March 27, 2018

Guardian: Six victories for the gun control movement since the Parkland massacre

Days after the March for Our Lives, the movement continues to see successful efforts – here are six victories since the Florida shooting

Amanda Holpuch in New York
26 Mar 2018

Two days after the largest demonstration against gun violence in the US, the movement to prevent gun violence continues to build momentum – this time in New Jersey, where lawmakers are voting on a stack of stricter gun control laws on Monday.

Teenagers at Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school have reinvigorated the movement after 17 people were killed at their school last month.

On Monday, New Jersey’s governor, Phil Murphy, vowed to sign into law six pieces of gun control legislation, including a ban on armour-piercing bullets and a bill to make it tougher to obtain a handgun permit, if they are passed by the state legislature.

“Today we marched in memory of Parkland,” Murphy said on Saturday. “But we will act in the name of every family and every community in our state that has been touched by gun violence, and the many more who wish to remain safe.”

Here is a look at other successful efforts to curb gun violence since the shooting in Parkland, Florida, on 14 February.

[...]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/mar/26/gun-control-movement-march-for-our-lives-stoneman-douglas-parkland-builds-momentum

March 26, 2018

TheAtlantic: A Grandpa's-Eye View of the March for Our Lives

He hadn't been to a demonstration since the early '60s, but the energy of the post-Parkland movement drove him to go.

Rachel Gutman 4:39 PM ET

When I asked my mother and my grandfather how the Parkland shooting made them feel, they both said nearly the same thing: “It felt like an attack on the integrity of [my] memories,” said my mom. “It interfered with those pleasant thoughts of living there,” my grandpa said.

When my mom was a teenager, she lived with her parents in Coral Springs, Florida. Their house was one mile away from what’s now Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. They had moved around a bit as a family—first from New York to Florida, and then in the Fort Lauderdale area. But, as my mom put it, “When I think of home, I think of Coral Springs.” My grandpa told me that their Coral Springs house “was the growing-up house where we as a family ... established who we are.”

Maybe that connection is what made my grandpa book a flight to Washington as soon as he heard about the March for Our Lives, even though he hadn’t been to a demonstration since college in the early 1960s. (He knows he joined a group of students who shut down a bridge, but he can’t remember why.) The last time he participated in an event of national importance was when he and my grandmother drove to Washington in 1963 to pay their respects to President Kennedy. (The line was too long for them to make it inside the Capitol, so they turned around and went home.) My grandpa didn’t go to the 1963 March on Washington because he “didn’t think it was that important at the time.”

But after the Parkland shooting, my grandpa told me, “I said to myself, you know what, you have missed so many moments in history because you hesitated and didn’t pay attention. Don’t miss this one.”

[...]

https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/03/grandpa-march-for-childrens-lives/556532/

March 26, 2018

TheCut: Stormy Daniels's Boring Interview Was Actually Brilliant

[Full headline:]

Stormy Daniels’s Boring Interview Was Actually Brilliant

Once again, she proves she’s a worthy adversary for Trump.

By Rhonda Garelick March 26, 2018

Last night’s 60 Minutes interview with Stormy Daniels set off so few fireworks, with so little new information, that it would be tempting to dismiss its importance. As Slate put it, “If you were hoping for a TV event that would do serious damage to the Trump presidency … [it] was a let down.” Let’s not be hasty here, though. Buried within the interview’s vanilla blandness lay some lessons worth pondering — if we want to save our republic. But the important parts were easy to miss.

[...]

But in her conversation with Anderson Cooper, Stormy mainly rehashed details she’d offered before: How she met Trump; how he compared her to Ivanka (still not that shocking, folks); and how he’d strung her along by “dangling” (the very word she’s used before — evoking atrophied flesh) the hope of an appearance on The Apprentice.

She did elaborate, though, on the most profoundly disturbing element in all this: the alleged personal threat made to her (to keep silent and “leave Trump alone”) in 2011. The story she told of being menaced by a thug in a parking lot while with her infant daughter was chilling but also, sadly — given what we already know about the world of Trump — not that shocking, and entirely credible.

[...]

Everything about this interview screamed legitimacy. 60 Minutes is the 50-year-old doyenne of broadcast journalism, a network show watched by grandparents and Trump supporters (and apparently even Trump himself). This was Stormy’s chance to take her case to the widest American public, to clear her name and tell her truth, even at the risk of being penalized for breaching her non-disclosure agreement (and possibly even at risk to her personal safety).

[...]

https://www.thecut.com/2018/03/stormy-danielss-60-minutes-interview-was-actually-brilliant.html

March 26, 2018

USAToday: Stormy Daniels and Donald Trump, brought to you by Mike Pence and the religious right

Thank Mike Pence and evangelicals for Donald Trump and Stormy Daniels. As they force their religion on everyone but their allies, the hypocrisy has never been more naked.

Jason Sattler, Opinion columnist
March 26, 2018

Congratulations, Mike Pence!

Since Donald Trump gave America’s kids the chance to learn about “Stormy Daniels,” his approval with self-identified white evangelical Protestants has risen 6%. Yes, amid a controversy about hush money to hide an affair involving a woman best known for performing in adult films, an alleged affair that took place just months after Trump’s third wife gave birth to their son, the president’s standing has actually improved with a group of voters who spent most of this century fretting about the sanctity of marriage.

The hypocrisy here is as obvious as Trump’s hundreds of conflicts of interests. American evangelicals, by and large, have decided that they can ignore Trump’s personal morality because they are getting something far more important in return — the chance to impose their personal morality on others.

And their role model for this devil’s deal is the evangelical who made the Trump presidency possible: Mike Pence.

“Trump’s got the populist nationalists,” said Steve Bannon, CEO of the Trump-Pence campaign in 2016. “But Pence is the base. Without Pence, you don’t win.”

[...]

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2018/03/26/stormy-daniels-donald-trump-thanks-mike-pence-evangelicals-column/457212002/

March 26, 2018

Texas lawmaker shares Facebook meme connecting gun control protesters to Holocaust victims

[Even worse, it came from Ted Cruz's page]

By Jackie Wang

A Houston-area state representative linked gun control advocates to Holocaust victims on Monday, with a meme that appeared to blame gun control for the genocide of six million Jews during World War II.

Spring Republican Valoree Swanson shared a Facebook post Monday from the “Ted Cruz Meme Page.” She did not add a comment to the post, which showed two photos. The first was from March 13, when 7,000 pairs of shoes were left at the U.S. Capitol to represent the children who have died from gunshot wounds since the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012. It was captioned: “Shoes left by gun control supporters, 2018.”

The second photo, of a pile of shoes in a concentration camp, was captioned: “Shoes left by victims of gun control, 1945.”

[...]

Swanson's page has since deleted the post. It still exists on the Ted Cruz Meme Page.

The original post had over 100,000 shares and 300,000 "reactions." Most of the comments on Swanson's post decried the picture.

[...]

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/guns/2018/03/26/texas-lawmaker-shares-facebook-meme-connecting-gun-control-protesters-holocaust-victims

[I don't do facebook; maybe someone who does can confirm whether or not Cruz is still pushing this shameful meme.]

March 26, 2018

State A.G.s demand answers from Facebook as regulators swoop in on scandal-tarnished company

[Full headline:]
State attorneys general demand answers from Facebook as regulators swoop in on scandal-tarnished company

BY Terence Cullen Monday, March 26, 2018

Facebook got more thumbs down from law enforcement and investors Monday as scandals continue to embroil the social media giant.

Attorneys general from nearly 40 states and U.S. territories on Monday fired off a full-throated letter to CEO Mark Zuckerberg — asking how Cambridge Analytica got its hands on data for 50 million accounts.

“Users of Facebook deserve to know the answers to these questions and more,” reads the letter.

“We are committed to protecting our residents’ personal information. More specifically, we need to understand Facebook’s policies and procedures in light of the reported misuse of data by developers.”

The missive — whose signators include New York AG Eric Schneiderman — comes as Facebook falls under regulatory scrutiny.

[...]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/group-ags-answers-facebook-regulators-swoop-article-1.3896822

March 26, 2018

Vox: The Summer Zervos sexual assault allegations and lawsuit against Donald Trump, explained

Zervos’s defamation suit could put Trump’s whole presidency at risk.
By Anna North Mar 26, 2018

“Summer Zervos is one of many women who has been subjected to unwanted sexual touching by Donald J. Trump.”

So begins the defamation lawsuit filed by Zervos, a restaurant owner and former contestant on The Apprentice, who says Trump sexually assaulted her in 2007 and then called her a liar when she spoke out about it in 2016.

Zervos’s case centers on a disturbing account of sexual assault, an important distinction from two other high-profile legal cases involving women and Trump. Adult film actress Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal (who is suing the company that publishes the National Enquirer) say they had consensual affairs with Trump.

Zervos scored a victory recently when a New York Supreme Court judge ruled that her suit could go forward, rejecting the Trump team’s argument that a sitting president can’t be sued in state court. “No one is above the law,” the judge responded. Trump’s lawyers have announced they will appeal the decision.

The potential implications of the Zervos case are huge. When Paula Jones sued Bill Clinton for sexual harassment 20 years ago, the Supreme Court set the precedent that a sitting president can’t push off a federal case until after he leaves office. Clinton’s perjury in a deposition in that case ultimately led to his impeachment.

[...]

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/3/26/17151766/summer-zervos-case-trump-lawsuit-sexual-assault-allegations

March 26, 2018

Parkland students guest edit Guardian US

[A Guardian series of stories under one link]

Students from the Eagle Eye, Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school's news magazine, guest edit our US edition.

The Guardian has invited student journalists from Parkland, Florida's high school newspaper, The Eagle Eye, to direct our coverage of the March for Our Lives gun violence protest. Throughout the weekend you’ll find exclusive features, interviews and live reports from the ground.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/series/parkland-student-takeover

March 26, 2018

MJ: Republicans Declare War on the Courts After Rulings That Threaten Their Majorities

In crucial swing states, Republicans are trying to nullify court orders they don’t like.

Ari Berman Mar. 26, 2018

On Thursday, a judge ruled that Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker must hold special elections this spring to fill two vacant state legislative seats that some Republicans fear could flip to the Democrats. But instead of scheduling new elections, Wisconsin Republicans came up with a different plan: They would convene a special legislative session to change the law governing special elections so they wouldn’t have to hold them before November.

Walker had a “plain and positive duty” to hold the elections, Dane County Circuit Court Judge Josann Reynolds, who was appointed by Walker in 2014, ruled on Thursday. She instructed Walker to issue an order within a week scheduling the elections.

But the next day, Walker threw his support behind the plan to change the election law. “It would be senseless to waste taxpayer money on special elections just weeks before voters go to the polls when the Legislature has concluded its business,” Walker said in a statement. “This is why I support, and will sign, the Senate and Assembly plan to clarify special election law.”

Democrats immediately denounced the move, saying Republicans were going to extraordinary lengths to avoid holding an election for two legislative seats previously held by Republicans that have been vacant since December. “Even for Republicans in Wisconsin, this would be a stunning action to keep citizens from exercising their right to vote,” said former Attorney General Eric Holder, who leads a Democratic group that sued Walker on behalf of Wisconsin voters in the two districts. “They appear to be afraid of the voters of Wisconsin.”

[...]

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2018/03/republicans-declare-war-on-the-courts-after-rulings-that-threaten-their-majorities/

March 25, 2018

EFF: How Congress Censored the Internet

By Elliot Harmon
March 21, 2018

In Passing SESTA/FOSTA, Lawmakers Failed to Separate Their Good Intentions from Bad Law

Today was a dark day for the Internet.

The U.S. Senate just voted 97-2 to pass the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (FOSTA, H.R. 1865), a bill that silences online speech by forcing Internet platforms to censor their users. As lobbyists and members of Congress applaud themselves for enacting a law tackling the problem of trafficking, let’s be clear: Congress just made trafficking victims less safe, not more.

The version of FOSTA that just passed the Senate combined an earlier version of FOSTA (what we call FOSTA 2.0) with the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act (SESTA, S. 1693). The history of SESTA/FOSTA—a bad bill that turned into a worse bill and then was rushed through votes in both houses of Congress—is a story about Congress’ failure to see that its good intentions can result in bad law. It’s a story of Congress’ failure to listen to the constituents who’d be most affected by the laws it passed. It’s also the story of some players in the tech sector choosing to settle for compromises and half-wins that will put ordinary people in danger.

Silencing Internet Users Doesn’t Make Us Safer

SESTA/FOSTA undermines Section 230, the most important law protecting free speech online. Section 230 protects online platforms from liability for some types of speech by their users. Without Section 230, the Internet would look very different. It’s likely that many of today’s online platforms would never have formed or received the investment they needed to grow and scale—the risk of litigation would have simply been too high. Similarly, in absence of Section 230 protections, noncommercial platforms like Wikipedia and the Internet Archive likely wouldn’t have been founded given the high level of legal risk involved with hosting third-party content.

[...]

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/03/how-congress-censored-internet