Question of the Day
Suggested by Shaker livi: "What is your favorite guilty pleasure TV?"
I've made no secret of the fact that I love garbage TV, and I'm shameless about it, so... All of it? LOL.
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 a photo I took recently of our Jason Tennant crow, showing what a lovely shadow it casts in the evening light, after Iain noticed the cool optical illusion it was creating:
Pence: Maybe We'll Arm Space Force with Nukes
Yesterday, Donald Trump vowed to increase the United States' nuclear capacity and threatened to deploy those nukes against foreign adversaries if he deemed it necessary.
Today, Mike Pence suggested that the Trump Regime might arm its planned Space Force with nuclear weapons. Robert Costa at the Washington Post reports:
Vice President Pence on Tuesday declined to rule out the idea of deploying nuclear weapons in space, saying the current ban on their use is "in the interest of every nation" but the issue should be decided on "the principle that peace comes through strength."In addition to the general "WHAT THE FUCK IS EVEN HAPPENING" of this item, two things to note:
"What we need to do is make sure that we provide for the common defense of the people of the United States of America and that's the president's determination here," Pence said in an interview with The Washington Post, when asked if nuclear weapons should be banned from orbit.
Pence added, "What we want to do is continue to advance the principle that peace comes through strength."
The new positioning comes as the Trump administration moves to potentially exit a major nuclear weapons pact with Russia and possibly bolster U.S. military operations in the heavens by forming a "Space Force."
The 1967 Outer Space Treaty outlawed weapons of mass destruction from space, including nuclear weapons, and stopped the arms race between the U.S. and the former Soviet Union from entering space.
...Pence announced in August that the administration hopes to establish Space Force as the sixth branch of the U.S. military as soon as 2020, the first since the Air Force was formed after World War II.
1. "Peace comes through strength" has been used to justify all sorts of things that are not really about strength at all, but about fear and malice. This is a prime example of that dynamic.
2. Pence, who has had designs on the presidency his entire life, just asserted that the defense of the nation and its people is exclusively "the president's determination."
That is not accurate. (At least, it's not supposed to be.)
It's chilling any time someone implies the president has unilateral decision-making about defense; it's especially so when the person making the implication aspires to the presidency himself — and is the proverbial one heartbeat away.
Fat Fashion
This is your semi-regular thread in which fat women can share pix, make recommendations for clothes they love, ask questions of other fat women about where to locate certain plus-size items, share info about sales, talk about what jeans cut at what retailer best fits their body shapes, discuss how to accessorize neutral colored suits, share stories of going bare-armed for the first time, brag about a cool fashion moment, whatever.
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I just got this mixed media top from Loft, and I love it so much! It's so easy to just throw on and wear for a casual look, or to dress up a bit. I wore it the other day with a pair of jeans from Old Navy and my Winnie Weejuns from G.H. Bass & Co.
You can just see in that image the back of the top peeking around from the side. The back is the same floral as you see at the bottom of the front of the top. I took an awkward picture over my shoulder so you could see, lol.
I've said this before, and I'll say it again: Loft is doing a great job with their new plus size line. The quality is commensurate with the pricing (and, by the way, they have frequent sales, too), and the styling is above-average for mainstream plus size clothing. It's also one of the few places at the moment where I feel I can find lots of good options as a 44-year-old, since a lot of plus size lines feel either too young or too old for me.
Anyway! What's up with you?
Have at it in comments! Please remember to make fat women of all sizes, especially women who find themselves regularly sizing out of standard plus-size lines, welcome in this conversation, and pass no judgment on fat women who want to and/or feel obliged, for any reason, to conform to beauty standards. And please make sure if you're soliciting advice, you make it clear you're seeking suggestions—and please be considerate not to offer unsolicited advice. Sometimes people just need to complain and want solidarity, not solutions.
[Note: I am not receiving anything in return for my recommendations here, nor am I affiliated in any way with any of the companies mentioned herein. Any endorsements made are on products I purchased myself, just because I like them!]
Daily Dose of Cute
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.
We Resist: Day 642
One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures (plus the occasional non-Republican who obliges us to resist their nonsense, too, like we don't have enough to worry about) is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.
So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.
Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.
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Earlier today by me: Trump Boasts That He's a "Nationalist" at Nativist Rally; Attacks Liberal Women and The Trump Effect: It's "Okay to Grab Women" and Trump Threatens "Whoever" with Nuclear War, and It Barely Makes the News.
Here are some more things in the news today...
[Content Note: Nativism; harassment; exploitation. Covers entire section.]
In further "Trump doesn't exist in a vacuum" news... Nicole Rojas at Newsweek: Woman Demands Passports from Tourists After They Spoke Spanish at Virginia Restaurant. "The woman harassed a Latina woman and her family, visiting from Guatemala after they spoke in Spanish. 'She asked for our passports. She said she knew everyone in the county and told us to leave,' the Latina woman, who asked to remain anonymous, told Telemundo's Washington D.C., affiliate. 'We told her: We're not speaking with you; we're speaking among ourselves.' The unidentified white woman was captured on cellphone video approaching the family and launching an expletive-filled rant. 'You don't freeload in this fucking country,' the woman can be heard yelling. 'You get the fuckk out, back to your fucking country.' The woman claimed the Guatemalan tourists were freeloaders 'on America,' according to the video posted by Telemundo."
It's not a coincidence that this happened at the same time that Donald Trump — and other members of the Republican Party — are relentlessly fear-mongering about a caravan of refugees headed for the southern border, to escape desperate violence in Central America.
Relatedly:
Gary Younge at the Guardian: 'They Want to Take Me Away': Immigrants Under Attack as Trump Tries to Rally Republican Base. "Ricardo was one of the first. As summer progressed almost 40 people in this Wisconsin town of 80,000, with a Latino population of around 16,000, have been detained. One man was stopped in his car as he drove three friends to work. They were only looking for him but they were all detained. In a meeting with the Interfaith Coalition, the county sheriff described the fellow passengers as 'collateral damage.' Now an entire community lives in fear. People aren't leaving their houses, not even to go to church. One man, who has stopped going to work, is living from odd jobs he does for church members who drive him to and from home."
Ian Millhiser at ThinkProgress: Neil Gorsuch's First Opinion of the New Supreme Court Term Is an Attack on Immigrant Communities. "In a brief opinion joined only by Justice Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch cast his lot on Monday with the Trump administration's effort to rig the 2020 Census in order to reduce the political influence of immigrant communities. Should this plan ultimately succeed, it is likely to shift power towards white people and away from Latinos."
Even if it were inconceivable ("You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."), there's still the problem that Trump and Pence are cynically and sinisterly equating "people of Middle Eastern descent" with "terrorists." https://t.co/BmSaoSM3Xb
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) October 23, 2018
Vera Bergengruen at BuzzFeed: Immigrant Recruits Are Having Their "Loyalty" Questioned for Following Lawsuits Against the Pentagon.
When the 29-year-old US Army recruit finally received the results of her security screening, a year after the exhaustive eight-hour counterintelligence interview all foreign-born soldiers must take and almost three years since her enlistment, she laughed in disbelief.Disgusting.
Under "Loyalty," she had been flagged for comments she made about following a series of lawsuits filed on behalf of immigrant recruits like her who'd enlisted in the U.S. military with a promised path to citizenship only to find themselves mired in years of bureaucratic limbo and at risk of deportation while they wait.
"I was shocked seeing it in under 'loyalty issues.' How is this disloyal to the United States, or dishonest? Of course I follow these lawsuits, these claims have merit," she told BuzzFeed News, speaking on the condition of anonymity for fear of endangering her family in her home country. "This really smells like retaliation. I felt like the screener was thinking 'hell, yeah, I can use that against you.'"
Sam Levin at the Guardian: Tech Firms Make Millions from Trump's Anti-Immigrant Agenda, Report Finds. "Silicon Valley technology corporations including Amazon, Palantir, and Microsoft make millions from U.S. immigration enforcement, according to a new report. They provide tools that aid surveillance, detention, and deportation of individuals targeted by Donald Trump's anti-immigrant agenda, according to a paper published Tuesday by a coalition of immigrant rights groups. The report outlined ways Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has expanded its reach, with infrastructure from tech companies that have faced growing internal and external pressure to cancel their contracts."
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[CN: Abduction, violence, and death. Covers entire section.]
There are reports today that Jamal Khashoggi's remains have been found. There has been no official confirmation and, as far as I have seen as of this writing, no positive identification made by Khashoggi's family. Because there are a lot of agendas among the various state actors involved in his murder, I would caution you to be wary of such news unless and until there is a public statement from his loved ones.
John Hudson, Shane Harris, and Josh Dawsey at the Washington Post: CIA Director Flies to Turkey Amid Growing Controversy over Jamal Khashoggi Killing. "CIA Director Gina Haspel departed for Turkey on Monday amid a growing international uproar over Saudi Arabia's explanation of the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, according to people familiar with the matter. ...The arrival of the director suggests an effort by the U.S. intelligence community to assess the information the Turks have, including what Turkish officials have said is audio that captures the killing. Intelligence officials are increasingly skeptical of the Saudi account and have warned [Donald] Trump that the idea that rogue operators flew to Istanbul and killed Khashoggi without the knowledge or consent of Saudi leaders is dubious, a White House official said."
Mary Lee at Politico: Turkish President Claims Saudis Planned for Days to Kill Khashoggi. "Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday declared that plans for the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi were hatched days before he disappeared inside the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul, disputing the Saudi government's claim that Khashoggi was accidentally killed during an argument. Erdogan, in remarks reported by The Associated Press, called on Saudi Arabia to divulge details on who ordered Khashoggi's 'savage murder' and demanded the 18 Saudi agents suspected of executing that order be tried in Turkish courts."
Anonymous in Saudi Arabia at ThinkProgress: Inside Saudi Arabia, Media Narratives of Khashoggi Killing Absolve Kingdom of Responsibility. "Until now, much coverage of resurgent Saudi nationalism has emphasized the more cheerful aspects of the kingdom's newly embraced secular identity. The socio-economic reforms championed by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, including an end to 'extremist ideas' and curtailed powers for Saudi religious authorities, have been coupled with state efforts to promote peaceful displays of national pride — flags and scarves and everything green on Saudi National Day, new investments in cultural heritage projects. Yet darker aspects of this renewed national attachment have been deployed alongside efforts to drown out any hint of dissent."
Alan Rappeport at the New York Times: Saudi Crown Prince Gets Standing Ovation Despite Inquiries into Khashoggi. "Saudi Arabia's crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, received a standing ovation as he made an unannounced appearance at a global investment conference [in Riyadh] on Tuesday, further clouding an event that has been thrown into disarray after the killing of a dissident Saudi journalist. The crown prince, who is suspected of playing a role in the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, appeared just ahead of a late afternoon presentation about technology but did not give any remarks. His presence came as American business executives attending the conference tried to keep a low profile and Saudi business leaders attempted to distance themselves from Mr. Khashoggi's murder."
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Fact check: Trump claims GOP is protecting people with pre-existing conditions. Evidence says otherwise. https://t.co/CQgsfBl9pX
— NBC Politics (@NBCPolitics) October 23, 2018
Josh Kovensky at TPM: Trump Lawyer Rudy Giuliani Headlines Pro-Russian Conference in Armenia.
Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani has a new side gig: Conference headliner in Armenia.
The 74-year-old Trump defense attorney spoke Tuesday in Yerevan at the International Forum of Eurasian Partnership, a conference aimed at promoting the Eurasian Economic Union — the Russia-organized economic bloc.
The former New York City mayor and current personal attorney to President Trump was the final speaker at a plenary session titled "technological breakthroughs and potential opportunities of the countries of the Eurasian Economic Union."
Joining Giuliani, a former U.S. attorney in the Southern District of New York, was Sergey Glazyev, an adviser to Russian President Vladimir Putin who was sanctioned in March 2014 for his role in the annexation of Crimea.
Glazyev, the Russian official Giuliani’s speaking alongside tomorrow, has his own history of working closely with one of America’s most well-known anti-Semites. https://t.co/zV91spJVkO pic.twitter.com/SyyCLTFbvG
— Casey Michel 🇰🇿 (@cjcmichel) October 23, 2018
[CN: Trans hatred] Amanda Michelle Gomez at ThinkProgress: Health Department Removes 'Gender' from Its Civil Rights Page. "The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) removed mentions of the term 'gender' from its civil rights webpage. The removals preceded a New York Times report on Sunday detailing a memo that the Trump administration is aiming to define gender as a fixed condition determined by genitalia at birth — and HHS is spearheading this effort. The Office of Civil Rights (OCR) webpage 'Discrimination on the Basis of Sex' was altered to remove ten mentions of the word 'gender,' according to a new report from the Sunlight Foundation's Web Integrity Project released on Tuesday. The changes occurred sometime between February 26, 2018 and March 5, 2018."
Audio leaked to @RollingStone reveals @BrianKempGA telling attendees at a closed-door campaign event that @staceyabrams’s voter turnout operation “continues to concern us, especially if everybody uses and exercises their right to vote.” Read my report. https://t.co/uAob3x4TVx
— Jamil Smith (@JamilSmith) October 23, 2018
April Reign also has an important thread on the Georgia governor's race, which begins here:
Today is the debate between Georgia governor candidates @staceyabrams & her opponent, who is currently GA's Secretary of State. I'm sure you've seen that there are active attempts to suppress votes. Lawsuits have been filed. But as if that wasn't enough... (#thread) #TeamAbrams
— April (@ReignOfApril) October 23, 2018
[CN: Homophobia; eliminationism] Andy Towle at Towleroad: Four Nashville Gay Bars Targeted by Pro-Trump 'MAGA' Hate Mail. "At least four gay bars in Nashville, Tennessee have been targeted with pro-Trump MAGA hate mail in the past week. ...The postcard has a 'MAGA' stamp on the back of it and has a return address that traces back to an empty lot in downtown Nashville. 'When you put a picture of an assault rifle on there which was used in the Pulse shooting and you mail it to every LGBT bar in Nashville, that is coming from a hateful place. To say that it's disturbing is an understatement,' [Melvin Brown, owner of Stirrup] said."
What have you been reading that we need to resist today?
Trump Threatens "Whoever" with Nuclear War, and It Barely Makes the News
Yesterday, Donald Trump was on his way to Marine One when a reporter shouted a question at him about increasing the United States' nuclear arsenal. He stopped, came back, and launched into an incredible, broad threat to deploy nuclear weapons.
President Trump told reporters that the US would increase its nuclear arsenal until other nations "come to their senses," days after he said he would withdraw the US from a Cold War nuclear treaty https://t.co/tEmqFic38n pic.twitter.com/ONkgde53YB
— CNN (@CNN) October 23, 2018
Transcript:So, there is a lot of news here. Trump says definitively that he is terminating the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) with Russia, and, although his word is garbage, it's still notable that he did say without equivocation that he's terminating a treaty which has been in effect since the Cold War.
Female reporter off-screen yells, over the sound of the helicopter: Sir, on the arms treaty, Mr. President! Are you prepared to build up the U.S. nuclear arsenal — you said you're gonna pull out of the arms deal? Treaty?
Trump shouts back: Until people come to their senses, we will build it up. [The reporter starts to ask another question; Trump holds up his hand and walks back in reporters' direction.] Until people come to their senses— Russia has not adhered to the agreement. This should have been done years ago. Until people come to their senses— We have more money than anybody else by far. We'll build it up — until they come to their senses. When they do, then we'll all be smart and we'll all stop and — by the way, not only stop; we'll reduce. Which I would love to do, but right now they have not adhered to the agreement.
Reporter: Is that a threat to Vladimir Putin?
Trump: It's a threat to whoever you want — and it includes China, and it includes Russia, and it includes anybody else that wants to play that game. You can't do that. You can't play that game on me.
Male reporter: You want more nukes, is what you're saying.
Female reporter: Are you actually going to withdraw, or— [crosstalk]
Trump: [crosstalk] —until they get smart. Until they get smart. They have not adhered to the spirit of that agreement or to the agreement itself — Russia. China's not included in the agreement; they should be included in the agreement. Until they get smart, there will be nobody that's gonna be even close to us.
Female reporter: Have you talked to our allies?
Trump: No, I have not. [crosstalk; male reporter asks inaudible question] I don't have to speak to 'em. I don't have to speak— I'm terminating the agreement, because they violated the agreement. I'm terminating the agreement.
Female reporter: When?! When?
Trump: Okay, thank you, everybody. [walks away]
Further, he not only vows to increase the U.S.'s nuclear capacity, but threatens to use those nukes on foreign adversaries — including China, amidst ongoing provocations of China by his administration — and broadens that threat to "whoever you want," on the basis of foreign states "being smart" and/or "coming to their senses."
All of this is extraordinary.
And yet it barely made headlines late yesterday or this morning. I have seen far more headlines about Trump's announcement that he has stopped calling Ted Cruz "Lyin' Ted" and now calls him "Beautiful Ted" than I have about Trump's announcement that he will increase the U.S. nuclear arsenal and nuke "whoever you want" unless they get "smart."
(And I certainly haven't seen any serious discussion about how this belligerent posturing about nuclear annihilation actually benefits both Russia and China, in different ways.)
The press still hasn't learned any lessons from 2016, and neither have most U.S. consumers of political media. Which, in addition to being totally depressing, is profoundly frightening. It's already too late to be learning these lessons.
And no one knows that better than Donald Trump.
The Trump Effect: It's "Okay to Grab Women"
[Content Note: Sexual assault.]
Speaking of behavior that doesn't happen in a vacuum: A 49-year-old Florida man is facing a federal charge of abusive sexual contact after he groped a female passenger on a flight.
He later told authorities that the president "says it's okay to grab women by their private parts."
It is not okay.
None of this is okay.
Trump Boasts That He's a "Nationalist" at Nativist Rally; Attacks Liberal Women
[Content Note: White supremacy; anti-Semitism; nativism; misogyny.]
Last night, at another Make America Clap for Me Again rally in Houston, Texas, Donald Trump went on another incredible rant, during which he told more spectacular lies about his own record and claimed popularity; his political opponents and critics; undocumented immigrants crossing the border to commit voter fraud; and more.
He also boasted about being a "nationalist," in what was less a dogwhistle than a bullhorn.
"You know, they have a word, it sort of became old-fashioned. It's called a nationalist," Trump said at a campaign event in Houston, where he rallied voters to support Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) in November's midterm elections.The crowd not only roared with applause, but broke out into a "USA! USA!" chant, just to drive home the point.
"And I say, 'Really? We're not supposed to use that word,'" Trump continued. "You know what I am? I'm a nationalist. Okay? I'm a nationalist."
As the crowd in the Houston Toyota Center roared with applause, the president continued: "Use that word. Use that word."
Again, I will note that Trump is a sophisticated media manipulator who did not become president by accident, and additionally knows how to play his cultists like a fiddle. He gives them talking points, and they repeat them. He sanitizes vile ideas, and they embrace them. He normalizes extreme language, and they use it.
He is getting more brazen in identifying himself as a white supremacist — and identifying himself as a "nationalist" and urging the deplorables to "use that word" is part of a strategy. One that becomes even clearer in context:
Trump's remarks followed a rebuke of "globalists" whom he accused of putting other nations' interests ahead of those of the United States.The term "globalist" is used by white supremacists to describe the global cabal of Jewish people who conspire to control the world economy. It's a whitewashed modern term used to express ancient anti-Semitism.
"Radical Democrats want to turn back the clock. Restore the rule of corrupt, power-hungry globalists," Trump said. "You know what a globalist is, right?"
He explained: "A globalist is a person that wants the globe to do well, frankly not caring about our country so much. And, you know what? We can't have that."
In addition to attacking refugees and Jews, Trump also launched jeremiads against his favorite female Democratic targets, to chants of "Lock her up!" from the crowd: Hillary Clinton, insisting that she must be investigated; Rep. Maxine Waters, again calling her a "low-IQ individual"; Sen. Elizabeth Warren, vowing he'll still call her Pocahontas; and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, mocking her over her role in the Kavanaugh hearing.
All of this has consequences. Trump's public behavior is hideously appalling on its own, but it also doesn't exist in a vacuum. As I have been saying about conservative bigotry and violent hyperbole for many, many years: This shit doesn't happen in a void.
To that end:
Sarah Mervosh, William K. Rashbaum, and Andrew R. Chow at the New York Times: At George Soros's Home in N.Y. Suburb, Explosive Device Found in Mailbox. "An explosive device was found on Monday in a mailbox at a home of George Soros, the billionaire philanthropist who is a favorite target of right-wing groups, in a suburb north of New York City, the authorities said. ...[J]ust this month, Representative Matt Gaetz, Republican of Florida, falsely speculated that Mr. Soros had funded a caravan of migrants moving north toward Mexico. There is no evidence that Mr. Soros paid thousands of migrants to storm the border. Nor is there evidence that Democrats support the effort, as [Trump] has said."
Fortunately, Soros was not home at the time, the bomb did not explode on its own, and the device was safely "proactively detonated" by bomb squad technicians.
But people are getting hurt and are going to keep getting hurt, because Trump's incendiary language against refugees, Jews, women, and other marginalized people is part of a sinisters strategy of stochastic terrorism.
Malice is the agenda, and Trump is encouraging his audiences to enact cruelties on his behalf against the people he designates as "enemies."
This is going to get a lot scarier.
Question of the Day
Suggested by Shaker aqf: "What's something that is universally accepted in a group you participate in (professional or serious avocation) that most 'outsiders' would find surprising or even counter-intuitive?"
That women are autonomous, rights-bearing, equal human beings with agency and the right of consent.
Monday Links!
This list o' links brought to you by piles of tissues.
Recommended Reading:
Anna Castro at the Transgender Law Center: Transgender Law Center Responds to Horrific Leaked Draft Memo by the Department of Health and Human Services Denying Humanity of Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Community
Jessica Silver-Greenberg and Natalie Kitroeff at the New York Times: [Content Note: Misogyny; reproductive discrimination; abuse] Miscarrying at Work: The Physical Toll of Pregnancy Discrimination
Peter Mishler with Tishani Doshi at LitHub: [CN: Misogynist violence] On Poetry, Being a Poet, and Writing a Battle Cry for #MeToo
Lindsay Gibbs at ThinkProgress: [CN: Exploitation] Why Last Week Was the Beginning of the End for NCAA Amateurism
Staff at NewsOne: Marshawn Lynch Launches Initiative to Provide Homeless People with Smartphones
Sara Delgado at Teen Vogue: Liam Payne Calls Out Daily Mail for Saying a Staff Member Was His "Mystery Girl"
Catie Keck at Earther: Mesmerizing Deep-Sea 'Headless Chicken Monster' Filmed in the Southern Ocean
Leave your links and recommendations in comments. Self-promotion welcome and encouraged!
World of Shakescraft
As you know, I am not a crafty person. I am terrible at crafts! And I'm only slightly better with DIY home projects, with the occasional modest success.
But lots of Shakers are very talented crafters and DIY-ers, and I am happy to read about all of your terrific projects! So here is a thread to talk about your current crafting and/or DIY project(s), completed projects, or future projects; to share ideas; to brag about your successes or lament your setbacks; and to solicit advice from fellow creators!
(As always, make sure you don't offer advice unless it's solicited.)
Have at it in comments!
Trans People Exist, Elections Matter, and Identity Politics Are Here to Stay
[Content note: Transphobia. Relatedly, by Liss: Trump Regime May Legislatively Obliterate the Definition of "Transgender".]
Per the New York Times:
"The [D]epartment [of Health and Human Services] argued in its memo that key government agencies needed to adopt an explicit and uniform definition of gender as determined 'on a biological basis that is clear, grounded in science, objective and administrable.' The agency’s proposed definition would define sex as either male or female, unchangeable, and determined by the genitals that a person is born with, according to a draft reviewed by The Times. Any dispute about one’s sex would have to be clarified using genetic testing.'"What this move tangibly means is that the Trump Administration is seeking to establish a federal, legal definition of gender that excludes trans and non-binary individuals, effectively eliminating HHS's, and possibly additional federal agencies', recognition and legal protection of trans and non-binary individuals.
I have three main takeaways:
(1) Transgender and non-binary people exist. For as much as the "non-politically-correct and proud of it" crowd likes to stake a monopoly on "facts," this Trump definition of "gender" is counter to reality.
(2) If I could relay anything to posterity about the importance of presidential elections, I would want to stress the following. Put aside the big, sweeping promises and slogans. "Revolution" in the U.S. isn't going to happen by simply electing a charismatic person in a presidential election, after which, the revolution will *jazz hands* have arrived.
Even with the disastrous Trump, his erosion of norms, liberties, and morals has occurred over a period of two years now. None of what we're seeing has happened overnight, even his "election" itself, which had a historical trajectory and context long in the making.
For those of us paying attention, the changes the Republicans have made since Trump was inaugurated are drastic and alarming. But, what have we become accustomed to as "just the way things are now"? What are we missing because it's being done behind the scenes, because it's not widely covered by the media, or because there's just so much all the time?
Take, for instance, how it's a critical role for presidents in our political system to make judicial and federal nominations and appointments. The recent Kavanaugh proceedings aside, these nominations and appointments, are often low-profile but just as insidious.
For instance, back in March 2017, the National Center for Transgender Equality noted that Trump had appointed Roger Severino to lead the Office of Civil Righs at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. At the time, they and a handful of other human rights organizations expressed grave concern over the appointment of Severino, "whose extreme views opposing women’s rights and transgender people brought him to prominence on the far right." And yet now, Severino is leading the charge to impose false sex and gender definitions across multiple federal agencies.
(3) Republicans know they can get away with attacking trans people partly because they know that many people on the moderate-to-left side of the political spectrum, particularly cishet white men, will give them sufficient cover.
Remember the spate of articles right after the 2016 election, those high-and-mighty "I told you so" taunts of marginalized people: You people had this coming for obsessing about identity politics!
I think about Mark Lilla's version of this genre often. His piece was called, "The End of Identity Liberalism." Wishful thinking, there? It was also published at The New York Times. For sufficient balance to all those "trans people are people" pieces, I suppose.
Even as Lilla suggests that people with (unlike himself?) identities are narcissists for wanting to be treated decently, his own piece is the height of self-centered lack of self-awareness. As you'll see, the pieces prove not that ordinary (read: white cishet men) Americans just want to focus on Issues Common to All Peoples, but that Hillary Clinton was right about them.
For, what else does one make of a mass of people who, by their own admission, simply don't care that their fellow human beings are treated inhumanely? For instance, Lilla snarked, "America is sick and tired of hearing about liberals' damn bathrooms," and gloated, "One of the many lessons of the recent presidential election campaign and its repugnant outcome is that the age of identity liberalism must be brought to an end."
There's also this opinion:
Don’t take this bait! - he WANTS Dems talking about identity for the next 16 days. https://t.co/zHIXE4kskj— Michael Pollan (@michaelpollan) October 21, 2018
Pollan's "sage advice" is really an admission that a large portion of Trump's base will revel in the "liberal tears" over this matter, which will energize them straight to the polls! Which is deplorable for them to do. But, one of our current "just the way things are" things is that we don't, no matter what, call Trump fans deplorable, because Hillary said it first and gods forbid we collectively admit she was right about a good goddamned thing.
That fact aside, it continues to strike me as an especially inapt time to ditch identity politics right at the moment a rightwing regime has been targeting people precisely because of their identities. The thing is, you give this sadistic, rage-entitled incarnation of the Republican Party an inch and they'll take a mile. I simply don't have confidence that its leaders see much moral and practical distance between ending the age of "identity liberalism" and ending people of particular identities.
Daily Dose of Cute
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.
We Resist: Day 641
One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures (plus the occasional non-Republican who obliges us to resist their nonsense, too, like we don't have enough to worry about) is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.
So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.
Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.
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Earlier today by me: Trump Regime May Legislatively Obliterate the Definition of "Transgender" and Trump Wants to Militarize the Border; He's Telling Lies to Justify It and Discussion Thread: Non-Appropriative Halloween Costumes.
Here are some more things in the news today...
Caleb Ecarma at Mediaite: Carl Bernstein: Trump Is Preparing to Declare Midterms 'Illegitimate' If Democrats Win. "Veteran journalist Carl Bernstein told CNN's Reliable Sources on Sunday that he has sources with knowledge of the administration who told him over the weekend that [Donald] Trump may call the midterms 'illegitimate' if Democrats squeeze out a win. 'I talked to people in touch with the White House on Friday who believe that, if the congressional midterms are very close and the Democrats were to win by five or seven seats, that Trump is already talking about how to throw legal challenges into the courts, sow confusion, declare a victory actually, and say that the election's been illegitimate — that is really under discussion in the White House,' Bernstein said on CNN yesterday, where he is a political analyst."
And, in the meantime, Republicans continue to try to cheat their way to victory, e.g. Jessica M. Goldstein at ThinkProgress: 10,000 Missouri Voters Received Republican Mailers with False Voting Information. "Some 10,000 voters in Missouri received mailers with incorrect information about the dates for their absentee ballots were due. The source? The Missouri Republican Party. Ray Bozarth, the party's executive director, admitted that his party was responsible for the misleading information but insisted the incorrect date was caused not by malice or an effort at voter suppression. It was, he said, simply 'the result of a miscommunication between the party and its vendor, which he declined to name,' as the Kansas City Star reported." Sounds legit.
They sure can't win on the merits of their policies or the integrity and skills of their candidates. AP/Guardian: Florida: Republican Governor Candidate Flounders over Trump as Role Model. "Florida gubernatorial candidate Ron DeSantis was asked on Sunday night if he thought Donald Trump, who endorsed him, was a good role model for children. DeSantis, who recorded a now famous campaign ad in which he taught his children the president's slogans and policies, responded by saying he thought Trump did the right thing by moving the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem." Woof.
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[Content Note: Nativism; child abuse] Miriam Jordan, Caitlin Dickerson, and Michael D. Shear at the New York Times: Trump's Plans to Deter Migrants Could Mean New 'Voluntary' Family Separations.
Facing a surge in migrant families entering the United States and with the midterm elections two weeks away, the Trump administration is weighing an array of new policies that it hopes will deter Central Americans from journeying north.This is exactly what I predicted would happen when Trump signed his executive order on immigration — that the public outrage about family separations would be exploited and misappropriated by the Trump Regime in defense of family internment. Fucking hell.
...The architects of the family separation approach have been hard at work on alternatives, according to people briefed on the group's efforts. Their goal is to announce a plan before the November elections that can withstand the legal challenges that crippled the administration's previous attempts.
The group's charge from the White House is simple and explicit: Replace what the administration describes as "catch and release," the practice of releasing immigrants from detention while they wait for court hearings.
The most talked-about alternative would be a variation of the family separation policy. Parents would be forced to choose between voluntarily relinquishing their children to foster care or remaining imprisoned together as a family. The latter option would require parents to waive their child's right to be released from detention within 20 days.
The goal of this option, known as "binary choice," would be to "maximize deterrence and consequences for families," according to a person familiar with the agenda for one of the officials' meetings.
GOP: “Let’s steal more children from parents.”
— Marc Love 🏳️🌈 (@marcslove) October 21, 2018
Pundits on Sunday shows: “Why are liberals so nasty?”
[CN: Nativism] Casey Michel at ThinkProgress: Trump Immigration Policy Breaks up a Military Family, Yet Again. "Furman, a former Canadian army captain, served in Afghanistan alongside American troops, and says he even achieved 'top-level security clearance,' according to the Guardian. The 47-year-old's work included stints alongside the CIA and the DEA. For good measure, his wife, Cynthia Furman, even worked as an officer in the U.S. Air Force. But as the Globe and Mail detailed last week, none of that mattered to the current administration, or to those working at Immigration, Customs, and Enforcement (ICE). ICE held the former artillery captain for months, due to a decades-old marijuana conviction — a conviction that had already been pardoned by the Canadian government."
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[CN: Abduction, violence, and death. Covers entire section.]
Martin Chulov at the Guardian: Jamal Khashoggi: Murder in the Consulate. "In the extraordinary 19 days since his disappearance and death, the fate of the 59-year old columnist and critic has steadily been pieced together. What happened inside the consulate walls has been traced to the doors of the Saudi royal court, sparked revulsion around the world, exposed the kingdom like no other event since the twin terror attacks of 9/11, and seen Washington and Riyadh shamelessly concoct a cover-up to protect their mutual interests and attempt to shield the powerful heir to the throne, Mohammed bin Salman."
Gul Tuysuz, Salma Abdelaziz, Ghazi Balkiz, Ingrid Formanek, and Clarissa Ward at CNN: Surveillance Footage Shows Saudi 'Body Double' in Khashoggi's Clothes After He Was Killed, Turkish Source Says.
A member of the 15-man team suspected in the death of Jamal Khashoggi dressed up in his clothes and was captured on surveillance cameras around Istanbul on the day the journalist was killed, a senior Turkish official has told CNN.Tamer El-Ghobashy, Kareem Fahim, and Carol Morello at the Washington Post: Saudi Attempts to Distance Crown Prince from Khashoggi Killing Haven't Quieted Uproar. "Saudi Arabia's foreign minister denied on Sunday that the nation's powerful young crown prince ordered Jamal Khashoggi's killing, but the attempt to distance Mohammed bin Salman from the journalist's demise did little to blunt an international uproar that could test Saudi Arabia's status as a regional power. At the same time, Saudi officials have failed to answer questions about where Khashoggi's remains are and have offered inconsistent narratives for how he was killed, undermining the government's assertion that Khashoggi died after a fistfight broke out when he was confronted by agents seeking to bring him back to Riyadh while he was visiting the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul on Oct. 2."
CNN has obtained exclusive law enforcement surveillance footage, part of the Turkish government's investigation, that appears to show the man leaving the consulate by the back door, wearing Khashoggi's clothes, a fake beard, and glasses.
The same man was seen in Khashoggi's clothing, according to the Turkish case, at the city's world-famous Blue Mosque just hours after the journalist was last seen alive entering the consulate on October 2.
The man in the video, identified by the official as Mustafa al-Madani, was allegedly part of what investigators have said was a hit squad, sent to kill the journalist at the Saudi consulate during a scheduled appointment to get papers for his upcoming wedding.
Kate Riga at TPM: Diplomats Disgusted with Pompeo's, Trump's Acceptance of Saudi Excuses. "Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's meeting with Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman last week, replete with broad grins and obsequiously grateful press releases, struck a discordant note with many in the light of the meeting's purpose: to suss out the details of journalist Jamal Khashoggi's murder. ...'Pompeo did not handle this well,' a former State Department official told Vanity Fair. 'I don't think it would have been difficult to be more somber in meetings and more nuanced in comments afterward.' 'Certainly from where I sit, it is discouraging to see the administration seemingly subordinate our values to other interests in such an egregious case,' a current State Department official added."
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Andrew Osborn and Tom Balmforth at Reuters: Kremlin: We'll Respond in Kind If U.S. Develops Intermediate Missiles. "The Kremlin said on Monday that Russia would be forced to respond in kind if the United States began developing new missiles after quitting a landmark Cold War-era treaty. [Donald] Trump said on Saturday that Washington would withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty because Russia was violating the pact, triggering a warning of retaliatory measures from Moscow. ...'This is a question of strategic security. Such measures can make the world more dangerous,' [Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov] said of the planned U.S. withdrawal."
[CN: Enslavement; exploitation] Betsy Woodruff at the Daily Beast: American Defense Contractor Accused of Enslaving U.S. Citizen Linguists. "A major American defense contractor held its translators in a tent city under slave-like conditions, breaking U.S. anti-slavery laws, according to allegations in a 2016 federal lawsuit that was recently unsealed. Under threat of arrest in Kuwait, the translators were held in tents where the temperature regularly topped 100 degrees. Company representatives seized their passports and indicated they would go to prison if they tried to escape. ...'These U.S.-citizen linguists are heroes — they go into combat unarmed to help minimize the chaos of the battlefield and gather intelligence,' said Joseph Hennessey, a lawyer representing the plaintiffs in both lawsuits. 'To have been treated so horrifically is unfathomable.'"
[CN: Class warfare] Olivia Paschal at the Atlantic: The Problem with Pence's New Talking Point. "At a rally last week in Wichita, Kansas, as Vice President Mike Pence kicked off a swing of campaign appearances across the Midwest, he unveiled a new GOP talking point. 'We're gonna stand firm and get a farm bill that includes work requirements for people, able-bodied Americans, on food stamps, so we get people back into the workforce and back enjoying the dignity of work,' Pence told the crowd, gathered at an old hangar near McConnell Air Force Base. 'We're going to do it.' He's probably wrong. The evidence that the new work requirements will hurt more than they help is mounting. ...Pence's support for 'dignity in work' belies the reality of the work requirements: According to a new study from the Brookings Institution's Hamilton Project, most SNAP recipients are either already working or physically can't."
What have you been reading that we need to resist today?
Discussion Thread: Non-Appropriative Halloween Costumes
As I've been obliged to write for many Halloweens now: Other people's identities are not your costume.
This continues to be a difficult concept for many people to grasp!
Here, however, is a thread to share ideas for non-appropriative costumes. Yay!
What are costumes you have worn yourself, are planning to wear, have seen other people wearing, etc. that don't borrow someone else's identity?
The last time I attended a Halloween party, I went as Grumpy Cat! A hat with cat ears (procured from Etsy), some face make-up to recreate her markings, and a white t-shirt onto which I'd spray-painted NO. Easy and fun.
Trump Wants to Militarize the Border; He's Telling Lies to Justify It
[Content Note: Nativism; Islamophobia.]
This morning, Donald Trump tweeted: "Sadly, it looks like Mexico's Police and Military are unable to stop the Caravan heading to the Southern Border of the United States. Criminals and unknown Middle Easterners are mixed in. I have alerted Border Patrol and Military that this is a National Emergy [sic]. Must change laws!"
Of course his stupid typo ("Emergy") is trending, because everyone's got jokes, since we're two years in and still haven't learned that mocking Trump isn't an effective strategy to halt rampaging authoritarianism.
As I noted on Twitter, there's something rather more important in that tweet: "Yes, 'emergy.' Ridiculous. But also: The President of the United States just asserted without evidence that 'unknown Middle Easterners are mixed in' to a caravan of refugees, which is some extreme Islamophobic trash to justify 'antiterrorism' measures at the border."
And of course Trump heard this garbage on Fox & Friends — though I'll note the shitwheels on Fox & Friends explicitly referred to terrorists, while Trump just said "Middle Easterners" and assumes (rightly, no doubt) that the deplorables will fill in the rest.
Just last Thursday, he threatened to close down the southern border altogether, and has repeatedly threatened to militarize the border in response to undocumented immigration. Now, he's escalating — asserting that the military must be deployed to the border to stop terrorists.
This, like the rest of Trump's arguments employed in defense of his nativist agenda, is a damnable lie.
Again, I want to underline: There is no urgent crisis threatening the United States because of undocumented immigration — not an employment crisis, not a crime and violence crisis, not a health crisis.
Their vile nativism is for no reason other than malice, which lies at the center of Trump's entire agenda.
Trump Regime May Legislatively Obliterate the Definition of "Transgender"
[Content Note: Trans hatred.]
Erica L. Green, Katie Benner, and Robert Pear at the New York Times report: "The Trump administration is considering narrowly defining gender as a biological, immutable condition determined by genitalia at birth, the most drastic move yet in a governmentwide effort to roll back recognition and protections of transgender people under federal civil rights law. ...The new definition would essentially eradicate federal recognition of the estimated 1.4 million Americans who have opted to recognize themselves — surgically or otherwise — as a gender other than the one they were [assigned at birth]."
There is much more at the link, but that's the basic gist.
Two points:
1. This has Mike Pence's filthy, Christian Supremacist fingerprints all over it.
2. There has already been an enormous amount of digital ink spilled in thinkpieces deconstructing the motivations behind this move, and I'm just going to be really blunt about my feelings on that: The why doesn't matter.
Every moment trying to assign rational (if heinous) explanations for this flaming garbage mound of undiluted hatred is a moment wasted, because it's a moment conceding the vile pretense that there is some reason for this proposed policy other than deliberate harm.
The object is malice.
Whatever transparent bullshit they offer as the thinnest veneer of legitimacy should never, ever, be treated as a principled position. It should be treated with naught but contempt.
Malice is the agenda. The rest is farce.
I will not engage with that farce, because it only benefits this sickening regime. This is wrong. It is cruel. There is zero justification for it. Denying people's identity and humanity is not "a difference of opinion." It's eliminationist trash.
