California is burning again.

Firefighters in California struggled on Thursday to gain control of major wildfires that have grown explosively and forced extensive evacuations amid a searing heatwave.

The deadly and destructive Fairview fire in southern California expanded in two directions, covering more than 30 sq miles (78 sq km) of Riverside county. It was just 5% contained.

In the Sierra Nevada, the Mosquito fire had scorched nearly 9 sq miles (23 sq km), forcing evacuations in Placer and El Dorado counties.

California’s a big state, bigger than many countries, but still, multiple huge fires=problem.

There’s another one in the San Bernardino mountains east of LA.… Read the rest

Originally a comment by Mike Haubrich on You’re never too young.

“With this gender fluid identity, within a day, you can easily experience three, four, or five different gender expressions … and that can end with people using different names or pronouns,” Laurence says.

Bonsai responds by claiming that “my gender changes from time to time,” and claims that her “identity had been very mixed up in high school.”

“I came out at first [and] thought I was a lesbian. Then, I went to [bisexual] … and then I started to question my identity. Who am I? I can’t explain it … and I’ve totally accepted it at this point,” Bonsai says.

She can’t explain it, but she’s totally … Read the rest

They’re all wrong. Everybody here is wrong. Disband and start over.

A chaplain was deemed a risk to children by his Church of England diocese for defending the right to question school LGBT policies, it has emerged.

The Rev Dr Bernard Randall, 49, is suing the Bishop of Derby and Trent College over alleged religious discrimination after he was sacked by the fee-paying school and reported to terrorism watchdogs.

But why was a school employing “a chaplain” in the first place?

The Rev Dr Randall was appointed in 2015 to provide pastoral care, share the Christian faith and lead services in Trent School’s chapel.

There’s part of your problem. Schools shouldn’t have “chaplains.” Religious schools shouldn’t exist, because … Read the rest

Oh no, now Trump has fallen out with…Fox News.

The Lincoln Project is amused.

We go low so you don't have to! pic.twitter.com/lIi8xYVDKR

— The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) September 8, 2022

Was it something we said? https://t.co/n3x7eti7w1

— The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) September 8, 2022

https://twitter.com/ProjectLincoln/status/1567894430832533504

This is the ad that pissed off Trump this morning. pic.twitter.com/Ee8edHICu3

— The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) September 8, 2022

… Read the rest

Interesting. There’s a grand jury investigating what lead to the January 6 insurrection, and it has now “expanded its probe to include seeking information about Trump’s leadership PAC, Save America.”

It’s kind of as if you can’t investigate anything about Trump without uncovering new dirt that leads to more new dirt repeat ad infinitum.

The interest in the fundraising arm came to light as part of grand jury subpoenas seeking documents, records and testimony from potential witnesses, the sources said.

The subpoenas, sent to several individuals in recent weeks, are specifically seeking to understand the timeline of Save America’s formation, the organization’s fundraising activities, and how money is both received and spent by the Trump-aligned PAC.

Fraudulently, that’s how.… Read the rest

Hottest summer on record in Europe:

A series of extreme heatwaves and a long running drought saw June, July and August shatter the previous high mark for temperature.

…

“An intense series of heatwaves across Europe paired with unusually dry conditions, have led to a summer of extremes with records in terms of temperature, drought and fire activity in many parts of Europe, affecting society and nature in various ways,” said Freja Vamborg, a senior scientist with the Copernicus Climate Change Service.

It’s the new normal, and the newer normal will be even worse. … Read the rest

Genevieve Gluck at Reduxx:

A video of a young trans-identified teenager is sparking controversy on social media for depicting a 13-year-old dressed in provocative, sexualized clothing as part of an official promotional video for the gender clinic at Chicago’s Lurie Children’s Hospital.

The child, identified as ‘Jupiter,’ uses they/them pronouns and can be seen speaking with a clinician named Natalia, who asks how adults, and parents in particular, can be more accepting of “gender diversity” and develop an “inclusive environment” for trans children.

“I think that one thing that should be explained to a lot of people is that you’re never too young to know about this kind of stuff,” Jupiter says, referring to gender identity.

“I feel

Since we’ve been talking about Critical Race Theory, let’s talk about Parchman Farm.

After the Civil War, the South’s economy, government, and infrastructure were left in compete shambles. Desperate to restore the previous economic and social order and to control the freedom of newly emancipated African Americans, Southern states adopted criminal statutes, collectively known as “Black Codes,” that sought to reproduce the conditions of slavery. These laws are also commonly known as Jim Crow laws.

“The plantation owners, as best they could, wanted Blacks to return to the same place as they had been as slaves,” according to historian David Oshinsky, author of Worse Than Slavery: Parchman Farm and the Ordeal of Jim Crow Justice.

In addition to

Originally a comment by Mike Haubrich on Ask the consultants.

I stlll have the opinion that schools should be teaching students how to analyze competing claims critically rather than shoveling facts at them. Yes, they need to have a grounding of relatively solidly established facts. But they also need to have a Zinn/Loewen style understanding of how to find perspective in the way that history is taught, so that the Charge up San Juan Hill is understood in context, or why the Phillipines were denied their independence by the United States due to realpolitik concerns and their strategic location.

Students should be encouraged to understand why there were riots following George Floyd’s murder, and what is the relationship between … Read the rest

It’s only gender conservative dullards who don’t consider it art to pour urine around in public spaces.

This kind of art protest will be mystifying to gender conservative dullards.

Trans Activists Left Over 60 Bottles of Piss Outside the EHRC https://t.co/kZNIWYQwTf

— Alex Sharpe (@AlexSharpe64) September 6, 2022

Speaking of what kind of people don’t get what, I think maybe Alex Sharpe isn’t all that attuned to the labor of cleaning up urine. I think maybe Alex Sharpe has never had to mop any up.… Read the rest

The Guardian says today’s news about the nuclear secrets is a game-changer.

The reported discovery of information about a foreign nation’s nuclear secrets in materials found at Donald Trump’s private residence is horrifying intelligence experts.

…

Shawn Turner, former director of communications for US national intelligence, was searing in his criticism during an interview Wednesday on CNN’s New Day:

The fact we now know there were highly classified, restricted access documents about another country’s nuclear defense capabilities stored at Mar-a-Lago is a gamechanger with regard to the risk it poses to our national security.
…
The bottom line is others are going to look at this information and determine what we know and don’t know, and they’re going

Among the classified documents Trump stole:

A document describing a foreign government’s military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities, was found by FBI agents who searched former president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence and private club last month, according to people familiar with the matter, underscoring concerns among U.S. intelligence officials about classified material stashed in the Florida property.

Some of the seized documents detail top-secret U.S. operations so closely guarded that many senior national security officials are kept in the dark about them. Only the president, some members of his Cabinet or a near-Cabinet-level official could authorize other government officials to know details of these special-access programs, according to people familiar with the search, who spoke on the condition of

California is cooking.

Western states are struggling through one of the hottest and longest September heatwaves on record. Temperatures began soaring last week and the National Weather Service (NWS) warned that dangerous heat could continue through Friday.

California’s state capital of Sacramento on Tuesday hit an all-time high of 116F (46.7C), breaking a 97-year-old record. Six places in the San Francisco Bay Area and central coast set all-time record maximum temperatures, including Santa Rosa, with 115F (46C).

Scary hot. Lethally hot.

[T]he high temperatures fueled wildfires in both northern and southern California. Four deaths were reported over the Labor Day weekend as some 4,400 firefighters battled 14 large fires around the state, with 45 new blazes on Sunday alone,

Just Daily Mail gossip, except there’s a point here.

Eddie Izzard struggles to find romance as a trans woman https://t.co/oOcooWkXC2

— Daily Mail Online (@MailOnline) September 7, 2022

Struggles does he? I wonder why.

Take a gander at the woman next to him in the first photo. Is it just me or does she look significantly younger then he does?

Now take a gander at him in the second photo. What is the demographic group he expects to want to do romance with him? Younger women as in the first photo? But why would most younger women want to do romance with him? The straight ones will be wanting a man and the gay ones will be wanting a lesbian. … Read the rest

Originally a comment by iknklast on Ask the consultants.

From my experience, most of what they teach us in teacher training is just someone getting a bee in their bonnet and producing idiotic materials that schools eat up…for awhile, until the next idiotic thing comes along and they move to that. I have been “trained” in what color I am (not in the terms of white/black, but in terms of what color of personality – they said I am a green), what sort of shoe I am, what my Myers-Briggs is, and something I can’t remember the name of that was peddled as being “actually scientific”…and it wasn’t.

Then there is the yearly training on Title IX, most of … Read the rest

Ah yes, protesting. That’s what that is.

They were protesting the UK government watchdog's policy on trans rights. https://t.co/YukLJbuQvQ

— VICE (@VICE) September 6, 2022

Why would women want single-sex spaces? Why would we not want men like that in the toilet stall next to us?… Read the rest

Wall Street Journal headline:

How Teachers Are Secretly Taught Critical Race Theory

I bet they’re not. I bet what they’re taught is a mishmash of trendy stuff from people like Robin DiAngelo, some of which is useful and some of which is bullshit. It may be some sort of bastard child of Critical Race Theory but I strongly doubt it’s Critical Race Theory itself, since that’s taught in law school, not third grade.

The Journal’s reporting is not very careful.

Randi Weingarten left no room for doubt. “Critical race theory is not taught in elementary schools or high schools,” the American Federation of Teachers president said in a speech last year. Even if that’s true, a Pennsylvania father’s battle with a

Yuh huh.

Lake Manchar has punched through.

The retaining wall of Pakistan’s largest lake burst on Tuesday after months of heavy rains, threatening hundreds more villages downstream and forcing thousands more from their homes.

The Pakistani government engineered two intentional breaches of Lake Manchar’s retaining wall over the weekend in an effort to ease the pressure on the structure, but an irrigation official told The Washington Post that the wall began to crack Tuesday as water levels continued to rise.

…

The Pakistani government is already struggling to respond to what has been described as a “catastrophic” crisis, and the Lake Manchar breach is likely to further impede access to those in need. Anger is growing among displaced Pakistanis, hundreds of

The Daily Beast on the “privilege” issue:

[Cannon’s] ruling was widely criticized by former prosecutors and legal scholars on Monday over the way it awkwardly lent credence to the idea that an ex-president can somehow assert “executive privilege” over government documents, even if federal law enforcement agencies operating with the tacit approval of a current president are acting in their capacity as the current executive branch.

Similar to the question I kept squawking yesterday – how does he get to claim “executive privilege” when he’s not the executive any more? What executive privilege? The whole point of it is to enable the actual executive to do the job. When the job is not yours any more you don’t need … Read the rest