Republican Kentucky senator says uppity black former president should Keep His Mouth Shut.

Last week, remarks by Obama were leaked to Yahoo News that were highly critical about Trump and his administration, seeming to break a convention in US politics that former occupants of the White House rarely criticize their successors.

Does that convention apply to private conversations though? I don’t think so. Obama’s remarks were leaked.

But really that’s beside the point; I wouldn’t think McConnell had more of a case if Obama had made his remarks in an editorial in the Washington Post. Conventions are all very well but Trump is not a normal “occupant of the White House.” It’s not just that he has bad policies, … Read the rest

Trump started yesterday’s press brawl by reading a statement, adding his own random remarks. It’s faintly comical how easy it is to pick out the ad libs.

In the span of just a few short months, we’ve developed a testing capacity unmatched and unrivaled anywhere in the world, and it’s not even close.  This is a core element of our plan to safely and gradually reopen America.  And we’re opening, and we’re starting, and there’s enthusiasm like I haven’t seen in a long time.

See them?

In the span of just a few short months, we’ve developed a testing capacity unmatched and unrivaled anywhere in the world, and it’s not even close.  This is a core element of our

In Kabul:

Two babies and 11 mothers and nurses have been killed in a militant attack on a hospital in the Afghan capital.

Another 15 people, including a number of children, were injured when several gunmen attacked the Kabul hospital on Tuesday morning, officials said.

Part of the hospital is run by the international medical charity, Medicins Sans Frontieres (MSF), and some of those working there are foreigners.

So God hates women, babies, medical workers, and foreigners.… Read the rest

Originally a comment by Screechy Monkey on The more accurate terminology.

I think it’s important to separate two things.

1) The underlying ruling is, I think, poor. I disagree with the substance of it, and I think a judge should refrain from limiting counsel’s language except in very clear-cut cases.

2) The reaction of the ADF’s counsel is worse. First, it’s shitty advocacy. When a judge tells you to stop saying something because it doesn’t help your case and he considers it uncivil, you STOP SAYING IT. Find another way to make your arguments. The entire point of wanting to use one term instead of another is because you’re an advocate trying to persuade the judge. Persisting in using … Read the rest

According to this chart the US doesn’t have the highest per capita rate of infections. I stand corrected.

Of course, the number of actual cases in a country is going to be higher than official figures show, with testing rates also varying dramatically. As with all figures relating to confirmed cases, they should be treated with caution.

Sir, sir, what did you mean, sir?

Hours after Trump posted a string of tweets and retweets about “Obamagate” — a new conspiracy theory that holds Obama responsible for masterminding the Russia investigation and railroading former Trump administration National Security Adviser Michael Flynn into a guilty plea for lying to the FBI (never mind that there’s no evidence of investigatory misconduct) — Philip Rucker of the Washington Post called Trump’s bluff.

“In one of your Mother’s Day tweets, you appeared to accuse President Obama of ‘the biggest political crime in American history, by far’ — those were your words. What crime exactly are you accusing President Obama of committing, and do you believe the Justice Department should prosecute him?”

Trump reached a new level of horrifying in today’s nightmare “press conference.”

Trump prematurely declares victory on the coronavirus: "We have met the moment and we have prevailed." pic.twitter.com/YhmwI2BwA3

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 11, 2020

Prevailed? We still have the highest rate of infection per capita on the whole planet, don’t we? Along with the highest number of deaths per capita? If that’s prevailing, what would abject failure look like?

Turns out he meant we have prevailed in testing. We haven’t, of course, but that’s what he meant.

TRUMP: "You never prevail when you have 90,000 people [dead], 100,000 people, 80,000 people as of today." pic.twitter.com/6i6Bg07SUZ

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 11, 2020

.@PhilipRucker: You appeared to

The Guardian has details on the truth or otherwise of Trump’s “virus going down everywhere!!” tweet:

Trump says “coronavirus numbers are looking MUCH better, going down almost everywhere.”

Here’s what we know. Nearly 1,330,000 people have been infected with the coronavirus in the US, more than any other nation on the planet, and at least 79,500 have died, according to a Johns Hopkins database.

…

According to a New York Times database, new cases are decreasing in just 14 states of 50 states. Among them are densely populated states like New York and Michigan, which were among the hardest hit. The list also includes sparsely-populated states like Montana and Alaska.

New cases are still rising in nine US states,

The tweet.

Coronavirus numbers are looking MUCH better, going down almost everywhere. Big progress being made!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 11, 2020

The reality:

US Coronavirus Cases:

1,377,408

Deaths:

81,190

If that’s better, what would worse look like?… Read the rest

Oh but laydeez are supposed to be kiiiiiiiiiiind.

I’m with the judge. Calling trans females “male” is pointlessly offensive. “Trans female” is more accurate. Why does the opposition have to be so callous and hurtful? Their case remains solid without any hurtful slurs. https://t.co/s90joPCEuE

— Andrew Sullivan (@sullydish) May 11, 2020

That’s like saying it’s pointlessly offensive to call a murder “homicide” in court. It’s like saying it’s pointlessly offensive to call forcible uninvited penetration “rape.” It’s like saying it’s pointlessly offensive to call Trump a liar.

The whole point of the case is that whether or not you think that Yearwood and Miller “feel” female inside, the reality remains that they have male bodies and for that reason should … Read the rest

When The National Review is on the sanity side of the argument…

Attorneys representing three female high school track athletes in their effort to bar biological males from competing against them filed a motion on Saturday calling for the presiding judge to recuse himself after he forbid the attorneys from referring to the transgender athletes at issue as “males.”

[Editorial correction: it’s “after he forbade the attorneys to refer”]

The ADF filed suit in February against the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference (CIAC) on behalf of three girls — Selina Soule, Alana Smith, and Chelsea Mitchell. The suit challenges the CIAC policy allowing students to compete in the division that accords with their gender identity on the grounds that it disadvantages

60 Minutes reports:

An American scientist who collaborates with the Wuhan Institute of Virology had his grant terminated in the wake of unsubstantiated claims that COVID-19 is either manmade or leaked out of a Chinese government lab.

Because if there’s anything we need right now it’s to cut off the funding of virology research.

Peter Daszak is a British-born American Ph.D. who’s spent a career discovering dangerous viruses in wildlife, especially bats.

In 2003, in Malaysia, he warned 60 Minutes a pandemic was coming. 

Peter Daszak in 2003 interview: What worries me the most is that we are going to miss the next emerging disease, that we’re suddenly going to find a SARS virus that moves from one part

We’re now in the “let’em die” phase of Trump’s regime.

The message from President Trump and Republicans on the novel coronavirus has gone through multiple phases, each as misleading and/or bizarre as the last. First they told us the virus would barely touch us. Then they said it was serious but Trump’s management would quickly make it disappear. Then they said it could have been worse, and anyway it isn’t Trump’s fault.

And now they’re saying “Yes yes yes many thousands will die, now get back to your job!”

“There’ll be more death” as we resume economic activity, says President Trump, but “we have to get our country back.”

You know, the one where hospitals are full and … Read the rest

Speaking of how heeding medical advice makes Macho Men feel weak…

Happy Mother’s Day from C& C in Castle Rock, where the owner said this is almost double a normal Mother’s Day. pic.twitter.com/cPSzjmAfAg

— Nick Puckett (@puckettwrites) May 10, 2020

https://twitter.com/Denverhuff/status/1259567954833715201

There you go. Not wanting to die gasping for air in an ICU equals you’re SCARED, you’re AFRAID, you’re a COWARD and a WEAKLING and UNAMERICAN.

The Denver Post has more:

A Castle Rock restaurant saw big crowds Sunday when it fully reopened for Mother’s Day in open defiance of the statewide public health order that limits restaurants to takeout and delivery services.

Customers packed C&C Coffee and Kitchen on Trail Boss Drive on Sunday, filling the

Why do guys like Trump and Pence refuse to wear masks?

Perhaps because they see them as emasculating:

Why the reluctance to model safe behavior? My research with Jennifer Berdahl and others suggest one critical reason, which is that appearing to play it safe contradicts a core principle of masculinity: show no weakness. In short, wearing a mask emasculates.

There’s an irony here, which is that Trump shows his weakness whenever he talks, and he talks constantly and endlessly. He clearly thinks he comes across as a macho guy, but…no.

Leaders who are more concerned with preserving a macho public image put our lives at risk as they prove their manhood by showing resistance to experts’ opinions, hypersensitivity

In South Dakota news:

Gov. Kristi Noem sent letters Friday to the leaders of both the Oglala Sioux Tribe and the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe demanding that checkpoints designed to prevent the spread of coronavirus on tribal land be removed, the governor’s office said in a statement.

“We are strongest when we work together; this includes our battle against Covid-19,” Noem said. “I request that the tribes immediately cease interfering with or regulating traffic on US and State Highways and remove all travel checkpoints.”

“We are strongest when we work together therefore I am telling the tribes to stop protecting themselves from the virus.” I guess the virus if it doesn’t kill you makes you stronger?

In response, Cheyenne

An item from Friday:

U.S. President Donald Trump said he had spoken to a number of world leaders in recent days, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and “they all view us as the world leader” when it comes to fighting coronavirus, “and they’re following us.”

Nope. No they don’t, no they aren’t, no they haven’t, no they won’t. Not even a little tiny bit.

Trump was speaking to Republican members of the U.S. Congress on Friday. Citing calls with Merkel, Japan’s Shinzō Abe and other, unnamed leaders, he said “so many of them, almost all of them, I would say all of them” believe the U.S. is leading the way when it comes to tackling the virus.

That progression … Read the rest

They are getting nervous.

The Trump administration is racing to contain an outbreak of Covid-19 inside the White House, as some senior officials believe that the disease is already spreading rapidly through the warren of cramped offices that make up the three floors of the West Wing.

…

The discovery of the two infected employees has prompted the White House to ramp up its procedures to combat the coronavirus, including daily tests for some senior staff, increased usage of masks and more rigorous screening of people entering the complex.

The concern about an outbreak of the virus at the White House — and the swift testing and contact tracing being done to contain it — underscores the broader challenge

Robert Reich presents some blunt truths:

With 4.25% of the world population, America has the tragic distinction of accounting for about 30% of pandemic deaths so far.

And it is the only advanced nation where the death rate is still climbing. Three thousand deaths per day are anticipated by 1 June.

No other nation has loosened lockdowns and other social-distancing measures while deaths are increasing, as the US is now doing.

Much of this is because we’re not really an advanced nation, not in all senses. Technologically we’re hot shit, but socially and politically we’re a disaster.

We now know Donald Trump and his administration were told by public health experts in mid-January that immediate action was required to

It turns out Obama has not been hugely impressed with Trump’s recent work. He

delivered a blistering critique of the Trump administration’s response to the coronavirus crisis, describing it as “an absolute chaotic disaster” during a private call Friday night with people who worked for him in the White House and across his administration.

…

In a 30-minute conversation with members of the Obama Alumni Association, the former president said the response to the coronavirus outbreak served as a critical reminder for why strong government leadership is needed during a global crisis. The call was intended to encourage former Obama staffers to become more engaged in Biden’s presidential campaign.

“This election that’s coming up — on every level