I Didn't Say It

Kamala Harris, Vice-President, taking  a stand against Florida’s “Don't Say Gay” law:

“I hate bullies. I can't stand it when so-called powerful people intentionally try to strike fear in innocent people. You look in Florida, [the] ‘don't say gay' bill and what this has meant for LGBTQ teachers who are now afraid. I'm looking at some 20-something-year-old teacher in Florida who has dedicated [themselves] to one of the most noble professions, which is teaching our children their God-given capacity, and that teacher who is in a loving relationship or marriage is afraid to put up a photograph of their family for fear that if the student in their classroom asks, ‘Who is that?' [that] it will raise a conversation about a same-sex relationship, and they could lose their job. Outrageous! We just have to make sure that this moment is motivating people to act and not motivating people to be afraid.”

Motivate people to speak up and stand up and vote these bigots from office, because once they come for the LGBTQ+ community and win because people were too worried or afraid to do something, they’ll come for the rest of you.

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Don Bacon, Nebraska’s GOP Representative, on Thing 45 and his treasonous acts:

“We don’t have a right to take top-secret information to our home. I’ve dealt with top secrets since I was 22 years old, in the military for 30 years now, and now in Congress. You don’t show our attack plans on Iran to people who are not cleared, or pick documents that talk about our nuclear technology or where our intelligence resources are located throughout the world. And that’s what happened there. And when the government asks for them back, you give them back. And if you deny having them, but then you have them, those are crimes.”

Simple. Direct. Truthful.

And from a  Republican who has the balls to stand up the MAGAts.

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Chris Christie, GOP candidate for President, responding to Thing 45 calling him fat—and, yes, this is what passes for politics in America in 2023:

“What? Like he’s some Adonis? Please. I don’t know what his point is. You know what it is? It’s like a child. It’s a bully in the schoolyard who teases you and makes fun of you. But here’s my message to him: I don’t care what he says about me. I don’t care what he thinks about me. And he should take a look in the mirror every once in a while. Maybe he’d drop the weight thing off of his list of criticisms.”

I think you both should look in a mirror and quite being a couple of whiny bitches and really tell the American people why you should be president.

And it’s not because the other guy is fatter than you.

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Newt Gingrich, Fox contributor, playing up the GOP lie of stolen elections:

“I think it’s probably almost impossible under current law to ensure an accurate election. And I think the only Republican strategy in the long run is to pick issues and win by margins so big that they can still win if you have a very close election. Democrats have a passion for stealing them. When you have the local union, which takes care of people in a nursing home going in to vote, the people who literally don’t cognitively know what they’re doing, that union is going to vote every single one of them for a Democrat no matter what their personal beliefs were. In states dominated by Democrats like New York, Illinois, California, you just have to assume that the machine will steal as much as it can.”

I think that with the GOP trying to circumvent people of color from voting—just see the latest rulings on voting in Louisiana and Alabama by the Supreme Court— Newt might be right, but he fails to see that it’s his own party that’s suppressing votes and making elections seem unfair.

But that’s Newt.

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Adam Kinzinger, former Representative and CNN commentator, on the recent coup attempt in Russia:

“I think you have to start thinking through every worst-case scenario. So obviously Putin out of the picture, I think generally it would be great for the world, but you think about the instability in Russia that will inevitably come from that. Even if this whole supposed coup fails, there will be some instability in Russia, which has nuclear weapons. There’s concern about proliferation if the Russian republic falls apart into even more pieces. I think on the other hand too, this is extremely good for the war in Ukraine because even if as Prigozhin is marching on Moscow, even if that fails, Wagner is out of the fight and they were a significant part of this effort against Ukraine, not to mention that all around the world Wagner protects Russian interests, whether it’s in Africa, Libya, and other places. This is a massive blow to the Russian republic, and a massive blow to their military effort, and I will also say it’s a massive blow to the people here in the United States, like say Tucker Carlson, who have been parroting Putin talking points, to have Prigozhin, the head of Wagner himself, say those have been lies. There have been a lot of people parroting those Putin lies, and the head of Wagner even just said those are lies.”

Tucker Carlson would switch gears and say he’s never been pro-Putin because once a liar …

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Bobservations

Last Friday we took Rosita to the vet for her post-adoption checkup; she’d had all her shots and been spayed, but they ask that you have the new pet checked out.

We were pleasantly surprised at how easygoing she was in car, in the waiting room, and then being poked and prodded by our vet—who is dreamy AF, by the way. But they could not get a stool sample from her so they sent us home with a small tube to, um, collect the sample. And, even with his eyesight, the rule is Carlos takes care of what comes out of the cats, so I put him in charge of collections.

He came to me Tuesday morning and asked if I had time to stop at the vet’s office as he had done his part; and, to show me his work, he held up a blue latex glove with one of the fingers tied off. I tell him the sample should be in the tube provided and he said just take it in the glove and we went back and forth with this until I finally said, somewhat loudly so the neighbors might hear:

“I am not taking a glove full of cat poop to the vet!!”

I never thought that was a sentence I would utter … but the sample was put into the tube, and then the receptionist and I laughed about Carlos, and then every single one of my co-workers and I laughed about Carlos, and the woman at the take-out counter at Masa and I laughed about it,

Good times.

From April 2010, Tuxedo takes his first political stance:

“Tuxedo Says Boycott Arizona

As a "cat of color" Tuxedo sympathizes with those men and women who are subjected to the Show-me-your-papers laws of Arizona and has decided to go into hiding himself because he does not have the proper documentation.”

Luckily, he was never stopped by Arizona PD.

The man—and I won’t name him because he deserves no notoriety—who murdered five people and shot forty-six others at the LGBTQ bar Club Q in Colorado Springs has pleaded guilty to five counts of murder in the first degree, and 46 counts of attempted murder in the first degree. He will five consecutive life sentences without the possibility for parole and will also receive 46 consecutive 48-year sentences for the attempted murder counts.

Good.Bye.

In Delaware, state Senator Sarah McBride, the country’s highest-ranking transgender elected official, announced her candidacy to become Delaware’s next sole congressperson.

If elected, McBride would become the first trans person elected to federal office.

Do this, Delaware.

Earlier this week, stuck in traffic, listening to a local radio station, there was one of those Be Caller 15 contests, and, with nothing to do, I called the station:

“Congratulations! You’re caller 15! Answer this next question correctly and win the Grand Prize!”

“Woo hoo!!”

“It’s a math question, are you feeling confident?”

“I love math, go ahead.”

“Okay get this question right and win two tickets and a backstage pass to see Taylor Swift in Columbia. What’s 2 + 2?

“Seven.”

Oh darn. Missed it by that much.

This week the Supreme Court dismissed Louisiana’s appeal seeking to prevent the state’s congressional map from being redrawn over claims that it unlawfully dilutes the influence of Black voters. The move was expected after the Court’s ruling in a similar case concerning congressional districts in Alabama.

Nice moves by the Court. This time.

Over the weekend our refrigerator decided to go to appliance heaven but we thought we might try to resuscitate it and set about cleaning filters and fans and such to keep the old girl cold. Carlos was on the floor behind the machine trying to remove the back panel to get to the fan, when I asked if he wanted a flashlight:

“What’s a flashlight gonna do for me?”

We laughed but then cut to an hour later when we went off to buy a new refrigerator and as I waited in the car, Carlos came into the kitchen and began … wait for it … it makes no sense … shutting off the lights.

How did he know they were on? I think he’s gaslighting me.

Texas Governor, asshat, Greg Abbott took to Twitter to blast country music icon Garth Brooks for being “woke" ... Brooks is opening a bar in Nashville and he will serve Bud Light, the beer the GOP fears.

But this is about a story Abbott read a story about Brooks on satire website The Dunning-Kruger Times that claims Brooks was booed off the stage at the 123rd Annual Texas Country Jamboree in Hambriston, Texas.

Never happened, because there is no such thing as the Annual Texas Country Jamboree , and there is no such town in Texas called Hambriston, something the governor should have known if he was woke, and then he might not have Tweeted:

“Go woke. Go broke. Good job, Texas.”

As soon as Abbott learned, again, that he’s a moron, he deleted the tweet but as the internet is forever and Abbott’s stupidity will live on.

As for Garth Brooks, he has been a longtime supporter of the LGBTQ+ community and his net worth is roughly half a billion dollars so he’s literally wok and nowhere near broke.

PS Fuck off Greg Abbott.

This is out actor and model Brandon Flynn, who stars in a new campaign from Calvin Klein but that’s neither here nor there: Would You Hit It?

Architecture Wednesday: Renovated Flat in Barcelona

This flat is located in the heart of Barcelona’s Dreta de l'Eixample neighborhood known for its architectural landmarks like Antoni Gaudí’s La Sagrada Família and Casa Batlló. Part of an Art Nouveau building that dates back to 1900, this is a three-bedroom, two-bathroom, fully renovated apartment near the city’s lively Passeig de Sant Joan promenade.

The 1,400-square-foot apartment recently underwent a careful restoration and renovation that maintained original design elements, including the shallow-arched, Catalan-vaulted ceilings and colorful tile floors that stretch across the main gathering spaces. 

Through the front door an entry hallway leads to the living and dining areas, opened up to be a large open space that also integrates into an open kitchen. At the far end of the main room is a small private balcony that overlooks a courtyard. 

The three bedrooms and two full baths are all tucked away on the opposite end of the floor plan to ensure ample privacy for residents, while the primary suite has its own small balcony.

Had I moved a little faster this could have been all mine … and, yes, Carlos’ too, if I’d had the 800K a few months ago.

I need to start saving again.

Dwell

Fifty-Four Years Ago Today

Originally posted June 27, 2009

It was fifty-four years ago, a lifetime to some of us, a minute to others, but it marked a turning point for what would become the LGBTQ+ community. It wasn’t the first time our community fought back—there was the Cooper Do-nuts Riot in 1959,  the Dewey's Restaurant protest in 1965,  the Compton's Cafeteria riot in 1966, the Black Cat Tavern and New Faces, The Patch in 1968, among other—but Stonewall marked one of the loudest times that gay men and trans women stood up en masse and said, ‘No. We will not be treated like this any longer!’

The weekend of June 27-29,1969 began what is the modern-day gay movement. To be sure, there were gay and lesbian activists before that weekend, but the confrontation between police and demonstrators at the Stonewall Inn in New York City lit a fire in the hearts of the LGBT community like it had never been done before.

And like any good story, there is controversy surrounding the Stonewall Riots; there are arguments and differences over what happened, how it started and how it ended. But the fact that we all need to remember is that it did happen, and it should continue to be a rallying cry for the LGBTQ+ community today, as we continue the march toward equality in the eyes of the law, and in the eyes of America.

Friday, June 27, 1969: the world was mourning the death of Judy Garland. Could it be that the death of one of the most famous gay icons was what sparked the fire of the modern-day Gay Rights Movement? Many people have speculated that Garland's death did indeed push the gay community into the streets of New York that night, but it was also hot in New York that night, and some say it was the heat that fueled the crowd into action, into reaction. I think maybe it was both, Garland's death and the hot summer night; or maybe it was just that the gay community had finally had enough of being told what to do, what not to do, and how we should live our lives. Whatever the reason, it was enough. Finally, enough.

In the early morning hours of June 28, police officers raided the Stonewall Inn, a small bar located on Christopher Street in Greenwich Village, as they had done on other occasions. Although mafia-run, the Stonewall, like other predominantly gay bars in the city, got raided by the police periodically.

Typically, the more "deviant" patrons—the queens and butch lesbians, especially if they were black—were arrested and taken away, while white, male customers looked on or quietly disappeared. The bar owners would be levied an insubstantial fine—a sign of police corruption and collusion between bar owners and police—allowing them to reopen for business the following day.

On this night, the charge at the Stonewall was the illegal sale of alcohol. The raid began as they always did: plainclothes and uniformed police officers entered the bar, arrested the employees, and began ejecting the customers one by one onto the street. For some reason, however, the crowd that had gathered outside Stonewall, a somewhat campy and festive crowd, began to cheer as the patrons were pushed out of the bar. But soon the mood changed; it was Judy Garland's death, or the summer heat, or the fact that the summer of 1969 was a particularly busy one for police raids on gay bars. Or maybe it was watching drag queens and lesbians being pushed and shoved and kicked into paddy wagons. Whatever it was, the on-lookers lost their patience. No one really knows who threw the first punch; some say it was a drag queen, some say it was a rather butch-looking lesbian. But someone defied the police that night; someone had finally had enough.

The crowd, now numbering several hundred, exploded. People began hurling coins at police officers, then they moved on to rocks and bottles, whatever they could grab. The police, at first stunned that the normally docile and shamed homosexuals would react in such a fashion, soon began beating the crowds with nightsticks. This group, however, was too angry, and was not going to be pushed around, or down, any longer; the police officers were forced to take refuge inside the Stonewall.

As news spread throughout Greenwich Village the crowd grew ever larger; many residents, some gay, some not, ran down to the Stonewall Inn to join the fight. Lighter fluid was squirted inside the bar and someone tried to light it; others grabbed a downed parking meter and used it as a battering ram against the front of the Stonewall. Someone began chanting "Gay Power!"

The riot-control police unit arrived to rescue the trapped officers and break up the demonstration, though it took over an hour before the crowd dispersed. To taunt their attackers a group of drag queens began to sing at the top of their lungs:

We are the Stonewall girls
We wear our hair in curls
We wear no underwear
We show our pubic hair
We wear our dungarees
Above our nelly knees!

That first Stonewall Riot ended the morning of Saturday, June 28, but the fight was far from over. That night a second riot broke out and the crowd now numbered in the thousands, filling the streets in the name of Gay Pride. They marched to the Stonewall Inn and waited for the police to arrive; and they did, in the early morning of Sunday, June 29.

For over a week, though in smaller numbers, protests and demonstrations continued in Greenwich Village. There was finally a sense of what could be accomplished by banding together, by being out, by being seen, by being heard. By being angry. It was a new day.

A month after the riots, the Gay Liberation Front [GLF] was formed. Radical and leftist, the GLF was one of many politically focused lesbian and gay organizations formed in the days following the riots. The number of lesbian and gay publications skyrocketed as well, which led to an even greater sense of community. The LGBT community was no longer strictly marginalized in United States society. Now, out and proud lesbians and gay men were developing their own communities in cities across the country.

Since 1970, marches have taken place in New York City—and all over the world—every year on the anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. In June 1994, hundreds of thousands of people converged on New York to celebrate Stonewall's 25th anniversary. In 1999 the United States government proclaimed the Stonewall Inn a national historic site. The following year, the status of the Stonewall was improved to "historic landmark," a designation held by only a small percentage of historical sites.

Stonewall, while not the first protest, is our Plymouth Rock. It's where the gay community landed and came together and began the march toward equality. Stonewall was our first glimpse of a new world where we weren't alone, we weren't all that different, where we belonged.

It makes no difference how it started. The death of an icon; the summer heat; a sense of frustration. It makes no difference who started it; drag queens or lesbians; coin tossers or rock throwers. The difference is that it happened.

As I said, no one really knows who started the riot, or how it all started, but we do know that a great deal of the credit goes to Marsha P. Johnson, a drag queen who frequented the Stonewall Inn, and fought back and fought for our community before some of us were even born.

Fifty-four years ago today.

As we have seen this past year, in states around the nation, and in the Supreme Court, no rights, no laws, are safe with this radical rightwing GOP. And while the Supreme Court justices say they won’t come for LGBTQ+ rights, or marriage equality, we know them to be deceitful. What we once thought was settled law could be lost to us unless we stand up, speak up, shout out, show up and CAST A GODDAMNED VOTE.

The march goes on …

The Pedophiles Are Inside The Churches ... Still

I don’t follow rightwingnut and faux Christian, Tomi Lahren, on Twitter, but I do see her posts every so often, where she rants about the LGBTQ+ community and drag queens sexualizing and grooming children. And every time she posts her nonsense, I ask her—though she never responds because it doesn’t suit the Hate Narrative she pushes, why she says nary a word about so-called Men of God, Men of Faith, who groom and abuse children and are arrested and imprisoned for such.

So, here’s some info for Tomi, that I will share to her page, and no doubt not hear a word about it …

CALIFORNIA

Jose Andres Lopez, A retired Orange County pastor, was sentenced to 186 years to life in prison for sexually abusing two young girls with whom he is related from 1991 to 2020.

ALASKA

Dwight Chris John, age seventy-one, who served on the governing board of a Christian & Missionary Alliance church, has been charged with six counts of Sexual Abuse of a Minor in the 1st Degree, seven counts of Sexual Abuse of a Minor 2nd Degree, Sexual Abuse of a Minor 3rd Degree, and three counts of Incest. The Investigation is ongoing.

CALIFORNIA

Michael Sasser, a Modesto man who stepped down from his role as a church youth leader a month before his arrest has pleaded guilty to three counts of child molestation for acts that occurred during a period of months in 2022 and was sentenced to 12 years in prison.

KANSAS

Joseph Heidesch, s former private Catholic school teacher at St. Thomas Aquinas High School, pleaded guilty to one felony count of sexual exploitation of a child and 25 counts of breach of privacy for secretly recording video of more than 100 girls and will spend five years in prison with no chance of parole.

VIRGINIA

Scott Asalone, now 66, A former Loudoun County Catholic priest, has been sentenced to eight years in prison for the sexual abuse of a 14-year-old child; Asalone is required to register as a sex offender for the remainder of his life.

TEXAS

Daniel Savala, who’s accused of sexually abusing multiple men in the Assemblies of God’s Chi Alpha Campus Ministries, has also been arrested in Houston on sex abuse charges involving minors.

It’s the second arrest in an investigation started in April by Waco Police Department’s Crimes Against Children Unit. On May 23, Chris Hundl, former leader of the Chi Alpha chapter at Baylor University and pastor of Mountain Valley Fellowship in Waco, was arrested on identical charges in Waco. According to police records, Hundl drove two boys to Savala’s residence in Houston where Savala “masturbated both children” in his home sauna.

OHIO

Robert Auxter, a former Monroe pastor at Grace Lutheran Church was sentenced to six years in prison after pleading guilty to two counts of Gross Sexual Imposition, which are third-degree felonies. Auxter is required to register as a tier 2 sex offender.

SOUTH CAROLINA

Daniel Kellan Mayfield, youth pastor at Gowensville First Baptist Church faces new charges of video recording girls—as young as 14—in the bathroom of the church he was fired from recently. He was also charged with using his phone to video record a woman while she was showering at her mother’s home in Greenwood County.

PENNSYLVANIA

Brandon S. Dasilva, a former youth pastor in Ephrata man is charged with possessing child pornography—and it’s not his first offense; he was also charged in February 2021 and failed to register his Twitch account and email address with Pennsylvania State Police, which was a condition of a prior conviction.

MAINE

Raymond K. Chang, a 36-year-old pastor at “Resurrection Church” was arrested on a warrant alleging he sexually assaulted a child. The victim reported being sexually assaulted by Chang multiple times from when she was 12 to 14 years old. The affidavit quotes the victim as saying that she reported the sexual abuse to a family member and in response the family got together with members of Chang’s former church—which is not named in the affidavit—and she was told to apologize and to forgive Chang.

CALIFORNIA

Steven Brian Arey, a former youth pastor in Tulare who was working for the California Department of Corrections at the time of his arrest in 2019, was sentenced to 300 years in prison on 20 counts of lewd acts with a child under the age of 14.

NEW HAMPSHIRE

Kevin Straughan, a former minister of Agape Ministries Church, is accused of strangulation and sexual assault and is being investigated for similar charges in Florida. Straughan has been indicted on several charges, including four counts of sexual assault and second-degree assault of children. Police said the victims were people he knew, including children.

TEXAS

Michael Anthony Romero, a former employee of a Magnolia church, has turned himself in and confessed to ‘inappropriate behavior with adolescents’ during his time at the ministry.

OHIO

The Rev. Michael Jude Zacharias, a Roman Catholic priest who has led parishes in Mansfield and Fremont, has been found guilty on all five counts of sex trafficking, two of which involved victims who were minors. Zacharias admitted to having had sexual relations with several men but maintained that the sex never involved anyone younger than 18 but a nine-page affidavit accuses Zacharias of “grooming” victims to use their drug addiction as a way to perform sexual acts on them.

MISSISSIPPI

Daniel Paul Harris, a Mississippi educator who, with his wife, founded the Kaimen Center to provide activities and experiences for children and adults of varying disabilities, was arrested and charged Thursday with two counts of molestation involving a child, two counts of sexual battery and one count of unnatural intercourse.

CALIFORNIA

Stephen McCurtis, pastor at Maricopa Community Church, has been charged with committing lewd and lascivious acts upon a child after a girl alleged McCurtis kissed and touched her inappropriately. The girl when she was 12 & 13 at the time. McCurtis denies touching the child intimately but told a deputy that he kissed her but claims he was not the pursuer, that the 13-year-old girl pursued him.

LOUISIANA

Jacob De La Paz, who left his employ at St. Thomas More High School abruptly, has been arrested after a video surfaced showing him shirtless and apparently saying sexually suggestive things to student he tutors. He has been charged with the federal crime of enticing a minor to produce child pornography or child sexual assault material.

IOWA

Jordan Dee Andrew Webb, who served as a missionary in the Caribbean island nation of St. Lucia, was found guilty of one count of second-degree sexual abuse with persons under the age of 12, a Class B felony; incest, a class D felony; and child endangerment, an aggravated misdemeanor.

See, Tomi, not one drag queen or gay person in the bunch, and yet these people, many of whom have been arrested, charged, tried and found guilty, or admitted guilt, will every appear on your timeline, because you just want to push forward the rightwing, GOP, faux Christian, lies about LGBTQ+ people.

But we see you, and we know who’s grooming children.

h/t JoeMyGod

The Funny Papers

Pedro X Molina, Tim Campbell, Deb Milbrath, RJ Matson, Bill Bramhall, Kevin Siers, Ann Telnaes, Michael de Adder, Steve Breen, Adam Zyglis, Mike Luckovich, Jack Ohman, David Horsey, Ed Wexler, Clay Bennett