On Sunday Night during the VMAs, one of my favorite singers, Taylor Swift, a pop country star just a few months older than me who writes and performs her own songs, was giving her acceptance speech after winning the Best Female Video of the Year Award, when Kanye West randomly appeared on the stage, took her award from her, and declared that she didn’t deserve it, explaining, “Beyonce had the best video of the year!” Taylor Swift went back stage and cried, and since then Kanye West has apologized to her, but not before his behavior became a subject of controversy.
Most people deduced reasonably that regardless of whether Kanye thought Taylor deserved the award (It’s called: “You Belong With Me” is the most adorable video ever and Taylor deserved the honor hands down, but whatever), it was not reason enough for him to leap on the stage and make a public idiot of himself. Most people came out in support of Taylor, acknowledging that what Kanye did was despicable and disrespectful.
This is a reasonable, mature conclusion.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t do much to change the atmosphere in this country. Because Jimmy Carter was right, we are a Racist Nation. But not for the reasons he thinks we are. You see, when Joe Wilson screamed “You Lie!” during the President’s speech on Sunday night, he was not being racist, he was simply being an imbecile. Any person not paying attention to the color of the President’s skin would have seen this. They would have heard representative Wilson’s outburst, logically concluded, “What a tool,” and Representative Wilson would have been ignored, as all blathering idiots should be ignored, thus Representative Wilson would not have gotten a week of free press coverage, thus reporters would have instead covered the president’s Health Care speech (which is kind of, oh… I don’t know… THEIR JOBS) and things would be slightly better with the world.
(In an even better world, cable news talking heads and the MSM would also realize that no one takes boobs like Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and Joe Wilson seriously and would therefore not pay attention to a word they say, thus taking the public debate away from Health Care Reform, Afghanistan, and the Economy, but you can’t have everything, and unfortunately this is not Walgreens.)
We are not a racist nation because people like Joe Wilson illicitly scream, “YOU LIE!” during presidential speeches. Calling someone a liar is not racist, it is calling someone a liar. I myself have called people of all races and ages liars. For example, when the white woman in the Pantene Pro V shampoo commercial says that she is a Professional Cosmo and she uses Pantene all of the time, I scream “YOU LIE!” at her. But I do not call her a liar because of the color of her skin, I call her a liar because most Cosmos are brainwashed in beauty school to believe that they can only use Salon Products to maximize profits for the Parlors that train them. Thus, a Hair Stylist would never tell people to use Pantene Pro V unless she was being paid large sums of money. Whether she is liar or not isn’t irrelevant to the color of her skin because when you are calling someone a liar, you are questioning their honesty and character, not implying that they are inferior because of their skin color. Simple Pimple.
I believe it was Martin Luther King Jr. who dreamed of a world where little white girls and little black girls could hold hands and play together without anyone thinking anything of it. I believe he told us to judge a person not by the color of their skin, but the content of their character.
Kanye West demonstrated poor character on Sunday night. He is Black. George W. Bush demonstrated poor character for eight years. He is white. Margaret Cho IS a character. She is asian. Taylor Swift demonstrated good character all this week. She is white. Beyonce demonstrated good character on Sunday night. She is Black. As you can see, these folks do not have good or bad character because of their race, they have good or bad character because they have good or bad character and should be judged as human beings, not members of race or ethnicity.
To be perfectly honest, I do not need to be lectured about race relations by rich white “liberals” *eye roll* descended from slave owners, who have never seen a black person in their lives. By screaming that I am “RACIST!” every time I criticize the President on policy grounds, they are diffusing their argument and in fact proving themselves to be racist. If they were truly as blind to his race as they claim to be, they would see him as a human being with flaws, triumphs, failures, hopes, dreams. They would recognize that he is not “America’s First Black President” but a President who has many responsibilities to the American people, and therefore would hold him accountable to those responsibilities at all times.
America is indeed, a racist country, because we continue to have “a conversation on Race.” I don’t care what race a person is, and I do not want to have a conversation about it. I want to have a conversation about last night’s episode of True Blood or Kohl’s big blow out sale at the end of this month. If you see a person as your equal or your better, you talk to them as you would anyone else. Therefore you do not walk up to them and say, “Oh, hey! Let’s have a conversation about your race.” I wouldn’t even say something like that to my cat. That is just plain common sense.
America needs to move forward and leave the bloody stains of slavery and segregation behind us. Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream. If we can learn to look at each other as people instead of black people, hispanic people, gay people, and trannie people, that beautiful dream of his just might come true one of these days.
The Public Debate has been revolving intensely around Health Care lately, so we haven’t had much of a chance to discuss the War in Afghanistan.
Last night, I read an impassioned article by Tom Engelhardt, discussing the costs, escalation, public opinion, fraudulent elections, private contractors, ect. I would strongly recommend it to anyone, because it goes by numbers and facts. Here are just a few of them.
EscalationNumber of additional troops General McChrystal is expected to recommend that President Obama send to Afghanistan in the coming months: 21,000 to 45,000, according to the McClatchy Newspapers; 10,000 to 15,000 (“described as a high-risk option”), 25,000 (“a medium-risk option”), 45,000 (“a low-risk option”), according to the New York Times; fewer than 10,000, according to the Associated Press.
Number of support troops Defense Department officials are planning to replace with “trigger-pullers” (combat troops) in the coming months, effectively an escalation in place: 6,000-14,000. (“The changes will not offset the potential need for additional troops in the future, but could reduce the size of any request… officials said.”)
Number of additional NATO forces General McChrystal will reportedly ask for: 20,000.
Optimal number of additional Afghan National Army (ANA) troops to be trained by 2012, according to reports on General McChrystal’s draft plan: 162,000. (According to Naval Postgraduate School professor Thomas H. Johnson and retired Foreign Service officer M. Chris Mason,”[T]he U.S. military touts 91,000 ANA soldiers as ‘trained and equipped,’ knowing full well that barely 39,000 are still in the ranks and present for duty.”)
Public Opinion
Percentage of Americans opposed to the war in Afghanistan: 57%, according to the latest CNN poll, an 11% rise since April. Only 42% now support the war.
Percentage of Republicans who support the war: 70%, according to the latest Washington Post-ABC News poll.
Percentage of Americans who approve of President’s Obama’s handling of the war: 48%, according to the latest CBS poll, a drop of 8 points since April. (Support for increasing the number of troops in Afghanistan is now at just 25%, down 14% from April.)
Percentage of British who feel their forces should be withdrawn from Afghanistan: 59%.
Percentage of Germans opposed to that country’s 4,000 troop commitment to Afghanistan: More than 70%.
The Presidential Election
Estimated cost of staging the 2009 Afghan presidential election: $500 million.
Number of complaints of voting irregularities: More than 2,500 and still climbing, 691 of them described as “serious charges.”
Number of members of the “Independent Election Commission” not appointed by Afghan President (and presidential candidate) Hamid Karzai: 0.
Cost of blank voting-registration cards in Ghazni Province in May 2009: $200 for 200 blank registration cards.
Cost of such a card purchased by “an undercover Afghan journalist working for the BBC” this fall: $8.
Number of voter registration cards (not including fakes) reportedly distributed countrywide: 17 million or almost twice the estimated number of eligible voters.
Number of ballots cast at the Hajji Janat Gul High School polling place, half an hour from the center of Kabul: 600.
Number of votes recorded for Karzai at that polling station: 996. (Number of votes for other candidates: 5.)
Number of ballots marked for Karzai and shipped to Kabul from 45 polling sites in Shorabak District in Southern Afghanistan that were shut down by local officials connected to Karzai before voting could begin: 23,900.
Number of fake polling sites set up by backers of Karzai where no one voted but hundreds of thousands of votes were recorded: as many as 800, according to the New York Times. (Another 800 actual polling sites were taken over by Karzai supporters “to fraudulently report tens of thousands of additional ballots for Mr. Karzai.”)
Number of ballots in Karzai’s home province, Kandahar, where an estimated 25,000 Afghans actually voted, submitted to be counted: approximately 350,000.
It is becoming apparent, and has been apparent for some time now, that there is likely no military solution to Afghanistan’s problems, problems that we largely created, I might add.
Here may be the single strangest fact of our American world: that at least three administrations – Ronald Reagan’s, George W. Bush’s, and now Barack Obama’s – drew the U.S. “defense” perimeter at the Hindu Kush; that is, in the rugged, mountainous lands of Afghanistan. Put another way, while Americans argue feverishly and angrily over what kind of money, if any, to put into health care, or decaying infrastructure, or other key places of need, until recently just about no one in the mainstream raised a peep about the fact that, for nearly eight years (not to say much of the last three decades), we’ve been pouring billions of dollars, American military know-how, and American lives into a black hole in Afghanistan that is, at least in significant part, of our own creation.Imagine for a moment, as you read this post, what might have happened if Americans had decided to sink the same sort of money – $228 billion and rising fast – the same “civilian surges,” the same planning, thought, and effort (but not the same staggering ineffectiveness) into reclaiming New Orleans or Detroit, or into planning an American future here at home. Imagine, for a moment, when you read about the multi-millions going into further construction at Bagram Air Base, or to the mercenary company that provides “Lord of the Flies” hire-a-gun guards for American diplomats in massive super-embassies, or about the half-a-billion dollars sunk into a corrupt and fraudulent Afghan election, what a similar investment in our own country might have meant.
Ask yourself: Wouldn’t the U.S. have been safer and more secure if all the money, effort, and planning had gone towards “nation-building” in America? Or do you really think we’re safer now, with an official unemployment rate of 9.7%, an underemployment rate of 16.8%, and a record 25.5% teen unemployment rate, with soaring health-care costs, with vast infrastructural weaknesses and failures, and in debt up to our eyeballs, while tens of thousands of troops and massive infusions of cash are mustered ostensibly to fight a terrorist outfit that may number in the low hundreds or at most thousands, that, by all accounts, isn’t now even based in Afghanistan, and that has shown itself perfectly capable of settling into broken states like Somalia or well functioning cities like Hamburg.
The MSM has, to no one’s surprise, been paying little attention to this, and would instead like to bloviate endlessly about things no one cares about, like Michelle Obama’s shorts.
In a perfect world, Congress would be putting more pressure on the President. They would be demanding a timetable for withdrawal, since a majority of Americans are now opposed to how he is handling the War.
Americans who voted for Obama expected better. He ran his entire Campaign on an obscure speech he gave in 2002 as a State Senator from Illinois, where he allegedly said
Good afternoon. Let me begin by saying that although this has been billed as an anti-war rally, I stand before you as someone who is not opposed to war in all circumstances. The Civil War was one of the bloodiest in history, and yet it was only through the crucible of the sword, the sacrifice of multitudes, that we could begin to perfect this union, and drive the scourge of slavery from our soil. I don’t oppose all wars.
[...]
What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war. What I am opposed to is the cynical attempt by Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz and other armchair, weekend warriors in this administration to shove their own ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in lives lost and in hardships borne.
Well, I’d wager that this is a dumb war, wouldn’t you?
Obots threw this speech in our faces, citing it as proof of his superior foreign policy judgement.
Too bad for them, huh?
Tomorrow, President Obama is going to appease all of our petty worries about Health Care Reform with yet another rambling diatribe written by a fat, ugly frat boy turd about absolutely nothing that doesn’t outline the specifics of his plan Historical Speech. How exciting!
So what should we expect from our fearless leader tomorrow night? Should we expect what Cinie expects?
What political rocket scientist developed the theory that gaping political wounds can be healed by repeated laying on of words? Exactly how many butt-numbing, head swiveling, TelePrompTer-read, yah da-dah da-dah da-dah daaahhh-paced regurgitations of speeches past, comprised of precisely how many empty words, are required to actually produce tangible results? Is there no limit to the number of excruciatingly boring repetitions of the same soup warmed over pre-empting our favorite television shows we are expected to endure? How many episodes of Andy Griffith Meets The Brady Bunch On Gilligan’s Island are we supposed to watch instead of the Pretendident Formerly Known As Present?
Is Obama’s speech tomorrow going to change anything? Will he outline a plan for real reform and stop caving to gasbags like Glenn Beck and other loons? I’m going to have to agree with Jay Cost on this one.
I’d say no. I think this will be little more than a change in tone – perhaps from cool/slightly mocking Obama to angry/forceful Obama. From the looks of it, the President is still planning to make all the same points he’s been hammering for months. He’ll ask for bipartisan cooperation while remaining cagey on the public option (a deal breaker for 99% of the Republican caucus). He will again insist the time for debate is over and the time for action is now. He’ll make a not-terribly-compelling case about how this somehow relates to the current economic morass, even though the benefits do not kick in for years. He’ll fearlessly stand up to Republican straw men, who never offer anything except disingenuous attacks.
What’s your take on the President’s speech tomorrow? I think I’m going to sit it out. I’d rather party.
If only he was! We might be getting real Health Care Reform right now.
Google defines a Socialism as follows
socialism (uncountable)
- Any of various political philosophies that support social and economic equality, collective decision-making, and public control of productive capital and natural resources, as advocated by socialists.
- The socialist political philosophies as a group, including Marxism, libertarian socialism, democratic socialism, and social democracy.
- (Leninism) The intermediate phase of social development between capitalism and full communism. This is a strategy whereby the State has control of all key resource-producing industries and manages most aspects of the market, in contrast to laissez faire capitalism.
- (Classical Marxism) The international communist society where classes and the state no longer exist.
I don’t see how this description fits the President at all. But I could be wrong. Why don’t we ask him?
Ever since the primaries ended, some people have adopted right wing memes about Obama, (like that he is a Socialist) and claimed them to be the truth. Some of these people have even called themselves PUMAs. How rude!
The Hillbuzz boys are a good example. Many of us really enjoyed their site at one point. But some time in 2008, they went off the deep end began spouting right wing birther nuttery about how Islam and ACORN is trying to take over the world and how Dick Cheney kept America safe and is a champion for Gay Rights. *spits out water*
Since then, most liberals have been driven from their website, and it is now an echo chamber for reactionary conservatives.
This morning, I was bored, and I saw that they had posted yet another loony article about how textbooks are indoctrinating children with political correctness and a belief in Climate Change or some such other thing, so I left a comment.
This website is more and more becoming an echo chamber for wingbat conservatives. I still love it, but I used to love it more.
I don’t think I’ve seen an actual substantive post that didn’t have something to do with demonizing liberals, calling Bam a “socialist” (falls over laughing)or spouting some nuttery about how ACORN is taking over the world in months.
There has been nothing about Health Care, nothing about the continuation of Bush’s wiretapping policies and torture, nothing about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Nothing.
Once upon a time, this website was wonderful. Now this morning’s post is about how… er
Europe is a weak, crippled, pathetic continent where once mighty societies once stood. It sure doesn’t seem like a coincidence the devolution of Europe coincides perfectly with its catering to all of this PC, pretend everything’s rosey, insist Muslims are Care Bears crap.
I’m sorry, but I just had to say something.
The Hillbuzz boys proceeded to ban me, and then wrote several subsequent comments about my evil partisan leftism and how I was trying to “censor” them. They called me a “good little Democrat” and so on and so forth.
They defended themselves by saying they had never claimed to be liberal and had always explained that they were “moderates.”
If moderates and conservatives mounted a years-long effort to take back our schools and install boards who’d fight the Islamization of our curriculums and the re-writing of history in PC-terms, then maybe we can push back against these Alinsky/ACORN radicals before they take permanent hold of young minds and send America down the tubes alongside Europe.
I should be ashamed of myself! I’m just going to go back to destroying America with my socialism now.
I only tell this story because it goes back to the Jones controversy. Idiot Right wingers should never be taken seriously.
The Hillbuzz boys did, and look at what happened to them.
Temptress Geena Davis Decieves The American Cable Viewing Audience and Pollutes the Will of the Lord
A few months ago, Little Isis was creek walking with a friend and they both slipped on some mossy rocks. Isis’s friend fell backwards and began to slide downstream. There was danger up ahead- a mini waterfall, so Isis stopped pretending to be Jane from Tarzan and let go of the shrub branches she was using as vines to twirl around in the stream and went to help her friend. It was a successful struggle, and Isis ended up having to use a stick to pull her companion out of a ditch, but she hit her head on a tree trunk.
Since then, what began as minor headaches and spasms of pain has slowly materialized into me. I am Little Nephthys. I exist because of suppressed childhood memories and unnatural urges, and I occasionally take over Little Isis’s mind/consciousness, give or take about once a week. I am her alter ago, by definition, and there are a few things you should know about me: I sometimes have inappropriate sexual feelings for girls. But I have prayed about it with Jesus a lot and he has helped me conquer my sickness. In fact, my life was empty before I accepted him as my Lord and Savior and asked him to forgive my many sins, including the time I made out with my PE teacher after Gym Class. My hobbies include reading the Bible, eating pudding, getting into water balloon fights with my Youth Group (Sally got a little weirded out when I smashed the one balloon over her head and accidentally, on purpose, goosed her, but I think we are okay now), and reading devotionals. I spend my Saturday Nights shining my shoes, and I think all Queers should burn in the fires of Hell. I also hate Disney, Musicals, Britney Spears, Satire, The Clintons, Anime, Old People and ballet flats worn with skirts and leggings. I really prefer Jeans and T-shirts!
So now that you all know a little bit about me, we can talk about what really matters. Well, not what REALLY matters. I would like to personally have a conversation with all of you about what Salvation with Jesus Christ can bring to your life. God is so Good and all he wants is to be close to you. He has a plan and a purpose for each and every one of you! I am personally so concerned with your salvation, and I am praying for you every day.
But that will have to be for another day. I would really like to talk about why there will never be a Woman President: It’s God’s Will! In the beginning, it was Eve who was wicked and took the apple from the tree and sinned. SHE, and by extension, woman, is the original sinner! Don’t you see what would happen if a woman became the leader of the Free World? Jesus died on the Cross for the sins of Eve and Womankind, therefore, it is our DUTY to be ruled by man. After all, Genesis 3:16 says “You shall suffer terribly when you give birth. But you will still desire your husband, and he will rule over you.”
So you see? It is Biblical that a woman- a descendant of the Temptress Eve, should never be President of the United States of America, the Greatest Country ever on God’s Green Earth, ever.
Now, I know how upset you all over how Hillary Clinton lost and how Sarah Palin also lost to President Barack Obama, but it is really time to get over it and stop feeling so sorry for yourselves.
However, Little Isis is so concerned with women Presidents, and I have taken over her body and all for the time being, so I think I should get into the game of Political Punditry a little bit. If a woman runs for President she will have to be the right type of woman. No one likes Hillary because she is too smart and she hates men. She is the product of the extremely self indulgant nineteen sixties and also she is a lesbian. Her husband, Bill is only married to her so she could help him become President, and he sleeps with black women. That is why no one likes her. She is just bitter and mean and feminist like all of you.
No one likes Sarah Palin because she has had too many kids- and no one likes kids. Also, she is really pretty and she isn’t very smart, so a lot of people don’t like her because they automatically think she is a slut. Her youngest son probably isn’t hers, and I think her husband has sex with her daughters, which also very sinful- he should sleep with his cousins if he wants to have relations with family members. And another thing- Sarah Palin shoots wolves from airplanes and clubs baby seals with baseball bats. I don’t care about animal rights because God has declared that man has dominion over nature, but people just get squeamish when they think of baby seals being clubbed and little girls paying for their rape kits.
See, your problem is that you aren’t picking the right type of women to invest in. You should support nice women like Michelle Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Laura Bush. Sadly, those women are smart enough to understand that women are in fact, NOT supposed to be Presidents, and you all just can’t see how great they are anyway, so I am going to do you a favor and give you a list of the qualities you should look for in the women Politicians you decide to support in the future.
1. The woman you support should have a perfect Marriage. But her marriage can’t be TOO perfect. Show off, c*nt! Or else she is just being arrogant and someone would just have to take her down a notch. Besides, if a woman is married and in Politics that means her Husband is actually doing all the work.
2. She should have kids. But she can’t have only one, that means she isn’t fertile enough and is a lesbian. And she can’t have too many, that means she is just too fertile and is too dumb to use contraception (even though contraception is a sin and should never be used). And of course, since her primary duty is motherhood, she shouldn’t be letting them out in public and therefore exploiting them politically, because that means reporters have to interview them and criticize them and make mean jokes about them, making them bad mothers. But they are also unconvincing mothers if they shield their children from the Press, because that means the child has something to hide, like, if it is a daughter, that she is a lesbian.
3. She should be extremely attractive. But not too attractive, because that means men are just voting for her because she is pretty. She should also be fashionable, but not too fashionable, because that means she spends money on clothes, and that means she is a Diva.
4. She should never complain about the misogynistic coverage she gets in the Press. You don’t want a whiner, do you? If you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen! But she should also call out sexism in the media whenever she sees it, because if she doesn’t that means she is just selling out women and Feminists.
5. She has to be Conservative. The first woman President has to be a Margaret Thatcher type, because men don’t want to vote for feminist ball busters, and the woman in question can’t appear weak. But also not very Conservative, because then she is a war hawk lesbian Republican ratf*cker c*nt.
6. She has to be experienced and an accomplished Public Servant- but not TOO experienced! Because that means she is not new and fresh and it also means she is a Washington insider, regardless of how much of her career has actually been in Washington. And besides, it would also mean that she is old. And old woman are boner crushers. But young, inexperienced women are only good for sex anyway.
7. She has to be Pro Life. What kind of mother isn’t Pro Life? But if she is Pro-Life, she is also selling out women and feminists.
8. She has to be a self made woman- no help from her husband in her political career. But also, that basically just means she is inexperienced and not fit to be Commander in Chief, and probably has a bad marriage. If her husband appears to be her partner in all things- including her political career, than that just means she is a sell out to feminists. Oh, and that she has a bad marriage, because it would just be a sham of political convenience.
9. She has to be a feminist. But not TOO feminist. No dude wants to vote for a hairy old man hating feminist. But if she is not a convincing feminist, than that just means she is selling out women.
10. She has to be a great politician- really talented! If she can’t even run a campaign, than how can she run a country? But not TOO great a p0litician, because that just means she is cold, calculating, divisive, and ambitious.
So you see? You are all just whining when you say that there will never be a woman President. Just find a woman like that!
And besides, electing a biracial man is way more important and historical than electing a woman. Women are supposed to be slaves anyway.
-Little Nephthys
Etymology and use
Biphobia is a portmanteau word patterned on the term homophobia. It is derived from the English neo-classical prefix bi- (meaning “two”) from bisexual and the root -phobia (from the Greek: φόβος, phóbos, “fear”) found in homophobia. Along with lesbophobia, transphobia, homophobia, gayphobia, and biphobia is a member of the family of terms used when discussing issues of intolerance and discrimination toward LGBT people. Note that biphobia need not be an equivalent to the clinical or medical meaning of a phobia – an anxiety disorder. Instead, its meaning and use typically parallel those of xenophobia. The adjectival form biphobic is used to describe things or qualities related to biphobia whereas the noun biphobe is a label for people thought to harbor biphobia[1].
[edit] Basic ideas and their negative stereotypes
Multiple negative stereotypes of bisexuals center on the belief that bisexuality does not exist and on the generalization that bisexuals are promiscuous.
[edit] Belief – Bisexuality does not exist.
This belief stems from binary views of sexuality: a heterosexist view or a monosexist view. In the first view, people are presumed to be attracted to the opposite sex and only heterosexuality and male to female relationships truly exist. Therefore, bisexuality, like homosexuality, is not a valid sexuality or identity. In the second view, people are either homosexual (gay/lesbian) or heterosexual (straight). Maxims such as “people are either gay, straight or lying”[2] embody this dichotomous view of sexual orientations.
Resulting negative stereotypes represent bisexuals as confused, undecided, dabblers, insecure, experimenting or “just going through a phase”. Attractions toward both sexes are considered fashionable as in bisexual chic or gender bending. Either homosexual or heterosexual relations are dismissed as a substitute for sex with members of the “right” sex or as a more accessible source of sexual gratification. What’s more, homosexuality can also be perceived as purely situational, in other words due to sex-segregated environments or groups such as the armed forces, schools, sports teams, religious orders, and prisons. Conversely, heterosexuality and opposite-sex relationships are viewed as “caving into” society’s pressures, fostering oppressions, condoning discrimination, keeping up appearances, retaining straight privilege, hiding in the closet, being self-hating or in self-denial, suffering from internalized homophobia, etc.
[edit] Generalization – Bisexuals are promiscuous.
Categorizing all bisexuals as being promiscuous is a hasty generalization. Moreover, having more than one sexual partner in one’s lifetime, in addition to being commonplace in the world, is not restricted to bisexuals. People of all sexual orientations change partners, practice serial monogamy or have multiple casual sex partners. The strict association of bisexuality with promiscuity stems from a variety of negative stereotypes targeting bisexuals as mentally or socially unstable people convinced that sexual relations only with men, only with women or only with one person is not enough. As a result bisexuals bear a social stigma from accusations of cheating on or betraying their partners, leading a double life, being “on the down-low“, and spreading sexually transmitted diseases such as HIV/AIDS. They are characterized as being “slutty”, insatiable, “easy”, indiscriminate, and in the case of women, nymphomaniacs. Furthermore, they are strongly associated with polyamory, swinging, and polygamy[3], the last being an established heterosexual tradition sanctioned by some religions and legal in several countries.
Meh.
Victories should be taken when they come. With the passage of Proposition 8 and all the Drama with Miss California and Perez Hilton, the LGBT Community needed something good, and it came.
We all love the Big Dawg. Regency said it best in what is possibly one of the best posts ever written at the Confluence.
I lived in this country during the 1990s. I knew the Clintons. I grew up worshipping Bill Clinton, that Bubba from a place called Hope with an affinity for Big Macs and a little bit of “soul” in his soul.
[...]
Millions of new jobs created throughout this country. Millions raised from poverty to hallowed middle-class status. Even with the battles he couldn’t win—like the Defense of Marriage Act, which he abhorred but that prevented the passage of a Federal Gay-Marriage Ban; like Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell that as best it could prevented an outright ban of gays and lesbians in the military—things were a little better, positive steps in positive directions had been taken. In that decade, it was good to be alive in America. And it was my party that had made it so.
[...]
I remember the man who cried as those around him struggled and deigned to share their struggles with him. I remember the President who apologized for the Tuskegee Experiment and asked that those still standing in its wake found it in their battered hearts to forgive a nation whose morality once stood so terribly bigoted. I remember the man who helped to re-enact the March on Selma because it meant so much to him. I remember a President who walked into Office on day one ready to lead, only to be stabbed in the back by the very people that brought him—but he soldiered on. That was the Way I was a part of, the Way that “embraces ‘tolerant traditionalism,’ honoring traditional moral and family values while resisting attempts to impose them on others.” There was no battle too small to undertake, no cause unworthy of effort or tears, nobody left behind. Anybody who “worked hard and played by the rules” got ahead, because no way was William Jefferson Clinton going to leave them in the dust.
Modo could never say as much. Recently, Bill came out in favor of Single Payer Health Care. In case you’re wondering why he didn’t go for it while he was President, he explained:
Mr. Clinton said that as he looked at the matter in 1993 he believed that he had two options for providing universal coverage: either a tax increase or an employer mandate. Since he had already expended a lot of political capital on a deficit-reduction plan that included tax increases as well as spending cuts, he said he had to rely on the employer mandate.
“If you had an employer mandate, then you could leave the small businesses out or come up with enough revenues to subsidize the smaller employers — and since we couldn’t raise taxes, having an employer mandate guaranteed that the National Federation of Independent Businesses would join with the insurance companies,” he said. “Now they don’t have to have an employer mandate, because they can offer buy-ins. I hope they won’t give up on this public option.”
Oh, Bill! In a similar vein, the Big Dawg has also come out in favor of same sex marriage.
He is now the most high profile politician to do so, beating out even Dick Cheney in his endorsement of gay matrimony. And since Bill and Hillary agree on most things politically, I predict that she will also come out in favor of Same Sex Marriage shortly.
In May of this year, Clinton told a crowd at Toronto’s Convention Centre that his position on same-sex marriage was “evolving.”Apparently, Clinton’s thinking has now further evolved. Asked if he would commit his support for same-sex marriage, Clinton responded, “I’m basically in support.”
This spring, same-sex marriage was legalized in Iowa, Vermont, Connecticut, Maine and New Hampshire. In his most recent remarks on the subject, Clinton said, “I think all these states that do it should do it.” The former president, however, added that he does not believe that same-sex marriage is “a federal question.”
Asked if he personally supported same-sex marriage, Clinton replied, “Yeah.” “I personally support people doing what they want to do,” Clinton said. “I think it’s wrong for someone to stop someone else from doing that [same-sex marriage].”
We all ready know what the Obots will scream. We have heard the song and dance so many times before we could recite it in our sleep. Bill passed DOMA! Bill passed DADT! The Clintons are Racist and EEEEEEEVVVVVIL!
Crimony. Tell them Bill.
Talking about Melissa Etheridge’s comment about the Clintons “throwing the gay community under a bus” when introducing DOMA, Bill Clinton said:
“I think it’s a slight rewriting of history that, let me just say, let me remind you, one of the raids that the Republican Party used to get its base out, I think it was in 2004, to have all these amendments on the ballot, right, to change the constitution of these states to ban gay marriage.
“There was at the time, a serious effort to argue that the congress ought to present to the states a constitutional amendment, a national constitutional amendment, on gay marriage. So the idea behind the defense of marriage act was not to ban gay marriage but simply to say that just because Massachusetts recognized gay marriage, which Hillary and I at the time defended their right to do, that marriage had always been a matter of state law and religious practice.
“The defense of marriage act did nothing to change that, all it said was that [the state of] Idaho did not have to recognize a marriage sanctified in Massachusetts, and that seemed to be a reasonable compromise in the environment of the time, and its a slight rewriting of history for Melissa, whom I very much respect, to imply that somehow this was anti-gay when I had more openly gay people in my administration and did more for gay rights and tried to provide an opportunity for gays to serve in the military and did provide an opportunity for gays to serve in civilian positions involving national security that they had been previously been denied to serving in. That’s a little bit of rewriting of history there.”
In the Nineties, public support for Gay Marriage, Equality of Benefits, and the right for Gays to serve openly in the Military wasn’t very strong. In fact, Gay rights were still something of a taboo back then. When Bill was President, he dealt with a foaming Republican Congress, Democrats on the Hill who loathed him, an overly hostile Press Corps, and a Right Wing Conspiracy Independent Counsel sniffing for his impeachment every time he or Hillary so much as farted. Because of Ross Perot’s Candidacy, he wasn’t elected with a majority, and he defeated an extremely popular incumbent. He didn’t have much Political Capitol at all, but he still tried to push as much liberal legislation through Congress as he possibly could before the midterm elections, when the party in power almost always loses seats. Even Dubya, when he was first elected President, passed whatever legislation he wanted, despite not being elected by a majority (and in fact, stealing the election) because his party was in power.
Barack Obama, on the other hand, has a fawning Press Corps and solid, filibuster proof majorities in the House and the Senate at his disposal. He is following an extremely unpopular administration into the White House and he was elected with 53% of the vote. At the moment he doesn’t seem to have much opposition for reelection in 2012. He should be the liberal God Obots claim him to be, but sadly, he is wiping his ass with the Constitution, continuing the War in Iraq, passing Stimulus Bills that stimulate nothing, Bailing out Banks with taxpayer money and proposing lousy Healthcare Reform.
On Gay rights and everything else, he has no viable excused. Polls show that a majority of Americans favor Gays serving openly in the Military and Gay Marriage. Similarly, with the roll out of several high Profile endorsements of Same Sex Marriage, it is apparent that Americans have evolved with their favorite President on the issue of Gay Rights. Not only should Obama be stronger for the LGBT Community, he should be shoving Single Payer Healthcare, which a majority of Americans also support, up Congress’s Bum-ol-ey and prosecuting Bush Administration Officials, but he obviously isn’t.
Obama is just a self absorbed, arrogant, immature, narcissistic coward. I hate to call him names, but there it is folks.
But regardless of what TOTUS does, we do have this victory of changing attitudes about LGBT rights in America. Americans clearly favor treating our Gay brothers and sisters with humanity and respect. And that is a victory worth celebrating, because it is a step in the right direction, and it makes equality for Gays, Lesbians, Bis and Trannies that much more attainable.
There is a right to Privacy. There is no right to Hypocrisy.
-Congressman Barney Frank
Everyone has a right to their own privacy. Nobody deserves to have their personal lives, personality, character, and morals judged and analyzed by people who either don’t know them, have never met them, or hardly know them.
Politicians are people. As people, they also deserve that basic right. When choosing to vote for them, most Americans have never met them, and the journalists who cover their campaigns, policies, and careers have also either never met them or hardly know them.
A majority of Americans do want their leaders to be decent people. An American voter votes on a candidate on faith, because they believe that candidate will do everything within their power to make their lives better. American voters, for the most part, want their leaders to be in Politics as Public Servants who believe in Public Service and Social Advocacy as a way to help others. It is, in fact, about “Putting People First.” The same can perhaps be said of Police officers, Surgeons, and others whose professions affect people’s lives. A Surgeon saves lives, and a Police officer protects lives. A politician can affect lives in many different ways, depending on what policies they implement, bills they sign into law, legislation they write, or what message they publicly send to the world.
Politicians are supposed to be Public Servants. And a person who serves the people tries to help those people. By extension, a person who helps others is generally considered to be a good person.
That being said, people, and most especially good people, can be complicated people with successes and failures. It is unfair to judge them solely on their failures and foolish to judge them only on their successes. And sometimes, good people can make mistakes and have problems in their personal lives. In case you haven’t noticed, shit happens.
That is why a politician’s personal life should never be aired in public. That is why there should be a basic right to privacy and that right should not be violated.
The examination of Politician’s personal lives started in the late eighties, with the emergence of reactionary right wing “values voters” that picked and chose Bible Verses to advance bigotry against women, gays, racial minorities, joy, laughter, and other blasphemous ungodly characters. They found a home with Movement Conservatives in the early 1990’s. And, as David Brock writes in his memoir, Blinded By the Right:
their judgments consisted of, “…making accusations with no proof, and of using ill-defined issues of ‘judgment’ and ‘character’ to discredit opponents based solely on alleged personal behavior. Sexual McCarthyism had been introduced into modern right-wing politics.”
These “Family Values” nutjobs and their allies in the media have an interesting way of judging elected officials’ personal lives. As John at LR states:
The bible literalists who spend many a happy hour bashing gays because of a few bible verses are mighty forgiving of Conservative adulterers as Joe Conason rightly points out. The biblical punishment for adultery is death by stoning. I have yet to see a right winger pitch at stone at Newt, Sanford, or Ensign. But say “Lewinsky” to one of them and watch them froth. I guess I don’t have the translation of the bible that includes the phrase “Forgive the Republicans but keep on trashing the Democrats with all the invective at your command.”
And maybe I am just being immature and completely juvenile about this (okay, I am) but the Big Dawg just got a couple of bl*wj*bs (granted, the Big Dawg’s sex scandal was a lot more fun, because there were characters like Linda Tripp and Lucciane Goldberg and Kenn Starr and other weirdos involved. Like a soap opera!). Sanford has recently been caught in a one-year affair with a chick from Argentina, and after lying about it to his wife, she caught him, and he actually asked her permission to go see his Mistress. Newt Gingrich, the coolest Conservative evah who will totally run for President and beat Palin in the Primaries! gave his wife divorce papers while she was on her death bed, then cheated on his second wife while he was calling Liberals “decadent” and “sick” and routinely sniffing through the Clintons’ panty drawers. Vitter, another Clinton Condemner, was caught with prostitutes. Larry Craig voted for the Federal Marriage Amendment, and he tried to boink a guy in a bathroom stall. The list goes on. In fact, I have a list!
Since 1998 there has been an average of two sex scandals a year. There are twenty four in my list. Fourteen involve Republicans and ten involve Democrats. And, as Joe Conason says
the worst that a conservative must anticipate is a stern scolding, followed by warm assurances of God’s forgiveness and a swift return to business as usual.
The hilarious thing is that Right Wingers don’t even notice the double standard or the blatant hypocrisy. Just spend a few minutes reading the comments at Hillbuzz, which has pretty much been taken over by Reactionary Republicans, and you would come away believing that all Democrats are the most lewd, immoral, promiscuous cretins in the Universe. But mention Vitter, Sanford, or Ewing and you will get nothing but crickets.
More:
Rating the Greatest GOP Sex Scandals
Sanford’s Hypocrisy Will Outlast Headlines of His Affair
Don't let their Vaginas eat you!
Sarah Palin is not qualified to be the President of the United States. She is dreadfully inexperienced. She is a Fundie. That alone is normally a disqualify, but let’s continue. When it comes to women’s reproductive freedoms and choices, she disappoints. Her energy policies are mediocre at best, and her obsession with drilling in ANWR is at times annoying. She doesn’t get that there isn’t much oil there to begin with, and drilling there will degrade the natural habitat. She is not as supportive of LGBT rights as she should be, and she would probably sell out our Health Benefits to jackoffs in the Insurance Industry, given the opportunity. I could go on, but you get my point.
But she has also, correct me if I’m wrong, taken on her own party Establishment and been elected as the youngest and first lady Governor of the largest and most beautiful state in the union,raised taxes on oil companies and created a state budget surplus, which she gave back to her constituents. Her first veto in office was a bill that would deny gay couples health benefits (and you know how those lesbians love Alaskan Cruises. Good call, Sarah!). She appointed a pro choice member of Planned Parenthood to the Alaskan Supreme Court in favor of a bible humping Fundie Blowhard, and she supports funding Head Start. She is, contrary to popular belief, pro-contraception, and has said so many times. She is a Feminist. Her husband is an Eskimo Union man who owns a commercial fisherman business. She is personally socially Conservative, but based on her performance as Governor, does not use her office to inflict those beliefs on her constituents. She has stated that she believes in Science and Evolution. In fact, her father was a Science Teacher and track coach, and her mother was a school librarian, so she likes books too.
Let’s face it: Bible Spice isn’t all that Conservative. Oh sure, she says she’s a Conservative, but in today’s political environment, that’s what you say if you’re a Republican. The word “liberal” has probably not been uttered by any politician for about 40 years. Not to say that Sarah is liberal, Goddess no. “Maverick” is code for “Moderate.” Like Riverdaughter always says, we have to pay attention to what politicians say. But honestly, it’s more important to pay attention to what they do. If Teleprompter Jesus taught us anything, he taught us that.
On the fourth of July, Violet Socks said it best when she marveled at the phenomenon that is Sarah Heath Palin.
The only thing Palin is commonly accused of that is actually true is her anti-abortion stance, though, as I’ve pointed out several times, her political position is that “the will of the people” should decide the law. She has also expressed sympathy for women choosing abortion and has said that she is totally opposed to any woman ever being criminalized for it. I’m not pretending she’s anything other than what she is (an adamant “pro-lifer”), but I am trying to be as clear and honest as I can be about her actual stance.
The fact is, that stance alone is not enough to explain the kind of frenzied hatred and feminist repudiation that Palin has attracted. Notice the example of Hugo Schwyzer, who, as I pointed out in my comment at IBTP, is allowed to call himself a feminist and even cross-post at RH Reality Check — while Sarah Palin is endlessly slandered and ridiculed for having the same beliefs. Notice, too, that the Republican Party (and even the Democratic Party) is full of other “pro-life” politicians, none of whom have ever been crucified and slandered Palin-style.
Speaking of slander, that brings me to my next big puzzlement: what is it with the feminists who just freely make shit up about Palin? The lies had to start somewhere, and they didn’t all hatch in the bowels of the Obama campaign (though a bunch of them did). Some of them were incubated by feminists, particularly the ones about Palin being an anti-sex “purity queen,” the kind of batshit Christian who believes in Purity Balls and abstinence pledges and is opposed to sex ed. None of that is true.
When I first started investigating Palin, I was very relieved to discover that she’s not nearly as nutty as she might be, given that she’s a Christian. I was pleased to learn that she’s not one of those fundies who thinks wives have to submit or that Adam and Eve rode on dinosaurs. She’s not into that whacked-out purity or abstinence-only stuff. That’s good. It’s good that she’s not a nutjob. So…why aren’t other feminists also happy that she’s not a nutjob? Why do they, in fact, spread lies to make her seem worse than she is?
Are people simply confused about the differences between Christians? Do they think all Christians are alike? I doubt it. I’m no godbag and I personally wish that Christianity would evaporate from the face of the earth, but I still recognize that not all Christians are alike. I think most other people do, too. I think most people in this country understand that Tennessee snake handlers don’t go to Catholic mass, and that the Quiverfull people are not the same as the Episcopalians. Being a Christian, even a conservative Christian, doesn’t automatically mean you’re a young earth creationist in a calico dress with a purity ring on your finger.
But to get back to the original point, Sarah Palin is not qualified to be President of the United States. And I think most everyone here, including me, would probably not vote for her, depending on the alternative. She is qualified to be VICE President of the United States, as is our current Disappointment in Chief. When we all thought the Democratic Nomination wasn’t going to be jacked from Hillary in a rigged nominating process, many of us here thought he would make a good VPOTUS. He could run around on Jay Leno and Conan O’Brien, making fun of the Special Olympics and talking about who would win in a fight (Ninjas or Pirates?!) while Hillary busied herself with ramming Single Payer Healthcare through Congress and down all of our collective grateful throats. So vital were his potential talents for distraction.
To reiterate, Sarah Palin is, in fact, no more qualified to be President of the United States than Barack Obama is. As David Harsanyi says
Can you believe the gall of these Sarah Palin cultists? Presidential aspirations? This is a woman who named one of her kids “Track,” for God’s sake. (Well, if it really is her kid.)
William Buckley once wrote that he rather would “entrust the government of the United States to the first 400 people listed in the Boston telephone directory than to the faculty of Harvard University.”
But running government is no longer a suitable vocation for the bumbling proletariat. It’s for folks with schoolin’ and such. It’s a job for herculean thinkers with degrees from Ivy League schools. In other words, no one from Alaska need apply.
Former sports reporters certainly won’t do. We need former constitutional scholars. Who else, after all, has a better understanding of how to undermine the document?
He’s right of course. Our last “Herculean Thinker” President from an Ivy League School was Dubya. And he was the greatest a great President. So the fact that Governor Palin doesn’t have a pretty Harvard degree is just a point against her, as far as America is concerned. In fact
If Palin were president, chances are we’d have a gaffe-generating motormouth for a vice president. That’s the kind of decision-making one expects from Miss Congeniality.
The job of building generational debt is not for the unsophisticated. Enriching political donors with taxpayer dollars takes intellectual prowess, not the skills of a moose-hunting point guard.
The talent to print money we don’t have to pay for programs we can’t afford is the work of a finely tuned imagination, soaring gravitas and endless policy know-how.
Palin is so clueless she probably would have rushed through some colossal stimulus plan that ended up stimulating nothing.
If Palin were president, no one doubts this nation would have continued the Bush-era policy of indefinite detention of enemy combatants and the CIA’s program of transferring prisoners to other countries without legal rights. Be thankful you have a president who makes you think this nation doesn’t.
If Palin were commander in chief — and, again, can anyone imagine anything so preposterous? — the United States still would be fighting endless and expensive wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
It’s true that Palin’s first veto as Alaska governor was of a bill that would have blocked state employee benefits and health insurance for same-sex couples, but does anyone doubt her true intentions?
If she were president, brave American soldiers still would be living under the dark specter of “don’t ask, don’t tell.” Palin even might have instructed her Justice Department to file a brief in defense of the Defense of Marriage Act. Such is the depth of her depravity.
Does anyone believe that Palin possesses the competence to nationalize entire industries without the consent of the people? A housewife from Wasilla isn’t equipped with political brawn to shake down banks and bondholders.
Palin never would be able to convince Americans that a trillion-dollar government-run health care plan would save taxpayers money or have the rhetorical ability to convince even a single person that a European-style cap-and-trade scheme has any benefit at all.
Palin is such a goofball that she probably believes oil will continue to be a vital American energy source.
And how is anyone as simplistic as Palin going to help change the habits of all these fatsos in America? We need a mommy … but, you know, not a real mommy.
It’s fairly obvious to everyone with a shred of certifiable sanity that Obots are one fry short of a Happy Meal. Projection is a common psychological phenomenon, and Obots seem to use it often. They have called Sarah Palin silly, narcissistic, bumbling, rambling, and an intellectual lightweight who cannot utter three consecutive sentences without the aid of a teleprompter. Gee. I think one could make a lot of money in this recession by declaring themselves kool aid prevention counselors.
Ever since Sarah Palin resigned, an enormous, slightly pointless debate has erupted on the PUMAsphere about Sarah Palin. It is very easy to say, “I do not support Sarah Palin politically, even though I like her and will defend her against personal, misogynistic, and unfair attacks.” Bam. Done. Simple Pimple. In fact, I have yet to meet anyone on this blog who has not stated that as their official Palinpalooza position.
The fact is, Sarah Palin, like Hillary Clinton, is provocative. I don’t mean their personalities are provocative. They both seem to be pretty normal, straightforward women. Hillary taught Sunday School at her Church in Little Rock, and she grew up in 1950’s Suburbia, playing softball, wearing poodle skirts and trying to convince her dad to let her go on dates. She goes shopping with Chelsea and watches Hospital Dramas with Bill on weekends.
Sarah Palin was a point guard basketball champ. She won the “Miss Congeniality” Award in the Alaska Beauty Pageant, which helped her pay for college. She eloped with her childhood friend because she was in a family way, and it would have embarrassed her dad. She goes to a normal Fundie Church, emails her mom on her blackberry and listens to Gretchen Meyer on her morning jogs.
it is striking to me how much of the political discourse in 2008 revolved around people who don’t exist. The main players last year, if you recall, were Obama, the genius messiah whose perfection and purity would save the planet; Hillary, the evil racist lesbian who killed Vince Foster with her bare hands before plotting the Iraqi invasion and then attempting to have Obama assassinated; and Sarah Palin, a crazed dominionist who hates polar bears and personally arranges for Christian girls to be raped by their fathers just so she can charge them for their rape kits.
Think back to the reactions to Sarah Palin’s speech at the convention. Remember the gal at Jezebel whose head throbbed with hate blood as she listened to Palin speak? The one who said she wanted to “murk that cunt”? What the hell is that? I cannot figure it out. I look and look, and it’s like trying to see someone else’s hallucination. No matter how hard I squint, I can’t see whatever it is they’re looking at. What is so horrifying?
Violet couldn’t wrap her head around it, and neither could her commenters. What is it about Sarah Palin (and even Hillary Clinton) that drives people into such frenzies of lunacy? So many took a crack at it. It’s Sarah’s working class background. It’s her hot husband. They’re upset because she chose to have her child.
The truth is, it’s not any of those things. Hillary and Sarah are two very different people who evoke the same violent, misogynistic reactions from people. I call bull shit on people who claim Sarah has it worse than Hillary did. Bull. Shit. Not that it matters, since misogyny is something that has to be called out no matter how varying the degrees.
Remember the Nineties? Remember Rush Limbaugh holding up a picture of Chelsea and saying she was the White House Dog? Remember all those reporters sniffing through Arkansas (the same way they would later sniff through Alaska) looking for dirt and a list of Hillary’s lesbain lovers? Remember John McCain calling Hillary and Chelsea ugly pigs? Remember the Internet graphics showing Hillary being raped by a donkey and flying on a broom? Remember Newt Gingrich’s mother calling her a bitch? Remember Hickman Ewing, one of Ken Starr’s goons, saying she was “a little woman,” and claiming the whole Whitewater “scandal” was just a cover up for her love affair with Vince Foster, who she later murdered? Late night comedians have and still do make countless jokes about her. I could go on and on, but that’s only the Nineties. 2008 was worse, as we all know.
And it will never end. Sarah Palin suffers the same fate as her. I could list the offenses against her too, but it was exhausting enough listing the ones against Hillary, and I don’t want to be in a bad mood. The point is that it is a fate Sarah Palin will continue to suffer, for as long as her political career lasts. But why?
Never fear, I have the answer for you, but I’m not telling yet. You’ll have to wait for Part 2.
To Be Continued….
