One question (of many):

It was the third argument before the Court in three months related to Donald Trump’s attempt to overturn his loss of the 2020 Presidential election. This one (Trump v. U.S.) was about his claim that Smith’s prosecution of him for election interference (U.S. v. Trump) must be dismissed because a former President is immune from criminal liability for any official acts he undertook in office. 

In what way is it an “official act” for a president to interfere in an election? Especially to interfere in an election in which he is one of the candidates? What’s “official” about that?

Michael Dreeben, arguing for the government, said, “The Framers knew too well the dangers of a king

… Read the rest

Whither “woke”?

So where does all of this leave woke itself, or the broader push for social, racial and environmental justice that has been growing roughly ever since the death of Michael Brown in 2014 sparked the Black Lives Matter movement? What happens now to the idea of being more open to sometimes uncomfortable challenge from minority perspectives that were previously suppressed: of saving the planet; uncovering forgotten histories; inclusivity at work; “be kind”? That isn’t dead. If anything, it’s quietly going mainstream.

Wut?

Social justice is not the same thing as “environmental justice” and climate change isn’t fundamentally political. What to do about it is politicized (but shouldn’t be), but the change itself is not responsive to whether we … Read the rest

Is there any room at all to say that Brynn Tannehill at The New Republic is exaggerating?

When Justice Sonia Sotomayor asked Donald Trump’s lawyer, “If the president decides that his rival is a corrupt person, and he orders the military or orders someone to assassinate him, is that within his official acts for which he can get immunity?”, he replied, “It would depend on the hypothetical, but we can see that would well be an official act.” 

Based on that one line of questioning, Trump’s argument should be going down in flames 9-0. A democracy cannot survive when its supreme leader can arbitrarily decide that it’s in the nation’s best interest to rub out his opponents, and then leave

… Read the rest

Michael Tomasky at The New Republic on Alito and Trump and sedition:

[T]his week, [Alito] told us, in essence, that in his view democracy depends on allowing presidents to commit federal crimes, because if ex-presidents were to be prosecuted for such things, the United States would become a banana republic. That’s a Supreme Court justice saying that. And while Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and even Clarence Thomas didn’t go that far Thursday, it was obvious that the court’s conservatives are maneuvering to make sure that the insurrection trial doesn’t see the light of day before the election—in other words, that a sitting president who very clearly wanted Congress to overturn a constitutionally certified election result (about this there is

… Read the rest

Yes let’s just throw all the toilets and changing rooms open to everyone, why not.

A gang of voyeurs hid in mixed-gender changing rooms at swimming pools to secretly film more than 5,000 young women getting undressed, a court heard.

Adam Dennis, 39, and Robert Morgan, 33, boasted of “hunting” teenage victims and made catalogues of their pictures to share and trade online.

Inner London crown court heard that the gang used hidden cameras to observe women in pools in east London and Surrey between April 2013 and November 2017. A fellow voyeur, Declan Golden, fled to the United States, while Miguel Jose Sainz’s whereabouts are unknown.

Gosh, they’re all male. What a surprise.… Read the rest

Oh puhleeze.

Transgender Athletes Could Be At A Physical Disadvantage according to major research commissioned by the International Olympic Committee, published in the British Medical Journal. https://t.co/Rr158atVxj

— Joe Brolly (@JoeBrolly1993) April 26, 2024

Same old same old same old cheat – “transgender athletes” instead of “male athletes competing against women.”

See also:

If that slice of the female population happens to come from further towards the “high” end of athleticism, and the male slice is further to the “low” end, of course you’ll find similar performances. Look at the VO2, BMI, Fat %, and you know exactly how this “similarity” was made

— Ross Tucker (@Scienceofsport) April 16, 2024

All this verbal cheating and distorting so that men can … Read the rest

Originally a comment by Screechy Monkey on Because she is a woman.

Somewhat tangential, but:

What kind of idiot puts that sort of thing in writing? People at work don’t always like each other and sometimes talk smack about each other, but leaving a trail is a whole different thing.

Lawyers get to read some interesting stuff that gets produced in discovery, so I could tell you some stories. Except that I can’t.

Emails aren’t quite the gold mine that they were back in the 1990s and 2000s, when people would routinely write things that they would never dare put in an interoffice memo. A lot of that talk has moved to texts and messaging apps, as in this … Read the rest

The conservative justices have, over the years, seen harbingers of tyranny in union organizing, environmental regulations, civil-rights laws, and universal-health-care plans. When confronted with a legal theory that establishes actual tyranny, they were simply intrigued. As long as Donald Trump is the standard-bearer for the Republicans, every institution they control will contort itself in his image in an effort to protect him.

The conservative justices have, over the years, seen harbingers of tyranny in union organizing, environmental regulations, civil-rights laws, and universal-health-care plans. When confronted with a legal theory that establishes actual tyranny, they were simply intrigued. As long as Donald Trump is the standard-bearer for the Republicans, every institution they control … Read the rest

Quislings everywhere.

We see that @KateOsborneMP, who has spent #LesbianVisibilityWeek blocking lesbian accounts, has now redacted a clip from her own performance in Parliament today, removing the part where she was told to retract an accusation against Joanna Cherry. Here is the clip as it should be. pic.twitter.com/Gh86LnPRyH

— Scottish Lesbians (@ScotLesbians) April 25, 2024

Osborne has the gall to say Joanna Cherry brings “so much hate and toxicity” to a “debate designed to celebrate all lesbians” by which of course she means “including the male ones.”

Hate and toxicity yourself you bad webbis. … Read the rest

What they really think of us:

The chief fire officer (CFO) and assistant chief fire officer (ACFO) of Shropshire Fire and Rescue Service both sent messages suggesting they wanted to kill or harm female colleagues. In the WhatsApp messages – which have been leaked to ITV News – the senior officers also use the words “lazy cow”, “bint” and “useless” to refer to women in the service.

Several of the messages target Area Manager Jan Morris, who resigned from the service this year after reading what had been said about her. “She does the square root of fuck all,” the now ACFO Adam Matthews messaged in February last year. “I’ve got no loyalty to the lazy cow,” he added

… Read the rest

Overturned:

Harvey Weinstein’s 2020 conviction for sexual assault and rape was overturned by New York’s highest court, reopening the landmark case that fueled the #MeToo movement and highlighting the challenges of holding powerful men accountable.

Many accusers of the former Hollywood movie mogul condemned Thursday’s decision, with the actress Ashley Judd telling reporters it was “an act of institutional betrayal.”

But maybe it wasn’t, maybe it was purely a matter of law and due process and all that.

In a bitterly divided 4-3 ruling, the state Court of Appeals said the trial judge made a critical mistake by letting women testify that Weinstein assaulted them, even though their accusations were not part of the charges he faced.

The

… Read the rest

Good one.

☠️☠️ cartoon! ☠️☠️ pic.twitter.com/zrnxjBsmJh

— Grizelda Cartoons (@GrizeldaG) April 22, 2024

… Read the rest

Here we see the problem with BBC reporting:

Girl, 13, charged after Ammanford school stabbings

Ok, we think, it’s the BBC, so…is the girl really a girl?

And we can’t tell by reading the piece.

A 13-year-old girl has been charged with three counts of attempted murder after two teachers and a pupil were stabbed at a school in south-west Wales. Dyfed-Powys Police said the teenager was arrested at the scene at Ysgol Dyffryn Aman, in Ammanford, Carmarthenshire.

Two teachers and a teenage pupil were taken to hospital with non-life-threatening stab wounds. They have all since been discharged.

And thanks to all the previous lying about the sex of various men who claim to be women, we can’t be sure … Read the rest

Trans trans über alles, über alles in der Welt.

The German Parliament, or Bundestag, passed one of the world’s most far-reaching sex self-determination policies on April 12, despite protests from women’s rights campaigners. The Self-Determination Act (SBGG) establishes ‘gender identity’ as a protected characteristic and allows parents to change the sex marker on their children’s documents from birth.

Hello Germany? That’s not self-determination. It’s parental determination.

Supported by Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s three-party coalition and promoted and supported by the Social Democratic Party (SDP), the SBGG also creates the potential for citizens to be fined up to €10,000 (approx. $10,800 USD) for revealing a person’s given name and birth sex without their permission.

So the lie is protected by the … Read the rest

I can’t understand this at all. It seems as batshit crazy as trans ideology.

Supreme Court justices in Trump case lean toward some level of immunity

But Trump is the living breathing knockdown argument for why immunity is a really really bad idea.

Conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices signaled sympathy on Thursday to the argument that presidents have some immunity against criminal charges for certain actions taken in office as it heard arguments over Donald Trump’s claim of immunity from prosecution for trying to undo his 2020 election loss.

He claims immunity for trying to steal the election. It’s an absurdity.

D. John Sauer, the lawyer arguing for Trump, painted a dire picture of the presidency without immunity.

“Without presidential

… Read the rest

Where would they be without the silly platitudes and the deceptive wording? At a complete loss, that’s where.

Scottish Greens shout

We must ensure that young people are supported and that their lived experience is at the heart of trans healthcare, says the Scottish Greens health spokesperson, Gillian Mackay MSP.

Why? Why must we or they or anyone make sure that anyone’s “lived experience” is at the heart of her/his/their healthcare? Healthcare isn’t a “lifestyle” choice, it’s a technology to prevent and cure illness and injury.

In a question to the Minister for Public Health, Jenni Minto, Ms Mackay said: “Many young people will be concerned about the effect of last week’s decision to pause the prescription of hormones on

… Read the rest

Ok here’s “Olly” of “Pop n Olly” –

I don’t like it – the minute plus 8 seconds I managed to watch – but then I’m primed not to like it. But then I’m primed not to like it for reasons, and some of the reasons are right there. He’s too fucking perky. I didn’t like excess perky when I was five, let alone older than that.

But more to the point, there’s a creepy mismatch between the perky bubbly twinkly presentation, meant for toddlers who don’t know many words yet, and the subject matter. If you’re going to do a tv series explaining “gender” and “identity” and “romantic love” and “sexual orientation” and “privilege” and “discrimination” and … Read the rest

Without the verbal tricks and cheats and concealments it would crash and burn in seconds.

https://twitter.com/Finn_Mackay/status/1783057122487361755

Like that. In the first tweet it’s “sex” but in the second one it’s “legal sex” – meaning, of course, fake sex, pretend sex, not sex, unreal sex. But the switch is not mentioned, it just happens, as if inevitably. It’s smoke and mirrors, aka lies, and it shows what a cheat the whole thing is.

https://twitter.com/Finn_Mackay/status/1783058040280826018

There again. Of course trans people have human rights, and nobody says they don’t. The issue is that there is no such thing as a right to force everyone to agree you are the sex you are not. Trans people have the human rights that humans … Read the rest

In school. In SCHOOL.

https://twitter.com/JournalistJill/status/1783162925609300139

IN SCHOOL.… Read the rest

A whistle blower steps up:

I am a 42-year-old St. Louis native, a queer woman, and politically to the left of Bernie Sanders. My worldview has deeply shaped my career. I have spent my professional life providing counseling to vulnerable populations: children in foster care, sexual minorities, the poor. 

Jamie Reed worked for several years at The Washington University School of Medicine Division of Infectious Diseases with teenagers and young adults who were HIV positive.

Many of them were trans or otherwise gender nonconforming, and I could relate: Through childhood and adolescence, I did a lot of gender questioning myself. I’m now married to a transman, and together we are raising my two biological children from a previous marriage

… Read the rest