Griner's now in the same situation as Paul Whelan, which is actually where she always was: a bargaining chip. She's worth more than some sketchy nobody, of course, but she could easily be there 2, 3 more years.

Relations are a tad frosty right now.

Here
the Rich
buy their way out
Ms Greiner w/Two jobs isn't
but in Russia even the Rich aren't Safe

Smokin' Joe
could sure use a
nice October Sur-
prise right about Now.

fuk
FAX
who
even
Gives
a FUCK
re Death
Pedantry?

other than
yourSelf obv.

but that IS
a Brilliant idea!

here's Another:
YOU do it!
on Spec!

it'll keep ya Busy
and we're All
just Dying
to Know!

thanks!

Spend even just a few minutes reading about Viktor Bout and then come back and tell me we should set him free to get a basketball player back.

I wonder how much having weed on the ballot will boost Dem turnout in those states?

@7 -- Great
questions!
see: @6.

(I'm sensing a-
nother Pulit-
zer here
sir).

@3: Wrong. "The Federal Bureau of Investigation doesn't have a mass shooting definition. Instead, the FBI defines "mass murder" as an incident where four or more people are killed, which can include gun violence."

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2022/06/05/mass-shooting-defined-meaning/7481731001/

@8: I have, and if that's what it takes, we should. And for a 1st-rounder like Bout, we should get Whelan back, too.

@16 - She claims she didn't know they were packed. I find that hard to believe.

I always know where my cannabis is 24/7 365 as tokers always know where our stash is. But I might be unaware that I packed a cigarette lighter.

@16 I would bet she had done it before with no issues and didn't think the Russian government would go after her since she was part of a Russian team and had contacts. If it wasn't a vape cartridge they no doubt would have found some other contraband or reason to hold her. Her mistake was not understanding the larger global tension and getting on the plane in the first place to go play there. Whoever her management/agent is really screwed her over by letting her go and assuming it would be ok.

@18 - very good point

@2,

You should contact the President of your local BLM chapter and let them know that you personally demand a public statement every time a person of color is murdered. Please report back and let us know how it goes.

@16 Thanks, Tucker II.

@17 My wife once realized that she had a pair of hand pruners in her back pocket as we walked up to the TSA checkpoint. She'd been doing some garden work before we left home for the flight and didn't notice that she had them on her still. The TSA agent was very kind (tool less than 7" long? OK!). I can 100% believe that someone would forget a vape cartridge before an international flight.

@22 It's common for WNBA players to play in Russia in our offseason. It's one of the few ways for athletes not in the top tier of sponsorships to make a living.

@23: 6 people total were shot, 2 died.

That's a mass shooting, not a mass murder. I look forward to the Stranger establishing 4 shot as a standard.

It unarguably was a(nother) school shooting, and I note that yet again, the wound-collecting murderer didn't use a swimming pool or a bomb or the sharp edge of an envelope.

@19- my thought (hope?) was that it would get more young people out to vote. If they voted as often as they yelled at us old people about how much things suck, the country would be a very different place.

Please don't blow up the Ash Lauryn gig. I'd like to enjoy myself without any help from the bridge and tunnel crowd.

@9 & 33: dvs99 for the WIN!! Bravo and well said.

It''s not surprising that all the usual lowlife trolling MAGAt incels have descended upon WBA player Brittney Griner like Mike Pence's flies on shit. May you all end up in a Russian prison and have to bow and scrape to the global evil that is Vladimir Putin. Let's see you Orange Turd bootlickers laugh then. You certainly won't be able to enjoy your boasted about Free Dumbs over there like you do here in AmeriKKKa.

@37 PrincessAngeline#2: Agreed on getting out of working for any corporation. +1 I have to carefully budget to support myself, but it's worth not being shat upon by big profiteering companies who expect 80 our work weeks and only want to pay for 20 of them, with no benefits or retirement funds available for employees.
I also agree with you that Britney Griner pulled a rather foolish stunt while playing abroad. I do think it's sad, though, that these detainees have to be batted around any bargaining table at all, like tennis balls. (Note that my comment @38 is not aimed at you directly. It's in reference to previous asinine commenters in this thread. They know who they are).

Black (and white) men need to stop picking up firearms, because every time they do, someone dies, and lives are ruined. Picking up the gun makes you a sucker to the elites. It's no accident they want you to pick up that firearm, even if white people are occasionally killed in a robbery or rape, because when that happens, it also does the work of the supremacist elites. Stop picking up firearms in America, unless you're pointing them at fascists invading your area, which is what might come next, though I think siege by starvation is much more likely.

Partial eclipses are nothing compared to the real thing, a full solar eclipse. I've been to two, one in Cabo San Lucas, which was a whopping 7 minutes long, and another in Oregon. They are worth travelling some distance to see, IF the skies are likely to be clear. Partial eclipses are NOT worth travelling for.

@43 PrincessAngeline#2: It's a day later, I read this, and I hear you. You have demonstrated Reason #1 why I believe so many people in foreign countries routinely brand anyone from the U.S. as "dumb Americans". People do dumb things.
To me, what is particularly sad is how costly Phoenix Mercury center, Britney Griner's international faux pas abroad is proving for her. What is even more tragic is that WBA players don't have the domestic (within the U.S. ) court time as their male NBA counterparts do. I believe the newly retired Olympic Gold Medal winning Seattle Storm point guard, Sue Bird, had been quoted as saying in an interview in The Seattle Times that female athletes don't have the pay, respect, and court time in U.S. cities as male athletes do, and thus are forced to play abroad. If female athletes had as much U.S court time as their male counterparts, horrible situations like Britney's wouldn't be happening. Her team would be less likely to travel abroad to countries like Russia to play professional basketball. That needs to change.