Showing posts with label Ben Carson. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ben Carson. Show all posts

We Resist: Day 412

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Wednesday, March 07, 2018
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a black bar with the word RESIST in white text

One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures (plus the occasional non-Republican who obliges us to resist their nonsense, too, like we don't have enough to worry about) is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.

So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.

Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.

* * *

Here are some things in the news today:

Earlier today by me: Joe Biden, What Are You Even Doing? and Gary Cohn Jumps Ship to Dogwhistled Anti-Semitism and On the Stormy Daniels Story.

Arelis R. Hernández at the Washington Post: Exodus from Puerto Rico Grows as Island Struggles to Rebound from Hurricane Maria.
Experts say the storm and its widespread devastation undoubtedly have sped up the pace of migration as residents have dealt with extended power outages, communication lapses, infrastructure failures and, in some cases, isolation. What already was the largest exodus in the island's history now includes people fleeing in droves simply to achieve some sense of normalcy.

Just this week, a power outage put nearly 900,000 residents in and around the capital city of San Juan in the dark and without water — again. Tens of thousands in Puerto Rico have had no electricity since the hurricane struck five months ago, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers estimates that 1 in 10 customers still won't have it as of the end of March.

The island's bankrupt public utility has struggled to restore power amid contracting scandals, materiel shortages and intermittent blackouts, and the biggest restoration contractor, Fluor Corp., confirmed that it is pulling out of Puerto Rico in the next several weeks after reaching the funding limit of its $746 million contract.

The governor announced plans last month to privatize the electric utility, sparking standoffs with unionized workers and arousing suspicions from residents. Some municipalities such as San Sebastian, a town in the island's northwest corner, didn't wait and formed their own volunteer brigades to string up power lines and return electricity to thousands of residents.

Nearly 58,000 homes here have roofs made of blue tarps while they await federal assistance; more than 437,000 residents — about 2 of every 5 who applied so far — have received money from the Federal Emergency Management Agency for home repairs.

For many, the future feels ominous.
It utterly guts me that so many Puerto Ricans are being forced to leave their homes in search of stability that the U.S. federal government should be able — and willing — to provide. This is a terrible shame, and I am stricken by the thought that Republicans are deliberately neglecting Puerto Rico to turn it into a profiteering opportunity for the wealthy. After all, the worse things get on the island, the lower the property values in one of the most beautiful places on the planet, just a short flight away from the continental U.S. That there are plans to privatize Puerto Rico's power because of lingering failures does not bode well. Just...fuck.

[Content Note: Genocide] Saphora Smith at NBC News: Rohingya Muslims Will Soon Face Cyclones, Monsoons in Bangladesh. "Refugees driven out of Myanmar by what the U.S. has called 'ethnic cleansing' now face a new threat: the looming monsoon and cyclone season. Authorities have warned that more than 100,000 Rohingya Muslims who fled into neighboring Bangladesh are at risk of losing their makeshift homes to the deadly floods and landslides that accompany seasonal rains. Workers are scrambling to reinforce shelters and dig drainage systems before the bad weather is expected next month. ...[The situation] is largely the same in other makeshift camps housing the refugees near Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh. 'It's a race against time,' said Caroline Gluck, a spokeswoman for the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) in the country. 'We're very alarmed, we're very concerned, we're doing what we can, but we're not sure it's going to be enough.'"

Goddammit. And where is the U.S. State Department during this? "Engaged vigorously in the diplomatic realm." Oh.

[CN: Terrorism; abductions; misogyny] Samuel Okocha at Rewire: Nigerians Continue #BringBackOurGirls Campaign Amid New Kidnappings, Violence. "Members of Nigeria's Bring Back Our Girls movement are vowing to continue the push to free girls who remain in Boko Haram's captivity amid news of another abduction of schoolgirls and increasing terror by the extremist group. Despite military and territorial gains against the terrorist group, Boko Haram has continued to unleash despair with the latest kidnapping of more than 100 schoolgirls in the northeast Nigerian town of Dapchi, believed to be the largest mass abduction since the 2014 notorious Chibok kidnappings. At least three aid workers died on March 1 in another Boko Haram attack in Borno's border town of Rann." Seethe.

* * *

Zeke Miller and Jonathan Lemire at the AP: West Wing Turmoil with Staff Exits; No Chaos, Trump Says. "Cohn's departure has sparked internal fears of an even larger exodus, raising concerns in Washington of a coming 'brain drain' around the president that will only make it more difficult for Trump to advance his already languishing policy agenda. Multiple White House officials said the president has been pushing anxious aides to stay on the job. 'Everyone wants to work in the White House,' Trump said during a news conference Tuesday. 'They all want a piece of the Oval Office.' The reality is far different."

Insert all the jokes here about a "brain drain" in Trump's White House, but, as I've said many times before, the fact that there aren't smart, competent, experienced, ethical people willing to work for the executive branch is not funny. It is terrifying. No one wants to live in a country being run by corrupt fools.

David Voreacos and Greg Farrell at Bloomberg: Trump Fundraiser's Email Breach Shows Risks Before Midterms. "A top Republican fundraiser for Donald Trump's 2016 campaign learned last week that his email accounts had been hacked, sowing concerns that document leaks could roil another national U.S. election cycle. Elliott Broidy, a deputy finance chairman of the Republican National Committee, became aware of the problem when a reporter asked about some of his private messages, said his attorney, Christopher Clark. Broidy then alerted law-enforcement officials, who are now investigating the breach of his private and business emails. Some news organizations have cited Broidy's communications in articles over the past week, describing how he sought to use his political ties to advance his business interests and those of foreign leaders. More embarrassing revelations could follow. All the information will be released soon on 'the dark web,' according to a note accompanying emails sent to Bloomberg."

Hacked DNC and Clinton campaign emails were reported without regard for the fact that they were illegally obtained, and the Russians, who were behind the hacking, never faced any consequences, so of course it's going to happen again during the next election cycle. We have learned nothing and taken no precautions to prevent a repeat of election interference. If anything, meddlers will double-down, because they know nothing will be done to stop or punish them.

Meanwhile, the investigation of the 2016 clusterfuck continues...


Swapna Krishna at Engadget: Russians Used Fake Social Accounts to Gather Americans' Personal Data. "The Internet Research Agency, which is backed by the Russian government, used fake social media accounts to collect names, email addresses, and more. The activity continued after the 2016 election. Using social media, Russian accounts such as @Black4Black and @BlackMattersUS reached out to small business owners, asking for personal information in order to write profiles and promotional content. They promised to add these companies to a business directory as part of their activist outreach. But nothing ever happened. ...It's not fully clear why Russian operatives want this personal information, but it could be tied to either identity theft or a larger effort to influence US politics." COULD BE!


We are so fucked.

* * *

[CN: Video may autoplay at link] Amanda Terkel at the Huffington Post: Ben Carson Removes Anti-Discrimination Language from HUD Mission Statement. "Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson is changing the mission statement of his agency, removing promises of inclusive and discrimination-free communities. In a March 5 memo addressed to HUD political staff, Amy Thompson, the department's assistant secretary for public affairs, explained that the statement is being updated 'in an effort to align HUD's mission with the Secretary's priorities and that of the Administration.' The new mission statement reads: 'HUD's mission is to ensure Americans have access to fair, affordable housing and opportunities to achieve self-sufficiency, thereby strengthening our communities and nation.' ...The Carson mission statement is quite different from the current one, which is still up on HUD's website. That one promises 'strong, sustainable, inclusive communities and quality affordable homes for all.' It also says these communities will be 'free from discrimination'."


[CN: War on agency] Rebekah Entralgo at ThinkProgress: Mississippi Senate Passes the Most Restrictive Abortion Ban in the Country. "On Tuesday, the Mississippi state senate passed a bill 35-14 that would ban abortions after just 15 weeks of pregnancy. The senate vote brings the state one step closer to enacting the most restrictive abortion ban in the country. Current state law prohibits the procedure 20 weeks after a woman's last period. No other state has a 15-week restriction. State lawmakers have previously argued that a 20-week ban was necessary in order to prevent fetal pain; by moving the ban to 15 weeks, the Mississippi legislature is making clear that this bill isn't really about the fetus, but about a larger attack on Roe v. Wade."


[CN: Sexual assault] Nigel Jaquiss at Willamette Week: In 2011, Portland Police Investigated a Sexual Assault Complaint Against Billionaire Mark Cuban: He Wasn't Charged; Here's What Happened. "The woman, whom WW is not naming because she's the alleged victim of sexual assault, agreed to a brief interview after WW obtained the police report and contacted her. She says she never contacted the media or sought publicity or compensation from Cuban and has put the incident behind her. 'I really left it in the past,' she says. 'I haven't thought about it for seven years.' Now married and in her mid-30s, the woman works in the medical field and enjoys hiking with her yellow Lab. 'I have a wonderful life,' she says. 'I'm a happy person.' But she's sticking to her story. 'I filed the report because what he did was wrong,' she adds. 'I stand behind that report 1,000 percent.'"

As you may recall, Marc Cuban was recently SHOCKED! to discover that a number of women spent years being harassed in the corporate offices of the Dallas Mavericks, the basketball team he owns. Ahem.

And finally...


Is there a single Republican who isn't a thoroughly hypocritical, ethically bankrupt, vile asshole?

That's rhetorical.

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?

Open Wide...
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We Resist: Day 378

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Thursday, February 01, 2018
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a black bar with the word RESIST in white text

One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures (plus the occasional non-Republican who obliges us to resist their nonsense, too, like we don't have enough to worry about) is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.

So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.

Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.

* * *

Here are some things in the news today:

Earlier today by me: This Is a Constitutional Crisis and Hope Hicks May Have Conspired with Trump to Obstruct Justice.

As I mentioned in comments earlier, Democratic House Leader Nancy Pelosi has sent a letter to Speaker Paul Ryan calling for Rep. Devin Nunes to be removed as chair of the House Intelligence Committee.
Congressman Nunes' deliberately dishonest actions make him unfit to serve as Chairman, and he must be removed immediately from this position.

House Republicans' pattern of obstruction and cover-up to hide the truth about the Trump-Russia scandal represents a threat to our intelligence and our national security. The GOP has led a partisan effort to distort intelligence and discredit the U.S. law enforcement and intelligence communities.

It is long overdue that you, as Speaker, put an end to this charade and hold Congressman Nunes and all Congressional Republicans accountable to the oath they have taken to support and defend the Constitution, and protect the American people.

The integrity of the House is at stake. We look forward to your immediate action on this subject.
Meanwhile, Carol D. Leonnig, Josh Dawsey, Ellen Nakashima, and Karoun Demirjian report at the Washington Post: Trump Expected to Approve Release of Memo Following Redactions Requested by Intelligence Officials.

No matter how many people try to convince him not to release the memo, with our without redactions, Donald Trump is going to go ahead and do it — because that was the entire point of Nunes drafting it in the first place.

Which is why, among many other reasons, he needs to be removed. And so does Trump.

Judd Legum at ThinkProgress: The Sketchy Past of Carter Page, the Man at the Center of the Republicans' Memo Obsession. "[The memo] really comes down to one question: Was an obscure Trump adviser named Carter Page a legitimate subject of FBI surveillance, or was he targeted improperly? ...Was the Steele dossier the sole basis to justify the surveillance? Based on what we know about Page, this is very unlikely. Page 'has been known to U.S. counterintelligence officials dating back to at least 2013, nearly three years before he joined the Trump campaign.' In 2013, Page met repeatedly with Victor Podobnyy, who was posing as 'a junior attaché at the Russian consulate.' In 2015, Podobnyy was charged with 'posing as a U.N. attaché under diplomatic cover while trying to recruit Mr. Page as a Russian intelligence source.' ...The memo may make it seem like the Steele memo was the primary or sole basis for surveillance of Page, but the reality is almost certainly far more complicated."

* * *

[Content Note: Genocide]


Horrifying.

In November, Trump "pledged support" for the Rohingya, but it's not entirely clear to me what that has meant, aside from the United States acknowledging the campaign against the Rohingya as ethnic cleansing. This is the best information I could find on what the U.S. has been doing:
"This is a tragedy that's worse than anything that CNN or BBC has been able to portray about what has happened to these people," Mattis told reporters during a trip to Indonesia, Reuters reports. "And the United States has been engaged vigorously in the diplomatic realm trying to resolve this, engaged with humanitarian aid, a lot of money going into humanitarian aid."
That's absurdly nonspecific, but there doesn't appear to be any better information available — and I suspect that's because the U.S. government isn't actually doing anything meaningful.

(And in case you're wondering: Yes, there are meaningful actions we could be taking. But we have not taken them.)

The lack of available solid information on what constitutes our "vigorous engagement in the diplomatic realm" highlights another critical issue: I literally don't know if we even have any functioning State Department in that part of the world at this point.

Which is another indication of how far gone our country already is. That we had qualified, competent ambassadors and other diplomatic staff in place during a crisis virtually anywhere on the planet was something I used to be able to take for granted. Now I have no fucking clue what is going on abroad.

And suffice it to say there would not have been a complete collapse of the State Department if Hillary Clinton were president.

Trump continues to fail us, and continues to fail the world.

In news related to the abject demolishment of the U.S. State Department:

Declan Walsh at the New York Times: As Strongmen Steamroll Their Opponents, U.S. Is Silent.

Matthew Lee at the AP: Top Career U.S. Diplomat to Step Down in Blow to State Department.

So things are only going to keep getting worse.

* * *

Jake Sherman and Anna Palmer at Politico: Behind Pence's Plan to Rescue the Republican Majority in 2018. "Vice President Mike Pence is launching one of the most aggressive campaign strategies in recent White House history: he will hopscotch the country over the next three months, making nearly three dozen stops that could raise tens of millions of dollars for House and Senate Republicans, all while promoting the party's legislative accomplishments. If done right, Pence said in an exclusive interview with POLITICO backstage before his speech to the House and Senate GOP here Wednesday night, Republicans could expand their majority in both chambers."

Setting fundraising aside, Pence will be accomplishing two things with this cross-country hobnobbing: 1. He will effectively be mounting a campaign that he's ready to be president, just in case. 2. He is laying the groundwork for the explanation when Republicans mysteriously have totally unexpected electoral success in the midterms. It won't be because Mike Pompeo rigged it with the Russians, but because Pence worked so gosh darn hard and visited all those places Washington doesn't care about blah blah fart.

I see you, Pence. I am annoyed that very few people in power seem to see you, including and especially Bob Mueller.

* * *

Catherine Garcia at the Week: HUD Lawyers Warned Ben Carson About Letting His Son Get Involved in Department Business. "Lawyers with the Housing and Urban Development department warned HUD Secretary Ben Carson that by having his son, businessman Ben Carson Jr., actively involved in organizing a listening tour in Baltimore last summer, he was risking violating federal ethics rules, The Washington Post reports. Using the Freedom of Information Act, the Post obtained a July 6, 2017, memo written by Linda M. Cruciani, HUD's deputy general counsel for operations, who said she had been told by HUD officials they were concerned about Carson Jr. and his wife, Merlynn, inviting people to tour events. ...[Cruciani expressed her concern] 'that this gave the appearance that the secretary may be using his position for his son's private gain.'"

[CN: War on agency; hostility to consent; nativism] Ed Pilkington at the Guardian: Trump Officials Considered Contentious Method to 'Reverse' Undocumented Teen's Abortion. "An anti-abortion activist who was appointed by Donald Trump to head a federal agency that detains undocumented immigrant children considered using a highly contentious and untested technique to stop a teenager from completing an abortion that was already in process, it has emerged. Scott Lloyd, the Trump administration's pick as director of the Office of Refugee Resettlement, raised the prospect last March of administering the hormone progesterone to a 17-year-old girl from El Salvador who had entered the U.S. illegally and was being held in custody in San Antonio, Texas. The procedure is unrecognized by the medical profession as a means of reversing abortion and has side-effects attached to it."

[CN: War on agency] Nicole Knight at Rewire: GOP Lawmakers Are Pushing 'Make-Believe Health Care' Across the U.S. "Proponents of abortion pill 'reversal' aim to gain a foothold in Idaho with Republican legislation to tell those seeking abortion care about the unproven treatment. Patients would receive a 'fetal development packet' with information on 'interventions, if any, that may affect the effectiveness or reversal of a chemical abortion' and where to find providers, under a bill introduced Monday by state Sen. Lori Den Hartog (R-Meridian). Abortion pill 'reversal' purports to stop a medication abortion by delivering a large dose of the hormone progesterone before a patient takes the second pill in a series of two required medications to have a medication abortion. Backed by anti-choice lawmakers, legislation advocating for the experimental treatment has appeared in at least ten states since 2015, with limited success. Colorado legislators are also considering an abortion pill 'reversal' bill this year. The American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists has condemned the so-called reversal treatment, saying it is 'not supported by the body of scientific evidence.'"

[CN: White supremacy] Rebecca Klein at the Huffington Post: American Students Aren't Learning the Full Truth About Slavery. "American students are being taught an inadequate and often sanitized version of history when it comes to slavery, according to a new report. The report, from the Southern Poverty Law Center, looks at how slavery is presented in K-12 classrooms and found that students are often taught a deeply incomplete version of events. ...Only 8 percent of high school seniors surveyed by an independent polling firm for the study identified slavery as the primary reason for the Civil War. Almost half identified tax protests as the main cause."


Recall what I was just saying this morning about white supremacists being the gatekeepers of Black history.

[CN: Environmental racism] Oliver Milman at the Guardian: Air Pollution: Black, Hispanic, and Poor Students Most at Risk from Toxins. "Schoolchildren across the U.S. are plagued by air pollution that's linked to multiple brain-related problems, with Black, Hispanic, and low-income students most likely to be exposed to a fug of harmful toxins at school, scientists and educators have warned. The warnings come after widespread exposure to toxins was found in new research using EPA and census data to map out the air pollution exposure for nearly 90,000 public schools across the U.S. 'This could well be impacting an entire generation of our society,' said Dr Sara Grineski, an academic who has authored the first national study, published in the journal Environmental Research, on air pollution and schools."

Jenny Rowland at ThinkProgress: The National Monuments Slashed by Trump Will Officially be Open to Mining on Friday. "Trump took an unprecedented step for a U.S. president in December — signing a proclamation that dramatically reduced the size of two national monuments. Bears Ears National Monument was cut by more than 85 percent and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument was reduced by half. This resulted in the largest elimination of protected areas in U.S. history. The move put tens of thousands of Native American sacred sites at risk, along with key wildlife habitat, and areas used for outdoor recreation. While the longer-term fate of Trump's likely illegal action will play out in the courts, also buried in his December proclamation was a provision that on February 2, 2018, the areas excluded from the monuments would become open to private mineral companies to begin staking mining and drilling claims."


Whitney Filloon at Eater: Tip-Pooling Will Cost Workers Billions, According to Hidden DOL Data. "As the debate around tip pooling continues, new evidence shows the Department of Labor hid data from the public that revealed its proposed regulations would cost restaurant workers billions of dollars, Bloomberg Law reports. The DOL reportedly conducted an analysis indicating that, if tip pooling was made legal again — that is, if restaurant owners were allowed to collect servers' tips and redistribute them as they see fit, including being allowed to pocket them — it would transfer billions of dollars' worth of gratuities from workers to business owners. These findings were left out of the department's December proposal to reverse the Obama administration rule that banned tip pooling."

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?

Open Wide...
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We Resist: Day 215

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Tuesday, August 22, 2017
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a black bar with the word RESIST in white text

One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.

So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.

Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.

* * *

Here are some things in the news today:

Earlier today by me: So the President Gave a Speech Last Night and Pence to Join Trump in Phoenix.

[Content Note: Disablism] Eugene Robinson at the Washington Post: It's Time to Talk About Trump's Mental Health. You know, even setting aside the disablism here and in the dozens of other pieces just like it, the problem is that their authors presume Trump is actually trying to govern like a traditional president and failing. But what if he isn't? And there's frankly an enormous amount of evidence that he isn't.

What looks like "mental illness" — or some other variation on "unfitness" — when judging Trump's comportment against traditional expectations of a president looks a lot less so when judging Trump's comportment against expectations of an aspiring dictator.

Maybe Trump praised Duterte, for example, not because he's "an idiot" who doesn't know any better, but because he actually admires Duterte.

I understand why people don't want to contemplate that possibility, but maybe "it's time" to talk about that.

* * *

[Content Note: War; death] Maya Gebeily at AFP/Yahoo News: Dozens Reported Dead in US-Led Strikes as Battle Nears Raqa Heart.
Dozens of civilians have died in two days of intense US-led strikes on Raqa, a monitor said Tuesday, as fighting to retake the Syrian city from jihadists nears its densely populated centre.

The coalition acknowledges it has pounded the city and surrounding area with more than 250 air strikes over the past week alone, in support of the Syrian Democratic Forces alliance battling the Islamic State group.

The SDF has so far captured just under 60 percent of Raqa, monitors say, leaving IS with about 10 square kilometres (four square miles) in the heart of the city.

But as clashes approach central Raqa, monitors and activists have reported scores killed in intensifying coalition bombardment of the city.

On Monday, US-led air strikes killed at least 42 civilians in several neighbourhoods in Raqa under IS control, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Nineteen children and 12 women were among the dead, the monitor said.

The Observatory says 167 civilians have been killed in coalition strikes since August 14, including 27 on Sunday.

"The tolls are high because the air strikes are hitting neighbourhoods in the city centre that are densely packed with civilians," Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said.
Goddammit. I don't even have words. My heart aches.

Tim Johnson at McClatchy: US Navy Collisions Stoke Cyber Threat Concerns. "The Pentagon won't yet say how the USS John S. McCain was rammed by an oil tanker near Singapore, but red flags are flying as the Navy's decades-old reliance on electronic guidance systems increasing looks like another target of cyberattack. The incident — the fourth involving a Seventh Fleet warship this year — occurred near the Strait of Malacca, a crowded 1.7-mile-wide waterway that connects the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea and accounts for roughly 25 percent of global shipping. ...In a little noticed June 22 incident, someone manipulated GPS signals in the eastern part of the Black Sea, leaving some 20 ships with little situational awareness. Shipboard navigation equipment, which appeared to be working properly, reported the location of the vessels 20 miles inland, near an airport. That was the first known instance of GPS 'spoofing,' or misdirection."


Of course it has.

Alec MacGillis at New York Magazine in collaboration with ProPublica: Is Anybody Home at HUD? "The story of the Trump administration has been dominated by the Russia investigations, the Obamacare-repeal morass, and cataclysmic internecine warfare. But there is a whole other side to Trump's takeover of Washington: What happens to the government itself, and all it is tasked with doing, when it is placed under the command of the Chaos President? HUD has emerged as the perfect distillation of the right's antipathy to governing. If the great radical-conservative dream was, in Grover Norquist's famous words, to 'drown government in a bathtub,' then this was what the final gasps of one department might look like."

[CN: Video may autoplay at link] Brian Ross, Matthew Mosk, and Rhonda Schwartz at ABC News: Glenn Simpson, Key Figure Behind Million-Dollar 'Dossier,' to Face Questions. "A key figure behind the so-called 'dossier' featuring uncorroborated and salacious allegations about then-candidate Donald Trump's ties to Russia will be questioned by investigators from the Senate Judiciary Committee today about the funding and sources for the document. ...Simpson, who will appear in a closed session on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, hired the former MI6 agent Christopher Steele to compile the now infamous 'dossier,' which alleged that members of the Trump campaign had colluded with Russian agents to damage Hillary Clinton, Trump's Democratic opponent."

My friend Leah McElrath notes that ABC kinda buried the lede on this one:


"According to people briefed on the developments, Steele has met with the FBI and provided agents with the names of his sources for the allegations in the dossier, but it is unclear, how much information lawmakers will be able to obtain from Simpson this week. Attorneys for Fusion GPS have indicated to the committee that its client relationships are confidential." That is the very last paragraph in ABC's piece.

[CN: Misogyny]


Jesus fucking Jones.

Glenn Kessler, Michelle Ye Hee Lee, and Meg Kelly at the Washington Post: Trump's List of False and Misleading Claims Tops 1,000. "We have been tracking [Donald] Trump's false or misleading claims for more than seven months. Somewhere around Aug. 4 or Aug. 5, he broke 1,000 claims, and the tally now stands at 1,057. (Our full interactive graphic can be found here.) That's an impressive number by any standard. In fact, we are a little late with this update because we have simply been overwhelmed keeping track of the deluge of claims made by the president in the later part of July. Things slowed down during the president's 'working vacation,' so we have finally been able to catch up. At the president's current pace, he averages nearly five claims a day."

That actually seems low to me, given that some of his tweets have five bullshit claims in them.

* * *

Oh. My. God.


Damian Paletta at the Washington Post: Treasury Secretary's Wife Boasts of Travel on Government Plane; Touts Hermes and Valentino Fashion.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin's wife, Louise Linton, boasted of flying on a government plane with her husband to Kentucky on Monday and then named the numerous fashion brands she wore on the trip in an unusual social media post that only became more bizarre minutes later.

When someone posted a comment on Linton's Instagram picture that criticized the way Linton touted the trip, the treasury secretary's wife swung back hard, mentioning the extreme wealth she and her husband control.

"Did you think this was a personal trip?!" Linton wrote on her Instagram page, responding to the person who had written "glad we could pay for your little getaway."

(Linton's Instagram account was later made "private" so that it could not be publicly seen).

Linton continued in her response to the critic: "Adorable! Do you think the US govt paid for our honeymoon or personal travel?! Lololol. Have you given more to the economy than me and my husband? Either as an individual earner in taxes OR in self sacrifice to your country? I'm pretty sure we paid more taxes toward our day 'trip' than you did. Pretty sure the amount we sacrifice per year is a lot more than you'd be willing to sacrifice if the choice was yours."

Linton added, "You're adorably out of touch … Thanks for the passive aggressive nasty comment. Your kids look very cute. Your life looks cute."
At ThinkProgress, Aaron Rupar notes: "Linton's condescending remarks come as Mnuchin, a 17-year veteran of Goldman Sachs who later ran a bank that has been described as a 'foreclosure machine,' ramps up his sales pitch for a tax reform plan that the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center says will disproportionately benefit the top one percent of earners."

It also "came on the same day as news about how [Donald] Trump's lifestyle is creating huge financial and logistical problems for the Secret Service and for taxpayers."

What a fucking administration this is.

* * *

[CN: Violence; murder; racism; death penalty] Mark Berman and Wesley Lowery at the Washington Post: Missouri Plans to Execute Marcellus Williams as His Attorneys Say DNA Evidence Exonerates Him. "Missouri on Tuesday plans to execute Marcellus Williams, a death-row inmate convicted in 2001 of killing a former newspaper reporter. But with Williams's lethal injection looming, his attorneys have appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court for a stay, arguing that Missouri may be on the verge of executing the wrong person. ...Attorneys for Williams argue that he is innocent, pointing to DNA tests they say produced 'conclusive scientific evidence that another man committed this crime.' They say this evidence shows that DNA belonging to someone else was found on the murder weapon, exonerating Williams. ...State officials, though, said they still believe Williams is guilty due to other 'compelling non-DNA evidence.'" JFC. End the death penalty now.

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?

Open Wide...
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We Resist: Day 183

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Friday, July 21, 2017
View Comments

a black bar with the word RESIST in white text

One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.

So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.

Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.

* * *

Here are some things in the news today:

Earlier today by me: Republicans Are "Dismayed" Again. Oh. and If You Make an Authoritarian President, He Will Behave Like an Authoritarian and I Don't Like This One Bit and Sean Spicer Has Resigned.

REMINDER: KEEP CALLING YOUR SENATORS TO TELL THEM TO VOTE NO ON REPEALING THE AFFORDABLE CARE ACT.


Sarah Boseley's important article is also accompanied by an equally stark image of Donald Trump signing the Executive Order that reintroduced the Mexico City policy, while surrounded by grinning white men: Reince Preibus, Peter Navarro, Jared Kushner, Steven Miller, and Steve Bannon.

The article is tough, but I highly recommend reading it. Please note if you have a needle phobia, there is an image of a young woman getting a contraceptive implant about midway through the story.

* * *

Ben Wieder, Gabrielle Paluch, and Kevin G. Hall at McClatchy: Ex Trump Associates Helped Fugitive Kazakhs in Visa Scheme.
Two former associates of Donald Trump helped a family of wealthy Kazakh fugitives make extensive investments in the United States, some aimed at helping family members obtain legal residency here, a McClatchy investigation shows.

Felix Sater, an ex-con and one-time senior adviser in the Trump Organization, helped the Trump family scout deals in Russia. He led an effort that began in 2012 to assist the stepchildren of Viktor Khrapunov, who that year had been placed on an international detention request list by the global police agency Interpol.

...On paper, Donald Trump's business relationship with Sater ended almost a decade ago. But earlier this year, Sater re-entered Trump's orbit when he and Michael D. Cohen, one of Trump's personal lawyers, were involved with a Ukraine-Russia peace proposal that was presented to Michael Flynn, then Trump's national security advisor.

...Several key people in Trump’s orbit did business with the Kazakh clan, including the law firm of Trump campaign surrogate Rudy Giuliani and the Bayrock Group, which developed Trump-branded projects in New York, Florida, and Arizona and was founded by Tevik Arif, a politically-connected former Soviet official from Kazakhstan.

Lincoln Mitchell, a political consultant who specializes in Russia and its neighboring countries, said virtually any investment from Kazakhstan warrants scrutiny.

"It would be hard to imagine getting Kazakh investment that wasn't close to the ruling family," Mitchell said in a telephone interview from the former Soviet republic of Georgia.
Again: Legitimate for Bob Mueller to scrutinize Trump's finances. Legitimate, and crucial.

Guardian/AP: CIA Director: Russia Loves to Meddle and 'Stick It to America'. "The CIA director, Mike Pompeo, said on Thursday that Russia had no plans to leave Syria and would continue to try to meddle in US affairs to 'stick it to America.' He reiterated his belief that Russia interfered in the US presidential election and described the US-Russia relationship as 'complicated.' 'I think they find any place that they can make our lives more difficult, I think they find that's something that's useful,' he said." Yep. Have you mentioned this to your boss, sir?

Speaking of Russians fucking with us... Keir Simmons and Saphora Smith at NBC News: Russia's Lavrov Says Trump May Have Met Putin More Times.
Donald Trump may have held more meetings with Vladimir Putin at the G-20 summit earlier this month, Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Friday — but he shrugged off the importance of the encounters.

"They might have met even much more than just three times," he told NBC News' Keir Simmons in an exclusive interview, dismissing speculation about the leaders' meetings.

"Maybe they went to the toilet together," he joked.

Asked whether the two presidents had other conversations or met in the corridors of the G-20 meeting, Lavrov used the analogy of children mingling at a kindergarten.

"When you are bought by your parents to a kindergarten do you mix with the people who are waiting in the same room to start going to a classroom?" he asked.

He added: "I remember when I was in that position I did spend five or ten minutes in the kindergarten before they brought us to the classroom."
Fucking ridiculous. I will never stop being angry that Donald Trump is such an overconfident dipshit that he put us in the position of being mocked by the Russian Foreign Minister, who just takes the piss at will, because we are being (un)governed by a man who is little more than a Russian nesting doll of character defects.

On that note... Philip Bump at the Washington Post: Trump Can Usually Make It About a Third of the Way Through an Interview Without Mentioning Hillary Clinton. "In fact, in 19 interviews that he's conducted since becoming president, we found that Clinton tended to be mentioned much earlier than a number of Trump's other favorite topics: The 2016 election, the votes he received, the electoral college and Barack Obama. ...In 17 of 19 of his interviews, Clinton came up, on average about 36 percent of the way in. ...How much does Trump like to raise the subject of Hillary Clinton? He even mentions her more frequently and sooner than his other favorite opponent: the press." GOD, DONNIE, GET IT THROUGH YOUR HEAD: SHE'LL NEVER LIKE YOU.

Sara Robinson at Rewire: Trump's Sensitivity to Being Laughed at Should Alarm Everyone. "When we hear Trump say, 'They're laughing at us,' it's almost certainly because he's about to put forth a policy explicitly designed to assert dominance or act out rage, abusing the vast powers of his office to brutally stuff some inferior group or nation back into its perceived place because they have dared to challenge him. Trump's fear of being laughed at is the clearest possible sign that we have installed an abuser-in-chief in the White House. Savvy global actors have already figured out that laughing at him is a very reliable way to provoke him into ridiculous postures and self-destructive policies. But closer to home, we also need to realize that over the next three and a half years, the worst abuses of power, the most draconian displays of force, and the most profound violence this administration does to our nation and to the bodies and futures of its citizens will almost inevitably occur because Trump thought somebody was laughing at him."

Daniel Dale at the Toronto Star: Donald Trump Said 414 False Things in His First Six Months. "The Star has tracked every single word Trump has said, tweeted or issued in his name since he took the oath on Jan. 20. Other than the sheer quantity of lies, what's most striking is their outlandish obviousness. With some exceptions, this is not sophisticated deceit. Trump is the toddler with purple icing on his face declaring that a fairy must have eaten the last piece of cake."

* * *

In other news...


[Content Note: White supremacy] Ayana Byrd at Colorlines: Climate Scientist Blows Whistle on Trump Administration's Department of the Interior.
Joel Clement's previous job: Director of the Office of Policy Analysis at the U.S. Department of the Interior, where he focused on helping endangered Native communities in Alaska prepare for and adapt to climate change.

His current job, as of June 15 when he was involuntarily reassigned: Collecting royalty checks from fossil fuel companies as a senior advisor at the Office of Natural Resources Revenue.

On Wednesday (July 19), Clement filed a complaint and a whistleblower disclosure form with the Office of Special Counsel, an independent investigative and prosecutorial agency for federal employees. That same day, The Washington Post published an op-ed by him titled, "I'm a Scientist. I'm Blowing the Whistle on the Trump Administration." It begins with this disclaimer:
I am not a member of the deep state. I am not big government.

I am a scientist, a policy expert, a civil servant and a worried citizen. Reluctantly, as of today, I am also a whistleblower on an administration that chooses silence over science.
Clement writes that involuntary reassignments like the one he (and about 50 others) received were used to eliminate those whose views did not agree with the new administration's.
Fucking hell. And what did Clement do that targeted him for retaliation? "I believe I was retaliated against for speaking out publicly about the dangers that climate change poses to Alaska Native communities."

[CN: LGBT hatred] Michael Fitzgerald at Towleroad: Donald Trump to Nominate Another Anti-LGBTQ Secretary to the Army. "Donald Trump has announced that he plans to nominate anti-LGBT veteran and defense contractor manager Mark Esper as Secretary of the Army. Esper is a lobbyist and vice president for government relations at defense contractor Raytheon and served as a Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense from 2002 to 2004. ...However, GLAAD reports that Esper was also the former chair of the National Security Policy subcommittee for the 2008 Republican Party Platform, which specifically targeted LGBT service members. Additionally, he has worked with anti-LGBT lawmakers including Senator Bill Frist and served as Chief of Staff and Assistant to the President of the Heritage Foundation."

David Shepardson and Valerie Volcovici at Reuters: White House Deregulation Push Clears out Hundreds of Proposed Rules. "The White House said Thursday it had withdrawn or removed from active consideration more than 800 proposed regulations that were never finalized during the Obama administration as it works to shrink the federal government's regulatory footprint. ...The steps to eliminate regulations makes good on a much-repeated Trump campaign promise to promote business-friendly policies. Investors have anticipated the action, helping to push share prices higher on hopes that fewer regulations will boost business growth and lead to higher corporate profits."

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?

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This Really Happened

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Monday, March 06, 2017
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[Content Note: Racist revisionist history.]

Today, HUD Secretary Ben Carson actually said this shit (video via Tommy Christopher):

People who worked not five days a week, but six or seven days a week. Not eight hours a day, but ten, twelve, sixteen hours a day. No such thing as a minimum wage. They worked not for themselves, but for their sons and their daughters and their grandsons and their granddaughters, that they might have an opportunity in this land. That's what America is about. A land of dreams and opportunity. There were other immigrants who came here in the bottom of slave ships, worked even longer, even harder, for less. But they, too, had a dream that, one day, their sons, daughters, grandsons, granddaughters, great-grandsons, great-granddaughters might pursue prosperity.
Yes, he called slaves "immigrants," after waxing nostalgic about the days where there were no labor laws and no minimum wage.

I mean.

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Trump Picks Carson for HUD

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Monday, December 05, 2016
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Because of course he does. I've got a few thoughts on that at Shareblue: "Unfit president-elect Trump chooses unfit nominee Carson to lead HUD.

Now, after dithering about it, Carson has accepted the nomination to HUD, despite his lack of qualifications. He will "oversee an agency with a $47 billion budget, bringing to the job a philosophical opposition to government programs that encourage what he calls 'dependency' and engage in 'social engineering.' He has no expertise in housing policy."

Carson's only cited qualification, such as it is, is having grown up in an inner city: "In a recent television interview, Mr. Carson said that he was prepared to lead the agency because he grew up 'in the inner city' and because as a physician in Baltimore he has 'dealt with a lot of patients from that area.'"

...But no expertise is required by Trump — who, after all, has no qualifications himself. He has never served a day in public office in preparation for the presidency, and has so little knowledge of the job that he was surprised he has to staff the White House.

What is telling about this selection is that it is clearly Trump's pick — unlike much of the Cabinet, which otherwise has Mike Pence's fingerprints all over it. That Pence, and whichever other Trump advisors are wielding influence, evidently stepped back and "gave" this one to Trump suggests what a low priority HUD is to the powerbrokers in the incoming administration.
There is, as always, more at the link, including a strong statement of objection from Nancy Pelosi. GOOD.

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The GOP Convention Is an Absolute Shitshow

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Tuesday, July 19, 2016
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[Content Note: Transphobia.]

Racism. Misogyny. Homophobia. Islamophobia. Calls for Hillary Clinton to be thrown in prison. Calling her a cunt. Skeevy behavior. Plagiarism. And transphobia:

"For thousands of years, mankind has known what a man is and what a woman is," [former GOP presidential candidate and current Donald Trump supporter Dr. Ben Carson] said to applause Tuesday at the Florida delegation breakfast near the Republican National Convention in Cleveland. "And now all of a sudden we don't know anymore. Now, is that the height of absurdity? Because today you feel like a woman, even though everything about you genetically says that you're a man or vice versa?"

"Wouldn't that be the same as if you woke up tomorrow morning after seeing a movie about Afghanistan or reading some books and said, 'You know what? I'm Afghanistan. I know I don't look that way. My ancestors came from Sweden, or something, I don't know. But I really am. And if you say I'm not, (then) you're racist,'" the former presidential candidate continued.

..."Anytime the secular progressives want to get people on their side, they go back to the civil rights movement, and they say this is a civil rights issue and it's not a civil rights issue," he said. "But we have to be willing to stand up, we have to be willing to call out people for this absolutely ridiculous stuff that they're trying to put over on us, that they're trying to put over on our children."
No, Dr. Ben Carson. Being trans is not the same as waking up and deciding you're "Afghanistan."

I would be terrified that a medical doctor could be so ignorant, if I hadn't already had that particular circuit in my brain blown by Carson' stance on abortion.

This convention is utterly contemptible.

I recommend reading Josh Marshall: "Violence, Blood, and Betrayal Inside the Trump Potemkin Village."

The sort of ignorance and hatred expressed by Carson here is not a bug of Trump-era Republicanism. It's a feature. The central, defining feature.

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In the News

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Tuesday, March 15, 2016
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Here is some stuff in the news today...

[Content Note: War on agency] Bad news in both Florida and Indiana: In Florida, the Republican-controlled state legislature has "passed an omnibus anti-choice bill that would include targeted regulation of abortion providers. HB 1411, sponsored by Rep. Colleen Burton (R-Lakeland), would create restrictions on abortion clinics, ban organizations that provide abortion care from receiving state Medicaid funds, and redefine the trimesters of pregnancy." In Indiana, the Republican-controlled state legislature has "authorize[d] an entire menu of grotesquely unconstitutional anti-choice TRAP (Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers) laws, as well as new forms of authoritarian, misogynistic devilry... [T]he new Indiana bill is in keeping with a series of laws that don't outright ban abortion, but which makes it really, really difficult to have a safe and legal abortion."

[CN: Antisemitism; Christian Supremacy] FUCK. THIS. "A North Carolina pastor warmed up the crowd at a Donald Trump rally by urging Sen. Bernie Sanders to become a Christian. Televangelist Mark Burns spoke to Trump supporters at a campaign event in Hickory ahead of Tuesday's North Carolina primary election, reported the Friendly Atheist blog. 'Bernie Sanders, who doesn't believe in God, how in the world (are) we going to let Bernie—I mean, really?' Burns said, as the crowd applauded. 'Bernie's got to get saved, Bernie's got to meet Jesus. He's got to have a coming to Jesus meeting.' Sanders describes himself as a secular Jew who is not 'particularly religious.'" This is inappropriate in half a dozen different ways, and I am really angry that anyone would talk about Sanders this way.

[CN: Bigotry] Sounds like Paul Krugman is reading Shakesville again! "Let's dispel with this fiction that the Trump phenomenon represents some kind of unpredictable intrusion into the normal course of Republican politics. On the contrary, the G.O.P. has spent decades encouraging and exploiting the very rage that is now carrying Mr. Trump to the nomination. That rage was bound to spin out of the establishment's control sooner or later. Donald Trump is not an accident. His party had it coming."

GOOD GRIEF THESE GUYS: "Dr. Ben Carson, who endorsed Donald Trump's presidential candidacy on Friday, appears less than enthusiastic about that decision. And the real reason the unsuccessful GOP presidential hopeful endorsed his former rival could be a violation of federal law. Carson told the conservative online site NewsMax TV on Monday that he backed Trump based on a practical calculus. 'I didn't see a path for [John] Kasich, who I like, or for [Marco] Rubio, who I like. As far as [Ted] Cruz is concerned, I don't think he's gonna be able to draw independents and Democrats unless has has some kind of miraculous change… Is there another scenario that I would have preferred? Yes. But that scenario isn't available.' Pressed to clarify, Carson said he meant he'd prefer to have backed one of the other candidates. Carson then said that Trump had promised him a role in his administration, 'certainly in an advisory capacity.'" Whoooooooops!

[CN: Rape culture; clergy abuse] "The Church of England is to make far-reaching changes to the way it deals with cases of sex abuse following a damning independent report that details how senior church figures failed to act upon repeated disclosures of a sadistic assault. The first independent review commissioned by the church into its handling of a sex abuse case highlights the 'deeply disturbing' failure of those in senior positions to record or take action on the survivor's disclosures over a period of almost four decades. The church acknowledged the report was 'embarrassing and uncomfortable.'" How terrible for them. Seethe.

[CN: Racism; class warfare] "Today (March 14) the U.S. Department of Justice charged state judges with the task of tossing out policies that effectively create debtors' prisons, filled with poor people who are unable to pay exorbitant fines for minor offenses. These policies are a major part of the government's lawsuit against Ferguson. 'The consequences of the criminalization of poverty are not only harmful—they are far-reaching,' Attorney General Loretta Lynch said in a statement. 'They not only affect an individual's ability to support their family, but also contribute to an erosion of our faith in government. One of my top priorities as Attorney General is to help repair community trust where it has frayed, and a key part of that effort includes ensuring that our legal system serves every American faithfully and fairly, regardless of their economic status.'"

Heads-up, gamers: "Xbox gamers will soon be able to play online against people using other systems such as PC and possibly even Playstation, Microsoft has announced. Currently gamers can only play together online if they use the same system. One of the first games to support cross-platform play will be Rocket League, which Xbox and PC gamers will be able to play together via Xbox Live. There is 'an open invitation' for other networks to collaborate, the tech giant said. ...'Cross-network play has been the number one most requested feature our community has asked for since Rocket League was first announced on Xbox One,' said Psyonix, the studio behind Rocket League. 'Today's announcement is a dream come true.'"

Neat! "The enigmatic circles of sand—burnt orange, almost impeccably round and rimmed by a fringe of tall grass—are spaced at surprisingly regular intervals across the otherwise barren landscape. Over the course of decades, they appear, expand and then fade, almost as if they had a life cycle of their own. And, viewed from above, they seem so perfect and improbable their existence can only be ascribed to something not of this world. ...It's not gods, scientists said on Monday in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and it's not dragons or bugs. It's the plants themselves. They've self-organised."

And finally! Fluffy Cat is soooooooooo fluffy! Hooray for fluffy cats!

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A Tale of #TwoTrumps

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Monday, March 14, 2016
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[Content Note: Bigotry.]

I've got a new piece up at Blue Nation Review, on the Two Trumps—the performer and the deceiver:

On March 11, Donald Trump got a curious endorsement from Dr. Ben Carson:
I've come to know Donald Trump over the last few years; he's actually a very intelligent man who cares deeply about America. There are two different Donald Trumps: There's the one you see on the stage, and there's the one who's very cerebral—sits there and considers things very carefully; you can have a very good conversation with him. And that's the Donald Trump that you're going to start seeing more and more of.
For his part, Trump initially agreed with Carson, saying, "I think there are two Donald Trumps: There's the public version, and people see that, and, I don't know what they see exactly, but it seems to have worked over my lifetime… Perhaps there are two Donald Trumps."

Then, later, in the same press conference: "I don't think there are two Donald Trumps. I think there's one Donald Trump."

So one Donald Trump agrees that there are two Donald Trumps, and the other Donald Trump does not agree that there are two Donald Trumps.

Well, that definitely clears it up.

Trump is certainly a man of contradictions—though not in the way the phrase is flatteringly deployed to underscore the complex humanity of a person of profound integrity. To the contrary, to say that Trump is a man of contradictions is to highlight his utter lack of a principled core.
Read the rest at BNR. With my thanks, once more, for their terrific support.

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In the News

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Friday, March 11, 2016
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Here is some stuff in the news today...

Hot damn! This campaign advertisement featuring Shonda Rhimes, and the stars of three of her hugely successful shows—Viola Davis from How to Get Away with Murder, Kerry Washington from Scandal, and Ellen Pompeo from Grey's Anatomy—endorsing Hillary Clinton is pretty fucking cool. I can't even imagine how jazzed Clinton must be!

In other endorsement news, Dr. Ben Carson has endorsed Donald Trump. Sure.

On the other hand: "The AFL-CIO, the largest U.S. federation of labor unions, will launch digital attack ads targeting Republican front-runner Donald Trump next week as part of a multi-pronged effort to derail the New York billionaire's bid for the White House and dampen union workers' enthusiasm for him. Officials at the AFL-CIO, an umbrella group of 56 unions representing 12.5 million workers, told Reuters the ads will depict Trump as anti-union, and will appear on Facebook and Twitter. ...'Donald Trump has tapped into the very real and understandable anger of working people. But while he says he's with America's working people, when you look close, it's just hot air,' AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka told Reuters. 'Donald Trump is nothing but a house of cards, and once we educate people, the house of cards comes crashing down,' he said."

[Content Note: War; displacement; descriptions of rape, murder, and violence] The United Nations Office of Human Rights has published an incredibly difficult but equally important report on the vast scope of brutal human rights violations in South Sudan, in which a civil war between government and opposition forces has been waging since 2013. Women and children are especially singled out for vicious abuse and sexual violence, and UN investigators found that the South Sudanese army have allowed their affiliated militias "to rape women in lieu of wages while fighting rebels. ...According to the UN report, militias operated under a 'do what you can and take what you can' agreement that allowed them to rape and abduct women and girls as a form of payment. They also raided cattle and stole personal property, it added. The scale and type of sexual violence committed in South Sudan constitute some of the most horrendous human rights abuses in the world, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein said." And still the world continues to refuse to meaningfully intervene.

[CN: War on agency] In Indiana, the state legislature is attempting to pass another abortion restriction so extreme that even some Republicans are objecting: "Under HB 1337, which both chambers of the legislature passed this week, women would be prohibited from seeking an abortion if they discover their fetus has genetic abnormalities. ...According to a Planned Parenthood statement, the legislation is 'particularly cruel in that it's designed to shame and demean a woman who is facing tragic circumstances with a lethal fetal anomaly.' Essentially, a grieving pregnant woman grappling with the news that her unborn child won't survive outside the womb would be required to receive information dissuading her from ending the doomed pregnancy. ...'The bill does nothing to save innocent lives. There's no education, there's no funding. It's just penalties,' Rep. Sharon Negele, a Republican who has sponsored anti-abortion legislation in the past, said this week at a hearing regarding HB 1337." When Sharon Negele says you've gone too far, you have truly derailed.

[CN: War on agency] Meanwhile, in Utah: "A Utah bill requiring doctors to administer anesthesia to a fetus at 20 weeks' gestation or later during an abortion procedure now heads to the governor's desk, after Republicans on Thursday pushed through the measure during the legislative session's final hours. The bill, sponsored by state Sen. Curt Bramble (R-Provo), hinges on the unsubstantiated notion that a fetus at 20 weeks' gestation feels pain, despite an exhaustive scientific review saying that's simply not the case. SB 234 passed in the house in a 56-13 party line vote, after clearing the state senate this month over Democratic opposition. Republicans control both chambers of the Utah legislature."

[CN: Fat hatred; video may autoplay at link] Fucking hell: "A new commercial that is part of Lane Bryant's body positive campaign may never get a chance to air. A representative for the clothing company tells People it has been rejected by multiple TV networks including NBC and ABC. ...In a statement to People, a representative for NBC said, 'As part of the normal advertising standards process, we reviewed a rough cut of the ad and asked for minor edits to comply with broadcast indecency guidelines. The ad was not rejected and we welcome the updated creative.'" Um, okay. Let me guess: These "indecency" issues with fat female bodies would definitely not be a problem with thin female bodies.

[CN: Holocaust survival] Yisrael Kristal, an Auschwitz survivor, is now the world's oldest known man, at age 112 and 178 days. "As he received his Guinness World Records certificate, Mr Kristal said he did not know the 'secret for long life' and that he believed everything was 'determined from above.' 'There have been smarter, stronger, and better looking men then me who are no longer alive,' he added. 'All that is left for us to do is to keep on working as hard as we can and rebuild what is lost.'" Blub.

"This Incredibly Deep Space View Could Solve One of the Mysteries of Our Universe." COOL.

And finally! Baby aardvark! That last picture is THE BEST.

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In the News

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Thursday, January 14, 2016
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Here is some stuff in the news today...

RIP Alan Rickman. Damn. What a career, to play all sorts of roles, from Sense and Sensibility's Colonel Brandon to Galaxy Quest's Alexander Dane, and to be remembered as both Hans Gruber and Severus Snape. And what an iconic voice. My condolences to his family, friends, colleagues, and fans.

The colossal $1.6 billion jackpot has been won, by "holders of three tickets sold in Tennessee, California, and Florida. Each of the three winning tickets is worth $528.8 million, the California Lottery said." Good luck to the winners! I hope it doesn't ruin your lives! That is not sour grapes, btw. That is a legitimate wish based on the knowledge that winning the lottery has ruined lots of winners' lives. I truly hope that does not happen!

[Content Note: ICE raids] Fucking hell: "Obama's Immigration Raids Are Turning Latino Communities into Ghost Towns: Across the country, other Latino-heavy communities have grown wary of raids—which the White House has said will continue despite the recent outcry. 'The community is very, very scared,' Raul Pinto, a staff attorney with the North Carolina Justice Center, told ThinkProgress." Everything about this is indecent. I'm so angry.

[CN: Cancer] "It was one of the more dramatic moments of Barack Obama's final State of the Union address: the president turned to Joe Biden to appoint the vice-president to lead an effort to cure cancer 'once and for all.' The exchange made for one of the most buzzed about highlights of the speech, the promise of a 'moonshot' goal so lofty it almost appeared quixotic. But leading US cancer researchers and doctors say they have very real hopes for the pledge. They describe the state of research around one of the world's leading causes of death as a golden age, and expect that more funding could lead to many additional breakthroughs. 'This is truly a historic moment in the history of cancer,' said Dr Ronald DePinho, the president of the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Texas." Please please please let it be so.

Oh no! "Carson campaign in turmoil as finance chair quits." Gee, I hope Ben Carson's candidacy is okay! (Ha ha no I don't.)

In other presidential news, the editors of The Nation have endorsed Bernie Sanders: "He has summoned the people to a 'political revolution,' arguing that the changes our country so desperately needs can only happen when we wrest our democracy from the corrupt grip of Wall Street bankers and billionaires. We believe such a revolution is not only possible but necessary—and that's why we're endorsing Bernie Sanders for president."

Whoa! "There may be a secret landscape complete with a vast canyon hidden beneath the Antarctic ice sheet—and the canyon might just be the largest in the world. An international team of researchers has discovered evidence in satellite data that this mysterious canyon might exist beneath Princess Elizabeth Land in East Antarctica, publishing their findings in the current issue of the journal Geology. Now, an airborne survey to take radar measurements of the subglacial landscape is underway to confirm the colossal canyon, which could be wider than the Grand Canyon in some places and may span more than 1,100 kilometers (683 miles) in length, Dr. Stewart Jamieson, a geography lecturer at Durham University in England and lead author of the research, told The Huffington Post. The new data is expected to be released later this year."

I don't normally watch James Corden's Late Show (or wevthefuck it's called), but I do love his Carpool Karaoke segments, which I watch online, and his Carpool Karaoke with Adele is exceptionally great! (If you want to watch another especially terrific one, check out [CN: video autoplays] Carpool Karaoke with Stevie Wonder.)

Peter Jackson will be remaking The NeverEnding Story. Are you excited? Y/N? [Note: Several commenters noted this is satire. Whooooooops! Well: Would you be into it if it were true?!]

And finally! "Animals Who Sleep Wherever They Please." LOL!

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In the News

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Tuesday, January 12, 2016
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Here is some stuff in the news today...

[Content Note: Homophobia] Tonight is President Obama's State of the Union address, and among those in attendance will be homophobic Kentucky clerk Kim Davis "after the Family Research Council arranged for her to be in the House audience along with her attorney Mat Staver." This would be awful enough, except it's even worse since Jim Obergefell, the plaintiff in the Supreme Court case which federally legalized same-sex marriage, will be there as an invited guest of President Obama. I hope he doesn't have to see her face.

[CN: Carcerality] This is very interesting: "Philadelphia has a plan to cut its prison population by one-third, or about 2,500 inmates, over three years. It just needs some help with the cost. So said the city in a proposal submitted Wednesday to the MacArthur Foundation, seeking $2 million in grants and pledging $2 million in new and existing city money to drive its prison number down by 34 percent. ...In May, Philadelphia was one of 20 cities to win a $150,000 planning grant from the foundation to develop strategies. Up to 10 cities will be selected for grants to implement their plans. ...Philadelphia's proposal focuses on decreased reliance on cash bail, and enhanced diversion programs and mental-health supports for defendants awaiting trial on criminal charges. Currently, 75 percent of Philadelphia inmates are awaiting trial. ...'The causes of mass incarceration are numerous and complex, so the fact that all our criminal justice partners have come together behind one comprehensive plan to significantly reduce our prison population is a great accomplishment,' said Mayor Kenney, who in his first week in office has stressed the need for criminal-justice reform at several public appearances."

In other interesting news out of Philly: "Struggling Philadelphia Inquirer is donated to nonprofit in groundbreaking deal: 'If newspapers are having trouble turning a profit without deep annual cuts, how about becoming a nonprofit?' That was the question posed just a few months ago by an article in NiemanLab, a news industry publication. Late Monday night, in a stunning development for a struggling business, that's pretty close to what the storied Philadelphia Inquirer and its sister publications, the Philadelphia Daily News and Philly.com, reported that they would become. Philly.com reported that owner H.F. 'Gerry' Lenfest donated the entire Philadelphia Media Network (PMN), which runs all three of the outlets, to the nonprofit Institute for Journalism in New Media, part of the Philadelphia Foundation. The institute will be headed by a board composed mostly of journalism school deans and academic and foundation executives." If this works, we could definitely see more of our newspapers headed the same way.

[CN: Misogyny; sexual harassment] In depressing but unsurprising news: "Sixty percent of the women working in Silicon Valley experience unwanted sexual advances, according to a new survey released this week. About two-thirds of them say that these advances were from their superior. The survey called Elephant in the Valley was conducted by seven women, one of whom was a key witness in the Ellen Pao trial last year. 'The inspiration for this survey came out of the incredible conversation from the Ellen Pao and [Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers] trial. What we realized is that while many women shared similar workplace stories, most men were simply shocked and unaware of the issues facing women in the workplace,' wrote the survey's authors." A luxury of privilege.

[CN: Misogyny] Speaking of misogyny: "Sen. Bernie Sanders accused Hillary Clinton of taking an increasingly aggressive stance against him because she's nervous that he is beating her in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination. 'It could be that the inevitable candidate for the Democratic nomination may not be so inevitable today,' Sanders said at the Iowa Brown & Black Forum in Des Moines Monday night." FOR FUCK'S SAKE. When has Hillary Clinton ever been "inevitable"? Considering she lost the last time she ran, I don't think Clinton has any illusions of inevitability; that's a thing the men who challenge her invent to make themselves seem more amazing than they are.

In other presidential news, President Obama says Donald Trump is a garbage person full of garbage (I'm paraphrasing): "I'm pretty confident that the overwhelming majority of Americans are looking for the kind of politics that does feed our hopes and not our fears, that does work together and doesn't try to divide, that isn't looking for simplistic solutions and scapegoating but looks for us buckling down and figuring out, 'How do we make things work for the next generation?'" I hope you're right, Mr. President!

Sad news for all you Rand Paul heads and Carly Fiorina fanatics out there! "Carly Fiorina and Rand Paul will be excluded from the main stage at Thursday's Republican presidential debate in Charleston, S.C. because of lackluster poll numbers, Fox Business Network announced Monday. Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Ben Carson, Chris Christie, Jeb Bush, and John Kasich will participate in the primetime debate at 9 p.m. Thursday, the hosting network announced." Can't wait!

[CN: Homophobia; transphobia] "GOP presidential hopeful Dr. Ben Carson sat down with Witherspoon Institute's Matthew Franck for an interview on the Catholic network EWTN over the weekend. He was asked about initiatives around the country to protect the rights of transgender students in schools. Carson, who said he thinks it's 'ridiculous' that LGBT people should get rights, also called LGBT people 'abnormal' who are ruining it for everyone else... 'I mean, it's beyond ridiculous that you take the most abnormal situation and then you make everyone else conform to it. That doesn't make any sense whatsoever.'" Actually, that's pretty much the exact basis for a pluralistic democracy, sir.

Whoa: "Over the last year, the solar industry added jobs twelve times faster than the rest of the economy, even more than the jobs created by the oil and gas extraction and pipeline sectors combined." Cool.

Heads-up, Star Wars nerds! "Disney and Lucasfilm are inching closer to finding their young Han Solo for the upcoming untitled Star Wars spinoff. Sources tell Variety that after seeing thousands of actors, execs have cut the list down to about a dozen actors with Miles Teller, Ansel Elgort, Dave Franco, Jack Reynor, Scott Eastwood, Logan Lerman, 'Brooklyn' star Emory Cohen, and 'Everybody Wants Some' actor Blake Jenner among the names making the cut." Wait a second—Dave Franco but not James Franco?! Come on. Everyone wants to see Han Solo kiss himself in a mirror. That's just science.

[CN: Moving GIFs at link] And finally! "26 Questions Every Cat Owner Has Asked Themselves." Facts.

Open Wide...
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