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Via Dave Weigel, at Slate, the Glitterati Go Large.
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He found the perfect tongue-in-check counterpoint, too, but you’re gonna have to click over to appreciate it.
LGBTQ Rights
Reader video
Reader P sends in a video about his big, fat gay wedding.
(The embed of this crashed my computer twice so I took it down, you can watch it at the link above.)
Even-Keeled Progressive
This Dan Savage interview in Salon is worth a read. His take on the mixed Obama record on gay rights is, well, mixed — as well as nuanced. And this is the opposite of “primary Obama now”:
You see the polls on marriage equality moving in our favor. Unfortunately, you know, some people say therefore the president should come out in favor of marriage equality. Fifty-one, 52 percent of Americans aren’t for marriage equality in every state. And the overwhelming support for marriage equality in California and New York, and blue states, isn’t going to add up to a victory. I’ve actually written and think that if the president came out for marriage equality now, I don’t think Republicans who are for marriage equality are going to vote for him on that basis, but I do think Democrats who oppose it will vote against him, for that reason. So politically, I don’t think it’s unwise for the president to evolve at the pace he’s evolving right now. But I don’t believe him.
What’s refreshing about the interview is the lack of black-and-white thinking and resentment/betrayal emotions. Instead, there’s dissatisfaction where Obama hasn’t gone far enough, satisfaction and pride about the victories, and a sharp pragmatic recognition of what’s possible, politically.
There Is Something Deeply, Deeply Wrong With These People
These wingnuts just lack any trace of empathy or humanity. Empty souls.
(via)
There Is Something Deeply, Deeply Wrong With These PeoplePost + Comments (96)
All Gay All the Time
Now that David Gregory has given questions about teh ghey and their satanic nature the beltway imprimatur, I hope we see this every fucking day and twice on the Lord’s day. And let’s ask the other candidates their opinion on choice Bachmann quotes like these:
REP. BACHMANN: It’s a very sad life. It’s part of Satan, I think, to say that this is gay. It’s anything but gay. … It leads to the personal enslavement of individuals. Because if you’re involved in the gay and lesbian lifestyle, it’s bondage. It is personal bondage, personal despair, and personal enslavement. And that’s why this is so dangerous. … We need to have profound compassion for people who are dealing with the very real issue of sexual dysfunction in their life and sexual identity disorders.
MR. GREGORY: Do you think that gay Americans hearing quotes like that from you would think that that’s, that’s honor and dignity coming from you about their circumstance?
REP. BACHMANN: I am not anyone’s judge…
MR. GREGORY: Right.
REP. BACHMANN: …and I’m not standing in as anyone’s judge.
Now that the economy is in the toilet, Republicans don’t want or need social issue distractions, but that’s too bad, because you can’t go cold turkey on that crack.
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The Front Runner in Words and Pictures
Just because it gives Joe Scar and Stu Rothenberg an aura for their next migraines doesn’t mean that Michele Bachmann wasn’t the first clown out of the car yesterday, and that she’ll probably be the recipient of a hell of a lot of money in the next few months. Bachmann will be the official front-runner for a very long time: the next contest is Iowa next February.
With that in mind, and since Republicans think it’s a scandal that Michelle Obama accompanies her husband on out-of-country trips and goes barefoot in the White House, incidents like the following (via) need a little more attention:
Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann, a Republican presidential candidate, was 30 minutes late to speak at her scheduled Iowa State Fair soapbox event and spoke for three of the 20 allotted minutes.
She said she was going to shake hands but left the makeshift stage quickly when 17-year-old civil rights advocate Gabe Aderhold of Edina, Minn., loudly questioned her husband Marcus about his counseling techniques to “pray the gay away.”
I hope incidents like this start to happen every time Bachmann is in front of the general public. And if they do, perhaps serious candidates Mitt Romney and Rick Perry will be asked about their unpopular anti-homosexual agenda.
Update: Confirming the irrelevance of Ames, TPaw just pulled the ripcord.
Hot Potato
I know that the question of whether there’s any bill that the Republican caucus can pass that doesn’t involve naming a post office or declaring a recess is riveting, but there’s another question I want to ask: what are the Republicans going to do about their gay problem?
Look at Michele Bachmann, who yesterday declared that Marcus and his pray-away-the-gay psychology practice was “off limits”, even though she’s been calling Michelle Obama un-American since 2008.
And how about Scott Brown, the only member of the Massachusetts delegation who wouldn’t appear in an “It Gets Better” video. Brown says that he’s against bullying, and he voted to repeal DADT, but this minor gesture was a bridge too far.
Marcus Bachmann, the federal money he takes to pray away gayness, and even the way he pings people’s gaydar are all going to be campaign issues. (On that last point, remember that Mrs. Bachmann comes from a party where the supposedly sane commentators criticize Mrs. Obama for going barefoot in her own damn house — simple quid pro quo justifies a few questions about Marcus’ sexual history.) And if Elizabeth Warren runs against Scott Brown, she’s not going to let him out of their steel cage death match by splitting on gay rights. The 2012 election is going to be very goddam interesting if our country survives to have it.