Wolves of Innistrad

Last week, the Trump administration quietly released a sweeping new federal rule that would use funding threats to force institutions across the country to reject transgender people. The 400-page proposed regulation would codify the administration's anti-trans executive orders into binding federal policy, imposing a blanket prohibition on federal funds going toward "gender ideology"

The proposed rule, formally titled "Regulation for Federal Financial Assistance," rewrites the government-wide framework governing all federal grants across every agency. Among its most consequential provisions, it requires that before a federal grant recipient can receive money, the award must pass a "pre-issuance review" conducted by a political appointee—not a career expert or peer reviewer—to ensure it is "consistent with applicable law, Federal agency priorities, and the national interest." The regulation explicitly instructs these appointees to screen for "denial by the recipient of the sex binary in humans or the notion that sex is a chosen or mutable characteristic." [...] An institution that acknowledges transgender people exist—through its policies, its training, its healthcare, its bathroom access, its HR procedures, its name-change processes—could be deemed to "deny the sex binary" or to “support the notion that sex is mutable” and have its federal funding blocked.

This torches everything. And I do mean everything.

A very abbreviated list of its ramifications include (but are not limited to):

ending funding for ALL DEI related initiatives

allowing the government to terminate grants at any point for any reason

preventing researchers from publishing, going to conferences, and being part of academic societies

requiring that topics must support the president’s agenda.

What this means, and if anything I’m under selling it, is the death of science and research in America. It allows the government to restrict any topic they please at a whims notice, putting officials who have no background in the topic in charge of deciding funding continuity. It controls what gets researched and if/how researchers are allowed to share their discoveries. There are no books to burn if the government never allows them to be written. This is fascism plain and simple.

Public comments are not a vote, it is a chance for you to say "here is an issue with this law I think you need to address" and provide justification for legal challenges if it goes forward:

"Comments raise the bar that agencies have to meet when making a rule; “if an agency fails to adequately respond to significant, relevant comments in a final rule, members of the public may seek to challenge the rule in court on that basis and claim it could be struck down.ˮ"

This year’s is different. They are now federal REQUIREMENTS, which means there’s no flexibility. As was said previously, the 400 pages are not singularly devoted to being absolute shitheads to trans people. Theres a lot of stuff in there, some of which is the standard dry boring grants stuff, some of which is the horrible ideological warfare outlined above.

This document is issued by the OMB, the Office of Management and Budget, which is currently lead by fucking Russell Vought, the principal architect of Project 2025. This is how they’re going to implement all the horrible shit in there that wasn’t covered by Executive Order. Russell Vought is actively coming for my job, my marriage, and my kid, and most of my friends lost their jobs last year because of him. He is the fucking arch villain behind the heinous shit the current regime is doing.

and this...

xo @ambernotember

thank youuuu @ambernotember!!

i'm picturing this to be like, early s3 era, when buck has some time on his hands while he's off and so he goes down particular rabbit holes on porn websites a few too many times for it to be considered a one-off anymore and then he goes down even more rabbit holes on wikipedia and all the queer history websites he can find

hen was not the only out member of the 118 at large, but bobby knows her best, so she's the one he gently volun-tells to represent them at the lafd pride booth every time it's the 118's turn to participate. she doesn't mind doing it, exactly, but after buck comes back from his leave and blurts out that he's bi one night at family dinner, she very happily shoves him in bobby's direction when it's that time of year again

buck, of course, gets INTO it. he's got the themed shirt, he's read all the pamphlets they're giving out; he even lets one of the other firefighters there, a paramedic named jenna from the 133, paint the bi flag on one cheek and the pride flag on the other. there's six firefighters there, but four of them are out in the crowd giving out rainbow-festooned lafd stickers and pins, so at the booth it's just buck and tommy, a pilot from the 217. he did not let jenna paint his face, but he did let her give him a sparkly rainbow temporary tattoo on his bicep and he's got a little pronoun pin with a gay flag background on his shirt.

tommy tells buck that he doesn't really mind the idea of doing these things, but he doesn't usually volunteer. usually he feels like it's not really his place as someone who's only been out a few years, but this year, his best friend guilted him into it. he's sarcastic and a bit bitchy when talking to buck and jenna and the other firefighters, but he also talks so kindly to kids who come by looking nervous

he tells buck in bits and pieces how he remembers what it's like to be that young and that scared and feeling like all of his options would make him hide his true self. how it took him until a few years ago to stop feeling like that scared kid all the time and if he can give even one kid like him hope for the future, he's happy. 

buck is halfway in love by lunchtime.

he copes by asking incessant questions about harbour and muay thai when there's nobody at the booth, trying to keep tommy's attention on him. tommy lets him, a little bit baffled but charmed. when it's time to close up the booth, buck asks if he can get tommy's number so he can get that tour of harbour, eager to spend more time with him. tommy gives it to him, and says he's happy to do the tour if that's what he really wants, but would buck like to go for a drink right now instead?

and obviously, yes, yes he would.

NOAH REID as LARRY in INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE

texas tech's quartback, brendan sorsby, was investigated for sports gambling. i know sports betting is all the rage right now, but athletes themselves are not allowed to do it. it is Rule Number 1 and it is the highest priority rule for the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), who governs all athletic programs at about 1,100 colleges in the US.

the invesitagetion of sorsby revealed that, not only did he place more than 9,000 sports bets when he himself was a collegiate athlete, but 40 of those bets were AGAINST HIS OWN TEAM when he was playing at indiana university. immediately, this threatens the integrity of the sport, and especially because indiana is the hottest team right now as the defending national champion.

the NCAA, which is largely a sham organization these days (they've truly lost their grasp and college athletics are the wild west now) actually enforced their Number 1 Rule and told sorsby his career is over, that he would never play college football again (and, subsequently, that he would never get drafted into the NFL because his college career was cut short).

well, because the NCAA is a husk of its former self, sorsby and texad tech immediately took this to court. MANY athletes have learned these past few seasons that if you can find a judge who's a fan of your team, you can get any NCAA ruling overturned. that's exactly what texas tech did. they filed a suit in Lubbock, where the university is located and where every judge is an alum of texas tech. so sorsby was granted an injunction and will now only be suspended for the first 2 games od the 2026 season (which are alwayd against no-name teams that will be destroyed regardless of who's suspended).

every other school in the country immediately went on the defensive because this is a very clear integretiy issue. so nebraska and georgia (sic em dawgs) released statements saying that all currently-scheduled competitions witb Texas Tech in ANY sport will be canceled and there will be no future schedulings. at least 3 of the major conferences (SEC, Big 10, Big 12) , who account for almost all division 1 sports teams in the country, are also in discussions about cancelling comtests. Texas Tech is part of the Big 12, and there is serious talk of all other teams in the conference shutting texas tech out.

now would probably be time where i say that texas tech is one of the wealthiest programs in college football becaise there is a single billionaire alumnus pouring money into the program with hopes of essentially buying a championship. so texas techs integrity has always been questionable. anyway, the university president put oit a statement that he doesnt care that sorseby violated regulation and that texas tech will sue any school that refuses to play them because it jeopardizes their championship prospects if they're umable to play any games.