Yet another anti-gay Republican's family values now suspect

Gosh, I hate when that happens.

Here we go again. This time it's Republican US Senate hopeful from Illinois, Jack Ryan. Ryan is a "family values" Republican, who had this to say on gay marriage: "On special rights, I'm against it. . . . I'm against any special rights attached to someone's sexual orientation.'" And on Ryan's campaign Web site, "defending marriage" is one of the top 8 issues he chooses to speak out on.

It's therefore with great sadness that I must announce that Mr. Ryan, yet another defender of America's families, isn't just divorced, but details of his apparently rather nasty divorce are about to go public.

Sigh. Isn't there a single defender of marriage who isn't a big ole hypocrite? If there is, we'll find him, because we're investigating all of them. Stay tuned.

PS I forgot to mention, this jerk divorced Jeri "7 of 9" Ryan - that alone puts him in the doghouse in my book. Read the rest of this post...

CBS to air anti-Clinton ad, wouldn't run Anti-Bush ad

Atrios alerts us to the fact that CBS refused to run MoveOn's ad critical of Bush, but has no problem running a right-wing ad critical of Clinton, violating CBS's "clear" policy of not running advocacy ads on controversial issues. What gives? Read the rest of this post...

Internet Ads Go After Cheney's Daughter

These are my ads, paid for by all of you who contributed to DearMary.com. This is a snippet of the AP story that just came out:

A campaign to compel the vice president's lesbian daughter to oppose a proposed ban on gay marriage is launching its first Internet ad on Monday.

A series of simply animated cartoon panels features stick figures of Mary Cheney and Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites). One image reads, 'Dick's daughter sold out to help Dick run again.'

The story line refers to Mary Cheney's job as director of vice presidential operations for the Bush-Cheney re-election campaign. She held a public role as her father's assistant in the 2000 campaign and helped the GOP recruit homosexual voters during the 2002 midterm elections. She has been less visible this year while traveling with the vice president or working at campaign headquarters in Arlington, Va.

President Bush, meanwhile, has disturbed many gays, Republicans included, by asking Congress to move on a constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage in the United States.

'They've clearly made the decision to keep her in the closet for this campaign,' said John Aravosis, who in February launched the Web-based campaign www.DearMary.com, which started running the ad on Friday. 'They clearly understand the contradiction between having a lesbian run the vice president's campaign at the same time they want to bash gays in the Constitution.'....

You can see the entire ad at the top of the DearMary.com home page. The ads officially start running across the Internet on Monday. Read the rest of this post...

Senator Coleman's (R-MN) family values questioned

A while back, Garrison Keiller wrote about Senator Norm Coleman (R-MN) for Salon.com. Coleman is a supporter of the anti-gay amendment to the US Constitution to "protect" marriage. Keiller seems to be implying something "interesting" about Coleman's marriage. I, for one, would like to know, in detail, what Keiller is talking about.

Here's what Keiller said in Salon.com about Senator Coleman: (sorry, it's their Premium service):

"Norm got a free ride from the press. St. Paul is a small town and anybody who hangs around the St. Paul Grill knows about Norm's habits. Everyone knows that his family situation is, shall we say, very interesting, but nobody bothered to ask about it, least of all the religious people in the Republican Party. They made their peace with hypocrisy long ago. So this false knight made his way as an all-purpose feel-good candidate, standing for vaguely Republican values, supporting the president."

Read the rest of this post...

US Senator Norm Coleman's (R-MN) Family Values

This is an open letter I sent today to hundreds of people across Minnesota:

Hi everyone,

This is a special message I'm only sending to those of you in
Minnesota. As you may already know, your US Senator, Norm Coleman (R-
MN), is an ardent advocate of the anti-gay constitutional amendment
that would ban same-sex marriage and likely wipe out scores of already-
existing gay civil rights laws in cities and states across America:

"I believe that the time has come for the Defense of Marriage Act to be officially ground into the impenetrable legal foundation that is the United States Constitution." - Senator Coleman, on his Web site.

If Senator Coleman believes that the defense of marriage is of such critical importance to the United States that we must amend the
Constitution, then certainly the Senator would agree that we ALL must
join together to defend ALL of America's marriages, including his own.

With that in mind, I'd appreciate receiving from you, your friends, or
your contacts, any information you have about Senator Coleman's
personal defense of family values. If he is a perfect husband and a
sparkling example of what marriage ought to be, I'd like to hear about
it. Or, on the contrary, if he has a history of extra-marital affairs,
children out of wedlock, frequenting prostitutes, or anything else that
would seem to undermine marriage and family, I'd like to know about
that as well. All I want - all anyone could want - is a fair
accounting of the Senator's crusade to defend the American family.

Rest assured that your correspondence to me will be kept confidential -
you can contact me at John@GayAdvocacy.com (and feel free to create a
new Yahoo or Hotmail email address if you're more comfortable
communicating with me anonymously).

Together, I believe we can fulfill Senator Coleman's dream of ensuring
that ALL Americans are doing all they can to defend the great
institution of the family.

Thanks so much,

JOHN

PS Please share this email with other friends in Minnesota who might
not subscribe to my email list.

Read the rest of this post...

Al Qaeda Beheads U.S. Hostage in Saudi Arabia

So what's your big plan now, Mr. President, as the world's largest oil exporter starts to fall to pieces under your watch? We haven't even begun to see high gas prices if Saudi Arabia falls... Read the rest of this post...

Funny, Senator Allard has a gay staffer, yet he's the constitutional amendment's chief supporter in the Senate

Isn't that queer. Senator Wayne Allard (R-CO) is one of the top two sponsors of the anti-gay constitutional amendment, and held a press conference today announcing that, in fact, the US Senate will vote on the amendment the week of July 12. Allard went so far today as to say:

"We must not stand still when the courts are being used to challenge and distort civilization's oldest, most venerable social institution," [Senator Allard] said.

The odd thing is that two months ago I met a guy at a gay watering hole here in town who is gay-gay-gay and told me he works for Senator Allard. A second source confirmed who this guy is, that he is in fact gay, and that he does in fact work for Senator Allard.

So here's my question: Why is Senator Allard, the lead man in the Senate behind making gays second class citizens, hiring gay staffers who are, at least according to the Senator, hell-bent on destroying civilization's oldest most venerable institution? Wouldn't those staffers be a threat to all of America, working in the hallowed halls of Congress? Or does Senator Allard have a double standard - bash gays in public, love 'em in private?

Perhaps we should ask Senator Allard that very question. His phone is (202) 224-5941. Read the rest of this post...

Sept. 11 Commission Becoming Campaign Factor

And it should:

'Over time, the commission's reports have helped erode Bush's credibility. These issues are going to be front and center in the presidential debates in the fall,' said David Birdsell, a political scientist at Baruch College in New York.

Read the rest of this post...

Somehow I became the leader of an "outing" campaign

This wasn't EXACTLY my position, but this article should give closeted staffers who work for anti-gay members of Congress a scare. My precise position is that if they work for members of Congress who support the anti-gay constitutional amendment, I have no problems with them being outed. As I said in the article, if you’re gay and you support making sexual orientation a political weapon, then your sexual orientation is fair game. Folks can't have it both ways - help to attack the community by day, then expect the community to defend them by night.

Two additional points the article missed.
1. The outing should include closeted members of Congress and Bush administration officials.
2. The outing isn't just about whether they're gay or not - if they have any problems with their personal "family values" and are working for the "family values" crowd, then the public has a right to know that fact. After all, they're the ones who say our family values are a legitimate political weapon.

A friend of mine just emailed me the following rather salient point:

I love this quote from the republican staffer in the Blade article:
"It angers me whenever I hear of gay people doing that to other gay
people. It's accomplishing nothing while demonstrating insensitivity to
a very personal process."

What angers me is gays who are working to enact a constitutional
amendment that will make us second class citizens.

That's what he should be worried about gay people doing to other gay
people. Jesus Christ...these people are unbelievable....they work to
enshrine discrimination and you are the bad guy?????????

Excellent point. Would that these gay staffers and members of the administration cared so much about what they're doing to other gay people. Again, they live by one code: "Please protect me while I attack you." Lovely way to live your life.

Curious what the rest of you think? Read the rest of this post...

Bush Seeks to Depict Kerry as Economic Pessimist

This from the man who talked the entire country into a recession his first year in office. Read the rest of this post...

Forbes Names Mel Gibson Most Powerful Celebrity

Why is this relevant? Because it puts to rest all that conservative crap about how Hollywood is so liberal, and all the moviemakers are so liberal, and all the stars are so liberal. Turns out the bigest friggin star with the most power in Hollywood is a Bible-thumping, anti-gay wingnut. Read the rest of this post...