[guest post by Dana]

If you’ve been following the awful claims about the gang-rape of “Jackie” at the University of Virginia, you know that suspicions were raised about the validity of the story. In light of young men being accused of such an horrific act of brutality (and in light of the Duke University debacle), it was troubling that reporter Sabrina Rubin Erdely chose, per Jackie’s request, not to interview the accused fraternity pledges. Given that, last week Jonah Goldberg had the audacity to express his own doubts about the story. (Ironically, his doubts were the things that it would seem any professional journalist with a hunger for truth and accuracy would not be able to shake off until solid explanations were given.) Anyway, Goldberg just wasn’t sold:

Rolling Stone has published an incredible story about a rape at the University of Virginia. The story has sent shock waves around the country.

But when I say the story is incredible, I mean that in the literal, largely abandoned sense of the word. It is not credible — I don’t believe it.

He also noted that the media had not challenged the story or done an independent investigation to corroborate the claims made, but instead jumped on the “rape epidemic” bandwagon. And ironically, a master’s candidate (journalist-in training!) at the USC Annegenberg School of Journalism took him to task for his ignorance and ill-informed berating that makes victims of sexual assault afraid to come forward in the first place.

However, vindication of a sort for Goldberg came today in the form of an apology from Rolling Stone to its readers:

In the months Erdely spent reporting the story, Jackie neither said nor did anything that made Erdely, and fact-checkers, question Jackie’s credibility. Her friends and rape activists on campus strongly supported Jackie’s account. She had spoken of the assault in campus forums. We reached out to both the local branch and the national leadership of the fraternity where Jackie said she was attacked. They responded that they couldn’t confirm or deny her story but had concerns about the evidence.

In the face of new information, there now appear to be discrepancies in Jackie’s account, and we have come to the conclusion that our trust in her was misplaced. We were trying to be sensitive to the unfair shame and humiliation many women feel after a sexual assault and now regret the decision to not contact the alleged assaulters to get their account. We are taking this seriously and apologize to anyone who was affected by the story.

In other news, Lena Dunham’s claim of being raped by a conservative at Oberlin College is not holding up under scrutiny.

–Dana

UPDATE: Last night, Rolling Stone quietly edited its apology to readers, without correction or mention of the update:

The new concluding paragraph acknowledged that the magazine made mistakes, then said “these mistakes are on Rolling Stone, not on Jackie.”

The new version’s two concluding paragraphs:

In the face of new information reported by the Washington Post and other news outlets, there now appear to be discrepancies in Jackie’s account. The fraternity has issued a formal statement denying the assault and asserting that there was no “date function or formal event” on the night in question. Jackie herself is now unsure if the man she says lured her into the room where the rape occurred, identified in the story, as “Drew,” was a Phi Psi brother. According to the Washington Post, “Drew” actually belongs to a different fraternity and when contacted by the paper, he denied knowing Jackie. Jackie told Rolling Stone that after she was assaulted, she ran into “Drew” at a UVA pool where they both worked as lifeguards. In its statement, the Phi Psi says none of its members worked at the pool in the fall of 2012. A friend of Jackie’s (who we were told would not speak to Rolling Stone) told the Washington Post that he found Jackie that night a mile from the school’s fraternities. She did not appear to be “physically injured at the time” but was shaken. She told him that that she had been forced to have oral sex with a group of men at a fraternity party, but he does not remember her identifying a specific house. Other friends of Jackie’s told the Washington Post that they now have doubts about her narrative, but Jackie told the Washington Post that she firmly stands by the account she gave to Erdely.

We published the article with the firm belief that it was accurate. Given all of these reports, however, we have come to the conclusion that we were mistaken in honoring Jackie’s request to not contact the alleged assaulters to get their account. In trying to be sensitive to the unfair shame and humiliation many women feel after a sexual assault, we made a judgment – the kind of judgment reporters and editors make every day. We should have not made this agreement with Jackie and we should have worked harder to convince her that the truth would have been better served by getting the other side of the story. These mistakes are on Rolling Stone, not on Jackie. We apologize to anyone who was affected by the story and we will continue to investigate the events of that evening.

Over the weekend, Rolling Stone retracted its blockbuster UVA story, and apologized to everyone involved. Nobody was fired or quit, and no changes to editorial policy have been announced. Reassuring!

But if you want to know how a narrative trumps facts in the mind of journalists, look no further than this think piece published in Politico (safe Google Cache link):

I am drained. I am confused. But I keep returning to one question. If everyone here believed Jackie’s story until yesterday — a story in which she is violently raped by seven men at a fraternity house as part of a planned initiation ritual — should we not still be concerned?

There was something in that story which stuck. And that means something.

You see where we’re headed: author Julia Horowitz is trying to sell us Fake But Accurate. It gets worse:

The University of Virginia — like most American universities — has a problem with rape. Current estimates, cited earlier this year by Vice President Joe Biden, hold that one in five women will be sexually assaulted while in college.

That means that in my 200-person politics lecture, roughly a full row will be filled with survivors. In my 20-person major seminar, there are at least two. That is not a calculus I should have to work out in the margins of my Marx-Engels reader.

DIGRESSION ON THAT STATISTIC: This startling statistic is the basis for much of what follows in the piece. The statistic is also questionable. To avoid this becoming a distraction, I have created a page that discusses some of the problems with the statistic, here. Suffice it to say that it is misleading to suggest that it is ironclad, as other studies have shown far less incidence of sexual assault, or that it is representative of the experiences of women on campuses throughout the country. (END DIGRESSION)

“If we are being honest with ourselves, no matter if specifics of the article are true, …reading the article as a college student, you were thinking, ‘This could happen,’” said Rex Humphries, a second-year who pledged a fraternity last spring. Your first reaction is not, ‘This is preposterous.” I asked if he thought Jackie’s story could be true. He paused and said, “Yes.”

If Rex Humphries actually does exist, the fact that he thinks a story “could be true” when we know it isn’t seems rather beside the point, doesn’t it? Not to Horowitz:

Ultimately, though, from where I sit in Charlottesville, to let fact checking define the narrative would be a huge mistake.

So who is Julia Horowitz, such that her musings get published in Politico?

Julia Horowitz is an assistant managing editor at The Cavalier Daily, the University of Virginia’s student newspaper.

She has a wonderful future in journalism.

[guest post by Dana]

Remember that Rolling Stone story about an alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia? Looks like it was just that, a story:

Charlottesville police announced Monday that they could find no evidence that a rape happened at a University of Virginia fraternity as described in a Rolling Stone article, and said they were suspending their investigation.

However, Chief of Police Timothy J. Longo wouldn’t close the door to the possibility that something still may have happened to Jackie:

“We’re not able to conclude to any substantive degree that an incident occurred at the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity house or any other fraternity house, for that matter,” Longo said at a news conference. “That doesn’t mean something terrible didn’t happen to Jackie … we’re just not able to gather sufficient facts to determine what that is.”

With that, Rolling Stone plans to release an outside review of the story within the next several weeks.

Writer of the original story, Sabrina Rubin Erdely has publicly remained silent on the controversy, with her last tweet posted November 30.

U-Va President Teresa Sullivan has not commented on news of the investigation being closed. She is, however, currently under scrutiny as the U-Va executive board decides whether or not to renew her contract which expires in June. It is being reported that the alleged gang rape story (which occurred during her tenure) and Sullivan’s response to it will be part of the review.

–Dana

[guest post by Dana]

I wonder how much longer we will need to say, The story continues to fall apart as opposed to The story fell completely apart? Because after this damning article, it would seem we are just about there.

Jackie’s friends challenge the Rolling Stone story:

The scene with her friends was pivotal in the article, as it alleged that the friends were callously apathetic about a beaten, bloodied, injured classmate reporting a brutal gang rape at the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity. The account alleged that the students worried about the effect it might have on their social status, how it might reflect on Jackie during the rest of her collegiate career, and how they suggested not reporting it. It set up the article’s theme: That U-Va. has a culture that is indifferent to rape.

“It didn’t happen that way at all,” Andy said. . . .

They said there are mounting inconsistencies with the original narrative in the magazine. The students also expressed suspicions about Jackie’s allegations from that night. They said the name she provided as that of her date did not match anyone at the university, and U-Va. officials confirmed to The Post that no one by that name has attended the school.

And photographs that were texted to one of the friends showing her date that night actually were pictures depicting one of Jackie’s high school classmates in Northern Virginia. That man, now a junior at a university in another state, confirmed that the photographs are of him and said he barely knew Jackie and hasn’t been to Charlottesville for at least six years. . . . He said it appears the photos that were circulated were pulled from social media Web sites.

Further:

Last week, Jackie for the first time revealed a name of her alleged attacker to other friends who had known her more recently, those recent friends said. That name was different from the name she gave Andy, Cindy and Randall that first night. All three said that they had never heard the second name before it was given to them by a reporter.

On Friday, The Post interviewed a man whose name is similar to the second one Jackie used for her attacker. He said that while he did work as a lifeguard at the same time as Jackie, he had never met her in person and had never taken her out on a date. He also said that he was not a member of Phi Kappa Psi.

The fraternity at the center of the Rolling Stone allegations has said that it did not host any registered social event on the weekend of Sept. 28, 2012, and it said in a statement that no members of Phi Kappa Psi at the time worked at the campus Aquatic and Fitness Center. A lawyer who has represented the fraternity said that no member of the fraternity at the time matched a description of “Drew” given by Jackie to The Post and to Rolling Stone.

Meanwhile, Sabrina Rubin Erdely and Jackie are not responding to media inquiries. Both have their attorneys speaking for them.

In spite of all this, Jackie’s friend explains what she hopes comes out of all of this:

“The main message we want to come out of all this is that sexual assault is a problem nationwide that we need to act in preventing. It has never been about one story. This is about the thousands of women and men who have been victims of sexual assault and have felt silenced not only by their perpetrators, but by society’s misunderstanding and stigmatization of rape.”

–Dana

[guest post by Dana]

The Washington Post has an interesting interview with Charles C. Johnson, the blogger who outed alleged UVA rape victim “Jackie”. Reactions to the release of her real name and personal information have run the gamut at Patterico’s. And not surprisingly, Johnson himself now feels targeted as he has been vilified on the internet, received death threats and has already been hacked.

However, in spite of having his own real-life location revealed and serious concerns for his family’s safety, Johnson expresses no regret for his decision to reveal Jackie’s identity:

He wants revenge for what he perceives to be a rupture in the public trust, inflicted by writer Sabrina Rubin Erdely’s article. “I want [Rolling Stone Managing Editor] Will Dana to resign. I want the people who control Rolling Stone to go over all of Sabrina’s stories. And I want Jackie to get psychological help. I want all the fraternities, suspended under these dubious stories, to be reinstated.” Then, because why not: “I want the [University of Virginia] president to resign. I would like some truth.”

Read the whole thing.

–Dana

[guest post by Dana]

Let’s get started!

First news item

Russian terror attack far from the frontlines:

Missiles hit a car park of a nine-storey office block in Vinnytsia, to the south-west of Kyiv and a long way from the heart of the fighting in Donbas. at around 10:50 (07:50 GMT), Ukraine’s State Emergency Service said.

Residential buildings were also hit in the centre of Vinnytsia, which has a population of around 370,000. There was little chance of finding survivors, a senior regional emergency service official told local TV. At least three children were among more than 20 killed.

“Every day, Russia kills civilians, kills Ukrainian children, carries out missile attacks on the civilian facilities where there is no military target. What is this, if not an open act of terrorism?” Mr Zelensky said in a statement on social media.

Second news item

Joe Manchin says NO to more inflation:

Sen. Joe Manchin on Thursday dealt a devastating blow to Democrats’ hopes for sweeping legislative action this year, telling Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and his staff “unequivocally” that he won’t support the climate or tax provisions of a Democratic economic package…

The two had been negotiating for months, and Schumer, a New York Democrat, had made a number of concessions to pare back the climate provisions to appease Manchin, whose support is critical in an evenly decided Senate.

…Manchin disputed the characterization that he had blown up the negotiations with Schumer but said that he asked that they wait until the July inflation numbers came out and pursue this after August recess.

“I said, ‘Chuck until we see the July inflation figures, until we see the July, basically Federal Reserve rates, interest rates, then let’s wait till that comes out so we know that we’re going down a path that won’t be inflammatory, to add more to inflation,’ ” Manchin told Hoppy Kercheval on Talkline. “He says, ‘Are you telling me you won’t do the other right now?’ I said, ‘Chuck, it’s wrong, it’s not prudent to do the other right now.’ “

Who needs Congress when you can rule by executive Beast Mode!:

Sheldon Whitehouse…The conspiracy-obsessed Rhode Island senator tweeted last night a list of laws he wants Biden to enact through the agencies, on the theory that, “with legislative climate options now closed, it’s now time for executive Beast Mode”

There’s a lot the Biden administration could be doing on climate change:
1. A robust social cost of carbon rule with broad reach.
2. Require carbon capture from all major emitters.
3. Stricter limits on co-pollutants from coal- and gas-fired power plants
4. Stronger emissions controls on cars/light trucks and heavy-duty vehicles.
5. Put lower emissions front and center in procurement (e.g. electrify USPS).
6. Hunt methane leaks with new satellite technology and enforce.
7. Tell DOJ to evaluate tobacco-style climate litigation (DOJ won big!).
8. Dozens of smaller regs across DOE, DOI, EPA, DOD, OMB (“thousand cuts”).
9. Call out corporations who block climate action in Congress (“good guys” too).
10. Use existing executive branch trade and tariff authority to establish a carbon border tariff for imports from countries with worse relative carbon emissions, based on industry carbon density.
Free at last. Let’s roll. Do it all and start it now.
With legislative climate options now closed, it’s now time for executive Beast Mode.

Third news item

Indiana doctor who performed an abortion on 10-year old victim followed law:

After Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita threatened to go after the license of an Indiana physician who provided an abortion to a 10-year-old rape victim from Ohio, documents obtained by FOX59 through a public record request proved the physician not only filed a terminated pregnancy report but filed the report within the required timeframe.

The terminated pregnancy report, obtained by FOX59’s Angela Ganote, shows that Caitlin Bernard, an Indiana obstetrician-gynecologist, reported the abortion on July 2, two days after the abortion was performed and within the three days required for terminations to be reported to the Department of Child Service and the Indiana Department of Health.

In the report, Bernard also indicated that the child suffered abuse.

Related: National Right to Life abortion legislation:

…according to the general counsel for the National Right to Life…Jim Bopp, an Indiana lawyer who authored the model legislation in advance of the Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade, told POLITICO on Thursday that his law only provides exceptions when the pregnant person’s life is in danger.

“She would have had the baby, and as many women who have had babies as a result of rape, we would hope that she would understand the reason and ultimately the benefit of having the child”…

While Bopp’s model legislation, which was released in advance of the Supreme Court’s ruling late last month, encourages states to ban all abortions unless necessary to save the life of the pregnant person, it notes “it may be necessary in certain states to have additional exceptions, such as for a women pregnant as a result of rape or incest.”

“Unless her life was at danger, there is no exception for rape,” Bopp said. “The bill does propose exceptions for rape and incest, in my model, because that is a pro-life position, but it’s not our ideal position. We don’t think, as heartwrenching as those circumstances are, we don’t think we should devalue the life of the baby because of the sins of the father.”

God help us. Ten years old is just that. A child. What makes me sick is that lost in the hurly-burly political machinations, a little girl was the victim of a heinous life-altering violent crime that violated her to the very core of her being. On top of that, she has endured a procedure that, while I believe was necessary for her sake, no child should ever have to endure. In the aftermath, there will be every sort of emotion ebbing and flowing throughout the course of her life as she matures. As such, what a dreadful shame that she has being victimized all over again by assholes who have falsely claimed that the story was a lie and/or chose not to wait for corroboration or tracked down her family because their own political and/or journalistic aspirations were the priority. Not the heart and soul of a child.

Fourth news item

What he promised on the campaign trail:

MITCHELL: Mr. Vice President, the CIA has concluded that the leader of Saudi Arabia directed the murder of U.S.-based journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The State Department also says the Saudi government is responsible for executing nonviolent offenders and for torture. President Trump has not punished senior Saudi leaders. Would you?

BIDEN: Yes, and I said it at the time. Khashoggi was, in fact, murdered and dismembered, and I believe on the order of the crown prince. And I would make it very clear we were not going to, in fact, sell more weapons to them, we were going to, in fact, make them pay the price and make them, in fact, the pariah that they are. There’s very little social redeeming value of the — in the present government in Saudi Arabia.

And I would also, as pointed out, I would end — end subsidies that we have, end the sale of material to the Saudis where they’re going in and murdering children, and they’re murdering innocent people. And so they have to be held accountable.

So much for “pariah” as MBS gets the prestige of the world seeing a U.S. President visiting him in person:

Fist bump between President Biden and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at Al Salam Royal Palace in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. pic.twitter.com/37Oz5EwwIB

— CSPAN (@cspan) July 15, 2022

And, as Jake Tapper reminds us:

Director of National Intelligence: “Assessing the Saudi Government’s Role in the Killing of Jamal Khashoggi” February 11, 2021

“We assess that Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman approved an operation in Istanbul, Turkey to capture or kill Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi…” The IS-member Saudi team that arrived in Istanbul on 2 October 2018 included officials who worked for, or were associated with, the Saudi Center for Studies and Media Affairs (CSMARC) at the Royal Court…At the time of the operation, CSMARC was led by Saud al-Qahtani, a close adviser of Muhammad bin Salman, who claimed publicly in mid2018 that he did not make decisions without the Crown Prince’s approval…Also on the team: 7 members of MBS’s “elite personal protective detail” that “exists to defend the Crown Prince, answers only to him, and had directly participated in earlier dissident suppression operations in the Kingdom and abroad at the Crown Prince’s direction.”…The Crown Prince viewed Khashoggi as a threat to the Kingdom and broadly supported using violent measures if necessary to silence him.”

Are President Biden’s abysmal poll numbers and party frustration any surprise:

Historic, global inflation and high gas prices have driven his popularity to lows that could threaten Democrats’ chances of retaining control of Congress this fall.

Amid calls from activists for Biden to show more urgency on issues such as abortion and gun reform, the White House has fired back, calling those who want more action on abortion “out of step.”

But a wide majority of Democrats in a New York Times/Siena College poll published this week – 64% – said that they want someone other than Biden to represent them in the 2024 presidential election.

Among those Democrats, the top reason they wanted another standard-bearer was because of Biden’s age (33%), followed by his job performance (32%). Further down the list, 4% cited his ability to win, and 3% pointed to his mental acuity.

UPDATE: President Biden brought up the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman:

“With respect to the murder of Khashoggi, I raised it at the top of the meeting, making it clear what I thought of it at the time and what I think of it now,” Biden told reporters. “I was straightforward and direct in discussing it. I made my view crystal clear.”

As you would expect, MBS hit back at Biden’s comments:

MBS, denied responsibility for the killing of Khashoggi at the kingdom’s Istanbul consulate. Biden said he indicated that he disagreed with MBS, based on US intelligence assessments, according to the source.

In response to Biden bringing up Khashoggi, MBS cited the sexual and physical abuse of prisoners at Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison by US military personnel and the May killing of Palestinian American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh in the occupied West Bank as incidents that reflected poorly on the US, Prince Faisal bin Farhan, the Saudi foreign minister, told reporters on Saturday.

“The Crown Prince responded to President Biden’s remarks on … Khashoggi after quite clearly — that this crime, while very unfortunate and abhorrent, is something that the kingdom took very seriously (and) acted upon in a way commiserate with its position as a responsible country,” bin Farhan said. “These are issues, mistakes that happen in any country, including the US. The Crown Prince pointed out that the US has made its own mistakes and has taken the necessary action to hold those responsible accountable and address these mistakes just as the kingdom has.”

Ultimately, Biden’s trip to the “pariah state” and fist bump with MBS doesn’t seem to have benefitted the US at all:

The Saudi Foreign Minister says oil production was not discussed at the Jeddah summit.

“We listen to our partners and friends from all over the world especially consumer countries. But at the end of the day, OPEC+ follows the market situation and will supply energy as needed.”

— annmarie hordern (@annmarie) July 16, 2022

Fifth news item

Eventually, the crazy works its way to the surface:

A federal judge is siding with the Sun Prairie School District in a lawsuit filed by two Black parents who objected to their children’s middle school assignment that asked students how they would punish a slave in ancient Mesopotamia.

Dazrrea Ervins and Priscilla Jones claimed the Black History Month assignment [Ed. how they would punish a slave was on a Black History Month assignment??? Are you kidding me??!!] in February 2021 violated their civil rights as well as those of their children, Zavion Ervins and George Brockman.

The question was not part of the school district’s curriculum on ancient Mesopotamia. Three teachers came up with the assignment on their own, according to an internal investigation. The teachers were placed on administrative leave and later resigned…

U.S. District Judge James Peterson… said the parents failed to show evidence that their civil rights or those of their children were violated by the assignment.

“A reasonable jury certainly could find that its content and timing were offensive, insensitive and justifiably upset students and their families,” Peterson wrote. “But a hostile environment claim requires much more than a single upsetting episode.”

Sixth news item

Running and screaming from the left:

“My perspective is, the single most important thing to focus on in the social system is the economic system,” he tells me. “It’s class.”…“I’m just a social democrat, man. Trying to make the world a better place.”

To hear [Rudy] Teixeira tell it, CAP, and the rest of Washington’s institution-based left, stopped being a place where he could do the work he wanted. The reason, he says, is that the relentless focus on race, gender, and identity in historically liberal foundations and think tanks has made it hard to do work that looks at society through other prisms. It also makes people nervous about projects that could be accused of giving short shrift to anti-racism efforts.

“I would say that anybody who has a fundamentally class-oriented perspective, who thinks that’s a more important lens and doesn’t assume that any disparity is automatically a lens of racism or sexism or what have you … I think that perspective is not congenial in most left institutions,” he says.

Seventh news item

United Kingdom issues Level 4 heat advisory for first time:

Britain’s weather forecaster issued its first-ever red “Extreme Heat” warning for parts of England on Monday and Tuesday when temperatures are forecast to reach record highs, triggering a “national emergency” alert level.

…

The highest ever recorded temperature in Britain was 38.7C (102 Fahrenheit) recorded in Cambridge University Botanic Garden on July 25, 2019. The Met Office said it was now forecasting temperatures of 40C for the first time in Britain.

“Exceptional, perhaps record-breaking temperatures are likely early next week,” Met Office Chief Meteorologist Paul Gundersen said, predicting a 50% chance temperatures top 40C and 80% chance a new maximum temperature is reached.

Concerns include:

Melting roads could cause congestion and leave people stranded in cars. Railways could buckle. Extreme heat on the London Underground could require bottled water to be supplied. Rising demand for electricity as people use air conditioning and fans at the same time as the heat reduces the power-carrying capacity of the system because it is harder to cool conductors.

Water shortages are a fear but if the mains supply is lost water companies are required to provide no less than 10 litres per person per day, with special attention given to the needs of vulnerable people, hospitals and schools.

Eighth news item

One hopes it continues to go in this direction:

Side-by-side maps of Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region—the frontline of the war—dated July 8 and July 12, show the number of active bombings by Russians before and after Ukraine ramped up attacks using the HIMARS precision rocket weapon system provided by Washington.

The maps illustrate a sharp decrease in the number of fires detected by NASA satellites—an indicator that long-range strikes on Russian ammunition warehouses appear to be playing in Ukraine’s favor.

On July 9, Ukrainian presidential adviser and peace talks negotiator Mykhailo Podolyak named HIMARS as one of three weapons Ukraine needs to turn the tide of Putin’s war in Ukraine, as clashes intensified in the battle for the country’s eastern Donbas region

“Do we want a turning point in the war? 3 components… HIMARS for high-precision targeting rear bases, logistics,” he tweeted. “Heavy artillery on the frontline allows matching number parity. APC [armored personnel carriers] for “breakthrough fists”… More tools faster we’ll clean our land of the Russians.”

Ninth news item

The Austin-Statesmen on why they published the unvarnished Uvalde videos:

The American-Statesman is publishing a video account of the delayed police response at Uvalde’s Robb Elementary School after a gunman walked into two classrooms and killed 19 children and their two teachers.

The video that we obtained is one hour and 22 minutes long. It is tragic to listen to and watch. Our decision to publish, along with our news partner, KVUE, comes after long and thoughtful discussions.

The Statesman is publishing two versions of the video, one that we edited to just over four minutes and highlights critical moments: the ease of gunman entering the school, how he shot his way into the classroom, the repeated sound of gunfire, and then the delay by police to stop the killer for 77 minutes as dozens of heavily armed officers stage in the school hallway before a group finally storms the classroom and kill the gunman.

We are also publishing the entire video for those who want to see what we obtained. In both videos we blurred the identity of a child who exits a restroom as the shooter approaches the classroom. The child runs back to the restroom to hide and was later rescued. We also have removed the sound of children screaming as the gunman enters the classroom. We consider this too graphic.

We also have chosen to show the face of the gunman as he enters this school. Our news organization guidelines state that we should not glorify these individuals and give them the notoriety that they seek. We chose, in this instance, to show his face to chisel away at any conspiracy that we are hiding something…

We have to bear witness to history, and transparency with unrelenting reporting is a way to bring change.

Tenth news item

Beauty cuts like a knife:

Members of the Kharkiv orchestra defying air raid sirens, playing the theme for “Schindler’s List” to a crowd on a Friday night.

Kharkiv, Ukraine. Day 142 pic.twitter.com/YBVloIUGyk

— Sergio Olmos (@MrOlmos) July 15, 2022

MISCELLANEOUS

Desert scene:

Have a great weekend!

–Dana

[guest post by Dana]

I realize that there was big news regarding the Supreme Court abortion decision today, but because JVW covered it this morning, I’m not including it in today’s news items (but obviously you can comment on it at this post, if you want).

Housekeeping: I want to briefly address the criticism that I am not posting what some readers think I should post in the Weekend Open Thread. First, an “open thread” means just that: you are free to post and link to any news item that interests you. Whether others will want to talk about it, is anybody’s guess. Second, if I haven’t posted about your preferred subject, just accept that I was either unaware of the issue or that other items interested me more. If you think that’s wrong, or feel the need to make a moral judgment about me for not posting what you want, please cut to the chase: patterico@gmail.com

Thank you.

So with that out of the way, let’s go!

First news item

Ah:

Jan. 6 committee plays testimony revealing that Reps. Brooks (AL), Biggs (AZ), Gaetz (FL), Gohmert (TX), Greene (GA) and Perry (PA) sought pardons.@RepKinzinger (R-IL): "The only reason I know to ask for a pardon is because you think you've committed a crime." pic.twitter.com/yrArap5rTd

— CSPAN (@cspan) June 23, 2022

This:

"We're heroes trying to save democracy from a massive crime but we'd like a pardon in advance just in case we're caught 'saving democracy'" is a helluva position for sitting congressmen to take.

— Jonah Goldberg (@JonahDispatch) June 23, 2022

Second news item

About bodily autonomy and abortion:

This basic bodily autonomy argument for abortion was first fully articulated in 1971 by moral philosopher Judith Jarvis Thomson. Thomson stipulated for the sake of argument that the unborn child is a human being—and even that it is a human person. But she nonetheless justified abortion as non-intentional killing. Her famous analogy compared a pregnant woman to a hypothetical individual who, without his consent, has been hooked up to a famous violinist who is sick and requires this connection to remain alive. Imagine someone with kidney or liver failure who needs to be plugged into your body so he can rely on your kidney or your liver for, say, nine months, until a transplant could be found.

In Thomson’s analogy, just as it would be morally acceptable for you to choose to detach from the violinist, even if you know he will die as a result, so too would it be acceptable for a pregnant woman to have the unborn child detached. In neither case did you consent to having the violinist plugged in or the child exist in the womb. And in neither case are you seeking the person’s death. You don’t want it for its own sake, nor do you want it for the sake of something else it will bring. Death is neither your means nor your end, in the jargon of philosophers. It isn’t intended, only foreseen. You cut someone off from invasive access to your body, while knowing this will result in death. With this argument, Thomson portrayed pregnancy as an act of violence against women. Just as the violinist was secretly hooked up without your knowledge or consent, violating your bodily integrity, so too the child conceived and growing in the womb does so without permission.

Thomson’s argument fails spectacularly…First, the bodily autonomy argument for abortion could only get off the ground if abortion entailed unintentional killing. But unlike the case of the violinist, where the intention truly is just to detach—with his death a foreseen but unintended side effect—in the case of abortion, the intended outcome is a dead child. Thomson’s hypothetical is wrong about what people want when they seek abortion. An abortion where the child survives is a failed abortion. By contrast, a detachment from the violinist where the violinist survives would be considered a success. In performing an abortion, the abortionist doesn’t seek only to remove an “invading” child from a womb but also to ensure that the child no longer exists. (This is why the pro-abortion movement opposes even the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, which would legally protect newborns who survive an attempted abortion.)

…

Second, the analogy between abortion and the violinist is a non-starter in any case other than when the pregnancy itself was the result of a violation of bodily integrity—as it would be if the violinist were hooked up to you. The analogy doesn’t apply to nearly all pregnancies, the vast majority of which result from consensual sex. In fact, the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute’s research has shown that only 1 percent of abortions are obtained in cases of rape—a percentage that holds steady across decades of data.

Third news item

The House sends President Biden gun violence bill:

The House sent President Joe Biden the most wide-ranging gun violence bill Congress has passed in decades on Friday, a measured compromise that at once illustrates progress on the long-intractable issue and the deep-seated partisan divide that persists.

The Democratic-led chamber approved the election-year legislation on a mostly party-line 234-193 vote, capping a spurt of action prompted by voters’ revulsion over last month’s mass shootings in New York and Texas. The night before, the Senate approved it by a bipartisan 65-33 margin, with 15 Republicans joining all Democrats in supporting a package that senators from both parties had crafted.

The bill would incrementally toughen requirements for young people to buy guns, deny firearms from more domestic abusers and help local authorities temporarily take weapons from people judged to be dangerous. Most of its $13 billion cost would go to bolster mental health programs and for schools, which have been targeted in Newtown, Connecticut, Parkland, Florida and many other infamous massacres.

14 GOP members vote YES:

Liz Cheney
Adam Kinzinger
Tom Rice
John Katko
Maria Salazar
Chris Jacobs
Brian Fitzpatrick
Peter Meijer
Fred Upton
Steve Chabot
Mike Turner
David Joyce
Anthony Gonzalez of Ohio
Tony Gonzalez of Texas

Related:

What I remember about guns is that I remember almost nothing about guns. People owned them; they didn’t talk about them. They didn’t cover their cars in bumper stickers about them, they didn’t fly flags about them, they didn’t pose for dumb pictures with them. (I’ll plead one personal exemption: When I was a little boy, relatives in Greece once posed me in a Greek Evzone-soldier costume with my uncle’s hunting shotgun. I could barely lift it.)

Today, there is a neediness in the gun culture that speaks to deep insecurities among a certain kind of American citizen. The gun owners I knew—cops, veterans, hunters, sportsmen—owned guns as part of their life, sometimes as tools, sometimes for recreation. Gun ownership was not the central and defining feature of their life…

I have always trusted my fellow citizens with weapons. Now the most vocal advocates for unfettered gun ownership are men sitting in their cars in sunglasses and baseball caps, recording themselves as they dump unhinged rants into their phones about their rights and conspiracies and socialism.

Fourth news item

Supreme Court and Miranda:

The Supreme Court ruled today, 6–3, that if a police officer fails to inform you of your right to remain silent and avoid self-incrimination when you’re suspected of a crime, you can’t sue under federal law as a violation of your civil rights.

To be clear, the Court isn’t overturning Miranda v. Arizona, the 1966 Supreme Court ruling that determined that it’s a violation of a suspect’s Fifth Amendment rights for police to interrogate him or her about a crime without informing them they have the right to remain silent and the right to request an attorney. But what the Court ruled today is that if and when this right is violated, people can’t turn to Section 1983 of the U.S. code and file a civil action lawsuit against the police officer or law enforcement agency and seek redress or damages.

Fifth news item

Overheard:

…Russian Ambassador ANATOLY ANTONOV had a big-name dining companion for lunch Thursday at Café Milano in Georgetown: former U.S. envoy for Afghanistan ZALMAY KHALILZAD. The two were hosted by DIMITRI SIMES, president and CEO of the Center for the National Interest. Our colleague Daniel Lippman was at a neighboring table, overheard the conversation, and took notes on what was said.

On the war in Ukraine: The Russian ambassador agreed when Khalilzad said “we need an agreement” to end the war between Ukraine and Russia. On the prospect of a peace deal, Antonov asked Khalilzad, “What would [the U.S.] like us to give up?” Khalilzad suggested that Antonov have dinner with the Ukrainian ambassador. In an apparent reference to Russia’s false claims that neo-Nazis are running Ukraine, Antonov asked Khalilzad: “You have a lot of Jewish guys in the United States. Why are they so tolerant of what’s happening in Kyiv?”

— On Zelenskyy: Antonov expressed befuddlement over Ukrainian President VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, and said he doesn’t “understand [Zelenskyy’s] vision for the future of Ukraine.”

— On U.S.-Russia relations: “We don’t get any respect” from Washington, Antonov complained, adding that Russia “need[s] respect” and “would like [the U.S.] to respect” it. Asked what might lead to the normalization of relations with the U.S., Antonov told Khalilzad, “I cannot answer your question,” but later said that Russia needed “security guarantees.”

— On diplomacy: Antonov bemoaned the lack of dialogue and communication between the U.S. and Russia, comparing it unfavorably to the Cuban missile crisis, during which the U.S. and Soviet Union continued to talk. Near the end of the lunch, Antonov said: “Zal, I would like to use your contacts and your contacts in this administration,” and Khalilzad discussed the need for a “track two” in communications between the U.S and Russia.

— On a new media outlet: Simes discussed a business idea of his: starting a new TV channel in Moscow, which Khalilzad said could be “very lucrative.” “Don’t forget my request to be junior partner,” Antonov joked. (It is not clear how serious Simes is about his idea.)

Sixth news item

Party before all else:

Finding signs to worry about the future of American democracy is not hard, but few are quite so painful and acute as the cognitive dissonance displayed by Rusty Bowers this week.

Bowers, the Republican speaker of the Arizona State House, was the star witness during yesterday’s hearing of the U.S. House’s January 6 committee. Bowers calls himself a conservative Republican, and he has the record to back that claim up. Like most Republicans, he supported Donald Trump in the 2020 election, but when Trump and Rudy Giuliani tried to pressure him to assist in their scheme to overturn the results of the election in Arizona, where Joe Biden narrowly won, Bowers refused.

…

Bowers’s testimony was powerful because it was somber, serious, and clearly heartfelt. This is also why it was threatening to Trump, who issued a statement before the hearing even began, attacking Bowers and claiming he’d agreed with Trump that the election was rigged. Under oath, Bowers said flatly that Trump’s account was false.

And yet in an interview with the Associated Press published yesterday, Bowers also said he would back Trump if he runs for president in 2024. “If he is the nominee, if he was up against Biden, I’d vote for him again,” Bowers said. “Simply because what he did the first time, before COVID, was so good for the country. In my view it was great.”

…

Once you’ve decided that your specific policy planks are more important than ensuring that the fundamental system survives, however, the result sooner or later is a government that has no interest in the will of the people. Imagining this doesn’t take much creativity: After the 2020 election, Trump tried to ignore the will of the people and remain in power. He was stopped only by the courage of people such as Rusty Bowers. If even Bowers is willing to back Trump again, despite his eloquent condemnations, the outlook for popular democracy is very bleak.

Seventh news item

Ukrainian troops withdraw:

Ukrainian troops will have to withdraw from the besieged eastern city of Severodonetsk, the regional governor said Friday…The last remaining major city in the Luhansk region of the Donbas still under Ukrainian control has endured weeks of bombardment by Russia’s invading forces…Lysychansk, Severodonetsk’s twin city in the Luhansk region, has also endured days of heavy shelling, prompting a Ukrainian official to warn the battle for the Donbas is “entering a sort of fearsome climax” this week…”Unfortunately, we will have to remove our military from Severodonetsk, because staying in broken positions makes no sense — the number of dead is growing,” Luhansk region Gov. Serhiy Haidai said in a Telegram post…”Defenders of Severodonetsk will leave the city for new, more fortified positions,” Haidai said in a later post.

Ammunition shortages plague Ukraine’s troops:

Ukraine is running out of shells for the majority of its artillery in part because of a clandestine Russian campaign of bullying and sabotage over the past eight years, including bombings of key munitions depots across Eastern Europe that officials have linked to Moscow, according to Ukrainian government officials and military analysts.

Fighting in eastern and southern Ukraine is now almost exclusively a near-constant exchange of artillery, and Ukraine’s shortage of shells has exacerbated what was already a mismatch on the battlefield against a Russian military with more weapons. Russia is firing more than 60,000 shells per day — 10 times more than the Ukrainians, Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar told The Washington Post.

Most of Ukraine’s artillery pieces date back to the Soviet Union, meaning they rely on the same 122mm- and 152mm-caliber rounds that Russia uses. But outside of Russia, very little supply exists — in large part because Russia spent years targeting Ukrainian and other Eastern European ammunition storage facilities and suppliers before launching its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in late February. Russia has also taken other steps to acquire the ammunition or otherwise prevent its sale to Ukraine.

“Even if everyone gives us this ammunition, it will still not be enough,” Malyar said, adding that Ukraine uses more of the 152mm shells than are produced globally in one day.

…

Howitzers used by NATO and the United States fire 105mm and 155mm shells. Western countries supplied Ukraine with plenty of those shells but only a limited number of systems to fire them. Despite U.S. and European pledges to send more artillery, Ukraine still does not have enough to replace its old Soviet-era equipment entirely with NATO-standard weaponry.

A U.S. citizen helping to broker weapons transfers to Ukraine said he recently approached an Eastern European country to negotiate a purchase of artillery rounds. Officials in that country said they couldn’t make a deal, the man said, because the Russians had already warned that they would “kill them if they sold anything to the Ukrainians.”

Eighth news item

Opinion writer expresses wrong opinion, gets demoted:

Gannett, the nation’s largest newspaper chain, with more than 200 daily newspapers, announced this month that it’s walking away from opinion sections like the one you’re reading. USA Today’s liberal editorial page editor said they failed to “evolve.”

I know something about Gannett’s evolution since I was USA Today’s deputy editorial page editor until August, when I was demoted after I tweeted, “People who are pregnant are also women.”

That idea was forbidden because a “news reporter” covering diversity, equity and inclusion wrote a story detailing how transgender men can get pregnant. I compounded my sin against this new orthodoxy by calling the idea that men can get pregnant an “opinion.”

If I wanted to keep any job at USA Today, my bosses informed me, I needed to delete these offensive tweets because they were causing pain to the LGBTQ activists and journalists on our staff.

Now, I have been an opinion journalist for 30 years — I thought I was authorized to have opinions. The idea that women are the ones who get pregnant has gone from scientific fact to opinion to outright falsehood in the blink of an eye. Nevertheless, it remains my opinion that women get pregnant…

Ninth news item

Developments in Uvalde investigation bring no comfort to parents or the community:

No security footage from inside the school showed police officers attempting to open the doors to classrooms 111 and 112, which were connected by an adjoining door. Arredondo told the Tribune that he tried to open one door and another group of officers tried to open another, but that the door was reinforced and impenetrable. Those attempts were not caught in the footage reviewed by the Tribune. Some law enforcement officials are skeptical that the doors were ever locked.

Within the first minutes of the law enforcement response, an officer said the Halligan (a firefighting tool that is also sometimes spelled hooligan) was on site. It wasn’t brought into the school until an hour after the first officers entered the building. Authorities didn’t use it and instead waited for keys.

Officers had access to four ballistic shields inside the school during the standoff with the gunman, according to a law enforcement transcript. The first arrived 58 minutes before officers stormed the classrooms. The last arrived 30 minutes before.

Multiple Department of Public Safety officers — up to eight, at one point — entered the building at various times while the shooter was holed up. Many quickly left to pursue other duties, including evacuating children, after seeing the number of officers already there. At least one of the officers expressed confusion and frustration about why the officers weren’t breaching the classroom, but was told that no order to do so had been given.

At least some officers on the scene seemed to believe that Arredondo was in charge inside the school, and at times Arredondo seemed to be issuing orders such as directing officers to evacuate students from other classrooms. That contradicts Arredondo’s assertion that he did not believe he was running the law enforcement response. Arredondo’s lawyer, George E. Hyde, said the chief will not elaborate on his interview with the Tribune, given the ongoing investigation.

It’s been a long week. I hope everyone has a restful weekend.

–Dana

[guest post by Dana]

In E. Jean Carroll’s upcoming book, “What Do We Need Men For? A Modest Proposal,” due to be released in July, the author claims that Donald Trump sexually assaulted her after encountering him in Bergdorf Goodman. Why didn’t Elle columnist and former television host Carroll go public with her story sooner? Say like when he was running for the presidency? Well, she’ll tell you why. In her recounting of the event, she meets skeptical readers head-on:

Why haven’t I “come forward” before now?

Receiving death threats, being driven from my home, being dismissed, being dragged through the mud, and joining the 15 women who’ve come forward with credible stories about how the man grabbed, badgered, belittled, mauled, molested, and assaulted them, only to see the man turn it around, deny, threaten, and attack them, never sounded like much fun. Also, I am a coward.

Thus she joins 15 other women who have made accusations of sexual misconduct against President Trump.

According to Carroll, it began when she happened to bump into Donald Trump, whom she had met once before, in Bergdorf Goodman. She describes a light-hearted romp through the store to help him find a gift for a woman:

I am surprised at how good-looking he is. We’ve met once before, and perhaps it is the dusky light but he looks prettier than ever. This has to be in the fall of 1995 or the spring of 1996 because he’s garbed in a faultless topcoat and I’m wearing my black wool Donna Karan coatdress and high heels but not a coat.

“Come advise me,” says the man. “I gotta buy a present.”

“Oh!” I say, charmed. “For whom?”

“A girl,” he says.

“Don’t the assistants of your secretaries buy things like that?” I say.

“Not this one,” he says. Or perhaps he says, “Not this time.” I can’t recall. He is a big talker, and from the instant we collide, he yammers about himself like he’s Alexander the Great ready to loot Babylon.

As we are standing just inside the door, I point to the handbags. “How about—”

“No!” he says, making the face where he pulls up both lips like he’s balancing a spoon under his nose, and begins talking about how he once thought about buying Bergdorf ’s.

“Or … a hat!” I say enthusiastically, walking toward the handbags, which, at the period I’m telling you about — and Bergdorf’s has been redone two or three times since then — are mixed in with, and displayed next to, the hats. “She’ll love a hat! You can’t go wrong with a hat!”

I don’t remember what he says, but he comes striding along — greeting a Bergdorf sales attendant like he owns the joint and permitting a shopper to gape in awe at him — and goes right for a fur number.

“Please,” I say. “No woman would wear a dead animal on her head!”

What he replies I don’t recall, but I remember he coddles the fur hat like it’s a baby otter.

“How old is the lady in question?” I ask.

“How old are you?” replies the man, fondling the hat and looking at me like Louis Leakey carbon-dating a thighbone he’s found in Olduvai Gorge.

“I’m 52,” I tell him.

“You’re so old!” he says, laughing — he was around 50 himself — and it’s at about this point that he drops the hat, looks in the direction of the escalator, and says, “Lingerie!” Or he may have said “Underwear!” So we stroll to the escalator. I don’t remember anybody else greeting him or galloping up to talk to him, which indicates how very few people are in the store at the time.

According to Carroll, it’s in the lingerie department where things turned ugly but not until after they playfully banter about which of them should try on the lingerie that he grabbed from the counter.

At this point in her story, Carroll confirms that there is no available security footage to back up her story (Bergdorf Goodman did not retain any footage from that time), and that she didn’t report the encounter to the police but did tell two close friends about what happened in the dressing room:

I told two close friends. The first, a journalist, magazine writer, correspondent on the TV morning shows, author of many books, etc., begged me to go to the police.

“He raped you,” she kept repeating when I called her. “He raped you. Go to the police! I’ll go with you. We’ll go together.”

My second friend is also a journalist, a New York anchorwoman. She grew very quiet when I told her, then she grasped both my hands in her own and said, “Tell no one. Forget it! He has 200 lawyers. He’ll bury you.” (Two decades later, both still remember the incident clearly and confirmed their accounts to New York.)

And here’s what Carroll claims happened once inside the dressing room:

The moment the dressing-room door is closed, he lunges at me, pushes me against the wall, hitting my head quite badly, and puts his mouth against my lips. I am so shocked I shove him back and start laughing again. He seizes both my arms and pushes me up against the wall a second time, and, as I become aware of how large he is, he holds me against the wall with his shoulder and jams his hand under my coat dress and pulls down my tights.

I am astonished by what I’m about to write: I keep laughing. The next moment, still wearing correct business attire, shirt, tie, suit jacket, overcoat, he opens the overcoat, unzips his pants, and, forcing his fingers around my private area, thrusts his penis halfway — or completely, I’m not certain — inside me. It turns into a colossal struggle. I am wearing a pair of sturdy black patent-leather four-inch Barneys high heels, which puts my height around six-one, and I try to stomp his foot. I try to push him off with my one free hand — for some reason, I keep holding my purse with the other — and I finally get a knee up high enough to push him out and off and I turn, open the door, and run out of the dressing room.

The whole episode lasts no more than three minutes. I do not believe he ejaculates. I don’t remember if any person or attendant is now in the lingerie department. I don’t remember if I run for the elevator or if I take the slow ride down on the escalator. As soon as I land on the main floor, I run through the store and out the door — I don’t recall which door — and find myself outside on Fifth Avenue.

Bloomberg News has published a statement from President Trump in response to Carroll’s allegations, saying `I’ve never met this person in my life’:

CNN’s Daniel Dale posts a photograph of Trump and his first wife socializing with Carroll and her former husband:

I completely understand why she didn’t go to the police and file a report. And I even understand why she remained silent all of these years. This especially if you read the entirety of the released portion of her book linked in the post. But what puzzles me (and maybe I’m just old school) is: Why would she would enter the confines of a dressing room with a man she had only met on one prior occasion? Who does that? (I’ll just note here that even if their mutually playful banter was an indication that there was the hope of something happening once inside the dressing room, it would obviously never justify the actions that Carroll has alleged that Trump took against her.)

As for Trump, well, Carroll’s description of the encounter neatly dovetails with Trump’s own description of himself: :

I just start kissing them, it’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything,” he said in the 2005 conversation. “Grab ’em by the pussy.”

Obviously none of know with certainty what, if anything happened between Trump and Carroll, but here’s the thing: Two women in whom she confided, have confirmed that she told them about the alleged assault. That alone matters. That alone is troubling. I hope they go public. And if the assault did happen as described by Carroll, then it should matter to Americans. And especially to those who support Trump, and are working toward his re-election. Because if an illegal act as described by Carroll took place at the hands of a man who is seeking to be re-elected as President of the United States and doesn’t matter to his supporters, then something is dreadfully wrong. Oh. Wait. What’s that? Right: We pretty much already know it won’t matter, and will be viewed as nothing more than a little blip on people’s radar. If that.

P.S. Carroll says that “the Donna Karan coatdress still hangs on the back of my closet door, unworn and unlaundered since that evening”.

(Cross-posted at The Jury Talks Back.)

–Dana

Perhaps the most inspiring thing I read today was this passage from my friend Ken White at Popehat:

Our values do not die just because you might interpret an election as rejecting them (more on that later). You don’t hold on to your values because they’re popular, you hold onto them because they’re right and just and they make you who you are. America’s history is full of popular fidelity to our stated values ebbing and flowing, and of Americans stubbornly holding on to those ideas in the dark times.

The values of which Ken speaks are not identical to my values in every respect; he is less of a fan of law enforcement than I, for example. But we share several core beliefs, among them being “[t]he rule of law, the equality of all people (feeble or powerful) before that law, freedom of thought and speech and worship, [and] strict limits on the power of the state over the individual.”

Talking heads have already started lecturing us about the death of conservatism. Populism wins the day, we are told again and again. Fans of limited government, the free market, liberty, the rule of law, and the Constitution might as well hang it up and go home, because this is Donald Trump’s world now. I don’t think so. This feels like a low point for classical liberal principles, to be sure . . . but we should let that inspire us further, not beat us down. Defeatism is for losers. These principles are true American principles, and they always have been; they are the principles that truly could make America great again.

I won’t give up on them. The members of my group The Constitutional Vanguard won’t give up either. If you support liberty, the free market, and the Constitution, join us.

There is another thing I want to discuss: how should the losers in this election be treated — especially those worried about the bigotry of the worst of the Trumpers? Yuval Levin has some thoughts on that:

In a similar spirit, and even more important, we should also recognize that for many Americans, regardless of their politics, this turn of events cannot help but be somewhat frightening. They have been witness in recent months not only to talk of Donald Trump’s obvious proclivities to viciousness but also to evidence of the depravity of some—a few, to be sure, but some—among his supporters. I have myself experienced a torrent of anti-Semitism that I had pleasantly imagined might not exist in America, and others have experienced and witnessed far worse.

To acknowledge that some among our fellow citizens have this concern is not to say that Trump’s support is rooted in racism, which it is not. It is not to say that his concerns about immigration are fundamentally xenophobic, which they are not. It is only to say that as good neighbors and good citizens we ought to be sensitive to the fears and concerns of those with whom we share this wonderful country. We must see that their worries, even if ultimately not well founded in the reality of the election, are nonetheless rooted in some realities of American life that have been both made clearer and exacerbated by this election season. And it is incumbent upon us on the Right, perhaps especially among those who championed Trump but also among those who didn’t, to offer some respectful, even loving, reassurance. It is above all incumbent upon Trump himself to offer reassurance that such worries, experienced by some as genuinely existential worries, are unfounded with regard to him, and to be clear that whatever his past he will not govern as a bully. His remarks last night certainly gestured toward such reassurance, which was very good to see.

And Ken White has further thoughts about how this might be scary for some people:

This result is genuinely horrifying to many people, and reasonably so. We can hope that Trump does not pursue policies overtly hostile to minorities of all sorts, and we can fight like hell if he tries. But whether you think Trump is racist or not, whether you think the result was an endorsement of racism or not, Trump’s campaign was accompanied by a groundswell of explicitly bigoted sentiment, one that I maintain he courted and did not effectively reject. Across the country, ethnic and religious and sexual minorities are afraid of what will happen to them. My daughter, like many, has heard talk about which classmates would no longer be allowed to stay in America. I know people who are genuinely afraid, and I don’t blame them — I think Trump’s rhetoric invited the fear, some segments of his supporters made it a realistic fear, and that there will likely be an upsurge in bigotry and violence. As a well-off white guy in the suburbs I’m lucky — my kids, not white, are somewhat less lucky. My friends and neighbors, of various ethnicities and religious and identities, are even less.

Now. I laugh at the clowns at Vox who claim: “Trump’s win is a reminder of the incredible, unbeatable power of racism.” They should be mocked for that. But part of our spirit of graciousness should be reserved for understanding the feelings of people who see some of the ugly bigoted sentiments of the worst of Trump’s supporters, and worry that this attitude will become more prevalent. Many people have witnessed Trump’s vindictive and cruel streak, and worry that he will use the levers of government to satisfy that thirst for vengeance. Showing triumphalism towards such people is not only wrong, it also ignores the fact that this was hardly a trouncing. Hillary may yet prove to have won the popular vote, so it was close. And the day will come when Democrats are back on top.

Laughing at the actual jerks who scream racisms!! at every turn is both justified and therapeutic. But assuming that anyone distressed about this result is being melodramatic ignores the evidence of Donald Trump’s entire life and the way he ran his campaign. I said this morning that I want to concentrate on the positive, and I do — at least today. But I won’t pretend he is someone he is not, and when people see the reality of who he is, and say he frightens them, I will not mock them.

Finally, as I said this morning: to the extent that Donald Trump wants to promote liberty, the free market, and the Constitution, I stand with him. But to the extent that he tries to ignore the separation of powers, impose ruinous tariffs or regulations, pass giant “jobs” bills or “infrastructure” bills that we can’t afford, raise the minimum wage, increase the government’s role in health care, and the like . . . well, as to that stuff: I hope he fails.

There, I said it.

[Cross-posted at RedState.]

[guest post by Dana]

A post by blogger Brandon Morse directed my attention to ardent Second Amendment supporter, Dana Loesch, who released a powerful video this week warning rapists, domestic abusers and violent criminal thugs that women are now arming themselves in greater numbers than ever before:

The further empowerment of today’s woman, isn’t that a good thing? What feminist wouldn’t support that, right? Well, the funny thing with feminists, as with the left in general, is that when you pit two hot-button social causes against each other, the Social Justice Warrior is required to defer to whichever cause is at the top of the pecking order. Consider how the left vigorously stands up for gay rights in America, but they are apparently unable to vigorously condemn Islamic countries where the state religion demands that gays be thrown off buildings to their deaths.

Given this, and given we’re talking about guns, it’s not surprising to see noted self-proclaimed feminist Jessica Valenti take Loesch to task for her efforts to empower women:

While her comment is not surprising, is certainly is depressing when one considers that Valenti would rather women not take full advantage of their Second Amendment rights to protect themselves. So, who does that then leave in the position of power when a woman finds herself in a situation fraught with rage and physical violence directed against her? Bizarrely, in Valenti’s world, women are apparently better off remaining victims.

So, why doesn’t Valenti take women’s safety more seriously? Why does she dismiss women arming themselves as a safe and reasonable method of self-defense? Because, as a leftist, she is compelled to. Remember, when two causes are pitted against each other, the SJW must choose that at the top of the leftist pecking order of importance. And every good leftist knows that by default, guns are always bad and lay at the root of every evil in our modern culture. Even if they can provide women with a solid line of defense from men who rape. Thus when Valenti offers an explanation for her criticism of Loesch’s message, it comes as no surprise:

Domestic violence victims are much, much more likely to be killed if there is a gun in the house – no matter who it belongs to

(No statistics were provided by Valenti to back up this claim. However, these statistics provided by Morse make it clear that “guns and self-protection go hand in hand isn’t just common sense, it’s documentable fact.” )

and:

Given the way rape victims are blamed for even coming forward, do we really think culture would be fine and dandy with them SHOOTING DUDES

(Let’s be clear: it is not rape victims that are blamed – it’s rape hoaxers who are justifiably held accountable) . Further, a “dude” does not a vicious rapist make. How conveniently disingenuous to lump the vicious rapist in with all other dudes who love, honor and respect women.

Anyway, Loesch neatly pushed back at Valenti’s assertion:

Perhaps Valenti would rather American women defend themselves against sexual assault by wearing neon-color bracelets warning any would-be rapist: “Don’t touch me.” Perhaps this infantilization of women is more her speed.

Valenti once lectured us that, “Naming what is happening to women – that we are being oppressed, held back, and yes, victimized – is not weakness. It takes strength to tell uncomfortable truths.” It certainly does, Jessica. And I’m strong enough to tell you this uncomfortable truth: When women like you work to convince other women not to protect themselves against sexual assault in any legal way possible, it is YOU who is do the victimizing.

–Dana