There are laws, and there are norms.

A special counsel’s investigation of a president is first and foremost a mechanism for addressing strictly legal questions. But it is necessarily always more, and the investigative process and the ultimate legal and factual findings reflect, help shape and often reinforce the state of key norms — fundamental expectations of presidential conduct.

The process norms, Bob Bauer writes, have come out of this pretty well.

But the Mueller report marked a low point for more substantive norms of presidential conduct. It shows that a demagogic president like Donald Trump can devalue or even depart radically from key norms, just short of committing chargeable crimes, so long as he operates mostly and brazenly

Keeping the rabble out:

At least one multimillion-pound housing development in London is segregating the children of less well-off tenants from those of wealthier homebuyers by blocking them from some communal play areas.

Guardian Cities has discovered that developer Henley Homes has blocked social housing residents from using shared play spaces at its Baylis Old School complex on Lollard Street, south London. The development was required to include a mix of “affordable” and social rental units in order to gain planning permission.

Henley marketed the award-winning 149-home development, which was built in 2016 on the site of a former secondary school, as inclusive and family-friendly. It said the “common areas are there for the use of all the residents”.

William Saletan does a close reading of Barr’s letter:

The letter says the Justice Department won’t prosecute Trump, but it reaches that conclusion by tailoring legal standards to protect the president. Here’s a list of Barr’s weasel words and what they’re hiding.

“The Russian government.” The letter quotes a sentence from Mueller’s report. In that sentence, Mueller says his investigation didn’t prove that members of the Trump campaign “conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.” The sentence specifies Russia’s government. It says nothing about coordination with other Russians.

Like for instance Kilimnik and Veselnitskaya.

“In its election interference activities.” This phrase is included in the same excerpt.
It reflects the structure of the

And a third:

A father dedicated to helping prevent mass shootings after his daughter was killed in the Sandy Hook massacre has died of an apparent suicide.

The body of Jeremy Richman was found in his Connecticut office building Monday morning, Newtown police said.

His death is the third suicide in the past week related to school massacres.

Richman, 49, was the father of 6-year-old Avielle Richman, who was among 20 children and six adults killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting.

You know…Sandy Hook was the one and only time Obama asked Michelle to come back to the White House from an engagement because he couldn’t deal.

After the Sandy Hook massacre, Richman tried to

Walter Shaub says yes but we already know he’s a criminal.

https://twitter.com/waltshaub/status/1109906362664972288

https://twitter.com/waltshaub/status/1109906366628548608

https://twitter.com/waltshaub/status/1109906370839658497

https://twitter.com/waltshaub/status/1109906373075222528

https://twitter.com/waltshaub/status/1109906375352700928

https://twitter.com/waltshaub/status/1109906378045489155

https://twitter.com/waltshaub/status/1109906379677093890

https://twitter.com/waltshaub/status/1109906381732282368

https://twitter.com/waltshaub/status/1109906383426719744

Put like that it all seems a bit damning, doesn’t it.… Read the rest

Word is the Mueller report says they didn’t find evidence that Trump conspired with Russia but they’re not exonerating him either. Naturally Trump interpreted that as “Complete and Total EXONERATION,” because in Trumpland “not exonerating=TOTAL EXONERATION.”

Special counsel Robert Mueller did not find Donald Trump’s campaign or associates conspired with Russia, Attorney General William Barr said Sunday.

Mueller’s investigation of whether the President committed obstruction of justice did not conclude the President committed a crime, but it also “does not exonerate him,” Barr quoted from Mueller’s report.

Not proven but not disproven. Not the same as totally exonerated.

Trump and his allies charged that Mueller’s report fully vindicated the President, while Democrats were already raising questions about Barr making the

Oh no no no no no.

#BREAKING: Second Parkland shooting survivor commits suicide, police confirm https://t.co/kjLOKi37zT Via @MoniqueOMadan pic.twitter.com/M2am516uU0

— Miami Herald (@MiamiHerald) March 24, 2019

The Miami Herald:

A second Parkland shooting survivor has killed himself, Coral Springs police confirmed on Sunday.

Investigators told the Miami Herald that a current Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School student died in “an apparent suicide” on Saturday night.

…

The death comes just about a week after a recent Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School graduate, Sydney Aiello, took her own life after being diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Broward County Medical Examiner’s Office told NBC News that Aiello died from a gunshot wound to the head.

Ryan Petty, father of

If you want to get people’s attention to a safety campaign, there’s only one way to do it: dangle a woman in underwear in front of them. That works, and nothing else does.

An advertising campaign by Germany’s transport ministry to persuade cyclists to wear helmets has sparked accusations of sexism, as it features a model wearing just a helmet and underwear.

With the slogan: “Looks like shit. But saves my life,” the advert features a profile-shot of Alicija Köhler, a competitor in the gameshow Germany’s Next Topmodel, sporting a violet coloured helmet and a lacy bra.

Women pointed out that it’s possible to advertise things without waving stripped women around like sparklers.

Defending the advert, a transport

Survivors’ Network proudly announces it is throwing women to the wolves:

We have recently received a huge increase in attention and interest in our inclusion of trans women in our women-only services. We are happy to make it explicitly clear: Survivors’ Network recognises trans women as women, and we welcome them to use all of our services.

You might as well say you recognize wolves as daffodils. Trans women are men, and they don’t belong in women-only services, especially those for survivors.

We know, through groundbreaking research, that trans people are disproportionately impacted by sexual violence, and we consider a trans inclusive feminism to be key to our values and central to our service as the Rape Crisis Centre

I’m curious about the “Morgane Oger Foundation” now, so looking into it. Pretty funny so far.

It has its very own Facebook page!

Which of course Morgane Oger could have set up all by xirself.

It sure does look as if Oger is providing all the content. It shares articles from…the Morgane Oger Foundation. For instance, it shares one with the stirring headline “Morgane Oger Foundation Applauds City of Vancouver Putting Inclusion First.” What does Oger mean by that? You already know.

We are concerned that public-funding organizations are closing their eyes to discrimination they enable by funding programs delivered by service providers which do not live up to the funding organization’s expectations. We urge all funders to address

And here’s a bad idea in the making:

An advocacy organization says it wants to map hatred and discrimination across Canada in a move that is prompting warnings of caution from one civil liberties group.

The Vancouver-based Morgane Oger Foundation has issued a call for volunteers to help build the Canadian Atlas of Populist Extremism, to be known as CAPE.

Founder Morgane Oger said the mapping tool would tie together extremist groups and people regularly associated with them, and also map incidents involving hate across Canada.

Is it actually an organization, or is it just Morgane Oger?

The idea is to shed light on how hatred is propagated, she said, while being mindful that allegations can’t be tossed out

The SPLC is back in the news, and not in a good way. Its president Richard Cohen resigned yesterday. The New Yorker has a bandaid-rippingoff article on the truth behind the myth by Bob Moser, who was a staffer there from 2001 to 2004.

In the days since the stunning dismissal of Morris Dees, the co-founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center, on March 14th, I’ve been thinking about the jokes my S.P.L.C. colleagues and I used to tell to keep ourselves sane. Walking to lunch past the center’s Maya Lin–designed memorial to civil-rights martyrs, we’d cast a glance at the inscription from Martin Luther King, Jr., etched into the black marble—“Until justice rolls down like waters”—and intone, in our

Here’s a thought: how about nobody recommends anybody gets killed? Radical, I know, but worth a try?

Ahmadi Muslims for instance: let’s nobody recommend they be executed for apostasy.

A [London] mosque has received an official warning after leaflets calling for the killing of a sect of Muslims were found on display.

Piles of the flyers, which say Ahmadis should face death if they refuse to convert to mainstream Islam, were found in Stockwell Green mosque.

…

A BBC investigation found the leaflets were authored by an ex-head of Khatme Nabuwwat, a group based in Pakistan which lists the mosque as its “overseas office”.

Previously a mosque trustee said he had never seen the leaflets before and suggested they

So, that’s eccentric.

President Trump undercut his own Treasury Department on Friday with a sudden announcement that he had rolled back newly imposed sanctions on North Korea, appearing to overrule national security experts as a favor to Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader.

The move, announced on Twitter, was a remarkable display of dissension in the Trump administration and was a striking case of a White House intervening to reverse a major national security decision made only hours earlier by the president’s own officials.

He really did.

It was announced today by the U.S. Treasury that additional large scale Sanctions would be added to those already existing Sanctions on North Korea. I have today ordered the withdrawal of those

Yet again I can’t find enough swears.

Sorry there are so many repetitions, the threading was messed up. Or Thread Reader App is easier, I’ll put that tweet at the end.

https://twitter.com/turnthetide2018/status/1109089766082052097

https://twitter.com/turnthetide2018/status/1109091720891940865

https://twitter.com/turnthetide2018/status/1109094962531102720

https://twitter.com/turnthetide2018/status/1109092243946827782

https://twitter.com/turnthetide2018/status/1109094962531102720

https://twitter.com/turnthetide2018/status/1109096602185150465

https://twitter.com/turnthetide2018/status/1109097658155569152

https://twitter.com/threadreaderapp/status/1109194565834231813… Read the rest

Remember the charming Peyton Rose, who wants to see “TERFs” punched in the throat? Trans Pride Scotland issued a statement on Rose’s ugly threats:

We at Trans Pride Scotland were today asked to comment on the activity surrounding a tweet made by one of our performers, Payton Rose. In our statement, we made clear that we have a policy against violence and harassment at our events, and while that remains true, we feel some clarity is needed after today’s press releases.

We believe that Payton has been unfairly represented by her detractors and the press, especially those who have a history of transphobic activity. While her tweet was certainly inflammatory and may have caused concern for many

More on Prince Jared’s casual entitled disregard for all the rules and laws and restrictions:

According to a Feb. 22, 2017, directive from the White House Counsel’s Office, all White House personnel are required to “conduct all work related communications on your official EOP email account” except under “emergency circumstances.”

Early last year, White House lawyers warned West Wing staffers in mandatory ethics training sessions not to use encrypted messaging apps. Kushner attended one of the sessions, The Washington Post reported at the time.

But hey, they all of them were indifferent enough to ethics and laws that barred them from working for Daddy’s administration to work in it anyway, so how much attention are they going to pay to … Read the rest