I Didn't Say It ...

Cody Conner, a Virginia Beach father of three, taking on the bigotry of Virginia’s governor and the schools boards in the state:

“You are never going to find a right way to do the wrong thing and Governor Youngkin’s policies are wrong. Never in history have the good guys been the segregationist group pushing to legislate identity. Never in history have the good guys been closely connected with and supported by hate groups like the Proud Boys. And the good guys don’t put Hitler quotes for inspiration on the front of their newsletters.

News flash: they’re the bad guys. They’re the bad guys supporting bad policy. And if you support the same bad policy, guess what? You’re one of the bad guys too. When you look around and see only the wrong people supporting what you’re doing, you’re doing the wrong thing. Now you’ve heard some speakers come up here and say how they love these kids but won’t accept them. I’m here to tell you that if your love makes somebody not want to be alive, it’s not love. That’s not love.

Some of you are going to get up here and say ‘it’s the law.’ Well, I remind you that slavery and segregation used to be the law here in Virginia.”

Conner was referring to the Youngkin’s “model policies” for public schools that require students to use the bathroom and sports team that matches their assigned sex; requires written instruction from parents for a student to use names or gender pronouns that differ from the official record, meaning that teacher can deadname students—refer to them by their prior name—if paperwork isn’t filled out by the parents; requires the school to inform parents if a student is questioning their identity.

Conner started speaking out at school board meetings after moving his family to Virginia Beach right before Youngkin’s policies passed. The Conner’s moved from rural Virginia to Virginia Beach so their 13-year-old trans daughter, who came out a year ago, would be in a school system that would be supportive, but that all changed because of Youngkin.

And Cody Conner ain’t playing.

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Bernie Sanders, Democrat Senator from Vermont, after breaking up the threat of a fistfight in Congress between GOP Senator Markwayne Mullin and a Teamsters boss:

“Well, it’s pretty pathetic. We have a United States senator challenging, you know, a member of the panel who is the head of one of the larger unions in America, which has just negotiated a very good contract for their workers, the Teamsters. The point I try to make there is this country faces so many crises. And by the way, it might be nice for the media to pay attention to really what the hearing was about, is that workers all over this country are standing up and fighting back against corporate greed. Unions like the UAW, the Teamsters, others are winning good contracts.”

But Markwayne Mullin and his tiny dick tried to hijack that idea.

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Laura Ingraham, on Markwayne Mullin’s ¿Quién es más macho? Performance:

“I never thought I’d say this, but Bernie Sanders seems to be the voice of reason here. Everything you just saw was a complete and utter embarrassment. It shouldn’t be what is projected to our kids from our nation’s capital. Reminder to all of you, yeah, the children are watching. You’re supposed to be the adults in the room, so act like it. I’ve seen a lot on Capitol Hill but this has been a week for the ages. This is why there is such a declining respect for our political leaders.”

Nice of you to speak out, Laura, but it's not “our” political leaders acting foolish and stupid, it's  the GOP political leaders. Markwayne’s pissy little hissy fit came on the heels of Kevin McCarthy elbowing a colleague in the halls of Congress because that man voted to have KKKevin removed.

It’s the GOP, Laura, the GOP.

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Chip Roy, GOP Representative from Texas and Freedom Caucus member, saying the quiet part out loud:

“One thing! I want my Republican colleagues to give me one thing, ONE, that I can go campaign on and say we did. One! Anybody sitting in the complex, you wanna come down to the floor and explain to me one material, meaningful, significant thing the Republican majority has done.”

Sadly, Roy ranted in a mostly empty chamber and, to be fair, Roy tried and failed to defund Pentagon diversity efforts and to repeal a federal law against blocking abortion clinics.

So, there are two things Roy couldn’t get done.

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Barry Manilow, saying he always knew he was gay and that coming out in his 70s was a “non-event”:

“[I knew I was gay.] We all do, when we’re five years old or something. The gay thing was pretty, pretty strong. It was strong, I couldn’t deny it. I think [coming out] was really a non-event for me. Really, Garry [Kief] and I’ve been together for so long. You know, it just never dawned on me that we were gonna come out. But when we got married, it was a big deal. Garry actually kind of saved my life, because as my career exploded, as I said, it was crazy. It was just crazy, and, you know, going back to an empty hotel room, you can get into a lot of trouble if you’re alone night after night after night. [After meeting Garry] I didn’t have to go back to those empty hotel rooms. I had someone to cry with or to celebrate with. I wish that to young people—that they don’t have to go back to those hotel rooms by themselves. In the 70s … it wasn’t the same as it is today. Now being gay is no big deal. But back in the 70s, it would have killed a career.”

Manilow married his high school sweetheart Susan Deixler but divorced her after a year. He would meet Garry Kief in 1978 and they have been a couple ever since, marrying in 2014 when same-sex marriage was legalized.

Still, Barry stayed closeted until 2017 when he was 73.

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Random Musings

Gilbert Baker died last week.

Don’t know who he is? You should; Baker was the man who created the LGBTQ Pride Rainbow flag way back in 1978 for the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade.

Gilbert Baker was born in Kansas in 1951, and served in the US Army from 1970 to 1972, stationed in San Francisco at the start of what was then called the Gay Liberation Movement.   After being honorably discharged Baker stayed in San Francisco and taught himself to sew; and he used that talent to make banners for gay and anti-war street protest marches, often at a moment’s notice, at the behest of his friend Harvey Milk.

In fact, Harvey Milk rode triumphantly under the first Rainbow Flags Baker made for that June 25th 1978, for the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade.

In 2008 Baker returned to San Francisco to recreate the banners and flags he made in the 70’s for the film Milk.

I smile a little, and feel a sense of Pride, every time I see that flag ... especially the huge one at Key West Pride.

RIP Gilbert.

In the wake of reports that he is a sexual harasser, Bill O’Reilly is facing the loss of advertisers for his Fox news show. As of yesterday some forty advertisers, from BMW to Allstate, have pulled their ads from his show. In fact, just about the only people supporting O’Reilly now, are his fellow male employees at Fox and a certain “pussy grabbing” president.

And that speaks volumes in and of itself.

At age 73 Barry Manilow has finally come out publicly in an interview with People magazine in which he talks about being gay and married to his manager Garry Kief.

Manilow and Kief have been together for 39 years, though keeping their relationship secret to many people.

Manilow admits he’s always been hesitant to discuss the relationship — and to come out publicly, even after he finally married Kief in April 2014.

In 2015, news of their marriage and Manilow’s sexuality made headlines, something the legend calls “a blessing and a curse” but he still refused to address it publicly:

“I thought I would be disappointing [the fans] if they knew I was gay. So I never did anything, [but] when they found out that Garry and I were together, they were so happy. The reaction was so beautiful — strangers commenting, ‘Great for you!’ I’m just so grateful for it.”

Naturally, Manilow is being blasted for not coming out earlier but, as I said on social media, you come out when YOU’RE ready, not when WE’RE ready.

Welcome out Barry.

Last Friday our local weathermen predicted a rainy wet day ... and it poured, flooding streets and making it impossible to drive through town.

On Monday, they predicted a huge storm coming through town with the threat of tornadoes and hail as big as golf balls and we got a Spring shower.

On Wednesday, the same tools, talked about the wave of storms coming through; the first would be around 4PM—though it started at 2PM—and would be bad, but the second would be worse, damaging winds, trees down, power outages, and the third, coming overnight, would see tornadoes touching down in South Carolina.

We got the first band through, ending at about 5PM and then ... yes, a lovely Spring shower.

Now, I get the weathermen cannot “predict” the weather, but their accuracy is just God awful. I tend to think the worst of the minor storms and think nothing about the forecasted big ones.

That said, this morning was a gorgeous sunny, cool, calm day in Smallville.

Also coming out as gay is Daniel Newman, the actor who plays Daniel on The Walking Dead. Newman came out in a video posted to Twitter and said:

“I'm #OUTandPROUD #LGBT Love you guys. Be proud to be yourself. We need everyone just the way you are!”

Newman says he decided to come out when he was working at a shelter for homeless LGBTQ youth and a girl thanked him for volunteering as a straight ally.

He told her he was gay, and she said, “Why have you never said that publicly before? You could help change our lives.”

“It hit me like a gut punch. It felt like someone had knocked the wind out of me. I realized how important it is in this day and age to be visible; have people know who you are…When you are accomplishing incredible things and you are hiding who you are, you are hurting hundreds of millions of people….By us staying quiet, we’re partially to blame for kids getting beat up and ridiculed, for stereotypes and stigmas….Now is not the time any longer to keep it private.”

Exactly; when one of us comes out, it makes it easier for others to come out, but, again, you come out when YOU’RE ready ...

It’s an individual choice.

Welcome out, Dan.

I didn’t see a single Hot Man on television this week ... at least none that hadn’t been seen here before. So I decided to post a photo of the Hottest Man at Casa Bob y Carlos ...

Sadly, Carlos wouldn’t pose, so I’ll go with the second Hottest Man in the house.

I kid ... this is the hottest man in our house: Tuxedo.

Oy! Look at the punum on that cat!

And in other Big Gay News ... a federal appeals court in Chicago ruled this week that the 1964 Civil Rights Act also protects LGBT employees from workplace discrimination.

This marks the first time that a federal appellate court has come to that conclusion. The decision by the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals comes after it threw out an earlier finding by three of its own judges that the law doesn’t cover sexual-orientation bias; it also comes as President _____’s administration has begun setting its own policies on LGBT rights, even though he cannot seem to make up his mind.

In January, _____ said he would enforce an Obama administration order barring companies that do federal work from workplace discrimination on the basis of sexual identity, but a month later _____ also revoked the Obama administration’s guidance on transgender students’ use of public school bathrooms, deferring to states.

But, as anyone with a brain knows, LGBT rights are civil rights, and so it’s nice to hear that a court has ruled it to be true.

Still, as we know, the march goes on.

In a continuing freefall, _____’s approval ratings have tumbled down to 35% ... meaning 65%—and that must include some of his supporters who’ve finally realized what they’ve done—of Americans thinks he’s unqualified to be President.

As I like to Tweet to _____ every so often, he’s fast becoming “The Best WORST President EVER” and perhaps he should have that turned into a gold sign he can hang from his jail cell door.