I Didn't Say It ...

Mark King, HIV/AIDS activist, looking back on his life, and the struggle today, of living with HIV and how it compares to the dark days of this regime:

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“My joy is a big fuck you to AIDS. My joy is a big f**k you to [Cankles]. Even in the most murderous days of the AIDS epidemic, we had a sense of humor … Putting an enormous condom over the home of Senator Jesse Helms was hilarious. Crisis hotlines are being unplugged. HIV prevention and treatment is being unplugged. People will die. It might not seem as immediate and in your face as what I had to face, but it’s there. I’m tired of internalizing that. I am fucking fabulous. I’m not going to take on the characteristics that people have put on this disease. If it’s going to live in me, it’s going to take on my characteristics, not the other way around. The collective voices of HIV positive people … are a roadmap to how we deal with adversity. It might be a cliché in the gay men’s community, at least, that you have a certain expiration date. Suddenly, you are invisible in the bars and the grocery stores. It takes a certain generosity of spirit from somebody like me to not want to go around and just tell my tragedy and instead say, this is something that happened to me that gives me the capacity to have more empathy for someone else, and that I can bring that experience into any conversation without saying it. All of those cameras in the ’80s trained on all of those white bodies. Why weren’t they trained on the Black allies that were there beside us? Because Black people dying was nothing new. It was new that white, privileged people were dying … The resistance today looks a lot more like our actual community. They often say about this current administration that cruelty is the point. Racism is the point. Transphobia is the point. That’s a winning strategy for them… So we cannot shy away from those political talking points that we think are losing points for us just because it makes people uncomfortable. There’s nothing wrong with being uncomfortable. It’s growth, and we need that growth in our own community. Don’t let them lop off letters from LGBTQ as if it will hold the wolves at bay a little longer. It’s not going to. They’re coming for all of us. [But] we paved the way. We put our bodies on the line so that somebody else might live better, longer, healthier. That’s good enough for me. Find the joy in the next piece of cake. Write outside the lines. Do something naughty… This is as corny as it gets, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned in 40 years, it’s that we are here to help somebody else. This life can be scary… and we’re here to make the ride a little less scary for someone else. Help somebody else. That’s the sort of thing you’re supposed to knit into a throw pillow, but it’s true.”

King has been through it all, more than once, and is here and still fighting HIV/AIDS stigma and now also fighting this fascist hate-filled regime.

Join in.

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Mark Hertling, retired Lt. General, on Pete Hegseth’s speech before the military leaders:

“This was a disciplinary approach in public so the whole nation could see. And it was an attempt at separating the military institution from the people they defend. And I guarantee you that the people in that audience will not execute any illegal orders. We’ve been saying that for a long time.”

I hope he’s right; I hope our military leaders stand up against this authoritarian regime and stop this.

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Pink, singer and activist, on this regime:

“Let’s be clear: if you believe the government belongs in a woman’s uterus, a gay person’s business or marriage, or that racism is okay—then please, in the name of your Lord, never fucking listen to my music again. And also, fuck right off. We good?”

This is resistance and standing up and speaking up and we need more of it from our leaders and from our friends and neighbors.

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JB Pritzker, Illinois Democrat Governor, taking on the madness of Cankles:

“This is a man who’s suffering dementia. This is a man who has something stuck in his head. He can’t get it out of his head. He doesn’t read. He doesn’t know anything that’s up to date. It’s just something in the recesses of his brain that is effectuating to have him call out these cities. And then, unfortunately, he has the power of the military, the power of the federal government to do his bidding, and that’s what he’s doing.”

Remember when he and the GOP attacked Joe Biden? That’s the strategy; every GOP accusation is an admission.

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Nancy Pelosi, Democrat Representative and icon for the people, on Democrats versus Republicans:

“Democrats who created Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the ACA, all of that, are now being asked to reject that so we can give a tax cut to the rich. We’re not doing it. It isn’t a question of, ‘Let’s come back together so we can discuss it.’ That isn’t going to happen.”

Pelosi, putting the needs and wants of many, the ability to help those that need it most, over the greed and wants of a handful of narcissistic billionaires.

Once again, Nancy stands up to Cankles.

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Steve Schmidt, GOP strategist who ran John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign , on Cankles:

"[Cankles] has been the worst president this country has ever had. And, I don't say that hyperbolically. He is. But he is a consequential president. And, he has brought this country in three short years to a place of weakness that is simply unimaginable if you were pondering where we are today from the day where Barack Obama left office. And there were a lot of us on that day who were deeply skeptical and very worried about what a [Cankles] presidency would be. But this is a moment of unparalleled national humiliation, of weakness. When you listen to the President, these are the musings of an imbecile. An idiot. And I don't use those words to name call. I use them because they are the precise words of the English language to describe his behavior. His comportment. His actions. We've never seen a level of incompetence, a level of ineptitude so staggering on a daily basis by anybody in the history of the country whose ever been charged with substantial responsibilities. It's just astonishing that this man is president of the United States. The man, the con man, from New York City. Many bankruptcies, failed businesses, a reality show, that branded him as something that he never was. A successful businessman. Well, he's the President of the United States now, and the man who said he would make the country great again. And he's brought death, suffering, and economic collapse on truly an epic scale. And let's be clear. This isn't happening in every country around the world. This place. Our place. Our home. Our country. The United States. We are the epicenter. We are the place where you're the most likely to die from this disease. We're the ones with the most shattered economy. And we are, because of the fool that sits in the Oval Office behind the Resolute Desk.”

Take no prisoners. Every single vile, hate-filled, racist, fascist, criminal thing that happened here, from erasing history and transgender Americans, to invading our own cities, to denying healthcare to the poorest among us, can be traced back to the gelatinous, cankled traitor at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

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