All in the (Republican) family

By Capt. Fogg

Remember Richard Nixon? Who? You know, the guy they tried to rehabilitate after he fled the White House ahead of the prosecutors, the guy they built a museum about with fake exhibits showing how he really was a great guy who was victimized by the Liberal Press?

Well as long as we have Dick Nixon's words on tape we don't have to kick him around any more, since his unique talent for kicking himself in the ass with both feet in his mouth relieves us of the burden.

Watching All in the Family and completely failing to get what it was about, all the trickster could get out of it is that it "glorified homosexuality" made a hippie out to be a better man than a "hard-hat" and was likely to destroy America. CNN plans to air this clip and more Nixon outrages tonight. I don't plan to watch it. I don't need to listen to this shitweasel, this piece of snake dung talking about how Rome and Greece were destroyed by "fags." I had enough many years ago when I heard him talking to Billy Graham about how the Jews were destroying America. I've had far more than enough of the party that supported him for decades, that attacked truth and justice to protect this horror, committed crimes to re-elect him and who now thinks he's way too far to the left for the modern tea-stained Republicans.

Watch this (my apologies for the ad) and ask yourself how this piece of human garbage ever got elected, how anyone would debase themselves and their country by supporting him in full knowledge of his words and deeds. Ask yourself how low a person has to be to be a Republican. Listen to his words America, and despair.

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Who said anything about "rebranding"?

By Mustang Bobby 

All that talk about rebranding the GOP after the beatdown in last year's election was just that: talk.  They really didn't mean it, according to RNC Chair Reince Priebus:

Speaking with David Brody of the Christian Broadcasting Network posted today, RNC Chairman Reince Priebus confirmed that the party will try to reach out to groups like gays and lesbians by simply appearing to be more respectful without actually changing its views on issues such as marriage equality.

After Brody said conservative evangelical voters are nervous that the GOP thinks "we have to be more tolerant," Priebus said there is nothing to worry about. "I don't know if I've used the word 'tolerance,' I don't really care for that word myself. I don't have a problem with it, I just think it has another meaning politically that can go the other direction," the party chairman said.

"It's not what you say, I think, it's sometimes – like our moms used to tell us – it's how you say it. And I think that's really the issue. And quite frankly, I think some of that has been overblown."

Priebus assured Brody that the GOP will continue to represent "things that are very square with our beliefs as Christians" and recognize that "there's only one sovereign God."

How very reassuring. For a while there we had a hope that they might become tolerant and open-minded, which would have been a major change and might even attract voters who previously saw them as sniveling patriarchs and bigots who saw the error of their ways. Not to worry; they're still the same old cranks.

(Cross-posted at Bark Bark Woof Woof.)

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Russia codifies extreme anti-gay bigotry

By Michael J.W. Stickings

While I respect the position Russian President Vladimir Putin is taking on the whole Snowden saga, there's really nothing else I like about the guy, and more and more it looks like he and his ilk want to turn their country into a right-wing dictatorship resembing the fascist states of old. For example:

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed into law [on Sunday] one of the most draconian anti-gay laws on the planet.

The new law, coming only seven months before Russia is to host the Winter Olympics in Sochi, would ban anything considered pro-gay, from gay-affirmative speech, to gays holding hands in public, to even wearing rainbow suspenders.

The law also contains a provision permitting the government to arrest and detain gay, or pro-gay, foreigners for up to 14 days before they would then be expelled from the country.  That provision ought to send chills to anyone gay, lesbians, bisexual or transgender who is planning to attend or participate in the Winter Olympics.

It is now literally illegal in Russia to say that you are gay.  It is illegal to kiss your partner in public – say, after you win a gold medal.  It is illegal for a gay athlete to wear the rainbow flag.  Or even to acknowledge during an interview that they are gay – or for the foreign press to acknowledge it – unless they mention that gay sexual orientation in a negative way.

Yes, Russia makes even Texas look progressive.

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The bigots will stop at nothing (updated)

By Michael J.W. Stickings 

UPDATE: Fail.

**********

From the L.A. Times:

ProtectMarriage, the sponsors of Proposition 8, filed an emergency petition to the U.S. Supreme Court on Saturday to stop same-sex marriages from continuing in California.

The petition says the decision by the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to permit weddings starting Friday afternoon was "premature."

It's Justice Kennedy, who of course wrote the majority opinion that struck down the Defense of Marriage Act, who will rule on this petition, as he is responsible for the 9th Circuit Court. Tom Goldstein of SCOTUSblog explains:

The application argues that the Supreme Court’s ruling in the Proposition 8 case is not yet "final," so the stay must remain in place. The Supreme Court ordinarily does not issue its formally binding ruling – known as the "judgment" – in a case from a federal court of appeals until 25 days after it releases its "opinion." Because the Court issued its opinion in the Proposition 8 case on June 26, it would by default not issue the judgment until Monday, July 22. (The 25th day is July 21, a Sunday.) The principal point of that delay is to permit the losing party to prepare and submit a petition for rehearing to the Justices, though such petitions are as a practical matter never granted.

So basically, the bigots behind Prop 8 want more time to prepare to continue to fight for their bigotry, and to "delay the inevitable," as Goldstein writes. In any event, Goldstein thinks this emergency petition will "likely" fail, for a variety of pretty solid reasons.

What's clear, though, is that the bigots are desperate, and will stop at nothing. So extreme is their bigotry.

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Anti-bullying

By Mustang Bobby

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) responded to the Supreme Court's ruling on DOMA by standing up against bullying... of bigots.

My hope is that those of us who believe in the sanctity and uniqueness of traditional marriage will continue to argue for its protection in a way that is respectful to the millions of American sons and daughters who are gay. It is also my hope that those who argue for the redefinition of marriage to include same-sex marriage will refrain from assailing the millions of Americans who disagree with them as bigots.

So there you have a bully begging not to be bullied for being a bigoted bully.

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Begging for it

By Mustang Bobby

Either the Family Research Council really has no idea what goes on outside of their nice little 1950s cocoon, or someone in their marketing department is a genius at coming up with not-so-subtle Freudian slips.

Here's their new logo for their anti-gay rally:

Seriously?  "On our knees" and "I'm in"? Well, whatever gets you off, buddy.

On the other hand, they could have gone with "I'm coming." [Or maybe something about the second coming? -- MJWS]

H/T to Americablog.

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Chris Christie hates DOMA ruling, reveals abject ignorance of American constitutionalism

By Michael J.W. Stickings

As you may have heard, sometime Republican superstar Chris Christie, the bullying blowhard (and media-friendly) governor of New Jersey, isn't terribly impressed with the Supreme Court for striking down the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).

The ruling is an "example of judicial supremacy," he said yesterday. "I don't think the ruling was appropriate," he opined. "I think it was wrong."

He criticized the justices, or at least five of them, for replacing "the judgment of a Republican Congress and a Democratic president" with "their own judgment," adding: "I thought that Justice Kennedy's opinion was, in many respects, incredibly insulting to those people, 340-some members of Congress who voted for the Defense of Marriage Act, and Bill Clinton."

Okay, we already knew Christie was a bigot -- yes, if you're against same-sex marriage, that's what you are, period. But what he showed with these comments is that he's an ignorant fool as well, with little regard for the checks, balances, and the rule of law.

Does he really have so little understanding of the Constitution, the history of the Supreme Court, and the concept of judicial review, particularly as established early on with Marbury v. Madison, one of the country's defining cases? 

This is what, in essence, the U.S. Supreme Court does. It rules on the constitutionality of federal laws, providing a check on the other two branches of government. And what it said on Wednesday is that DOMA is unconstitutional. It had every right to do so. It's in the fucking Constitution.

Furthermore, it hardly matters that DOMA was enacted by a Republican Congress and Democratic president, or by any partisan combination. That was 17 years ago. Clinton himself is now against it. And laws are not enacted for eternity.

But Christie is really just grasping at straws. He opposes same-sex marriage and so opposes the ruling simply because he doesn't like it. In so doing, though, he misunderstands or misrepresents checks and balances as "judicial supremacy." And in fact the 5-4 ruling was rather conservative. The justices may have struck down DOMA, but they did not issue a sweeping endorsement of same-sex marriage, one that would have required it immediately at the state level. Yes, the case against DOMA is essentially the case against state bans on same-sex marriage as well, but the Court effectively left it to states to address.

Christie is safe. He'll win re-election easily later this year, and of course he's done a lot of good in his state in response to Hurricane Sandy, not least by embracing Obama as his BFF last year. But behind the media-friendly pragmatism lies the core of an ideological conservative who in many ways isn't all that different than your standard Republican from anywhere else.

And his ridiculous take on the historic DOMA ruling just shows him to be a moron as well.

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Church of Hate

By Capt. Fogg

The old cliche has rats leaving a sinking ship.  Southern Baptists aren't that smart and it seems they do intend to go down with their foul and foundering wreck of antique bigotry.

Lifelong member President Jimmy Carter left that self-righteous ship of fools about 4 years ago over Church teachings about the subservient role of women and I'm waiting to see who tumbles into the lifeboats over the latest decision to dump the Boy Scouts because they decided on May 24th that they no longer are going to excommunicate gay Scouts.

It's a "Moral" thing you see and it's not really bigotry because they justify
it with some ancient political propaganda they somehow attribute to some god and so they can, in all good and righteous confidence recommend that Southern Baptist Churches all over the South withdraw support from about 100,000 scouts.  I wonder how many of those will, lacking something decent to do after school or in the Summer, lacking the impetus toward self-improvement will wander toward making bad personal decisions and wind up getting into trouble and into jail where predatory Southern Baptists can recruit them for the faith as though youth homes and penitentiaries  were prep schools and seminaries. 

Of course the SBC was a supporter of Slavery and Segregation because it was a moral thing and a Biblical one - not because they're a bunch of bigots and moral cowards. It's what God wants and who can question the absolute truth of anything someone put into God's mouth for his own purposes?

Yes, yes, they decided to stop beating that dead horse and renounced all that back in 1995 -- decades after the horse died but perhaps that's only because they had gays and women to turn to while blathering about God's word.  One wonders what they will choose as the next life raft when the world of decency, respect and morality, in due course rejects once again that rotting prison hulk of the Southern Baptist Convention.

(Cross-posted from Human Voices)

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Republican candidate for lieutenant governor of Virginia, E.W. Jackson, apparently also running for Worst Republican Ever

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Okay, here's what we know about this crazy guy so far:

-- He thinks President Obama sees the world from "a Muslim perspective" and is anti-Semitic and anti-Israel.

-- He thinks gays are "very sick people psychologically."

-- He thinks Democrats are like slave masters.

-- He thinks Planned Parenthood has been "far more lethal to black lives than the KKK ever was." Oh, and that "the Democrat Party and the black civil rights allies are partners in this genocide."

And... well, you can read more here. This is all stuff he's said in the past, before he was a candidate. Who knows what will come during the campaign?

Oh, and here's another thing: 

E.W. Jackson, the Virginia GOP's nominee for lieutenant governor, began his career as a minister and attorney in Boston. While there, he lent his support to a high-profile 1988 fight against a plan to desegregate public housing developments in the neighborhood of South Boston.

Yes, that's right. He was against desegregation. And by the way, the fact that he's black doesn't really make that any better. 

Well done, Virginia Republicans. Your state is turning purple (or, rather, has already turned purple and may now be turning blue) and you respond to that by nominating a guy so out on the right-wing fringe he makes the guy running for governor, Ken Cuccinelli, look like a sensible moderate by comparison. (Well, no, not really. Cuccinelli still hates blow jobs and has a long record of the right-wing crazy.)

The only thing that would make sense would be if Republicans picked Jackson to make Cuccinelli look better. But that's way too Machiavellian -- there was no such conspiracy.

No, they just fucked themselves with Jackson. No wonder they're already panicking.

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Vive la France! Down with Texas!

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Progress is on the march. In countries like Portugal and, of course, France:

France's president has signed into law a controversial bill making the country the ninth in Europe, and 14th globally, to legalise gay marriage.

On Friday, the Constitutional Council rejected a challenge by the right-wing opposition, clearing the way for Francois Hollande to sign the bill.

He said: "I have taken [the decision]; now it is time to respect the law of the Republic."

It wasn't easy:

Mr Hollande and his ruling Socialist Party have made the legislation their flagship social reform since being elected a year ago.

After a tortured debate, the same-sex marriage and adoption bill was adopted by France's Senate and National Assembly last month.

The bill was quickly challenged on constitutional grounds by the main right-wing opposition UMP party of former president Nicolas Sarkozy.

But the Constitutional Council ruled on Friday that same-sex marriage "did not run contrary to any constitutional principles," and that it did not infringe on "basic rights or liberties or national sovereignty".

Indeed, while France is a generally progressive country (e.g., on health care), the right is still very strong, with conservatives well to the right of Sarkozy, and issues like gay rights and immigration prove to be deeply divisive.

Still, it's done, a victory for liberty and equality (and, for that matter, fraternity), and that's more than you can say about the U.S., which includes retrograde states like Texas:

A Republican Texas Judge has ordered a lesbian couple to live apart or give up custody of their children. According to Think Progress, Judge John Roach of McKinney, Texas has given Page Price 30 days to move out of the home she shares with Carolyn Compton and Compton's two children from a previous marriage because he does not approve of Compton and Price's "lifestyle."

Roach has placed a "morality clause" in Compton's divorce papers, which forbids Compton from having anyone she is not related to "by blood or marriage" in her home past 9:00 p.m. if the children are present. Same sex marriage is illegal in Texas, so by law, Compton cannot live with Price if she wishes to retain custody of her children.

That's not Saudi Arabia, that's Texas. And that's right, this bigot of a judge, reinforcing the bigotry of that state, is denying this woman her liberty and her equality (and, for that matter, her fraternity).

Truly, utterly shameful.

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