Hedgeiii - Searching For Sang-froid

Maybe the best red common creature for decades, certainly top 5.

Dwarven Soldier

There is a legend among present-day Dwarves that the Dwarves of Sarpadia will one day return to defend Dwarvenkind against a deadly peril.

Artist: Randy Asplund-Faith TCG Player Link Scryfall Link EDHREC Link

There are people – some in my own Party – who think that if you just give Donald Trump everything he wants, he’ll make an exception and spare you some of the harm. I’ll ignore the moral abdication of that position for just a second to say — almost none of those people have the experience with this President that I do. I once swallowed my pride to offer him what he values most — public praise on the Sunday news shows — in return for ventilators and N95 masks during the worst of the pandemic. We made a deal. And it turns out his promises were as broken as the BIPAP machines he sent us instead of ventilators. Going along to get along does not work – just ask the Trump-fearing red state Governors who are dealing with the same cuts that we are. I won’t be fooled twice.

I’ve been reflecting, these past four weeks, on two important parts of my life: my work helping to build the Illinois Holocaust Museum and the two times I’ve had the privilege of reciting the oath of office for Illinois Governor.

As some of you know, Skokie, Illinois once had one of the largest populations of Holocaust survivors anywhere in the world. In 1978, Nazis decided they wanted to march there.

The leaders of that march knew that the images of Swastika clad young men goose stepping down a peaceful suburban street would terrorize the local Jewish population – so many of whom had never recovered from their time in German concentration camps.

The prospect of that march sparked a legal fight that went all the way to the Supreme Court. It was a Jewish lawyer from the ACLU who argued the case for the Nazis – contending that even the most hateful of speech was protected under the first amendment.

As an American and a Jew, I find it difficult to resolve my feelings around that Supreme Court case – but I am grateful that the prospect of Nazis marching in their streets spurred the survivors and other Skokie residents to act. They joined together to form the Holocaust Memorial Foundation and built the first Illinois Holocaust Museum in a storefront in 1981 – a small but important forerunner to the one I helped build thirty years later.

I do not invoke the specter of Nazis lightly. But I know the history intimately — and have spent more time than probably anyone in this room with people who survived the Holocaust. Here’s what I’ve learned – the root that tears apart your house’s foundation begins as a seed – a seed of distrust and hate and blame.

The seed that grew into a dictatorship in Europe a lifetime ago didn’t arrive overnight. It started with everyday Germans mad about inflation and looking for someone to blame.

I’m watching with a foreboding dread what is happening in our country right now. A president who watches a plane go down in the Potomac – and suggests — without facts or findings — that a diversity hire is responsible for the crash. Or the Missouri Attorney General who just sued Starbucks – arguing that consumers pay higher prices for their coffee because the baristas are too “female” and “nonwhite.” The authoritarian playbook is laid bare here: They point to a group of people who don’t look like you and tell you to blame them for your problems.

I just have one question: What comes next? After we’ve discriminated against, deported or disparaged all the immigrants and the gay and lesbian and transgender people, the developmentally disabled, the women and the minorities – once we’ve ostracized our neighbors and betrayed our friends – After that, when the problems we started with are still there staring us in the face – what comes next.

All the atrocities of human history lurk in the answer to that question. And if we don’t want to repeat history – then for God’s sake in this moment we better be strong enough to learn from it.

I swore the following oath on Abraham Lincoln’s Bible: “I do solemnly swear that I will support the constitution of the United States, and the constitution of the state of Illinois, and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of Governor .... according to the best of my ability.

My oath is to the Constitution of our state and of our country. We don’t have kings in America – and I don’t intend to bend the knee to one. I am not speaking up in service to my ambitions — but in deference to my obligations.

If you think I’m overreacting and sounding the alarm too soon, consider this:

It took the Nazis one month, three weeks, two days, eight hours and 40 minutes to dismantle a constitutional republic. All I’m saying is when the five-alarm fire starts to burn, every good person better be ready to man a post with a bucket of water if you want to stop it from raging out of control.

Those Illinois Nazis did end up holding their march in 1978 – just not in Skokie. After all the blowback from the case, they decided to march in Chicago instead. Only twenty of them showed up. But 2000 people came to counter protest. The Chicago Tribune reported that day that the “rally sputtered to an unspectacular end after ten minutes.” It was Illinoisans who smothered those embers before they could burn into a flame.

Tyranny requires your fear and your silence and your compliance. Democracy requires your courage. So gather your justice and humanity, Illinois, and do not let the “tragic spirit of despair” overcome us when our country needs us the most.

Sources:

• NBC Chicago & J.B. Pritzker, Democratic governor of Illinois, State of the State address 2025: Watch speech here | Full text

• Betches News on Instagram (screencaps)

This is an old favorite build-around card of mine. The mini game of Flailing Soldier (turn one, first player) is fascinating and wonderful test case for testing both new and established players regarding card and strategy priorities, resource commitment, resource saving, risk assessment, and I think a few more skills not hitting me at the moment.

Where on the storm scale is "any player may activate this ability" type abilities?

I’d call it an 8.

So here’s the thing. News stations love to sensationalize the orange man for money. If you weren’t politically aware during his first term I have a few tips to help your wellbeing till 2025:

Do not engage with news media after 8pm. Nothing you learn then will help you before the next morning. You’ll just go to bed anxious and mad

You’re gonna see the worst possible people nominated to head diff parts of the govt. Understand that’s the point, to set everything in favor of corps, internalize that feeling and remember it for the next election, and move on. Dwelling on it only serves to hurt yourself

Learn to sit in uncertainty. Last term the orange man would tweet policy and expect it to manifest. This led to people never knowing if he was talking big game or passing legislation, so people did not know how the government was going to act. Chill. We don’t know what will happen.

Curate your social media experience, do not follow algorithms. Algorithms need you hooked and its easier to keep you hooked if you’re miserable. Be purposeful when you engage with political content, don’t do it on a whim

You are not responsible for the ailings of the world. Don’t put that on yourself. And don’t put it on yourself to keep up with every single wrongdoing about to happen. There will be far too many for one person to keep up with, you’ll exhaust yourself and make yourself miserable

Chill. Its not gonna be fun, but there are ways you can take care of your own well being to keep from spiraling.

Love this

today we post everett true

Tesla is tanking so hard it is dragging the entire EV segment's sales down into the negative. When you omit Tesla from the equation, EV sales are up 13% across the board.

Don't let anyone tell you EV sales are in a slump.

Big agree, Friend. Love the set. Only slight disagreement is I love Bloomburrow more, methinks, at least for now.

After so many core sets, you guys absolutely nailed it with Foundations. Best set of the year (a high bar against Bloomburrow). I’m drafting it a lot having tons of fun. Right mix of traditional and modern magic, accessible but not boring, you really mastered the core set foundation. Please, would you be so kind to apply generous high fives to everyone involved on its creation? Thank you.

Will do.