See what's up in Charlottesville. Charlottesville Dogwood Festival/parade is usually in April and C-Ville Dogwood foundation will set up someplace and sell small cheap dogwoods. They're usually like $30 or something like that.

Yeah, but Bowlero is kind of the same thing. At Bowlero you are also paying for the bowling, and the disco lights, and the arcade, and whatever else they got going on. It's not the food, it's the experience.

I miss old school bowling alleys where you just went there mainly to bowl. We used to bowl league at the old AMF by the airport and it was like $3.00 a game and half the time they'd let you bowl cheaper and sometimes for free.

But there wasn't a demand for cheap bowling anymore. That's why AMF had to rebrand themselves as Bowlero and bring out the loud music, blacklights, bars, DJ's and 40 lane entertainment complexes. I remember they had that "Bowling is just the beginning" ad line, which is really just another way of saying "No one wants to just bowl anymore."

The Mills is not particularly "high end" as far as Richmond brunch-ish places go. But Richmond brunch-y places are inherently somewhat high end. Everything is, nowadays. Bars, restaurants, movies, even strip clubs are trying to upscale in their own weird way.

There are no working middle class-ish entertainment options because the working middle class has been steadily drying up in this country in a way that is unsustainable.

You can definitely see that in Richmond. We used to laugh about how the Richmond scene was just Greek/Italian and burgers. There used to be like 20 places in the Fan that would serve you a ridiculously oversized plate of baked spaghetti for $10. Most of them have closed. But now there are 20 breweries in Scott's Addition where you can buy $20 four packs.

Things are gonna go back to being cheaper, shittier, and probably more corporate. But not because corporations are driving prices up, but because big corporations can keep prices down. The local economy in Richmond is an upper-middle class boutique economy mostly dealing in luxury goods and services.

You're having a bit of an avocado toast moment. A bag of frozen fries at the store is what-- like $1.25 a lb?

If a school cafeteria were serving $9.50 fries with cheese, bacon, and gravy we would all be throwing a fit that they are serving unaffordable and unhealthy food.

You are paying extra money for your fries to be extra fucking tasty and unhealthy, and not have to do the work of cooking bacon and gravy and cleaning all of that up, so you can sit down and enjoy life and friends for an hour or so.

That is not corporations driving up the prices of inputs. That's demand from people who have both the money and time to savor a nice, long, relaxing, extra tasty meal and maybe some Mimosas. The Mill is filling that demand.

It's not like The Mill is ripping people off. If you want a fine French Fry experience while hopefully also paying their staff living wage, it's gonna cost an amount of money that only the relatively wealthy can afford.

It's The Mill. Look at that menu. $9.50 for fries with cheese, bacon, and gravy. Not that that isn't tasty, but it's horrible for you.

This is a fairly expensive restaurant in a relatively affluent area. People are not going there because they need sustenance quickly between working their two jobs. They are going there to splurge on food over a two hour brunch.

Their prices are on the higher end because they are trying to appeal to the higher end consumer. When the economy goes bad, luxury goods and services are the first to go. The next few years are going to be a bloodbath for local coffeeshops, breweries and restaurants.

Evernest is Dodson, right? Yeah, I can imagine there are a lot of people with complaints.

No, what I'm saying is that as a practical matter, there is very little difference between Lamont Bagby and say, Dawn Adams.

Look up their voting scorecards on votesmart:

NORML-- 100% for both

Repro Rising Virginia-- 92% for both

LEAP-- 100% for both

Equality Virginia--100% for both

Social Conservative-- 5% VA Family Foundation for both, Bagby 31% Tea Party, Adams 28%

Labor Unions-- Bagby 100%, Adams 86%

The perception is that Bagby taking Dominion money must somehow inevitably corrupt him in some major way, but that's not really the case.

Like, they speak and behave in the ways their constituencies want. Adams voters might get mad if she isn't perceived as actively fighting for certain hopeless causes so the Democrats will let her waste a certain amount of everyone's time on stuff that will never pass. Bagby may not need the rub, so he does something else.

Honestly, I would be annoyed if anyone let Adams take the lead on a bill of any substance because she's not good at it.

You're acting like Bagby is a secret social conservative or something.

If we were going to stereotype Bagby's base, it's basically the people that progressives claim we all ought to listen to, but whom they never listen to.
Probably no one has suffered more under systemic racism than the older/traditional black communities he represents it. They have been personally screwed by the system due to their race, and they've are fighting against this.

They don't want their fight for racial equality subsumed into a class war, which is what the progressives/Socialists think has to happen.

Look at Bagby's voting record. It's not particularly outlandish. It's basically exactly the current mainstream of the Democratic party, which in terms of bills that could actually pass is virtually identical to the progressive platform.

The only thing is that he takes money from big business, which is a cardinal sin for a certain set of progressives but which his constituents mostly don't give a fuck about.

This is going to be a big headache for us over the next few years. I'm in favor of all the city employees being able to unionize, I'm just saying one big reason they need a union is because they get shitty pay and the city administration is a hot mess.

So for the employees to get treated properly, we will have to raise taxes and a lot of city council, mayor, school board, etc. will need to go and there will have to be some considerable restructuring.

It's good in that this has needed to happen for some time, and hopefully things improve. But the transition is going to be messy as hell.

That's the way the AP does it.

They had to fill the seat. It would be un-democratic if one of the most Democratic districts in the state had no representation during a GA session.

Pop’s Poker. They closed it.

They rewrote the rules to crack down on charitable poker. In part to help push casinos. But mostly because Lessin was running Pop’s Poker while simultaneously serving as the head of the charitable gaming board without recusing himself, which was an obvious conflict of interest. In the shock of the century, the proposed rules were very lax and heavily favored “charitable” poker facilities.

Bagby was born in Richmond, graduated from Henrico HS, went to college at NSU, got his masters from VCU, served on the Henrico school board, served on NSU’s Board of Visitors, runs a non-profit in East End, and has represented a chunk of the district in the House.

How is he “buying” his way in? His name recognition comes from a lifetime of living and serving in the community his entire life.

At some point, you have to come to grips with reality. Dominion money or not, people voted for Bagby because they know him, they like him and they trust him.

Alexsis Rodgers was basically running on a vague pro-labor/Dominion sucks platform. So if IBEW666 is endorsing Lamont Bagby, I feel like Bagby knew he didn’t need to sweat this election very much.

Bagby is pretty different than Saslaw.

Basically, yeah.

I actually got to meet her. I definitely wouldn't call her a policy wonk. But she's not just a flaming radical shit-stirring idiot, either.

But she hasn't been able to translate this into her campaigns or public image. I think it is quite possible she could be good. But as you said, she appears to run largely on vibes alone.

That's why I wonder why she doesn't run for city council where it looks like she can win at least two districts. Or take a job in state or local government instead of just being a lobbyist. Show people that there's more to her than just slogans and memes.

Rodgers never had a chance. She does has Sonjia Smith behind her, so with a full campaign she can be dangerous.

But that's why I question if what she is doing. This is twice now she has entered into campaigns with low name recognition, not much time to campaign and where she cannot win.

There are plenty of elections she can win, but she won't run in them. I could see how maybe she's just trying to get her name out there, but I don't know if It's working.

This is pretty simple to do.

They cannot claim adverse possession if the possession was not adverse, so you just need to make it clear you are letting them rent the land with your knowledge. So draft an agreement that basically lays out the space in question and that they can lease it from you for 12 months solely for the purpose of parking their truck for the price of $1.

I mean, you should get a lawyer to do it properly. But you get the idea. As long as you make it clear that it’s your land, and you are explicitly giving them use only for some temporary period of time and specific use, they can’t claim it’s theirs. They’ve signed a statement explicitly stating they are only renting from you.

If it were my kid, I would want the death penalty. Which is why victim families shouldn't determine sentences. The amount of time which is appropriate is the amount of time that prevents the most child sexual abuse.

There is research that shows what risk factors lead to higher potential for abuse. The laws and sentencing have almost no relationship with those factors.

Throwing the book at these dudes is easy because they are unsympathetic and it allows people to pat themselves on the back for their self-righteousness. It makes us feel good about ourselves like we did something.

People are stuck on their feels. If I say the punishment for CSAM non-production crimes are too harsh, then I must secretly be a pedophile. But how many times have we also seen it that the people who are most self-righteous and draconian against some behavior end up being the ones who are secretly doing it? Attacking the messenger is stupid.

If I bring up any sort of argument, I get told it's a "fact" that CSAM consumption is different and cannot be compared to anything else. Which is not a fact at all, it's just people refusing to think.

We can study child porn like we study anything else. P2P and Drop Box work the same whether it's CSAM or Game of Thrones. Psychologists can study pedophilia just like they study anything else. There are basic behavioral drives all humans have in common.

There is research on this topic, and experts who study it. The evidence is more and more showing that the way we are dealing with CSAM does nothing to stop child sexual abuse and is more likely making it worse.

Need more info. What law firms are you talking to? I can’t think of why they would not take your case. They’re just billing you by the hour for one, and for another it’s absolutely worth pursuing because of the risk of adverse possession and the problems you might run into if you ever want to sell your house and the fence line does not match the property line.

These sentences are not doing a single thing to stop sexual abuse of children.

Fuck you.

Fuck you. So far you've implied that I am unsafe around children, that I have secret pedophilia tendencies, or that I must be a friend of John Maher.

I never said they were. I'm also not the person who created a special username just for this and then complained wrongly I about being banned by an automod.

The sentencing guidelines in child porn are bad. Pick someone other than Maher and I will still say they are bad, under the same username.

This came up in the Ketanji Brown Jackson case. Go back and rewatch the hearings or re-read some of the articles that were written at the time.

Most judges don't follow the sentencing guidelines and typically deviate by around 60 months. In the majority of cases where KBJ was accused of being soft on child porn for giving light sentences, she was following the recommendation of the probation officer and the prosecuting attorney.

So just consider which is more likely-- that the majority of judges and attorneys including KBJ are secret kiddie diddlers or that the sentencing guidelines are fucked and Josh Hawley is a flaming asshole?

The Supreme Court has held that this is protected free speech under Ashcroft v Free Speech Coalition and Ferber vs New York.

>2012 ussc suggestions to congress would still pin johnny to the mat. the enhancements they suggest in one of the three areas is based on type of content, volume in possession, age of the victims, types of misconduct depicted, and how they’ve organized and maintained the collection over time.

What USSC has always suggested is that these enhancements need to be revised because virtually everyone gets hits with them. It means that the 5 year minimum is pointless because no one actually ever gets the minimum.

It's basically technology. In 1985, if you had 15,000 pirated songs in your possession, you were seriously into it in a way that was not just like personal hobby use. By 2005, it was pretty common to have that many songs. You can just hop on a torrent and get thousands of videos or images, legal or illegal. You just download a motherlode of stuff and watch/play/listen to what you want.

There is a minimum 5 year penalty for receiving child porn. There is no minimum for possession. But if you did not produce the porn, but you have it, you must have somehow received it. So everyone starts at 5 years.

And because no one is perusing everything and collecting one item at a time, and just downloading big torrents or whatever, they automatically get stuck with several enhancements. So now the real minimum is not 5 years, it's closer to 10. This is all stupid.

>oh baby, the hill you are choosing to die on tonight is sus.

Maybe. But I guess I will die on this hill along with Ketanji Brown Jackson and the majority of criminal judges in the US.