Republicans are all like “It’s not such a big deal.”

Regardless of the explanations and justifications, the procedural vote is just the latest, clearest sign of fading Republican support for finding Trump responsible for the Capitol riot three weeks ago.

You can see their point. It was almost three weeks ago. Generations have been born and died since then. Memories have faded. It’s in the past now. Nobody gets hot under the collar about the War of 1812 and it’s the same with this.

Shortly after the incident, Lindsey Graham – one of the president’s closest allies in the Senate – said the president’s actions “were the problem” and that his legacy was “tarnished”.

Then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell reportedly

The Republicans are so shameless.

All but five Senate Republicans voted in favor of an effort to dismiss Donald Trump’s historic second impeachment trial on Tuesday, making clear a conviction of the former president for “incitement of insurrection” after the deadly Capitol siege on Jan. 6 is unlikely.

Just utterly shameless. Trump is a horror, and what he did before during and after the election was horrifying, including in terms that Republicans would normally sign up to (precedent, law, rule-following, respect, civility, tradition, truth-telling, Constitutionality), yet they’re still defending him.

What seemed for some Democrats like an open-and-shut case that played out for the world on live television is running into a Republican Party that feels very different. Not

Another point about that evasive non-response from Essex –

“a person can experience unknown genders”

What can that possibly mean? The whole point about these oh so important “genders” is that the people who claim to have them and experience them say they know they have them, and what they are, and what we have to do in relation to the fact – the cold hard fact – that they have and experience and know them. They don’t say it’s just some vague state of mind or mood, much less that they don’t know they have it, they insist, with menaces, that it’s real and they experience it and that experience is knowledge that it’s real. The reality is … Read the rest

Ah yes the infinitude of genders again. You just can’t have too many genders.

Remember @Uni_of_Essex claim that 'pangender' is a gender identity, 'whereby a person identifies with a multitude, and perhaps infinite (going beyond the current knowledge of genders) number of genders either simultaneously, to varying degrees, or over the course of time? Well… pic.twitter.com/vuwODrUMFU

— Kathleen Stock (@Docstockk) January 26, 2021

https://twitter.com/Docstockk/status/1354130254944751618

Very cunning, very very cunning, but the problem remains – if we don’t know what they are how can the guidance guide us into the correct behavior and mode of address and belief?

We derived some wholesome amusement from the infinite genders doctrine way back in February 2017:

This is hilarious. It’s incoherent nonsense, but

Gee, if only we could do that.

Ever since President Joe Biden emerged as the winner of the United States’ presidential election, Fr John Zuhlsdorf has been carrying out exorcisms about what he describes as “fraud” and “lying” during the vote-counting process. 

The prominent priest-blogger and President Trump supporter, also claimed that his Bishop, Donald Hying of Madison, granted him the authority to carry out the exorcism rite.  

His Bishop says oh no he didn’t.

The priest-blogger did an exorcism the day before the insurrection.

“I have the permission of the bishop to say this, which increases the authority of the praying of the prayer,” he said ahead of his 5 January exorcism which he carried out in Latin.

They were blocked.

The commander of the D.C. National Guard said the Pentagon restricted his authority ahead of the riot at the U.S. Capitol, requiring higher level sign-off to respond that cost time as the events that day spiraled out of control.

Is it because BLM protesters are scary while angry white guys who want to kill all the Democrats are just a little energetic?

Local commanders typically have the power to take military action on their own to save lives or prevent significant property damage in an urgent situation when there isn’t enough time to obtain approval from headquarters.

They can give the orders in an emergency.

But Maj. Gen. William J. Walker, the commanding general of the

Fauci agrees that it’s nice not having Trump ruining everything.

“One of the things that we’re going to do is to be completely transparent, open and honest,” Fauci told reporters [last week]. “If things go wrong, not point fingers, but to correct them. And to make everything we do be based on science and evidence.

“That was literally a conversation I had 15 minutes ago with the president, and he has said that multiple times.”

Asked if he would like to amend or clarify anything he said during the Trump presidency, Fauci insisted he had always been candid, noting wryly, “That’s why I got in trouble sometimes.”

…

At Thursday’s briefing, Fauci was asked how it feels to no longer

That’s one way of looking at it.

I think people are too quick to forget that we didn’t have the language & understanding of trans identities in the 80s that we do now. Many of the people who died would have been trans but wouldn’t have had the privilege to come out as such. That doesn’t mean they didn’t exist

— Calum McSwiggan (@CalumMcSwiggan) January 25, 2021

But it’s the wrong way. It’s not that we lacked the language and understanding of a truth, it’s that we hadn’t been bombarded with the rhetoric and bullying of a stupid ideology.

“Trans identities” are not a scientific discovery, they’re a pseudo-official name for a type of fantasy.

The fact that the ideology … Read the rest

Josh Hawley is a piece of work.

Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat, called out Senator Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican, for claiming in a widely read op-ed that he’s been “muzzled.”

In a cover essay published by the New York Post on Monday, Hawley claimed that he’d been “canceled” and “muzzled” in the U.S. The title of Hawley’s essay is “It’s time to stand up against the muzzling of America.” The GOP lawmaker, who has been widely criticized for formally objecting to Arizona’s and Pennsylvania’s electoral votes when they were certified by Congress earlier this month, linked to the article in a tweet Ocasio-Cortez later retweeted with criticism.

You were given prime space to say this

There is discussion over whether or not to charge all the insurrectionists, not because some of them were innocent bystanders but because the courts could be swamped.

The internal discussions are in their early stages, and no decisions have been reached about whether to forgo charging some of those who illegally entered the Capitol on Jan. 6, according to multiple people familiar with the discussions.

Justice Department officials have promised a relentless effort to identify and arrest those who stormed the Capitol that day, but internally there is robust back-and-forth about whether charging them all is the best course of action. That debate comes at a time when officials are keenly sensitive that the credibility of the Justice Department

Four Seasons Total Landscaping won’t get him out of this one. Giuliani being sued for telling damaging lies:

An election technology company that has been the focus of consistent conspiracy theories by Donald Trump and his allies has sued the former President’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani for defamation after he pushed the “Big Lie” about election fraud on his podcast and TV appearances.

Dominion Voting Systems is seeking more than $1.3 billion in damages.

“Just as Giuliani and his allies intended, the Big Lie went viral on social media as people tweeted, retweeted, and raged that Dominion had stolen their votes. While some lies — little lies — flare up on social media and die with the next news cycle,

All the kids are doing it.

M I S O G Y N I S T pic.twitter.com/qyFEYA9tJI

— Tom Farr (@uracontra_) January 25, 2021

… Read the rest

Pure fluff, but it is nice to have actual humans there again.

On Sunday, the first dogs arrived from Delaware, where they had been waiting until things were unpacked and settled enough to allow a comfortable entry for the two German Shepherds at their new pad.

“Champ is enjoying his new dog bed by fireplace and Major loved running around the South Lawn,” the White House said a press release early Monday morning. Champ lived at the vice president’s residence during the Biden’s time there, and Major was adopted by the family in 2018 from a Delaware pet rescue.

Awwww.

On Sunday they picked up bagels at a deli in Georgetown.

Biden’s visit to a DC dining establishment

They’re not wasting time.

The single article of impeachment against Donald Trump will on Monday evening be delivered to the Senate, where the Democratic majority leader, Chuck Schumer, is promising a quick but fair trial.

Trump made it easy for them, by standing up there and ordering the crowd to march on Congress.

Pelosi is going to take the article from the House to the Senate later today, and that’s the start of the impeachment, but then they’re pausing for two weeks to get a lot of urgent work done and give the lawyers time to prep.

Though the Senate is now controlled by Democrats, two-thirds of senators must vote against Trump if he is to be convicted.

Also, hey now, what’s that fancy thing on your wrist, sir, and why are you not covered in coal dust?

Really, NY Times, really? We've just had the tackiest president in history flaunting fictional wealth and you pick on his watch?
Is That a Rolex on Biden’s Wrist? https://t.co/PijbJ2Uxe9

— Jeff Jarvis (@jeffjarvis) January 22, 2021

Tan suit tan suit tan suit!

Is the Times really going to keep doing this shit?

https://t.co/QXjgWJUPqt

— Clara Jeffery (@ClaraJeffery) January 22, 2021

Really, @nytimes? Between this and the breathless story about how the President and Dr. Biden co-own a Peloton, I'm starting to think you're reaching…https://t.co/7OJH6BYiAv pic.twitter.com/pfP284mKcZ

— Erica C. Barnett (@ericacbarnett) January 22, 2021

… Read the rest

Awwww.… Read the rest

Christ, this insistence that feminism act as unpaid carer to all other activist movements – and sacrifices, without complaint, its own interests in doing so – is precisely why feminism exists.

— Kate (@KateVWilliams) January 24, 2021

Feminism is not interchangeable with other movements. Very often the interests of women are in tension, at the very least, with those of other groups.

— Kate (@KateVWilliams) January 24, 2021

Feminism can't defend women if it cannot speak this truth, or is forced to speak for those who do not share this experience. However marginalised they might be, their reality is not women’s reality, because women’s reality, their oppression, is the consequence of their biology.

— Kate (@KateVWilliams) January 24, 2021

Feminism … Read the rest

The end:

Trump left the White House with his wife, Melania, at about 8:20 a.m., refusing to take questions from the press. He walked to Marine One with an ominous send-off: “I just want to say goodbye, but hopefully it’s not a long-term goodbye. We’ll see each other again.” Later, in a brief departure ceremony at Joint Base Andrews before flying to Florida, he gave a familiar and repetitive summation of what he views as his accomplishments in office. He of course neglected to mention the incident that will come to overshadow everything else that happened over the past four years: a lethal insurrection carried out by his supporters after a rally in which he’d again falsely claimed that

They didn’t mean it, they were just overexcited.

A Texas man who participated in the attack on the US Capitol on 6 January has been charged with threatening to “assassinate” the New York Democratic representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Garret Miller of Texas faces five criminal charges arising from his participation in the pro-Trump riot, including “knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted buildings or grounds without lawful authority” and making threats.

According to court documents, he allegedly tweeted: “Assassinate AOC.”

He is also charged with violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds, obstructing or impeding any official proceeding, and certain acts during civil disorder.

High spirits! The thrill of the moment!

[His lawyer Clint] Broden said: “Mr

Can Trump at least get his social life back?

Asking if Donald Trump can rehabilitate himself in US public life as did a disgraced president before him, legendary Washington reporter Elizabeth Drew was not optimistic.

“For all their similarities,” she wrote, “Nixon and Trump clearly are very different men. For one thing, Nixon was smart.”

For one very big thing. Massive, really. Who with more intelligence than a sponge wants to hang out with Trump? Who wants to listen to that raspy voice talking repetitive bullshit in a 300-word vocabulary for hours and hours? No one.

Drew, 85 and the author of the classic Washington Journal: Reporting Watergate and Richard Nixon’s Downfall, published her thoughts in the Washington