The recent grand jury decisions involving civilian deaths at the hands of police officers have been like a one-two punch. Anger is still simmering in Ferguson, where a grand jury declined to indict officer Darren Wilson last month. Now that a separate grand jury has let NYPD cop Daniel Pantaleo off the hook for killing Eric Garner via chokehold on Staten Island this summer, plenty of pissed-off protesters in NYC have been busy ​wreaking havoc of their own.

Bona fide and armchair activists alike have been mulling over the same question: Who the hell did they find to serve on these grand juries? Even Greta Van Susteren—a Fox News personality—doesn't get what's going on here. Of course, we'll never find out who was on the grand jury because their identities are a closely guarded secret. As such, we'll never be able to ask how they came to their decision.

But we don't have to guess what cops think about all this—law enforcement officers have their own online forums, and if you ever want to hear the other side of the debate, those are the places where you go to find it.

For instance, there's ​​Thee Rant, a forum where only verified cops can post. You can also visit ​PoliceOne, a multipurpose site where officers can both buy body cameras and debate what happened in the Eric Garner video. As you might imagine, posters are pretty secure in the idea that both Garner and Brown asked for it. And as upset as civilians are about the decision, these officers appear equally upset about what they see as the degradation of their profession in the public eye by people who don't respect their authority. Anyway, here's a sampling of how the other side thinks:

Poli​ceOne

Kenstah:

But...the media keeps saying the officer did a CHOKE HOLD, like we're the WWF or something, NOT calling it a carotid restraint like it's supposed to be called.

Burn this bitch down!

Rick445:

Okay this is bad, right. People are protesting the POLICE and honoring CRIMINALS. And now for the multiplier: "Federal Authorities will conduct their own investigation." i.e. the first one was somehow flawed. ERIC HOLDER you are HELPING tear this country apart and attempting to tarnish my profession. Look in the mirror, do the right thing and RESIGN NOW! President Obama, if he does not do the right thing, do it for him.

Aviano25

I think this is the start of the civil war several people have suspected may be coming...stay guarded brothers in blue...that's white, black, asian, etc...

DPSCanton

What officers SHOULD do is nothing. This may sound horrible, but as we all have been shown, this is the truth. Most officers don't live in the neighborhood they patrol in, so if the citizens don't care about the neighborhod [sic], why should the police? Answer calls, take reports, TAKE YOUR PAYCHECK and go home. Don't be proactive, let the neighborhood destroy itself. It's not worth our lives or our career [sic.] If people want to live among criminals, thats [sic] their choice. I hope all the businesses that burned in Ferguson relocate and do not open shop in that town again. Police can't service people who cant [sic] serve and take care of themselves, their neighborhoods, so don't even try.

SAPDMAS

I WILL DO EVERYTHING IN MY POWER TO KEEP MY 2 SONS FROM EVER, EVER BEING LEOS [law enforcement officers]. This proffesion [sic] has been thrown under the bus and we have little to no support anymore. I will not let my sons be sacraficed for ungrateful, spoiled, hateful animals.

haziz

My 5 tips on how black and others can survive a police encounter with police are very simple and if you stop and think about it make a lot of sense: 
1.Do NOT under any circumstance ARGUE with police out in the street. You cannot win an argument with police out in the field. 
2.2. Do NOt raise your voice, but stay cool and calm. Do NOT make any quick or aggressive movements. Remember the police officer does NOT know you and will react to protect himself or those around him. 
3.Police know that hands kill, so always keep your hands in plain sight. Before you move your hands ask permission, officer I need to go into my back pocket to get my ID, is that OK with you? 
4.NEVER run from police even if you are innocent. When you run you create a heightened sense that something must be wrong here. 
5.DO NOT resist arrest – if you do one of three things is going to happen: 
a.You are going to get beat down till you stop resisting 
b.You are going to get injured or accidentally killed 
c.And you are going to have charges taken out against you.

​Thee Rant:

Da job sucks

Good bless the jurors for having common sense and not being bullied by Sharpton, Obama, holder and the rest of the racists

WasInTheBag

I was afraid this was going to be payback for Ferguson. Thankfully that wasn't the case.

ProjectKid


Thank the good Lord it happened in the Isle of Staten where there are still some working class white folks. The same situation in the bogey down would be an indictment for Murder. That's what "justice" has become. It all depends on where it happens.

HAPD

Hands up-fo chicken wings-hands up fo Obamaphones-hands up fo free cheeze. Good intelligent work on behalf of the majority of this Grand Jury. I'll be willing to wager that they can actually speak English and think and write in it also. 
As for Alwhore Sharpton Inc.-go stick yer head up a blow dryer you skull headed leech.

EddieR

F u c k Black America, their equal or worse than whites, when speaking of Racism...

F u c k Diversity, it's not working and never will work, Water and Oil don't Mix, no matter how much you try it always separates itself, Diversity only accomplishes one thing, Lazy, Dumb idiots who don't care about any Position they attain, You Listening Mr. President ?

So to summarize: At least a few cops out there think there's a war against them, that they should retaliate by not trying to help people anymore, that black people are just being racist, and that the media is incorrectly referring to the maneuver that killed Eric Garner. 

Amid all of this, a cop ​killed an unarmed black man in Phoenix on Tuesday evenin​g. 

Follow Allie Conti on Twitte​r.

​In November, nearly 70 percent of voters in Washington, DC, cast ballots in support of legalizing weed for personal use. But in one of the more bizarre quirks of American democracy, those votes could now be invalidated by one Republican Congressman, whose relationship with the District goes no further than Capitol Hill steakhouses and smoking patios.

With the deadline looming for Congress to pass a spending bill to keep the government running, House Republicans are fighting to include a provision in the national budget that would forbid DC from using any funds to legalize marijuana. The amendment, known in Washington-speak as a rider, is sponsored by Maryland Republican Andy Harris, Congress's loudest and most relentless defender of prohibition, who has made it his personal mission to make sure kids in DC aren't getting high.

GOP House leaders have gotten behind the amendment, and are insisting it be included in the omnibus spending bill currently under negotiation in Congress. According to the Natio​nal Journal, House Speaker John Boehner and Kentucky Republican Harold Rogers, the chair of the powerful House Appropriations Committee, are both in favor of limiting the city's power to enact the legalization law, known as Initiative 71, and are pushing to include Harris's measure in the final budget bill. A spokesman for Boehner confirmed in a statement to VICE that "the Speaker obviously supports the provisions in the House-passed bills," but added, "we are not directly engaging with Democrats on this issue."

Democrats, including President Barack Obama, are opposed to the rider, and to Congress's attempts to meddle with the District's laws in general. Several Republicans have also indicated that they are opposed to blocking DC's legalization law, signaling a bipartisan shift away from ​hawkish federal drug policies. Kentucky Republican Senator Rand Paul, the incoming chair of the Senate subcommittee that oversees DC, has​ said that he doesn't think the federal government should get involved in local affairs. And earlier this year, many House Republicans joined Democrats in passing a measure to block the De​partment of Justice from using funds to target medical marijuana providers operating legally under state laws.

Given this bipartisan attitude, marijuana advocates in Washington were in​itially bullish on the prospect that the law would survive congressional challenges. Beyond the question of legalization, activists argued that it would be a bad look for Republicans to block a law that was widely seen as a victory for racial justice in a city where black people account for the vast majority of marijuana arrests. (A 2013 ACLU​ report found that black people account for nine in 10 marijuana arrests in DC, despite having equal usage rates as whites.)

But they may have underestimated their opponents' zealous commitment to telling people how to live their lives. That's because, despite the general opposition to Harris's rider, it is unclear if Democrats have the political will to force Republicans to remove if from the final budget bill. There are literally hundreds of riders attached to the bill, including amendments targeting Obama's immigration order and the Environmental Protection Agency, and only one week left to negotiate before funding expires and the government shuts down, so making sure weed stays legal in DC is hardly anyone's priority.

The White House has previously threate​ned to veto any legislation that meddled with DC's autonomy, but it's hard to imagine the president shutting down the government over weed. The truth is, Congress doesn't have a problem telling the city how to spend its money. According to a press release from DC's non-voting congressional delegate, Eleanor Holmes Norton, the House appropriations bill contains two other DC-related riders—one to prohibit the city from enforcing its gun control laws, and another to stop it from spending local funds on abortion services. Both are likely to make it into the final bill.

A spokesperson for Norton's office said she "is involved in conversations with House and Senate leaders and the White House asking that they hold fast against Republican efforts to carry House interference with D.C. home rule into the final bill."

The American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) journal, Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, published a new study in its December issue that says "breast asymmetry may negatively impact the psychological quality of life of adolescents."

The study included 160 subjects with macromastia, in addition to 59 girls between the ages of 12 and 21 years who had unevenly-sized breasts. The researchers, it would seem, failed to realize that nearly every female-bodied person on earth has some level of "breast asymmetry."

The press release accompanying the study even alludes to that in its first sentence:

Differences in breast size are common, especially in early adolescence. The breasts usually even out over time, but in some girls the difference persists after puberty. The new study is the first to focus on the mental health impact of breast asymmetry.

"These findings suggest that patients suffering from breast asymmetry have poorer emotional well-being and lower self-esteem than their female peers," Dr. Labow and coauthors write. They note that the mental health impact is similar for girls with mild versus more severe breast asymmetry.

Study co-author Dr. Brian Labow, who is both a professor at Harvard Medical School and a surgeon at Boston Children's Hospital, goes on to say that while younger girls don't necessarily need surgery right away, "early evaluation and intervention for these patients may be beneficial, and should include weight control and mental health counseling."

Message to teen girls everywhere: not only are your (still growing) boobs all wrong, you are also fat and crazy.

VICE wrote to the Boston Children's Hospital requesting comment on the message this study sends to young girls about body image, and also requested data on the amount of breast reconstruction surgeries taking place annually at Dr. Lebow's Adolescent Breast Clinic located at the hospital. The hospital did not respond.

A disclosure in the study's author information claimed: "The authors have no financial interest to declare regarding the content of this article." Just below, it conceded that the research was supported by the Plastic Surgery Foundation—which states in its annual report that a percentage of membership dues go toward state and federal lobbying as well as health policy.

While it's clear that this "research" is inextricably tied to the financial goals of the plastic surgery industry, it's disturbing to know that such studies can impact legislation and health policy affecting young girls whom already face massive pressure to think there's something wrong with their bodies. The board of the Plastic Surgery Foundation is comprised of around 25 men and two ladies (presumably sprinkled in for good measure).

VICE spoke with Dana Edell, executive director at teen-driven campaign SPARK, which stands for Sexualization Protest, Action, Resistance, Knowledge. A SPARK member, Julia Bluhm, successfully campaigned to get Seventeen magazine to stop using Photoshop on its photos of girls in 2012 when she was just 14. A large part of the group's mission is to block the constant barrage of media images that tell girls there is something wrong with the way they look.

"Companies are trying to make money off of every inch of our bodies," Edell told VICE. "If you can instill this idea in girls from a young age that their breasts are not normal, of course they are going to be insecure."

Edell said that studies like this can make it seem as if the insecurity girls feel comes first, but in fact body image problems are usually caused by the very messages the studies propagate.

"It's the opposite. They create the anxiety, which then leads to mental health problems," Edell said. "If there's a girl growing up in a place where this kind of thing doesn't exist, she's not going to care if her breasts are slightly different sizes."

Alice Wilder, another member of SPARK and a 19-year-old student at University of North Carolina, told VICE that she still remembers the body anxiety of middle school, when she and her friends started discussing the possibility of one day getting breast implants.

"The problem isn't within girls. The problem, when I was in middle school, was what boys are going to think," Wilder said. "That I'm going to be a freak, and this is how girls are supposed to look. We talked about turning your body into a to-do list of problems that need to be solved.

"I think it was a thing mostly when you're younger and you don't know as much about medical realities. You're afraid to talk about one of your breasts being bigger than the other," said Wilder. "Now that I'm in college, I know that no one has boobs that are the same exact size. People would talk about it like it was a big secret, but now we know it's just a medical reality."

Wilder said that reading the press release for the study made her "angry," and worried that a lack of good sex education programs could leave girls with misunderstandings about whether their bodies are normal.

"There's an enormous amount of money and time that goes into making teenage girls hate themselves," said Wilder. "It's like people sit in boardrooms and think up ways to get teen girls to see their very pores as a problem, when pores are just part of the anatomy."

In a video on the website of the journal Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, editor Dr. Rod Rohrich claims that the study "was able to conclude that breast asymmetry—which, unfortunately, is often classified as a cosmetic issue—is truly a condition which has lasting psychological and emotional effects."

Dr. Rohrich's assertions would presume that nearly every woman in the world is suffering from psychological and emotional problems.

"I would rather see them doing studies on sexualization and the root causes of these insecurities," Wilder told VICE. "When I was 12 years old I thought I had small breasts. Would he have done surgery on me? Now I'm 19 and I'm fine with my body."

Follow Mary Emily O'Hara on ​Twitter.

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Valerie Cummins

This post first appeared on VICE UK

Food banks pop up like melanomas on a sick society. Last week, Ireland opened a giant food bank to cope with the 600,000 people living in food poverty. According to data on Material Deprivation published by the European Commission, Ireland comes in at number three on the list of most deprived countries in the EU-15, just after Greece and Italy. This means that one million people, or 28 percent of the Irish population, struggle to provide themselves with heat, shelter, food, and bills.

Bia, Ireland's first giant food distribution hub, was launched last Friday in Munster. What makes it different is that, rather than a community response to a failing state, Bia comes with state backing—almost $ 330,000 of backing from the Department of Social Protection over the next three years. Joan Burton, Ireland's minister for Social Protection and Leader of the Irish Labour Party, opened the center, to little media attention.

I visited Valerie Cummins in a small corner of Dublin's run down north inner city as she divvied up boxes of cereal, tins of peas, and bags of pasta. Valerie works for Crosscare, a social support agency in Dublin that set up Ireland's first community food banks.

"We collect the food here and then distribute it via local charities to people in need. We also set up community food banks where people get a voucher that entitles them to a week of food," she told me. "Right now, demand is so high we can't keep up. People are dropping in all the time asking for emergency parcels to get them through the next few days. I've been working with Crosscare for 25 years and I have never seen things so bad. People are more desperate than ever."

It's in this climate that charities like St Vincent de Paul and Crosscare struggle to carry out the gargantuan task of providing the homeless, working poor, and those on welfare with supplies that will see them through the cold Irish winter.

Rose Sinclair-Doyle, 44, is a final-year art school student and mother of two from Tallaght, south Dublin. She has recently started to use the new community food bank to feed her family. "People never think it could happen to them," she said. "I've been living under austerity for years, but it was only when my daughter moved back home with her two kids that the money just couldn't stretch to feed us all."

Rose now collects a weekly voucher that entitles her and her family to a set amount of food worth $98. Previously, she was the only income in the house, receiving a Back to Education Allowance that gave her $231 a week. After paying her mortgage of $160 a week, Rose, her daughter, and her two grandkids were expected to live on $71 a week, or $17 per person.

"I'm ashamed going in, but I need food," she said. "It's not an easy thing to do, but after I split from my partner I was left alone with the mortgage repayments. I don't get fuel allowance, so I have to think about heating my house, paying for electricity... it's so hard. I'm so angry and upset with the government of Ireland for doing this to us."

But Rose isn't alone. Students, the unemployed, people on low incomes, and those who racked up massive debt during the economic boom are now starting to depend on Ireland's new community food banks to feed their families.

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Cllr Brian Leech

Councillor Brian Leech from the Anti Austerity Alliance in Tallaght, south Dublin, told me the community food banks are drawing in Ireland's "new poor" who cannot manage from paycheck to paycheck. "Initially it was just people on benefits or low income who ran out of money at the end of the month. Now that's trickled down to middle income earners who are totally lost," he said. "The banks threw money at people during the boom, and now people are trying to pay it all back and feed their families. No one wants food banks, but people have to eat and the government isn't helping hungry people."

It's impossible to gauge how many unregistered food banks have popped up in Ireland during the recession, but they've now become lifelines for a huge chunk of the population.

As Rose explained: "When I lived alone, I was able to stock up. Things were tight, but I could manage. I would always have that point where there'd be a bill I couldn't pay, but I got by until I was suddenly responsible for putting food on the table for four people. Then I had to get help. It just takes one thing to push you to the breadline, and that's where we are in Ireland right now."

The promotional blurb for Bia—the country's biggest food redistribution center—says that it's a "bridge for the redistribution of surplus food from Irish Food Businesses to charities throughout Ireland, while benefiting Ireland in the process for a real win-win-win!" But, of course, it wouldn't need to exist if there weren't losers from years of austerity, a lack of job creation, and wage cuts. By giving money to the Bia project, it seems that the Irish government is resigning itself to the new status quo—where people can't afford to feed themselves. To many, it looks like the institutional acceptance of food banks.

Brian Leech feels that, in accepting help, we cannot overlook the root causes of poverty. "People need better lives, more income equality, and jobs. The food banks are very important now, but we should all want a better future. We can't lose sight of the issues that are forcing people to go to food banks and forcing their very existence," he said.

As Valerie struggled to fill parcels, I asked her about Ireland's "new poor" and the food bank model. She stopped and sighed. "A man came in here last week. He drove up in a white van, was well-dressed, and well-spoken," she said. "I could tell he was embarrassed, so I brought him into the office. He said he works full-time but after bills that day he was left with $18 to feed his family for the week. He said his wife would die of shame if she knew he went to a food bank."

"Even though it's against policy, I put together an emergency parcel that will last him three days. I might never see him again—he's part of Ireland's new invisible poor, eking it out week to week. We shouldn't live in a world with food banks, but what can you do when people in here are hungry?"

Follow Norma Costello on ​Twitter.

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Today we premiered the first comic in Gilbert Hernandez's ​weekly comic series for VICE. If you like comics at all you probably know GIlbert Hernandez. If you don't know Gilbert Hernandez than you should fix that.

Gilbert is most famous as one half, and occasionally one third, of the famous "Los Bros Hernandez." Along with his brothers Jaime and Mario he created the comic series Love and Rockets, which started in 1981 and has been coming out consistently in different formats for almost 35 years.

The brothers each have their own characters, stories and universes that they explore. Jaime's comics focus on a Mexican-American woman named Maggie who lives In LA. Gilbert's primarily follow a woman named Luba and her life in a remote Mexican village, although his comics have since shifted focus primarily to her relatives.

When the Hernandez Brothers started making comics during the 80s black-and-white boom, the alternative comics scene was incredibly small and now it seems like half of the literary comics floating around are very directly influenced by the work that Gilbert and his brothers did.

Now he's doing comics for us. Here's a little interview I did with him.

VICE: How's it going Gilbert? I really appreciate you doing a comic for VICE's website.
​ I'm doing good, thanks for asking

Have you done weekly comics before?
​ I've never done a weekly comic before, but it seems like it'll be a fun challenge.

What made you think of Roy as a good choice for a central character in a recurring strip?
​ Roy is a character of such flexibility, story-wise, that I can take him anywhere in our mad universe.

Roy has a Spongebob like naivety to him. Do you remember how you came up with Roy? Was he a random drawing that you assigned a personality to or did you need a character like him and design his looks second?
​ I created Roy's look and personality at the same time. I wanted a hapless nerd that I could put in any comic book situation I could think of, especially ones where he is humiliated to the nth degree.

What do you think Roy's voice sounds like.
​ Roy's voice sounds like ​Butterfly McQueen's.

Isn't Roy usually joined by his bespectacled girlfriend? Was her name Inez?
​ Her name is Judith, like the baby on The Walking Dead.

Will his priest friend and punk child pal join him again?
​ ​Father Sandoval and Lil Punk will return, as well as other previous Roy associates like The Little Stunt Boy, The Sammer Monster, Shout Ramirez, etc.

You have so many characters in your comic that it's hard for me to keep them all straight. Have Father Sandoval and Lil Punk appeared before?
​ ​Father Sandoval or the punk kid haven't appeared before officially. I created Father Sandoval as a lame pro wrestler years ago. He still might turn out to be that.

Do you know a lot of smoking priests?
​ ​Don't all priests smoke, drink, and shoot up heroin?

Do you know a lot of substance-addicted priests? What was your religious upbringing like?
​ I was raised Catholic and I didn't know any priests, but the couple of nun teachers I did know were two of the kindest and most considerate adults I've ever met. I didn't go to Catholic school full time, only on weekends, so I don't have any horror stories about nuns or priests.

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Is it odd to have grown up when the LA punk scene was fresh and new, and then witness it become an institution?
​ I wasn't aware that the LA punk scene was revered. It was a mess when I was hanging out. The LA punk scene of the late 70s was more of an art/party/drug scene and in the 80s it was more aggressive, dumbed down, and hostile.

Over the past decade there have been a couple books about the LA punk scene. There's We're Desperate and We Got The Neutron Bomb, and probably a bunch of others.
​ I've little interest in recalling those days now except for when I need research for a story. I don't really care about nostalgia unless it's for building something new from it.

Did you ever have any interactions with Spot, the photographer?
​ I never met ​Spot, but my wife knows him.

I had just got a copy of a new book of his photos which is why that was on my mind. How did you meet your wife?
​ I met my wife Carol when The Clash played for the first time in LA, February 1, 1979. I was with my brothers Jaime (Love & Rockets), Ismael (Dr. Know) and our cousin. She knew Carol from high school and introduced us. Carol and I've been together since.

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There's something you and Jaime have commented on before in interviews about how people are disappointed by meeting you at cons because they want to meet your characters and you two don't really seem like your characters. Some cartoonists do. Clowes and Crumb. Are there any of your characters that you see as embodying you the most? Are they are all just minor facets of who you are?
​ I guess a couple of characters that are like me the most, or at least express my attitude are Luba (Killer's grandmother) and Hector (Killer's dad). Few people reading this will know what I'm talking about.

Are you collecting anything lately?
​ I collect old horror movies on disc because a lot of them are still not available on streaming or YouTube. Horror from the 1960's and 1970's, from Italy or Turkey or India or Indonesia, on and on...

What are you liking in comics right now, either new things or old things?
​ I buy reprints of old horror comics of the 1950's, and comic strip collections of Dick Tracy and Steve Canyon. A lot of stuff I do get from Fantagraphics when somebody there remembers to send me stuff. I very rarely buy work from contemporary artists because they come off as awfully wimpy and self-important. Some, dare I say, even SUCK.

Is there any chance of seeing your other characters show up in this strip?
​ Probably, like the ones I mentioned earlier.

Follow Nick Gazin on ​Twitter.

​

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This article originally appeared on VICE UK

As per every December since records began, it's impossible to escape the cold hands of James Bond. The latest in the series, Spectre, is on its way, and the daft old racist Bond of earlier films will soon be infiltrating your Christmas TV. Be prepared to spend yet another Boxing Day plonking your gorged carcass in front of that one where he climbs into a submarine disguised as a crocodile, that one where he kicks a car off a cliff, or that one with Sean Bean in it. 

True Bond-heads laud the character's status as a throwback: he's paid his dues, he's worked his way through the ranks, he's unashamedly British. But his antiquated image was at its nadir in the 90s, sent-up by both Robbie Williams in the ​"Millennium" video and Mike Myers before he stuck a laser beam up the ass of his career with The Love Guru. 

There was an entire generation whose favorite Bond memory was shooting that bloke on the bog in the N64 version of GoldenEye. Judi Dench's M dismissed Pierce Brosnan's 007 as a "sexist, misogynist dinosaur," while superior espionage flicks left Bond looking like ​Dave Whelan at a ​Kick It Out meeting. 

Like all these serious movies about grown men in rubber pants, the Daniel Craig-fronted 007 movies have been something of a dark and gritty reinterpretation of the character. Bond may not be a superhero, but there's been a similar attempt in the genre to drop him into the so-called "real world." 

You can imagine the studio execs banging on about "streamlining" as they sever Bond from his Etonian roots and re-brand him as a slightly more modern murderer. He—Christ!—had a woman as his boss for a bit, and—fucking hell!—isn't bothered whether his Martini is shaken or stirred. He emerges from the sea in his underpants, chest glistening in a reversal of Ursula Andress' Dr. No turn; he flirts with Javier Bardem; he may have had some mommy issues. The writers try to sculpt a more complex version of Bond, one that will leave the viewer asking questions (although the only question anyone had after 2008's Quantum of Solace was, "What the fuck's a Quantum of Solace?")

However, it's very proven difficult to shake the idea that Bond is the sort of man who subscribes to both GQ and Tatler, and who spends his free time wearing Barbour jackets and adding to his ludicrous chronograph watch collection. The overriding sense remains that 007 is the smuggest of smug cunts. 

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Skyfall—an enjoyable, if derivative, movie—contained your de facto Bond scene of perfunctory intercourse, albeit with a victim of sex-trafficking rather than someone whose name is a riff on their genitalia. Later in the film, this character has a shot of Scotch placed on her head, and Bardem invites Craig to shoot it off, William Tell/Burroughs-style. Bond misses. Bardem hits. As the woman falls to the ground, 007 remarks, "What a waste of good Scotch." He remains unable to resist a quip or a cheeky nob gag, even in the most unrelenting of circumstances. It stands to reason that his biggest fan is Alan Partridge.

While Bond's adversaries have moved with the times—now seeking the more prosaic pleasures of seizing control of Bolivia's water supply or winning at poker, rather than, say, creating a new master race in space or attacking Washington, DC, with a giant laser made of diamonds—007 is disappointingly static. Connery injected some globe-humping glamor, Brosnan reeled out some Cool Britannia shtick, and Roger Moore wore a safari suit. But try as they might, Bond is still the ultimate establishment figure. The aging white man with the old-school tie. The government-funded assassin of rent-a-goons. The arch capitalist, who inspires impressionable grown men to drop almost $4,700 on  ​Sony spy gear. 

Indeed, Bond's tiresome Queen-and-Country, little Englander spiel is undoubtedly more ​Bullingdon than Bourne, and carries the putrid reek of UKIP leader ​Nigel Farage. His nemeses are scheming, hand-wringing Euro-pastiches, evil primarily because they're a) wealthy and b) Slavic, Mediterranean, or Russian. They're coming over here and running their keys down your Aston Martin.

Bond is the back-slapping buffoon from the old boy's club, dropping some casually-racist nuggets masquerading as banter. Fanboys will exalt the "escapism" of Bond movies, but it's hard to root for such a relic. He's a Daily Express Princess Diana commemorative plate, a "Keep Calm" meme, a grizzled Great British Bake-off contestant. His favorite film is Zulu. If UKIP (The UK Independence Party) is the purest expression of the macho conservative British zeitgeist, Bond is the UKIP of action heroes.

Perhaps Bond will never detach himself from the maniacal grip of Ian Fleming; a man who wrote "All women love semi-rape. They love to be taken," in The Spy Who Loved Me. Perhaps we've simply never had the right Bond. The character's mix of brute machismo and racist commentary could have well suited Mel Gibson, who was rejected in 1987 for "not being British" (oh, the irony), which is not half as dismissive as the pass on Ranulph Fiennes ​for having "hands too big and a face like a farmer."

We'll never truly root for Bond because he is a product of a parasitic England that is sadly very much alive. Not that 007 will be killed. He'll continue working his way through a bevvy of glitzy Euro-booty and sinister plutocratic cartels in much the same fashion as ever.  

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Aaron ​Carter still knows how to throw an "Aa​ron Party." More than a year after we wat​ched him give the performance of a lifetime at a Mexican restaurant in New Jers​ey, Carter continues to impress audiences around the world. This year, the former child star has courted a cult-like online following called "Aaro​nators," à la Lady Gaga's Little Monsters, and char​ged them $400 to meet him.

"I saw him in The Fantasticks ten times," a 20-year-old Aaronator named Alexandria Valentine told us at Carter's recent New York show. "He's just really nice and down to earth. Tonight will be the 12th time I'm meeting him. He gave me a kiss on the mouth once—that was cool. I have a video of it."

Other Aaronators also expressed their thoughts about Carter's romantic life. "The heart wants what the heart wants," 18-year-old Gavi Kovacs told us, referring to the pop singer's desire to rekindle his 2​003 love affair with Hillary Duff. "It sucks for him, but I don't think it's pathetic in any way."

When we saw a sign at a Nic​k Jonas concert advertising a Carter appearance at the relatively large (by his standards) Gramercy Theatre, we knew we had to send one of our favorite photographers, Amy L​ombard, to hang out with our boy AC backstage. 

Me and scarlet Johansson at the #VICE20 pic.twitter.com/T6suPneg6S

— Ghostface Killah (@GhostfaceKillah) December 6, 2014

Last night we celebrated our 20th anniversary party with everyone from Scarlett Johansson to Jarvis Cocker to Lil Wayne. Throughout the event, our friends and family tweeted their favorite moments of the night. Here are a few of our favorite tweets from the show.

"I'd like to dedicate this to @eddymoretti, to @shanesmith30, to @SurooshAlvi, to @vice!"—@kareno introducing @YYYs' "Maps" #VICE20

— VICE (@VICE) December 6, 2014

Goodtimes = pardee times. http://t.co/dRllCNUm3r

— shane smith (@shanesmith30) December 6, 2014

Thanks to all the bands for coming out last night and making our #VICETURNS20 epic. Especially @nickzinner! You are a beautiful baby boy.

— shane smith (@shanesmith30) December 6, 2014

Andrew wk, house of jealous lovers, unicorns, punk, Jonah hill, metal, action b, cro-mags, so far

Jarvis Cocker covering "If the Kids Are United" #VICE20 https://t.co/CWM9WOpYFR

— VICE (@VICE) December 6, 2014

— alex miller (@AlexGAMiller) December 6, 2014

​

GHOSTFACE #VICE20 pic.twitter.com/kwW4KByY83

— Noisey (@NoiseyMusic) December 6, 2014

Partners in crime @alicesperi #VICETURNS20 #VICE20 pic.twitter.com/axjufPJRHj

— Claire Ward (@thementalward) December 6, 2014

Last night's lineup-the craziest of my career. HipHop/Hollywood/Indie royalty + a metal jam. Fun! Thanx @vice #VICE20 pic.twitter.com/tS5cwtkwpg

— Alex Skolnick (@AlexSkolnick) December 6, 2014

My partner in crime @thementalward and @mattaikins #VICE20 pic.twitter.com/Wg22Gy4vXa

— Alice Speri (@alicesperi) December 6, 2014

Spike Jonze watching Scarlett Johansson covering New Order. Ultimate. #VICE20 pic.twitter.com/US9bajqQoN

— Adrienne Scissons (@ascissons) December 6, 2014

"When it's time to party we will party hard..." for #VICE20, @VICE. pic.twitter.com/WAq68CStKT

— Carrot (@Carrot) December 6, 2014

Punk rock mega group dedicates set to #Ferguson protestors. #vice20 pic.twitter.com/39iPu3q0Q8

— Dell Cameron (@dellcam) December 6, 2014

Feeling too many things while ScarJo sings "Bizarre Love Triangle." #VICE20 pic.twitter.com/2h5ep8PMpv

— Bruce (@octoberxswimmer) December 6, 2014

#VICE20: Scarlett Johansson rocked it yesterday covering a New Order song on stage! Spike Jonze was in the audience! pic.twitter.com/TiONbmKsP4

— Scarl Johansson News (@scarlett_news) December 6, 2014

@carrot ladies reppin' at the #VICE20. @VICE pic.twitter.com/uzP5wVU0xb

— Carrot (@Carrot) December 6, 2014

Partying with my spirit animal and our CEO, @shanesmith30. #VICE20 pic.twitter.com/V1P2sxS97F

— Caroline Pahl (@CarolinePahl) December 6, 2014

LETS GET THIS PARTY STARTED @VICE #VICE20 #ANDREWWK pic.twitter.com/CCJw3qvrKV

— Jax Teller (@eugenehu) December 6, 2014

pic.twitter.com/OZ5mNyfULS

— Jonah Hill (@JonahHill) December 6, 2014

Favorite moment from #vice20: @NickfromIslands & @cassieramone singing I Was Born (a Unicorn) #theunicorns @VICE pic.twitter.com/hm755twRda

— mindy bond (@mindybond) December 6, 2014

Had a great time at #VICE20 with #DreamTeam collab @amy_lombard and kylarae_ http://t.co/uYJEl7SYDg

— Mitchell Sunderland (@mitchsunderland) December 6, 2014

Club goin' up. #VICE20 pic.twitter.com/bNVxRNvrha

— Noisey (@NoiseyMusic) December 6, 2014

​When singer Actually Huizenga sent us her latest mu​sic video, we knew it would include something weird. After all, we did premiere her "Baby ​Love" music video, which featured a cover of a song by the porn star Cicci​olina and imagery that referenced the Easter bunny and the death of Jesus Christ. But nothing prepared us for "Predator Romantic." Set to a catchy dance song, the six-minute epic resembles the trailer for John Travolta and Jamie Lee Curtis's Perf​ect, if the movie took place on the set of Splash and Curtis rubbed rodents all over her body. All we've ever wanted is a weird recreation of the classic Travolta-Curtis drama, so we think "Predator Romantic" is perfect.

No animals were harmed in the production of this music video. 

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Photo by Andrew White

Last night VICE turned 20, and to celebrate we threw a huge party for our family and friends! Nick Zinner of Yeah Yeah Yeahs led a supergroup, and we put together a lineup featuring Lil Wayne, Karen O, Pussy Riot, Jarvis Cocker, Stephen Malkmus, the Black Lips, Jonah Hill, Scarlett Johansson, Chromeo, and many more. Check out the setlist and our favorite photos of the night below. 

Setlist

"Party Hard," Andrew WK
"Needy Girl," Chromeo
"House of Jealous Lovers," Nick Thorburn
Metal Medley 
"Run," Ghostface Killah
"Daytona 500,"  Ghostface Killah and Raekwon
"Punk Medley," Damian Abraham and John Joseph
"Marvin's Room," Jonah Hill and Spike Jonze
"I Was Born (a Unicorn)," Nick Thorburn
"Paper Planes," The-Dream
"Easy Rider," Action Bronson
"Give Me One Reason," Action Bronson
"Family Tree," Black Lips
"Bad Kids," Black Lips
"NYC Cops," Meredith Graves
"Range Life," Stephen Malkmus
"Remedy," Stephen Malkmus
"Bizarre Love Triangle," Scarlett Johansson
"Deceptacon," Pussy Riot
"Maps," Karen O
"Art Star," Karen O
"Power of Love," Jarvis Cocker
"If the Kids Are United," Jarvis Cocker
"Believe Me," Lil Wayne
"Loyal," Lil Wayne
"No Worries," Lil Wayne
"John," Lil Wayne
"Anarchy in the UK," Andrew WK

The "French Whore," as she asked to be identified, sees wealthy Wall Street clients in her two-room Brooklyn apartment. Photos by Pearl Gabel

"My finance guys tend to contact me after big changes in the market—a day or so after it goes up or down. They rest, and then they call me," said Zoë,* a $600-an-hour independent escort in her mid 30s who's been in and out of the business since her late teens, alternating with stints in the legal $10-an-hour tip-based economy.

Among the half dozen women I've spoken to on and off the record in recent weeks about their work in the local sex trade, all of them agreed that there's no escaping Wall Street, since almost every sector in New York—real estate, restaurants, prostitution, you name it—opens its mouth to finance's trickle-down. As the Dow has ticked up and come to represent an ever larger share of the national economy over the past two decades, it's been a long, steady climb up for New York, setting aside the short but hard September crashes when the Twin Towers went down and when Lehman Brothers fell seven years later.

Lehman Brothers was how the French Whore—an American woman in her mid 30s who asked to be called that to protect her identity—said she ended up in the business. She keeps a sleeping bed in one room and a client bed in the other, and the walls are decorated with her own artwork (in her ads, she describes herself with phrases like "art student needing a hand"). Her story is a particularly perverse tale of what former NYC mayor Michael Bloomberg once envisioned as the luxury city, a place to accommodate the rich and house the members of their servant class. In her telling, she's been forced to make a living fucking the guys who fucked the American economy because they took her down with it.

After studying fashion out west (she preferred not to say where), the French Whore came to New York to try to make it "doing custom-made fashion."

"It wasn't very profitable," the French Whore told me. "I never really made money. Long hours, bringing in fifteen dollars an hour. I worked in fashion for two years in the city. Someone like me, without money—I wasn't able to work my way up. It's for trust-fund kids. Money would have given me more chance to work on the right jobs—another five years in internships."

So when the market crashed in 2008, as gigs dried up and her rent soared, she started selling sex out of sheer economic necessity, she said. The clients she met through an escort agency, many of them in finance ("most, I think, but it's not like they gave me their business cards"), ground her down, so eventually she went "old school," dropping her price point and working for herself in a $200-an-hour volume business.

"It's a low rate—that way I can opt out of things," said the French Whore.

"The bankers, the upscale clientele, they care about getting good service and are willing to pay the price, but they're demanding. Now, I have no overhead but rent, and I make about three thousand dollars a weekend. It's a hardworking weekend. Nonstop."

When Zoë and I spoke over bourbons at the Maritime Hotel bar in Chelsea on a Tuesday night, her outfit stood out. She was dressed in her usual fall getup of shorts, tights, a warm sweater, and boots. Nearly every woman around us was in costume, most of them in spiky heels and high-slit gowns with low-cut necks. I asked her what she does that makes her worth three times more than the French Whore.

"Marketing, mostly," she said. "Selling—and giving, I hope—a sense of human connection. I know it's not that my sex is three times better."

Marketing has helped her diversify her client base and reduce her reliance on the finance crowd. "I'm an independent now, so I don't deal with your coke calls, your twenty-five-year-old hedge-fund dickheads, but you still feel the market," Zoë said. "My clients at least make plans to see me. The young guys who blow their money on agencies don't tend to be planners—they call for an appointment in half an hour, not a month out. The girls there are like tickers. They feel it when markets move.

"Not to play a violin for them, but it's tough," Zoë said, shifting to the demand side. "Wall Street's a pyramid—there are a lot more guys in their twenties scrambling up than guys in their forties who've made it there. The attrition is brutal, and they all have to be hungry and work ninety hours a week with their hair cut the same way. They seem sad, frequently, but are determined to have the kind of good time that's sexy and pricey.

"Their consumption is conspicuous even though they're not doing it front of other guys," she continued. "It's like a vote of confidence in themselves—they know there's only a small chance they'll get to the top of the pyramid and make portfolio manager by forty or get into private equity, so spending a lot on hookers and blow is a vote of self-confidence: I know I'm going to keep making a shit-ton of money, so I can spend now like there's more coming in."

February, when the bonuses come in, is a big month, making up for the usually slow December, Zoë said. (It also brings her real estate brokers and car salesmen and others who end up with a cut of that cash.) For the Wall Street guys, "I think it's a rite of passage," she said. "You get a hundred thousand, and you blow ten on hookers that weekend. It's very important to them that if they're going to be the kind of guy who's hiring an escort, it's a very expensive escort. The more you charge them, the happier they are.

"The guys like agencies because they don't want a person; they want pizza. This way, once you've been vetted, you can call and order and half an hour later someone's there."

Still, she said, finance clients are infamous for contesting credit-card charges ("almost like dining and dashing, but by guys making seven or eight figures"). So, almost inevitably, credit-card companies end up cutting off agencies' accounts.

When they're paying, the French Whore told me, the finance customers are "more demanding. The way they want you to suck their dick, they're very specific. And if the guy has coke dick you might suck the dick all night long.

A lot of guys want you to rim them, too. Even for five hundred dollars, it doesn't pay off. And if they think you do it bad, they review you badly. When I worked at an agency I had to do all that stuff," she said, explaining why she decided to go independent.

"Some guys can't get it up, and I just sit around naked and watch them do coke," she said. "Once they come, they are gonna go. If they don't come, I have to do a blowjob. The deal is if you're gonna fuck someone, even if it takes over an hour, they have to come."

Not everyone is so fastidious. "There's actually a term for it—a party call," Zoë said. "There are girls who specialize in that stuff because they really like doing cocaine. And there's not a lot of sex involved"—at least on relative terms. "It's just clients who don't like to snort alone, and it makes them feel important, or, I don't know, stylish, maybe, to do it with a naked girl there." Some agencies specialize in "champagne" delivery, with sex just a side item on the menu.

"I still don't like prefab lofts," Zoë added. "I hate their shitty furniture. I hate their getting-to-know-you questions that are awkward and make the transition from chitchat to the sexy thing brutal for me, and for them. 'Where are you from?' 'Do you like the city?' My normal sense of humor is a little shit-talky, like, 'I'm gonna mock you, you're gonna mock me, we'll be friends.' And those guys don't get that at all. You bring up a book they haven't heard of, and it's like, 'Oh, you're real smart, huh?'"

"These guys are making money," the French Whore said. "This is just buying a thing. They want the skill level, a level of service. And then they need to discard it, like a product, once it's used. And they're in denial. Some of them ask not to use a condom." She caught one guy, with his wedding ring on, trying to sneak his condom off midway through.

"They're so narcissistic. They are in complete denial that this is part of their real life," she said. When I asked her whether they think she has a real life, she just said no.

Zoë echoed that, then bounced in a different direction: "The finance guys are less interested and capable of seeing me as a person, an actual human, than anyone else." She paused and lingered over a sip of her drink. "And sometimes, I find that a relief. They don't need me to make them feel special. Just show up, do the sexy thing, and then get the fuck out of their home.

"The one client I dated, briefly, was a Wall Street dude, and one reason I dated him was because he was uninterested in things that weren't him, so what I did for a living really didn't matter."

Pearl Gabel contributed reporting.

*Names have been changed.

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On Friday nights, people around the world leave their offices to fill their innards with cheese fries and shitty booze to put the pain of the workweek behind. This makes for some gross yet be​autiful moments, so we've decided to send photographers to the planet's finest (or shittiest, depending on your point of view) cities and towns to capture Friday night as it unfolds. For this week's installment, Vlad Brateanu went to the Bucharest Old Town to look at a lot of drunk people and a kitschy Christmas fair full of greasy food.

​Based on ​the news c​ycle, you'd think ​LGBT people all lived in a sparkly version of hell. It's true that in many ways, ​being queer can suck, but besides dealing with a whole lot of crap, LGBT people are living ​beautiful, diverse lives in a variety of cities across the world. Our new photo column ​"Being Gay Is Beautiful in..." explores this idea, showcasing photos of a different city's LGBT community, displaying how being queer is fucking awesome. This week, the column takes us to Oakland, California, where Cheyennemat Sophia shoots stunning technicolor pictures of her lovers, her friends, and herself. 

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See more of Cheyenne's work on her ​web​site.

Follow ​Ma​tt and Mitchell on ​T​witter. 

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To many rock fans, Billy Corgan is a joke. He plays eight-​hour synth interpretations of literary novels, admires conspiracy theori​st Alex Jones, and continues to call his band the ​Smashing Pumpkins​ although he's the only original Pumpkin in the band. It doesn't help that he's called the band's ​new album, due out this week, Monuments to ​an Elegy, but in the past nine years, under Corgan's control, the Pumpkins have remained one of the few 90s alternative rock bands to continue to sell records and receive critical acclaim without becoming (solely) a nostalgia act.

Their last studio album, 2012's Oceania, moved 54,000 copie​s in its first week, landing in the top five of the Billboard 200—which is a lot for a rock band in the 21st century. After Corgan "reunited" the band in 2005 without the original guitarist or bassist (drummer Jimmy Chamberlin left the new incarnation after a few years), the Pumpkins' new albums and performances have received rave reviews from the likes of Rol​ling ​Stone, Sp​in, and the BB​C, even as Corgan continues to provoke people with cat magazine covers and eight-hour livestreams of electronic noddling.

Monuments to an Elegy will likely receive similarly solid notices when it becomes available for download this week. Like most Smashing Pumpkins records with ridiculous titles, the record blends earnest emotions with movie soundtrack–like instrumentals. Although the internet collectively LOLed when he announced that Motley Crue and sex-tape legend Tommy​ Lee Jones serves as the drummer on the new album, Jones's playing style makes the Pumpkins sound as powerful as they did in 1995. As I noted in my r​eview of "Tiberius," one of the album's promo singles, these new songs feel as intimate as those on Adore and as expansive as those on Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness. They're the kind of rock songs that will make you sound like a teenager screaming in a bedroom all over again.

After listening to his latest batch of elegies, I called Corgan to discuss his sensitivity, why Tommy Lee Jones joined the band, and why people hate him.

VICE: How did Tommy Lee Jones end up playing the drums on a Smashing Pumpkins album?
Billy Corgan: We were working on a song that reminded us of something Tommy would play. I made a joke: We needed someone to play like Tommy on this song. I was like, "[Let's get] the real Tommy." I was probably on the phone with Tommy the next day. I went to LA to see him. He said no. Tommy wanted to play the whole thing.

Were you a Tommy Lee fan before that?
Oh yeah. I was an old Crue fan, going back pretty much to the first [Motley Crue album]. I've known Tommy socially since the early 90s. He'd come to our shows every once in a while—and [current Smashing Pumpkins guitarist Jeff Schroeder] was a huge Crue fan. He grew up in LA, so for him Crue is legendary, so it was a really easy fit. On paper it looks stranger than it really is.

How do you choose your dramatic album titles?
I never get into that because I don't really know how to be honest. These things just pop into my head. When I was a kid, I would just write stuff down that popped into my head and made no sense. It just kinda became part of my inner poetry, for lack of a better way to put it. I was really a huge fan of William Burroughs when I was a kid.

Do you write your albums in a stream of consciousness?
It's all [subconscious] really. I just do a little tweaking in the end, to make sure it makes some kinda sense.

Does it bother you when people mock your dramatic style?
I haven't seen that. I don't really read any of that stuff. What are the jokes? You have my curiosity.

They say the new album title, Monuments to an Elegy, is melodramatic.
No more melodramatic than Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness. Last time I checked, [Mellon Collie] sold 10 million copies. Not to make myself seem the victim—because, like, every kid gets bullied in their own way—but actually I was bullied as a kid for being melodramatic. I was bullied as a kid for being into reading, in the arts and stuff like that, so to me that kind of criticism is more about our repressive, fearful society. When people attack words, I always find it really interesting because words are really quite innocent for the most part.

I'm a heterosexual, which in many ways makes me stranger because I'm definitely not supposed to be sensitive. I grew up around jocks and the whole thing. I played sports and I heard all those things and I always thought it was a bit strange because to me the greatest men I have ever known are people who are inwardly balanced.

How does this album differ from previous Pumpkins records?
There are the obvious things, like who's on them. I don't really know. All I've ever tried to do is be reflective of where I am. If I'm in a lame place then the records are lame. I don't really know what else to do. I really am an intuitive artist. I pretend to be an intellectual, but my work is really a guess. People say, "Why do an eight-hour synthesizer show?" I woke up on Tuesday and it seemed like a good idea. I just have a kind of a nose for creating a storm around me, so that's a bit dramatic too. Yeah, I'm an attention whore too, but that's part of being a performance artist.

I really like art that makes me uncomfortable, and I suppose I like poking at their biases. Going back to the question of sensitivity, I heard a lot of that stuff in the 90s when Siamese Dream came out. My very stage presence, sort of androgynous, made people violent. They would come over the barricades to punch me out. Back then, you suddenly had all these jocks coming to the show. They didn't know how to deal with androgyny. Suddenly I got the guy coming over the barricades trying to punch my lights out because I'm moving my hips a certain way. It was very strange.

I'm only 22, so it sounds like a totally different universe.
It's a totally different universe—you were dealing with an incredible level of repression. Why is that repression there? What is it that will send somebody off like a bomb? It's those hidden, unspoken biases that are the source of great art. Having been exposed to performance art in my late teens, and watching someone smearing themselves naked with some chocolate or something [made you think], Oh what the fuck is it? But then I would later [find] that I had a reaction. Why would I have a reaction? Big deal, he just smeared chocolate on himself.

People make fun of your band, but your sales are pretty damn good. What makes your music so appealing to people?
I think the question, which is a fantastic one that no one ever asks me, is [hard to answer] because the substantive things that make the band unique are not easily cleaned apart by somebody's opinion. No one sings like me, for better or for worse—you know my voice. My two-year-old nephew can point to the radio and say, "That's Uncle Billy." You can't imitate my voice. There is only one voice like mine. Two: I'm a songwriter. I know my shit. I studied the greatest. I've worked with some of the best people on the production side, like Alan Moulder, Roy Thomas Baker, Bush Vig—I've learned from the masters.

I've learned how to make records the old-fashioned way, and I've been blessed with a cast of musicians who somehow find some kind of common ground with me, whether it is short or for long, to help me navigate this language which I don't understand and I don't pretend to understand. Look at the album cover. I mean I took that picture like on a Sunday morning [at] like 6 AM. Why it turned out that way, I don't know. Why I named the album that, I don't know. Why is the last song of the album about a guy and a girl in a car? I don't know.

I'm still here. You are held up like kind of a piñata, but they forget that you are still there, so how much of a piñata can you be? I could very easily name 57 bands from my generation that got just as much hype and just as much record company pushes as we did. Sometimes it just comes down to talent and a little bit of moxie.

Despite all the bullshit you have to deal with, you sound pretty happy.
For me it starts with the belief that—and it is personal—that there is justice in the cosmos. The first 28 to 30 years of my life, my whole self-worth was judged on whether or not I was worth something to someone else. When you wake up from that dream, you realize, Wow. I can't really determine my worth this way, because if I do I'm going to kill myself all because I'm being told constantly I have no worth. Everybody knows what that feels like. You don't have to be a star to figure that out.

Follow Mitchell Sunderland on Tw​itter. 

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Image via Flickr user ​Jonathan

Welcome back to the Fear Digest, our weekly roundup of the top ten things Americans are freaking out about. Read last week's​ column here.​

10. The End of the Universe
Humans aren't usually asked to contemplate the end of humanity itself, which is good because that prospect is pretty nightmarish. But we recently got some news on that front, as scientists discovered that dark matter is apparently being consumed by dark energy. We don't know much about either substance, but what's important is that dark energy is essentially the force that is causing the universe to expand. More dark energy means a faster expansion, which means the universe will become a cold, lifeless expanse more quickly. ​As Michael Brooks wrote in the New Statesman:

Eventually, all the other galaxies will be so far away, and receding so fast, that their light will never reach what remains of our Milky Way. Nearby stars will burn out. Our sun is expected to end its life as a huge single crystal of carbon: a dark diamond in the sky, with no surrounding starlight to make it sparkle.

Good thing we'll all be dead by then!
​Last week's rank: Unranked

9. The End of an Era in Left-Wing Letters
​But people don't care about what will happen to stars 10 billion years from now. They care about stuff like whether their friends still have jobs. That's why the liberal blogosphere was gnashing its collective teeth and rending its garments this week over the firing of a couple top editors and a general staff reduction and restructuring at The New Republic. The venerable left-wing magazine inspires the same sort of devotion in a certain kind of Northeastern liberal that conservatives feel for guns and the American flag. (Other lefties, by the way, have a grudge against TNR and even think it's been ​racist in the past.) This wasn't just another not-as-good-as-it-was-in-its-heyday publication moving in a new, more online-oriented direction and abruptly firing people in the process. ​It was an utter tragedy. New York's Jonathan Chait was almost theatrically upset, ​writing, "My only hope now is that one day this vital American institution can be rebuilt," and he was among a host of employees and contributing editors (friends of the magazine, basically) who resigned to protest owner Chris Hughes's mismanagement and general shittiness. It's worth noting that a very, very small number of people care about any of this, but the ones that do have reacted as if the Lincoln Memorial was blown up by the KKK, so this makes the list. 
​Last week's rank: Unranked

[tweet text="BREAKING: Mass resignations just submitted at @TNR

Full list... pic.twitter.com/SdM0VPQ8Et" byline="— Ryan Lizza (@RyanLizza)" user_id="RyanLizza" tweet_id="540882331733856256" tweet_visual_time="December 5, 2014"]

8. The NSA
​Hey, did you know ​the US government hacks into cellphone networks all over the world? Pretty neat, right?
​Last week's rank: 9

7. A Government Shutdown
​Last year, the GOP ​shut down the federal government rather than compromise over some spending bills, which made a lot of people very upset and accomplished nothing. Now Texas Senator Ted Cruz, a key supporter of the shutdown, ​wants to do the same thing all over again. On the bright side, Congress does very little at this point so it may as well just continuously give itself crises to negotiate out of. 
​Last week's rank: Unranked

6. The Islamic State
​Secretary of State John Kerry said this week that it's going to take years to defeat the jihadists ruling parts of Iraq and Syria and "that we will engage in this campaign for as long as it takes to prevail." So I guess the US has officially entered another potentially endless war in the Middle East. It's been awhile.
​Last week's rank: 8

5. Al Qaeda
​The terrorist group founded by Osama bin Laden was once America's foremost bogeyman, and though it's been replaced by the Islamic State in headlines, it's still out there setting off bombs and kidnapping civilians. This week it regained the spotlight, as a SEAL operation intended to rescue two al Qaeda–held Western hostages in ​Yemen went horribly wrong, resulting in their deaths.
​Last week's rank: Unranked 

4. Cigarette Taxes
​But most American fear and anxiety, as usual, was reserved for events closer to home. For instance, when the death of Eric Garner, the Staten Island man who was killed after being in a chokehold by an NYPD cop, ​didn't result in any charges for Officer Daniel Pantaleo, ​protests raged in New York, and even Rush Limbaugh was outraged—because the cops had supposedly approached Garner in the first place because he was allegedly selling cigarettes illegally. "This guy ends up dead because the city of New York is hell-bent on driving out the black market cigarette industry from Manhattan," is how Rush ​put it on Thursday. I guess any ally in the fight against police brutality is a good ally to have?
​Last Week's Rank: Unranked

3. The EPA 
Conservatives were also outraged this week that the Environmental Protection Agency was following through on a plan to shut down power plants ​that don't comply with federal carbon emission standards. Obviously the purpose of these standards is to slow down climate change and *dramatic music* save the world, but the coal industry and the politicians who support it are basically like, Um, there's no way we can stop polluting without just closing plants and cutting a bunch of jobs. So either coal states get even poorer, or the coasts get flooded by rising sea levels. I think we lost this game of Civilization IV. it's time to start another one.
​Last Week's Rank: Unranked 

2. The Country Rising Up Against the Cops
Here is a real thing an ​anonymous police officer wrote on an online forum:

I think this is the start of the civil war several people have suspected may be coming...stay guarded brothers in blue...that's white, black, asian, etc...

And here's another:

What officers SHOULD do is nothing. This may sound horrible, but as we all have been shown, this is the truth. Most officers don't live in the neighborhood they patrol in, so if the citizens don't care about the neighborhod [sic], why should the police? Answer calls, take reports, TAKE YOUR PAYCHECK and go home. Don't be proactive, let the neighborhood destroy itself. It's not worth our lives or our career [sic]. If people want to live among criminals, thats [sic] their choice. I hope all the businesses that burned in Ferguson relocate and do not open shop in that town again. Police can't service people who cant [sic] serve and take care of themselves, their neighborhoods, so don't even try.

Last week's rank: Unranked

1. Being Shot by the Cops
Yeah, ​this shit is ​still happening.
​Last week's rank: 3

Follow Harry Cheadle on ​Twitter.

Former AIG chairman Hank Greenberg in Washington, DC, prior to testifying before the House Oversight Committee in April 2009. Photo by Gerald Herbert/AP

In case you were born in the 90s and don't remember the infamous AIG bonus controversy of March 2009, it was a bizarre moment in our nation's history when it seemed like everyone in America was angry about the same thing. And that particular thing was the crux of the "problem"—a microcosm of everything else that had gone wrong with Western civilization. Today, thanks to a lawsuit being argued in Washington, we now know how comprehensively we were duped.

AIG is an insurance company that sold credit-default swaps—insurance policies on the default risk of companies, countries, and other issuers of bonds. Some of those bonds were amalgamations of agglomerations of very dubious mortgages, which is in part why AIG ended up famously needing a massive federal bailout in autumn 2008. A few months later, someone in Washington noticed a provision in the bailout legislation that ensured retention bonuses for certain AIG employees, $165 million of which were being paid out to employees of the financial products division. Within days, various legislators had subpoenaed the company for the names and addresses of the bonus recipients. They introduced legislation levying a 90 percent tax on any bonuses that were not returned to the government; convened numerous congressional hearings in the ostensible attempt to hold someone accountable for this treasonous waste of taxpayer dollars; and deluged the 24-hour news cycle with inflammatory sound bites advising bonus recipients to resign, return the money, or kill themselves.

Reading news coverage of all this five and a half years later is kind of like reading old infatuation-era emails with a much older ex-boyfriend you never think about—but who in hindsight was kind of a pedophile. It goes without saying you will never again be that young or trusting, your senses never again so alive as they were in those months after the election of 2008, when it seemed as though our elected officials had somehow finally been moved by unprecedented events to switch their respective moral compasses off airplane mode and tax the rich. But it's hard not to feel a little gross for having personally joined the outrage orgy—especially given the revelations of the lawsuit against the government brought by former AIG CEO Hank Greenberg, a cranky old rich guy Tim Geithner definitely figured would be dead by now.

At the time we were told that it was the "greatest corporate failure in American history"—hat tip to Senator Richard Shelby—because politicians needed to cover up for the actual perpetrators of the crisis. They had us believe that AIG's "rogue" financial products unit was the assassin of the economy, because they were conveniently placed and relatively unsympathetic bit players who happened to be completely removed from the more sinister machinations of the subprime racketeers. And in stark contrast to the narratives promulgated by former Treasury secretaries Tim Geithner and Henry Paulson and by appointed media mouthpieces like Andrew Ross Sorkin—whose crisis chronicle Too Big To Fail portrays the AIG bailout as the thoughtless design of a group of bankers Geithner summoned to the New York Federal Reserve Bank and exhorted to "Work harder, get smarter!"—the truth is that it was all very deliberate and intentional. Because, as the Fed and Treasury lawyers were acknowledging among themselves at the time, the AIG "bailout" appears to be by far the most illegal thing they did.

Here's how Greenberg's complaint chronicles his company's assassination: On September 16, 2008, Geithner called Bob Willumstad, who had been the CEO of the company for all of three months, and told him he was about to send him the term sheet for an emergency line of credit, that he wasn't going to like the terms, and that that was OK, because they were firing him anyway—replacing him with someone they could persuade to take the job. (Naturally, that someone, Ed Liddy, would turn out to be a former Goldman Sachs board member.) But the Fed apparently hadn't gotten around to drafting a term sheet, so instead it furnished AIG's outside counsel, a ubiquitous crisis figure named H. Rodgin Cohen, with two pages of incoherent bullet points Willumstad later said "might have been put together by my grandchildren." Cohen instructed Willumstad to sign a single page with a line for his signature and the date, and nothing attached. He faxed it over to the Fed.

For the next week the AIG board labored under the delusion that they were negotiating a deal with the government—even filing a notice with the SEC on September 18 announcing their intention to hold a shareholder meeting to vote on the terms of the deal "as soon as practicable."

Meanwhile, Fed lawyers were exchanging emails about how they were going to legally cover their asses to avoid any such vote, since there was decisively no provision in the Fed charter allowing it to seize control of private institutions. Finally, Thomas Baxter, the general counsel of the New York Fed, decided it would be OK if some of them set up an independent trust, overruling the objections of his titular superiors because, he explained in an email on September 21, the "concern that there will be a shareholder action."

Cohen presented the government's terms to the board that evening. It would extend to AIG an $85 billion line of credit at an interest rate of 14.5 percent, in exchange for $85 billion in collateral and 79.9 percent of the company's shares. He would also no longer countenance AIG filing for bankruptcy under the "business judgment rule"—leaving the directors open to litigation if they voted to file. Which is when they realized, as one director put it, that "the government stole at gunpoint 80 percent of the company."

Once in control, the government went about engineering AIG's blitzkrieg self-destruction. The 14.5 percent interest rate was a death sentence in itself—the other 407 institutions that borrowed from the Fed during the crisis paid an average of less than 2 percent. But then the Fed commanded its puppet CEO to immediately buy back some $62 billion of mystery-meat mortgage "products" from a consortium of megabanks (but especially Goldman, which controlled $22 billion in mortgage credit-default swaps) at 100 percent of their face value. To put this in perspective, banks that purchased credit protection from insurers other than AIG ended up getting as little as 13 cents on the dollar out of the ensuring bankruptcies. If AIG had been allowed to file, it might have fared even worse than that, because in many cases the mystery meat it received in this deal was far more diseased than the crap it had actually insured.

In spite of all this, AIG ultimately returned to profitability. In fact, the relative health of its business may have fucked it harder than all those credit-default swaps—as one of the last institutions to run out of cash, it was also one of the last to start seeking a lifeline from foreign wealth funds. Once it did, the China Investment Corporation, the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation, and a consortium of Arabs who got Hillary Clinton to lobby their case all approached Paulson with serious offers. All were rebuffed. On September 26, China Inc. made an explicit $50 billion offer for four subsidiaries. It took ten days for Paulson to even bother calling back to officially blow them off.

Given all the blatantly illegal actions the government took to commandeer control of AIG, the bonus controversy looks almost like a cheap ploy to give the appearance that the Treasury and Fed felt somehow bound by the law in their dealings with the company. At the same time, as AIG executives' houses became destinations for populist rage tourism, the uproar served to further intimidate anyone at the company who might have questioned the government's handling of the situation.

Former US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner testified on a class-action lawsuit brought against the US government by shareholders of AIG. Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images

The crisis was too big for any one institution to take the fall, of course. A week after the AIG takeover, rumors began to circulate that Wachovia was suffering a silent run of high-net-worth depositors, and the requisite authorities began recruiting potential rescuers to acquire the bank. In the end only one came forward, and the term sheet was harsh. Citigroup would agree to "save" Wachovia at a price of $1 a share, CEO Vikram Pandit decided, if and only if the government agreed to guarantee $312 billion worth of the bank's assets—a move that would require the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to invoke a rarely used "systemic risk" clause in its charter.

But then Wells Fargo decided that Wachovia was worth $7 a share, with no government subsidies whatsoever, and made a counteroffer—incurring the wrath of Geithner, who recalled being "livid" at the news: "The United States government made a commitment," he said. "We can't act like we're a banana republic!"

Geithner wanted Citigroup to "save" Wachovia because Citi had hundreds of billions of dollars of worthless mortgages and mortgage-based products on its books—close to a trillion dollars in uninsured foreign deposits that could evaporate at any moment. It also had a 12-figure line of credit with the Fed and the Federal Home Loan Bank and literally thousands of lobbyists, publicists, emissaries, and miscellaneous fixers—from former chairman Bob Rubin to Obama crisis headhunter Michael Froman, who simultaneously led a private-equity division at Citi and was in the president elect's transition team during the fall of 2008—on its payroll. It desperately needed Wachovia's massive deposit base to make it through the month, and it had the clout to make that happen. The day after Wells made its competing bid, one of Citi's lobbyists slipped into the second draft of TARP legislation a line promising "exclusivity" to institutions recruited to rescue failing banks. The bill passed that evening, and the bank used the statute to get a judge to block the deal the next day.

With the help of celebrity lawyer David Boies, Wachovia and Wells ultimately prevailed, in part because the judge Citi persuaded to issue the restraining order had been a New York state judge and TARP was a federal statute. A week later, Citi got the first of three extra bailouts, in the form of one of the Treasury Department's "mandatory" capital injections, in an episode that later led FDIC chairman Sheila Bair to wonder whether the entire production was simply an elaborate propaganda campaign to bail out Citigroup with minimal public embarrassment.

"How much of the decision making was being driven through the prism of the special needs of that one, politically connected institution?" Bair asked later. "Were we throwing trillions of dollars at all of the banks to camouflage its problems? Were the others really in danger of failing? Or were we just softening the damage to their bottom lines through cheap capital and debt guarantees?"

If there is one person who is now positioned to tell us what the point of all this shameless flimflamming was, it is Boies, who is now arguing Hank Greenberg's case against the government. But while his meticulous reconstruction of events makes an irrefutable case that Geithner et al. acted intentionally, it makes no attempt to divine what their intentions ultimately were. If they were focused on saving Citigroup at any cost, then a $22 billion windfall for Goldman Sachs might have been one of those costs, but who knows. In the end it was all grotesquely profitable for Wall Street, just as the outcome of the Iraq War was great for war profiteers and the passage of time is generally great for the wealthy. But given how little popular opinion matters to the people who concoct these schemes, what warranted the elaborate disinformation campaign? In the end I think they just like fucking with us.