[CONTENT NOTE: gendered violence, murder, suicide.]
OCTOBER 26, 2020
BREAKING NEWS
Man shoots girlfriend dead on Manhattan street, then commits suicide in front of shocked onlookers
Bursts of gunfire sent passersby running for cover just before 9:20 a.m. at Morris St. and Trinity Place in the Financial District, where violence is rare.
Oh noez! Jared and Ivanka are not happy.
Seems some gaggle of wealthy, well-connected #NeverTrumpers started a PAC last year called The Lincoln Project. These self-styled “ex-Republicans” just put up two billboards in Times Square:
![Photo of 2 billboards in Times Square. 1) Ivanka happily and gesturing toward statistics: "33,366+ NEW YORKERS. 221,247+ AMERICANS." 2) Jared smiling smugly next to quote: "[NEW YORKERS]" ARE GOING TO SUFFER AND THAT'S THEIR PROBLEM."](https://i0.wp.com/freethoughtblogs.com/iris/files/2020/10/jared-ivanka-billboard.jpg?ssl=1)
(photo: Twitter via New York Daily News)
In case it’s hard to make out in the image, on one billboard Ivanka is smiling blithely while gesturing toward bold block print:
33,366+
NEW YORKERS.
221,247+
AMERICANS.
On the other billboard, Jared smiles smugly next to a quote:
“[NEW YORKERS] ARE GOING TO
SUFFER
AND THAT’S THEIR PROBLEM.”
Here’s something we hardly ever get to see: powerful conservatives owning the fact that they are terrible people. And I am 100% here for it.
Conservatives, especially elite conservatives, normally hide or deny their racism, lawbreaking, lying, hatred for democracy and… hmm, how should I put this?… Moral flexibility.
But I received this “Breaking News” email alert from WaPo:
Videos show closed-door sessions of top conservative activists: ‘Be not afraid of the accusations that you’re a voter suppressor’
Footage obtained by The Post, covering dozens of hours of Council for National Policy meetings in February and August, offers an inside view of activists’ obsessions, fears and plans at a pivotal moment in the conservative movement.
I clicked through to read the full article. And voter suppression? JFC that isn’t even the half of it. In fact, if I were writing that email blurb, “voter suppression” might not even make it in (although “open hatred for democracy” might). But that’s probably only because I am interested in things like truth and calling things exactly what they are. Unlike, say, editors at The Washington Post.
Investigative journalist Robert O’Harrow Jr. wrote the piece after viewing dozens of hours of video obtained by The Post from two secretive conferences put on this year by some Very Big Willies in the conservative movement. This Council for National Policy (CNP) sounds sort of like CPAC, only much more exclusive. You know, without all the riff-raff. Let’s dive right in and have a look, shall we? C’mon, it’ll be fun.
On Friday, the preferred president of assholes everywhere issued a shitty proclamation declaring that today’s federal holiday is exclusively a celebration of Italian-American contributions to our nation and the exploits of a particular 15th century Italian explorer, said exploits necessarily encompassing the ensuing brutal colonization and genocide of Indigenous people in the Americas. This proclamation is much, much worse than I even imagined. (And I write this as a person with significant Italian-American heritage.) If you choose to read on, you will first want to ensure that your irony meter is in excellent working order and – this is the important part – still under warranty.
For one thing, consider what Pres. Alpha Asshole and his Merry Minions of Masklessness would be saying and doing about Italian immigration a hundred years ago. You know: before Italians suddenly and miraculously became white. I’m pretty sure my grandmother, who happened to be exceptionally dark-skinned even for southern Italy, would have been locked up in a cage along with her sister and all the other Italian immigrant children.
Of course those among us who think we should instead recognize and reckon with the truth of our nation’s history are deemed “radical activists” and “extremists” who “seek to squash any dissent from their orthodoxy” and instead promote a “radical ideology” and “revisionist history” just to “spread hate and division.”
Let us pause for a moment here so that you can recalibrate your irony meter and/or attempt to extinguish the flames emanating therefrom.
Okay now? Good. The preceding was merely setting the stage for what I really want to talk about on this Indigenous Peoples Day. If you guessed that is “Indigenous people,” you win all the internetz! 🏆⭐️🏅
Hahaha. HAHAHAHAHA!
Former NYC mayor and Trump BFF Rudy Giuliani is one of those conservatives who saves me the trouble of mocking him by mocking himself.
Composite image result for google search of “giuliani nosferatu“
And today’s news does not disappoint.
[CONTENT NOTE: police violence against peaceful protesters, lying police liars who lie.]
A new report from Human Rights Watch documents the NYPD’s brutal assaults against peaceful George Floyd protesters at a June 4 rally in the Bronx (via New York Daily News):
NYPD trapped over 300 George Floyd protesters in the Bronx and waited until after curfew to ‘assault and arrest’ them: report
The NYPD trapped over 300 protesters in the Bronx marching for George Floyd and waited until the 8 p.m. citywide curfew to arrest them for breaking the law, a human rights group wrote in a scathing report released Wednesday.
Human Rights Watch said Bronx cops surrounded protesters on June 4 in a tactic known as kettling, refused to let them disperse, then began “whaling their batons, beating people from car tops, shoving them down to the ground and firing pepper spray in their faces” as soon as the curfew hit.
The 8 p.m. shutdown was imposed a few days earlier to stem widespread looting amid marches against the death of George Floyd, who died in Minneapolis police custody.
“As protesters cried out — some with blood dripping down their faces — the police began to arrest them. They forced people to sit on the street with their hands zip-tied behind their backs, at times so tight that their hands went numb,” said Human Rights Watch in their report.
[Human Rights Watch] said they questioned 81 protesters and reviewed 81 videos and police scanner calls for the report. They also released a 12-minute video filled with diagrams of the Mott Haven clash, interviews with witnesses and protesters, and cellphone videos taken at the scene.
Here is video from Human Rights Watch detailing the sequence of events on June 4.
CONTENT NOTE (from the filmmakers):
“This video contains violent and disturbing images and profanity. Viewer discretion is advised.”
My state’s governor Andrew Cuomo emails me every (non-holiday) weekday with a COVID-19 update. In Friday’s missive he mentioned that Labor Day, celebrated today in the United States, was first celebrated in New York City.
As is the governor’s practice, he included an “image of the day.” Here it is:
![The bottom caption reads: NEW YORK CITY—GRAND DEMONSTRATION OF WORKINGMEN, SEPTEMBER 5th—THE PROCESSION PASSING THE VIEWING-STAND AT UNION SQUARE—From a Sketch by a Staff Artist—See Page 55 The side caption reads: September 16, 1882] FRANK LESLIE'S ILLUSTRATED NEWSPAPER.](https://i2.wp.com/freethoughtblogs.com/iris/files/2020/09/first-labor-day-parade-sketch-union-square-nyc-1882.jpg?ssl=1)
In case it’s hard to discern in this format, the bottom caption reads:
NEW YORK CITY—GRAND DEMONSTRATION OF WORKINGMEN, SEPTEMBER 5th—THE PROCESSION PASSING THE VIEWING-STAND AT UNION SQUARE—From a Sketch by a Staff Artist—See Page 55
The left side caption reads:
September 16, 1882] FRANK LESLIE’S ILLUSTRATED NEWSPAPER.
Something that really resonates with me about this image is my own presence at Union Square countless times, including for protests and political gatherings. (And the truly amazing greenmarket. And chemo and radiation and too many doctors appointments to keep track. And monitoring the Sciuridae menace.)
Long ago, there was a pavilion built specifically for protesting at Union Square; once upon a time, the city was actually required to construct spaces for public meetings and protest. (More Union Square history and some great historical pics at this link, including the immediate aftermath of an anarchist’s failed mass bombing of a socialists meeting in 1908, and a barbers strike in 1913.)
It’s both exhilarating and humbling to know I’ve walked the same paths – and for many of the same reasons – as so many before me.
Of course, it’s also very, very disheartening. Which brings me to the second thing that really strikes me about that image: the messaging on the signs.
[CONTENT NOTE: murder of Black transwoman Queasha Hardy; murders of transgender people generally and related statistics; misgendering; deadnaming. Post below the fold, because despite what we atheists like to tell you, HELL IS REAL. It is right here, right now, for far too many of the wrong people, and far too often Made In Amerikkka® by members of our own species.]
What could possibly go wrong?
Via New York Daily News:
‘A downright dirty plan’: Trump admin quietly pulls funding for disinfecting N.Y. subways, schools
This is Derrick Ingram.
Derrick Ingram
Black Lives Matter Protester and Organizer
Co-Founder,Warriors in the Garden
(photo via Amnesty International USA)
On August 7, dozens of NYPD officers in riot gear swarmed his apartment’s hallways, his fire escape and surrounding locations. They had no warrant. They did have a helicopter hovering overhead, though. They also brought police dogs right to his door and threatened to break it down. They lied to him about his rights and tried to interrogate him without legal counsel.
This siege lasted FIVE HOURS. It ended only after Derrick started livestreaming the incident: in response, a large group of protesters showed up, along with some media types who started asking questions. That is when the NYPD Stormtrooper Squadron™ finally took their toys U.S. military surplus equipment and went home.