USCE 2023: Please let them shove a camera up your butt

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > USCE 2023: Please let them shove a camera up your butt

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marshmonkey: Dec 5, 2003; I was sick of looking
at your stupid avatar
so
have a cool cat instead.; Switchblade Switcharoo

Discendo Vox posted:

Cannabis legalization and regulation is not as simple as conservatives and out of touch old pols trying to block the devil lettuce, and it hasn't been for decades. The entire ongoing clusterfuck, including the various state legalization efforts, are the product of billions upon billions of dollars from some of the filthiest money and interests out there, all looking to profit from different legalization models. The incredibly long and winding process by which this has occurred is for two primary reasons:

1) Burns-like, these competing interests each are looking for different regulatory structures that will benefit them and close out the market to others. The tobacco companies trying to create a sideline through e-cigs want different laws from the OTC drug companies, who want different laws from the prescription drug companies with existing IP, who want different laws from the "legacy market" (read: organized crime), who want different laws from the alt-med and supplement companies, who want different laws from the pure VC groups and techlords. Each of these sets have cross-funding and pollination, all feeding through several dozen lobbying and trade association and "consumer advocate" groups.

2) There's actual public health concern. Cannabis isn't as addictive as other stuff on schedule 1, but it still hits a lot of addiction markers and qualifies as carrying abuse potential (including under the frameworks applied by DEA and HHS, which is why this is getting recommended at Schedule 3 and not for full descheduling). The really, really unpleasant elephant in the room, though, is data showing cannabis having a causal role in the development of schizophrenia. At this point (particularly with cohort data from countries with broader legal use, such as this study), it's clear that while the mechanism isnt well-characterized (and it doesn't hit everyone equally), it's pretty clear it's causal and not correlational (so it's not, for example, people having a tendency to self-medicate for early symptoms of development). Most of the industry groups under 1) aren't very interested in a regulatory setting that addresses that side of the equation. Regulations that would address it are made much messier because so far every indication is the mechanism is way worse in men than women.

FDA's seeking a whole new harm reduction framework and authority to try to handle cannabis and related products; it's unclear that it would work versus creating a new avenue for industry capture.

what a buzzkill

# ? Sep 2, 2023 00:30

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# ? May 28, 2024 22:32

Discendo Vox: Mar 21, 2013; We don't need to have that dialogue because it's obvious, trivial, and has already been had a thousand times.

I really wish we had access to the HHS recommendation; it'd be incredibly interesting to see how they carried out their evaluation. I'm sure there are like 30 different FOIAs submitted for it already.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 00:38

Uglycat: Dec 4, 2000; MORE INDISPUTABLE PROOF I AM BAD AT POSTING
---------------->

It should be regulated the same way tomato plants, tomato seeds, tomatoes, and tomato products are regulated.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 05:58

Kro-Bar: Jul 24, 2004; USPOL May

Uglycat posted:

It should be regulated the same way tomato plants, tomato seeds, tomatoes, and tomato products are regulated.

Regulate weed like tomacco.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 07:23

Nervous: Jan 25, 2005; Why, hello, my little slice of pecan pie.

Kro-Bar posted:

Regulate weed like tomacco.

Love putting tomacco in my salads. It's amazing how many more leafy greens I've been eating lately.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 07:30

Twincityhacker: Feb 18, 2011

Kro-Bar posted:

Regulate weed like tomacco.

Though that does remind me the time my uncle grew *tobacco* without a lisence for the lulz. It was literally visable when you drove up to his house but since it was one plant in a planter and very few people know what tabacoo plants look like...

He also worked in a gardening store that was big into hydroponics so he had a lot of customers who were very interested in the systems but curiously never had any questions about how to grow specifc plants.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 11:45

parthenocarpy: Dec 18, 2003

I don't know if the fad is trending upwards again or not but I'm seeing a lot of sovcit court videos that are current to this year. What inspires people to try these tactics? I remember seeing compilations of "are you detaining me?" moments where the officer ultimately decides to move on with life and let the traveler go. Can that really be enough? I've imagined there is some trove of sovcit success stories that circulates in a way I can't detect and I want to know more

# ? Sep 2, 2023 12:34

cr0y: Mar 24, 2005

Uglycat posted:

It should be regulated the same way tomato plants, tomato seeds, tomatoes, and tomato products are regulated.

Legalize marinara

# ? Sep 2, 2023 12:44

Inferior Third Season: Jan 15, 2005

parthenocarpy posted:

I don't know if the fad is trending upwards again or not but I'm seeing a lot of sovcit court videos that are current to this year. What inspires people to try these tactics? I remember seeing compilations of "are you detaining me?" moments where the officer ultimately decides to move on with life and let the traveler go. Can that really be enough? I've imagined there is some trove of sovcit success stories that circulates in a way I can't detect and I want to know more

It seems like the courts themselves have been promoting "magical phrases" the past few years, particularly so that they can punish and deny the rights of anyone who recites an incantation slightly incorrectly. It just so happens, completely coincidentally, I'm sure, that minorities slip up with this more often.

Louisiana Supreme Court Justice Crichton posted:

In my view, the defendant�s ambiguous and equivocal reference to a �lawyer dog� does not constitute an invocation of counsel that warrants termination of the interview and does not violate Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U.S. 477, 101 S.Ct. 1880, 68 L.Ed.2d 378 (1981).

# ? Sep 2, 2023 13:21

SpeedFreek: Jan 10, 2008; And Im Lobster Jesus!

Unless that judge was 100+ years old and completely senile they knew. When I had jury duty for the gang murder the 60ish year old white lady judge seemed to have a good enough grasp on slang understand what the witnesses and defendant were saying and prompting them to rephrase when appropriate. Thinking back the judge was the only one in the whole case that seemed to do their job well, the police really suck at their jobs from the responding officers who waited around for the gang to destroy evidence and clean up the crime scene to the lead detective who didn't know anything at all about firearms.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 13:51

Inferior Third Season: Jan 15, 2005

SpeedFreek posted:

Unless that judge was 100+ years old and completely senile they knew.

Obviously. But when judges themselves say that the reason someone's rights were violated is because they didn't say exactly the right words in exactly the right way, it isn't surprising that people buy into the "magical incantation" view of how the law works.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 15:38

The Top G: Jul 19, 2023; by Fluffdaddy

Inferior Third Season posted:

Obviously. But when judges themselves say that the reason someone's rights were violated is because they didn't say exactly the right words in exactly the right way, it isn't surprising that people buy into the "magical incantation" view of how the law works.

That IS how the law works. �I invoke my right to silence� and �I wish to have a lawyer present for further questioning� are very powerful incantations when used against the police.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 15:44

the_steve: Nov 9, 2005; We're always hiring!

The Top G posted:

That IS how the law works. “I invoke my right to silence” and “I wish to have a lawyer present for further questioning” are very powerful incantations when used against the police.

Sure, the point being that they are choosing not to understand those words because they all suddenly forgot what synonyms are and fabricate a loophole out of bullshit in order to ignore those incantations.

It'd be like saying you plead the fifth and them busting you for it anyways because technically you never specified 5th amendment, for all they knew, you were pleading for a 5th of whiskey.

Or using the real world example mentioned just a few posts up: "I want a lawyer, dawg."
But suddenly cops don't understand commas or that dawg is different from dog.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 16:01

Failed Imagineer: Sep 22, 2018

There's nothing in the Constitution that says a dog can't be your lawyer

# ? Sep 2, 2023 16:54

Nervous: Jan 25, 2005; Why, hello, my little slice of pecan pie.

Failed Imagineer posted:

There's nothing in the Constitution that says a dog can't be your lawyer

As my zealous public defender, I would like a particularly ill tempered and vicious Rottweiler.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 17:21

yronic heroism: Oct 31, 2008

The weird smarmy opinion being referenced was a concurrence. Apparently the other justices didn�t think it was worth signing onto the concurrence, hopefully because everyone not being willfully ignorant would know what dog/dawg means in this context.

The real constitutional question under Supreme Court precedent is does a conditional �if you think I did it why don�t you get me a lawyer� (paraphrased) type-statement unambiguously invoke the right to counsel.

Legal commentary treats this as a close question: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2017/11/03/the-lawyer-dog-decision-isnt-obviously-wrong/

The actual quote, at least as it was transcribed, is below.

quote:

If y�all, this is how I feel, if y�all think I did it, I know that I didn�t do it so why don�t you just give me a lawyer dog cause this is not what�s up.

yronic heroism fucked around with this message at 17:34 on Sep 2, 2023

# ? Sep 2, 2023 17:30

Xand_Man: Mar 2, 2004; If what you say is true
Wutang might be dangerous

Hereby ordered that the police terminate further questioning until a dog passes the bar

# ? Sep 2, 2023 17:31

Quixotic1: Jul 25, 2007

Xand_Man posted:

Hereby ordered that the police terminate further questioning until a dog passes the bar

Lawyer Dog was immediately involved in an altercation with police at the station. As it entered the police station to speak to its client, it charged at the officers In a threatening manner, wagging its tail, and a firearm was discharged and logged into the brain of the lawyer dog. No officers were harmed in the incident. The client is now being charged with accessory to attempted murder for hiring the lawyer dog.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 17:53

haveblue: Aug 15, 2005; Toilet Rascal

Air Bud 12: You May Appooch The Bench

# ? Sep 2, 2023 18:27

VitalSigns: Sep 3, 2011

E: wrong thread

VitalSigns fucked around with this message at 18:58 on Sep 2, 2023

# ? Sep 2, 2023 18:36

Discendo Vox: Mar 21, 2013; We don't need to have that dialogue because it's obvious, trivial, and has already been had a thousand times.

parthenocarpy posted:

I don't know if the fad is trending upwards again or not but I'm seeing a lot of sovcit court videos that are current to this year. What inspires people to try these tactics? I remember seeing compilations of "are you detaining me?" moments where the officer ultimately decides to move on with life and let the traveler go. Can that really be enough? I've imagined there is some trove of sovcit success stories that circulates in a way I can't detect and I want to know more

Reworking a post on this from the trump legal problems thread:

When sovcit actions work (which is vanishingly rare), they work along three basic patterns:

a) jury nullification. Rare but possible.
b) the vexatious filings are so severe and continuous that the court or prosecutors drop things or move to a lesser charge because it's burning up so many resources that could go into other cases. The judicial and prosecutorial systems are overburdened and in a state of triage like everything else.
c) occasionally the prosecutors or officials gently caress up in trying to cut through all the bullshit and an actual violation occurs. This is rare, but it makes other courts paranoid about repeating it...so they bend over backwards to avoid such issues...which gives the sovcit leverage and burns more resources.

In practice, any individual case of this working feeds back into the cycle of scam artists who sell sovcit concepts, becoming permanent influential examples of how these things "work". A great example of b) happened in Baltimore in, the early 2000s and the result was to greatly spread belief in the practice. here's the article:

quote:

None of these arguments had a prayer of overturning the charges. But they had an impact nonetheless. They made a long, complex trial longer and more complex still. Seeking the death penalty is rightfully arduous�it requires legal justifications for the penalty itself, enhanced scrutiny over jury selection, an additional penalty phase after a conviction, and so on. Conspiracy charges create further legal burdens. And the way Mitchell et al chose to deal with their attorneys� not dismissing them outright, but asking them to sign a peculiar �contract� that would essentially prohibit them from mounting a defense�created more problems. If the defendants weren�t dealt with carefully, they might be able to appeal by claiming that they had been inadequately represented. The last thing Judge Davis wanted was for an appellate court to throw out a verdict and send the case back to Baltimore to start all over again. According to a source close to the court, dealing with the flesh and blood defense has been �one of the greatest challenges Davis has faced in twenty years as a judge, by far.�

By mid-2007, the federal prosecutors were starting to run low on a vital resource: time. As years go by, memories fade, police officers retire or transfer, informants change their mind, and juries wonder, why, if the case is so straightforward, it took so long to make. On September 6, 2007, prosecutors withdrew the death penalty for all four defendants.

Crucially, like all scams, delusions and falsehoods, the gurus and jailhouse attorneys who promote these practices generally at least partially believe in them, themselves. Ultimately, what's being "sold" or taught is a way out, a way to relieve the fear, anxiety, desperation, inevitability and seeming inscrutability of a legal outcome. Motivated reasoning and a desire to believe that you are somehow going to be in the right can make almost anyone stupid if they're under enough pressure.

Speaking to your question about the spread of new sovcit videos, the reality is that court systems have developed practices and toolsets in response to sovcits. Procedural standards for "vexatious litigants" and similar terms let the court stop handling sovcit and pro se actors with kid gloves and shut down these practices more quickly. Sovcit filings are thus far less "effective" or disruptive than they used to be. If you're seeing more videos, it's because there's more advertising from one or more scammers in that ecosystem, often due to changes in media that cause the belief to spread (like tiktok)...or because something has caused the relevant algorithms to send more of the videos to you, specifically.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 18:56

FlamingLiberal: Jan 18, 2009; Would you like to play a game?

I see sov cit filings pretty often in my work (domestic cases) and it's generally just nonsense that the judges tend to ignore.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 18:58

Discendo Vox: Mar 21, 2013; We don't need to have that dialogue because it's obvious, trivial, and has already been had a thousand times.

One sovcit practice that is probably still effective in many jurisdictions, at least as a form of harassment, is filing spurious property liens. Those go through a different set of systems and would require different, structural reforms to address.

Discendo Vox fucked around with this message at 19:32 on Sep 2, 2023

# ? Sep 2, 2023 19:00

SpeakSlow: May 17, 2004; by Fluffdaddy

Law Bud - The Buddy Cop Dog
Bud Law - The Lawyers Who Prosecute Them

# ? Sep 2, 2023 19:21

FlamingLiberal: Jan 18, 2009; Would you like to play a game?

Former NM Dem governor Bill Richardson passed away last night at 75. He had previously run for President in 2008, and during the Clinton admin was a UN Ambassador. One of his last public efforts was being involved in the back-channel negotiations to free Brittney Griner from Russian prison.

https://twitter.com/SecDebHaaland/status/1698035698371273027?s=20

# ? Sep 2, 2023 19:24

parthenocarpy: Dec 18, 2003

Discendo Vox posted:

One sovcit practice that is probably still effective in many jurisdictions, at least as a form of harassment, is filing spurious property liens. Those go through a different set of systems and would require different, structural reforms to address.

Thank you for your replies. I'm looking forward to that (thread?) you're planning. I find all of this fascinating.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 19:44

Discendo Vox: Mar 21, 2013; We don't need to have that dialogue because it's obvious, trivial, and has already been had a thousand times.

parthenocarpy posted:

Thank you for your replies. I'm looking forward to that (thread?) you're planning. I find all of this fascinating.

Sorry, it's not that I'm making a new thread. The post was just a reworking of a post (this one) from the already existing trump legal troubles thread.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 19:52

Main Paineframe: Oct 27, 2010

parthenocarpy posted:

I don't know if the fad is trending upwards again or not but I'm seeing a lot of sovcit court videos that are current to this year. What inspires people to try these tactics? I remember seeing compilations of "are you detaining me?" moments where the officer ultimately decides to move on with life and let the traveler go. Can that really be enough? I've imagined there is some trove of sovcit success stories that circulates in a way I can't detect and I want to know more

The success stories are made up. It's not like anyone succumbing to gold fringe nonsense is going to go searching through court records to try and find out if the success stories they're hearing are actually true.

You're making the common mistake of thinking that, because a bunch of people believe something, there must be some real thing underlying that belief. There really isn't! It's all bullshit. There doesn't have to be even the slightest hint of truth to it. When someone needs to "prove" that it works, they can just make poo poo up from whole cloth. Someone who's even remotely willing to believe "the entire federal government is nothing more than a vast conspiracy to trick you into willingly surrendering your immunity to laws" is not going to be double-checking the claims.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 20:41

selec: Sep 6, 2003

FlamingLiberal posted:

Former NM Dem governor Bill Richardson passed away last night at 75. He had previously run for President in 2008, and during the Clinton admin was a UN Ambassador. One of his last public efforts was being involved in the back-channel negotiations to free Brittney Griner from Russian prison.

https://twitter.com/SecDebHaaland/status/1698035698371273027?s=20

Major Epstein pal too:

https://www.lcsun-news.com/story/ne...itz/1975518001/

# ? Sep 2, 2023 20:42

Main Paineframe: Oct 27, 2010

Possibly the greatest tragedy of this entire campaign season so far is that Trump hasn't taken the debate stage against DeSantis. It's probably for the best, but the :sickos:

in me can't help but want to see Trump eviscerate this pushover on live TV. When headlines like Ron DeSantis Is Afraid of Questions From a 15-Year-Old are popping up and are completely believable and unsurprising, there was no chance this motherfucker was ever gonna be a serious challenger to Trump.

In this case, a high schooler managed to own him badly enough in a Q&A session that DeSantis' staff apparently blacklisted him.

quote:

Quinn Mitchell has seen at least 35 presidential candidates in person since 2019, when he first started showing up at New Hampshire primary events to ask them questions.

Not a single one of them had ever treated the now-15-year-old as if he were a threat�until Ron DeSantis came to town.

It all started with a straightforward question. In June, when DeSantis stopped for a town hall event in Hollis, Mitchell raised his hand in the crowd.

�Do you believe that Trump violated the peaceful transfer of power,� the teenager asked the governor, �a key principle of American democracy that we must uphold?�

DeSantis dodged the question and said Americans shouldn�t get stuck in the past, but not before remarking�in a somewhat impressed, incredulous tone�on Mitchell�s age. �Are you in high school?� the governor asked.

The moment went viral, with DeSantis� non-answer encapsulating how even Donald Trump�s lead primary rival could not bring himself to acknowledge the former president�s efforts to undo the 2020 election. CNN even played it during an interview with Chris Christie to tee up a question to the Trump foe.

For Mitchell, however, the exchange kicked off a series of events that deeply rattled him and his family.

Speaking about it for the first time in an interview with The Daily Beast, Mitchell says that he was grabbed and physically intimidated by DeSantis security at two subsequent campaign stops, where the candidate�s staffers also monitored him in a way he perceived as hostile.

The experience, Mitchell said, was �horrifying� and amounted to �intimidation.�

At a Fourth of July parade DeSantis attended, Mitchell was swarmed by security and physically restrained after a brief interaction with the governor�with his private security contractors even demanding Mitchell stay put until they said so.

With his mother alarmed, the situation escalated to such a degree that the candidate�s wife, Casey, spoke directly with her�but to suggest her son was being dishonest about what happened, according to Mitchell.

Then, at an August 19 event�where Mitchell was tailed closely by two security guards�an attendee told The Daily Beast they saw a staffer for DeSantis� super PAC, Never Back Down, take a photo of the teenager on Snapchat before typing out an ominous caption: �Got our kid.�

Seven other sources corroborated Mitchell�s version of events, either by sharing contemporaneous communications with the family or recounting what they witnessed in person at DeSantis events, including the Fourth of July parade. The teenager and his family say they have yet to receive any kind of apology from DeSantis.

The DeSantis campaign and Never Back Down did not return multiple requests for comment from The Daily Beast.

As astute an observer of the state�s politics as any, Mitchell had a blunt assessment of the fiasco over DeSantis� treatment of him. �Really stupid,� he said, �in a small state like New Hampshire.�

�I Just Want to Ask My Question�
As the DeSantis campaign�s summer from hell comes to an end, the governor is not much closer to seriously threatening Trump for the GOP nomination. Amid concerns over his stagnant polling numbers, his fundraising performance, and unsustainable spending, the DeSantis operation has seen substantial turnover, including the ouster of his campaign manager.

Across all of the reboots and turmoil, a consistent thread apparently remained: the DeSantis team�s willingness to go to unusual lengths to prevent a teenage boy from having a chance to follow up with the candidate on his question�and, to hear Mitchell tell it, personally express regret that he made the governor look bad.

More broadly, the teenager�s story distills some key reasons why DeSantis� presidential bid is struggling: a candidate with clear difficulty making personal connections, a team obsessed with managing every detail on the campaign trail, and a pervasive anxiety over the idea of alienating Trump voters.

Combined together, those factors may ensure DeSantis gets nowhere near the White House in 2024. In New Hampshire, they�ve already pushed a precocious and passionate teenager to consider quitting politics altogether.

�I may be older now and know I can handle this a lot more, but if they had done that to me a few years back, I don�t know if I could have handled that,� Mitchell said. �It�s unfortunate, because I just want to ask my question.�

In the nation�s first primary state, where individual voters can have an outsized impact on the process, Mitchell made himself a staple of the New Hampshire political scene before he was even a teenager.

A self-described political independent who loves history and politics, Mitchell sees it as his �civic duty� to show up to ask questions, especially on behalf of �people who live in other states and the people who want to ask those questions,� who �don�t always get the opportunity.�

Before DeSantis, presidential candidates have not just tolerated the teenager but seemed to genuinely appreciate him. In the 2020 Democratic primary, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) met with Mitchell and later worked his enthusiasm for politics into her stump speech.

More recently, Christie not only gave him a shoutout during the CNN interview��he goes to every town hall meeting� he asks really tough questions��but was quoted in a recent USA Today profile of Mitchell. �Quinn, remember me when you are president,� the former New Jersey governor quipped.

�They're Watching You�
After his question about Jan. 6 blew up on DeSantis, Mitchell�who was not intending to land a punch on the governor�said he �genuinely felt bad about it.� A few days later, he woke up early for the hour-and-a-half drive to Merrimack, where he intended to personally say as much to DeSantis at the town�s Fourth of July parade.

Once there, the high level of security around the governor�s contingent stood out to Mitchell and other observers. Staffers for the super PAC, Never Back Down, �were nudging the security guys and pointing at me,� Mitchell said. �I actually had a reporter come up and just say, �They�re pointing at you and they�re watching you.��

Unfazed, Mitchell patiently walked along as the candidate crossed from curb to curb, shaking hands with voters; each time he came close to DeSantis, however, the security guards would hold their arms out in front and parry him away.

Finally, Mitchell was able to get within earshot of the governor. When he passed by, he told him, �I�m so sorry that I got you in all that trouble,� and offered him a chance to give a different or more detailed answer to the question.

According to Mitchell, DeSantis nodded in response, at least acknowledging his question, and the two had a quick handshake. That�s when things went south: right after the handshake, Mitchell recalled his shock when he felt a firm tug on his shirt, pulling him away from DeSantis. Suddenly, all he could see were the outstretched arms of security guards and plain clothed aides.

�Usually what they do is they don�t push you or anything, but they put their hands out and kind of body you, so you just don�t move, basically,� Mitchell said, describing a shuffling motion more akin to an offensive line on a football team than a presidential candidate�s security detail.

If that were not startling enough, right after the fracas, a DeSantis security guard cornered Mitchell and ordered him not to move from the spot for another five minutes. In response, he did what almost any 15-year old would do.

He texted his mom.

Toward the end of the parade, Mitchell�s mother reunited with her son and then demanded an explanation from DeSantis for why his security detail was putting their hands on her boy, an interaction that was observed by a Boston Globe reporter on the scene.

What the Globe didn�t catch was the involvement of the second most important person in the DeSantis campaign: Casey, the governor�s wife and arguably his top political adviser.

Instead of diffusing the situation, however, the Florida First Lady suggested to Mitchell�s mother that she was overreacting�and that her son was fibbing.

�Well, I�m a mother, too,� Casey said, according to Mitchell and other witnesses, along with multiple sources who shared contemporaneous communications on the incident with The Daily Beast. �I know what you�re experiencing, and we�re all very afraid for our children�even if they�re exaggerating.�

As for the candidate himself, DeSantis told Mitchell he would �get to the bottom� of the one-sided encounter with security, and even told the teenager to come to his next event.

�Got Our Kid�
Ahead of their August 19 event, a staffer for Never Back Down reached out to Mitchell. USA Today let the PAC know that a photographer wanted to come photograph Mitchell for the upcoming profile. The staffer just wanted to confirm he would be in attendance.

The teenager obliged. But after walking into the event, held in a firearm factory in Newport, he noticed something odd.

It wasn�t just that he saw a pair of security guards flanking him as he made his way to the far side of the venue. The weird part was that Never Back Down staffers were taking photos of him. It was notable to Mitchell, even before he learned of the ominous caption��got our kid��that one staffer was seen attaching to a Snapchat photo.

The governor kept audience questions to a tight 15 minutes, throwing Mitchell a glance but ignoring his outstretched hand, though the teenager now stands over 6 feet tall.

Security kept their defensive posture as Mitchell tried to make his way to stage right�where DeSantis was attempting to chat with voters and take selfies�blocking him from getting toward the group of voters waiting to chat with the candidate.

Even after Mitchell gave up on his months-long pursuit of a follow-up question to DeSantis about his views on Trump and the transfer of power, security prevented him from crossing the room to see a family friend, until they eventually relented.

Since the incidents, Mitchell has not heard from the DeSantis campaign, or the PAC, though he expected to. He could not reach an in-state contact for the governor�s team himself.

�The campaign, they could have called and said, �We�re so sorry, this should have never happened, we�ll get to the bottom of it,�� Mitchell said. �Never got a call like that. They never apologized to us for any of it.�

Mitchell often says that it�s a privilege to live in New Hampshire, a state where even a determined teenager can have the power to influence the presidential election in a small way. His dream is to become a political reporter, but he said the DeSantis events almost made him want to hang it up for good.

Whatever happens, Mitchell is likely to keep up his rigorous primary schedule�even if he�s unlikely to try to see DeSantis again anytime soon. But the teenager said if he ran into him �at conventions or a multiple candidate event, I will do my best to press him.�

Still, the political history buff came away with one silver lining after the last DeSantis event.

�I actually got a free hat that day,� Mitchell said, a fine collector�s item, even if it was for the Never Back Down PAC and not the DeSantis campaign proper.

For a 15-year-old who sacrificed more than a few dog days of summer�and more than a few hours of Minecraft�to be treated as a security threat by a major presidential candidate, a free Never Back Down hat selling for nearly $30 online was, he quipped, �probably the only good thing that happened that day.�

This motherfucker wants to be president, and he's so scared of a high schooler who's made a hobby out of visiting political rallies that he's tasked his security team with making sure that kid in particular never gets close enough to him to spark a viral video moment ever again.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 20:56

FlamingLiberal: Jan 18, 2009; Would you like to play a game?

I'm pretty sure a jar of Miracle Whip is a threat to DeSantis

# ? Sep 2, 2023 21:01

haveblue: Aug 15, 2005; Toilet Rascal

Having thoroughly disrupted the movie and TV industries, SAG-AFTRA is now turning their attention to video games. A modern high-budget video game cutscene or voiceover session is almost indistinguishable from a shoot for a movie or TV show, with full performance capture rigs in a tracked volume, and is also very much like streaming in that it's such a new field that evolved so rapidly that big money was able to tilt the playing field in its favor before performers could catch up.

quote:

SAG-AFTRA�s National Board has voted unanimously to send a strike authorization vote to SAG-AFTRA members in preparation of the union�s forthcoming bargaining dates with signatory video game companies, which include:

Activision Productions Inc.,
Blindlight LLC,
Disney Character Voices Inc.,
Electronic Arts Productions Inc.,
Epic Games, Inc.,
Formosa Interactive LLC,
Insomniac Games Inc.,
Take 2 Productions Inc.,
VoiceWorks Productions Inc., and
WB Games Inc.

It has been nearly a year since SAG-AFTRA�s video game contract, the Interactive Media Agreement, was extended beyond the original expiration date as we negotiated with the companies for critical terms SAG-AFTRA members need. Unfortunately, throughout the negotiations, the companies have failed to address those needs. For this reason, the negotiating committee and National Board unanimously agreed that the union should have a member-approved strike authorization in hand when bargaining resumes on Sept. 26.

SAG-AFTRA is seeking basically the same things they're seeking from Hollywood- more money and protection against AI encroachment. They are also seeking to bring worker protection measures on video game shoots up to parity with those required on movies and television, including mandatory rest periods and an on-set medic for stunt work.

Voting will take place until September 25, with the results presumably being announced shortly after.

# ? Sep 2, 2023 21:36

Civilized Fishbot: Apr 3, 2011

MickeyFinn posted:

Your experience was (going off the demos on SA) likely college in the 2000s or early 2010s. The rich kids you saw smoking weed and doing coke will have real political power at the federal level in about 20 years.

When do you think weed became popular on college campuses?

Weed is federally illegal because it's profitable and facilitates police work, not because politicians are mad that they didn't get to smoke weed in college.

Civilized Fishbot fucked around with this message at 23:09 on Sep 2, 2023

# ? Sep 2, 2023 23:07

Medullah: Aug 14, 2003; FEAR MY SHARK ROCKET IT REALLY SUCKS AND BLOWS

Civilized Fishbot posted:

When do you think weed became popular on college campuses?

Weed is federally illegal because it's profitable and facilitates police work, not because politicians are mad that they didn't get to smoke weed in college.

Yeah weed was a way of life when I went to college in 1995. Of course I was at the University of Michigan that had the annual hash bash so it may be biased.

Oddly I never got into it while I was there

# ? Sep 2, 2023 23:18

KillHour: Oct 28, 2007

Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:

Edit: I wonder why so many people are seeing UFOs in the Baltic sea between Denmark, Finland, and Poland.

Ghost of Kyiv got lost sorry

# ? Sep 2, 2023 23:37

PhazonLink: Jul 17, 2010

i hope triple A videogames does a good labor thing.

but im not sure. videogames (and tech) have a ton of flavoraid drinkers.

# ? Sep 3, 2023 02:50

Ghost Leviathan: Mar 2, 2017; Exploration is ill-advised.

PhazonLink posted:

i hope triple A videogames does a good labor thing.

but im not sure. videogames (and tech) have a ton of flavoraid drinkers.

True, but things can change very fast, especially in fields of mostly younger people who barely know unions even exist. Hopefully the actors can bully the nerds into joining.

# ? Sep 3, 2023 03:24

Staluigi: Jun 22, 2021

PhazonLink posted:

i hope triple A videogames does a good labor thing.

but im not sure. videogames (and tech) have a ton of flavoraid drinkers.

They will continue abusing vidja game makers till a bunch die

# ? Sep 3, 2023 03:32

Randalor: Sep 4, 2011

Nazis are just outright parading and demonstrating around Florida now. So that's... what's the opposite of "cool and alright"? That.

# ? Sep 3, 2023 06:14

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? May 28, 2024 22:32

Gyges: Aug 4, 2004; NOW NO ONE
RECOGNIZE HULK

Randalor posted:

Nazis are just outright parading and demonstrating around Florida now. So that's... what's the opposite of "cool and alright"? That.

They've been doing it since at least DeSantis creating a literal brown shirt State Guard. So a year or two, with it getting more and more outrageous. I think the last big story about it was nazis outside Disney with DeSantis signs.

# ? Sep 3, 2023 07:13

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > USCE 2023: Please let them shove a camera up your butt

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