I Didn't Say It

Eric Swalwell, Democrat Congressman from California, to his GOP counterparts regarding legislation that would raise the age limit for purchasing semi-automatic rifles from 18 to 21:

“Are you here for our kids, or are you here for the killers? Because if you were here for the kids, you would do all you could to protect the next school shooting that’s about to happen, and we know it’s gonna happen in America. You would vote to raise the age on purchasing an assault rifle, you would vote to ban high-capacity magazines, you would vote to require safe storage and you would vote to address ghost guns, which are ravaging communities across America. But if you’re here for the killers, you would do everything to make it easier for the next school shooting to happen.”

Or simply do nothing other than cash those NRA checks while offering meaningless prayers for the dead.

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Louie Gohmert, Texas GOP Congressman, responding to Swalwell:

“I don’t think that it’s very effective for the children to have people on the other side of the aisle come in and accuse Republicans of being complicit in murder. And that we put our right to kill over others’ right to live, to infer by rhetorical supposed questions, who are you here for, we must be here for the gunman, is an outrage. How dare you. You think we don’t have hearts? We care about people. We care about their lives, and lives have been so trivialized. We care deeply. How dare you. How dare you, you arrogant people, attributing murder to those of us that want to do things to stop it. Because we’ve seen what your ideas do, they create more murder.”

Democrats create murder? This from the party that sucks at the teat of the NRA, Loonie Louie, who has taken more than his fair share of blood money. This from Loonie Louie and his party who offer NO response other than arming teachers or doctors or more Americans as a solution to gun violence

The good news is that Loonie Louis Gohmert will be leaving Congress at the end of the year, hopefully to never be heard from again.

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Bill Cassidy, Louisiana GOP Senator, on a proposed ban on assault weapons … he’s against it:

“If you talk to the people that own it, killing feral pigs in the, whatever, the middle of Louisiana. They’ll wonder: ‘Why would you take it away from me?' I’m law abiding, I’ve never done anything, I use it to kill feral pigs. The action of a criminal deprives me of my right.”

What a typical NRA-loving GOP asshat who thinks there an explosion of feral pigs in Louisiana, and that the the only weapon capable of killing feral pigs is an assault weapon.

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Gabe Kapler, manager of the San Francisco Giants, speaking out about the United States of Guns:

“The day 19 children and 2 teachers were murdered, we held a moment of silence at sporting events around the country, then we played the national anthem, and we went on with our lives. Players, staff, and fans stood for the moment of silence, grieving the lives lost, and then we (myself included) continued to stand, proudly proclaiming ourselves the land of the free and the home of the brave. We didn’t stop to reflect on whether we are actually free and brave after this horrific event, we just stood at attention. When I was the same age as the children in Uvalde, my father taught me to stand for the pledge of allegiance when I believed my country was representing its people well or to protest and stay seated when it wasn’t. I don’t believe it is representing us well right now.

This particular time, an 18-year-old walked into a store, bought multiple assault rifles and hundreds of rounds of ammunition, walked into a school with an armed resource officer and its own police district and was able to murder children for nearly an hour. Parents begged and pleaded with police officers to do something, police officers who had weapons and who receive nearly 40% of the city’s funding, as their children were being murdered.

We elect our politicians to represent our interests. Immediately following this shooting, we were told we needed locked doors and armed teachers. We were given thoughts and prayers. We were told it could have been worse, and we just need love.

But we weren’t given bravery, and we aren’t free. The police on the scene put a mother in handcuffs as she begged them to go in and save her children. They blocked parents trying to organize to charge in to stop the shooter, including a father who learned his daughter was murdered while he argued with the cops. We aren’t free when politicians decide that the lobbyist and gun industries are more important than our children’s freedom to go to school without needing bulletproof backpacks and active shooter drills.

I’m often struck before our games by the lack of delivery of the promise of what our national anthem represents. We stand in honor of a country where we elect representatives to serve us, to thoughtfully consider and enact legislation that protects the interests of all the people in this country and to move this country forward towards the vision of the “shining city on the hill.” But instead, we thoughtlessly link our moment of silence and grief with the equally thoughtless display of celebration for a country that refuses to take up the concept of controlling the sale of weapons used nearly exclusively for the mass slaughter of human beings. We have our moment (over and over), and then we move on without demanding real change from the people we empower to make these changes. We stand, we bow our heads, and the people in power leave on recess, celebrating their own patriotism at every turn.

Every time I place my hand over my heart and remove my hat, I’m participating in a self-congratulatory glorification of the ONLY country where these mass shootings take place. On Wednesday, I walked out onto the field, I listened to the announcement as we honored the victims in Uvalde. I bowed my head. I stood for the national anthem. Metallica riffed on City Connect guitars.

My brain said drop to a knee; my body didn’t listen. I wanted to walk back inside; instead, I froze. I felt like a coward. I didn’t want to call attention to myself. I didn’t want to take away from the victims or their families. There was a baseball game, a rock band, the lights, the pageantry. I knew that thousands of people were using this game to escape the horrors of the world for just a little bit. I knew that thousands more wouldn’t understand the gesture and would take it as an offense to the military, to veterans, to themselves.

But I am not okay with the state of this country. I wish I hadn’t let my discomfort compromise my integrity. I wish that I could have demonstrated what I learned from my dad, that when you’re dissatisfied with your country, you let it be known through protest. The home of the brave should encourage this.”

That is everything Americans need to know.

That and registering to vote, and casting a vote against each and every politician who takes blood money from the NRA.

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The Funny Papers

Michael de Adder, Jack Ohman, Steve Breen, JD Crowe, Mike Luckovich, Matt Wuerker, Marc Murphy, David Horsey, Nick Anderson, Dave Whamond, Bill Day, John Darkow, Darrin Bell, Deb Milbrath, Clay Bennett, Bill Bramhall, Kevin Siers, 

Bobservations

A couple of years after buying this house, we had it painted but, for some reason, we never had the “barn”—folks around here say barn, we say shed—painted. Recently Carlos began giving English lessons to a Hispanic couple in kind of a bartered deal; lessons for painting the shed.

This week the barn shed went red, and it looks, I know, like a little barn. Carlos also wanted the interior painted white so he could see better when he went in there and we cleaned everything out.  But before putting things back, I suggested we thin that shed herd a bit and began separating things into piles of Keep, Toss, Donate.

There was an old fireplace screen we removed from the house. Habitat for Humanity. Check. Old boxes. Trash. Garden tools? Keep. A small tabletop charcoal grill. He says keep; I say donate. But, he says, we use that, and I say …

“Tell me one time in the last twenty years we used it, and remember, we don’t have charcoal or lighter fluid or anything for it.”

I think in Miami I cooked chicken on it once.”

So, sometime, over fourteen-and-a-half years ago, you slapped a chicken on the grill and you think we still need it?”

“It can go.”

This hoarding sense of his explains the cluster of 80s silk shirts in the back of the closet that he doesn’t wear but needs to keep … just in case.

PS She's kina purty now, isn't she?

Tuxedo never went to school, and so he doesn’t know from mathematics, but even he can see how this seems all kinds of wrong!

Last weekend the San Francisco Giants became the very first Major League Baseball team to incorporate LGBTQ+ Pride colors into their on-field uniforms.

In honor of Pride month, players will sport an SF logo Pride Patch on the right sleeve of their home jersey as well as a custom cap with the 11 colors of the Progress Pride Flag, which incorporates black, brown and the transgender pride flag colors with the original six rainbow stripes.

Bravo!

Why don’t these anti-choice politicians and states just use “thoughts and prayers” to stop abortions. I mean, that’s what they do when people murder actual live children in schools.

Just a thought.

The twice-impeached, one-term loser’s blog, where he shared his thought [singular] after larger social media companies banned him from their platforms, has been permanently shut down.

His people made some excuse about it being planned to shut it down, but it had only been a month and was getting less traffic than my little bloggy thing here.

Sorry not sorry.

JP Morgan Chase & Co will resume making political donations to U.S. lawmakers … but not to any Republicans who voted to overturn President Biden’s election victory.

Good. Hit ‘em in the only real place their care about, their wallets.

In other Thing #45 news, he is set to do a series of rallies around the country will fellow sexual assaulter Bill O’Reilly that I have dubbed Sexual Predator-a-Palooza.

And I hear Matt Gaetz is going to open for them.

This week, during a House Natural Resources hearing, Texas Representative Louie Loonie Gohmert asked if the Forest Service or the BLM [Bureau of Land Management] can alter the orbit of the moon or the Earth in order to fight climate change.

Gohmert represents 725,000 Americans, just so you know.

Alex Sewall is a 30-year-old model from Chicago, and a former football player at Indiana State University, who played for a brief time in arena football before beginning a modeling career.

Alex also is very smart, noting that his ass … and it’s real and it’s spectacular is “is usually the thing that gets the most comments and compliments” and he has no problems showing skin.

He seems to love his country, he seems to love music, and he appears to like the sports ball things. Plus, any man that can pull off a hat, after pulling off everything else, is all right in my book.

That’s all.

I Didn't Say It ...

Nancy Pelosi, paying tribute to John Lewis, the “conscience of the U.S. Senate.” as he lies in state at the Capitol:

“When he made his speech [at the March on Washington] 57 years ago, he was the youngest speaker. How fitting it is that in the final days of his life, he summoned the strength to acknowledge the young people peacefully protesting in the same spirit of that march, taking up the unfinished work of racial justice. Helping complete the journey begun more than 55 years ago.”

The best thing we can do to honor and remember Lewis is to stand up, speak up and vote.

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Louie Gohmert, the GOP loon and anti-masker from Texas, blaming his positive test for Covid-19 on wearing a mask:

“It’s really ironic because a lot of people have made a big deal out of my not wearing a mask a whole lot but in the last week or two I have worn a mask more than I have the whole last four months. … I can’t help but wonder if by keeping a mask on and keeping it in place, if I might have put some germs… some of the virus on the mask and breathed it in… But the reports of my demise are very premature.”

Stupid, stupid man you have representing you Texas.

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Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious diseases expert, on _____’s assertion that he had mislead Americans about Covid-19:

“I don’t know how to address that. I’m just going to certainly continue doing my job. I don’t tweet. I don’t even read them, so I don’t really want to go there. I just will continue to do my job no matter what comes out because I think it’s very important. We’re in the middle of a crisis with regard to a pandemic. This is what I do, this is what I’ve been trained for all my professional life and I’ll continue to do it…I have not been misleading the American public under any circumstances.”

Gosh, who to believe? The medical expert, the college educated doctor, or the fuckwit who believes in Demon Sperm and drinking bleach?

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Anderson Cooper, CNN, taking _____ to task for defending a Houston doctor/minister who touts hydroxychloroquine as a “cure” for Covid-19 and how witches and demons use astral projection to have intercourse with humans from afar:

“Once again, today, he did have plenty to say about this woman who he has praised for her public embrace of hydroxychloroquine. She is a doctor who also preaches about alien DNA and the sperm of demons … [and] … she’s part of a group of doctors talking about unproven and… potentially dangerous Covid treatments. He would not or could not face questioning the support of this person he knows nothing about and today he made no mention of demon sex but like a man possessed, he was still praising her. ‘I’m impressed with her; he says, ‘I know nothing about her’ he says. It been 24 hours and if the president did want to know something about this person that he is now promoting on a global stage, he’s had plenty of time to Google her or have someone else do it and tell him about her and the demon sex and astral sex. Hard to imagine this president’s ears wouldn’t perk up with those topics. Clearly, what doesn’t interest him is medical studies and the action of the FDA removing authorization of the drugs she’s touting. What clearly doesn’t interest the president is scientists and guidelines on social distancing or wearing masks. Things that actually can save lives.”

Our new death rate is One American Per Minute thanks to the continuing ineptitude of the man who said he alone can fix anything.

So much winning.

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Madonna, on the Demon Semen Doctor:

“The Truth will set us all Free! But some people dont [sic] want to hear the truth. Especially the people in power who stand to make money from this long drawn out search for a vaccine. Which has been proven and has been available for months. They would rather let fear control them and let the rich get richer and the poor and sick get sicker. This woman is my hero. Thank you Stella Immanuel.”

Gurl, stick to what I would loosely call singing. Or, maybe just go back to taking semi-nude photos in your tub. Or is it that Demon Semen Doc is the one who's been doing all your recent plastic surgery?

Seriously.

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Seth Meyers, Later Night host, with his own take on Dr. Demon Sperm:

“As the coronavirus pandemic has spread out of control, so has misinformation about it. If you have Facebook, or an uncle who still wears his class ring, you’ve probably heard some of it. [But] believe me, we all wish hydroxychloroquine actually worked. Everyone wishes there was a cure for coronavirus. No one wants to be trapped inside for this long …[But] demon sperm sounds like a catchphrase on Church Chat After Dark. Seriously, who on Earth could possibly trust a doctor like this? _____ won’t listen to the renowned infectious disease expert who actually works for him, but he loves the demon sperm lady.” 

Perhaps had he taken his own SATs and failed miserably and never got into college and became the fat orange blob that works a loading dock at a big box store and spends the weekend getting drunk and choking his mushroom shaped chicken to high school pictures of his hooker daughter Ivanka, we wouldn’t be in this mess.

So, naturally, I’m’a blame the guy who took the test for _____.

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South Carolina Republican Wants Pride Flags Taken Down

So much going on in politics, scandals and scandals, sex and political, and all at the feet of the Fat Bastard. So, you know the politicians in charge would be doing something about it, right?

Not if you’re a politician from South Carolina—where it’s not the heat, it’s the stupidity. Nope, Republican Congressman Jeff Duncan has introduced legislation that aims to bar U.S. embassies from flying the Pride flag in recognition of the LGBT community.

Duncan quietly introduced the measure—because homophobes fear the light—which seeks to “prohibit the flying of any flag other than the United States flag over United States diplomatic and consular posts, and for other purposes.” Now, we have the title of the legislation … H.R.6450 … but the full text of the legislation isn’t online at the Library of Congress website—again, homophobes fear the light—and Jeff Duncan’s office isn’t responding to questions from the media.

However, Ian Thompson, legislative director of the American Civil Liberties Union [ACLU] is talking and he says, based on the title of the legislation, the measure seems aimed at barring U.S. embassies from flying Pride flags, though the wording isn’t specific to the Pride flag:

“[But] that is clearly the motivation for this ridiculous, petty bill. It is telling that many of the most doggedly anti-LGBTQ members of the House of Representatives are co-sponsors.”

Those thirty-three co-sponsors include a plethora of the most wacknut, anti-LGBT lunatics in Congress, from Republican Vicky Hartzler, Missouri, to Republican Steve King, Iowa, Republican in the midst of a sex scandal, Jim Jordan, Ohio, and Republican, and certifiable asshat, Louie Gohmert of Texas.

Before now the flying of Pride flags at U.S. embassies has become common as a sign of U.S. solidarity with the LGBT community overseas and just days ago, for the first time ever, the U.S. embassy in Belize raised the Pride flag in support of LGBT people in that country. 

But Jeff Duncan is still trying to lie about his little legislation:

“The United States flag is the single greatest symbol of freedom the world has ever known, and there’s no reason for anything but Old Glory to be flying over our embassies and posts around the globe.”

Except to show that this country, under most presidents, except the amoral traitorous kind that Duncan, Hartzler, King, Jordan and Gohmert, support, this country is proud of its LGBTQ citizens.

But hey, what’s a little hate from the GOP? It’s business as usual.

Washington Blade

Random Musings

Well, that didn’t take long … just a one day after endorsing Donald [t]Rump, House Speaker Paul Ryan disavowed the GOP nominee’s accusations of bias against Gonzalo Curiel, the judge in the Trump U case, because of his “Mexican heritage”:

“It’s reasoning I don’t relate to. I completely disagree with the thinking behind that.”

He may have added, “I mean, if the judge was gay that’s another story,” though I cannot verify that at this point.

In addition, even Senate Majority Leader Mitch McTurtle, er, McConnell said Trump should be doing more to unite Republicans. But McTurtle, who would never say anything bad about a Republican, added that he was unfamiliar with Trump’s comments about the judge.

Really, McTurtle? Pick up a paper every now and again you moron!

And speaking of [T]Rump, after calling a reporter a sleazebag — and let’s not discuss how unpresidential that is — last week, the Love Gloves the media used on [t]Rump are off.

As evidenced by that CNN news scroll from last week when they blatantly called the GOP gasbag a liar.

Loving it!

There are as many reasons people think being gay is bad and sick and dirty and perverted and against God, as there are reason for justifying why people hate The Gays, but this one is just about the craziest one yet. And the fact that it comes from Texas wingnut Congressman Louie Gohmert comes as no surprise.

In a speech on the House floor last week, Gohmert went down to the subbasement of stupid by arguing that continued discrimination of LGBT people is necessary to, ahem, save the future of mankind! His theory? Glad you asked …

Say a meteor is hurtling toward Earth and we are all in danger of extinction. Wouldn’t we try and find a way to save ourselves like by, maybe, building a rocketship to take everyone to Mars so we can start over and colonize the Red Planet?

Well, Gohmert figures we’d need about 40 people to go to Mars to start over — though how he came up with forty he isn’t saying — but, as Gohmert says, if we can’t discriminate against LGBT people, then what happens if all the people on the spaceship are gay?

You know, because gay women cannot give birth to children and gay men cannot get women pregnant, and we all know that heterosexual people, whilst repopulating Mars would never ever give birth to a person who was born gay.

To me, the only way to insure the safety of mankind, should a meteor come crashing though our atmosphere, is to aim it at Louie’s house and rid the planet of stupid.

Javier Raya, a twenty-five year old Olympic figure skater from Spain, has come out as gay in a new-fashioned way … by posting a picture to Instagram of him kissing his boyfriend Andrew Nicholson:

And then adding:

“Many of you know, others can imagine by the pictures and others will be surprised, but I have to say that right now I feel like the luckiest person in the world! Thank you!”

The photo was posted three weeks ago, but did not get much attention outside of the Spanish media but coming on the heels of that other Spanish athlete, Olympic water polo player Victor Gutierrez, coming out as gay last week, suddenly Javier is news and out and proud.

And the recipient of the HOMO HQ Coming Out Toaster Oven and a copy of The Gay Agenda.

Welcome out, Javier!

Well, it looks like it’s on North Carolina … because last week Renee Ellmers, a  Republican Congresswoman, a [t]Rump supporter, and lover of the state’s anti-trans HB2 law has become the GOP’s first incumbent to lose in a primary this year.

Yup, Ellmers, who backed North Carolina’s constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, who supported bills to prevent military chaplains from officiating same-sex marriages and who endorsed efforts to defend the Defense of Marriage Act, lost her seat to fellow GOP Congressman George Holding.

You’re on the right path, North Carolina; send all the haters packing.

In celebration of LGBT Pride month, the NBA has unveiled a new collection of rainbow t-shirts and all the proceeds will go to GLSEN-- Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network.

GLSEN executive director Eliza Byard:

“Professional sports showing up for LGBT people is one of the biggest cultural developments of the last decade, and really the last five years. The NBA has been showing up for LGBT youth and for GLSEN for a number of years. Having this be a league-wide initiative, knowing any LGBT fan in the country can choose to celebrate their team and themselves with one of those shirts, that’s a whole new thing.”

Good on the NBA for recognizing that even The Gays, well, some of the gays because I don’t follow the volleyball, love them some sports.

Or men in sports, maybe?

So, I watched a new show the other night, based on a comic book, or so I was told. It’s called Preacher, and it stars the scorchingly hot Dominic Cooper, top, as a priest who gets infected by an alien something or other and can now make people do things for him … or something.

The first episode was ultra-violent and when I see a way to do film a scene showing a man rip his own heart out of his chest without the actual visuals and still make it scary and violent, well, sorry Dominic, even your hotness won’t lure me back; but we’ll always have episode one.

I also watched Saint Laurent, about fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent and it stared French actor, and scorchingly hot and hotter, Gaspard Ulliel, bottom left. I am now officially obsessed and it’s not just because of Gaspard’s very impressive nude scene in the film. Really … it’s not!

We also watched Hunters, about a US terrorism unit tracking down extra-terrestrial terrorists. It started off good, and there was some gore — though not the literally ripping your heart out of your chest variety — and stars beefy Aussie actor Mark Coles Smith, bottom right, who might be a mole in the terrorism unit … meaning he’s one of them.

Good hot stuff, I say.

Remember when Lindsey Graham went after Donald [t] Rump and said he was the worst possible choice for president? And then, once [t]Rump sent all his opponents packing Miss Lindsey tentatively leaned out towards [t]Rump to kiss his ass, er, ring? Well, now Miss Lindsey ain’t playing any more and says she will not vote for The [t]Rump and is publicly encouraging Republicans to unendorse the Bigot:

“If anybody was looking for an off-ramp, this is probably it.”

And add Illinois Senator Mark Kirk to that list because now he says he will not endorse the GOP nominee either:

“It is absolutely essential that we are guided by a commander-in-chief with a responsible and proper temperament, discretion and judgment. Our president must be fit to command the most powerful military the world has ever seen, including an arsenal of thousands of nuclear weapons.”

Infighting is fun.

Sidenote: is it me, or did Mark Kirk steal some of his objections about [t]Rump from Hillary’s foreign policy speech? Maybe that's who he's voting for? Just sayin’.

Up there to Canada, they are looking to make their national anthem gender neutral: 

“Bill C-210, which passed 219 to 79, proposes to switch just two words in the lyrics of ‘O Canada’ — changing “in all thy sons command” to “in all of us command” in one verse. The simple substitution is meant to do away with the exclusively male phrasing in part of the song, but it’s also causing an uproar among some conservative members of Canada’s government.”

You know, because conservatives think in terms of men only.

And I’m the gay one? Hee hee … one.