#I want them unelectable

[nimthirielrinon]

GOODBYE RIGHT-WING GOVERNMENT IN AUSTRALIA PLEASE LET EVERY DOOR HIT YOU ON THE WAY OUT YOU SCUMBAGS!

#auspol #Australia votes #thank fuck #I want that party EVISCERATED #I want them unelectable #ever again #YESSS

[fullhalalalchemist]

URGENT: 🚨🚨EARN IT ACT IS BACK IN THE SENATE 🚨🚨 TUMBLR’S NSFW BAN HITTING THE ENTIRE INTERNET THIS SUMMER 2023

April 28, 2023

I’m so sorry for the long post but please please please pay attention and spread this

What is the EARN IT Act?

The EARN IT Act (s. 1207) has been roundly condemned by nearly every major LGBTQ+ advocacy and human rights organization in the country.

This is the third time the Senate has been trying to force this through, and I talked about it last year. It is a bill that claims "protects children and victims against CSAM" by creating an unelected and politically appointed national commission of law enforcement specialists to dictate "best practices" that websites all across the nation will be forced to follow. (Keep in mind, most websites in the world are created in the US, so this has global ramifications). These "best practices" would include killing encryption so that any law enforcement can scan and see every single message, dm, photo, cloud storage, data, and any website you have every so much as glanced at. Contrary to popular belief, no they actually can't already do that. These "best practices" also create new laws for "removing CSAM" online, leading to mass censorship of non-CSAM content like what happened to tumblr. Keep in mind that groups like NCOSE, an anti-LGBT hate group, will be allowed on this commission. If websites don't follow these best practices, they lose their Section 230 protections, leading to mass censorship either way.

Section 230 is foundational to modern online communications. It's the entire reason social media exists. It grants legal protection to users and websites, and says that websites aren't responsible for what users upload online unless it's criminal. Without Section 230, websites are at the mercy of whatever bullshit regulatory laws any and every US state passes. Imagine if Texas and Florida were allowed to say what you can and can't publish and access online. That is what will happen if EARN IT passes. (For context, Trump wanted to get rid of Section 230 because he knew it would lead to mass govt surveillance and censorship of minorities online.)

This is really not a drill. Anyone who makes or consume anything “adult” and LGBT online has to be prepared to fight Sen. Blumenthal’s EARN IT Act, brought back from the grave by a bipartisan consensus to destroy Section 230. If this bill passes, we’re going to see most, if not all, adult content and accounts removed from mainstream platforms. This will include anything related to LGBT content, including SFW fanfiction, for example. Youtube, Twitter, Reddit, Tiktok, Tumblr, all of them will be completely gutted of anything related to LGBT content, abortion healthcare, resources for victims of any type of abuse, etc. It is a right-wing fascists wet dream, which is why NCOSE is behind this bill and why another name for this bill is named in reference to NCOSE.

NCOSE used to be named Morality in Media, and has rebranded into an "anti-trafficking" organization. They are a hate group that has made millions off of being "against trafficking" while helping almost no victims and pushing for homophobic laws globally. They have successfully pushing the idea that any form of sexual expression, including talking about HEALTH, leads to sex trafficking. That's how SESTA passed. Their goal is to eliminate all sex, anything gay, and everything that goes against their idea of ‘God’ from the internet and hyper disney-fy and sanitize it. This is a highly coordinated attack on multiple fronts.

The EARN IT Act will lead to mass online censorship and surveillance. Platforms will be forced to scan their users’ communications and censor all sex-related content, including sex education, literally anything lgbt, transgender or non-binary education and support systems, aything related to abortion, and sex worker communication according to the ACLU. All this in the name of “protecting kids” and “fighting CSAM”, both of which the bill does nothing of the sort. In fact it makes fighting CSEM even harder.

EARN IT will open the way for politicians to define the category of “pornography" as they — or the lobbies that fund them — please. The same way that right-wing groups have successfully banned books about race and LGBT, are banning trans people from existing, all under the guise of protecting children from "grooming and exploitation", is how they will successfully censor the internet.

As long as state legislatures can tie in "fighting CSAM" to their bullshit laws, they can use EARN IT to censor and surveill whatever they want.

This is already a nightmare enough. But the bill also DESTROYS ENCRYPTION, you know, the thing protecting literally anyone or any govt entity from going into your private messages and emails and anything on your devices and spying on you.

This bill is going to finish what FOSTA/SESTA started. And that should terrify you.

Senator Blumenthal (Same guy who said ‘Facebook should ban finsta’) pushed this bill all of 2020, literally every activist (There were more than half a million signatures on this site opposing this act!) pushed hard to stop this bill. Now he brings it back, doesn’t show the text of the bill until hours later, and it’s WORSE. Instead of fixing literally anything in the bill that might actually protect kids online, Bluemnthal is hoping to fast track this and shove it through, hoping to get little media attention other than propaganda of “protecting kids” to support this shitty legislation that will harm kids. Blumental doesn't care about protecting anyone, and only wants his name in headlines.

It will make CSAM much much worse.

One of the many reasons this bill is so dangerous: It totally misunderstands how Section 230 works, and in doing so (as with FOSTA) it is likely to make the very real problem of CSAM worse, not better. Section 230 gives companies the flexibility to try different approaches to dealing with various content moderation challenges. It allows for greater and greater experimentation and adjustments as they learn what works – without fear of liability for any “failure.” Removing Section 230 protections does the opposite. It says if you do anything, you may face crippling legal liability. This actually makes companies less willing to do anything that involves trying to seek out, take down, and report CSAM because of the greatly increased liability that comes with admitting that there is CSAM on your platform to search for and deal with. This liability would allow anyone for any reason to sue any platform they want, suing smaller ones out of existence. Look at what is happening right now with book bans across the nation with far right groups. This is going to happen to the internet if this bill passes.

(Remember, the state department released a report in December 2021 recommending that the government crack down on “obscenity” as hard the Reagan Administration did. If this bill passes, it could easily go way beyond shit red states are currently trying. It is a goldmine for the fascist right that is currently in the middle of banning every book that talks about race and sexuality across the US.)

The reason these bills keep showing up is because there is this false lie spread by organizations like NCOSE that platforms do nothing about CSEM online. However, platforms are already liable for child sexual exploitation under federal law. Tech companies sent more than 45 million+ instances of CSAM to the DOJ in 2019 alone, most of which they declined to investigate. This shows that platforms are actually doing everything in their power already to stop CSEM by following already existing laws. The Earn It Act includes zero resources for proven investigation or prevention programs. If Senator Bluementhal actually cared about protecting youth, why wouldn’t he include anything to actually protect them in his shitty horrible bill? EARN IT is actually likely to make prosecuting child molesters more difficult since evidence collected this way likely violates the Fourth Amendment and would be inadmissible in court.

I don’t know why so many Senators are eager to cosponsor the “make child pornography worse” bill, but here we are.

HOW TO FIGHT BACK

EARN IT Act was introduced just two weeks ago and is already being fast-tracked. It will be marked up the week of May 1st and head to the Senate floor immediately after. If there is no loud and consistent opposition, it will be law by JUNE! Most bills never go to markup, so this means they are putting pressure to move this through. There are already 20 co-sponsors, a fifth of the entire Senate. This is an uphill battle and it is very much all hands on deck.

CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVES.

This website takes you to your Senator / House members contact info. EMAIL, MESSAGE, SEND LETTERS, CALL CALL CALL CALL CALL. Calling is the BEST way to get a message through. Get your family and friends to send calls too. This is literally the end of free speech online.

[phone] connects you to the congressional hotline. Here is a call script if you don't know what to say. Call them every day. Even on the weekends, leaving voicemails are fine.

2. Sign these petitions!

Link to Petition 1

Link to Petition 2

3. SPREAD THE WORD ONLINE

If you have any social media, spread this online. One of the best ways we fought back against this last year was MASSIVE spread online. Tiktok, reddit, twitter, discord, whatever means you have at least mention it. We could see most social media die out by this fall if we don't fight back.

Here is a linktree with more information on this bill including a masterpost of articles, the links to petitions, and the call script.

DISCORD LINK IF YOU WANT TO HELP FIGHT IT

TLDR: The EARN IT Act will lead to online censorship of any and all adult & lgbt content across the entire internet, open the floodgates to mass surveillance the likes which we haven’t seen before, lead to much more CSEM being distributed online, and destroy encryption. Call 202-224-3121 to connect to your house and senate representative and tell them to VOTE NO on this bill that does not protect anyone and harms everyone.

#earn it act #internet censorship #restrict act #us politics #net neutrality

[wilwheaton]

The five Justices in the majority opinion, however, went farther than necessary to insulate insurrectionists from being disqualified from federal elections. They didn’t just rule that states cannot disqualify Trump, or Presidential candidates, but rather that states cannot disqualify any insurrectionist candidates for federal office. The Justices gave all the power to a notoriously dysfunctional Congress to do so, even though Section Five did not explicitly make Congress the sole enforcing authority of Section Three. As in the Dobbs case that overturned 50 years of Roe v. Wade, the conservative principle of “judicial restraint” does not exist with this Supreme Court. Republicans like to blast “activist judges,” but as we see yet again, an “activist judge” is just someone who rules against you. Under the Supreme Court’s expansive ruling, a state is currently unable to disqualify a candidate for federal office who engaged in insurrection, even if that person has been charged and convicted of insurrection. Even a federal court would be unable to bounce an insurrectionist from the ballot absent a law enacted by Congress.

There's No Restraining This Activist Supreme Court

This SCOTUS needs to be burned to the ground and rebuilt with actual Justices, instead of these unelected activists who are opposed by nearly 8 in 10 Americans.

The Courts are not going to save us. The Courts aren’t even going to enforce existing laws that were written to protect us. The Courts are actively working against Democracy and doing everything The Courts can do to hasten Fascism’s hold on the levers of power. Fascism has already come to America. It is taking root in every state that is under Republican occupation, urged on and enabled by this SCOTUS majority, and their ideological partners in the House and Senate. The only way we can stop this from spreading like a Zerg creep over all of America is to overwhelmingly put Democrats into office and then force them to act.

If Congress won’t do something to limit the grotesque abuses of power by people who don’t interpret the law, but make law from the bench, it will be up to America to rise up and demand action. 

I refuse to be ruled by 6 Christofascist Nationalists, and I refuse to sit quietly while people who have the legal means to do something throw up their hands and furrow their brows.

This is going to be our last election that matters, if we don’t.

I’m serious. If Trump somehow gets into the White House again, we will never have another election in my lifetime.

LISTEN TO ME: any vote that is not for Joe Biden is a vote to end Democracy in America. Any vote that is not for a Democrat is a vote to end Democracy in America. When I see people insisting they won’t support Biden or Democrats because they aren’t Left enough, I want to pull my hair out. The stakes are too high for all of us -- especially the most vulnerable among us -- to indulge temper tantrums.

It’s a very simple choice: you can vote for Biden and Democrats, or you can vote to turn America into a Christian Nationalist Theocracy, ruled by autocrats.

This will be our last free election, if Republicans are not resoundingly and forcefully rejected at all levels.

#uspol #scotus

[thevalicemultiverse]

Very glad I don't live somewhere like China or Cuba and instead live in a country founded on DEMOCRACY where most laws are decided on by a council of unelected wizards doing seances to ask the ghost of Thomas Jefferson what he thinks

Alice: [rubbing her temples] I know what the joke is there, but honestly? I think that particular, literal system might be better that what's going on now.

#~M: I want some questions! now! (ask) #~M: grin without a cat (anon) #~V: Cuddlepile #~T: Girls Love Girls And Boys #democracy equals unelected wizards #~C: Alice Liddell #((at least while they were arguing with Thomas Jefferson #they wouldn't be doing monstrous things to the country at large #we'd have a window of time to subvert them #guuuuh)) #~M: with this hand I will lift your queue

[mimiga-village]

evil evil evil evil

#the people in power do not care for you they want you to die #thousands at the very least are going to die and suffer forever #the people making these decisions see people afab as incubators #because our unelected god-emperors are christofacists and need more flesh for the great american meat grinder #reminder that the original draft referred to a lack of domestic supply of infants #they do not care about children they see them as commodities to exploit and rape #everything is so awful and evil #I am filled with so much rage I hope every person who contributed to rvw being overturned is scared for their life

[odinsblog]

When most people talk about expanding the Supreme Court, they're talking about adding a few Justices, two or four to the bench. But I am not most people. I do not think we should add a few Justices to get into an endless tit for tat with Mitch McConnell and his Federalist Society forces. I think we should blow the lid clear off this incrementally institutionalized motherfucker, and add 20 Justices.

I'd like to tell you about my Court expansion plan and explain why adding many Justices instead of fewer Justices is actually a better reform, fixes more underlying problems with the Court, and works out to be less partisan or political than some of the more incremental plans out there.

Let's start with the basics.

Expanding the number of Justices on the Supreme Court can be done with a simple act of Congress, passed by the Senate and signed by the President. Court expansion does not become easier or harder based on the number of Justices you seek to add to the Court. From a civics perspective, the process to add two Justices to the Court is just the same as the process to add 20.

Arguably, the rationale is the same too.

The current plan, supported by some Democrats, is to add four Justices to the Supreme Court. Their arguments are that the Court has gotten woefully out of step with the American people and the elected branches of government, which is true.

They argue that the country is a lot bigger now than it was in 1869, when Congress set the number of Supreme Court Justices at nine, which is also true. Basically, all of these arguments flow together into the catchphrase, “we have 13 Circuit Courts of Appeal, and so we should have 13 Justices.”

See, back in the day, each Supreme Court Justice was responsible for one lower Circuit Court of Appeal. Procedurally, appeals from the lower circuits are heard first by the Justice responsible for that circuit. But now we have 13 lower Circuit Courts of Appeal, meaning some Justices have to oversee more than one. If we expanded the Court to 13 Justices, we'd get back to a one to one ratio for Supreme Court Justice per Circuit Court of Appeal.

But it doesn't actually matter how many circuits each Justice presides over, because all the Justices do is move an appeal from the lower court to the Supreme Court for the full Court to consider whether to hear the appeal.

Their function is purely clerical.

It doesn't matter.

One justice could oversee all 13 circuits while the other eight went fishing, kind of like hazing a rookie on a team. And it wouldn't make a damn bit of difference in terms of the number of cases the Supreme Court hears. It's just a question of who has to work on Saturdays.

Indeed, I'm not even sure that I want the Court to hear more cases. These people are unelected, and these people already have too much power. More cases just gives them more opportunities to screw things up. I don't need the Court to make more decisions. I need the Court to make fewer shitty decisions. And for that, I need to reform how the Court makes those decisions. And for that, I need more people. And I need those people to make their decisions in panels.

Those lower courts, those 13 Circuit Courts of Appeal, almost all of them operate with more than nine judges. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has — wait for it — 29 judges!

All the lower courts use what's called a panel system. When they catch a case, three judges are chosen at random from all the judges on the circuit to hear the case. Those three judges then issue a ruling. If the majority of the circuit disagrees, they can vote to rehear the case as a full circuit.

The legal jargon here is called “en banc” when the full circuit hears the case.

But most of the time, that three judge panel ruling is the final ruling on the issue, with the circuit going en banc only when they believe the three judge panel got it clearly wrong.

Think about how different it would be if our Supreme Court operated on a panel system instead of showing up to Court knowing that six conservative Justices were against you, or the one or two conservative Justices that you invited onto your super yacht are guaranteed to hear your case.

You literally wouldn't know which Justices you'd get on your panel.

Even on a six-three conservative court, you might draw a panel that was two-to-one liberals, or you might draw Roberts, Kavanaugh, and Barrett instead of Thomas, Alito and Gorsuch, which could make a huge difference. Either way, you wouldn't know which Justices you'd get.

Not only does that make a big difference in terms of the appearance of fairness, especially in this time when some Justices are openly corrupt, it also makes a big difference in terms of what kinds of cases and arguments people would bring to the Court. Without knowing which Justices they'd get, litigants and red state attorney generals would have to tailor their arguments to a more center mass, mainstream temperament, instead of merely shooting their shot and hoping their arch conservatives can bully a moderate or two to vote with them.

Now, you can do panels with nine or 13 Justices, but you pretty much have to do panels with 29 Justices. Overloading the Court with Justices would essentially force them to adopt the random assignment process used by every other Court.

That would be good.

Sure, litigants could always hope for en banc review, where the full partisan makeup of the Court could be brought to bear. BUT, getting a majority of 29 Justices to overrule a panel decision requires 15 votes. Consider that right now you only need four votes, a minority of the nine member Court, to get the full Court to hear a case.

I'm no mathlete, but I'm pretty sure that 15 is just a higher bar.

That brings me to my next big point about expanding the Court to 29: Moderation.

Most people say that they do not want the Court to be too extreme to either side. Generally, I think that argument is bollocks. I, in fact, do want the Court to be extreme in its defense of voting rights, women's rights, and human rights. But maybe I'm weird.

If you want the Supreme Court to be a more moderate institution, then you should want as many Justices on the Supreme Court as possible. Why? Because cobbling together a 15-14 majority on a 29 member Court will often yield a more moderate decision than a five-four majority on a nine member Court.

Not going to lie. The law is complicated, and judges are quirky. If you invited five judges off the street over for a barbecue, they wouldn't be able to agree on whether hot dogs and hamburgers count as sandwiches.

It's simply easier to get five people to do something extreme than it is to get 15 people to do something extreme.

Think about your own life.

If you wanted to hike up a damn mountain, that is an activity for you and a couple of your closest friends. You're not taking 15 people to climb a mountain. That's not even a hike. That's an expedition, and you're expecting one or two of them to be eaten by bears on the way to the top. But if you're organizing an outdoor activity for 15 people, you're going to go to the park, and your friends will be expected to bring their own beer.

Most likely, adding 20 Justices would moderate the conservative majority just by putting enough people and personalities in the mix that it would be harder for them to do their most destructive work.

Just think about how the five worst senators you know, or the five worst congresspeople you can think of, often don't get their way because they can't even convince other members of their party to go along with their nihilist conservative ride.

Note, I said Conservative majority.

The astute reader will notice that I have not said that I want to add 20 fire-breathing liberal comrades who will stick it to Das Kapital for the rest of their lives. No, I believe the benefits of this kind of court expansion are so great — panels and the moderation from having more justices trying to cobble together en banc majority opinions — that I'd be willing to split the new justices ten and ten with conservative choices.

A 16-13 conservative leaning court would just be better than a six-three conservative court, even if my guys are still in the minority. The only litmus test I'd have for this plan is that all 20 have to be objectively pro-Democratic, self-government. All 20 have to think the Supreme Court has too much power. You give me 20 people who think the court should not be rulers in robes, and I'll take my chances.

However, there's no objective reason for elected Democrats to be as nice and friendly as I am when adding 20 Justices. Off the top, seats should be split eleven to nine, because Mitch McConnell and the Republicans must be made to pay for their shenanigans with the Merrick Garland nomination under Barack Obama. Republicans stole a seat. Democrats should take it back, full stop. I will take no further questions about this.

From there, this is where Democrats could, I don't know, engage in political hardball instead of being SAPS like always.

You see, right now, Republicans are dead set against court expansion because they are winning with the Court as it is. I can make all of the pro-reform, good government arguments under the sun, and the Republicans will ignore them because, again, they're winning right now.

But if you put forward a bill to add 20 seats, the Republican incentives possibly change: obstruct, and the Democrats push through court expansion on their own, and add 20 Justices of their own choosing, and you end up with people like, well, like me on the court. Or Mitch McConnell could release Senators to vote for the plan, and Republicans can share in the bounty.

It puts a different kind of question to McConnell: Join, get nine conservative Justices and keep a 15-14 conservative majority on the court, or Obstruct, and create a 23 to six liberal majority on the court, and trust that Republicans will take over the House, Senate, and White House so they can add 20 of their own Justices in the future.

Note that McConnell will have to run that whole table while overcoming a super liberal Supreme Court that restores the Voting Rights Act and strikes down Republican gerrymanders. Good luck, Mitch.

My plan wins either way.

Either we get a 29 person court that is more moderate, we get a 29 person court that is uber liberal, or McConnell does run the table and we end up with a 49 person court or a 69 person court. And while Republicans are in control of that bloated body, everybody understands that the Court is just a political branch there to rubber-stamp the acts of the President who appointed them.

Perhaps then, voters would start voting based on who they want to be in control of that court, instead of who they want to have a beer with.

The court is either fixed, or neutered.

It's a win-win.

I know 20 is a big number. I know we've all been institutionalized to believe that incremental change is the only change possible. And I know it sounds fanciful to ask for 20 when the starting offer from the establishment of the Democratic Party, the Republican Party, and President Joe Biden, is zero.

But like a doctor with poor bedside manner, I'm less interested in people's feelings and more interested in fixing the problem.

If you give me two Justices or four Justices, I can reverse a number of conservative policies that they've shoved through a Supreme Court that has already been illegitimately packed with Republican appointees. If you give me a few Justices, I can reestablish a center-left, pro-democracy majority… at least until those new Justices die at the wrong time, under the wrong president.

But if you give me 20 Justices, I can fix the whole fucking thing.

—ELIE MYSTAL, In Contempt of Court

#politics #elie mystal #scotus #court packing #packing the court #roberts court #john roberts #federalist society #the federalist society #republicans

[mlmxreader]

The Royal Ranger | Legolas x gn!reader

『••✎••』

↳ ❝ Legolas

16 "I know you're watching me" ❞

: ̗̀➛ there is another ranger in Legolas' life, one who happens to be his favourite.

: ̗̀➛ mentions of violence

↳ @thesnowurzikdjinn @arthurmorgansballsack

•───────────────★•♛•★──────────────•

The forest was quiet. The trees barren of leaves as the cold chill of winter began to creep up to its worst, but still bursting with life as the birds fluttered amongst the branches; in a few months, the branches would be adorned with thousands of nests ready for thousands of little lives.

The bushes were scattered with ripe berries protected by small and fat spiders of brown and yellow; they stood guard so loyally and so bravely, using their webs to tell when friend or foe or food was approaching.

Amongst the dark green and harsh yellow grasses, foxes and hares ran and dug through the thick black dirt; bursting and bubbling with life amongst the cold and damp weather. In the night, wolves would howl amongst themselves as they got lost in the dark and separated from one another; their harsh jaws gnashing and gnawing as they chased down deer and foxes alike.

The forest was always bursting with life. It was home, as much as it could be.

True home still lied to the West; across a short sea, there laid a large island made up of three kingdoms.

One, and the furthest to the West, was ruled by a fair and just king who had been chosen by his people; with a red dragon at his side, he saw that his people were always looked after and comfortable.

The King saw that his rangers were trained by the best in Middle Earth; he sent them to the Rangers of the North for training and always saw that they were treated well upon their return.

The King's dragon, Drygyn, was a pleasant creature, too; towering, with legs like thick branches and jaws big enough to swallow a house in one gulp, was always happy to allow the children of the kingdom to climb upon his great armoured back, and always protected his people when called to do so.

To the East of that Kingdom was another; ruled by an arrogant and ill-tempered king, it was a horrid place. Filled with greed and destruction; the people and their unelected king despised those to the West, and if it had not been for Rohan and the Elves, they would have destroyed it and stolen it for themselves.

So greedy they were, that not even dragon sickness could describe their conditions. Not even the most selfish and covetous of dragons could match them.

But the kingdom that sat the most North was kind; ruled by a king who rode a horse with a singular horn, he was a pleasant man who saw that his people were well off and looked over.

He held elections once a year, and always won them; he had the hearts of his people, and he always aided the kingdom in the West.

The West and North were brothers, as much as they could be without sharing blood; they shared it on the battlefield, and would for ever be close.

Originally part of the King of The West's royal guard, you had been asked if you wanted to become a ranger; the king himself had recognised your skills and talents, and had asked you personally. He would see to it that you would be well looked after during your training, and wanted you to expand your horizons as much as you could.

Six years, he said, and then you would be able to come home; but if you wished to stay in Middle Earth, he would also understand. He would send gold across the short sea to give you your pension; once a month, eighty gold coins. Six years later, when he had written to you to ask, you admitted that you wished to stay.

Your mentor, Aragorn, who was only four years older than you, treated you well and through him, you had met an Elf Prince and fallen in love with him. The King was overjoyed, so much so, that his letter in response was written with shaky hands and littered with constant praise and congratulations.

It made you laugh when you read it to Legolas and Aragorn, and they had smiled and laughed along with you just as much; Thranduil was also the recipient of a letter from the king, and found it amusing how a king could sound so much like a commoner.

He didn't realise that, once upon a time, the king was a commoner.

Within the forest, though, you heard familiar footsteps approaching; you tilted your head, listening closely as you closed your eyes for a moment and inhaled the scents.

Aragorn and Legolas.

You smiled, quick to climb up a tree with efficency and silence; burying yourself amongst the empty branches as you tried not to laugh. They passed beneath you, calling your name loudly; you furrowed your brows as they looked around, unable to pick up your trail as much as they had tried.

Aragorn had taught you well, and your service to the King of The West had taught you even more beforehand. You were a soldier at heart, yet took to a Ranger's life more easily than a dragon to gold. You heard Aragorn sigh as he turned to Legolas, who didn't seem convinced as he raised a brow and called out loudly.

"I know you're watching me! Show yourself!"

You huffed, making your way down and through the trees until you stood beside him. "Is this any better?"

"You were stalking me," Legolas hummed.

"We've been together for half a mortal's life," you pointed out. "Hardly stalking."

"Hunting, then," he argued with a smile on his lips.

"We need your assistance," Aragorn started, "all three of us have been summoned to Lord Elrond."

"So?" You shrugged. "I'm sure whatever it is, you can deal with it."

"No," he shook his head. "Arwen and I took four hobbits to Rivendell. One of them bears the Ring."

"A hobbit? With a ring of power?" You asked with a scoff. "Impossible."

"It's true," Legolas admitted. "I saw them all myself."

"And what are we to do?" You asked.

"I cannot tell you here," Aragorn admitted. "Please. Come with us."

You grumbled as you whistled for your horse. "Fine."

He was a big, towering beast with a short cut and trimmed mane so that it couldn't be snagged upon branches or grabbed by enemy hands either; with his tail short and trimmed as well, he was easy to ride through forests. His massive hooves adorned with a red and green and white painted flag on them, he was easy to spot.

A dragon birthmark sat on his left shoulder, bright red and almost glowing; all horses born in the West Kingdom had that birthmark. Just as all the dogs had it on their chests, all the sheep and goats and cows had it on their left thigh, and all the people had it on their left shoulders. All bright red, and all treated as a mark of pride.

The royal guard, however, were all born with the dragon upon their right forearms; their armour was always engraved with bright red dragons on a half white background that stopped halfway down and was white the rest of the way.

They fought with swords that had triangular tips like spears, mimicking the dragon's tongue and tail, all made with bright red steel; upon their helmets, they always wore leeks of beautiful green and daffodils of bright gold.

They were awed by everyone from every kingdom, and were some of the best fighters in all of the world; they were revered for their just and kind nature, and sought after for their impeccable skills on the battlefield. Seasoned fighters, they could take giants down with just a sweep of their swords.

You got upon your horse, looking at Legolas and Aragorn with a raised brow as you tilted your head; Aragorn gave a whistle, and his horse came trotting along, but Legolas made no such sound and no horse came looking for him either. He looked up at you, smiling as he offered his hand.

"Well?" You hummed. "Get walking, green boy."

Legolas scowled at you, trying not to laugh but failing so miserably. "Let me up."

"Do I have to?" You asked, grabbing his hand and hoisting him up behind you. "You may want to hold on, pointy ears."

"Quiet," he grumbled, his arms around your waist as he drew close to your body. Smiling to himself.

At the Council of Elrond, however, there was an unexpected surprise; sitting honourably near the other men, sat your king.

With his dark skin and dark eyes, he looked absolutely gorgeous bathed in the soft golden light of the council; his white and green armour shimmered, the red dragon on his breastplate shining brightly and the one upon his face seemingly glowing.

The pointed tail rested on his neck, whilst the rest of the four legged beast trailed to the side of his mouth, its head just below his eye.

Beside him sat the King of The North; proud, his armour was thick, and deep blue with a bright white X painted across the breastplate. His brown skin seemed to glisten in the light and he smiled softly as he nodded at you; you nodded back, tears in your eyes and your vision slowly beginning to blur as you felt your bottom lip tremble.

Across from them, however, and distanced from the rest of the council, was the King of The East. His pale white skin seemed dull and slimy as he leaned back; with his bright blue eyes, he scowled at everyone, his lip turned upwards and exposing a few of his white teeth. His fingers were thick and grubby, unwashed for years, and red at the tips. He seemed to sneer as you walked past.

The Queen of the island that sat to the West of all three kingdoms, however, sat beside the West and North kings; she was beautiful, dark skin so gently touched by the golden lights of the council, around her neck sat beautiful light green jewels, dazzling the same way that stars did.

Her dress was orange and white and green, bringing out the shades of green within her hair and painted upon her nails. They called her the Emerald Queen, and she was known to be just and kind as well as firm and strong; she was gorgeous, and her dark green, almost black, eyes caught yours as she smiled.

You smiled back, bowing and bending your knee.

"My Lady," you said softly. "It is an honour to meet you."

She pulled you up, shaking her head. "No one bows to me, nor I to them. We are all equals here, Ranger."

"Ranger, indeed," your king grinned, coming to stand beside you as he patted your back gently. The red dragon upon his face seemed to glow. "My finest. Once my best royal guard, now my best ranger."

The King of The East sneered as he scoffed, turning to Legolas. "This is an insult to me. I have been assaulted."

Legolas raised a brow as he looked at him; his lips were thin, almost nonexistent, and his thin grey hair and his thin grew brows were no distraction from his ghastly looking face.

He seemed to be rotting from the inside, and even his red, white and blue robes would not distract from such a heinous smell; his voice sounded sickly, and made Legolas' stomach churn. He put his hand on the King's shoulder, shaking his head in warning.

"That ranger is under my protection, and under the protection of my father," he hissed. "You shall not look if you are not told directly."

"Legolas, come come!" Your king beamed. "Emerald, my Queen, you must meet Legolas!"

Legolas laughed softly as he walked over, shaking her hand and letting his arm rest upon your waist. "It is an honour, my Lady."

"Your ranger here is lovely," she complimented. "And I must admit that, if you had not caught such a heart, I might have."

"It's a shame we have to meet under such circumstances," you told her.

"Perhaps," Legolas hummed. "One day, we will meet again."

The Emerald Queen nodded as she leaned back into her seat. "Whatever your fellowship requires of me, of my people, know that you have it... but be warned."

The King of The North nodded as he stole a look at her. "Oh, aye. The East Kingdom cannae be trusted with the Ring."

"Agreed," your king agreed, glaring at Legolas in certainty. "They cannot."

"Tell Elrond," the Emerald Queen insisted. "He cannot trust the East King."

"Eva," the North agreed. "They cannae eva be trusted."

"No, never," your king concluded. "They will use the ring to commit terrible acts, they can never have it."

Legolas pulled you aside while the formalities continued; he kept you close, hiding behind one of the many white pillars as he smiled, sighing heavily.

You both knew what would be asked of you, and you knew what would come if you were to fall; you didn't mind, gently placing your hands against his chest as you dared to smile.

"You're almost as warm as a dragon," you whispered. "I fell asleep against him many times whilst on guard duty... Legolas?"

"Yes?"

You licked your lips, sighing as you swallowed thickly. "If I should fall... please, return me to my kingdom."

"Of course," he agreed quietly, nodding curtly. "But I cannot allow that to happen. If you fall, I will, too."

"No-"

"Yes."

#mlem writes #legolas x reader #legolas x you #legolas x y/n #legolas imagine #legolas fanfiction #legolas fic #legolas greenleaf x reader #legolas greenleaf imagine #legolas greenleaf fanfic #legolas greenleaf #legolas #lotr x reader #lotr x you #lotr x y/n #lotr imagine #lotr fanfiction #lotr fanfic #lotr fic #lotr legolas #lotr #lord of the rings x reader #lord of the rings x you #lord of the rings imagine #lord of the rings fanfiction #lord of the rings fic #lord of the rings

[qsycomplainsalot]

I'd like to say, I really appreciate you taking an unapologetic stance on the French Revolution. In the US and UK there has been a renewed push in pop history and in fiction to portray the revolution as unjust, or as racist, sexist, undemocratic etc. etc. I even remember my underfunded public school history textbook back in the day having a big sob story about antoinette and the king and the nobles, trying to make us feel sorry for them. The recent addition of vague social justice language to discredit the idea of overthrowing oligarchs and unelected rulers makes it quite clear (to me, at least) that this is simply the fears of the ruling class manifesting themselves again. While certainly the revolution is Morally Complicated when taken as a whole, I feel no compunction to hand wring about the destruction of monarchy by any means necessary. SO, thank you!

That's a bit of an odd comment because I don't think I defend it that much ? And also it's funny because in France we're definitely not told enough about, and it ends up coming off better than it was. The thing is the first revolution was kind of an overall failure, it blundered along into achieving great things until monarchy returned in one way or another. The actual process of getting to actual democracy took almost a hundred years and you could argue even by the third republic we weren't there. But it got the ideals of enlightenment philosophers out of parlors and into government policies, it DECIDEDLY set a new tone for the relation between the people and the kings, and generally was a good precedent to dangle over the head of future monarchs. It broke the back of a royal dynasty that had been ruling France uninterrupted for eight hundred years, showing people that something else was possible. But it was also a brutal mess of conflicting ideologies and political reprisals. It never had a single effective government and did not in any way match the idea of progressivism tumblr bloggers assign to it. Of course all the while having to deal with external factors such as England bankrolling the whole of Europe to attack us because they wanted to have their backyard safe while taking over a third of the world's landmass. So like yeah I tend to defend the revolution against right wing idiots who try to make it seem like the French nobility didn't have it coming for hundreds of years, but I'm also gonna remind the people shipping St-Just and Robespierre that those were actual, deeply flawed and murderous bastards operating a repressive government "in the name of liberty". It's not a simple period of history to characterize, just like Napoleon's reign which if you ask me is the one with a real smear campaign run against it in the anglo world.

#history

[gay-jesus-probably]

I feel like Zelda does not recognize that her actions have consequences, which is. A very bad attitude for a leader to have, and seems to extend VERY far back in the Hyrulian royal family. You're also very right about them seeming to think that Ganondorf was too far beneath them to do any real harm. They thought they were being clever, but they failed to recognize that he can be very dangerous if he wants to be. This is entirely in a "good for her" way towards Ganondorf btw. So basically I am shaking Zelda by the shoulders and screaming "WHEN WILL YOU LEARN!!! WHEN WILL YOU LEARN THAT YOUR ACTIONS HAVE CONSEQUENCES!!!!"

Oh my god, right??? I mean, I'm not surprised, that kind of shit is just par for the course with royalty. They're literally born into a position of absolute power and authority, and told that they deserve it because they are fundamentally better people than literally everyone else, and all these lesser people exist only to serve them. That is the philosophical bedrock that a monarchy is built on. And in the LoZ universe it's a thousand times worse, because now we're also talking the divine right of kings (divine right of princesses in this case i guess), except it is canonically true. The literal canon says that the Hylian royal family has actually descended from a goddess, and that means they get to rule the world forever, and anyone who disagrees with them is pure evil to be crushed.

I mean, don't get me wrong aesthetically I love a good fantasy monarchy, that's just an inherent guilty pleasure of the genre. But I like them being done well. I don't want my fantasy royalty to just be the beautiful well mannered people that wear fancy clothes and sit on thrones. I like them being written as a person in a mandatory lifelong political position, and taking their duty as head of state really fucking seriously. Yeah, they're rich and powerful and live in a cool castle, but the trade off is that literally their entire life is dedicated to the betterment of the kingdom, regardless of what they actually want to do. That's the deal. You get anything you want, but you don't get to be your own person. If you don't want to do the job, then you don't get to have the privilege that comes with it. Honestly, one of the best examples I can think of off the top of my head is Riju; she's the unelected leader of the Gerudo and took the throne as a child... and took her responsibility really fucking seriously. She's been an exemplary leader in all her apperances, and she's clearly dedicated to the idea that being the head of state means serving your people above all else. She's dedicated her life to the wellbeing of the Gerudo, and that makes her an incredibly good person; she's more than earned her position and the benefits that come with it.

...And then we have Zelda, who isn't so good at this. Honestly, I'd say her main problem is just straight up entitlement; not really surprising given her environment. I mean for fucks sake, just look at how the civillians in TOTK treat her; I'm still absolutely horrified by that one sidequest where a research team misheard her instructions, thought she told them to go exploring in their underpants, and instead of refusing or even questioning the situation, they actually fucking did it. Every single one of them stripped naked, and set off to do their job in the manner the Princess had asked them to. A job that included going into monster dens. Now of course this is all silly, because naked people are funny, but if you actually think about it for five seconds, it's actually not funny at all. A group of civilians believed that their ruler ordered them to throw away their weapons, remove all their armour, strip naked, and walk into a monster den. This is outright said to be suicide. And they were actually going to fucking do it, without a single complaint or word of question. And the game's actual response to this is just "wow, it's so great to see how everyone's so devoted to our princess! this is a really heartwarming story". No game, I do not consider it heartwarming that a group of civillians were immediately willing to throw themselves to a pointless, agonizing death for no benefit other than Zelda's amusement. Not that she actually told them to do it, but the misunderstanding spiralling that far says so much about the state of Hyrule, and how much accountability Zelda is being held to. Which is to say, literally none whatsoever. Even when the fake Zelda is raising hell across the country and actively ruining lives, the only response from her apparent victims is to get worried that they haven't been showing Zelda enough devotion which is why they must have deserved this torment, so the only response is to dedicate even more of their lives to her service! Nobody questions her, nobody even gets angry or scared that she's seemingly hurt them. They just grovel at her feet.

The point I'm making here is that Zelda has spent years in an environment where literally everyone tells her that she is the most important person in the world, she deserves all the power, respect and riches, and she could never do anything wrong. That would go to anyone's head, and let's be real here... the game never even suggests that Zelda's tried to get people to take it down a few notches. She isn't worried about the mindless worship, she's perfectly okay with her country being a goddamn suicide cult. And you can see the entitlement coming across in her actions during the game - she has the four sages swear that their entire races will dedicate themselves to serving the Hylian royal family, and specifically their still-unborn descendants will take up the role to do her dirty work. She thinks it's perfectly reasonable to ask people to sell their unborn children into her service, and there's nothing ethically dubious about making demands of people who haven't been born yet, with two of them still being children when they're ordered to take up arms. And I realize it's a serious situation, but the game doesn't acknowledge this as being a morally grey action; the new sages are swearing to dedicate their lives to the glory of their god-ruler, how could anyone find that alarming?

And her treatment of LInk is particularly infuriating, because let's remember her, the last time she sees Link is immediately after he's been gloom-fucked by Ganon. His entire left arm is dead, and his beloved weapon is destroyed. She saw it happen. He absolutely could have just died right after she was yeeted back in time, because again, he was mortally wounded and in an extreme amount of danger. And even if he did live, he's just had his entire arm ripped off; after everything he's gone through, it would make perfect sense for him to finally hit a breaking point and decide he can't stand to fight anymore. My man's literally died before, and now he's lost his dominant limb, how could anyone be expected to keep going after that? But Zelda never even considers that Link might not be able or willing to fight for her. She treats it as a given that he's perfectly fine, and will do exactly what she wants even if she isn't there to order him around. It's not like he can think for himself, that would be ridiculous. Link is denied any and all agency; he can't even form his own opinions about the main plot or influence it in any way; everything was decided several thousand years ago. He's just here to do as he's told.

It just... all makes me think of that one memory in BOTW where Zelda runs away from Link, and when he catches up to do his fucking job, she greets him by angrily declaring that obviously she's the only one with a mind of her own. That was supposed to be her being way the fuck out of line, and abusing Link to deal with her own frustrations. But apparently TOTK... decided that she was right. Zelda is the only one with a mind of her own. Link's just here to follow her around and swing the sword when she tells him to.

It's just so fucking bleak, I hate this story so much. I love the gameplay, but I'm having a miserable time with the plot, every new development just makes me more frustrated and upset. I'm working on the fifth sage thing right now, and gotta say, absolutely fucking hate how Mineru refers to Link as just Zelda's Human Weapon. Like thank you furry goat lady, I realize that Zelda chose me to be her personal bootlicker, but I sure as hell didn't consent to any of this, and nobody has asked me if I'm actually willing to put my life on the line for this woman yet again.

At least BOTW fucking asked me if I was willing to risk my life to stop the Calamity.

#tears of the kingdom spoilers #tears of the kingdom #this got longer than i meant it to lmao #i just have a lot of thoughts about this story and none of them are good #the gleeful oppression and the narrative supporting it... super don't like that #if you pay attention to the narrative you'll see: zelda is never allowed to be wrong #even fake zelda is treated as a perfect angel right until people suspect she miiiight not be the real one

[mudefrau]

girl who has only seen the hunchback of notre dame: getting a lot of hunchback of notredame vibes from this

(au details⬇️)

elphie and nessa live alone in the colwen grounds cathedral. their parents have been dead for awhile, but frex would say that elphaba is a monster who's only less monstrous because she got to hold nessa as a baby who is "holy".

over the years elphaba stays locked at the bell tower because of this. nessa went to school (shiz) and learned magic; glinda was a classmate of hers.

elphaba studied magic from nessa's books at home but didn't tell her, and she might be even better than her or glinda. she enchanted the gargoyles (named chistery, malky and killjoy) so she could have someone to talk to, but it's a secret.

nessa, the very virtuous minister of justice of nest hardings, HATES pleasure faithers, hates fun, hates the dragon clock. she blames them for inciting the crowd to kill frexspar or something plus they pose a threat to her unionist values.

still, they come to town every year, especially for the festival of fools, to which she's forced to attend "as an unelected official". she advises elphaba (who wanted to go) to stay in, "because they'll kill you too; the world is wicked".

the dragon clock is operated by boq (this was a dwarf in the novel, but i wanted a role for boq and he's short enough) and this dancer from vinkus who tags along with his old goat. (like nessa, this fiyero is a musical+book fusion as i want him to have the "fun :D" personality on together with his brave, compassionate nature)

meanwhile, captain glinda returns from war (vs emerald city / royal oz since munchkinland is still struggling to be independent), summoned by nessa, who "disposed" of her previous captain nick chopper('s limbs) because he wasn't... cutting it (heh)

"what? you've called me to arrest drunk people and puppets?!" "this is the real war, captain" *crushes ants with her silver shoe*.

nessa asks glinda to be her "back support" at the festival since she doesn't want to bring elphaba. surprise surprise elphaba goes anyway and gets in trouble because the green is, indeed, not paint.

etc. i ended up not taking this story too seriously as i didn't care much for the quasi-esme-phoebus triangle, and tbh all i wanted to see is frollo!nessa being consumed by "the fires of hell". since i think that's close to what you get if you combine her book self (godliness-obsessed but ignoring her own corruption) and musical self (forcing guy who doesn't want to be with her, to be with her, using her power(s)). just a thought exercise of whether she'd be as destructive if she were in love in the novel, except i gave boq a break.

#cw frollo #i guess #nessarose thropp #wicked the life and times of the wicked witch of the west #wicked the musical #elphaba #glinda #fiyero #boq #nessarose

[fullhalalalchemist]

🚨🚨CONGRESS SECRETLY TRYING TO SNEAK IN EARN IT ACT COPYCAT INTO MUST PASS SPENDING BILL (PLEASE READ EXTREMELY IMPORTANT)

July 20, 2023 Congress is right now determining what is included in a must pass spending bill the NDAA. Often congress will sneakily add as amendments their bills that they can't pass in a normal setting.

If you remember, I made a previous post about EARN IT being reintroduced here.

The EARN IT Act and it's copycats are bipartisan bills that will greatly censor if not completely eliminate encryption and anything sexual and LGBTQ+ from the internet, globally. Anything the far-right doesn't like will be completely gone. The best way to stop them is to use https://www.badinternetbills.com/ to call your senators.

Following it's initial introduction earlier this year was massive opposition from human rights, LGBT, tech, political groups, and grassroots groups. Bc of this, the senators decided to remake the bill but give it a new name, so they can still pass Earn It without actually passing Earn It. Those bills are the Stop CSAM Act (yes really, they actually named it that), and the Cooper-Davis act.

The entire point of these bills is to mass surveil and censor everyone and I don't know why more people or senators speak out against it. There is a direct timeline from when the Attorney General Barr (under Trump) said he wanted to do this to it's initial introduction in 2019, and how the senators explicitly knew they couldn't actually say that so they lied and said it was about "stopping CSAM" or "stopping drugs" for Cooper-Davis Act.

These bills essentially do the following:

they gut encryption, the one thing actually protects you from having your data seen by anyone. Do you want republicans to know you're trans? that someone had an abortion? that they spoke out against the govt? to see your private photos you have uploaded to the cloud? to see what porn you watch? if youre a journalist, or an abuse survivor, any hacker or abuser can see your stuff and track you.

they gut parts of Section 230, the one thing that allows anyone to post online and birthed social media. Previous gutting into 230 gave us the tumblr nsfw ban and killed that site.

they create an unelected commission with some already established govt body (DOJ, FTC, etc) that will include law enforcement and people from NCOSE or other Christian conservative groups who will decide what is and isn't lawful to say. no citizen can vote who's on this commission, and the president gets to pick. it's like the supreme court, but for the internet.

lead to mass censorship and surveillance because of the above

We have until the end of the month to stop this, but this can be added literally any moment until then. It's literally code red. If this is added it goes into effect immediately. The BEST way to stop this is to drive calls and emails to the senate. https://www.badinternetbills.com/ connects you directly to your members of congress & gives you a call script.

It is ESSENTIAL to call the Senate leaders who can stop this. Here's a more precise call script you can use: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1huD5Ldd1lPTECYTEb9Gg2ZzrqW6Y9tryHT-MdjOl8kY/edit

All these people expressed concern over Earn It, so we need to press them hard to not allow it's copycats Cooper-Davis or Stop CSAM into the NDAA. This is URGENT and needs all hands on deck. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) [phone] Maria Cantwell (D-WA) [phone] Jon Ossof (D-GA) (202)-224-3521 Alex Padilla (D-CA) [phone] Cory Booker (D-NJ) [phone] Mike Lee (R-UT) [phone]

Please please please spread this message and blow up their phones.

TLDR; The Senate is trying to quietly push the Earn It Act's copycat bills into the must pass NDAA, which will lead to mass censorship and surveillance online by gutting Section 230 which is the entire reason you can even be on tumblr and why the internet exists, killing encryption which put everyone's lives in danger, and appointing far-right people to a supreme court-esque commission that the president has direct control over. They could be added in ANY DAY and we need to push hard to stop it before it gets to that point. CALL YOUR SENATORS **NOW** BY USING https://www.badinternetbills.com/ AND CALL THE SENATE LEADERSHIP AND SPREAD THE WORD!!!!

[wilwheaton]

In her dissent, Justice Elena Kagan dismantled the majority’s analysis of the Clean Air Act, demonstrating that the kind of greenhouse gas regulation at issue is exactly what Congress intended when it passed that law, as a plain reading of the text makes clear. “Some years ago, I remarked that ‘[w]e’re all textualists now,’” Kagan noted. “It seems I was wrong. The current Court is textualist only when being so suits it.” She concluded: Whatever else this Court may know about, it does not have a clue about how to address climate change. And let’s say the obvious: The stakes here are high. Yet the Court today prevents congressionally authorized agency action to curb power plants’ carbon dioxide emissions. The Court appoints itself — instead of Congress or the expert agency — the decisionmaker on climate policy. I cannot think of many things more frightening. Respectfully, I dissent. The reason the court’s conservatives appointed themselves the decision-makers on climate policy is simple: They don’t like what the EPA did. No real constitutional or statutory violation was at issue. They simply believe, as part of their conservative ideology, that the government shouldn’t combat climate change, so they’re going to stop the government from doing it.

The Supreme Court’s EPA ruling says: We’ll do whatever we want

Six unelected evangelical extremists, five of whom were appointed by presidents who lost the popular vote (three of them by a twice-impeached president), are imposing their ideological agenda on millions of Americans. With today’s EPA ruling, they are now imposing their extremist agenda on the world.

When I learned about our government, much was made of the checks and balances, the foresight to ensure that one branch did not become so powerful, it could control the entire country.

Well, that’s not at all the reality we face in 2022.

If this is America, if we are a country where a small minority of white supremacist evangelical extremists can impose laws that are at odds with 80% of the American people, we are not living in a Democracy or even a Republic. We are ruled by a small cabal of untouchable, unaccountable, extremists. If that’s the way it is, and that’s the way it’s going to be, we have to stop pretending that America has anything at all to do with true freedom, opportunity, and justice under the law.

Fuck these Fascists, and fuck everyone who supports them.

[thewales]

The Times:

Harry’s court crusade will define him. And it’ll never end

The Duke of Sussex is on a mission and nothing will deter him from pursuing it, writes Roya Nikkhah

The anguish of reliving what he describes as a lifetime of trauma at the hands of the tabloids was unmistakable, even if the evidence for his claims was harder to detect. Why do it? Why put himself through the pain and emotional angst that many thought he expunged in Spare, his blockbuster memoir?

In short, because he can.

If the past three years have shown anything since the Sussexes stepped down from royal duties, it is that banning them from using their HRH titles has only emboldened them to take on all the battles that royal life once prevented them from entering.

Harry’s performance on the witness stand last week was a textbook case.

Since leaving the royal fold, Harry has repeatedly claimed “the institution” refused to stand up for him and Meghan with the British press, a claim that induces exasperated sighs and rolling eyes in the royal households. It also prompts former aides who worked with the couple and who pushed their relationships with the media to the limit defending them to recall Elizabeth II’s phrase: “Some recollections may vary.”

As some who have worked with Harry over the years say, his memory often does not tally with theirs. A Morten Morland cartoon in The Times last week prompted amusement among several former aides, showing the prince’s hand on a copy of Spare in place of the Bible, swearing to tell “my truth, my whole truth and nothing but my truth”.

But his claim last week that alleged phone hacking by MGN was “contained within the palace” left a senior former courtier who worked with William and Harry during that period scratching their head. “Did we keep things from him? No. At no point did it come up that the Mirror was doing it while I was there, it never came across our desk. I never had any conversations with either of the princes about ‘where are the Mirror getting those stories from?’”

Harry was adamant that “every single one of these articles played a destructive role in my growing up”, but failed to point to any solid evidence linking them to phone hacking. Instead, he often relied on his “suspicions” about stories concerning him, his mother Diana and his first love Chelsy Davy, prompting the same former aide to suggest that Harry’s self-proclaimed “mission” to “reform the media” is more important to him than victory against MGN.

The prince said he would feel it “an injustice” if phone hacking cannot be proved, but the former aide says: “It’s a means to get revenge on the tabloids and an opportunity to pursue that mission, win or lose. He won’t want to lose, but he will have had his chance to say ‘this is what it was like for me, my family, my girlfriend’. Perhaps all those millions from his book and Netflix deal was to build a war chest to pursue the tabloids until the end. Of course he forgets he’s had a lot of positive coverage over the years. Like an actor, he only remembers the bad reviews.

One barbed comment in Harry’s 55-page witness statement last week got Palace aides particularly hot under the collar, given the constitutional requirement for the royal family to be “above politics”. The fifth-in-line to the throne wrote: “Our country is judged globally by the state of our press and our government, both of which I believe are at rock bottom.” Has the prince, who travelled the world for years representing the UK, so soon forgotten that Britain is also judged internationally by its royal family? To many, his comment was woefully misjudged, others saw it as unconstitutional. Either way, what must the royal family make of their unelected, exiled prince launching attacks on this country’s elected representatives?

A royal source says: “The Palace will find that extremely difficult and uncomfortable, because you can never fully separate yourself from the institution and it will have raised eyebrows on both sides of the park — at Westminster too — not least because it wasn’t necessary for the core of his case.

“But it only underlines the wisdom and importance of [Elizabeth II’s] decisions taken at Sandringham [the family summit in January 2020], that you cannot be half-in and half-out. Those decisions are now the royal family’s insurance — when one of its members continues to break with convention, they can point out that he is speaking as Harry Windsor, not as the Duke of Sussex, working member of the royal family representing the nation. Then, there is the deep irony of a member of the royal family talking about how the country is judged around the world, which is often by and through the royal family. It shows a deep misunderstanding by him.”

A source who knows Harry well, says: “I think he’s been sitting in the Californian sunshine for a long time, hanging out with James Corden [the actor and TV host] and has lost all the instincts on how to do this, how to conduct himself carefully, still as a member of the royal family. He’s lost the knack of what he can and can’t say and there is no one around him to say, ‘No, Harry, you can’t say that, take that bit out’. It’s embarrassing for him and for Britain, for a prince to be saying, ‘We’ve got a shit government’.”

The reality is Harry cares little about any of this, because he knows there are no consequences to his actions and the monarchy has no more levers to pull.

He has continued to shrug off raised royal eyebrows and veiled threats. The King might have booted his son out of Frogmore Cottage and relegated him to the third row at Westminster Abbey for his coronation behind Princess Anne’s plumed hat, a detail that a royal insider says prompted “much hilarity among the family about where the plume ended up and what it ended up obscuring”. But the Sussexes have kept hold of their titles and those of their children, Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet, proving that however unconstitutional their words or deeds, the punishment is unlikely to be heavier than fiddling with seating plans for the occasional state occasion.

But even some of Harry’s friends and staunchest supporters acknowledge that the noise generated by his legal actions threatens to drown out all the other work on the military, conservation and mental health that he has spent years building. Harry will be at the Invictus Games in Düsseldorf in September, putting him back on the map as a champion of veterans. A friend says: “I couldn’t even tell you, apart from Invictus, what Harry is for at the moment. I think there’s an acknowledgment that while this is all going on, everything else is a sideshow. Championing the causes close to his heart will never go, but he’s hit the pause button to focus on this. It is coming to define him — I think through design.”

The friend also believes Harry’s journey is open-ended: “When these cases are over, it won’t be the end of it. He sees his mission as being the standard bearer of a fair media and I think we’ll see more of this in years to come. He feels so strongly about it. He’ll always be a powerful advocate of fair and true reporting.”

A former courtier has another theory on why Harry is willing to endure the torment: “I think he is seeking inner peace and this becomes the target — he thinks if he can bring the media to heel, it will cure his pain. Sadly, I don’t think it will. He’s still defending his mother. Nothing will take that pain away.”

Full article

#basically they can do whatever they want because the brf won’t do anything to stop this #And that is precisely why he should have been stripped of his titles #because even though he does not work for the monarchy he is a prince of that monarchy the King’s son #and what he says and does reflects on the institution #perhaps not in the same way as it would if they were still an active part of it but it still looks bad. #brf #the suxs

[reneewalkersbiceps]

some things i feel like i should share today as another unelected, money hoarding, tax-dodging, out of touch parasite takes his place as the ‘leader’ of the country:

• i have always been and will always be anti-monarchy. end of.

• today, peaceful protestors on the streets of london are being arrested before they have even started their protests. signs are being confiscated and the public arrested.

• this coronation comes at a time when nurses, junior doctors, teachers and countless others are striking for better working conditions, safety for those they look after and fair pay for the life saving work they do.

• this country has never had more food banks open and overwhelmed. we are drowning in a cost of living crisis that affects everyone but the rich. people have no food and yet east midlands railway is handing out free scones exclusively to it’s first class passengers to celebrate the coronation.

• over 270,000 people in the uk are unhoused (as of jan 2023), living on the streets or in temporary accommodation, meanwhile monarchists have been camping out on the streets for days - uninterrupted by the met police - to catch a fleeting glimpse of a man in a golden carriage driving past.

• speaking of the met police, a recent report found them ‘institutionally racist, misogynistic and homophobic’. just saying.

there’s so much more i could say but i just wanted to illustrate the absolute state of this country at the moment for anyone abroad. we should be ashamed that we as a country are celebrating this day when so many are starving to death, dying on the streets and dying pre/in hospital due to unsafe workplace conditions.

fuck the monarchy. fuck the tories. fuck the police. fuck the coronation. fuck this country and it’s warped sense of what’s right and what’s wrong.

#fuck the monarchy #not aftg #coronation #uk politics #acab #fuck the police

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

This may be the biggest seizure of power by the federal judiciary in US history. Brace yourself. The Supreme Court conservatives, exuding the heady self-confidence of a team that knows it cannot lose, haven’t been coy about the jurisprudence they want to reshape or tear down. Religious liberty, abortion, guns — the Court has recently taken up and dispensed with a whole swath of cases at astonishing speeds, often dramatically changing the bench’s long-held posture in relative silence through the shadow docket. But perhaps on no topic has the Court telegraphed its intent more clearly than the administrative state, the power of federal agencies to regulate and make rules. The dry name belies a system absolutely critical to every corner of American life.

“If I want to dump chemical waste in a swamp, I’d prefer that the federal government not have power to regulate that,” Julian Davis Mortenson, professor at the University of Michigan Law School, told TPM. “If I want to pay people working in my factory a miserably tiny wage, or employ 12 year-olds, I’d rather the federal government not have the power to make a rule against that.” The Court is now stocked with justices hungry to shift the power back in the direction of those nonregulatory interests. In doing so, they’ll really be shifting power to themselves. “If the Supreme Court truly honored the rule of law and precedent, then they would acknowledge the power of the agencies that was granted to them by Congress in order to save our environment,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) told TPM of a recent illustrative case involving the Environmental Protection Agency. “But this is an extremist Supreme Court, so I’m very worried about the outcome.” Because Congress is already paralyzed on critical issues, the prospect of a future in which the administrative state is rendered toothless is also a future in which unelected, conservative Justices become the arbiters of what the government can and can’t do. It’s a right-wing fantasy, cherished and developed for decades, come to life.

#TPM #Talking Points Memo #SCOTUS #corrupt SCOTUS #anti-democratic #power #the administrative state #federal agencies #regulation #the rule of law and precedent #rule of law

[laundryandtaxes]

The baseline shape of political discord between American liberals and conservatives wrt the appropriate size and role of the federal government (when you strip back the culture war games that change regularly) is funny currently because I think conservatives are correct to point out that our governance is increasingly carried out by unaccountable, unelected beaureacrats relying on, at best, loose interpretations of the mandates given to them by Congress, working for agencies with names most Americans wouldn't recognize by name, and that is a real problem for many reasons, including accountability. But firstly we got here largely because legislators have gotten used to collecting their checks for doing nothing but giving culture war speeches and signing off on whatever their party leaders tell them to, and secondly this is the case at the same time that all the teeth have been smashed or spat out of regulatory and other agencies which legislators, directly accountable to the people, set up with all their authority as a legislature, which itself is derived from the votes that landed them there. In the 1970s Americans were so concerned about the health of their waterways that millions of them took to the streets to demand EPA action to preserve their health. Clearly this was indicative of a strong base of popular support for environmental protections, and yet in the 1980s the EPA went the route of neither carrots nor sticks but of just asking polluters if they'd please like to stop polluting, and the result is waterways on their deathbed in parts of the country, it's shore fishing communities just killed out by lack of fish, etc. Because the EPA has refused to do its job, waterways are just dead and dying. Because the FDA has refused to crack down on meat processing plants' food safety practices and almost doesn't even inspect food anymore, people just get sick and die every year due to foodborne illness. Because the FAA let airplane manufacturers handle all their own safety testing, people recently died, and because the FAA hasn't cracked down on the practice of airline subsidiaries, we have unqualified pilots carting people around. It's just very obviously not the case that the federal government is shoving its hands in everything, it's much more the case that it does none of the things which most Americans want done (modern conservatives are not, last I checked, generally opposed to having real meat inspection) at the same time that it takes obnoxious, troublesome, or even heinous actions for which basically no actors can be held accountable even when those actions are explicitly not the right of the federal government to take.