Historic WH Treaty Room To Become Guest Bedroom

tRump treats the White House the official residence and working office of the president. The longest any resident may live there is normally 8 years or 10 years if the vice president takes over after 2 years of the president’s term. A federal judge told tRump’s administration that he was only holding the White House in trust for the people and next person to hold the office. It did not give him the right to change it or do what he wanted with it as if it was Mar-a-Lago or one of his other properties. That judge ordered a stop to the ballroom until congress authorized it, which the people do not want at a time when all their social services are being cut. tRump is deluded into thinking the more gold in a room the fancier and wealthier the person seems. He is trying to keep up with other dictators palaces. Now he is talking about replacing the front of the white house, the iconic columns. It is almost like he thinks he won’t be leaving. And that every other president will share his clearly in his mind superior tastes in decorating. However most people will see it as tacky and pretentious, which both describe tRump. Hugs

Historic WH Treaty Room To Become Guest Bedroom

The New York Times reports:

President Trump has discussed turning the White House Treaty Room, historically a meeting place for diplomats and statesmen, into a guest bedroom with an en suite bath. He has added gold flourishes to the East Room of the Executive Residence in a style similar to the gilded trimmings he installed in the Oval Office. And he has affixed “challenge coins” that celebrate his presidency — including the newest medallions in red and gold — to the walls inside the West Wing.

The Treaty Room is one of the most historic rooms in the White House. Presidents Ulysses S. Grant and William McKinley used it as a Cabinet room, and it was where the Spanish-American War peace protocol of 1898, and the nuclear test ban treaty of 1963, were signed. Once known as the “Monroe Room,” because it was where President James Monroe worked, it also has been the setting for major wartime addresses by presidents George W. Bush and Joseph R. Biden Jr.

Read the full article.

The sharply conservative Supreme Court that Trump's three appointees remade is the first since at least the 1950s to reject civil rights claims in a majority of cases involving women and minorities, according to a detailed analysis conducted for The Washington Post.

— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1.bsky.social) 2026-04-10T00:41:21.736Z

https://youtu.be/mPuQEG19BIM

Boise Has Moxie-

Tissue alert. Seriously. But, for happy tears.

Idaho Banned Pride Flags. Boise ‘Complied.’

Delicious compliance.

Doktor Zoom

The new Pride-themed flagpole wraps outside Boise City Hall. Photo: Doktor Zoom.

The Idaho Legislature is steadfastly devoted to terrible ideas, like banning abortion (and losing maternity care), eliminating “pornography” that isn’t in libraries anyway (and forcing some libraries to close), and making the lives of trans people miserable. Last year, just to be jerks, the Lege passed a bill aimed at forcing the city of Boise to stop flying the Pride flag outside City Hall, where it has flown for a decade, just a few blocks down the street from the state Capitol.

The 2025 law forbade any flags on public property other than the flags for US America, Idaho, cities and tribes, military services, and a few other official flags of “a governmental entity.” The bill’s Republican sponsor insisted that this wasn’t culture war, heavens no, it was about promoting unity, and America, and “stuff that we can all agree on.”

The Boise City Council promptly turned right around and passed a resolution adopting the Pride flag as one of three official City of Boise flags, and ran the rainbow colors up the flagpole again. Hooray!

Unwilling to accept such rampant disrespect to their edict, Republicans in the Lege this year passed a whole new flag law, this one adding a new rule saying that only official city or county flags “designated prior to 2023” will be allowed. The new law also added a $2000 per day / per flag fine, to show Boise what serious business this flag war is. The bill’s sponsor, state Rep. Ted Hill (R), explained the fine was absolutely necessary to force compliance from “insubordinate government officials. […] It sets a tone of anarchy.” He too said that we must have “unity” under the stars and stripes, or else.

Screenshot of rainbow pride flags flying from light posts in the tree-lined median strip of a residential street in Boise. The grassy median and the trees are lush and green. (In more recent years, the trans-inclusive version of the Pride flag has made up about 50 percent of the flags) — Pride flags along Harrison Blvd. in Boise, 2023. Since Trump’s first term, assholes have stolen and even burned multiple flags each year. They’re then replaced by the volunteers who put ‘em up in the first place. Screenshot, KTVB-TV on YouTube.

In an extra little kick at Boise, where light poles on the median of one major residential street have long displayed Pride flags throughout June, the bill specifically applies to land along “parks, roads, and boulevards.” No nice things for you, Boise.

Just to be a real prick about it, Gov. Brad Little signed the bill on March 31, the Trans Day of Visibility. Little also signed another far worse bill criminalizing trans people who use bathrooms or locker rooms that match their gender identity, not only in schools and public buildings, but also in “public accommodations,” like private businesses. First offense is a misdemeanor, with up to a year in prison, and a second offense would be a felony, with up to five years in prison. The Idaho affiliate of Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates called it “the most extreme anti-transgender bathroom ban in the nation.”

In response to the two new laws, Boise Mayor Lauren McLean ordered the Pride flag lowered outside City Hall, but also presided over a special session of the City Council to honor the Trans Day of Visibility. Choking back tears, McLean said to the Council and an audience of about 60 Boiseans, “Many people in this state and around this country are seeking to divide us. They’re seeking to divide us by targeting the most vulnerable among us. I want the people in this room to know that I see you. We see you. You are wanted, important, and unique members of our community.”

That night, City Hall was lit in the colors of the transgender flag.

Photo via Boise State Public Radio.

Then, a week after the Pride flag came down, the three flagpoles in front of City Hall sported new vinyl wraps in the colors of the Pride/Progress flag, and a big new banner was visible in the building’s windows, with the rainbow and the slogan, “Creating a city for everyone.” Yr Dok Zoom went downtown to take some photos, and damn right he plugged in his EV at one of the two free EV chargers at City Hall (still hadda feed the meter, though, so that explains the $1.50 on my company card, Rebecca).

You can see the poles up top, and here’s that nice new sign:

Photo by Doktor Zoom

Boise merchants downtown are also reminding us of that other heretical idea that got a local teacher forced out of her job last year, the divisive phrase “Everyone is welcome here.”

Lightpole banner reading 'Everyone is welcome here,' with colorful abstract blobs, musical notes, and two dancing human figures that resemble Keith Haring paintings if his figures were rounded off instead of angular. — Photo by Doktor Zoom

And now at nighttime, City Hall is lit up in rainbow colors as well. Gosh I like my city a lot!

City Council President Meredith Stead told local TV station CBS2 that the city is observing the new state law to the letter, and joyfully at that. “The law was based on the flag and we are using rainbows, and it’s not at all a flag,” Stead explained, and I hope she was grinning. “So I would say we are in full compliance of the law, that’s certainly the most important thing to us. So we’re going to be sure that we always are, and this was just a different way to celebrate our diversity and values.”

The cost of the flagpole wraps and new banners was $5,931.87, from the city’s operating budget. We think that may also have included the printing costs for these spiffy new stickers you can pick up at City Hall; I got a nice big one that looks great in the rear window of my EV:

Heart-shaped sticker with the multi-colored stripes of the Pride/Progress rainbow flag. Text in white letters: '"A city for EVERYONE means EVERYONE" — Boise Mayor Lauren McLean.' Text in black letters on the white stripe: 'City of Boise.' — We like this “everyone” thing the mayor is going on about! Photo: Dok Zoom.

Needless to say, while all the folks you’d like to hang out with in Boise are delighted by the city’s latest reply to the Lege, the Usual Suspects are big mad about this latest besmirch statement by the city, and we can only imagine what sort of stupid crap law the Idaho Lege will pass next year in another futile attempt to control the wayward capital city. We’ll close with this line from the very timely second season of Andor, which Dallas ally, former Obama official, and teamonger Brandon Friedman says nicely sums up Boise’s Rainbow Battle: “Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle.”

Keep up the good fight, Boise. (snip)

Toons ‘n’ Stuff

Bazookas For Bibi

Gazongas for goobers

Clay Jones Apr 09, 2026

A new report by The New York Times details how Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu persuaded Donald Trump into going to war with Iran. Details in the story show that Donald Trump was oversold on the idea. But Trump wasn’t just oversold; he wanted to be told what he wanted to hear, even if it was wrong.

There was deep skepticism from his inner circle about going to war, and despite polling his top advisers, he often only heard “what he wanted to hear,” and his team wound up serving as an echo chamber for his gut instincts.

According to story written by Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman, JD Vance was the most vocal in his opposition to the United States going to war with Iran, while CIA Director Jim Ratcliffe, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Gen. Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned Trump that Netanyahu had “oversold” him on what could be achieved by the bombing campaign. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, on the other hand, was gung-ho on going to war. (snip-MORE, and it’s hot)

No suffering on Hegseth’s part

Sec. of Defense Pete Hegseth’s war mongering just inflicts pain on others

Ann Telnaes

Trump Wins

Trump TACO’ed out again

Clay Jones

As predicted, Donald Trump taco’ed out again after threatening to commit genocide against the Iranian people.

Make no mistake about it, threatening to destroy an entire civilization is threatening genocide. Donald Trump was threatening to commit war crimes. (snip-MORE, also hot)

“Trump officials cite white supremacists in bid to end birthright citizenship”

Gross. (snip)

CDC Mulls Plan To Classify COVID Vaccine “Injuries”

*** Personal Note. By Monday things here should be back to normal. Ron will be in Texas driving his sister home. I will have had the weekend to rest. Ron is on his last full day of doing no exertion not even house work. They went into a major artery in his wrist. He had a wrist board to keep the wrist from flexing for 24 hours, shower lightly but leave the large bandaid on. Change the bandaid after showering for 72 hours. Call 911 if it starts to bleed. On Saturday morning he is off restrictions and flies to Texas. Then he and his sister will drive to Florida. She will stay with us for a few days as her house here is emptied and then she will settle her stuff and go to New Hampshire. She is flying up there. Hugs ****

CDC Mulls Plan To Classify COVID Vaccine “Injuries”

Axios reports:

Trump administration health officials are giving serious consideration to a plan that would make injuries from COVID-19 vaccines a formal diagnosis that can be coded in medical records. Increasing documentation of what’s still a loosely defined condition could help lay the groundwork for future lawsuits against vaccine manufacturers.

The ICD-10 system already covers general vaccine injuries and reactions to some specific vaccines, but it doesn’t have a designation for the COVID shot, whose safety has become a major point of contention within the administration.

The new code could allow providers “to identify, track, and study patients who experience adverse effects specifically related to COVID vaccines,” Mary Stanfill, a CDC health information specialist, said during a public meeting on code proposals last week.

Read the full article. You will recall that the cult has claimed that COVID vaccines cause the human body to become literally magnetic, and that they cause “turbo cancer,” autism, miscarriages, myocarditis, pericarditis, hearing loss, and taste loss. Oh, and the vaccines also supposedly contain graphene nanobots meant to connect people to the internet for the purpose of mind control.

https://x.com/abettel/status/2037116250225020969?s=20

A Few Short Vids: Some Politics/War, Some Not, & A Marriage Proposal!

Well, Here Is This:

Linked in a Wonkette newsletter.

Why Democrats are suddenly winning back the left — and the “double-haters”

Plus, the share of Americans calling themselves Republicans just hit a decade low. Your weekly political data roundup for April 5, 2026.

G. Elliott Morris

Leading off: Very liberal Americans, who have rated the Democratic Party poorly relative to other partisans since 2024, have swung sharply back toward congressional Democrats over the last few months. A new poll also finds voters who dislike both parties now prefer Democrats by 31 points. These gains should reassure a party that has faced internal strife since Trump’s second term began, but look less due to renewed faith in the Democrats and more like anti-Trump consolidation. That might not matter for the midterms — a vote won is a vote won — but it will matter for 2028 and beyond.

On deck this week: Tuesday’s Deep Dive will cover some new research on the level of ideological thinking in the electorate and the value (or not) of ideological moderation by the Democrats, and Friday’s Chart of the Week will respond to whatever’s in the news. I’m also finalizing questions for our April Strength In Numbers/Verasight poll this week — so subscribers, send in your question recommendations if you haven’t already! (Email or comments are fine.)

On with the data.

1. Anti-Trump sentiment, not pro-Democratic enthusiasm, is uniting Democrats again

A new YouGov/The Economist poll, fielded from March 27 – 30, finds that Democratic voters have grown significantly warmer toward their members of Congress over the last few months. Earlier in 2026, Democrats said their party’s MOCs were favorable at a rate just 30 points higher than the rate they said their party was unfavorable. That gap has now grown to +55 — rivaling the favorability of Republican MOCs among Republican voters.

Aggregate Democratic views have increased because very liberal Americans have become sharply more favorable toward congressional Democrats since January. This group evaluated the party’s members of Congress favorably by a net +28 points margin — up from a -13 deficit in January. That’s a 41-point shift in two months:

Among Americans who are liberal but not very liberal, moderate, or conservative (basically everyone else), views of congressional Democrats barely budged.

Overall, U.S. adults give the Democrats a favorability rating of -21, 5 points higher than the rating they currently give Republicans.

That is a meaningful change. Last summer, Strength In Numbers documented that Democratic party favorability was unusually weak even as the party remained competitive on the generic ballot. We dug into the survey microdata and found out that this was because many left-leaning Americans were frustrated with their own side after the 2024 loss. Charles Franklin, who conducts the Marquette University Law School Poll, has been tracking the same dynamic in both national and Wisconsin polling. Among Democratic identifiers in Wisconsin, his data shows a net +56 favorability rating for their party, compared to +74 among Republican identifiers for the GOP.

Franklin finds that while Democrats still disagree about what they’re for, they are virtually unanimous in what they’re against: Donald Trump.

The simplest explanation for Democrats’ gains is that politically active party members on the left — who have had a lot of complaints about how the party is handling Trump 2.0 — are now responding to the same thing many other Americans are right now. That is, the president has moved public policy on many issue domains far to the right and up on the authoritarian axis (certainly far past the policy temperature “set point,” to use the language of the thermostatic model), and progressives are setting their differences with the Democrats aside for the moment as they focus on defeating an increasingly unpopular Republican president. This looks more like anti-Trump unity than pro-Democratic enthusiasm.

But it’s not just the base

The Democrats’ consolidation of left-wing liberalism is one piece of a broader backlash to Trumpism that shows up in the polling data right now. Another notable finding this week is from a new CNN/SSRS survey that found that about one-quarter of the public holds an unfavorable view of both parties. These are the so-called “double haters.” This group prefers Democrats on the 2025 generic ballot by 31 points.

This is a big deal for two reasons. First, that’s a massive shift; Double haters broke for Trump in 2016 and again in 2024. Now they’re swinging hard the other way.

Like Franklin’s polling, the CNN report also finds that Democrats’ gains are driven largely by opposition to the GOP, not enthusiasm for Democrats themselves. When asked what they dislike about Democrats, 22% of double haters called the party “do-nothing” and 11% said they aren’t standing up enough to Trump and the GOP, while 10% said they’re too liberal.

Will 2026 be a Democratic fake out?

So we’ve got two layers of anti-Trump consolidation happening at once. YouGov’s data shows the Democratic left is coming home, and the CNN poll shows voters who dislike both parties — a swing group that has been decisive in recent elections — are breaking heavily toward Democrats for the first time in years. Neither group is necessarily enthusiastic about Democrats. But both are currently heavily voting against Republicans. According to the CNN poll, 79% of voters who plan to support Democrats say their vote is a message of opposition to Trump. (Only 46% of Republican voters say they’ll vote to show support for the president.)

This could make for a big electoral win for Democrats in November, despite the division in the party and its overall nominally unpopular rating. According to CNN, Democratic-aligned voters are 17 points more likely than Republicans to call themselves “extremely motivated” to vote in 2026 — even though they’re 14 points less likely to view their own party favorably. Meanwhile, the Democrats have opened up a large lead in the U.S. House generic congressional ballot for 2026. They are up +6 in both the CNN and YouGov surveys, and closer to +5 on average.

This is the pattern I’d expect in a midterm environment that favors the out-party. But with many Americans (including the vaunted “double-haters”) still viewing the Democrats as weak and ineffectual, a big electoral victory will not completely solve their deeper problems of identity and division.

The trend in this data is good for the Democrats, in other words — but don’t misread a positive trend for a positive level.

2. What Strength In Numbers published last week

Readers of Strength In Numbers got three articles last week — a lighter load, since I was out sick Monday and Tuesday.

This week’s Deep Dive asked a question I’ve been getting a lot lately: if Trump is 20+ points underwater, why aren’t Democrats leading the generic ballot by 20?

Trump is 20+ points underwater. So why aren’t Democrats up 20 for the midterms?

G. Elliott Morris Apr 1

Read full story

On Thursday, David and I recorded our weekly podcast about Trump’s record-low polling numbers on Iran and the economy:

(snip-a bit More, go see it)

Olympic Athletes Rapinoe and Bird Slam IOC Trans Ban: “I’m Sickened By It”

https://www.erininthemorning.com/p/olympic-athletes-rapinoe-and-bird

“It’s just a total acquiescence to the Trump Administration,” Rapinoe said.

s. baum

Apr 07, 2026

Holly Rowe

Erin In The Morning is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a subscriber.

In the latest episode of their podcast A Touch More, all-star athletes Megan Rapinoe and Sue Bird denounced the International Olympic Committee’s new rule requiring sex testing for athletes competing in the women’s category.

The anti-trans policy will subject athletes competing in the women’s division—and only women’s, not men’s—to invasive sex testing to determine whether they have an SRY gene. Why this is where the International Olympic Committee chose to draw the gender line is arguably arbitrary.

No major medical organization endorses this litmus test as a reliable marker of athletic skill or “biological sex.” Even the scientist who discovered the SRY gene has slammed this practice in sports, saying “science does not support” this “overly simplistic” approach. Rather, it’s an arbitrary line in the sand used to cram unscientific ideas about gender and sex into manmade, binary boundaries.

Nonetheless, if a woman tests positive for the gene, she could be forced to compete in the “male” category. This has had dire consequences the last few times it was deployed against women’s athletes. From 1992 to 1999, cisgender women were forced into testing and found out, on the world stage, that they had intersex conditions they never knew about. The spectacle led to ostracization, disqualification, and at least one suicide before such testing was abolished.

“What we’re doing is subjecting everybody, all women and all people who are identifying as women, to this really invasive testing that only to me just says like, oh, so we’re just trying to whittle it down to a certain type of woman,” Rapinoe said.

Rapinoe is one of the most high-profile athletes in the country, a soccer player with three Olympic competitions under her belt and a decorated career in the U.S. Women’s National Team (USWNT). Bird, meanwhile, is among the most successful athletes in history—the retired WNBA legend spent her 20-season professional career as a point guard for the Seattle Storm, and is a record-breaking Olympian in her own right. The athletic power couple has been engaged since 2020. Together, they’ve long been outspoken advocates for the LGBTQ community.

Rapinoe connected the anti-trans vitriol in sports to the right wing’s broader attacks on queer and trans people, calling the push for sex testing “hateful.”

“They sort of like, lost the battle on gay marriage,” Rapinoe said. “So, it’s just like, we’re going to have this whole campaign for all these years to just hate trans people, which is such a small percentage of the population.”

Countless women, cisgender and transgender alike, have faced harassment and persecution because of the anti-trans athlete witch hunt.

“It’s just a total acquiescence to the Trump Administration,” Rapinoe said. “It’s just horrible, and I’m just sickened by it.”

The IOC rule is part of a broader pattern. In the United States, sports bans have served as a Trojan Horse for more sweeping anti-trans policies. The DOJ’s recent lawsuit over “women’s sports,” for example, also demands that transgender students be banned from bathrooms and locker rooms.

“Can we please stop obsessing over trans people and, I don’t know, maybe focus our time, energy, and resources into real problems women’s sports face?” Bird chimed in. She rejected the idea that sex testing, as the IOC claims, “protects women,” instead calling it a “fear-mongering” political ploy meant to generate support from conservative voters.

“That’s all this is,” Bird said. “If you crack this door open, it gets blown open. You’re now policing women’s bodies across the board.”

Erin In The Morning is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a subscriber.

Well, It’s True.

Funny, some, but true. I enjoy reading at McSweeney’s, and I don’t do it often enough.

Final Exam for the Class “What a Presidential Candidate Can and Cannot Survive, Apparently” Taught
by Howard Dean

by Tom Ellison and Nick Morgan

Final Exam
Poli Sci 401
Yale University,
Jackson School of Global Affairs
Professor Howard Dean

Part I (50 points) – multiple choice

1. Which of these public utterances would immediately end a candidate’s presidential ambitions?

A. “I want to be a dictator.”

B. “If [she] weren’t my daughter, perhaps I’d be dating her.”

C. “YEEEAAAAAWW!!!”

2. Each of the following moves would consolidate a candidate’s base, except:

A. Expressing agreement with the great replacement theory

B. Expressing solidarity with the Proud Boys and January 6 insurrectionists

C. Expressing enthusiasm, which was a big no-no in 2004 Iowa, apparently

3. Which violation of American values would cause the electorate to doubt the candidate’s fitness for the presidency?

A. Violating the human rights of families by tearing children away from their parents at the border

B. Violating the bodies of twenty-six women

C. Violating the unspoken decibel limit on cheering at an event meant for cheering, which is definitely a good rule that applies equally to everyone

4. If exposed to the public, which revelations would instantly decimate campaign fundraising?

A. The candidate being caught with boxes full of state secrets next to their toilet

B. The candidate being caught sleeping with a porn star just after his wife had a baby

C. The candidate being caught up in a moment, just a fleeting moment, which at the time seemed normal, not the end of everything the candidate had ever worked for since the candidate was twelve

5. Which of the following statements warrants being aired 633 times by national news outlets in a span of four days?

A. “They’re poisoning the blood of our country.”

B. “Laziness is a trait in Blacks.”

C. “YEEEAAAAAWW!!!”

6. Which of the following audio recordings would be so damaging that it becomes a years-long political meme and defines the candidate for the rest of their life?

A. A recording where the candidate extorts Ukraine for election assistance

B. A recording where the candidate brags about grabbing women “by the pussy”

C. A recording where the mics picked up the candidate but not the roar of the crowd, which, if you were there, was really loud and made screaming much more normal in context, actually

7. Which action would cause an immediate, double-digit drop in the polls?

A. Starting a movement to hang the vice president

B. Starting a coup d’etat attempt against the United States of America

C. Starting to say “yee-haw” because it felt so right after rattling off the upcoming state primaries, but then realizing halfway through the first syllable that, dammit Howard, someone from Vermont can’t pull off “yee-haw,” and then panicking and switching to “yeah!” or “yay!” all at once, but it was too late and a lump in your throat made it come out like the death knell of a tortured bobcat

8. True or False: It makes perfect sense that the twenty-five-year abortion record of the presidential candidate who ended Roe v. Wade has less Wikipedia content than the three-second audio record of a candidate who just, you know, was pumped up in the face of a setback in the Iowa caucuses, so pumped that he lost control of his body in a burst of unvarnished optimism:

A. True

B. False

C. There has not been a difference between truth and falsehood, right and wrong, or sanity and insanity since early 2004

9. Which charges would provoke widespread calls to suspend a campaign?

A. Being charged in New York with thirty-four felony counts for covering up sex with a porn star

B. Being charged in Florida with forty felony counts for stealing state secrets and lying to the FBI

C. Being charged in Georgia with ten felony counts for conspiring to steal an election

D. Being charged in DC with four felony counts for trying to stop the electoral vote certification in Congress in order to seize power from the lawful president-elect, Joe Biden, in violation of the US Constitution and the peaceful transfer of power

E. Being charged with all eighty-eight felony counts above, all in a five-month period

F. Being charged with a zeal to oppose the invasion of Iraq and establish universal health care, which looks pretty good these days if you ask some people but was apparently too sincere for the petty, vindictive shitheads who actually vote in this country.

10. Which of the following statements would make voters question a presidential candidate’s mental capacity?

A. “HAPPY EASTER TO ALL, INCLUDING CROOKED AND CORRUPT PROSECUTORS AND JUDGES THAT ARE DOING EVERYTHING POSSIBLE TO INTERFERE WITH THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION OF 2024, AND PUT ME IN PRISON, INCLUDING THOSE MANY PEOPLE THAT I COMPLETELY & TOTALLY DESPISE BECAUSE THEY WANT TO DESTROY AMERICA, A NOW FAILING NATION, LIKE ‘DERANGED’ JACK SMITH, WHO IS EVIL AND ‘SICK,’ MRS. FANI ‘FAUNI’ WADE, WHO SAID SHE HARDLY KNEW THE ‘SPECIAL’ PROSECUTOR, ONLY TO FIND THAT HE SPENT YEARS ‘LOVING’ HER, LONG BEFORE THE GEORGIA PERSECUTION OF PRESIDENT TRUMP BEGAN (AND THEREBY MAKING THE CASE AGAINST ME NULL, VOID, AND ILLEGAL!), AND LAZY ON VIOLENT CRIME ALVIN BRAGG WHO, WITH CROOKED JOE’S DOJ THUGS, UNFAIRLY WORKING IN THE D.A.’s OFFICE, ILLEGALLY INDICTED ME ON A CASE HE NEVER WANTED TO BRING AND VIRTUALLY ALL LEGAL SCHOLARS SAY IS A CASE THAT SHOULD NOT BE BROUGHT, IS BREAKING THE LAW IN DOING SO (POMERANTZ!), WAS TURNED DOWN BY ALL OTHER LAW ENFORCEMENT AUTHORITIES, AND IS NOT A CRIME. HAPPY EASTER EVERYONE!”

B. “YEEEAAAAAWW!!!”

Part 2 – Essay (50,000 pts)

Write a twenty-five-page essay on the following question:

Does anything even matter?

(snip)

Federal court OKs Iowa’s “cruel” book ban law in stunning LGBTQ+ defeat

The idea behind these laws seems to be if they can hide that LGBTQ+ people / kids exist they can prevent the acceptance and tolerance of LGBTQ+ kids / people. In the minds of the haters who write these bills hopefully that will force people who are not straight or cis to stay hidden from society. They are desperate to return to the 1950s when LGBTQ+ people had to stay hidden or risk losing everything they had, their job, housing, and friends. They are pathetic in their need for everyone to be the same as they are, feel the same as they do, and to live as they do. Why I did not know or understand. The irrational hate for LGBTQ+ kids is really weird. That they would rather have kids hurt, harmed, assaulted, ostracized, and possibly driven to suicide rather than give them acceptance or simply tolerance. I don’t undestand what their gain is in this? Hugs

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2026/04/federal-court-oks-iowas-cruel-book-ban-law-in-stunning-lgbtq-defeat/

April 2026

The appeals court vacated two separate injunctions against the law, but advocates promise to keep fighting.

John Russell (He/Him)April 7, 2026, 1:00 pm EDT· Updated on April 8, 2026

Shutterstock

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit has ruled that Iowa can enforce a 2023 law restricting classroom instruction on LGBTQ+ topics and access to certain books while legal challenges against the law proceed.

On Monday, the three-judge panel overturned injunctions previously issued by lower courts in two separate lawsuits challenging aspects of the Senate File 496, according to the Associated Press and The Des Moines Register.

Related

Republicans want to expand Iowa’s Don’t Say Gay law to high schoolers

Passed by the Iowa state legislature and signed by Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds in 2023, the law prohibits “any program, curriculum, test, survey, questionnaire, promotion, or instruction relating to gender identity or sexual orientation” in kindergarten through sixth grade. It also bans materials featuring “descriptions or visual depictions of a sex act” from school libraries and classrooms — a provision which critics say is intended to ban books featuring LGBTQ+ characters and themes.

The law went into effect on July 1, 2023. The following November, the ACLU of Iowa and Lambda Legal sued the state on behalf of LGBTQ+ advocacy organization Iowa Safe Schools and seven students and their families, challenging SF 496’s classroom instruction ban.

Last May, a federal judge issued a split decision, upholding the law’s ban on discussion of gender identity and sexual orientation in K–6 classrooms, but blocking its ban on school “promotions” and “programs” that acknowledge the existence of LGBTQ+ people. U.S. District Judge Stephen Locher also blocked a provision of the law banning schools from providing “accommodation that is intended to affirm the student’s gender identity” without notifying their parents, writing that S.F. 496 was impermissibly vague about what constitutes an “accommodation.”

Writing for the Eighth Circuit on Monday, Judge Ralph Erickson held that the state’s interpretation of the law as requiring school “programs” and “promotions” to only encompass curricular activities does not violate the U.S. Constitution. However, the court did not address whether it is constitutionally permissible for the state to ban specific groups and extracurricular programs, such as Gender & Sexuality Alliance groups, because the Iowa Safe Schools lawsuit did not challenge specific applications of the law, according to the Register.

The court also disagreed with Judge Locher’s ruling that the law’s language around “accommodations” was too vague, restoring S.F. 496’s ban on schools accommodating students’ gender identities without outing them to their parents.

In a separate November 2023 lawsuit, the Iowa State Education Association was joined by publisher Penguin Random House and several prominent authors of banned books in a challenge to S.F. 496’s book-banning provision. Last March, Judge Locher sided with the plaintiffs, issuing a preliminary injunction preventing schools from removing books it considers “obscene” from classrooms and libraries.

Again, writing for the Eighth Circuit in a separate decision Monday, Judge Erickson disagreed w ith Locher’s ruling that school library books are not part a school’s curriculum. Erickson wrote that a school’s library catalogue constitutes government speech and can be restricted by state law, according to the Register.

The decisions on both cases send them back to the district court. But as the Register notes, the Eighth Circuit indicated in both rulings that the plaintiffs could not show a “likelihood of success on the merits” in their challenges to S.F. 496.

At the same time, in a joint press release the ACLU of Iowa and Lambda Legal noted that the rulings narrow “where and how the law may be applied.”

“The prohibition regarding sexual orientation and so-called gender theory applies only to specific, mandatory instruction on these topics during class time. The law, as currently interpreted, does not require schools to prohibit student expression of LGBTQ+ identity nor does it limit the sponsorship or promotion of GSAs,” ACLU of Iowa Senior Staff Attorney Thomas Story said.

“The court’s interpretation of the provision on banning books is that it applies only to those that specifically describe or depict one of those sex acts defined in Iowa’s criminal law. And with the forced outing provision, a report would be made to parents or guardians only if a student specifically requests a school accommodation for the stated purpose of affirming a gender identity different from their registration forms,” Story added.

In a statement responding to the court’s decision, Iowa State Education Association president Joshua Brown told the Register that the case was “about much more than legal technicalities.”

“It is about protecting the freedom of speech and the right to share ideas — values guaranteed by the First Amendment,” Brown said. “Our schools should be safe spaces where students are free to learn, teachers can use their professional expertise without fear, and families can trust that education is based on open inquiry rather than government censorship.”

A spokesperson for Penguin Random House indicated in a statement to the Register that the company intends to keep fighting against S.F. 496. Similarly, Lambda Legal Senior Attorney Nathan Maxwell called the ruling “a setback,” but noted that “it is not the end of this fight.”

“Iowa’s SF 496 is a cruel and unconstitutional law that silences LGBTQ+ children, erases their existence from classrooms, and forces educators to expose vulnerable students to potential harm at home,” Maxwell said in a statement. “We will continue to use every legal tool available to protect these young people. They deserve nothing less.”

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John Russell is a writer and editor based in New York City. In addition to covering politics and entertainment for LGBTQ Nation, he has written for Vanity Fair, Slate, People, Billboard, and Out. He also writes about film, TV, and pop culture in his free newsletter Johnny Writes…

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What’s New at the Earth Observatory April 7, 2026

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NASA’s Earth Observatory brings you the Earth, every day: sharing images, stories, and discoveries about the environment, Earth systems, and climate that emerge from NASA research, including its satellite missions, in-the-field research, and models.

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The crew of Artemis II set a record for the farthest-traveled humans from Earth, and they still could not get away from Donald Trump. The mission had a 45-minute blackout from communication with Earth while flying over the dark side of the moon, and Donald Trump was waiting for them when they came out of it.

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And now, this brilliant story from a friend of the blog: