CNN fact checks the Republican National Convention

I know I make people click a lot more than Scottie does; he works hard to get so much good info so we can stay aware. I’m reading here, https://poodyheads.wordpress.com/2024/07/17/cnn-fact-checks-the-republican-convention/ , which leads to here, https://dianeravitch.net/2024/07/16/cnn-fact-checks-the-republican-convention/ , then went here https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2024/07/15/politics/fact-check-night-one-republican-national-convention to get the fact checking, which seems quite good, so skip to that (then go back to the others.) I say seems because I don’t watch their pageant, and I think I more avidly avoid it this year than I have since they quit broadcasting the actual convention activities on CSPAN. Anyway, go see! It helps us when we run across someone who might be watching in the belief they’re getting information as opposed to circus work (no offense intended to circuses. Except the ones that still use animals, I don’t mind insulting them.) Snippets:

*Sen. Blackburn claims Biden administration hired 85,000 new IRS agents

Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee claimed in her speech Monday that the Biden administration has hired 85,000 new Internal Revenue Service agents to “harass hardworking Americans.”

Facts First: This claim is false.

The Inflation Reduction Act – which Congress passed in 2022 without any Republican votes – provided an about $80 billion, 10-year investment to the IRS. The agency plans to hire tens of thousands of IRS employees with that money – but only some will be IRS agents who conduct audits and investigations. Many people will be hired for non-agent roles, such as customer service representatives. And a significant number of the hires are expected to fill the vacant posts left by retirements and other attrition, not take newly created positions.

The 85,000 figure comes from a 2021 Treasury Department report that estimated the IRS could hire 86,852 full-time employees – not solely enforcement agents – over the course of a decade with a nearly $80 billion investment.

From CNN’s Katie Lobosco

*Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene on Transgender Day of Visibility

Greene said while attacking Democrats in her convention speech that “the establishment in Washington” held Transgender Day of Visibility on Easter this year.

“They promised normalcy and gave us Transgender Visibility Day on Easter Sunday,” the Georgia Republican said.

Facts first: This claim needs context. Transgender Day of Visibility has been held annually on March 31 since it was started in 2009 as a day of awareness to celebrate the successes of transgender and gender-nonconforming people. Easter is celebrated on the first Sunday after the first full moon following the first day of spring and can change year to year. The holiday happened to fall on March 31 in 2024.

Responding to Republicans criticizing President Joe Biden, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre in an April 1 briefing said she was “surprised by the misinformation” surrounding Easter and Transgender Day of Visibility falling on the same day.

“Every year, for the past several years, on March 31, Transgender Day of Visibility is marked. And as we know — for folks who understand the calendar and how it works, Easter falls on different Sundays every year. And this year, it happened to coincide with Transgender Visibility Day. And so, that is the simple fact,” she said.

From CNN’s Jack Forrest

*Republican chair falsely claims Middle East was ‘at peace’ four years ago

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Whatley said in his speech on Monday: “Four years ago, Europe and the Middle East were at peace.”

Facts First: Whatley’s claim is false. Whatever the merits of the Abraham Accords that Trump’s administration helped to negotiate, in which Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates agreed in 2020 to normalize relations with Israel (Morocco and Sudan followed), there was still lots of unresolved armed conflict around the Middle East four years ago in mid-2020 and when Trump left office in early 2021.

The list notably included the civil war in Yemen; the civil war in Syria; and the conflicts between Israel and Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, between Israel and Hezbollah on its border with Lebanon, between Israel and Syria, and what former State Department official Aaron David Millercalled “the war between the wars between Israel and Iran on air, land and sea.” Also, the US, its allies and civilians continued to be attacked in an unstable Iraq.

“It’s a highly inaccurate statement,” Miller, who worked on Mideast peace negotiations while in government and is now a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said last fall, when Trump himself made a similar claim about having achieved peace in the Middle East.

Dana El Kurd, senior nonresident fellow at the Arab Center Washington DC think tank, also called that claim “false” when Trump made it. She said in a November email: “The Abraham Accords did not achieve peace in the Middle East. In fact, violence escalated in Israel-Palestine in the aftermath of the Accords (using any metric you can think of – death tolls, settlement violence, etc).”

From CNN’s Daniel Dale

*RNC video attacks Biden with two-year-old gas price figure

The Republican National Convention featured a video attacking Biden over the price of gas. But the video misleadingly deployed out-of-date figures as if they were current.

A narrator claimed: “When President Trump left office, gas cost only $2.20. Under Biden and Harris, gas skyrocketed to the highest price in history, over five bucks a gallon.” Later in the video, a young man said, “Within my first year of driving, I’m having to deal with an average of $5.03 across the nation,” and a woman said, “It’s impossible to pay $5.03. We need to care about our people better than that.”

Facts First: These claims about Biden-era gas prices are two years out of date. The national average for a gallon of regular gasoline was about $3.52 on Monday, according to the AAA. The national average did, under Biden, hit a record high of more than $5 per gallon – about $5.02, according to AAA data – but that happened in June 2022, after the Russian invasion of Ukraine triggered a global spike in oil prices. The RNC videos offered no indication that the national average has since fallen substantially.

Also, the national average on the day Trump left office in January 2021 was about $2.39 per gallon, not $2.20, though it was lower than $2.20 in some states.

From CNN’s Daniel Dale

(More on the page)

Some snarky coverage of the Republican convention

Because humorous snark is the only way I can take coverage of Republican conventions. Lots of good stuff here, so do click through and look at it all when you have time.

Wonkette Went To The Moms For Liberty Key Party And All We Got Was This Lousy Sticker

It was their key party, news factcheck websites!

ROBYN PENNACCHIA

AND

DOKTOR ZOOM

JUL 17, 2024

On Tuesday, because of how we are all pretty much gluttons for punishment at this point, we (well, Dok and Robyn) attended a Moms For Liberty chat at the Bradley Symphony Center in downtown Milwaukee. Are you so jealous? I bet you are! Anyway, instead of writing a whole post on it, we decided to just have a Slack about our favorite moments. Fun? Fun!

Robyn: Hey Dok! So HOW MUCH FUN did you have at the Moms For Liberty forum yesterday?

Doktor Zoom: Well, I got that new bandage from Walgreens on my blistered toe, so that was a real win!

Robyn: That was pretty exciting. I got a bunch of Vitamin C there because I thought it might make me less anemic. So that was also nice. But sadly, instead of spending a few hours in the Walgreens where I could happily stare blankly at the ELF section for a while (it’s makeup, okay?) we had to go to the Bradley Symphony center not to see the symphony but to see a bunch of weirdos talk about how they are SAVING THE VERY SOULS of the children, but not in any specific way.

Doktor Zoom: But it was very specific, Robyn. Moms for Liberty cofounder Tina Vescovich started with a warning that “there’s something going on in this country,” which is a definitely true statement that I dare anyone to refute. Then she explained it was a battle between good and evil, and that sure sounded scary. Also, I guess radical Marxists are coming for America’s children, possibly to buy them school lunch, but also for their souls. That’s clearly terrible, and I hope the children don’t have their souls taken, by some unspecified Marxist evil.

Robyn: I feel like it’s not a real battle for good and evil if there’s not a Hellmouth but ymmv!

To be specific, she said that the radical Marxists are coming for their children’s futures, which is actually pretty true in the way that the radical Marxists do hope that, in the future, their children will have health care, subsidized college, a living wage, and a planet that is not entirely decimated.

Of course, the real “radical Marxists” are people like me (I guess?) with literally no power to do any of that, nevermind making it so the workers own the means of production, so perhaps she assumes we’ll just give up and … eat babies?

Doktor Zoom: Oh, wait, that does sound like us, doesn’t it. We’re the baddies, then. Also there’s all the radical gender ideology and the books that will make children think about gay pornsex if they see a child in a picture book who has two mommies, but for some reason nobody in the discussion actually mentioned any of the things that Moms for Libertines is best known for.

https://www.wonkette.com/p/wonkette-went-to-the-moms-for-liberty?r=1pk2l&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

Mary L. Trump’s The Good In Us

The Most Anti-Woman Ticket in History

Donald and J.D. Vance are coming for women’s rights

MARY L TRUMP

JUL 17, 2024

Donald was never going to pick a woman to be his running mate. He has far too much contempt for us.

In Vance, he’s found someone who hates women as much as he does; someone who wants to control them as much as he does. If the Trump/Vance ticket wins this election, it will be the beginning of the end of women’s reproductive rights and bodily autonomy.

Our corporate media don’t seem to care, but I’m fairly certain American women haven’t forgotten that, with the help of Mitch McConnel and Leonard Leo, my uncle rigged the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade, overturning over 50 years of precedent and stripping away a basic human right from half of the population. Maybe they think we’re as fixated on President Biden’s age as they are, but we don’t have the luxury of forgetting. While the press might want to gloss over or downplay Vance’s backwards views on women, I can promise you that American women do not.

Vance’s website has a whole section entitled “End Abortion.” When asked if he believes whether or not there should be exceptions for rape or incest, he said, “two wrongs don’t make a right” We know he thinks women in abusive marriages should stay with their abusers for “the sake of the children.”

Just days after Roe was overturned, Vance tweeted: “If your worldview tells you that it’s bad for women to become mothers but liberating for them to work 90 hours a week in a cubicle at the New York Times or Goldman Sachs, you’ve been had.”

And then there’s what he told fellow misogynist Tucker Carlson: “We are effectively run in this country… by a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made. And they want to make the rest of the country miserable too.”

American women will know misery if by some great tragedy Donald and Vance get into the White House because those two will make The Handmaid’s Tale our reality.

If you think I’m exaggerating, just look at Vance’s record. As NBC reported this week: “Like most Republicans, Vance has consistently voted against Democratic-led legislation to codify abortion rights, restore the protections of Roe v. Wade, establish federal rights to access contraception and create protections for in vitro fertilization.”

Last year, after Ohio voters overwhelmingly approved a constitutional amendment to protect reproductive rights, Vance called the people’s decision a “gut punch.”

“There is something sociopathic about a political movement that tells young women (and men) that it is liberating to murder their own children,” Vance said after the vote. “So, let’s keep fighting for our country’s children, and let’s find a way to win.”

Vance found his way to a win by sucking up to a man who demands total obedience, humiliation, and subjugation—especially from those, like Vance, who had spoken out against him in the past.

We need to recognize that the white men who see women as breeding stock have created a strong alliance. This week we learned that Elon Musk—who, along with fellow tech billionaire and all-around vile human being Peter Thiel, pushed hard for Vance to be the pick—is donating $45 million a month to Donald’s super PAC.

On Tuesday morning, we learned from a video accidentally leaked by Robert Kennedy’s son, that my uncle is colluding with the independent candidate to win the election.

These are scary times, but it’s good to know where everyone stands. I stand with the women of America. So do Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

We know where Donald and Vance stand. And we need to make sure neither of them gets anywhere near the Oval Office.

https://open.substack.com/pub/marytrump/p/the-most-anti-woman-ticket-in-history?r=1pk2l&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email

Reblog Monday at the Movies

Monday at the Movies

Reblog of Janet’s

Her own commentary is quite good.

Robert Reich asks “How Are You Coping?”

I think the kids are all right

at least, Target stores believes it. I just saw a back to school ad for Target. A boy was explaining that if it isn’t sharks it isn’t for him. It struck me as a resistance statement, because the Don has no love for sharks. I wanted to mention it, because that gives me a great giggle on the first evening of the Republicans’s dratted convention. Back to school with sharks!

(I looked for it on YouTube, but probably it needs another day or two to be there. I’m sorry about that, but I knew I’d forget if I didn’t post now, right after I saw it. It’ll be around.)

Sharks for resistance! 🦈🦈🦈🦈🦈🦈

Florida is quietly denying transgender residents updated birth certificates

The rejection comes without public notice or new law — even when all other government-issued identification reflects their current gender identity.

Originally published by The 19th – republished per their instructions.

In the past year, Florida’s health department has declined to amend gender markers on birth certificates for both transgender adults and minors. Although the agency says it is basing denials on pre-existing state statutes, transgender Floridians had previously been able to update their birth certificates for at least a decade. Now, they face an opaque process that seems designed to reject all applicants.

Transgender Floridians have been denied updated birth certificates even when all of their other government-issued identification reflects their current gender identity. When applicants provided paperwork detailing clinical treatment for their gender transition and their legal name change,they were still denied.This is at odds with how the agency has handled this approval process for years — and is the latest example of Florida’s state agencies enacting anti-LGBTQ+ policies even when anti-LGBTQ+ laws fail to pass.

In 2023 and 2024, trans minors and adults who applied for amended birth certificates received denial letters from the state health agency’s Bureau of Vital Statistics. In those letters, reviewed by The 19th, thebureau says the paperwork that has long been accepted to update gender on birth certificates — like proof of clinical treatment and a legal name change — no longer works.

“Specifically, the documentary evidence does not establish that the sex identifier on the birth record contains a misstatement, error, or omission,” one denial letter from March 2024 reads.

The denial letters also offer conflicting requirements. One, from August 2023, states that for trans minors, “documentary evidence established prior to the child’s seventh birthday is required.” In another letter, the bureau says that trans adults trying to update their birth certificates must provide documentation “established prior to the registrant’s 18th birthday.” Many transgender adults did not know they were trans as children, or did not pursue gender-affirming care as children even if they did realize their identities — rendering either requirement difficult, if not impossible, to navigate.

Simone Chriss, an attorney with the Southern Legal Counsel in Florida and the director of the organization’s transgender rights initiative, has worked with around 80 clients who she says have all been denied updated birth certificates since last August. None of their appeals, including an administrative hearing overseen by Florida’s health agency, have worked. As a result, none of them have been able to update their birth certificates.

“Most are just being ignored,” Chriss said. “I’ve filed many. There’s at least five that I have pending at this moment that the department hasn’t responded to.”

The Florida Department of Health and its Bureau of Vital Statistics did not respond to requests for comment.

Republican lawmakers in Florida have repeatedly failed to pass legislation that aims to prevent transgender people from being able to obtain accurate birth certificates. This year, a proposed bill to require that state identification and licenses reflect Floridian’s sex assigned at birth failed to pass. Last year, a bill that would explicitly prohibit gender markers being changed on birth certificates also failed to pass. Despite the lack of legislation, Florida agencies have moved to enforce such restrictions on their own.

In January, the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles told local officials that the state would no longer allow transgender people to update their driver’s license with their correct gender. That move was not prompted by any new law, and was simply based on a new agency policy. LGBTQ+ and legal experts believe the rule likely takes Florida out of compliance with federal law, which the state disputes.

Now, Florida’s Bureau of Vital Statistics within its health agency has reversed course on birth certificate updates, arguing that discrepancies between sex at birth and gender identity do not constitute a paperwork error in need of fixing.

Updating all of the necessary identity documents is costly. The name change fee in Florida is $400 andfingerprinting for the background check as part of that name change is $50. The requirement of a doctor’s letter for updating the gender marker on a birth certificate means paying out of pocket for a doctor’s visit or at least a copay. Then, there’s the $20 application fee to amend the birth certificate; applicants may also pay more if they opt for rush service.

For many transgender Floridians, the entire process appears to have ended on a brick wall, with no public notice that a policy change has taken place and no clear path to access accurate documentation. And the new policy appears to be based on a definition of sex that excludes transgender people — a change from what was put on the books less than a decade ago.

In 2018, Florida relaxed its conditions for updating gender markers on birth certificates following pressure from LGBTQ+ and legal advocacy groups. Until then, the state had required proof of sex reassignment surgery in order to change the gender marker — which at least twelve other states still do, according to the Movement Advancement Project. After 2018, Florida’s health agency began accepting letters from medical providers documenting clinical treatment for gender transition. This broadened the scope of who could apply for new documentation since some transgender people never pursue surgery.

Across the country, only five other states do not update gender markers on birth certificates. Many transgender people pursue this documentation as they legally change their name or update their gender on their driver’s license or Social Security card.

Without accurate personal documents that align with their gender expression and other forms of identification, trans people face harassment or discrimination when going about their daily lives, like when applying for a job or enrolling in a new school. The risk of being “outed” by an incorrect piece of paperwork can have dangerous consequences for trans people, especially in a state considered dangerous for LGBTQ+ people.

“Despite making, I think, very compelling arguments as to why the department is violating the rights of transgender people born in the state of Florida, they have come back with the same rationale over and over for denying it,” Chriss said. “Which is … ‘sex doesn’t change.’”

Right now, the best option for trans Floridians seeking an updated birth certificate is to update all of their other government-issued documents to reflect their gender identity, Chriss said. Passports, a primary identification document, can be used in most cases instead of state identification.

“It’s clear the only avenue or the only route to reversing or striking down this policy is using federal impact litigation, like we have in all the other areas where trans folks’ rights have been eroded in Florida. We are planning to challenge this in federal court as well,” she said.

Peace and Justice History for 7/15

I’ve received this newsletter since before the US bombed Afghanistan back in 2001. It’s a wealth of nice info, sent out daily with snippets about important bits of history of the date. Here is today’s. There’s a mixed bag today, sorta like the Republican Party platform which is sorta like Project 2025 which is sorta like the Don’s own Agenda 47. We are not doomed to repeat history if we remember it.

=====

Let’s talk about every classroom in Louisiana and the Commandments….

New College board member floats leadership shakeup, ‘terminating’ all employee contracts

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/politics/2023/01/30/ron-desantis-appointees-to-new-college-board-could-shakeup-leadership/69853637007/

The Christian Nazis have taken over a liberal arts college that the Deathsantis wannabe king hated as it taught respect and compassion for others along with all the other life skills of education. I am so worried that we did not realize how behind the curtain these groups were building up power. Remember the first time he got elected governor Deathsantis barely won, he was almost defeated. But by giving into the hate and discrimination demanded by the minority haters who cannot accept that time has moved on from cavemen days and stoking that hate into action DeathSantis created a large following. He won this last election with a wide margin partly due to the corporate democrats insisting on putting a former republican up against him. Think about it, Democrats don’t want a former republicans who vetoed everything they wanted and the republicans don’t want a republican lite. Those of us in the state knew this would be the result but the national democratic committees claimed they knew better, as they always do and they are always wrong. Notice the first thing this new right wing Christian Nationalist insisted on was opening with a prayer to his god, not anyone else’s god but his Christian god. We are lucky that DeathSantis cannot run again for governor but the state is seriously fucked now as much as other southern states. Yet it was a blue state not this way when I moved here in 1994. Sorry I hurt too much to colorize it. Hugs

Zac Anderson
Sarasota Herald-Tribune

A new president, new board chair and new legal counsel all will be up for discussion Tuesday when the New College of Florida board meets, along with the possibility of ending faculty tenure, terminating all employee contracts and rehiring anyone who fits into the school’s “new financial and business model.”

These are all ideas floated by new board member Eddie Speir in a recent Substack post. They could result in a big shakeup less than a month after Gov. Ron DeSantis reshaped New College’s board in a bid to reinvent the 63-year-old Sarasota school.

Speir, a Christian school founder appointed by DeSantis to the board, wrote a Substack post over the weekend saying he wants to “Discuss need for new president and possible motion to give Pat Okker title of Interim President.”

More:New board member says his assignment is ‘to lead New College of Florida out of wokeness’

More:New era at New College kicks off with contentious meetings, report of death threat

New College President Patricia Okker has been on the job for less than two years, but DeSantis’ push to transform the school has led to speculation about her future at the college and that only increased when Tuesday’s board agenda was released with “President Okker’s Employment Agreement” as one of the discussion items.

The agenda also includes “Election of the Board Chair and Vice Chair” and “General Counsel to Board of Trustees.” Speir appears to be a driving force behind some of these discussions.

Tuesday’s board meeting, which starts at 3 p.m. at the Sudakoff Conference Center, has been a subject of intense interest. It is the first meeting for seven new conservative board members, including six chosen by DeSantis.

Speir and other new board members have criticized the college’s leadership.

Speir clashed with legal counsel David Smolker over his request to open the board meeting with prayer. He said Smolker initially denied the request, but in his latest Substack said that decision was reversed and an opening prayer will be allowed.

Speir writes in his Substack that he wants to “dismiss General Counsel from the Board, NOT the school.” He also makes it clear that he wants to remove board Chair Mary Ruiz.

“My concern is that Chair Ruiz will not resign and/or delay resignation,” he writes. “Thereby halting and/or delaying the necessary clarity that NCF needs as soon as possible.”

New College Professor Amy Reid, director of the school’s gender studies program, urged board members to be more deliberative and not move “rashly” to replace leadership.

“We’ve heard a lot of saber rattling from individuals, but we still haven’t heard from the majority of the board” Reid said. “I encourage the board to find out more about the institution, to really look before they leap when it comes to leadership changes.”

It’s not clear if a majority of board members would back a leadership shakeup at the college.

Mark Bauerlein, one of the board members appointed by DeSantis, told the Herald-Tribune recently that he has “no idea” if he would support Okker’s removal.

“I haven’t seen any records about her, but our phone call the other day was pleasant and informative,” Bauerlein said.

Speir has a long list of motions he plans to make at Tuesday’s board meeting.

Among them is a proposal to identify “wokeness” as a “set of beliefs” akin to religion. He then wants to identify aspects of wokeness that are “shared values” worth preserving, that are “dogmatic” and should be excluded from curriculum and that are “pledges of fealty” that should be actively fought against.

“One such example of a pledge of fealty is the demand that woke pronouns are used,” Speir writes.

Speir also wants to explore ending faculty tenure and “terminating all contracts for faculty, staff and administration and immediately rehiring those faculty, staff and administration who fit in the new financial and business model.” He wants to board to send a letter to “the new counsel” seeking a legal opinion on the feasibility of such a plan.

Another motion Speir plans to introduce would remove some media members from the meeting.

“I move that we remove USA Today and its affiliates from the list of approved media outlets until an apology is received with a commitment from USA Today to adhere to its own policies,” Speir writes, referencing Herald-Tribune parent company Gannett’s flagship newspaper, USA Today.

The Herald-Tribune is part of USA TODAY Network – Florida. Speir is upset about comments made by Herald-Tribune readers.

The Herald-Tribune reached out to Speir for comment Monday morning and has yet to receive a response. When contacted for comment last week, Speir said “I’m still waiting for a formal apology” from the Herald-Tribune and the removal of reader comments.

New College Board of Trustees meeting

The New College of Florida Board of Trustees is meeting from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 31 at Sudakoff Conference Center, 5845 General Dougher Pl Sarasota, FL 34243.

Visit the Herald-Tribune’s website – http://www.heraldtribune.com – for live coverage of the board meeting. A full report on the meeting will be in Thursday’s print newspaper.