Hope you’re not going to get tired of me posting Nina Simone songs because I just had to do it again. I woke up and feel optimistic for a nice change. I would like to say that my life is on the up and up but this is much less specific than that. I feel better about being a woman in the USA and that’s a big deal.
Two really great SCOTUS decisions came down today that protect women’s right to choose and the victims of domestic abuse who are overwhelmingly women and children. The Supremes have thrown out the Texas Trap Law and refused to water down gun bans for domestic abusers. Then, there was some campaign excitement! Senator Elizabeth Warren tore up the stage with a Donald Burning and an enthusiastic Hillary support speech in Cincinnati. Women on the Supreme Court made a huge difference! Can you imagine the difference a woman President may make?
It felt as if, for the first time in history, the gender playing field at the high court was finally leveled, and as a consequence the court’s female justices were emboldened to just ignore the rules. Time limits were flouted to such a degree that Chief Justice John Roberts pretty much gave up enforcing them. I counted two instances in which Roberts tried to get advocates to wrap up as Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor simply blew past him with more questions. There was something wonderful and symbolic about Roberts losing almost complete control over the court’s indignant women, who are just not inclined to play nice anymore.
The case involves a crucial constitutional challenge to two provisions in Texas’ HB 2, the state’s omnibus abortion bill from 2013. The first requires doctors to obtain admitting privileges from a hospital 30 miles from the clinic where they perform abortions; the second requires abortion clinics to be elaborately retrofitted to comply with building regulations that would make them “ambulatory surgical centers.” If these provisions go into full effect, Texas would see a 75 percent reduction in the number of clinics serving 5.4 million women of childbearing age. The constitutional question is whether having 10 clinics to serve all these women, including many who would live 200 miles away from the nearest facility, represents an “undue burden” on the right to abortion deemed impermissible after the Casey decision. Each of the female justices takes a whacking stick to the very notion that abortion—one of the safest procedures on record—requires rural women to haul ass across land masses larger than the whole state of California in order to take a pill, in the presence of a doctor, in a surgical theater.
The morning starts with an arcane and technical debate that eats up most of Stephanie Toti’s time. Toti, arguing on behalf on the Texas clinics, first has to answer an argument—raised by Ginsburg—that the clinics were precluded from even bringing some of their claims. Between this and factual challenges from Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito as to whether there was any evidence on the record to show that the law itself triggered the closings of Texas clinics, she doesn’t have much time to get to the merits. So frustrated is Justice Elena Kagan by the conservatives’ repeated insistence that perhaps the clinics just coincidentally all closed within days of HB 2’s passage that she finally has to intervene. “Is it right,” she asks Toti, “that in the two-week period that the ASC requirement was in effect, that over a dozen facilities shut their doors, and then when that was stayed, when that was lifted, they reopened again immediately?” Toti agrees. “It’s almost like the perfect controlled experiment,” continues Kagan, “as to the effect of the law, isn’t it? It’s like you put the law into effect, 12 clinics closed. You take the law out of effect, they reopen?”
The Supreme Court on Monday struck down Texas abortion restrictions that have been widely duplicated in other states, a resounding win for abortion rights advocates in the court’s most important consideration of the controversial issue in 25 years.
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy joined the court’s liberals in the 5 to 3 decision, which said Texas’s arguments that the clinic restrictions were to protect women’s health were cover for making it more difficult to obtain an abortion.
The challenged Texas provisions required doctors who perform abortions at clinics to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital and said that clinics must meet hospital-like standards of surgical centers.
Similar restrictions have been passed in other states, and officials say they protect patients. But the court’s majority sided with abortion providers and medical associations who said the rules are unnecessary and so expensive or hard to satisfy that they force clinics to close.
In a 6-2 decision, the Supreme Court on Monday ruled that reckless domestic assaults can be considered misdemeanor crimes to restrict gun ownership. The decision comes as a major victory for women’s rights and domestic violence advocacy groups.
The Supreme Court ruled Monday against a Maine resident who argued he should not have been stripped of his ability to possess a firearm despite a prior domestic violence charge in state court.
Stephen Voisine pled guilty to a misdemeanor assault charge in 2004 against a girlfriend. Five years later, he was investigated for shooting a bald eagle and as part of the investigation he turned over a firearm to authorities.
After reviewing his criminal record, Voisine was then charged with unlawful possession of a firearm pursuant to a federal law which makes it unlawful for a person who has been convicted of a “misdemeanor crime of domestic violence” to possess a firearm or ammunition.
Lawyers for Voisine argued that his misdemeanor offense did not rise to the level to trigger the federal law.
The justices agreed to take the case to interpret the reach of a federal statute. But Justice Clarence Thomas during oral arguments was also interested in the 2nd Amendment implications, breaking in to ask a series of questions for the first time in 10 years during oral arguments.
The three-judge panel of the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against Voisine and another defendant, holding that the “question before us is a narrow one.”
Congress recognized that “guns and domestic violence are a lethal combination,” the panel said.
Is it really possible that we may see a woman President and Vice President next year? The rally in Cincinnati this morning with Hillary Clinton and Elizabeth Warren held out that tantalizing option.
BB caught me in bed with a cup of coffee this morning. Turn on the TV! There they were and there it was. No more Texas Trap Laws! Two Powerful women thrashing a Republican Bully while the world and Cincinnati cheered them on! It’s a new day! It’s a new dawn! Warren definitely put the B in the Trump Burn. She was amazing and you could see that Hillary loved every minute of it.
Donald Trump is “a small, insecure money-grubber who fights for no one but himself,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts said Monday morning at the Cincinnati’s Union Terminal, as the possible vice presidential candidate lit up the crowd in her first appearance with Hillary Clinton.
“What kind of a man?” Warren said of the presumptive GOP nominee, with whom she has had drawn out Twitter battles. “A nasty man who will never become president of the United States, because Hillary Clinton will be the next president of the United States.”
Warren, who is popular with many progressives who backed Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont in the primary, lobbed attacks at Trump as she stood below the terminal lobby’s large mosaic of of iron-workers, railroad men and farmers. Clinton stood beside her, grinning and clapping.
The joint appearance, and Warren’s enthusiasm for attacking Trump, added to speculation about her likelihood of receiving the nod to join Clinton as the vice presidential candidate on the Democratic ticket. Clinton and her supporters have touted Warren’s endorsement as the former first lady seeks to unite Democrats after a long primary battle with Sanders.
At Union Terminal, Warren punctuated her criticisms of Trump and praise of Clinton by raising her fist and shouting “Yes!” Drawing applause and supportive laughter, Warren turned and clapped wildly for Clinton, then joined the crowd in shouts of “Hillary! Hillary!” and a “Woo!”
“Donald Trump thinks poor, sad little Wall Street brokers need to be free to defraud everyone they want,” said Warren, known for her anti-Wall Street stances. “Hillary fights for us.”
“You know I could do this all day. I really could,” Warren said of attacking Trump. “But I won’t. OK, one more.”
“You just saw why she is considered so terrific, so formidable, because she tells it like it is,” Clinton said of Warren. “I just love how she gets under Donald Trump’s skin.”
These two are a great tag team. I can’t wait to watch the thin, orange-skinned one’s twitter feed. He hates it when women put him in his place.
Hillary Clinton after being introduced by Senator Elizabeth Warren at a campaign rally in Cincinnati, Ohio. REUTERS/Aaron Josefczyk
Warren and Clinton both share a desire to do everything they can to “stop Donald Trump” from becoming president, and, according to a campaign aide, they will both warn of the risks Trump would have on the economy during their event today, according to HASKELL and KREUTZ. “The Republicans underestimated and underestimated and underestimated Donald Trump. Look where that got them. They kept saying, no, no, no, that’s not going to happen, we don’t have to worry about that,” Warren said when she endorsed Clinton. “Donald Trump is a genuine threat to this country. He is a threat economically to this country. But he is a threat to who we are as a people. There is an ugly side to Donald Trump that we all have to stop and think about what’s going on here.” As Clinton and Warren’s relationship continues to evolve and Warren’s stock grows as a possible choice for vice president, it appears the senator is diving head first into helping elect Clinton. She even stopped by Clinton’s Brooklyn presidential campaign headquarters 10 days ago to give staffers a pep talk telling them “Don’t screw this up.”
They didn’t screw it up. It was marvelous, darlin’!
So, there’s some good news!
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The presidential primary process is over. Voters in the District of Columbia will be the last to sound off, as Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont and ex-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton face off one last time in the battle for their party’s nomination.
With 29 percent of precincts reporting, Clinton was declared the winner by the Associated Press shortly after 8:45 pm EST, leading Sanders 78.8 percent to 21 percent.
DC offers up 20 pledged delegates, 13 of which are split among the four wards of the non-state’s two municipal districts. The overall winner receives all seven of the remaining pledged delegates. There are even more superdelegates, however, 26 in total, of which all but four have already aligned with Clinton
The primary’s rules favor Clinton, as only Democratic Party members are allowed to vote. In many of Sanders’ victorious showings, it was non-partisans voting in semi-open primaries that tipped the balance for the self-described Democratic socialist.
Up to this point, Clinton has won 33 primary contests and Sanders has been victorious in 23, in which Clinton has garnered a total of 2,203 pledged delegates to Sanders’ 1,828. In addition to those tallies, 581 superdelegates have committed to Clinton, while 49 have voiced support for Sanders.
The Democratic National Convention will take place from July 25 to 28 in Philadelphia.
Hillary Clinton will win the last contest of the Democratic primary season, according to a CNN projection, eclipsing Bernie Sanders in the little-noticed election in the District of Columbia.
The contest doesn’t change the general election match-up. Clinton clinched her nomination last week, but Sanders declined to drop out and pledged to give every voter a chance to decide between the two candidates.
Though the primary was essentially over, Sanders held a single campaign event in Washington last Thursday, and he reminded voters here about his support for statehood for the nation’s capital.
It’s a live blog and open thread!! Hillary is the one!
Once again we see the results of toxic religious zealotry and resentment whipped up to the point that some nutter feels compelled to kill in the case of the Orlando massacre. This occurs all too frequently in this country. You may recall the Colorado Planned Parenthood shooting where we saw Robert Dear go on a shooting spree with the same deadly combination of anger whipped up by right wing politicians and preachers, mental illness, and easy access to weapons. One claimed ISIS inspiration and Islamofascism. The other was inspired by Christofascists in the US that bring you terror in the name of Fetus Fetishism.
We still haven’t heard about the motives of the Indiana man–a 20 year old white guy–in terms of why he was going after participants and viewers of a California Gay Pride parade. Suffice it to say, the politicization of the private lives of the GLBT community by Republicans, their presidential candidate, and the various religious whackos that they court likely will come into play at some point.
Harassing and encouraging anger is just one political tool used regularly by Republicans these days. I have noticed that the silence is deafening right now on James Wesley Howell. The press can is clearly focused on the bloodbath and the sensational background of the Pulse Shooter rather than wondering why we manage to get bigger and badder displays of hatred and anger these days. I’m not sure that most people realize that any Abrahamic-based religion is going to beget violence in some folks. It goes with territory. A few of them take retribution and strict commandments from their angry sky fairy way too seriously. This is especially the case if they have some kind of severe emotional or mental disorder.
(Spoiler Alert) It’s the easy access to guns of all kinds in this country. The irresponsible and cynical use of anger and outrage to gain power and money is out of control. Religion is just another vehicle to whip up the anger and the outrage and it frequently turns deadly.
There were calls to ban the weapon after the Newtown shootings, which led to a spike in sales. Gun manufacturers have called the AR-15 one of the most popular weapons in the U.S., with more than 3 million estimated to be in circulation.
“It was designed for the United States military to do to enemies of war exactly what it did this morning: kill mass numbers of people with maximum efficiency and ease,” lawyer Josh Koskoff, who’s representing Newtown families in their lawsuit against the gun industry, said Sunday.
Regulations on magazine capacity for the weapon vary from state to state, but it can fire 45 rounds a minute.
Most forms of the gun had been prohibited under the 1994 federal assault weapons ban that was allowed to expire in 2004, following ferocious lobbying by the National Rifle Association.
The NRA has used its lobbying might in the years since to bury attempts to revive the ban.
“During the decade of the ban, there were half as many casualties in mass shootings as the decade before, and a third as many casualties in mass shootings as the decade after,” said Richard Aborn of the Citizens Crime Commission of New York City, a strategist involved in the original legislation.
Hillary Clinton has called for a renewal of the Assault Weapons Ban that her husband signed in his first term. This is one of the reasons that I am so happy she is the nominee. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has some extremely neoconfederate views of gun control that he reiterated yesterday. He believes it is a state and local issue, voted against the Brady Bill many many times, and has supported relieving gun manufacturers and stores of any liability for the damage done by their product.
Hillary Clinton has called for the reinstatement of the assault weapons ban in the wake of the worst mass shooting in American history that left 49 people and the gunman dead at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida.
In forthright comments a day after the massacre at the Pulse Club, the presumptive presidential nominee for the Democratic party issued a call for a return to “commonsense gun safety reform” and lambasted the Republican-controlled Congress for what she called a “totally incomprehensible” refusal to address the country’s lax gun laws.
“We can’t fall into the trap set up by the gun lobby that says if you cannot stop every shooting you shouldn’t try to stop any,” she said.
Clinton’s tough stance on gun control sets up a torrid fight with her Republican rival for the White House Donald Trump, who has positioned himself as a champion of the second amendment and dismissed any calls for greater gun controls as weakness. She insisted that while she did believe that law-abiding American citizens have the right to own guns, it was also possible to see that “reasonable, commonsense measures” could be taken that would make people more safe from guns.
A day after the deadliest mass shooting in US history, questions are mounting over why the shooter Omar Mateen was legally able to buy an assault rifle and handgun despite having been investigated twice by the FBI for suspected terrorist sympathies.
Mateen, 29, launched his attack on Pulse club, an LGBT venue in downtown Orlando celebrating its popular Latin dance night, at 2.02am on Sunday morning.
Twenty minutes into the spree he took the bizarre step of making a 911 call in which he reportedly referred both to Islamic State and the Tsarnaevs, the brothers who carried out the Boston Marathon bombings in April 2013.
Sunday’s attack – which left 49 clubgoers dead and 53 injured – was launched by Mateen using a .223-caliber assault rifle and 9mm semi-automatic pistol with multiple rounds of ammunition that had been purchased quite lawfully in the week before the rampage using Mateen’s firearms license. Mateen was shot dead by police.
He also held a permit to work as a security guard, which he did at a courthouse in Port St Lucie, Florida, even though he was interviewed three times by the FBI in 2013 and 2014 following separate reports of extremist behavior and connections to terrorism that were in the end deemed insubstantial.
Mateen was released because no evidence of wrongdoing was found by the FBI. He’s a natural born American so that provides him the usual protections. This is something that appears to have blown completely pass Donald Trump whose rhetoric and bragging were dialed up to 11 yesterday. He revisited his call to ban all Muslims from entering the country despite the fact that all three of the shooters claiming support for Islamofascim–Nidal Hassn (Fort Hood),Syed Rizwan Farook, (San Bernardino) , and Mateen (Orlando)–were American citizens. Only Farook’s wife–Tashfeen Malik–was foreign born.
The presumptive Republican nominee pulled no punches in a lengthy statement yesterday, going so far as to call for Barack Obama to resign and reiterating his call for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States (despite the fact that the shooter was born in New York).
“In his remarks today, President Obama disgracefully refused to even say the words ‘Radical Islam’. For that reason alone, he should step down,” Trump said in his press release. “If Hillary Clinton, after this attack, still cannot say the two words ‘Radical Islam’ she should get out of this race for the Presidency. If we do not get tough and smart real fast, we are not going to have a country anymore. Because our leaders are weak, I said this was going to happen – and it is only going to get worse. I am trying to save lives and prevent the next terrorist attack. We can’t afford to be politically correct anymore.”
“We admit more than 100,000 lifetime migrants from the Middle East each year. Since 9/11, hundreds of migrants and their children have been implicated in terrorism in the United States,” Trump added. “Hillary Clinton wants to dramatically increase admissions from the Middle East, bringing in many hundreds of thousands during a first term – and we will have no way to screen them, pay for them, or prevent the second generation from radicalizing.” (To be fair, this mischaracterizes Clinton’s position.)
The statement followed a stream of self-congratulatory tweets.
Hillary Clinton on Monday broke from President Barack Obama in referring to the terrorist attack as “radical Islamism,” countering Donald Trump’s accusations that both she and Obama are weak on tackling terrorist threats.
In an interview with NBC’s “Today” on Monday morning, Clinton said words matter less than actions, but that she didn’t have a problem using the term.
“And from my perspective, it matters what we do, not what we say. It matters that we got Bin Laden, not what name we called him,” Clinton said. “But if he is somehow suggesting I don’t call this for what it is, he hasn’t been listening. I have clearly said we face terrorist enemies who use Islam to justify slaughtering people. We have to stop them and we will. We have to defeat radical jihadist terrorism, and we will.”
Both terms “mean the same thing,” Clinton continued, adding, “And to me, radical jihadism, radical Islamism, I think they mean the same thing. I’m happy to say either, but that’s not the point.”
“I have clearly said many, many times we face terrorist enemies who use Islam to justify slaughtering innocent people. We have to stop them and we will. We have to defeat radical jihadist terrorism or radical Islamism, whatever you call it,” Clinton said later on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” reiterating, “it’s the same.”
The U.S. cannot, on the other hand, she added, “demonize, demagogue and declare war on an entire religion.” Clinton also said she could assure Americans that she is equally committed to fighting Islamic extremism as well as protecting law-abiding Muslims.
President Obama said Monday that the Orlando mass murder was “inspired” by violent extremist propaganda on the internet and there’s no evidence the killing spree was ordered by ISIS.
“We see no clear evidence that he was directed externally,” Obama said from the Oval Office, using another name from the Islamic State terror group. “It does appear that at the last minute he announced allegiance to ISIL.”
Obama said investigators are tracing Omar Mateen’s “pathway” to murder by reviewing his internet searches and other materials.
“It appears that the shooter was inspired by various extremist information that was disseminated over the internet,” Obama said.
“All those materials are currently being searched … so we will have a better sense of pathway that the killer took in the making a decision to launch this attack.”
Obama made the brief remarks after meeting with FBI Director James Comey, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson and other security officials.
The Orlando shooting and the shooting that might have been in California both are rooted in hate and easy access to guns. Both shooter and potential shooter had histories of mental illness. The Orlando shooter had a history of Domestic violence which in many states would stop him from getting access to any gun. Clearly, we have a problem in this country with hate and guns turned on the hapless population. One of our political parties has weaponized hatred and bigotry then enabled shooters by catering to all the whims of the most radical elements of the NRA gun lobby.
Clinton is right. This has to end on all accounts.
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There are a few things I really need to rant about today and all of it has to do with the fact that some people just can’t see past privilege and recognize when they’re behaving liked spoiled asses. Well, it’s mostly white people and mostly men, and mostly Christians and mostly straight people, but there’s enough of them and they’ve got the power and the anger to ruin the lives of a whole bunch of people. I am really trying to be gracious to the people who got caught up in the Bernie scam. Sheesh, people, where are your critical thinking skills?
I’ve been watching one thread that started out as a complaint about the possible price tag of an Armani jacket degrade into Hillary took a private jet plane to her speech in NYC. I also had to endure some white dude who hasn’t got enough money explain to me that he has no privilege so take it up with the folks with money. Dude, money is just one aspect where you can achieve favoritism by society. Do some research! Develop some empathy. Oh wait, you’ve listened to Bernie who thinks only your net worth matters as a measure of your integrity.
Much of the criticism of Sanders’s foreign policy stances have come from his left flank. The World Socialist Web Site called Sanders a “silent partner of American militarism.” And Counterpunch, a left-wing magazine, has criticized Sanders on more than one occasion for being insufficiently pacifist.
“He behaves more like a technofascist disguised as a liberal, who backs all of President Obama’s nasty little wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Somalia, and Yemen,” wrote Thomas Naylor in the magazine. “Since he always ‘supports the troops,’ Sanders never opposes any defense spending bill. He stands behind all military contractors who bring much-needed jobs to Vermont.”
Sanders’s support of the Kosovo War led to the resignation of an adviser; when antiwar activists occupied his office, he had them arrested; and Sanders voted to authorize the war in Afghanistan, Howard Lisnoff wrote in the same publication.
[R]eaders ought not to count on him to push back on the militarism and military actions that have become routine under both Democrats and Republicans who occupy the presidency,” Lisnoff added.
The double standards for women and the bull shit people will buy about Hillary is just one set of the things that we knew we’d face this election because the folks who seem like rational liberal democrats suddenly start sounding like they spend time reading every conspiracy possible from InfoWars when it comes to Hillary Clinton. We’ve seen the AP set up emergency lines for Reporters getting threats from Bernie Sanders. Super Delegates have been receiving similar threats and many are being investigated by law enforcement. Every time some one posts for Hillary some really nasty, caps using creep threatens violence and all kinds of things.
Even as some top supporters have started backing down since Tuesday night, when Hillary Clinton claimed the Democratic nomination — and as a planned Sanders letter to superdelegates campaigning for them to support him rather than Clinton appears in limbo — frustration is bubbling among those who want the senator to keep the campaign going.
In their view, the president is trying to prematurely end the fight. They warn that it won’t work and that the blowback might show him he’s not as popular with the Sanders wing of the Democratic Party as he might like to think.
“The president is not Sen. Sanders’ boss. We’ve got to get this straight here,” said Nina Turner, a former Ohio state senator who’s been traveling the country on behalf of the campaign. “There’s respect that’s for the commander in chief … but Sen. Sanders is duly elected, and he’ll make his own decisions.”
Or else.
“In some ways, even though [the president’s] numbers are good, and good with the Democratic base, he overestimates,” said a Democratic strategist aligned with Sanders. “Much of the activist Bernie movement — I think he overestimates his strength with those people.”
The campaign is hypersensitive to any whiff of being treated as a smaller, protest candidacy, to failures to acknowledge that Sanders won more than 40 percent of the primary vote, or to being dismissed by what they see as the Democratic establishment. And an endorsement of Hillary Clinton by a president who many Sanders supporters believe fell short of his progressive promise has that establishment smell.
“They don’t want to see him shoved to the side,” the Democratic strategist said. “A lot of love is going to be more productive than a lot of pressure. There’s a strain out there that just wants to hit [Sanders] with a 2-by-4 and say, ‘get out.’ The better course is to show appreciation and engagement and show how much the party needs this guy.”
Sanders has never been much interested in what Democratic leaders have had to say about his presidential bid, and every call along the way for him to drop out seems only to have encouraged him to push ahead. That’s left prominent Clinton supporters worried about what the reaction to Obama’s urging will be.
“People talk to Bernie. But Bernie marches to his own drum. And that’s true if Clinton talks to him or if Obama talks to him,” said Clinton ally and former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell. “The president deserves an A for effort, but I’m not sure he’s going to have much of an impact.”
I’ve noticed how many of us are in “secret” and “closed” Hillary Facebook Groups. We have to in order to post our true feelings over there for many reasons not least among them are the tons of angry Bernie Trolls that just dump right wing memes straight out of InfoWars on any thread.
Writer and comedian Joanna Castle Miller wrote a Facebook post that is going viral on Twitter (she took a screenshot of the original). Miller has a lot of insight into the campaign—even though she’s a liberal, her father is Darrell Castle, the real, live third party candidate of the right-wing Constitution Party. Traveling around the country and meeting voters and supporters of all kinds, she noted something unique about Hillary supporters. It maybe explains why you see (and hear) Sanders & Trump supporters all over the Internet but only saw Hillary supporters in vote tallies. Here’s the solution to the mystery of the missing Hillary fans.
Over the last week, I spent time with all of the 3 major campaigns here in CA as part of the show I’ve been working on. Everyone I met was polite, energized, and passionate. But I noticed one big difference between Hillary’s supporters and everyone else.
When I spoke with Trump and Bernie supporters, they were most eager to get in front of the camera. They spoke with a lot of confidence, and they spoke very freely.
Almost all of Hillary’s volunteers (approx the same number as were at Bernie’s office on the same day) were women, of varying age and race. Her supporters did *not* clamor for the camera. It was the opposite. They wanted to be interviewed, but they debate it for what seemed like forever. They got quiet and asked questions like, “Will my name be used?” “Where will this be seen?” and “Can I wear sunglasses?” Some of them thanked me and said no, and they looked really sad about it. When I pressed them, they told me they were terrified of the online threats they might receive, and in some cases had already received. Even lead organizers admitted they hadn’t put up a yard sign or bumper sticker for fear of retaliation. When women walked in to volunteer for the phone bank, they were assured they wouldn’t have to give their names if they were too afraid.
Hillary’s office was tucked away in a dying mall, with little hand-drawn posters taped up, cheerleader-style. It was cheery, but quiet and nearly invisible. A lot like those volunteers.
This is not to generalize all women as Hillary supporters or as timid – of course not! But I personally believe there’s a correlation between her largely female volunteer base (as of now), her unexpected voter turnout, and the fear so many women have expressing themselves online, or on the street, or in the board room.
A lot of people on social media have wondered where all of Hillary’s votes came from, because there was no signage no outpouring of love on Facebook. It shouldn’t surprise us that when we fail to listen to women’s voices well in the public sphere, we mis-calculate what women are actually thinking and doing in private. We didn’t know where Hillary’s votes were coming from because they didn’t feel it was safe for them to tell us in the first place.
So, there you go: they were there, a lot of them were women, and they didn’t trust the general public not to act like general a-holes if they spoke up.
During a Republican district convention in the suburban Twin Cities last month, Ali Jimenez-Hopper helped seal her endorsement as a state House candidate with a speech that attacked her Democratic opponent on the basis of her sexual orientation and race.
Referring to Erin Maye Quade, a staffer for Keith Ellison who has a black dad and is married to a woman, Jimenez-Hopper said “she is really far left [in] her values.”
“She brings up that she is half black and she uses that as a strength. She brings up that she is in support of LGBT and that lifestyle and puts out pictures on Twitter of her and her wife,” Jimenez-Hopper continued. “I believe in the traditional marriage in the sense that it’s between a husband and wife and God and that family is important. We need to have these values so we can go forth and think about your community.”
Following that speech, Jimenez-Hopper was officially endorsed as the GOP candidate for the House seat being vacated by Republican Rep. Tara Mack. Neither Jimenez-Hopper or Maye Quade face primary challengers, meaning they’re set to face off in the general election this November
Reached for comment, Maye Quade said that like many people, she first heard audio of Jimenez-Hopper’s remarks when they were detailed in a thecolu.mn report published Wednesday. She said she came across the article this morning while in bed with her wife Alyse.
“This isn’t a Republican or Democrat thing, it’s basic human respect and it’s shocking to hear from anyone,” Maye Quade told ThinkProgress, adding that she’s never met Jimenez-Hopper. “That’s not the tone I want for this election — at least for me.”
Maye Quade, a longtime community organizer and Apple Valley resident, said she’s completely unaccustomed to experiencing racism or homophobia in her suburban community. As news of Jimenez-Hopper’s remarks circulated, Maye Quade said she’s experienced an “outpouring of love” from people on both sides of the aisle.
Despite the fact that the seat Maye Quade is running for is currently held by a Republican, she pointed out that the “purple” district was carried by Barack Obama in 2012 and Democratic Gov. Mark Dayton two years later. She said she intends for her campaign to be focused on issues like ameliorating childhood hunger, investing in transportation, enacting statewide paid family leave, and providing people with better mental health resources.
“We can’t afford to focus on dividing people and spewing hate,” she said.
Dividing people and spewing hate–especially towards women and minorities of all flavors–is the tagline of the 2016 elections.
Bernie Sanders on Thursday emerged from a White House meeting with President Barack Obama and vowed to work together with Hillary Clinton to defeat Donald Trump in November.
Warning that Trump would make a “disaster” leader of the country, the Vermont senator — who has pledged to continue his White House bid even after Clinton became the Democratic Party’s presumptive presidential nominee — said he would “work as hard as I can to make sure that Donald Trump does not become president of the Untied States.”
“I look forward to meeting with (Clinton) in the near future to see how we can work together to defeat Donald Trump and to create a government which represents all of us and not just the 1 percent,” Sanders said.
The senator thanked both Obama and Vice President Joe Biden for showing “impartiality” during the course of the Democratic campaign.
“They said in the beginning is that they would not put their thumb on the scales and they kept their word and I appreciate that very, very much,” Sanders said.
He added that he will monitor a “full counting of the votes” in California, where Clinton won the Democratic primary contest on Tuesday. The results will show “a much closer vote,” Sanders predicted.
Sanders’ high-profile meeting with Obama and his public remarks after come just days after Sanders declared that he intends to continue his White House campaign. At a campaign rally Tuesday night, Sanders had declined to acknowledge that Clinton had secured the necessary delegates to win her party’s nomination. At the tail end of the primary season, Sanders had vowed to forge ahead to the District of Columbia’s primary next week, and then on to the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.
You can see the presser at the CNN link above.
We shall see Bernie. We shall see. As my Irish Grandmother used to say, “the proof is in the pudding”.
Other Female Firsts Covered Like Hillary’s Historic Nomination
Hillary Clinton has made history by becoming the first female presumptive presidential nominee of a major U.S. party. In doing so, she joins a long line of celebrated female firsts…
MAY 20, 1932
DERRY, Northern Ireland — “Amelia Earhart completed her solo non-stop flight across the Atlantic yesterday afternoon. Her landing was met with skepticism by aviation enthusiasts who claimed her aircraft gave her an ‘unfair advantage.’”
SEPT 20, 1973
HOUSTON, Texas — “Billie Jean King has crushed her male opponent Bobby Riggs in a highly anticipated tennis match. This raises the question: do the rules of tennis need to be changed?”
DEC, 1903
OSLO, Norway — “Ignoring voice vote, rigged Nobel Prize committee hands award to Marie Curie.”
There are more of them and they are very very funny.
My headline today includes the beginning of a quote from one of my local sheroes Chef Leah Chase. She’s called the Queen of Creole Cuisine and had to fight to be taken seriously as a chef. She owns a very successful restaurant here and has achieved many prestigious awards. You have no idea how significant this is for a Black American woman to hold so many accolades. She was born in 1923 which is exactly the year my parents were born. You can read the full quote on the painted power box picture.
We’re still watching the returns from the primaries tonight. Hillary’s speech was amazing. She spoke of her mother, her daughter, and her granddaughter and it was so moving! My youngest daughter was here too which is why I was away for some time. We’ve been drinking white wine and looking forward.
Hillary Clinton embraced her place in history Tuesday as the first woman to become the presidential nominee of a major political party while showing an eagerness to take on Donald Trump in the fall.
“Thanks to you, we’ve reached a milestone,” she said during a speech in Brooklyn celebrating her status as the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee. “Tonight’s victory is not about one person. It belongs to generations of women and men who struggled and sacrificed and made this moment possible.”
Her long-awaited moment of celebration comes as six states hold contests that close out a tumultuous primary season. She will notch wins in the New Jersey and New Mexico Democratic primaries, according to CNN projections, adding a slew of delegates to her column. All eyes are now on delegate-rich California, where Clinton’s Democratic rival Bernie Sanders hopes for a symbolic victory that could make him a force during next month’s convention.
Reaching out to Sanders supporters, Clinton praised the Vermont senator for his long public service and “extraordinary” campaign. She played down any notion of divisions and their vigorous primary campaign was “very good for the Democratic Party and for America.”
The Sky Dancing banner headline uses a snippet from a work by artist Tashi Mannox called 'Rainbow Study'. The work is described as a" study of typical Tibetan rainbow clouds, that feature in Thanka painting, temple decoration and silk brocades". dakinikat was immediately drawn to the image when trying to find stylized Tibetan Clouds to represent Sky Dancing. It is probably because Tashi's practice is similar to her own. His updated take on the clouds that fill the collection of traditional thankas is quite special.
You can find his work at his website by clicking on his logo below. He is also a calligraphy artist that uses important vajrayana syllables. We encourage you to visit his on line studio.
Good Afternoon!
I am so relieved that the Trap Law creep has been put down. Signing such a bill in Louisiana was one of the last things the dread pirate 
Bobby Jindal did to us. There are women celebrating all over the south. Wendy Davis won in the long run.
Okay, I’m completely in stitches over this headline: “Our long national nightmare is over: DC votes in last-in-the-nation primary.” This should come as no surprise. Hillary is the winner of the DC primary with 47% of the votes tallied per the AP.
Hillary is the winner of the DC primary with 47% as this posting. CNN has weighed in too.
Colorado Planned Parenthood shooting where we saw Robert Dear go on a shooting spree with the same deadly combination of anger whipped up by right wing politicians and preachers, mental illness, and easy access to weapons. One claimed ISIS inspiration and Islamofascism. The other was inspired by Christofascists in the US that bring you terror in the name of Fetus Fetishism.
The weapon of choice for mass shooters is the AR-15 rifle. This is one of the weapons that was included in the assault weapons ban signed by Bill Clinton in 1994 that expired in 2004. The rifle was used in Orlando, Aurora, Newton, and San Bernadino. It’s easily obtainable and the latest shooter–who had a history of Domestic Violence and was under the eye of the FBI for terrorist rantings–had a license to carry it and to obtain it legally. Let that sink in.
Hillary Clinton has called for a renewal of the Assault Weapons Ban that her husband signed in his first term. This is one of the reasons that I am so happy she is the nominee. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has some extremely neoconfederate views of gun control that he reiterated yesterday. He believes it is a state and local issue, voted against the Brady Bill many many times, and has supported relieving gun manufacturers and stores of any liability for the damage done by their product.
protections. This is something that appears to have blown completely pass Donald Trump whose rhetoric and bragging were dialed up to 11 yesterday. He revisited his call to ban all Muslims from entering the country despite the fact that all three of the shooters claiming support for Islamofascim–Nidal Hassn (Fort Hood),Syed Rizwan Farook, (San Bernardino) , and Mateen (Orlando)–were American citizens. Only Farook’s wife–Tashfeen Malik–was foreign born.
Gays” pastor or the horrid group at Westborough Baptist Church. She used the term on several morning news shows today.
I’ve noticed how many of us are in “secret” and “closed” Hillary Facebook Groups. We have to in order to post our true feelings over there for many reasons not least among them are the tons of angry Bernie Trolls that just dump right wing memes straight out of InfoWars on any thread.
We’re still watching the returns from the primaries tonight. Hillary’s speech was amazing. She spoke of her mother, her daughter, and her granddaughter and it was so moving! My youngest daughter was here too which is why I was away for some time. We’ve been drinking white wine and looking forward.
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