Support our soldiers! Ask Obama to pardon Choi and Pietrangelo at PardonOurSoldiers.com
Our soldiers would give their lives for us, and it doesn’t matter if they are gay or straight. Yesterday, two brave men, Lt. Dan Choi and Capt. Jim Pietrangelo protested the US Military’s practice of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, the discriminatory practice of throwing gay and lesbian soldiers out of the armed forces. For that, they were arrested and thrown in jail.
Now is the time for us, those of us that support the military, to ask President Obama to pardon Choi and Pietrangelo. Please go to PardonOurSoldiers.com and sign the online petition!
How to put half a million people to work, RIGHT NOW
Face it. Unemployment is insane at over 10%. We need to do something about it, and we need to do it fast, or else Sarah Palin will be telling Barack Obama in 2012, “It’s the economy, stupid”. Wow. Wouldn’t that be ironic.
In Oregon, where the ProudLiberal is, as well as in New Jersey, we have special programs. It’s called “you can’t pump your own gas”. It has to be done by someone else. An employee of a gas station. Someone who is paid, specifically to take your payments, and pump your gas. it’s not a horrible job, though the weather is not always cooperative. But it’s also a job that anyone, from a Harvard educated MBA to an 8th grade middle school drop out can do. So we got that going for us.
There are over 115,000 gas stations in the United States, according to a 2008 estimate. Most of those are going to be opened a good portion of the day – say two shifts. And good thought that you are going to have to have at least four people to cover a week, plus one more to cover for vacations. So, that is 115,000 stations times at least 5 people. That comes out to 460,000 jobs. Jobs that could be created TOMORROW if we just went mandatory full-service gas (including truck stops and commercial service stops) all across the United States.
Two caveats. First, we have to pull out Oregon and New Jersey from the 460,000. However, I think that it would probably balance out, with the mega-gas stations that exist out there, and making commercial gas stations full service as well.
Second caveat is the thought, “But that will drive up the price of gas!”. Okay – let’s look at reality here. Oregon, which is full service only, is currently at $2.867 per gallon. Washington, right next door, is currently at $2.973 per gallon. What was your argument again?
Half a million people, back at work and getting paid, will be paying into unemployment for the rest of us. They’ll be paying taxes again for our needed infrastructure. And the boon in construction jobs associated with building out-buildings at some gas stations will be that much better.
Let’s get to work!
We must be our own fierce advocate, because to everyone else, we are just props
Remember during the 2008 election, when Senator Barack Obama said that he would be a “fierce advocate” for the GLBT community? Fast forward a few months, when President Obama’s administration defended DOMA, the Defense of Marriage Act, and equated gay marriage to pedophilia and incest.
Remember the 1992 election, when Governor Clinton became one of the first national leaders to champion gay rights? And then remember the following years when DOMA and DADT came about? Senator Clinton caught hell for that in 2008, when rocker Melissa Etheridge said that Clinton’s husband threw the gay community “under the bus” given the first chance.
Flash forward to today in Washington, DC. There was a big buildup to a massive protest, headlined by “gay advocate” comedian Kathy Griffin. She was headlining at an HRC gala a few nights ago, and was to be part of a Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell repeal affair with the HRC (Human Rights Campaign). Griffin made it to lobby the Senate. Then she indeed headline at a rally today, along with HRC’s leader Joe Solmonese and Lt. Dan Choi. When Lt. Choi got up to speak, he apparently offered an act of civil disobedience. He asked Griffin and Solomnese if they would go to the White House with him and Captain Jim Pietrangelo in support, which apparently they said they would.
Well that was it for Griffin and Solomnese. A photo-op is all they wanted. They didn’t dare step anywhere near Choi or Pietrangelo, especially when Choi and Pietrangelo handcuffed themselves to the White House fence. Griffin and Solomnese were nowhere to be seen.
Griffin did tweet after the rally. This is what she (@kathygriffin) wrote:
Yes, he does. We, as a community – a community of gays, lesbians, democrats, liberals, and progressives – WE need to have balls like Lt. Choi and Captain Pietrangelo. Why? Because our “fierce advocates”, from President Obama, to Kathy Griffin, to HRC President Joe Solomnese aren’t. They proved today that they could care less about what is right, and only about what is doing what is convenient for them.
What if Rosa Parks decided, “Well, I don’t want to rock the boat. I’ll move to the back of the bus”?
What if Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “I have hopes for my children, but I’m not willing to make waves over it.”?
What if Susan B. Anthony decided, “Yes, women should be equal to men, but I shouldn’t speak up.”
These people were different. They were the leaders that we need today. We don’t need people like Griffin or Solomnese, who are using the GLBT community as props. Props for ratings. Props for fame. Props for money. Props for donations. We need people who stand up and do the right thing, like Lt. Dan Choi and Captain Jim Pietrangelo. They know what needs to be done, what we need to do to get the progressive movement MOVING!
I previously took the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Give” pledge because Democrats decided to stop moving forward on GLBT issues, and when the Obama White House decided to defend DOMA. Now, the HRC has shown that it wants to do what’s convenient, not what’s right, and abandoning GLBT soldiers, so that organization can go and rot, too. But you and me. We are the ones that can use Choi, and Parks, and Anthony, and King as our guides, and do what is right – not what’s convenient. We are nobody’s props. We are humans, and we all deserve civil rights.
CNN is trying to out-FOX FOX
There is an uproar brewing about CNN, and it’s just getting uglier and uglier.
Seems that CNN is trying to do something about it’s ratings. Let’s see now, who has higher ratings than CNN? Why, that would be FOX News, right? So what does CNN do? They announce proudly that they are hiring Redstate.com founder – and HATE monger – Erick Erickson.
Well, yes, that is their perogative. They are a business, and want ratings and sensationalism (see previous post about two headlines), and they are going to get it with Erickson. You know like how Erickson calls First Lady Michelle Obama a “Marxist Harpy”. Or equated gay people with pedophiles. Or that the GOP doesn’t want ANY minorities in the Senate. And don’t ask what he thinks about US Supreme Court Justice Souter. It’s too vile.
So there you have it. CNN is putting forth a right-wing blowhard with his own whacked out agenda. Oh, and what liberal did they hire when they hired Erickson? Nobody, of course. Seriously CNN; you’re not even trying anymore.
There is now a movement called “Dump CNN”. You can find the Twitter page here, and the Facebook group here. I’ve unfollowed all CNN sources within Twitter, and told them why. And now, I refuse to turn to CNN for news at all. Plus, we’re lobbying to get the CNN feed here at work (on four different TVs around the office) turned off or turned to something completely different.
So, CNN. Do what you want. I’ve made my choice, and it no longer includes watching your channel. Remember what happened when Glenn Beck said that President Obama was a racist? Yeah, dozens of sponsors left his program and/or FOX News. Welcome to the FOX-fold, CNN!
A tale of two headlines
Okay, so it’s more than two headlines. It’s the concept of two different headlines for the same basic story, with VERY different undertones. But it’s the headline that gets you going, and gets you into the story, which is all the more reason that this has been bugging me all day long.
I use Yahoo!’s “My Yahoo!” page as a news aggregate for me so I can keep up on things. One headline that I kept seeing all day long was this one:
Wow. Read the headline. I did, and THEN I clicked on the link. The link told you something VERY different. Now let’s look at some other of the “LIBERAL MEDIA”.
Here is what ABC News had to say, not only in big bold letters, but with a picture of Holder.
Wow. “NEVER APPEAR IN AN AMERICAN COURTROOM” the headline screams. Damn commie bastard Obama must be going to tell bin Laden “tsk tsk tsk” and shoo him away, right?
Now lets try CBS News:
Wow. That Eric Holder must be a DOUCHE, because this headline implies that bin Laden is going to be allowed to keep his silence forever and never have to say a word about anything. And since when is “Tiger Woods” more of a hot topic than bin Laden? I mean, Tiger may have slept with a bunch of women. Oh, I get it. Tiger has bin Laden’s 72 virgins. Well, WERE virgins.
Let’s see what FOX News has to say, shall we?
Well it was kind of buried on FOXNews.com, so I had to hunt for it. And weird. FOX didn’t call him “bin Laden”, they called him “Usama”, which sounds and looks a LOT like “Obama”. Is Obama on trial for something? Oh yeah, we were talking about bin Laden, not President Obama. My bad.
Okay then. Lets look at that “bastion of the left” MSNBC and see what they have to say, eh?
It’s kind of in small print, and not easy to find on the page. But hey! They imply that bin Laden is going to get off scott free, now don’t they? Wow.
So, like, the New York Times. They’re in the know with that leftist hippy socialist crowd, right? Hmmm…
Man. Not only does the New York Times give you the headline that bin Laden will always be free, hell with the first sentence from the article, it sounds like bin Laden will be driving a two ton Chevy truck down your street. Better lock up your kids, because the New York Times says bin Laden will roam free and use them for bait!
How about Time Magazine? Sure, they’re a weekly, but they have to have a say, right?
Yep. Time and the New York Times agree. Mothers, hide your children.
Okay, so now that you’re all enraged because Osama bin Laden is not only invading your neighborhood, but he’s probably planning on poisoning your kids Halloween candy, deflowering your oldest daughter, call you during dinner to sell you a time share, and talk during the BEST parts of whatever movie you’re seeing this weekend. But then again, what if you looked at a different news source? What if you just per chance, stumbled upon a news source that not every mainstream person in the US would go to on a regular basis?
Let’s try NPR. They’re some sort of government socialist plot news story service, right? What do they have to say?
WHAT WHAT WHAT?!?!?!? What in the hell is this “won’t be captured alive” bullcrap? We’ve all been led to believe bin Laden is being protected by Holder and Obama, and was probably bowling with the first family every alternate Tuesday night.
Now for the real test. Let’s look at the Huffington Post, ’cause we know they’re just downright wrong, right?
Not captured alive? Wow. That makes Holder sound a little butch.
You see what is going on here? Hype and confusion may stir up a mess, get you higher ratings for a bit, and more clicks and webads, but people realize – when they take the time – that you are fucking with their heads. You, the “main stream media” are doing a number on them, frightening them out of their skins, just to turn a profit. A true journalist would not allow a line like CBS, MSNBC, CNN, Time, or the like to put out. And if you look at each of their stories on each website, it says in the first few sentences what Holder REALLY said and REALLY meant.
So mainstream media? You can bite it. Because we’re not as dumb as you want us to be. We can hit back, and we can do the news ourselves – and do a better job at it.
Unemployement benefits and the big “FU!”
Like many Americans, I have been watching the Senate wrangle with the issue of unemployment benefits, and the detestable act that Kentucky Senator Bunning has committed in denying benefits be continued. Then I watched as Senator John Kyl of Arizona, the number two Republican in the Senate, call people that got unemployment benefits “lazy”. This was pretty much a horrible situation for the American people.
But the big “FU” was not just Bunning flipping the bird to the American public. It came in the form of an accusation from CNN reporter Christine Roman this morning. Did you see it? Roman, in explaining that the benefits finally passed last night, said, “Why did Democrats let this go for so long?” Yes, she blamed DEMOCRATS for the fiasco. I’m sorry, but when did Senator Bunning cross the aisle and become a Democrat? Which top Democratic Party Official in the Senate asked Senator Bunning to object to the unanimous consent on the continuation of unemployment benefits? NONE! What CNN’s Roman did was subtle, but nonetheless, a jab at Democrats instead of the real culprit, Senator Bunning and his supporters. I’ll post the transcript when it comes out.
CNN, you not only got it wrong this morning, you got it FOX NEWS wrong!
UPDATED: TRANSCRIPT FROM CNN:
ROBERTS: You got a Numeral for us this morning, a Romans Numeral?
ROMANS: I do, and this has do to with broken government, everybody — a 11.5 million people. Eleven and a half million people who for five days have been watching as the Democrats let the situation marinade and as Jim Bunning continued to talk about how we have to talk about — 11.5 million people are the number of people who get unemployment checks.
Many of the (ph) people couldn’t feed their families without them and I just think that — and what I’ve been getting — the feedback that I’ve been getting from our viewers and the like and on Facebook and on Twitter is that a lot of people have been watching this, quote- unquote, “Bunning bashing” but have been saying, wait a minute, why did the Democrats let this go on so long?
Couldn’t they have fixed this last Friday? Did they — is this — is this also political maneuvering on both sides? And 11.5 –
CHETRY: And the answer is yes.
Homophobia seems to be making a comeback (image technically NSFW)
It seems that there is more and more homophobia, calls for violence, and all-out crappy treatment of the LGBT community that either being reported, or just becoming more fashionable to do. I’m not sure which one if is, but it’s disturbing, especially given that hate crimes against the LGBT community seem to be going up.
So the first big one was the Notre Dame cartoon. Second was John Mayer’s comments. Now, it’s another gay-bashing T-Shirt making the rounds.
Perusing through Facebook, I found an update from T-Shirt Hell. Normally their stuff is edgy but fun. Then I saw they were promoting this shirt to bring back (the top image):
Go check it out for yourself. Yeah, the “Holy Fucking Shit” is gross, but hell, to each his own. But “Nothing runs like a queere”, with a person being chased by people with baseball bats? That’s crossing the line. If you want to see for yourself, sign into Facebook and check T-Shirt Hell’s page at: http://www.facebook.com/tshirthell. They think it’s so funny, that’s their company’s avatar.
Another difference between Democrats and Republicans
There has been a great “compare and contrast Democrats and Republicans” list out there for quite a while, and trust me it is great. But recently, something struck me as the biggest difference of them all. Let me tell you about it. And yes, it may sound hokey, but there is definitely a lesson to be learned here.
I worked in an office that was 90% Republican, 10% Democrat. We had a little kitchen that wasn’t very well kept up, but we managed. Towards the end of my assignment in that office, there was behavior that just struck me as odd. Here’s what it boiled down to: When a Republican was in the kitchen and in need of a paper towel to clean things up, they walked about 10 feet away to the bathroom, got a few paper towels, and cleaned up their mess. Once clean, they went about their day. When a Democrat was in the kitchen and in need of a paper towel to clean things up, again they walked to the bathroom. However, every single time, the Democrat brought back enough paper towels for multiple jobs, not just for what they needed to clean up. Republicans and Democrats would both use these reserve paper towels to clean up the mess, until such time as they were gone. Then the whole cycle would start over again.
So what does a lesson in paper towel usage between Democrats and Republicans teach us? That Republicans do what they need to for the short term, whereas Democrats do the same job, but at the same time, plan for the future.
So there may be a good “compare and contrast democrats and republicans” list out there already. But all you really need to know comes from a little office kitchen, and how Republicans don’t plan for the future, while their Democratic brethren most certainly do.
No footnotes, no asterisks
You know, when you read the Declaration of Independence put forth by the Founding Fathers, you have to notice one fact. There are no footnotes or asterisks that direct the reader to some subsection saying that “well, we didn’t mean it applies to this group or that”. The most famous line is, of course, this:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Yes boys and girls, that is exactly how it’s written. It’s not:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal (see note 1), that they are endowed by their Creator (see note 2) with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Note 1: This may not apply to those Catholics; we just don’t get their religion. Oh, and not the homos. No offense, but ewww… And not those Italians that come over here. You know, looking all swarthy and all. And don’t get us started on those crazy Indians! We’ve got some smallpox blankets to take care of them!
Note 2: When we say “Creator”, we mean the good, PROTESTANT God. We don’t mean a Catholic God, or some heathen race God like Ganesha or Mohammed or Zeus or Odin. Nope, the only Creator we mean is our good, Protestant God.
So what does this mean? It means that A) we are ALL meant to be able to pursue Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness and B) every person has the right to their own beliefs about their Creator. It means that black people have the right to marry white people. It means that people should be allowed to be hermits in a cave, or be the life of a party in downtown Manhattan. It means that people are allowed to pursue Mormonism. It means that people are allowed to howl at the moon, if that is their want for worship. And it means that men should have the right to marry other men, and women should have the right to marry other women. You see, it all comes down to Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. I have been with my partner for over seventeen years. But someone took away our rights of the pursuit of Happiness in a popularity contest back in 2004.
We should be granting rights, not taking them away. Because honestly, no one person is better than another. No one person’s rights should be granted when another person’s rights are taken away. We are all equal. We should all BE equal. That is the way that our Founding Fathers wanted.
Straight boys looking at naked ladies makes them GAY?!?!?!
Okay, who came up with this? Oh yeah, some yabbo – Senator Tom Coburn’s Chief of Staff at the Value Voters summit – declared that. Okay, who believes these wackos?
But just in case, maybe I should send Hugh Jackman a case of Playboy magazines….and my address. 
