List
One only knows their own best, dearie. One only knows their own best.
Oh, England, the last hope for mankind, thou too?
Art thou now going the wayward way of America? Welfare cuts, issues with your NHS, increased defense spending, a kid named 'Prosper' (geez, the irony) murdering his family and planning the worst mass shooting in Britain, and Heathrow closing down due to a suspicious nearby fire--oh, say it ain't so!
I'd love to visit Devon/Cornwall, if I'd the chance, time and money. The area looks so historically idyllic, strange as you claim the folks might be. I'm not what might be called mainstream meself. So, might just be the place for me--*sigh*
17 days ago
RE: Add Blackmail to the List
I grew up in Devon. There's always been a bit of banter between Devonians and the Cornish. They put the Jam on their scones first! Can you imagine? The horror.
17 days ago
RE: Add Blackmail to the List
WT@#$! Jam on their scones first??? Unimaginable atrocity!
I mean...what are scones? And do they put the jam on it before another topping/spread, or do they beat y'all to the scones (whatever the heck those still are) in putting jam on it first--like y'all Devonians should be the first to do that?
Still look like quaint, scenic, tranquil spots, with lots of 'natural' nature bits.
17 days ago
RE: Add Blackmail to the List
well i was going to put forward the claim that the jam ALWAYS goes on the scones first before the generous dollop of whipped cream, but in the face of a philistine who doesn't even know what a scone is, let alone how to make waiheke island scones (the best kind, using lemonade in the mix) I will make the claim anyway.
I only know one Cornish person, the lovely Sally Carter (ex FanStory) but I do have a poem set in Cornwall which may add another aspect of what they are/were like...
The Wreckers of Lannerbrofell
At Lannerbrofell, at Lannerbrofell,
the things that you see you must never tell.
'Tis a wrecker's town and they all know well
how to guard their tongues in Lannerbrofell.
On a winter's day, when a gray haze lay
over the shore and the wrinkled sea,
the townsfolk knew of a storm that brewed,
and none more so than Marrek the Tree.
A giant of a man, who led his band
that plundered the wrecks on Lanner's Reef,
he was strong, he was brave and he mocked the grave
with his vow to live and to die a thief.
Ere the sky grew dark he had spied his mark,
a distant sail on the world's far rim.
Now the breakers crashed and a cruel wind lashed
that he knew would bring his prize to him.
So Marrek's crew to their task they flew
through the cold, black night to Pinnacle Rock.
To douse the flame was their evil game,
the beacon that warned the seafaring flock.
At a three-mile gap, they laid the trap
with a new blaze set to lure their prey.
To the clifftop then, swarmed the wrecker's men,
to wait for the riches to come their way.
By the storm-winds ruled, by the false flame fooled,
the ship and her crew to their death drew near.
With a thunderous sound, they ran aground
and prayed to their God in a hopeless fear.
In the dawn's grey light, what a terrible sight,
the great ship lay like a stricken bird;
from the shattered deck of the broken wreck,
the cries of a few survivors heard.
Then Marrek the Tree cried, "Come with me!"
and ordered his men to the small boats there,
his words like cracks on the crew's bent backs --
"Pull hard, pull hard, or I'll take your share!"
With his pistol's boom, to a watery tomb,
the frightened seamen were soon dispatched,
while Marrek's men were rewarded then
for the heinous crime that he had hatched.
At Lannerbrofell, at Lannerbrofell,
the waves on the reef may sound your knell,
and many a mariner's sent to Hell
by Marrek and the wreckers of Lannerbrofell.
I can also recommend the novel (and subsequent Hitchcock movie starring Charles Laughton and Maureen O'Hara) Jamaica Inn.
there is also this sterling piece of advice from Rudyard Kipling from his poem "The Smugglers' Song,"
If you wake at midnight, and hear a horse's feet,
Don't go drawing back the blind, or looking in the street,
Them that ask no questions isn't told a lie.
Watch the wall my darling while the Gentlemen go by.
16 days ago
RE: Add Blackmail to the List
To us avant garde Phoenicians--not Philistines, thank you; there's a subtle difference--scones sound like rock pies made from bones and stones, kilned in the hellish furnace of an erupting volcano. Sounds delish!
I will establish the occult society of 'Ball and Scones' for genteel ladies who have grown half a pair and august gentlemen who enjoy getting it rammed down their throats.
16 days ago
RE: Add Blackmail to the List
Dairy first. The cream has a similar function to butter.
Devon and Cornwall are beautiful. So is the North East coastline and dales where I am now. The middle of the UK, where I lived for many years between Devon and the channel islands, not so much.
15 days ago
RE: Add Blackmail to the List
Ah, back to the topic at hand. Scones, of course, when hot from the oven are delicious with just butter. If we forego that most simple deliciousness and replace it with jam (or jelly in the philistine country) it is obvious that the jam should go first because you can't possibly spread jam on top of soft-whipped cream. What a mess that would be!
The real topic, Trump's crimes. Blackmail is so last week, isn't it, having been swiftly overtaken by the fruity nuttiness of compounding his crime of bundling unidentified folks onto planes and sending them off to some hell-hole in Central America and then having the administration's legal team spit in the face of the judges with a growing series of bizarre claims about how this all occurred - when, who ordered it, who signed the proclamation - not Trump according to his fatfulness.
Topped off, of course, just like the cream on the scones, by the most senior officials, right up to the VP carrying on a conversation about top-secret war plans over Signal. Another crime, as it happens...
It won't be in the headlines for long, though, before there is another criminal abomination to take over.
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