1. North Carolina's restroom regulations bill (which requires people to use the public restrooms that match the gender on their birth certificate) also includes license to discriminate for all kinds of things. In fact, it's very similar, but even worse, than Georgia's "religious freedom" bill. So it makes Georgia look not quite so bad, by comparison; and makes our Gov. Deal look downright courageous in contrast to NC's Gov. McCrory, who eagerly rushed to sign the NC thing. But Deal still gets only two cheers, not three, from me. He has a lot of negatives to make up for. Virginia governor Terry McCauliff just yesterday vetoed an anti-LGBT "religious freedom" bill -- and he did it without dithering around until threats of business losses to the state forced his hand.
2. A transwoman (meaning a person whose birth certificate says male but who now identifies as a woman) tweeted out this very attractive photo (presumably of herself) with the attached caption to Gov. McCrory:"And it's the law for me to g0 in the men's room with you, governor."
Exactly. That's what they just don't seem to get.
3. North Carolina Attorney General, Roy Cooper, says he will not defend the new law in a suit filed against the state by the ACLU and Lambda Legal. It's not a surprise. Not only is AG Cooper a Democrat, but he is also running to replace the Republican Gov. McCrory.
4. Donald Trump told Chris Matthews, in an interview on MSNBC, that there "has to be some form of punishment" for abortion if it is banned -- as he thinks it should be -- and that the woman should be the one who is punished. He said he would be far more lenient on the man who impregnated the woman; the man would not bear the same level of responsibility.
His campaign rushed to walk it back, putting out a statement from The Donald saying that -- if abortion were banned -- it would be the person performing the abortion, not the woman, who should be punished. Then the statement added, "My position has not changed -- like Ronald Reagan, I am pro-life with exceptions." Even so, both pro-life and pro-choice groups have denounced his original position about punishing women.
5. This latest will certainly not endear him to women, who already dislike him. An NBC poll of women overall shows 21% positive and 70% negative opinions of him. Even Ann Coulter, who has been a Trump supporter and once called him "fantastic," scolded him for his late night re-tweeting of the unflattering picture of Heidi Cruz, calling him "mental." She said, “It’s like constantly having to bail out your 16-year-old son from prison.”
6. Trump's campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, has been arrested for misdemeanor battery on a female reporter -- who happened to be reporting for the conservative Breitbart news, which has endorsed Trump. At first Lewandowski and Trump denied it ever happened, saying she was "delusional." Then a video turned up, which convinced the police enough that they arrested him. She was simply trying to ask Trump a question as he walked through a crowd after a press event. Lewandowski grabbed her by the arm, pulling her away from him, but he did it forcefully enough to cause bruises on her arm. Her story was corroborated by a reporter for the Washington Post, who was standing just behind her. Now Trump is saying say that maybe his manager thought the reporter's pen was a knife and was trying to protect him.
7. A number of large corporations, who usually provide lots of sponsoring money for the conventions, are questioning whether to get involved with the GOP this year, because of the chaos and negativity Trump evokes and the risk of violence. Coca Cola, who contributed $660,000 to the GOP convention in 2012, has given $75,000 this year and said that's it. The city of Cleveland is taking bids for 2,000 sets of riot gear for its police forces. Xerox, Google, Apple, and others are concerned that donating to the GOP event would be akin to endorsing Trump's "hateful and racist rhetoric."
8. Hillary Clinton sent out a tweet, saying: "Just when you thought it couldn't get worse . . . " Bernie Sanders simply tweeted: "Your Republican front runner, ladies and gentlemen. Shameful."
That's enough for today, lest we all lose our sanity.
Ralph
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