Sir sir sir sir that’s not true sir, none of that happened sir, you made it all up sir. There aren’t Republican voting places and Democratic voting places; the ballot is supposed to be secret. Remember that? The secret ballot? It’s kind of a big deal. If the ballot’s not secret then elections can be distorted, aka stolen. Did you know that? Probably not. You don’t know much.
Author: Ophelia Benson
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Specify that credential
The press secretary is supposed to spin the news, not be the news.
On that most essential qualification, the new lead White House spokeswoman, Katie Zacharia, is struggling.
She has presented herself as a lawyer but does not meet the requirements in her home state to use that title.
But she went to law school! What more do you want?!
Zacharia has a law degree from the Pepperdine Caruso School of Law, but there’s no evidence she ever passed a bar exam. She does claim to have obtained a credential in China, but it’s not at all clear what credential she’s talking about.
The technical term is bullshit credential.
Press secretaries don’t have to be lawyers but they do have to tell the truth, or did until very recently.
The issue is that Zacharia has presented herself repeatedly on TV, including on CNN, as a lawyer, something the independent journalist Judd Legum first documented. Trump used the term “attorney” to describe her when he announced she would be his press secretary.
A review by CNN’s K-File found at least six instances when she referred to herself as either a lawyer or a corporate lawyer in her own words and multiple other instances in which she posted or reposted to social media using the term attorney or “legal strategist.”
Washington, DC, is filled to the brim with people who have law degrees but do not practice law. And it does not appear that Zacharia inappropriately tried to represent anyone in a court.
But all of this does suggest the vetting operation at the White House is, to be charitable, not very thorough.
Which is charitablese for nonexistent.
There are requirements for college and law school, or their equivalents; for “good moral character”; passing an ethics exam; and passing the bar exam in California.
Zacharia, as a result, should not be considered a lawyer in California, the state where she has lived and worked.
A separate section of California law makes it a misdemeanor to pretend to be a lawyer.
If only there were a federal law that makes it a felony to pretend to be qualified to be president. If only if only if only.
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Wull Fox says she is
Wellll she’s a lawyer the same way Trump is a president.
When President Donald Trump announced Katie Zacharia would be his new White House press secretary, he called her “an attorney.”
Now, Zacharia, a conservative commentator who made her debut in the White House briefing room on Tuesday, is facing scrutiny over her credentials and how she has represented herself over the course of her career.
Journalist Judd Legum, who writes the Popular Information newsletter, wrote on Tuesday that Zacharia has long touted her credentials as a lawyer during appearances on national news outlets. Legum added that Zacharia was identified as a lawyer during at least 18 appearances on Fox News Channel since March 2025.
Ah well if Fox News says so…
While Zacharia graduated with a law degree from Pepperdine University, Legum wrote that he found no evidence she has ever passed a bar exam in any state or Washington, D.C. Aspiring lawyers must normally pass a state’s bar exam before they can be licensed to practice law in that state. However, the criteria for admission to the bar are set by each state, according to the American Bar Association.
On Tuesday, when a journalist asked which state Zacharia had passed the bar exam in, she replied: “When I moved to China.” That has raised further questions about whether it is possible for her to have done so, and the legal work she has undertaken since.
It has also raised the question about whether that’s any kind of answer to the question. “When I moved to ___” does not answer the question “which state did you pass the bar exam in”. It’s a where question, not a when question. In addition, China is not a state, it’s a country – a separate country, on the other side of the planet. Also moving to somewhere is not passing the bar exam. The two are different. Always be aware of differences; they matter.
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Cut off
So Musk is helping Putin smash Ukraine?
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy‘s office confirmed on Wednesday that the country’s military has been cut off from full access to SpaceX’s Starlink satellite system as it seeks to defend itself against a now nearly five-year Russian invasion.
“Tonight SpaceX introduced a speed limit for the Starlink terminals in motion,” said Presidential Adviser Sergiy Beskrestnov. “Our defence forces were not warned about this restriction, which led to the disruption of a number of missions. Obviously, this action cannot be a coincidence and is linked to the current political situation,” he added.
What situation is that?
That political situation refers to US President Donald Trump‘s recent decision to extend Russian President Vladimir Putin a lifeline by lifting sanctions, buying Russian oil and berating Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy — saying he needs to stop attacking Russian oil infrastructure and that he should be replaced because “he won’t make a deal” with Russia.
Another plunge into the abyss.
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Two whole entire hours???
Another rape crisis centre, another insult to women.
In July 2025 I resolved a 4 year legal case against the Brighton rape crisis centre Survivors’ Network for their failure to provide women with a single-sex peer support group. You can read the background to the case here.
You can read our joint statement following the resolution here.
On 27 March of this year, almost eight months after publication of the Joint Statement, Katy Bourne OBE, of The Sussex Police & Crime Commissioner announced there would be:
“A women-only* support group for survivors of sexual violence – provided by Survivors Network – available from April 26”, “women only” meaning “those assigned female at birth, who still identify as a woman”.
Survivors’ Network states on its website that the group (the Maple Group):
- Is part of a pilot commissioned by the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner for Sussex, initially running for a year;
- Will take place on Mondays, 14:00 – 16:00 at an accessible venue in the centre of Brighton; and
- Is for biological women survivors who still identify as women.
It’s that Monty Python skit about the important document available to everyone that’s in a locked box in a closet in a basement in Outer Mongolia – not the exact wording but you get the drift of the joke, and here it is in real life, not a joke but an astounding insult. Ok, bitches, you get your god damn “women only” service, for two hours a week. Can’t make it at that time? Tough shit.
It’s just astounding.
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At one point engaged
It just didn’t work out for them.
Kimberly Guilfoyle, the U.S. ambassador to Greece until she was effectively fired on live television on Tuesday when the new White House press secretary said that President Trump had asked for her resignation, was at one point engaged to Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son. The couple owned a $9.7 million home in Florida, appeared at Trump rallies together and sent each other adoring posts on Instagram.
A very clumsy first sentence, but you get the drift. The usual Trump family grift of handing out important government jobs to random people they happen to know from the golf club or the poker game or jail.
Today, the junior Mr. Trump is married to a Florida socialite and model. And Ms. Guilfoyle, who was nominated as ambassador to Greece by the president soon after her engagement to his son was broken off two years ago, is out of a job after a series of damning reports in The Wall Street Journal, including that she asked a Republican donor to pay off $100,000 on her American Express credit card just before her Senate confirmation hearing in July 2025.
So? A hundred k? Big deal. The donor should have complied and thanked her for her attention to this matter.
The rise and fall of Ms. Guilfoyle, 57, was not a surprise at the White House, where many saw her as a flamboyant party girl with questionable judgment.
A party girl? At age 57?
Anyway. She’s out.
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Wrong office, wrong floor, wrong building
Dang, this takes some nerve. We’re the cult??? We’re the ones using language in a novel fashion? We’re the ones trying to isolate “members” from the “outside world”?
No, dude, trans dogmatists are the cult who use language in a deranged fashion and try to isolate members from people who know that men are not women.
Also, whoever Wayne is, he’s a bozo. “Cookie” is a strictly US word; UK terfs don’t use it at all, let alone blither about tiptop cookie pie.
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and contested legacy
The BBC is sharpening its knives.
BBC Factual and BBC Scotland announce J.K. Rowling (w/t), a two-part documentary series from Rogan Scotland (Becoming Frida Kahlo; The Secret of Me; Becoming Victoria Wood) for BBC Two, BBC Scotland and iPlayer, which traces Rowling’s dramatic rise, cultural influence and contested legacy, using her life as a lens through which to explore three decades of profound social, political and technological change.
[Wtf is w/t? Working title? Why do they include it in an article? Why do they expect the general public to be familiar with journalism/media jargon?]
No doubt the “contested legacy” bit will be presented very fairly and reasonably.
Kidding! I never can resist a joke.
Episode two follows Rowling as she steps out from behind her creation and becomes an increasingly powerful political voice. Amid the rise of social media and intensifying culture wars, her interventions on Scottish independence, feminism, free speech and gender identity place her at the centre of increasingly bitter online exchanges. Admired by supporters as a fearless defender of women’s rights and condemned by critics who call her an opponent of trans equality, she finds herself divided from some of the actors and fans who once championed her work.
Yo, Beeb, what does “trans equality” mean?
You sneaky shits know damn well she’s not opposed to equality or rights for anyone. There’s no such thing as “equality” that means pretending to be other people and forcing everyone to endorse and flatter the pretending. JKR does not, repeat not, oppose equality or rights for trans people. You know that.
James Rogan, Executive Producer, said: “J.K. Rowling has achieved extraordinary literary success, with her influence spanning a generation of fans, crossing into cinema and the online world. Rogan Scotland explores her unique story from her early days as a writer to the present moment and how her unflinching personal beliefs have sparked a fraught and divisive dialogue that continues to this day.”
It’s fraught and divisive only because people and organizations like the Beeb have been forcing it on us for the past decade and more despite the fact that it rests on an enormous and insulting lie.
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Shave that park
Meanwhile Trump has just done a scorched earth move on a DC public park that he wants to turn into a golf course. He violated a judge’s order in doing so.
The superintendent of the National Mall and Memorial Parks, a unit of the National Park Service, was ordered to testify under oath in U.S. District Court in D.C. on Monday after a federal judge ordered a stop to all tree cutting at East Potomac Golf Course until at least Tuesday morning, days after the NPS began a new round of tree removals at the historic golf course.
U.S. District Court Judge Ana Reyes ordered NMMP Superintendent Kevin Griess to testify about the removal of 430 trees Saturday, including who ordered the removal and when he received the order.
430 trees. In a public park. Because pigman wants yet another golf course.
“I am thoroughly unamused right now. I do not know how I could have made it any plainer that I did not want what was to happen to happen. I have given the government every single benefit of the doubt, that it would not do precisely what it has done,” Judge Reyes said at the start of the hearing Monday morning. “Every single time, I have given the government the benefit of the doubt, and every single time I made absolutely clear that I wanted notice.”
She shared that the administration only gave the court and the plaintiffs 12 hours notice of the tree cutting on Friday, while the federal government’s legal defense, the U.S. Department of Justice, learned of the tree cutting on Thursday, Oct. 8.
“The amount of benefit of the doubt that I have given the government, no one could have thought or overlooked the fact that the plaintiffs should have gotten notice immediately,” Reyes said, adding that she’s “furious” that government went against its promises to the court.
The tree removals come as Trump has moved to turn the course into a world-class golf venue as part of his grand vision for D.C.
We don’t want his god damn grand vision for DC or anything else. His grand visions are the vulgar trashy gold-plated visions of a man like donaldtrump.
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Well at least it wasn’t 3 a.m.
NPR underlines the fact that the Justice Department is ok with all this.
Federal agents searched the Washington, D.C. home of Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., Monday morning.
The Department of Justice said in a statement to NPR that agents with Homeland Security Investigations “executed a judicially authorized search warrant.”
The warrant was approved by the DOJ and is part of an “ongoing federal investigation.” Federal authorities did not give further details on the reason for the probe.
All very well but this is not normal. Separation of powers type of thing. The executive branch is not supposed to harass the legislative branch. This looks more like harassment (to put it mildly) as opposed to genuine law enforcement.
Jackie Rogers, a spokesperson for the congresswoman, called the search a “raid” and an “outrageous abuse of power and an unprecedented escalation in the weaponization of federal law enforcement to target political enemies.”
Sharon Jackson, 79, lives across the street from the congresswoman and said federal agents woke her up around 4:30 a.m. Monday morning.
“I got awakened by boom, boom, boom,” Jackson said. “They were out here with a great big truck.”
See what I mean? Why the hell turn up at 4:30 in the morning? How is that anything but harassment?
The search took place ahead of next month’s midterm elections, in which Omar is seeking reelection.
Vice President Vance has previously alleged Omar committed immigration fraud — something she denies.
Even if she did, how is it necessary to raid her house at 4:30 a.m.?
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Weimar
House Democratic leaders condemned the search of Rep. Ilhan Omar’s home as an “abuse of power” Monday.
“For years, Donald Trump and far-right extremists have relentlessly targeted Congresswoman Omar with vile personal attacks and baseless accusations,” House Democratic leaders said in a statement. “Now, less than 30 days until the midterm election, his violent mass deportation machine has descended upon the home of a duly elected Member of Congress and her family.”
The search of the Minnesota congresswoman’s home so close to next month’s midterm contests that will determine control of the House and Senate was swiftly condemned by top Democrats in Congress and raised questions about the timing given longstanding Justice Department protocol to avoid overt investigative steps involving political candidates in the direct run-up to an election.
Are no Republicans in Congress condemning this grotesque abuse of power?
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Yet another way to cheat and steal
Trump tried to make us pay for his advertising of himself.
A federal judge on Sunday evening ordered the Trump administration to stop airing taxpayer-funded ads that had drawn widespread backlash for their explicit glorification of President Trump.
The commercials ran on network and cable television and were paid for through a $20 million contract from the Department of Homeland Security. One bragged about the capture of the former Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro. Another echoed a campaign video from 2024 that denounced political enemies of Mr. Trump as “villains.”
Your tax dollars at work! No thank you.
The ads had run during programs and shows like “Good Morning America” and “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” as well as during weekend football games on Fox. Some officials had said the administration might have violated federal law by using taxpayer money for publicity or propaganda.
Along with Mr. Trump, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth are featured in the ad gloating about the capture of Mr. Maduro.
“Don’t play games with this president’s in office because it’s not gonna turn out well,” Mr. Rubio says.
Mr. Trump was personally invested in seeing the ads air. He instructed Russell T. Vought, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, to find the money for the ads, The New York Times reported this month. In late September, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which falls under D.H.S., awarded a contract to a Maryland marketing firm for the commercials.
…
Mr. Trump announced last week that his super PAC, MAGA Inc., would pay for the ads. But the next day, White House officials said that would apply only “moving forward” and that Mr. Trump would not reimburse taxpayers for what had already been spent.
Of course. He got away with it so ha.
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Game over
Serving in public office in the United States is dangerous. From state and local government to Congress, an unending river of violent threats is washing through the mailboxes, offices, voice mail and texts of those who govern the nation. Thousands of public servants are living, working and, in the final weeks of election season, campaigning in a state of fear.
And it’s getting worse, officeholders said in dozens of interviews.
An investigation by The New York Times examining hundreds of records obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests, court documents and law enforcement logs has found that, over a two-year period from 2024 to August of this year, thousands of violent threats inundated the lives of elected officials in unprecedented ways.
This is probably the worst thing about Trump – the way he has normalized violence, threats, daylight robbery, corruption, bullying, blackmailing – the list is endless.
Some threats were vague; some were frighteningly specific. They promised torture, stabbing, rape and murder. They aimed at Republicans and Democrats alike, and at a range of officeholders from county clerks to United States senators. They targeted spouses, parents, siblings and children.
At least 44 governors, as well as their staff and families, have been subjected to violent threats over the past two years, The Times’s investigation found. That’s also true of at least 70 of the nation’s 100 senators, and at least 185 members of the House of Representatives — nearly half the body. More than half of the country’s secretaries of state, most of whom serve as their states’ chief election officers, have received threats of violence.
Actual violence also spiked during that period: assassination attempts against Donald Trump, the killing of Charlie Kirk, the assassination of the legislative leader Melissa Hortman and her husband in Minnesota, the firebombing of Gov. Josh Shapiro’s home in Pennsylvania. For many elected officials, the escalation is a grim testament to the toxicity of violent rhetoric and how it can shake the country’s democratic institutions.
The threats have also reshaped private lives. Dozens of officials have fortified their homes, installed cameras and hired private security guards, often at their own expense. They’ve changed their daily routines, moved their children to new schools, grocery-shopped only at certain times and places. They’ve scrubbed the internet to remove personal information about themselves and their loved ones.
Some of them have altered what they say in public and, in rare cases, how they govern. Some, including members of Congress, have quit. Both parties have struggled to recruit candidates, especially women.
And all of this, I suppose, will continue even after Trump either drops dead or stops being president. All of this means we can never have nice things ever again.
Vague state and federal laws and free speech protections can make prosecution challenging. Anonymous letters and screen names can be hard to track. The sheer volume of threats can make hunting down those responsible virtually impossible.
This new normal can also be measured in dollars spent. In the 2017-2018 election cycle, candidates for federal office spent roughly $6 million on security-related items, according to campaign finance records. In the current midterm cycle, candidates had already spent at least $25 million by Aug. 1, with the final general election sprint still to come. That excludes what many officials are spending from their own pockets.
All of which is going to slash the pool of candidates down to nothing.
Women are often more aggressively targeted than men, and harder to recruit, said Greta Neubauer, the Democratic minority leader in the Wisconsin State Assembly. Mothers are more apt to avoid the risk to themselves and their families, she said.
If potential recruits don’t bring up fears of violence on their own, Ms. Neubauer does. “There is an amount of risk that you and your family are going to need to accept if you choose to do this,” she regularly says to potential candidates. “And we want to make sure that you are fully aware of that in advance.”
That’s one of the most despair-inducing things I’ve ever read.
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Bad neighbours
The Free Speech Union tells us:
If you need any more evidence that an Islamic blasphemy law has taken root in Britain, look no further than the case of Stephen Gray. It is truly one of the most extraordinary cases the FSU has ever come across.
A former police officer who gave 30 years of public service had a knock at the door from the police after his neighbour reported him for reposting something on Facebook.
In April, Stephen was convicted of being “grossly offensive” — an offence under the Communications Act 2003 — for reposting a joke about Islam.
The post featured an image of a rasher of bacon and a man in a turban, accompanied by the text: “Fun facts about bacon! People who eat bacon have a lower chance of marrying a 9 year old!”
While giving evidence, Stephen explained that the post was a reference to the marriage between the Prophet Mohammed and Aisha, which occurred when she was six and was consummated when she was nine. It was a satirical post, but also sought to make a serious point about child marriage.
But the district judge wasn’t having any of it. Stephen was ordered to pay £1,100 in fines, plus legal costs, and now has a criminal conviction.
I suppose it’s the bacon that was the problem. I doubt the judge would have done the same about a sober essay on Islam and child marriage, but jokes are another matter. I have to admit I’m not hugely impressed by this joke myself, not least because “9 year old” obscures the issue. The joker forgot the girl part – it’s 9 year old girls who are handed over to adult men.
But should it be treated as a crime? Of course not.
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Far away
Oh dear god. Evil Kennedy is risking the lives of African children because he can’t get away with doing it in his own country.
A controversial research trial that will withhold hepatitis B vaccines from some African newborns was given approval to move forward this week.
It is a central part of the vaccine vision for Robert F Kennedy Jr, the secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and a longtime vaccine opponent.
At an anti-vaccine conference last month, Kennedy praised the Danish researchers behind the trial and touted US-supported research on hepatitis B in newborns as exemplifying the Trump administration’s agenda for vaccines, which has included slashing vaccine recommendations and casting doubt on the safety and effectiveness of shots.
Yes the Trump agenda is to kill more people and Kennedy is eager to help.
Kennedy “wants to make it so we don’t use a birth dose here in this country,” said Paul Offit, an infectious disease physician at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. “That’s the goal.”
Kennedy would never be able to do the trial in the US because of its significant ethical concerns, Offit added. “He’s taking advantage of a developing country … Is it because children in Africa are more expendable than children here?”
Why yes, that’s exactly what it’s because.
Danish researchers plan to enroll 14,000 infants in Guinea-Bissau in the trial, giving the hepatitis B vaccine to half of the babies at birth and withholding it from the others for the first six weeks of life.
An ethics committee at the researchers’ home institution of the University of Southern Denmark voted this week to proceed with the trial, and officials in Guinea-Bissau have also greenlit the project, which the health minister, Quinhin Nantote, initially said was suspended after international uproar earlier this year.
Stig Børsen Hansen, a founding member who was one of two reviewers who presented the study to the Danish committee, resigned from the group in protest on Friday, citing major ethical issues with the study.
“You are now enrolling newborns in a lottery to test a hypothesis,” Hansen said. The children who are randomly selected not to receive the birth dose of the vaccine, those who “lost the lottery”, face in their earliest days the risk of contracting hepatitis B, which can cause irreversible lifelong damage. “They contract hepatitis B in the context of being part of a research project,” Hansen said, which made their infection happen, in effect, “by design”.
Three other members of the committee have also resigned in protest.
Bad Kennedy, on the other hand, is thrilled.
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Oh but surely…
That naughty Cleese fella being all irrelevant and wicked again.
Wait what’s so naughty and irrelevant about that?
Puzzling.
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Pillars or pipsqueaks?
Robert Jenrick has been reported to the police and Prevent after criticising the “Islamification” of Britain.
Shock horror: once again, the Islamic website 5Pillars broke the story — just as it did last week when comedian John Cleese was referred to Prevent.
Aha, it’s 5Pillars we have to thank for the harassment of Cleese. How interesting.
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Caught red-handed
Here’s John Cleese being all right-wing & evil & shit.
Ok so not exactly right-wing & evil but…um…too tall?
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Every other
What a damn fool question.
If someone’s a sexual predator, they’re a sexual predator, but assuming that all trans people are sexual predators – like we wouldn’t do that for any other protected minority so why is it okay to do it to trans people?
Well, of course, it’s not ok to assume that all trans people are sexual predators, but then that’s a hyperbolic question. I don’t suppose that many people do assume that all trans people are sexual predators, but it’s not unreasonable to keep in mind that claiming to be trans is a very good dodge for someone who is in fact a sexual predator. There’s a difference.
This is one of the chokepoints of the ideology. Claiming to be trans is a good way to hide being a sexual predator, and that fact in turn is a good reason to be at least cautious about taking all claims of all trans-identifying people as automatically and always forthright and true.
To sum up: trans is not like “every other protected minority”.