Though vidding is now generally a part of online culture, it originated in the grassroots editing efforts of female television fans.

DAVIDSON, N.C.—Four thin, metal cylinders containing the world’s most potent greenhouse gas stand lashed to the base of a Duke Energy substation on a quiet country road. The tanks are made to hold sulfur hexafluoride (SF6), an electrical insulator that was once used to fill race car tires, tennis balls and even Nike Air Max shoes. A single pound of SF6 heats the planet as much as 25,200 pounds of carbon dioxide and remains in the atmosphere for 3,200 years according to the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. SF6 is one of several long-lived, synthetic, fluorine-containing chemicals that are released by heavy industry, chemical manufacturers, semiconductor-makers and electric utilities according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA, which does not regulate emissions of any of these potent greenhouse gases, notes that once they are released, they are “essentially permanent additions to the atmosphere.” In 2020, Duke Energy, which provides electricity in six states, leaked nearly 11 metric tons of SF6 into the atmosphere from its electric substations in North and South Carolina alone, more than any other utility in the nation, according to mandatory reports the company files with the EPA each year, reviewed by Inside Climate News. The emissions were equal to the annual greenhouse gas emissions of more than 59,000 automobiles, according to the EPA’s greenhouse gas equivalency calculator.

Alongside author Andreas Malm, the foursome behind the new heist film discuss the limits of art and the demands of the moment

WASHINGTON (AP) — Campaigning for a northwestern Ohio congressional seat, Republican J.R. Majewski presents himself as an Air Force combat veteran who deployed to Afghanistan after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, once describing “tough” conditions including a lack of running water that forced him to go more than 40 days without a shower. Military documents obtained by The Associated Press through a public records request tell a different story. They indicate Majewski never deployed to Afghanistan but instead completed a six-month stint helping to load planes at an air base in Qatar, a longtime U.S. ally that is a safe distance from the fighting.

Working conditions and compensation in the rideshare industry have significant consequences for millions of California’s workers and their families, who are disproportionately people of color and immigrants. With the advent of Uber and Lyft, the number of adults who work as taxi drivers or chauffeurs for their primary job tripled over the past decade. From 2020 to 2021, 1.3 million Californians drove for rideshare and food delivery companies. Key findings include: Drivers’ median net take-home earnings are just $6.20 per hour under Prop 22. Drivers who pay for health insurance out of pocket earn nearly half of that. The wage floor under Prop 22 is just $4.10 per hour. Drivers would earn nearly $11 more per hour if they were classified as employees. Rideshare work has become less flexible and more controlled by rideshare companies under Prop 22.

New York Attorney General Letitia James has filed suit against former President Donald Trump, three of his adult children and his business empire, accusing them of large-scale fraudulent financial practices and seeking to bar them from real estate transactions for the next five years. The attorney general’s civil suit alleges more than a decade of deception, including billions of dollars in falsified net worth, as part of an effort to minimize his companies’ tax bills while winning favorable terms from banks and insurance companies. It seeks about $250 million in allegedly illegal profits netted from the scheme, as well as a five-year ban on the former president, Donald Trump Jr., Ivanka Trump and Eric Trump participating in any real estate transactions–a restriction that would spell the end of the Trump real estate empire. In addition, it seeks a permanent ban on the former president and his family members involved in his business enterprises from serving as directors or officers of any New York corporation or business licensed in the state. James’s suit relies on a special statute for repeat instances of alleged violations of the law, stemming from real estate transactions. She is also filing a criminal referral to federal prosecutors in Manhattan and a separate tax fraud referral to the IRS for the same underlying allegations.

The GOP used to pass laws to scapegoat marginalized groups. Now it’s turning to executive fiat instead. In defiance of state and federal law, Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin announced Friday a new mandate to enshrine discrimination against trans students in school district policy. Should this “model policy,” drafted under Youngkin Education Department appointees, go into effect as anticipated in late October, schools will have no obligation to respect the rights of trans and nonbinary students, and indeed could be compelled not to. Under the new policy, the state will require trans and nonbinary students to out themselves to their parents to obtain permission to be called by their name and pronouns and to use the correct bathroom. “By outing LGBTQ+ students who have not had conversations with their parent, Youngkin and his Dept. of Ed are willing to subject LGBTQ+ students to abuse,” said Equality Virginia on Twitter on Saturday. At the same time, even if a parent affirms their child’s gender, individual teachers and school employees can still refuse to honor a student’s gender and pronouns if they believe it violates what the policy characterizes as their “constitutionally protected” right to reject them. In essence, the state is saying parents have the right to determine their child’s gender, but that right is only guaranteed if their child is not trans. The Youngkin model policy sends the message that trans and nonbinary students should be subject to further judgment and discrimination. It is also an explicit challenge to the U.S. Department of Education, which in 2021 instructed schools to respect trans students’ rights under Title IX, after the Supreme Court’s decision affirming trans rights in Bostock v. Clayton County. Virginia itself is home to the landmark case Grimm v. Gloucester County School Board, in which a Virginia student successfully challenged a school policy that had barred him from the male restroom because he is trans, on the grounds that the school board had violated his rights under Title IX and the Equal Protection Clause. Youngkin’s new policy will not go into effect immediately, and several Virginia school boards and school board members have vowed to keep protections for trans students. The policy is sure to be immediately challenged in court. Citing the state’s Human Rights Act (which forbids discrimination on the basis of sex and gender identity in public accommodations, including schools), Virginia Delegate Danica Roem said, “Executive fiat does not overrule state law.” But as we have seen in other states led by Republican governors, they are all too willing to push the boundaries of the law when it suits them. They know and perhaps even count on the fact that in the prolonged months it can take for courts to weigh the legality of their directives, the damage will already be done.

It seemed extraordinary to see them line up against him — dozens of elected Democrats from every corner of Pennsylvania voting with Republicans to hold Larry Krasner, a prosecutor from their own party, in contempt of the state House. They included 10 representatives from Philadelphia, the city where Krasner has twice won citywide elections, including in a landslide last year. And they included a Western Pennsylvania representative who happens to be the running mate of the party’s nominee for governor. The vote was unusual. But in some ways, it was just a new twist on an old dynamic: The progressive Krasner has never had the full-throated backing of the Democratic establishment. And the GOP effort to impeach him in an election year forced legislative Democrats to take a position.

Sheriffs are the perfect messenger for Claremont, spreading spread their extremist beliefs with the imprimatur of gun and badge. Last November, the Claremont Institute hosted its inaugural class of “Sheriff Fellows.” Over the course of a week, eight sheriffs—all white men—chosen from the more than 3,000 in the country stayed at the Waterfront Beach Resort in Huntington Beach, attending a series of discussions, lectures, and fireside chats steeped in the far right-wing think tank’s heady intellectualism and radical ideology. While the Claremont Institute restricted public access to the fellowship, a review of the fellowship’s previously unreported curriculum reveals a program that presented for the sheriffs two sets of people in America: Those communities sheriffs should police as freely and brutally as they see fit, and those “real” Americans who should be considered virtually above the law. Public information requests and other reporting have provided insight into the stated and unstated reasons behind the Claremont Institute’s recruitment of county sheriffs, as well as revealing the curriculum of the fellowship. (You can read the full curriculum at the bottom of this article.) What emerges in reviewing this information is a portrait of the far-right’s deep investment in sheriffs. They seem to be a key target of the movement because the office is already vulnerable to extremism and because sheriffs can enable other extremist actors like vigilantes and militias to wreak havoc on society. Claremont provides a historical and intellectual cover for selected sheriffs to continue a march into white Christian nationalism; for Claremont, the sheriffs are elected influencers who can push their message into the mainstream, far from the coterie of intellectual elites. They also have the authority to use violence under the color of law to enforce these principles in their communities. Claremont is currently recruiting a second class, with a plan to announce the lucky few this fall. The five-decade old Southern California institution announced in an email sent during the fall of 2021 that the goal of the fellowship was to connect with sheriffs as “uncorrupted law enforcement officials… not beholden to bureaucratic masters,” whose “jurisdictional latitude … places them on the front lines of the defense of civilization.” While the Claremont Institute hosts a variety of other fellowships, the Sheriff Fellows is the first program to focus on currently-serving elected officials. For that reason, information about the fellowship and the program is important for voters who live in counties where these sheriffs run jails, serve warrants, detain individuals at traffic stops, and help federal officials to enforce immigration laws. Sheriffs also have a great deal of discretion in important, contested legal areas like the enforcement of gun laws—where they are often in charge of issuing permits and confiscating weapons under red flag laws—and how to handle health orders, including enforcement of anti-COVID measures like mask mandates, business closures, and vaccination policies. Some of the Claremont sheriffs, at least, were recruited for their resistance to COVID orders from state and federal governments. Riverside County, California, Sheriff Chad Bianco was specifically praised by the institute for “the courageous stand [he has] taken over the past year,” clearly a reference to Bianco having allied himself early on in the pandemic with anti-vaxxers and with right-wing anti-abortion advocates in Southern California. Most recently, Bianco accused a Latina Riverside city councilmember, Clarissa Cervantes, of defacing the county courthouse because of her participation in a pro-choice protest, spurring calls for his resignation. “You are lucky we couldn’t arrest you!” he threatened Cervantes through social media.

Tests performed for thousands of Chicago residents found lead, a neurotoxin, in amounts far exceeding the federal standards

Bosses in industries such as retail, health care and logistics are reverting to an old tactic and trapping people in miserable jobs by threatening to saddle them with debt if they quit. Workers across the United States in fields ranging from nursing to trucking have been discouraged from leaving jobs they hate or can’t afford to keep because employers vow to charge them for training costs if they quit before an arbitrary deadline.

"It has been made abundantly clear to me that in the case of season three of Mob Psycho 100, Crunchyroll is not going to be producing that show on a SAG-AFTRA contract."

Earlier this month, the CDC released preliminary 2021 figures from its ongoing STD surveillance data. There were at least 2.5 million reported cases of chlamydia, gonorrhea, and syphilis in the U.S. during 2021, the three major STDs that doctors and local health departments are obligated to track and report (other serious STDs such as HIV or hepatitis B are tracked as well, but their numbers are analyzed and reported elsewhere). These case counts are known to be an underestimate, since not all infections cause symptoms and many people do not get regularly tested for STDs.

A pipeline protester who glued himself to the doors of a Nanaimo bank earlier this year has been sentenced to 12 months of probation — and a court order that he cannot possess glue outside of his home. Victor Lawrence Brice was one of several people who glued themselves to the Royal Bank of Canada branch at Brook’s Landing Shopping Centre on April 7, according to a sentencing decision released posted on the Canadian Legal Information Institute’s website. Brice and others were staging the demonstration to demand that RBC divest from the Coastal GasLink pipeline on Wet’suwet’en territory in northern British Columbia, according to a release at the time from environmental group Extinction Rebellion.

This previously-unpublished essay by the late Charles W. Mills (1951–2021) seeks to demonstrate the racially-structured character of the universe created by J. R. R. Tolkien in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Written long before the popular film series, the essay critically examines Tolkien's novels and comments on the nature of fictional creation. Mills argues that Tolkien designs a racial hierarchy in the novels that recapitulates the central racist myth of European thought.

From Johnny Tabacco to Richard Citizen Journalist, they are all real guys you've heard of before

The investigation into Marilyn Manson by the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department has been sent to Dist. Atty. George Gascón for a decision on whether to file criminal charges against the singer.

Man played British national anthem and pro-democracy protest song to crowds gathered during funeral

Federal prosecutors said some of the defendants — a network of individuals and organizations tied to Feeding Our Future, a Minnesota-based nonprofit — allegedly put the laundered funds toward luxury cars, houses and other personal purchases.

Pedestrian and cyclist fatalities continue to rise in the U.S., with an estimated 7,485 people killed by drivers last year, an increase of almost 15 percent from 2020. Meanwhile, Ford Motor Company thinks it has a solution: A cell phone app. Ford will demonstrate a new app this week at the Intelligent Transportation Society of America’s World Congress—an industry group comprised of a who’s who of companies that make money selling cars or technology in cars—with the aim of using Bluetooth Low Energy, signals that existing smartphones are capable of emitting, “to communicate their location to a connected Ford vehicle,” a Ford press release stated. “If the vehicle calculates a potential crash risk,” Ford’s infotainment system will, in theory, “alert drivers by the in-vehicle screen showing graphics of pedestrians, bicyclists or more with audio alerts sounding.” It is difficult to envision how this system supposedly works. The idea is that the app would somehow know a pedestrian or cyclist—“even those hidden from direct view” the press release says—is about to emerge in front of your car and create some kind of alert in the car via the app telling you there is someone nearby so you…slow down? Look up? Slam on the brakes? It is not clear what is supposed to happen after this alert occurs, other than to force you, the driver, to pay attention to the road. In theory.