STFU, Dick Cheney

[Content Note: Terrorism; violence.]

Former Vice-President and growling nightmare monster Dick Cheney has, for fully the one billionth time since leaving office, warned that another terrorist attack even bigger than 9/11 is coming:

Former Vice President Dick Cheney on Tuesday predicted the United States would not make it out of the next decade without another terrorist attack, likely much bigger than 9/11.

Cheney, who has made a similar warning a number of times before, said the threat might come from a nuclear device.

"I think there will be another attack. And next time, I think it's likely to be far deadlier than the last one," Cheney told radio host Hugh Hewitt. "You can just imagine what would happen if somebody could smuggle a nuclear device, put it in a shipping container, and drive it down the Beltway outside of Washington, D.C."
Seriously, Dick Cheney, SHUT THE FUCK UP. It's not that you're wrong about the possibility of a major terrorist event; it's that we all know that, and your compulsive need to talk about it and to urge us to "imagine what would happen" is gross and creepy and terrible.

There's not even any pretense to caring about people's lives, the human cost of a terrorist attack, when such an attack is routinely invoked with the demeanor of a bad cop with a wicked grin who just wants anyone to give him a reason.

And it's exploitative—because the whole point is to talk shit about President Obama and his foreign policy decisions (which is something that former vice-presidents have not previously done to sitting presidents, out of respect, which is another reason Cheney needs to STFU):
"One of the things I worried about 12 years ago, and that I worry about today, is that there will be another 9/11 attack and that the next time, it'll be with weapons far deadlier than airline tickets and box cutters," he said.

"And when we have a situation developing in Pakistan, for example, where there are nuclear weapons, where supposedly that technology has been sold to the North Koreans, at the same time, the president announces the complete withdrawal from Afghanistan right next door, that we're missing the boat."
Said with the usual unfounded conviction of a man whose foreign policy positions are always wrong. Neoconservatives are intractably resistant to the idea that militaristic meddling in other countries is what makes us the target for retributive terrorism. If Cheney really gives a shit about keeping the US safe, he'd advocate peace.

But peace doesn't pay dividends like the military-industrial complex does.

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So This Happened

[Content Note: Image and description of violence.]


Yesterday at the World Cup, Uruguay striker Luis Suarez bit Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini. Suarez literally bit Chiellini on the shoulder, and then flopped to the ground grabbing his own mouth, in order to pretend they'd just had a collision once Chiellini stood up and revealed the bite marks, which of course he immediately did.

The ref, however, missed it. And Suarez was not red-carded and sent off. Within a minute, time that would have not been used for play if Suarez was kicked out of the game, Uruguay scored the only goal of the match, sending Italy out of the competition.

Replays of the game clearly show Suarez biting Chiellini, and so FIFA is now investigating. One might think it sounds incredible that there has to be any investigation beyond footage that clearly shows Suarez biting Chiellini, and Chiellini saying YES HE BIT ME, but FIFA is a corrupt and pathetic organization that prioritizes talent and money over decency every time.

Suarez, as it happens, has already been suspended twice for biting other players. He's additionally been suspended for racist verbal abuse of another player.

What he was still doing on the pitch yesterday after a history of attacking other players speaks to the cavernous lack of ethics in many corners of professional football, where being a good player always matters more than being a good person.

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Open Thread

image of a kitten asleep in a pile of My Little Ponies

Hosted by a kitten.

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Question of the Day

What is the one Feminism 101 argument you never, ever, want to have again with anyone, ever? I mean, obviously, all of those arguments are the FUCKING WORST, but if you could choose just one to never have to have again, which would you choose?

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Photo of the Day

image of Brazil at night from the International Space Station, showing populated areas lit by electricity
[Click to see larger version.]
Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo as Seen From the International Space Station: US astronaut Reid Wiseman captures an image of Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo at night as the International Space Station orbits the Earth. Sao Paulo is the farthest cluster of lights on the right side and Rio de Janeiro is closer to the middle of the picture. There are three World Cup 2014 stadium cities in one picture: Arena de Sao Paulo, Estadio Mineirao (Belo Horizonte), and Estadio Do Maracana (Rio de Janeiro). [NASA/Reid Wiseman]
Neat!

I love the tie-in to the World Cup, but that is also just an extraordinarily beautiful picture.

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Quickly

As I've mentioned, our local paper has a section called "Quickly," where people write in one- or two-line comments about random shit and the paper prints them. As you can imagine, this provides me with endless amusement on a constant basis.

Recently, there's been a fierce debate about unionization generally, and at the local steel mills specifically. The quality of the debate varies. Which is my polite way of saying that the people who write in in defense of unions are generally a lot smarter than the people who write in in opposition to unions.

But don't take my word for it. Here's a terrific example of the high-end arguments from the anti-union crowd:

All of those "Proud Union Home" signs you see in yards are great reminders of why everything made in the USA costs so much money. If union members don't stop the greed, we'll eventually have signs in our yards that say "Proud Imported Home."
Argue with THAT! I dare you!

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This Is Not Right

[Content Note: Violent rhetoric.]

Under the subject "Hillary Sexism Watch," we detailed more than 100 incidents of misogyny directed at Hillary Clinton during the 2008 primary. Many of them intersected with violent imagery and/or violent rhetoric.

Hillary Clinton has not even announced whether she is running again in 2016, and it has already begun once more:

Asked how Clinton would fare in Arkansas if she pursued the presidency in 2016, 2nd Congressional District chairman Johnny Rhoda told U.S. News, "She'd probably get shot at the state line."
David Catanese, the senior political writer for U.S. News & World Report, reported this with a lede describing Rhoda's words as "colorful language."

This is not "colorful language." It's violent, threatening, eliminationist language.

I don't care how anyone feels personally or politically about Hillary Clinton. That a male politician can use this sort of language to speak about a prominent female politician, and have it be reported as just another day in politics ha ha, should concern anyone who has even the most modest investment in a future in which women can and do run for public office.

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Ted Cruz

[Content Note: Homophobia, misogyny, racial slur, incitement.]

Republican Senator Ted Cruz totally definitely for sure wants to be your president, and he is almost certainly going to run for the 2016 Republican nomination. So queue the long-form profiles of this terrifying gentleman from Texas!

First up! Jeffrey Toobin for the New Yorker: "The Absolutist: Ted Cruz is an unyielding debater—and the far right's most formidable advocate."

If you don't feel like reading the whole thing, Elias Isquith has some highlights here.

But I recommend taking the time to read the whole thing, because it's a pretty solid background piece on one of the likely candidates for the next presidential election, which will be starting any second now.

Every word that comes out of Senator Cruz's facehole is stanktankerous garbage, but I am particularly contemptuous of all of his little ha-ha jokes about how the conservative base needs to "rise up" and take on Washington. Which isn't even part of the country, per Cruz.

Cruz and I were talking in a back room at the Fort Worth Convention Center earlier this month, during the Texas Republican Convention. A crowd of more than seven thousand greeted Cruz's speech there rapturously. They cheered his anti-Washington gibes. "I spent all week in Washington, D.C., and it's great to be back in America," he told the delegates.
Says the man who makes his living as a Senator and wants to be President.

He doesn't hate D.C. He just wants his constituents to hate it. But just enough to keep sending him back there with ever more power.

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These Pictures

[Content Note: Criminalization of need; child endangerment; racism.]

On Friday, I mentioned that immigration activist groups have filed a federal complaint alleging child abuse at the US-Mexico border in Texas and Arizona, and that the Obama administration has designated three military facilities to house undocumented child immigrants.

CBS5 Arizona has published a slideshow of photos from inside one of those detention centers in Nogales, Arizona, where more than 800 children from Central America are being held.

We're assured in captions that the facility "is kept at a very comfortable temperature by evaporative coolers" and that the children "are given showers, clean clothes, and something to eat," after they're processed, given a number, and had their personal possessions bagged and tagged with that number. Just like grown-up prisoners.

"They also undergo a health screening and are given vaccinations," we're informed. And then: "The kids are assigned to living areas separated by tall chain-linked fences and segregrated by age and gender."

image of two small Latino children asleep in a tiny room behind a chain-link fence

This looks like an image taken in an animal shelter, not a facility in which children are living. Not all of the children sleep in these cages, apparently:

image of lots of children with blankets sleeping higgledy-piggledy on a cement floor

The above image is simply captioned: "It's crowded." And so it is: That image is followed by an image of children, wrapped in their matching blankets, sleeping on what appears to be the floor of a bathroom. There are children in a room labeled "holding cell." There are children everywhere.

I understand this is not an easy situation to fix. Believe me, I get that. But piling children into overcrowded prisons while they await reconnection with family members, sometimes indefinitely, is not any kind of solution.

We have all the money we ever need in this country to wage wars, and never enough to care for human beings in need.

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Four-Year-Old Tells the Truth; Saves the Day

[Content Note: Racism; guns; theft; police harassment.]

Check out this awesome kid: Four-year-old Abby Dean of Washington was home alone with her 17-year-old babysitter when the sitter's boyfriend and another man entered the home, brandishing weapons and ordering them out of the house while they stole a bunch of stuff, including Abby's Xbox, Wii, iPod, and kitty bank.

When the police arrived, the sitter, who'd hatched the plan with her white boyfriend, told police that she'd never seen the thieves before, but that they were black men, one of whom looked a black neighbor named Cody Oaks. Oaks was immediately taken into custody for questioning.

Police handcuffed Oaks and questioned him for hours. It was Abby, however, who told police that he couldn't be the robber. "It wasn't the right skin color," said Abby. The robbers she saw, she said, were white men.

When police confronted the sitter with that detail, the 17-year-old broke down and confessed to the crime.

Abby's mother, Jennifer Dean, said she's proud of her daughter for telling the truth. "Literally in 30 seconds she changed everything that had been going on for five, six hours," she said.

Neighbor Cody Oaks is angry to have been unfairly targeted by police acting at the sitter's direction.

"It's kinda sad 'cause I don't think she realizes the dangerous position she put me in," he said.

Abby happily reported that all of her belongings have been returned. "They got it back because of me being the superhero," said the girl.
As awesome as this kid is, her shitty babysitter and her thieving dude pals are inversely awesome. By which I mean fucking terrible.

I don't think she realizes the dangerous position she put me in. She literally could have gotten this man killed, which is to say nothing of how she didn't give a fuck if he was arrested and convicted for the crime of which she was accusing him. Which is almost certainly for what she was hoping, so her boyfriend could get a free Wii.

And then there's this: The police questioned Oaks for hours because a white teenager said a robber looked kind of like him, and only released him when a white child said it couldn't have been him. I'm curious whether he was alone at the time and had no alibi, or whether the people who could vouch for him were also POC.

I'm also curious why the police didn't even ask the only other witness to the crime to verify the babysitter's details, before taking Oaks into custody.

Ha ha just kidding. I know why.

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Daily Dose of Cute

image of Matilda the Fuzzy Sealpoint Cat lying on the arm of the loveseat with her head upside-down and the tip of her tongue and fangs sticking out
Matilda, with little pink tongue and fangs on display, for maximum silliness.

As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.

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Two-Minute Nostalgia Sublime



The Go-Go's: "We Got the Beat"

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In the News

Here is some stuff in the news today...

[Content Note: Abduction; misogyny; terrorism] Boko Haram has reportedly abducted dozens more women and girls: "Suspected Boko Haram fighters have abducted more than 60 women and young girls in the past week in restive northeast Nigeria, a local official and a vigilante leader said Tuesday. ...The new kidnappings allegedly occurred during a Boko Haram attack on Kummabza village in the Damboa district of Borno state. The attack left at least 30 dead, according to residents who escaped the violence. ...It was not clear why news of the attack and kidnapping has taken days to trickle in, but local officials seemed to confirm to several news outlets the veracity of the information. 'Over 60 women were hijacked and forcefully taken away by the terrorists. The village was also destroyed,' one official told Agence France-Presse."

[CN: Persecution; religious intolerance] Meriam Ibrahim, the Sudanese woman who was arrested and sentenced to death for being Christian then released, has now been re-arrested "with her husband and two children at Khartoum airport on Tuesday as the family attempted to leave the country. Agents from the National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS) detained the family just 24 hours after Ibrahim was released on the orders of the appeal court. Her lawyer, Elshareef Mohammed, who was with Ibrahim at Khartoum airport at the time of the arrest, said more than 40 NISS officers apprehended the family as they attempted to board a plane to the US. Ibrahim's husband, Daniel Wani, is a US citizen." Fucking hell. Give Ibrahim her freedom. Fuck.

Something something Governor Chris Christie something something the Pulaski Skyway something something this guy and bridges amirite.

[CN: Militarization of police] More on the increasing militarization of US police forces. It's like declaring martial law in infinitesimal increments.

[CN: Bigotry; misogyny] The full interview with Gary Oldman I mentioned yesterday is now available here. He really sounds like a total asshole. Also, I hope someone lets Gary Oldman know someday that ladies make movies, too!

In good news: The Rev. Dr. Cameron Partridge, the Episcopal chaplain at Boston University, became the first openly transgender priest to preach from Canterbury Pulpit at the Washington National Cathedral when he was a guest preacher last Sunday. Neat!

[CN: Abuse; emotional manipulation] Robin Thicke, the rape apologist behind "Blurred Lines," is using his latest album to publicly harass his estranged wife and try to coerce her to reconcile with him. This is not romantic. This is abuse and coercion.

And finally! Here is a nice story about a man who rescued an injured dog from traffic and then adopted the dog. Yay! (Hey, know who else did something like that? Deeky!)

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Today in Rape Culture

[Content Note: Sexual assault; victim-blaming; rape apologia.]

Navy Lieutenant Sean Banks, about whom I wrote in February of last year, has been found guilty of multiple sexual assault charges, after raping two women he met through the online dating sites ChristianMingle.com and Match.com. He now faces 40 years to life in prison.

And even though he has been convicted by a jury, his defense attorney continues to peddle classic rape apologia:

Banks' lawyer told NBC 7 Banks he is deeply disappointed in the results of what he called a "he said-she said" case. He plans to meet with his client to see what their options are moving forward, including possible motions for a new trial.
Even when it's multiple women—two women who were raped, who came forward, who filed reports, who testified—it's still just a "he said-she said," because the voices of multiple female victims are just flattened into one bit of noise against the clear, single, disproportionately weighted voice of their rapist.

That is rape culture. Right there.

And so is this:
But prosecutors were pleased that this "very dangerous internet predator" will be placed behind bars.

"Sean Banks is an example of why it is very important for women to know who they are going out with," the deputy district attorney said.
Got that? It's really the women's fault for not knowing who they were going out with. This, according to the prosecutor. Even the people ostensibly on the side of Banks' victims are implicitly blaming them for going on a date with a man who raped them.

And implicitly blaming all future victims of predators who use online dating, or any kind of dating, to abuse their dates.

You have to "know who you are going out with." Welp. That makes dating kind of difficult, since one of the primary objectives of dating is getting to know someone.

I'm sure this deputy district attorney would assure us zie meant only go out with people whom you meet in more traditional ways (as though no woman has ever been raped on a date that wasn't made online), or only go out with people for whom someone you know can vouch (as though most women who are raped aren't raped by someone they know), or only do this thing or that thing or some other thing that in some way tasks women with magically discerning who is a rapist and staying away from them, but definitely doesn't suggest that rape is the exclusive responsibility of rapists.

"Sean Banks is an example of why it is very important to dismantle the rape culture and convey to men in no uncertain terms that rape is unacceptable," said anyone who isn't a victim-blaming rape apologist.

I hope this conviction has brought these two women some measure of justice, although I'm quite certain Banks and his attorneys will do everything possible to undermine that. I wish them peace.

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Good Morning! Or Whatever!

Via Shakesville Moderator Hallelujah_Hippo, here is just a terrific video of a corgi excitedly running on a merry-go-round to start (or end) your day!


Video Description: A wee corgi dog sits on a metal merry-go-round, looking expectantly at the person holding the camera. A woman's voice says, "Meatball, what do you want it to do?" A teenage white boy comes into frame and begins to spin the merry-go-round quickly. Meatball the Corgi whines excitedly. As it picks up speed, Meatball runs in the opposite direction that it's spinning, in between the hand-holds, then starts joyfully barking. The boy sits down and stretches out his legs; Meatball jumps over his legs as he runs around.

The boy hops off. As the merry-go-round begins to slow, Meatball hops as he runs, trying to keep it spinning. The boy comes back and spins it for him some more. More running and barking.

When it starts to slow again, the boy stands beside it and spins it from a single point, and Meatball runs in place beside him until it's spinning wildly again and the boy hops back on. More running and barking.

Eventually, the woman suggests they let it wind down. Meatball continues to run and bark and jump, trying to keep it going. He tries running in the direction of the spinning. He hops off and barks at it, then hops back on and keeps running. He is panting. He barks at the boy, who then gets back on, with the camera, and spins it once more. Meatball runs and barks. Yay!

"All done, Meatball?" asks the woman. But Meatball is not done. He runs to the opposite site of the merry-go-round, peering over it, then jumps back on and runs some more.

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Open Thread

image of the front entry of the Knickerbocker Hotel

Hosted by the Knickerbocker Hotel in Chicago.

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Question of the Day

Suggested by Shaker Merkohl: "What's the story behind a time when you were a total badass? Just on fire with confidence, totally rocking the moment/hour/day/etc? Or, perhaps lacking confidence, but still assertive and firm (outwardly) in the face of challenging circumstances?"

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A+

image of Pearl Jam lead singer Eddie Vedder singing at a concert

Above is a picture of Pearl Jam lead singer Eddie Vedder singing at a concert Friday night in Milan, Italy. And over at Loudwire, you will find a video clip of Vedder singing a bit of "Let It Go" from the animated film Frozen, segueing from their hit song "Daughter."

Honestly, I still haven't even seen Frozen or heard "Let It Go," except for this clip, but I know how much that movie means to basically all my friends' kids, especially their daughters, and I will always love how much Eddie Vedder cares about girls.

Eddie Vedder forever the end.

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Quote of the Day

[Content Note: Class warfare; poverty.]

"I felt like this was my opportunity to basically improve life for all of us, and the one key part of it is now not available, so what do I do now? That was my only thought: 'What do I do now? What do I do now?'"—Shanesha Taylor, discussing the day she had a promising job interview but no childcare, after an arranged babysitting agreement fell through, leading her to fateful decision to leave her two young children in the car during the interview.

I strongly urge you to read the entire article. Taylor's story is remarkable, not because it is extraordinary, but because it is so terribly ordinary. So common. Most USians are not more than one financial catastrophe away from falling off the edge.

And the way we collectively deal with that is by telling fairy tales about bootstraps and hard work, and how misfortune only happens to the lazy, the immoral, to people who deserve it.

No one deserves this. No one. No parent, no child. No person.

There is so much wealth in this nation. We could do so much better for everyone, if only we had the will.

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Drone Policy for US Citizens

[Content Note: Drones; violence.]

That is, the policy under which the Obama administration justifies using drones against US citizens:

A federal appeals court on Monday released a redacted version of the U.S. Justice Department's memorandum of justification for a 2011 drone attack that killed Anwar al Awlaki, an American-born Islamist preacher suspected of having ties to al Qaeda.

The memo says that because the U.S. government considered al Awlaki to be an "operational leader" of an "enemy force," it was legal for the Central Intelligence Agency to attack him with a drone even though he was a U.S. citizen.

The memo says the killing was further justified under Congressional authorization for the use of U.S. military force following the Sept. 11, 2001 hijacked-plane attacks.

The Obama administration released the memo in response to a court order following Freedom of Information lawsuits filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and The New York Times.

...Human rights advocates criticized the legal justification outlined in the memo as overly broad and a distortion of the law.

Pardiss Kebriaei, a lawyer with the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York, described the justification as "highly aggressive and controversial interpretations of international law."
That post-9/11 authorization for the use of military force, aka the AUMF, has been used for all manner of fuckery for 13 years. It's never going to be repealed so long as we are fighting "the war on terror." It's magic for every US president.

And the only sort of person who would get rid of it is the sort who would never want the office of the US presidency.

Or could win, even if they did.

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