Originally a comment by Screechy Monkey on Barr seems eager.

Old conventional wisdom: Biden needs to win the popular vote by ~ 3 points to avoid an Electoral College loss

New conventional wisdom: Biden needs to win the popular vote by ~ 5-6 points to avoid it being close enough for Trump to steal.

Welcome to America, everyone. The shining city on a hill. (gag) A beacon of democracy. (eye roll)

On a related note, David Frum had a good Twitter thread recently where he called out the utter nonsense that gets babbled every Inauguration Day, when television talking heads marvel at the “peaceful transfer of power” that occurs, even between rival political factions. Such a uniquely American tradition! … Read the rest

It all boils down to the Senate. Trump and Republican legislators are openly planning ways to steal the election.

So now a dark question arises. What will the US’s increasingly progressive majority do if Republican state officials reinstall Trump in the White House, in defiance of the voters? What will they do if that 6-3 court overturns Roe v Wade and bans abortion across the entire country?

Think for a second how that latter situation will have arisen: it is because the Senate picks the judges, and the Senate enshrines minority rule. With two senators per state, tiny Wyoming (population: 600,000) has the same representation as gargantuan California (40 million). On current trends, 70% of Americans will soon

… Read the rest

A week ago.

https://twitter.com/OkBiology/status/1306635799765676032

Bev Jackson: Now there are people who believe that they were born in the wrong body. We personally don’t believe that anybody can be born in the wrong body –

Benjamin Butterworth: Hunhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!

Bev Jackson: ……You find that shocking – but we don’t believe that someone can –

Benjamin Butterworth: I find that bigotry!

Today:

https://twitter.com/AdrianHarrop/status/1309461546528104449

Hunhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!! … Read the rest

Charlie Hebdo again:

Two people have been stabbed and seriously hurt in Paris near the former offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.

Two suspects have been arrested. One of them was seized in the nearby Bastille area with blood on his clothing, police told the BBC.

…

A blade – described as a machete or a meat cleaver – was recovered at the scene of the attack near the Boulevard Richard-Lenoir.

The people stabbed worked at a tv company in the area.

“Two colleagues were smoking a cigarette outside the building, in the street. I heard shouting. I went to the window and saw one of my colleagues, covered in blood, being chased by a man with a

… Read the rest

Barr plans to steal the election for Trump.

Donald Trump’s astonishing suggestion at a campaign rally last weekend that the US president will deploy government lawyers to try to hit the brakes on the counting of ballots on election night relies on the complicity of one federal official more than any other.

It’s Barr, the boss of all those lawyers who could stop the count.

Conveniently for Trump’s stated plan, Barr appears not only ready to acquiesce, he seems eager to bring the lawsuits, having laid groundwork for challenging the election with weeks of misleading statements about the integrity of mail-in voting.

It also looks as if he’ll be willing to sic the military on us.

In order for

… Read the rest

The NHS instructs trans women on how to do a “bum swish”:

https://twitter.com/harryoakey/status/1309432631071838208

In case the image isn’t legible – the underlined bit says: “As a trans woman with a more masculine appearance, you may need to compensate with other “elements” that convey that you are female.”

Trans women are women, but they have to jink around with their appearance so as to “compensate.” Compensate for what? They just are women, so why is there any need to compensate?

Sorry to interrupt; the rest of it is: “The “feminine walk” may help. If you place each foot across yourself each time you take a step this creates the “bum swish.””

And what else does it do? It slows down your … Read the rest

In action.

https://twitter.com/JammersMinde/status/1280548088403439616… Read the rest

Less than a month ago, though, Mermaids was energetically blaming JK Rowling for suicidal thoughts among trans youth and for sharing her non-expert opinions on what it is to be a woman.

Today, J.K.Rowling re-stated her position on transgender lives. We have previously reached out to her both publicly and privately, offering a calm conversation around the issues she has raised and today, we sent a further email to her team, renewing that offer. We are yet to receive a response…. Without giving personal detail, without betraying confidences, we must represent the seriousness of the situation. We are aware through our work with families that there have been cases of self-harm and even attempted suicide following J.K.Rowling’s statements and the

… Read the rest

It seems that Mermaids, in light of the new guidance, is…erm…trying to hide the bodies.

Watch @Mermaids_Gender. Watch their reverse ferret. It's happening right now. pic.twitter.com/2LsSXmldjk

— Jack (@j4ppleby) September 24, 2020

But … But … pic.twitter.com/vB9Q1GYb9Z

— Rachel Rooney (@RooneyRachel) September 24, 2020

Creeeeeak…shiver…crack…shudder…will the great shambolic edifice topple?… Read the rest

David Smith at the Guardian on Trump’s prelude to dictatorship performance yesterday:

Trump careered from touting miracle vaccines to building supreme court suspense, from insulting a female member of the British royal family to abruptly departing for a mysterious “emergency” phone call. But first, there was the small matter of kneecapping American democracy.

Perhaps it was not chance that the president, ever eager to generate media outrage, gave the first question to Brian Karem, who describes himself on Twitter as a “Loud Mouth” senior White House reporter at Playboy. “Will you commit to make sure there’s a peaceful transferral of power after the election?” Karem asked.

And the answer was no, not unless I win.

“Get rid of the

… Read the rest

There there, they say, don’t worry, they say, he didn’t really mean he’s going to steal the election. It’s an uphill battle though seeing as how he said what he said.

Senator Mitt Romney of Utah, the sole Republican to vote to remove Trump from office at his impeachment trial earlier this year, drew comparisons with a crisis in Europe, tweeting: “Fundamental to democracy is the peaceful transition of power; without that, there is Belarus. Any suggestion that a president might not respect this Constitutional guarantee is both unthinkable and unacceptable.”

Right, but he did suggest it, so there we are.

But there were alarming signs of dissent on the Republican side. Thomas Massie, a member of the conservative

… Read the rest

Failing state:

US President Donald Trump has refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power if he loses November’s election.

“Well, we’ll have to see what happens,” the president told a news conference at the White House. “You know that.”

No. Nobody knows that. It isn’t true.

“I’ve been complaining very strongly about the ballots,” Mr Trump, a Republican, said. “And the ballots are a disaster.”

When the journalist countered that “people are rioting”, Mr Trump interjected: “Get rid of the ballots, and you’ll have a very – you’ll have a very peaceful – there won’t be a transfer, frankly, there’ll be a continuation.”

Well yes, if we get rid of the ballots, there won’t be a transfer, … Read the rest

Any pretext will do.

In an interview with France Bleu Alsace radio, Elisabeth said she was walking home when one of the three men said: “Look at that whore in a skirt.”

Two of the three men then held her while the third hit her in the face, leaving her with a black eye, she told the station. The men then fled.

They hate women, and they’re stronger than women. No deeper reason needed. She’s in a skirt! She’s in jeans! She’s a slut! She’s a bitch! There is no Acceptable State for a woman.

She said more than a dozen people witnessed the incident, but no-one intervened.

On Wednesday, junior interior minister Marlene Schiappa – who is

… Read the rest

The UK has issued new guidance for schools on sex and relationships teaching. One passage in particular has drawn praise from people with sane views on children and “gender”:

We are aware that topics involving gender and biological sex can be complex and sensitive matters to navigate. You should not reinforce harmful stereotypes, for instance by suggesting that children might be a different gender based on their personality and interests or the clothes they prefer to wear. Resources used in teaching about this topic must always be age-appropriate and evidence based. Materials which suggest that non-conformity to gender stereotypes should be seen as synonymous with having a different gender identity should not be used and you should not work

… Read the rest

Welcome to the theocracy of the country called The Savior, where women are harshly punished for having miscarriages and stillbirths.

A woman sentenced to 30 years in jail after a stillbirth that was judged to be her fault has been released from jail in El Salvador.

First rule of theocratic misogyny: it’s always a woman’s fault. “It” means anything and everything.

Cindy Erazo, 29, from San Salvador, was granted conditional freedom on Wednesday after six years in jail.

Morena Herrera, head of the Citizen’s Group for the Decriminalisation of Abortion, said that Erazo, who has a son aged 10, had an obstetric emergency when she was eight months pregnant. She was accused of attempting to end the

… Read the rest

Navalny is out of the hospital.

Navalny, who has built a huge following on social media, described his condition in an Instagram post featuring a photo in which he is staring into the camera from a Berlin park bench. He wrote that sleeping is still his biggest problem and that doctors decided the best treatment is a return to “normal life.”

Alexei Navalny/Instagram

Navalny said he is taking walks and spending time with his family and that his plans are “simple”: daily physiotherapy sessions so he’ll be able to stand on one leg again and regain full control of his fingers. He joked that he’ll find out if he can get a prescription for the PlayStation 5.

Colleagues of

… Read the rest

This guy is fascinating. He just can’t stop telling women what to do.

It seems there was a Mumsnet thread discussing surrogacy that included harsh remarks about him, and Justine Roberts of Mumsnet took it down after he complained about it.

Btw this was just replaced with a topic about how awful surrogacy is in all circumstances. Is this the official view of @MumsnetTowers @Justine_Roberts ? https://t.co/YBOIgHSbFm pic.twitter.com/bLQvK3Dg8e

— Benjamin Cohen (@benjamincohen) September 23, 2020

Well is it? Justine?! I’d like an answer please!

Who the hell does he think he is? It’s no wonder Pink News is so awful, when he’s the CEO of it.… Read the rest

Speaking of Trump’s refusing to accept the election result…

President Donald Trump on Wednesday would not commit to providing a peaceful transition of power after Election Day, lending further fuel to concerns he may not relinquish his office should he lose in November.

“Well, we’re going to have to see what happens,” Trump said when asked whether he’d commit to a peaceful transition, one of the cornerstones of American democracy.

As if “American democracy” is something to boast of at this point.

His reluctance to commit to a peaceful transition was rooted in what he said were concerns about ballots, extending his false assertion that widespread mail-in voting is rife with fraud.

“You know that I’ve been complaining very

… Read the rest

So, about this election…

If we are lucky, this fraught and dysfunctional election cycle will reach a conventional stopping point in time to meet crucial deadlines in December and January. The contest will be decided with sufficient authority that the losing candidate will be forced to yield. Collectively we will have made our choice—a messy one, no doubt, but clear enough to arm the president-elect with a mandate to govern.

As a nation, we have never failed to clear that bar. But in this election year of plague and recession and catastrophized politics, the mechanisms of decision are at meaningful risk of breaking down. Close students of election law and procedure are warning that conditions are ripe for a

… Read the rest

Well you see it’s like this…

https://twitter.com/AdrianHarrop/status/1308408256109445120

Male same-sex couples can’t reproduce. It’s that simple. They don’t need reproductive healthcare services because of the not being able to reproduce thing. Female same-sex couples can’t reproduce on their own either, but the fix for that is technologically quite simple and quick and entirely non-invasive. It’s very different from pregnancy that way. The obstacles that exist for male couples that don’t exist for straight couples are all about the presence or absence of a uterus. That’s not because of unfair laws or homophobia, it’s just how female and male bodies work.

Harrop puts it the way he does because he wants us to think that access to female reproduction is there for … Read the rest