Vote Blue .. . And Here's Why, AGAIN!!!

It’s been a few weeks since we checked in on the GOP and their special brand of bigotry and ignorance, so let’s dive right in …

INDIANA

Last week the city of Westfield deleted Twitter and Facebook posts that recognized Pride Month under the direction of Mayor Andy Cook because he says the city “should not engage in supporting a social agenda.”

The city has previously posted celebrations of Black History Month and Juneteenth without Cook complaining about any “social agenda”  but they are clearly trying to erase us.

MONTANA

The state legislature has passed a bill to specifically ban people dressed in drag from reading books to children at public schools and libraries, part of a host of legislation aimed at the rights the LGBTQ+ community.

As RuPaul says, Reading is fundamental, but the library is closed to drag queens trying to read children’s books to children.

TEXAS

Texas Congressman, and a Republican because … of course … Chip Roy wants to defund the entire U.S. military because an Air Force base is hosting a few Pride events in June.

This is the GOP; defund the entire military because The Gays.

Ant then the Texas House gave initial approval to a bill restricting children from seeing sexually explicit performances; the bill was originally designed to restrict kids from attending drag shows, but its most recent version seeks to criminalize any live performance that the bill defines as sexual.

The party who stands against the idea of more government now wants to tell parents how they can and cannot raise their children.

NORTH CAROLINA

The state GOP has proposed the “Clarify Regulations on Adult Entertainment” bill that would prohibit “adult live entertainment” on private property in the presence of anyone under age 18 and not allow it at all on public property.

Now the GOP wants to tell Americans what they can do on their own property.

FLORIDA

Ron DeSantis has signed a bill imposing tough new penalties and restrictions on undocumented immigrants in Florida that, among other things, requires employers to use E-Verify to make sure workers are authorized to work in the U.S.

As a result, Latin American truck drivers were threatening to stop delivering to and in Florida, and migrant workers and construction workers are leaving their jobs as well.

Keep in mind that DeSaster will do the same for this entire country effectively destroying the economy.

Also note that DeSantis signed a bill to bar state colleges and universities from spending money on diversity, equity and inclusion programs, and limiting how race can be discussed in many courses.

In college, adults cannot be taught about diversity and equality and race.

In Ron DeSantis’ “Straight Whites Only” state.

Oh, and also in Florida under DeSantis, the state education department rejected two new Holocaust-focused textbooks for classroom use, while forcing at least one other textbook to alter a passage about the Hebrew Bible in order to meet state approval.

If we don’t teach the Holocaust how can we stop it from happening again; and if you don’t think it will, keep watching.

PS  DeSantis proclaims himself Israel’s best friend and during a visit there last month he credited a prayer he inserted into the Western Wall with warding off a major hurricane. DeSantis also had his children baptized with water from the Sea of Galilee.

But he doesn’t want his children to learn about the Holocaust.

NORTH DAKOTA

GOP Governor Doug Burgum has signed a bill to prohibit public schools and government entities from requiring teachers and employees to refer to transgender people by the pronouns they use. The new law also requires teachers to out the children to their parents and bans  transgender students from using the bathroom of their choice without prior approval from a parent or guardian.

They are coming for Free Speech.

OKLAHOMA

GOP Governor Kevin Stitt vetoed a bill to fund the state’s PBS station, Oklahoma Educational Television Authority through 2026, accusing the station of indoctrinating young children with shows like “Sesame Street,” “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood,” and “Clifford The Big Red Dog.”

Stitt is pissy because of a “PBS Newshour” feature on parents’ support for various gender care treatments, a gay character in “Work It Out Wombats,” and the news that “Clifford the Big Red Dog” introduced LGBTQ characters.

Stitt says these anti-LGBTQ+ moves don’t represent his values but says he represents the taxpayers.

Just the hate-filled, anti-LGBTQ+ bigoted ones, apparently.

GOOD NEWS

TEXAS

A push to inject religion into public schools faltered after the House failed to pass a contentious bill that would have required the Ten Commandments to be displayed prominently in every classroom. The measure was part of an effort by conservative Republicans expand the reach of religion … be clear, only Christianity … into public schools.

I’ll remind the Texas GOP: Separation of Church and State.

OREGON

The State Senate failed to reach quorum again, meaning six additional Republican senators have now disqualified themselves from running for reelection under Article IV, Section 15 of the Oregon Constitution.

The Senators in question all hit 10 unexcused absences—refusing to show up for votes in which the GOP side would lose—and under Measure 113, passed by 68% of voters in November, they are now barred from running for their current Senate seat in the next election.

Now just three of the state’s Republican senators are left to run for re-election at the end of their term.

MONTANA

The State Supreme Court has solidified protections for abortion access and will allow nurses with advanced degrees to continue performing abortions in Montana; all seven supreme court justices agreed that the law unconstitutionally interferes with Montanan’s right to privacy to seek medical care from the provider of their choosing.

As of now, women in Montana still have some rights.

MISSISSIPPI

The church-state separation watchdog American Atheists has won a lawsuit to remove mandatory “In God We Trust” language from the state’s official license plate. American Atheists filed suit on behalf of the Mississippi Humanist Association, accusing state officials of violating nonreligious people’s freedoms of speech and religion by forcing them to display “In God We Trust” on their personal vehicles.

GOP Governor Tate Reeves has boasted about the “In God We Trust equating the phrase with “Mississippi’s values,” insinuating that only Christians are real Mississippians.

Not so fast, asshat.

OKLAHOMA

The state Supreme Court has tossed out two state laws outlawing abortion. One bill would have banned abortion when a fetal heartbeat was detected, which is usually at six weeks and before most women know they are pregnant, while the other bans the procedure starting at conception.

A win for women’s rights.

NEVADA

Joe Lombardo is one of the first Republican governors to enshrine protections for out-of-state abortion patients and in-state abortion providers, making Nevada another state that has solidify their status as safe havens for abortion patients.

Lombardo, who describes himself as “pro-life” and was endorsed by the National Right to Life Committee, says he respects the will of voters who codified abortion rights up to 24 weeks in a 1990 referendum vote.

As it should be done.

ALABAMA

In a decision that is a major victory for the Voting Rights Act, the US Supreme Court struck down Alabama’s racist House map, finding that the state discriminated against Black voters when it drew its seven congressional districts last year.

Alabama will have to redraw its congressional map to include a second majority-Black district. Black voters currently comprise a majority of the voting age population in just one district, despite making up a quarter of the state’s population.

A strike against racist GOP tactics to keep Black Americans from voting.

ARIZONA

Democrat Governor Katie Hobbs has vetoed a GOP-backed bill that would have put legal requirements on public school bathrooms and denied transgender students from using the bathrooms that match their gender identity.

Good news.

LOUISIANA

Democrat Governor John Bel Edwards has vowed to veto the “Don’t Say Gay” bill and says he will veto other bills that would seek to ban gender-affirming healthcare for trans youth and bills to ban teachers from addressing students with their preferred pronouns.

The march goes on …

If you like the Good News, please note that many of the stories are about Democrat governors and Democrat-led legislatures—with a couple of exceptions—which should prove one thing:

Vote Blue .. . And Here's Why, AGAIN!!!

It’s been a few weeks since we checked in on the GOP and their special brand of bigotry and ignorance, so let’s dive right in …

FLORIDA

GOP lawmakers who fear the T in the LGBTQ+ community have passed one of those Bathroom Bills requiring people to use bathrooms that line up with their sex assigned at birth. The bill applies to the use of bathrooms at facilities such as public schools, colleges, universities, state and local government buildings, prisons and jails.

Once again, I’ll say it: trans people use the bathrooms that align with their gender identity because they want to pee.

LOUISIANA

Efforts to increase the state’s minimum wage—currently $7.25 an hour—were rejected in a GOP-controlled legislative committee. The failed bill would have gradually increased the state’s minimum wage to $10 an hour in 2024 and to $14 an hour in 2028. And yet the day before those same GOP lawmakers advanced a bill to double their own salaries from $16,800 to $40,000.

Louisiana has the second-highest poverty rate in the country, with nearly 19% of the population impoverished … unless you’re a GOP lawmaker and you give yourself a raise.

MONTANA

Representative Zooey Zephyr, the transgender state lawmaker who was silenced after telling Republicans they would have blood on their hands for opposing gender-affirming health care for kids, was barred from returning to the Montana House floor in a court ruling that came just hours before the Legislature wrapped up its biennial session.

Silenced by the GOP because she stands for the rights of trans Americans and dares to speak out.

FLORIDA

The GOP-controlled legislature passed a bill to allow the state remove transgender minors from their homes if they are receiving gender-affirming care. Odd when you realize that in 2022 DeSantis signed the Parental Rights in Education act, which reinforces parents’ fundamental rights to make decisions regarding the upbringing of their children. 

In education, not healthcare; in those cases Ron DeSantis and his merry band of Nazi Sympathizers make the decisions.

TEXAS

Public schools will have to prominently display the Ten Commandments in every classroom starting next school year under a bill the Texas Senate approved. This is the latest attempt from the Texas  GOP to inject religion into public schools. The Senate also gave final passage to Senate Bill 1396 authored by GOP Senator Mayes Middleton to allow public and charter schools to adopt a policy requiring every campus to set aside a time for students and employees to read the Bible or other religious texts and to pray.

What about atheists and agnostics, or those who believe public schools are not the place for religious exercises?

LOUISIANA

GOP Party officials want state lawmakers to forbid the study of racism at colleges and universities, arguing in a resolution that classes examining “inglorious aspects” of United States history are too divisive. The resolution asks the Legislature to pass laws removing diversity, equity and inclusion departments and agencies “within any institution of higher learning within the state.”

Funny, because that old saying goes, “When we know better, we do better,” but in Louisiana they don’t want to know better.

MONTANA

GOP Governor Greg Gianforte signed into law five bills aimed at restricting abortion access in the state triggering a legal request from Planned Parenthood of Montana later in the day to block one of the bills.

Five Bills??

UNITED STATES

After suffering recent electoral losses  due to a historic surge in turnout from younger voters backing Democrats, GOP lawmakers around the country are making it harder for students to cast ballots where they attend school.

A new law in Idaho specifically bars the use of student identification cards to vote, while a change in Ohio law means students will no longer be able to use tuition or college housing receipts as a form of voter ID, long a popular option for students without state driver’s licenses. Similar legislation has been introduced in at least 11 other states this year, including the presidential battlegrounds of Pennsylvania and Nevada, and a bill in Texas would bar college campuses from serving as polling places.

Funny how the GOP only works to suppress the votes of those who vote against their racist, anti-democracy, anti-LGBTQ+, anti-women, pro-gun agenda.

ON THE UPSIDE …

FLORIDA

Mayors across the state, from Orlando, Miami Beach, Tampa, Tallahassee and more, are speaking out in support of LGBTQ+ rights in light of several bills targeting the community that have been passed by the state legislature and are heading to the desk of Fascist Governor Ron DeSantis.

At least eight mayors have signed the pledge in support of the LGBTQ+ advocacy organization GLSEN and its Rise Up campaign.

The march goes on …

ILLINOIS

It looks like Illinois is set to become the first state to punish public institutions that ban books. Democratic Governor JB Pritzker supports a House bill that would withhold state funding from any of the state’s 1,600 public or school libraries that remove books from their shelves, and said:

“In Illinois, we don’t hide from the truth, we embrace it and lead with it. Banning books is a devastating attempt to erase our history and the authentic stories of many.”

The impetus for the legislation came from newly elected Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias, a Democrat of course, who said he couldn’t fathom that book banning is happening in 2023.

MINNESOTA

In times like these we need more governors like Tim Walz, who, while not really naming that ‘F’ state and its Fascist governor, said in his State of the State speech:

"They're banning books from their schools. We're banishing hunger from ours."

Walz has also signed the "Democracy for the People Act" which implements automatic voter registration, allows 16- and 17-year-olds to pre-register to vote, and creates a permanent absentee voter list that will automatically send people who sign up a ballot each election. The proposal also requires voting materials and sample ballots to be in languages other than English and prohibits voter intimidation at the polls.

Pay attention … vote … speak up … vote … because if we don’t all stand together one day all of this country will be like Florida and Tennessee and Missouri and Idaho, and the GOP and the traitors come for us all.

h/t to JoeMyGod and NCRM

Bobservations

The other day someone rang the bell at Casa Bob y Carlos. I was at the back of the house, so I yelled to Carlos about the bell; I got no response. So, I went out to see what was what and found Carlos at the door talking to someone … a  salesperson hawking those doorbell cameras. Carlos ever so politely told the woman he was in the middle of something and asked if she had a brochure he could look at; she did not. She kept talking, and Carlos’ voice turned gruffer, as he told he was cooking dinner and didn’t have time to stand and talk. The woman said she understood and proceeded again with her sales pitch.

As I am the Mean One to people who come a ‘knocking at the door trying to sell gutters or a new roof or the Baby Jesus, I was about to step in, when Carlos said:

“Ma’am! I've explained to you that I do not have time. If you have no printed information, I suggest you get off my porch and off my property. I will be making a call to your company [Vivint] to complain and will tell you that if I ever need or want a doorbell camera, your company is the last company I will pick. Good day.”

I loved him for that, and for saying ‘Good day’ like he was Joan Crawford.

Y’all probably already knew this, but Tuxedo was LGBTQ+-friendly when being LGBTQ+-friendly wasn’t cool.

That’s my boy.

Jurors at a civil trial found that rapist Bill Cosby raped a 16-year-old girl at the Playboy Mansion in 1975 and awarded the girl, Judy Huth who is now 64, $500,000.

Jurors believed Cosby raped the girl, knew she was under 18, and that his conduct was driven by unnatural or abnormal sexual interest in a minor.

Lock him back up.

I was looking for a new pair of short shorts for summer and found a pair I liked, but they didn’t have a pocket for my phone so I modified them slightly,

I like ‘em better now.

New York Governor Kathy Hochul has signed the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Act of New York, which aims to prevent voter suppression or dilution based on race or language preference.

I guess if the members of the GOP in Congress don’t want equal rights at the polls, perhaps We The People need to do it state by state.

Russian journalist Dmitri Muratov put up his Nobel Peace Prize for auction and it was sold to an anonymous buyer for $103.5 million, obliterating the record for a Nobel medal.

Muratov instantly gave all the money away to UNICEF to aid Ukrainian children and their families displaced by Russia’s invasion of their country.

That’s how it’s done.

More Carlos … we have a guy, Craig, who does projects around Casa Bob y Carlos for us, and he was here the other day doing some work inside the house. He’s gotten to know the cats over the years and is used to Tuxedo following him around and checking his work or offering to help; and he knows Consuelo will look at him, and the disappear the rest of the time he’s working. And he knows Max will see him, turn tail and run, so he was surprised this day when he walked into the guestroom and Max was in there, and didn’t move when he saw Craig. Craig asked me if Max was losing his hearing because he didn’t hear Craig in the room, and I told him Max was about 17-years-old and has some health issues, but I didn’t think hearing was one of them. I added that Max was the “crazy one” in the house, and Craig said:

“After Carlos, right?”

And he was right.

Mehmet Oz, the quack “doctor” and GOP nominee for the Senate from Pennsylvania spent his entire primary run boasting about Thing 45’s endorsement of him.

But my oh my how things have changed with the January 6th Hearings. Oz and his team are quietly shifting his campaign message away from Thing 45, and his banners now say, “Thank you, Pennsylvania” and no longer feature any phots of Oz and Thing.

Pandering fuck.

Peter Finn is an actor and model, living in Los Angeles, but enough about that …Would You Hit It?

The Funny Papers

Nick Anderson, Kevin Siers, RJ Matson, Adam Zyglis, David Horsey, Jack Ohman, Michael de Adder, Matt Wuerker, Marc Murphy, Ed Wexler, Clay Bennett, Darrin Bell, John Deering, Bill Bramhall, Ann Telnaes,

The Funny Papers

Nick Anderson, Benjamin Slyngstad, Deb Milbrath, Dave Whamond, Drew Sheneman, David Horsey, JD Crowe, Kevin Siers, Jack Ohman, Ann Telnaes, Clay Bennett, David Fitzsimmons, Ed Hall, Michael de Adder, 

This Bitch: Is Not Working For The People

Arizona’s DINO—Democrat In Name Only—Senator,  Kyrsten Sinema, spit in the face of Democrats, and 705 of Americans, who wanted to see changes to the filibuster that would allow voting rights legislation, said last week that she both supports the legislation itself and the 60-vote threshold that is keeping its passage an impossibility.

She’s trying to play you all that she wants to help but her hands are tied, and that is yet another lie from Sinema.

In a floor speech, the Arizona Democrat portrayed the Senate’s rule allowing members to block debate on legislation with a 41-vote minority as a necessary tool for safeguarding democracy in a time of unprecedented political divisions.

“I strongly support, and will continue to vote for legislative responses to these state laws. [But] I will not support separate actions that worsen the underlying disease of division infecting our country.”

She supports voting rights but won’t vote for the one way to pass voting rights because she believes in bipartisanship and yet not one single Republican will cross the aisle.

And keep in mind that she is allowing 41 people out of 100, a minority, to run this country

How’s that working out for you, Kyrsten?

Sidenote: Arizona is coming for you and you’re not going to be able to lie your way out of this, and all that corporate money you took, that you swore you’d never take, won’t help you each.

Take the day and write, email, Tweet, Facebook, carrier pigeon, your Congressional Representatives and demand  they pass legislation to protect and expand voter's rights for without those, we are lost.