Whatcha been cooking up in your kitchen lately, Shakers?
Share your favorite recipes, solicit good recipes, share recipes you've recently tried, want to try, are trying to perfect, whatever! Whether they're your own creation, or something you found elsewhere, share away.
Also welcome: Recipes you've seen recently that you'd love to try, but haven't yet!
Shaker Gourmet
Daily Dose of Cute
"Hey! That food you're eating? Give me some. Give me some.
Give me some. Hey. Give me some. Please? Give me some."
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: Slavery; rape; torture; terrorism; misogyny] This is horrifying: "Islamic State theologians have issued an extremely detailed ruling on when 'owners' of women enslaved by the extremist group can have sex with them, in an apparent bid to curb what they called violations in the treatment of captured females. ...The fatwa was among a huge trove of documents captured by U.S. Special Operations Forces during a raid targeting a top Islamic State official in Syria in May. Reuters has reviewed some of the documents, which have not been previously published. Among the religious rulings are bans on a father and son having sex with the same female slave; and the owner of a mother and daughter having sex with both. Joint owners of a female captive are similarly enjoined from intercourse because she is viewed as 'part of a joint ownership.' The United Nations and human rights groups have accused the Islamic State of the systematic abduction and rape of thousands of women and girls as young as 12, especially members of the Yazidi minority in northern Iraq. Many have been given to fighters as a reward or sold as sex slaves. Far from trying to conceal the practice, Islamic State has boasted about it and established a department of 'war spoils' to manage slavery."
I am sitting here recalling how former President George W. Bush and his entire disgusting administration and their disgusting neocon cheerleaders justified their Middle East interventions by routinely asserting they would be freeing women. "W is for Women" is an actual fucking slogan that was actually fucking used. And IS emerged from the chaos they created. War criminals, who plunged Iraqi women into this nightmare, under the auspices of "saving" them. There aren't sufficient words to describe the profundity of my rage and grief.
[CN: Terrorism; war; death] In other IS news: "US-led airstrikes have killed a Syrian-based jihadi linked to the chief planner of the November suicide attacks in Paris, the Pentagon said on Tuesday. Pentagon spokesman Col Steve Warren named the dead man as Charaffe al-Mouadan, thought to be French, who he said had a direct link to the Paris attack cell leader, Abdelhamid Abaoud, and was killed on 24 December. 'Al-Mouadan was actively planning attacks against the west,' Warren said. 'We will hunt Isil [Isis] leaders working to inspire attacks against US and our allies. As long as Isil external attack planners are operating, the US military will hunt them and kill them.'" Is anyone else getting that old "Al Qaeda #2" refrain stuck in their heads?
[CN: Terrorism; Islamophobia] Meanwhile, as we continue to disproportionately focus on threats to "us" (ahem) in the US, while largely ignoring what IS is doing to people in their occupied territories, we also ignore the increasing risk to Muslims resulting from the irresponsible conflation of Muslims with terrorist extremists: "Authorities are investigating a firebomb attack on a mosque in Tracy, California that took place on Sunday as a hate crime. 'It exploded all over the place,' Mohammed Arain, president of the Islamic Center, said of the molotov cocktail that hit the mosque. ...No one was injured in the attack, but it has made congregants feel ill at ease at a time when more and more mosques and Muslims have come under fire. 'It doesn't happen accidentally, so they have certain hate involved,' Saifi Raniwala, a member of the Islamic Center's board of trustees said."
[CN: Privacy violations] The hell? "We've seen boat loads of personal info dumps online in the last year, but none as bizarre as this: A discovery of personal data from millions of Americans who've voted since 2000, found by a researcher and sitting in a sloppily configured database. In other words, it was just hanging out on the web. For unknown reasons. And we have no idea who put it there. ...This mysterious voter database contains a mix of voters' personal and public information including Phone numbers, home addresses, party affiliations, email addresses, full names, ethnicity, gender, and age. Luckily, though, Social Security numbers, driver's license numbers, and sensitive financial data were not exposed."
[CN: Homophobia] The fuck? "Two men were caught on camera defacing one of Philadelphia's rainbow crosswalks in the city's Gayborhood on Monday night. Video recorded by an onlooker shows one vandal taking a sledgehammer to the crosswalk before being joined by another man who 'chiseled' away at the rainbow pavement. ...The rainbow crosswalks were installed in June to show Philadelphia as a LGBTQ-friendly city." What is wrong with people?! Seethe.
[CN: Privilege; video may autoplay at link] Hey, remember Ethan Couch, the 16-year-old wealthy white Texas teenager who received probation after killing four people while drunk driving, because he suffers from "affluenza," i.e. being a privileged shit who's never held accountable for his actions? Well, he broke his probation by traveling abroad and was just apprehended in Mexico. Where he was chilling with his mother. They seem like a neat family.
RIP Lemmy. "Ian Kilmister—the iconic Lemmy of British heavy metal pioneers Motörhead—died Monday at age 70... 'There is no easy way to say this,' Motörhead said. 'Our mighty, noble friend Lemmy passed away today after a short battle with an extremely aggressive cancer.'"
If you've been waiting to see for whom Samuel L. Jackson will vote before you make up your mind, wait no longer! "I'm forever a Democrat, you know, and I'm gonna vote for Hillary. I mean, I love Bernie—Bernie's a man of the people—but he can't win. So I gotta cast my vote for a person that can keep those other people from winning, okay? Not to mention, you know, Hillary kinda knows the job, she can hit the ground running. She didn't have a huge learning-curve like Barack [Obama] had or some other people had. And hopefully she can open up the skeletal files of those do-nothing assholes that go to work, like, four times a year and not vote on things [an apparent reference to Sen. Marco Rubio and other elected officials with poor attendance records] and threaten them with whatever she and Bill [Clinton] uncovered on them years ago and make 'em do something and we can get something done." LOL!
The Olive Garden in Times Square will be "charging diners $400 a pop on NYE." NOBODY TELL IAIN!
[CN: Video may autoplay at link] "It isn't every day that a mystery from the deep swims into plain sight. But on Christmas Eve, spectators on a pier in Toyama Bay in central Japan were treated to a rare sighting of a giant squid. The creature swam under fishing boats and close to the surface of Toyama Bay, better known for its firefly squid, and reportedly hung around the bay for several hours before it was ushered back to open water. It was captured on video by a submersible camera, and even joined by a diver, Akinobu Kimura, owner of Diving Shop Kaiyu, who swam in close proximity to the red-and-white real-life sea monster. 'My curiosity was way bigger than fear, so I jumped into the water and go close to it,' he told CNN. 'This squid was not damaged and looked lively, spurting ink and trying to entangle his tentacles around me. I guided the squid toward to the ocean, several hundred meters from the area it was found in, and it disappeared into the deep sea.'"
And finally! "15 Photos That Prove Goats Are Underrated, Majestic Beings." One time, at a petting zoo, I saw a goat eating another goat's poop directly as it was falling out of that goat's butt. "Majestic" is absolutely how I would have described it.
An Observation
[Content Note: Privilege.]
It's interesting, ahem, how there are so many straight white cis men who are keen to tell me that visibility and diversity in films don't matter—until there's a film that doesn't exclusively center straight white cis male characters.
Primarily Speaking
Get ready for MORE TRUMP on your teevee! Republican front runner Donald Trump is reportedly planning a multimillion dollar ad blitz "to bolster his candidacy ahead of the Iowa caucuses. According to Fox News, the 'initial wave of ads'—which could cost upwards of $2 million a week—will focus on Trump's 'vision and his stance on key issues…but that could change if any GOP rivals target him with negative commercials.'" Sounds terrific! Can't wait to hear more about how Trump is going to make America great again through some combination of xenophobia, misogyny, fearmongering, braggadocio, and insults!
Can someone mention to Jeb Bush that he is a terrible candidate who is very bad at running for president? Because it doesn't seem like he knows. "Bush says he'd like to square off with real estate mogul Donald Trump in a one-on-one debate. Asked Monday what he would say to the GOP presidential front-runner if he walked into the room, Bush offered some tough talk. 'Donald, I'll take you on one-on-one in a debate, any time, any place,' Bush said at an event hosted by the Forum Club in Palm Beach, Florida. 'You name it and I'll do it.'" No, Jeb. No. I mean, listen, I love to watch this dipshit embarrass the fuck out of himself as much as anyone, but even I have my limits.
Sweater vest supermodel Rick Santorum is bragging about being mentioned in IS' official magazine, Dabiq. "'The only person that's been listed in ISIS magazine as an enemy of ISIS is me,' said Santorum." (Actually, Senator Lindsey Graham was mentioned, too.) I don't think that says as much about Santorum as it does that IS doesn't understand US politics as well as one might imagine they do.
[Content Note: Rape culture; sexual abuse] Professor of Bible bigotry Mike Huckabee incredibly claimed that he never defended Josh Duggar. Except whoooooooooooooops he definitely did.
Corporate power-failure Carly Fiorina defended Trump's attacks on Bill Clinton, saying: "Of course Bill Clinton is fair game. He's a former president. As I recall, Donald Trump threw George W. Bush under the bus way back in September." Once again, Fiorina simply ignores the context to spout a bunch of mendacious nonsense. Trump is attacking Bill Clinton personally to get at Hillary Clinton, not attacking Bill Clinton's presidency.
[CN: Christian Supremacy; terrorism; video may autoplay at link] This was from early this month, but I missed it until today: Thirty Jerk Marco Rubio says terrorist attacks are all part of god's plan. Asked during a campaign event "where god was" during the terrorist attacks on 9/11 and in Paris earlier this year, Rubio said: "Where God always is—on the throne in Heaven. The question was how could God allow these bad things to happen? It always challenges us to understand that God's ways are not our ways. What we may interpret as bad, and most certainly is in the case of Paris or 9/11, even that is part of a broader plan for the universe and for our lives that we are just not going to know the answer to. God's ways are not our ways." God's ways are not our ways, but let's definitely run our government on those ways we don't even understand! COOL IDEA.
In other GOP news, Dr. Ben Carson, pugilist Chris Christie, Joe McCarthy impersonator Ted Cruz, real person Jim Gilmore, "moderate" John Kasich, charisma void George Pataki, and proximate apple Rand Paul, are all still running for president.
On the other side of aisle, East Coast Gavin Newsom Martin O'Malley keeps agitating for more Democratic debates, which seems like an awfully strange strategy to me, given that his debate performances have not been stellar. His showing in the last debate, for example, generated headlines like "Martin O'Malley's Democratic Debate Performance Was Awfully Sad" and "Martin O'Malley's Saddest Debate Moments." Does he imagine more headlines like that are going to help him? Maybe he and Jeb Bush should debate each other!
Senator Bernie Sanders responded to Donald Trump calling him a "wacko" by saying, via a spokesperson: "Being called wacko by a pathological liar like Mr. Trump makes me think he is getting nervous that the American people are catching on to his pathetic policies, which include giving hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks to billionaires like himself while refusing to raise the $7.25 an hour minimum wage." Kudos for getting some real policy stuff in there, but "Being called a wacko by a pathological liar like Trump is a compliment," would have been snappier.
#FeelTheSlowBernWithSeriousPolicyCriticismThatSortOfTriesToBeASlam is pretty cool, too, though.
[CN: Misogyny] And finally! Thank Maude for the bastion of totally trenchant journalism that is the Daily Mail, where we can get excellent reporting on the Democratic front runner and world's most admired woman like this prizewinner:
Ohmahgawd! Would you want anyone who wore that with her finger on the button?! *thisface*
Talk about these things! Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. Life is short.
Weather Warnings
[Content Note: Extreme weather; death.]
Many parts of the world are still experiencing extreme weather at the moment, care of the most powerful El Niño in 100 years, which has been strengthened by climate change.
In South America, more than 150,000 people have been displaced by the worst flooding in 50 years.
In Australia, bushfires have destroyed dozens of homes and flooding has "forced the evacuation of almost 500 people and brought saltwater crocodiles into remote communities."
Across the US, flooding and damage from storms and tornadoes have left nearly 50 people dead, and thousands of homes have been damaged, with more storms on the way: "The Mississippi River remained in danger of flooding, with waters approaching record levels."
Britain is experiencing "some of the worst floods ever known" there.
And with all the rain elsewhere, there isn't enough rain in parts of Africa:
El Niño's reach is also being felt in the sun-baked farmlands of rural Zimbabwe, Malawi, and South Africa, where rains that usually start in October or November have simply not materialized this year.Let us all hope for rains for southern Africa to avoid devastating famine if they do not come.
Millions could suffer from famine if the pattern holds through the first few months of 2016 — as forecasters says it almost certainly will.
"Southern Africa is a particular and obvious concern," said Maxx Dilley, director of the Climate Prediction and Adaptation division at the World Meteorological Organization. "A canonical effect of El Niño is drought in that part of Africa."
...One reason for some hope is that El Niño does not always bring season-long drought in southern Africa — and in fact the 1997-98 season produced close to normal rains in the region despite that year's record El Niño.
Question of the Day
Suggested by Shaker Diverkat: "If you could go back in time and learn to be an expert at something, would you? What would that be?"
Bats. Obviously.
Tamir Rice's Killer Will Not Face Charges
[Content Note: Police brutality; racism; guns.]
A grand jury has declined to bring charges against Timothy Loehmann, the officer who shot and killed 12-year-old black boy Tamir Rice in Cleveland last year. Rice was playing with a toy gun in a park when police officers pulled up and Loehmann fatally shot him less than two seconds after arriving. Loehmann's partner, Frank Garmback, will also face no charges.
Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy McGinty, who has been an unethical nightmare during the year-long investigation, made the announcement at a press conference earlier today. And, in what has been typical and indecent fashion throughout this farce, Tamir Rice's family found out via the media: "Subodh Chandra, an attorney for Tamir's mother Samaria, said they had been given no information about the announcement beforehand and had learned it was taking place through a public statement made by the county prosecutor's office about an hour earlier."
In a statement, Tamir's family said they were "saddened and disappointed" by the outcome, "but not surprised."There is no surprise to be had. Not by anyone who has been paying attention and/or doesn't have the luxury of indifference afforded by privilege. There is only sadness and disappointment and grief and anger.
And the bitter taste left by the reality, deconstructed so powerfully by Prison Culture, that even if charges had been brought, even if these officers had been tried and even if they had been convicted and even if they were sentenced, it would not truly be justice.
Meaningful justice will only be achieved by dismantling the (in)justice system which is catastrophically contaminated by white supremacy.
Which is a daunting task to contemplate, but the enormity of the task before us shouldn't let us treat as justice what will be, at best, limited individual accountability in a comprehensively corrupt system.
Mychal Denzel Smith once wrote: "Justice for Renisha would have looked like Michael Brown being able to attend college. Justice for Trayvon would have looked like Renisha McBride getting the help she needed the night of her accident. Justice for Oscar Grant would have looked like Trayvon Martin making it home to finish watching the NBA All-Star game, Skittles and iced tea in tow. And so on, and so on. Justice should be the affirmation of our existence."
Real justice will be no more death.
People will protest this decision. Maybe some people will riot. And I will say once again: If a vile lack of even the most infinitesimal drip of accountability for the state sanctioned murder of a child isn't worth protesting, then I don't know what the fuck is.
The Monday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by apple pie.
Recommended Reading:
Erin: Ten Times I Knew I Loved You
The Feminist Griote: [Content Note: Misogynoir; abuse] Internal Abolition
Sarah: [CN: Fat hatred; privilege; body and emotional policing] The Real "Small Fat Complex"
Nina: [CN: Misogyny; queerphobia] United States Once Again Embraces Sexual Rights−with a Catch
Digby: We're Starting to Get Used to the Idea That a Puerile Braggart Is Running for President
Angry Asian Man: Poet Justin Chin Taken Off Life Support After Stroke
David: Prayers for Richard
Andy: 'Straight James/Gay James' Looks at Both Sides of James Franco, Through Poetry
Lauren: 10 Amazing Podcasts to Catch Up on This Season That Aren't Serial
Leave your links and recommendations in comments. Self-promotion welcome and encouraged!
Daily Dose of Cute
Sophie and Dudley.
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: Video may autoplay at link] There is extreme weather on many parts of the globe right now, and some of it is making for uncharacteristically mild weather and some of it is making for dangerous weather. If you're in one of the latter spots, my sympathies and wishes for safety to you.
[CN: Terrorism] "Boko Haram militants struck the northeastern Nigerian city of Maiduguri on Monday with rocket-propelled grenades and multiple [redacted] bombers, witnesses said. At least 50 people were killed and the death toll could go higher. Another twin [redacted] bombing killed at least 30 people in Madagali, a town 150 kilometers (95 miles) southeast of Maiduguri, witnesses said. ...'We are under siege,' [civil servant Yunusa Abdullahi] said. 'We don't know how many of these bombs or these female [redacted] bombers were sneaked into Maiduguri last night.' He said some residents have found undetonated bombs." (I continue to find it inappropriate that young women and girls who detonate bombs strapped to them are called "suicide" bombers, which connotes an agency that the women and girls kidnapped and forcibly sacrificed by Boko Haram do not have.)
[CN: War on agency] Goddammit: "A Tennessee woman accused of using a coat hanger to try to terminate her pregnancy pleaded not guilty to attempted first-degree murder charges Tuesday. Prosecutors indicted Anna Yocca this month for illegally attempting to end her pregnancy herself. Yocca in September allegedly filled a bathtub with water, sat in it, and then took a coat hanger and attempted to abort her pregnancy, prosecutors said. Yocca reportedly bled heavily during the attempt, at which point her boyfriend rushed her to the hospital. Medical professionals at Saint Thomas Midtown Hospital in Nashville delivered a 1.5-pound infant boy. The baby survived and will reportedly need extensive medical care. Hospital staff alerted law enforcement officials after, they said, Yocca made 'disturbing statements' to them about trying to terminate her pregnancy. Abortions must be performed by a physician under Tennessee law. The state has no abortion clinic providing care after 16 weeks."
[CN: Police brutality; racism; guns] Fucking hell: "Chicago police shot and killed two people early Saturday morning after responding to what they called a domestic disturbance call. According to NBC 5, police fatally shot Quintonio Legrier, a student at Northern Illinois University, after responding to a call from Legrier's father. Family at the scene say that police were called after Legrier threatened his father with a baseball bat. However, Janet Cookery, Legrier's mother, said her son suffered from mental illness. 'He was having a mental situation. Sometimes he will get loud, but not violent,' Cookery told WLS-TV in Chicago. ...The second victim in Chicago, Bettie Jones, was a mother of five who lived in the same apartment building as Legrier and his father." The police say that Jones was "accidentally struck." Rage. Seethe. Boil. And all of this while Chicagoans, led by black Chicagoans, protest police violence.
RIP Meadowlark Lemon. "Meadowlark Lemon, the court jester of the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team who delighted audiences around the world for some 25 years with an array of trick shots, comedy routines, and pure charisma, has died at the age of 83, the team announced on Monday. ...Lemon was the undisputed master of the long-range hook shot, rubber-band ball, and other crowd-pleasing tricks during the years he wore the Globetrotters' star-spangled red, white and blue uniform. The team's website said he played in 7,500 consecutive games—the equivalent of more than 92 NBA seasons—in some 100 countries before audiences that included everyone from Britain's Queen Elizabeth and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev to three popes."
Dear David Spade: I can think of few things thirstier than calling the president thirsty for appearing on a reality show. I mean, not for nothing, but have you even seen what the actual news looks like these days? Bear Grylls' show is like a million times more respectable than CNN. I'm just saying. No Love, Liss.
Welp, this is my new favorite website: "The new year is almost here, and fans of arbitrary starting points tend to use it as a time to make resolutions for ways they want to change their lives. Do you need a little extra motivation to try and get yourself going in 2016? Or maybe do you just want to feel bad about yourself? Then the website supbowie.com is perfect for you. The ethos of the website is set up with the simple, yet garish, text that greets you: 'What did David Bowie do at your age?' You type in your age, and the website tells you something that Bowie did at said age. Sometimes, the entry includes helpful video and or photographic evidence of what weird, yet incredibly successful, thing Bowie did at the time." LOL!
And finally! "A Dog's Life in London." Awwwwww!
STAR WARS!!!!!!!
GENERAL LEIA.
(Where have I seen that expression before? Oh right.)
SPOILERS! SPOILY-OILY-OILERS! SPOILERS! SPOILERS IN THIS POST AND NO DOUBT IN COMMENTS! PROCEED WITH CAUTION! SPOOOOOOOOOOOILERS!
Have you seen Star Wars: The Force Awakens yet?! Did you love it?! I LOVED IT!!! Here is an incomplete list of the things I loved about it!
Rey. Finn. Rey and Finn. Finn and Rey. The moment when I was like OMFG A WOMAN AND A BLACK MAN ARE IN CONTROL OF THE MILLENNIUM FALCON AND THERE ISN'T A WHITE MAN IN SIGHT YES MAUDE YES. "Stop taking my hand. I know how to run without you holding my hand." YESSSSS. "That ship is garbage." Ahhhhhhhahahahahaha! Adam Driver's performance was exquisite! He really channeled Young Anakin's tantruming, but managed to play it with so much pathos. Oh goddddd when his eyes are tearing and then the light falls out of the sky and his expression hardens... ADAM DRIVER WHAT ARE YOU EVEN DOING TO ME? A+ The scenes between Han and Leia were SO, SO GOOD! "We both turned to what we knew." Damn. When the big thing happened that I won't even put into writing lest someone scrolling by who wants to avoid spoilers accidentally sees it, and Chewy went apeshit. OH MY HEART. Maz. Lupita Nyong'o's voice work. MAZ. Maz forever. LADY STORMTROOPER BOSS. "You might not recognize me because of my red arm." Hahaha! "Is there a trash compactor?" Hahaha! "Keep the jacket. It suits you." MY HEART THO! When Rey forced the lightsaber out of the snow. OMG. When J.J. Abrams flip-flopped the traditional (and CONSTANTLY infuriating to me!) camera angles to shoot women (angle camera down) and men (angle camera up) during several key scenes. WE WERE LOOKING UP AT REY! Finn. Rey. Finn and Rey. Rey and Finn. That there are misogynists who can't enjoy the film because of their own bigotry. Haha! Sucks to be you! And no, jerkoffs, Rey is not a Mary Sue AND THE REASON SHE DEFEATED KYLO REN IS BECAUSE HE WAS INJURED AND ALSO CONFLICTED AND ALSO JUST KILLED SOMEONE IMPORTANT TO HIM AND ALSO HAS THE WEIGHT OF A MOVEMENT ON HIS SHOULDERS AND SHE WAS FIT AND FIGHTING FOR HER OWN SURVIVAL AND SURE IN WHAT SHE WAS DOING AND HAS BEEN A SCRAPPY SURVIVOR MOST OF HER WHOLE DAMN LIFE AND LITERALLY FIGURED OUT THE FORCE ON HER OWN. And if you can't appreciate any of that, then you deserve to not like Star Wars. There is just soooooo much more, but I will stop myself now before I go on all day. (WHICH I COULD.) I will just say this one last thing: The Force Awakens reached $1 billion in box office in just 12 days, and is smashing just about every other record ever.
Maybe now we can put to bed the bullshit that movies with female and/or nonwhite protagonists don't make money?
Primarily Speaking
Not only does Senator Bernie Sanders not fear gold toilet aficionado Donald Trump—he's coming for Trump's supporters! "Sanders told CBS's Face the Nation that many of Trump's supporters have legitimate fears stemming from income inequality that Sanders is best positioned to address. 'What Trump has done with some success is taken that anger, taken those fears, which are legitimate, and converted them into anger against Mexicans, anger against Muslims,' Sanders said. 'In my view, that is the not way we are going to address the problems facing this country,' he said. Instead, Sanders supports a platform of bringing citizens together to push Congress to pass laws that address income inequality. He said that many of Trump supporters are 'working class people and they are angry' because they are losing their jobs to overseas firms, cannot afford to send their children to college, and are working longer hours for lower ages."
I mean, no one will get any argument from me that Donald Trump is the uncontested champion of racist scapegoating, but he didn't invent it. When his supporters crow approvingly about how he says what "everyone" is thinking, they're indicating the preexistence of these beliefs, which Trump merely cynically and expertly exploits. It's naive to imagine that generations of conservative scapegoating can be eradicated simply by offering a legislative alternative to people who define themselves ("Real Americans") explicitly in contradistinction to the people they other and blame.
Economic policy is crucial to addressing endemic bigotry, but it must come packaged with intersectional analysis that straightforwardly deconstructs that bigotry in order to effectively dismantle it.
It simply isn't and never will be enough to suggest "a platform of bringing citizens together to push Congress to pass laws that address income inequality," not only because there are serious technical problems with Sanders' coalition fantasy, but because the very Trump supporters to whom Sanders imagines appealing with this platform are profoundly suspcious of and hostile to the federal government.
It's a nice idea, but it's unrealistic on every level. People sneer at Hillary Clinton when she describes herself as a pragmatic progressive, and there are lots of spaces in which we need big progressive thinkers who prioritize aspiration over utility, but the presidency isn't one of them.
Anyway.
Speaking of Clinton, she also tops, for the 20th time (!), Gallup's poll of most admired woman in the world. President Barack Obama is the most admired man in the world.
Still some of my favorite pix of these two ever.
In other Clinton news, here's a really interesting piece in the New York Times about part of her work with civil rights activist Marian Wright Edelman: In 1972, Clinton traveled to Dothan, Alabama, "to help prove that the Nixon administration was not enforcing the legal ban on granting tax-exempt status to so-called segregation academies, the estimated 200 private academies that sprang up in the South to cater to white families after a 1969 Supreme Court decision forced public schools to integrate." It's a compelling piece about a particular time in the nation's history, and the last paragraph is powerful. Damn.
Presumably, Martin O'Malley is still running for president.
On the other side of the aisle: Senator Lindsey Graham has dropped out of the presidential race. Sad trombone! And then there were 13!
Dr. Ben Carson, quickly fading fast after voters realized he is kind of a weird dipshit, is reportedly on the precipice of dropping out but is definitely still giving kind of weird dipshit interviews!
Even though President Obama stole the win, Trump took second place in Gallup's most admired man poll, tied with Pope Francis. Yeah, that sounds about right.
In other news, trainwreck Jeb Bush, pugilist Chris Christie, Joe McCarthy impersonator Ted Cruz, corporate power-failure Carly Fiorina, real person Jim Gilmore, professor of Bible bigotry Mike Huckabee, "moderate" John Kasich, charisma void George Pataki, proximate apple Rand Paul, thirsty jerk Marco Rubio, and waking nightmare Rick Santorum are all still running for president.
Talk about these things! Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. Life is short.
Women Are Human
[Content Note: Misogyny.]
It turns out Hillary Clinton is not actually an inhuman soul-consuming shebeast from the netherdepths of Hades but is, in fact, a human being who occasionally has to visit the whiz palace:
As a lot of the world now knows, last Saturday night, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton was late returning to the stage at the Democratic Debate after a five-minute break. Almost immediately media reported that she was delayed because of a line at the women's bathroom. As the break came to a close, with Clinton nowhere in sight, the moderators of the debate started without her. Within minutes, Clinton walked back onto the stage, smiling, and said, "Sorry," to knowing laughter. Women, the laughter acknowledged, live in the interstitial spaces of a world shaped by and for men.At the link, Soraya Chemaly does a great job of breaking down while access to toilets, and toilet equality, is a feminist issue, and also why disgust about women's bodies is central to conservative politics. Disgust like that expressed by Donald Trump, in response to Clinton's delayed return to the stage.
Clinton's wry smile and later explanation, "You know, it does take me a little longer. That's all I can say," sent tetchy sexist commentators, and more egalitarian commentators, aflutter.
[Trump] took the opportunity, once again, to put his bottomless reservoir of shame and misogyny on public display. "I know where she went, it's disgusting, I don't want to talk about it," Trump said, talking about it. "No, it's too disgusting. Don't say it, it's disgusting, let's not talk."Trump obviously isn't alone in believing that even the most benign reference to toileting is "too disgusting" to speak aloud. And while there is certainly a small percentage of germphobic people who cringe at any mention, Trump's disgust is more reminiscent of the legions of straight men who get grossed out by the thought of any woman carrying out any basic bodily function. To pee, to poop, to fart, to menstruate—disgusting! Because they are reminders that women are human beings.
There was something disgusting that happened, all right, and naturally we are not talking about it: The fact that the Democratic debate carried on without Clinton, instead of waiting for her to return.
Men's bathrooms are designed to minimize men's need to wait, while women's bathrooms are designed with little regard for whether women are delayed.
Looks like Democratic debates are designed so that men never need to be inconvenienced by having to wait, either.
The Jon Swift Memorial Roundup 2015
Jon Swift (aka Al Weisel), a brilliant blogger and satirist, and sometime contributor to Shakesville, used to wrap up each year by asking as many bloggers as he could contact to submit their best posts of the year for a massive roundup of awesome writing.
Weisel died in 2010, and, in his honor, Batocchio of Vagabond Scholar has continued to compile an annual Jon Swift Memorial Roundup.
Here is 2015's, and, as always, there's lots of good stuff there.
The piece I submitted this year is "Jeanie Bueller's Day of Feminist Killjoying." I don't know that it's precisely the best thing I've written all year, but it was a piece that I liked a lot.
Slàinte mhor a h-uile là a chi's nach fhaic!
[Translation: "Great health to you every day that I see you and every day that I don't!"]
Most of the contributors and mods will be traveling and/or holidaying over the next week, so we'll be taking the week off and will be back on Monday, December 28, at which time we will resume your regularly scheduled abundance of feminist commentary, political snark, pop culture deconstruction, cute things, pretty pictures, and sundry shenanigans.
See you then!
[My thanks to JupiterPluvius for the phrase used in the image.]
Your Best Photograph
If you're a photographer, even if a very amateur one (like myself), and you've got a photo or photos you'd like to share, here's your thread for that!
It doesn't really have to be your best photograph—just one you like!
Please be sure if your photo contains people other than yourself, that you have the explicit consent of the people in the photos before posting them.
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Here's one I took recently of a squirrel taking a morning nap, its fluffy tail curled up over its back. It's not a very good photograph technically, but it's the best I could do without waking the squirrel. As soon as I crept closer, it woke up and scurried down the tree trunk, where a younger member of its clan immediately pounced and began a rip-roaring game of CHAAAAAAASE!
