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OBLIGATORY FILLER MATERIAL – Giving thanks edition: Kickin’ around Caracas, Pt. 5

Continuing… (It's Part 6 in the saga, I fucked up. Sorry.)
So, after a few re-fueling and impromptu cigar-purchasing stops in South and Central America, we wheel up to the deserted jetway at LAX.
“Thought we were going to Elmendorf?” I asked.
“This isn’t it?” the pilot replied, feigning worry.
“No.”, I replied, “Looks like California. Fruits and nuts. All around. What’s going on? One minute we’re off to Texas, then Cali, then Texas again, now we end up here at the California airport of the iconic tower.”
“Yeah, it’s confusing enough haulin’ civilians around. But when we get a call from Virginia, we tend to comply without any questions,” the pilot explains.
“Aw, shit!”, I sort of exclaim, “Rack and Ruin called?”
“Yeah”, the pilot replies, “Figures you’d know these guys. They said they were closer to LAX rather than Texas and had us divert here. In fact, you look over there, see that dark blue Chevy? That’s them; and evidently, your ride.”
I tipped the airman from earlier a couple of cigars as he helped me with my gear off the plane and into the trunk of Rack and Ruin’s plain-Jane blue late modeled Chevy. Had to move the Sidewinder Missiles off to one side, though.
“Most honorable Agents Lack and Luin!” I quipped in my faux-racist greeting. “What the hell, guys? I’ve got to get to Japan and get some newly rigidified digits.”
“Let’s see your hand”, Agent Rack asks. “Nasty.”
“Yeah”, I sigh “And with the medicos in South America and their penchant for plaster, I don’t so much have a left hand as more of an ankylosaur tail.”
“Or Thagomizer”, Agent Ruin tittered. “Anyone gives you grief, and one upside the head should set them right. Or dead.”
“You’re a riot, Ruin.” I replied, “But not entirely incorrect.”
We all agreed that I really didn’t need any extra accouterments to make myself look more dangerous. I mean with my severe haircut, stern beard clip, and perpetual ‘Go fuck yourself’ scowl.
“Yeah”, I replied, stroking the aforementioned beard, “I just can’t get that. I’m such a people person.”
After Agents Rack and Ruin finished drying their eyes from laughing what I thought was en extremis, we finally got down to business.
“So, what’s the skinny, guys”, I asked. “New marching orders?”
“No. Not as such”, Agent Ruin said, still sniggering over my ‘people person’ comment.
I see we’re moving. Agent Rack is just driving casually, like Chewbacca when they were waiting to see if the Empire went for that expensive Bothan code.
“Then, what?” I asked, getting a slight bit piqued.
“Well”, Agent Ruin noted, “When you went to South America, you took some of your artillery collection with, correct?”
“You know I did. You even made some snide comments about my personal choice of sidearms and their ‘excessive’ calibers, if memory serves”, I reiterated.
“And if you are proceeding normally, as you always do, they’re all nestled in the trunk of this very car. All cleaned, quiet, unloaded, and smelling sweetly of Hoppe’s Number 9 and WD 40, correct?” Rack inquired.
“Yes?” I cautiously venture.
“Well, ya’ big dummy, do you think they’re going to let you saunter into Tokyo armed like the Third Fleet?” Agent Ruin chuckled.
“Um…well…I do have a Diplomatic Passport.” I ventured.
“That’s not going to work this time.”, Agent Ruin said, shaking his head. “They’re tighter than Dick’s Hatband about sidearms. Want to bring in your Rigby SXS .500 Nitro Express double rifle? Not a problem. Sidearms, especially in your alien hunting calibers, nope.”
Well, that’s just….*dandy!”, I reply, semi-put out. “Now what the hell am I going to do?”
“Ever think that’s why Ruin and I are here, now?”, Rack asks.
“And here I thought it was just so you could bask in the warm glow of my fucking wonderful personality. Or that you actually cared about me as a real goddamn human”, I joshed.
“Ummm…yeah”, Rack replies, “There’s no way we can answer that without going on some Deadpool list. “
I agreed.
“OK, here’s the deal: you get your sidearms, ammunition, speed loaders, brass knuckles, Asp, laser range finders, Sap, Zeiss scopes, Kukri, Wisconsin Cheese Whittler, Buck folding skinner, Marine K-Bar, those two ultra-illegal Cheburkov Cobra titanium switchblades...”
“Three. Olga the KGB lady sent me one for Geologist’s Day.”
“Ahem. Those three ultra-illegal Cheburkov switchblades, that Wyoming Speedholer, your MASER Time-Distance Computer, garrote, pocket rail gun and whatever else lethal you carry and deposit it in the iron box in the trunk. We’ll ensure that it’s delivered to Esme post-haste. And by post-haste I mean one of our guys will deliver it personally.”
“Well…I suppose”, I conceded, “But best send someone who’s been to the house recently. I don’t know how much bigger Khan has grown since I left on this little fantasy trip. Wouldn’t want a star on the wall in Langley for someone eaten by a mastiff. Want to see a picture….Oh, bother. That’s right. My phone’s at the bottom of fucking Lake Maracaibo.”
“Good point”, Ruin interjects, “Guess we’ll do a little road trip and deliver it ourselves. Best call Esme and let her know what’s going on.”
“I have no objections to your proposals. Please give Esme this when you see her. I had some luck in the Calaveras Casino and if I don’t send her some mad money. Ouch. She’ll never forgive me for not taking her along to Japan.” I asked.
“But I thought Esme hated Japan? Too crowded and too ‘fussy’, I believe was her estimation.” Ruin asked.
“Yes, but once she saw the Ginza, all bets were off. Shopping the likes of which even Allah himself hasn’t seen.” I replied, slowly shaking my head.
“I see”, Ruin said, “Well, since you’re off to Sapporo, perhaps you can do a recon for Esme on the shopping there.”
“Not bad. Not bad at all.”, I smiled, “Now I know why I let you guys hang around with me.”
So, as advertised, I am now standing on the tarmac at LAX, basically feeling naked.
“Can’t I keep just one switchblade?” I moaned to Agent Rack.
“Go ahead, if you’re really keen on donating it to Japanese customs”, he replied.
“Fuckbuckets.” I groused.
“There, there now. That’s the usual Dr. Rocknocker of which we’re all so fond.” Agent Ruin chuckled.
“Remember, you do have that wallet-sized credit card gizmo from the Company. So you’re not entirely ‘naked’. Think of it as an emergency breechcloth.” He smiled.
“I’d like a larger model if you don’t mind. It’s chilly out here.” I joshed.
After Agents Rack and Ruin stripped me metaphorically naked as they de-weaponized me, they handed me a Business Class ticket to Tokyo, and a pass to the Japan Airlines Hospitality Suite and Lounge.
“So sorry you guys can’t hang around and have a few farewell snorts”, I chided, “But you’ve got a bit of a drive, so best be off before the weather turns to shit.”
“Who says we’re driving?” Agent Rack asked as he hooked a thumb over his shoulder at the ready and waiting C-130 cargo plane currently taxiing slowly in our direction.
“Well, in that case”, I smiled even more broadly, “Let’s invite the flight crew to join us. That’ll make the flight home all that much more interesting.”
After near tear-jerking farewell sentimentalities, i.e., “Piss on you”, “Get stuffed” and “Take a fuckin’ hike”; Agents Rack and Ruin, my weapons and the Agency’s plain-Jane Blue Chevy were all nestled snugger than buggers in ruggers in the belly of the thundering C-130.
Now truly on my own, I trudge the hundred thousand or so centisteps to my departure terminal, make a quick recon that my flight’s still slated to go in a generally westward direction, and hightail it to the nearest courtesy desk to ask for a motorized cart to take me and my remaining luggage to the JAL Hospitality Suite.
Hey. I’m old, infirm, and currently among the walking wounded.
Anyone that disagrees risks an Ankylosaur tail club swat or Thagomizer to the skull.
Finally ensconced in the JAL Hospitality Suite, Polo Lounge of course; I was drinking Tokyo Teas (3 oz. vodka, 2 oz. gin, 2 oz. rum, 1 oz. triple sec, 1 oz. Midori, good splash of lime juice, a slight splash of 7-Up (diet, of course), over ice with a lime wheel) with Pabst Blue Ribbon Extra 1844 chasers and Hangar One’s “Fog Point” vodka on the side, hiding from the brutish realities of this foul year of two thousand and twenty-something, Common Era…
I’ve already called Esme and we’ve had a good, long chat. She still managed to give me her shopping list for whenever I find myself bored on the Ginza.
She’ll be shocked when she learns that I’m not going to be in Tokyo long, but have 1st class tickets on the Bullet Train to Sapporo. Still, I’ll probably find myself in Pole Town or the Stellar Place there, trading piles of US greenbacks for locally produced Japanese curios and clothing.
I can hardly wait.
I order another round of drinks, as the wonderful attendants in the Hospitality Suite were bored out of their skulls because of the COVID-induced drop-in customers flying anywhere that requires a hospitality room stay, and I was virtually the only one around. They tried their level best to outdo each other when it comes to Japanese efficiency and friendliness.
After a couple of hours, they ask if I would like something from the grill, as the day chef had “the COVID” and the night chef just arrived. A quick perusal of the menu and I chose a 28-ounce dry-aged Porterhouse and another round of drinks.
I usually don’t like to eat too much before I fly, but JAL tells me the flight is going to be virtually empty, something like <121 pax, all told, so restroom availability shouldn’t be too much of a concern.
Plus, who am I to say no to a free, blue 28-ounce dry-aged Porterhouse?
There was a bit of difficulty conveying to the chef through the intermediaries of the hospitality just how I wanted my steak.
“Blue,” I said.
“Brue?” was the reply.
“Rare. Very, very rare.” I continued.
Look of total bewilderment.
I drag out my Personal Language Pro, speak “Steak, very, very rate” into the infernal gizmo, and hand the contraption to the attendant.
“珍しい、非常に珍しいステーキ?”[ Mezurashī, hijō ni mezurashī sutēki?]
“Raw! Nama!” I say, louder than need be.
They toddle off to find the chef.
“How is it sir, that you would like your steak cooked?” he asks.
“Very rare. Just a minute or two per side. Inside still cold.” I instructed.
All I got for the trouble was a puzzled smile.
“Give me the language gizmo…” I type in a few words…
“お尻を洗い、角をノックオフして、ここから出してください”
[O shiri o arai,-kaku o nokkuofu shite, koko kara dashite kudasai.]
“Wash its ass, knock its horns off, and walk it out here.”
“OH!” as the lightbulb pops. “Rare. Got it! Excellent!” the chef laughs and zips back to the kitchen.
Like I always say, I’m nothing if not the international ambassador of amity and goodwill.
“Crack tubes!”
Dinner was fantastic. I do wish I could have somehow mailed the Porterhouse bone back home for Khan. After that hambone incident, he might even taste it.
Finally on the plane, in an almost empty Business Class, the flight captain informs us that we’re headed to Haneda Airport Tokyo and anyone not headed in that direction better ‘haul ass off’ the flight or forever hold their peace.
Late-night international flights tend to be a bit more wooly than your average Chicago to Omaha gig.
Especially when the flight’s damn near empty and we have the next 12 hours or so to be best friends.
We taxi, turn and head into the wind. I’m doctoring up a couple of dossiers and keeping my personal cabin attendant, Luna since there were two of us in Business and two business flight attendants, busy with her trying to play ‘Stump the Geologist’.
“I’ll bet you never had this before.” She beamed and handed me a tumbler of very dangerous-looking brown liquor.
I cautiously sniff, take a modest gulp, swirl and glug the rest down.
“Ohishi Single Sherry Cask”, I say with a muffled belch. “Light. Fruity. An Englishman’s drink.”
“Oh. You knew. Let me try again.” She smiles beatifically.
“I have no objections to your proposal.” I smile as nicely as this crotchety old Komodo Dragon could.
She returns with another flagon of spirits; it smells of obsidian, leather, and earth.
I just had some of this back in LAX. I take a snort, smile, and shotgun the rest.
“Hibiki Japanese Harmony…lovely stuff.” I smile. “A little light for my jaded palate, but I’d never turn it down if it were free.”
“Oh, you win again. Wait. One more.” She smiles and skitters off to the galley.
She returns with another soupçon of some more dangerous brown liquor.
“Here, try this. It will make you very popular at social gatherings”. She smiles.
Sniff. “Splendid.” Snort. Swirl. Smile. Shotgun.
“Kanosuke New Born, if I’m not mistaken.” I smile back. “Very nice. I really do like this one.”
“You too good at this. One more!” she stands and stomps off defiantly. She returns in a trice and hands me the glass.
“Hmm…brown. Light notes of earth, leather, dating your daughter, and Kentucky…
“Beam Suntory, right?”
“You know them all!” she says, feigning irritation.
“And I thank you. Those were all excellent. Now, anything in the dangerous clear liquor category? I asked.
Luna smiled as I palmed off a 20k yen tip.
“Oh, no sir. Wait until we land.” She demurred, referring to the gratuity; which is know is not de rigueur in the Orient, but she didn’t seem to mind.
“Just in case we never make it to Tokyo”, I laughed, unknowingly presciently.
We both chuckled about that last line as she tried out various sakes and shōchūs and an actual Japanese ‘White Liquor’ (ホワイトリカー), which were all excellent as was the company.
I tell her that I need to get some work done and could she bring me a tall Rocknocker. After explain the origins and construction of the eponymous drink, she brings me one that must tip the scales at 1 or so liters.
She settles down to an empty seat and I get after the work that I need to finish before we land. I’m about ½ way through my drink when it felt as if the plane hit a brick wall. She quivered and quaked and clutched at herself while I made some comments about the pilot’s mental health.
We dropped like a paralyzed falcon, then just as suddenly, felt like it was an express elevator to Angel’s 11. The plane bucked and shimmied, wickedly. Then we slam-danced right and fell a few more stories. It was like we were in a Mixmaster and the owner was trying out every speed.
The emergency lights in the 777-300ER popped on, and the fasten seat belt sign barked loudly so even sleeping travelers could enjoy the show.
Rinse. Spin. Shudder. Repeat.
Finally, the ride smooths out and we hear the captain on the blower.
“This is your captain speaking…ah, we seem to have hit some uncharted turbulence back there.”
“Thanks, Captain Obvious”, I muttered.
“Everything’s A-OK. “ he reports.
“That’s good”, I note.
“But…”
“There’s always the but…” I groan.
“…we have a couple of warning lights for which we can’t quite account. So to just be safe and certain, we’re going to divert to Hawaii, get a clean bill of health and resume this flight once we make sure everything here is hunky-dory.”
There were scattered groans and applause. Add them together and divide by two and the average response on the flight was “Meh. Whatever.”
Except for the other guy in Business, with whom I hadn’t shared two words. He began to absolutely lose his shit.
“Oh, man! We’re so screwed! Mechanical malfunction? What does that mean?” he positively fizzed with fear.
The flight attendants tried to calm him down, to no avail. They basically gave up and said they’d report his misgivings to the Captain.
I motioned over to my personal flight attendant, Luna, and asked if I could be of service.
“Oh, Doctor Rock”, she smiled at me, “If you could speak with him. You are so calm, and he is…”
“Losing his bloody mind”, I chuckled as I finished her sentence for her. “Of course, I’ll take a stab at it.”
So, I grab my drink and ease over to my Business Class partner and introduce myself.
“Hey, pal. How’s it going? I’m Dr. Rock, gentleman, scholar, and connoisseur of cigars and things alcoholic. You doing OK?”
He looks at me with an ashen face and his eyes the size of bloodshot dinner plates.
“Yeah. I’m Todd Schotts. I’m flying to Japan for business.” He mumbles
“No surprise there,” I reply calmly and take a slug of my drink.
“But now we’re all going to die. The plane is busted and we’ll crash…” he started off again.
“So, Todd is it? Good. You drink?” I asked.
“Yeah?”, he stammered back.
I asked Luna to make us a fresh batch of my eponymous cocktails.
“OK, Todd, listen up”, I began after the drinks were served, “I have flown literally millions of miles over the last 4 decades. On Aeroflot when it was still the USSR. On TACA (Take A Chance Airways), on Chalk’s in the Caribbean, on Bob’s Verrifast Plane Company in Rhodesia, on regional carriers that don’t even exist anymore. All over the world. Had some bad experiences flying, and me ol’ mugger, this ain’t one of them. This is nothing more than the glitch for this mission.”
I chuckled lightly and complimented Luna on a fantastic drink.
“Yeah…yeah…yeah…but we have to land and check out some lights…” Todd squealed.
“Well now, Todd. It would be rather difficult to do any external assessment while in flight, don’t you agree?” I asked.
“But we’re diverting. We have to land and that adds more risk. We’re going to crash and die!” he was coming more and more unglued.
“I will bet you every cent you have on your person and home bank accounts that that will not happen”, I chuckled.
That took him by surprise. At least it shut him up for a while.
“Look, Todd. This is Boeing’s latest model. They have the most incredible safety record. And if a little clear air turbulence were to be knocking planes out of the sky, don’t you think we’d hear about it as the press went berserk?” I asked.
“But they don’t know what the lights mean! What if one of the engines’s out? How far can we fly on one engine?” Todd stuttered.
Having my fill of a supposedly grown man with inane childlike fears, I calmly replied,
“All the way to the crash site.”
He went white.
“...hope we hit something hard. I don’t want to limp away from this.”
He went limp.
Then I went to my seat and motioned for Luna to prepare a reload.
Of course, 45 minutes later, we land without incident at Daniel K. Inouye International Airport, Honolulu Hawaii.
We were told to just wait around until they figure out what the problem if any, was.
They had officials waiting at the end of the jetway to check our COVID status and passports before they let us loose in the terminal.
I asked Luna if she knew this airport. She noted that she did.
“Is there a JAL hospitality room here at this airport? I asked.
“Yes, Doctor. It’s the Sakura Lounge. It is located on the third level above The Local, Terminal 2.” She replied.
“Please notify whoever needs to know that that’s where I’ll be for the duration”, I smiled and handed her my business card. “See you soon, I hope.”
“Oh, Dr. Rock”, she replied, “I am sure it is nothing much. We’ll be back in the air within mere hours.”
“Well then”, I smiled, “Guess I’d better get ready to hoof it to the lounge.”
“Oh, Doctor Rock”, she smiled, “No rush. I will call for you a courtesy cart. You are injured, you are Business, you are priority.”
“I love that Asian efficiency.” I smiled back and toddled down the jetway.
At the terminus of the jetway, I show my COVID-clear papers, dates and times of my Anti-Virus vaccine administrations, the letter from Virginia clearing me of all detention, and my red Russian diplomatic passport.
While in the cart, whizzing our way to the JAL lounge, the driver said “Man! You must be some kind of VIP. You were through that welcoming committee in less than two minutes!”
“Me? Nah!”, I chuckled, “Just an old phart of a geologist that they didn’t want to mess with. Not on such a bright, sunny day as this.”
“I see you’re not wearing a mask.” The driver quipped.
“Very observant. There are reasons for that.” I replied.
He careens around a corner and if this were a normal pre-Covid day, I’m certain we’d have killed hundreds. However, the airport, as I’ve come to grow accustomed to, was virtually deserted.
“Yeah? Like what?” he asks.
“Well, Scooter, 1. I have an active and hardworking immune system that I let off the chain every once in a while for exercise. Got to let it know what it’s up against, right? 2. I’ve had all my shots and some that were experimental. They seem to have worked. And 3. I find it difficult to drink and smoke cigars while wearing a mask. However, if you’d prefer, I will mask up. No problem, though it still is optional.”
“Nah, man”, he said, “I was just wondering if you were one of those religious idiots or conspiracy nuts.”
Nope”, I smiled back, “Just another geologist out in the world plying his trade for cash. Y’know, whorin’ around for money.”
He laughs aloud as we skid to a stop right in front of Lounge.
I slip the guy a $20 and ask if he’d listen for the JAL flight I was just on. If we’re going on ahead today, I’d need him to scoot by and putt-putt me back to the plane.
He laughs and pockets the $20 as quick as a mink ruts.
“No worries. I’ll just hang around this area. I hear anything about the flight, I’ll come and let you know.” He grins.
“Good man”, I say, as I hand him my card. “I’m Dr. Rocknocker. Call me Rock”.
“And I’m Kapula Mano, call me Kap” he replies.
“Good man”, I say again, “Hope to see you in a while.”
He grins, floors his electric cart, and peels out at speeds approaching 4.5 MPH.
I wander into the lounge, show my credentials, and am escorted to a post up on Mahogany Ridge.
The bar is very quiet. Besides the bartender, I can’t see anyone else in the darkened and Smooth Jazz-infused drinking emporium.
I order a local drink, a Mai Tai, just for the experience and something a bit different.
It’s served in a goldfish bowl on a stem, bedecked with a slice of lime, a sprig of mint, a stick of sugar cane, a polychromatic orchid, and the obligate paper umbrella.
“Ah. Mai Tai. I will enjoy it.” I said to no one in particular.
One was enough, and I decided to go back to the old standard. Once I explained to the bartender what that was, he made them heroic and enthusiastically.
I’m reading up on a random dossier, making notes in a new file, and puffing away on a Fuentes Onyx double Maduro Churchill cigar.
I hear a slight cough coming from my right, and this here lovely lady, she sat to my immediate starboard and looked at me semi-quizzically.
Not in the mood for shenanigans of any stripe, I give her the obligate Baja Canada nod and tilt of the drink. I return to my dossiers and continue to read and take notes.
“Excuse me!” I hear.
Fearing the worst, either the woman is Karen-oid anti-smoking or a religious fruit-and-nutburger, I slowly turn to face her and reply, somewhat glacially, I have to admit.
“What?”
“That cigar…”
“Here we go…” I mutter, eyes rolling northward.
“Smells exquisite. Could you tell me the brand? My husband would enjoy some like that.” She notes.
Instantly my demeanor switches 1800.
“Yes, ma’am. It’s an Arturo Fuentes Onyx. Churchill size, or 60 ring x 7” length, double Maduro. Here, take one for your husband. I have an ample supply.” I smile.
“Oh, no. I couldn’t. Could I?” she asks.
“Please. I insist.” I smile the best I could given the circumstances.
“Thank you. You’re too kind…umm…Mr….?”
“Doctor. Doctor Rocknocker. World traveler, oilman, and international ambassador of amity, good drinks, and fine cigars. Call me Rock” I said.
“Oh! A Doctor?” she brightens.
“Yes, of Petroleum Geology and Engineering. Not medicine.” I chuckle.
She chuckles back.
“And I am Hella Aaberg”, as she offers her hand for a quick shake.
“Interesting name, Hella. Scandinavian or Old German heritage?” I ask.
“On my father’s side. He’s Finnish.” She replies.
“But I’ll wager your mother is not Scandinavian, correct?” I ask.
“She was from Truk, an island…”
“In the South Pacific, Micronesia. Was she from Weno city?” I asked.
“Why yes. How could you possibly know that?” she asked.
“Oh, I’ve been there. Great diving amongst the WWII wrecks. I think it’s actually called ‘Chuuk Lagoon’ or something like that now.” I said.
“That’s right! Amazing. Where else have you been?” she asked.
“Anywhere there’s oil, strife, booze, cigars, heavy explosives and typically long distances from whatever most normal people call civilization,” I replied with a chuckle.
Suddenly, I hear a voice booming out behind me.
“Why don’t you save that rapier-like wit for those musky-fuckers back home, Rocko?”
My expression changes. My eyes pop fully wide open.
“Hella?” I asked.
“Yes?”
“May I ask you a favor?”
“You can ask…”
“Thank you. Now, looking over my shoulder, is there a hulking goon of a person, thin up top, paunchy halfway down with the most ridiculously tiny sized shoes you’ve ever seen for a so-called grown man?” I ask.
“Yes. Yes, there is.” She replies.
“I thought so. Many thanks.”
I spin and launch off my barstool and grab Toivo by the hand. He hadn’t seen my left-hand Thagomizer yet.
“Toivo! You old sumbitch. What the flying fennec fox fuck are you, of all people, doing in Hawaii?” I laughed.
“Just keeping an eye on you, Rock!” he laughed equally as loud.
“No, fucking-A, seriously. What the actual fuck? What are you doing in this actual nice place?” I asked.
“Just headed to Tokyo to conduct a bit of service company business. I walked into the lounge and smelled a foul cigar. I figured it can’t be the venerable Dr. Rocknocker. He’s back at some school up north terrorizing geology and engineering grads and undergrads.” Toivo laughed.
“But there I was. Surprise!”, I laughed and pumped his hand.
“What the fuck, Rock. Now what did you do?” he asks, referring to my Ankylosaur tail club left hand.
“Ah, fuck. Long story. Oh, pardon me. Toivo, this is Hella. We were just talking about the South Seas Islands.” I said.
“Planning on running off together?” Toivo laughs, to the amusement of neither party.
“Oh, and this idiot is Toivo, a man with a congenital foot-in-mouth disorder. He’s mostly harmless.” I noted to Hella.
Greetings were shared all around. Hella made some small excuses and said she needed to depart. I gave her another cigar for her husband, shook her hand, and wished her well.
“Here’s my business card. If your husband has any questions, have him drop me a line.” I noted.
Hella smiled beautifully. She said she would. Then she thanked me shook our hands, and like that, there she was, gone.
“Well Toivo, you old bastard. Don't just stand there in the doorway like some lonesome goddamn mouse shit sheepherder, get your ass over here and have a drink.” I motioned over to my perch on Mahogany Ridge.
“Don’t mind if I do”, he says as he deftly winds his way to a seat to my left, snagging a cigar out of my pocket on the way over.
“You might want these”, I say in an exasperated tone, and hand him my gold Dunhill Hobnail lighter and V-cutter gizmo.
He cuts and fires up his heater.
“What you drinkin’, Rock”, he asks.
“Anything with alcohol, as usual. You know that Toiv.” I reply.
“No. I mean right now.” He clarifies.
“Well, I had a Mai Tai. Very nice if you like fruity, flowery drinks. It’s the locals’ favorite.” I reply.
“Sounds good. I’ll have several. And you?” Toivo asks.
“My usual. The bartender is already apprised of the situation.” I reply.
Toivo smiles the smile of one knowing his sobriety is going to be taken out for a swim. Hell, taken out and tossed into the deep end.
Toivo and I sit there, swapping lies, smoking cigars and sipping at our toddies.
Hell, Toivo was slurping them like a sump-pump during an extra-wet summer.
We chattered about family, work, whether or not Tokyo was going to host the Olympics or if the COVID-boogie man scared everyone off.
Toivo, always one afflicted with TB (“Tiny Bladder”) got up to go to the loo for the third time that hour. He left his pocket organizer on the bar and I swear on a stack of Origins of Species, I didn’t touch it.
I reached over to his vacated seat to retrieve my cigar lighter when I looked down and saw in his organizer a tab that reads “Rack & Ruin”.
“Oh. No. Fucking. Way.” I recoiled as I’d just reached out and petted a 6-foot hungover scorpion.
“One of my best friends? Secretly allied with the Agency? No. Not possible.” I drained my drink and called for another.
“No. No. No. It can’t be. No. No fucking way…” as doubt began to dissolve when I thought back to all those times I had just ‘run into’ Toivo.
“But he’s oil patch as well. That could be chalked up to coincidence.” I ruminated quizzically in my brain.
I quickly reflected back on J.M. Darhower: “Yes, you see, there’s no such thing as coincidence. There are no accidents in life. Everything that happens is the result of a calculated move that leads us to where we are.”
She may be the author of the execrable New Adult Sempre series, which Esme likes and I loathe, but she might just be right on this occasion.
Toivo return, lighter in the bladder and good sense. He never even noticed he’d left his organizer out in broad bar light for all to see.
“So, Toivo, when’s your flight?” I ask.
“Oh, man. Was I lucky. The JAL flight to Tokyo from Los Angeles had mechanical trouble and had to divert here. I got a ticket on the plane for that flight, when it continues.
“You mean ‘if it continues’,” I replied.
“Yeah. Yeah. That’s what I meant. Hey! Was that your flight?” he asks innocently. He’s really innocent of fieldcraft.
I decide to have some fun at my old friend’s expense.
“Yep. Hit some CAT (Clear Air Turbulence) and the JAL pilots reported some lighting problem. No apparent ruin to any of the systems. They relay racked their brains to figure it out, but they couldn’t that’s why I here.” I said, waiting for the words to swim upstream in Toivo’s coconut and make some sort of connection.
“Yeah. Double lucky. No problem with the plane and I get to go to Japan early.” Toivo crookedly grins.
“So, no trouble with the plane? Then why haven’t I heard that the flight’s going to resume?” I asked as I pushed a fresh, seriously strong drink to Toivo.
“Oh, must have heard it in the john.” Toivo countered and tried to cover his tracks by taking a huge gulp of his drink and damn near dying coughing.
I pound on Toivo’s back.
“Heimlich time?” I ask.
Toivo signals ‘no’.
“Jesus Christ, Rock. What was that?” he asks.
“Just my usual”, I innocently replied.
“Holy fuck. No wonder you have the reputation of…” Toivo realizes too late that he’s said too much.
“Yeah. They can rack you out. Really ruin a person if they’re not careful.” I reply icily.
“Why, Rock. Whatever do you mean?” Toivo slurred as he realized he’s been caught out.
“The jig is up, you turncoat. You know Agents Rack and Ruin from the agency. Right? You keeping tabs on me for them? You Quisling! You Benedict Arnold!” I almost was on the verge of losing my cool.
“It was nothing. They approached me years ago as I kept being mentioned in your reports. They asked me for some information. One thing leads to another…” Toivo was ready for an Ankylosaur tail club swat to the bean.
“Oh, put your fucking hands down, you asshole.” I smiled and chuckled.
“You’re not mad?” Toivo slurred badly. I had the bartender make him another special drink.
“No, Toivo. Not mad. Just disappointed.” I said, smiling like a Komodo Dragon just finishing up a fortnight-old wildebeest.
Toivo sat there and puzzled and puzzled until his puzzler was sore.
“You’re not going to kill me or anything rude like that?” Toivo asked, half-assedly trying to inject humor into the proceedings.
“Nah. The paperwork’s too ridiculous for me to do another liberation. But, Jesus Fucking Christwagons, Toivo; you could have mentioned it to me. Fuck, I thought we were friends to the end?” I said, dejectedly.
I was really getting through to Toivo. I could tell he was loaded; feeling like shit and massively deplorable.
Great fieldcraft, indeed.
I told him things “are what they are” and that I won’t blow his cover nor his honorarium.
He began to feel better. I often wonder if he was serious about the sanctioning thing.
Then I delivered the strategic missile strike.
“Just remember, Toivo. I wrote your dossier for the Company…”
He swivels to look at me.
“And one for the KGB. Olga says ‘howdy’.” I grin evilly.
Toivo short-circuited at that. Russia is his company’s bread and butter. Now he has the KGB as well as his best buddy looking over his shoulder at every move.
I bought him a few more drinks and continued to needle him about his ’leading a double life’. He was well and truly fuckered when the electric tap-tap driver from before came looking for me to whisk me back to the plane.
Seems it was simply some knocked-out wires on the plane, or slammed bulbs that were generating a false positive, indicating something other than the system that alerts one to something haywire went haywire.
Toivo was pretty much down for the count. I got him sober enough to hand them his ticket and ensure that he was really supposed to be on this flight. Thing was; h e was in Economy, and I was, as always, in Business.
I spoke to Luna, and the plane was going to be even less crowded than previously because some folks could or wouldn’t wait, or didn’t want to go on with the rest of the trip on a ‘damaged’ aircraft, or were just stupid and superstitious.
“Luna, could I pay for the difference between Business and Economy for my less than 100% conscious friend here? He’s had a rough day.” I asked.
“Dr. Rock. Just put him into Business. No one will be the wiser. Luna says so.” As she gave us a grand smile.
“Luna, I owe you. Thanks so much.” I said.
“Now get on board. Your friend looks like he needs all the downtime he can get.”
“Yes, ma’am!” I said and saluted here be best I could which dragging a schnozzled Toivo down the jetway.
I dumped Toivo in a window seat well away from my seat. I know Toivo. He snores like a semi-load of live hogs rocketing downhill locking up the brakes at 88 MPH.
Surprise! There was no one else in Business. Luna looked at me, at Toivo, and gave me a thumbs up.
Whatever I can write to further her career at JAL, she’ll have it before I deplane.
We finally get everyone settled, and with Captain Kangaroo at the helm, we bounced gracelessly off the tarmac, into the warm, tropical Hawaiian air, finally headed for the Land of the Rising Sun.
Toivo was snoring like a chainsaw hitting rusty nails as I worked on the various letters, communiques, and dossiers which needed updating before we reached touchdown. I gave Luna a thick letter with instructions not to open it until we were on the ground and Toivo and I were well off and away into the terminal.
We left Hawaii at 1300 hours, so we should arrive at Tokyo Nareda around 4:00 pm, the previous day. I was so bereft of time and time zones, I couldn’t figure out what time it really was, as judged by my biometric rhythms, so I asked Luna for a stiff drink as I was kicking off my boots and going to attempt to get some kip.
She brought me another liter or so eponymous drink. I was sawing logs by the time I slurped the last swig of that nifty drink.
Suddenly, or later, I have no idea really, some loudmouth drunk asshole from way-the-fuck-back in economy-land toward the ass end of the plane staggered into Business demanding free drinks.
Luna was nothing but civil, and asked him to both shut up and return to his seat. His air cabin hostess, or whatever the fuck they’re calling them these days, will attend to his needs.
“Naw they won’t! They want me to pay for more drinks! I’m broke but I demand more booze! You fucking owe me.” railed the asshole. “I sat at the bar in Hawaii for four hours. Them fuckers charged me an arm and a leg!”
“No, they don’t owe you shit”, I said in a voice that unmistakably loud and clear.
“Fuck you, old man! You stay the fuck out of this!” he bellowed. “Shut up or I’ll do ya’!”
“’Old man’? ‘Do me’? Excuse me. Luna, may I have a word alone with this individual?” I asked sweetly.
Luna shook her head in the affirmative, and I stood up to confront this flagrant asshole.
“Now look, Scooter. You have gone way, way over the fucking line. You are loud. You are abusive. You are obnoxious. And you stink. Plus you insulted a person who is just barely containing his righteous wrath right now. So, I’m giving you one and one only chance to shut up, sit back down before your body spontaneously develops all sort of bruises, contusions, broken bones, and unconsciousness.” I said calmly, evenly, and threateningly.
“What da’ fuck you think you’re going to do…old man?” he screeched, trying to inflate himself into full mammalian threat posture, all 5’ 9” of it.
He didn’t notice Toivo walking up quietly behind him, as Toivo was returning from the head, quiet as a moose.
“Well, Scooter, I am an Air Marshall. Duly appointed, fully trained, and properly pissed off. Right now, I can arrest you, physically detain you, turn this flight around and take you to the Hawaiian police, at your cost for the inconvenience of the entire flight. Or I could arrest you, physically detain you, and turn you over to the Japanese authorities when we land. It’s really your choice. Choose wisely.”
To be continued…⇝
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The USA PATRIOT Act: The Story of an Impulsive Bill that Eviscerated America's Civil Liberties

The USA PATRIOT Act provides a textbook example of how the United States federal government expands its power. An emergency happens, legitimate or otherwise. The media, playing its dutiful role as goad for greater government oversight, demands "something must be done." Government power is massively expanded, with little regard for whether or not what is being done is efficacious, to say nothing of the overall impact on our nation's civil liberties.
No goals are posted, because if targets are hit, this would necessitate the ending or scaling back of the program. Instead, the program becomes normalized. There are no questions asked about whether the program is accomplishing what it set out to do. It is now simply a part of American life and there is no going back.
The American public largely accepts the USA PATRIOT Act as a part of civic life as immutable, perhaps even more so than the Bill of Rights. However, this act – passed in the dead of night, with little to no oversight, in a panic after the biggest attack on American soil since Pearl Harbor – is not only novel, it is also fundamentally opposed to virtually every principle on which the United States of America was founded. It might not be going anywhere anytime soon, but patriots, liberty lovers and defenders of Constitutional government should nonetheless familiarize themselves with the onerous provisions of this law, which is nothing short of a full-throttle attack on the American republic.

What’s Even in the USA PATRIOT Act?

What is in the USA PATRIOT Act? In the Michael Moore film Fahrenheit 9/11, then Rep. John Conyers cracked wise about how no one had actually read the Act and how this was in fact par for the course with America's laws. Thus, before delving into the deeper issues surrounding the PATRIOT Act, it is worth discussing what the Act actually says. Here’s a brief look at the 10 Titles in the PATRIOT Act:
Most of the provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act were set to sunset four years after the bill was passed into law. However, the law was extended first by President George W. Bush and then by President Barack H. Obama. The latter is particularly scandalous given that, at least in part, a rejection of the surveillance culture that permeated the Bush Administration was responsible for the election of Obama in 2008.

Passing the USA PATRIOT Act

Next, it’s important to remember the environment in which the USA PATRIOT Act was passed: Post-9/11. It is not the slightest bit of exaggeration to label the environment in which the PATRIOT Act was passed as “hysterical,” nor is “compliant” a misnomer for the Congress of the time. Opposition to the Act was slim and intensive review of one of the most sweeping Acts of Congress in American history was nonexistent.
All told, Congress took a whopping six weeks drafting, revising, reviewing and passing the PATRIOT Act. That’s less time than Congress typically spends on totally uncontroversial and routine bills that don’t gut the Fourth Amendment. The final vote found only 66 opponents in the House and one (Wisconsin Democrat Russ Feingold) in the Senate. The entire passage of the PATRIOT Act, from start to finish, took place behind closed doors. There were no committee reports or hearings for opponents to testify, nor did anyone bother to read the bill.
“Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism” is the bloated and overwrought full name of the bill, crafted by a 23-year-old Congressional staffer named Chris Cylke. This ridiculous name puts the focus not on the surveillance aspects or the erosion of basic civil liberties enshrined in Western society since the Magna Carta, but on patriotism. At the time of its creation, the messaging was very clear: Real patriots support massive intrusions on civil rights. As President George W. Bush said at the time, “Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.” This sentiment very much seemed to apply to American citizens.
While the argument that if you have nothing to hide you shouldn’t fear investigation is anathema in a Constitutional republic with regard to citizens, it should be standard operating procedure when it comes to our organs of government. If we cannot expect transparency from the United States Congress – elected officials charged with representing the will of the people and protecting the Constitution – then we certainly can’t expect it anywhere else.

The Unfortunate Growth of the USA PATRIOT Act

It’s no surprise to those in the liberty movement that given an inch, the government (in particular the military-intelligence community) took a mile. Even the nebulous definition of “terrorism,” largely centered around a long litany of acts rather than the motivation behind them, has expanded to include receiving military training from a proscribed organization (without actually committing any terrorist acts or even acts of violence of any stripe) as well as “narcoterrorism” – the latter particularly convenient, as the United States government continues its losing “War on Drugs.”
Indeed, in many ways, the War on (Some) Drugs was the template for the War on Terror. Both wars have no defined enemy, no defined terms of victory. Instead, they are waged against a nebulous concept, while enjoying bipartisan support for their ever-expanding budgets. What’s more, it didn’t take long for the Feds to start using the USA PATRIOT Act for things it was never intended for, including prosecuting the War on Drugs.
Perhaps the silliest application of the USA PATRIOT Act is the prosecution of Adam McGaughey. McGaughey maintained a fansite for the television series Stargate SG-1. The Feds charged him with copyright infringement and computer fraud. In the course of their investigation, the FBI leveraged the PATRIOT Act to get financial records from his website’s ISP. This was made possible by the USA PATRIOT Act amending the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, allowing for search and seizure of ISP records.
The New York Times discovered in September 2003, that the USA PATRIOT Act was being used to investigate alleged drug traffickers without what would otherwise be sufficient probable cause. These were investigations into non-terrorist acts using a law ostensibly designed to investigate terrorism. There was some suspicion that the Act was being used to investigate crimes occurring before the Act was passed, violating the ex post facto clause of the United States Constitution.
In one of the biggest power grabs (excluding virtually everything we know from Edward Snowden – more on that below), the FBI sent tens of thousands of “national security letters” and procured over one million financial records from targeted businesses in Las Vegas. These businesses were primarily casinos, car rental bureaus and storage spaces. The data obtained included financial records, credit histories, employment records and even people’s personal health records.
The FBI maintains and databases this – and, indeed, all information collected through the USA PATRIOT Act – indefinitely. In the good old days before the PATRIOT Act, the Feds were compelled to destroy any evidence they collected on someone later found not guilty of a crime. Note that the aforementioned data collection brought to public attention by Edward Snowden (which, again – we’re getting to that) falls under this provision. Not only is the government collecting obscene amounts of private and personal information about you, they’re also storing it indefinitely with no plans to stop.
What’s more, the FBI has approached public libraries to turn over the records for specific terminals, collecting information not about specific users who might be under investigation, but about anyone who has ever used the computer at the public library. Libraries, to their credit, have been very much at the forefront of resistance against the PATRIOT Act, with some litigating compliance despite operating on small budgets and others posting “canary letters,” which effectively say “The FBI Hasn’t Been Here Yet.” The removal of such a letter would warn patrons that the FBI has been sniffing around in their records.
Indeed, the greatest criticism of the PATRIOT Act is the simplest and perhaps most obvious: Why does an Act ostensibly passed to fight terrorism so drastically expand the government’s power to investigate virtually everyone else? The PATRIOT Act is not merely unconstitutional, it is an unprecedented expansion of state power in the Anglosphere, a culture based on restricted government and the primacy of individual rights.
An excellent example of this is the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) expansion. Most people are familiar with the term “FISA court,” but very few people actually know what it is – a special federal court created under the Carter Administration that grants approval of electronic surveillance of both citizens and resident aliens in the event that they are accused of acting in the service of a foreign power. The last part of this sentence is very important: The FISA courts are not simply for allowing surveillance of anyone that it might be expedient to collect information about. The scope of their powers is very, very limited.
Or was.
The PATRIOT Act lowered the burden of evidence required to obtain a FISA warrant for electronic surveillance and expanded the overall scope of the FISA courts. Any savvy federal agent can now drape his charges in the garb of (what else?) “national security” and obtain electronic surveillance privileges hitherto only dreamed of by investigators. FISA courts have become pliant tools in the hands of the Feds, gladly approving their requests to monitor phone and internet surveillance, as well as access to medical, financial and educational records.

The Future of the USA PATRIOT Act

Do we still need the PATRIOT Act? Did we ever? All laws are certainly a product of their times. But this seems much more acutely true of the USA PATRIOT Act, which was passed in a rush and under duress without due consideration.
Particularly in light of the revelations from Edward Snowden – that the government is spying on everything they possibly can – it’s worth asking if there’s any walking back. He points out that the police state apparatus was originally for drug dealers, then for terrorists, but ultimately ended up being applied to anyone and everyone.
What’s more, Bob Bullard notes another frightful aspect of the USA PATRIOT Act: Terrorism-related cases are not subject to the Freedom of Information Act. This means that there is little or no oversight. There is no surer hallmark of a police state than an all-powerful domestic surveillance agency with no transparency or oversight. While the USA PATRIOT Act might not create an American Stasi as such, it certainly paves the way for one.
Continue reading The USA PATRIOT Act: The Story of an Impulsive Bill that Eviscerated America's Civil Liberties at Ammo.com.
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The Governor's 5/14 Coronavirus briefing will begin soon as of 2:00 PM

Streaming at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S82_3b9JITQ and http://ohiochannel.org/governor-live-stream.html
I recommend using the youtube link.
I will be keeping this post updated with a summary as it continues. Things I find most important will be bold. Keep in mind it will often be paraphrased. The stream itself is the best source.
Previous streams can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCporaXCeaOJgZKz7y3C0zbg
Thank you for all the awards and other offers but please save your money for the future economic uncertainty which is likely going to occur.
Ohio: 24,800 confirmed cases (with 1,557 extra probable cases), 1,388/24,800 confirmed deaths (with 146 extra probable deaths), 4,718 hospitalizations, 1,268/4,718 in the ICU
United States: 1,397,700 confirmed cases and 84,109 deaths.
Here is a link to a google drive that shows the history of cases and deaths created by kcmasterpiece347: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1CNGX6aLGsyIWZctChwsQ-UdRQ8JEzhuS9I_1oVnkb4s/edit?usp=sharing
0110010001100010 has put together information on the latest and most accurate numbers here: http://covid19.danoniot.com/
Here are some graphs showing the latest information created by st1tchy:
4/7: https://imgur.com/BX95vIU
4/8: https://imgur.com/OdP8nFu
4/9: https://imgur.com/bXtPvZI
4/12: https://imgur.com/Zu2G5Dp
4/13: https://imgur.com/VqYuLzP
4/14: https://imgur.com/KD43gKy
4/15: https://imgur.com/JHwcrsJ
4/16: https://imgur.com/dNCPrZr
4/17: https://imgur.com/rzkZwuJ
4/18: https://imgur.com/4FFkKHn
4/19: https://imgur.com/bMEGH0e
4/20: https://imgur.com/a/vvOfaD6
4/21: https://imgur.com/QJXKMfx
4/22: https://imgur.com/dBSow4z
4/23: https://imgur.com/Ea7GULT
4/24: https://imgur.com/MQTZWku
4/27: https://imgur.com/UeHhlve
4/28: https://imgur.com/IPt12zi
4/29: https://imgur.com/zdVKLQA
4/30: https://imgur.com/dCeij16
5/01: https://imgur.com/bIPUbzw
5/04: https://imgur.com/G28UoY3
5/06: https://imgur.com/VitMOFA
2:03 PM: The Governor begins speaking
Today I'm wearing a tie from Case Western Reserve University
This week is Police Week. I want to thank everyone in law enforcement. Unfortunately, many events honoring our fallen police officers have had to be canceled due to COVID-19. I would like to take a moment to mention those who have died serving Ohio in 2020. Let's have a moment of silence in remembrance of their sacrifice and the sacrifices of those currently serving Ohio.
A close friend of mine, Dwight Radcliff died on May 6th. Fran and I attended his funeral. He was the longest serving sheriff at the time of his retirement in 2013.
Former state representative Andy Thompson also unexpectedly yesterday. He served the state well.
On Tuesday, I talked about childcare and explained the concerns we had. We've been discussing this for weeks, trying to figure out what the best practices for reopening would be. There really is not enough data about children and COVID-19. We want to get more data and find a way to reopen safely, in a way that protects children and childcare employees. if we do this wrong we will run the risk of exposing more Ohioans to COVID-19. Childcare providers will be allowed to reopen on May 31st. This will look different from before and I am going to have Joni Close, President of the Sisters of Charity Foundation speak about the changes we plan to make.
2:12 PM: The Governor stops speaking
2:12 PM: Joni Close begins speaking
Maximum of 9 per classroom for most children, with toddlers having a maximum of 6 per classroom. Hygienic standards will be increased dramatically. These will be only some of the changes and there will be more. Some of these might make you somewhat uncomfortable due to it being different but we believe it will be the best for you and your children.
2:16 PM: Joni Close stops speaking
2:16 PM: The Governor begins speaking
There's really no playbook out there for doing this. We need to be cautious to keep everyone safe during this pandemic. We will be constantly monitoring the current situation and we may make changes as necessary based on what we see.
We're going to perform a study into the childcare situation as it reopens. This will make Ohio a leader in the country, as we will be capable of learning more about how the virus spreads. Unfortunately, there is a lot of what we don't know and that will affect how we proceed. Childcare providers will need help due to our changes. We are going to give 60 million dollars to Ohio childcare providers, both public and private, in order to ensure they are properly funded. We will have additional information available online shortly.
2:19 PM: The Governor stops speaking
2:19 PM: The Lieutenant Governor starts speaking
May is a new chapter in our response to COVID-19. We're trying to keep a balance between health of Ohioans and the health of our economy. Some more businesses may be reopening but keep in mind that it will be up to the local health departments to control what reopens and what does not.
Day Camps will reopen on May 31st. The protocols governing day camps will be released tomorrow online.
BMVs will reopen on May 26th. We want you to use the online services, as we've put a lot of effort into moving many services there. There will be some cases where you have to go into the BMV but only go as absolutely necessary. There is still an extension on renewals, so you do not have to do this immediately.
Campgrounds will also open completely, on May 21st. They will have to meet certain requirements that are currently available online.
Gyms and fitness center may reopen on May 26th. The new protocols for them will be available later today. Non contact and limited sports will also reopen on May 26th. Other, more contact-oriented sports will be investigated for reopening as well.
Pools will also be able reopen on May 26th. The CDC has found no evidence of the spread of COVID-19 in water. Water parks and amusement parks will not be reopening based on our guidance.
Horse racing can reopen on May 22nd but spectators will be prohibited. This does not mean that Casinos or Racinos can reopen.
2:30 PM: The Lieutenant Governor stops speaking
2:30 PM: Amy Acton starts speaking
231,795 tested in total. Of those infected, 4,121 were health care workers.
We're digging deep into the policies related to childcare and how it will affect the spread of COVID-19. I want to thank our entire childcare team. We're going to be working with a national study, that will have a large focus on Ohio, in order to find out the best practices for reopening childcare. We're working to become a nationwide leader in the study of childcare during this pandemic.
2:36 PM: Amy Acton stops speaking
2:36 PM: Question Period Begins
Regarding childcare and with the possibility of further illness and death in children with COVID-19, is it possible we are gambling the lives of our children by reopening and doing this study?
Amy Acton: I don't think we're gambling by doing this. Everyone is important and deserves protection. We are going to do this based on expert advice on best practices. We need to give parents a chance to go back to work and prosper. We know of the cases of children getting far sicker and we're paying close attention to this. COVID-19 has an exaggerated response on our immune system no matter the age, but we want to make sure to learn and understand how it affects children, as well, as time goes on.
2:39 PM: There are concerns that children are not receiving the education they would have otherwise. Will schools be capable of reopening in the fall and what can you do to ensure they are receiving the education they need if they do not?
Governor: I think this is a major concern. Many teachers are making strides in distance learning but some kids don't have internet or have other issues. The fact that we know so little about COVID-19 makes us feel that schools cannot reopen any time soon but every school is currently looking into ways they can reopen. We still don't know how things will be by the fall but we will do everything we can.
2:42 PM: It sounds like many childcare centers will have to turn families away. How do you plan on advising them on that subject?
Governor: I think it's going to be difficult for any of us to predict how the market will change with these new rules. We are giving money to childcare providers in order to ensure they are capable of reopening. This is a work in progress, which means that we're still learning and finding out new ways to lessen the spread of COVID-19, while reopening childcare.
Childcare providers may have to hire more employees in order to serve the families they had in the past. Unfortunately, some may not be capable of reopening due to financial troubles. We did all of these things in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and we will keep making these decisions with that in mind.
2:46 PM: It seems that cases, deaths, and other metrics have plateaued rather than gone down. What has changed in how you perceive success as time has gone on?
Governor: We've seen a plateau over three weeks in terms of all of our metrics. We were most worried about a large surge. We're still ramping up our testing. We're doing 8,000 tests every day sat this point. We need to keep our testing capacity increasing while also ensuring our supply chain can keep getting those tests out to those who need them. Testing and contact tracing is how we're going to keep this virus from spreading. There are many other indicators, such as traffic rates throughout the state, that we are looking at in order to make future decisions regarding mitigations.
2:48 PM: Reddit is freaking out and it’s causing some problems with my updates. Fixed as of 2:50 PM.
Amy Acton: No one on our team is ignoring the concern and worry that Ohioans are feeling right now. As we go on, you need to keep in mind how at risk you are and use that knowledge to make your decisions and keep yourself safe.
2:51 PM: Using what we've learned about antibody testing, how do we know that we didn't have a surge earlier?
Amy Acton: This is a process that will take years. We won't understand COVID-19 for quite some time. Many have been claiming that they had many symptoms of COVID-19 early on in the knowledge of the disease. Obviously, as time goes on, hindsight will be 20-20. We'll keep looking into new information as it comes out.
2:54 PM: The most prevalent question I've received is regarding the unemployment system not serving Ohioans properly. I know you've made improvements but many feel it is not enough. What more can you do for them?
Lieutenant Governor: This is the thing I've been most frustrated for Ohioans about personally. Director Kim Hall has been working to do everything her team can do to improve the system and has already created the new system for 1099 employees. I know that around 100,000 people have not been served yet and many others have not been able to get through to receive more information on their claims. We're all doing everything we can to expand the system as possible. Our system is very old and difficult to update but many other states are facing these same issues. Unfortunately, we have received many fraudulent claims and those need to be policed and denied. This is part of what leads to such delays.
2:59 PM: What targets will state agencies be hitting in terms of reductions in the coming fiscal year?
Governor: We'll be discussing that with the legislature. We've already made very tough cuts but we don't have any new information available at this time. One thing I can say is that this is a very difficult time. Costs are going up and our revenues are decreasing dramatically.
3:01 PM: Do you have an idea of how many families might be left out of day cares? Will licensing become more flexible? What about using school facilities?
Governor: It's not our goal to have any families left out of the system. We're doing surveys on how many providers will be coming back. We'll adjust as necessary. We can't make any definitive statements at this time.
Lieutenant Governor: Please remember that we're working on supporting the childcare industry to ensure that all of this can work.
3:03 PM: Are you going to remove Dr. Acton's order that closed school facilities until June in order to allow youth sports to reopen?
Governor: We were actually just discussing that earlier. It's a very good point. We're still looking into that.
Lieutenant Governor: Grounds are not technically closed by the order, only buildings. We will not be forcing any local community to reopen. I am sure that as we go on, there will be things that slipped through the cracks and we want to ensure that the lines of communication are open as much as possible.
3:06 PM: Are you concerned about a pending legal battle over your orders? As you know, Wisconsin's stay at home order was struck down by their Supreme court.
Governor: I have already been sued a lot. We want to ensure that our orders conform more to what we are seeing day to day. We are seeing stories from Europe about second waves and we really don't want to have to see that in Ohio. We need to be very careful as everything opens up. Staying safe in this crucial time will decide our future numbers and whether we have to close again.
3:08 PM: There is a feeling that your Minority Health Task Force hasn't made any new statements or released more information. What is going on with this?
Governor: I will be talking about that either Monday or Tuesday. This virus has pulled back the curtain on poverty and racial issues, especially in regards to health care access. We've worked with the legislature to look into issues of infant and maternal mortality and we saw these issues already. We're now going to have to figure out new ways to help African American communities in Ohio. That will come next week.
3:11 PM: Why are we not hearing more about treatment? Also will we not be returning to normal life until a vaccine comes out? Is Hydroxychloroquine being given out to patients?
Amy Acton: I talked a lot about treatment early on but I can talk about it more in the future. We've received shipments of new drugs for use against COVID-19. There is still developing information on drugs like Hydroxychloroquine, in terms of its affect on COVID-19. For now we'll have to treat the symptoms up until we can find a cure, if we can find a cure. The thing that worries me the most is the low oxygen levels found in those with COVID-19, who are walking around, not even realizing it.
3:16 PM: How can you prove to those who are trusting in your orders that reopening as we are is safe?
Amy Acton: When we first made our orders, we were using information from George Bush's administration, that we believed would best protect Ohioans. We do know that this has had effects on the economy and even people's mental and physical health. This is going to be a collaborative process but it needs to go on with caution. The biggest thing that will slow and stop the spread of disease will be how everyone lives. Be judicious with your choices and decisions as time goes on.
3:19 PM: How do you plan on bringing forward gun reforms in Ohio that you promised, despite the pandemic?
Governor: That's a continuing discussion with the legislature.
3:21 PM: There's been information in certain nursing home facilities regarding the zone and region system you've mentioned that showed that some of them have no information regarding that system. What do you think about that?
Governor: This is not something that should be happening. I believe you that this is happening but it's something that I do not want to have happening. I don't know what facility you're talking about but I think we're going to keep moving forward on that.
Amy Acton: I'll look into this and speak to our leaders in that area regarding improving this.
3:24 PM: Are we getting close to returning to normal regarding surgeries?
Governor: It's been in the past week or so that we've released new orders regarding that. We need to keep monitoring our hospital capacity as time goes on in order to decide if we can return to normal
3:25 PM: Question Period Ends
3:25 PM: The Governor begins speaking
Thank you to all of our childcare workers and everyone else returning to work.
We'll be playing a rendition of Amazing Grace by the Combined Pinkerton North and Pinkerton Central Marching Bands.
No more updates until Monday unless it's absolutely necessary.
3:27 PM: The Stream Ended.
submitted by PeaceIsSoftcoreWar to Ohio [link] [comments]

What Wisconsin Democrats Learned from 2016

It was a most unusual sight for Joe Biden’s campaign: a crowd. Across the street from the Wisconsin Aluminum Foundry, in the town of Manitowoc, several hundred fans of the former Vice-President gathered in the afternoon sunshine late last month, carrying signs and wearing masks that allowed them to muster energetic, if muffled, chants. This was not a planned rally, more like a flash mob without the theatrics. Biden, insistent on modelling good medical etiquette during the pandemic, schedules no grand gatherings, leaving them to his rival, Donald Trump, who, before his coronavirus diagnosis, routinely spoke from a stage, with Air Force One positioned scenically behind him, as thousands cheered his boasts and invective.
A line of police officers kept the crowd away from the brick foundry, where Biden’s motorcade was parked. Closest to the building, about a hundred Trump supporters had gathered, many waving campaign banners. One homemade poster read “A Vote for Biden = Socialism.” Another said, “Build the Wall with Liberal Tears.” A chant for four more years merged into one for four more terms. Few on the Trump side wore a mask. All of the Biden supporters did, including Darlene Wellner, an eighty-year-old retired social worker. I asked Wellner what brought her out for Biden. She started with Trump’s dishonesty and turned to his environmental policies. “So much damage has been done. It’s just heartbreaking what is happening in this country,” she said. Wellner has taken it upon herself to write thirty postcards to people she considers fence-sitters. “If I can influence five of them, it wouldn’t be bad.”
Biden had arrived in Manitowoc, a town on Lake Michigan, largely thanks to Sachin Shivaram, the C.E.O. of Wisconsin Aluminum Foundry, who was so worried about Biden’s chances in the state that he contacted everyone he knew in hopes of persuading the campaign to deploy the candidate. “If you don’t have that on-the-ground presence of the candidate, it trickles down,” he told me. In his community of De Pere, he saw a surfeit of Trump signs, and almost none for his rival. At the factory, the union leadership supported Biden, but he noticed that some workers were wearing maga gear. He was thrilled to hear, about seventy-two hours ahead of time, that Biden would be seeking attention in Manitowoc, in a state where Hillary Clinton barely competed. He wasn’t alone. On the afternoon of the visit, the Manitowoc County Democratic Party storefront was bustling. “We’re in Trump country,” Karen Steingraber, a volunteer, said, as she assembled Biden-Harris signs, “but we do what we can.”
Inside the foundry, Biden delivered a series of sharp-edged attacks to a few dozen carefully distanced onlookers and reporters. The speech was good stuff for the faithful—evidence that Biden, at seventy-seven, could deliver a biting anti-Trump narrative, along with his customary empathy toward the families of the covid-19 dead and those who are struggling financially. Addressing the working-class voters in Wisconsin who favored Trump last time, he pledged, “You will be seen, heard, and respected by me.” Speaking, as he often does, from behind a surgical mask, he said, “Frankly, I’ve dealt with guys like Trump my whole life. Guys from the neighborhood I come from who would look down on us because we didn’t have a lot of money or your parents didn’t go to college. Guys who think they’re better than you. Guys who inherit everything they’ve ever gotten in their life and squander it. Guys who stretch and squeeze and stiff electricians and plumbers and contractors working on their hotels and casinos and golf courses just to put a few more bucks in their pocket. Guys who do everything they can to avoid paying the taxes they owe because they figure the rest of us, the little people, we can pick up the tab for the country.”
On paper, Wisconsin looks eminently winnable this year for Biden and the Democrats. The respected Marquette Law School poll, released on Wednesday, showed Biden ahead by five points, with a Libertarian candidate, Jo Jorgensen, receiving four per cent, and Trump favored by just forty-one per cent of likely voters. If it weren’t for the shock of 2016, when polls showed Clinton comfortably ahead in October, Biden supporters’ worry meter would be much lower. “Every Democrat is on edge,” Ben Wikler, the chairman of the Wisconsin Democratic Party, told me as we sat on his back porch, in Madison. “To me, it means that every Democrat will work their heart out.” Trump was the first Republican Presidential candidate to win the state since 1984, but his winning margin was less than one per cent of the roughly three million votes cast, suggesting that even minor adjustments in the Clinton campaign’s message or tactics could have changed the outcome. Clinton received 238,449 fewer votes than Barack Obama had four years earlier, including forty thousand fewer in Milwaukee alone. Yet she lost the state by only 22,748 votes.
Clinton and her team assumed that they would win Wisconsin with a minimal investment, even after she was pummelled in the Democratic primary, losing to Bernie Sanders by thirteen points. Only in the last two weeks of the campaign did Clinton advertise on television in Milwaukee, Green Bay, and Madison. This year, Biden has dominated television advertising for months. In one measure of the intensified effort, a list of campaign events, Biden interviews, surrogate appearances, and radio and television advertisements stretches to two single-spaced pages. And the ground game is broad. By the campaign’s count, three thousand people have done phone-banking sessions in Milwaukee, where there are forty teams of volunteers and dozens of paid staffers. (The campaign declined to say exactly how many.) “We definitely learned our lesson,” Marcelia Nicholson, the chairwoman of the Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors, told me.
Despite polling averages that have shown Trump lagging Biden for months, the Republicans, too, are boasting of their efforts on the ground and including rallies in the schedule. Before his coronavirus diagnosis, Trump had planned to hold events in La Crosse and Green Bay; Vice-President Mike Pence has visited the state five times since July, including a recent trip to Eau Claire, where he was joined by Ivanka Trump. The campaign is trying to fortify rural counties that voted for Obama twice before flipping to Trump in 2016; it also took the rare step of opening an office in Milwaukee, aiming to reduce Biden’s large margins among Black and Latino voters. Team Trump has held training sessions with more than six thousand people, according to the campaign. Samantha Zager, the deputy national press secretary, noted, “We’re the only campaign in the state currently asking Wisconsinites for their votes in person.” She described Biden’s bid for Wisconsin as “too little, too late.”
I asked Wikler how Democrats intend to avoid a nail-biter this time. “Organizing,” he said. “In 2016, you’d go into an office and no one would be there. Someone behind a table would tell you to pick up a clipboard and bring it back when you’re done.” The next year, Martha Laning, Wikler’s predecessor, began building a statewide organizing effort that would operate year-round rather than emerge near the end of a campaign cycle. “You hire organizers to recruit local leaders to build neighborhood teams. They’re volunteer team leaders, they recruit volunteers. Those teams are responsible for organizing their neighborhoods,” Wikler said, likening them to old-school ward captains. In 2018, Democrats swept the elections for statewide offices for the first time since 1982.The current ground game is a joint operation of the Biden campaign and the Wisconsin Democrats. In addition, staff and volunteers from a raft of independent organizations are working to get out the vote. In Milwaukee, significant efforts are under way by Black Leaders Organizing for Communities (bloc) and Voces de la Frontera Action, which focusses on the city’s hundred thousand Latino residents, as well as other Latinos around the state. Since Kamala Harris, a Howard University graduate and member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority, joined the ticket, organizers have been drawing strength from members of the Divine Nine historically Black fraternities and sororities. In Fitchburg, the state’s first elected Black mayor, Frances Huntley-Cooper, an Alpha Kappa Alpha, called it “an automatic network. I have so many sisters who are on the phone every day.” Many others, she said, are helping people navigate the requirements for voting by mail, and volunteering as poll workers.
Then there is money. In one sign of the Democrats’ success, last month’s live reading of the script of “The Princess Bride,” by most of the original cast, attracted an astonishing hundred and ten thousand viewers and raised $4.25 million. The cast members of “Parks and Recreation,” “The West Wing,” and “Veep” appeared on other nights. Citing the organizing oomph, the Democrats I spoke to in several Wisconsin cities expressed confidence in Biden’s chances, if the election is fair and square. Their worry is that Republicans will find ways to suppress Democratic turnout. For months, Trump has been groundlessly attacking mail-in voting, recently tweeting falsely, for example, “The Ballots being returned to States cannot be accurately counted. Many things are already going wrong.” With court battles over voting rules already under way in Wisconsin, I asked Mandela Barnes, the state’s Democratic lieutenant governor, what he foresees. He said, “Republicans are going to use any tactic they can try to keep people from voting, because they know that lower turnout is typically beneficial to them.”
More than a million voters have already requested an absentee ballot, and more than six hundred thousand have voted. Anticipating a torrent, election officials are getting creative. Some have positioned drop boxes outside public buildings, such as libraries, in Milwaukee. In Madison, a Democratic stronghold, hired clerks sit outside the City-County Building during office hours to collect ballots, first checking that they have been signed and witnessed. The city organized two events called Democracy in the Park, where poll workers stationed themselves in two hundred and six parks to register voters and receive ballots. On the first day, roughly ten thousand people delivered ballots. An attorney for two of the state’s most senior Republican legislators unsuccessfully tried to stop the exercise, arguing that it was “an illegal collection of ballots.” Republicans are also in federal court trying to limit the number of days that ballots, postmarked by Election Day, November 3rd, will be received and counted. Yet even as Trump rails against the dangers of absentee voting, the Wisconsin Republican Party is saying precisely the opposite, in literature designed to be hung on a voter’s door handle. “Absentee and Early in-person voting are safe and secure ways to guarantee your voice is heard,” the flyer says, featuring a stylized black-and-white photo of Trump, with only his trademark red tie in color, pointing at the camera. “president trump wants YOU to make a PLAN to vote TODAY!” I picked up the door-hanger at an office of the Racine County Republican Party, in Burlington. Among other handouts was a card showing a Photoshopped highway sign that read, “Caution: Democrat Voter Fraud Ahead.” Behind the counter, a volunteer, who asked not to be identified for fear of being targeted by Trump opponents, said he was afraid that Democrats would try to steal the election. “I know if Democrats lose,” he said matter-of-factly, “they will try to burn the country down.”
Trump, whose campaign is lagging financially, is distributing flyers that misrepresent Biden’s record and positions. One, with the Trump campaign’s signature, is printed handsomely in red, white, blue, and gray. It wrongly states that Biden is calling for defunding the police, that he intends to “raise taxes on the middle class,” and supports climate policy that would cost ninety-three trillion dollars. I spotted it when I visited the middle-class Milwaukee suburb of Brown Deer, where Emily Siegrist, a Democratic nurse practitioner and former soldier in the Wisconsin National Guard, is running ahead of Dan Knodl, a Republican state legislator, who defeated her in 2018. This time, she is well-funded and working hard. When I caught up with her, she was wearing cut-off jean shorts and a gray sweatshirt that said, “Girls Unite.” I asked about the Democrats’ decision not to knock on doors or hold rallies, in contrast to the Trump campaign and many down-ballot Republicans. She said it makes campaigning harder, and creates a wild card in predicting the outcome. Although her volunteers have made fifteen thousand phone calls, by her estimate, she sometimes can’t resist campaigning the old-fashioned way. “I’ll ring the doorbell and jump back. I’ll talk to them from a distance, ‘My name’s Emily. I just want to introduce myself.’ ”
Back in Manitowoc, Shivaram revelled in the positive vibes from the crowd that gathered to cheer Biden. “I had no idea that this many people supported Biden in Manitowoc,” he said. Although Biden held no rally and shook no hands, the visit accomplished its pandemic-era goals by earning plenty of local television, radio, and print coverage from the foundry speech and interviews with reporters in the larger Green Bay market. “The media coverage made the visit look big. That really energized people,” Shivaram said. So, I asked him, was he feeling better about Biden’s chances? “From my little corner, it doesn’t feel good at all,” he replied. “I’m scared he is going to lose.”
submitted by UrbanCentrist to neoliberal [link] [comments]

Anonymity by State/Country: Comprehensive Global Guide III

Ever since i started playing regularly, i've researched anonymity in places. Here is what i have for each state plus a bunch of other countries. If anything is outdated or incorrect, please comment.
United States
Alabama: No current lottery. Source: https://www.wtvy.com/content/news/Lottery-bill-other-legislation-is-likely-dead-in-Alabama-legislature-569059451.html
Alaska: No current lottery/Not Anonymous. "Unlike most other states, Alaska doesn’t have a state-sponsored lottery." Source: https://www.lotterycritic.com/lottery-results/alaska/ Alaska does permit charities to run lotteries, the largest one is Not Anonymous. Source: http://www.lottoalaska.com/
Alaska's governor has proposed a bill to create an official Alaska State Lottery. Source: https://apnews.com/78cacca5137f6b47e41be2de37600044
American Samoa: No current lottery. Source: https://simonsblogpark.com/onlinegambling/simons-guide-to-gambling-in-american-samoa/amp/
Arizona: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner for all wins of $100,000 and over. Source: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/arizona-becomes-latest-state-shield-lottery-winners-names-n995696
Arkansas: Not Anonymous/Other entities unclear. "Winner information is subject to disclosure under the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). A winner who receives a prize or prize payment from the ASL grants the ASL, its agents, officers, employees, and representatives the right to use, publish (in print or by means of the Internet) and reproduce the winner’s name, physical likeness, photograph, portraits, and statements made by the winner, and use audio sound clips and video or film footage of the winner for the purpose of press releases, advertising, and promoting the ASL". Source: https://www.myarkansaslottery.com/claim-your-prize
California: Not Anonymous/Only individuals can claim. “ The name and location of the retailer who sold you the winning ticket, the date you won and the amount of your winnings are also matters of public record and are subject to disclosure. You can form a trust prior to claiming your prize, but our regulations do not allow a trust to claim a prize. Understand that your name is still public and reportable”. Source: https://static.www.calottery.com/~/media/Publications/Popular_Downloads/winners-handbook-October%202018-%20English.pdf
Colorado: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via trust. “As part of the Open Records Act, we are required to release to the public your name, hometown, amount you won and the game you played. This information will be posted on coloradolottery.com and will be furnished to media upon request.” Source: https://www.coloradolottery.com/en/games/lotto/claim-winnings/ Source: https://denver.cbslocal.com/2016/01/15/in-colorado-and-other-states-lottery-winners-can-keep-names-secret/
Connecticut: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via a trust or LLC, "Certain information about our winners is public information: Winner's name and place of residence, date of claim, game played, prize amount won, and the selling retailer's name and location. While most winners claim prizes using their individual names, some winners come forward using other legal entities (i.e., trusts, business partnership) to claim their prizes. In those instances, the Lottery will promote the win using that legal entity's name. For more information about such instances, please consult your personal accountant or legal advisor.” Source: https://www.ctlottery.org/Content/winner_publicity.aspx
Delaware: 100% Anonymous if requested by winner. "Many winners have chosen to remain anonymous, as allowed by state law, but their excitement is yours to share!" Source: https://www.delottery.com/Winners and https://www.delottery.com/FAQs
DC: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via a trust or LLC. Anonymous question is not directly answered on lottery website. "In the District of Columbia, specific lottery winner information is public record." However, a Powerball Jackpot win was claimed via a LLC in 2009. Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/04/AR2009050402008.html
Florida: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via LLC. "Florida Lottery winners cannot remain anonymous. Florida law mandates that the Florida Lottery provide the winner's name, city of residence, game won, date won and amount won to any third party who requests the information; however Florida Lottery winners' home addresses and telephone numbers are confidential." Source: http://www.flalottery.com/faq
The Florida Lottery allows trusts to claim it, however winner information is still released in compliance with the law. A $15 Million jackpot was claimed by an LLC. Source: https://www.fox13news.com/amp/consumehit-the-lottery-remain-anonymous-not-in-florida Source: http://flalottery.com/pressRelease?searchID=199128
Georgia: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner for all prizes over $250,000. Source: https://www.stl.news/georgia-governor-signs-bill-allowing-lottery-winners-remain-anonymous/121962/
Guam: Anonymity appears to be an option. Source: https://www.kuam.com/story/11218413/guamanian-wins-big-in-sportsbingo-but-has-yet-to-claim-2m-prize
Hawaii: No current lottery. Source: https://www.kitv.com/story/40182224/powerball-or-mega-millions-lottery-in-hawaii
Idaho: Not Anonymous."By claiming a winning lottery ticket over $600, winners become subject to Idaho’s Public Records Law. This means your “win” becomes an offcial Idaho public record. Your full name, the town where you live, the game you won, the amount you won (before and after taxes), the name of the retailer where you bought the ticket, and the amount the retailer receives for selling the ticket are all a matter of public record." Can seek anonymity if you have specific security concerns (rarely granted). Source: https://www.idaholottery.com/images/uploads/general/winnersguideweb.pdf
Illinois: Not Anonymous/Anonymous if requested by winner for all wins over $250,000 however info will be released to a FOIA request. "However, Murphy also cooperated with the Illinois Press Association in adding an amendment that ensures that Freedom of Information Act, an act designed to keep government agencies transparent by allowing the public to access any public record by request, supersedes the privacy law, according to attorney Don Craven, the press association’s legal counsel." Source: https://www.thetelegraph.com/news/article/Hidden-riches-Big-lottery-winner-in-Beardstown-13626173.php
Indiana: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via LLC or trust. "Indiana law allows lottery jackpot winners to remain anonymous, with the money being claimed by a limited liability company or legal trust." Source: https://www.chicagotribune.com/nation-world/ct-indiana-mega-millions-winners-20160729-story.html
Iowa: Not Anonymous/Can use a trust to claim but information will be released. "When you win an Iowa Lottery prize of $600 or more, you have to fill out a winner claim form that includes your name, address and Social Security number before you can claim your winnings. Iowa law makes the information on that claim form public, meaning that anyone can request a copy of the form to see who has won the prize. We redact sensitive information, such as your Social Security number, from the form before we release it, but all other details are considered public information under Iowa law (Iowa Code Section 99G.34(5)." Source: https://www.ialotteryblog.com/2008/11/can-prize-winne.html.
For group play, "Prizes can be paid to players who play as a group. A check can be written to an entity such as a trust or to a single individual." Source: https://ialottery.com/pages/Games/ClaimingPrizes.aspx
Kansas: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. "Kansas is one of a handful of states that does not have this requirement. If you win a prize in Kansas, you may request that your identity not be released publicly." Source: https://www.kslottery.com/faqs#faq-8
Kentucky: Anonymity appears to be an option. Anonymity or who can claim is not addressed on lottery website. But multiple instances of winners claiming anonymously have been reported in the news. "Kentucky Lottery spokesman Chip Polson said the $1 million Powerball winner claimed the prize on May 15 and the Mega Million winner claimed the prize on May 12. He confirmed that both players wanted their identity to remain a secret." Source: https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/local/2017/05/19/two-1-million-lottery-winners-who-bought-tickets-louisville-want-privacy/101870414/
Louisiana: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via trust. "Under the Lottery's statute, all prize payment records are open records, meaning that the public has a right to request the information. Depending upon the amount won and public or media interest in the win, winners may NOT be able to remain anonymous. The statute also allows the Lottery to use winners' names and city of residence for publicity purposes such as news releases. The Lottery's regular practice is not to use winner information in paid advertising or product promotion without the winner's willingness to participate. Source: https://louisianalottery.com/faq/easy-5#35 Source: https://louisianalottery.com/article/1050/the-williams-trust-claims-share-of-50-million-powerball-jackpot
Maine: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via trust. "In the event that Maine does have a Mega Millions winner, he or she can opt to remain anonymous — but Boardman says that’s never happened. “What a winner could do in Maine is they could file their claim in the name of a trust, and the trust becomes the winner. So that’s how a winner could claim their ticket anonymously,” he says." Source: https://www.mainepublic.org/post/lottery-official-reminds-mainers-they-re-exceedingly-unlikely-win-16-billion-jackpot
Maryland*: Not Anonymous by Law, Anonymous in Practice. "However, the legal basis for this anonymity in Maryland is thin. The Maryland Lottery does not advertise that lottery winners may remain anonymous, but it posts articles on its website about winners and notes those winners who have “chosen to remain anonymous:” Source: https://www.gw-law.com/blog/anonymity-maryland-lottery-winners
*"Please note that this anonymity protection does not apply to second-chance and Points for Drawings contests run through the My Lottery Rewards program. Those contests are run as promotions for the Lottery. As such, they are operated under a different set of rules than our draw games and scratch-off games. The rules of participating in our second-chance and Points for Drawings contests state that winners' identities are published."" Source: https://www.mdlottery.com/about-us/faqs/
Massachusetts: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via trust "Lottery regulations state that a claimant's name, city or town, image, amount of prize, claim date and game are public record. Therefore, photographs may be taken and used to publicize winnings." Source: https://www.masslive.com/news/2018/05/lottery_sees_increase_in_winne.html
Michigan: Not Anonymous for Powerball and Mega Millions/100% Anonymous if requested by the winner for all other winners over $10,000. "Winner Anonymity. Michigan law requires written consent before disclosing the identity of the winner of $10,000 or more from the State lottery games Lotto47 and Fantasy 5. You further understand and agree that your identity may be disclosed, and that disclosure may be required, as the winner of any prize from the multi-state games Powerball and Mega Millions." Source: https://www.michiganlottery.com/games/mega-millions
Minnesota: Not Anonymous. Anonymity or who can claim is not addressed on lottery website but lottery blog states "In Minnesota, lottery winners cannot remain anonymous. A winner's name, city, prize amount won and the place that the winning ticket was sold is public data and will be released to media and posted on our website." Source: https://www.mnlottery.com/blog/you-won-now-what
Mississippi: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. "In accordance with the Alyce G. Clarke Mississippi Lottery Law, the Mississippi Lottery will not disclose the identity of the person holding a winning lottery ticket without that person's written permission." Source: https://www.mslotteryhome.com/players/faqs/
Missouri: Not Anonymous. "At the Lottery Headquarters, a member of the Lottery's communications staff will ask you questions about your win, such as how many tickets you bought, when you found out that you won and what you plan to do with your prize money. This information will be used for a news release. You will also be asked, but are not required, to participate in a news conference, most likely at the store where you purchased your winning ticket." Source: http://www.molottery.com/whenyouwin/jackpotwin.shtm
A Missouri State Legislator has submitted a bill to the State House to give lottery winners anonymity. Source: https://www.kfvs12.com/2020/02/25/mo-house-considers-legislation-protect-identity-lottery-winners/
Montana: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via trust. "In Montana, by law, certain information about lottery winners is considered public. That information includes: the winner's name, the amount won and the winner's community of residence. Winners may choose to claim as an individual or they may choose to form a trust and claim their prize as a trust. If a trust claims a lottery prize, the name of the trust is considered public information. A trust must have a federal tax identification number in order to claim a Montana Lottery prize." Source: https://www.montanalottery.com/en/view/about-faqs
Nebraska: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via LLC. Anonymity or who can claim is not addressed on lottery website but a winner created a legal entity to claim anonymously in 2014. "Nebraska Lottery spokesman Neil Watson said with the help of a Kearney lawyer, the winner or winners have created a legal entity called Carpe Diem LLC." Source: https://journalstar.com/news/state-and-regional/nebraska/m-nebraska-powerball-winner-to-remain-anonymous/article_a044d0f0-99a7-5302-bcb9-2ce799b3a798.html
A Nebraska State Legislator has now filed a bill to give 100% Anonymity to all winners over $300,000 who request it. Source: https://journalstar.com/news/state-and-regional/nebraska/anonymity-for-lottery-winners-bill-would-give-privacy-to-those/article_1cdba44d-c8bb-5971-b73f-2eecc8cd4625.html
Nevada: No current lottery. Source: https://www.reviewjournal.com/business/casinos-gaming/heres-why-you-cant-play-powerball-in-nevada/
New Hampshire: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via a trust. Anonymity or who can claim is not addressed on lottery website but a winner successfully sued the lottery and won the right to remain anonymous in 2018. Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2018/03/12/winner-of-a-560-million-powerball-jackpot-can-keep-the-money-and-her-secret-judge-rules/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.bec2db2f7d2c
New Jersey: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://www.nj.com/politics/2020/01/win-big-you-can-claim-those-nj-lottery-winnings-anonymously-under-new-law.html
New Mexico: Not Anonymous. “Winners of $10,000 or more will have name, city, game played, and prize amount and photo on website.” Can seek anonymity if you have specific security concerns (rarely granted). Source: https://www.nmlottery.com/uploads/FileLinks/82400d81a0ce468daab29ebe6db3ec27/Winner_Publicity_Policy_6_1_07.pdf
New York: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via a LLC. Anonymity or who can claim is not addressed on lottery website but per Gov. Cuomo: "For the past 40 years, individuals wishing to keep their name and information out of the public view have created LLCs to collect their winnings for them." Source: https://nypost.com/2018/12/09/cuomo-vetoes-bill-allowing-lotto-winners-to-remain-anonymous/
North Carolina: Not Anonymous. "North Carolina law allows lottery winners' identity to remain confidential only if they have an active protective order against someone or participate in the state's "Address Confidentiality Program" for victims of domestic violence, sexual offense, stalking or human trafficking." Source: https://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/local/article54548645.html
North Dakota: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://www.kfyrtv.com/home/headlines/ND-Powerball-Winners-Have-Option-to-Remain-Anonymous-364918121.html
Northern Mariana Islands: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://www.nmsalottery.com/game-rules/
Ohio: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via trust. Anonymity or who can claim is not addressed on lottery website but appears to have an anonymous option. "The procedure from there was a little cumbersome. I needed to create two separate trusts. One trust was to appoint me, as the trustee on behalf of the winner, to contact the Lottery Commission and accept the Lottery winnings. The secondary trust was set up for me as trustee of the first trust, to transfer the proceeds to the second trust with the winner as the beneficiary. This enabled me to present the ticket, accept the proceeds, and transfer it to the winner with no public record or disclosure." Source: https://www.altickcorwin.com/Articles/How-To-Claim-Lottery-Winnings-Anonymously.shtml
Oklahoma: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via trust or LLC. In accordance with the Oklahoma Open Records Act and the Oklahoma Education Lottery Act, the name of any individual, corporation, partnership, unincorporated association, limited liability company, or other legal entity, and their city of residence will be made public. Source: https://www.lottery.ok.gov/playersclub/faq.asp Source: https://oklahoman.com/article/5596678/lottery-winners-deserve-some-anonymity
Oregon: Not Anonymous. "No. Certain information about Lottery prizes is public record, including the name of the winner, amount of the prize, date of the drawing, name of the game played and city in which the winning ticket was purchased. Oregon citizens have a right to know that Lottery prizes are indeed being awarded to real persons. " Source: https://oregonlottery.org/about/public-interaction/commission-directofrequently-asked-questions Can seek anonymity if you have specific security concerns (rarely granted). Source: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3353432/Man-living-Iraq-wins-6-4-million-Oregon-jackpot.html
Pennsylvania: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via trust. Source: https://lancasteronline.com/news/local/trust-that-won-powerball-no-relation-to-manheim-township-emerald/article_29834922-4ca2-11e8-baac-1b15a17f3e9c.html
Puerto Rico: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/puerto-rico-powerball-winner-claims-prize-chooses-stay-anonymous-n309121
Rhode Island: Not Anonymous/Anonymous if requested but all info is subject to FOIA. "While the Lottery will do everything possible to keep a winner's information private if requested by the winner, in Rhode Island and most other states, this information falls under the Freedom of Information Act, and a winner's name and city or town of residency must be released upon request." Source: https://www.rilot.com/en-us/player-zone/faqs.html
South Carolina: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Anonymity or who can claim is not addressed on lottery website but appears to have an anonymous option based on prior winners. Source: https://myfox8.com/2019/03/15/the-anonymous-south-carolina-winner-of-the-largest-lottery-jackpot-is-donating-part-of-it-to-alabama-tornado-victims/
South Dakota: Not Anonymous for draw games and online games/100% Anonymous for Scratchoffs if requested by the winner. "You can remain anonymous on any amount won from a scratch ticket game. Jackpots for online games are required to be public knowledge. Play It Again winners are also public knowledge." Source: https://lottery.sd.gov/FAQ2018/gamefaq.aspx.
Tennessee: Not Anonymous/Can use a trust but info subject to open records act. Anonymity is explicitly noted as not being allowed on the official lottery website. Source: https://www.tnlottery.com/faq/i-won
However if it is claimed via a trust then the lottery will not give out your information unless requested to do so. "The TN lottery says: "When claiming a Lottery prize through a Trust, the TN Lottery would need identity documentation for the grantor and all ultimate beneficiaries. Once we are in possession of these documents and information, records are generated. If a formal request is made by a citizen of Tennessee, the Trust beneficiary's name, city and state must be made available under the Tennessee Open Records Act." Source: https://www.avvo.com/legal-answers/in-tennessee--can-a-lottery-jackpot-be-claimed-whi-2327592.html
Texas: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner for $1 million or more IF the winner claims it as an individual AND chooses the Cash option. Not Anonymous if claimed by a trust or LLC or if the winner chooses the Annuity option. Source: https://www.txlottery.org/export/sites/lottery/Documents/retailers/FAQ_Winner_Anonymity_12112017_final.pdf
Utah: No current lottery. Source: https://www.lotterycritic.com/lottery-results/utah/
Vermont: Not Anonymous/Anonymous via trust. “The name, town and prize amount on your Claim Form is public information. If you put your name on the Claim Form, your name becomes public information. If you claim your prize in a trust, the name of the trust is placed on the Claim Form, and the name of the trust is public information.” Source: https://vtlottery.com/about/faq
Virginia: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner for prizes over $10 million. "A new law passed by the Virginia General Assembly and signed by the Governor prohibits the Virginia Lottery from disclosing information about big jackpot winners." "When the bill goes into effect this summer, the Virginia Lottery will not be allowed to release certain information about winners whose prize exceeds $10 million, unless the winner wants to be known." Source: https://www.13newsnow.com/article/news/local/virginia/new-virginia-law-allows-certain-lottery-winners-to-keep-identity-private/291-c33ea642-e8fa-45fd-b3a4-dc693cf5b372
US Virgin Islands: Anonymity appears to be an option. A $2 Million Powerball winner was allowed to remain anonymous. Source: https://viconsortium.com/virgin-islands-2/st-croix-resident-wins-2-million-in-latest-power-ball-drawing/
Washington: Not Anonymous/Can use a trust but info subject to open records act. "As a public agency, all documents held by Washington's Lottery are subject to the Public Records Act. Lottery prizes may be claimed in the name of a legally formed entity, such as a trust. However, in the event of a public records request, the documents forming the artificial entity may be released, thereby revealing the individual names of winners." https://www.walottery.com/ClaimYourPrize/
West Virginia: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner for prizes over $1 million and 5% of winnings remittance. "Effective January 1, 2019, House Bill 2982 allows winners of State Lottery draw games to remain anonymous in regards to his or her name, personal contact information, and likeness; providing that the prize exceeds one million dollars and the individual who elects to remain anonymous remits five percent of his or her winnings to the State Lottery Fund." Source: https://wvlottery.com/customer-service/customer-resources/
Wisconsin: Not Anonymous/Cannot be claimed by other entities. "Pursuant to Wisconsin’s Open Records law (Wis. Stats. Secs. 19.31–19.39), the Lottery is required to disclose a winner’s name, likeness and place of residence. If you win and claim a prize, the Lottery may use your name, likeness and place of residence for any purpose without compensation to you.
Upon claiming your prize, you waive any claims against the Lottery and its representatives for any and all liability which may result from the disclosure or use of such information." "The original winning ticket must be signed by a single human being. For-profit and non-profit entities, trusts, and other non-human beings are not eligible to play or claim a prize." Source: https://wilottery.com/claimprize.aspx
Wyoming: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. "We will honor requests for anonymity from winners. However, we certainly hope winners will allow us to share their names and good news with other players." Source: https://wyolotto.com/lottery/faq/
Other countries
Australia: 100% Anonymous if requested by winner. "The great thing about playing lotto in Australia is that winners can choose to remain anonymous and keep their privacy, unlike in the United States where winners don't have such a choice, and are often thrown into a media circus." Source: https://www.ozlotteries.com/blog/how-to-remain-anonymous-when-you-win-lotto/
Bahamas: No current lottery. Source: https://thenassauguardian.com/2013/01/29/strong-no-vote-trend-so-far-in-gaming-referendum/
Bahrain: Not Anonymous. Source: https://bdutyfree.com/terms-conditions1#.X8ru92lOmdM
Barbados: Not Anonymous. "No. Barbados Lottery winners cannot remain anonymous. The Barbados Lottery mandates the winner’s name, address, game won, date won and amount won be provided; however Barbados Lottery winners' home addresses and telephone numbers are confidential." Source: https://www.mybarbadoslottery.com/faqs
Brazil: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://www.lotterycritic.com/lottery-results/brazil-lottery/
Canada: Not Anonymous. Every provincial lottery corporation in Canada requires winners to participate in a publicity photo shoot showing their face, their name and their municipality. Can seek anonymity if you have specific security concerns (rarely granted). Source: https://consumers.findlaw.ca/article/can-lottery-winners-remain-anonymous/
Carribbean Lottery Countries (Antigua/Barbuda, Anguilla, St. Kitts/Nevis, St. Maarten/Saba/St. Eustatius, and Turks/Caicos): Not Anonymous. "No. Caribbean Lottery winners cannot remain anonymous. The Caribbean Lottery mandates the winner’s name, address, game won, date won and amount won be provided; however Caribbean Lottery winners' home addresses and telephone numbers are confidential." Source: https://www.thecaribbeanlottery.com/faqs
China: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Must appear in a press conference and photo but allowed to wear disguise. Source: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2015/01/22/china-lottery-winners-mask/22108515/
Cuba: No current lottery. Source: https://oncubanews.com/en/cuba/society-cuba/cuban-traditions/lottery-the-national-game-infographics/
EuroMillions Countries (Austria, Belgium, France, Ireland, Luxembourg, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, and UK*): 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://www.euro-millions.com/publicity
*United Kingdom: Excludes
*Caymen Islands, and Falkland Islands: No current lottery. Source: https://calvinayre.com/2018/11/02/business/cayman-islands-move-illegal-gambling-doesnt-address-real-issue/ Source: https://simonsblogpark.com/onlinegambling/simons-guide-gambling-falkland-islands/amp/#lottery-falkland-islands
*Anguilla, and Turks & Caicos: Not Anonymous. Source: https://www.thecaribbeanlottery.com/faqs
EuroJackpot Countries (Croatia, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Netherlands*, Norway, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, and Sweden): 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://www.euro-jackpot.net/en/publicity
*Netherlands: Excludes
*St. Maarten, Saba, and St. Eustatius: Not Anonymous. Source: https://www.thecaribbeanlottery.com/faqs
Fiji: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://fijisun.com.fj/2012/11/08/3m-lotto-win-here/
Georgia (Kartvelia): Anonymity appears to be an option. "2.9.1. Prizes and Winners. Each Bidder shall provide details of:....how winners who waive their right to privacy will be treated;" Source: https://mof.ge/images/File/lottery/tender-documentation.pdf
Greece: Anonymity appears to be an option. "The bearer of the ticket shall keep the details of the ticket confidential and not reveal them to any third party." Source: https://www.opap.gen/identity-terms-of-use-lotto
Guyana: Not Anonymous. Source: https://www.kaieteurnewsonline.com/2013/05/16/winner-says-he-was-too-busy-to-collect-78m-lotto-prize/
India*: Not Anonymous. Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-35771298
*: Only available in the states of Kerala, Goa, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, West Bengal, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Manipur, Sikkim, Nagaland and Mizoram. Source: https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/lottery-mizoram-nagaland-sikkim-kerala-975188-2017-05-04
Indonesia: No current lottery. Source: https://apnews.com/45eb94ff1b1132470a7aa5902f0bc734
Israel: Not Anonymous by Law, Anonymous in Practice. “[A]lthough we have this right, we have never exercised it because we understood the difficulties the winners could encounter in the period after their win. We provide details about the winner, but in a manner that doesn’t disclose their identity,” Dolin Melnik, then-spokesperson for Israel’s Mifal Hapayis lottery told Haaretz in 2009." Source: https://www.timesofisrael.com/why-the-israeli-lottery-gives-winners-masks/
Jamaica: Not Anonymous. First initial and last name of winner was released but winner was allowed to wear a mask for photo. Source: https://news.e-servicis.com/news/trending/lottery-winner-takes-prize-in-scream-mask.1S/
Japan: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2017/09/08/business/japans-lottery-rakes-declining-revenues-younger-generation-gives-jackpot-chances-pass/#.XRYwVVMpCdM
Kenya: Not Anonymous. "9.1 When You claim or are paid a prize, You will automatically be deemed to grant to O8 LOTTO an irrevocable right to publish, through all types of media broadcasting, including the internet, for the purposes of promoting the win, Your full name (as well as Your nick name), hometown, photograph and video materials without any claim for broadcasting, printing or other rights" Source: https://mylottokenya.co.ke/terms-conditions
Malaysia: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://says.com/my/news/a-24-year-old-malaysian-woman-just-won-more-than-rm4-million-from-4d-lottery
Nagorno-Karabakh: Not Anonymous. Source: http://asbarez.com/120737/artsakh-lottery-winner-claims-car-prize/
New Zealand: 100% Anonymous if requested by winner. Source: https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10383080
North Korea: Not Anonymous. Source: https://www.nknews.org/2018/11/north-korean-sports-ministry-launches-online-lottery/
Northern Cyprus: Anonymity appears to be an option. Source: https://www.pressreader.com/cyprus/cyprus-today/20181124/281590946615912
Oman: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: http://www.omanlottery.com/
Philippines: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://www.rappler.com/nation/214995-ultra-lotto-winners-claim-winnings-pcso-october-2018
Qatar: Not Anonymous. Source: https://www.qatarliving.com/forum/qatar-living-lounge/posts/qatar-duty-free-announces-latest-us1-million
Romania: Anonymity appears to be an option. Source: https://www.thelotter.com/win-lottery-anonymously/
Russia: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: http://siberiantimes.com/otheothers/news/siberian-scoops-a-record-184513512-roubles-on-russian-state-lottery/
Samoa: Not Anonymous. Source: https://www.rnz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/191796/samoa%27s-lotto-winner-still-a-mystery
Saudi Arabia: No current lottery. Source: https://www.arabnews.com/police-arrest-lottery-crooks-victimizing-expats
Singapore: Anonymity appears to be an option. Source: https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/did-you-win-here-are-results-of-136m-toto-hongbao-draw
Solomon Islands: No current lottery. Source: http://www.paclii.org/sb/legis/consol_act/gala196/
South Africa: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://www.thesouthafrican.com/powerball-results/powerball-winner-r232-million-found-lottery-details/
South Korea: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: https://elaw.klri.re.keng_mobile/viewer.do?hseq=38378&type=sogan&key=5
Sri Lanka: Anonymity appears to be an option. Source: http://www.thesundayleader.lk/2010/01/31/where-do-all-the-lottery-winners-go/
Taiwan: 100% Anonymous if requested by the winner. Source: http://m.focustaiwan.tw/news/asoc/201806250011.aspx
Trinidad and Tobago: Anonymity appears to be an option. Source: https://trinidadexpress.com/news/local/student-wins-the-million-lotto/article_3f3c8550-570d-11e9-9cc3-b7550f9b4ad4.html
Tuvalu: No current lottery. Source: http://tuvalu-legislation.tv/cms/images/LEGISLATION/PRINCIPAL/1964/1964-0004/GamingandLotteries_1.pdf
United Arab Emirates: Not Anonymous. Source: https://www.ndtv.com/indians-abroad/shojith-ks-in-sharjah-uae-wins-abu-dhabi-duty-free-big-ticket-4-million-jackpot-rejects-calls-2032942
Vatican City: Anonymity appears to be an option. Source: https://cruxnow.com/vatican/2018/12/04/popes-white-lamborghini-up-for-raffle-winner-gets-trip-to-rome/
Vietnam: Anonymity appears to be an option. Source: https://ampe.vnexpress.net/news/news/vietnamese-farmer-identified-as-winner-of-4-million-lottery-jackpot-3484751.html
Windward Lottery Countries (Dominica, Grenada, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines): Not Anonymous. "Prize winners asked to do so by Winlot must give their name and address, and satisfactory establish their identity. All winners of the Jackpot (Match 6) prize will be photographed. Note that Winlot and CBN reserve the right to publish the names, addresses and photographs of all the winners." Source: http://www.stlucialotto.com/snl/super6_rules_regs.php
submitted by Kingofearth23 to LotteryLaws [link] [comments]

Manic Hanukkah joyride 2019. AMA

I have pretty bad bipolar, To the point where I’ve been hospitalized multiple times, and I’ve tried a slew of drugs to help but to no avail. My first actual manic episode occurred in 2011 accompanied by a god complex and believing that my car became a time machine. I would stay at random places in the city of Chicago that year, until I finally ended up back in my parents house in the suburbs which was the very last place I wanted to go after having a failed suicide attempt there prior to my mania. I have saved most of my manic episode images and videos on my hard drives these past few years in an attempt to keep myself from going off the deep end like that again, little did I know that it would not help in any sense of the word. Last year I was self medicating myself with whatever street drugs I could get my hands on to help alleviate my internal brain pains of this existence, and I had been doing it for a while so nothing really changed in that regard, however I had a brilliant idea for a new cryptocurrency and it really took off on 4chan. This token was going to break into the adult webcam tipping industry which is currently in the hands of many third party websites and they don’t even use crypto. So in this stroke of self supposed brilliance a team of incredibly talented people came into my life and helped me develop my idea further. I was broke so I had no actual money to pay these guys, however they were kind enough to accept the tokens that I made as part of their share and payment for the work they completed. Things were off to an amazing start, we had a website, and an incredible back end developer who was on an entire different level as far as his knowledge of cryptography and cryptocurrency development. As things progressed slowly I began to have these ideas of also self supposed brilliance, like being able to decipher and decode my personal subjective viewpoint of reality and also communicate to myself through this “external” self of my immediate environment outside of time/space. Simulation theory also played a big role, along with synchronicity and the phrase “there are no coincidences.” Repeated through my unbeknownst to me revving up doozy of a manic episode. It was so gradual and logic to me in those moments that I never for a chance thought that I was on my way to yet another mega minded god complex episode. As I started spiraling downward in viewpoints of many who had invested in my project, my mother eventually called the police to my apartment for a wellness check. Now I had gotten kicked out of my previous place for inviting some real shitheads to move in, in order to make my newly ex 21 year old girlfriend and my old roommate as uncomfortable as possible. Yeah she started sleeping with my roommate after I got a job...anyway, I digress. I was able to move into an amazing studio apartment using funds that I had obtained from selling a few billion of my tokens to a guy OTC. Things just seemed to magically come together for me in this manic state of mind. So the first wellness check went horribly, as when the police came I was totally naked and they had to convince me to put my clothes on upon entering my abode. It didn’t take me long to figure out I needed clothes to go outside as I was making the argument that I was doing nothing wrong being nude in my own apartment. Next thing I know it’s been 10 entire days in a psych ward. When I finally got out I was welcomed to my entire crypto project team abandoning not only myself but the project entirely. I was devastated and felt betrayed. They had put up a paragraph on the old website giving details on the situation and how they were moving forward with things and starting a new project. I kept moving at incredible speed towards the insanity cliffs that I could not see from my level viewpoint of the mental path ahead of me. To the point of running away from my apartment because I was afraid my mom would call the police on me once again. I ended up taking the metra train all the way to Wisconsin and started walking to Milwaukee from there. I had an ex girlfriend that I had hoped might take me in. I walked until my feet started disintegrating off my legs. I managed to get most of the way to Milwaukee where the police arrested me for walking on the side of the freeway. When they pulled over I was very resisting about them taking me from my PTSD psych ward good times. They ended up only keeping me in jail for the rest of the evening before releasing me into the late night fog. For some reason while I was in jail I got paranoid that those who were in with me were trying to poison me and have me locked in a cell to be killed, so immediate upon release I fled to the nearest bus bound as far north and away from that place as possible. I literally started seeing synchronicities that confirmed all of my increasingly delusional thoughts, going as far as thinking my parents were abusive to us as children and they too were joining in the hunt. I had flashes of imagery of my parents being horrible people and torturing children, and I continued my escape to self assured places of safety. One of the areas I found myself in once I exited walking for miles along some railroad tracks. I felt people trying to ambush me and trap me in this small religious residential town that seemed surrounded by a massive fence with barbed wire. At one point I took my shirt off and acted like a jogger, to where someone released their dogs leash and right onto me...his was not imagined. I ran as fast as I could into a parked boat that was half filled with rain water, and I was so scared that I had to actually dip myself all the way into that very frigid water through my pants as I literally felt hunted. I heard gunshots and voices shouting in the distance, dogs barking, I just laid there completely motionless for my life depended on it. When I finally thought the coast was clear I got out as inconspicuously as possible to which I was met with yet another thunderous brigade of voices and gunshots. I then found myself in a recycling bin before I started to sneak very low around parked cars in the driveways. I finally made it to the end of this nightmare as I could see the fence beyond a final row of houses, I waited a few minutes before finally darting at full speed to and over that barbed wire fence cutting my lower back in the process. So there I was, shirtless, bleeding from a decent sized cut in my back, down the side of a road with quite a bit of traffic, coupled with my state of mind at that time it felt very supernatural. I felt like people were staring at me from their cars and recognizing me as a being not from this world. In my mind I had thought I recognized specific entities that I was channeling information from through the akashic records. I had started posting rap style videos on TikTok, delving through a multitude of emotional ranges and topics. I had thought I was trying to wake up the entire planet to the illusion pulled into their eyes. The final experience I had upon returning south to Milwaukee took me through open fields continuing to feel like a hunted piece of game. I felt that there were other beings that joined this hunt as well, that were not human at all. So now I was trying to evade an alien species that I had thought was controlling the police from the woods of Milwaukee. I had the idea to try to mimic who I had thought these creatures looked and moved like, and I inverted my jacket to further disguise my appearance. I had thought I saw them coming out of the woods so I figured that was where the aliens nest was. It was logical for me to try my best to blend in with them, and of all places to look for me, the last place I would think they would search would be their very own nest. So I mimicked what I thought they were doing going in and out of the woods at a high speed and with veracity. I waited until all cars passed and ran full speed into the woods, and being surprised with not only very thick trees, thorns, and bushes...but a very steep declined terrain. It was very hard for me to control but I kept running through and downward to the depths of what I thought would be an alien nest hell hole. It was pitch black that night and I could barely make out anything, but after about 5 minutes of diving down this steen terrain I began to see a clearing...it was water. As I exited the tree line I walked along this seemingly endless lake that had lights out incredibly far on the horizon, I came to the conclusion that the aliens lived underwater in this lake and the lights were potentially part of their base. As I continued walking down he sliver of a shoreline among the bushes, I saw something I was not expecting...severed giraffe heads with their tongues sticking out. It was surreal. I concluded that this was a place where they studied our animals and dissected them. Upon seeing this I noticed that in the near tree line there was a break, and a very comfortable looking incline out from the pits of that hell I had stumbled into. I calmly walked up and out of there as casually as possible. The police then picked me up after I told them where I was headed and it was around Christmas, so they obliged. I had figured I passed their test and was now the alpha dog in the system of control there in Milwaukee. These scenes and experiences are as close to what I experienced in those moments as I can possibly detail, the police got me on a bus back to Chicago where I finally made it home. This of course was not the end. I had left all of my keys and a lot of clothes I had with me in the deep woods in Milwaukee, so upon arriving to my apartment I could not enter. I ended up throwing a brick into the back door window and entering finally to what I thought would be peace. The entire building I lived in was dead quiet. I had thought that my neighbors were all taken out by black ops because they had been a part of an organized crime scheme, but it was just Christmas. Even my neighbors annoying dog was gone and I assumed they had shot it as well. It is truly incredible what a completely delusional mind is capable of, and I was completely sober the entire time. Once I finally got a chance to sit for a minute and gather my highly dependable thoughts and realized I needed to go to Walmart. I was all comfortable and showered as well as wearing a super comfy ninja turtles onesie that I was planning on rocking in the store while shopping. Immediately upon exiting my apartment complex I realized that I no longer had keys and there was no way I could get to the back door without someone letting me through. I took this as a sign to once again leave my apartment and my belongings and find a safer place. The universe confirmed that I wasn’t supposed to go back home, I had no key and I locked myself out. I headed straight downtown. It was now one of the days on Hanukkah and there were Jewish people everywhere. I felt their eyes grazing me and giving me chuckles as I was wearing this giant green fleece ninja turtles onesie walking around downtown Chicago. I was wearing some old shoes at the time, but because I had convinced myself that shoes were hurting my ability to practice walking correctly for my anatomy, I ditched them in the streets. I walked up to the nearest train station and got on. When I was in the train I had noticed some printouts taped to the car walls showing a human figure above the tracks with a little electric zap near his feet. In my mind I saw this as directions someone had left me on how to finally exit the matrix. I was supposed to jump in the tracks and I would be out of this place as Neo did with landline phones. I slowly made my way to the very rear car of the train and opened the door and slinkied my way through the last safety chain keeping me from my finally found freedom from this horrible nightmare of a “reality” game. I made my way onto the tracks and hopped on top of them in my bare feet. I finally made it to the electrified elevated rail and braced myself for the incoming trip of a lifetime. I gathered all the courage I had and made the jump...nothing. Ok strange. I jumped off and made my way along the other tracks further analyzing them to make sure I had indeed jumped on the electrified track. Confused as I verified it was, I hopped along the other tracks and back towards the wooden platform. During this entire scene there were many people, mostly Jewish who were trying to convince me not to do what I was trying to do. They didn’t know I was escaping the matrix, they thought I was trying to harm myself. I pressed on. I noticed there was a space between the two directional electrified tracks where I would be able to grab one line in each hand, further securing the one way journey I was about to take. I knew that if I grabbed them palms down I wouldn’t let go. I walked to the area and braced myself for what very well nigh still be a very painful ride out. I got in my knees between the tracks and told myself there was no way I would come this far and go though all of this hell to pussy out now. I gathered all of my courage and grabbed both lines. Again I was met with nothing. Maybe I was immune to the electricity? Maybe I had already made the trip? Very confused I started waking on the tracks back towards the shouting people and the platform. Jumping on each rail one foot at a time. BOOM. It hit me before my big toe even touched one of the rails. It threw me immediately off the track and I had a brief moment of unconsciousness while in the air. I landed between the tracks and continued to make it to the platform. A jolt of intense pain shot up my foot from a now bloody big toe. This was entirely unexpected to me as the track I had gotten jolted from was the one I had tested previously with no power. Confused and a bit tingly and disoriented I limped in pain back up to the wooden platform. One of the guards asked if I was alright and I just hurried past them saying I was fine. I got down to the street and in my hazy mind was able to make out a van with its driver standing next to it open and running in the street. Taking this as a sign to move quickly I jumped into his car and shut the door while he yelled for me to not continue. I then grabbed the wheel and hit the gas. I was getting out of here. I never thought I could drive this fast. I was weaving in and out of traffic, barely missing both cars and pedestrians, while assuming the police wouldn’t be far behind. I threw the man’s phone and toll device out of the window as soon as I could. I was still wearing my coat on top of my onesie which I had failed to mention earlier, and while driving I made sure I inverted it and try to blend in to normal flowing traffic. In my stable mind I had come to the conclusion that this van had been used for unanswered trafficking and that there was dead children unseen in the cargo space. I felt like this was a mission to infiltrate this trafficking network to find out what was happening. I had to once again blend in. I drove as fast as I could for the immediate escape of the city, and upon the freeway I stayed within the laws of the road. I are it through several small towns until one seemed as if a police car had started to escort me a certain direction. I acted at first to be taking his direction until halfway through a turn I bolted he opposite direction, ensuing a chase. Many cars were then called and I was being acutely chased now and I started driving to the very ends of my physical limits of reaction time and the vans capability of speed and control. I thought I had a way out, but soon I realized I was trapped. I saw a bus parked near the casino where I had ended up and thought his might have been a drop off/pickup location for the traffickers. I stopped for a moment next to the bus and made eye contact to a very confused looking driver. I then started trying to maneuver away until I quickly ran out of road and bottomed out the delivery van. My ride was coming to an end, I had managed to take half of my onesie off while being in between pursuit so I was now half naked and being commanded by many guy wielding police officers to get out of the vehicle. Thankfully I had remembered in that moment it is very important to always show your hands to police. This detail may have saved me from being suicided by making a wrong move. I was still stuck in the car with my seatbelt on, and repeated to the officers that I was moving my hand to open the door. I opened the door and they proceeded to have me crawl on my stomach towards them scraping against sharp chunks of broken concrete along the way. I kept crawling for seemingly forever as any one of these cops or a failed movement on my part could end this moment quite disastrously. I finally was allowed to get up with their assistance and subsequent handcuffing. They sat me on a large piece of concrete and tried to cover my genital area while trying not to laugh. It was quite the site I am sure. A half naked man wearing a green onesie barefoot and bleeding from his driving toe. I was laughing with the cops and small banter was exchanged as they tried to figure out what to do with me. They asked me what was going on and I told them I know where the bodies were, and I pointed to the concrete that was laying in the area. I was convinced that all the missing children’s bodies were being disposed of via pulverizing and into our cities concrete structures and sidewalks. I didn’t say this to the officers but assumed they knew what I meant when I pointed to the concrete when they asked. I slowly got paranoid they were going to try to kill me. I was asking them questions about where they were taking me and I had thought his was finally the end. I knew too much. An ambulance arrived and I was taken to my certain death. I arrived at a hospital and they do the common questions and my paranoia is in high gear. They want to strap me into the gurney and I kept vehemently refusing. They actually respected my decision as long as I was calm. Slowly my paranoid mentality began to fade as I was logically asking myself why nurses would waste all the effort testing me physically if they were just going to kill me anyway. I was finally safe. Until they injected me with antipsychotics. I am not a fan of big pharma, but I can attest that the shots did help kick me out of my delusional mind. The side effects were horrible, but my mind was finally getting to a point where I could see my insanely delusional mind from the outside instead of through the failed system I had unintentionally built over the course of the last few months. I will never forget this experience. It was indeed life changing and PTSD inducing. I have a completely new respect for what the mind can do, and what seemingly benign and silly mental games can potentially become. I had thought I figured it out, all the while reminding myself that I hadn’t, but also feeling as I was the one who was chosen by the architect of the universe to be his speaker and teacher. I had convinced myself I was an ascended master, practicing transcendental mediation. I was teaching people on the street how to walk. That part is actually true. Balls first, your pinky toe side of your foot is supposed to make first contact, followed by your big toe ball and finally your heel. Look it up. ;) This was quite an unplanned story but I hope you enjoyed the ride and the experience as best as I could convey to to you and your incredibly complex and relatively small space between your two ears. Thank you and have an incredible rest of your vibrant and passionate existence. Remember to respect yourselves and the power you have both individually and collectively. 4444. <3
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Summary of the Governor's 5/14 Coronavirus Briefing

Previous streams can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCporaXCeaOJgZKz7y3C0zbg
Thank you for all the awards and other offers but please save your money for the future economic uncertainty which is likely going to occur.
Ohio: 24,800 confirmed cases (with 1,557 extra probable cases), 1,388/24,800 confirmed deaths (with 146 extra probable deaths), 4,718 hospitalizations, 1,268/4,718 in the ICU
United States: 1,397,700 confirmed cases and 84,109 deaths.
Here is a link to a google drive that shows the history of cases and deaths created by kcmasterpiece347: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1CNGX6aLGsyIWZctChwsQ-UdRQ8JEzhuS9I_1oVnkb4s/edit?usp=sharing
0110010001100010 has put together information on the latest and most accurate numbers here: http://covid19.danoniot.com/
Here are some graphs showing the latest information created by st1tchy:
4/7: https://imgur.com/BX95vIU
4/8: https://imgur.com/OdP8nFu
4/9: https://imgur.com/bXtPvZI
4/12: https://imgur.com/Zu2G5Dp
4/13: https://imgur.com/VqYuLzP
4/14: https://imgur.com/KD43gKy
4/15: https://imgur.com/JHwcrsJ
4/16: https://imgur.com/dNCPrZr
4/17: https://imgur.com/rzkZwuJ
4/18: https://imgur.com/4FFkKHn
4/19: https://imgur.com/bMEGH0e
4/20: https://imgur.com/a/vvOfaD6
4/21: https://imgur.com/QJXKMfx
4/22: https://imgur.com/dBSow4z
4/23: https://imgur.com/Ea7GULT
4/24: https://imgur.com/MQTZWku
4/27: https://imgur.com/UeHhlve
4/28: https://imgur.com/IPt12zi
4/29: https://imgur.com/zdVKLQA
4/30: https://imgur.com/dCeij16
5/01: https://imgur.com/bIPUbzw
5/04: https://imgur.com/G28UoY3
5/06: https://imgur.com/VitMOFA
2:03 PM: The Governor begins speaking
Today I'm wearing a tie from Case Western Reserve University
This week is Police Week. I want to thank everyone in law enforcement. Unfortunately, many events honoring our fallen police officers have had to be canceled due to COVID-19. I would like to take a moment to mention those who have died serving Ohio in 2020. Let's have a moment of silence in remembrance of their sacrifice and the sacrifices of those currently serving Ohio.
A close friend of mine, Dwight Radcliff died on May 6th. Fran and I attended his funeral. He was the longest serving sheriff at the time of his retirement in 2013.
Former state representative Andy Thompson also unexpectedly yesterday. He served the state well.
On Tuesday, I talked about childcare and explained the concerns we had. We've been discussing this for weeks, trying to figure out what the best practices for reopening would be. There really is not enough data about children and COVID-19. We want to get more data and find a way to reopen safely, in a way that protects children and childcare employees. if we do this wrong we will run the risk of exposing more Ohioans to COVID-19. Childcare providers will be allowed to reopen on May 31st. This will look different from before and I am going to have Joni Close, President of the Sisters of Charity Foundation speak about the changes we plan to make.
2:12 PM: The Governor stops speaking
2:12 PM: Joni Close begins speaking
Maximum of 9 per classroom for most children, with toddlers having a maximum of 6 per classroom. Hygienic standards will be increased dramatically. These will be only some of the changes and there will be more. Some of these might make you somewhat uncomfortable due to it being different but we believe it will be the best for you and your children.
2:16 PM: Joni Close stops speaking
2:16 PM: The Governor begins speaking
There's really no playbook out there for doing this. We need to be cautious to keep everyone safe during this pandemic. We will be constantly monitoring the current situation and we may make changes as necessary based on what we see.
We're going to perform a study into the childcare situation as it reopens. This will make Ohio a leader in the country, as we will be capable of learning more about how the virus spreads. Unfortunately, there is a lot of what we don't know and that will affect how we proceed. Childcare providers will need help due to our changes. We are going to give 60 million dollars to Ohio childcare providers, both public and private, in order to ensure they are properly funded. We will have additional information available online shortly.
2:19 PM: The Governor stops speaking
2:19 PM: The Lieutenant Governor starts speaking
May is a new chapter in our response to COVID-19. We're trying to keep a balance between health of Ohioans and the health of our economy. Some more businesses may be reopening but keep in mind that it will be up to the local health departments to control what reopens and what does not.
Day Camps will reopen on May 31st. The protocols governing day camps will be released tomorrow online.
BMVs will reopen on May 26th. We want you to use the online services, as we've put a lot of effort into moving many services there. There will be some cases where you have to go into the BMV but only go as absolutely necessary. There is still an extension on renewals, so you do not have to do this immediately.
Campgrounds will also open completely, on May 21st. They will have to meet certain requirements that are currently available online.
Gyms and fitness center may reopen on May 26th. The new protocols for them will be available later today. Non contact and limited sports will also reopen on May 26th. Other, more contact-oriented sports will be investigated for reopening as well.
Pools will also be able reopen on May 26th. The CDC has found no evidence of the spread of COVID-19 in water. Water parks and amusement parks will not be reopening based on our guidance.
Horse racing can reopen on May 22nd but spectators will be prohibited. This does not mean that Casinos or Racinos can reopen.
2:30 PM: The Lieutenant Governor stops speaking
2:30 PM: Amy Acton starts speaking
231,795 tested in total. Of those infected, 4,121 were health care workers.
We're digging deep into the policies related to childcare and how it will affect the spread of COVID-19. I want to thank our entire childcare team. We're going to be working with a national study, that will have a large focus on Ohio, in order to find out the best practices for reopening childcare. We're working to become a nationwide leader in the study of childcare during this pandemic.
2:36 PM: Amy Acton stops speaking
2:36 PM: Question Period Begins
Regarding childcare and with the possibility of further illness and death in children with COVID-19, is it possible we are gambling the lives of our children by reopening and doing this study?
Amy Acton: I don't think we're gambling by doing this. Everyone is important and deserves protection. We are going to do this based on expert advice on best practices. We need to give parents a chance to go back to work and prosper. We know of the cases of children getting far sicker and we're paying close attention to this. COVID-19 has an exaggerated response on our immune system no matter the age, but we want to make sure to learn and understand how it affects children, as well, as time goes on.
2:39 PM: There are concerns that children are not receiving the education they would have otherwise. Will schools be capable of reopening in the fall and what can you do to ensure they are receiving the education they need if they do not?
Governor: I think this is a major concern. Many teachers are making strides in distance learning but some kids don't have internet or have other issues. The fact that we know so little about COVID-19 makes us feel that schools cannot reopen any time soon but every school is currently looking into ways they can reopen. We still don't know how things will be by the fall but we will do everything we can.
2:42 PM: It sounds like many childcare centers will have to turn families away. How do you plan on advising them on that subject?
Governor: I think it's going to be difficult for any of us to predict how the market will change with these new rules. We are giving money to childcare providers in order to ensure they are capable of reopening. This is a work in progress, which means that we're still learning and finding out new ways to lessen the spread of COVID-19, while reopening childcare.
Childcare providers may have to hire more employees in order to serve the families they had in the past. Unfortunately, some may not be capable of reopening due to financial troubles. We did all of these things in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and we will keep making these decisions with that in mind.
2:46 PM: It seems that cases, deaths, and other metrics have plateaued rather than gone down. What has changed in how you perceive success as time has gone on?
Governor: We've seen a plateau over three weeks in terms of all of our metrics. We were most worried about a large surge. We're still ramping up our testing. We're doing 8,000 tests every day sat this point. We need to keep our testing capacity increasing while also ensuring our supply chain can keep getting those tests out to those who need them. Testing and contact tracing is how we're going to keep this virus from spreading. There are many other indicators, such as traffic rates throughout the state, that we are looking at in order to make future decisions regarding mitigations.
2:48 PM: Reddit is freaking out and it’s causing some problems with my updates. Fixed as of 2:50 PM.
Amy Acton: No one on our team is ignoring the concern and worry that Ohioans are feeling right now. As we go on, you need to keep in mind how at risk you are and use that knowledge to make your decisions and keep yourself safe.
2:51 PM: Using what we've learned about antibody testing, how do we know that we didn't have a surge earlier?
Amy Acton: This is a process that will take years. We won't understand COVID-19 for quite some time. Many have been claiming that they had many symptoms of COVID-19 early on in the knowledge of the disease. Obviously, as time goes on, hindsight will be 20-20. We'll keep looking into new information as it comes out.
2:54 PM: The most prevalent question I've received is regarding the unemployment system not serving Ohioans properly. I know you've made improvements but many feel it is not enough. What more can you do for them?
Lieutenant Governor: This is the thing I've been most frustrated for Ohioans about personally. Director Kim Hall has been working to do everything her team can do to improve the system and has already created the new system for 1099 employees. I know that around 100,000 people have not been served yet and many others have not been able to get through to receive more information on their claims. We're all doing everything we can to expand the system as possible. Our system is very old and difficult to update but many other states are facing these same issues. Unfortunately, we have received many fraudulent claims and those need to be policed and denied. This is part of what leads to such delays.
2:59 PM: What targets will state agencies be hitting in terms of reductions in the coming fiscal year?
Governor: We'll be discussing that with the legislature. We've already made very tough cuts but we don't have any new information available at this time. One thing I can say is that this is a very difficult time. Costs are going up and our revenues are decreasing dramatically.
3:01 PM: Do you have an idea of how many families might be left out of day cares? Will licensing become more flexible? What about using school facilities?
Governor: It's not our goal to have any families left out of the system. We're doing surveys on how many providers will be coming back. We'll adjust as necessary. We can't make any definitive statements at this time.
Lieutenant Governor: Please remember that we're working on supporting the childcare industry to ensure that all of this can work.
3:03 PM: Are you going to remove Dr. Acton's order that closed school facilities until June in order to allow youth sports to reopen?
Governor: We were actually just discussing that earlier. It's a very good point. We're still looking into that.
Lieutenant Governor: Grounds are not technically closed by the order, only buildings. We will not be forcing any local community to reopen. I am sure that as we go on, there will be things that slipped through the cracks and we want to ensure that the lines of communication are open as much as possible.
3:06 PM: Are you concerned about a pending legal battle over your orders? As you know, Wisconsin's stay at home order was struck down by their Supreme court.
Governor: I have already been sued a lot. We want to ensure that our orders conform more to what we are seeing day to day. We are seeing stories from Europe about second waves and we really don't want to have to see that in Ohio. We need to be very careful as everything opens up. Staying safe in this crucial time will decide our future numbers and whether we have to close again.
3:08 PM: There is a feeling that your Minority Health Task Force hasn't made any new statements or released more information. What is going on with this?
Governor: I will be talking about that either Monday or Tuesday. This virus has pulled back the curtain on poverty and racial issues, especially in regards to health care access. We've worked with the legislature to look into issues of infant and maternal mortality and we saw these issues already. We're now going to have to figure out new ways to help African American communities in Ohio. That will come next week.
3:11 PM: Why are we not hearing more about treatment? Also will we not be returning to normal life until a vaccine comes out? Is Hydroxychloroquine being given out to patients?
Amy Acton: I talked a lot about treatment early on but I can talk about it more in the future. We've received shipments of new drugs for use against COVID-19. There is still developing information on drugs like Hydroxychloroquine, in terms of its affect on COVID-19. For now we'll have to treat the symptoms up until we can find a cure, if we can find a cure. The thing that worries me the most is the low oxygen levels found in those with COVID-19, who are walking around, not even realizing it.
3:16 PM: How can you prove to those who are trusting in your orders that reopening as we are is safe?
Amy Acton: When we first made our orders, we were using information from George Bush's administration, that we believed would best protect Ohioans. We do know that this has had effects on the economy and even people's mental and physical health. This is going to be a collaborative process but it needs to go on with caution. The biggest thing that will slow and stop the spread of disease will be how everyone lives. Be judicious with your choices and decisions as time goes on.
3:19 PM: How do you plan on bringing forward gun reforms in Ohio that you promised, despite the pandemic?
Governor: That's a continuing discussion with the legislature.
3:21 PM: There's been information in certain nursing home facilities regarding the zone and region system you've mentioned that showed that some of them have no information regarding that system. What do you think about that?
Governor: This is not something that should be happening. I believe you that this is happening but it's something that I do not want to have happening. I don't know what facility you're talking about but I think we're going to keep moving forward on that.
Amy Acton: I'll look into this and speak to our leaders in that area regarding improving this.
3:24 PM: Are we getting close to returning to normal regarding surgeries?
Governor: It's been in the past week or so that we've released new orders regarding that. We need to keep monitoring our hospital capacity as time goes on in order to decide if we can return to normal
3:25 PM: Question Period Ends
3:25 PM: The Governor begins speaking
Thank you to all of our childcare workers and everyone else returning to work.
We'll be playing a rendition of Amazing Grace by the Combined Pinkerton North and Pinkerton Central Marching Bands.
No more updates until Monday unless it's absolutely necessary.
3:27 PM: The Stream Ended.
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are there any casinos open in wisconsin yet video

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