They're Everywhere [Though a Lot Are In Florida] ... Part Six

Since they’re still at it, I’m still posting …

FLORIDA

I guess we should let it be known that you can take a gun  into a movie theater, and if another patron won’t get off his cell phone, and you confront him about it, and he tosses popcorn in your face, you can shoot him dead and be found not guilty.

That’s what happened this week to retired Tampa police officer … uh huh … who murdered Chad Oulson eight years ago.

Flori-duh.

ARIZONA

Governor Doug Ducey has no regrets about spending $500,000 to elect a GOP state senator, Wendy Rogers, with open ties to the white nationalist movement because, as he said, it’s still better than having a Democrat in her seat.

Ducey would rather a racist on office than a Democrat because racists stick together.

 FLORIDA

New statewide requirements on how race is discussed in schools, colleges and workplaces were approved by the Florida House this past week.

The legislation—which still needs Senate approval before going to DeSantis, who is certain to sign it into law—prohibits any teaching that could make students feel they bear personal responsibility for historic wrongs because of their race, color, sex or national origin.

I believe it’s the White Fragility Law.

Oh, and fuck Flori-duh.

UNITED STATES

Thing 45 recently launched Truth Social as a stand against censorship and for Free Speech.

Within hours they had already banned a used for creating an account called @DevinNunesCow.

Free Speech unless you hurt Devin Nunes’ feelings.

OKLAHOMA

Oklahoma Attorney General John O’Connor is reviewing dozens of books found in public school libraries to determine whether they violate state obscenity law. Books like … Of Mice and Men and Lord of the Flies … and newer titles that cover LGBTQ and social justice issues.

In 2018, O’Connor was nominated by Thing 45 to the federal bench but he did not get a hearing after the American Bar Association rated him “not qualified” on the grounds of “professional competence and integrity.”

He was appointed Oklahoma Attorney General in July 2021 by GOP Governor Kevin Stitt and immediately joined a suit to block Biden’s vaccine mandates.

Oklahoma, not okay.

FLORIDA

In an 11-point plan outlining the future agenda of the GOP, Senator Rick Scott proposes banning all government collection of racial data. The proposal would also remove all data on race from the US Census Bureau’s next population count in 2030.

He wants to erase the races in this country.

OHIO

Senate candidates Josh Mandell, a Republican, Morgan Harper, Democrat, participated in a debate last week and things got, um, interesting.

Mandel declared that “the only country on the whole planet where Africans were not brought as slaves” was the “Jewish state of Israel.”

Israel declared its independence in 1948.

Harper refused to shake Mandel’s hand after it was over because stupid is also a virus.

TEXAS

January 6 rioter Jenna Ryan claims that she was denied “basic human needs” while in jail over charges related to the Capitol attack.

What was she denied? Basic needs like “sunshine, phone, food.”

And she claims she was tortured in prison … possibly because she couldn’t access her Instagram.

Get educated and save yourselves from The Stupids.

CAST A GODDAMNED VOTE. 

The Funny Papers

Jack Ohman, Bruce MacKinnon, Darrin Bell, Rick McKee, Steve Sack, JD Crowe, Bill Day, Pete Kreiner, Bill Bramhall, Nick Anderson, David Fitzsimmons, Mike Luckovich, Pat Bagley, Clay Bennett

Random Musings

Carlos eyes are not getting better, though we knew that was the case. We saw a doctor in Charleston last month and he told her he was thinking of starting to use a white cane because ... and this is just one more reason I love him ... then people would see him coming, get out of his way, and he’d feel less nervous being in strange places. Even the doctor said that was a wise way to look at it.

So, about a week later, his cane arrived in the mail; he only uses it when he’s in places he’s unfamiliar with, and just so that people see him coming and adjust accordingly and he can focus on looking ahead instead of looking down; the cane does the “looking down” for him.

Now, that said, at a staff meeting at his job this past week, his boss asked him to tell the office about his eye condition—Retinitis Pigmentosa—and to explain that he might be using the cane on occasion and this is what he said:

“I have RP, which a person gets when they have sex under a Black Moon.”

Luckily most people laughed but a few—and remember we’re in South Carolina—laughed nervously.

But it broke the ice and several people then talked with him about the cane and if he ever needed anything ... all in all, except for the Black Moon Sex, it was a good thing.

Remember last spring when House Majority Whip, and Republican, Steve Scalise was shot while playing baseball by some lunatic with a gun?

Well, Scalise returned to Congress just a few days before the mass shooting in Las Vegas and he says this latest shooting—which left 59 dead and over 500 injured—has only reconfirmed his opposition to gun control.

Yes, he was shot by a deranged man with a gun and then watched the events in Las Vegas and still doesn’t think we need any form of gun control.

Asshat.

UPDATE ... Last month I posted the story of Family Values Conservative Republican Tim Murphy’s adulterous affair proving he’s a lying hypocritical pig, and now, well, it’s worse.

It appears now that pro-life asshat Tim Murphy urged the woman with whom he was having that affair to abort her pregnancy during what turned out to be an “unfounded pregnancy scare” in January.

And on the very same day this story broke lying hypocritical pig Tim Murphy voted for legislation that would ban abortion after 20 weeks.

He’s pro-life when it comes to you but pro-abortion when it comes to his mistress being knocked up. And now, Murphy—from Pennsylvania—has announced he will not seek re-election when his current term is up:

"After discussions with my family and staff, I have come to the decision that I will not seek reelection to Congress at the end of my current term. In the coming weeks I will take personal time to seek help as my family and I continue to work through our personal difficulties and seek healing. I ask you to respect our privacy during this time."

Personal difficulties? While married you began an affair with a married woman and then asked her to have an abortion and you want to play this off like you have some difficult issues?

The only difficulty you have is being a lying cheating adulterous hypocritical pig.

I need some Hot Men to calm me down ... or heat me up ... so without further ado, the Men of Liar ... the story of a well-respected doctor who goes on a date with a teacher and then she reports that he raped her.

Ioan Griffudd plays the ALLEGED rapist, Dr. Andrew Earlham, while Richie Campbell is Liam Sutcliffe, the ALLEGED victim’s brother-in-law, with Warren Brown as Tom Bailey, the ALLEGED victim’s boyfriend.

One show, triple the Eye Candy.

UPDATE ... this past week I posted about _____’s DOJ getting involved in a case about a gay man being fired for being gay and coming down on the side of the employer ... meaning the _____ Administration is fine with gay folks being fired for being gay.

Well, it looks like the DOJ got smacked down somewhat by the court after EEOC attorney Jeremy D. Horowitz explained why “sexual orientation cannot be separated from sex”:

1. The “but-for” theory ... argues that anti-gay discrimination qualifies as sex discrimination because, but for the gay person’s sex, he would not suffer discrimination.

2. The sex stereotyping theory ... SCOTUS ruled that sex stereotyping—punishing a worker for her failure to conform to gender norms—is a kind of sex discrimination. At first, courts only applied sex stereotyping to masculine women and feminine men, but the Seventh Circuit Court explained that gay people are “the ultimate case of failure to conform” to sex stereotypes, since men and women are typically expected to date only individuals of the opposite sex.

3. The associational sex discrimination theory ... holds that anti-gay bias constitutes sex discrimination much like anti-miscegenation laws constituted race discrimination.

That set up Assistant Attorney General Hashim Mooppan—arguing to legalize discrimination—to make his case ... which did not go well.

Chief Judge Katzmann wanted to know why the DOJ didn’t defer to the EEOC on Title VII, as it almost always does and Mooppan said it was because the DOJ was the nation’s “largest employer” and had an interest in retaining its capacity to fire gay people for being gay. Then as Judge Katzmann began asking more questions about interactions between the EEOC and the DOJ Mooppan declined to answer, basically Pleading the Fifth, which did not sit well with the court.

It was a terrible start for Mooppan, and it only went downhill from there because, as he explained: sex discrimination must always involve a belief that one sex is inferior to the other. Anti-gay discrimination does not rest on such a belief, and so it is not sex discrimination.

That theory is ridiculous for a few reasons, though, as the court pointed out, the most obvious one is that decades of case law disprove it. The Supreme Court has never held that an employer must express animus toward one sex in order to violate Title VII but need only take sex into account in any adverse employment action to run afoul of the law.

Judge Jacobs asked Mooppan whether he can refute the EEOC’s associational discrimination theory and its parallel to interracial and interfaith marriage, and Mooppan responded:

“When you discriminate against interracial marriage, you are promoting racial superiority. When you discriminate against interfaith marriage, you are promoting religious superiority. That makes the comparison to homosexuality moot.”

Except, to the judges it seemed to make the EEOC’s stance true that the DOJ was peddling a “radical reinterpretation of Title VII.”

The arguments concluded, but because of Mooppan’s refusal to answer certain questions, and the fact that his own arguments seemed to support the other side, it looks like the court might rule in favor of the EEOC and disallow the idea that it’s perfectly acceptable to fire someone for being gay.

Fingers crossed; we may have dodged a bullet.

This week, two weeks after the hurricane, _____ finally went to Puerto Rico and wasted no time in congratulating himself and putting down the people of Puerto Rico and saying the island should be “very proud” of its low official death count:

“Every death is a horror, but if you look at a real catastrophe like Katrina, and you look at the tremendous hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people that died and you look at what happened here with a story that was just totally overpowering.”

And then he downplayed how dire things are in Puerto Rico, where more than half of the people don’t have power, running water, or cellphone service two weeks after Hurricane Maria

“What is your death count?” Trump asked Puerto Rican governor, Ricardo Rossello. “Sixteen, certified” he replied. “Sixteen people certified. Sixteen people versus in the thousands,” he said, comparing it to Katrina.

And, since most of those are brown-skinned people who speak Spanish and therefore didn’t vote for _____ what’s the big deal?

Oh,. And let’s not forget that he told an island filled with people asking for help with the basic necessities of life that Puerto Rico has “thrown our budget a little out of whack.”

Says the man who costs this country millions of dollars so he can haul his fat white lazy ass to the gold course every weekend.

In Good News ... this week the US Census Bureau reversed a previous decision to exclude a question on sexual orientation from the Census after many in the LGBT community demanded to be included; Rea Carey, Executive Director of the National LGBTQ Task Force, issued the following statement:

“Make no mistake—public pressure on the _____ Administration works. It was messages from the members of the National LGBTQ Task Force and our partner organizations that compelled the Census Bureau to reverse their appalling decision to stop counting us.”

Resist, and you will see change.

Last week the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva voted to condemn “horrific laws” that condemn people to death because of their sexual orientation; 27 nations voted in favor of condemning the resolution; 7 nations abstained; 13 nations voted against condemning.

The thirteen who voted against the resolution?

Bangladesh, Botswana, Burundi, China, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Iraq, Japan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates ...

... and the United States of America.

Yes, we did. We voted not to condemn countries that give gay people death for being gay.

Carlos has been fighting a cold this week so I am the cook. I cooked dinner last Friday, Saturday, Sunday—I made Chicken Soup for his cold—and Monday. On Tuesday he said he’d cook and then he ... wait for it ... microwaved the pasta sauce that I made the day before and reheated some leftover pasta, too, and called it dinner.

When we sat down to hit, he said, sarcastically, to me:

“Uh, thanks for dinner?”

To which I sarcastically replied:

“Uh, when you microwave pasta sauce and reheat yesterday’s noodles, that is not cooking. Thank you’s are not necessary; but if they were, you could thank me for making the sauce and noodles that you could simply warm up.”

I’m lucky not to have ended up with a face full of marinara!

Man how shocking was it to hear that Tom Petty died this week at 66? I mean, I saw him, and the Heartbreakers, in concert several times and it was always a great show.

Petty suffered a heart attack last Sunday night and then passed away later at UCLA Santa Monica Hospital. He had just ended a tour celebrating the band’s fortieth anniversary with three sold-out shows at the Hollywood Bowl.

I guess he wanted to go out on a high note.

RIP Tom; thanks for all the music, and enjoy The Great Wide Open.

Random Musings

First off ... big shout-out to Anne Marie for her donation to The Will of the People Fund —click that lick up there on the right — a group Carlos and I helped create to fight for marriage equality in South Carolina.

Thanks Anne Marie, for the donation-slash-wedding-gift in our name.

You don't know how much we appreciate it!

So, I mentioned last week that Carlos and I ordered our wedding bands. I mentioned that Carlos had been into the “Smallville Jewelers” a couple of weeks back and how receptive they were to selling bands to a same-sex couple. I mentioned that when I looked at the rings — in silver, platinum and tungsten because I am not a golden kind of gay — I picked one that I really liked and Carlos told me he had also picked that very same ring.

Great minds, right?

Cut to the weekend and Carlos and I are in the car and he says to me, “Do you really like the rings?”

Yes.”

“We could get something else if you want …”

“Wait! You want a different ring?”

“No, I really like the ones we chose but if you want a different ring …”

“UM, why would I walk into a jewelry store, pick a ring, found out it’s the same exact mother%^$ing ring you’d pick, get our fingers sized, place the order and then decide I wanted something different?”

“I just want to make sure you like them.”

Oy.

Ann Romney, that insufferable Republican bitch, and wife to serial loser Mittsy Romney, is back in the spotlight saying her husband would have prevented the current ISIS mess … or made a fortune off of it … and then, when asked if Mittsy would run in 2016, she said, oh so sickeningly sweet, "We will see."

Let him run, and when he becomes a three-time loser maybe then this self-involved, out of touch, wannabe queen of America will shut her stinking piehole for good.

God, I loathe her.

UPDATE:

After an airman was unable to complete his reenlistment because he omitted the part of a required oath that states “so help me God,” the Air Force changed its instructions for the oath and, following a review of the policy by the Department of Defense General Counsel, the Air Force will now permit airmen to omit the phrase, should they so choose.

The change is effective immediately.

Good, since we are going back to war and will need as many military men and women as possible, eh?

Still, it was a stupid policy and it’s nice to see it ended so soon.

After arrest warrants were issued, three of the suspects involved in that mob gay bashing of a gay couple in Philadelphia turned themselves into police. They are: 

Kevin Harrigan, Kathryn Knott, and Philip Williams.

Most galling of all is that these three, and hopefully any and all others involved in the attack, will not be charged with committing a hate crime as Pennsylvania hate crimes laws don’t cover sexual orientation because, well, gay people are less than.

I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating: if you bash a couple because they are gay, that’s hate; if you bash a couple because you want their wallet, that’s hateful.

There is a difference.

Now, while I abhor violence of any kind, the more I read about what these f&kmonkeys did, and especially read Kathryn Knott’s homophobic Tweets, I wish the punishment would be that they endure the exact same public beating they gave that couple.

And then lock them up for a good long while.

New TV season Hottie Alert:

Ioan Griffudd, of ABCs Forever about an immortal man who works in a morgue and dies every episode only to be brought back to life. It’s like Sherlock Holmes, who never dies. But Ioan is adorable with a delicious accent, so we’ll stick around for a while with this one.

And Las Alonzo, from The Mysteries of Laura AKA Grace Adler is a Cop Now. The show is cute, kinda funny, kinda serious, but I fell it could be wearing thin after a few views. But Las is definite eye candy while we watch.

Color me surprised, but a group of Texas county sheriffs and law enforcement officers have filed a brief with the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals this week in support of marriage equality.

Yes, in support of marriage equality.

The letter, filed by Harris County Sheriff Adrian Garcia, Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez, and more than 50 other Texans working in law enforcement, said, in part:

 “Gay and lesbian law enforcement officers and other first responders put on their uniforms, place themselves in harm’s way to protect and defend our communities, and swear to uphold our laws without prejudice or bias. … They serve our communities with equal distinction, skill, and bravery. But Texas denies these men and women the equal dignity and respect they deserve. Texas does not treat them equally in their day-to-day work, nor, tragically, even when they make the ultimate sacrifice.”

Good on Texas and good on law enforcement.

Fun Fact: President Obama and Tea Party Senator Ted Cruz are cousins—14^th cousins to be exact.

Picture that Thanksgiving dinner!

Oy.

Just in time for our wedding, new census data released last week makes a simple, but oh so substantial change in the ways that same-sex couples will be categorized now.

We are now considered families.

In prior years, the U.S. Census Bureau counted same-sex couples as “unmarried partners” — even if they were legally married — but starting with the new annual American Community Survey, same-sex couples will be counted in the family totals.

It sounds so minor, really, but it’s a huge deal; we are no longer co-habitators or partners or buddies or friends of the same-sex with benefits … we are family.

I might break out into a little Sister Sledge!

Overheard at work:

Racist, homophobic, idiotic Republican client: “What was all that protesting about climate change in New York? That’s just stupid. I say let Mother Nature take care of it.”

Me [to myself, way under my breath because I’ve learned not to poke the racist, homophobic, idiotic Republican client]: “That’s the problem you moron, Mother Nature is doing what she does because of what we’ve done.”

Asshat.

Random Musings

Overheard at Home: 
Bob: "Maya Angelou died today."
Carlos: "Oh. I'm sorry to hear that."
Bob: "Yeah, she had a pretty incredible life."
Carlos: "Now, which aunt is that — ?"
Bob: "What?"
Carlos: "Is that your aunt from Virginia?"
Goddess love him, eh?

I like a good beer, but I especially like one that tastes like equality.

Out in Idaho Crooked Fence Brewing has released a new brew taking aim at their anti-marriage equality governor, C.L. 'Butch' Otter. Their new India brown ale is being called "Little Bitch Otter."

Crooked Fence Brewing co-owner and marketing director Kelly Knopp:

"Anyone that is going to try to take away freedoms or not let someone be equal, Crooked Fence is against."

Knopp also says a portion of opening day sales will go directly to Add the Words Idaho, and the Pride Foundation.

Good brew!

I didn't watch Lifetime's Flowers in the Attic or the sequel Petals on the Wind because they sounded kinda stupid and kinda soft-core lady porn.

But then I saw actor Wyatt Nash, who co-stars in Petals, and, while I still won't watch it, i may be on the lookout for him.

Well, well, well, count me in.

The U.S. Census Bureau will start categorizing gay married couples as families. Gay married couples are families? Who knew?

The 2013 American Community Survey results, which will be reported in September, will, for the first time, integrate the estimated 180,000 same-sex married couples into the nation’s 56 million families.

We count! We really count!

Okay, so y’all know I’ve taken shots at Justin Bieber in this here bloggy thing because he’s kind of a spoiled little douche, a Sizzurp-slurping, weed-smoking, drag-racing, law-breaking, egg-tossing, fan-hating, misogynist, but, you know, every once in a while even a puissant like The Biebs does something right.

At a recent event for amfAR [American Foundation for AIDS Research] Bieber was listening as one man stepped up with a donation of $545,000 to the charity and he decided, quietly, to match the offer with his own 545K.

His act of generosity apparently stunned the crowd, and also stunned organizers who asked him if he was serious; he was.

I’ll give him props for that.

After cutting Jessica Urbina’s picture from the yearbook because she was wearing a tuxedo, the Sacred Heart Cathedral Prep school in San Francisco has apologized for their asshatted move.

School president John Scudder Jr. and Principal Gary Cannon applauded the students who stood up for, and stood by, Jessica:

“Given the nature of this specific case, we believe that decision, while conforming with our policy, was wrong.”

School officials now say the dress code will be updated to no longer require female students to wear dresses in an effort to be more sensitive every student’s gender identity.

Too bad, though, that Jessica won’t appear in this year’s yearbook.

I was surfing this here Interwebz and I came across this headline over at Towleroad:

‘CLUELESS' ACTRESS STACEY DASH JOINS FOX NEWS

Clueless, indeed. Sometimes these things just write themselves!

Florida … of course … Republican … naturally … Representative  Charles Van Zant has said that the American Institute for Research, a testing company administering new statewide tests for students, has a pro-homosexual agenda because it has done research on LGBT issues. 

Speaking at an education conference, Van Zant said the testing program would "attract every one of your children to become as homosexual as they possibly can."

Yeah, that old indoctrination lie. But it’s a Republican from Florida so did anyone really expect common sense, or even the truth?

Some of you may have noticed that I haven’t posted about 22-year-old Elliot Rodger’s murder spree in Santa Barbara last week.

Well, it’s because I’m tired. I’m tired of everyone getting all riled up about these things when they happen and demanding that gun laws change and then doing nothing about it. I am tired of our elected officials using these murders as a chance to speak about gun control and then go back to their cushy jobs and do nothing about it.

We don’t want gun control, as a nation, because if we did we would demand it, and we would vote out of office every single Republican, Democrat, Independent, and Teabagger who is in the pocket of the NRA. But we don’t, so we don’t care about gun control.

Until it hits close to home, as happened to Richard Martinez, whose son Christopher was murdered by Elliot Rodger. Martinez wants members of Congress and others to stop calling him to offer condolences for his son's death, and he wants them to do something:

"I don’t care about your sympathy. I don’t give a s— that you feel sorry for me. Get to work and do something. I’ll tell the president the same thing if he calls me. Getting a call from a politician doesn’t impress me. … They talk about gun rights. What about Chris' right to live?! When will this insanity stop? When will enough people say, 'Stop this madness?' We don't have to live like this! Too many have died. We should say to ourselves, 'Not. One. More.' … I’m angry with the leadership of the NRA who always want to characterize this as if it’s a lone madman. That it’s an act of nature we have to tolerate. I am angered by how they have worked to normalize this. … I will go anywhere and do anything to support political candidates who are running for office who are in favor of reasonable gun control. … You don’t need three handguns with 400 rounds (of ammunition). That’s crazy. It’s a matter of proportion.”

Hopefully Martinez, who is meeting with Elliot Rodger’s father to create a plan to have stricter gun laws enacted, will be the one to do something.

So we won’t have to hear about these stories again.

Now, onto some better news …

St. Paul’s Hospital in Vancouver, British Columbia, has shut down its dedicated AIDS ward, saying they no longer have enough patients — and the end of AIDS is in sight.

Ward 10C opened in February 1997 during the peak of the HIV and AIDS epidemic in Vancouver, when approximately one person was dying of AIDS every day. Earlier diagnosis of HIV, along with advances in treatment and care, has resulted in a significant decrease of AIDS. Patients living with HIV will continue to receive world-leading treatment and care. The focus of the ward will include treatment related to addictions such as various bacterial and viral infections like chronic hepatitis.

British Columbia's number of AIDS cases has dropped by 90% since 1995.

Perhaps an end is in sight?

And more good news …

Orange is the New Black actress and trans activist Laverne Cox will be the cover-girl on the June 9th issue of TIME Magazine and took to Facebook to spread the word:

“What a wonderful bday present! Yes today is my birthday and I am on the cover of @TIME magazine. I realize this is way bigger than me and about a tipping point in our nation's history where it is no longer acceptable for trans lives to be stigmatized, ridiculed, criminalized and disregarded. This is for my trans siblings out there and for anyone who has ever been told that who you know yourself to be at your core is not legitimate. You are who you know yourselves to be. #girlslikeus #whereislavernecox #lavernehive”

The times continue to change, eh?