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Blend-o-licious endorsements...
The Christian Civic League of Maine's Mike Hein calls Pam's House Blend: "a leading source of radical homosexual propaganda, anti-Christian bigotry, and radical transgender advocacy."
He is "praying that Pam Spaulding will "turn away from her wicked and sinful promotion of homosexual behavior."
(CCLM's web site, 10/15/07)
Ex-gay "Christian" activist James Hartline on Pam:
"I have been mocked over and over again by ungodly and unprincipled anti-christian lesbians."
(from "Six Years In Sodom: From The Journal Of James Hartline," 9/4/2006, written from the "homosexual stronghold" of Hillcrest in San Diego).
Peter LaBarbera of Americans for Truth Against Homosexuality heartily endorses the Blend, calling Pam:
A "vicious anti-Christian lesbian activist." (Concerned Women for America's radio show [9:15], 1/25/07)
"A nutty lesbian blogger." (MassResistance radio show [16:25], 2/3/07)
Pam's House Blend always seems to find these sick f*cks. The area of the country she is in? The home state of her wife? I know, they are everywhere. Pam just does such a great job of bringing them out into the light.
--Impeach Bush
who monitors yours Bevis ?? Just thought I would drop you a line,so the rest of your life is not wasted.
Yesterday I posted my initial impressions about the passing of Jesse Helms ("Bye, Jesse, you left quite a legacy"), today I wanted to put up a post to discuss what the end of this chapter of bigotry really means. As in what's really changed in the social conservative movement.
Our country has made many strides in overcoming racial prejudice and homophobia since Jesse Helms stepped onto the political scene, but success to combat it has taken legislation, court decisions, and forward-thinking portions of the business community that saw discrimination as bad for business.
By and large the masses who are scared of diversity have been dragged, kicking and screaming, into mandated legal compliance, but those tools don't change hearts and minds -- only personal interaction does that over time. I've said that time and again when referring to the power of coming out of the closet.
Jesse Helms knew he was losing the battle to maintain the social order of his childhood that he championed (you know, where the Negro knew his place). The conservative movement back then had his back.
Here's a topic I'd like to explore and discuss -- where does social conservatism stand today, and how different is it than it was in Helms's time? What does today's conservatism stand for in your state's GOP?
When my daughter was about 18 months old, I was entertaining the idea of moving to the lower-48 in the Southern regions (yes, it was February in Anchorage). For the heck of it, I was checking out some "live-in" positions where high-powered, type-A folks were looking for personal assistants to be at their beck-and-call. I started talking to a nice, older couple...a retired oil exec and his wife who were heavily involved in foundations, fundraising and event planning. The position would have been perfect! I sent them my resume, samples of my writing and made sure they knew I had an 18-month-old daughter.
They were impressed with my abilities and tickled at the thought of having a child in the house again. It really looked like this was going somewhere. As a proud mama, I decided to send them a picture of Morrigan and I together.
That evening, I received a curt (at first) phone call saying they were no longer interested in my services.
The summer heats up as pols and pastors get caught with their figurative pants down.
Milwaukee: Deacon exposes himself to undercover cop while cruising for homosex
Here we go again -- another moral leader of his religious community lands in the pokey for a lewd act. Jerome Pitchford, 48, a youth counselor and deacon of Milwaukee's Holy Redeemer Church of God in Christ was caught in a police sting in a park known for cruising. (WISN):
Police said Pitchford apparently does not practice what he teaches in Sunday School. Police say after church at the Holy Redeemer Church of God in Christ on Sunday afternoon, he was arrested and charged with lewd and lascivious behavior at Milwaukee's Estabrook Park.
The criminal complaint says he was looking for sex with another man. He exposed himself, to what turned out to be an undercover police officer. "They initiate either by you know grabbing the officer, which is fourth-degree sexual assault or exposing themselves, which is lewd and lascivious behavior," said Milwaukee County Sheriff's Deputy John Nelson.
One neighbor had this reaction, laying the groundwork for a "the devil got into me" defense: "I can't believe it, but I hope that he will get ... a little therapy and get himself straightened out." The video report is here.
Jesse Helms has died. As a native and current resident of North Carolina, even today many people I run into outside of this state who know little about it -- recognize the name Jesse Helms. He leaves a long, dark trail of professional racial bigotry (he opposed the MLK national holiday, and civil rights legislation) and homophobia (that list is so long, you don't know where to begin).
Former U.S. Sen. Jesse A. Helms, the son of a Monroe police chief who rose to national prominence as one of the leading lions of the American right, died early this morning. He was 86.
During a political career that began with his election to the Raleigh City Council in the late 1950s and included 30 years in the U.S. Senate, Jesse Alexander Helms endeared himself to conservatives throughout the country.
Helms became known as "Senator No" for his constant battles against everything from increased government spending to civil rights legislation to communism to the National Endowment for the Arts.
I viewed the late Senator many a time when he was a commentator on WRAL. For me, as a young child of color, his blunt, unforgiving, unacceptable views were distressing and surreal to watch.
Here are some quaint quotes from the former U.S. Senator, collected by the Raleigh N&O, which also has a timeline of his career:
"Unless our Negro citizens submit more easily than we predict they will, North Carolina does not have the simple choice between segregated schools and integrated schools. Our only choice is between integrated public schools and free-choice private schools. ... The decision will have been made by a very small minority of people who are hell-bent on forced integration.""
"To rob the Negro of his reputation of thinking through a problem in his own fashion is about the same as trying to pretend that he doesn't have a natural instinct for rhythm and for singing and dancing."
- Helms responding in 1956 to criticism that a fictional black character in his newspaper column was offensive.
"I shall always remember the shady streets, the quiet Sundays, the cotton wagons, the Fourth of July parades, the New Year's Eve firecrackers. I shall never forget the stream of school kids marching uptown to place flowers on the Courthouse Square monument on Confederate Memorial Day."
- Helms writing in 1956 on life in his hometown of Monroe, N.C.
His infamous "Hands" ad, which he ran during his re-election bid in 1990 against Charlotte mayor Harvey Gantt, (who is black); Gantt led in the polls until this aired:
Lots of folks put something on the grill, others veg out. There's nothing like grilled veggies or a nice burger...hey, here's an interesting Q of the day --
What is your favorite burger joint of all time?
I'd have to go with Junior's in Brooklyn, NY. Great flame grilled taste (I always ordered "E" on the burger menu. Heavenly onion rings, cheesecake, and challah bread as well. Burger is a heart attack on a bun. Good thing I don't live there any more.
What is your favorite hot dog of all time?
This one was tougher, since I don't recall ever ordering one at a restaurant, only those Sabretts you get on the streets of NYC or the ballpark. I've not been impressed with Nathan's Famous, though its fries are fantastic. Out of the ones I've purchased and cooked, only kosher beef franks make the cut, since it's frightening to think of what else might end up in that meat. I never liked a lot of stuff piled on a frank, like chili, relish, etc. Just Gulden's spicy brown mustard. I always thought it was strange when I saw someone putting ketchup on a hot dog.
Oh -- believe it or not the best one I've had recently (as in the last 5 years since I rarely eat them) was the quarter-pound hot dog that Costco sells at its food concession stand, I think the Sinai Kosher brand. You can get that and a soda for $1.50. Another heart attack on a bun (the link is to the terrifying "nutrition" information, which explains why it tastes so good).
OneNewsNow quotes Dr. David Stevens, the Chief Executive Officer of the Christian Medical & Dental Associations (CMDA) in their piece Transgenderism -- purely psychological?, where he makes a patently false statement about what the Bible says about altering the shape of one's genitalia. He makes his false statement in a call for not treating transgender people with "immoral" treatments:
"Well, the Bible does tell us very clearly that mutilation of the body is wrong, and it's sad that these people have this psychological disorder -- but it should be treated from a psychological perspective," Stevens contends.
The "psychological perspective" that Dr. Stevens is referring to is obviously conversion therapy, because he's rejects the American Medical Association's house of delegates approval of a resolution in June that supports removing barriers to treat and care for transgender people, as apparently he also rejects the Harry Benjamin Standard Of Care (HBSOC) [of which the purpose of the HBSOC is to articulate WPATH's consensus about the psychiatric, psychological, medical, and surgical management of gender identity disorders (GID)].
Here's what Dr. Stevens does say about treatment for trans people in the OneNewsNow:
The CMDA spokesman has taken a look at the recent [AMA] resolution. "They're calling on insurance companies to provide treatment for gender-identity disorder, which actually is a sex-change operation. Those are very expensive and obviously treat something in a way that really isn't going to solve the problem, just perpetuate it. [It is] sad that this has happened, but we're increasingly seeing this happen at the American Medical Association and other professional organizations across the country," Stevens explains
Lovely.
But hey, back to the headline: The real difficulty I have with Dr. Stevens comments on "mutilation" is that he's either ignorant of what the Bible says -- specifically in a quote attributed to Jesus -- regarding changing the shape of one's genitalia, or he's lying about it. The quote from Jesus that Dr. Stevens should have been aware of:
For there are eunuchs who were born that way from their mother's womb; and there are eunuchs who were made eunuchs by men; and there are also eunuchs who made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. He who is able to accept this, let him accept it.
The Geneva Study Bible states this about that verse quoted above -- Matthew 19:12 -- on how one becomes a eunuch:
A man can become a eunuch in one of two ways: the first is by castration or emasculation, and the other by natural causes, such as a rupture.
There were no genital reassignment surgeries besides castration available at the time the New Testament was written.
For Dr. Stevens to indicate he knows what the Christ and the Bible says about genital mutilation when he obviously doesn't -- well, it takes the underpinning out from his and his organization's stated beliefs. He's either intentionally lying about what the Bible says about changing one's genitalia, or he's completely ignorant about what the book of Matthew quoted Jesus as saying about changing one's genitalia.
Either way, Dr. Stevens looks a lot more like an ignoramus than a man with such an advanced medical degree should probably look. It certainly speaks loudly to how little knowledge the Christian Medical & Dental Associations must have even on basic scriptural references to changing one's genitalia if their spokesperson is Dr. Stevens.
And hey, if some peewee, conservative Christian, medical association -- with "Christian" boldy included in its name -- doesn't even know what the Bible states about an issue their commenting on, one can only wonder what this peewee, conservative Christian, association -- with "Medical" boldy included in its name -- doesn't know about the medical side of issues it comments on.
~~~~~
Further Reading:
* John Wesley's Explanatory Notes, Isaiah 56:3-8
"We are committed to a transgenerational, multiethnic and multiracial conservative movement."
-- a laughably bold Mat Staver of Liberty Counsel, to a gathering of 90+ fundies who are hand-wringing about the decline of their movement and what they need to do to revitalize it -- in other words, Obama envy.
More than 90 evangelical leaders representing millions of conservative Christians met in Denver on Tuesday to lament the condition of the religious conservative movement and to conclude they should get behind Sen. John McCain even if they didn't like everything about him as a candidate.
"The alternative is so bad we must support John McCain," said Phyllis Schlafly, founder and president of Eagle Forum, adding that the leaders should have held a strategy meeting in 2001 when it was clear Vice President Dick Cheney wouldn't run for president instead of waiting until four months before the 2008 election.
...Mostly white and middle-aged, the group was called together by Mathew Staver, president of Liberty Counsel and dean of the law school at Liberty University.
Who was on this list of womb-controlling, LGBT hating theocrats?
* Rick Scarborough, founder and president of Vision America. He claims that Christianity will be criminalized if pro-LGBT laws are passed.
* Jim Garlow, lead pastor of Skyline Church in San Diego, who is rounding up California pastors to help the pro-marriage amendment effort there.
* Phil Burress, president of Citizens for Community Values in Ohio: "I was once one of those people who said 'no way' to Sen. John McCain as President. No longer. The stakes are too high. And if Obama wins I need to be able to get up on November 5th, look at myself in the mirror, and when I pray, say, 'Lord, I did all that I could.'"
* Gary Glenn, head of the American Family Association for Michigan. He advocated that McCain select Huckabee as VP to appease that crowd; apparently a motion to send a letter to that effect out for signatures -- and a majority of attendees said they would sign on.
* Donald Hodel, former president of the Christian Coalition and Focus on the Family. He boldly expects McCain to win, and that fundie access would be necessary in a McSame admin.
And perhaps the saddest attendee of all:
* Alveda King, niece of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. She said of her cousin Bernice (Dr. King's anti-gay daughter): "Bernice says herself that she knows deep within that her father did not march and did not take a bullet for same-sex marriage." She supports a federal marriage amendment.
The most interesting part of this article is the description of the dressing-down the gray-hairs received by younger evangelicals in the room.
Various speakers lamented the lack of a unified strategy that had evangelicals supporting various primary candidates and the fact that their message does not seem to resonate with younger voters, African-Americans or Hispanics in the same way Sen. Barack Obama's does.
More than an hour was spent listening to younger leaders tell the group that religious conservatives must be perceived "to care" about social issues and the environment to appeal to young people who are voting for the first time.
Sorry young folks, your elders crapped away their chance to garner those votes with egregious anti-immigrant bleating and only token outreach to socially conservative blacks, so you reap what you sow. Maybe you need to take the reins away from the battle weary fogies running the professional "Christian" show (and the GOP).
The message for us is clear -- they've thrown down the gauntlet of bigotry. Are we ready to get our butts in gear now? Note this:
Others privately said they feared an Obama landslide. One participant said he couldn't imagine anything worse. "Obama has done the impossible," he said. "He's made Hillary Clinton look good to Christian conservatives."
On Queen Drudge, he turns on the tired old police siren for breaking news -- here at the Blend it's time to flip on the rainbow siren!
Now that the Florida governor's found that "special someone," you know, the adulteress he's been allegedly boinking for sometime now, he's making his "union" legal -- something gay and lesbian couples in the Sunshine State cannot do. Obviously, Charlie Crist wants that McCain VP slot so badly he can taste it...
Gov. Charlie Crist, single for nearly three decades, on Thursday morning became engaged to his girlfriend of nine months, Carole Rome.
"She's special in every way. She's brilliant, beautiful and sweet. I'm very, very lucky," Crist told the St. Petersburg Times in an exclusive interview.
Crist said he picked out the sapphire and diamond ring on Wednesday at the Gold and Diamond Center in St. Petersburg's Northeast Shopping Center.
...And his engagement is likely to reverberate well beyond Florida because the popular governor is widely viewed as a contender to be likely Republican presidential candidate John McCain's running mate. Not since Franklin Pierce picked William King to be his running mate in 1852 has America had a bachelor vice president.
Congrats to the happy couple...I wonder if the McCain campaign will have a congratulatory press release out soon.
Click on the screenshot for the Sun-Sentinel video report. The anchor is so giddy. Oh, and the readership of the paper doesn't buy this one either:
When gay men discriminate against transsexual men who identify as bisexual, are we supposed to approve of the discrimination within the LGBT community? This is apparently what CEO Joseph Lee and Technical Director Brian Brown of TangoWire wants gays and lesbians to do, according to the Bay Windows article Bi personals site boots trans member.
"[BisexualDatingNow.com] say[s], tell us about yourself in your own words. And I stated, 'I'm a 25-year old trans guy living in Boston.' ... I didn't want to mislead anyone looking at my profile, so that's why I put that," said Teich. Within a day he had received three "smiles," which members send to express their interest in getting to know each other.
Teich thought little of his decision until he wrote to the site's customer service staff about a problem he was having using the site. He exchanged e-mails with a customer service representative named Kiar Dupuis, and after reading his profile Dupuis informed him that the site does not allow transgender users.
"I am sorry, as a transgender, our site would not meet your needs. I am afraid we have to remove your profile," wrote Dupuis, according to an e-mail provided to Bay Windows by Teich. His profile was deleted shortly after he received the e-mail.
Here's what technical director Brian Brown stated when questioned by Bay Windows about the policy:
Brian Brown, chief technical officer for TangoWire, confirmed that the company does not allow transgender people to create profiles on the site. When asked why identifying as transgender would exclude someone from identifying as bisexual and placing a personal ad on a bisexual dating site, Brown reiterated that TangoWire's site does not accommodate transgender people.
"It's that T side [in LGBT] that we have not been able to fully accommodate within our program. That is shown [by the fact] that in our registration, transgender is not one of the options we provide, and we don't provide that as such. ... That identity is not an identity we have an ability to support," said Brown.
So why isn't adding transgender identities to the list of programmed choices the solution, vice excluding people who publicly identify as transsexual and/or transgender in their profiles? -- Especially as the Why Choose Us? section of BisexualDatingNow.com's site states of the business:
TangoWire was founded by, is directed by, and is run by gay personnel. We don't discriminate against our straight co-workers - they're cool people, too, and just as committed to your great experience on our site.
But, they do make no bones about discriminating against transgender people.
Daryl Herrschaft, director of Human Rights Campaign's (HRC) Workforce Equality Project, said that HRC works to educate gay-owned businesses about the transgender community, but he could not recall an instance of a gay-owned business being so blatant in discriminating against transgender people.
So is it ever okay for a gay or lesbian owned and operated business to fail to accommodate potential transgender patrons -- whether these businesses are web or brick and mortar based? And, is it more egregious, or less egregious discrimination to transgender people if it's gay or lesbian people failing to accommodate transgender patrons because of the concept of LGBT community?
~~~~~
Further reading:
* Dating Web sites usually are not big revenue generators (references how TangoWire uses their database of dating profiles for multiple dating websites)
~~~~~
Related:
* eHarmony and California's Unruh Civil Rights Act
* Married White Man Seeks Big Black D*ck
If you are not familiar with this tedious saga, Bolthouse is a food company. Its founder started a "will of god" foundation with the pro-forma contributions to the extreme homophobic right. This, in turn, led to some boycotts. You can use The Google for more information.
Anyhow, Bolthouse claims that he sold the company. The company has insisted that Bolthouse is no longer a shareholder. As the company is privately held, no further information was available.
Until, that is, our friend Tony Perkins started an anti-boycott drive which states (emphasis added):
". . . the intimidation tactics are being endorsed by one of the nation's largest unions -- the AFL-CIO. Homosexual advocates, with the powerful backing of national union leaders, are calling for a boycott of Bolthouse Farms, a California company . . . simply because one of the minority owners donated money to the petition drive to put a marriage amendment on the ballot."
Assuming that "CofCC Tony" is right, then that confirms that Bolthouse and the Bolthouse company are liars. Again, truth does not seem to be an important value for the values crowd if it interferes with gay bashing.
Many thanks for the props from Wayne Hicks of Electronic Villager. Take a look at some of the other great blogs that made the list after the jump, including Jack and Jill Politics, another excellent political blog that made the cut for the general pool at the DNCC in Denver.
Dapper Don Wildmon and Co. have launched a boycott against McDonald's for being too pro-homosexual. Of course you'd expect a lot of bluster right out of the box, but with this ludicrous disclaimer the AFA is already on the defensive:
What the boycott of McDonald's IS NOT about
This boycott is not about hiring homosexuals.
It is not about homosexuals eating at McDonald's.
It is not about how homosexual employees are treated.
The "evidence" presented on the site of the pro-homo agenda is a video of the Golden Arches' sponsorship of the 2007 S.F. Gay Pride parade.
W-E-A-K. Can you hear the giant flushing sound of the American Family Association's power as it goes down the crapper?
I haven't worked up the nerve to go into the comments (up to 115 already) of this article at ABCNews. I can only imagine how bad the trans-bashing gets in there.
Thomas Beatie, the transgender man who made headlines as the so-called "pregnant man," gave birth Sunday to a healthy baby girl, ABC News has learned.
The birth - at St. Charles Medical Center in Bend, Oregon - was natural, according to a source, who added that reports that Beatie had a caesarean section are false.
I only glanced at the headline, because I was up to my ears in work. But what I read was enough to give me a sick feeling; the kind you get when you begin to wonder whether you've made a disastrous choice, or cast your lot with exactly the wrong person. (It's a feeling at least some Bush voters, circa 2004, should be familiar with.) The headline? "Obama to Expand Bush's Faith Based Programs."
Reaching out to religious voters, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama called for expanding President Bush's program steering federal social service dollars to religious groups and - in a move sure to cause controversy - supported some ability to hire and fire based on faith.
Obama unveiled his approach to getting religious charities more involved in government anti-poverty programs during a tour and remarks Tuesday at Eastside Community Ministry, which provides food, clothes, youth ministry and other services.
"The challenges we face today ... are simply too big for government to solve alone," Obama said.
Obama's announcement is part of a series of events leading up to Friday's Fourth of July holiday that are focused on American values.
Expand them? And here I'd been hoping - but not praying - that maybe getting the next Democrat in the White House would ashcan the whole idea.
Governor Napolitano starts out fine, explaining that there is any reason to amend the Constitution, but then she goes on to say this (sound familiar?):
"I believe marriage is between a man and a woman," Napolitano said. "I don't think the constitutional amendment is necessary. The voters of Arizona will have a chance to decide this. Personally, I'm going to oppose it. We already have a statute that defines marriage. The courts have already said the statute is constitutional."
Some of the reader comments on the article:
I agree with the Governor and think that this is yet another hope by the GOP to polarize the electrate and ginny the hardliners to the polls. Shame on them.
WE need a Constitional Amendment that actually places a real definition on marriage. Otherwise the 9th Circus Court will do what was done in Californabomanation!
The governor is correct. The referendum is nothing more than another election year chicanery by the GOP for the purpose of divisiveness among the electorate, another way of calling upon their supporters to close the ranks and nothing.....more. The GOP has no shame.
Albatross, a change to the State Constitution isn't going to impress a federal court if they believe that the law violates the US Constitution.
We just went through this a couple of years ago, and already know that the good citizens of Arizona are not anti-gay as so many of our leaders are.
...so she can marry her girlfriwnd when she's out of office....
It would have saved me a lot of money if they didn't allow men and women to marry.
Lots of folks put something on the grill, others veg out. There's nothing like grilled veggies or a nice burger...hey, here's an interesting Q of the day --
OneNewsNow quotes Dr. David Stevens, the Chief Executive Officer of the 
as apparently he also rejects the 
Gov. Charlie Crist, single for nearly three decades, on Thursday morning became engaged to his girlfriend of nine months, Carole Rome.
Governor Napolitano starts out fine, explaining that there is any reason to amend the Constitution, but then she goes on to 
