Today iIn Bald-Faced Liars

And of course, it's an evangelical preacher -- none other than Robert Jeffress:

There is no such thing as a separation of church and state in the Constitution. We have allowed the secularists, the atheists, the humanists to hijack our Constitution and pervert it into something our forefathers never intended.

And I’m gonna say this. I’m gonna say this, and it may cost me some book sales, but I’m gonna say it anyway. Thank God we have a president like Donald J. Trump who understands that. I don’t like seeing my friend under attack like he is under right now, but I don’t like the prospect of what’s going to happen in America if we allow the left to seize control of this country again.

And I believe one of the great ironies of history is gonna be this: When the historians look back, they are gonna say with great surprise, that it was a secular, billionaire real estate tycoon from New York City who became the most pro-life, pro-religious liberty, and pro-Israel president in history.

I have a couple of quotes for Mr. Jeffress. The first is from Amendment I to the Constitution of the United States of America, which begins:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. . . .

The second is from Thomas Jefferson's letter to the Danbury Baptists:

. . . I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State.

Now, you may recall that Jefferson, aside from being the third president of the United States, had also served in several capacities in previous administrations, including vice president and secretary of state. He was also, while American envoy to France, in close touch with the framers of the Constitution, so I suspect he had a fairly good idea of what it meant. (And no, as long as we're on the subject, America was quite deliberately not founded as a "Christian nation.")

As for the rest of the drivel -- well, can you say "sycophant"?

There's video at the link, if you can stand it.

Culture Break: Linkin Park: The Catalyst

Given the state of the country these days, this seems appropriate:

And yes, Linkin Park is one of my favorite bands, right up there with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

This Week at Green Man Review

Our usual eclectic selection:

Falstaff’s Fireplace, Superb Chocolate, Single Pot Irish Whiskey, Great Fiction and Sweet Music — Small Treats Indeed!

Hop on over and enjoy!

Today's Must-Read: Business As Usual

This is what happens when you install a sleazy CEO in the White House:

We always hear that Trump thinks of things transactionally. So he will think of the Saudi protection contract as a "new business" contract that he got for the Pentagon. He expects the Pentagon will make money off the deal, after all, "They pay cash!"

With the recent deal that let him move money from military programs to The Wall, Trump can now see the military budget as just one big pool of money--that he just added to by signing a long term protection contract with "The Kingdom"

Trump will now expect the generals and the contractors to be grateful to him. He's a good earner for them. The Wall money, from the military budget, is now rightfully his. After all, he got them the big contract. When he didn't go after MBS for the murder of Khashoggi, he was protecting a huge revenue stream to the military.

The art of the deal, indeed. I suspect this is really the way Trump thinks.

Read the whole thing -- yes, it's pretty snarky, but that's certainly merited.

Today's Must-Read: Telling It Like It Is

Interesting profile/analysis on Beto O'Rourke -- makes me want to vote for him:

Beto O’Rourke, the former congressman from Texas who is now a Democratic presidential candidate, has been titillating the schoolmarms of the American press corps by saying naughty words. He let an F-bomb fly while dressing down the media for pretending that it was debatable whether Donald Trump was responsible for inspiring the mass shooting in El Paso, O’Rourke’s hometown. He let loose another one in response to another mass shooting in the Midland-Odessa area, which is relatively nearby by Texas standards.

Somehow, the press response to this was simultaneously one of feigned delicacy at his language and hardened cynicism, the assumption being that O’Rourke was using this extremely common word that almost everyone uses in private out of some political calculation. The possibility that mass slaughter in his own backyard had rattled O’Rourke out of political calculation and into talking like a normal person — no doubt the way all these pundits speak in casual conversation — was dismissed out of hand.

But let’s just assume for a moment that it’s real and what we’re seeing now is a man who, shaken by having to deal with unimaginable horrors inflicted on his once-peaceful community, has run out of fucks to give. When it comes to pandering to the pearl-clutching instincts of the Beltway media, Beto’s fuck-giving account is cleaned out.

I confess I've gotten pretty fed up with the Democrats' response to Trump's continuing atrocities against America (this latest bag of bullshit from Nancy Pelosi is just one more example of the Democrats' complete misreading of the mood of their constituents -- mean, is she seriously talking about changing the law to allow sitting presidents to be indicted when everyone knows that Moscow Mitch will spike any such attempt?)

This is a good example of how completely off in space too many Democrats in positions of prominence are:

During the most recent debate in his home state of Texas, O’Rourke didn’t flinch when asked if he was serious about this, saying, “We’re going to take your AR-15, your AK-47. We’re not going to allow it to be used against a fellow American anymore.”

As Max Boot at the Washington Post noted, some Democrats, such as Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware and South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg, flinched, scolding O’Rourke for giving Republicans an excuse to flip out about “gun-grabbers” on the left.

But what these Democrats fail to understand is that, buoyed by the radicalism and cash infusions of the NRA, Republicans are already calling Democrats a bunch of gun-grabbers. Since they’re going to make that accusation one way or another, why not do what O’Rourke’s doing, and just stake out a position that might actually open a discussion about real-world approaches to preventing gun violence?

It's not even a matter of giving Republicans an excuse -- they're already calling Democrats "gun grabbers". These Democrats should be shooting back, starting with the fact that a huge majority of Americans favor just that sort of approach -- which, by the way, worked very well in Australia and is now underway in New Zealand. And in both cases, it took one mass shooting to trigger their response. We have one at least once a month, and the Republicans blame everything except the NRA. And what are the Democrats afraid of -- offending Trump's base?

At any rate, read the whole article.

Today's Must-Read: Am I Surprised?

Not really: The "Christian" right is turning Americans off to religion:

A few weeks ago, the Democratic National Committee formally acknowledged what has been evident for quite some time: Nonreligious voters are a critical part of the party’s base. In a one-page resolution passed at its annual summer meeting, the DNC called on Democratic politicians to recognize and celebrate the contributions of nonreligious Americans, who make up one-third of Democrats. In response, Robert Jeffress, a Dallas pastor with close ties to Trump, appeared on Fox News, saying the Democrats were finally admitting they are a “godless party.”

This was hardly a new argument. Conservative Christian leaders have been repeating some version of this claim for years, and have often called on religious conservatives and Republican politicians to defend the country against a growing wave of liberal secularism. And it’s true that liberals have been leaving organized religion in high numbers over the past few decades. But blaming the Democrats, as Jeffress and others are wont to do, doesn’t capture the profound role that conservative Christian activists have played in transforming the country’s religious landscape, and the role they appear to have played in liberals’ rejection of organized religion.

It's beyond hope that someone as arrogant and self-absorbed as Robert Jeffress would confess to being the problem, if he could even entertain the notion. However:

Social scientists were initially reluctant to entertain the idea that a political backlash was somehow responsible, because it challenged long-standing assumptions about how flexible our religious identities really are. Even now, the idea that partisanship could shape something as personal and profound as our relationship with God might seem radical, or maybe even a little offensive.

But when two sociologists, Michael Hout and Claude Fischer, began to look at possible explanations for why so many Americans were suddenly becoming secular, those conventional reasons couldn’t explain why religious affiliation started to fall in the mid-1990s. Demographic and generational shifts also couldn’t fully account for why liberals and moderates were leaving in larger numbers than conservatives. In a paper published in 2002, they offered a new theory: Distaste for the Christian right’s involvement with politics was prompting some left-leaning Americans to walk away from religion.

I suspect that it has something to do with the fact that most Americans at least in theory believe in traditional American values: equality under the law, welcoming immigrants (and unless you're a pureblooded American Indian, your ancestors were immigrants -- although, taking a somewhat longer view, every human being in the Americas is descended from immigrants, given that there were no humans here until about 15,000 years ago), generosity, a government that actually does provide for the common welfare, those sorts of things, all of which are diametrically opposed to the Republican-evangelical program.

Do take the time to read the whole report -- it's pretty interesting, if a little soft-pedaled.

Via The New Civil Rights Movement.

Now That's Chutzpah!

This is from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, regarding the bombing of Saudi Arabian oil facilities:

Whenever you report about them, and you say, ‘The Houthis said,’ you should say ‘The well known frequently lying Houthis have said the following.’ This is important because you ought not report them as if they are truth-tellers, as if these are people who aren’t completely under the boot of the Iranians.

“So there you go, whenever you say Houthis, you should begin with, ‘the well-known, frequently known to lie Houthis.’ That’d be good reporting [laughter] and I know you care deeply about that good reporting.

Do you really want to go there?

And a not-so-tangential thought: There must be a strong push for war with Iran among Trump's toadies. This looks more and more like just paving the way.

Today's Must-Read: Another Brick in the Wall

And here we have another instance of the Trump regime trying (and probably succeeding) in stonewalling Congress:

Greg Sargent does an excellent job of laying out the DNI whistleblower story. It's confusing and the media generally isn't making it less so. (They seem to be being led in various directions by Intelligence sources who may or may not have their own agenda.)

This story is about to get a whole lot more media scrutiny, because it involves secretive back-channel maneuvering, a possible threat to national security and potential lawbreaking at the highest levels of the Trump administration, possibly at the direction of President Trump himself — all with a whole lot of cloak-and-dagger intrigue thrown in.

And now the mystery of Rep. Adam Schiff and the whistleblower has taken an ominous new turn, one that should only underscore concerns that serious — and dangerous — lawbreaking might be unfolding.

At the very least, we’re seeing yet another serious erosion in checks on this administration’s norm-shredding — and, as I hope to explain, there are big and important principles at stake here.

The latest development: The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) has informed Schiff, the California Democrat and chairman of the Intelligence Committee, that he will not forward a whistleblower’s complaint to the committee, as required by law.

Yet the legal rationale for refusing to do this appears specious — and raises further questions as to why this is happening at all.

Sargent makes the point that the acting Director of National Intelligence hasn't got a legal leg to stand on in this -- the statute that deals with whistleblowers in the executive is very clear and unambiguous, and he simply hasn't got the legal authority to do what he's doing.

Digby finishes with this caveat:

I should add that anyone who thinks that an administration that is willing to defy the congress this way will adhere to the rules and norms governing out elections are fooling themselves. We saw how far they were willing to go in 2000 and did nothing about it. We saw what they did in 2016 and we're wanking on the kitchen table every day. So I'm afraid we can't act surprised if they simply steal it openly in 2020 and then stand there and say "what are you going to do about it?" They have every reason to believe we will do nothing.

That's if we have an election at all.

Antidote: Yes, We Do Need Education

Here's a celebrity project that's worth more than publicity:

The students paraded through hugs and high-fives from staff, who danced as Sister Sledge’s “We Are Family” blared through the hallways. They were showered with compliments as they walked through a buffet of breakfast foods.

The scene might be expected on a special occasion at any other public school. At LeBron James’s I Promise School, it was just Monday.

Every day, they are celebrated for walking through the door. This time last year, the students at the school — Mr. James’s biggest foray into educational philanthropy — were identified as the worst performers in the Akron public schools and branded with behavioral problems. Some as young as 8 were considered at risk of not graduating. . . .

The academic results are early, and at 240, the sample size of students is small, but the inaugural classes of third and fourth graders at I Promise posted extraordinary results in their first set of district assessments. Ninety percent met or exceeded individual growth goals in reading and math, outpacing their peers across the district.

It's also working for the parents:

The school is unusual in the resources and attention it devotes to parents, which educators consider a key to its success. Mr. James’s foundation covers the cost of all expenses in the school’s family resource center, which provides parents with G.E.D. preparation, work advice, health and legal services, and even a quarterly barbershop.

It's worth reading the whole article -- it's really an amazing project, and it seems to be delivering huge dividends.

Via Crooks and Liars.

Tweet du Jour

No, it's not from Glorious Leader. Next best thing:

With thanks to commenter Boreal at Joe.My.God.

Culture Break: Philip Glass: Koyaanisqatsi, Part I

This is some of my favorite Philip Glass, who is one of my favorite composers (as in about 36 albums stored in my media player). From the description at YouTube:

Koyaanisqatsi, also known as Koyaanisqatsi: Life out of Balance, is a 1982 film directed by Godfrey Reggio with music composed by Philip Glass and cinematography by Ron Fricke. The film consists primarily of slow motion and time-lapse photography of cities and many natural landscapes across the United States. The visual tone poem contains neither dialogue nor a vocalized narration: its tone is set by the juxtaposition of images and music. In the Hopi language, the word Koyaanisqatsi means 'crazy life, life in turmoil, life out of balance, life disintegrating, a state of life that calls for another way of living', and the film implies that modern humanity is living in such a way. The film is the first in the Qatsi trilogy of films: it is followed by Powaqqatsi (1988) and Naqoyqatsi (2002). The trilogy depicts different aspects of the relationship between humans, nature, and technology. Koyaanisqatsi is the best known of the trilogy and is considered a cult film.

I have a dim memory of having seen the film many years ago, but don't ask me for any details. Although now I'm intrigued, and may look up the whole trilogy.

Today in Disgusting People

I realize that the last post was on the same theme, but it seems as though disgusting people make the news a lot more than they used to. This story is really appalling on a number of fronts:

Sean Cormie, 23, came out as gay in the spring. Since then, he said his family has asked him to go to church and bring his partner, Gary Gardner.

On Sunday, Sept. 8, the two joined family and friends for a service at a church Cormie had already attended many times.

“I wanted to go to church to make my mom proud and make her happy,” Cormie said.

The service was normal but at the end, something unexpected happened. Cormie said as 12 to 15 congregants circled around Gardner and himself, their prayer growing louder. Meanwhile, they said the pastor began making statements against homosexuality.

“‘It’s a sin, it’s an abomination, you need to realize, wake up, and see it for a sin,’” Cormie said.

The prayer got louder and louder until the two men felt so humiliated, they got up to leave. But Gardner was shuffled out of the building alone.

"They hold me down, pin me down, and I’m crying, and the Holy Spirit just comes through me, and they keep speaking in tongues, praying over me." Cormie said he was even punched in the face. "I was just crying 'mercy, mercy.'"

First off, the behavior of the congregation is beyond reprehensible. Fortunately, Cormie had sense enough to file a police report: this is assault, at the very least, and probably a few other crimes on top of that. Of course, he's now being threatened.

And it really looks as though his parents set him up.

What stopped me cold is this:

He said he does believe homosexuality is a sin, but he can't be forced to be something he's not.

"I’m full fledged gay, you can’t change it," Cormie said. "It’s my nature. I’m born that way, so let it be."

He obviously has conflicts. I really think he should drop this church -- there are denominations that are accepting of homosexuality, if he insists on remaining a Christian. There's no need to put yourself through this kind of torture for the sake of religion. He should also do what so many of the rest of us have had to do: if your family can't accept you as you are, make your own family. And get some professional counseling.

I have a lot of objections to Christianity, particularly those fundamentalist sects that are more grounded in the Old Testament than in the Gospels. (Which includes the most prominent "Christian" spokesmen so much in the news these days -- they really are nothing more than power-hungry hypocrites.) And the doctrine of Original Sin is thoroughly repellent -- it's nothing more than a tool to enforce obedience through guilt. The idea that the way you were born is sinful springs from that, and it paints a picture of a thoroughly disgusting idea of the divine.

Via Joe.My.God.

Today in Disgusting People

But we knew he was a disgusting piece of work:

Acting U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) Director Ken Cuccinelli on Sunday defended the Trump administration’s decision not to grant temporary protected status to Bahamians displaced by Hurricane Dorian, saying the government there is “capable of taking care of their own.”

“The Bahamas is a perfectly legitimate country capable of taking care of their own,” Cuccinelli said on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” adding that U.S. immigration agencies “rushed in resources” and noting that power has already been restored in the northernmost islands.

The Associated Press reported Sunday that the official death toll from the storm stands at 50, and some 1,300 people are missing.

Even though he's nominally Catholic, Cuccinelli sounds like an evangelical "Christian". I'm sure that the fact that the population of the Bahamas is 80% black and only 12% white has nothing to do with it.

And according to commenter BobSF_94117 at Joe.My.God., they don't expect to have power restored to Abaco for weeks.

This seems like an appropriate place to refer to this article:

I understand why it’s hard for normal people to believe that white evangelical Christians are sadists. Normal people have never been, as I was a long time ago, on the inside of that shadowy religious world. But the sooner they understand this, the sooner normal people will see that white evangelical Christian support for Donald Trump isn’t rooted in hypocrisy, contradiction or merely straying from the straight and narrow. The reason they support a fascist president is simple: They’re sadists.

The word “sadist” is off-putting. I get that. But if you’re thinking of sex, you’re thinking in the wrong way. If you’re thinking of “pleasure,” as in sexual pleasure, you’re thinking the wrong way. The pleasure white evangelical Christians derive from the suffering of human beings deemed less human than they are is not about sex. It’s about the pain, humiliation or even violence out-groups deserve by dint of being out-groups. Gay men, for instance, deserve their punishment because they are gay. Punishment for being gay is “divine justice.” From such “justice” comes pleasure—which is sadism.

The whole article is worth reading, but I'm not sure that the analysis is spot-on: it's more complex than that. There is, in fact, a large element of hypocrisy in the attitudes of too many "Christians" toward the suffering of others, and, notwithstanding the fact that right-wing luminaries such as Tony Perkins and Franklin Graham, and Cuccinelli himself, spend a lot of time and effort inflicting pain on other people, that's in direct contravention of the tenets of the faith they claim to follow. (I'm sure you've noticed that however much they drop Jesus' name at the slightest opportunity, they're solidly grounded in Leviticus.) And I think that one of the main reasons so many white evangelicals support Trump is that they're proto-fascists themselves: they want everything cut and dried, they need to follow an authority figure, and Trump's saying the things they believe but haven't dared to say themselves. While the author concentrates on the right's focus on gay rights, the idea does have broader application, as indicated by the article above.

With thanks to commenter greenmanTN at Joe.My.God. for the link.

And now that Brett "I Like Beer" Kavanaugh is in the news again, a runner-up (aside from Kavanaugh himself):

The tweet is deleted but they really did say it. Having an unwanted penis shoved in your face is harmless fun according to @nytopinion #whoknew? #brettkavanaughlikesbeerandslappingwomeninthefacewithhispenis pic.twitter.com/pXLphK9nld

— 🔱🧜🏽‍♀️🔱Neptune’s Daughter🔮🐚🐳🦀🐬🦞🐡🐙🐠🦐 (@TurtleTears) September 14, 2019

How clueless is the Times? "Harmless fun"? Seriously? What kind of person thinks that sort of thing is "harmless fun"? I mean, aside from Brett Kavanaugh and whoever wrote that tweet at the Times.

With thanks to commenter Halou at Joe.My.God.

This Week at Green Man Review

And an interesting week it is:

Patrick Street, Ethan Iverson Quartet, Ashley Hutchings, Patricia McKillip, The Band, Issac Asimov and Other Matters as We See Fit

So hurry on over to see all that and especially those "other matters".

Giggle du Jour

Courtesy of commenter Harveyrabbit at Joe.My.God.

Hit 'Em While They're Down

This should come as no surprise to anyone who's been paying attention to the Trump regime's attitude toward brown people:

The U.S. will not grant temporary protected status to people from the Bahamas displaced by Hurricane Dorian, an administration official told NBC News.

The status would allow Bahamians to work and live in the U.S. until it is deemed safe to return home. The same status is currently granted to over 300,000 people living in the U.S. from 10 countries, including the victims of Haiti’s 2010 earthquake.


Acting Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Mark Morgan said on Monday that the Trump administration was considering whether to grant temporary protected status to people fleeing the Bahamas after Hurricane Dorian devastated two major islands there.

Bahamians can still come to the U.S. temporarily, if they have the right travel documents, but will not be granted work permits.

So, they can come here -- if they managed to run out to the American consulate during a category 5 hurricane to get a visa -- but they can't work, and if they apply for public assistance, they'll be deported. Neat, huh?

This is Trump, as quoted in the NBC article:

"I don't want to allow people that weren't supposed to be in the Bahamas to come into the United States, including some very bad people and some very bad gang members and some very, very bad drug dealers."

Because everyone who's not from Europe is a gang member or a drug dealer. (And the man has the vocabulary of a five year old.)

Oh, but that's not all. Trump is going to solve the homelessness problem -- in California:

There was a time when Republicans would have had a fit at the idea of the president sending in federal authorities to deal with something that is clearly a local and state issue. "Local control" and "states' rights" were their watchwords. But no longer:

President Trump has ordered White House officials to launch a sweeping effort to address homelessness in California, citing the state’s growing crisis, according to four government officials aware of the effort.

The planning has intensified in recent weeks. Administration officials have discussed using the federal government to get homeless people off the streets of Los Angeles and other cities and into new government-backed facilities, according to two officials briefed on the planning.

(Emphasis added.)

That's it -- put them in cages.

Here's a summary of Trump's deep understanding of the issue:

Trump on urban decay: “It’s a phenomenon that started 2 years ago. It’s disgraceful ... You can’t have [it] where police officers are getting sick just by walking the beat. I mean, they’re actually getting very sick ... This is the liberal establishment.” pic.twitter.com/E4o9mVOqlL

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 2, 2019

Why California? Well, that should be obvious -- it's full of people who are mean to him.

Oh, and don't hold your breath waiting for the outcry from our "religious" leaders. Trump has them in his pocket.

We Don't Need No Edjicashun!

For some reason, the right really hates education. The irony here, of course, is that the Founders, to whom the right appeals on the slightest pretext, counted on an educated populace to make the country work. (While the Constitution does not specifically mention public education, which is left to the states, the Fourteenth Amendment does guarantee equal access to public education regardless of race, religion, sex, etc.)

However, the right has determined that education is the root of all evil, especially higher education:

Tennessee State Sen. Kerry Roberts, a safe-seat Republican who can’t tell the difference between the Bible and the Constitution, says we should eliminate higher education — just get rid of the whole damn thing — because it’s a “breeding ground” for liberals. . . .

… If there’s one thing that we can do to save America today, it is to get rid of our institutions of higher education right now, and cut the liberal breeding ground off! Good grief! The stupid stuff that our kids are being taught is absolutely ridiculous, and this is a woman who’s a product of higher education. She’s learned all of this stuff that flies in the face of what we stand for as a country!

And here we are as legislators paying for this garbage to be taught to our children, and we’re not doing anything about it. And all these red states across America, we let it exist, and it’s absolutely unbelievable. And this is the price that we pay: the murder of over half a million innocent lives every year, with people sitting there, justifying it to their last breath.

Yes, this was a response to a discussion of abortion rights. Of course.

But then, why have public schools at all? From Todd Starnes, he of the incisive intellect (snicker):

We’re on the verge of a civil war. How bad is it? It’s pretty bad. Especially when you look at the issues that divide us. And look at the polling data. My concern is not what happens over the next two years, it’s what’s happening over the next 10 years.

You see, our public school system is being used as the engine to drive this social change. When you look at the polling data, it’s all there.

Get it? Society changes, and it's all the fault of public schools.

Lest you think I'm exaggerating, get this from the Texas GOP platform a few years ago:

The Texas GOP’s declarative position against critical thinking in public schools, or any schools, for that matter, is now an official part of their political platform. It is public record in the Republican Party of Texas 2012 platform. With regard to critical thinking, the Republican Party of Texas document states: “Knowledge-Based Education – We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs that are simply a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) (mastery learning) which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the student’s fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.”

How biblical.

Through the Looking Glass, Again

Now, we all know that Tony Perkins would rather lie than tell the truth about almost anything, but this is -- well, see for yourself -- this is where it gets really surreal:

Especially, as many of us would point out, based on the Left’s flat-out denial of real science about gender, creation, conception, and medical research. Unlike conservatives, the president’s opponents are so ideologically-driven that they’ll ignore decades of technology just to deny that an unborn baby is a human being — or that gender is defined by biology at birth.

Setting aside the fact that Perkins apparently doesn't know the difference between science and technology (no real surprise there), let's start with gender, since trans folk are Perkins' latest target, now that he's lost the battle on gay rights. Courtesy of commenter JustDucky, from the Cleveland Clinic:

“The brain and the body can go in different directions,” Dr. [Murat] Altinay says. “Gender is not only in our genitalia; there’s something in the brain that determines gender.”

“The male and female brain have structural differences,” he says. Men and women tend to have different volumes in certain areas of the brain.

“When we look at the transgender brain, we see that the brain resembles the gender that the person identifies as,” Dr. Altinay says. For example, a person who is born with a penis but ends up identifying as a female often actually has some of the structural characteristics of a “female” brain.

And the brain similarities aren’t only structural.

“We’re also finding some functional similarities between the transgender brain and its identified gender,” Dr. Altinay says.

In studies that use MRIs to take images of the brain as people perform tasks, the brain activity of transgender people tends to look like that of the gender they identify with.

So, Perkins and his ilk don't understand gender, which is something separate from biological sex.

As for creation, do we really want to go there? The most rudimentary research into earth's beginnings and the origin of living organisms with blow the Biblical account[s] (yes, there are a couple) of creation out of the water. And the scientific version is backed up by evidence. The Biblical version is based on what we can only call hearsay.

Conception? Who denies the science behind conception? (And what is the "science" behind conception, anyway?) Anyone? Bueller?

And the idea that an "unborn baby" is a human being, that's just Perkins playing word games -- is a blastula a human being, entitled to all the rights thereof? If Perkins thinks that's the case, perhaps he should undertake a care and feeding of one such. (Oh, and as for this concern for children, anyone recall how forcefully Perkins and his fellow-travelers have spoken out about the children in cages on the southern border? I thought not.) (And don't forget, this whole theme is the anti-abortion plank, which, certain "Christians" claim, is against God's will. Well, not always.

This whole denial of science shtick is pure projection, no more, no less. Well, with a helping of word salad.

But then, it's Tony Perkins.

Antidote: It's Official

This is a great story:

It all started when Laura Snyder, the unnamed boy’s teacher at Altamonte Elementary School in Altamonte Springs, Florida, posted the story about the Tennessee-obsessed student.

“This particular child came to me and told me that he wanted to wear a University of Tennessee shirt, but he didn’t have one. We discussed that he could wear an orange shirt to show his spirit. He told me every day leading up to it that he had an orange shirt that he was going to wear”, Snyder said in her post.

When the day finally came the boy showed up to school wearing his orange shirt with a piece of paper attached to it with his homemade design of the University of Tennessee logo drawn on.

But when the boy went to lunch, things apparently took a turn for the worse.

But when the University of Tennessee heard about it, it got better:

The University of Tennessee decided that they would take the boy’s design and make it an official school shirt with a portion of the proceeds being donated to STOMP Out Bullying, a national non-profit organization that is dedicated to eradicating bullying of all forms.

The shirt design became so popular that the University of Tennessee’s online store crashed yesterday.

Here's the news report:

Read the whole article -- and grab a hankie.

Via Joe.My.God.

This Week at Green Man Review

Yeah, a day late again -- I had to leave before I got this done yesterday.

So, in case you didn't wander over on your own to see what was up, here it is:

Celtic Music, Making Cider, Folkmanis dragons, Sherlock Holmes films, Pub Renovations, Music by the Old Blind Dogs and There’s a Touch of Frost in The Air

And it's all there waiting for you.

Meanwhile, Across the Pond

Britain's answer to the wannabe king in our White House isn't having such an easy time of it:

Boris Johnson’s bid to trigger a general election next month has been blocked by MPs following a string of heavy defeats for the government in both houses of parliament.

The prime minister was thwarted three times in the House of Commons: an attempt by opposition parties and Tory rebels to block a no-deal Brexit easily cleared its second and third readings, and Johnson later failed in his attempt to force a snap general election.

This is one of those times I wish we had a parliamentary government, with the head of state and the head of government being different offices. I could wish that Congress would somehow develop a spine -- which is not likely when #MoscowMitch is running the senate to suit himself and Nancy Pelosi seems intent on not rocking the boat -- but we're hampered by the separation of powers, which normally works fairly well -- until the president turns out to be a sociopath with severe ego deficiency who's in it for the money. Johnson can't even hold his own party in line, while our GOP, which has become a nest of racist grifters, falls right into line with whatever Trump wants.

As for the parallels between Johnson and Trump, this was enlightening:

This is Parliamentary Sketch Writer John Crace's take on Johnson's first Prime Minister's Question Time

Practice makes imperfect. There was an air of expectancy on the Tory benches as Boris Johnson prepared to face his first prime minister’s questions. Surely the previous day’s car crash could only have been an aberration. This time their clown prince would prove to be the headline act they had been promised. Bring them sunshine, make them smile. Give them a reason to feel good about their tawdry, shabby lives. Some hope.

Johnson has breezed through life, flailing effortlessly upwards while happily trashing the lives of all those with whom he comes in contact. For him, being the prime minister is merely a position of entitlement rather than of responsibility. The ideal job for someone predisposed to laziness and arrogance. Someone for whom the idea of preparation is an unthinkable admission of failure.

It goes on, describing the train wreck in detail. One can't help but wonder what would happen if Trump had to address Congress directly on major issues. Something very similar, I expect.

Maybe the Brits can pull themselves back from the brink.

Via Joe.My.God.

Whopper du Jour

This goes beyond Newspeak:

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) won’t tweak a recent blog post environmentalists say is inaccurate because the agency argues its blog is not considered public information.

The tension stemmed from a June post on the agency’s blog that included apparent praise for EPA action on pesticides considered harmful to bees.

“The Washington Post has also recently reported on some of our efforts, saying that ‘the Trump administration’s action [to protect pollinators] was welcome news to some environmentalists,’ which demonstrates how united Americans are on this important issue,” Alexandra Dapolito Dunn, the EPA’s assistant administrator for the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, wrote in the blog post.

But that Washington Post article more broadly referenced how the EPA scaled back the use of some pesticides as part of a legal settlement with the Center for Food Safety.

Here's the really Orwellian part:

The Center for Biological Diversity filed a complaint under the Information Quality Act, which can be used to demand a correction of inaccurate information from government sources.

“This statement fails to capture the impetus for EPA’s cancelation of the pesticide products, which was that an environmental non-profit had to sue EPA” to stop the use of pesticides harmful to bees, Lori Ann Burd, director of the Center for Biological Diversity’s environmental health program, wrote in the complaint, noting the five-year legal battle. “This quote is taken entirely out of context.”

But the EPA rejected the complaint late last week.

“The EPA Blog is an example of information that would not be considered disseminated by the EPA to the public,” Kevin Kirby of the EPA wrote in response to Burd.

Words fail me.

Via Joe.My.God.

The Real Americans

A sobering post from Tom Sullivan at Hullabaloo, one how Trump has landed the working class vote:

Don't go looking to Matt Taibbi for hope this Labor Day. Taibbi's jaundiced eye is particularly yellow in his examination of the cult surrounding the acting president. "The average American likes meat, sports, money, porn, cars, cartoons, and shopping," he writes at Rolling Stone. Democrats need to worry their 2020 pitch is relentlessly negative about all that.

What makes MAGA cultists love their hero is not his absent appeals to their better selves. Rather, Trumpism means never having to say you're sorry for being like him:

Ronald Reagan once took working-class voters away from Democrats by offering permission to be proud of the flag. Trump offers permission to occupy the statistical American mean: out of shape, suffering from gas, poorly read, anti-intellectual, treasuring things above meaning, and hiding an awful credit history.

It's a pretty depressing picture, and veers awfully close to stereotype, but then, Trump himself is a stereotype. (Stray thought: Considering his notable lack of success as a "businessman", is it any wonder that his administration is occupied by losers?)

However, there's a bit of uplift at the end:

Meanwhile, 94-year-old Jimmy Carter is back to building homes for Habitat for Humanity after hip surgery in the spring. The former president and his wife Rosalynn Carter head to Nashville, Tennessee in October to help build 21 new homes.

In MAGA America, because people are not selling merchandise emblazoned with his face or rude taunts, that makes Carter a loser. But in Jackson Mississippi, Habitat and $1,000 a month, no strings attached from a local guaranteed-income pilot project — Springboard to Opportunities — are transforming Cheryl Gray's life:

Gray’s relationship with money changed dramatically. She used to want to put her children in the hottest clothes to prove that she was providing for them, but now saw the value of visiting the clearance racks. She paid off $4,000 in credit card debt. She found an $11-an-hour teaching job at a preschool and another part-time job, so she could save more money. As her new bank account grew from zero to $1,000 to $2,000, she began looking to leave the projects.

And she's sending $60 a week for her children's tutoring.

Sullivan notes that "You won't hear that celebrated at a Trump rally."

The irony is palpable: Cheryl Gray is the icon, so beloved of conservatives, of the American lifting herself by her bootstraps -- she's the real American the right has worshipped -- until Trump. But Sullivan's right: you won't hear them cheering her on any time soon, or Carter, for that matter.

Maybe that stray thought wasn't so stray after all: Trump's cultists are really just a bunch of losers.

Tweet du Jour

It's called "capitalism".

Happy Labor Day.

With thanks to commenter Reality.Bites at Joe.My.God.

This Week at Green Man Review

Our usual mix of this, that, and some other things, as well:

Italian flugelhorn music, a Zelazny collection, Pogues fronted by Strummer, a Miles Morales Spider-Man and Summer is Fading Away

As for the other things, you'll have to see for yourself.

This is Probably a Must-Read

An interesting article on the future of LGBT rights -- and perhaps civil rights in general -- under the Trump Court;

There’s no denying it: efforts to protect LGBT+ persons through the federal courts suffered a substantial—perhaps devastating—setback when Justice Anthony M. Kennedy retired on June 27, 2018. The author of Romer v. Evans (1996), Lawrence v. Texas (2003), United States v. Windsor (2013), and Obergefell v. Hodges (2015), Kennedy had long played a key role in the U.S. Supreme Court’s invalidation of laws that discriminate against gay men and lesbians. His most recent decisions in that vein (Windsor and Obergefell) were written for a five-justice majority, with Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, and Samuel Alito in dissent. Kennedy’s retirement augured the emergence of a solid conservative majority, now including Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, whose members are very likely opposed to meaningful constitutional protection for LGBT+ persons as a class. As we assess the implications of that development, here are some key questions to consider.

It's a little dense, but worth reading. Especially striking was this section:

Will the Court Undermine Antidiscrimination Laws in the Name of the First Amendment?

A holding that Title VII prohibits discrimination against LGBT people would mean a lot less if the Court subsequently held that the First Amendment immunizes anybody who describes acts of discrimination as expression or religious practice. However, in recent years, the right-leaning justices have taken worrisome steps toward imposing novel constitutional limits on antidiscrimination law.

I can't help but wonder, though, whether the Court giving carte blanche to religiously inspired bigots might also be held as establishment of religion.

We'll see how it all turns out. I'm not optimistic, unless the House grows a spine and starts impeachment proceedings against, say, "I like beer" Kavanaugh, who probably lied during his confirmation hearings.

Culture Break: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Symphony No. 40

I've been listening to a lot of Mozart lately. I have no idea why -- maybe I just needed a break from my normal trad/folk/rock lineup. At any rate, this is a good one:

I meant to do this yesterday, but got distracted.

Today in Disgusting People (Updated)

That would be anyone associated with the Trump regime.

First, another attack on migrants:

It’s a puzzle of public health that we don’t take flu seriously. Every year, only about half of American adults get the vaccine that prevents it. And yet, every year, at least 37 million Americans catch the flu, more than 500,000 become sick enough to be hospitalized, and somewhere between 36,000 and 61,000 die. Let’s pause for a second: That’s tens of thousands of deaths, many of which could have been prevented with a simple shot. Meanwhile, international health planners tensely monitor the unpredictable evolution of the flu virus, watching for the emergence of a pandemic strain that could kill many millions.

Yet perhaps because only a small percentage of cases ends catastrophically—or conversely, because many of us have experienced recovering from flu—we chronically underestimate the toll taken by the virus. Which might be the kindest explanation for the decision by US Customs and Border Protection, uncovered last week by CNBC, not to give the flu shot to any of the adults or children the agency is holding in crammed border camps.

We've already come to understand that this regime, and the would-be dictator that heads it, are inhumane. But there's probably also another purpose here -- aside from killing more children. Just think of the propaganda value:

The saddest part of the danger being created by this policy is that, accidentally or cynically, it revives a trope that a globalized world ought to have discarded: that immigrants are dirty and dangerous and inherently embody risk. As Alan Kraut of American University has written, that charge has been leveled at new arrivals throughout US history, against the Irish (cholera), Jews (tuberculosis), Italians (polio), and Chinese workers (plague). In almost every case, the diseases were an accident not of migration, but of close urban living—but, prefiguring the current situation, the immigrants had been forced into legal or actual ghettos that facilitated the spread of illness.

And once diseases took hold in an immigrant group, that could be used against them, as is happening again now. “It’s a crude political ploy,” says T. Katherine Hirschfeld, a University of Oklahoma anthropologist who studies health conditions after political collapse. “Denying people bathing and encouraging the spread of disease increases their dehumanization. It is part of a propaganda campaign.”

This one is worth reading. Hat tip to commenter Lazycrocket at Joe.My.God.

And then, there's the troops. Support our military, indeed:

Some children born to U.S. service members and government employees overseas will no longer be automatically considered citizens of the United States, according to policy alert issued by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) on Wednesday.

Previously, all children born to U.S. citizen parents were considered to be "residing in the United States," and therefore would be automatically granted citizenship under Immigration and Nationality Act 320. Now, children born to U.S. service members and government employees who are not yet themselves U.S. citizens, while abroad, will not be considered as residing in the U.S., changing the way that they potentially receive citizenship. Children who are not U.S. citizens and are adopted by U.S. service members while living abroad will also no longer receive automatic citizenship by living with the U.S. citizen adopted parents.

This one's on really shaky legal ground. Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment reads:

All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Traditionally, children have automatically been considered citizens if at least one parent was a citizen. Now, if your parents are overseas when you are born, you have to apply for citizenship.

Previously, all children born to U.S. citizen parents were considered to be "residing in the United States," and therefore would be automatically granted citizenship under Immigration and Nationality Act 320. Now, children born to U.S. service members and government employees who are not yet themselves U.S. citizens, while abroad, will not be considered as residing in the U.S., changing the way that they potentially receive citizenship. Children who are not U.S. citizens and are adopted by U.S. service members while living abroad will also no longer receive automatic citizenship by living with the U.S. citizen adopted parents.

A nice thank-you for those serving their country abroad.

There's been a lot of speculation that this is another attack on birthright citizenship, which is part of the Fourteenth Amendment -- gotta stop those "anchor babies", after all -- something that gives Ken Cuccinelli a woody -- not to mention the rest of the GOP. (Cuccinelli, you will remember, aside from being an openly racist politician in Virginia, is now the "acting" director of Citizenship and Immigration Services.) And that's probably true. But one other thing occurred to me: a significant proportion of U.S. service members belong to racial or ethnic minorities and/or are women.

Two birds with one stone, so to speak.

This one's via Joe.My.God.

Update: The Hill has published an article that clarifies the new policy:

USCIS issued a clarification to the rule later Wednesday, explaining that the new rule would only affect three categories of people: Children of non-U.S. citizens adopted by U.S. citizen government employees or service members; children of non-U.S. citizen government employees or service members who were naturalized after the child's birth; and children of U.S. citizens who do not meet residency requirements.

From the statements by representatives of USCIS and the Pentagon, this is just a matter of bringing the current policy in line with the Immigration and Naturalization Act and existing State Department guidance.

And if I trusted anyone in this regime, that might be enough.

Update: And the war on the environment continues:

The Trump administration is set to announce on Thursday that it intends to sharply curtail the regulation of methane emissions, a major contributor to climate change, according to an industry official with knowledge of the plan.

The Environmental Protection Agency, in a proposed rule, will aim to eliminate federal government requirements that the oil and gas industry put in place technology to inspect for and repair methane leaks from wells, pipelines and storage facilities.

The proposed rollback is particularly notable because major oil and gas companies have, in fact, opposed it, just as some other industries have opposed the Trump administration’s other major moves to dismantle climate change and other environmental rules put in place by President Barack Obama.

Some of the world’s largest auto companies have opposed Mr. Trump’s plans to let vehicles pollute more, while some electric utilities have opposed the relaxation of restrictions on toxic mercury pollution from coal-fired power plants.

Via Joe.My.God.

Trump's attitude toward our air and water reminds me of a Tom Lehrer song:

Back to the Fifties!

Today's Must Read: About That Second Term

It starts to look a lot less hypothetical:

Federal Election Commission Vice Chairman Matthew Petersen announced his resignation today.

This means the agency that enforces and regulates the nation’s campaign finance laws will effectively shut down — something that hasn’t happened since 2008 — because it won’t have the legal minimum of four commissioners to make high-level decisions.

Petersen’s resignation, first reported by the Washington Examiner, will throw the FEC into turmoil for weeks — and perhaps months — as the nation enters the teeth of 2020 presidential and congressional elections.

For now, the FEC can’t conduct meetings.

It can’t slap political scofflaws with fines.

It can’t make rules.

It can’t conduct audits and approve them.

It can’t vote on the outcome of investigations.

And while staff will continue to post campaign finance reports and attend to day-to-day functions, the commission itself can’t offer official advice to politicians and political committees who seek it.

Petersen gave no reason for his resignation in his letter, which is here:



And of course, the way this regime operates, one has to wonder who applied what kind of pressure on Petersen. The timing is somewhat more than suspicious.

Given past history, I doubt that vacancy will be filled. After all, who needs honest elections?

Read the whole thing.

Via Joe.My.God.

Some Things Never Change

The Republicans are licking their chops over the prospect of gutting Social Security and Medicare, now that they've created a massive deficit by giving our money to the ultra-rich:

It's hard to imagine at this point that the GOP would try to cut social security and Medicare at this point. They would be attacking their own voters. But with deficits exploding under Trump it's not hard to see the hardcore wingnuts believing that their time has come to get rid of those pesky "entitlements" once and for all. And despite his promises, if Trump wins re-election he won't have to run again. So, who knows how he will see his own self-interest in a second term? (And we know it's all about his self-interest.)

It's an interesting analysis, but, like all the other discussions I've seen on this, it misses one key point: Social Security is not part of the general fund, and Medicare is only part of it for administrative costs (some of them, at least). Which means that neither has any effect on the deficit. (Except that the last time I looked, Social Security was the government's biggest creditor -- most of SS funds are in Treasury bonds.)

Of course, this fact will have no effect on the Republicans' narrative. And the GOP base will believe every lie they come up with and screw themselves because they're "patriotic Americans".

As for the headline -- "Will they hurt their own voters?" -- yes, of course they will. They're already doing it -- American farmers are hurting from Trump's tariffs -- and their voters will remain faithful to the cult the GOP has become.

And do note that this is planned for Trump's hypothetical second term, because to start on it now would guarantee a Blue Tsunami in 2020.

Brazil, Take Note

Costa Rica is doing it right:

This is how Costa Rica 🇨🇷 doubled the size of its rainforest in a generation. Bravo Costa Rica! You inspire then World

pic.twitter.com/6SQLMkhLjk

— Erik Solheim (@ErikSolheim) August 25, 2019

I'm sure you get the reference to Brazil, but in case you haven't been paying attention (like most of the American media), there's this:

And from NYT:

The destruction of the Amazon rain forest in Brazil has increased rapidly since the nation’s new far-right president took over and his government scaled back efforts to fight illegal logging, ranching and mining.

While campaigning for president last year, Mr. Bolsonaro declared that Brazil’s vast protected lands were an obstacle to economic growth and promised to open them up to commercial exploitation.

Less than a year into his term, that is already happening.

Bolsonaro has rapidly gained a reputation as the Trump of the South, but more extreme. A lot of the international outrage stems from the supposition, not entirely unfounded, that the Brazilian government is encouraging the burn-off.

The Times does point out that most of the fires are on land that has previously been cleared. The problem there is that the rain forest hasn't had a chance to recover -- which it will do, given time. I've also seen speculation that Bolsonaro wants to capture the Chinese market for soybeans, etc. The problem is that the soil in a rain forest is thin, without much in the way of nutrients. A healthy rain forest has a lot of fungi among the tree roots, which serves to recycle nutrients quickly -- otherwise, the rain would just leach them out. So, clearing a section of rain forest for farming is a short-term endeavor -- the soil will give out in two or three years.

And to give you an idea of the scale of of this year's burn:

Sidebar: The Field Museum has an exhibition devoted to conservation, including a lengthy video on their efforts in the Amazon rain forest. The Field's researchers have focused mainly on the Andes-Amazon region in Peru, where they have had notable success in getting large sections officially protected. Somehow, I doubt they would receive a similar welcome in Brazil at this point.

Review: Steven Brust: Brokedown Palace

Another Epinions orphan; I also reviewed this one at Green Man Review.

Brokedown Palace is another one of Steven Brust’s romps – I have to admit, the man astonishes me: from the highly individual noir detective cast of the Vlad Taltos novels to the delightful and affectionate take-off on Dumas in The Phoenix Guard and Five Hundred Years After, he has an amazing range and an astonishing amount of creativity. In this one, he’s done it with the traditional folk tale – not that this story owes much to any particular tale, but Brust has taken the idea of folklore and the means and methods of folklore to make an engaging and fabulous – in the strict sense – novel

The universe is the same as that of the Vlad Taltos novels, in a different time and with a very different tone. Structurally, the story follows a more-or-less traditional narrative form, broken by interludes that may describe events that are important but of which the characters are unaware, or may simply be folktales (of the “tall tales” variety) within the larger folktale. The story is quite simple: it is the story of László, King of Fenario, who is not particularly sane, and his brothers, Andor, who is shallow and perhaps overly religious – at least sometimes; Vilmos, who is the archetypal giant, large, strong, gentle, and perhaps with a little more on the ball than others realize; and Miklós, the youngest, who is a little – well, more than a little stubborn, and more than a little outspoken. It is tempting to say that the Palace is another major character, but it’s not; it is, however a potent symbol that Brust uses to great effect. László has a tendency to try to beat Miklós to death, or nearly so, and is extremely sensitive about the condition of the Palace, which is tottering on its foundations – in this case, it’s called denial. After one nearly-fatal beating, Miklós exiles himself to the land of Faerie – in the Taltos cycle, Dragaera – where he learns Dragaeran sorcery (pre-Empire, needless to say) before his return to Fenario. We meet the táltos horse Bölk, a magical steed who is much more than he seems and always answers questions with more questions; the Countess Mariska, destined to wed László – or perhaps one should say resigned to the fact – and Brigitta, László’s mistress. There is a hidden villain, and a magical tree, and the Demon Goddess Varra, who has her own agenda.

And the whole thing is permeated by magic – not only the fantasy-world magic of spells and incantations, but the fairy-tale magic that says the unbelievable is real and is walking right next to you. In this novel, Brust displays a remarkable gift in combining irony, wit, and the innocence of childhood, in which the Palace, the River, a horse, a tree, all have their own purposes and their own ways of effecting their goals. As in folklore, the characters are broadly drawn, but this is a novel, and they accumulate the telling details that belong to real people as the story progresses – they are well-developed, but always hover in the realm of the archetype.

A word about the narrator, who encapsulates Brust’s various gifts in a highly entertaining way. The narrator is indeed a storyteller, who digresses (another of Brust’s many talents) to fill in the story, bring us details about the history of Fenario, the people and the land, and who provides a commentary that is sometime wry, sometimes matter-of-fact, but always lively and good-humored. But make no mistake – there are dark and terrible events in this story, as is necessarily the case if we are to be engaged at all, and as is very much the basis of folklore as it is of literature. Whether Brust’s stance makes them more terrible or more distanced is something that each reader, I think, will have to decide.

A final note: those who are more familiar with Eastern European folklore than I may derive an additional layer of enjoyment from this book. The vocabulary and I suspect the general tenor of the narrative seem solidly based in Hungarian language and Hungarian traditions (alright, Fenarian is Hungarian, or damned close), which brings an element of the exotic to the tale that just adds to the fun.

Recommended? Absolutely.

(Ace Books, 1986)

This Week at Green Man Review

Even with the chaos emanating from D.C., at least you know some things are reliable:

Yolen on Writing, Beatles in Portland, Costume Design on Doctor Who, Music from Kathryn Tickell and Other Late Summer Matters

There's more -- there's always more. So hop on over and enjoy.

Personal Ad du Jour

It's funny, but it's also a sad commentary on men.

With thanks to commenter Steven B. at Joe.My.God.

Giggle du jour

With thanks to commenter Bulldog Cajun at Joe.My.God.

This Week at Green Man Review

Our usual mix of the odd, unusual, and very, very interesting:

An Alternate Cairo, Craft Cider, Angela Carter’s Writings, Live Breton Music and Other Autumn Is Coming Matters

Well, Autumn is still a bit away, but there's lots of interesting stuff anyway. Check it out.

It Can Be Done

But not by this administration. The contrast between Australia and the US is even more stark than you might imagine:

 CreditAsanka Brendon Ratnayake for The New York Times

It’s a magical sight: Just as the light begins to vanish, thousands of tiny penguins waddle out of the surf on an island in southeastern Australia, then head up the beach and along well-worn paths toward their burrows.

The “penguin parade” has been a major attraction since the 1920s, when tourists were led by torchlight to view the nightly arrival of the birds — the world’s smallest penguin breed, with adults averaging 13 inches tall — from a day of fishing and swimming.

For much of that time, the penguins lived among the residents of a housing development, mostly modest vacation homes, in tight proximity to cars and pets, as well as ravenous foxes. The penguins’ numbers fell precipitously. But in 1985, the state government took an extraordinary step: It decided to buy every piece of property on the Summerland Peninsula and return the land to the penguins. The process was completed in 2010.

The Trump regime, of course, goes the opposite route, setting the stage for wiping out our remaining wildlife.

They're Getting Really Brazen

If all else fails, lie about it; better yet, blame it on the opposition:

House Republican leadership has sent a memo to GOP members of Congress directing them to lie about right wing white supremacist gun massacres, and to call it “violence from the left.”

The memo, which The Tampa Bay Times acquired, includes talking points for congressional Republicans to parrot when speaking with reporters or constituents. It instructs them on how to address questions about gun violence, including the domestic terrorism recently perpetrated in El Paso, Texas.

And Fox News will start parroting it in 3 . . . 2 . . .

This is what the Republican party has become. That's why we can't have nice things.

Giggle du Jour

Just because:



With thanks to commenter Doug105 at Joe.My.God.

We Don't Need No Stinkin' Animals

And the Trump regime's war on the environment continues:

The Trump administration moved on Monday to weaken how it applies the 45-year-old Endangered Species Act, ordering changes that critics said will speed the loss of animals and plants at a time of record global extinctions .

The action, which expands the administration’s rewrite of U.S. environmental laws, is the latest that targets protections, including for water, air and public lands. Two states — California and Massachusetts, frequent foes of President Donald Trump’s environmental rollbacks — promised lawsuits to try to block the changes in the law. So did some conservation groups.

Given that Trump's administration is filled with two-faced liars, I'm calling bullshit on this:

Pushing back against the criticism, Interior Secretary David Bernhardt and other administration officials contend the changes improve efficiency of oversight while continuing to protect rare species.

“The best way to uphold the Endangered Species Act is to do everything we can to ensure it remains effective in achieving its ultimate goal — recovery of our rarest species,” he said in a statement. “An effectively administered Act ensures more resources can go where they will do the most good: on-the-ground conservation.”

Bernhardt is a former oil industry lobbyist.

This just makes me sick at my stomach. Yes, I'm a nature freak, bolstered by the understanding that it's all one system -- it's all interrelated, and if you screw up one part, you damage the whole thing. And this is the only planet we have.

I wonder when the Trump boys are going to go on their first wolf hunt.

Read the whole article -- it's pretty awful.

Via Joe.My.God.

A Good Question

Do I really need to add anything?

With thanks to commenter RomanHans at Joe.My.God.

What's New at Green Man Review

Yeah, I know, a day late -- suddenly yesterday morning my computer went wonky, including wiping my music from Windows Media Player. (Fortunately, the files weren't deleted as well, and it seems to be reconstituting itself. Let's hear it for Windows updates!)

Nevertheless, Green Man Review published as usual:

Scottish Sort of Trad Music, A Fiendish Bean Dip, Africa, The Muppets and other Summer Things

So head on over, if you haven't already, and enjoy.

Oops!

This one's gone viral, but I have to post it here.

A crowd at Modesto’s City Council erupted into laughter when Don Grundmann, the co-organizer of a Straight Pride event planned for that California city in late August, slipped while arguing to the assembled chamber and councilmen.

“We’re a totally peaceful racist group,” proclaimed Grundmann, defending his cause and inspiring a facepalm from one councilwoman and gales of laughter and cheers from the crowd.

And the crowd went wild.

Mayor Pete

Strangely enough, this is the first time I've seen Pete Buttigieg in action -- chalk it up to my habit of skipping over videos that people post in comment threads. However, this one I did watch, and I think it's worth sharing:

He's not at all what I expected. I mean, I knew he was intelligent, thoughtful, and (usually) right on the mark. I didn't expect him to be so forceful -- and he's not pulling any punches.

I especially like the way he's taking back "values" from the fascists -- oops, I meant the Republican/evangelical con men.

With thanks to commenter Lazycrocket at Joe.My.God.

Today in Disgusting People

Everyone involved in this:

Following a massive undocumented immigration enforcement operation that resulted in more than 650 arrests, many children of those taken into custody are now left homeless with nowhere to go.

Community leaders in Forest, Mississippi came together Wednesday night to put them up in a community gym. 12 News reporter Alex Love was granted permission to talk to community leaders and the children.

These children — some as young as toddlers — were relying on neighbors and even strangers to pick them up outside their homes after school and drive them to a community center where people tried to keep them calm. But many kids could not stop crying for mom and dad.

Good for the community. And please, can we hear from some "Christians" about their "family values"?

This via Towleroad.

And please note this, from commenter greenmanTN at Joe.My.God.:

Humanity

This speaks for itself:

An emotional moment: Beto O’Rourke meets Sean Nixon, 20, a Walmart employee who was there at the time of the shooting and helped a child.

O’Rourke asked if he was getting counseling, offered his personal cell number and said to call if he needs help. pic.twitter.com/GryDGQJWeD

— Eric Bradner (@ericbradner) August 7, 2019

Can you think of a Republican who would do this? I can't.

Thanks to commenter Dazzer at Joe.My.God.

Today's Must-Read(s)

Hullabaloo is the place to be this morning -- there's a whole series of posts that demand attention. Start with this one by Tom Sullivan on our history of racism, which Trump has made allowable:

Donald Trump did not say he personally condemned those sentiments and racist ideology, only that "the nation" should. He blamed the Internet and video games for the body count rather than the racism, bigotry, and white supremacy he cited moments earlier (and that the alleged El Paso shooter cited for his actions). Trump blamed mental illness for the slaughter and would not address the ready availability of weapons in the U.S. and its gun culture. As if to punctuate his own disconnect from victims, Trump managed in the end to misidentify the affected Ohio city as Toledo.

Then scroll down to this one by Digby; the bulk of it is a column by Ben Shapiro from 2010; the title should give you a hint of the thrust: "Obama's Race War":

That's just an excuse. The Obama administration is racist. They are using that racism to let black criminals off the hook, justify illegal immigration, hamstring law enforcement across the country, and push redistribution as a solution to supposed continuing discrimination against "people of color." The predictable result of this policy will resemble the results of the 1876 election: federal abdication on racial violence, state abdication on racial violence and local abdication on racial violence. The next race war will come not from racist whites, but from racist blacks and Hispanics who feel empowered to act on their racism by an administration that excuses all minority misbehavior.

Shapiro isn't much for predicting the future.

And, something positive -- Digby's post on Beto O'Rourke's comments on Trump's racism, and Trump's racism itself. Here's a sample:

"The only modern western democracy that I can think of that said anything close to this is the Third Reich, Nazi Germany. Talking about human beings as though they‘re animals, making them sub-human to make it ok to put their kids in cages.” — @BetoORourke pic.twitter.com/UzdZEEeAn2

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) August 5, 2019

And yes, this has everything to do with the rash of mass shootings this week. (One of this first things I saw this morning was that there was another one last night. Four dead, I believe.)

This Week at Green Man Review

Yep, it's Sunday again, and that means:

Alternative Egypts, American Indian Literature, The Final BronyCon, Irish trad music, Alan Moore’s Mind, Hunter’s smoky egg dip and Other Matters

Don't forget the other matters -- some juicy stuff included in that. So click on over and enjoy.

(Oh, by the way -- that's a different Hunter.)

Image du Jour

All you need to know about Mitch McConnell:

With thanks to commenter StevenJ at Joe.My.God.

Coneflowers

I remember reading not all that long ago that purple coneflowers were an endangered species. Now, they've become a common garden plant, at least in Chicago.

I have to confess that I always wondered why they were called "coneflowers". I guess I must have been observing them too early in the blooming cycle, when the central portion -- the part that has the actual flowers -- was flat. I've been noticing lately that as the season progresses, that center does become more and more cone-shaped.

And it happens that the scientific name is Echinacea purpurea. For those with any acquaintance at all with herbal medicine, you know that Echinacea is recommended as an aid to the immune system. The American Indians used it for all sorts of ailments, including wounds, burns, snake bites, throat infections, what have you.

And best of all, the flowers are really attractive.