All entries by this author

The step

Aug 3rd, 2019 3:45 pm | By

Good to see he protected his hearing before killing at least 18 people at random.

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Ineffable

Aug 3rd, 2019 3:32 pm | By
Ineffable

Brilliant juxtaposition. So appropriate, so thoughtful, so sensitive.

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Volodya? Is that you?

Aug 3rd, 2019 2:48 pm | By

Military Veterans Against Fascism:

Trump offered Putin help with fighting wildfires in Siberia…planes, personnel, money, and materials.

When California was burning from wildfires he blamed the state and threatened to stop federal funding from going to the state.

Analysts believe Trump’s call to Putin was him looking for more support (election meddling on his behalf) going into 2020. Given his pick of nominees for the head of the nation’s intelligence system is a Trump loyalist with no intention of preventing Russia from interfering…we may be seeing Trump actively colluding with Russia to rig the 2020 vote.

Moscow Mitch’s refusal to secure our election suggests the criminal conspiracy extends beyond the White House to several prominent GOP leaders.

The Republicans

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If his next girlfriend is a cis woman

Aug 3rd, 2019 2:28 pm | By

Huh? What? What have women done wrong this time?

Diana Tourjée @DianaTourjee

Dear cis women, Your boyfriend & your brother like trans girls. When you find that out, I hope you remember what happened to these men after women in their lives shamed & rejected them. The stories in this piece are devastating, & sickeningly normal.

“This piece” was written by none other than Diana Tourjée.

It’s the story of Owen, whose girlfriend got so mad at him when she found out he lusted after trans women.

He’d love to have a healthy, public relationship with a trans woman. But it feels unlikely. He doesn’t really know where to meet trans women, and if his next girlfriend is a cis

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Pretty stoked

Aug 3rd, 2019 11:58 am | By

McKinnon wins again.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B0rNc1wFlm_/

https://www.instagram.com/p/B0tJqKvFxcp/… Read the rest



You want some?

Aug 3rd, 2019 11:04 am | By

What Trump inspires:

A man has been charged after he punched an anti-Trump protester outside the president’s rally in Cincinnati Thursday night. Footage obtained by CBS affiliate WKRC shows Dallas Frazier, 29, being immediately arrested after hitting another man multiple times.

Before President Trump was set to give a speech inside U.S. Bank Arena, video shows Frazier, dressed in a green polo shirt, opening the door of a red pickup truck and going after 61-year-old Mike Alter. (The footage, which contains some profanity, can be seen here.)

Frazier is seen sizing up the victim and asking, “You want some?” –– before swinging at the man three times and knocking his sunglasses off. Officers then arrest him.

They go … Read the rest



Tell us more about the power differentials

Aug 3rd, 2019 10:10 am | By

A philosopher tackles some weighty issues in the disagreements between gender critical philosophers and what she chooses to call “transfeminist” ones. (What does that even mean? Identifies as feminist but is actually a misogynist?) I haven’t finished reading it yet because one item demanded immediate attention.

What about the claim – elaborated most fully in Dr. Stock’s Quillette column – that trans-inclusive institutional policies can constrain professors’ freedom to teach?

I think the answer here is mixed. Certainly, no one should mispronoun a non-binary person simply because they (the speaker) have adopted the scholarly view that there are only two genders. But there is an easy workaround. If, for some reason, I refuse to say “they”, then when engaging with

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80 million Olympic swimming pools

Aug 2nd, 2019 3:25 pm | By

Robert Reich:

Greenland’s ice sheet lost 11 billion tons of surface ice in one day. July is on pace to become the hottest month ever recorded. Wildfires are raging across the Arctic.

We are already feeling the effects of the climate emergency. But Trump and Republicans in Congress refuse to even acknowledge the basic science of this crisis, much less take action to address it. The oil and gas industry donated almost $24 million to Republican candidates last election cycle — and they’re getting their money’s worth.

He was linking to CNN:

After months of record temperatures, scientists say Greenland’s ice sheet experienced its biggest melt of the summer on Thursday, losing 11 billion tons of surface ice

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Crow Tribe et al v. Zinke

Aug 2nd, 2019 2:53 pm | By

Oh no – Native Americans are destroying our Western way of life, at least so says Liz Cheney.

On a momentous day for Tribal Nations, Congresswoman Liz Cheney (R-WY), the House Republican Conference Chairwoman, stated that the successful litigation by tribes and environmentalists to return the grizzly bear in Greater Yellowstone to the Endangered Species Act (ESA) “was not based on science or facts” but motivated by plaintiffs “intent on destroying our Western way of life.”

Our Western way of life? Whose Western way of life? White people’s? Republicans’? White Republicans’? Cheneys’? Because from what I remember – correct me if I’m wrong – white people did quite a lot to ruin Native Americans’ way of life back in … Read the rest



Shamelessness on full display

Aug 2nd, 2019 10:48 am | By

Now for Aaron Rupar’s report on the Cincinnati fascist rally:

Trump made it more clear than ever before that he conceives of himself as the president of the states that voted for him, and little more. At various points during his speech in Cincinnati, he ridiculed living conditions and violent crime in blue “inner cities” like Baltimore, Los Angeles, and Chicago.

Arguably the lowest point in Trump’s speech came when he escalated his one-sided feud with elected officials representing one of America’s blackest cities by turning victims of gun violence in Baltimore into a political cudgel to wield against Democrats. The spectacle of the American president trying to score partisan points on violent crime in an American

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Frothing

Aug 2nd, 2019 10:38 am | By

Aaron Rupar at Vox covered Trump’s Cincinnati rally at Vox but before I get to that I want to say something about the photo above his piece.

Andrew Spear/Getty Images

It’s shamingly easy to find pictures like that of Trump, and impossible to find any where he looks like a reasonable sensible grown-up human. The hair alone rules that out, and the hair isn’t all. But the thing is…you don’t see pictures like that of other political figures talking. Even Mitch McConnell, even Lindsey Graham – you don’t see photos of them rolling their eyes and screeching like lunatics. Trump? They’re everywhere. He looks unhinged…and that’s because he is.

Photos can be very misleading, but in Trump’s case they convey … Read the rest



Racist enough yet?

Aug 2nd, 2019 10:11 am | By

Also the president of the US takes to Twitter to mock Elijah Cummings for having an intruder break into his house.

“Really bad news! The Baltimore house of Elijah Cummings was robbed. Too bad!” Trump tweeted Friday morning.

Trump’s tweet came less than 24 hours after a report from WJZ, the CBS affiliate in Baltimore, that Cummings’ home had been burglarized early Saturday morning, hours before Trump launched a Twitter attack on the congressman.

He had another fascist rally yesterday.

At a raucous rally in Cincinnati, Ohio, on Thursday night, Trump continued to drag the city of Baltimore through the mud ― and extended his attacks to Chicago, San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Trump claimed that Baltimore’s homicide rate

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A short talk but a good talk

Aug 2nd, 2019 9:45 am | By

Trump wants to help Putin with the fawrest fiyas because apparently we’re especially good at putting out fawrest fiyas.

It’s funny/disgusting that he twice explains to us how bad the fiyas are by saying they’re the worst he’s ever seen.

One – he hasn’t seen them. Two, why would what he’s seen be the measure of anything? Three, he’s relying on reports by people who do know what they’re talking about, just like the rest of us, but he frames it as if he had taken a godlike trip up above the planet to check on the size of the fires in Siberia. It’s just so dopy and clueless and inept.

Also of course he contemptuously brushes off the question … Read the rest



Almost the size of Belgium

Aug 1st, 2019 1:49 pm | By

Also, the fires that destroy forests that could have absorbed some of the CO2 also fill the air with soot which…raises temperatures further.

Russia has declared a state of emergency in five Siberian regions after wildfires engulfed an area of forest almost the size of Belgium amid record high temperatures as a result of climate change.

Officials said 2.7 million hectares of forest (about 10,400 square miles) were ablaze on Tuesday as soaring temperatures, lightning storms and strong winds combined, sending smoke hundreds of miles to reach some of Russia’s biggest regional cities.

Environmental groups worry that in addition to the destruction of carbon-absorbing forest, the carbon dioxide, smoke and soot released will accelerate temperature increases that are already

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The Greenland ice sheet

Aug 1st, 2019 1:41 pm | By

What happens when there’s nothing left to melt?

In years past, when it rained near Greenlander Toennes Berthelsen’s family camp, water would flood down as the mountain top ice melted, creating rivers where there usually are none.

Last week, when it rained there, there was no river at all.

“It was heavy raining, but we couldn’t see any flood coming down,” Berthelsen said. The ice cap at the top of the mountain was completely gone.

It’s been exceptionally warm in Greenland this year.

Now, the same heat dome that cooked Europe is forecast to raise temperatures in Greenland into the 70s Fahrenheit on parts of the coast, and the ice sheet is in the midst of one of its most

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Not Emmett Till

Aug 1st, 2019 1:10 pm | By

Updating to add: The article is from August 2016 so obviously the inspiration must be the other way around. H/t clamboy for noticing.

Yaniv has inspired imitators. Of course.

A transgender woman in Charlottetown has filed a complaint with the P.E.I. Human Rights Commission alleging she was refused service at a local salon because of her transgender status.

Kristen McKay says she went into Carrie’s Esthetic Salon in downtown Charlottetown on Tuesday afternoon to get her nails and makeup done and for makeup lessons.

Behold the transgender woman in question:

Krystalle Ramlakhan/CBC

McKay said a woman at the salon informed her that she didn’t do services for men, and when McKay replied that she’s not a man but a

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Give back those medals

Aug 1st, 2019 10:47 am | By

The dictator strikes again:

Navy officials said Wednesday they are pulling achievement medals from prosecutors who argued the case against a decorated Navy SEAL who was acquitted in the death of a wounded Islamic State captive after President Donald Trump intervened.

Trump tweeted earlier Wednesday that he had directed the secretary of the Navy and the chief of naval operations to “immediately withdraw and rescind” the Navy Achievement Medal from prosecutors who argued the case against Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher, who was acquitted by military jurors earlier this month. “The Prosecutors who lost the case against SEAL Eddie Gallagher (who I released from solitary confinement so he could fight his case properly), were ridiculously given a Navy

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Target

Aug 1st, 2019 10:39 am | By

A seller of guns seeks new customers by putting targets on lefty brown women in Congress:

A gun shop owner in North Carolina put up a billboard that is more of an attack than an advertisement. The sign, about one mile away from Cherokee Guns in Murphy, North Carolina, shows four congresswomen of color — who have become known as “the Squad” — with a disparaging message.

“The 4 Horsemen Cometh,” the sign reads, with the word “Cometh” scratched out and replaced with “are idiots.”

Below are the faces of Reps. Ilhan Omar, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib and Ayanna Pressley, who were the subject of a barrage of racist tweets by President Trump.

What could possibly go wrong.

He’s giving … Read the rest



He could have founded a race of super…whatevers

Jul 31st, 2019 5:28 pm | By

Oh look…Jeffrey Epstein had big dreams of improving the human species by mass-impregnating women with his SpecialSpunk™.

Jeffrey E. Epstein, the wealthy financier who is accused of sex trafficking, had an unusual dream: He hoped to seed the human race with his DNA by impregnating women at his vast New Mexico ranch.

Mr. Epstein over the years confided to scientists and others about his scheme, according to four people familiar with his thinking, although there is no evidence that it ever came to fruition.

Mr. Epstein’s vision reflected his longstanding fascination with what has become known as transhumanism: the science of improving the human population through technologies like genetic engineering and artificial intelligence. Critics have likened transhumanism to

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Guest post: Is that an appropriate thing to ask?

Jul 31st, 2019 4:50 pm | By

Originally a comment by Screechy Monkey on Can you affirm my gender at 3 p.m. Tuesday?

The “gender affirming” bit is key. It seems to be what all of these fights are about, or at least most of them.

Yaniv wants these spas to give her treatments that will supposedly “affirm” her in her gender. (I’m more than a little suspicious that this is Yaniv’s only or even her main motive, but let that go for now.)

Trans women athletes want to compete with cis women because it will “affirm” their gender to be in the “women’s” event. (Again, I’m being charitable and assuming that they’re not motivated by a desire to win awards and scholarships.)

Same for arguments about … Read the rest