Shakesville

YESSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!

Today, Hillary Clinton is campaigning in New Hampshire with Senator Elizabeth Warren and New Hampshire Governor Maggie Hassan, who is running for Senate, and Warren absolutely let Donald Trump have it.

Elizabeth Warren to Trump: "We nasty women are going to march our nasty feet to cast our nasty votes to get you out of our lives forever!” pic.twitter.com/epCA13EZfo
— Bradd Jaffy (@BraddJaffy) October 24, 2016

And Donald Trump disrespects—aggressively disrespects—more than half the human beings in this country. He thinks that because he has money, that he can call women "fat pigs" and "bimbos." He thinks because he is a celebrity, that he can rate women's bodies from one to ten. He thinks that because he has a mouthful of Tic Tacs, that he can force himself on any woman within groping distance.

Well, I got news for you, Donald Trump! Women have had it with guys like you! And nasty women have really had it with guys like you! Yeah.

Get this, Donald: Nasty women are tough. Nasty women are smart. And nasty women vote!

And on November 8th, we nasty women are gonna march our nasty feet to cast our nasty votes to get you out of our lives forever! Yup!

AMAZING!

And let me also comment once again on the sartorial commentary of the Democratic candidate, Ms. Hillary Rodham Clinton. She is wearing blue. While Warren is wearing red. While Hassan is wearing purple.

I see what you did there, ladies! A+

In the News

Here is some stuff in the news today...

RIP Tom Hayden. "Tom Hayden, the preeminent 1960s radical who roused a generation of alienated young Americans, became a symbol of militancy by leading riotous protests at the 1968 Democratic National Convention, and added Hollywood glamour to his mystique with an activist partnership and marriage to film star Jane Fonda, died Oct. 23 in Santa Monica, Calif. He was 76." Truly an end of an era. My condolences to his family, friends, colleagues, and fans.

Katie Klabusich was kind enough to have me on her show again, and you can listen to it here!

[Content Note: Hacking; sexual assault; misogyny] This is a really fascinating read: "Inside the Strange, Paranoid World of Julian Assange." Another case of "this is a guy who clearly has a problem with women, which is why you maybe should have never turned him into a hero in the first place," but don't mind Cassandra!

[CN: Climate change] Damn: "Levels of CO2 in the atmosphere have surged past an important threshold and may not dip below it for 'many generations.' The 400 parts per million benchmark was broken globally for the first time in recorded history in 2015. But according to the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO), 2016 will likely be the first full year to exceed the mark. The high levels can be partly attributed to a strong El Niño event."

Ugh. "AT&T/Time Warner deal could be approved without any FCC merger review."

[CN: Guns; racism] The Mothers of the Movement continue to campaign with and for Hillary Clinton, making their case for why they hope people will vote—and vote for her.

Donald Trump's strategy of trying to depress enthusiasm among Clinton supporters by dragging the campaign down in the dirt has wildly backfired: "The key finding in the new ABC News tracking poll, which finds Clinton leading among likely voters nationally by 50-38, is that affirmative support for Clinton among her supporters, as opposed to a motivator only rooted in dislike for the other side, is growing. As ABC's polling memo notes, the percentage of Clinton supporters who say their vote will be for her [as opposed to against Trump] is at a new high." And it's increased 16 points since early September.

LOVE: "That look when you cap off a day on the trail by watching the Cubs cement their trip to the World Series."

Awwwww: "Grandma Gets Emotional When Family Surprises Her with Puppy." The puppy she always wanted!

What have you been reading?

Daily Dose of Cute

image of Matilda the Fuzzy Sealpoint Cat wrapped in a blanket, looking all sleepy, with her whiskers curled around pointing toward her nose

Cat Bedhead is waking up from your nap with your whiskers pointing the wrong way.
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.

Quote of the Day

pic.twitter.com/e6CfLp7wr0
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) October 22, 2016

Image Description: Photo of Tim Kaine in front of a U.S. flag, wearing a Hillary pin, smiling. Text added to the photo by me reads: "I'm so proud to be a strong man supporting a strong woman who will be the next president of the United States."

Kaine said these words during a huge rally in Philly that he attended with Hillary Clinton in front of a huge crowd over the weekend.

This Is Disgusting

[Content Note: Violent imagery.]

Donald Trump held a rally in Virginia Beach over the weekend, and, along with the usual vile chants toward Hillary Clinton, there was a disgusting display of violent imagery toward her on display.

Spotted at Trump VA Beach rally - bullseye with Clinton's face on it pic.twitter.com/GFJzdm0Mcl
— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) October 22, 2016

[Tweet includes image of Trump supporter holding up Trump sign with Clinton's face in a target.]

Spotted at Donald Trump's rally in Virginia Beach: Hillary Clinton's head on a stake. pic.twitter.com/iqnya3NeuF
— Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) October 22, 2016

[Tweet includes image of a Trump supporter holding up an effigy on Clinton's head on a stake.]

VA Beach [📷 @evanvucci] pic.twitter.com/SDwbkqYRbZ
— Katy Tur (@KatyTurNBC) October 23, 2016

[Tweet includes image of a Trump supporter holding up a poster with Clinton's face in a target.]
This is absolutely despicable. Trump clearly did not invent vicious hatred toward Clinton, but he has inflamed it and he has exploited it and he tolerates it.

This man has to be rejected with a massive landslide and his campaign of white nationalist and misogynist hatred forcefully repudiated by voters.

Think About What This Says About Her

I've got a new piece at Shareblue about what it says about Hillary Clinton that she's dedicated so much of her life and career advocating for children:

Hillary Clinton often says that she has spent her life advocating for children, women, and families. She has — but rarely do we consider what this says about her.

And, more specifically, how it crushes so many pernicious narratives about her.

Does someone who is, as she is so frequently said to be, ruthlessly ambitious, who will stop at nothing to seize ever more power, dedicate her life to children, who cannot vote? Who cannot give her money? Who have no cultural power to grant to her?

Part of the reason that there are so few politicians who center their work around children is for this very reason. Children are a special interest group with nothing immediate to offer in exchange for advocacy on their behalf.

When children are invoked in political discourse, it is rarely as their own rights-bearing citizens with diverse needs, but generally as dehumanized political justification for harming a marginalized population from whom they need to be "saved" or "protected." Pro-choice activists, LGBTx people, atheists, etc.

They are often rhetorical tools to most politicians, rather than a demographic in need of passionate advocates.

But not to Hillary Clinton.

As always, there's more at the link!

Open Thread

image of a purple sofa

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

The Virtual Pub Is Open

image of a pub Photoshopped to be named 'The I'm With Her Pub'

[Explanations: lol your fat. pathetic anger bread. hey your gay.]

TFIF, Shakers!

Belly up to the bar,
and name your poison!

Two-Minute Nostalgia Sublime

Travis: "Flowers in the Window"

This week's TMNS has been brought to you by Scottish bands.

The Friday Blogaround

This blogaround brought to you by hazelnuts.

Recommended Reading:

Angry Asian Man: Help Defend Asian American Voting Rights on Election Day

Sasha: Clinton Drops Another Trump Burn After Night of Jokes

Jorge: Hillary Went Out and Partied with Latinx Voters After Crushing Trump in Vegas Debate

Keith: [CN: Sexual violence] Jurors Pose for Photos with Derrick Rose Following Conclusion of Rape Trial

Andy: [CN: Transphobia] Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick Rebrands Anti-LGBT Bathroom Bill as 'Women's Privacy Act'

Charline: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Talks Empowerment Through Cosmetics as Face of a New Makeup Campaign

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

"Would my son have a place in your America?"

[Content Note: War; death; Islamophobia.]

Khizr Khan, the father of a Muslim U.S. soldier who gave his life for his country in Iraq, came to be known by most of us when he used his platform at the Democratic convention to ask the Republican nominee: "Donald Trump, you're asking Americans to trust you with their future. Let me ask you: Have you even read the United States Constitution?"

Now, he is featured in a powerful and moving new ad for Hillary Clinton, despite the fact that his speaking out has had a steep cost for his family.

In 2004, my son was stationed in Iraq. He saw a suicide bomber approaching his camp. My son moved forward to stop the bomber, when the bomb exploded. He saved everyone in his unit. Only one American soldier died. My son was Captain Humayun Khan. He was 27 years old, and he was a Muslim American. I want to ask Mr. Trump: Would my son have a place in your America?

I feel very grateful for Mr. Khan's continued willingness to share his story and perspective during this election, in spite of the risk. I regret the reasons he has been obliged to do so. We need his voice. I value it enormously.

I See What You're Doing, Donald Trump

[Content Note: Misogyny; racism.]

Donald Trump went off on Michelle Obama today, in a very particular way, and I am incandescently angry about it. I've got a new piece at Shareblue deconstructing exactly what he's up to:

Trump is mischaracterizing the First Lady's eight-year-old words, and in a very particular and pernicious way.

He is attempting to create a rift in what has been seen as a profoundly inspiring political partnership between two of the most prominent and admired women in the nation, who are strongly allied on the subject of women's empowerment and eradicating gender bias.

And who are united in condemning his attitudes and behavior toward women, and united in trying to defeat him.

So he is attempting to drive a wedge between them, and subvert the unified passion so many women across the nation have for the work Michelle Obama and Hillary Clinton are doing together on our behalf.

This is an age-old disruptive strategy used by anti-feminist men, particularly white men who are unnerved by seeing alliances between Black and non-Black feminists.

Trump further suggests that his mischaracterization of Obama's words give him license to personally attack Clinton.

This is an ugly, despicable thing he's said — part of a long, ugly, despicable history of dividing to conquer feminist women.

There is more at the link, including video, with a complete transcript, of what he said.

The way this will get reported is that he's just being his usual bullying self, this time with the First Lady in his target. But it's much more sinister than that. And he knows it, even if most of the people listening to him don't.

In the News

Here is some stuff in the news today...

[Content Note: Misogyny] A Republican Congressman from Texas defended Donald Trump sneering into his microphone "such a nasty woman" during the third presidential debate, because "a lady needs to be told when she's being nasty." Yes, that's a real thing that happened, and I've got a piece at Shareblue on it.

Good news in reproductive health: "A federal judge on Thursday sided with women's health provider Planned Parenthood in a lawsuit aiming to block a Mississippi law that barred medical providers that perform abortions from participating in the state's Medicaid program. The decision by U.S. District Judge Daniel Jordan III is the latest in a string of rulings striking down similar laws elsewhere in the country against the women's health provider. Jordan's two-page order noted a ruling from the 5th U.S. District Court of Appeals that rejected a similar law in Louisiana, saying 'essentially every court to consider similar laws has found that they violate' federal law."

Former RNC Chair Michael Steele says he won't be voting for Trump. I'm not surprised that Steele isn't supporting him, but I didn't realize this: "Steele is the third former Republican National Committee Chairman to say he won't support Trump." Welp.

[CN: Video may autoplay at link] This MIT-engineered crib to help babies sleep looks amazing. Please make one for adults and then take my money.

Awwwwww: "Experts Say Dogs Dream About Their Humans; People Can't Stop Crying."

What have you been reading?

Daily Dose of Cute

image of Olivia the White Farm Cat sitting up in a chair

Someone thinks she's people.
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.

An Observation

I read a headline last night, to which I'm not going to link, that described this election as "soul-crushing."

No, it isn't.

That is not to say it isn't sad in many ways, or hard, or upsetting.

But we are also very likely about to elect the first woman president of this nation. Who also happens to be the most qualified candidate ever to seek the office.

If you can describe this election as "soul-crushing," while giving no attention to that enormously exciting and important detail, maybe the problem isn't really the election, but you.

Blog Note

Hey, everyone: Just wanted to make a request to the community to not post photos of ballots in comments. It's not legal everywhere: It depends on where you live and how you post it. But just to be on the safe side, the mods will be deleting any posted pictures of ballots. And you can help us out by not posting them in the first place! Thanks in advance for your understanding.

It's Not Just You

[Content Note: Disablist language.]

You're not crazy: The internet is messed up right now https://t.co/tckhZpkuvg pic.twitter.com/iFdsWWf5Jj
— The Atlantic (@TheAtlantic) October 21, 2016

There's more at Gizmodo:

Twitter, Spotify and Reddit, and a huge swath of other websites were down or screwed up this morning. This was happening as hackers unleashed a large distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack on the servers of Dyn, a major DNS host. It's probably safe to assume that the two situations are related.

Domain Name Servers (DNS) act as the Internet's phone book. Basically, they facilitate your request to go to a certain webpage and make sure you are taken to the right place. If the DNS provider that handles requests for Twitter is down, well, good luck getting to Twitter. Some websites are coming back for some users, but it doesn’t look like the problem is fully resolved.

Dyn posted this update on its website: "Starting at 11:10 UTC on October 21th-Friday 2016 we began monitoring and mitigating a DDoS attack against our Dyn Managed DNS infrastructure. Some customers may experience increased DNS query latency and delayed zone propagation during this time. Updates will be posted as information becomes available."

There is a list of websites experiencing problems at the link.

The Al Smith Dinner: Trump Gets Booed; Clinton Hands Trump His Ass

If you don't know what the Al Smith Dinner is, here's a brief description care of Wikipedia: "The Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, commonly known as the Al Smith Dinner, is an annual white tie fundraiser for Catholic charities supporting needy children held at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York on the third Thursday of October. It is organized by the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation in honor of former New York Governor Al Smith, the first Catholic presidential candidate; the dinner is hosted by the Archbishop of New York (currently Cardinal Timothy Dolan). The first dinner was in 1945, the year after Al Smith's death. It is generally the last event at which the two U.S. presidential candidates share a stage before the election [during presidential election years]."

Not only do the candidates share a stage: They roast each other, and, typically, themselves.

So, last night, the two candidates showed up and did their thing. I'm sure you'll be shocked to hear that Donald Trump behaved abysmally. His jokes were cruel, and he got booed by the audience, which is unprecedented in the history of the Al Smith Dinner. The closest he got to sending up himself was throwing Melania under the bus in a plagiarism joke.

[Complete transcript.]
Hillary Clinton, wearing pink for breast cancer awareness month, but choosing the precise bright pink of Planned Parenthood, which I'm guessing is no coincidence because she is AMAZING, was genuinely funny with a far superior delivery, and she handed Trump his ass.

[Complete transcript.]

Welp, Hillary just handed Trump his ass at the #AlSmithDinner. "He looks at the Statue of Liberty and sees a 4" absolutely ended me.
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) October 21, 2016

"He's as healthy as a horse--the horse Putin rides around on" was a close second. Omgggggg lol. #AlSmithDinner
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) October 21, 2016

What's fascinating to me about Clinton's segment is that Trump seems delighted that she's even mentioning him, as opposed to the usual stony-faced reception he usually gives at these sorts of things. Honestly, it's the closest I've ever seen him come to actually laughing.

I'm not sure what that's about, exactly, but it reminds me of this ex-boyfriend of a friend of mine, who was the most enormous douchebag, and, the first time we met, referred to my friend and me as broads. "Are you broads ready to go or what?" I'd already suffered a half-hour of this guy's misogynistic bravado, and I replied with a snarl through a saccharine smile: "Modern women prefer to be called cunts." He paused, his eyes flashed, and then he broke out into cascading laughter. "I like this one!" he pronounced to my friend.

Whatever that's about is what was going on with Donald Trump as he watched Hillary Clinton last night.

Anyway. In summation: Donald Trump is an unfunny jerkbag and Hillary Clinton rules. The end.

Open Thread

image of a pink couch

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

Question of the Day

[Note: I am wrapping up a little early today, because I am going to be talking to Katie Klabusich this afternoon! I'll see you tomorrow.]

Suggested by Shaker Blue_Cat: "What have you been reading recently?" Other than political news, of course!