Last night’s crash had me skip documenting the atrocities, but Trump’s been a very busy boy.
First, here’s Erin Reed’s review of the latest anti-trans executive order.
The executive order wields every available lever of federal power—and even some Trump may not legally control—to attempt a nationwide ban on gender-affirming care for transgender people under the age of 19. Notably, this includes legal adults who are 18 years old. While such a sweeping move lacks legislative backing, Trump relies on dubious reinterpretations of existing laws to justify parts of the order while outright bypassing constitutional limits in others. The success of this effort will largely depend on enforcement and whether hospitals preemptively comply, something advocates are already warning medical institutions against.
As Erin notes, this is just another step towards trans erasure. Also, last night Denver Health, the big public hospital system in Denver, announced they were stopping gender-affirming surgery for 19 and under.
Second, Trump made some mouth noises about expanding Gitmo to take more immigrants — he mentioned 30,000, which is far beyond the capacity of that place at the moment. Current capacity is somewhere under 1,000 and people on BlueSky are saying that there’s not enough water to expand it to 30K.
I think the plan here, insofar as there is one, is to send a few military planes with immigrants there, especially if the country of origin refuses entry to the planes. The whole Colombia incident that happened over the weekend was over military planes and the condition of the Colombian citizens on those planes. Colombia, and as far as I can tell, most countries have been and will continue to accept repatriation flights. Mexico, for example, has announced that they have 35,000 jobs ready for returning immigrants, and they only denied entry to one military repatriation flight (which Trump ignored, because he’s scared of Claudia Sheinbaum and the economic disaster of a trade war with our biggest trading partner.)
Anyway, this is your daily list of “bad shit Trump did” — I try to just pick the lowlights, but I’m sure there are others that you might want to mention.
Kay
Republicans and Trump are disgustingly targeting trans people to dehumanize them, but let’s not forget their “centrist” enablers in media and punditry.
Panics don’t take off unless there’s buy-in by centrist media. Media and pundits pushed the trans hate panic every day for years. They are as culpable as Donald Trump.
Sure Lurkalot
Currently blaming the air tragedy on DEI. This is and will be their go-to for every failure, tragedy and self-own fuck up.
different-church-lady
Welcome to day 11 of Every-Bit-As-Bad-As-You-Thought-It-Would-Be.
Fuck you mainstream media. Fuck you idiot electorate. Fuck you neo-Fascists.
Ohio Mom
I didn’t earmark the article (can’t provide a link) but the Cincinnati newspaper, hardly a bastion of liberal thought, recently reported that almost all of the gender-affirming surgeries conducted at our local children’s hospital are gynecomastectomys.
In these surgeries, excess breast tissue is removed from teen boys’ chests so they don’t appear to have breasts. In other words, the gender that is being affirmed is that they are male.
Medicine has its own vocabulary: positive test results are usually bad, elective surgeries are usually not optional, just not urgent emergencies, and keeping boys from being teased because they look like they need a bra for their boobs is gender-affirming surgery.
Ned F
this morning I read that there is an order to suspend all DEI celebrated events i.e. MLK Day, Pride month, black history month, holocost rememberance day, women’s history month and others
https://x.com/kenklippenstein/status/1884623315911823747/photo/1
As it’s going, the memo is contradictory and inconclusive in it’s goals, except to proclimate that the government won’t support these celebrations. I guess that means no pride colors on the whitehouse this year.
different-church-lady
@Ned F: The goal is fascist propaganda, and it’s quite conclusive in that way.
Kay
@Sure Lurkalot:
It’s so clearly excuse making and avoiding responsibility. If Americans fall for this they deserve to lose their country. They behave like poorly raised 6 year olds.
The plane crashed. Screw up your courage you fucking weaklings and LOOK at why that happened.
different-church-lady
New policy: anyone who says Hitler comparisons are over the top gets kicked in the nuts.
@mistermix.bsky.social
@Kay: Someone on BlueSky noted that if Krugman had decided to write about how trans people are satanic, his editors wouldn’t have been so fussy about him covering the same topic more than once. Pretty much true.
I guess where I’ve landed is that these centrist media elites consider their children to be an extension of their social status. It’s like the stickers on the back of cars touting where their kids are going to college. A trans kid is hard to talk about at the cocktail parties, or something.
John S.
@@mistermix.bsky.social:
If they talked to trans people at the cocktail party instead of about them, things would be so much better.
scav
@Ned F: Well then, logically, we need to also put the kibosh on the Irish celebrating Saint Patrick and clear up all those Italians insisting Columbus Day is all about them. No? Are there national guards yet in place to ensure that all Valentine’s Day cards, candy and roses are only being exchanged with those of the properly expressed mixed combination of genders? Don’t forget to check the birth certificates and underwear drawer for conformity!
Librettist
@Sure Lurkalot:
Always be hitting the talking points!
The interesting traffic was shoving Vance in front of the cameras. To quote the normies: “Have you seen him? When they look like that, they go fast…..”
The replacement neither has the requisite experience nor temperament for an executive level position.
Eural Joiner
Need Some Tips to Resist in the Office? Look at This Old CIA Field Manual to Resisting Fascism
I swear the manual was written by Collin Robinson (from “What We Do in the Shadows”) – he’s the energy vampire who feeds off the energy of humans for those who didn’t watch the show…he becomes all powerful once he’s promoted to middle management and starts doing PowerPoint presentations :)
snoey
@scav: As long as we are going to have ethnic hero days we ought to highlight Pulaski Day, which was big in neighboring towns when I was a kid. Casimir Pulaski was a Polish cavalryman and Revolutionary war hero. Can’t be more dashing and manly man than that.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/was-revolutionary-war-hero-casimir-pulaski-intersex-180971907/
ArchTeryx
And people wonder why I post the things I post, despite the fact they often fall like the proverbial tree in the forest with nobody to hear. Yeah, I’m salty this morning.
trollhattan
When Trump is holding it, the news firehose becomes truly a weapon. Kanna keep up, kiptin.
E.
Man I am really having some trouble with this. My school superintendent just supported having ICE raid his schools. I also have zero doubt they will race to comply with any order to harm trans students. I think it was Timothy Snyder who advised writing down what actions by the fascists will trigger what actions by you so you don’t normalize shit and move your own goalposts. I never did that exercise and now I am wondering if I would have written down “SWAT teams forcibly removing screaming schoolchildren from their classrooms while the School Administration looks on and does nothing” as some kind of marker to join the underground or flee the country or something, but it seems like an important shift.
scav
@snoey: Chicago comes through yet again! The corner of Pulaski and Peterson are well known to me plus Bohunk National is just a bit further down. (Employers never gave us the day off though. Harumph.)
jonas
Breathing a huge sigh of relief that we were able to get GAC and surgery for our son when he was younger and that we live in a blue state that will hopefully protect his rights — he’s over 19 — to continue receiving that care, but we’re scared. Our best hope right now is that this order gets tied up in lawsuits until the end of time. Any law-talking type jackals able to weigh in on what might happen on that front?
Stella
@Kay: The group I’ve seen most despondent over the current landscape has been other trans people. So many of them feel abandoned by their nominal allies, and I don’t think it’s all in their imagination.
The recent military spending bill that stripped trans military kids of healthcare was passed with Dem support. And I understand the political calculus of that vote, I really do. It had lots of other stuff in it that was wanted, and the Dems recognized a sticking point when they saw one. But at the end of the day, the political calculus was that it was a sacrifice they were willing to make. That hurts. And even if there are people within the group that fight harder, even if you know the Republicans would do so much worse if they had their choice – are doing it now – it still hurts to always feel like the bottom priority.
So many groups have abandoned trans people that we’re just really sensitive to it now. It’s easier to harden your heart than it is to be disappointed. I know there are lots of Dems that care, that are fighting for us, that want to make things better. I just wish I believed that the party as a whole would make it a priority too, rather than treat it with the obvious nervousness they do.
If I’m, at times, overly harsh with my language on the Dems, I promise it comes from a place of hurt and disappointment rather than hate or dismissal. I know how much good they do – how much they try to do. It just feels so little, at times, when things are growing so dark.
jonas
@E.: I wonder if this order on GAC will allow some of these kids and their families to claim asylum in the EU or Canada — it’s straight-up government persecution of a vulnerable minority.
(Note: the UK has already limited most kinds of GAC for kids under 18, so that’s out)
Professor Bigfoot
@Ned F: We’re looking at government of the straight white Christian men, for the straight white Christian men, and by the straight white Christian men.
Whatever their target du jour, it will never, ever be straight white Christian men.
Old Man Shadow
If we allow the government take ownership of our bodies then they can do anything they want to us without our consent.
Imprisonment without cause? Yep.
Torture? Why not?
Forced labor? Yep.
Forced pregnancy? Hahaha… we’re already there. But they might expand that by taking away birth control including condoms.
Forced religious attendance? Yep.
ArchTeryx
@Stella: Believe me you’re far from the only one. The despair among the trans folks I take care of, and that I read on BlueSky, is palpable. They’ve entirely given up on American democracy. They figure it’s a war now, and they’re utterly, totally on their own. Trashing Dems on a daily basis about things like Laken-Riley doesn’t help matters, but I can’t be too angry at them for it. They really think they have zero allies in government, from either party, right now.
John S.
@Professor Bigfoot:
Except for Joe Biden, Jack Smith, Mark Milley, etc.
I know this is your schtick, and your point largely stands, but there’s no such thing as absolutes in this world. Never say never (again).
ETA: For clarity, I agree that straight white Christian men as a group will not be targeted. But individuals will be.
cmorenc
@Sure Lurkalot:
…said in the complete absence of any evidence of non-white pilots or AT controllers involved. Not that if any of the involved pilots or controllers were non-white, that they were at fault in this incident, rather just pointing out the openly racist presumption here of riffing “DEI: as having anything whatever to do with the crash.
LAC
@John S.:
<blockquote>I know this is your schtick</blockquote>
Jaysus, Professor Bigfoot has a “schtick”, does he? Couldn’t be that maybe he has a point?
Lobo
To the Trans and wider LGBTQ+ community. I am sorry for what is happening. I know you are the canary in the coal mine. It won’t stop with you. Already Puerto Ricans and Native Americans are being caught up in the deportation dragnet. I am here as an ally, accomplice and an advocate, however imperfect. Injustice to one is injustice to all.
My heart goes out to you all.
Peace
John S.
@LAC:
Yes, it’s a schtick. And I acknowledged and accepted his point with a useful caveat, so I’m not quite sure what your gripe is exactly.
Elizabelle
@Eural Joiner: Here’s the link. Directly from the CIA.
Simple Sabotage Field Manual. Written (or at least, assembled) by the famous Wild Bill Donovan of the predecessor OSS.
Sister Golden Bear
@Ohio Mom: Yes, of the 150 breast reductions done on kids under 18 nationwide. 146 were done on cisgender boys. Sorry don’t remember the time period at the moment. And yes, it’s absolutely (cis)gender affirming surgery.
Elizabelle
@ArchTeryx:
Well then, maybe they need to learn up. Fear and hysteria are not their allies.
Seriously. This shit was not happening under Biden, and would not under Harris. But go ahead and blame everybody if it makes you feel better.
Elizabelle
@Sister Golden Bear: Funny how that inconvenient fact has not come to light, ehh?
Soprano2
@@mistermix.bsky.social: I think most of this panic is from people who are terrified their kids are going to “turn trans”. Just like thinking if their kids don’t learn about gay people they’ll never be gay, they think if they don’t learn anything about trans people they’ll never be trans. They don’t understand it doesn’t work that way at all!
TONYG
Let’s be honest about Trump’s “plan” to “expand Gitmo to accommodate” people rounded up by ICE. No real facilities will be built; any money allocated for this effort will be stolen by the Trump family and their allies. The people rounded up will be left without shelter, food or water to die. Or maybe they’ll just be dropped into the Caribbean Sea on the way there. It’s happened before in history. Am I exaggerating? WHY WOULDN’T THESE PSYCHOPATHS DO THAT? (And millions of Good Christian Real Americans will be happy with that.)
Elizabelle
@Stella: Thank you for your more nuanced comment.
Steve LaBonne
@John S.: The point is that they were not targeted BECAUSE they are straight white Christian men. More than that, they were in part targeted for being allies of those who are not one or more of those things. Pointing out how racism and misogyny work is not a “shtick” and if you think it is you really need some education.
Elizabelle
@TONYG: The Fyre Festival, only it’s Gitmo!
Eural Joiner
@Elizabelle: oh, yeah, I know it’s real CIA…but, dang, it really hits all of CR’s tactics for feeding. You know, being a vampire and all, he could’ve actually been the one to write it! :)
John S.
@Steve LaBonne:
You need to try reading what people write instead of wishcasting a bunch of nonsense onto them. Or continue with your present course of arrogance and presuming what other people need to do so they can conform to your worldview.
Jesus.
ETA: In common usage, the word shtick has come to mean any style or habit for which a person is particularly well known, even if not intended for comedic purposes.
There’s some education for YOU.
Steve LaBonne
@John S.: Right back atcha. Professor Bigfoot is one of the commenters whose insights I most value. You might try reading his comments with some degree of comprehension. You might actually learn something. P. S. Nice but completely ineffective attempt at ass-covering in your addendum.
John S.
@Steve LaBonne:
LOL, whatever gets you through the day, man.
Citizen Alan
Might? griswold versus connecticut has been on the chopping block.Since amy coathanger, barrett got put on the court. It’s their last pitstop on the way to overturning brown versus board of education.
LAC
@Steve LaBonne: Thank you! I am just putting this mansplainer back into pie. He has done this to Professor Bigfoot and Thin Black Duke, and it is an actual schtick.
John S.
@LAC:
Keep fucking that chicken! Meanwhile, you all keep Jewsplaining Yiddish to me. Hilarious.
LAC
@John S.: What the hell are you actually talking about? Does the need to have the last word overtake making any sense?
Actually, do not bother explaining…
Miss Bianca
@Stella:
Yes.
Sister Golden Bear
@Stella: Come sit by me. Yes, 1,000%.
John S.
@LAC:
I’m just waiting for you and Steve to regale me with more wisdom about the word shtick and it’s proper usage.
Sister Golden Bear
There was yet another EO late yesterday that among other things ordered the feds to help states prosecute teachers who use proper pronouns for trans kids.
Sister Golden Bear
@Elizabelle: Nor that puberty blockers were originally developed for cisgender kids experiencing precocious puberty, and have been safely used in them for years. And that the state laws banning blockers for trans kids specifically allow them to be used by cisgender kids.
Ohio Mom
@Sister Golden Bear: That is about the same ratio that mthe Cincinnati paper reported.
Our children’s hospital has a transgender clinic but they focus on counseling and hormone therapy.
TONYG
@Old Man Shadow: Yes. I think that forced labor will be a big part of this roundup of immigrants. The labor shortage that is being caused by this detention of immigrants will be solved by forcing (by credible threat of violence) the detained immigrants to work on farms, poultry processing plants, etc. for the princely sum of $1 (or $0) per hour. The Good White Christian Trump supporters will love that.
TONYG
@Citizen Alan: As is the case with the ban on abortions, the ban on contraception will be circumvented by the correct (rich, white) people. That’s how these things work.
TONYG
@Elizabelle: That’s right. A Fyre Festival that will last until all of the untermenschen are dead.
gvg
@John S.: Oh yes groups will. Especially real Christians who actually listened to the Bible IMO.
Any allies of the persecuted will be targeted. Why do you think the 2 Kenedy’s were killed? They are the famous ones, but the ordinary ones were targeted too. During the era of Jim Crow there was a very significant intimidation of ordinary white people to “conform” and not break the ranks and just be nice, or sell as ordinary things etc. There also was and still is an ongoing social practice of raising woment to be afraid of black men. My grandmother was rather terrified of them. I didn’t understand as a child, but then I started to grow up and get the conditioning myself as a young woman…it was hard to resist. I don’t think I would have if I had not already been going to school with enough black children very young.
White people got beat up and murdered. They also had threats made to their families, particularly the women. The white man who sheltered the Rosewood survivors also had to flee for his life and lost his business. That’s the way it worked. A few examples and whispers. Possibly even taking credit for things they didn’t do. Also, making the doers complicit, so they couldn’t back out later. I think there was blackmail involved too. The anger at race traitors is real to the other side. Murderously real. That part of my fathers stories about his childhood is hard to convey, and his parents were yankee transplants. Both my parents had friends that were…seriously harmed in that time.
John S.
@gvg:
I completely understand where you’re coming from. But allow me to make a distinction I see as relevant.
The white Christians who have suffered for their support of human rights were not targeted BECAUSE they were white Christians, but because as you point out they were deemed race traitors.
Blacks, Jews, women, trans, etc. are all targeted because of who they are, not because of what they do.
Everyone has their own unique experiences, so I’m certainly not trying to discount yours in expressing my opinion.
Steve LaBonne
@John S.: Yummy dessert says what?
Matt McIrvin
@cmorenc: I follow the YouTube channel Mentour Pilot– the creator is a Swedish former airline pilot who, among other things, analyzes crashes. He’s a wonderfully sane and sensible voice but he’s got commenters who will find an excuse to blame anything and everything on “DEI” or “woke”, even crashes in distant countries with who knows what hiring culture. I think it mostly means somebody involved wasn’t a white man. But it can just be a reflexive thing.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@snoey:
I’m a big Rev War person, have written gaming rules for the period, painted a ton of figures, even visited where Pulaski first arrived in the US.
Didn’t know about the intersex thing. Thanks so much for the article!
Stella
@snoey: As someone that grew up in Pulaski County, GA, this is so incredibly cool to learn.
Jacqueline Squid Onassis
Democrats dropping protections for the trans community sucks – even if that’s what they had to do to get the bill passed. The lack of any kind of statement explaining that combined with the lack of clearly worded defenses of the trans community tells us what they think of us.
It’s a terrible strategy because we’re not the entirety of the fascists’ list. There’s not a person in the Democratic Party who isn’t on that list. When you let them take us out, you’re just making it easier for them to take you out. So even if you hate trans people, helping to get rid of them (including not speaking up in their defense) is just a terrible strategy.
Elizabelle
@Eural Joiner: You remind me I need to watch that series! Sometimes one is in the mood for an energy vampire, or any other kind.
Did see the movie. It was wonderful.
MomSense
@gvg:
My dad’s colleague and someone he really admired, and tried to emulate was killed in 1965. Rev. Reeb was participating in the March in Selma and beaten by police.
prostratedragon
@snoey:
@scav:
Pulaski Day is a public school holiday here in Chicago. Early March, I believe, when everyone is good and ready for one.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Stella:
His death was stupid and needless, leading a last-minute assault with cavalry on a fortified position during the Siege of Savannah.
Interesting factoid, there are 7 Pulaski Counties in the US.
prostratedragon
@MomSense:
I remember the incident with Rev. Reeb. The feeling was very much that he was singled out to intimidate other white people, as most likely was Viola Gregg Liuzzo.
Alce _e_ardillo
@different-church-lady: or the ovaries.
Alce _e_ardillo
@Jacqueline Squid Onassis: Dear Democrats, Pastor Niemöller would like a word…
Paul in KY
@Stella: I have seen mighty statues to him in Chicago and DC. Read about him in school. Great to hear that it really is Gen. Pulaski buried there. Also cool to hear about him maybe being intersex.
Paul in KY
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Sure was personally courageous though! Strategically, maybe not so much.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Paul in KY:
The personal bravery of so many, often high-ranking officers during the War was really something.
Washington’s bravery under direct fire was legendary and he wasn’t alone in that.
Betty
@Kay: Dem Rep Seth Moulton is doubling down on his anti-trans position. Shameful.
Professor Bigfoot
@John S.: Of course NOT ALL, but SO GODDAMN MANY that I’m only RATIONAL to speak of the entire demographic this way.
Naming white men who, as individuals, will be targeted (entirely because of their support for people who are NOT straight white Christian men) does not in any way change the fact that it’s straight white Christian men who are busily fucking the lives of every goddamn body else.
Professor Bigfoot
@LAC: Black man not allowed to have a point.
Only white man can do that.
Professor Bigfoot
@John S.: MMmmmm, banana pudding.
Scamp Dog
@ArchTeryx: I rarely (never?) reply to you, but I’ve been reading your posts for years and remember how bad things got for you.
I’m glad things are somewhat better now, and that you’re taking steps to help the ones around you.
Ruckus
I have been to Gitmo 3 times when I was in the USN. What shitforbrains knows about it is that it exists and it has a prison. One would have to build on land that doesn’t exist, and multi stories high to hold every one he wants to send to jail for not one fucking reason. Then there is all the staff for any prison – with no place to live. He is the guy we all think he is. And his project 2025 bullshit is absolutely all about complete and utter hate and racism. Maybe some racist shitheads might think it’s a grand idea, but it is nothing but hate and racism.
Kayla Rudbek
@Eural Joiner: like the Laundry Files!
Kayla Rudbek
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: and von Steuben was gay, to boot.
AWOL
@Lobo: WTF? People from Puerto Rico are full US citizens.