Chaos in USA

[Pinky the pilot]

America's most inbred family started with identical twin brothers whose children married each other - causing heartbreaking genetic defects which have left some of them grunting instead of talking.

Ohhh &%$#!!!!

Further comment eludes me.

[OFSO]

There is a bar in Castelló yclept 'The Old Forge" of which I was told the family who own it are somewhat inbred and communicate in grunts. At one Festival de Trobadors I sat outside on a hay bale and indeed, there was grunting a-plenty going on.

[Woody]

I’ll never understand the Yanks

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-65234314

[PHXPhlyer]

Let's hear it for AI.
Unfortunately, the artificial type is the only kind displayed!

Meet the 'RuPublicans': GOP lawmakers are reimagined as AI-generated drag queens
Amid a wave of state bills seeking to restrict drag performances, one couple took a creative — and comedic — approach to their advocacy.

https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-pop ... -rcna79136

https://www.instagram.com/rupublicans/? ... 9c8636bd93

The category is: Republican drag queen realness.

As the centuries-old art form of drag has taken a surprisingly central role in the modern-day American culture war, one drag-loving couple decided to take a creative approach to their activism: A parody Instagram account dedicated to artificial intelligence-generated portraits of Republican leaders in drag.

“We’re huge fans of drag, and we were bearing witness to the GOP’s anti-drag rhetoric and action, and we wanted to do something about it, so we said, ‘Let’s put the GOP in drag,’” said Craig, who created the “RuPublicans” Instagram account with his husband, Stephen. The men asked that their last names not be published due to concerns for their personal safety and security.

The name of the account, which launched March 30 and now has over 95,000 followers, is a nod to “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” the popular drag competition show. The RuPublicans account has posted portraits of 11 conservative heavy hitters so far, with each subject given his own distinctive style and, of course, drag name. And while it might appear that these men each had their own glam team on hand, the images were purely created by Craig, Stephen and an AI text-to-image program called Midjourney.

“It’s all generated without a photo that we input,” Craig said. “I provide prompts on what I want to see in the photo — what’s in the background, what is the person wearing, how are they feeling, like it gets into that level of specificity — and then it spits out images, and you don’t always get what you want, and sometimes the AI generator gives you something that you could have never even imagined that blows you away, and you like run with it.”

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis — who made national headlines last year by signing his state’s so-called Don’t Say Gay bill and engaging in a faceoff with the CEO of the Walt Disney Co. — is among the Republicans given an AI drag makeover. His drag alter ego, “Rhonda Santy,” is shown in a trio of images, including one portraying her as an evil stepmother-type villain with Disney’s Magic Kingdom in the background.

“Rhonda Santy — Category is: Book Banning Princess Eleganza. She’s on a mission to turn that Magic Kingdom into a Tragic Kingdom and isn’t afraid to give Mickey the finger(s),” the caption on the DeSantis parody images reads.

Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas is portrayed as “Cruzella Deville” in five portraits, which all include the conservative lawmaker in a full face of makeup, a blond or pink wig and bedazzled gowns.

“Cruzella Deville — Serving homophobic realness, she struts her stuff in fur coats lined with family values and defends every fetus and every gun,” the caption says of the reimagination of Cruz, who recently said the Supreme Court was “clearly wrong” in its 2015 decision to legalize same-sex marriage.

Neither DeSantis nor Cruz immediately responded to a request for comment.

Rudy Giuliani (“Rudy Garland”), Lindsey Graham (“Lady Graham Cracker”) and Mike Pence (“Mother Pence”) are among the other political figures who have been reimagined as drag queens by the RuPublicans account.

While Craig and Stephen called their RuPublicans project “pure fantasy,” they said they hope it can also serve as a platform for activism.

“We want it to serve as a platform for a message and show that drag really isn’t that scary,” Stephen said. “It makes you laugh, and it makes you think, and this isn’t just for us and gay people. I hope that a lot of Republicans see this and can have a laugh at themselves, too.”

So far this year, Republican lawmakers in more than a dozen states have proposed bills to restrict drag performances, according to an NBC News analysis. Tennessee is the only state to sign such a bill into law.


While the photos have sparked thousands of responses since the account first launched, one in particular made a big impact on Craig and Stephen, they said. The message was from a woman whose child attends The Covenant School, a private Christian school in Nashville, where just a few weeks ago a mass shooting left three children and three adults dead. The mother said she had her first laugh in weeks upon seeing the RuPublicans account.

“She had this beautiful message about how important it is, what we’re doing, and how much it helped her,” Craig said. “So those are the types of things that are like fueling this, and keeping it going.”

“You know, there’s a lot of dark times that we’re living through right now, and we just want to spread brightness and laughter and levity, but also be really smart and poignant with it,” Stephen said.

PP

[barkingmad]

Returning to the OP, erewego again, this time in Dadeville, Alabama and strangely as usual, youngsters are the majority of victims;

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-65293737

The usual squabble will erupt between the ‘gun lobby’ and Sleepy Joe, who wants to supposedly control the guns, both forgetting that if a nutter wants to inflict carnage then that person only needs an easily obtained pickup truck or powerful heavy car in order to succeed.

For the stats fans her is one source of info about these tragedies which are dependent on breeding and nourishing suitable individuals who may have been programmed by watching “shoot ‘em up” videos in their bedrooms late at night;

https://www.gunviolencearchive.org/

As of posting it appears the perp has so far escaped...

[boing]

Looks as though the crowd is playing "shutmouth" and the police have a suspect but refuse to release a description. Obviously a very thorough investigation.

.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

but refuse to release a description

So, they have released a description

A Government non-statement is all the statement you need.

Just like: What's happening with the Budweiser boycott?

The MSM are ignoring it completely, which tells you all you need to know.


Government and MSM in the 2020's - the only question is not What are they investigating?, but What are they not investigating?

My local press is now offering a year's unlimited digital access for C$20.
That's for a newspaper that costs $3.26 a day, offered at 7c a day.
Nobody, as they say, is buying it

And yet apparently 40% of people still read the newspaper weekly.
They wrap the flyers in a single sheet with a couple of recipes and a reprinted article.
This counts as reading the newspaper weekly, even though nobody reads it.
And they make it impossible to cancel the flyers.

[Woody]

I’d just got my popcorn in ready to watch this

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65318654

[Woody]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65319833

Anyone approached the NRA for comment

[Boac]

Worth watching CNN's reaction to the Fox news/Dominion settlement https://www.independent.co.uk/news/worl ... 22420.html

[Dushan]

The type of bullet that killed Ms Gillis was a large lead slug fired from a 12-gauge shotgun, according to the Times Union newspaper.
It is typically used to hunt big game, the newspaper reports.
Investigators have not said what weapon was used in the shooting.

I guess they need to get Sherlock Holmes to investigate.

[llondel]

Worth watching CNN's reaction to the Fox news/Dominion settlement https://www.independent.co.uk/news/worl ... 22420.html

Fox is one of the few networks that makes a profit from carriage fees charged to cable networks, so they don't need advertisers to be profitable. They are expected to come in asking for more money to have their channels shown on cable networks, which means that subscribers get to pay more. Perhaps if more of us said we would rather have a cable offering without Fox, and when that's declined, reduce to a lower package or cancel cable TV altogether, the cable networks would either push back or decide they can make more money by not giving any to Fox.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

First Republic Bank is bust today, despite all the Fed help.
Interesting times.

[John Hill]

I hope the important depositors got their money out in time!

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

That was the point of the Fed help.

[barkingmad]

Erewego again, another well-armed nutter takes his revenge;

https://apnews.com/article/mass-shootin ... b00ec5fbaf

Allegedly because they grumped about his target practice keeping the kids awake...

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

First Republic Bank, corpse of, sold off to JPM yesterday.

Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPM, said yesterday

"The system is very, very sound."

"We need large, successful banks in the largest economy," Dimon continued, proclaiming that "this is nothing like '08 or '09."

The good news, Dimon declares regarding bank failures,

"this is getting near the end of it."

Today, two more US regional banks have had their stock trading suspended today after losses of 24 and 20 percent, PacWest and Western Alliance

At least 3 more are dropping significantly, same timings as the first two for selloffs.

Bud Light sales continue to drop, third week now since controversy and 26% drop over last year. First two weeks were 17% and 21% respectively.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

I'm told the Budweiser Clydesdales are in the new ads all day, every day, gambolling down Main Street, Smallville.

Must make a nice change for them to get out, and not have to stand over those cans all day, filling them.

[barkingmad]

Meanwhile, back to the OP, here’s a later tragic league table for the topic which makes grim reading;

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-41488081

But in addition to the possible influence of pharmaceuticals on the perpetrators, others are trying to find explanations as to why Homo sapiens is sooh obsessed with slaughtering their fellow hominids;

https://rumble.com/v17h07a-fatherless-s ... ilism.html

I’m just offering food for thought, not advocating any particular explanation, before the usual culprits pile in with criticism.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen keeps insisting that the banking system is “sound.”

Should really be in the Friday Jokes thread

Here's an article explaining what may be going on.
n.b. Charles Schwab was one of the banks whose stock value dropped significantly yesterday.
In essence, banks may have large bond holdings which are now overvalued given persistent inflation.

https://mises.org/wire/charles-schwab-a ... -insolvent