[Content Note: Misogyny.]
On Friday night, one of Bernie Sanders' senior advisors, Tad Devine, appeared on MSNBC with Chris Hayes, and here is a thing he actually said: "Listen, I think it's very important that we have, you know, diversity in our representation. And it's great that women are getting more and more involved in politics and we encourage that."
So, this is pretty interesting, ahem, in a couple of different ways.
For one, based on Sanders' ugly pattern of commentary on his female opponents, what I'm hearing is: "We encourage women to get involved in politics. Just not Hillary Clinton. Or Stella Hackel. Or Madeleine Kunin. Or..."
Secondly, Devine is talking only about women getting involved in electoral politics (and he's still wrong). Because all women are involved in "politics," whether we want to be or not.
To be a woman in the US is to exist with a politicized body.
Of course, I don't expect anyone affiliated with the Sanders campaign to acknowledge that at this point. Which doesn't say a whole lot for his campaign.
What Are You Even Talking About, Sir?
Daily Dose of Cute
Zelda is so over it.
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...
Well, it's hard to believe, but Real Person Jim Gilmore suspended his fiery hot presidential campaign earlier this month, and I didn't even hear about it! Sad trombone. Now all that is left of a primary field that once consisted of 17 candidates has dwindled down to a mere five. Five terrible nightmare men.
[Content Note: War on agency] In other presidential news: Ohio Governor "Moderate" John Kasich "on Sunday signed a bill that aims to strip funding from Planned Parenthood in the state." This fucking guy and his whole fucking party.
Meanwhile, Marco Rubio has picked up some awesome endorsements from Tim Pawlenty and Donnie Wahlberg.
Irin Carmon interviews black feminists about the Democratic primary: "'An emphasis on not only black women, but black feminists, is long overdue,' said Lori Adelman, co-executive director of Feministing. 'So often, black women's support is taken for granted.'" YES. Taken for granted, and discussed incessantly as if black women are a monolith with a universal set of needs and opinions.
[CN: Rape culture; sexual violence] I am having a difficult time articulating how incandescently angry and profoundly grief-stricken I am with the court decision that singer Kesha would not be released from her contract with Dr. Luke, whom she reports sexually assaulted and psychologically abused her. This is a decent piece explaining the legal aspects of the case. Taylor Swift has donated $250,000 to her continuing legal battle. I just want to say, at this point, that I believe survivors. I believe Kesha. And to all my fellow survivors: I see you. I believe you.
Ian Millhiser lays out the "Four Paths Obama Could Take with His Supreme Court Nominee." Personally, I am really hoping the President goes for the "Declaration of War" option: "A final strategy the White House could deploy is to choose a nominee that would most highlight the distinctions between the two parties. The most obvious way to do so would be to nominate DC Circuit Judge Nina Pillard to replace Scalia. Pillard is the closest thing America has produced to another Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. A former Georgetown law professor, litigator in the Solicitor General's office, and attorney with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, Pillard litigated two of the most important women's rights decisions of the last two decades. She also produced an unapologetically feminist scholarship as a professor. ...Pillard's resume, her sex-positive scholarship, and her open support for women's reproductive freedom will not earn her many friends on the Republican side of the aisle." GOOD. THIS IS THE WAY TO GO.
[CN: Racism; carcerality] In other good (for lack of a better word, because there's nothing good about this situation except that it's ended) news: "A former Black Panther activist who was in solitary confinement for 43 years was freed from a United States prison after years of legal cases trying to prove his innocence. Albert Woodfox was the last one of the 'Angola Three' activists to be freed from jail... In June 2015, a federal judge ordered Woodfox's unconditional release that ceased any other trials that brought up any charges around murdering prison guard Brian Miller. Albert Woodfox managed to overturn his conviction for the crime twice, but Louisiana's attorney general was determined to continue with a third trial. After pleading 'no contest' to two smaller charges, he was released on his 69th birthday. He, later, released a statement. 'Although I was looking forward to proving my innocence at a new trial, concerns about my health and my age have caused me to resolve this case now and obtain my release with this no-contest plea to lesser charges,' Woodfox said in a statement. 'I hope the events of today will bring closure to many.'"
[CN: Water access; violence] Fuck: "More than 10 million people in India's capital are without water despite the army regaining control of its key water source after protests, officials say. Keshav Chandra, head of Delhi's water board, told the BBC it would take 'three to four days' before normal supplies resumed to affected areas. Jat community protesters demanding more government jobs seized the Munak canal, the city's main water source on Friday. Sixteen people have been killed and hundreds hurt in three days of riots. The Munak canal supplies around three-fifths of water to Delhi's 16 million residents. Mr Chandra said that prior warnings meant that people had managed to save water, and tankers had been dispatched to affected areas of the city, but that this would not be enough to make up for the shortfall."
[CN: Bigotry] Get me to a fainting couch: "Women, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people, and those from ethnic minority backgrounds are suffering under an 'epidemic of invisibility' in Hollywood, according to a damning new report on diversity released days before the 2016 Oscars. Study authors said US film and television production was experiencing an ongoing 'inclusion crisis.' The report by the Media, Diversity, and Social Change Initiative at the University of Southern California's (USC) Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism found that 87% of directors across 414 studied films and television shows were white. About half of these failed to include a single Asian or Asian-American character, and one fifth failed to include a single black character. ...Only a third of speaking characters across the studied films and television shows were female, and only 28.3% were from ethnic minority backgrounds, around 10% less than the relevant figure among the general US population. Older characters were even more likely to be male, with only 25.7% of those over 40 being female. Just 2% of speaking characters identified as LGBT. Among the most damning statistics, only 3.4% of the 109 films released by major studios in 2014 were directed by women, and only two were black women."
On a totally different note: Congratulations to Paul Feig on being awarded the Athena Film Festival's inaugural Leading Man Award, for his commitment to writing great roles for women. And a diversity of women, at that. Ghostbuster Kate McKinnon presented him with the award, saying, in part: "Paul's heartfelt and hilarious films have no political agenda …His true subversion lies in creating female protagonists who are striving for the universal goals of friendship, connectedness, justice, and personal growth. These golden fleeces have always been the sole province of male protagonists. They don't call it an everyman for nothing. By building stories around female protagonists who are striving not for romance but simply to become their best selves, he has permanently changed the game for us all." This is why I love Paul Feig. (Well, that and the fact that he retroactively ruins men's childhoods, giving me a sustainable supply of male tears.) I can't overstate how much it means to me he writes parts for fat women where we aren't tragic or nothing but punchlines.
And finally! I love this so much: "Shelter Dog Photobooth Pics Helps More Pups Find Forever Homes." Awwww. ♥
Love with One Million Hearts
Video Description: Virginia McLaurin, a 106-year-old black woman, who is very short, using a cane, and dressed in a blue suit, is escorted into the Oval Office to meet President Barack Obama, wearing a dark suit, and First Lady Michelle Obama, wearing a white dress. A man introduces her: "Virginia McLaurin."
"Hi!" she exclaims. She reaches out her arms toward President Obama and quivers excitedly. He takes her hands. "How are you?" he asks her. "I'm fine!" she says. "Oh, it's so nice to see you," he tells her. "It's an honor; it's an honor," she says. "You want to say hi to Michelle?" he asks. "YES!" she exclaims.
He escorts her toward the center of the room, and as she races toward Michelle, he says, "Slow down now! Don't go too quick!" Laughter. She walks up to Michelle, who leans way down to embrace her. "She's a hundred and six!" the President says. "No you are not!" says Michelle. "You are not!"
As Virginia confirms she is indeed 106, President Obama laughs, "Well, you gotta slow down!" Michelle says, "Oh my goodness!" Virginia says, "Thank you!" Michelle, holding her hand, says, "I wanna be like you when I grow up."
"You can!" says Virginia, and wiggles. Michelle wiggles with her. "She's dancing!" says the President. He takes her other hand. "Come on!" he says, and they all dance. "What's the secret to still dancing at one-oh-six?" he asks. Virginia laughs. "Just keep moving!" says Michelle.
Virginia is all smiles. "We're so happy to have you here," says Michelle. The President gently turns her, so she's facing the cameras. "And look at those nails!" says Michelle. "Nails are all done," says the President. "Wooooo! Those nails!" Virginia laughs and shimmies.
"Yes, sir!" says Virginia. "I thought I would never live to get in the White House."
"Well, you are RIGHT HERE!" says the President. "And I tell you," says Virginia, "I am so happy." Michelle says, "And we are happy to have you."
Virginia looks up at the President. "A black president," she says. "Look at him! Right there!" says Michelle, gesturing at her husband. "A black wife," says Virginia. "That's me," says Michelle, pointing at herself. "Yes!" exclaims Virginia. "And I'm here to celebrate Black History."
"That's exactly right," says the President. "Yeah, that's what I'm here for," says Virginia. "Well, we're glad to have ya here!" says the President. Virginia laughs.
"You have just made our day, you know that? That energy, man!" says Michelle. "Well, you made my day," says Virginia.
* * *
1. I love Virginia McLaurin.
2. At 106, Virginia McLaurin would have been born in 1910 (or 1909), fully a decade before women even got the right to vote in this country. (And being a black woman, it might have been many years after that before she was able to vote, depending on where she lived.)
3. This is what I mean when I say this President is more than a mere symbol.
4. I am going to miss President Obama.
5. Blub.
Mass Shooting in Kalamazoo
[Content Note: Guns; violence; death.]
On Saturday, a 45-year-old white man named Jason Dalton went on a shooting spree over seven hours, killing six people seemingly at random and injuring two others. Dalton was an Uber driver and allegedly continued to take fares in between shooting people.
My sincerest condolences to the families, friends, and colleagues of the victims, and to the entire community.
Time has a recap of what we know so far. Naturally, because Dalton is white, he was taken into police custody "without incident," his neighbors are being quoted as saying how nice and unassuming he is, and the narratives that he must be mentally ill are flying.
I don't know what I could possibly say about this incident that I haven't said a thousand times before. Except perhaps this: The fact that this is becoming so routine that there's nothing new I can say, and that a mass spree shooting is barely a blip in the national media, is appalling in the extreme. We are becoming so inured to mass shootings that it's just another day in the United States of America.
Primarily Speaking
[Content Note: Harassment.]
Over the weekend, the Democrats had their caucus in Nevada, and the Republicans had their primary in South Carolina.
In Nevada, Hillary Clinton was the winner, making her the first female presidential candidate to win twice in the same state. (She also won in another squeaker in 2008.) Congratulations to Hillary Clinton! Yay!
In South Carolina, Donald Trump was the winner, by another huge margin. He won by ten points (32.5%) over Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, who basically tied for second (22%). Jeb Bush came in a distant third, virtually tied with John Kasich and Ben Carson; each of them got around 7-8%.
After another poor showing, Bush finally dropped out of the race. Please clap.
And then there were six. If you include Jim Gilmore. Which I definitely do! Good luck, Jim Gilmore!
There was a bit of controversy at the Democratic Caucus, as labor leader and civil rights activist Dolores Huerta was reportedly shouted down by Sanders supporters when she offered to translate the proceedings into Spanish.
Although there is no question that she was denied the opportunity to translate, and that the permanent chair said, "English only" from the stage, there was debate over whether people in the audience "chanted English only."
Janell Ross and Angus Johnston have both written pieces explaining how that possible misrepresentation happened. (I say "possible" because it's frankly not possible to determine from the video everything that was being said in the room.) The short version is: It wasn't bad faith, as lots of people are asserting it to be.
And, as Ross notes:
So there you have it. Right? Sanders's voters can't be tarred and feathered for -- or even deemed guilty of -- Huerta's "English-only" chants claim. And Huerta appears to have misattributed the permanent chair's English-only decision to the raucous crowd.As Ana Mardoll observed on Twitter (sharing with her permission): "People clapping at the 'English only' announcement were applauding disenfranchisement." That's a big goddamn problem. Even when the people clapping aren't claiming to be mounting a sweeping revolution.
But it's really not quite that simple.
...Whether intended or not, those applauding effectively sanctioned a process that allowed qualified voters who do not speak English, or who are Spanish-dominant, limited insight and influence in the evening's events.
Some people at the caucus gathering may have been singularly focused on what they viewed as the risk of a Clinton supporter interpreting events for all Spanish-speakers in the room. But then, at the very least, they shouted an 80-plus-year-old woman off the stage for what they believed to be political bias. That is not a moment of which to be proud.
That the woman in question happened to be Dolores Huerta really does make matters worse. After all, Huerta is one of many people who personally waged activist war to create a multilingual voting system in the United States.
I also want to note that an important part of the context in which this transpired is the observable online shouting down of women of color by Sanders supporters for months. This didn't happen in a vacuum.
In fact, in happened in the same space in which Sanders surrogate Susan Sarandon took to 'splaining at Dolores Huerta, like she doesn't fucking know what's up.
That video is utterly cringe-inducing. And totally emblematic of how a large number of Sanders supporters engage with people, especially marginalized people, as if they need to educate us on what's important.
As if we are too dim to have assessed the candidates in a thoughtful way.
They don't even stop to contemplate the arrogance of telling another human being what "the biggest issue" is.
Maybe the economy is the biggest issue FOR YOU. Other people have immediate needs that don't have singularly economic solutions.
If you can't even respect that very basic truth of individual humanity, you're not leading any kind of progressive revolution, pals.
The Virtual Pub Is Open
[Explanations: lol your fat. pathetic anger bread. hey your gay.]
TFIF, Shakers!
Belly up to the bar,
and name your poison!
Kids Today!
Five-year-old pre-K student Cloe Woods is a hero after rescuing her grandmother and the family dog after a fire broke out in her family's kitchen:
Back in October, her class went to the Kenner Fire Department to learn something else, if there is a fire then get out of the house.She is the cutest hero I've ever seen.
Cloe was listening and learning, and it came in handy. Early Wednesday morning (2/17), the stove in her home caught fire setting off the smoke alarm. That's when little Cloe sprang into action.
Cloe's mom, Shone Arceneaux, said the 5-year-old jumped out of bed and ran to her blind grandmother's room and told her to get out of the house.
Once she was out of the house, Cloe made sure her grandmother and dog were ok before running door to door looking for water to pour on the fire.
When Arceneaux returned from bringing her older children to their carpool stop nearby, Cloe brought her the news.
Kenner Fire Department Chief John Hellmers said thanks to this little girl paying attention on a field trip, tragedy was avoided.
Kids today! Get ON my lawn!
[H/T to Elle.]
Who "Millenials" Support
[Content Note: Racism.]
On Tuesday, I quoted a piece by Leela Daou, in which she observed that the fact a majority of black millenial voters were supporting Clinton was at odds with the ubiquitous narrative that millenials overwhelmingly support Sanders and noted: "Unless someone in the media wants to argue that black millennials don't matter, let's see some coverage of this. Because 'millennials' shouldn't just mean white millennials."
Case in point: "In South Carolina Poll, Younger Blacks Lean Toward Clinton, not Sanders."
The new NBC News/Wall Street Journal/Marist poll of South Carolina Democrats shows Hillary Clinton leading among African-American voters under age 45. That finding suggests that the former secretary of state's much-ballyhooed problems with younger voters may be limited to young, white voters and that she can find greater support among young people of color.To be abundantly clear, I'm not sharing this information in order to suggest that there is a "right" (or "wrong") way for millennials to vote, or for black people to vote. I am not in the business of telling people how they should vote.
...The South Carolina survey showed that among blacks under age 45, Clinton had 52 percent support, Sanders 35 percent, with 13 percent undecided. (A survey released Thursday by Monmouth University poll showed a similar gap: Clinton led 60 percent to 26 percent among black voters under age 50 in South Carolina.)
In short, at least in South Carolina, Clinton's advantage among younger black people is cutting into Sanders' lead among younger voters overall.
I'm sharing this because I am deeply contemptuous of the contention that millennials overwhelmingly support Sanders, when, although it may be technically accurate in straight numbers, is is predicated on concealing that a large majority of black voters support Clinton. Which effectively writes black millennials out of definitions of their own generation.
That isn't fair to black millennials, and it isn't decent on the one hand to recognize black voters as a dedicated Democratic voting bloc and on the other disappear some of those voters in order to perpetuate a white supremacist narrative regarding support for a Democratic candidate.
Daily Dose of Cute
If Sophie were any tinier, she'd slide down the drain!
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...
RIP Harper Lee. "Harper Lee, whose 1961 novel To Kill a Mockingbird became a national institution and the defining text on the racial troubles of the American deep south, has died at the age of 89. ...Within minutes of the announcement of the novelist's death, encomiums began to flow. Her literary agent Andrew Nurnberg said in a statement: 'We have lost a great writer, a great friend and a beacon of integrity.' He added: 'Knowing Nelle these past few years has been not just an utter delight but an extraordinary privilege.'" My condolences to everyone who knew and loved her and/or her work.
[Content Note: War; terrorism; child abuse; death] Fucking hell: "Islamic State has been dispatching children and teenagers into battle and sending them as [redacted] bombers at an unprecedented rate, analysis by US researchers has found. Examining Isis death notices of 89 children and youths on Twitter and the encrypted communications app Telegram, a study by Georgia State University found that the minors came from at least 14 nationalities, with just under two-thirds aged between 12 and 16. According to the analysis, which ran from the start of 2015 until the end of January this year, the death rate has doubled for those aged 18 and under being used by Isis. Overall, 39% of them were used to drive cars or trucks laden with explosives at the enemy. A further 33% died as foot soldiers. ...'The Islamic State has so heavily championed the mobilisation of children—on a scale rarely associated even with violent extremist organisations—that it suggests organisational concerns that far outweigh short-term propaganda benefits,' the report said."
[CN: War on agency] Damn: "A clinic that has provided abortion services in New Orleans for nearly four decades closed its doors this week after its primary physician retired, according to advocates, leaving pregnant people in the state with one less option for reproductive health care. ...A Planned Parenthood facility that will provide surgical abortion care has been under construction in New Orleans, but it is unknown when that clinic will open. There are three other clinics that provide abortion services in the state, located in Baton Rouge, Shreveport, and Bossier City." This is another way that anti-choicers are eroding abortion access: By intimidating doctors so that there are fewer and fewer of them who are willing and able to provide abortions.
[CN: Homophobia] This girl is so brave and tenacious, although I deeply resent that she was obliged to be by homophobia: "Taylor Victor will now be allowed to wear a T-shirt that identifies her as a lesbian, after reaching a settlement with her school district that resulted in an update to the student dress code. Last fall, Victor wore a shirt to her Northern California school that read, 'Nobody knows I'm a lesbian.' She said she wore it ironically because she is open about her sexuality. The administration reprimanded her and gave a slew of defenses for that decision, saying the T-shirt was 'disruptive' an 'open invitation to sex,' could be 'gang-related,' and that students couldn't wear shirts that stated their 'personal choices and beliefs.' In response, Victor sued two administration officials with the representation of the ACLU. The Manteca Unified School District reached a settlement with the ACLU this week. Although the school district denied wrongdoing, it agreed to change its dress code to make it clear that students can wear clothes that support either their own identities on the basis of sexual orientation, gender, race, religion, and other identities, or support their classmates identities, without retribution from the administration."
Wow: "It's time to add another item to the list of Black firsts: Yesterday (February 17), ABC announced that Channing Dungey is the television network's new entertainment president. Variety reports that she is the first Black person to control programming for a major broadcast network. You might not know Dungey's name, but you know the shows she developed during her tenure as senior vice president of drama development. They include Scandal, How to Get Away With Murder, Quantico and American Crime."
YES: "Scalia was not a great judge: he was a bad one. And his badness consisted precisely in his contempt for the rule of law, if by 'the rule of law' one means the consistent application of legal principles, without regard to the political consequences of applying those principles in a consistent way. One of Scalia's many obnoxious qualities as a jurist was his remarkably pompous, pedantic, and obsessive insistence that the legal principles he (supposedly) preferred—textualism in statutory interpretation, originalism when reading the Constitution, and judicial restraint when dealing with democratically-enacted legal rules—were not merely his preferences, but simply 'the law.' ...[T]he truth is that, far more than the average judge, Scalia had no real fidelity to the legal principles he claimed were synonymous with a faithful interpretation of the law. Over and over during Scalia's three decades on the Supreme Court, if one of his cherished interpretive principles got in the way of his political preferences, that principle got thrown overboard in a New York minute."
"Bush machine running on fumes." I guess that means if we all stop farting at him, he'll have nothing left.
Neat! "The Hubble Space Telescope has given scientists their sharpest-ever look at a known galaxy containing an enormous black hole. The supermassive black hole is in a galaxy called NGC 4889, one of several in the Coma Cluster, officials said Thursday. ...Even though NGC 4889's black hole measures 130 billion kilometers in diameter, you can't see it in the picture. Black holes are invisible because light can't escape their gravitational pull, according to NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA). But scientists were able to measure NGC 4889's black hole by using the velocity of the stars moving around it and found it to be one of the largest known black holes."
Aww precious wee beastie: "Also known as Limacina helicina, the sea butterfly navigates cold ocean waters in the northern Atlantic and Pacific. Its shell measures about 1 to 4 millimeters (0.04 to 0.16 inches) in diameter, and it swims using a pair of winglike appendages. It can retract these into its shell when threatened. Many types of zooplankton, tiny ocean animals, have structures like the sea butterfly's, which they use as paddles to propel themselves through the water. But when researchers conducted the first-ever analysis of how the sea butterfly's appendages move, the scientists found that the creature swam in a completely unexpected way. ...'The more we looked into it, the more we found that the sea butterfly is an honorary insect,' said study co-author David Murphy, from the Georgia Institute of Technology. 'We looked at the wing kinematics—how it moves its wings in a figure-eight pattern—and it's very similar to how a fruit fly beats its wings.'"
[CN: Moving GIF at link] And finally! "You'll Never Be as Chill as These Lizards Truly Living Their Best Life." LOL!
I Support Transgender Access to Bathrooms
[Content Note: Transphobia; sexual assault.]
Yesterday on Twitter, @EmmaCaterine urged: "I need every cis person to say that they support transgender access to bathrooms NOW. Your silence will permit this violence against us."
I absolutely and unequivocally support transgender access to bathrooms. And I reject being used as a prop in the transphobic campaign to deny trans people access to bathrooms, under the auspcies of "protecting me."
You know, there is actually a place where people are pissing where they shouldn't, flashing their junk at people, and committing sexual assaults against people who share the space with them. It's called the subway. Maybe these moral crusaders could look into making that space safe for women. From cis men.
I Am Just Baffled
[Content Note: Misogyny; racism.]
I honestly don't even understand, at all, what the Sanders campaign is doing at this point. Yesterday was another totally confounding day, leaving me struggling to make sense of what Bernie Sanders is even doing.
On Wednesday, I wrote about rapper Killer Mike, who has been campaigning with and for Sanders, saying during a Sanders rally that a "uterus doesn't qualify you to be president."
Sanders finally issued a statement on that incident, and it is truly astounding:
What Mike said essentially is that is that politics should not be, people should not be voting for candidates based on their gender, but based on what they believe. I think that makes sense. I don't go around, no one has ever heard me say, 'hey guys, let's stand together, vote for a man.' I would never do that, never have. I think we—in a presidential race we look at what a candidate stands for and we vote for the candidate who we think could best serve our country.Welp. A couple of thoughts here:
1. No one has ever had to say, "Let's stand together; vote for a man," because there's literally never been a female presidential nominee for which people could vote from a major party. So this is some aggressively disingenuous shit.
2. Some people's beliefs include, all things being relatively equal, that a vote for a marginalized candidate is a valuable and legitimate choice. That Sanders doesn't acknowledge voting "based on what [you] believe" and voting for a woman because she's a woman aren't mutually exclusive options is a big problem.
3. Sanders may be able to legitimately claim he's never explicitly said that he's never called people to "stand together; vote for a man," but when he has run against women, he has very pointedly made issues of his opponents' gender. When he ran for governor of Vermont in 1976 as the Liberty Union candidate, against Republican Richard Snelling and Democrat Stella Hackel, he said: "The only difference between Richard Snelling, a Republican, and Stella Hackel, a Democrat, is that one of them is a man and one a woman." A decade later, when he ran against then-Vermont Governor Madeleine Kunin: "He urged voters not to vote for me just because I was a woman. That would be a 'sexist position,' he declared."
He also said, of Kunin and her Republican opponent Peter Smith, "It is absolutely fair to say you are dealing with Tweedledum and Tweedledee," despite "Kunin's solid, groundbreaking record on women's issues." In 1974, he called Connecticut gubernatorial candidate Ella Grasso, against whom he wasn't running, "nothing more than a political hack," singling her out after saying he was "not impressed with other women candidates elsewhere."
Over and over, he has said that voters should not support women just because they are women, and repeatedly called female candidates part of the establishment, virtually indistinguishable from Republicans.
So, sure, he's never said the words "vote for a man," but he has sure stuck to the same shitty critiques of female candidates for 40 years. None of them are progressive enough; all of them are shills; no one should vote for them just because they're women. This is a pattern. And it's an ugly one.
* * *
[CN: Video may autoplay at link] Then, in an interview with BET, there came this:
BERNIE SANDERS on the Obama presidency: "You know, Hillary Clinton now is trying to embrace the President as closely—as she possibly can. Everything the President does is wonderful. She loves the President, he loves her and all that stuff. And we know what that's about. That's trying to—win support from the African American community where the President is enormously popular. But you know what? I have enormous respect for the President. He's a friend. We have worked together. I think he has done a great job in many respects. But you know what? Like any other human being, he is wrong on certain issues."Wow. There are a lot of problems with this: Tactical problems, logic problems, decency problems, and racist problems.
And then there's this: Obama is Clinton's former boss, but also, as they have both said a lot, they are friends.
I find it really objectionable that Sanders would say Clinton only embraces Obama cynically. Her face when she defends him against GOP—woo. That look. That's not cynicism. That's not even collegial. That's a person defending her friend.
And honestly? If someone worked for me, publicly defended me, called out bigotry against me, promised to continue work I'd started, used words like "brilliant" to describe me, challenged me in good faith, complimented my efforts all to "pander," I'd say: "Pander away!"
But of course it's not pandering. You think when HRC says repeatedly PBO doesn't get enough credit, it's because she's pandering? Fuck that. It's because she believes in him.
And it's because they are friends.
And erasing that friendship? Well, fuck. That plays into a lot of ugly shit. Obama is divisive. Clinton is cold. Their observable personal and professional relationship is a direct counter to those narratives. So it's extra shitty to conceal it, in order to accuse Clinton of gross cynicism.
But maybe I'm just literally the tiredest of hearing a white dude shit on what I think is a cool relationship between two people who aren't white men.
* * *
Last night, there was another Democratic Town Hall in Nevada, hosted by MSNBC and Telemundo. MSNBC has a complete transcript.
The evening opened with Sanders being given the opportunity—twice—to walk back his comments on Citizens United being his only litmus test for a Supreme Court nominee. He was even asked directly about Roe, and he stuck to his guns.
MSNBC ANCHOR JOSE DIAZ-BALART: Senator, let me start by telling you a little bit about Secretary Clinton, who's been describing you recently as a single issue candidate. You disagree with that characterization. But this week, you told my colleague, Jon Ralston, that your one litmus test for a Supreme Court nominee is overturning "Citizens United." So why doesn't that prove what Secretary Clinton says about you? I mean you didn't say that you have a "Roe v. Wade" litmus test. You didn't say you had an immigration—Where to even begin? "I'm not a one-issue candidate—now listen to me talk about wealth inequality some more!"
SANDERS: (INAUDIBLE). I don't (INAUDIBLE)—
DIAZ-BALART: —action, litmus test, a marriage equality litmus test—
SANDERS: No, I don't think that's what Secretary Clinton is actually talking about. If she happened to come to one of my rallies, I—which she has not yet, but I welcome her, she would hear me speaking for about an hour and a half, for an hour and 15 minutes. And we would cover 15 or 20 separate issues. So I'm not quite sure where she comes up with this single issue idea.
But do I believe that there has to be a major focus on the economy when the middle class is disappearing, when people in Nevada and all over this country are working longer hours for lower wages and almost all new income is going to the top 1 percent? Yes, I am going to focus on that.
To answer your question about "Citizens United," why is that a litmus test to me? Because if we continue going the way we are going, Jose, in terms of a corrupt campaign finance system, you know what's going to end up happening? A handful of billionaires are going to control the political life of this country and undermine American democracy and what men and women have fought to defend. So to me, this is a underlying enormous issue.
DIAZ-BALART: But that is the priority. It is the litmus test, not one of them, it's the litmus test—
SANDERS: Oh, but that's not—I think that's not what she is talking about. I think she is talking, actually, about my focus on Wall Street.
But if you are asking me, do I think we have got to overturn this disastrous "Citizens United" Supreme Court decision so that billionaires will not be able to pump unlimited sums of money into super PACs and buy elections, man, I do believe that is an enormously important issue.
Again, abortion access was being eroded long before Citizens United was decided. Again, abortion access is a key economic issue for more than half the population. Again, breaking up the banks and campaign finance reform and free college don't restore abortion access.
And I frankly can't put it any more plainly than this: Why am I supposed to fucking care if the country is being led by a billionaire who doesn't prioritize abortion access, or a pauper who doesn't prioritize abortion access?
Or, as the case may be, a not-billionaire-but-still-wealthy Democratic Socialist who doesn't prioritize abortion access?
What difference does that make to me? NONE.
But naturally, I am supposed to understand that Sanders is a "strong feminist."
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Good evening. Thank you, Senator Bernie Sanders. My question is, do you consider yourself a feminist? If so, how do you, as a white male, understand the intersectional identities that people of color face, especially when entering high positions of power within business or government?Good grief. So: Don't vote for a woman because she's an actual woman, but definitely do vote for a man because he's an honorary woman. Noted.
SANDERS: I consider myself a strong feminist. And, in fact, Gloria Steinem—everybody knows Gloria is one of the leading feminists in America—made me an honorary woman many, many years ago. [laughter] I don't know exactly what that meant, but I accepted it when she came to campaign for me.
* * *
Bernie Sanders says he's running to stage a revolution. But I don't see anything revolutionary. What I see is a hell of a lot of thinly veiled misogyny and racism, embedded in messaging that is tailored to appeal to white privilege, male privilege, and the economic insecurity of young white people.
That's not agitation for a revolution. That's agitation for a change in management.
I am exhausted with this campaign, which is increasingly unrecognizable to me as a progressive campaign with every passing day.
Good Morning! Or Whatever Time of Day It Is in Your Part of the World!
Video Description: A thin man who appears to be white sits on the opposite side of a windowed enclosure from a young orangutan. The man holds a styrofoam cup. He tilts it, to show the orangutan that there's a sweetgum seedpod inside of it. The orangutan watches him intently as he puts the lid on the cup, then shakes it up, then lowers it, so that it's just out of the orangutan's field of vision, where he quickly empties it. He brings the cup back near the window, shakes it again, then removes the lid and reveals that the seedpod is gone. The orangutan looks at it curiously, then breaks up into laughter and falls over. The man and a woman holding the camera laugh.
[H/T to Spudsy.]
The Thursday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by a lamp.
Recommended Reading:
Nerdy Wonka: [Content Note: Disablism; war] Young Minds Matter
Kath: [CN: Fat hatred; classism] Let's Talk Classism in Plus-Size Clothing
Keith: Marley Dias Reaches Her #1000BlackGirlBooks Goal
Monica: Honored to Be Named a Transformative Leader by Planned Parenthood
Cat: [CN: Fat hatred; weight loss talk; privacy violations] On Irresponsible Reporting (Just Another Day in the Fatpocalypse)
TLC: [CN: Transphobia] TLC Congratulates SPLC on Settlement in Transgender Prisoner Case
Sameer: [CN: White supremacy] #TBT to When Toni Morrison Checked Charlie Rose on White Privilege
Leave your links and recommendations in comments. Self-promotion welcome and encouraged!
