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Federal Land Theft Prevention Act of 2012
 
#26
Beauregard Claghorn of South Carolina?

...

That's a JOKE, son!
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll
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#27
I want to apologize. My muse for DW8 suddenly came back from Patagonia and then mainlined uppers on me; I've been churning out new material for that in vast quantities and haven't gone back to this except to plug in names and companies. It's not forgotten though.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
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#28
And then I did forget it. Argh. I'll punch it up a bit and post what there is in the Wiki.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Reply
 
#29
No I won't. I'm not done with it yet. But here's what I've got now, for further commentary and suggestions:


The Federal Land Theft Protection Act of 2012
Infamous anti-[[Fen] legislation passed shortly after the launch of the SV ''[[Grover's Corners]'' from West Virginia on April 20, 2012, frequently referred to as the "Land Theft Act".  Rushed through the legislative process and signed into law in a matter of weeks, the Land Theft Act is now regarded as one of the great examples of the Law of Unintended Consequences in modern American legislation.
==History==
In the immediate wake of the launch of the ''[[Grover's Corners]'' from West Virginia, a bipartisan group of United States senators (including [[Wallace Webster] (R-NH), [[Isabella Ward] (R-TN) and [[Kendall Dixon] (D-NJ)) drafted a bill intended to outlaw the creation of [[Unreal Estate] within the borders of the United States.  The hastily-written legislation was the first time the term "[[Land Theft]" was used in an official government document, and the bill classified it as a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classes_of ... ederal_law Class A Federal Felony], with each count punishable with up to life imprisonment and/or a $250,000 fine. 
The classification of Unreal Estate as a criminal activity was based on an argument invoking "the public good".  While acknowledging (and indeed, celebrating almost to the point of enshrinement) the right of individuals (and corporations) to own land, it put forth the legally dubious claim that to remove such land from the surface of the Earth robbed future generations of its use, and (more importantly, claimed more cynical observers) also deprived Federal, state and local governments of any future tax revenue on such land.
The bill was introduced to the United States Senate on 9 May 2012 as S.2767.  It was immediately referred to the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.  This surprised many outside observers, who expected it to be handled by the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.  Senator Webster explained in a press conference on 10 May 2012 that all matters concerning Handwavium and the Fen were considered national security issues, and in accordance with White House guidelines issued in 2008 the bill was referred to committee accordingly.  The 115-page bill received committee approval in a matter of days, which prompted some observers to object that it had not been reviewed thoroughly enough.  Despite this, the committee report on the Land Theft Act was published on 18 May, and the bill was subsequently placed on the Senate's Legislative Calendar. 
Debate on the bill was held on 12 June 2012, and lasted barely two hours.  The Land Theft Act passed on a voice vote with 79 yeas, 17 nays, and 4 abstentions/absences.  It was immediately referred to the House of Representatives, where it became H.R.5789 and followed an almost identical track, starting with referral to the House Committee on Homeland Security.  Once again it was approved by the committee in a matter of days (several congressional watchdog organizations characterized this as a "rubber stamp" approval).  It came up for debate before the House on 9 July 2012, endured just under four hours' discussion (characterized by observers as "perfunctory" and "lackluster"), and was passed by a vote of 391 for, 37 against, and 7 abstentions/absences.
No reconciliation was necessary between the Senate and House versions of the bill, and President Rudolph Guiliani signed it into law in front of the press on 10 July 2012.
==Prosecutions==
The first arrests and prosecutions under the terms of the Act took place less than a week after it was signed, suggesting to many that the Federal Government had had several "candidates" under surveillance in anticipation of its passage, and had delayed moving against them in order take advantage of the harsher terms of the new law.  By the end of July 2012, the FBI had raided nearly a dozen locations, including sites in California, Wisconsin and New Jersey, followed closely by EPA HAZMAT teams.  Almost all the individuals arrested were said to have been inspired by the launch of the ''Grover's Corners''.  (It is perhaps emblematic of the United States government position that during these and all subsequent proceedings the ''Grover's Corners'' was never identified by its proper name, but only with such euphemisms as "the 2012 theft of American territory from West Virginia".)
Indictments and trials took place with an alacrity which prompted observers as well as several Congresspersons to accuse the Justice Department of "fast-tracking" them over more important cases in order to intimidate and discourage other potential Fen.  In no case did any trial last longer than a week, and almost every one returned a "guilty" verdict.
Among the convicted were:
* Terrance and Patricia Klaus, of Guilford, Kansas.  The Klauses were convicted for the smallest known instance of Unreal Estate, a patch of land approximately 10 feet by 10 feet (3m x 3m) occupied by an inexpensive steel shed.* Daniel and Felicia Williamson, Donnie Curtis, Freddie Carpenter, Amanda Gonzales, Scott and Nicoline Aylmer and Bryant Kelley of Prentice, Wisconsin, who had attempted to emulate the ''Grover's Corners'' by converting an entire neighborhood into Unreal Estate.* Suhayl Mansur of Rocksprings, Texas, a naturalized American citizen originally from the United Arab Emirates.  In addition to Land Theft, he was also charged under Federal anti-terrorism statutes, apparently simply for being a Muslim of Middle-Eastern extraction.  The extra charges were dismissed by the judge partway through his trial, but not before he was thoroughly tarred in the press as a "terrorist".
==Flaws in the Act==
Almost from the first the Land Theft Act was criticized for its vague and overly-broad language, as well as its apparent intent to restrict an entire American subculture.  The Act's authors made a token attempt to keep it from looking like an explicitly anti-Fen law -- several of them had been burned badly in [[Subversive Literature Act of 2009|the abortive 2009 attempt to criminalize the science fiction and fantasy genres], and all were aware that support for the Fen among American citizens was growing at that time, especially with some commentators lauding the launch of the ''Grover's Corners'' as a bold and courageous journey to a new frontier in the grand American tradition.  Still, the intent behind the law was considered obvious by many, and its fast-tracking through the Homeland Security committees was seen as a ploy to avoid possible Fen sympathizers in the Science and Technology committees.
However, in the process of "genericizing" the Act's terms and definitions to dodge accusations of Fen persecution, its authors accidentally opened up its targets to include far more than just those who intended to go into space.  At some point during early revisions, language which had initially required the use of Handwavium to alter the "shape, form, nature, composition and/or location" of a tract of land had unintentionally become uncoupled from the description of the new Federal crime, which was now defined simply as any such alteration, regardless of means, motive or intention.  As finally passed, the Act considered the use of Handwavium an "aggravating factor" mandating a maximum sentence, but no longer a ''requirement'' for a violation.
===Exploitation by Environmental Groups===
Activist environmental groups such as Greenpeace quickly discovered this flaw in the Act.  While historically environmentalists have been sharply divided on the subject of Handwavium, a coalition of several such groups came together to exploit the law.  A small number of volunteers allowed themselves to be caught and prosecuted for "attempted Handwavium-assisted land theft" over the course of nearly a year.  Some pleaded guilty or no contest; others pled not guilty then put up half-hearted or inadequate defenses that resulted in their conviction.  No appeals were made, and the Land Theft Act was never challenged; in fact, defense attorneys went out of their way to acknowledge the validity of the Act.  Combined with the "legitimate" prosecutions of actual cases, the result was a considerable and weighty collection of legal precedents.
Once the last of these trials had entered into case law, the coalition sprang its trap.  Land theft accusations were made against several large mining concerns, most notably Newmont Mining Corporation (who operated gold strip mines in Nevada and Colorado) and Arch Coal (infamous for mountaintop removal mines in the Appalachians); complaints complete with chapter-and-verse quotations of the Act were sworn out against them, and arrests were made of both corporate officers and field supervisors.  As corporate lawyers attempted to extricate the mining firms from the charges in Federal courts, several P.R. companies hired by the coalition began astroturf campaigns with the theme of "same crime, different results" and emphasizing how "the little guys" were prosecuted, but big companies were able to ignore Federal Law. 
That in a number of the earlier "trap" cases the charges were in fact dismissed or ignored only helped these campaigns.  They received a further boost when Stephanie Flores, a Federal Prosecutor assigned to one of the cases, was recorded in an unguarded moment saying that the Land Theft Act applied "only to the Fen, not legitimate American businesses", and that accordingly she was making only a token effort at prosecution.  The video clip and sound bite spread virally across the Internet, and were distributed by virtually every major news outlet save for FOX News.  Flores was fired, and as damage control the Justice Department immediately stopped making deals for reduced or dismissed charges with accused violators and began pursuing their remaining prosecutions with a vigor rarely seen before or since.
Within a year of Flores' slip, Newmont and Arch were both found guilty of multiple counts of violating the Act.  They were each fined in excess of US$5 million and were forced to shut down all their mining operations, and several executives from each company were sentenced to a minimum of 25 years in Federal prison.  At the same time, the Justice Department launched new cases cases against those companies which had initially escaped prosecution.
===Reaction===
By 2014, the American mining industry had essentially ground to a halt as a result of the prosecutions; collectively they lost billions of dollars in lost revenues and only the complete exhaustion of existing stockpiles prevented most mining companies from going bankrupt.  Even so, several smaller companies went under. 
Second- and lower-order effects of the Act were as severe.  The paralyzation of the mining industry resulted in mass unemployment among their labor base.  Their reduced output had a domino effect among industries directly and indirectly dependent on them -- prices went up and availability went down for everything from automobiles to electronics.  With the help of the Federal government some of the nation's mining production was replaced by imports; while they helped bolster production, they did little to help prices.
The response of the mining industry was swift and politically brutal.  All Congresspersons who had voted for the Land Theft Act and had previously enjoyed support from the industry had that support abruptly and very publicly revoked.  On March 11, 2014, the National Mining Association held a press conference at which they identified those politicians who had lost the favor of the industry.  The NMA also announced that they would be backing pro-Fen and anti-Land Theft candidates on the local, state and Federal level for at least the next several election cycles, including the next Presidential race in 2016.  They also funded a series of full-page newspaper ads across the country, identifying local elected officials who had supported the Act.  Other industries who suffered as a result of the Act threw in with the NMA, forcing Congress to face a veritable revolt of what once were some of their most generous contributors and supporters.
Simultaneously, public outcry in those areas of the country most severely struck by the economic side-effects of the Act all but exploded.  The NMA's newspaper campaign resulted in a storm of voter backlash, and incumbents began losing their positions almost immediately, with the first effects visible in Congressional primaries held during the summer of 2014.  In particular, the authors of the Act were singled out for especially vicious and persistent attacks.  Dixon in particular lost his bid for re-election that fall, and Ward resigned in summer 2015 after more than a year of attack ads steadily eroding her approval rating among her consituency.
Meanwhile, the environmentalist coalition shifted its efforts from encouraging the prosecutions to a word-of-mouth campaign to maintain the Act.  Unfortunately, they were the victims of their own achievements -- they had succeeded on a scale they had never before dreamed of, but in the process had done so much damage to the economy and the lives of ordinary citizens that their accomplishment was doomed to be undone.
==Repeal==
The first calls for the repeal of the Land Theft Act were heard in Congress in late 2013, but it wasn't until the NMA's press conference in March 2014 that a repeal bill actually made it out of committee.
[[Repeal passes in Senate almost unanimously (only original authors do not vote yea, but abstain), and passes House with almost the same numbers as the Act passed.  Guiliani threatens to veto, but doesn't because it's clear the veto will be overturned with ridiculous ease, and maybe because the NMA offers to not work against him and the Republicans in 2016.]
===Pardons===
[[Repeal of the law does not result in automatic pardons for those convicted, nor are sentences automatically commuted -- this is standard in American legal system.  President needs to pardon or offer amnesty -- and Guiliani is pressured by multiple industries to pardon the mining executives now in Federal prison.  He does so.  He also (*very* reluctantly) pardons the various Fen and Fen-wannabes and the environmentalists who were convicted to prevent a PR nightmare.  He doesn't pardon them for environmental/Handwavium possession and use crimes, though, so while the rich white guys get out, the poor folks stay in jail for quite a while longer.  This causes its own P.R. problems which ripple through to the 2016 presidential election and beyond. ]
==Long-Term Effects==
[[Republicans lose both Congress and White House in 2016.  Massive influx of new congresscritters as incumbents get thrown out in 2014, 2015 and 2016 -- and possibly onward through 2019 as various senators' terms end.  Attempts at anti-Fen legislation (appear to) end here.  Mining industry takes a decade to recover; secondary industries recover quickly, some with Fenspace imports?  Asteroid mining gets a boost?  More?]
{{gazetteer}}{{Mundania}}[[Category:Government][[CategoryBig Grinanelaw government][[Category:Fen History][[Category:Fen Politics]



While I finish this up, anyone want to brainstorm the circumstances around the "Subversive Literature Act of 2009", which is described above as "the abortive 2009 attempt to criminalize the science fiction and fantasy genres"? I'm sure it was a bit more subtle than I make it sound, and might have had a different name which wasn't quite so obviously eeeeeevil. I also envision the entire entertainment industry banding together to tell Congress to go to hell in response to its proposal, among other groups.
Edit:  Revised and expanded, with notes for unwritten sections.  Contributions for long-term effects of the Act are welcome.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
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#30
I don't know....

I have a feeling someone started it has a sarcastic joke with H.R. 451 or something like that and it caught wings? A proposition from Representative Poe?
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
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#31
Bob Schroeck Wrote:... Guiliani threatens to veto, ...
Full-page ads in Nevada and the Appalachians: "The President wants to keep you from going back to work!"

Bob Schroeck Wrote:... Asteroid mining gets a boost? ...
Definitely.

I shouldn't need to mention that StellviaCorp is not in the mining business. Both Moria Mining (gasses) and Rockhounds (heavy metals) would make out well, though.

Bob Schroeck Wrote:...
While I finish this up, anyone want to brainstorm the circumstances around the "Subversive Literature Act of 2009", which is described above as "the abortive 2009 attempt to criminalize the science fiction and fantasy genres"? I'm sure it was a bit more subtle than I make it sound, and might have had a different name which wasn't quite so obviously eeeeeevil. I also envision the entire entertainment industry banding together to tell Congress to go to hell in response to its proposal, among other groups.
I'm in too good a mood to think that darkly at the moment, sorry.

However, I'd expect that once the bill is tabled, the American Library Association, the American Booksellers Association, the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Lucasfilms, the National Coalition Against Censorship, and Paramount would remind Congress of the First Amendment - especially if news of the bill breaks near or during Banned Books Week. (If the bill claims that F&SF is "inflammatory speech", citing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandenburg_v._Ohio]Brandenburg v. Ohio would also be appropriate.)
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
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#32
HR 451 is a brilliant bit of "coincidence" for that whole mess.

Gotta wonder how the leftist extremists evolved in Fenspace, as we started the setting while the pendulum was fairly right-wing.

Would there have been an Occupy Wall Street>Progressive Stack>Gamers are Racist Transmisogynists!>"It's {CURRENT YEAR}!" progression? Or would the voices that might have amplified them beyond "random crazies" have gone Up and became various parts of the Senshi?
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll
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#33
Jupiter Mining Corporation would probably have, well, "taken advantage" (read: provide jobs, and damned better ones in terms of pay and benefits on top of that) to some of those put out... specifically those in the parts of the transportation industry that would have been secondary casualties of the economic catastrophy that resulted. Note: This is probably the point that JMC started their internal use gas mining operations, as there needed to be another point of absorption for displaced mining/well workers caught up in the middle of all that.

"Yeah, I miss home sometimes... but you know what? I can work smarter, I got training that I wasn't out of pocket for, I get better benefits and better pay, and say what you like about Mister Antilles, he has our best interests at heart, and he kept me from having to panhandle my way."
--

"You know how parents tell you everything's going to fine, but you know they're lying to make you feel better? Everything's going to be fine." - The Doctor
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#34
My main quibble of note was that Guiliani apparently gets a second term? I had no real belief that he'd get one--Fen or not he's still Rudy Guiliani, to know him is to hate him and after four years I can't imagine anybody but hardline anti-Fen types particularly liking him all that much.

So, rework: Guiliani takes a dive in the '12 elections but his anti-Fen base holds on to power in the House and Senate. The support is broadly bipartisan--a rarity in OTL or FTL--and nobody's explored the consequences of HR 451 yet so there's no immediate groundswell to repeal. Meanwhile the new President (D-somebody, are we looking for someone more optimistic or do we uphold the nobility of the scumbag? Got a couple options if we feel like it...) has their own agenda and the anti-Fen bloc is still there so no sense in rocking the boat, right? At this point things proceed as written: the environmentalists make their move, the mining industry loses their shit & the anti-Fen bloc gets launched into orbit on their own petard. The pardons would shake out a little differently depending on who's President, but hardline anti-Fen tactics die out with the Land Theft Act's repeal.

(Timeline note: around the same time Greenpeace makes their first moves is also around the same time the Artemis hearings are happening in DC. Coincidence? Probably, but you never know...)

Quote:However, I'd expect that once the bill is tabled, the American Library Association, the American Booksellers Association, the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Lucasfilms, the National Coalition Against Censorship, and Paramount would remind Congress of the First Amendment
Let's not forget the Holy Rodent Empire. Imagine heavy-handed political advertisements featuring doe-eyed children asking their folks why they can't sing along with Elsa anymore, daddy? Why? >Big Grin

This, incidentally, would not necessarily stop such a bill from going forward. American law has always been very flexible when it comes to "subversive literature" under the right conditions. Those conditions probably don't exist here.

Quote:Would there have been an Occupy Wall Street>Progressive Stack>Gamers are Racist Transmisogynists!>"It's {CURRENT YEAR}!" progression?
I think so. Some would certainly migrate upstairs and never look back, but in all honesty that upswell wasn't and wouldn't be driven by Fen. There's a large confluence of events that led to these things and if anything they might be stronger and angrier after four years of Guiliani and another four of, idk, Cuomo just to keep the "fucking REALLY?" train running. And of course just because the Fen are active in Fenspace doesn't mean they're not meddling downstairs as well: the Soviets naturally, various corpers have their interests in etc.

(Also, though we're often loath to admit/remember it, a good chunk of the unpleasant people on the other side of that equation would be upstairs as well. So there's that too.)
Mr. Fnord interdimensional man of mystery

FenWiki - Your One-Stop Shop for Fenspace Information

"I. Drink. Your. NERDRAGE!"
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#35
Foxboy Wrote:...
Would there have been an Occupy Wall Street>Progressive Stack>Gamers are Racist Transmisogynists!>"It's {CURRENT YEAR}!" progression? Or would the voices that might have amplified them beyond "random crazies" have gone Up and became various parts of the Senshi?
Yes.

And, while some of the voices that went Up would have joined the Senshi, others would have joined other factions. The Trekkies are big on equality and sharing the wealth, just to name one group. The more corporate factions (and the actual corps) probably wouldn't attract too many of them, though.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
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#36
And the actual proper Libertarians who have something resembling an internally consistent ideology would probably be out in the Belt where they're free to get on with being as minarchist as they want to be, potentially resulting in the Freedom Caucus going even crazier even faster.
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#37
I recall an interesting idea a while ago.

What about manufacturering unreal estate, on a massive scale?

All you need is a dome shaped excavation, sufficient mine tailings, concrete, topsoil and silica? Chuck in a spindizzy and away you go with the yoke.
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
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#38
I'm not sure how that'd be better than erecting a buckydome on a suitably-sized asteroid.
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#39
Easy shipping of general shite and materials.

Insitead of shipping everything out to the belt, ship it to arseholanowhere, build it, dome it, then fly it wherever. A lot easier to bring all the comforts of home somewhere else on earth and launch it, than move them to space individually.

You have a big, contained, ball of living stuff ready to go froma biosphere rather than the alternative.
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
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#40
You'd also have a ready supply of breathable air (definition of "breathable" varying depending on where you did this - rural middle-of-nowhere would probably be better there than downtown big-city as far as pollutants are concerned).
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
Reply
 
#41
Quote:My main quibble of note was that Guiliani apparently gets a second term? I had no real belief that he'd get one--Fen or not he's still Rudy Guiliani, to know him is to hate him and after four years I can't imagine anybody but hardline anti-Fen types particularly liking him all that much.

So, rework: Guiliani takes a dive in the '12 elections
Okay, so who's president in 2012-2016, then? We can't have someone too close to moderate (let alone progressive/liberal), or some of the post-2012 anti-Fen stuff would have a hard time gaining steam, and in particular the LTA probably needs someone anti-Fen to some degree to sign it into law -- because regardless how the spin doctors play it to the public, the members of Congress will most if not all understand the real purpose behind the bill.

Who's our best candidate?
EDIT:  Oh, wait, Guiliani signs it into law before the 2012 election; we don't need to have another rigthwinger as President after him.  Never mind that requirement, then.  Still, the question remains -- what name do I plug into $PRESIDENT for the repeal?
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Reply
 
#42
Quote:Bob Schroeck wrote:
Quote:My main quibble of note was that Guiliani apparently gets a second term? I had no real belief that he'd get one--Fen or not he's still Rudy Guiliani, to know him is to hate him and after four years I can't imagine anybody but hardline anti-Fen types particularly liking him all that much.

So, rework: Guiliani takes a dive in the '12 elections
Okay, so who's president in 2012-2016, then? We can't have someone too close to moderate (let alone progressive/liberal), or some of the post-2012 anti-Fen stuff would have a hard time gaining steam, and in particular the LTA probably needs someone anti-Fen to some degree to sign it into law -- because regardless how the spin doctors play it to the public, the members of Congress will most if not all understand the real purpose behind the bill.

Who's our best candidate?
EDIT:  Oh, wait, Guiliani signs it into law before the 2012 election; we don't need to have another rigthwinger as President after him.  Never mind that requirement, then.  Still, the question remains -- what name do I plug into $PRESIDENT for the repeal?
I am tempted to say Bernie Sanders. He's the closest to a moderate they've got and a viable enough candidate that he's running now and lacks the controversy that a Hillary or Obama would throw up. He's certainly more the type to actively reach out to the Fen and attempt a reconciliation.
Alternatively, if the timeline doesn't support an immediate reconciliation (I forget exactly what we decided on there), one term for Obama followed by Sanders.
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.
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#43
Sanders doesn't quite cut it; he's a presidential candidate of his specific time and place OTL. Also, socialist, so where you get "moderate" from I have no idea. Clinton took her shot in '08 and lost to Guiliani thanks to handwavium butterflies. She returned to the Senate and stayed there. Obama... not sure. I could see him going for the brass ring in '12, but I could also see him holding off until '16 if the winds don't seem to favor his campaign.

Broadly speaking the anti-Fen bloc in American politics holds until '14, whoever gets elected would have to at minimum mouth that party line and not object to or veto anti-Fen legislation. Since the repeal hits during the '14 midterms they'd also have to be flexible. I'm actually warming to the idea of Andrew Cuomo in the role: he's enough of an opportunist that he'd run on a "tough on Fen" platform and then whip right around and promise reconciliation. He'd be a one-termer like Guiliani ("STOP. ELECTING. NEW YORKERS>"), replaced for the '17-'21 term by Obama or candidate-to-be-named-later as part of the general handwavium thaw process.
Mr. Fnord interdimensional man of mystery

FenWiki - Your One-Stop Shop for Fenspace Information

"I. Drink. Your. NERDRAGE!"
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#44
I find I'm liking that idea.... penciling in Cuomo now, subject to further development.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Reply
 
#45
Re: the 2009 "Subversive Literature Act"... probably would not have named F&SF directly, but make references to "enabling or encouraging handwavium-related criminal activities" would be a good code-phrase.

Have it come from a right-wing bible-thumper, maybe, one of the really obnoxious ones.
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.
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#46
Good old Representative "Please Don't Sue Me" I'm guessing. I'm also guessing he or she is from Flyover Country.

Sadly, I can see one of their constituents who very vehemently "Did not vote for that jackass" cheerily burning a stack of "innocuous" books like Alice in Wonderland, Grimm's Fairy Tales, and Bibles to "... [get] ready for when [Childish opponent nickname]'s law passes."

Hmm. "Susan Happery" [R, Kansas] perhaps?
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll
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#47
Both good ideas; I've added them to my work file.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Reply
 
#48
Foxboy, do you mind if I turn Susan Happery into a 1-term freshman Representative who basically loses all RNC support after she makes them look bad with the SLA? I'm starting to build a narrative for the bill, and a know-nothing housewife-turned-Representative who suffers from evangelical Christian cultural tunnel-vision ("Star Trek? Star Wars? Aren't those popular only with terrorists and teenaged misfits living in their parents' cellars?") fits what I have shaping up.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Reply
 
#49
Go right ahead. I just liked the idea of her having the nickname "Sue-Happy."

I could come up with all sorts of sympathetic backstory, but I won't bother.
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll
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#50
Yeesh. The nickname flew right past me. I'll add that in, possibly as the way she got involved in politics.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
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