Republicans Call Coulter Slur Inappropriate, Offensive
Posted on March 4, 2007
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It took more than a day, but three of the Republican campaigns managed to denounce Coulter’s anti-gay slur at CPAC after a firestorm of reaction from the blogosphere and activist groups. The New York Times has an article that quotes McCain, “wildly inappropriate;” Giuliani, “completely inappropriate…no place for such name calling…;” and Romney, who comes closer to nailing it with, “offensive.” No quotes from Brownback, Huckabee, or Cheney were supplied.
McCain’s hands were generally clean as he had not attended CPAC. Romney had the most to answer for, since he had introduced Coulter and she had endorsed him, though perhaps not exclusively.
Coulter, asked for a reaction to Republican criticism, replied with a joke, apparently not addressing the offensive nature of the slur.
Coulter has in the past used the anti-gay slur (faggot, for those who haven’t heard), and suggested various democrats were somehow defective, by suggesting they were gay, thus in the same breath painting gays as somehow defective.
Her past attacks were made in talk show and interview formats, where casual, if offensive, speech doesn’t carry the same freight. In those settings she largely gets away with sounding ignorant or trashy. At CPAC, Coulter was delivering prepared remarks for a national audience, from the same stage as the Vice President and the leading candidates for the Republican nomination. Incredibly, Coulter behaved as if she did not know the threshold for civility would be higher in that setting.
We’ll see if she has been damaged by this episode as Republicans who want to protect their credibility demonstrate whether they’ll share a mic or a stage with her in the future.
Sphere ItReprehensible Ann Coulter Video With Alternative F-Bomb
Posted on March 3, 2007
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Here’s the video. Somehow I thought she might have some charisma or something that contributes to her minor success. I guess I was wrong.
Expletive Deleted: Coulter Attacks John Edwards
Posted on March 3, 2007
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I suppose I should be more enthusiastic about John Edwards now that Ann Coulter has called him “a faggot.” I feel a strange, sympathetic bond toward the candidate who is attacked with the same word I’ve sometimes been attacked with. It seems the haters in the world are actually trying to push that word to carry as large a burden of hate as “nigger.” [God, it pains me just to type out those two words, but I just don’t feel like being delicate about it right now.] The difference in status of the two words is that the reprehensible creature who spoke the former today would dare not speak the latter. She knew what she was doing, though. She knew that it would stir up her audience the same as if she had been leading a kkk meeting or talking to a group of neo-nazis. The video is here.
Andrew Sullivan wrote about her speech a few times today, lamenting how “Seeing college kids line up to worship her tore [him] up.” I think so. Like him, I have often written Coulter off as a tasteless performance artist, but I think she is more dangerous. It speaks volumes that the far right would host her at their CPAC convention. It was the same stage occupied by Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani. McCain had the good sense to take a pass. It is beyond ironic that in the same “performance” Sullivan quotes her as saying “There are more people voting on Christian moral values than on tax cuts.” The hate speech that accompanies talk of “Christian moral values” among the far right is the main reason many of us run from the label “Christian” these days.
Sullivan says Republicans need to distance themselves from her and I couldn’t agree more. Where I break ranks with him is when he says “she’s their Michael Moore.” There is no comparison. Michael Moore does not engage in hate speech. He might be seen as biased and inflammatory by those who don’t agree with him, but his main technique is to lay out facts and suggest they imply something, whether or not the implication is entirely fair (I’m thinking of speculating what’s going on in Bush’s mind while reading to elementary school students and hearing of the 9/11 plane crashes). Mostly, he lets his subjects hang themselves (the example here would be “Bowling for Columbine,” listening to gun enthusiasts with the appearance of complete credulity, allowing his audience to form their own conclusions). Moore, while looking for agreement with his point-of-view, invites his audience to think. Coulter does not require thinking, just all-too-enthusiastic agreement.
[Just added “I Speak for the Republican Party” badge on the Ann Coulter photo, courtesy of “Tild” who has a lovely blog post on the topic.] —JPM 3/4/07
Sphere ItMcCain and Obama Apologize Needlessly for Saying Lives Wasted in Iraq
Posted on March 2, 2007
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Why do good men fall all over themselves to apologize for telling the truth?
On Letterman Wednesday night John McCain while announcing his run for the presidency said:
Americans are very frustrated, and they have every right to be,” McCain said about the Iraq War. “We’ve wasted a lot of our most precious treasure, which is American lives.
Quote via ABC News
Barack Obama is quoted in a 2/13/07 MSNBC post:
During a campaign trip to Iowa over the weekend, the Illinois senator told a crowd: “We now have spent 400 (b) billion dollars and have seen over three-thousand lives of the bravest young Americans wasted.”
Now these two are saying that they meant something else, saying what they should have said, and then banging on the tired theme that protects politicians from all harm, “I support the troops.”
My Apple - Oxford American Dictionary defines waste this way:
1. used or expended carelessly, extravagantly, or to no purpose :
To my reading, these two spoke truth at a time when the whole subject of the war in Iraq has been treated like some sacred cow.
If one has to say in a positive way what our soldiers died for, they died and were maimed for duty. That is a very honorable cause, especially in the military. Our soldiers do not get to pick their wars. Some might believe in the cause for which they fight, but that is secondary to duty. A soldier does their duty as laid out in the chain of command, starting with the Commander-In-Chief.
Obama seems to have shifted to the word “sacrifice.” It has a bit of the root of “sacred” in it. I agree that what is lost is sacred. But that only supports the sense of the waste of it.
What would be offensive to me is if you declared that the soldiers wasted their own lives by the choices they made. No one ever said that. They chose the military to serve. Even those who joined for reasons other than civic or patriotic duty, joined, taking a dangerous job to improve their lives through exposure to broader experiences, leadership, training, and educational benefits.
No one is saying they made bad choices, were not honorable, or wasted their lives.
The promise inherent in each of these young lives was used carelessy by cynical leaders who had never taken the same risks themselves. It was extravagant to expend so many resources, the greatest of these, human, to achieve so little.
We can only believe that the administration, who committed our young people’s lives to this war, had no purpose — or at least no honest or honorable purpose, as each stated purpose, WMD, terrorism, even establishing a western-style democracy with the implied individual freedoms, has been discredited.
What a waste.
Sphere ItTalk of Bush - Clinton Dynasty is a Big Fat Red Herring
Posted on February 28, 2007
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All over the blogosphere I keep reading the phrase “Bush - Clinton Dynasty,” especially in readers’ comments to blogs. WTF? When were these two families combined? It’s hard to believe the two families are of the same species, let alone sharing some genetic lineage. I wanted to find out who manufactured this particular bit of garbage, but my Google skills didn’t help me out this time. Of course I suspect any number of personalities from Fox News. Folks over there swim with the red herrings — which is quite a feat, since smoking fish ’til they’re red, generally makes swimming difficult for them.
It may be fair to say the powerful Bush family is somehow analogous to dynasty, but to connect all the years of the Bushes with Bill Clinton’s presidency and say that somehow that represents continuous familial power is a serious load of…herring.
From a Joan Wallace interview of Kevin Phillips in Salon.com:
Looking at four generations of Bushes, and all that inherited wealth and power, there’s really no comparison between the Bushes and the Clintons.
No, they’re not the same at this point. But if she were to run and win in 2008, the idea of a wife succeeding her husband is just as interesting as a son succeeding his father.
In some ways it’s more interesting, but it’s not a dynasty. You can even quibble about the use of the word “dynasty” with the Bushes, because obviously, he didn’t inherit the presidency. We did elect him.
Obviously? I’m not sure it’s obvious at all. [Laughs.]
The power of the Bush family is well-documented, going back to Prescott Bush, a Senator from Connecticut. His son is George H.W. Bush, POTUS #41, who was head of CIA, then Vice President for 8 years before his 4 years as President. Two of his sons became governors of wealthy states, George W., then serving as president (POTUS #43) for two terms.
The Clinton family? Bill is a fulfillment of the American dream as told to school children. A boy raised by a single mother with little means who, through ambition and hard work, became governor of his state and then president of the United States. He married a talented woman who became a successful lawyer, and who after putting her own career on hold to be first lady, was elected to the U.S. Senate. Clearly connections and name recognition played a part in her political success, but her marriage could as easily have proved to work against her.
There is no comparison and certainly no connection between the two families. Bush family privilege clearly is the source of W’s successes, as a person of his talent seems far better suited for appliance sales or leading tent revivals.
Whatever her connections — and few get anywhere without them — Hillary’s successes, present and future, are her own.
Sphere ItWith Oscars, Hollywood Leads America to an International Vision
Posted on February 28, 2007
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As the U.S. continues to “go it alone” in the world with regard not only to neocon-style hegemony but also regarding environmental treaties, war crimes treaties, weapons bans, land mines, and transmitting any other number of insults to critics and allies alike, there is a large moneyed faction of “ordinary americans” seeking to take up the slack in foreign diplomacy.
The people I speak of are ordinary only in the sense that they have no official roles, for the most part, in our governing bodies. They vote at the ballot box and with their checkbooks, just like the rest of us.
Many of those folks could be seen on stage and in the audience at The Oscars Sunday night. The awards show was billed as the “most diverse” in The Oscars’ history, but they were not (only) talking about American diversity — Latino Americans, African Americans, Jewish Americans and Gay Americans — these and many other diverse Americans were full participants, and treated as if it had always been so (it has not). Instead, the host, Lesbian Ellen DeGeneres, when she brought up the topic, was talking about creating an international night of celebration.
It was great seeing and agreeing with such great folks as Ellen, Leonardo DiCaprio, Will Smith, Melissa Etheridge, George Clooney, Clint Eastwood, Martin Scorsese, Forrest Whitacre, Cate Blanchette and Kate Winslet.
The theme seemed to come out of a convergence of some truly great international filmmaking and performances — any few of which, might have made it into the show naturally, and a conscious effort on the part of the organizers and participants to include international visions and voices.
It’s always been a somewhat reasonable, if short-sighted, argument that the show is an American awards show produced in America, primarily for an American audience. The second part of that argument was that an American focus must be maintained to keep the American audience. For this year, at least, all that was tossed aside. We can hope it is the beginning of a trend of American entertainment being inclusive of many astounding contributions from abroad.
Nathan Gardels and Mike Medavoy writing for Huffingtonpost.com see a larger movement in the international film industry, they’re clearly on to something, but I don’t see it as bad for Hollywood, though perhaps challenging:
But it is Babel’s Gonzalez Inarritu who has best captured what’s happening. “The world is changing,” he says. “The film community is now a global film community. Its not anymore about cultural barriers or language barriers. Its emotion and humanity. We are using the power of cinema to cross borders. We are understanding that now there’s a connection that needs to happen.”
I really don’t believe that parochialism is a distinctly American trait. It is true that we’ve made it an issue around the world, in part by our success, but lately, to a much larger extent because of our lack of consideration of others’ contributions from around the globe. Worse, by far, has been the aggression and arrogance we’ve allowed our leaders to project.
Clearly Iraq should not have happened. The language of “the war on terror” does nothing to make us safer or more well-thought-of (and safety and the perception of the U.S. in the world do seem to be linked). We should be leading the way on green energy technologies, not denying global warming at the highest levels and withdrawing from Kyoto.
The U.S. has unique qualities that should enable us to be one of the strongest advocates for peace and cooperation. Our multiculturalism provides a variety of perspectives if we have the ability to learn from them. We have boisterous religious expressions and debates with very little civic strife resulting. Our constitutional freedoms now joined by technology are beginning to allow everyone of us to directly participate in the debate on issues that affect our lives.
Our friends in Hollywood are able to do something more. The work product of the film industry, likely competes rather effectively with the work product of our government for the hearts and minds of people around the world. The images from our government have been for the most part not well received whether we were seeking to provide aid or to increase our own power. When we project so much aggression, our efforts to benefit others are received cynically, expecting cynicism in turn.
Hollywood is not without it’s issues in the international market. We’ve seen the film industry grow to become, as a whole, vastly more sensitive to other cultures. Viewing an old Tarzan movie (I’m sure there are worse examples) is all that’s needed to imagine how bad it could get. Some fault American films for promoting an image of American decadence around the world. I imagine if that issue could be addressed it would be done in the distribution channels, as the overall industry’s subject matter is diverse enough not to promote a single set of values.
Even I might fault our films for overemphasis on violence and spectacle and too little emphasis on story and character development. Even if producers believe that violence and sex is all people want, I’d challenge them to study the successes (and there are many) where violence and sex were not depicted, or where the story may derive from such strong drives and emotions but the audience sees only the buildup or the human consequences. Let the actors do the drama. Fireballs beget only bigger fireballs.
In defense of Hollywood, their product can live virtually forever. A politician or political movement from 30 years ago is very old news — annals of history stuff. A 30-year old film can continue to have a vast audience. As a human political movement, Hollywood can only be reasonably judged, as other politicians are judged, based on a short time span.
Clearly the people who spoke to America and to the world on Sunday night believe in a global community. A world where there is broad cooperation on issues that affect us all, like global warming, especially, but also human rights, AIDS and other diseases, American hegemony, and sectarian violence.
In the case of the Iraq war and global warming, the world can’t wait for our government to change. While we have a good idea, there’s no assurance it will change. Even if it does change, I don’t believe the majority of us are willing any longer to let government “leaders” set the agenda and determine our priorities. It was perfectly fine and perfectly “American” for actors, singers, directors and comedians to stand up and say on a national platform what they value and what are their priorities. The most stunning aspect was the stark contrast between their visions and those of the present administration’s.
Sphere ItCongress Must Exercise Power of the Purse
Posted on February 27, 2007
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The old saw “Power of the Purse” takes on new meaning as a woman controls the gavel in the house. Now that she’s busted up that nasty “marble ceiling” maybe Mrs. Pelosi can take her gavel or her purse an bust up some Republican war-mongering while she’s still swinging.
This week Sen. Byrd’s Appropriations Committee takes up the administration’s $100 Billion Emergency Supplemental budget request to continue waging war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Jack Murtha will manage the request in the House. This follows on the heels of a supplemental for $70 Billion passed in September.
Our new Democratic majorities have already learned that the Republicans are willing to create gridlock against all reason to protect the president’s murderous adventure in Iraq. The Democrats have tried to pass legislation to set a new course, starting with the mildest resolution only seeking consensus that the congress does not agree with a troop escalation. The Republicans in the Senate blocked the discussion before any vote could be taken.
Clearly seeking consensus in such a divided Congress is impossible with folks on the other end of the avenue still somehow able to exert pressure on enough members to work against all moral and patriotic efforts to repair the damage of the last 4 years.
The fact that the war has been financed on Supplementals and debt, all outside the federal budget, actually gives the Democrats more power to restrict funding. Now the administration has to walk down Pennsylvania Ave., hat in hand, and ask for and justify the funds to continue their aggression.
Congresspersons, Senators: This is your chance and perhaps your only chance to turn around the greatest foreign policy error in American history. We do not have to fund the president’s escalation. You can restrict funds—Hell, there ARE no funds—for any action that is not directly aimed at getting our people out of there and protecting the innocent.
Clearly, we have obligations in Iraq and Afghanistan, but we have no obligation to participate in a sectarian war, and we certainly have no obligation to secure Iraq’s oil. There has to be funds to get our military and civilians out of harm’s way, but no obligation to enrich contractors selected and hired without proper procedure or oversight.
I suppose the way to do it will not be one huge bill that appropriates money for some things but not others. The Republicans will block that bill—just as they block whatever they’re told— and then blame the Democrats for cutting off funds to our troops. Congress will have to do the work to break the supplemental down to its component parts, and pass it bit by bit, starting with those parts that are non-controversial. Additional moneys will have to be justified and argued for as if any part of our actions in Iraq were ever rational. What merits passage will pass, what seeks to prolong a purposeless war, should not pass.
It’s time to end what should never have begun. The way to do it is with the power of the purse.
Sphere ItCraig Ferguson’s President’s Day Confessional
Posted on February 25, 2007
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If you’ve been following along, you’ll know I try and do something just a bit different on Sundays. I’ve seen this video posted around a few times but didn’t really know Ferguson and his work or the nature of the video. I’d read that he was saying to cut Britney Spears some slack. I tended to agree with that sentiment, but still am totally not into the Us Weeklyscene, and left it alone.
I’m glad I decided to watch it this morning.
If I tried to say what Craig says in this video, I likely would sound too preachy. He does it with grace and still a fair dose of humor. He’s talking about doing in comedy what good preachers try to do on Sunday mornings: “afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted.” Things go all wrong when you do it the other way around. The basic morality of it seems to fit equally well in multiple venues, including religion, politics, government, and yes, comedy. And as you can see here, self-deprecating humor is still some of the best humor of all.
Sphere ItTen Ways To Keep Your Political Puppet Happy
Posted on February 24, 2007
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As we head into the next presidential election season, we’re profoundly aware that our current “I’m the President” is term-limited. While Mr. Bush can never be replaced, we do need to find someone to fill the office. Those who fear change need not panic, however, if we can make use of what we’ve learned in the past six years.
[While we do have a viable woman candidate, the masculine pronoun is used, and the particular woman running would require a somewhat adjusted strategy.]
- Fill the White House with sycophants and handlers.
A person elected, not on his merits and qualities, but because he can be controlled, needs lots of folks to reinforce for him the concept that HE IS THE PRESIDENT. Get people he considers smart, like Condi Rice, Harriet Miers, Karl Rove, and Barney to tell him how smart he is. Of course such a man will need a lot of help staying out of trouble. Have no fear: Cheney, Rumsfeld, Condi, and Barney will also be out of work and potentially available. - Give him something to do, part I.
First tell him he’s a compassionate conservative. Say it: “I’m a compassionate conservative.” Then pull out all the iniatives your opponents value and get him to champion them with your own cynical twist. Make sure that the “replacement iniatives” sound like they solve the original problem, but set them up so that they line the pockets of wealthy donors. If occasionally they creat social good as an unintended consequence, get the press office right on it. See: “No child left behind,” medicare drug benefit, and privatizing social security. - Give him something to do, part II.
When you just need your guy out of the way, give him a shiny mountain bike or a tractor to clear brush. If he insists on being involved in government, tell him there’s a “democrat” plot to kill a woman in Jeb’s state who, though in a vegetative state, can still smile. - Don’t explain big words to him.
If you see his brow furrow a bit whenever he hears the word “neocon,” and if he repeats the word, using it incorrectly, pretend not to notice. If he begins to doubt himself, enlist sycophants [above] to praise him on his command of the issues and language. - Stage showy, ego-boosting events.
Have plenty of mirrors available when you dress him in his flight suit with codpiece. Don’t tell him about the “Mission Accomplished” banner until you’ve landed him on deck. You want his strut to appear authentic for the cameras, and it preserves deniability if the event is later ridiculed. - Teach him to say, “I’m the decider!”
This is especially effective when popular opinion turns against him and his handlers’ policies. After a few refrains of “I’m the decider!” the electorate and the press are completely placated. The people, who in a democracy would be “the deciders,” will yawn, shrug and say, “well, I guess that’s been decided.” - Get the hired sycophants to all stand and salute whenever he declares, “I’m the President!”
NOTE: This idea has been discredited, as the puppet may start saying it in public, sounding like he needs broader convincing. It’s especially pathetic when no one salutes. - Tell him who to hate.
It helps if he’s already got someone in mind. Throw in a nasty non-state attack, and start making linkages to — states. Since hating Iraq is a given, get someone like David Frum to link that to terror. Gather extra handlers to help him write something catchy, just because it sounds good, like “Axis of Evil.” If Condi wants more credibility, suggest adding Iran and North Korea. Next step, put it on a tele-prompter for State of the Union. Nothing like firing up your enemies so your guy knows who they are. - Let him think it was his idea.
Start a whisper campaign within the oval office. While he’s semi-distracted fetching for Barney, mention that you think Iran might want to build a nuclear bomb to your co-sycophant / handler. Pretend you’re not speaking to him when you say in his hearing Samuel Alito is the best judge in America. (Use simple, even simplistic, declarative statements for best effect.) - Remove all dissent — and newspapers
Show the door to Colin Powell, Paul O’Neill, Christine Todd Whitman, and any number of generals who desrespect the new sovereign by, gasp!, expressing their own ideas. Use parental blocking on any TV within your guy’s reach to allow only ESPN, HSN, Fox News, and Lifetime. For God’s sake, don’t let him learn about C-SPAN!
Have no fear if the current crop of candidates appear too autonomous for the above strategies. The primary election process has often been quite useful for weeding out independent thinkers.
Sphere ItMartin O’Malley Calls For End to Maryland Death Penalty
Posted on February 22, 2007
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Maryland’s New Governor, Martin O’Malley is seeking an end to Maryland’s Death Penalty. The move is good government policy and is correct from both moral and ethical points of view.
O’Malley is taking good advantage of a change in mood around the country, questioning the death penalty, as we continue to assimilate more data and anecdotal evidence that it is administered unevenly and unfairly, being issued more often when those convicted are minorities or of few economic means.
That DNA evidence has been used successfully to exonerate those both condemned and killed by the state helps him to build the most popularly accepted argument in his case.
from the Washington Post:
“Can the death penalty ever be justified as public policy when it inherently necessitates the occasional taking of a wrongly convicted, innocent life?”
O’Malley makes the arguments that will win him the votes he needs to pass the measure, which you can read in his op-ed. These focus on the well-supported evidence that death is not a deterrent to violent crime, and that it is not good fiscal policy.
There are much more compelling arguments, from my point of view, but they don’t seem to have popular political support.
Any voter who claims to be informed by their Christian faith should be moved by the idea of redemption. While the truly violent and those who have done tremendous wrongs must remain in jail for whatever their sentence, there is the opportunity, while they’re still alive, for a change of heart or religious conversion. Those Christians who advocate the death penalty seem to want to foreclose on the convicted’s potential for salvation, thus stepping in and passing God-like judgement on that person’s eternity.
There is also the arguments to be made for the sanctity of life:
We have all these good people in our churches, in public office, and on Sunday morning talk shows who like to talk about zygotes in petri dishes and embryos in freezers, of biomedical research, and of Terri Schiavo. They love to talk about the sanctity of life. That is, that life itself, is sacred or holy. At what point in a man’s life is his life no longer holy? Can his actions negate sanctity, or does the sacred come from God? Why is is so hard to say we abhor a man’s behavior, but the spark of life in him, which comes from God, we can not take away? If we can say it to protect a cluster of cells in a petri dish, why not for a man — whatever the condition of his soul or of his karma?
Abolishing the death penalty should be a conservative issue. Most conservative Catholics already understand that. In addition to the question of the sanctity of life, it’s fiscally sound policy, does not satisfy deterrence, and is arguably an overextension of government power and raises several constitutional questions.
The death penalty continues to exist in the U.S. only because of demagoguery. Politicians play to people’s basest fears desires for vengeance, and want to be seen as strong on “law and order.” They ignore the fact that the solution they promote does nothing to make us safer and there is no legitimate government role in seeking vengeance.
Martin O’Malley in the finest expression of leadership, summarizes his op-ed by seeking to preserve what is best in us:
Human dignity is the concept that leads brave individuals to sacrifice their lives for the lives of strangers. Human dignity is the universal truth that is the basis of ethics. Human dignity is the fundamental belief on which the laws of this state and this republic are founded. And absent a deterrent value, the damage done to the concept of human dignity by our conscious communal use of the death penalty is greater than the benefit of even a justly drawn retribution.
Amen.
Sphere ItHillary Shaves Head to Grab Limelight from Obama
Posted on February 21, 2007
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This is too precious! You know I love Hillary like a sister, auntie, future President.
Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, whose presidential campaign has been overshadowed in recent weeks by charismatic rival Sen. Barack Obama, D-IL, today walked into a K-Street beauty salon in Washington, D.C., commandeered the clippers and shaved her head down to the bare skin.
read more | digg story
George Takei Spoofs Tim Hardaway’s ‘Phobia
Posted on February 20, 2007
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Some days blogging is too easy. This will be everywhere in moments, but it’s irresistible. Who knew StarTrek’s Sulu had it in him?
Sphere ItJohn Edwards and Civil Unions
Posted on February 20, 2007
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The You Tube poster, who can be found at nickadamsweb, headlines this video, “John Edwards speaking at Dartmouth College equivocating his ass off on gay marriage.”
From my point of view, this is closer to what I wanted to hear from Edwards than what I’ve heard before. I have praised Hillary for her affirmative, half a loaf, statement supporting civil unions but knocked Edwards for gratuitous equivocating on the subject. It’s still half a loaf but he’s not pulling out the whole loaf and then taking half away. To my ear, he is not equivocating, but describing — and not totally defending — his own weakness. Mentioning his daughter suggests he truly believes in a better way. I’d suggest he work that emphasis more.
I wrote the Edwards campaign about this issue and the specifics of his earlier statement that caused me to cringe. I’d like to think he and his people heard me. It’s pretty clear he’s at least heard people like me.
The next question, as I watch the video, is will this man become an advocate when advocacy is called for? I’m not asking any of these candidates to take up gay rights to the exclusion of any other worthy issues and initiatives. What I want to know is will this current crop of Dems step up to this civil rights issue when called on and do the right thing? In the midst of a broad culture war will a new Democratic president affirm equal rights in words and action, pretend to do so — as Bush does on environment, or will they hide like Reagan did in the midst of the worst of the AIDS crisis?
Can Edwards overcome the bias he speaks of in refreshing candor? Will Hillary play both sides (which can be done to our benefit or detriment)? Will Obama overcome his own “marriage is between a man and a woman” bias?
There are many deciding factors going into next years’ primaries. I’m going to choose the candidate who, in my opinion, will do the best overall. In this election, though, because of the attacks on glbts from the right, I’ll add more weight than ever to how the candidates comport themselves around the issues of gay equality.
Sphere ItNYT’s David Brooks: Hillary Doesn’t Need to Apologize
Posted on February 19, 2007
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John in DC of American blog writes
Sphere It[quoting David Brooks]
…I mean, have the people calling for her apology actually read the speeches she delivered before the war? Have they read her remarks during the war resolution debate, when she specifically rejected a pre-emptive, unilateral attack on Saddam?
A World Without Liberals
Posted on February 19, 2007
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The site noted in Paly’s post, quoted below, has additional nasty stuff on it. Paly notes irony in the text of a t-shirt sold on the site. I might congratulate right-wingers for discovering irony, finally, even when it’s turned against people like me. Unfortunately, much of their stuff seems to like to dance on the edge of hate speech—clearly crossing that line at times. In total, I find the whole enterprise hateful or when not promoting hate, promoting ignorance. I’m a free speech kinda guy, and yet this clearly is speech that’s problematic. Any thoughts?
The Paly Voice discusses a twisted t-shirt on a right-wing site that begins:
Sphere ItImagine a world without liberals. Imagine a world without diversity training, gay marriage, abortion on demand, gun control, environmentalists, anti-American war protesters, The United Nations, France, Illegal Aliens, The National Education Association, multiculturalism, National Organization for Women, the New Age Movement, Hippies…
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