Category: Notes and Comment Blog

Seen on Facebook:

Ali Kashif, a 25-year-old Pakistani imam who had reportedly lived in Brescia, Italy, for six years, was deported to Islamabad shortly after an undercover television report aired footage of him defending the marriage of girls as young as nine. Italian authorities moved to expel him under immigration provisions related to public order and security.

The controversy began with an undercover investigation by the Italian television program Fuori dal Coro on Rete 4. Reporter Francesco Leone posed as an Italian man interested in converting to Islam and questioned Kashif about marriage. During the conversation, Kashif reportedly argued that a girl should be considered an adult after experiencing her first menstrual cycle and said that girls aged nine or older could marry significantly older men.

The remarks sparked widespread outrage after the footage was broadcast. Brescia police commissioner Paolo Sartori subsequently ordered Kashif’s expulsion. Authorities reportedly cited provisions of Italy’s immigration law allowing foreign nationals considered a threat to public order or security to be removed. Officials also said Kashif did not have a valid residence permit at the time.

Setting aside the rights or wrongs of deporting him, what does that first menstrual cycle criterion tell us?

It’s unpleasantly, brutally, harshly obvious what it tells us. Female people are breeding stock, and nothing else. A nine-year-old girl is not a person, with her own dreams and hopes and potential; she’s a cow, a mare, a sow, a hen. Once she has her first menstrual cycle we know she can breed, and that’s all we need to know. Once she can breed, two realities come into play.

One, the guy who “marries” her can get her pregnant. Two, all other guys have the potential to get her pregnant so she has to be locked up. Marriage for her is that being locked up. All those other guys who could rape her can’t get at her, because she’s been imprisoned at the age of nine.

Such a benign, idealistic, humane religion.

And it’s not just the heat. It’s also the water drying up.

Europe braced on Wednesday for a fifth heat wave of a record-breaking summer that has already spurred wildfires of rare ferocity, caused water shortages across the continent and, for many Europeans, sapped the joy from a season they once savored.

The heat is expected to sweep from the west, with a high of 109 degrees Fahrenheit, or 43 degrees Celsius, predicted in Spain on Thursday, before hitting more eastern countries like Germany over the weekend.

…

In more than 70 percent of mainland France, water use is limited because of the widespread droughts. Groundwater levels have declined in more than 90 percent of underground water reserves in mainland France, the country’s national geological service reported this month. In some regions, people could be fined for using water in certain contexts, like washing their cars or filling swimming pools.

Across the channel, nearly three-quarters of England is now in drought, according to officials, with tens of millions of people in Britain under a hose ban.

…

The new heat wave comes after Western Europe recorded its hottest June-to-July period on record, according to Copernicus, the European Union’s climate monitoring service.

Droughts, magnified by climate change, are crippling some of the continent’s critical waterways, including the Rhine. In Serbia, the Danube River’s receding water levels exposed ships from a Nazi fleet that sank at the end of World War II.

Droughts and hail produced by uncharacteristically violent rainstorms have played havoc with agricultural land, harming farming revenues. Coldiretti, Italy’s largest agricultural trade association, estimates that climate-related damages have exceeded three billion euros, or nearly $3.5 billion.

Oh well, it’s only the food supply.

The Trump regime takes yet another axe to climate science.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is pulling its support from an Arctic climate and environment report it has helped with in the past.

Rick Thoman, lead editor for the 2026 Arctic Report Card, said that participants were informed Monday that they would no longer receive assistance from the government agency.

“We were informed in a phone call with NOAA yesterday that effective immediately NOAA was ending all support for the Arctic Report Card,” Thoman told The Hill.

“No rationale was given at all,” he added.

The report has been published every year since 2006 and describes current conditions in the Arctic.

They don’t need no stinkin’ rationale. Trump said so and that’s that.

NOAA spokespeople did not immediately respond to The Hill’s request for comment. However, the agency confirmed to CNN that it would no longer coordinate the report, but said it would still collect and publish data. 

Last year, NOAA did publish the Arctic Report Card on its website.

While it’s not clear who gave the direction to stop supporting the report this year, it comes after several other moves made by the Trump administration to target climate science and action. This includes dismissing all of the scientists working on the National Climate Assessment and repealing an Environmental Protection Agency legal finding that the phenomenon poses a threat to the public. 

It’s called shooting the messenger.

Trump’s grandchildren are not going to think highly of him.

Oh look who’s back.

BURLINGTON, Ont. – The Margaret Todd Trophy will be remaining on the West Coast as Team British Columbia successfully defended the Inter-Provincial Team title to mark three straight championships at the Canadian Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship, presented by BDO at the Burlington Golf & Country Club in Burlington, Ont. on Thursday.

Team British Columbia was represented by Nonie Marler of Vancouver, B.C., Aram Choi of Surrey, B.C. and Veronica Ivy of Victoria, B.C. who finished with a combined score of 5-over. This marks the second consecutive year that the trio has won the title at the Canadian Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship.

This marks the second consecutive year that the trio has won the title at the Canadian Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship.

“Doing it back-to-back is fun especially out of province,” said Marler. “We fought hard and the course is in unbelievable shape and we’re proud to bring it home to B.C.”

Proud even though one of you is a man?

Gee I wonder which one.

Sturgeon misunderstands.

Nicola Sturgeon has accused JK Rowling of being “obsessed” with her and insisted she is not at war with the Harry Potter author. The former first minister also said she would not be reading Joanna Cherry’s memoir on the grounds that it is “shit”.

Which she knows without having read it. She’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer, is she.

Earlier in the week, Ms Rowling had accused the former First Minister of being a “world-class misogynist”.

Asked about the prospect of an amnesty in her “war with JK Rowling”, Ms Sturgeon replied: “I’m not at war with JK Rowling. She seems to be at war with me. So, if there’s going to be an amnesty, I think it’s probably going to have to come from her.”

“We disagree on more than one thing,” the former SNP leader added. “You know, we disagree about independence. We clearly disagree on trans rights. My God, that woman is obsessed with me. I won’t spend as much time thinking about her as she does about me.”

Uh, no. It’s not personal. It’s because you were First Minister for a long time, and because you treat women like shit.

During the interview, Ms Sturgeon was also asked about former SNP MP Joanna Cherry’s memoir, Keeping the Dream Alive: An Insider’s Account of a Tumultuous Decade in Scottish Politics.

Ms Cherry is due to appear at Mr Dale’s show at a later date.

Ms Sturgeon was asked what question she would like Mr Dale to put to Ms Cherry.

“Again, somebody else who seems to have an obsession with me,” Ms Sturgeon replied. “I’m afraid it’s not reciprocated. It’s an unrequited obsession.”

See above. It’s not personal. It’s because you had the top job. That’s it, that’s the only reason.

When it’s not transphobia it’s Islamophobia and when it’s not Islamophobia it’s transphobia.

I am Islamosceptic, not Islamophobic

Unfortunately, some Muslims cannot tolerate any form of criticism, even from someone who has made many jokes about Christianity

Nobody ever called me Christophobic after Life of Brian ! https://t.co/ta482n4JVZ

— John Cleese (@JohnCleese) August 11, 2026

Not called Christophobic maybe but there was that famous appearance with Malcolm Muggeridge who flung a lot of wild accusations at them. I attended a bookstore event of Michael Palin’s once and he talked about it with considerable heat, aka fury.

What set off the accusations today:

Thank you, James

I am now checking on the security arrangements.

Never had to do this in the old days !

Hope this doesn't spoil the evening for all the people who were just looking forward to a good laugh https://t.co/ETzVdNx0Cy

— John Cleese (@JohnCleese) August 11, 2026

Islam is a set of ideas and commands. We’re allowed to hate it. We’re also right to hate it; it is hateful. If you ever want to check up on that, look for Islam & stoning women. Take very deep breaths first.

Can we spot the difference? Yes we can.

What is the difference?

Just a tiny little thing. Hitler had 6 million Jews genocided, along with other, smaller genocides and a world war. Rowling? Set up a rape crisis center in Edinburgh.

Oh NOW he tells us to get vaccinated.

Robert F Kennedy Jr, the US health secretary, on Sunday told American parents that they should get their children vaccinated against measles, as the surge in infections has reached numbers not seen in the past 35 years.

Kennedy, a leading vaccination skeptic who has spent years amplifying misinformation about vaccines, including the shot that protects against measles, mumps and rubella (MMR), made his call in the course of a contentious interview with CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday morning.

His remark came as the incidence of measles crossed a milestone – the US has now officially recorded 2,371 confirmed infections so far this year, surpassing 2025’s total tally of 2,289.

And Kennedy’s anti-vax views have probably done their bit to boost those numbers. He angrily denies it, but he has after all been airing his anti-vax views from his position as health secretary. It’s not as if we made that up.

Kennedy’s statement was extracted from him by Dana Bash, CNN’s host, who invited him to use his “bully pulpit” to talk directly to parents as the new school year approached. She urged him to tell families that they should vaccinate for measles “because it is safe and it will help them save their children’s lives”.

The health secretary replied: “Parents should get their children vaccinated for measles. A measles vaccine is effective, it stops measles in about 97% of the cases. People should get vaccinated.”

Later in the interview he added that people should also get the combined measles, mumps and rubella vaccine, the main protection against the disease that has been a particular target of the anti-vaccination movement.

Round of applause for Dana Bash.

Kennedy continues to shrug off criticism that his work as a prominent vaccine skeptic, both before and after he entered the Trump administration, has exacerbated the problem. Asked whether he took any responsibility for the measles surge, he said: “Absolutely not.”

So his noisy vaccine “skepticism” was completely inert? It influenced no one? Not one person acted on it?

Any hope that Kennedy’s measles statement might indicate a change of heart were dashed in the rest of the CNN interview in which he turned combative. Batting off questions from Bash, the health secretary responded with personal attacks.

He accused the CNN host of “saying nonsense”, “repeating like a parrot” and “making assertions you can’t support”. In one especially demeaning remark he said Bash had become “flustered”.

“I’m not flustered at all,” she asserted in a calm voice. “I am frustrated because you are the HHS secretary and you are talking about things that lead to vaccine hesitancy in this country.”

In a further comment dripping with condescension, Kennedy told Bash “you probably don’t understand this because you’re not a scientist”.

The journalist riposted: “But you’re not, either.”

There are a lot of other things he’s not.

The health secretary’s belligerent approach, in which he at times appeared red-faced while frequently poking his finger towards Bash, attracted the attention of commentators. The journalist Aaron Rupar described the performance as “RFK Jr’s epic CNN crashout” and said in a post on X that Kennedy’s “yelling” sounded like “a rabid dog barking”.

I wonder if he’s had his rabies shot.

Special.

Civil servants have threatened to back legal challenges against the government after officials scrapped up to 13 weeks of paid special leave for transgender staff undergoing gender reassignment.

The Civil Service LGBT+ Network and a:gender, two employee groups, have urged Whitehall to halt the introduction of a replacement policy, and said they would no longer promote the Civil Service as an inclusive employer.

Until now, transgender employees could take up to 13 weeks of special leave in a rolling 12-month period for medical treatment and recovery related to gender identity without it being counted as sick leave.

13 WEEKS? That’s not counted as sick leave??

That is some extreme special treatment.

The provision was removed after analysis of equality law “in mitigation of potential discrimination in respect of different provisions for other employees”.

Yeah no shit. 13 weeks of vacation that other employees don’t get is different provisions all right.

The previous rules formed part of the Civil Service’s Gender Identity and Intersex Model Policy Package.

According to the networks, the new guidance said access to workplace facilities could not be decided by the transgender employee alone and should instead be discussed with a line manager.

It is also understood to say transgender staff must not use single-sex facilities for the opposite sex and could instead be told to use unisex facilities or those of their biological sex.

Is it finally beginning to dawn on the higher-ups that people who claim to be the opposite sex are not actually entitled to whole truckloads of extra rights that no one else has?

Manivannan is trying to backpedal.

Q Manivannan, the Scottish Parliament’s first non-binary MSP, has apologised over comments describing rape as being “on a spectrum”.

The Scottish Green MSP, who was elected in May, sparked fury and was widely condemned after a clip from The Subjective Space podcast in which Manivannan said that there “definitely is a demonisation of rape” and there are “different modes” of consent. The podcast was recorded last year and has resurfaced on social media.

The clip shows Manivannan saying: “It is a spectrum, none of which is any less, or more, worse, but it is a spectrum of things that constitute that one homogenised word, rape. And I think there’s also different modes of not just consent, but also ideas, also contexts and conditions under which rape is, well, rape.”

As many people have pointed out, not his call. It’s not for men to inform us that rape is what they say it is.

Manivannan added: “I recognise that the words in the clip shared, without the full context of the conversation, have caused considerable upset. For that I apologise. I will always stand with and for victims and survivors.  

“Rape and sexual violence can leave profound pain, fear, hurt and trauma. I know from my experience of surviving sexual violence and speaking about recovery how deeply those experiences can affect people. And this complete mischaracterisation of my words has now returned me to my trauma.”

And there it is – he’s the one who is really suffering here.

Scottish Rape Crisis Alliance (SRCA), which represents four Scottish rape centres, criticised Manivannan’s comments in an open letter, saying there is “no hierarchy of rape” and warning not to “minimise” sexual violence.

The alliance has also said it “fundamentally rejects the suggestion that society is demonising rape”.

The SRCA said: “We do not need to exaggerate its seriousness. We do not need to turn perpetrators into mythical monsters.

“But neither should we be afraid to say plainly that rape is horrific, that it causes profound trauma and harm, and that responsibility for that harm belongs with the person who chose to violate another person.”

The Scottish Conservatives have called on the Scottish Greens to suspend the whip from Manivannan immediately.

The party’s equalities spokeswoman Meghan Gallacher said: “These remarks from an extremist Scottish Greens MSP were appalling and beyond the pale.

“It is deeply alarming that anyone, but especially an elected representative, would ever seek to minimise the seriousness of rape and suggest that there is a spectrum of offences.”

Yes but he’s non-binary. Doesn’t that make it ok?

New Manchester mayor refuses to commit to implementing trans guidance

The Mayor of Greater Manchester has refused to say whether she would adopt new guidance on single-sex spaces.

Bev Craig, who replaced Andy Burnham as mayor last month, twice refused to commit to imposing Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) guidance which says transgender people should use either gender-neutral bathrooms or those intended for biological sex.

So in other words the mayor of a large important city refuses to commit to protecting women from men who want to perv on them in places like bathrooms.

Asked whether she would oversee the “full imposition” of EHRC’s guidance, Ms Craig told Times Radio: “I am working through what the guidance means in terms of the transport services that I am in control of.”

Asked a second time whether this meant with the intention of implementing the single-sex guidance, Ms Craig replied: “Well, with the intention of understanding what would be different to what we do now.

“Actually many of our services are compliant. The reality here is that we are probably talking about a handful of public toilets. Am I as the Mayor going to be checking people’s bits on the way into the toilet? Absolutely not.”

That wasn’t the question. Of course. This is part of the playbook – pretend the questions are outrageous and absurd when in reality they are not. The question was not about the mayor delving into people’s underpants.

Last week, a coalition of Left-wing councils in London pledged to defy the new rules because they were “an attack” on transgender and non-binary residents.

The leaders of Lambeth, Hackney, Haringey, Lewisham, Southwark and Waltham Forest councils made a joint commitment to keep their services “inclusive”.

Which being interpreted means they made a joint commitment to keep their services hazardous for women.

During the by-election campaign to replace Mr Burnham, the former leader of Manchester city council said she had “fought for LGBT rights” throughout her career and would not “pit minority against minority”.

She said: “I believe in a world where the two can go hand in hand. I’ve shown that you can stand up for single-sex spaces, like women’s refuges that are important, but also not throw our trans communities under the bus.”

Under Ms Craig’s leadership of the council, it passed a motion in 2022 which declared “trans men are men, trans women are women, non-binary people are non-binary and trans rights are human rights”.

So the council passed a motion telling two major lies. Whoopee.

The Telegraph chats amiably with an actor, and then suddenly there’s a plot twist.

Powley will soon be playing Petunia Dursley (Harry Potter’s Muggle aunt) in HBO’s forthcoming TV adaptation of the Harry Potter books. It is a project that also presents serious issues, albeit of a very different nature. Is she worried about how her career might be affected by such association with JK Rowling and her gender critical views? It seems that she – quite sensibly – has her statement ready on that one.

Oh my god!! Serious issues!!! So serious!!!! Association! Such association!! How can she stand the filth, the contamination, the impurity?!!!!

What a good thing she has her statement ready. Whew. It would have been Armageddon if she hadn’t. Hooray she’s so quite sensible.

Wtf. This is the Telegraph, not the BBC or the Guardian. Why is the Telegraph coming over all queasy and censorious about JK Rowling? Does the Telegraph think men belong in women’s rape crisis centers? Does the Telegraph think men are women if they say they are?

“I strongly disagree with JK Rowling’s views on gender,” she says. “I think that the trans community deserve safety and dignity and respect and total acceptance [Rowling, in fact, would agree with that, but argues that biological sex is real and immutable]. But,” she throws up her palms. “I love Harry Potter. I grew up with the books. I am from that first generation of readers and, again, I love magic and spookiness.”

So one minute the Telegraph is screaming in horror because it has to mention Rowling, and the next minute it’s inserting an explainer that Rowling is not in fact a monster who wants to eat trans people with some fava beans and a nice Chianti. Confused much?

Reflecting

You’d be forgiven for thinking the saga involving Donald Trump’s vile prosecutions of innocent people over his Reflecting Pool fiasco has finally come to an ignominious end. On Thursday, a judge officially threw out felony charges against former Olympic canoeist David Hearn, who’d been falsely accused by Trump of vandalizing his disastrous renovation of the landmark.

…

But this is not the final chapter in this story—not by a long shot. And what happens next will help settle whether we are capable of dispensing real justice to all those Trump accomplices who are helping make our slide into authoritarianism possible.

Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee are set to launch an investigation into the decision to criminally charge Hearn and others over the Reflecting Pool fiasco, I’m told. Although Democrats are in the minority, their probe offers a blueprint for what they’ll pursue with subpoena power if they control the House in six months.

It would be nice to know more about this ludicrous bit of petty tyranny.

This week, Representative Jamie Raskin—the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee and potentially its future chair—will formally demand that the Justice and Interior Departments turn over a wealth of documents related to the charging decisions made in this case.

“Judiciary Democrats will investigate who lied, who buried the evidence, and who decided to threaten an American citizen with prison simply to protect Trump’s wounded feelings and continuing corruption,” Raskin said in a statement to me. “Participants in this frame-up will be held to account.”

At the center of this saga is Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. Attorney for Washington, D.C. and a longtime Trump confidante. Pirro’s office eagerly indicted an innocent man after the ailing despot in the Oval Office, embarrassed over reports of algae and other problems plaguing his Reflecting Pool renovation, raged that his underlings must produce a scapegoat to spare him from humiliation. Pirro did subsequently move to dismiss the case. But there’s a ton we still don’t know about all these corrupt machinations.

Corrupt and at the same time absolutely ludicrous.

Indeed, none of Pirro’s excuses explain why her office brought the indictment when it did. After all, her office hadn’t yet gotten a full accounting from the Interior Department of how the damage had been caused. Heck, the government’s own sole witness testified to the grand jury that this damage was visible before Hearn ever touched it, and it was obvious to the naked eye that something far more than vandalism had marred the project.

“The notion that they did not know that there was a botched, rushed renovation of the Reflecting Pool does not hold water,” Norm Eisen, a lawyer for Hearn, told me.

It doesn’t hold water or pieces of blue pool lining.

Sigh

An NHS trust has told staff that trans people can still use women’s bathrooms and wards in spite of new guidance over single-sex spaces.

Midlands Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust (MPFT) told staff on Wednesday that there would be “no immediate changes” to its policies or practices while it awaited further guidance from NHS England.

What. fucking. further. guidance? They’ve already had the guidance – and anyway what kind of “guidance” is necessary? It’s very simple: no men in women’s bathrooms and wards. Seven words, all of them familiar to people who work in hospitals. What’s to guide?

Patients can access single-sex facilities, including hospital wards, according to their gender identity rather than biological sex, under the Trust’s Trans Inclusion and Single Sex Accommodation policies.

Staff are also allowed to use toilets and showers based on their gender identity.

Which being interpreted means men can continue to terrorize and humiliate women despite the law.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission’s (EHRC) revised Code came into force on Wednesday, more than a year after the Supreme Court ruled “sex” in equality law means biological sex rather than gender identity.

It says single-sex services must be provided based on biological sex. Transgender people should use facilities intended for their biological sex or separate or mixed-sex alternatives.

Must. Not “should” but “must”. The word ought to be must. It’s all this shuffling and hemming and cringing and replacing “must” with “ought” that encourages people to keep ignoring the law in order to make women’s lives hell.

An email from MPFT to staff this week said: “We understand this may be a difficult and anxiety-provoking time for our trans, non-binary and gender-diverse colleagues, service users and communities, and we want to reassure you that we stand by you, and remain committed to being an inclusive organisation.”

But no email saying that to women, I take it. Women don’t matter, it’s only our trans, non-binary and gender-diverse colleagues, service users and communities who matter. Women are just so much tiresome mud.

Female MPFT employees told The Telegraph they were upset by the decision to leave the policies unchanged.

One said: “The email lists a range of groups that the Trust stands by, but there is no mention of women or people who think sex matters.

Exactly so. What the hell is wrong with everyone?

Terry Stock, a public governor at MPFT, told The Telegraph he was disappointed but unsurprised by the Trust’s failure to update its policies.

Documents seen by The Telegraph show Mr Stock has repeatedly challenged the policies since becoming a public governor in late 2024, warning of risks to vulnerable female patients and staff.

After raising concerns about transgender activism and women’s rights, he was told colleagues had been left feeling “hurt or excluded” and was discouraged from attending an LGBT+ staff event because it was “not an appropriate forum for questioning the legitimacy of trans identity or debating trans rights”.

Which being translated means it’s not an appropriate forum for defending women’s rights.

The Trust agreed in April 2025 to examine the lawfulness of its policies. However, a freedom of information response confirmed in June that the policies and guidance were unchanged.

Again: there’s nothing to “examine”. Just stop letting men invade women’s spaces.

“The Trust appears to be ideologically captured,” said Mr Stock. “Senior officials have repeatedly failed to address the conflict between these policies and the law. Nothing changes. They show a complete disregard for women’s privacy, dignity and safety.”

The dispute comes amid wider uncertainty over the NHS’s response to the new Code.

NHS England has declined to set out a timetable for replacing national guidance that allows transgender patients to be accommodated according to gender identity, saying only that updated policies will be published “shortly”.

Why shortly? Why not right this minute? It isn’t rocket science. No men in women’s spaces: five words.

Every hour of every day we’re reminded how easy it is for people to trash women’s rights for the sake of a tiny minority of men who like to pretend to be women. I’m tired of it.

It’s very simple. The job is to prosecute the people the boss tells you to prosecute. It’s not to run around saying there is no case – it’s just to follow orders.

Jeanine Pirro swept into Washington last year as a camera-ready prosecutor and staunch ally of President Donald Trump. Suddenly she was everywhere: crime scenes and community forums, court hearings and TV interviews, TikTok-style videos and black-tie dinners.

But after more than a year in office as U.S. attorney in the nation’s capital, Pirro now finds herself at odds with Trump — with her job at risk — over scraps of blue liner that peeled off the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.

Well at least it’s about something important.

Pirro, who left her job as a Fox News host to become the top federal prosecutor in D.C., immediately began seeking the toughest charges possible for violent crimes. She launched criminal probes of more than a half-dozen public officials who had drawn Trump’s ire — then punted the blame to judges and juries when those efforts collapsed.

But her moves to drop several cases of alleged vandalism at the newly renovated pool contradicted Trump and blamed the administration’s handpicked contractor for botching a project the president had championed.And in the end, they exposed a crack in Pirro’s ability to balance Trump’s demands with her legal responsibilities.

Ah yes a crack. I suppose it’s that crack where the absence of evidence breaks away from Trump’s determination to harm everyone he dislikes. From where Trump sits, Pirro is not there to go after the baddies when the evidence is solid, she’s there to go after anyone Trump tells her to go after, evidence or no evidence. This sounds sarcastic but it’s obviously just the plain truth. He expects her to use the law as a weapon, and reality, truth, facts, evidence have nothing to do with it.

Trump claimed vandals had torn up the pool’s “beautiful facade,” and Pirro initially filed criminal charges against four people, including a former Olympic canoeist who was indicted on a felony count of destruction of property. In her booming New York brogue, Pirro castigated that defendant at a news conference and said her office was “committed to protecting our national resources, our monuments, and our parks from vandals.”

But Pirro abruptly dropped all four cases weeks later, blamed the Interior Department for misleading prosecutors into filing unsupported criminal charges and wassoon inside the Oval Office to explain herself.

Of course she was, because “unsupported” is neither here nor there. Her job is to prosecute the people Trump tells her to prosecute. The end. It’s not to look for evidence or support or facts or witnesses or anything else.

The rift between Trump and Pirro, over peeling bits of paint at a national monument, came after she had launched criminal probes into six Democratic lawmakers who criticized the administration’s military actions, as well as the Federal Reserve chair at the time, Jerome H. Powell, who refused Trump’s demands to resign or institute lower interest rates.

So she’s perfectly willing to use the law to torment people at Trump’s behest so why didn’t she just oblige him this time? Who knows.

Pirro’s office said in the Reflecting Pool court filing, prosecutors were voluntarily dismissing the charges. Trump said Pirro “folded like an umbrella.”

“I just think she was totally wrong,” Trump told reporters Wednesday, noting that National Park Service employees had told authorities they saw vandals in action. He described problems with the contractor as “a couple of little things” and said he hadn’t made a determination on whether to keep Pirro on the job.

Trump continued his criticism Friday, saying on social media that “U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro should revisit her hastily made decision.”

Trump never makes decisions hastily.

In Trump’s second term, Flood said, some U.S. attorneys in key offices have discovered that being a responsible prosecutor is sometimes a fireable offense. He noted that Erik S. Siebert, whom Trump had appointed as the interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, was forced out last year after declining to seek criminal charges against former FBI director James B. Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James. Career prosecutors in both cases had said the evidence was too flimsy to take to court.

“The reality is if you’re an ethical U.S. attorney, and you won’t be bent to Trump’s will, you’re gone,” Flood said. Of Pirro’s decision to drop the Reflecting Pool cases, he added: “She gets some credit for standing up to Trump.”

Judges have also criticized Pirro’s office for wiping out the most serious convictions from the Jan. 6 riot — the seditious conspiracy cases against the far-right Proud Boys and Oath Keepers.

Members of the extremist groups stockpiled firearms and led the charge into the Capitol, according to the evidence presented at their trials. Pirro this year signed on to key court filings to clear those charges as a matter of loyalty to Trump, according to people familiar with the matter. But she declines to take questions about those moves, even as federal judges bemoan the historical consequences of undoing convictions for crimes against the country.

Dirty dirty dirty dirty dirty. There’s just no end to the filth.

Joan Smith wrote the book on this subject. The literal book.

My mind inevitably goes back to the Yorkshire Ripper murders. West Yorkshire police interviewed Peter Sutcliffe 9 times, didn't search his house & accepted alibi evidence from close relatives.

What happens to women, then & now, isn't a glitch in the system. It is the system.

— Joan Smith (@polblonde) August 8, 2026

Vikram Dodd at the Guardian doesn’t mince his words.

Catastrophic errors left a persistent and proven sex offender free before he murdered two women in London, it can be revealed.

On Friday, an Old Bailey jury found Simon Levy, 40, guilty of murdering Carmenza Valencia-Trujillo in March 2025 and Sheryl Wilkins five months later.

Levy was on bail as a suspect for the first murder when he committed the second, after police said they lacked sufficient evidence to charge him.

Months before the first killing, police arrested Levy for sexual assaults of women on trains but made errors that delayed charging him. While on bail, he carried out further attacks, taking the total to 10 across London. Although charged with most of the offences, Levy remained free and went on to commit his second murder.

Prosecutors also admitted to bungling efforts to have Levy remanded in custody, by failing to provide three court hearings with key information demonstrating the full extent of the danger he posed to women.

Yet even before the attacks on women travelling by train, police and prosecutors knew Levy posed a serious risk.

He was first jailed for a sexual offence in 2021. While in prison, he sexually assaulted a female prison officer.

After his release, he carried out a series of sexual assaults on trains across London between 2023 and 2025. He was also the prime suspect in a rape investigation.

In January, March and August 2025, Levy, from Tottenham in north London, savagely attacked three women who provided sexual services, killing two and leaving one seriously injured.

Maybe the police were too busy hunting for terfs to bother with men who abuse and murder women.

The Crown Prosecution Service, the Metropolitan police and British Transport Police have admitted making errors.

Kevin Southworth, a deputy assistant commissioner at the Met, which investigated the killings, described Levy as a “predatory monster”. He said Wilkins, the second woman murdered by Levy, would probably have been alive were it not for what he described as “collective system failures”.

And how interesting it is that the collective system failures are at the expense of women as opposed to…anyone else.

The failings come despite decades of promises from police chiefs, senior prosecutors, courts and government that the criminal justice system will better protect women from male violence after a series of scandals.

Too busy going to Pride parades?

Were the cops too busy being trans allies to notice?

A British man was convicted on Friday ​of murdering two sex workers after sexually assaulting multiple women in London, with police and prosecutors accepting ‌they made errors which allowed him to continue his escalating offences.

Simon Levy, 40, was found guilty of the murder of Carmenza Valencia-Trujillo in March 2025 and of Sheryl Wilkins in August 2025, as well as the rape and serious assault of a third woman in January that ​year.

Police had arrested Levy on suspicion of murdering Valencia-Trujillo, 53, in April 2025 but released him – after which ​Levy sexually assaulted five women on trains in London before he killed Wilkins, 39.

…

Levy was convicted on Friday after a trial at London’s Old Bailey of murdering Valencia-Trujillo and Wilkins and counts of rape, causing grievous bodily harm with intent, and ​intentional strangulation in relation to the third woman.

He had also been convicted in February after ​a separate trial ⁠of sexually assaulting 10 women on London trains between October 2023 and May 2025, with six of those attacks occurring in early 2025.

…

Britain’s crime and policing minister Sarah Jones welcomed ​the IOPC investigation into Levy’s case.

“The fact that Levy was able to inflict such devastating harm after being freed by police and the courts is ​deeply concerning,” Jones said in a statement. “It raises serious questions that require urgent answers.”

It does rather. Like for instance “Do you see women as just not worth the trouble? Or what?”

Hmmm.

Imagine if someone Blacked up or got in a wheelchair, says the man who Womans up and verbally abuses women who object.

He’s not really a very clear or sharp thinker, is he.

It’s on a spectrum, you see.

A trans Green MSP has claimed rape exists on a “spectrum”.

Q Manivannan said the “demonisation of rape” led to an overly simplistic idea about what kind of people committed the offence.

The act, the Indian-born poet and academic argued, instead exists on a “spectrum” and is dependent on different “contexts”. Anyone, he said, can commit the offence – including women.

Well, no, because “rape” means what it means. If you want to talk about sexual misconduct that’s not rape then you need a different word. Rape means rape in much the same way women means women.

Isn’t it interesting that it’s the words women need that are getting all this chin-scratching over do we really mean rape when we talk about rape my dear chap?

Rape is rape. Consensual sex in which one person gets violent without consent is something else. Rape is still rape.

Manivannan said the remarks were intended to highlight how society has too narrow a definition of what counts as rape and of the people who are likely to commit it.

No, because if you want to talk about abuse or violent consensual sex or a host of other variations you can, but you don’t need to change the meaning of “rape” to do that. Also, men aren’t the ideal sex to do it.

Susan Smith, co-director of feminist campaign group For Women Scotland, said: “We were very disturbed to hear the comments from Manivannan which betrayed such utter ignorance of the trauma and violation of rape.

“This will be a test of the determination of the Greens to ‘queer’ all boundaries.

“Having decided that gender is fluid and that ‘women’ can have penises, will they now defend the notion that consent and sexual violence are fluid, mutable concepts and that women have to accept rapists’ self-assessment that they are great lads and not to be ‘demonised’?”

This is why Manivannan is not the right person to talk about this. At all.