Originally a comment by Pliny on Trump’s impression.

DATELINE PORTLAND

(Your man in the streets Pliny)

Large numbers of people out in the streets – and parks, and by the river, and on the river. Lots of families apparently using children as human shields.

Smoke rising from many backyard barbeques.

Coffee shops fomenting with – patrons

Biggest thing about ICE is the video showing them pepper spraying peaceful protestors who were not interfering w operations.

Many Portlanders fear that military will not bring enough trash bags like in DC. Some areas could use their help.

Also having troops in town has raised fears that it’s just what we need – more people living in tents…

From War-torn Portland… Read the rest

In Portlandia the streets are not running with blood.

A visit to downtown Portland, Oregon, on Saturday, hours after Donald Trump falsely declared the city “war ravaged” to justify the deployment of federal troops, made it plain the US president’s impression of the city, apparently shaped by misleading conservative media reports, is entirely divorced from reality.

There were just four protesters outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) field office in an outlying residential neighborhood that the president had claimed was “under siege” by antifascists and “other domestic terrorists”. Jack Dickinson, 26, wore a chicken costume draped in an American flag and held a sign that read “Portland Will Outlive Him”. Passing motorists honked in appreciation.

Well…um…he could … Read the rest

Jeez I go offline for a few hours and all hell breaks loose.

President Donald Trump has ordered the deployment of US troops to Portland, Oregon, authorising use of “full force” if needed, to suppress protests targeting immigration detention centres.

But we’re allowed to protest. It’s called a right.

Trump said he was “directing Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, to provide all necessary Troops to protect War ravaged Portland”.

Mushbrain draft-dodger pretends protesters are great big scary sojers and he alone can stop them.

And Hegseth is Secretary of Defense. His job is not to help Trump unleash the military on protesters.

The announcement drew pushback from Democratic lawmakers, who said there was no need for federal troops

It turns out Hegseth is summoning the top brass from all over the planet to his office because he’s making a moooovie.

New details are leaking about why Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called top military officials from around the world for an in-person meeting in Virginia next week.

The former Fox News personality, now a top Trump official, reportedly wants to make a video of his brief speech. Hegseth will be addressing military standards and the “warrior ethos,” multiple people familiar with the planned event told The Washington Post.

One has to wonder why he couldn’t have done the usual online meeting type of thing, rather than spending millions (to say nothing of the risks) to make the brass … Read the rest

A man of wisdom.

Trump said Saturday that he was directing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to “provide all necessary Troops” to Portland, Oregon.

In a post on Truth Social, the president wrote that the troops would “protect War ravaged Portland” and protect Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities that he claimed are “under siege from attack by Antifa and other domestic terrorists.”

Yes, it’s World War 4 out here on the left coast.

The president has repeatedly spoken negatively about [trashed] Portland, including saying on Thursday that “anarchy” is taking place in the West Coast city.

Yeah there are no laws here, we just run over each other with our tanks.

“You go out to Portland, people die out there.

Gender news from Texas:

LUBBOCK — In a first for Texas higher education, the Texas Tech University System has ordered faculty across its five universities to limit classroom discussion of transgender and nonbinary identities, but gave little guidance on how academic endeavors or instruction should proceed.

What guidance is needed? Trans and nonbinareee idenninies are not academic endeavors or instruction. They’re political/ideological as opposed to epistemic or academic, so banishing them makes room for academic endeavors as opposed to hindering them. If students were insisting on talking about football or ballet in physics classes and faculty were cheering them on rather than teaching physics, the bosses would be within their rights to say stick to physics in physics classes. … Read the rest

Cringecringecringe

Donald Trump’s trip to Windsor last week was a history lesson, albeit one from which the president drew worrying conclusions. He has been raving about all of the things he learnt while in the castle, but one name stood out in particular. “William the Conqueror… that’s the coolest name I ever heard,” the commander-in-chief ominously told the American Cornerstone Institute. “He was known for winning wars,” Trump added, proving that there are no flies on him, but he also said he’d asked the current King “Why don’t we call you Charles the Conqueror?” The sovereign and sometime biscuit-maker told Trump that this wasn’t really his style.

He was unfamiliar with the name William the Conqueror. CRIIIIIIIIINGE… Read the rest

Oh my god. Seriously?

CNN:

Pete Hegseth’s surprise gathering of hundreds of generals and admirals in Virginia next week is being called so he can describe the administration’s reinvention of the Department of Defense as the “Department of War” and outline new standards for military personnel, according to half a dozen people familiar with the planning.

Are you SERIOUS???

He could do that with technology. There is no reason to gather them all in one room as if it were 1820.

It is reckless, expensive, pointless, grotesque, dangerous, boneheaded to gather them all in one room, so Pete from the television gathers them all in one room.

It’s as if the planet is slowly but steadily forming itself into … Read the rest

Timothy Snyder writes:

My historian colleagues might correct me, but I do not think anyone at least in recent history has done what Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is about to do: put all of the American generals and admirals from around the world into a single room (next week, in Virginia) just to say something to them.

There is no practical reason to do this: he has easier and more secure ways to communicate with the commanders. And there are obvious risks: the entire armed forces of the United States, spread around the world, will be without its leaders. Given that the government could well shut down the next day, the separation of commanders from their command might

Peak crazy.

Registered sex offender Richard Cox was back in an Arlington, Virginia, courtroom Thursday for a lengthy preliminary hearing.

Cox is accused of exposing himself to multiple women and children in Arlington Public Schools’ girls’ locker rooms. Those facilities have pools that are open to the public outside of school hours.

A dozen witnesses testified in the preliminary hearing for the Cox case, including women who said they saw him naked in the women’s locker rooms in Arlington County‘s Wakefield High School, Washington Liberty High School, and Barcroft Sports and Fitness Center.

One witness said when she and her five-year-old daughter went into the girls’ locker room after swim class, Cox – who identifies as a woman but

David Frum says the monster will devour all of us if we let him.

The charges against Comey are not just about the president’s abuse of his power for personal retribution. They represent a test of the president’s plans for the future.

Since the assassination of Charlie Kirk, Trump and his top aides have spoken of their plans to bring cases against people who give money to anti-Trump causes. “My administration will find each and every one of those who contributed to this atrocity and to other political violence, including the organizations that fund it and support it, as well as those who go after our judges, law enforcement officials, and everyone else who brings order to our country,” Trump 

Maggie Haberman on Trump’s Revenge:

In the span of a few hours on Thursday, President Trump went from claiming no knowledge of a possible indictment of the former F.B.I. director James B. Comey to celebrating it as “JUSTICE IN AMERICA!” In reality, Mr. Trump had handpicked the prosecutor — previously one of his own personal lawyers — in an effort to ensure it happened.

It was a landmark moment in Mr. Trump’s retribution campaign, one that put on full display the relentlessness of his efforts to use the criminal justice system to get back at those he feels persecuted him. 

…

Throughout his first term, Mr. Trump — under investigation himself for possible ties between his 2016 presidential campaign

Busy day in Trump world. Summoning all the military top brass for a meeting, and now indicting Comey.

Former FBI Director James Comey has been indicted by a federal grand jury, an extraordinary escalation in President Donald Trump’s effort to prosecute his political enemies.

Comey, a longtime adversary of the president, is now the first senior government official to face federal charges in one of Trump’s largest grievances: the 2016 investigation into whether his first presidential campaign colluded with Russia. He has been charged with giving false statements and obstruction of a congressional proceeding, the Justice Department said in a statement.

Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a post on X, “No one is above the law.”

Oh … Read the rest

Robert Reich did a public Facebook post yesterday that I find intensely annoying.

Friends,

I can’t tell you exactly how I know but after sixty years in and around politics I’ve developed a sixth sense, and my sixth sense tells me the tide is now turning on Trump.

This past week did it.

On Monday, he sued the Times in a lawsuit that, as CNN put it, read “like a pro-Trump op-ed, with page after page of gushing praise for the president.”

On Tuesday, he accused reporter Jonathan Karl and his employer, ABC News, of engaging in hate speech against him, and warned that Pam Bondi, the attorney general, might go after them.

And so on for each day of … Read the rest

Good god. This is deranged, and reckless, and outright dangerous. We’re in a car driven by suicidal lunatics.

Hundreds of US generals and admirals around the globe have been called to Virginia for a meeting with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth next Tuesday, several US officials told CNN, though the reason for the meeting is unclear.

What?

Fox News personality orders top military brass to gather in one place and does not make the order a secret. What could possibly go wrong?

The meeting is expected to be held at the military installation in Quantico, Virginia, multiple officials said, adding that no one seems to know what the meeting is about, including the general and flag officers themselves, or why

Throwing a pinch of Stalin into the mix:

Prosecutors are expected to ask a grand jury to indict former FBI Director James Comey in the Eastern District of Virginia in the coming days, two sources briefed on the matter told Reuters on Wednesday.

The exact charges remained unclear, and it was uncertain whether the grand jury would return an indictment against one of Trump’s longtime political antagonists.

There’s nothing to indict him for, but Trump has ordered them to come up with something.

One of the sources said some prosecutors within the Eastern District of Virginia have presented new U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan with a memo explaining why charges should not be filed, saying the case lacked evidence

Well, he’s not wrong.

The slogan “trans women are women” is scientifically false and harms the rights of women, Richard Dawkins has said.

It’s silly that that’s even news. What are trans women? Men who say they are women. Of course it’s false – scientifically and otherwise – to say that men are women. It’s false and it’s absurd. It’s like saying elephants are rabbits or houses are airplanes.

In The War on Science, Dawkins joins several scientists and philosophers contending that academic freedom and truth in universities was being stifled by diversity, equity and inclusion policies that promoted falsehoods under the banner of social justice.

“I draw the line at the belligerent slogan ‘trans women are women’

Another entry for the President Baby file.

Trump has added a “Presidential Walk of Fame” to the exterior of the White House, featuring portraits of each of the previous commanders-in-chief – except for one.

Instead of a headshot of Joe Biden, the Republican incumbent instead placed a photo of an autopen signing the Democrat’s name – a reference to Trump’s frequent allegation that the former president was addled by the end of his term in office and not really the one making decisions.

The snub is the latest attempt by Trump to delegitimise a predecessor he routinely belittles, including in front of more than 100 world leaders on Tuesday at the UN general assembly gathering. Trump has never acknowledged

Dang. Talk about going out of your way to insult and dismiss women.

Chris Northwood is a man.

The Express asked us about awarding the Patsy Carlton Prize to Cllr Chris Northwood. This is our response:

"This prize acknowledged an exceptional woman in Cllr Chris Northwood. The message it sends to women members and voters is that the Liberal Democrats honour and value all…

— Liberal Democrats (@LibDems) September 24, 2025

“This prize acknowledged an exceptional woman in Cllr Chris Northwood. The message it sends to women members and voters is that the Liberal Democrats honour and value all of our women members.”

And what they mean by that, of course, is that the Liberal Democrats honour and value men … Read the rest

Sorry, kid, no dice.

Oop! Emma Watson has realised the tide is turning and is setting the groundwork so that she can come crawling back to @jk_rowling when it’s politically convenient!

“I just don't think these things are either or. I think it's my deepest wish that I hope people who don't agree… pic.twitter.com/s1tuV9FCIk

— Hazel Appleyard (@HazelAppleyard_) September 25, 2025

Nope.

A little reminder for anyone who may be regretting their very public sprint to the front of the mob and is now trying to discreetly shove their pitchfork out of sight. https://t.co/pt6SOguDUI

— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) September 25, 2025

That ship has sailed and disappeared over the horizon. … Read the rest