Thursday, August 26, 2010

And one more thing...

Arch-Assh@le and scumbag former straight Ken Mehlman has never once said that he is sorry for all the hurt and pain he has caused. Oh sure, he has regrets... but he is not sorry. He wanted money, position, power and all that goes with it. Now that he's not at the RNC,  has made a packet of money, is living in a flashy new apartment in Chelsea, and living life as a great big queen, he wants to be accepted and work for marriage equality. 

You're too late Mary. Screw you!

Most un-surprising headline of the week: Ken Mehlman is gay

It was long rumored and often spoken of in Washington DC circles that the former head of the Republican National Committee, Ken Mehlman is a big gay girl. He has now "officially" come out a gay in an article in the Atlantic. Several of the leading gay bloggers have come out in support of the very difficult step of coming out as gay and have given him an "atta girl" for doing it.

From John Aravosis at AmericaBlog Gay:

Good for Ken. I know a lot of people will want to criticize him for heading up the GOP as a closeted gay man. He says he only recently came to terms with being gay. I suspect he always knew he was gay, but recently came to terms with accepting it, and embracing it. And good for him. He's now doing the right thing, helping support marriage equality. I'm not going to fault him for that. Coming out is a horrendously difficult and complicated thing. It's not rational.

Now, does that mean I oppose efforts to out people who are hurting our community? Absolutely not. I was there with the rest of them calling Mehlman out for being a closeted gay man running a homophobic political party. Our long-time readers will remember Mehlman Mondays on AMERICAblog. I long talked about Mehlman being the only closet-heterosexual I'd ever heard of - a man not willing to admit he's straight.

But that doesn't mean we don't embrace him now. And not just for strategic reasons. Mehlman, from what Ambinder says, is doing the right thing. He's now using his position in the GOP to help our community on our number one issue: marriage. For that, he deserves our thanks.

Now my take:

Ken Mehlman is an assh@le! He presided over the Republican Party during one of the most hateful, bigoted and downright heinous times for Gay American citizens in this country. He demonized gay and lesbian citizens as a tool to gin up the homophobic bigots in this country to vote for Republicans in elections. He is completely responsible for that. The Republicans saw that the best way of rallying the religious right to their cause was to make sure that they knew that the Republican Party and Conservatives in general were the ones who would keep the fags in their places and the white Christianists in power. Mehlman knew this. He participated in this. He planned this. He executed this. How many ruined lives is he responsible for? How much pain and degradation is he responsible for? As a gay man, closeted or otherwise, he organized, funded, and participated in  people like himself being used as grist for the Republican Party's "hate the fags" agenda.

Rather than embracing this scumbag and congratulating him for the journey he has made, and accepting his help in future outreach efforts, as some have suggested, which to me is just as bad as what he did for Republicans, he should be outcast. He is pariah. He is not to be forgiven so blithely. He deserves to be shunned for considerably more time so that he can appreciate and learn from the damage that he has done.  

That man is a disgrace to his ruby slippers.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Mitch McConnell refuses FOUR TIMES to answer a question about how extending the Bush era tax cuts will be paid for

I find it increasingly difficult to stomach the lies, distortions and evasions of the leaders of the Conservative/Republican  movement. Watching them dodge, weave and obfuscate when asked a direct simple question is at once laughable and horrific. 


On Sunday's edition of Meet the Press Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell was as preposterous as House Minority Leader John Boehner on the same show two weeks ago, blustering about having to account for how much extending the Bush tax cuts for the megarich – set to expire in 2011 -- will deepen the deficit. Just as Boehner sputtered and refused to answer repeatedly, then blamed "this Washington game and their funny accounting" for the vexing fact that protecting the megarich will add $3.2 trillion to the deficit, so did McConnell obfuscate. "Why did it all of a sudden become something that we, quote, 'pay for'?" McConnell asked host David Gregory, calling the tax cuts "existing tax policy."

It's hard to believe the entire country doesn't remember (with outrage) that Republicans under George W. Bush didn't have the courage to make the tax cuts permanent when they passed them in 2001. Phasing the cuts out in 2011 masked the enormous hit to the federal budget, and also ensured the GOP could pass them via reconciliation, with a simple majority. (Remember how Bolshevik that idea was when the Democrats proposed using it for healthcare reform?)

I also don't understand why, if as the Republicans claim, these tax cuts are the secret to job growth, two Bush terms only saw the number of jobs grow by 1.1 million, when jobs grew by 22.7 million under Bill Clinton, at the same time that taxes on the rich were higher. And that's according to the Pulitzer Prize-winning Politifact.com, which fact-checked a Bush-Clinton job-growth comparison made by liberal Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown, and found he was wrong – he actually overestimated job growth under Bush.)

Pew Poll says 18% of US Citizens say Obama is a Muslim

From the Pew Research Center:

The view that President Obama is a Muslim is more widespread among his political opponents than among his backers. Roughly a third of conservative Republicans (34%) say Obama is a Muslim, as do 30% of those who disapprove of Obama’s job performance. But even among many of his supporters and allies, less than half now say Obama is a Christian. 

The people who said that they think Obama is a Muslim are just plain STUPID! It was just before the President was elected that these fools were hyperventilating over the President's former pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright comments about 9/11. Is it so hard for these idiots to remember what they felt so fervently about just two short years ago? And to those who think that the President is not a Christian, who could blame him if he wasn't? With all of the "good, God-fearing Christians" who are out there bearing false witness against him simply for political advantage, I certainly wouldn't blame him if he wasn't a Christian. The epic hypocrisy and ignorance of the Conservative/Republicans is beyond belief.

In the words of Shirley Q "these folks is ignunt!"

Monday, August 23, 2010

Another mosque project under fire. This time in Kentucky

Bigoted Moron

Perhaps it's no longer surprising in the current climate, but yet another mosque construction project is coming under increased attack from critics this month. It's time to add Florence, Kentucky to the list of controversial Islamic construction projects stretching from Temecula, California to Murfreesboro, Tennessee to, of course, lower Manhattan.

It may be that the Cordoba House project in New York has led to increased attention on -- and opposition to -- the Florence, Kentucky mosque project, which has been in the planning stages since at least 2002. At least one Republican politician has weighed in on both, and the answer is (or, really, is not) surprising: he says one shouldn't be built, while construction of the other is Constitutionally guaranteed.

Whenever I see someone carrying a sign like that I can't help but think that we really are at a turning point in our country. Do we turn right and go down the road of Conservative Nationalism, with all of the fear, paranoia, bigotry, lies, hatred and demonization of those that are different for us, like Germany in the 1930's, or to the left where there are equal rights for all citizens of this country guaranteed by the Consitution? We need our President to stand up and be a leader and tell these people calling for abridged rights of Muslim-Americans that they are WRONG. I thought he was going to hit it out of the park the other night when he said at the White House iftar that "This is America..." But he dropped it there. He should have continued "...and those that are saying that Americans can't build a house of worship (which the project two blocks from "Ground Zero" is most certainly not) are just plain wrong. Freedom to practice your religion is what this country is founded on. Period."

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof

Someone had better pick up that dropped ball and do it soon before we have a religious war on our hands here. And you Republicans that are fanning this controversy for political gain had better watch out too. You have "let slip the dogs of war" and will find that they are very difficult to control when they smell blood.

Sunday, August 22, 2010

The Golden Age of TV Commercials

I've posted this one before but it is so very campy and today is so very gray that I had to do it. Here is Ann Miller flogging Great American Soups. 

Lumiere! Musique! 


Olsen and Boies to Prop 8: You're probably going to have to pay


From The Advocate: 
Attorneys representing two California gay couples in the federal Proposition 8 case may seek to recoup mounting legal fees from their opponents if an appeals court upholds U.S. district judge Vaughn Walker's landmark decision. 

In court filings this week, the attorneys requested extended time to consider fees and court costs but have also asked Prop. 8 supporters for an expedited response in the matter — which they opposed in a Wednesday filing.

"Plaintiffs seek to drastically shorten [our] time to respond to that motion so that they have more time to prepare an application for attorney’s fees in the event this Court does not grant their motion to enlarge time," Alliance Defense Fund attorney Brian Raum wrote. "Such a burden shift is unwarranted." 

The legal team led by Ted Olson and David Boies has not disclosed how much the litigation has cost, though the organization charged with funding the suit, the American Foundation for Equal Rights, has in recent weeks reached out to the public for donations as the case proceeds to the U.S. court of appeals for the ninth circuit. 

Oral arguments are scheduled for the week of December 6.

Good! They should pay up.  This case is simple. Can the majority deny rights to a group of American citizens because they think we are inferior? The (according to Conservatives, Holy-of-Holies) US Constitution says: No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. 

Comme il faut.  

When all else fails demonize the Gays

WhitmanAt a news conference yesterday, California From Andy Towle at Towleroad.com:

GOP gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman said that, unlike Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger or Attorney General Brown who have declined defending the measure, she would defend Proposition 8 if elected governor:
"The issue right now is, as I understand is 'Will Proposition 8 have the appropriate support to actually make an appeal to the circuit court of appeals?' " Whitman said. "And I think the governor, the attorney general today has to defend the constitution and has to enable the judicial process to go along and has to enable an appeal to go through. So if I was governor, I would give that ruling standing to be able to appeal to the circuit court." 

The Courage Campaign took Whitman's hypothetical situation and threw it in the trash.

"She wouldn't be governor yet. The appeals court will decide before there would be a change of governor and attorney general...You're going to see us making it clear that Meg Whitman is unqualified to be governor on any stand."

So what's happening here is Whitman burnishing her "cred" with the homophobe creatures in California by letting them know that "if I could" I would keep the gays from marrying. ItThat's  like me saying that "I would free all political prisoners in Myanmar" if elected to the presidency of Myanmar. No chance of that happening soon I think. 

What a pig!