This again:

90 years after Virginia Woolf gave her feminist Cambridge lectures, asking for A Room of One’s Own, 500 Oxford students are persecuting @selina_todd and Senia Paseta for having a view of their own. https://t.co/9hv8TQ0nNH

— Kathleen Stock (@Docstockk) October 10, 2020

From the article:

More than 500 students and alumni at Oxford have come together to sign an open letter condemning “two professors with a history of transphobia”.

The letter expresses disappointment and distress over the controversial appointment of professors Selina Todd and Senia Paseta to lead a new programme on Women’s Equality and Inequality at the Oxford Martin School. Accusing the Martin School of ‘tacitly sanction(ing)’ the views of Professor Todd and Professor Paseta, the

Just one giant platform, that’s what.

Meet TIME’s 2020 Next Generation Leaders: “I have faith that everybody can grow.” @MunroeBergdorf on using her blossoming platform to educate the world about racism and transphobia https://t.co/WWV7sfozCl pic.twitter.com/aavB2ttI1D

— TIME (@TIME) October 9, 2020

… Read the rest

The BBC leans heavily on one side of the scale again.

LGBT rights campaigners have criticised World Rugby’s decision to prevent transgender women from competing at the highest levels of the women’s game.

Some have, and others have praised it.

LGBT charity Stonewall says it is “deeply disappointed” with the decision.

“The proposals were based on hypothetical data modelling that has little relevance to the questions of fairness and safety in rugby that the policy review sought to address,” said Stonewall chief executive Nancy Kelley.

Don’t be schewpid. Men are bigger and stronger than women, so letting them play on women’s teams is not fair as well as not safe. Parents don’t call for evidence before telling Joe age 14 … Read the rest

Thus we are reminded why intense religious cults are not benign.

Rebekah Powers was 11 when members of her faith group, the People of Praise, gathered around as she sat on a chair and laid their hands on her to pray. Powers’ sister had shown a gift for speaking in tongues, a defining trait of the followers of the small charismatic Christian community, and Rebekah was expected to do the same.

She couldn’t do it.

“I couldn’t get it, and I stayed there an hour and a half before they gave up and finally said, ‘You just have blockage. You need to just work on your sin and be more open,” she said.

There. That’s why. She was … Read the rest

Trump will be far away from the crowd.

The White House communications director, Alyssa Farah, says that today’s address from Donald Trump will be short and to the point. Although, as many of you will have noticed, brevity is not exactly the president’s strong point.

Neither is getting to the or making a point. There is no point, there’s only a surging mephitic sea of exclamations.

“The President’s at a great distance, he’s gonna be up on the balcony and very briefly address the supporters there,” Farah told reporters at the White House on Saturday.

But “the supporters” will be in a crowd. See the problem there?

If reports that 2,000 people have been invited to watch the president’s

In the blizzard yesterday I missed this one:

Just so it's clear. @realDonaldTrump today called for @BarackObama and @JoeBiden to be indicted and prosecuted. Have our standards fallen so far that this kind of antidemocratic authoritarian behavior passes without criticism? Is this now normal?

— Jeffrey Toobin (@JeffreyToobin) October 8, 2020

Oh did he.

Yes he did.

Wow!!! NOW DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS, THE BIGGEST OF ALL POLITICAL SCANDALS (IN HISTORY)!!! BIDEN, OBAMA AND CROOKED HILLARY LED THIS TREASONOUS PLOT!!! BIDEN SHOULDN’T BE ALLOWED TO RUN – GOT CAUGHT!!! https://t.co/hf7zjqZYQ4

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 7, 2020

The Girl Bot tweet is from 2018 but sure whatever.

Max Boot elaborates:

Trump’s henchman Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe

Lindsey Graham refuses to get a COVID test before he debates Jaime Harrison. Now why would he do that? Because he has it or suspects he has it?

A debate between incumbent Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and his Democratic challenger, Jamie Harrison, scheduled for Friday night was cancelled after Harrison demanded both candidates be tested for Covid-19 before the debate and Graham refused, leading the organizers to replace it with separate televised interviews.

Why refuse? Remember when people couldn’t get a test? Why would anyone refuse?

Last week, Graham said he tested negative for the coronavirus after President Donald Trump announced his Covid-19 diagnosis. Three senators, two of whom are on the Judiciary Committee, which Graham chairs, have tested positive

Aw Don wanted to go out and play again but it seems that being hospitalized with the covid just a few days ago means you can’t do that immediately.

President Donald Trump will remain at the White House this weekend, people familiar with the matter said, after he said he wanted to hold rallies in Florida and Pennsylvania despite questions over the stage of his recovery from Covid-19.

Covid shmovid; he wants to play.

White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany said Trump “will be clear to go” on Saturday, when “he wants to talk to the American people.” There are medical tests underway to ensure he doesn’t transmit the virus when he returns to the campaign trail, she

Trump blathered at Rush Limbaugh for a few hours just now, because obviously he has nothing more important to do.

Towards the end of the radio broadcast, Limbaugh remarked that the president’s stamina was proof he had recovered from the coronavirus.

“The president’s status with COVID-19 is pretty solid,” Limbaugh declared, adding: “Not once during the hour and 42 minutes has the president been stumped, has he not known what he’s wanted to say.”

Oh please. Trump always knows what he wants to say, which is it doesn’t matter what, because the point is to prevent others from talking. We’ve watched him do it a million times in those “press briefings” – the way he holds out his pudgy little … Read the rest

There’s standing in solidarity with and then there’s the other thing.

We’re deeply disappointed in World Rugby’s decision to move ahead with proposals to stop most trans women playing in competitions they govern.

We stand in solidarity with those who will feel shut out from the sport they love.https://t.co/Mm2hT5UCxO

— stonewalluk (@stonewalluk) October 9, 2020

StonewallUK means they stand in solidarity with men who identify as women who will feel shut out of women’s rugby. They do not mean they stand in solidarity with women who feel shut out of women’s rugby because playing against men will be too dangerous. They also ignore the fact that men who identify as women will not be shut out of men’s rugby. … Read the rest

Trump’s spiraling mania is causing “concern” among people who don’t want a feverish lunatic in control of the codes.

President Donald Trump‘s increasing political desperation is raising concerns about his judgment following his aggressive Covid-19 treatment and as suspicion mounts that the White House is not telling the truth about his health.

It’s not just “suspicion” though – we know for a fact that the White House is refusing to answer some key questions, like when Trump’s last negative test was. We know the White House is not telling the complete truth about Trump’s illness, even if we don’t know for sure that they’ve told lies.

He is pressing his aides to clear him to return to the campaign

Juana Summers at NPR:

President Trump referred to California Sen. Kamala Harris as “this monster” in an interview on Thursday, a continuation of his pattern of attacking Black women with demeaning insults. The president has previously reserved the term “monster” for terrorists, murders and major natural disasters.

…In a telephone interview on Thursday morning on the Fox Business Channel, Trump referred to Harris as “this monster that was onstage with Mike Pence, who destroyed her last night, by the way.”

“I thought that wasn’t even a contest last night. She was terrible. I don’t think you could get worse,” he added. “And totally unlikeable. And she is.”

Uh huh. And what is “unlikeable” code for? Ball-busting bitch, aka woman … Read the rest

Really?

‘trans women aren’t women’

okay well explain this then pic.twitter.com/b3w0QuMuVe

— Cambell Kenneford (@Cambellxo) October 6, 2020

Too easy! Give us something more difficult!

Explanation: that’s a male porny idea of “woman.” It’s not ours. … Read the rest

Last night’s news, but I just need to pin it down.

This is late evening on a day when it was all over the news that a group of wacko-right vigilantes were planning to kidnap Michigan’s governor Gretchen Whitmer. She’s a Democrat and a woman and she takes the necessary precautions during a lethal pandemic, so naturally the bully boys plan violence against her, and Trump cheers them on.

Governor Whitmer of Michigan has done a terrible job. She locked down her state for everyone, except her husband’s boating activities. The Federal Government provided tremendous help to the Great People of Michigan. My Justice Department and Federal Law Enforcement announced…

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 9, 2020

…I do

Ominous signs.

A top Republican senator has said that “democracy isn’t the objective” of America’s political system, sparking widespread outrage at a time when his party has been accused by Democrats of plotting voter suppression and questioning a peaceful transition of power in November’s election.

He did say that.

Democracy isn’t the objective; liberty, peace, and prospefity are. We want the human condition to flourish. Rank democracy can thwart that.

— Mike Lee (@SenMikeLee) October 8, 2020

Of course, how liberty, peace, and prospefity are defined will be up to the undemocratically selected Rulers, so the 90% of us on the bottom might not fare all that well.

His democracy tweet immediately prompted alarm, including from a number of

Some concerns:

Just days after being prescribed a powerful cocktail of drugs to treat his coronavirus infection, President Trump returned to the Oval Office on Wednesdayas he delivered a barrage of incendiary tweets that referred to a “treasonous plot” and “coup” against him.

Trump’s behavior, which included tweets about ending negotiations with Democrats over an economic stimulus package and then more tweets about resuming those negotiations, appeared erratic even by his standards and raised questions among some medical professionals about the effect of the treatment on his mental state and whether it impacted his ability to govern.

And not just among medical professionals! Among complete amateurs too! Trump’s behavior raises very pressing questions among me for instance.

Similar drugs,

NPR explains about the dexamethasone:

Dexamethasone is an anti-inflammatory drug used for a range of ailments, including arthritis, kidney, blood and thyroid disorders and severe allergies. The drug is on the World Health Organization’s list of essential medicines and is also used to treat certain types of cancer.

Earlier this year, a large clinical trial in the U.K. found that giving dexamethasone to patients hospitalized with COVID-19 reduced their risk of dying. Patients were given 6 milligrams of the drug for 10 days.

The study, published in The New England Journal of Medicine in July, found the drug cut mortality by a third among severely ill COVID-19 patients who were on ventilators, and by a fifth for patients

Also

Debates Motel pic.twitter.com/40lpMsDU6l

— The Daily Show (@TheDailyShow) October 8, 2020

… Read the rest

Official statement by official manager of official Trump campaign:

President Trump won the first debate despite a terrible and biased moderator in Chris Wallace, and everybody knows it. For the swamp creatures at the Presidential Debate Commission to now rush to Joe Biden’s defense by unilaterally canceling an in-person debate is pathetic. That’s not what debates are about or how they’re done. Here are the facts: President Trump will have posted multiple negative tests prior to the debate, so there is no need for this unilateral declaration. The safety of all involved can easily be achieved without canceling a chance for voters to see both candidates go head to head. We’ll pass on this sad excuse to bail out