Clever trick!

The Secret Service had asked for a room close to the president. But Mar-a-Lago said it was too late. The room was booked. Would agents like a room across the street from the president, instead?

March 2017, this was. They didn’t waste much time.

The next time, the Secret Service didn’t take the same risk. It paid Mar-a-Lago to book rooms for two weeks at a time — locking them up before the club could rent them to others, according to newly released records and emails.

For Trump’s club, it appeared, saying no to the Secret Service had made it a better customer. The agency was paying for rooms on nights when Trump wasn’t even visiting — to be ready just in case Trump decided to go, one former Trump administration official said.

More $$$$ for him, less for us. That’s what the presidency is for, right?

Trump has now visited his own properties 271 times as president, according to a Washington Post tally — including a visit Thursday, when he met with GOP donors at his D.C. hotel.

Through these trips, Trump has brought the Trump Organization a stream of private revenue from federal agencies and GOP campaign groups. Federal spending records show that taxpayers have paid Trump’s businesses more than $900,000 since he took office. At least $570,000 came as a result of the president’s travel, according to a Post analysis.

This is one of Trump’s talents – thieving and cheating on the small scale as well as the large.

Now, new federal spending documents obtained by The Post via a public-records lawsuit give more detail about how the Trump Organization charged the Secret Service — a kind of captive customer, required to follow Trump everywhere. In addition to the rentals at Mar-a-Lago, the documents show that the Trump Organization charged daily “resort fees” to Secret Service agents guarding Vice President Pence in Las Vegas and in another instance asked agents to pay a $1,300 “furniture removal charge” during a presidential visit to a Trump resort in Scotland.

This is all part of his rebellion against The Elites.

In response to questions for this report, White House spokesman Judd Deere said in a statement that Trump has “turned over the day-to-day responsibilities of running the company though he was not required to, [and] has sacrificed billions of dollars” because of discarded deals.

…

“The Washington Post is blatantly interfering with the business relationships of the Trump Organization, and it must stop,” Deere wrote in his statement. “Please be advised that we are building up a very large ‘dossier’ on the many false David Fahrenthold and others stories as they are a disgrace to journalism and the American people.”

There are newly-released documents that show Trump charged the government inflated prices, contrary to what Eric Trump has been claiming all this time.

In early 2017, for instance, Pence visited Las Vegas to speak to a Republican Jewish Coalition gathering. He stayed one night at the Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas, newly released receipts show. The Secret Service was charged for 151 rooms, at about $102 per room per night — the maximum rate for Las Vegas at the time under normal federal per-diem rules. Secret Service agents are allowed to exceed the limit while on protective duty.

In Las Vegas, the Trump hotel also tacked on $29 per room in “resort fees,” receipts show. That added $4,379 to the bill, for a total of $20,183. The hotel’s website said the fee covered services such as coffee, shoe shines and shuttle service to the shopping mall at the Caesars Palace casino. The Trump Organization did not say why it had charged resort fees to working Secret Service agents.

Here’s why: because it could. Because we have all these putative norms and rules and must nots, but we do exactly nothing to enforce them.

Trump’s children and grandchildren also visited Trump properties repeatedly, bringing their own taxpayer-funded Secret Service details.

In September 2017, for instance, Donald Trump Jr. stayed at the Trump hotel near the White House while in Washington to testify before a Senate committee investigating Russian interference in the 2016 presidential campaign. His Secret Service detail reported paying the hotel $3,300 for rooms over two days, according to the newly released receipts.

It’s great, isn’t it? Junior had to testify because he’s entangled in his daddy’s corrupt government even though the rules say he should have nothing to do with it, and because they’re ignoring all those norms, they get to stick us with yet another inflated bill for staying in his daddy’s own hotel. Heads they win tails we lose.

Trump visited his D.C. hotel Thursday to meet with donors and supporters. The hotel has been a hub of activity all week, with panels and private events led by senior Trump administration officials ahead of his Republican National Convention speech. Some Trump family members, officials and allies have spent time in a private suite there before and after their speeches. Thursday’s event was arranged by Trump Victory, a joint fundraising committee for the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee, officials said.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Trump is having success in stoking violence.

Yesterday in Portland:

A person was shot and killed in downtown Portland Saturday night as a pro-Trump car caravan wound its way through city streets, clashing with counterprotesters along the way.

…

Images from the scene Saturday night show a man wearing a hat featuring the logo of Patriot Prayer, a group that has regularly attended, hosted and engaged in violence at Portland protests through the years. The man was also wearing a “Thin Blue Line” patch on his shorts, indicating support for the police.

The shooting occurred around 8:45 p.m. near the corner of Southwest Third Avenue and Alder Street. Portland police are investigating it as a homicide.

…

The lead-up to Saturday’s “Trump cruise rally” generated fear of yet more violence from both sides. A post pinned to the Facebook event page, which drew some 2,500 attendees, discouraged people from openly carrying firearms and instead encouraged concealed carry.

It’s all so Weimar.

Videos posted online show people in flag-adorned trucks driving through groups of protesters, firing paintball guns at crowds and deploying what appears to be pepper spray. Individual cars or groups of counterdemonstrators tried to break the caravan’s steady stream, blocking them with vehicles and bodies, which sometimes led to dangerous, tense confrontations.

And then somebody got shot. Nice job, Don.

Most most most most most maximum progressive. Also most vulnerable.

I particularly love that this enlightened person is a “sensitivity reader.” Ho yus, all about the sensitivity.

Yet again, I don’t understand how it works. Yet again I don’t understand the basic concept. Yet again I think it’s the concept that’s broken, not my reading comprehension.

Rupert Goodwins says that saying only women are women is to deny trans women’s [i.e. men’s] rights as women.

That’s such a peculiar thing to say, and to think. As usual, imagine saying it of anything else. Saying only rabbits are rabbits is to deny trans rabbits’ [i.e. lions’] rights as rabbits.

How is it possible for men to have rights as women? If men have rights as women then what do women have? Rights as men? Wouldn’t it be simpler just to leave things as they were, so that women have women’s rights and men have men’s?

RG is saying that women deny men’s rights by saying that women are women, which is absurd on its face. The only way they can make this work is by inserting magic words which are intended to delete everything we know about what we mean by “women” and “men.” If you refer to women as “cis women” then suddenly the whole category is up for grabs, and women are just part-timers in their own sex. If you refer to some men as “trans women” then it becomes okay to pretend that women, who are only part-timers after all, are oppressing men by saying men are men.

And what, exactly, are “trans women’s rights as women”? Trans women are men, so what “rights as women” can they have? What rights can they have that make it a violation of those rights for women to say that men are men? Do men have a “right” to force women to agree that they (men) are women if they say they are? What kind of “right” would that be exactly? Surely it’s more of a liability or handicap or obstacle than a right.

It never stops being weird to see adults talking this absurd gibberish.

Oh ffs.

It even signals that that’s what he’s doing – saying “it’ll be difficult for anyone — China, Russia, Iran — to change actual vote tallies” just underlines that it will be easy for anyone to do other things to influence the election. It will be difficult for anyone to change actual vote tallies but easy to change voter views and motivations, by lying and fakery and manipulation. What a relief!

More openly fascist by the day:

A pro-Trump caravan of trucks drove into downtown Portland on Saturday to clash with Black Lives Matter protesters there, leaving one person, who was wearing the insignia of far-right group Patriot Prayer, dead.

Trump cheered on a caravan of his supporters that rolled into Portland on Saturday as “GREAT PATRIOTS,” even after video showed them driving into protesters, hurling tear gas and shooting them and a New York Times reporter with paintballs.

He did.

About this “We’re not going to brief you on security threats any more, we’ll just send you a few written notes” thing:

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence has informed Senate and House intelligence committees that it will no longer brief Congress on foreign efforts to interfere in the November election, according to congressional Democrats.

In a joint statement released Saturday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Adam Schiff, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said Congress had been set for briefings on election security in mid-September. But briefings for members of Congress, including the House and Senate intelligence committees, by the office of National Intelligence Director John Ratcliffe have now been called off, they said.

“This is a shocking abdication of its lawful responsibility to keep the Congress currently informed, and a betrayal of the public’s right to know how foreign powers are trying to subvert our democracy,” Pelosi and Schiff said in the statement.

Well yes, obviously. Can’t they do anything?

The apparent shift in protocol comes as intelligence officials warn that multiple nations may attempt to influence the November election.

Earlier this month, the top counterintelligence official in the U.S. government warned of ongoing interference and influence efforts by China, Iran and Russia.

Just the people we want participating.

But apparently the Dems are just going to issue a statement and leave it at that. I don’t get it.

This Serena Daniari guy is a trip.

If he’d just written the words, they’d still be wrong, but there would be nothing remarkable about them. But no, he included the photo, as if to demonstrate that the reason he knows who he is (i.e. a woman) is because of that photo. What is a woman? Why, someone with eyebrows six inches above her eyes, and a tiny nose, and gigantic bulbous lips – that’s what a woman is. A woman looks more like a blow-up doll than a human being. Also she’s giving the “fuck you” sign.

He’s good at respecting his sisters, too.

One, there’s the obvious rudeness and cruelty, the cheap tattered misogyny, but two there’s the fact that he completely missed the point. Katy Carmichael said makeup and enhancement have nothing to do with being a woman, and his response is “You’re ugly!”

He’s just an abusive angry fool, another mini-trump, one of millions, but the politics of trans ideninny = he’s stunning and brave.

Speaking of Trump’s efforts to make sure that everyone Catches This Thing as fast as possible, yesterday –

Football! All of football! High school included! Down to the smallest Montana town, it all has come back, NOW.

That’ll get those daily numbers up!

Meanwhile…

As revelers at Trump rally on Friday booed suggestions to wear masks, the Washington Post has published a story about the health toll Trump’s campaign events are taking on Secret Service members. From the story:

In the past two months, dozens of Secret Service agents who worked to ensure the security of the president and Vice President Pence at public events have been sickened or sidelined because they were in direct contact with infected people, according to multiple people familiar with the episodes, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the incidents.

You know, eventually they’ll run out of agents. There’s not an infinite supply of them.

In one instance, five secret service agents had to be swapped out after one agent they were working closely with tested positive for coronavirus. The ongoing infections amongst people closest to Trump represent the latest fallout from the current president’s decision to hold campaign rallies amidst an intensifying global pandemic.

Despite that, Trump has continued to hold large, in-person rallies. His acceptance speech for the RNC on Thursday night drew 1,500, mostly un-masked supporters on the South Lawn on the White House.

Coz evbody gon catch this thing.

This is fine, this is normal, this is nothing to worry about.

CNN White House correspondent Jim Acosta called the maskless crowd at President Donald Trump’s Republican National Convention potential “super-spreaders”  of the coronavirus, and said a senior White House official’s explanation for the lack of social distancing “might blow you away.”

After Trump’s Thursday night RNC speech, Acosta delivered a report from the South Lawn of the White House, where hundreds of maskless revelers had been seated for the festivities. Anchor Wolf Blitzer tossed ti [sic] Acosta by noting “You had about 2,000 people sitting very close, and most of them were not wearing masks.”

“Yeah, Wolf, we not only heard a lot of gaslighting tonight, we possibly saw and witnessed some super-spreading from this event,” Acosta said. “And I talked to a senior White House official earlier this evening about all of these people, hundreds of people sitting side by side in the audience, not wearing masks, and the senior White House official brushed off these concerns about the lack of social distancing at the president’s speech.”

“It’s cool, bro, all part of the plan. We gotta open up the economy, and the football.”

Acosta prefaced the quote by saying “And get this, this quote might blow you away,” then revealed the official told him “Everybody is going to catch this thing eventually.”

“Those are the words coming from a senior White House official about the concerns being raised about this being a possible super-spreader event tonight,” Acosta said.

And even if the official is right, and even if we accept for the sake of argument that that’s ok, it’s still not a good plan to hurry the process up, because we need to avoid overwhelming the hospitals again. The hope for the lockdown was primarily to spread the cases out so that we wouldn’t need field hospitals in parks again.

Oh, ok, fine. Two months before the election the DNI stops briefing Congress on election security. Brilliant plan.

They might as well be sending out embossed announcements on heavy paper saying “We are helping Trump steal the election, you’re welcome.”

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence has informed the House and Senate Select Committees on Intelligence that it will no longer be briefing on election security issues, a senior administration official told CNN. It will provide written updates, the official said.

The official added that other agencies supporting election security, including the Department of Justice, Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security, intend to continue briefing Congress.

For now. For a few more hours. Maybe. Expect a memo from each of them shortly.

A clinical psychologist argues that we need to set aside the bouquet of armchair diagnoses of Trump and settle on the one overriding diagnosis that captures it all.

I invited Dr. Greenwood, who is a clinical psychologist and founder of The Washington Center For Cognitive Therapy, to answer a few questions. In addition to his presence o[n] Medium, he has just launched a new website, dutytoinform.org. You can follow him on Twitter at @dutytoinform.

The first question is why do we need one overarching diagnosis.

Mental health professionals have offered several diagnoses of the president. They have done so usually to warn the public about his psychiatric vulnerabilities and dangerousness. They want to engage the public in a serious argument. And to be fair, the president does appear to meet diagnostic criteria for more than one disorder. However, by offering multiple diagnoses of the president, the impact and understanding of a particular diagnosis is compromised. Information overload kicks in, and people tune out.

Also, a more severe diagnosis deserves to be emphasized.

And that more severe diagnosis is…dude’s a psychopath.

The first core trait of the Psychopath is the “Drive to Dominate.” How does that manifest in Trump’s behavior in life, business and politics? I’m guessing it also explains his attitude to Black Lives Matter protesters?

Yes, the drive to dominate is one of the driving forces of the psychopath. They cannot lovingly connect with others, and can only relate to others through the gear of domination. “Winning,” as Trump endlessly repeats, is everything. Nestled within this cluster of traits are arrogance, deceitfulness, and attention-seeking.

And there’s nothing in column B. Literally nothing.

Trump’s bandwidth of emotions are limited to those associated with his drive to dominate others and prevail over his critics: anger, contempt, jealousy, feeling thwarted, mistrust, glee. These are the emotions depicted in the well-researched biographies of the man and his autobiographical writings. He is devoid of the more tender emotions that could engender solidarity, trust, or empathy.

That’s the creepy bit. That’s what makes it impossible to ignore him.

And it’s what his millions of fans like about him. That’s a fact about the US now, and it’s one we’ll never live down.

The second core trait is “Remorselessness.” Again, how does that apply to Trump?

Remorselessness is perhaps the most consequential trait in the man. Psychopaths appear to be born with brain abnormalities that lead to a deficit in conscience and empathy. Our conscience—that inner voice of “I should”—motivates us to meet our obligations and commitments to both those we love and the broader community. When this fundamental concern for others is missing, what’s left is a focus on immediate, egocentric gains.

And a terrible terrible person.

Originally a comment by Sastra on Merfinks.

Frankly, I wouldn’t be surprised if there were indeed suicide threats or attempts when Rowling came out as gender critical. Such wailing and gnashing of teeth, fan clubs panicking, and breathless article after article expressing shock and concern over the effect on the most vulnerable, most marginalized, most suicidal group in the world.

There’s not a teenager out there who isn’t well aware that transgender people routinely kill themselves if not accepted as “who they know they are.” They’re reminded of that over and over, it’s drummed into their heads by Tumblr and Twitter and Tavistock and all the handwringing social media and organizations throwing out statistics because this is a real, live possibility for every … single … one of them.

Mental health professionals think that’s a very wise thing to do. Young adults aren’t susceptible to suggestion, or social contagion. Psychologists and therapists agree. Warn teenagers about the sorts of things that are likely to make them throw their life away. Keep them on their toes. It’s good.

No. Not really. Doing that is bad. If there really were suicide attempts not just following, but because of Rowling’s statements, I wouldn’t blame Rowling. She didn’t set them up.

Now that’s some player activism.

In the aftermath of player protests across various professional sports leagues, the Board of Elections in the City of New York announced Friday that Madison Square Garden will serve as a polling site for the upcoming general election.

And it’s not just the aftermath; it’s what the players asked for.

Manhattan voters who are assigned to Madison Square Garden can vote there on Election Day, Nov. 3, as well as an early voting period from Oct. 24 until Nov. 1, with hours varying. The polling site will be located at MSG’s Chase Square at the 7th Avenue entrance between 31st and 33rd Streets.

The news comes after a three-day period of social activism from athletes across North America, which began when the Milwaukee Bucks decided not to play their NBA playoff game Wednesday.

Many teams followed their lead, with all NBA playoff games being postponed on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. The NHL postponed its playoff games on Thursday and Friday, while the WNBA did not play on Wednesday or Thursday. MLS canceled most of its games on Wednesday, and while MLB didn’t have any full day of postponement, a total of 10 games were postponed due to individual teams protesting.

The player strikes came in response to the Aug. 23 police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin and were aimed at addressing systemic racism, social injustice and police brutality.

Players from both the NBA and NHL have agreed to return to play Saturday, with the NBA’s Player Association negotiating terms that “focused on a broad range of issues, including increasing access to voting, promoting civic engagement, and advocating for meaningful police and criminal justice reform.”

So, yeah. Go teams.

Part of the agreement between the NBPA and the league stated that, “In every city where the league franchise owns and controls the arena property, team governors will work with local elections officials to convert the facility into a voting location for the 2020 general election to allow for a safe in-person voting option for communities vulnerable to COVID.”

Well done.

I was alerted by this.

So, bristling, I read. They really do say that.

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.

How sanctimonious that is, how passive-aggressive, how entitled, how intrusive. Yes, Rowling has nothing better to do than “have a conversation” with the damn fools (or fool) of Mermaids. If they offer she has to respond.

As part of that email, we have disclosed something we hoped never to say. We say it now with permission from those involved. 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 public response on social media and in the press. Surely this must cause us all to pause and question the way young trans lives are being debated in public. 

Note, first of all, that “following” is not the same as “because of.” I wonder if a lawyer told them to phrase it that way, or if they’re just naturally sneaky.

Note also this oily insinuating crap about “lives” – transgender lives, young trans lives. It’s another branch of the bullying. Lives shmives, the point is the ideology, the truth claims, the doctrine, the bullshit we are told to believe and repeat and endorse and force on everyone else.

No movement is perfect, no movement can succeed without evolution, but history is kind to those who stand up for their rights.

What? What does that mean? The Proud Boys see themselves as standing up for their rights. Nazis saw themselves that way. Men’s rights activists see themselves that way. If “history” is “kind” to them it will probably be in a world where Donald Trump is a saint and Ivanka Trump is in her seventh term as president.

We can all look back in admiration at those brave, radical people deserving of statues, who stood against racism, homophobia, misogyny and all forms of prejudice, all the while threatened by the famous, rich and powerful of their day. 

Who’s we? Who’s all? Lots of people don’t look back in admiration at feminists and anti-racists and LGB rights activists. This is Whig history on steroids.

Sadistic bully “Jessica” Yaniv is suing those women all over again. Devika Desai in the National Post:

Trans activist Jessica Yaniv has filed a civil suit against three female beauticians for close to $12,000, almost a year after a human rights tribunal ruled against her complaints against the same women. 

Documents published to the British Columbia Court services website on Aug. 26 show that Yaniv — who legally goes by Jessica Simpson — filed a suit against Sandeep Benipal, Marcia DaSilva and Sukhdhip Hehar for $11,800. 

Props to the National Post for assigning the story to a woman with an Indian name. Seriously: nicely done.

Little is known about the reason behind the civil suit, but this isn’t the first time Yaniv has attempted to bring legal proceedings against the women in question.

…

The tribunal member Devyn Cousineau dismissed Yaniv’s complaints in October 2019, finding Yaniv’s testimony to be “disingenuous and self-serving” and said that the complaints were filed with “improper motives or in bad faith.”  

Yaniv, according to the ruling, “targeted small businesses, manufactured the conditions for a human rights complaint, and then leveraged that complaint to pursue a financial settlement from parties who were unsophisticated and unlikely to mount a proper defence,” the ruling read.

Furthermore, in many of her complaints, Cousineau ruled that Yaniv was “motivated to punish racialized and immigrant women based on her perception that certain ethnic groups, namely South Asian and Asian communities are ‘taking over’ and advancing an agenda hostile to the interests of LGBTQ+ people.”

The ruling ordered Yaniv to pay $2,000 to Hehar, Benipal and DaSilva for“improper conduct” including using human rights law as a “weapon” for “extortion.”

And the National Post assigns Devika Desai to write it up. Nyah nyah nyah.

Yaniv is an absolute pustule.

H/t YNnB

A tweet four hours ago.

And one hour ago.

Ok but why?

… according to Sarah Posner, the author of Unholy: Why White Evangelicals Worship at the Altar of Donald Trump, Falwell’s influence has been overestimated.

“His fall does not change anything. Trump has built relationships with the evangelical base and the religious right leadership in Washington, and they see him as their saviour – God’s hand is on him, he has come to save America at this critical juncture,” she said.

But why? Why? Even if you accept the God thing and the hand thing and the saving thing, why would God put the hand on Trump? Of all people? As some kind of sadistic joke? Because that’s about the only way it makes any sense.

Why wouldn’t god put the hand on a good person?

What can possibly be the point of a god putting the hand on a monster of selfishness and cruelty and sheer vulgarity like Trump? I can certainly see a point to putting the hand on someone outwardly insignificant or even repellent, but I fail to see the point of doing it to someone who is evil and monstrous in every way and all the way down.

Also he’s filthy rich, also he’s filthy rich via corruption and theft and not paying workers, so…? What’s the lesson here?

I know, there’s some perverse prodigal son type formula according to which the worse he is the bigger the redemption or some such shit, but I spit on it. At that rate god’s hand must have been on Hitler and Stalin, so I say it’s spinach and I say the hell with it.

Pompeo is evil.

News from Congress, where the House foreign affairs committee has announced the opening of contempt proceedings against Mike Pompeo, Donald Trump’s secretary of state who, as it happens, gave a hugely controversial speech to the Republican national convention from Israel on Wednesday night.

The battle between the Democratic-controlled committee and Pompeo is a long one, as the secretary of state refuses to co-operate with the panel as it investigates his conduct in office, including regarding administration approaches to Ukraine for dirt on Joe Biden, the approaches which led to Trump’s impeachment.

He has no right to refuse. It’s outrageoous.

In a statement, committee chair Eliot Engel said: “From Mr Pompeo’s refusal to cooperate with the impeachment inquiry to his willingness to bolster a Senate Republican-led smear against the president’s political rivals to his speech to the RNC which defied his own guidance and possibly the law, he has demonstrated alarming disregard for the laws and rules governing his own conduct and for the tools the constitution provides to prevent government corruption.

“He seems to think the office he holds, the Department he runs, the personnel he oversees, and the taxpayer dollars that pay for all of it are there for his personal and political benefit.”

Just like Trump.

Pompeo doesn’t care.

There is a general sense among former foreign service officials that the secretary of state, who was a stickler for congressional oversight when he was in the House of Representatives, does not care about it at all, and is increasingly focused on a presidential run in 2024.

Rori Kramer, former deputy assistant secretary of state in the bureau of legislative affairs, said of Engel’s announcement: “That’s wonderful but there’s not as much teeth as there used to be with congressional oversight.

“It’s really shocking. Four years ago, it would have been completely bizarro Twilight Zone that Congress could subpoena you and hold you in contempt, and the answer of the administration would be: I don’t care.

“The people who work for the people who say we don’t care about oversight and then his senior leadership and/or political appointees also don’t follow the rules and then authoritarian dictators and other countries also see that, and continue not to follow the rules. And it’s a race to the bottom.”

Evil in all directions.