Judge Chuck Weller, a family court judge in Reno, NV, was shot in the chest while standing by a window in the courthouse earlier today. He’s been taken to the hospital; no word on his current condition. Wonder if he’s one of those nasty activist judges we hear so much about—that, in fact, our president was just bemoaning recently during his ringing endorsement of the federal marriage amendment.
I looked him up, but couldn’t find much about him. He’s on some (seemingly conservative) bad judges lists, but not because he appears to be liberal; it looks to be one of those “he’s not conservative enough” things. I also found some very angry fathers’ rights advocates who were complaining that he ran on a platform promising to uphold fathers’ rights, but has let them down.
Judge Shot in Reno
Media in Freefall
WTF kind of GD article is this? I am officially renaming this rag WASTE of TIME, for evidently believing I’m supposed to give a shit about the presidential fluffer’s collection of castaway junk so craptacular that it would make people selling Dat Phan collectibles on eBay blush.
Stand for Purity
Grab your blue blindfolds, Shakers:
When the Pure Life Revolution's disciples scouted out a staging location for a full-frontal assault on what they call the "pornographic plague" and its threat to Nashville, the sidewalk outside Hustler Hollywood seemed ideal.McLeod picked the location for the 21-day “Stand for Purity on Church Street” for more than just the ironic name of the street serving as the address for the Hustler Hollywood sex shop outside which they’re holding vigil. There are also gay clubs nearby, which are, apparently, part of the “pornographic plague.”
…These folks on the sidewalk — "prayer warriors," they call themselves — are on a campaign to purge pornography not just from stores but from their hearts and those of other church people.
"We want for the church to come clean, get real, get honest," says pastor Scott MacLeod. The first targets are the Christians who sample such wares while claiming higher moral ground. He doesn't think churches should be finger-pointing if pew-sitters are "entangled in pornography."
Kudos to these folks for not being aggressive or threatening in their demonstration (although, prayer warriors?—why is it always war imagery with these people?), and for pointing out things like “When the Christian conferences come to town, the (in-room hotel) porn rentals go higher than at any other time.” But I’m not sure I understand the idea behind setting up camp outside a shop selling the porn, sex toys, lingerie, etc. to which they object, since, by the store employees’ admission, it’s been good for business. Seems a bit self-defeating, if you ask this dildo-owning heretic.
Got any ideas?
Please help Brigitte Dillen and Ivo Driessens name their 15th baby:
A Belgian couple expecting their 15th baby have put an ad in a newspaper because they have run out of ideas for names. [They] have given all of their children names ending in a 'y' but can't think of anymore. So they have asked readers of the Gazet Van Antwerpen to help name their 15th baby.A few off the top of my head: Dopey, Grumpy, Sleepy, Sneezy, and Happy.
The new baby will be a brother or sister for Wendy (20), Cindy (18), Jimmy (17), Brendy (16), Sonny (15), Sandy (14), Purdy (13), Chardy (9), Yorry (8), Yony (6), Britney (5), Yenty (3), Ruby (2) and Xanty (1).
Ivo said: "My wife has said she wants to stop having babies after her 40th birthday. She's 37 now. We still have time for twins."Settle down, Ivo. You’re making my uterus ache.
Whew!
Eventually, when the husband gets sick of my grousing and puts me in a home (it is my goal in life, after all, to be a grouchy old man), I'll be in good company.
SAN FRANCISCO - Like other gay men in their golden years, Jack Norris and Seymour Sirota had heard the horror stories.
An elderly lesbian couple is housed on separate floors of a nursing home and kept from seeing each other. A gay retired college professor feels compelled to keep his sexual orientation a secret after his roommate at an assisted living facility asks to be transferred.
"I thought, 'We are not going to be in that situation,'" the 67-year-old Norris says crisply. "This is not going to happen to us in our final days."
That's how the two New Yorkers, partners for 14 years, landed at Rainbow Vision, a just-completed senior community in Santa Fe, N.M. From the private dining room named after Truman Capote to the cabaret where '60s teen icon Lesley "It's My Party" Gore was scheduled to appear this weekend, everything about the 146-unit retirement village was designed with the comfort of graying gays and lesbians in mind.
Lesley friggin' Gore is performing there. Holy crap, I want to live there now. This is really fantastic news. Before I moved to NYC to be with my husband, my roommate's (gay, partnered) father used to invite us to his parties and get-togethers. Everyone there was over 50 and gay. Interestingly, there was also an equal distribution of sexes; there were as many lesbians as gay men that were in their circle of friends. I got to know many of these people; they were really wonderful and fun to be around. But there's one thing I remember them all saying: "I'll never go in a home." One man joked, "The rooms in those things are small enough; imagine having to get into one of their closets." I was very happy that the article didn't ignore that particular issue:
"In a retirement community, you want to be with people of like minds and like interests, whether it's a golf community or a religious community," said Bonnie McGowan, who is spearheading Birds of a Feather, a second gay senior complex in New Mexico. "Until I feel safe walking down the street holding a woman's hand ... and not feel like I'm going to offend even one person, there is a need for this."This is one example of the "gay community" that I'm behind, 100%. I wish one would open here in Chicago so I could volunteer.
Besides personal safety, specialists in gay aging issues offer other reasons why the so-called Stonewall Generation, named for the 1969 New York riots that marked the beginning of the modern gay movement, needs and craves places of its own to retire.
Among them are the years of stigma and isolation many gays who are over 50 experienced, that may have left them estranged from their families, financially insecure and childless.
"There is a real sense of disenfranchisement and also a sense of independence, of 'I don't want to be dependent on family, I want to be dependent on community,'" said Judy Dlugacz, founder of the San Francisco-based lesbian travel company Olivia Cruises and Resorts.
I take a little umbrage with the word "specialized" when describing these facilities... it sounds too much like "special rights," which the homobigoted love to trumpet at every occasion. But I'm just being potato-potahto picky. Cheers to Norris and everyone involved in getting these places off the ground.
And this is just too cute:
"Now, we have more options and we may be more out, but it's still going to be hard to find friends or partners," she said. "It doesn't help to live in a gay-friendly community without any other gay people."
Along with second chances — Silver is planning to throw a prom party "for those of us who didn't go to senior prom with the person we wanted to" — Rainbow Vision was designed to foster a sense of immediate belonging.
If they'll allow a bar in my room, I'm so retiring to this place.
(Pardon me, boy... is that the Chattanooga cross-post?)
Possum fritter
M and I are blessed with pretty good neighbors. It's not that we're bosom buddies with these people, but we're on good terms with all and conversant with a couple. There are seldom issues involving property boundaries or loud music or the like. The domestic experience depends heavily on good relations with those around you, and we've been fairly lucky in that respect.
I have to say, however, that my neighbors fall somewhat short in the road kill department.
Note: Best to have already eaten (breakfast, lunch, whatever) hours before continuing with this post.
Specifically: a possum met its untimely end in the street near our house late last week. We learned of this upon returning home from work on Friday. It made for a pretty grisly homecoming: the animal's carcass had been pretty well flattened by traffic into a large, unsavory, rapidly decomposing possum fritter. M was distressed (she is always concerned for the welfare of those friggin' critters) and I wasn't terribly happy myself. We didn't have time to do anything about it; we had an engagement elsewhere and had just enough time to feed the cats before leaving.
An important point: The corpus in question was actually located in front of the house of our west-side neighbor, though positioned squarely in the middle of the street. As a matter of informal neighbor law, disposition of the carcass was a matter for that resident or his opposite number across the street. That's how I saw it, at least, though I suspected that my neighbors might have other views on the subject. As M and I left for our engagement, I felt certain that the once-possum would still be there to greet us upon our return.
And, indeed, it was.
Friday gave way to Saturday: a relentlessly hot Saturday, a bad Saturday for dealing with road kill. The possum fritter was still there, flatter and more putrescent than ever, judging from the cloud of flies that hovered around it. I watched grimly from the sealed sanctuary of my living room, sipping at coffee and wondering when a neighbor would step up and take charge of the sanitation matter. Such a neighbor never appeared.
Saturday gave way to Sunday: a cooler day and a wet one due to storms that passed through the area the night before. The former possum was still in the road, though no longer surrounded by flies. I did note one new development regarding a car which happened to belong to someone in one of the houses with jurisdiction over the possum corpus. This vehicle is usually (and vaguely irritatingly) parked in front of our house, but was now parked a full housefront and a half to the east - that is, farther away from the possum fritter.
I mulled that over while drinking a couple of cups of coffee. I poured myself a third cup, but set it aside and grabbed a pair of work gloves. "I'm gonna pick up the possum, " I told M.
There wasn't much to it, really, except that the smell was awful. My one concern was that the possum fritter stay in one piece as I shoveled it into a garbage bag, and it did...pretty much.
Later, I made some trenchant observations about neighbors and road kill. M asked, "Do you think it's possible that the city takes care of that sort of thing?"
"Sure," I scoffed. "Guys ride around town in orange city trucks that say 'Roadkill' on the side panels, looking for dead critters."
"Well, not that, exactly," M said, laughing. "But doesn't the city respond to dead animal calls?"
I frowned. "I have no idea."
Well, as it turns out, the city does exactly that.
Note to the Citizens' Service Bureau: Cancel that call to pick up a dead possum - if you actually got such a call, which I kinda doubt.
Blogworthy? Maybe not. It's just that this is the second once-and-former possum I've disposed of in the five years I've lived in this house. That first unfortunate creature actually did fall in my jurisdiction (as I understand informal neighbor law), and I did my duty right away. Would that all neighbors did likewise.
Pardon me while I harrumph a couple of times, snap my newspaper, and yell "Hey, you kids!" out the window.
(Cross-posted. Harrumph!)
You do the math.
Submitted without comment:
Murders, robberies and aggravated assaults in the United States increased last year, spurring an overall rise in violent crime for the first time since 2001, according to FBI data…
The overall increase in violent crime was modest, 2.5 percent, which equates to more than 1.4 million crimes. Nevertheless, that was the largest percentage increase since 1991…
Violent crimes peaked at 1.9 million in 1992 and fell steadily through the end of that decade. The number has been relatively stable for the past six years.
Crime last year increased in all regions, although the 5.7 percent rise in the Midwest was at least three times any other region's. These states make up the Midwest: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota and Wisconsin.
Happy Graduation Day; This School Sucks!
I wonder if this kid watches The Colbert Report:
Graduating student Kyle Stublen had seen it all: the illiterate football players praised and promoted at every turn, the methodical crimes of stealing college-prep test answers, the bored "guidance counselors" who told kids not to bother with college, even the lines of students snorting coke and smoking dope in the bathrooms at lunchtime.Stublen was chosen after a try-out at which he read a speech with, ahem, a slightly different tone. After giving his real speech at graduation, the school withheld his diploma for five days, finally releasing it after they realized that being pissed off wasn’t a legitimate reason to keep it from him.
Annoyed by the faculty's blind eye to what was really going on at Charlotte High School, he decided to address these issues in a venue where people might actually pay attention. Stublen, a member of the debate team and would-be trial lawyer, stunned his fellow students, their parents and the school's staff by reading a scathing, bitter speech at his graduation ceremony.
There’s a big debate in his Florida town over his speech; some are, inevitably, accusing him of ruining his fellow graduating seniors’ big day, and others are congratulating him on speaking to important issues that need to be addressed, but are routinely ignored. It was, to be sure, an inappropriate venue by one definition, but by another, there was arguably no better place to point out the real failings of a troubled school.
What do you think?
First Hurricane Warning
The first hurricane warning of the yearKeep Litbrit—and every other Floridian possibly at Alberto’s mercy—in your thoughts.
has been issued for the Florida coast. Tropical storm Alberto, originally not expected to become a hurricane, has suddenly strengthened.
ACLU Takes Wiretapping Issue to the Courts
Good.
Ann Beeson, the ACLU's associate legal director, said the administration's arguments in defense of the program don't square with the Constitution.The Duh of the Year, which very few of our Congresscritters seem willing to say. Thanks, Ms. Beeson, for saying it. And good luck.
"The framers never intended to give the president the power to ignore the laws of Congress even during wartime and emergencies," she said last week during a conference call with reporters.
Four Years
He is a flawless lyric in a song.
He is its music, stirring and sublime,
Evoking me to ever sing along.
He is a fate an optimist predicts.
He is a writer’s grand and timeless tome.
His very presence mortar to my bricks;
Wherever he is, and am I, we’re home.
His voice a tune of which I never tire;
His smile an enduring work of art.
His ev’ry move and gesture stealth conspire,
To catch my breath and pause my beating heart.
He’s ev’rything that stirs in me response;
He is my passion and my renaissance.
Happy Anniversary, Mr. Shakes. I love you.
Superman: Highly Heterosexual!
Rest assured, the Man of Steel is no fag:
After weeks of Internet buzzing that the new Superman movie portrays the Man of Steel as gay, the director of the film issued a strong denial on Friday and said it was the most heterosexual character he has filmed.Except for that one time, maybe, but what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.
Superman "is probably the most heterosexual character in any movie I've ever made," said Bryan Singer, director of "Superman Returns," a new movie about the crime-fighting superhero that opens June 28. "I don't think he's ever been gay."
So what prompted Bryan Singer, who himself is openly gay, to issue this firm denial that Superman is light in the leggings?
Young men are the movie's target audience and the film needs to attract millions of them to earn a profit and relaunch the "Superman" film franchise.Right, money. (Which is almost as good as truth, justice, and the American way.) Goodness knows, we don’t want to disenfranchise young men with any hint of the appearance that Superman’s a homo. If straight kids start admiring gay superheroes, it would totally undermine the sanctity of the Justice League.
Aside from the idiocy of the belief that young men’s homophobia is something worth indulging and protecting, the other thing that annoys me about such an explicit assertion of Superman’s heterosexuality is that it betrays the unspoken agreement of sorts that the entertainment industry has honored with gay and gay-friendly audiences since film began—which is, basically, that as long as they get to keep making all the superheroes and such straight, we get to keep exploiting the subtext of it for our own amusement. When we giggle to ourselves, “Sure, Superman says he’s got the hots for Lois Lane, but look at his outfit!” they’re not supposed to come back with, “So he wears a leotard and flies around in a red cape. Big deal, Singer said, noting Spider-Man wears tights. The X-Men do too, and they aren't gay.” What a party-pooper.
Of course, in the time-honored tradition of gays, hags, nerds, fat girls, and other marginalized folks who rarely see themselves onscreen in the blockbusters, I’ve decided to regard this press released equivalent of “Don’t go there, you subverts—he’s all hetero!” as an obvious example of “He doth protest too much.”
“We were all scratching our heads," said Paul Levitz, president and publisher of Superman owner DC Comics. "He's not a gay character."OMG. That means Superman is totally gay—and I bet Paul Levitz is, too!
(Hat tip 429News.)
Rumorz...and the Press Gets Thwarted (Again)
Since when is Morrissey Page Six material? Oh yeah—since there were rumors (made up, like the rest of The Times of London rumors, by The Times of London staff smoking doobies in the men’s room) that he had a HOTT gay liaison with another famous gay:
MORRISSEY is shooting down rumors that he had an affair with R.E.M. frontman Michael Stipe. "That's absolute [bleep], absolute [bleep], and I don't know why people ever said that. Do you?" Morrissey told The Times of London.Yeah, I know why they said that. Because any time two gay celebrities are on the same continent at the same time, the obvious conclusion is that they’re having sex. And also because Mozza and Michael Stipe had a well-known written correspondence, about which they both spoke, and everyone knows that “letters” is gay code for rampant buttsex.
When asked to address the long-debated question of whether he's gay, straight or bisexual, the Pope of Mope replied, "It's neither of those things. I'm simply myself, which is inexcusable to many people. I'm not trapped by anything."When will the media learn that he will never indulge their prurience? And why would he? His answering that question would bring to a screeching halt the longest-running sustained frustration ever of an annoying question repeatedly asked by the media. For more than two decades, they’ve been asking him if he’s gay, and for more than two decades, he’s been thwarting their efforts with evasive redirections, enigmatic innuendo, claims of celibacy, and Oscar Wilde quotes. (Hello? Get a clue.) In 1984, he said, “I refuse to recognise the terms hetero-, bi-, and homosexual. Everybody has exactly the same sexual needs. People are just sexual, the prefix is immaterial,” and has said variations on the same just about every year since.
Every Morrissey fan in the world knows he’s gay, and the names of many of his long-term boyfriends. It’s no secret. Morrissey just doesn’t believe he owes the media an answer about something that doesn’t bloody matter, which drives them crazy, especially because it isn’t a secret. They don’t understand why he won’t go “on the record” with something he takes no great pains to hide, but it’s the principle of the matter. He is, bar none, the greatest antagonist of the media, refusing at every turn to play any of the games celebrities are expected to play, and I love him desperately for it.
“I think the mission of most journalists is to expose me, because they have this notion that I’m totally fake—as though I’m secretly some mad sex monster. People are ready, in wait, for the cloak to drop and to see me photographed in the Playboy Club. They’re trying to unravel me.” — December 1984.
Now why on earth would he ever choose to be complicit with that, when endlessly foiling them is ever so much more fun?
Bush the Diplomat
Nobody likes him, everyone hates him, and sitting in the corner eating wet cigarette butts isn’t getting him anywhere, so Bush has decided to try diplomacy. Not internationally, mind you. Just at home. And just people in his own party:
Now, with Mr. Bush's poll numbers sinking and his agenda faltering, the White House needs Republicans in Congress more than ever. Without necessarily taking the advice he is seeking from Capitol Hill, Mr. Bush is adding a more personal touch to his presidency in an effort to put himself in the good graces of lawmakers.Gee, only five years in and he’s learning that there’s a whole other branch of government, the members of which are worth paying attention to, if not actually taking their advice. Not the tightest learning curve I’ve ever seen, but presidenting is hard work. It’s not the easiest position to approach when you’re totally dependent upon on-the-job training. Just wait until he discovers the Democrats—that will be fun!
…[T]he president, a man not given to Washington schmoozing, now holds intimate cocktail parties on the Truman Balcony, overlooking the South Lawn, for lawmakers and their spouses, complete with tours of the Lincoln Bedroom led by him and the first lady.
For the first time in his presidency, Mr. Bush is also inviting lawmakers to the White House in small groups not to discuss specific issues, but simply to ask what is on their minds. These informal brainstorming sessions occur not in the Oval Office, but over iced tea and lemonade in the cozy Yellow Oval room of the private residence.
Next year, I look forward to a NYT article announcing Bush’s amazing new ability to discern his ass from his elbow.
A Tale of Two Headlines (Part 1,367)
Science Movers and Shakers
Coturnix and Mike the Mad Biologist have both moved to Science Blogs. Coturnix can now be found at A Blog Around the Clock, and Mike can now be found at the new Mike the Mad Biologist. So update your blogrolls!
Newt for Pres?
So he says. If Newt runs, he could be real trouble, because he has the freedom to be critical of the GOP currently in power in a way that other GOP candidates don’t (mainly by their own choice). He’s an odious scumbag, and largely responsible for ushering in the conservative rule that’s now wreaking havoc upon America, but I don’t trust the Dems to make that case clear to the electorate, which has a woefully short memory, especially as he distances itself from it with what would be legitimate criticism had he not been an architect of the mania.
My feeling is, if Newt runs, we’re really going to need Gore. It would make Newt’s emerging outsider platform a lot more difficult if he were facing someone as outside the current debacle as he is.
