Oh you mean if we tell thousands of damaging lies about you on our very popular “news” channel you’re going to sue us? For real???

Lou Dobbs is out at Fox Business, just a day after the voting machine company Smartmatic filed a $2.7 billion lawsuit against him, the cable news network and several purveyors of the debunked theory that its technology was used to commit massive voter fraud.

It wasn’t really a “theory,” bunked or debunked. It was a story. Trump wanted a story so they made a story for him.

After the initial threats were made, Fox News and Fox Business ran deposition-esque segments on the shows of the three anchors now sued by Smartmatic — Dobbs, Maria Bartiromo and Jeanine Pirro — downplaying the evidence for such claims. Newsmax read a statement on air saying pretty much the same thing, and it has since awkwardly tried to shut down MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell when he made such claims. One America News has resisted retracting claims made on its airwaves and has ridiculed its far-right competitor for “censoring” Lindell, but it has quietly removed several stories about Dominion from its website. And the station carrying Giuliani’s radio show on Thursday played a disclaimer distancing itself from claims made on the show, to Giuliani’s chagrin.

We disavow our lies! They were never ours! It was all those weirdos who work for us! Sue them, not us!

Also reinforcing the potential legal jeopardy: Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel recently acknowledged that, during a particularly far-flung news conference held by Giuliani and then-Trump lawyer Sidney Powell at the RNC, “I certainly was concerned it was happening in my building.” She added that she was specifically worried about “what is the liability of the RNC, if these allegations are made and unfounded?”

Lie down with dogs get up with fleas and libel suits.

It just always has to be misrepresented. From a Guardian piece on the sacking of Joanna Cherry:

Some SNP MPs described a “palpable sense of relief” within the Westminster group this week, along with a degree of frustration that action had not been taken sooner. As one MP said: “The party has a hard-won reputation for being socially liberal, pro-equality, and any perception that our politicians are not has a terrible effect on younger supporters in particular, and with that comes the fear that they will go to the Greens at the next election.”

So the implication is that Cherry, and the rest of us pesky feminists who don’t agree that men can become women, is socially conservative and anti-equality.

What a grotesque, destructive, loathsome thing to say. We are not anti-equality. Feminists who want to hang on to women’s rights are not anti-equality – women are half (or slightly over half) the world population and we’re pro-equality for them, so how can we be anti-equality? We think women should have equal rights along with men; how is that anti-equality? We also think trans people should have equal rights along with women and men, we just don’t think men who identify as women should take rights away from women.

Can that nice man who defiled Pelosi’s office go home if he promises to be good? No.

A federal judge on Thursday ordered the detention of an Arkansas man photographed with his feet on the desk of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi during the Jan. 6 rioting at the U.S. Capitol, describing his behavior as “brazen” and “entitled” after excoriating his defense lawyer over “frivolous” claims of prosecutorial misconduct.

In ordering the detention of Richard Barnett, Chief Judge Beryl Howell said the charges he faces, including unlawfully entering the Capitol grounds with a weapon, are “in some ways, too benign sounding to fairly describe what happened.” The judge went on to describe the deadly events that took place at the Capitol during the congressional certification of President Joe Biden’s election win, which took place down the street from the federal courthouse in Washington, D.C., within sight of her chambers.

I walked past there last time I was in DC, after a quick look at the Capitol. They are indeed not far apart.

“We’re still living here in Washington, D.C., with the consequences of the violence” that Barnett and others committed, Howell said, describing how she could see members of the National Guard patrolling outside her window.

She added that Barnett’s prior conduct, including reports of him pointing a rifle at a car with a Black Lives Matter sticker and him carrying a weapon at a “Save the Children” rally—an event rooted in the QAnon conspiracy theory—were part of a behavior of troubling conduct.

He’s shown us who he is. Believe him.

Oh hooray, the scales have fallen from my eyes and I have been educated, curly blonde red eyeshadow boy has EXPLAINED FEMINISM and everything is different. Thank god for curly blonde red eyeshadow boy and his hatred and contempt for women!

Still at it.

“the person is pregnant”…

Should Trump get intelligence briefings?

Uh, no. He shouldn’t have been getting them for the past four years and he sure as hell shouldn’t be getting them now.

President Joe Biden said that former President Donald Trump should not receive intelligence briefings even though they typically have been given to other former presidents.

Biden told CBS News in an interview that Trump was “unfit to be president” and his “erratic behavior” is why he should [not] have access to the nation’s classified information.

…

Biden added, “I just think that there is no need for him to have the intelligence briefings. What value is giving him an intelligence briefing? What impact does he have at all, other than the fact he might slip and say something?”

You might as well give intelligence briefings to Champ and Major. At least they wouldn’t do any harm.

Intent doesn’t matter?

Use/mention distinction.

Also…

Maybe there’s more to it.

The Daily Beast is patting itself on the back for being the source:

The New York Times on Friday announced the ouster of science and health reporter Donald McNeil Jr., who The Daily Beast reported had allegedly used racist language while on a 2019 trip with students to Peru.

McNeil, formerly the paper of record’s top reporter on COVID-19, leaves amid fallout from an incident that occurred during a Times-sponsored educational trip to Peru when he used the “n-word” and made other racist comments, according to complaints first reported by The Daily Beast. At least six students or their parents claimed McNeil had made racist and sexist remarks throughout the trip.

…

McNeil’s departure comes just days after Times staffers wrote a letter to the paper’s top brass expressing outrage over the allegations that McNeil had used racial slurs, and over the response from Times leadership, which the letter’s signers suggested was wholly insufficient.

Times executive editor Dean Baquet had previously said McNeil should be “given another chance” because his comments were not “hateful or malicious” in intent, but in a message to staff on Friday, the top editor wrote, “We do not tolerate racist language regardless of intent.”

See above. The word appeared in the paper just this week. Reporting on the word is not using the word.

Maybe there’s more to it. Maybe there isn’t.

More “Jessica”:

They’re so bitchy, do they need Tampax, do they need Midol, are they all PMS hur hur hur?

I’m sure that will go well for him.

Chase Strangio is just straight-up libeling people now.

I hope JKR has a word with Chase. She’s not bashful about introducing her lawyers to libelers.

An old acquaintance continues to contribute to the gaiety of nations.

That’s the erstwhile Jessica Yaniv, of course, after another whimsical name change. It seems there’s a celebrity Jessica Simpson, so no doubt Yaniv will be suing her for impersonation soon.

He did sue his local health service just a couple of weeks ago, so while he was also harassing the Langley fire department. Busy guy.

A Langley woman known for her controversial legal and human rights challenges is now suing Fraser Health and the Provincial Health Services Authority (PHSA) for allegedly breaching her personal health information.

Jessica Simpson, formerly known as Jessica Yaniv, filed a small claims case in Surrey Provincial Court against the two health agencies on Monday, Jan. 18.

And then went home to take a bath and summon the fire department.

Simpson has also been arrested and found guilty of one charge of possession of an unauthorized weapon after she brandished an electric stun gun-style weapon on a YouTube livestream. She was sentenced to probation and a firearms prohibition in September of 2020.

She has also attempted to sue the Township of Langley over her alleged treatment by Langley RCMP after her arrest on the stun gun charge.

Now he can attempt to sue the Township of Langley over his treatment by Langley Fire Services. It’s an exciting life he leads.

This seems like a bad idea.

Hunter is writing a book about himself.

When Joe Biden first launched his presidential bid, inquiries about his son, Hunter, were so taboo they were met with the full fury of the campaign.

“Ask the right question!” Biden snapped at a reporter early in the campaign who asked about Hunter Biden’s business interests in Ukraine.

That’s bullshit. As I said about 5 thousand times during the campaign, Biden should have stopped him. Biden should have told his son he couldn’t leverage his daddy’s job into a highly lucrative job for himself for which he had no particular qualifications. It was sordid at best and corrupt at worst. Joe Biden had no right to snap at people asking about it.

Now, it’s the president’s son who is revealing his own story — and, along the way, opening himself up for more scrutiny — just as his father’s presidency is taking hold.

So, again, he’s leveraging his daddy’s job into profit for himself.

Hunter Biden’s new memoir, “Beautiful Things,” to be released April 6, details his struggles with addiction.

But it also piggybacks on his daddy’s job.

[T]he Biden family on Thursday said they stood by his decision to pen the book.

“The shared feeling is that telling this story takes a hell of a lot of strength and courage,” said a close Biden ally. “And right now when [the American public’s] substance use has increased during the coronavirus outbreak and when so many families are feeling the pain of the opioid epidemic, this is especially meaningful and could help others find the support they need. “

But also it will sell more copies because of who Daddy is.

Yes the Republicans exploited the Hunter issue during the campaign, but they didn’t create the issue. Hunter did that.

The Biden campaign adopted a strategy to forcefully push back on media questions about Hunter Biden, arguing it was a distraction from Trump’s conduct and likening the scenario to the media’s fixation on Hillary Clinton’s emails in 2016.

So corruption is ok then.

The upcoming memoir is being portrayed as a way to further those conversations around addiction. But it could also open up Hunter Biden to charges that he is once more using his last name for profit.

Because he is.

Such criticism was directed at Ivanka Trump, when she published “Women Who Work” in 2017, months after Trump took office and she started working as a White House adviser to him. She said at the time that she’d donate the unpaid part of her advance and any royalties to charity. It is unclear what Hunter Biden plans to do with his earnings.

Donald Trump Jr., meanwhile, released “Triggered” and “Liberal Privilege” while his father was in the White House. The Republican National Committee bought copies of both books to give to donors, shelling out more than $100,000 on copies of “Triggered.”

Note to the DNC: don’t do that.

Well shown and said.

Marjorie Greene has been stripped of her committee duties, and she’s exploiting her rebuke as a way to get people to give her money. Very trumpy.

Greene defended herself ahead of the vote in a speech on the House floor and attempted to distance herself from the dangerous and debunked QAnon conspiracy theory, which she has previously embraced.

But Democratic Rep. Jimmy Gomez of California, who has introduced a resolution to expel Greene, told reporters he still believes she should be removed from Congress even after watching her floor remarks. The congressman said of his resolution, “I’m committed to bringing it up, and I said that to leadership that there needs to be a vote sooner rather or later on this.”

Gomez said that the reason why he is pursuing a resolution to expel Greene “is to send a message that this kind of discourse in our politics is not acceptable, inciting political violence, threatening people as is not acceptable and a person like that should not hold a position in the House of Representatives.”

But the voters voted her, so that’s that.

The Constitution gives Congress the ability to impeach federal officials and judges, but not its own members. They can only be removed by expulsion, which requires a 2/3 vote, a high bar that would be unlikely to be cleared with Democrats holding only a narrow majority.

Hey, all she did was threaten to kill them.

Greene, meanwhile, has been highlighting how much she has been able to fundraise amid the controversy sparked by reports over her past conduct, including from CNN’s KFile that she repeatedly indicated support for executing prominent Democratic politicians in 2018 and 2019 before being elected to Congress.

That’s democracy.

The Pioneer Plaque…

Not really transphobic, because hey, it doesn’t say who is which or how anyone identifies.

Anyway. Ignoring Satiria’s satir, I’m mildly intrigued by the image. It was launched in March 1972. It’s a little odd that they chose that nice young couple from Connecticut to represent all of humanity. No infants, no children, no old crocks, and no people from Shanghai or Kolkata or Mombasa.

Also, down to finer detail…it’s only the man who is doing something, the woman is just standing there passively. The man stands solidly while the woman is pointing her toe for no apparent reason. Advertisers do this – if a woman’s bare feet are visible in an ad she has to be pointing them. No relaxed neutral-position feet for them, no sir, it’s ballet-style pointing or gtfo. And then the hair – since the intended audience is Beings From Spaaaaaaace you’d think the plaque-makers could have put a little more thought into the hair. Also the raised hand is out of proportion; it’s as big as his head.

Quote of the day:

I’m looking forward to the ACLU’s fight for the inclusion of sawhorses, seahorses, and pommel horses in the next running of the Kentucky Derby.

–Your Name’s not Bruce?

The current right-wing gotcha is claiming that Ocasio-Cortez lied about being in the Capitol during the attack. “She wasn’t even there!! She was in her office next door!!! Doesn’t count!!!!”

But some have questioned her story, with conservative critics mentioning that her office is in the nearby Cannon House, not the main Capitol building. GOP Rep. Nancy Mace, whose office is close to Ocasio-Cortez’s, tweeted: “Insurrectionists never stormed our hallway.”

That’s fascinating, but how would AOC or anyone else have known that at the time?

Ocasio-Cortez has vigorously defended her account of the day. She shared a tweet by the alt-right activist Jack Posobiec, who claimed that the congresswoman was “not in the Capitol building at the time of her ‘near death’ experience.”

She wrote that these comments were part of a move by the right who were “manipulating the fact that most people don’t know the layout [of] the Capitol complex. We were all on the Capitol complex—the attack wasn’t just on the dome. The bombs Trump supporters planted surrounded our offices too.”

Her account was supported by Ari Rabin-Havt, former deputy campaign manager for Sen. Bernie Sanders‘ tilt at the Democratic presidential nomination last year. He tweeted that he was at the Rayburn Tunnel in the Capitol complex during the attack.

“Trying to find a hiding place, I moved to [Cannon]. A swat team came running through the tunnel intersection yelling it was not safe & I should find a place to hide. Anyone suggesting @AOC is exaggerating is ignorant or a liar.”

Or ignorant and a liar and a misogynist and a reactionary.

In another tweet he compared the attack with the evacuation of the Capitol complex on 9/11. “I’ve witnessed dozens of protests and security situations at the Capitol. I have traveled with two presidential campaigns. The only moment in my career I have been scared was in [Cannon] that day.”

I was jumping out of my skin that day and I was three thousand miles away.

Speaking of carefully choosing photos for your “Hooray for transwomen in sport!” tweets…

Hiding the hecox there.

H/t guest

The Guardian reported a few days ago that Maajid Nawaz (who, from what I’ve seen, has been moving ever farther to the right lately) has been talking up trumpish conspiracy theories.

The prominent radio presenter and activist Maajid Nawaz, co-founder of a respected British anti-extremist thinktank and a one-time government adviser, has alarmed former admirers and academics with his interest in conspiracy theories about the lockdown and voter fraud in the US election on his Twitter account.

As an LBC radio host, he regularly takes provocative stances, but now a string of controversial and potentially harmful tweets is prompting further questions.

Followers were initially alarmed when Nawaz, who set up the Quilliam Foundation in 2008, inspired by his own move away from Islamic extremism, retweeted a “fascinating thread” in November last year on how the “myth” of a killer coronavirus pandemic had been spread. Nawaz adds he has no opinion on this claim.

No opinion on it but retweets it anyway, regardless of the harms of treating a lethal pandemic as a “myth.”

After the US presidential election, Nawaz tweeted a series of claims that fraud had taken place, questioning the credibility of the voting machines and reproducing some of the arguments put forward by Trump’s former legal cheerleader, Sidney Powell, whose claims proved so outlandish that she was eventually disavowed by the former president.

Following the attack on the US Capitol, Nawaz retweeted false claims that it was antifa, or anti-fascist groups, who orchestrated the raid, rather than Trump supporters.

…

Last week Nawaz also challenged Facebook to explain why it had marked one of his posts as false. He had drawn attention to allegations that America’s chief medical adviser to the president, Dr Anthony Fauci, had invested in the Wuhan laboratory suspected by some of leaking the virus into the human population. The wild allegations about Fauci – for which there is no evidence – were contained in a Fox News report from Steve Hilton, the British former public relations adviser to David Cameron.

If you’re promoting loony claims from Fox News, you’re not an anti-extremism campaigner any more.

Sunder Katwala, the director of the thinktank British Future, is one of those who has been attempting to hold Nawaz to account for spreading unproven theories and scare stories. He argued that the presenter poses more of a problem than conspiracists because of his LBC platform, the fact that he leads a counter-extremism thinktank and is also a prominent British convert from extremism. Katwala, a former general secretary of the leftwing Fabian Society, believes Nawaz’s public profile makes such references to “conspiratorial propaganda more worrying”.

“It has been alarming to witness this evolve from unusual misreadings of the US constitutional process into an interest in electoral fraud conspiracies,” said Katwala. “I cannot conceive of a benign explanation for participating in and spreading QAnon-inspired online conspiracies.”

A wacky sense of humor?