From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
Little Gay Billy's BIG Gay Newsapalooza!
- Recapping: Marriage equality was approved within the first two months of this year by legislatures in New Jersey, Washington and Maryland. New Jersey's got vetoed by the governor despite 57% public approval for it. All three face possible citizen referendums.
- Maine has a voter referendum in November that would let same-sex couples apply for marriage licenses. Unlike the previous 2009 referendum, the Catholic church is staying out of this year's rematch. That's good.
- If you missed Saturday's live all-star (Clooney! Pitt! Sheen! Lynch! Takei!) performance of "8"---featuring excerpts from the Prop. 8 trial transcripts---you can watch it here. Really well done.
- President Obama is in North Carolina today, and all equality-minded ears will be listening for him to say the magic words: "On May 8, Vote 'No' on One." You can do it!
- Memo to Kirk Cameron: I'd rather be an honest agnostic gay man like me than a lying Christian straight man like you any day. If your life is so hollow that you feel you have to lie about gay people destroying "many of the foundations of civilization," while simultaneously claiming you "love all people," you need professional help, buddy. But since you started it, let me reciprocate with equal love by saying: The Cosby Show kicked your ass.
- Never thought I'd see the NHL reaching out to GLBT kids, so color me pleasantly surprised by their "You Can Play" PSA.
- The Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against Minnesota's Anoka-Hennepin school district over harassment of GLBT students, and announced an "extensive settlement." That's in Michele Bachmann's district, by the way. Naturally she hasn’t lifted a finger or said a word to stop the harassment.
- The United Nations is wondering if the world can agree that, if it's not too much trouble, perhaps GLBT human beings can at least have a right to not be killed. The answer is, of course, no. Because assholes with power and shit for brains still roam the earth.
- Happy 20th birthday to Servicemembers Legal Defense Network. You don’t look a day over 15.
Never a dull moment. Meanwhile, Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Note: I'm dropping my Senate bid effective immediately. Too many videos, not enough time to bury them all.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til "Play ball!": 29
Days 'til the Asheville Bread Festival: 17
Mitt Romney's and Barack Obama's current favorable rating, respectively, among women: 37%, 55%
(Source: NBC news/Wall Street Journal poll)
Percent of Democrats and Republicans, respectively, who say global warming is real: 78%, 47%
(Source: University of Michigan-Muhlenberg College survey)
Percent by which a couple is likelier to divorce if one partner has a commute longer than 45 minutes: 40%
(Source: Harper's Index)
Increase in employment in the video game industry between 2005 and 2009: 8.6%
Average starting salary for an undergrad and grad student, respectively, in the video game design field: $54,054 / $62,862
(Source: Entertainment Software Association)
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Mid-week Rapture Index: 182 (including 4 gogs and 1 Obama reptilian head implant). Soul Protection Factor 44 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
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Puppy Pic of the Day: "Mush!"
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CHEERS to past performance guaranteeing future results. The big news up here in Maine is the announcement that former independent Governor Angus King is running for Senator Olympia Snowe's soon-to-be-vacant seat. While I can't say for sure how he feels about fiscal issues these days, I do know that he's just fine on social issues. Example: Governor King went out on a limb by appearing in an election-season TV ad supporting the gay and lesbian community…way back in 1995:
Never before has a governor in a state facing a referendum on gay rights taken such a step. … By agreeing to be featured in a 30-second TV spot now airing throughout Maine on all four networks, King has taken an aggressive stand on a divisive issue. … The governor's upfront stance could reap him strong enemies among Question 1 supporters. It also could cement his status as an independent outsider who sets his own course.
And from a purely physical perspective, he bears quite a resemblance to the hero of Gettysburg,
Joshua Chamberlain. So that's cool, if irrelevant. Now all eyes are on King's good friend, Democratic Rep. Chellie Pingree, who is still
mulling over her options. Bottom line: if she jumps in, the Republican candidate stands a better chance of winning because of a King/Pingree vote split. Decisions, decisions. We'll keep ya posted…
CHEERS to a brief look in the rearview mirror. Booze and chocolate ice cream made Super Tuesday tolerable last night. Voters in 10 states turned out to pick their choice to lose in the general election. And the winners are: Vermont, Virginia, North Dakota, Ohio, Massachusetts, Georgia, Oklahoma, Alaska, Tennessee and Idaho. Because for them it's finally over. Candidates: don’t let the door hit ya where the good lord split ya.
P.S. Up next: Kansas and Wyoming caucuses on Saturday, as campaign season shows no signs of ending anytime soon. Please curb your enthusiasm, Kossacks. You've broken enough chandeliers already.
CHEERS to Pa Bell. 136 years ago today, in 1876, Alexander Graham Bell received a patent---#174,465---for a communications device that featured a vibrating diaphragm inside it. Bell called it the telephone. Rush Limbaugh calls it a slut.
CHEERS to "No Drama Obama" in action. In yesterday's C&J poll, a whopping 83 percent of you thought the neo-conservative saber-rattling over Iran sounded awfully similar to the rhetoric leading up to our little adventure in Iraq. So it was good to see the President ratcheting things "down" a few notches at yesterday's presser, and also putting the backseat-driving Republican candidates on the defensive:
“This is not a game,” Mr. Obama said during a news conference at the White House timed to coincide with Super Tuesday voting in the Republican primaries in a number of crucial states. Mr. Obama gave a staunch defense of his administration’s actions to rein in Iran’s nuclear ambitions and said tough sanctions put in place by the United States and Europe were starting to work and were part of the reason Iran had returned to the negotiation table.
“The one thing we have not done is we have not launched a war,” Mr. Obama said. “If some of these folks think we should launch a war, let them say so, and explain to the American people.” […] “At this stage it is my belief we have a window of opportunity,” Mr. Obama said. “And so this notion that somehow we have a choice to make in the next week or two weeks or month or two months is not borne out by the facts,” the president said.
No smoking guns. No mushroom clouds. No significant quantities of uranium from Africa. No gog and magog nonsense. Just a hot cuppa
"Chill the fuck out…I got this." Somewhere in the beltway bubble, Judith Miller is making a frowny face.
JEERS to thuggish thuggery. On March 7, 1965---America's "Bloody Sunday"---a march by civil rights demonstrators was broken up in Selma, Alabama when "state and local lawmen attacked them with billy clubs and tear gas." Right now---and through Friday---there's a reenactment of the marches going on, with a modern-day message:
Participants say this year---an election year---is about more than just remembering, it's about raising consciousness. "Right now, we are seeing the Voting Rights Act attacked more consistently across the country than we have seen since it was passed." [NAACP president Ben] Jealous said.
Since crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge on Sunday, marchers are continuing on to Montgomery to bring attention to what they call a modern-day attack on voting rights. "We need people to understand that not only is history not very distant, but we stand on the precipice of repeating it," Jealous said.
The Alabama march is going smoothly so far. No injuries have been reported beyond a few cases of banjo on the knee.
JEERS to information you can probably do without. I've been told that I'll get a free rum and Coke if I write an item that will make you roll your eyes in disgust. So here goes: Snooki is engaged and pregnant…not necessarily in that order. Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha! (Hey…don't forget the lime.)
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One year ago in C&J: March 7, 2011
CHEERS to the Whisker Rebellion. Recently Maine's tea party governor said that the chemical BPA---labeled a "substance of concern" by the EPA and CDC---was so safe that the worst it would do is give women "little beards." In response, the grassroots called attention to his "joke" by designating last Friday "Little Beards Day." Maine women (and supporters from away) took photos of their fuzzy faces and posted them on Facebook. It's a reminder that humor can be an effective attention-getter. And also that if we're not vigilant Republicans are going to get us all killed.
CHEERS to a mild tut-tut from below. The Shuttle Discovery astronauts undocked from the International Space Station this morning, but not before its crew got an earful from the President. Anyone who appreciates a leader with steely-eyed resolve will be glad to hear that Barack Obama demanded that R2, the first humanoid robot in space, be unpacked ASAP:
“He’s still in packing foam?” Obama said feigning disappointment. “That’s a shame, man. Come on guys, unpack the guy! He flew all that way and you guys aren’t unpacking him?”
It was all good-natured ribbing, of course. Especially after an aide reminded him that
Discovery is the shuttle that's got the laser cannons.
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And just one more…
JEERS to the inevitable freakout. As you may have heard, the ethically-challenged blogger Andrew Breitbart, no stranger to conspiracy theories, died last week of what was likely a "sudden death" heart attack that strikes roughly 100,0000 people a year, even young'ish people like him (43). After a few moments of bipartisan condolences, out came the nuts:
"I do not believe Breitbart died from natural causes," one commenter on [conservative blogger Lawrence] Sinclair's site wrote. "He died for speaking the truth... He probably should not have announced he had videos of BO's college days... I find it quite interesting that he died alone on a street. There will be an autopsy and they will decide on natural causes, but there is a way to induce a heart attack in human beings." […] "I'm going to reiterate what I said before," a commenter wrote on InfoWars.com. "In my opinion THIS GUY GOT ELIMINATED. Plain and simple."
That is so outrageous. He wasn't eliminated. He's happily sedated in a cage in a bunker at Area 51. Right next to the set where they staged the fake moon landing. Duh!
Have a Super Wednesday, cuz Tuesday was kinda bleh. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
“I think the problem is the Republican leaders don’t have the courage to say what they say in quiet: they think Bill in Portland Maine is a buffoon. They think he is like a clown coming out of a small car at a circus. It’s great he is entertaining and all that. But nobody takes him seriously.”
---Matthew Dowd
3/4/12
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