So says The Huffington Post.

Quote:Assistant U.S. Attorney Molly Gaston said during closing arguments that the subpoenas were straightforward and that Bannon chose to blow them off.

“Our government only works if people show up. It only works if people play by the rules, and it only works if people are held accountable when they do not,” Gaston said, according to NBC News.

Based on a famous Irish language novel.

Available behind this link here from the State's Irish Language Channel


As Gaeilge, ach tá fotheidil ann.....

Hermione Granger and The Boy-Who-Lived got an interlude this week.

EDIT: The story by "Jackpot-kun", not the other one.

From a Chinese social network's banned words list.

A short summary
'Winnie the Pooh',
'Diabetic Pooh',   (Diabeetus the Pooh - ed)
'Shithole Art of War',
'Heil Xitler',
'Ph.D. in physics who believes in theism',
'Leader of China's Offshore Hidden Asset Management Leading Group',
'Undressed and embroidered on one shoulder, carrying Maiguang, pulling and rolling crooked neck, throwing coins, primary school doctor emperor' (WTF),
 Cicada 3301 XD - (Remember that?)

A lot of them get a little lost in translation.


Link to Translate list

The Original Chinese, incase that Xit's the bed

ACRONYM Creation Rationalizations, Or: Naming Your Machinery

I've asked this kind of question before, because I tend to have only accidental success at it myself, but anyoine have suggestions for why a power armor might be officially referred to with the letters EZLS? Best I've got so far is Enhanced Zero/zero Light Suit, probably appended to something like Cyberpunk's ACPA as a catch-all for the general class of Armored Combat Power Armor, with zero/zero being either referring to being able to deploy from the air like an ejection seat (zero altitude/zero airspeed to as high as the vehicle can take it) or something like zero reduced agility/zero added sensor signature compared to a normal foot soldier.

Or as the troopers call it, Easy Alice, 'cause it's hot and tight and any conscript farm kid can get in and ride as soon as they get out of Basic Training, but even the old hands have to admit it's damn good fun. Despite not matching the unit's official designation in any way, this also leads to the more complicated recon/spec ops suits (with a notoriously PITA active camo system) being called "Bitchy Betty."

I don't like the Z/Z part as it stands, though, so if anyone can come up with a better rationale to fit the flavor text, it would be welcomed.

Likewise, if anyone's got a piece of gear they want help naming, let 'er rip; I may not be much help but I can try.

link

So, the obvious application of this is that everyone in range gets a happy level of buzz on for the duration, which is short but not as short as the average V&V combat in-character, so quite viable as a Doug-grenade style distraction. As usual, though, the effects don't last beyond a few seconds after the music ends, which itself can be quite handy depending on the plan and circumstances.

The less obvious application is that that any toxic substance affecting anyone in Doug's AoE will be limited to "feeling a little unsteady" for the duration, by the simple expedient of Doug's power vanishing any amount of it in their systems that would result in a stronger effect -- and while his conjurations and direct influence fades rapidly, material that's gone stays gone. This means two and a half minutes of grace even in a cloud of die-in-seconds nerve gas or swimming in a vat of Menacing Green Villain Goop, etc., and in one-and-done cases like snakebite, chemical accidents, or something along those lines, probably not even needing serious attention to recover unless it's something the body can't deal with in even the smallest quantity.

Only works on substances that affect the target by chemical means, (ie not physical trauma) with caustics and nanotech as a grey area that probably depend more on Doug's subconscious perception of them than strict interpretation of physical science - it won't help with the cut left by a poisoned blade, for example, or a telepathic attack simulating the target getting blackout drunk and falling asleep.

Likewise, physical defenses or effects that prevent mental attacks but couldn't help against the target having a buzz due to to blood alcohol level (or an equivalent for the subject's biology, if sufficiently different for alcohol to be ineffective or too lethal for recreational use) won't stop Doug from bringing on the party, with robots and more exotic infomorphs like Hooloovoo in another grey area going that way.

May backfire if used on Jackie Chan, but if you're fighting on the other side from Jackie Chan you should take a real close look to make sure you're on the right side to begin with.

(Because I'd really love to see a scene where Doug rocks up to the villain's front door and draws a mob of minions, then gets them all drunk and has a slapstick mass brawl. Jackie Chan team-up optional, but enthusiastically and emphatically encouraged.)

No tl;dr - read it all.

Every so often a post comes along which plays into every national sterotype - one so grotesque in character and oblivious of reality that it can only be fake but you *know* it's not because you've met these people in real life.

The tourists who treat their destination as a theme park, where everyone is an employee there to make the experience they paid for happen. You're all things they paid for, so you better know your place....

These is blowing up the Irish internet. It's gone completely Coronaviral here

They're sending me unsolicited political emails, which is against the law in Canada...

Pre-retcon, it was easy to figure out who to involve in a story when a residence needed external help... because one writer insisted on his SI being involved everywhere.

Post-retcon, that is no longer the condition that applies. Which means that there are at least three "asking for advice" scenes that need to be retconned, and maybe more.

So, when a building manager needs to kick a matter up the chain but it isn't important enough to bother Sebastian or Belldandy directly, who do they call?

One thought, for discussion: By Christmas 2016, there's an "inner council" (which really needs a better name than that) of building managers and trusted displacees who offer advice and assistance. Is this something we want in the setting?


Assuming we're doing this:

First question: Who's in the group?

The "building managers" part is easy enough: all of them.

The "trusted displacees" part, though...

To begin with, I'd include both Tessa Testarossa (ranking active military officer among the displacees, even if she's paramilitary) and Artemis Mau (ranking spymaster among the displacees) - if a decision is made that requires armed response or espionage, one or the other will be in charge of turning that decision into action, so they may as well be involved in the meetings. I'd also include one displacee from each residence who takes the building manager's place if the manager is unavailable for whatever reason, with a Doylist expectation of having these displacees take over from the building managers eventually.

Who else gets tapped to be on-call to give advice and make decisions without bothering the Celestials?