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Top story: Call evil by its name

Good morning, Graham Russell here with the news to start your week.

A man who is accused of murder after driving into a crowd of anti-racism protesters in Charlottesville faces court on Monday as Donald Trump continues to draw criticism from all sides for failing to condemn white supremacists when a rally turned fatal.

Tensions ran high throughout the weekend after the death of rights activist Heather Heyer on Saturday, with the organiser of the extremist rally chased away as he tried to give a speech on Sunday.

But it was Trump who again became the focal point of anger. He denounced hatred and violence on many sides but stopped short of calling out white supremacists, whose attempt to hold the protest resulted in a state of emergency in Virginia.

Leading Republicans, a slew of Democrats and even Anthony Scaramucci lined up to urge Trump to be more specific. Republican senator Cory Gardner tweeted: Mr President, we must call evil by its name. These were white supremacists and this was domestic terrorism. The Guardian view: Trumps moral failure shames America.

Murder suspect James Fields who was earlier spotted at a neo-Nazi rally is accused of multiple charges relating to the car attack in which 19 others were injured.

Hammond being played? The chancellor has been accused of abandoning his previous position on a soft Brexit after putting on a display of unity with Liam Fox over departure from the EU customs framework. Richard Corbett, the deputy leader of Labour MEPs, said Philip Hammond had caved in, former Brexit minister David Jones said he had rowed back and Vince Cable said he had teamed up with one of the more extreme and ideological supporters of a hard Brexit.

Amid the political chaos, Britains retirees are wasting no time in heading for Spain, France and Portugal. Experts say it is extremely unlikely European countries would let older Britons make such a move so easily in future.

Falling through the cracks More than 100,000 children in England feared to be at risk of abuse or neglect receive help only when they are at crisis point, a new report has warned. The children were highlighted as needing help but did not meet the criteria for statutory support, said Action for Children. Responding to the report, Richard Watts from the Local Government Association said in many areas services were being pushed to breaking point.

Scaramucci speaks Trumps former communications director has used his first TV interview since his sacking to warn the president of subversive elements within the White House. In a move that will surely feed the presidents apparent love of conspiracy theories, Anthony Scaramucci said an enemy within was scuppering his agenda and urged him to bring in more loyalists. He also likened himself to Harvey Keitels character in Pulp Fiction.

Different medium, same abuse Almost half of girls are harassed or abused online, a survey has found, with the nature of the abuse echoing what they face in the real world. Childrens charity Plan International said its survey of 11- to 18-year-olds revealed girls were being told what to wear, how to look, to shut up about their opinions. The poll also showed that 40% of boys have received harassment online.

Vile high club Arrests for drunkenness on flights or at UK airports increased by 50% in the past year, with routes to Spain singled out as particularly troublesome. Cabin crew told the BBCs Panorama programme of the resulting sexual harassment, with passengers seeing them as barmaids in the sky.

Im going to be here for 24 hours and I wont be sleeping, says Glen Nagle enthusiastically. He is one of the space experts Nasa is relying on in Australia to capture what Nagle calls the last breath of data from spacecraft Cassini as it hurtles into Saturns atmosphere next month. The end of its 20-year voyage means all eyes will be on Tidbinbilla, a serene station outside Canberra enveloped by national parks and sheep where the hum of moving antennas and the occasional paging announcement are the only sounds.

Top-flight football is back and Manchester Uniteds performance in their 4-0 win over West Ham, in which Jos Mourinho paired Romelu Lukaku with Marcus Rashford, gave renewed hope to the club. Rafael Bentez has revealed that Jonjo Shelvey apologised after collecting an inevitable red card in Newcastles defeat to Tottenham in Sundays other Premier League game. Meanwhile, Diego Costa has accused Chelsea of treating him like a criminal and revealed he will not return to the club. In France, the worlds most expensive player, Neymar, scored on his Paris Saint-Germain debut while in Spain Cristiano Ronaldo scored a sensational goal and was then sent off for a combination of his provocative celebration and for diving as Real Madrid beat Barcelona.

Two more medals on Sunday a silver in the womens 4x400m and a bronze in the mens 4x400m meant Britain completed a sweep of relay honours and took their final tally in the world athletics championships to six, as Mo Farah accused sections of the media of trying to destroy his achievements on the track. And Englands defence of their Womens Rugby World Cup title continues to simmer in Dublin after try doubles from Emily Scarratt, Danielle Waterman and Lydia Thompson lit up a comfortable 56-13 victory over Italy.

The Japanese economy has recorded its longest period of expansion for more than a decade after figures revealed a sixth straight quarter of positive growth on Monday. It is the best run since 2006 and is good news for Shinzo Abes attempts to kickstart an economy dogged for years by deflation. It didnt do much for the Nikkei average in Tokyo, however, which was off 0.8% in contrast to positive showings in other markets in Asia. The FTSE100 is set to rise 0.3% this morning, according to futures trading.

The pound is flat at $1.30 and 1.10.

We have the usual variety of news angles to start the week. The Sun reports on Hunts 44k flush fund and claims the health secretary demanded a new toilet and shower in his office so he could freshen up after cycling to work.

The Guardian leads on the events in Charlottesville and Donald Trumps muted reaction to it.

The Telegraph has the Tory backbencher and definitely not future leader Jacob Rees-Mogg calling for stamp duty cuts.

The Mirror goes with TV celebrity Ant McPartlins hopes of saving his marriage after apparently being treated for addiction to painkillers.

The Times meanwhile claims Theresa May is under fire from Whitehall officials for trying to rush through Brexit decisions during a chaotic summer.

The Mails headline is War on heart deaths and says GPs are to offer check-ups for people at risk.

If you would like to receive the Guardian Morning Briefing by email every weekday at 7am, sign up here.

Read the rest here:
Monday briefing: Trump fights for his alt-right - The Guardian

White House Senior Adviser Steve Bannon and Donald Trump.

Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images

Donald Trump has done more than any political figure in the United States to propagate the beliefs and court the support of the white supremacist "alt-right" movement, whose adherents held a rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, on Saturday, where a white supremacist named James Fields Jr. killed a nonviolent protester named Heather Heyer with his car. Here's an attempt at a comprehensive list of the ways Trump has promoted and benefitted from the movement.

(Note on nomenclature: I'm using the term white supremacist in some cases where others might use white nationalist. The self-identification distinction between the two groups is that many white nationalists claim that they believe the United States should be a culturally and politically white-dominated society because it has historically been so, not because whites are intrinsically superior. An avowedly white U.S. "ethnostate," though, is still one in which whites would maintain supremacy over nonwhites, so I believe white supremacist applies broadly. Also, regardless of what they may claim, many self-identified white nationalists are quite obviously racially prejudiced against nonwhites.)

Birtherism. Trump began insisting in 2011 that Barack Obama may not have been born in the United States. He once said a "very credible source" had informed him that Obama's birth certificate was fraudulent and claimed to have sent investigators to Hawaii to research the matter. Trump has also suggestedObama may be a Muslim who is sympathetic to the goals of groups like ISIS. (Obama is an American-born Christian.)

Steve Bannon. The former chairman of Breitbart News helped run Trump's campaign and is a senior White House adviser. Bannon once proudly described Breitbart as "the platform for the alt-right," and under his leadership the site published an infamous article which celebrated the work of several white supremacists, including Richard Spencer, who was one of the leaders of the Charlottesville rally and who made headlines for using Nazi slogans and gestures at a Washington, D.C. celebration of Trump's inauguration. (Breitbart also famously posted some of its stories under the heading "Black Crime.") Bannon has repeatedly and publicly endorsed The Camp of the Saints, a novel popular in white-pride circles in which black Americans, "dirty Arabs," and feces-eating Hindu rapists (among others) destroy civilization. The book refers to black individuals as "niggers" and "rats." Bannon has also reportedly praised a far-right French writer named Charles Maurras who was sentenced to life in prison after World War II for collaboration with Nazi occupiers. And he's complained publicly that too many tech CEOs are Asian American. And he reportedly told his ex-wife that he didn't want their children attending schools with significant Jewish enrollment.

Milo Yiannopoulos. The Nazi-fetishizing former Breitbart staffer who co-wrote the white-supremacist article described above can thank Bannon, who has called his work "valuable," for launching his career. Trumps first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, called Yiannopoulos "brave" and said he was a "phenomenal individual" in November 2016. In February of this year, Trump himself tweeted a threat to revoke the University of California at Berkeley's federal funding because it canceled Yiannopoulos' appearance on campus. Yiannopoulos subsequently resigned from Breitbart during a furor over approving remarks he made in 2016 about pedophiliabut it appears that his career is still being funded by Robert Mercer, a right-wing billionaire whose daughter Rebekah served on Trump's transition team.

Alex Jones. Jones' site InfoWars advocates paranoid beliefs of all sorts, including but not limited to alt-right-adjacent theories about the "Jewish mafia" and "globalists," such as the Rothschilds, who manipulate world events to enrich themselves. Trump called Jones "amazing" during a 2015 interview, and the White House seemingly confirmed to the New York Times that Trump and Jones occasionally speak on the phone.

Sebastian Gorka. Ostensibly a counterterrorism adviser, Gorkas job appears to consist entirely of making grandiose and factually erroneous declarations during Fox News appearances, and he is reportedly a member of a far-right Hungarian group called Vitzi Rend that collaborated with the Nazis during WWII. (He denies it.)

Julie Kirchner. Previously the executive director of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, Kirchner was appointed to work at the federal Office of Citizenship and Immigration Services by the Trump administration in May. The Federation for American Immigration Reform's founder and its current president are both interested in eugenics and crank race science;both have complained that immigration undermines whites' dominance.

Social media outreach. Trump conducted an exclusive Q&A in July 2016 with a notorious Reddit forum called The_Donald. The first question he answered was submitted by Milo Yiannopoulos, and another user whose question he answered had previously referred to Black Lives Matter protests as "chimp outs." Other threads on The_Donald prior to Trump's Q&A had covered such subjects as "race mixing," Nazis' allegedly high IQs, and the "Jewish influence" in America. Top Trump aide Dan Scavino is essentially a White House liaison to internet extremists, while Donald Trump Jr. has retweeted prominent white supremacists and conducted an interview with a white-supremacist radio host who has said that interracial relationships constitute "white genocide." Trump Sr., for his part, famously retweeted a Twitter user named "WhiteGenocideTM" and posted an anti-Semitic Hillary Clinton meme image created by a Twitter user whose other work involved grotesque caricatures of black and Jewish individuals.

Saying and doing racist things constantly. During the 2016 campaign, Trump attacked a federal judge who had prosecuted drug traffickers in a previous job by calling him "Mexican" (he was born in Indiana) and suggesting that he was sympathetic to Mexican cartels; asserted that Mexican immigrants are disproportionately likely to commit rapes; defended the internment of Japanese Americans during WWII; retweeted a hoax graphic which wildly overstated the rates at which black Americans commit crimes against whites; claimed incorrectly that Oakland is one of the most dangerous cities in the world; suggested that bereaved miitary father Khizr Khan supports Islamic terrorism; reiterated his belief that the Central Park Five are guilty despite their having been legally exonerated; and approvingly repeated an apocryphal story about an American officer putting down an insurrection in the Phillippines by executing Muslims using bullets dipped in pigs' blood.

NBC News tracked down alleged Charlottesville killer James Fields Jr.'s mother on Sunday. She told the network that she hadn't known that her son was attending a white supremacist event. "I thought it had something to do with Trump," she said. Indeed.

Read more here:
Donald Trump's ties to alt-right white supremacists are extensive. - Slate Magazine (blog)

Images and footage from Seattle of riot-gear-equipped police standing between rallies of the white nationalist group Patriot Prayer and anti-fascist counter-protesters, carried live on MSNBC this afternoon, make clear the tensions that exploded in Charlottesville yesterday are carrying into the last stretch of the weekend.

A couple hours into the rallies, police have managed to keep the groups away from one another. A less eventful, more peaceful and smaller anti-Trump protest was being held in New Yorks midtown near Trump Tower.

The Portland-based, pro-Trump Patriot Prayer group had been planning its Seattle rally prior to yesterdays events and chose not to cancel. A counter-protest was organized by theGreater Seattle General Defense Committee, an anti-fascist group that posted a post-Charlottesville message on its website today: We may be entering a new stage of struggle. We are determined to meet the challenges ahead of us. We will beat back and defeat the fascists. We must defend each other. That means all of us.

Footage tweeted by a Seattle Times photographer (watch it below) showed the counter-protesters confronting a shielded line of police, chanting Let Us March and spraying the police with Silly String. The incident also was shown on MSNBC.

As of mid-afternoon Seattle time, neither CNN nor Fox News Channel had thrown live to Seattle.

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MSNBC Goes Live To Tense Seattle Alt-Right Rally & Counter-Protests - Deadline

(Last Updated On: August 13, 2017)

Inside GamerGate: A Social History of the Gamer Revolt is currently available right now on Amazon for $4.99. The 202-page, non-fiction book recounts specific events that occurred during the height of the #GamerGate saga, told through the lens of author James Desborough.

The gonzo style approach that Desborough took with covering #GamerGate was written to offer an alternative view of the events that unfolded around the explosive hashtag. It also attempts to give readers insight and details on the consumer revolt that the mainstream media and most enthusiast press have refused to cover in an evenhanded or honest fashion.

Desborough recently offered to answer some questions about the recently released e-book and his experiences with #GamerGate that eventually led him to writing about it. He also covers what sort of information both casual readers and hardcore gamers might glean from picking up a copy of the book. You can check out the interview below.

One Angry Gamer: So first of all how involved were you in #GamerGate and how much of it did you participate in?

James Desborough: I was involved since before it was Gamergate. Having previously been a bit of a booster on Depression Quest as a sufferer myself and even a defender of Quinn I was worried about what I was hearing. The only real sources of information were the early IRC channels and theres logs of me visiting one to ask what the hell was going on, and then leaving. That mere presence, by the way, was taken as damning enough to pull an interview on the issue I did for The Escapist, later on down the line.

I was mostly involved on Twitter, then on Youtube, and in discussions, debates and arguments around the issues in the tabletop gaming community. It got quite nasty. I got burned out in 2016 but kept a weather eye on what was going on, even as it died down.

So I was really rather involved, attended a meet up in the UK, battled constantly for what I thought was right, wrote a lot of emails but not for boycotts and took a lot of personal and professional hits on Gamergates behalf.

OAG: When did you decide to start working on the book? How long was it after #GamerGate got underway did you decide to put pen to paper?

James: I was umming and ahhing and discussing the idea with people for some time, going way back to 2016 after Id left, but it was the announcement of Quinns book and my awareness of it that kicked it into high gear and ultimately led me to take the plunge. Well, that and gamedropping (mentioning Gamergate) in all sorts of stupid media articles and trying to link it to the Alt-Right or Trump. It became clear that the other versions of the stories needed to be out there, and from a personal gonzo perspective, not as dry text. We needed something counter to what will inevitably be the lies and misrepresentations in Crash Override, but with a personal touch. I normally prefer to be more dry, measured and academic, but thats not what this needed.

OAG: And on the subject of length how did you decide what events to cover from #GamerGate in order to give it a start and end? Some people still feel as if the event is going on while others feel its concluded. What did you feel was a good end point, so to speak, for covering the event(s)?

James: For me it really did end petering out in 2016 and giving birth to legacy movements such as the ongoing fights over regionalisation and censorship relating to Japanese games. So I planned to historically contextualise it and then cover it from before it was Gamergate, right back to establishing events and contemporaneous context, through to what I considered the end. Then of course The Last Night happened and even since I finished the book we now have relevant things like the GoogleMemo or the reporting on Charlottesville which has included gamedropping which I would have included if I were still working on the book now. At some point you have to type your final full-stop though.

OAG: Three years after #GamerGate started a lot of people still dont know what it is. For people completely out of the loop, will a book like Inside GamerGate be able to catch them up on all the necessary information to get a grasp on what the event was about? Or is it something that more-so outlines the media narratives and ideological slants that helped push the subject into mainstream ever-so-briefly?

James: I hope so. I think the main thing that a lot of people dont understand is how this fits into a much broader historical narrative around fear and loathing of new media that can be traced all the way back to the advent of the printing press, and no, Im not being hyperbolic. For slightly older nerds the shadows of the PMRC, Satanic Panic and Jack Thompson are supremely important in understanding Gamergate but unless youre immersed in nerd history its hard to grok the how and why of the whole thing. The nerd media willfully misrepresented and the mainstream media was criminally lazy. The book, if it can do anything, can at least contextualise that and hopefully humanise Gamergate participants. I dont know how many anti-gamergate people will even bother to read it, but at least its now part of the historical record.

OAG: Some people might be quick to dismiss the book because it doesnt take a listen and believe approach to the subject matter, or because it counteracts the mainstream narrative. For those people who have already read the Wikipedia entry for #GamerGate or decided to get their info from a Gawker/Gizmodo site, how does the book deal with convincing these people that they may be approaching the topic from the wrong perspective?

James: Listen and believe cuts both ways. Listen and believe to me. You dont have to agree with me, but you can at least read it and, as a result, understand my point of view, why I involved myself, why I was outraged and fought so hard and through me maybe you can understand some of the revolt as a whole. The personal touch and the, somewhat controversial, shock opener is intended to try and hit them over the head with that side from the get go. Well see if it works.

OAG: Ultimately, what do you hope to achieve with Inside GamerGate now that its out on the market and available for the general public to consume? Is it about reaching people who may have been misled? Informing people who didnt know #GamerGate existed? Perhaps convincing the media that they really managed to get #GamerGate wrong? Or is it about achieving something else entirely?

James: All of that would be great but I am content that there is, at the very least, now a record from our perspective. I think Brad Glasgows Gamergate book, when it comes out, and mine would make a good complimentary set of books on things. Mine more personal, his more objective.

OAG: If the book manages to really take off, would you consider doing a follow-up or is the one book on #GamerGate enough?

James: Ive been surprised how well it has done. Maybe non-fiction is what I should be writing I wouldnt do another Gamergate book but I could, perhaps, be tempted to write something about the Culture War of the 2010s and how it relates to history. Ive been shocked and appalled at how politically and historically illiterate so many actors in this drama are, both AntiFa and the Alt-Right people especially. Its a fascinating and disappointing point in history. I dont think thered be enough interest in that though, especially written by a somewhat amateur commentator without a pre-existing media platform, and who would publish it? Im too left wing for one set of publishers and too politically incorrect for the other set. Self publishing is exhausting and I prefer to save that for my game design, which is a lot more fun!

One isnt enough, but its enough for me to write.

Huge thanks to James for answering the questions. You can either check out the book on Amazon to learn more, or you can follow James Desboroughs content on YouTube through his Grim Jim channel.

(Artwork courtesy of Kukuruyo)

Original post:
Inside GamerGate Interview: Media Lies, Gamedropping And Culture Wars - One Angry Gamer (blog)

The Google engineer who blamed biological differences for the paucity of women in tech had every right to express his views. And Google likely had every right to fire him, workplace experts and lawyers say.

Special circumstances -- from the country's divisive political climate to Silicon Valley's broader problem with gender equity -- contributed to the outrage and subsequent firing. But the fallout should still serve as a warning to anyone in any industry expressing unpopular, fiery viewpoints.

"Anyone who makes a statement like this and expects to stick around ... is foolish," said David Lewis, CEO of Operations Inc., a human resources consulting firm.

Why He Lost His Job

The engineer, James Damore, wrote a memo criticizing Google for pushing mentoring and diversity programs and for "alienating conservatives." The parts that drew the most outrage made such assertions as women "prefer jobs in social and artistic areas" and have a "lower stress tolerance" and "harder time" leading, while more men "may like coding because it requires systemizing."

Google's code of conduct says workers "are expected to do their utmost to create a workplace culture that is free of harassment, intimidation, bias, and unlawful discrimination." Google's CEO, Sundar Picahi, said Damore violated this code.

Yonatan Zunger, who recently left Google as a senior engineer, wrote in a Medium post that he would have had no choice but to fire Damore had he been his supervisor.

"Do you understand that at this point, I could not in good conscience assign anyone to work with you?" he wrote . "I certainly couldn't assign any women to deal with this, a good number of the people you might have to work with may simply punch you in the face."

Though one might argue for a right to free speech, however unpopular, such protections are generally limited to government and other public employees -- and to unionized workers with rights to disciplinary hearings before any firing.

Broader protections are granted to comments about workplace conditions. Damore argues in a federal labor complaint that this applies to his case, but experts disagree.

"By posting that memo, he forfeited his job," said Jennifer Lee Magas, public relations professor at Pace University and a former employment law attorney. "He was fired for his words, but also for being daft enough to post these thoughts on an open workplace forum, where he was sure to be met with backlash and to offend his colleagues -- male and female alike."

Uniquely Google

The fallout comes as Silicon Valley faces a watershed moment over gender and ethnic diversity.

Blamed for years for not hiring enough women and minorities -- and not welcoming them once they are hired -- tech companies such as Google, Facebook and Uber have promised big changes. These have included diversity and mentoring programs and coding classes for groups underrepresented among the companies' technical and leadership staff. Many tech companies also pledge to interview, though not necessarily hire, minority candidates.

These are the sorts of things Damore's memo railed against.

As such, experts say Damore might not have been fired at a company that doesn't have such a clear message on diversity.

In addition, had Damore worked for a smaller, lesser-known company, an internal memo might not have created such a "media storm," said Aimee Delaney, a Hinshaw & Culbertson attorney who represents companies on labor matters.

A Different World

Still, bringing so much public, negative attention would spell trouble for any worker. That's especially so in this age of fast-spreading social media posts, when internal company documents can easily leak and go viral.

It didn't help that this was in the heart of Silicon Valley, where typing fingers are on 24/7 and people rarely disconnect from social media, even on a quiet August weekend. Or that Google is a brand consumers interact with all day -- and want to read about when memos go viral.

Perhaps the biggest lesson is this: Don't be so quick to post your angry thoughts for thousands, then millions, to see.

Michael Schmidt, vice chairman of labor and employment at the Cozen O'Connor law firm, said that while workers might have refrained from such remarks around the physical watercooler, "people treat ... electronic communications much more informally than face-to-face speech."

But the consequences are similar, if not more severe.

Explosive Climate

Initially shared on an internal Google network, the memo leaked out to the public over the weekend, first in bits and pieces and then in its 10-page entirety.

It took a life of its own as outsiders weighed in. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange took to Twitter to offer Damore a job. One conservative group, Americans for Limited Government, criticized what it called Google's politically correct culture and left-wing bias. Others called for a Google boycott.

Known for its motto, "don't be evil," Google is broadly seen as a liberal-leaning company, something Damore criticized in his manifesto. Liberals and tech industry leaders came to Google's defense and denounced Damore's claims as baseless and harmful.

"It's fair to say that whatever side of the political aisle you are on, ... we are in a climate where we are dealing with very highly charged and emotional issues," Schmidt said. "And those issues are spilling into the workplace."

Instead of looking for a bright-line test on what is permissible, he said, "both sides need to understand there has to be a sensitivity to the bigger picture," a level of respect and cultural sensitivity across all demographics.

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Google Gender Debacle Speaks to Tech Culture Wars - Top Tech News