Shakesville

#DemandFairDebates

Over at Shareblue, Peter Daou and I have written a piece deconstructing how crucial it is that the debate moderators, starting with Lester Holt next Monday at the first presidential debate, conduct themselves in a way that can facilitate something resembling a fair debate:

Matt Lauer's moderation of NBC's Commander-in-Chief forum was widely panned—and deservedly so—but Lauer's fault was not that he did something unusual. To the contrary, Lauer's performance was a one hour microcosm of a year's worth of media coverage.

It included the three core elements of what has been a relentless double standard: Antagonism and scorn for Clinton, an unhealthy obsession with her emails, and sheepish acquiescence to Trump's lies.

The unfairness of it all became glaringly manifest when condensed into a 60 minute spectacle.

Lester Holt can learn from Lauer's mistake.

First, he can face the truth about the abysmal coverage of Hillary Clinton. Even as trust in the mass media plummets to new lows, too many of his fellow journalists are in denial about their Clinton problem. Second, he can prepare to call Trump's lies what they are. Third, he can keep the conversation focused on issues that matter to working Americans, not optics that only matter to elite reporters and well-paid pundits.

Here is the harsh truth Holt must face if he intends to do justice to his important role: The corporate media have spent 18 months repeating pervasive narratives about Hillary Clinton, priming news consumers to have a Pavlovian response to only a single word and doing their level best to set her up for defeat.

...The national media have been marching through the forest of this election for 18 months. Their reporting on Trump has been a haphazard meander from tree to tree. Their coverage of Clinton has been a focused trek, creating a path of well-tread grooves. Now every time a question settles into those grooves, voters know exactly where they're headed: Down the path that's been cut to a familiar destination. The destination is a caricature of Clinton as a corrupt, dishonest, and disliked monster.

Holt, and the following moderators, have a major task ahead of them. They must avoid that path.

There's much more at the link.

Again, I will strongly encourage you, if you are on Twitter, to contact the moderators to #DemandFairDebates.

image featuring the information listed below

Monday, September 26: Lester Holt | @lesterholtnbc

Tuesday, October 4 (veep debate): Elaine Quijano | @elaine_quijano

Sunday, October 9: Martha Raddatz and Anderson Cooper | @martharaddatz and @andersoncooper

Wednesday, October 19: Chris Wallace | @foxnewssunday

Photos of the Day

From Hillary Clinton's speech in Orlando yesterday, on disability and the economy:

image of Hillary Clinton standing on a box in front of a large, excited crowd; she is holding a microphone and smiling broadly, her hand clasped to her heart

I like how she's standing on a box, so people in the back can see her better. And she can see them.

a young white man with Down Syndrome stands in the crowd with a look of anticipation on his face and sporting a Clinton-Kaine button on his shirt; an older woman, presumably his mother, stands beside him, her arm around his neck, gesturing toward Hillary

Cool button.

Hillary reaches into the crowd to shake the young man's hand; she has a huge grin and he is looking back at her in awe

The look of awe on his face! I would have had the same expression, my friend. ♥
I know I'm the brokenest of broken records, but it continually moves me when I scroll through Hillary Clinton's Flickr account and see diverse crowds who are so enthusiastic for her, and see picture after picture of Clinton excitedly meeting with all kinds of people, from every demographic, of every age and race and gender and sexuality and ability and class and occupation...

Her campaign looks like America.

[Photos by Barbara Kinney for Hillary for America.]

"For too long, accessibility has been an afterthought; let’s make it a priority."

I've got a piece at Shareblue about Hillary Clinton's landmark address on disability and the economy, which includes the complete video of the address, if you'd like to see the whole thing. Head on over to check it out, and if you prefer or need a transcript, the complete transcript is below the fold.

This was really extraordinary. And guess how many US channels carried it live? Zero.

One out of five people in the United States has a disability (or multiple disabilities), making us one of the largest voting blocs in the nation, and one rarely addressed directly by presidential candidates. I certainly can't remember another presidential candidate giving an address like this.

And the cable news decided it wasn't worth broadcasting. Which, you know, kind of makes Hillary Clinton's point about not treating disabled people like we don't matter.

Open Thread

image of a yellow couch

Hosted by a yellow sofa. Have a seat and chat!

Question of the Day

Suggested by Shaker GoldFishy: "What is your favorite time of day (or night)?"

Two-Minute Nostalgia Sublime

[Content Note: There are some flashing lights in this video.]

Divine: "Shake It Up"

The Wednesday Blogaround

This blogaround brought to you by sunshine.

Recommended Reading:

Jamil: [Content Note: Xenophobia] Resistance Is Futile: In Trump's America, Assimilation Isn't About Unity—It's About Submission

Katie: [CN: War on agency; abortion stigma; classism] The Moral Case for Abortion

Kai: [CN: Colonialism; racism] How Non-Indigenous Activists Can Support Indigenous People

Monica: [CN: Transphobia] I Don't Need Your Permission to Have My Humanity Respected

Fannie: [CN: Misogyny] Sarah Paulson Did Something Incredible

Maddie: Tiny Fossils Suggest Antarctica's Largest Ice Sheet Could Collapse

Leave your links and recommendations in comments. Self-promotion welcome and encouraged!

Quote of the Day

“American hands will rebuild our nation. Not the hands of people from other nations.” — Donald Trump
— Matt Viser (@mviser) September 21, 2016

I don't even know where to begin detailing the many, many, many things wrong with this comment. The hostility toward immigrants; the erasure of colonialism and slavery and indentured servitude and immigrant-built infrastructure; the fact that he is the son of an immigrant and is married to an immigrant...

Meanwhile, in her economic address earlier today, Hillary Clinton spoke about bringing undocumented immigrants into the legal economy because it's the right thing to do and because our country needs everyone's talents.

I am running out of words for this guy and the garbage he disgorges from his awful mouth every day.

I'll just leave it here: Donald Trump, as a person who is myself married to a "person from another nation," your contempt for the contributions of such people is duly noted. Asshole.

Yes We Are

image of a Black Muslim woman in a headscarf sitting in front of a white woman holding up a sign reading STRONGER TOGETHER at a Tim Kaine campaign event

[Photo: Michael Davidson for Hillary for America, at a Tim Kaine event in Ames, IA.]

In the News

Here is some stuff in the news today...

[Content Note: Police brutality; death; racism] READ THIS: "To be Black in America is to be afraid."

Hillary Clinton wrote an op-ed for the New York Times on her plans to address poverty: "My Plan for Helping America's Poor."

[CN: Racist slur] At a Trump campaign event in Cleveland Heights billed as a "town hall meeting on African American concerns," Don King used the n-word while introducing Donald Trump. While I'm not about to police whatever words King wants to use, seeing Trump chortling away about it in the background is deeply disturbing.

[CN: Video autoplay at link; hostility to consent] Joss Whedon and a bunch of celebrities put together a video about the importance of voting in this election, with a pretty clear message about for whom to vote. Two big problems: One, I don't find the joke (even though he's clearly in on it) about Mark Ruffalo getting naked funny, since the joke is still premised on the appearance of non-consent. Two, I don't really think this works to convey the seriousness of this election. Too clever by half.

GOOD: "Congressional Democrats Campaign to Prove Hyde Amendment's Undue Burden."

[CN: Domestic violence; death] Another family annihilator "is in custody after a quadruple homicide left his four children dead and their mother in critical condition from an apparent stabbing." (But let's continue to not have a public conversation about toxic masculinity.) My condolences to the woman who was harmed herself and has lost all four of her children. I don't even know how one could begin to process the scope of that sort of violence and loss. I ache for her.

"On Wednesday morning, 31 countries officially ratified the Paris climate agreement, pushing it over one of the required thresholds needed for the agreement to enter into force. Sixty parties, representing 48 percent of the world's emissions, have now officially joined. For the Paris agreement to enter into force, at least 55 nations, representing at least 55 percent of global emissions, must formally ratify. That means that the agreement needs just 7 percent more greenhouse gas emissions before the agreement can enter into force."

"Clever Dog Saves the Life of a Newborn Puppy Abandoned on a Garbage Pile." Awwww good dog!

What have you been reading?

Daily Dose of Cute

image of Matilda the Fuzzy Sealpoint Cat lying on the tiled floor of a shower

Matilda chilling in one of her favorite places: The floor of the shower.
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.

And Again

[Content Note: Police brutality; death; racism; disablism; violent protests.]

Keith Lamont Scott, a 43-year-old Black man, was shot and killed by police yesterday in Charlotte, North Carolina. Police say that Scott was armed. Witnesses say he was not. If that doesn't sound familiar by now, you haven't been paying attention.

The shooting ― the sixth Charlotte-Mecklenburg police killing of a civilian in the past year ― happened just before 4 p.m. at an apartment complex roughly a mile from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department officers were searching at the complex for someone else who was wanted on an outstanding warrant, police said in a statement.

During the search, officers said they saw a man exit a vehicle with a firearm, then get back inside. When police approached, the man got out of the vehicle again and "posed an imminent deadly threat to the officers who subsequently fired their weapon striking the subject," according to the police statement.

...A woman who identified herself as Scott's daughter captured the aftermath of the shooting on Facebook Live. She and other witnesses said Scott had a disability and did not have a gun.

In one account I read, which I cannot confirm, Scott was holding a book that he'd been reading while sitting in his car waiting to pick up his son from school.

What I do know is that North Carolina is an open-carry state. So even if Scott had been carrying a gun, it's unclear how that would constitute "an imminent deadly threat to officers," especially once he was back in his car.

The officer who shot and killed Scott is himself Black. I have already seen people making the mendacious argument that "proves" this isn't about racism. But that argument elides the fact that the police, as an institution, have long been informed—and often explicitly governed—by white supremacy.

There were protests in Charlotte last night. Some damage was apparently done to property, and police fired tear gas to break up the protest. Meanwhile, the police chief is citing a law allowing police to withhold video, except that law doesn't take effect until next month.

I was speaking to a friend this morning, who's a Black woman and a mother of Black children, and I told her I don't even know what to say anymore, or what to do. She said she didn't, either. The problem is that a meaningful and immediate solution to this problem is so radical that the powers that be haven't even begun to seriously contemplate it. Reforms such as implicit bias training and reimagined community policing and body cameras and so forth take time. We don't have that kind of time. We need radical action now.

My condolences to Scott's family, friends, and community.

ELECTION UPDATE!!!

[Content Note: Racism.]

1. Hillary Clinton spoke at the 39th annual Black Women's Agenda Symposium Workshop and Awards Luncheon last Friday, and here is something she said: "You, your daughters, your granddaughters ... leave the house every morning, put on that game face that we all practice and enter a society that consistently challenges your worth. Yet you remain fierce in the face of these challenges. ...While your stories are often missing from the history books, make no mistake—you are the change makers, the path breakers and the ground shakers. And you are proof that, yes indeed, black girl magic is real."

2. Donald Trump spoke at a campaign event in Kenansville, NC, last night, and here is something he said: "We're going to rebuild our inner cities because our African American communities are absolutely in the worst shape they've ever been in before. Ever, ever, ever." And, hey, here's an interesting factoid: "Kenansville itself is named after a man whose family owned a slave plantation."

3. BUT BOTH CANDIDATES ARE TERRIBLE. EQUALLY TERRIBLE. Oh, also: Our national media is garbage.

4. Tim Kaine continues to be very delightful and also makes good and serious points about how Donald Trump is a terrible candidate. I hope he's never sent or received any emails or started a foundation that has saved millions of lives or coughed or sat on a stool or felt faint from a combination of heat and pneumonia or rested against a pillow or SUSPICIOUSLY wore his purse on a different shoulder than usual one day or change his hairstyle or wear something unflattering or tried to walk up airplane steps in heels. Although it probably doesn't matter, because he's a dude.

5. Mike Pence continues to be the absolute fucking worst.

47 more days of this shit.

That about sums it up! Discuss.

Just...Wow.

Hillary Clinton posted this video yesterday:

Video Description: Nyle DiMarco, a 27-year-old thin white man, who is a model, actor, and deaf activist, stands onscreen looking into the camera. He begins to speak in American Sign Language, and captions appear at the bottom of the frame. He signs: "You can leave this ad muted—there's nothing to hear. And keep scrolling past it if you want; we're used to being ignored. But if you're still listening to my voice, please know that there are a lot of people out there without one. Among the 50 million Americans living with a disability, many don't have the ability to work, to travel, or to do countless other things you might take for granted. So this November, please consider voting for the only candidate with a plan to change that." He gestures beside him, and a graphic showing the URL to Hillary's voting page appears. He then continues signing: "Because the voice of your vote is the greatest voice we have. Thank you." Kissy emoji. He blows a kiss.

As I mentioned yesterday, today Clinton will deliver an economic address in Orlando that will include reforms to make the US economy one that "welcomes people with disabilities, values their work, rewards them fairly, and treats them with respect."

I'm already seeing bullshit frames in the media that essentially boil down to: "She's doing this because Trump mocked that reporter." I can't stress enough that Clinton did not suddenly develop an interest in disability rights after seeing Donald Trump mock a reporter. That's certainly yet another cool way of implying she's a cynical opportunist who will do anything to win and doesn't actually care about people, though!

Clinton has a long history of disability rights work, starting as a young attorney advocating for disabled children to have access to an equal education. And she has continued that work throughout her career.

This is who Hillary Clinton is. And, frankly, given the possible outcomes of this election, anyone who has endeavored to conceal that has done something I find unforgivable.

Open Thread

image of a red couch

Hosted by a red sofa. Have a seat and chat!

Question of the Day

Is your shower/bath routine the same every time, the same things in the same order, or do you tend to mix it up?

Two-Minute Nostalgia Sublime

PJ Harvey: "50 Ft Queenie"

Shaker Gourmet

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!

In the News

Here is some stuff in the news today...

[Content Note: Racism; Islamophobia; white supremacy] "Skittles are literally more dangerous than refugees." In addition to everything at that link, another cool thing about Trump Jr. tweeting about hypothetically poisonous food is how his dad just proposed rolling back food safety regulations last week.

Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt are reportedly getting divorced. I am not linking to any story about that, because they are all garbage. Best wishes to both of them as they make tough decisions about what's best for their family.

Hillary Clinton has written an open letter to the Wells Fargo customers who were defrauded by their bank. "There is simply no place for this kind of outrageous behavior in America. Our economy depends on a strong and safe banking system to help keep it moving. But even after Americans spent years working hard to recover from the Great Recession, the culture of misconduct and recklessness that preceded that crisis too often persists. I have a plan to address it."

[CN: Video may autoplay at link] And tomorrow: "Hillary Clinton's economic speech on Wednesday in Orlando will focus on how the United States can create an economy that values people with disabilities, an attempt to contrast the former secretary of state with Republican nominee Donald Trump. Clinton, an aide said Tuesday, will propose an economy that 'welcomes people with disabilities, values their work, rewards them fairly, and treats them with respect.'" Wow.

George Soros explains why he's decided to "earmark $500 million for investments that specifically address the needs of migrants, refugees, and host communities. I will invest in startups, established companies, social-impact initiatives, and businesses founded by migrants and refugees themselves. Although my main concern is to help migrants and refugees arriving in Europe, I will be looking for good investment ideas that will benefit migrants all over the world."

[CN: Displacement; racism] "A Proposed Coal Mine Would Put Alaskan Natives at Risk: Coal production may be falling, but one company is taking a gamble—one that would affect the Tyonek tribe's fishing and hunting grounds."

Neat: "It was already known that tardigrades, also known as water bears, were able to survive by shrivelling up into desiccated balls. But the University of Tokyo-led team found a protein that protects its DNA—wrapping around it like a blanket."

What have you been reading?

This Is the Pay-for-Play You Were Looking For

I've got a new piece at Shareblue about the latest revelations regarding Donald Trump using his charitable foundation as a slush fund, which is definitely unethical and possibly illegal:

As my colleague Matthew Chapman detailed, the breathless reporting on the Clinton Foundation yielded nothing but innuendo and speculation. When no evidence of wrongdoing was unearthed, it magically became a story about "optics," with pundits arguing something nefarious could have happened, even if nothing did.

By that standard, the newest revelations about the Trump Foundation from David Fahrenthold in the Washington Post should warrant round-the-clock coverage from now until Election Day—because there is much more to this story than the mere appearance, or possibility, of wrongdoing.

We have known for some time that Donald Trump was alleged to have used his charitable foundation to buy the compliance of two state attorney generals who were tasked with investigating fraud complaints against Trump University, and to buy retribution against another who refused to drop his investigation. He also used the foundation's money to purchase self-aggrandizing items such as a six-foot-tall portrait of himself.

Now, Fahrenthold reports that Trump used at least $258,000 from his foundation to settle lawsuits brought against his for-profit business, which may constitute a violation of laws regarding "self-dealing—which prohibit nonprofit leaders from using charity money to benefit themselves or their businesses."

...What is abundantly clear—at minimum—from these newest findings is that Trump has used the charitable foundation which bears his name to avoid having to spend a dime of his own money to settle lawsuits generated by his own businesses. The question that Trump needs is answer is: Why?

Was it simple greed—or was it a decision he made to help perpetuate another fraud? Is it possible, as some have speculated, that Trump, the self-proclaimed "king of debt," is not remotely as wealthy as he asserts and didn't even have enough liquid cash to fund these larger settlements?

That's a question Trump needs to be asked—and he cannot be taken at his word when he reflexively treats the question as absurd. He needs to provide verifiable evidence, e.g. his tax returns.

There is much, much more at the link. And the long and the short of the media's response to these new facts is this: Having set a high standard for how important even the appearance of wrongdoing is, this is a story they simply cannot ignore without a wholesale abandonment of all integrity and credibility.