… Read the restSection 1 of Article Two is one, but not the only, place where the Constitution defines who may run for president. Whereas Section 1 of Article Two has to do with a factors over which a person has no control, place of birth and legal status of parents, Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment concerns how an American citizen behaves. It forbids officeholders who try to overthrow the Republic from holding office again.
It is obvious on a plain reading of this part of our Constitution that (absent a two-thirds vote of both houses of Congress) Donald Trump is now ineligible for the office of the presidency. He took an oath as an officer of the
All entries by this author
Now ineligible
Aug 15th, 2023 10:26 am | By Ophelia BensonWhy him?
Aug 15th, 2023 9:39 am | By Ophelia BensonWhy would any radio personality bring in India Willoughby of all people to talk about hate?
James O’Brien spoke to former Loose Women panellist and trans woman India Willougby after two men were stabbed outside a Clapham gay bar in a homophobic attack, as police hunt for the knifeman.
Why? Why not talk to a gay man rather than a man who calls himself a woman? Especially when the man who calls himself a woman is the venomous misogyny-mongering horror show that is India Willoughby?
… Read the restIndia said to James: “You see attacks on drag queens, drag queen storytime. Now drag is not trans. Drag is gay culture and for me, thugs and bullies, they do not differentiate when you’re out
Wait, he has a report
Aug 15th, 2023 6:30 am | By Ophelia BensonDetailed but irrefutable. Why “but”? Detailed and irrefutable are not incompatible or contradictory. He meant “and” but his brain tricked him, probably because he knows the “details” are inventions aka lies.
Trump’s attempt to do a version of this in a Sept. 2021 letter to Brad Raffensperger is literally a charge in the indictment. pic.twitter.com/fmrvBvETx3
— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) August 15, 2023
The full depths
Aug 15th, 2023 4:56 am | By Ophelia BensonNorm Eisen and another lawyer (Amy Lee Copeland) on why the Georgia indictment is such a good thing.
… Read the restMs. Willis charges a wide range of conspirators from the Oval Office to low-level Georgia G.O.P. functionaries and is the first to plumb the full depths, through a state-focused bathyscope, of the conspiracy.
Her case also provides other important complements to the federal matter: Unlike Mr. Smith’s case, which will almost certainly not be broadcast because of federal standards, hers will almost certainly be televised, and should Mr. Trump or another Republican win the White House, Ms. Willis’s case cannot be immediately pardoned away. It offers transparency and accountability insurance. As Ms. Willis said in her news conference Monday night, “The
41 counts
Aug 15th, 2023 3:57 am | By Ophelia Benson
- A Georgia grand jury indicted former President Donald Trump today, charging him with felony racketeering and numerous conspiracy charges as part of a sweeping investigation into the effort by him and his allies to overturn the 2020 election.
- The 41-count indictment also names lawyers Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Kenneth Chesebro, Jenna Ellis and Ray Smith and several other people.
- Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis enlisted a special grand jury last year that heard testimony from 75 witnesses.
- Among the best-known moments in the pressure campaign against Georgia officials was a call in which Trump asked Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” the votes he needed to beat Joe Biden.
That was indeed a moment. I … Read the rest
Witness intimidation or tampering
Aug 14th, 2023 3:36 pm | By Ophelia Benson… Read the restFormer President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social, his social media platform, on Monday saying Georgia’s former Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan “shouldn’t” testify in grand jury proceedings this week regarding allegations that Trump attempted to overturn the 2020 election results in the state—and some legal analysts are saying the post could be witness intimidation or tampering.
…
Ryan Goodman, former special counsel in the Department of Defense, tweeted a screenshot of Trump’s post alongside a screenshot of a Georgia law requiring that a judge find the defendant “poses no significant risk of intimidating witnesses” before approving bail.
CNN’s top legal analyst, Elie Honig, said the post is “straight-up witness tampering, witness intimidation.”
…
Per Georgia law, anyone who
We’re not going anywhere
Aug 14th, 2023 3:28 pm | By Ophelia BensonVictoria Smith on Mhairi Black’s contempt for women who are older than she is:
… Read the restAgeist sexism is central to trans activism. The idea of “womanhood” that it promotes is bound up in the social construction of femininity, whilst utterly dismissive of the material reality of ageing female bodies. Through history, patriarchy has not just sought to define and exploit women as a sex class; it has done so in different ways depending on where women are in the female lifecycle. Trans activism, as an expression of patriarchy, does this, too.
…
Ageing female bodies interrupt the pornified fantasies of the likes of Andrea Long Chu, Julia Serano and Grace Lavery. They spoil the self-pitying narrative that depicts “cis women” as
Bail in Georgia
Aug 14th, 2023 3:22 pm | By Ophelia BensonAha.
Andrew Weissmann explains why Trump may have a Georgia bail problem, "The exact words because this is the provision that the court has to find to release someone on bail in Georgia, is that the defendant poses no risk of intimidating witnesses." pic.twitter.com/dVIDTEOtla
— Sarah Reese Jones (@PoliticusSarah) August 14, 2023
Does Donald Trump pose no risk of intimidating witnesses? Apart from the fact that he does it in public and in all caps every day?… Read the rest
Breach
Aug 14th, 2023 2:32 pm | By Ophelia BensonThey wanted to find evidence of voter fraud in Georgia, so they did everything they could to find some.
… Read the restAtlanta-area prosecutors investigating efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia are in possession of text messages and emails directly connecting members of Donald Trump’s legal team to the early January 2021 voting system breach in Coffee County, sources tell CNN.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is expected to seek charges against more than a dozen individuals when her team presents its case before a grand jury next week. Several individuals involved in the voting systems breach in Coffee County are among those who may face charges in the sprawling criminal probe.
Investigators in the Georgia criminal
Let men win
Aug 14th, 2023 11:22 am | By Ophelia BensonMSP Patrick Harvie thinks men should be allowed to invade women’s sports.
https://twitter.com/CallieMac88/status/1690988451003318272His stupid little cardboard sign says TRANS PEOPLE BELONG IN SPORT which is of course repetition #18 billion of the Big Lie. Nobody is saying trans people don’t belong in sport; people who know their ass from their elbow say male people don’t belong in female sport. Men who claim to be women can still be in sport, they just shouldn’t be in women’s sport.
Conspicuous twit Xander Elliards writes:
… Read the restPATRICK Harvie stood in solidarity with trans women at a protest on the final day of the cycling world championships.
The Glasgow MSP, who also serves as Active Travel Minister in the Scottish Government, was criticised
Blatantly unlawful
Aug 14th, 2023 10:11 am | By Ophelia BensonThe Daily Beast lines up some lawyers who say Trump is indeed engaged in open witness tampering.
… Read the rest
Donald Trump publicly insisted on Monday that a key witness in Georgia’s grand jury probe shouldn’t testify this week as ordered—a brazen ask that one legal expert described as “witness tampering in real time.”Georgia’s former Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, a Republican, was the witness at the center of the early morning tirade from Trump, who has been raging for weeks as the Fulton County grand jury is seemingly inching closer to filing criminal charges against him over alleged efforts to meddle in the 2020 presidential election in Georgia.
While singling Duncan out on Monday, Trump misspelled his first name.
“I am reading
Grab the steering wheel
Aug 14th, 2023 10:01 am | By Ophelia BensonFormer President Donald Trump on Monday launched a string of familiar attacks against Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis on Monday as Willis is expected to begin presenting her election interference case to a grand jury later today.
In three all-caps posts on his social media platform Truth Social, Trump attacked Willis over her investigation, blasted media leaks, specifically urged “someone” to tell the grand jury he did not interfere in the election while continuing to make false claims that the 2020 election was stolen.
Witness tampering and DA intimidation right out in the open.… Read the rest
Trump fucks around
Aug 14th, 2023 9:43 am | By Ophelia BensonJoyce Vance six minutes ago:
Looking forward to the "find out" part of this pic.twitter.com/0DpyjoblS1
— Joyce Alene (@JoyceWhiteVance) August 14, 2023
He’s blabbing about stuff from the disclosure docs!
Update: No he’s not; this is the Georgia case. My bad. I was so startled I didn’t pause to read any replies.
But still. Farking hell.… Read the rest
Fake Frederick Douglass
Aug 14th, 2023 9:35 am | By Ophelia BensonVia Tim Harris at Miscellany Room: Ron DeSantis and Prager U (not a university, just an initial!) explain slavery.
I could only stand 4 minutes.… Read the rest
Trump not refraining
Aug 14th, 2023 4:51 am | By Ophelia BensonTrump thinks he can do whatever he wants no matter what. He may turn out to be right.
Donald Trump slammed the judge presiding over his newest criminal case early Monday, testing her three-day-old warning that he refrain from “inflammatory” attacks against those involved in his case.
In a Truth Social post just before 1 a.m., Trump assailed U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan as “highly partisan” and “very biased and unfair,” citing as evidence a statement she made during the sentencing of a woman who participated in the mob that breached the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
“She obviously wants me behind bars,” Trump wrote.
He’s jumping up and down in front of the judge saying “Nyah nyah you … Read the rest
Proto-cis
Aug 13th, 2023 5:15 pm | By Ophelia BensonAn item from last month:
Now more than ever, cis female athletes must show solidarity with trans athletes
Must? Why?
Is there ever going to be a time when we’re told trans athletes must show solidarity with women?
Of course not. Stupid question. Women are privileged bitches, Karens, hags.
Johanna Mellis goes on:
Kathryn Bromwich argued that the main threat to us cisgender women comes from cisgender men, and not trans women. It is the same in sport: historically and currently, the common perpetrators of sexual assault, abuse and harassment in sport are cisgender men.
Trans women are men. Skip the “cis” label, which doesn’t mean anything. Trans women are men who pretend to be women, which doesn’t make them … Read the rest
New slogan
Aug 13th, 2023 4:27 pm | By Ophelia BensonWell, that’s up front.
Women don’t only have to move over and let men compete in their sports. They have to let them win as well. Like you would with a toddler. No signs supporting trans men to compete and win over men, funnily enough. pic.twitter.com/QX8pbrDmu1
— Fergie (@Fergie_CJ) August 13, 2023
Let trans women win, the protest sign says, meaning: let men cheat by competing against women. Let men win by pretending to be women so that they can easily win all the prizes. So they’re cheating, so what, let them win!!
You wouldn’t think they’d want to go with that.… Read the rest
Not an expert
Aug 13th, 2023 11:29 am | By Ophelia BensonColin Montgomerie telling women what we can and can’t say about men pretending to menstruate by wearing white jeans with a huge red blob in the crotch.
https://twitter.com/KatyMontgomerie/status/1690431049828868096It’s good playful fun! Really!
Norwich Pride. Drag queen in white jeans with fake menstrual blood throws tampons out to family audience.@MailOnlinehttps://t.co/nR9V9AEi6G
— Maya Forstater (@MForstater) August 12, 2023
A bit of fun
Aug 13th, 2023 10:26 am | By Ophelia BensonNightclub sells the opportunity to spy on women:
A Scottish nightclub has installed a two-way mirror allowing male revellers to secretly spy on women when they visit the venue’s toilets.
Only clubbers who hire out either of the two £800-a-time private rooms at The Shimmy Club in Glasgow can view the spyglass which overlooks the sinks in the women’s toilets.
Similar to the those used in police interrogation rooms, the mirror allows revellers in the private function rooms to spy on those in the women’s toilets without their knowledge.
“Revellers” nothing. Evil men degrading women.
… Read the restA picture taken inside one of the rooms and leaked on the internet shows two female clubbers applying make-up in the toilets completely unaware
Redefining the family unit
Aug 13th, 2023 9:57 am | By Ophelia BensonA lesbian* couple decided to try to “co-parent” a kid with another couple.
For us, the ideal parenting setup would consist of three or four of us sharing responsibility for a child (the others involved would also be responsible for providing the sperm).
The others? Not one of the others, but both of them? Really?
The way we see it, why not use the implicit obstacles we face as a same-sex couple to become parents in a way that works for us and redefines the family unit completely?
Ah. There’s actually an answer to that question. Or several answers, but one in particular is very basic. It’s because biological parents have a stake in the child that non-biological parents … Read the rest