Author: HP McLovincraft

Seeker of rabbit holes. Pessimist. Libertine. Contrarian. Your huckleberry. Possibly true tales of sanity-blasting horror also known as abject reality. Prepare yourself. Veteran of a thousand psychic wars. I have seen the fnords. Deplatformed on Tumblr and Twitter.

‘Not appropriate’: Blue-state attorney general paid $570 an hour to law firm that contributed to his campaign

Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown’s office agreed to pay $570 an hour to attorneys at an outside law firm that contributed to Brown’s campaign, records obtained by The Center Square show.

Four additional law firms that received contracts with the AG’s office donated to the campaign of Brown, a Democrat, records show. Together, the five firms and their affiliated political action committees contributed $30,250 to Brown’s campaign committee.

Brown’s office signed the contract with Ballard Spahr LLP of Philadelphia in November 2022. Two years earlier, the firm donated $2,500 to Friends of Anthony Brown, Brown’s campaign committee, according to state campaign finance records. Two months after the contract was signed, the law firm donated another $2,500. The contract also pays paralegals $295 an hour. If renewed, attorney rates increased to $595 an hour and paralegal rates to $315 an hour.

Brown’s office initially refused to release the hourly rates but reversed course Wednesday after The Center Square appealed to the Public Access Ombudsman, a voluntary, confidential mediator.

The Center Square requested the records for contracts with outside counsel since 2023, the year Brown, 61, took office. Brown’s office released two outside-counsel contracts and the names of 81 law firms, lawyers and legal nonprofits with which it entered into agreements.

The redaction was at odds with two recent rulings by the state’s Public Information Act Compliance Board, which held that another government agency should make similar payment information public.

Under the contract, Ballard Spahr may represent multiple state agencies, including the Maryland Department of Transportation and the Department of General Services. A Ballard Spahr spokesman did not respond to two requests for interview.

The office also declined to provide bidding documents or requests for proposals to show how the contracts were issued and the total amounts paid the firms.

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The University of Minnesota is Paying ‘Diversity’ Staffers Almost $1.5 Million Annually

The University of Minnesota is paying ‘diversity staffers’ almost a million and a half dollars every year. And people still wonder how college has gotten so expensive.

What exactly do diversity staffers even do? Does anyone know?

Parents and students must understand that when they take out massive government loans to pay for college, this is part of what they are paying for. The exorbitant salaries of these pointless employees.

Campus Reform reports:

University of Minnesota pays DEI staff nearly $1.5 million annually

The University of Minnesota pays its Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) staff members more than $1.4 million annually, according to publicly available state payroll records.

Despite federal executive orders restricting DEI offices and activities, the University of Minnesota maintains an Office for Equity and Diversity, which consists “of over 15 offices and major initiatives.”

“Equity and diversity is fundamental to everything we do at the University of Minnesota,” the office’s website says.

The central office employs four leadership staff and five administrative staff. Five of those staff members are receiving six-figure salaries, according to OpenPayrolls.

Record from 2025 list Vice President for Equity and Diversity Mercedes Ramírez Fernández ($391,759), Associate Vice President for Equity and Diversity and Faculty Development Keisha Varma ($238,540), Associate Vice Presidents Tina Marisam ($230,444) and Malinda Lindquist ($196,267), and Chief of Staff Elizabeth Martinez-Podolsky ($164,800).

The payroll data also lists Kate Klosterman ($74,298), John Michael Bradshaw ($50,086.40), Jenna Olien ($47,237), and Tia Phan ($99,194).

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Prosecutor Investigating U.S. Boat Strikes and Claims of Torture Was Murdered in Ecuador

Alexandra Bravo, the prosecutor assigned to investigate U.S. strikes on three Ecuadorian boats and the 36 survivors’ subsequent accounts of torture and kidnapping, was shot dead in the coastal city of Manta last month. According to police, on June 14 a hitman aboard a black motorcycle opened fire on Bravo as she and her sister were leaving a café at about 11 a.m. Bravo’s sister, who jumped to protect her, was also killed in the attack.

Upon arriving at the crime scene, officers say they found five 9mm shell casings and Bravo’s injured driver, but no sign of the police detail that had been assigned to protect her. The Police Directorate, which operates entirely under the executive branch, has launched a probe to determine if there’d been an internal security breach.

Bravo is the 26th member of Ecuador’s justice system to be assassinated since 2020 and the second individual investigating state crimes murdered that week. Besides her usual caseload of homicide and organized crime, Bravo had been working the Fiorella, Negra Francisca, and Don Maca cases—a series of drone attacks on civilian fishing ships exposed by Drop Site in April. Two of the boat’s crews returned home and reported being abducted, blindfolded, and starved for eight days by American gunmen in U.S. military uniforms aboard a U.S.-flagged patrol ship, before being abandoned in El Salvador. The UN Committee on Enforced Disappearances endorsed the calls for an investigation, demanding that the U.S. provide information on the whereabouts of the eight still-missing men and any involvement in the matter by April 27. To date, the United States has not responded.

Under Ecuador’s right-wing president Daniel Noboa—a Miami-born billionaire often characterized as a “U.S.-backed dictator”—the country has become a central testing ground for Operation Southern Spear, Washington’s extrajudicial bombing campaign purporting to target “narco-terrorists,” which has killed 221 people to date. There is no evidence that many of the victims, including those in Bravo’s investigation, had engaged in drug trafficking.

“I can’t make any assertion regarding it being a political assassination, but evidently, when a prosecutor is killed it’s because of the investigation they’re conducting,” Fernando Bastias, a renowned human rights attorney with Ecuador’s CDH and member of the Geneva-based World Organization Against Torture, told Drop Site, “That’s something we’ve learned from our experience in Ecuador.”

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The WNBA Aligns with the Radical Left and Attacks Caitlin Clark’s Fans Labeling Them Racist

As All-Star Game Approaches – Radical Left Attacks Caitlin Clark’s Fans, Labeling Them Racist.

The WNBA could not handle the explosion of excitement for the league that Caitlin Clark brought with her two years ago.  Rather than highlight the massive increase in fans that Clark brought with her to the league, the league attacks Clark physically while labeling her fans racists.  The WNBA is easily the worst league in sports history!

Clark fans see a league of jealous women who attack and physically abuse her every game.  They see blind refs who allow it, a coach who ignores it and does all she can to prevent Clark from being herself, and league management who appear to be in collusion in targeting and destroying their golden goose.

The beatings are so vicious and constant that the members of the US House are investigating them.

But rather than show sympathy and provide protection for the woman who gave her league credibility, the league sympathizes with the attacker, claiming she is the victim of abuse.

Last night, the refs called their 7th tech against Clark this season for trash-talking an opponent, saying, “Look at the scoreboard”. But when Clark was pummeled by Alyssa Thomas on the floor no foul was called.

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ANOTHER ONE: Indian Illegal Alien Trucker with Valid California CDL Busted Hauling Nearly $3 Million in Stolen Military-Grade Powder – Now in ICE Custody

Here we go again.

An illegal alien from India who possessed a valid California commercial driver’s license is now in Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody after authorities caught him transporting nearly $3 million worth of stolen tungsten oxide powder.

The suspect, identified as 31-year-old Deepak Kumar, was arrested in Greenfield, Indiana, after police tracked his tractor-trailer traveling westbound on Interstate 70.

The truck was wanted in connection with a massive cargo theft reported in Pennsylvania on June 25.

According to the Greenfield Police Department, Kumar is suspected of using fraudulent documents to obtain nearly 40,000 pounds of tungsten oxide powder valued at a staggering $2,857,500.

The powder was being shipped to Mitsubishi Materials Corporation in Japan.

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Dem Political Operative Arrested for Trying to Take Cop’s Gun During NH Traffic Stop

A Montpelier woman identified as a longtime Democratic political operative in Vermont and Bernie Sanders senior campaign aide has been charged after New Hampshire police say a Saturday, July 18 traffic incident escalated into an attempt to seize an officer’s firearm during her arrest.

According to the Lebanon, New Hampshire Police Department, officers responded at about 6:13 PM Saturday, July 18, to multiple 911 calls reporting a white Mazda stopped in the middle of Mechanic Street near Slayton Hill, blocking traffic.

Witnesses told police the driver, identified as Sheila Healy, 39, of Montpelier, was yelling at passing motorists and people who stopped to help. Callers also reported Healy claimed a sniper was targeting her and warned that anyone approaching would be shot.

Police said the Hartford VT Police Department had alerted Lebanon officers shortly before the incident that the same vehicle had crossed into New Hampshire with its hazard lights activated after allegedly traveling about 60 mph in a 30 mph zone and running multiple red lights.

When officers arrived, they found Healy attempting to refuel the vehicle with a gasoline can while it remained stopped in the travel lane. Police said she ignored repeated commands to keep her hands visible, re-entered the vehicle, and refused orders to get out.

According to police, officers removed Healy from the vehicle and attempted to place her under arrest. During the struggle, she allegedly pulled away, refused to walk, and reached for an officer’s holstered handgun, attempting to remove it from the duty belt. Officers prevented her from taking the weapon and completed the arrest without injuries.

Healy was held on preventative detention and transported to the Grafton County House of Corrections.

She is charged with attempted taking of a firearm from a law enforcement officer, disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, reckless operation, simple assault on a law enforcement officer, three counts of criminal threatening, and parking or stopping where prohibited. She is scheduled to be arraigned July 20 in Lebanon District Court.

Lebanon Police Chief Phillip Roberts commended the officers’ actions, calling the attempted disarming of an officer “among the most serious and dangerous attacks an Officer can face,” and credited their teamwork and restraint with preventing serious injury.

Healy has worked in Democratic politics for many years. Her online professional profile lists her current position as full-time campaign manager for Friends of Bernie Sanders, a role she reportedly began in July.

However, WCAX reports that a spokesperson for Sanders said in a statement that Healy “has not had any formal role or voluntary role since the end of the 2020 presidential campaign. She is not associated with and does not represent the Friends of Bernie Sanders campaign or the Senate office.”

She previously served as labor outreach director for Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign and has held positions as field director for Sanders’ U.S. Senate reelection campaign, senior advisor to the Vermont Democratic Party, regional vice president of the Vermont AFL-CIO, and executive director of the Arizona Democratic Party. 

Court records show she filed a breach-of-contract lawsuit against the Arizona Democratic Party in 2017 following her dismissal. The suit alleged she had been offered the Vermont Democratic Party executive director position but declined it,  based on expectation of a bonus that was not provided.

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CO Dem Candidate Deleted These Reddit Posts. You Can See Why He Did That.

Manny Rutinel is the Colorado Democrat running in the 8th district. He’s also another candidate with some unusual social media posts. No, it’s nowhere near as extreme as Graham Platner, who is on a different level with posts about masturbating in port-a-potties, among other things, but it’s worth noting that Rutinel deleted these Reddit posts, likely because they could damage the local economy. They were a form of advocacy for vegan authoritarianism, which is not something ranchers want to hear.

State Rep. Manny Rutinel, in since-deleted posts made nearly a decade ago on the social media site Reddit, voiced support for a movement that aims to put animals on the same legal footing as humans and in turn prohibit their slaughter for food and other uses. 

Rutinel, a Democrat running to represent Colorado’s toss-up 8th Congressional District, envisioned a future in which so-called animal liberation legislation would be adopted.

“Veganism will grow at a gradual pace, farmers will produce fewer farm animals to meet the decreased demand,” he posted in 2017. “The fewer animals that are left living by the time an animal liberation amendment arrives will spend the remainder of their lives happily in either an animal sanctuary or be kept as a pet.”

[…]

His changing views on meat could be politically helpful: The 8th District, which spans Denver’s northeast suburbs into Greeley, is arguably Colorado’s agricultural capital. 

It’s filled with ranches, feedlots and dairy farms, which generated about $1.2 billion in animal products in 2022. The district is also home to a JBS meatpacking facility in Greeley, one of the nation’s largest beef slaughterhouses. 

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How non-citizens are getting voter registration forms across the US — and how Republicans are trying to stop it

Welfare offices and other agencies in at least 46 US states are providing voter registration forms to migrants without requiring proof of citizenship, leading Republicans and conservatives to call for swift federal action to stop the handouts.

Every state but North Dakota, New Hampshire, Wisconsin and Wyoming gives applicants for either welfare benefits, driver’s licenses, or in some cases, mail-in ballots federal voter registration forms without demanding proof of citizenship.

There is currently no requirement on federal voting forms to provide proof of US citizenship, though it is illegal to falsely claim one is a citizen or for a non-citizen to cast a ballot in a federal election.

But millions of migrants with humanitarian parole, refugee or asylum status are eligible for benefits that would bring them to the offices where voter registration takes place.

The National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) of 1993 ordered states to register voters at the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) and agencies where Americans apply for public benefits — and those offices are required by federal law to hand over the registration forms along with the application papers.

If an applicant attests that they are a US citizen, that is considered valid on its face and the person is registered to vote — except in Virginia, Tennessee and New Mexico where they must provide a full Social Security number as well.

Arizona recently passed a law requiring proof of citizenship on state but not federal voter registration forms.

The House Administration Committee last month approved the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act to require states to receive proof of citizenship when anyone registers to vote by mail, at a DMV or a welfare agency office.

“While Biden and radical progressive Democrats give ISIS and criminals an app to literally schedule their illegal entry, Republicans must fight any chance of illegal voter registration until we can mass deport,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), who introduced the measure, told The Post.

“As President Biden has welcomed millions of illegal aliens through our borders, including sophisticated criminal syndicates and foreign adversaries, it is incumbent upon Congress to implement greater enforcement measures that secure the voter registration process and ensure only American citizens decide the outcome of American elections,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said in a statement following its approval.

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DSA Assault on Prisons Is Rooted in Third Worldist Lust for Barbarism

The Democratic Socialists of America are having a moment. In fact, they’re having a season. DSA candidates are winning nationwide in Democratic Party primaries, knocking off incumbents while running on some of the most deformed and deranged platforms in recent political memory. Zohran Mamdani, the charismatic young socialist in Gracie Mansion, is the new leader of the DSA pack. Terrifying as it may be, Zo may be the closest thing the entire activist left has these days to a kingmaker.

It couldn’t be clearer what the DSA wants: The democratic socialists want to finish the job, launched by Barack Obama on the precipice of presidential victory in 2008, of “fundamentally transforming” the United States. The DSA’s new policy platform, released earlier this month, says the quiet part out loud: “We are workers fighting to transform society,” to “draft a new constitution, and create a democratic socialist republic.”

It would be one thing if these were the words of a starry-eyed freshman pothead, first exposed to Marx and pontificating to dormmates while John Lennon’s dreadful song “Imagine” plays in the background. But people like Hizzoner and the new uptown socialist “it girl,” Darializa Avila Chevalier, are adults. They are serious. And that makes them not just naive but dangerous.

Zo has had a complicated relationship with the issue of public safety.

The official DSA platform stops short of calling for full “abolition” of prisons or policing, instead calling to “demilitarize police departments” and “end mass incarceration.” But Avila Chevalier promoted full-on police and prison abolition from a since-deleted Twitter/X account, and Mamdani condemned the “carceral state” when he ran for state assembly in 2020. After Avila Chevalier’s primary victory, Mamdani was pressed during an appearance on ABC News on whether he supports the existence of prisons. “There are prisons,” he simply responded.

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Italy Once Conquered the World, Today Citizens Aren’t Allowed to Defend Themselves

Watching the news and conservative social media feeds from Italy, one sees that migrant crime has exploded across the country. Even global tourism destinations such as Rome have become unsafe at night, while robberies and other violent or sex-related crimes are occurring at an alarming rate, even during the day.

For two thousand years, Rome projected power across three continents, building an empire on the discipline of its legions and the authority of its law. Today, Italy is being overrun with invaders, and an Italian citizen who fights back against a criminal in their own home or shop faces a mandatory criminal investigation and often a prison sentence longer than the one handed to the person who attacked them.

Gun ownership is highly restricted, castle laws are virtually nonexistent, and even the police are discouraged from defending themselves or using force to apprehend noncompliant criminals.

Under the Italian Code of Criminal Procedure, any use of lethal or serious force against an intruder or attacker automatically triggers an “iscrizione nel registro degli indagate,” a formal entry into the register of criminal suspects. Prosecutors typically open the case as manslaughter or “eccesso colposo di legittima difesa” (culpable excess in self-defense), pending forensic and ballistic review.

A 2019 reform, Law no. 36/2019, was intended to strengthen self-defense rights, establishing that proportionality between defense and offense is presumed inside one’s home or business. In practice, judges continue to draw a hard line: force used against an active, ongoing threat is defensible; force used against a suspect who is already fleeing is not, and courts have consistently classified the latter as excessive or even as an act of vengeance.

American laws are generally much more favorable toward self-defense and the defense of one’s home. California Penal Code section 198.5, a “castle doctrine” statute, gives homeowners a legal presumption of reasonable fear once an intruder has forcibly entered, shifting the burden onto prosecutors to disprove that fear.

Italian law, even after 2019, still requires the defender to establish that danger was actual and the response proportionate, case by case. Separately, 38 U.S. states have “stand your ground” laws removing any duty to retreat anywhere a person is lawfully present. Italy has no equivalent.

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