The NY Times muddies the waters in the approved fashion.

The headline is muddy:

Democrats Block Bill to Bar Transgender Girls From Female Sports Teams

“Transgender girls” are not girls. No doubt most NYT readers know that, but all the same, the word “girls” does its work. When we see the word “girls” we don’t correct it to “boys” automatically; it takes extra time and attention to remember that the subject here is boys in girls’ sports. Mostly we don’t read that slowly. Referring to boys as transgender girls is conditioning, and journalism really ought to stop doing it.

Democrats on Monday blocked a Republican-written bill aimed at barring transgender women and girls from school sports teams designated for female

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Anne Applebaum on The Rise of the Brutal American:

Quite apart from their politics, Trump and Vance are rude. They are cruel. They berated and mistreated a guest on camera, and then boasted about it afterward, as if their ugly behavior achieved some kind of macho “win.”

That’s putting it mildly. Even “rude” and “cruel” and “ugly” fall short of describing the grotesque nightmare of that performance.

Europeans can also see that this alternative reality is directly and profoundly shaped by Russian propaganda. I don’t know whether the American president absorbs Russian narratives online, from proxies, or from Putin himself. Either way, he has thoroughly adopted the Russian view of the world, as has Vance. This is not new.

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Still melting.

Global sea ice fell to a record low in February, scientists have said, a symptom of an atmosphere fouled by planet-heating pollutants.

The combined area of ice around the north and south poles hit a new daily minimum in early February and stayed below the previous record for the rest of the month, the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) said on Thursday.

The fun thing about this is that it’s both a symptom and the thing itself. It’s a sign of warming and it is warming. A twofer.

Scientists had already observed an extreme heat anomaly in the north pole at the start of February, which caused temperatures to soar more than 20C above average and

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A guy called Pips is “honored and excited” to have been given a role that should have gone to a woman, because of course he is.

Pip Bunce to be exact. We’ve heard of him before.

Honoured and excited to have been chosen as a delegate for this years United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (CSW69) Previous years events attended have been incredible and I know that this years will be as good, if not even better!! Spending time with all the amazing delegates is always a pleasure, as too is working with like-minded individuals working to progress inclusion, equality and equity. Our shared ethos being that together we can make a change and equality and equity for

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Trump has halted intelligence sharing with Ukraine.

The Trump administration has paused intelligence sharing with Ukraine alongside a military aid freeze, officials said on Wednesday, part of a pressure campaign to force its government to cooperate with the White House’s plans to end the country’s war with Russia.

A U.S. official said that military targeting information was no longer being shared with Ukraine.

…

Some U.S. officials said the hope was that any pause in intelligence sharing would be very short, with little practical impact. A senior Trump administration official said the initial plan was to pause military and intelligence sharing for a week or two as part of the campaign to pressure Mr. Zelensky.

Oh that’s fine. Just … Read the rest

What this ideology does to wannabe progressives. Noisily laughing at a high school girl receiving a brain injury.

Hahahahahahahahaha https://t.co/D1tZ3IOw8Z

— Emma Vigeland (@EmmaVigeland) March 5, 2025

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Ah yes, that infuriating tic.

It’s safe to say U.S. President Donald Trump isn’t exactly endearing himself to many foreign leaders these days.

In the last few days alone, he’s clashed with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and paused its U.S. military aid, launched a trade war with Canada, Mexico and China, and mocked Lesotho in his first speech to Congress, claiming “nobody has ever heard of” the country.

That last one – that toddler cognition that tells him what he is unaware of, everyone is unaware of. He lacks that mechanism that adults have, that reminds them of the variety of what different people know. Trump is pig-ignorant therefore everyone is exactly as pig-ignorant as he is. He’s ignorant in himself and … Read the rest

Now Trump is playing “Let’s negotiate.” Howzabout I skip the tariff on cars, ok? Yeah sure bro, howzabout I torch 90% of your house instead of all of it?

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is expected to speak to his U.S. counterpart Wednesday after the Americans launched a trade war yesterday with devastating tariffs on all Canadian goods.

A senior government official told CBC News that the call is expected sometime around midday. It’s the first time Trudeau has spoken to U.S. President Donald Trump since his administration torpedoed free trade between the two countries by imposing steep levies on imports.

The call comes as the federal government grapples with the usual chaotic situation out of Trump’s Washington with the president’s advisers suggesting at

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David Frum in the Atlantic:

The Trump administration’s elimination of PEPFAR, the American program to combat HIV infection in Africa, symbolizes the path ahead. President George W. Bush created the program because it would do immense good at low cost, and thereby demonstrate to the world the moral basis of American power. His successors continued it, and Congresses of both parties funded it, because they saw that the program advanced both U.S. values and U.S. interests. Trump and Vance don’t want the United States to be that kind of country anymore.

The thing about this demonstrating the moral basis of one’s power is that you can’t do it without actually having the moral basis. The ulterior motive is there, … Read the rest

Originally a comment by Your Name’s not Bruce? on Prank.

Will nobody tell Trump how tariffs work? He’s under the impression (or giving the impression) that the countries he’s targeting with these tariffs are going to pay him for the privilege of selling in the US. Canada isn’t going to pay a dime; it’s US customers of Canadian goods who are going to be stuck with the bill, or needing to scramble to find alternate sources for the products we can sell more profitably elsewhere. Trump seems to think that, like some hoity- toity credit card with exorbitant annual fees, we’ll pay through the nose in order to be permitted to bow and scrape our way back into his … Read the rest

It’s the science, stupid.

Fellows of the Royal Society met yesterday to discuss, as they put it, “Fellows’ behaviour”. In light of the resignation of two fellows and an open letter signed by nearly 3,500 scientists, many, including me, expected the discussion to be focused on the behaviour of one particular fellow: Elon Musk.

The Royal Society, as one of the world’s most esteemed scientific institutions, bears the responsibility of maintaining standards among its fellows. Musk, admitted as a fellow in 2018 for his technological innovations, has recently engaged in behaviour that contravenes the society’s code of conduct.

I did not know Musk is an FRS.

In particular, many scientists have taken issue with his assault on

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Trump being activisty again.

You cannot repeal the first amendment by tweet. I know this because I watched Schoolhouse Rock. pic.twitter.com/i4VpnCKK5M

— Sean Casten (@SeanCasten) March 4, 2025

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Wheels falling off already.

A leading spokesperson in the Department of Health and Human Services announced his resignation Monday after stark disagreements with Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. over how to manage the growing measles outbreak.

Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Thomas Corry resigned effective immediately on Friday only two weeks after starting the job, he posted on LinkedIn, wishing his colleagues in the department “the best and great success.” Corry reportedly butted heads with Kennedy and Kennedy’s principal deputy chief of staff, Stefanie Spear, over how to manage the department, according to Politico.

Let me guess – he thought it should be managed in the direction of shutting down outbreaks of dangerous disease?

Specifically, Corry was not

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Goddam Democrats voted unanimously to let men invade women’s sports.

Help is on the way.

A useful graphic for all the DEMOCRATIC SENATORS!!!!! pic.twitter.com/fyLfY4FbrO

— Martina Navratilova (@Martina) March 4, 2025

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No, it’s really not.

Women’s history is women’s history. That’s all. We have zero obligation to share it with other categories of people, because it’s women’s. Words have meaning.… Read the rest

Trump is doing his tariff thing.

Donald Trump just took the biggest gamble of his young second presidency.

His hammer-blow 25% tariffs against Canada and Mexico that hit at midnight dealt a fresh shock to an economy showing alarming signs of slowing growth and rising inflation – a perilous mix for any president.

Trump also doubled an additional tariff on all Chinese imports to 20%, in a trio of decisions that sent stocks – a cherished metric of his own performance – tumbling. 

Not to worry. All part of the plan. These guys know what they’re doing. This is three dimensional chess.

“It’s going to be very costly for people to take advantage of this country. They can’t come

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Trump has stopped military aid to Ukraine.

We’re restarting our live coverage as the White House announces that the US will pause military aid for Ukraine.

“The President has been clear that he is focused on peace. We need our partners to be committed to that goal as well. We are pausing and reviewing our aid to ensure that it is contributing to a solution,” a White House official has told the BBC’s US partner, CBS News.

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According to officials this pause is said to be temporary until President Trump determines that Ukraine can demonstrate a “commitment to peace negotiations” with Russia.

The Trump administration basically wants President Zelensky to sign the minerals deal and “make peace” with

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The dogma is solemnly recited.

I’m not rebranding, @jk_rowling.
It’s unfortunate that rather engaging critically with my tweet, you try to turn me into some sort of caricature.
I’m less concerned with my “personal clout” than I am in challenging your bigotry.
Trans women are women. https://t.co/70wOKzWaRe https://t.co/Al3WliwhUC

— Thomas Willett (@ThomasWillett9) March 2, 2025

JKR replies:

The fringe idea that we all have a ‘gender identity’ that may or may not match our biological sex is the whole point of this discussion. Trans activists act as though the existence of ‘gender identity’ is a settled, self-evident point, when to the vast majority of the world it’s unevidenced, quasi-religious, pseudoscientific nonsense, which has been imposed top down on

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Letter to Dim Don:

https://twitter.com/rshereme/status/1896628953600995407 https://twitter.com/rshereme/status/1896628959917568466

https://twitter.com/rshereme/status/1896628969174335519 https://twitter.com/rshereme/status/1896628987180523908 https://twitter.com/rshereme/status/1896628992343683458

Signed, Lech Wałęsa, former political prisoner, Solidarity leader, President of Poland

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National Organization for Women:

ACTION ALERT: Urge your Senators to vote against the “Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act

Yes hello we are the national organization for women and we are telling you to vote against keeping men and boys out of women’s and girls’ sports. We are telling you to campaign not to exclude men and boys from sports for women and girls. We are, in short, telling you to ruin sports for women and girls. Are we progressive or what.

This bill prohibits school athletic programs from allowing trans women, or individuals not assigned female at birth, to participate in school athletic programs. This endangers all players on women and girls’ sports teams no matter

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