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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