Many of you are probably familiar with the WWII era “Kilroy Was Here” meme, in which the phrase – usually accompanied by this drawing – was written on walls by American GIs virtually everywhere they ended up.
Recently, the plummeting standards for photographs in the US news media have reached a new nadir. For years now, an increasing number of photos on the internet have been taken by people who apparently don’t comprehend why a photo framed as a vertical rectangle is called “portrait” style; these pictures are done as landscapes, but rarely feature any interesting detail in the wide swaths of space which appear to one or both sides of the human subject. Worse still, they’re often headshots which cut off the top of the subject’s head and/or the bottom of his chin, like bad amateur photographers used to do with cheap cameras in the days before digital image capture became ubiquitous. But all too often there’s still plenty of space to the sides of the face, as though the photographer was too stupid to understand that a cell phone can take pictures when held vertically. Given that many of these cutoff photos are mug shots, you can find many examples in my news columns; I crop the extraneous space from the sides, but there’s nothing I can do to restore missing crowns or necks, resulting in crap like this or this. But though those pictures are bad, they’re fine portraiture in comparison with the new fashion, which appear to have been inspired by Kilroy. The first was taken by cops of one of their gang, so it’s perhaps unsurprising that it would be useless as a means of identifying this rapist:
I encountered these within days of one another, so it seems unlikely to be a mere coincidence. And the widely-separated sources point to their both being influenced by some original specimen of cloddishness I haven’t yet encountered. I truly hope I’m wrong, because for this kind of aesthetic idiocy to gain any traction at all would indicate that the Muses have entirely abandoned us to the tender mercies of some horde of cross-eyed imps of the perverse. But only time…and perhaps the Times…will tell.
Expanding the definition of human trafficker means more convictions, which…means huge “increases” in…trafficking numbers that authorities can point to in order to further justify expanding the police state. – Elizabeth N. Brown
Believers in the…QAnon [outgrowth of the popular “sex trafficking” moral panic] are always on the hunt for the powerful pedophiles they imagine run the world…but…court records reveal that QAnon leader Phil Godlewski has a criminal past of his own involving an inappropriate relationship with a minor that [apparently] turned sexual. Thanks to an ill-conceived defamation lawsuit against a local newspaper, Godlewski has put his conspiracy-theory career at risk by inadvertently prompting the release of more details regarding his case, including lurid text messages and a video of his erect penis. Perhaps worse…Godlewski has [apparently] been caught both committing perjury himself and attempting to convince his own victim to do the same to ensure a “financial windfall” for them both…
Most states are trying to distance themselves from the most wackadoodle aspects of “sex trafficking”” mythology, but Florida prefers to take the facts about one of the few situations in which young girls really are in increased danger of sexual exploitation – the foster care system – and view it through the bizarrely-distorted lens of a dying moral panic. If you’ve got a little time, read these concise comments I made about the topic a few years ago, and then try this outlandish fantasy of “neighborhood sex traffickers” “prowling the area” to abduct unwary 12-year-olds by the thousands without anyone at all noticing. Though I hesitate to ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence, this reads like an attempt to exploit the plight of young people dramatically failed by the government into a narrative that can be used to advance a specific political agenda for that same government.
…The U.K…[is] using its Modern Slavery Act to target anyone who employs a minor in the drug trade…[Glodi] Wabelua was the first drug dealer to be prosecuted under the U.K.’s Modern Slavery Act, but not the last…most of the defendants in drug-related [“modern] slavery[“] cases were Black men under 21. Many, if not all, were only one rung removed from the streets themselves”…Laws targeting prostitution and low-level drug crimes may seem overly punitive to you and me, but for many authoritarians these punishments don’t go far enough. By ratcheting up the charges to human trafficking or modern slavery, officials can subject sex workers and drug dealers to much longer periods of incarceration, larger fines, and more stringent restrictions on movement, employment, free association, free speech, and privacy…
[A typical and representative] New York [cop named]…Kristofor O’Rourke [has finally been arrested for a sexual assault he committed]…on July 1…he…[accused] a woman [of]…driving while intoxicated and then…oral[ly raped her after]…threatening to take her to jail if she didn’t comply…[after the victim registered her] complaint…O’Rourke was immediately [rewarded with a paid vacation]…
The Department of Transportation is considering a disturbing new rule that could force every commercial motor vehicle to install an electronic device that would wirelessly transmit location data and other personal information to police on demand…[DoT] offers no reason to believe the warrantless collection of identifying information will make anyone safer. It might make some inspectors’ jobs easier, but that is no reason to override the rights of truck owners and operators. One might as well call for putting us all in ankle monitors, just because it might reduce crime if the cops know where everyone is all the time. The Fourth Amendment requires the government to get a warrant before encroaching into private space to gather information…The Supreme Court has ruled that police must get a warrant—regardless of whether the subject of a search has a reasonable expectation of privacy—before they physically install a tracking device. The rule is no different just because the government forces people to purchase and install the tracking device on their own property…
Britain will not force tech giants to remove content that is “legal but harmful” from their platforms after campaigners [convinced a few influential politicians]…that the move could curtail free speech…Online safety laws would instead focus on the [nebulous goal of] protection of children and on ensuring companies removed content that was illegal or prohibited in their terms of service…[but spokesbureaucrats] would not specify what legal content should be censored…
A Virginia [cop drove to California]…murdered the mother and grandparents of a teenage girl he catfished online, [then tried to burn down their house] before trying to [abduct]…the teen…[neighbors] called…the…[cops when they witn]essed…the [abduction and saw the]…fire…The Riverside Fire Department …discovered [the] three [murder] victims…[while] the [violently-deranged cop,] Austin Lee Edwards…[fled] through San Bernardino County…before being fatally shot by…[sheriff’s] deput[ies. Luckily the girl was unharmed]…The slain family members were identified as 69-year-old Mark Winek, his wife 65-year-old Sharie Winek, and their daughter, 38-year-old Brooke Winek…
I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one. Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful. But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer. So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets. Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements. Thanks so much!
If you’re a new reader and don’t understand why I specifically honor St. Nicholas on his day, I suggest you reread my 2014 column for this day, and don’t skip the links. And if you wish to honor the jolly saint yourself, I suggest you reread my column from November 25th and proceed accordingly; I’ve provided ways you can help several of the saint’s favorites at the same time. And if you already know what this is about, what are you waiting for? I know you don’t want to end up on his naughty list.
The landscape after an overnight snowfall is so very beautiful in that time between dawn and the sun rising high enough to melt it. Everything is covered with a soft, dry flocking that absorbs sound, so the storybook scene is accompanied by a hush that instills a sense of peace and well-being. Right now, dawn is about a quarter to eight here, and I wake up about 30 to 45 minutes after that and usually manage to drag myself out of bed by about quarter to nine or so. I go downstairs, wash my face, and then give the animals their morning feed before preparing my own breakfast; I put on my wellies and walk out to the paddock in my robe, leaving well-defined prints in the powdery snow. By ten or so the sun is usually high enough to start turning the dry snow into wet slush, and by early afternoon the beauty has vanished like faerie treasure, leaving nothing but muck and patches of grungy ice behind. I’m definitely not a morning person, but in late autumn and early winter the mornings are dark, gentle, and quiet enough for even a child of shadow to appreciate them, especially when she has no place to be but home and nothing in particular to do on anyone’s schedule but her own.
If you, my friend, are not acquainted with the juvenile justice system, you will be very shortly. – cop, to autistic 7-year-old
Although she had several high-profile hits, this is the one I think of when Irene Cara’s name comes up, and the lyrics are certainly the most fitting to commemorate her passing. The links above the video were provided by Amy Alkon, Isley, Kevin Wilson, Jesse Walker, and Cop Crisis (x3), in that order.
I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one. Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful. But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer. So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets. Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements. Thanks so much!
A suspect behind serial killings of sex workers in Tijuana is thought to be somewhere in San Diego, and the Attorney General of Baja California says he is working with U.S. authorities to find the killer…a U.S citizen…[who] finds his victim’s [sic] in strip clubs and bars in Zona Norte…the suspect [rapes]…his victims, [then] beats them and kills them…Each woman was found dead in a motel room…Authorities say they are keeping some details of the murders confidential so as not to alert the suspect…[but] they…know who he is and that he crossed the…border into San Diego…
A campus [cop named David Laudon] at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth resigned…[after groping a female student and then constantly harassing her with frequent unwanted texts and calls] in 2010…Laudon, was then…hired…in the nearby town of Blackstone, Massachusetts [to lurk in schools and harass students. While there]…Laudon was [given his dream job of]…investigating reported sexual assaults and [leering at] students…who have been sexually victimized…Blackstone [sacked]…Laudon…after…[finding out about his previous] misconduct…but [w]as [kept] on the town police force…as an investigator who handles sexual assault reports…
…police chief…Kenny Payne of Plaquemine, Louisiana, was indicted by a grand jury with…malfeasance in office…[after demanding] a…woman…[reveal her] breasts and perform oral sex on him [in exchange for dropping a case against her boyfriend]…The next day, Payne ordered a lieutenant to delete text messages from the woman to the [cop she] report[ed] the [demand to]…Payne also requested Iberville Parish Sheriff Brett Stasi to…cease…investigati[ng]…him after the woman filed a…complaint…
…On Nov. 14, New York City Department of [Torturing Caged Humans] commissioner Louis Molina outlined plans to digitize mail in city-run facilities…cit[ing cop fantasies of] “dozens” of letters “soaked in fentanyl” [to justify a scheme] to have mail scanned by a third-party vendor and delivered to incarcerated people via tablet. If the plan goes into effect, it will make New York the latest in a string of carceral systems to end the delivery of paper mail…By damaging…people’s ties to the outside community, the policy could make it more difficult for them to re-enter society, potentially increasing their chances of recidivism…Wanda Bertram…[of] the Prison Policy initiative [says] mail bans are nothing but the flavor of the week in prison and jail policy…11 state prison systems…about 140 jails nationwide…and the Federal Bureau of Prisons [inflict this petty mistreatment on those condemned to their clutches despite]…a host of technical issues: delayed deliveries, blurred photographs, unreadable letters, and missing pages. In…Pennsylvania…scanning…has resulted in Christmas cards being delayed until March…
A [Georgia cop named]…Robert Vaughn [was arrested] and [charged with possession of child porn] in both Clay and Early County…after receiving [too many reports on his online activity to ignore]…from…NCMEC…[but his cronies are still hiding his identity by refusing to release a mugshot]…
Two [California screws] have been arrested [for]…sex crimes against children…The [screws lurked in] different prisons. It’s unclear if the two [rapi]sts [a]re connected. Matthew James Leavens…is being charged with six counts…including rape…[and] Matthew Robert Solem…was [charged with]…14…
I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one. Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful. But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer. So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets. Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements. Thanks so much!
This is what my new bathroom looked like two days before Thanksgiving. Since my highest priority for the holiday was getting the new toilet functional, the bathroom itself took precedence over the shower; I did the walls on the 16th and 17th, then the floor on the 19th-21st. The product we used is called Durabak; it’s frequently used to protect the beds of pickup trucks, but is applied like paint and will bond to nearly anything (including human skin, which I discovered the hard way). It’s tough, skid-resistant, waterproof, and comes in a variety of colors; it’s thus the perfect material for coating the inside of a shower, and I decided it was best to do the bathroom with it as well. Durabak costs about twice as much as decent paint, and is applied with rollers and brushes (for corners); it’s really sticky and is xylene-based, so it’s quite smelly and some people (including Grace and Jae) are sensitive to the fumes. Luckily I’m not, but I was surprised to discover that large drips or splatters will go right through fabric to leave stains on the skin beneath, which can only be removed with more xylene (which irritates the skin) and a lot of really hard scrubbing (which irritates it even more). Once a can is open, you’ve got three hours to use it before it starts to harden; after the two-hour mark it starts to get really tacky and doesn’t go on as smoothly, so time is of the essence. On the first day, I did the first coat on all of the walls; it took two cans, but the second can was enough to get the second coat on one wall, then the third can finished the second coat all around. After the first coat, it looked so awful I was thinking, “Ye gods, what have I done?” But as you can see, the second coat made a huge difference. Grace discovered in the process that the stuff really needs to be mixed mechanically, with a kind of whisk attached to a drill; that made the third and subsequent cans much smoother and shortened application time to under two hours per can. Since the cans can’t really be resealed and there was no way to add a second coat to the floor until the first was dry enough to walk on, I left a narrow walkway from shower to bathroom door and then used the rest of the can to do one of the shower walls because they’re the same color; I then used the last of the can to paint over my escape route as I exited. Then I repeated the process with the second and third coats (walls need only two, but floors need three or four). When I went to do the second coat, the floor was still too tacky even 24 hours later, so after I applied that coat (and fixed the faint footprints I’d made in the first) I set up a space heater with a fan to blow hot air into the room overnight, and that did the trick nicely. After the third coat and another night of drying, we put in the lavatory (not yet functional) and toilet (functional!) in time for company; look for a picture next Friday.
I’ve often said the popular belief that WW2 ended in the victory of “democracy” over fascism is wrong; it was actually a triumph of “soft” maternal fascism over “hard” paternal fascism. But since the fall of Soviet communism, the prevailing Western post WW2 fascism has hardened. Fascism is a system built on three legs: the political, the corporate, and the military/paramilitary. Corporations support politicians and political machines, and the politicians make laws advantageous to their sponsors. They also use the corporations to achieve social controls they are forbidden by their constitutions or practical considerations (such as censorship and surveillance). The cops and/or soldiers enforce the diktats of the politicians and protect corporate interests (which is why tax money is used to fund pursuit and punishment of petty shoplifters), and in turn their forces are increasingly funded and given privileges no other group has (like getting away with rape, robbery, mayhem and even murder). Natty uniforms and ugly racist rhetoric are window-dressing for fascism, not its defining characteristics; the reason these often show up is that they appeal to the kind of undeveloped, morally-primitive mind that make up large enough fractions of the human population to vote the fascists in and support their schemes.
I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one. Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful. But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer. So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets. Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements. Thanks so much!
…[A high] school [principal in]…Colorado…[has been] accused of possessing child pornography…Bradley Bass…is facing up to 12 years in prison and the possibility of being branded a sex offender [just as the teenagers he was trying to catch would have been]…Bass violated a Colorado law that says even unintentionally possessing explicit images of [legal minor]s is…having child pornography…The case began when Bass and…[his boss] Scott Hodgson…[seiz]ed [students’ phones based on a rumor and]…found photos on a few students’ phones, saved in the disappearing photo application Snapchat. Worried the boys [might escape having their lives destroyed by “child porn” charges via the expedient of]…delet[ing] the photos by logging into their Snapchat accounts remotely, Bass used his work cellphone to take photos of the students’ phones…After police learned the administrators had taken photos of the boys’ phones, they arrested them [just as they wanted the students to be arrested]…
…Gov. Charlie Baker [of] Massachusetts…[has] recommended pardons for Gerald “Tooky” Amirault and Cheryl Amirault Lefave, who were convicted of sexually abusing young children at their Malden day care…in the [Satanic Panic]…of the…1980s…[despite] the…scientific [and practical absurdity of the claims]…Baker’s office included in its announcement of the pardons a statement of approval from former Attorney General Tom Reilly, who fought as Middlesex district attorney in the 1990s to keep the Amiraults and their mother in prison…
[A cop named] Eric Matthews decided Jessica Logan probably killed her baby before he talked to a single eyewitness or collected…any evidence…the coroner hadn’t [even] announced a cause of death. What Matthews did have was a recording of Logan’s 911 call…[from which he magically divined that]…the 25-year-old…had likely staged the scene to cover up a murder…Matthews…reach[ed this bizarre, megalomaniacal conclusion because]…he had taken a two-day law enforcement training course called “911 homicide: Is the caller the killer?”…the [pseudoscience has]…spread across the country and burrowed deep into the justice system, largely without notice…defense lawyers and judges…often learn…[of] the technique for the first time in the courtroom…[but] hundreds of [cops and other sociopaths and psychopaths]…who have taken the course…now present themselves as experts, able to divine truth and deception — and guilt and innocence — from the word choice, cadence and even grammar of people reporting emergencies…
A…pastor at Faith Baptist Church in Round Rock, Texas who was caught with…child pornography…[tried to excuse his behavior by blaming it on] an addiction…David Lloyd Walther now faces federal charges for distribution, receipt, transportation and possession of child pornography…[includ]ing an image of a nude boy with a collar on his neck and being sexually abused, a similar image of a female toddler…images of nude young boys and girls being restrained by ropes and tools…[and] a bestiality video involving a dog and a female toddler “likely less than three years old”…
Another Alabama woman has been jailed for using drugs while pregnant. But this time there’s a twist: she wasn’t actually pregnant. Her young child merely told a social worker that she was, according to the woman’s lawsuit against…Etowah County…[which locked her in a cage instead of just giving her a] pregnancy test…Etowah County… “has prosecuted more than 150 women on pregnancy-related charges in recent years,” Pregnancy Justice said. “Of the more than 1,700 pregnancy-related criminalization cases Pregnancy Justice has documented from 1973 through 2020, Alabama leads the nation with more than 600 cases, and Etowah County leads the state.” Freeman is now suing [pregnancy-persecuting cop Brandi] Fuller and Etowah County Sheriff Jonathon Horton…
[A fantasy that] Halloween candy collected in [Calgary, Alberta was] tainted with fentanyl…is [of course bogus, but the]…RCMP are continuing to [search for some person whose life they can ruin on a bogus charge of]…illicit tampering…a[nother] woman [claimed that] that she found a sewing needle in the wrapping of a chocolate bar her child received while trick-or-treating on the same Halloween night [in the same small city even though it has ever actually happened anywhere since at least the Second World War]…
A [typical and representative] Charleston [Illinois cop] who fled the country after being charged with three sex crimes was sentenced…to [a mere] six years in prison on lesser charges…David Iwaniw…pleaded guilty…to a charge of official misconduct…[for raping a 17-year-old girl and filming it]…Judge James Glenn sentenced Iwaniw to three years in prison on the official misconduct charge and another three years for fleeing the country, with credit for 313 days already served…[after the rape he told his victim that he would] “hunt her down if she told anyone what happened and that if she told, no one would believe her because he was a police officer”…
I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one. Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful. But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer. So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets. Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements. Thanks so much!
As regular readers know, I’m serious about my traditions and rituals, and not inclined to treat them in a loosy-goosy fashion. So it takes a lot to delay my tree-trimming, which I tend to do on the day after Thanksgiving like clockwork. But I really wanted to get the waterproof coating (see this coming Friday’s column) done in the shower before it’s too cold to work with the stuff, and since we’re supposed to be getting a coldfront this weekend I didn’t want to risk delaying. So after Chekhov and I went out and found this tree last Friday, I put it in the stand and gave it water, but did nothing else with it that day. On Saturday I had to do the second coat in the shower, plus too many other small chores (like making stock from the turkey carcass) to have time. But Sundays are my light writing day, so after I finished the third coat I was able to knock out my other chores pretty quickly, and trimmed the tree Sunday night. I think it came out pretty nicely; the trees around here are spindly compared to the ones we had in Oklahoma, but it’s still very satisfying to get a tree from one’s own woods. But while I’ve got your attention: please consider donating to my toy drive! The last few years I’ve started slow and still did well, so I’m not worried about this year’s slow start again. But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to remind y’all every chance I get!
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