Here he is saying it (go to 2:20). He says a lot of other stupid shit too.
Loot
Oct 21st, 2019 11:42 am | By Ophelia Benson
There are no words, just the photo of the cheater’s two stolen medals and his “rainbow” jersey.
While Ivanka nods like a wind-up doll
Oct 21st, 2019 11:26 am | By Ophelia BensonA tiny yet significant item – Trump gives the finger to the woman astronaut who had the audacity to correct (in a tactful way) his assertion that she and her colleague were the first women ever to work outside the space station.
Repeating it over and over doesn’t make it true
Oct 21st, 2019 10:51 am | By Ophelia BensonThe Guardian says Trump told lie after lie after lie in that Cabinet meeting.
Trump bounced from one falsehood to another while speaking to reporters during his cabinet meeting at the White House.
Here are just a few fact-checks from reporters about the president’s 70-minute meeting:
Trump’s remarks in the Cabinet room are a stream of exaggerations, boasts and falsehoods….
For example, in his remarks about Doral: “Miami International, one of the biggest airports in the world. Some people say it’s the biggest.”
(MIA is not even in the top 20)
That stupid “some people say” thing, as if simple facts like comparative airport size can be decided by “some people saying.”
President Trump on Syria: “We’re having very good news coming out. The ceasefire’s holding.“
Note: U.S. officials have told NBC & CNN that the ceasefire is not holding in Syria.
Repeating it over and over doesn’t make it true. Contrary to what Trump says, the whistleblower complaint was factually quite accurate, according to the White House’s own rough transcript.
Lie after lie after lie after lie.
Guest post: Experience with gold furniture and fixtures
Oct 21st, 2019 10:33 am | By Ophelia BensonOriginally a comment by Screechy Monkey on Is Taco Bell available?
I know normally the game is “what if Obama had done this,” but I think in this instance it’s more fun to play “what if Hillary had done something even vaguely approaching this?”
Like, let’s say the G-7 summit host contract was awarded to some resort after a thorough bid process pursuant to applicable government procurement regulations. Then some enterprising right wing news site “uncovers” that President Hillary Clinton’s former college roommate’s cousin’s dentist sits on the board of that resort. Scandal! The right wing erupts in fury and outrage! Fox News runs wall to wall coverage. Every conservative legal analyst soberly opines that this is EXACTLY the sort of situation that the Emoluments Clause was intended to prevent, and because Republicans care so much about the Constitution, they really have no choice but to impeach her. The Washington Post tries to be “balanced” by noting the “controversy,” but the New York Times dives right in, quoting anonymous FBI sources who are reportedly “troubled” by the allegations.
If you think I’m exaggerating, consider this: conservatives are currently trying to invent a scandal out of the fact that the lawyer who represents one of the Ukraine whistleblowers used to (pre-2000) work for the same public interest organization as the man who went on to be Hillary’s campaign manager. Two DC figures crossed paths once? They are “linked,” and obviously conspiring!
At this point, Trump could announce that he’s taking the U.S. government’s gold reserves and using it to make new toilets at every Trump Hotel, and GOP senators would nod and say “yes, that makes perfect sense and is utterly appropriate. Trump Properties have excellent experience with gold furniture and fixtures.”
Holden Caulfield in the Cabinet Room
Oct 21st, 2019 10:17 am | By Ophelia BensonTrump is currently busy pissing on the Constitution in public.
Even after reversing his decision to hold the June G7 summit at his Florida resort, Trump is still insisting that the property would have been the best place for the multi-nation event.
Reuters White House reporter tweets:
.@realDonaldTrump says during White House cabinet meeting that the G7 at his Doral resort would have been the greatest G7 ever, Democrats went crazy about that plan even though he would have done it for free. (Trump announced Saturday he would no longer hold the G7 at Doral.)
The Guardian continues:
The president is blaming Democrats for forcing his hand on the issue, but a number of reports have surfaced that Trump only changed his mind after hearing frustration from congressional Republicans about having to defend the decision.
But wait! That’s not the pissing on the Constitution part! That came a few minutes later:
Taking questions from reporters about his canceled plans to hold the June G7 summit at his Florida resort, Trump appeared dismissive of a constitutional clause forbidding federal officeholders from accepting gifts from foreign states.
The president said, according to the pool report: “You people with this phony Emoluments Clause.”
That’s it! That’s the pissing part. Trump calling a clause of the Constitution he swore a solemn public ceremonial oath to protect and defend, “phony.”
Ask a stupid question, get ratioed
Oct 21st, 2019 9:47 am | By Ophelia BensonPeter Tatchell again nudges us to applaud his hostility to women:
Preventing trans women from competing in sport is denying their human rights. Most athletes have some form of advantage, such as fast-twitch muscle fibres, large hearts & lungs or extra long legs. Why single out trans competitors? https://cyclingweekly.com/news/racing/preventing-trans-women-competing-denying-human-rights-transgender-athlete-rachel-mckinnon-returns-defend-track-world-title-440713#YcXIv2c8K4qvKXlm.99
FOLLOW @MunroeBergdorf
As a professor of human rights, I say you are talking bollocks.
247 other people commented in a similar vein (I’m one of them); I scrolled and scrolled and scrolled and didn’t find one in the opposite vein.
Do better people
Oct 20th, 2019 5:16 pm | By Ophelia Benson
Rachel McKinnon has some deep thoughts for people who aren’t respectful of sport and fair play.
Masters women’s track cycling is a rare and special thing. It allows us to extend our competitive careers and not think so much about contracts or going to the Olympics. We’re a small community, and we should take GOOD CARE of each other.
Like, by not competing against each other if we’re not actually women? That kind of GOOD CARE of each other?
Think about the optics of your behaviors. My new friend, multi time Danish elite national champion is now a friend. We bonded. And she chose to wear one of my #sportisahumanright stickers on her jersey on the podium!! That’s a powerful, small action to show her support for me and what I’m doing.
Pat pat pat. His new friend, whose full name he can’t remember (or can’t be bothered to say). His new friend who went along with his pretense. She’s the good kind of woman, the one who doesn’t make a fuss and lets men do whatever they want.
But someone is characteristically and conspicuously off to the side, not sharing the embrace, instead putting her hand behind her back. I had hoped for better from her.
Do better people.
He had hoped for better from her – he, the selfish narcissistic asshole who stole her first place win by cheating his way into the race, he had hoped she would smile in a friendly way as he walked all over her.
Unfuckingbelievable.
Updating to add: there’s more scolding on the next post.
I’ll just let this photo to stand for itself. Two new friends, and a serious supporter of my racing, sharing the joy of achieving hard-won goals. Can’t wait to see Kirsten next year. …and then another who is somewhat less enthused to lose a race against me…off to the side. It’s traditional for everyone on the podium to put their arms around each other’s backs. It’s a group photo.
Hey, you know what else is traditional? For men to race against men. For men not to cheat their way onto women’s teams by announcing that they’re women in a political climate in which people aren’t allowed to respond with “No you’re not.” For competitors not to cheat. That’s what. Self-righteous lectures by a cheater aimed at the woman he cheated out of her win are not needed or wanted.
When one athlete purposefully put that hand behind her own back communicates something that matters. It’s bad sportsmanship.
I have a LOT more to say about this long mess of a week and how much transphobia was just EVERYWHERE.
Bad sportsmanship.
Says the cheating cheater after his successful cheating won him a prize he would never have won if he’d raced against other men.
We have a LOT more to say about this long mess too, and by god we’re saying it.
Stronger competition
Oct 20th, 2019 11:33 am | By Ophelia BensonI have yet to meet a real champion who has a problem with trans women.
Real champions want stronger competition.
If you win because bigotry got your competition banned… you’re a loser.
Real champions may want stronger competition but that doesn’t mean they want unfair competition. Champion footballers age 12 no doubt want to play against the best age 12s, that doesn’t mean they want to play against the best adult players.
What a truly gruesomely self-serving self-flattering dishonest thing to say – that conceited selfish narcissistic piece of shit telling the women he’s doing them a favor by upping the competition when in fact he’s stealing their chances.
It’s not being a loser for women to race against women without having hulking Rhys McKinnon thrown into the mix. The loser is Rhys McKinnon insisting on racing against women.
Babes…those assholes are spending their day off harassing and stalking trans women…
…just leave them to their dad pathetic lives.
Do something more productive than argue with fuckwhistles.
“Fuckwhistles”?
We’re not the ones with the whistle or the dad issues, Rhys.
Second place kept her distance
Oct 20th, 2019 9:58 am | By Ophelia Benson
DOCTOR Rachel won his race against the women:
I’ll just let this photo to stand for itself. Two new friends, and a serious supporter of my racing, sharing the joy of achieving hard-won goals. Can’t wait to see Kirsten next year.
…and then somewhat less… https://www.instagram.com/p/B31KuybliJC/?igshid=6bg9xqlm7maw …
Louise Moody has a better photo:
Third place, Kirsten wore my
#sportisahumanright sticker as a sign of solidarity. We hugged, and are embracing here in celebration. Second place kept her distance and put her hand behind her back as her own sign… signifying something like poor sportsmanship.
Except that “second place” was actually first place, but Rachel stole her medal by cheating. Rachel has some nerve accusing the woman she stole a gold medal from of “poor sportsmanship.” Some.brass.nerve.
His birth certificate says he’s really female
Oct 20th, 2019 9:41 am | By Ophelia BensonWhat’s DOCTOR Rachel up to? Accusing other people of “poor sportsmanship.” Yes really.
But first there was the rallying call to the troops, excuse me I mean the “babes.”
Babes, just ignore the random transphobes. Block and let them scream into the void.
Please?
The void. He thinks that if he blocks us what we’re left with is the void. Now that’s narcissism.
Many people claim to support trans women
But often they only support us until our lives impact them in any meaningful way
In my case, people literally say they support trans women…but not in sport
There can be no ‘but’
We are either full and equal women, or not
We are.
How? Why? Based on what? He might as well say “We are either full and equal armadillos, or not”
But facts. Facts, I tell you!
And babes, facts don’t care about your feelings: medical professionals (WHO, AMA), mental health practitioners (both APA’s), and sport (IOC) all say that trans women are *real* women, are really female. Cry about it all you want. Your feelings won’t change the facts that we are.
That’s hilarious, especially coming from a philosopher. Institutions saying things=those things are FACTS. Real, true, irrefutable FACTS, unlike your stupid fluffy FEELINGS. Medical professionals, by which I mean the people who write policy statements for institutions like the WHO and the AMA, say that trans women are real women, and so that claim becomes a stone cold fact.
Derp.
Also it has to do with who matters and who doesn’t.
There’s no need for me to change *your* misguided opinion on the matter. You *don’t* matter.
Sorry. You don’t.
So we can be swept away then? Like so much rubble?
He’s so trumpy.
Everyone who *does* matter already says we’re real women, really female.
My birth certificate, passport, US green card, etc etc all say I’m really female.
Note, again, the risibly unphilosophical treatment of various official certificates as guarantees of absolute truth.
This is why I refuse to debate, live or otherwise, whether trans women are *really* women.
That debate is over.
You lost. Your feelings don’t trump our rights and basic human dignity.
Get a better hobby. Obsessing and harassing trans women is not a good hobby.
Our feelings don’t trump his rights…but apparently his feelings do trump our rights. Why is that, exactly?
The thing is, the people who oppose trans women’s full and equal rights think that the ‘facts’ are on their side.
This is why they always come back to “common sense.”
That’s not an argument, loves. It’s the last refuge of the ignorant. It means you’ve already lost, bad.
No, we don’t always come back to “common sense,” and the accusation is laughable coming from someone who claims PR releases from institutions=absolute unarguable truth.
Coming up next: the “poor sportsmanship” follies.
Is Taco Bell available?
Oct 20th, 2019 9:03 am | By Ophelia BensonThe reaction was too much even for “President” Shameless: Doral’s off.
Responding to stinging criticism, President Donald Trump has abruptly reversed his plan to hold the next year’s Group of Seven world leaders’ meeting at his Doral golf resort in Florida.
“I think he knows,” his acting chief of staff said Sunday, “people think it looks lousy.”
Think? Mulvaney thinks he knows? How could he possibly not know? Are they holding him in an empty room and feeding him only the information they want him to have?
And people think it looks lousy? It’s not a matter of opinion and it’s not an appearance – we know for sure it is lousy, very lousy indeed. Also bedbuggy and mosquitoey.
“Based on both Media & Democrat Crazed and Irrational Hostility, we will no longer consider Trump National Doral, Miami, as the Host Site for the G-7 in 2020,” Trump tweeted.
Ah what a hardened liar he is. If he really thought it was just crazed irrational hostility from Enemies on the Left he wouldn’t have ditched it.
Mulvaney on Sunday claimed that Trump was “honestly surprised at the level of pushback” after the Doral announcement.
Well, chum, that’s because he’s stupid, and corrupt, and mind-blind, and narcissistic. That’s your boss: the guy who can’t comprehend any opinion or view of the world other than his own.
Pride shmide
Oct 19th, 2019 5:15 pm | By Ophelia BensonPride Toronto is furious at Toronto Public Library for refusing to banish Meghan Murphy. Pride Toronto has A Statement.
Pride Toronto strongly opposes the Toronto Public Library’s decision to host and support an event with guest speaker Meghan Murphy to take place in a publicly funded space.
For many years, Pride Toronto has worked in partnership and allyship with the Toronto Public Library (TPL), including hosting a sold-out signature event in 2019 featuring headliner Abby Jacobson. It was our understanding that our relationship was entering a new phase of mutual cooperation, support and reciprocity. It was our belief that the TPL was committed to creating library spaces that are inclusive, safe and welcoming. The recent decision to allow the event with Meghan Murphy is a betrayal to our LGBT2SQ+ communities.
It is well known Meghan Murphy asserts publicly and repeatedly that Trans women cannot be women and will always be men. This is a denial of the lives, experiences and identities of Trans people. It is a crude, hateful and hurtful assertion. It says that the existence of Trans people is invalid and that therefore their human rights are up for public debate.
“It is well known that” Meghan Murphy doesn’t agree that men magically become women just by saying they are women. Neither do I; neither do lots of women. The claim is stupid and supernatural and not credible. It’s not the same kind of claim as “women should not be treated as inferiors” and “people of color should not be treated as inferiors.” Treating people as equals is not the same kind of thing as agreeing that people are what they manifestly are not. What if the next move is for people to declare they are trees, and run around threatening and punishing and exiling people who don’t accept that claim? It’s not part of any left worth its salt to try to force people to believe, or pretend to believe, magical nonsensical claims people make about themselves.
I would love to see an end to self-pitying burble about “denial of the lives, experiences and identities of” trans people or tree people or furries or anime characters any other damn fantasies people have about themselves. Have all the fantasies you want, knock yourself out, but don’t try to impose them on everyone else. No. We’re not buying it any more, so threaten all you like but no. No.
Also, claims about “saying the existence of Trans people is invalid” are meaningless garble. Existence isn’t a library card or a bus pass, so “validity” is not a relevant category. Nobody says “the existence of Trans people is invalid”; saying men are not women is not saying the existence of men who claim to be women is “invalid,” whatever that would mean, it’s just saying their claims about themselves are not true. There is no duty to accept all claims people make about themselves. There just isn’t. We couldn’t function if there were. I could claim to be the true owner of any big house with an ocean view I fancied, and then what? No. We don’t have to treat obviously false claims people make about themselves as true. Yelling that they find that hurtful is becoming just so much noise, and very boring noise at that.
Meghan Murphy also spreads the propaganda that as trans rights increase, the rights of women decrease. Feminists with an intersectional lens know that feminism and the rights of women are stronger when feminism includes all women. Trans women are women.
Yes, the rights of women are stronger when feminism includes all women, but not when it includes men. Trans women are men.
Do you SUCK AT YOUR SPORT?
Oct 19th, 2019 4:30 pm | By Ophelia BensonSometimes you have a chance to create an iconic moment…this was mine.
It’s “iconic” all right, but not in the way he means.
“I might have an advantage, but I don’t always win”
Male logic for why it’s ok for males to compete in female only events — apparently as long as they don’t win EVERY single time, it’s fair.
This male athlete smashed another women’s cycling world record yesterday. He gets to race against women because he “feels like a woman” inside. When will all you still staying quiet on this issue join us in the fight to #savewomenssport? Find your voice.
It is excluding women and girls from their own category
Oct 19th, 2019 12:00 pm | By Ophelia BensonSome notable female athletes have said transgender athletes should not compete in female competitions.
They claim women who were born biological males retain a competitive advantage in some sport and have called for more research into the issue.
They don’t “claim” that, they simply point it out.
Ex-swimmer Sharron Davies said it will take female athletes “being thrown under the bus” at Tokyo 2020 before changes are made to transgender rules.
Prominent trans rights campaigner McKinnon has defended her right to compete, but said: “I’ve thought about giving up about half a dozen times a year at least.
“It’s so stressful to even show up for me given the sort of attention I get.
“Every athlete has physical advantages and we’re all trying to exploit them. So to single out a trans woman, when I lose most of my races, is a little unfair.”
Of course it’s not. It’s not any amount of unfair to “single out” a man who insists on competing against women. It’s the man doing that who is unfair, and not a little. Just imagine being the woman who was bumped down to silver because of him. Imagine being the woman who won no medal because of him.
Former British Masters champion Victoria Hood, who competes in the same category as McKinnon but is currently injured, told BBC Sport that other riders “sacrificed” the opportunity to compete at the World Championships because “they don’t want to compete” against McKinnon.
“The science is there. The science is clear – it tells us that trans women have an advantage,” she said.
“The world record has just been beaten today by somebody born male, who now identifies as female, and the gap between them and the next born female competitor was quite a lot.
“The world record was two tenths of a second. I know that doesn’t sound like a lot but it is.
“The gap between them and the next female competitor was four tenths, which to put into perspective in a sprint event like this, that would be 15m of the track, when sprint events are usually won by centimetres.
“It is a human right to participate in sport. I don’t think it’s a human right to identify into whichever category you choose.”
Earlier this week, athletics’ governing body the IAAF said trans female athletes must lower their levels of testosterone.
But Hood called on sports’ governing bodies to “step up”, saying they were “excluding” athletes born female.
“If people want to push this through some misguided idea that they are being inclusive, it is not inclusive. It is excluding women and girls from their own category. It’s not fair,” Hood said.
“The IOC need to make fair policies that are based on the science that we have, because if they can’t then they are not fit for purpose.
“They are washing their hands of it and it is becoming more political than it is about science and biology.”
So that’ll be what prompted DOCTOR McKinnon’s self-important “statement” and “press release” then.
DOCTOR McKinnon denounces
Oct 19th, 2019 11:43 am | By Ophelia BensonMcKinnon’s campaign to get more attention and fraudulent medals and attention is in high gear today. Just 15 minutes ago he announced:
WHAT DOES THE FOX SAY? She says GOLD! Back-to-back world sprint champion!! Way too many people to thank. Thank you especially to the dozens of fans cheering your heads off, and I’m glad to have met a new friend…
Yeah baby! Cheater’s gold! Awesome athlete Rachel – formerly Rhys – McKinnon wins GOLD by racing against women!
There he is, in all his glory, a man who stole a gold medal from a woman.
He has a new pinned tweet, which is a “press release”:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: “DR. RACHEL MCKINNON RESPONDS TO BRITISH CYCLIST VICTORIA HOOD”
Let me guess. Hood suggested that men shouldn’t lie their way into women’s competitions, and McKinnon responded that oh yes they should, at least when their name is Rachel McKinnon they should.
DOCTOR McKinnon doesn’t half think well of himself, does he.
Choices
Oct 19th, 2019 11:19 am | By Ophelia BensonThe rules are clear for nearly everyone who works in the executive branch: Officials are prohibited from playing even a minor role in a decision that directly creates a financial benefit for the employee or the employee’s immediate family.
But those rules do not apply to the president and vice president, the only executive branch officials who are exempt from a criminal statute and a separate ethics regulation that govern conflicts of interest.
Exempt…because?
I’ll take a wild guess that it’s the usual bullshit “because the president is so very busy, must not be investigated or prosecuted, much too busy” – the bullshit that is letting this brazen criminal get away with brazen crimes for close to three years now.
That exemption is the reason President Trump could legally play a role in the selection of the Trump National Doral resort near Miami as the site of next year’s summit meeting of the Group of 7. If anyone in the executive branch other than Mr. Trump or Vice President Mike Pence tried the same thing, they would likely have been blocked by government lawyers, faced an ethics investigation and perhaps become the subject of a criminal inquiry, federal ethics lawyers from both parties said Friday.
But if Trump does it it’s totally legal.
Pardon me while I smash up the furniture.
Nine days before Mr. Trump’s inauguration, one of his lawyers, Sheri A. Dillon, released a document detailing how Mr. Trump would avoid conflicts of interest after he was sworn in, even if he was not prohibited under law from taking actions that would benefit his family financially.
“President-Elect Trump, as well as Don, Eric, and Alan are committed to ensuring that the activities of The Trump Organization are beyond reproach, and that the Organization avoids even the appearance of a conflict of interest, including through any advantage derived from the Office of the Presidency,” Ms. Dillon wrote in the six-page document, referring to Mr. Trump’s two oldest sons and Alan Garten, the chief legal officer at Trump Organization.
Hahahahahahaha just kidding folks, we don’t mean a word of it.
But that same day, Mr. Trump made clear he was aware that he had a legal exemption that provided him considerable flexibility to decide for himself what would be permissible.
“I have a no-conflict-of-interest provision as president,” Mr. Trump said. “It was many, many years old, this is for presidents. Because they don’t want presidents getting — I understand they don’t want presidents getting tangled up in minutia; they want a president to run the country. So I could actually run my business, I could actually run my business and run government at the same time.”
Yeah we definitely don’t want Donnie the Trump getting tangled up in minutiae like being told he can’t book international meetings into his foul hotels, he’s far too busy tweeting and watching Fox and tweeting and screaming about shifty Schiff and tweeting and holding rallies and tweeting.
The acting White House chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, said on Thursday that Mr. Trump was the first to recommend the Doral resort as a site for the Group of 7.
“We were back in the dining room and I was going over it with a couple of our advance team,” Mr. Mulvaney said. “We had the list, and he goes, ‘What about Doral?’ And it was like, ‘That’s not the craziest idea. It makes perfect sense.’”
No it is the craziest idea. Really.
Mr. Mulvaney on Thursday defended the approach the White House took in selecting the Doral, saying that a dozen locations were evaluated, which suggests that federal contracting rules might have been honored. But Mr. Mulvaney would not disclose the other locations or the process used to evaluate them.
So that’s totally above suspicion then.
David Farenthold of the Post tells Chuck Todd at Meet the Press about the ludicrous pantomime of “looking at other possible sites for the meeting and finding them all unsuitable” – except they won’t say anything about exactly what the sites are or how they decided to look at them. Farenthold:
The only thing they’ll say is that one of them was so high in the mountains that if you wanted to hold a meeting you’d have to give the leaders oxygen.
I burst out laughing at that and so did they. Why pick that one to consider then? Well exactly; why indeed. Farenthold:
That’s the thing – if your list was like a campground at the top of Mount McKinley, and a Chuck E. Cheese, and Doral, then Doral was the best place, you know?
I see a new game forming.
A chicken processing plant; Folsom Prison; Doral.
A forest that is on fire; Arctowski Station in Antarctica; Doral.
Kīlauea; an airport runway; Doral.
A cotton field in Arkansas; Pizza Hut; Doral.
Crashing out
Oct 19th, 2019 10:13 am | By Ophelia BensonBoris Johnson has said he will press on “undaunted” with Brexit on 31 October, despite losing a crunch Commons vote.
The prime minister must now ask the EU for an extension to that deadline after MPs backed a motion designed to rule out a no-deal exit by 322 votes to 306.
He told MPs: “I will not negotiate a delay with the EU and neither does the law compel me to do so.”
He vowed to bring in legislation on Monday to implement the deal he struck with Brussels this week.
MPs could also be given another vote on the deal on Monday, if Commons Speaker John Bercow allows it.
The Commons defeat is a major setback for the PM, who has repeatedly insisted that the UK will leave at the end of the month come what may.
So they’re staring each other down on either side of an abyss?
Downing Street refused to offer any explanation as to why the prime minister did not consider he was obliged to negotiate a fresh extension.
Probably because there is no explanation? It’s just more attempted dictatorship, like what we have over here only not quite so crude in the execution?
This is the most overt corruption to date
Oct 18th, 2019 5:08 pm | By Ophelia BensonWalter Shaub is livid about the Doral crime. He’s also informative – he says the Doral thing is a whole new level. I thought that in terms of the extreme blatancy and defiance of boundaries, but he says more than that. I’ll just go way back early yesterday and quote the hell out of him.
Agents of chaos want you to be cynical about democracy and believe public servants are, were and always will be corrupt. If that’s true, nothing matters. The life of Elijah Cummings and last night’s #Sammies2019 tell a different story. Democracy requires belief in what can be.
The summit will be held in June, when Miami is hot and Doral is usually empty. In 2017, only 38% of Doral’s rooms were occupied in June. Only August (31%) was slower. Now — b/c @realdonaldtrump has awarded the summit to himself — it will be full.
The “Miami is hot” bit matters – people don’t want to go to Florida in summer. Trump is forcing heads of state and everyone who accompanies them to go to a bad nasty place to make money for himself.
This is the most overt corruption to date. How any Senator could fail to object to this is beyond me. There’s no universe in which anyone could believe that, in a country as big as ours, the selection of Trump’s resort was anything but a product of the worst kind of corruption.
Somebody please ask the White House what agency ran this procurement. The White House does not have a procurement team that could run this, and it definitely does not have an appropriation to use for the event.
This is so overtly corrupt that it can’t be viewed as anything but a loyalty test for Senators. If they are corrupt enough to look the other way, Trump will know he can do anything. In that case, he will do everything.
Shaub says CREW filed an investigation request with the State Department on the Doral issue a month ago and haven’t heard anything. That’s not a good sign.
In case it’s not clear from my freaking out, this G-7 thing is an escalation. It may look from the outside like it’s been corruption all along—because it has been—but participating in a contract award to yourself is different by orders of magnitude. This is a red line crossed.
Good to know. Bad to know, but good to know.
I’d like you to imagine a conflict of interest prosecution in which a defense attorney’s closing argument is based on the things Mick Mulvaney said in defense of awarding the G7 contract to Doral. That attorney would be disbarred. The arguments are ridiculous.
The President of the United States participated in the award of a contract to himself. Are there Senators who find that acceptable? Are you prepared to say all future Presidents can award themselves contracts? Why do we even have an @OfficeGovEthics if the Senate will allow this?
We now live in a country where government employees like Mick Mulvaney can violate the ethical principle prohibiting misuse of position for private gain without official rebuke. The ethics program died yesterday.
So…there it is. If they let him get away with this everything will get even worse.
Public con artist
Oct 18th, 2019 4:18 pm | By Ophelia Benson
Also McKinnon:
The first item in his Twitter profile is “World Champion Cyclist.” But he’s a “World Champion Cyclist” only because he cheated in order to race with women even though he’s a man. He’s not really a “World Champion Cyclist.”
He’s not a public intellectual, either. He’s a public bullshitter and fraud and bully.
He’s pretending to be indignant because people who object to his cheating object to his cheating:
Y’all should be ashamed of yourselves. They’ve had to disable the live chat on the live feed for the world championships because transphobic bigots took over and wouldn’t stop. But I *am* glad they acted and disabled the chat, because it was a horrific mess.
He’s stealing prizes from women and people object to that. The horrific mess is inside the house.
