Over thirty-six million people in the US live in poverty.

The administration is trying to spin this as good news, by saying that income is rising in all economic classes. Problem is, it’s not keeping up with the cost of living. It also ignores the fact that the raise in income for African-Americans was tiny.

Children and African-Americans are the hardest hit by poverty, as well as single mothers. Over twelve percent of the poor are children. Over 24 percent of Black people are poor; poor Whites come in at a little over eight percent.

Granted, I’m sure some folks, who know they can’t say that the obvious solution would be to stop being Black, will tout personal responsibility, while ignoring the fact that it’s actually very expensive to be poor. (We already saw this with Katrina.) This is a self-perpetuating system, and it’s not because the poor person is so lazy. It’s because when you’re poor, you’re less likely to have reliable transportation to get to a decent paying job or a grocery store (grocery stores don’t tend to be located in poor cities or neighborhoods). If you have to rely on a convenience store or fast food place for your food, you’re not going to be healthy (but it’ll be your fault for not buying healthful food from the grocery store that’s far away and inaccessible to you). You likely won’t live in a safe area, so going out for a walk or a jog could be dangerous. Your kids won’t have a place to play if this is the case, and even if it’s not, your kids will be more likely to get asthma (thanks to environmental racism/classism–we aren’t likely to see a medical waste incinerator in affluent areas any time soon). Lack of exercise plus crappy food equals more health problems. And if you don’t have health insurance, well, then, you can go to the ER of the county hospital that is already overcrowded, understaffed, and underfunded and hope that you’ll get care. Oh, and don’t miss any work, as you’ll get docked or fired.

Some pundits, like those at the Heritage Foundation, repeat the myth of the Marriage/Money Fairy. It goes like this: if these poor single mothers would only marry the fathers of their children, they would cease to be poor. The Marriage/Money fairy would come on their wedding night and shower them with good paying jobs, health benefits, decent schools for the kids, safe and affordable housing, and access (either by car or very convenient public transportation) to their jobs and the grocery store.

Problem is, if the father of your child is as poor as you are, marrying him isn’t going to solve your problems. Marriage as a cure all is bogus. Unless the kid’s father is running a private equity firm and is going to marry the mother of his child, I’d say this is about as useful as chilipepper toothpaste.

You know that actually helps the poor? Livable wages; healthcare; well-funded, staffed and maintained schools; safe and affordable housing; safe neighborhoods; access to things like jobs and grocery stores; clean air and water; and decent public transportation.

You can be married and oh-so-responsible and still be poor.

Yes, while I fight against the scourge that is democracy, I still allow for voting on really important matters, like who looks best shirtless and lifting things while gracefully sweating.

Today, I’ve got your individual suggestions here. Next week, we’ll do hot tennis players, and in in the upcoming weeks, we’ll do cooks, long-haired geeeks, the Wheedonverse, hot politicians and hot comics. And of course, guys in eyeliner. So I will need your suggestions.

Hotties below the fold.
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Well, everyone, thanks to a new job and other factors that I won’t get into here*, I’ve nothing prepared for today’s Tuesday Lechery.

However, I’m all for voting. Not for my Presidency-for-Life, which is a not-so-benign, but completely fabulous dicatorship, but for who to feature in next week’s edition. Share names and links and enjoy the hotness.

Hey, everyone remember the posts about New Orleans and how the survivors of Katrina are getting screwed left right and center? Remember Leigh, who gave a lot of good information? Well, she will be one of the people speaking about the post-Katrina Gulf Coast recovery tonight at The Democracy Center from 6:00-8:00. The center is located at 45 Mt. Auburn Street Cambridge, MA.

I know! I’ve been slack in posting Tuesday Lecheries. In my defense, I’m changing jobs and have had a rather busy couple of weeks. Heck, it’s going to continue to be busy for a while. So, in addition to this week’s edition, I’ve got a link to Cattygurl’s own revue. A twofah!

This week, because I felt a bit Japan-sick, I’m going to leave pics of Japanese actors. I really miss watching Japanese doramas and rehashing every plot point (as a cover for eventually going on and on about how hot X was with my friends).

Pics below the fold. (more…)

Of course I don’t advocate this. But damn, it’s funny.

Contrary to popular belief, this isn’t how most people think.

The thing about reading business publications is that you are transported to an imaginary world where nothing really exists outside of the boardroom. It’s all quite interesting when it’s a board game, I suppose, but when real life bleeds in, folks get uncomfortable and start complaining about the people who rudely harshed all over their Wall Street euphoria.

You’d think that the biggest problem with the subprime mess was that already-wealthy investors would lose their bonus–which is of course, really, truly urgent–but that the everyday people caught in the vice-like squeeze of the credit trap and the quicksane of stagnating wages and inflated costs were just a few exceptions. You’d also think that the moves of business leaders and lobbyists had zero to do with this mess.

Recently in the press there’s been all kinds of stories about the subprime mess with (finally) some concern about the fallout–the foreclosures, bankruptcies, the private equity funds that are now on shaky ground, and the burden of debt on people, and the suspiciously high rate of exotic mortgages for people of color–despite their good credit, they were pushed into dubious mortgages at a higher rate than Whites when they refinanced.

And make no mistake, this is nothing to sneeze at. I’ve always been skeptical of the unusual mortgages out there such the adjustable rate and interest only mortgages. As Amanda pointed out, the subprime mortgage industry drove housing prices into the stratosphere. Unfortunately, enough people plugged them (hell, enough banks pushed them) with the result that people signed up and found themselves in the middle of a debt hurricane a few years later.
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Dear future dates/boyfriends:

If I find out that you blog about the women you go out with in intimate detail, I’ll likely give you a pass. Not my style.

If you read my blog hoping for mentions of you, you’re gonna be disappointed. I just don’t do that sort of thing.  And I don’t think I’d want someone who’d get off on being the star of my blog, anyway. I’m the star of my blog, dammit.

Not for me, but for a blogger whose privacy is being violated on the internet.

Ballastexistenz has a post up about a fellow female blogger in the autistic community who has had compromising pictures of her posted on the internet by a guy she’s had a running dispute with.

This blogger has not given any consent to post these pictures.

If anyone can provide some sort of legal or (strategic but legal) advice to Ballastexistenz’s blog, please do.

Note: Any posts about the actual dispute will be deleted–as I said above, I don’t care how “bad” the blogger was (and I doubt it very much), it’s beyond the pale to pull this crap.

A woman is beaten in front of her two young daughters. What’s the first line of advice from the peanut gallery? “Call the cops! Press charges! Call 911!”

Yeah. Okay. Maybe not in Georgia.

Emelina Ramirez called police to tell them her roommates were attacking her, punching and kicking her in the stomach. When the police arrived, they handcuffed her, took her to jail and ran her fingerprints through a federal database. She is now in an Alabama cell awaiting deportation.

Getting a beat down while brown is a crime.

Ramirez, 30, was three months’ pregnant in June when, she says, her roommates attacked her. The Carrollton police officer who arrested her did not speak Spanish. He charged her with simple battery and took her to jail.

When jail officials ran her fingerprints through their database, they discovered that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement wanted her because she had missed a deportation hearing in Texas.

“The bottom line is: She was in the U.S. illegally,” said Lt. James Perry, the investigating officer in the case. “She was involved in an incident where the system caught up with her. That was that.”

Carrollton police do not target illegal immigrants, Perry said. In the last year, the department has worked with undocumented immigrants who were witnesses or victims of a July 2006 home invasion that resulted in murder at a trailer park. Since then, the Police Department has set up a Spanish-language tip line.

Still, the police report from the Ramirez case raises questions about whether officers do, in fact, target Latinos.

After Ramirez was arrested and her 8-year-old daughter went to the station to give her account of the incident, Perry said, he went back to the house to interview the roommates about the allegations.

Before asking questions, however, Perry asked the inhabitants for identification and observed “both body language and verbal language that led me to believe they might be illegal.” According to the police report, “we then told everyone they would have to go to the jail to be fingerprinted.”

We can thank Carrolton’s finest for showing us just how much of a priority crime fighting is–it’s pretty high, if the crime you’re worried about is an expired visa, or being brown, or having suspicious body language. The assault and battery? Not so much.

Note too, the lack of outrage of a beatdown of a pregnant woman–in this case, a Latina woman. And make no mistake, that’s because there is no concern for her or the fetus. If she was White, you’d see all sorts of outrage over the harm to the fetus. The DA would file charges. If she miscarried as a result, heads would roll. But she’s not White, and she’s not middle class, and her fetus won’t be a bundle of joy but just another brown face that too many people would like to see gone.

Xicanopower also reports that Ramirez was possibly abused by her ex-husband. This is a dirty little secret–abusers will hold the citizenship status of their partners over their heads. Report the abuse, go to jail. Lose your kids. Get deported.

I’m pretty sure some folks will step up and ask why she didn’t just leave. Why not leave her abusive ex? Why not leave this horrible situation with her psychopathic roommates? And the only thing I can say to that is, have you ever been through this? Abusers use everything at their disposal to control their targets–be it money, violence, fear, whatever. You don’t realize going in that someone is just a craptastic abusive jackhole. It happens gradually, and by the time it’s really bad you’re in so deep and you’re so messed up by the abuse that you feel there’s no way out.

Oh, and? If you’re an immigrant, apparently there is no way out, except to jail.

Thanks to Brownfemipowerfor the heads-up post.

Update (from XP, who posted this over at my site):

I finally got a little more information about the whole ex-husband deal. Her friend just left a comment on my site. This is what he just told me.

She did marry a police officer from Carrollton, GA who, instead of obtaining an attorney and getting her legal status straightened out, held her status over her head, and was abusive towards her. He is the father of her youngest US born child. After about a year and a half of abuse, and aid from a woman’s shelter, she obtained a divorce from the abusive cop, and thanks to him, remains “undocumented”.

Karlas’ father has not paid child support in I don’t know how long, nor has he made any attempt to see his daughter.

Is it being “undocumented” that’s the crime here? Or is it being brown and female?

Pics are below the fold. The first may be borderline NSFW. Seriously.
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I challenge you to look at Iggy Pop’s moves

and NOT say that this guy used Iggy as his inspiration.

(FWIW, I love Iggy and the Stooges.)

Can we all just admit the airports aren’t any safer than they were before 9/11? The whole nonsense with the 3.4 ounces of liquid in bottles toted in a quart ziploc bag is nonsense, but when you have the Transportation Safety Administration allowing disposable butane lighters and refillable lighters back on board as of August 4, it’s time to hang it up and call bullsh*t.

This is the reason for lifting the lighter ban:

“Explosives remain the most significant threat to aviation,” said TSA administrator Kip Hawley. “By enabling our officers to focus on the greatest threats, we are using our officers’ time and energy more effectively and increasing security for passengers.”

Lighters are the leading item seized at airport checkpoints, at an average of more than 22,000 a day. It costs TSA $4 million a year to dispose of them because they contain hazardous materials.

Now I seem to recall that Richard Reid was caught trying to light his shoe with a match to blow up an airplane — an actual terrorist attempt, and lighters were banned because he may have succeeded if he had had one.

Wouldn’t you think a bottle of shampoo presents less of a risk to flight safety than a lighter, for god’s sake?

***

And for a kicker, how about this story out of Arizona, from ABC15.com, about Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport.

It’s what we discovered in the middle of the night - TSA agents going away, and security guards taking over. It’s 4.5 hours - every night - when an employee badge becomes an all-access pass.

Night after night, our hidden cameras captured what security experts tell us is a disaster waiting to happen. The X-ray machines were off, the metal detectors were closed, and bags with unknown contents were carried to the secure side of the airport where the planes are.

We watched as a security guard let people with purses, coolers and suitcases walk right through - bags unchecked. Even more surprising, some of the people you trust to keep you safe planned it this way.

Larry Wansley is widely regarded as one of the nation’s top airline security experts. “It’s a frightening situation, I’ve just simply never seen anything like it,” he said. “I really honestly have not.”

You can find the CNN transcript here and here. I thought I’d share a couple of observations I didn’t mention in last night’s thread at my pad .

Format: The YouTube question format was executed beautifully; the CNN editors selected a nice sampling of topics, some not covered at all in the other debates. I thought Anderson Cooper was fantastic; it was a long debate, but he kept it moving smoothly, and when the candidates tried to avoid answers, he interjected appropriately, ensuring that the audience was well aware of the dodges and canned answers.

You could tell some of the candidates were ill at ease with this format, due to the unpredictability of 1) content of the questions and 2) the framing of the questions, given they were being delivered by average Americans and in some cases directly addressed to a particular candidate. It put a personal face on what often seems like abstract issues

Candidates: To her credit, Hillary Clinton seemed quite comfortable onstage, as did Barack Obama. John Edwards seemed a tad nervous, and Joe Biden, well, is it me or did the man seem nearly as untethered at times as folks accuse Gravel of being? I guess for the pundits there’s a fine line between humorous and unhinged. I thought that Bill Richardson acquitted himself well in this debate, with an excellent stab at No Child Left Behind, and a sane answer on gun and violence, and the ties to crime and poverty in the inner city.

LGBT Rights: It was remarkable that LGBT concerns were so prominently featured, and that’s a good thing. It definite was healthy prime time for the issue;  a sea change from the last presidential cycle.

The format served this issue well, too, because Rev. Longcrier’s question was phrased beautifully

Senator Edwards said his opposition to gay marriage is influenced by his Southern Baptist background. Most Americans agree it was wrong and unconstitutional to use religion to justify slavery, segregation, and denying women the right to vote. So why is it still acceptable to use religion to deny gay American their full and equal rights?

I think it was pretty clear that some of the candidates gave stock answers we in the LGBT community have heard before (Dodd, Richardson, Kucinich), but it’s likely the first time that most of America (the ones who tuned in anyway) had a chance to see candidates discuss the issue openly, without fear — even if we didn’t hear the answers we’d like from some of them.

This will present an interesting challenge for Republicans if they are confronted with the same questions. If they don’t have the security blanket of religion to hold on to as they suck their thumbs protecting marriage, they are  going to come out looking pretty damn bigoted. CNN would be wise to toss Rev. Longcrier’s question their way. More below the fold.
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And we’re not talking about black men. David Amsden’s lengthy, interesting piece in New York Magazine, “Married Man Seeks Same for Discreet Play” discusses the open closet, where men with families are pursuing same-sex desires with abandon because the Internet has made it easier to be on the down low. These men want a detection-proof double life that allows them to maintain public heterosexual privilege while they get their rocks off.

Subject line: “MM looking for other MM for side romance.” Text: Are you tired of playing games? I am. I’m looking for other married men who have always wanted to be with another man. Looking for someone in the same situation that can keep their home life at home but still have a separate life with me.

No, he was not raised in a religious or bigoted household. No, he does not think being attracted to men is “wrong.” No, it’s not that simple. This much he will allow: “This is not the life I was meant to live. I don’t know what that life is, what it looks like, but I know it’s not this. But I don’t think most people are living the life they think they were meant to live, so I don’t feel that bad.”

…I found about 1,000 married, closeted New Yorkers online — certainly a fraction of the true population since most men in the closet don’t identify themselves as such, even online.) Say you want to meet someone between the ages of 35 and 50, preferably dark-haired, for half an hour in midtown, between the hours of one and two in the afternoon– a few clicks of the mouse and you’ll have numerous options. Or, as William puts it to me in an instant message: “Without Craigslist I would probably just be a normal married guy who occasionally flirted on the subway. LOL.”

WingNutDaily runs this regular feature called “MR. PRESIDENT! — Your questions for George W. Bush and his spokesmen.” It’s usually a haven for bitching and moanings sessions by the readers about “King Jorge” allowing The Brown Menace^TM to stream across the border unimpeded. I’m not sure if the moderator has been deep-sixing the flood of angry questions/comments on this forum, but the immigration issue seems to have taken a back seat to the war on “Islamofacism.”

Take a look at this winner, who’s ready to drop the nukes…

Kid Gloves
Posted by The Chiefster on Jul 21, 2007 08:59

When are we going to take off the kid gloves in the war against IslamoFascism? Have we become such slaves to Political Correctness, Public Opinion, and just downright wimpishness that we no longer have the courage to fight a war in an all-out fashion by totally annihilating the enemy and wiping them off the face of the earth to win the war? The last time we did that was WWII and this fight is no less important. It’s time we end our concerns for collateral damage. Since the enemy only respects strength, it’s time they see the full strength and fury of the US. We need to unleash every weapon in our arsenal to not only eliminate them but also their breeding grounds and thus end this war once and for all much like we did in WWII. World opinion be damned. They’ll thank us in the end.

Mitt made a big macaca moment for himself while in South Carolina.

How does he explain this endorsement of equating Obama with the terrorist responsible for 9/11? TMZ caught this coup — Mitt’s holding up the spelling challenged Palmetto State supporter’s sign for crying out loud:

More here.  It didn’t take long for the parodies to come out, with this as inspiration:

resulting in this:

and this.

and this.

and this.

What did his campaign say in response to the appearance of Mitt endorsing the message? Election Central:

“The governor stopped briefly for a picture with a supporter who just happened to be holding their own sign with an alliterative play on words,” [Romney spokesman Kevin]Madden said, via e-mail. “I don’t think it was equating or comparing anyone.”

The quote of the day goes to the Freepers next to us at the Durham IHOP last night (we had a late-night craving for the buttermilk pancakes).

The place was nearly empty, but the waitress sat us in a booth across from a table of honest-to-goodness wingnut, grizzled, redneck Republicans (one with a well-worn stereotypical NASCAR T-shirt) who must have driven in from the outskirts of the town. We received nasty stares from a couple of them (clearly Kate and I must either have “dyke” written on our foreheads, or they had a problem with us because we are an interracial couple; who knows with these knuckledraggers).

Anyway, these low-information voters were talking politics, and we decided to eavesdrop. They start gabbing about the GOP presidential field with deep analysis:

Southern stereotype man #1: “I like Fred Thompson; I think people will be drawn to him.”

Southern stereotype man #2: “Yeah, he’s going to be the next Ronald Reagan. That Law and Order guy has what it takes.”

There was no discussion about any of Thompson’s positions (or his role as a lobbyist for, among other entities, a pro-choice org). It was as if there was a data dump from Faux News into their noggins and they just bleated out the Thompson-as-GOP-savior mantra.

Wow. The Base was sitting right next to us. The folks responsible for the last six+ years of this crap; the pilfering of our wallets, the destruction of Iraq, the torching of our Constitution and the never-ending corruption — the people who voted for our Dear Leader.  It was an earful. Eventually I tuned out and we started talking about the stupidity of the Base, and how the next President is so f*cked. The mess W has left the next White House occupant is so vast that it will be impossible for that person to clean it up in one term — and they are going to be targeted by this impatient, ignorant Base from day one, egged on by Faux News.

I received an email from author Al Weisel, who recently blogged about the passing of Lady Bird Johnson. He recalls an action she took in the past that has some relevance to the recent incidents with David Vitter and Bob Allen.

I was very sad to hear of the death Lady Bird Johnson, a woman who served as First Lady with uncommon grace. I thought I would share a story about her that not many people know about, which comes from a piece I wrote about the Walter Jenkins scandal. Jenkins was one of Johnson’s closest aides and when he was arrested for a gay liaison in a YMCA bathroom on the eve of the 1964 election Lyndon Johnson was afraid that it would have an impact on the campaign. Lady Bird was more concerned about doing the right thing:

In the hours after he learned of the arrest he said little publicly, releasing only a perfunctory statement to the press announcing Jenkins’ resignation. Lady Bird Johnson, however, knew exactly what to say. Against her husband’s wishes, she issued her own statement of compassion and support for Jenkins. It was the only time she publicly defied her husband in their 39 years of marriage.

In a White House recording of a telephone conversation, Lady Bird tells Johnson that if “we don’t express some support to him, we will lose the entire love and devotion of all the people who have been with us.” Though he tries to dissuade her from getting involved, telling her patronizingly, “We have the best minds working on it,” she refuses to budge. Finally she responds, in a voice dripping with honey and heartache: “My love, my love, I pray for you along with Walter. You’re a brave, good guy, and if you read some things I said in Walter’s support they’ll be along the line that I just said to you.” Her emotional statement, which began, “My heart is aching today for someone who has reached the end point of exhaustion in dedicated service to his country,” transformed the climate surrounding the scandal. In its wake, a host of newspaper editorials recommended compassion for Jenkins.

The Jenkins incident involved a different era and a different political party, but many of the issues are still relevant today, particularly for Republicans. This is a party that has chosen not only to portray itself one of narrowly defined “family values,” but to go out of its way to demonize anything outside of that fundamentalist worldview as evil. When you have incidents of the sort that David Vitter or Bob Allen were involved in, it’s hard to have Lady Bird’s compassion, particularly since Jenkins wasn’t involved in hypocritical political behavior; he was “just” closeted. We’re living in an era where Faux News and the rest of the MSM spent 24/7 on the Bill/Monica BJs and The Starr Report.

Should there be compassion instead of scorn for individuals caught in such incidents, or has the political battlefield and rank hypocrisy made it impossible for these pols — or homophobic, hypocritical Dems, for that matter –  to elicit any sympathy? Why yes or no?

Given that I expect a lot of no votes out there, share more than snarky reasons why the scorn is deserved.

Actual banner up at MSNBC now (12:30 PM):

No creative visualization necessary, I suppose. Discuss.

Raw Story:

When President Bush undergoes a colonoscopy Saturday, the power of the presidency will transfer to Vice President Dick Cheney while Bush is sedated [isn’t the man sedated most of the time?], White House spokesman Tony Snow said Friday.

“Because the president will be under the effects of anesthesia, he once again has elected to implement Section 3 of the 25th Amendment to the Constitution,” Snow said during his regular White House press briefing.

Oh yeah, baby; hypocrites on a roll — he’s also a former Baptist minister. (WSOC)

Former state legislator Coy C. Privette, a Cabarrus County commissioner and retired Baptist minister, was charged Thursday with aiding and abetting prostitution, authorities said.

Privette, 74, was charged with six counts of misdemeanor aiding and abetting prostitution by renting a hotel room and paying for sexual acts, according to State Bureau of Investigation Agent Kevin Canty. Tiffany Denise Summers, 32, of Salisbury, was charged with six counts of misdemeanor prostitution, Canty said.

Privette didn’t immediately return an e-mail message or messages left on his home and cell phones Thursday. Eyewitness News spoke with Privette’s wife, who would only say she was shocked by the charges.

Privette also serves as the president of the Christian Action League of North Carolina, which advocates in the General Assembly for Christian groups. Privette has been one of the state’s most vocal opponents against alcohol sales and legal gambling.

We are in the General Assembly of North Carolina with a full-time presence promoting legislation that is consistent with a Christian worldview. We advocate for those measures that strengthen the family and oppose legislation that would erode the family structure. We are the voice of conservative evangelical Christians in the State Legislature.

We discourage the promotion and use of beverage alcohol and other drugs, pornography, sexual immorality and other sinful practices that not only undermine the spiritual lives of those who participate in them, but also undermine the strength of our State and National character.

***

This morning while driving in, I heard on the radio that Privette has been “suspended” from the Christian Action League. Ah, the fallout begins.:

“Because we have been unable to speak with Mr. Privette,” [CAL Executive Director, Rev. Mark] Creech said, “and because we are committed to the principle of due process, the board of directors has decided under the circumstances the Christian Action League is immediately suspending Mr. Privette’s duties … and his membership on the board of directors depending on the outcome of this matter.”

…Privette, who had been serving as interim director for the Rowan Southern Baptist Association, which has an office on South Main Street, Salisbury, is no longer in that job. A woman who answered the phone said Privette no longer has the job. She refused to comment further.

Hat tip, Ian.

Perhaps this news will put to bed the right-wing bleating about John Edwards’ $400 haircut and we can get on to real issues.  Mitt’s spending his dough on makeup consultants. It’s hard work staying beautiful, folks. (Raw Story):

The perception that Mitt Romney is some sort of pretty-boy was burnished earlier this week when reports emerged that he spent $300 in campaign funds for makeup “consulting” this year.

It turns out Romney has maintained an expensive beauty regimen for years.
A RAW STORY analysis of Romney’s campaign finance records during his time as Massachusetts governor shows he spent nearly $2,000 on makeup artists over four years. The personal-beautification spending was divided over six sessions to three separate companies. Individual makeup jobs ranged in price from $180 to $690.

…The Politico on Monday reported that Romney twice paid $150 to a California company that describes itself as “a mobile beauty team for hair, makeup and men’s grooming and spa services.”

A must view video. Here’s the generation that will not sacrifice a damn thing in Dear Leader’s Big Military Misadventures — they want to let the poor do the fighting. These College Republicans have important work to do on the home front. Listen to all of the lame excuses why they just can’t serve (but they would if they could, you know).

Max Blumenthal takes us on a hilarious and shocking tour of the College Republican National Convention, where the GOP’s next generation cheer on the war in Iraq, then make sorry excuses for why they can’t serve. Also featuring Tom DeLay, brainwashed evangelical youth, and moving interpretive dance by Blumenthal.

Considering what a screw-up this president regarding the treatment of those serving our country — not enough body armor or re-inforced Humvees, shoddy equipment, atrocious conditions at Walter Reed, the latest bottom of the barrel thinking coming out of this admin is par for the course:

3.5% raise too much for Bush.

With President Bush’s popularity scraping bottom in opinion polls, with U.S. casualties rising in Iraq in a force surge that has stretched tours to 15 months, the Bush administration has said it “strongly opposes” key military pay and benefit gains tossed into the fiscal 2008 defense bill.

…Like the House, senators favor a 3.5 percent military pay raise for 2008 versus the administration’s proposed 3 percent to match private sector wage growth as measured by the government’s Employment Cost Index or ECI. The White House calls the extra half percentage point unnecessary and notes that basic pay has jumped by 33 percent since 2001. The added cost of the bigger raise, $2.2 billion through 2013, is money “that would otherwise be available to support our troops,” said the OMB letter.

I’m sure they’ll have nothing to say about the sociopath-in-chief, who doesn’t give a damn about what military families are going through. This administration is tone deaf and amoral.

And how much are some of those contractor guns-for-hire getting paid compared to our men and women in uniform?

The 145,000 active-duty U.S. forces are nearly matched by occupation personnel that currently come from companies like Blackwater USA and the former Halliburton subsidiary KBR, which enjoy close personal and political ties with the Bush administration. Until Congress reins in these massive corporate forces and the whopping federal funding that goes into their coffers, partially withdrawing U.S. troops may only set the stage for the increased use of private military companies (and their rent-a-guns) which stand to profit from any kind of privatized future “surge” in Iraq.

…According to the Government Accountability Office, there are now some 48,000 employees of private military companies in Iraq. These not-quite GI Joes, working for Blackwater and other major U.S. firms, can clear in a month what some active-duty soldiers make in a year. “We got 126,000 contractors over there, some of them making more than the secretary of defense,” said House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman John Murtha. “How in the hell do you justify that?”

A completely random post…

I haven’t blogged about the bizarre case of pro wrestler Chris Benoit, who killed his family and hanged himself a few weeks ago, but details from the medical examiner’s report were just released and they are pretty mind-blowing.

This was a chemically-enhanced horrorshow that makes you wonder what on earth kind of home life this poor child of Benoit and his wife Nancy had.

* Chris Benoit’s body contained 10 times the normal level of testosterone, as well as amounts of the anti-anxiety drug Xanax and the painkiller hydrocodone.

* Nancy Benoit tested positive for Xanax, hydrocodone, the painkiller hydromorphone, and had a blood-alcohol level of 0.184 percent, over double the level at which Georgia law considers a driver intoxicated.

* Daniel, their young son, had Xanax in his system (the article suggests he was sedated before he was killed).

While there’s no proof that high levels of testosterone are definitely connected to violence and erratic behavior in this case, 10x the amount coursing through your blood stream is an insane imbalance. The authorities did find prescription anabolic steroids in the home as well.

It’s such a tragic senseless event.

What I can’t figure out is who looked the other way/got paid off –  the doctor involved in giving scripts for Benoit, Dr. Phil Astin, is charged with overprescription of performance enhancing drugs to other wrestlers as well. You have to think this is the tip of the iceberg.

Rev. Reggie Longcrier, pastor of Exodus Missionary Outreach Church in Hickory, N.C., submitted a question on marriage equality for the CNN’s YouTube Presidential debate. It’s a powerful, short and simple video.

While Longcrier’s question could have been asked of all of the presidential candidates (save Gravel and Kucinich), he happened to direct the question to former N.C. Senator John Edwards because of his statement that he is unable at this time to “cross that bridge” to support marriage equality. His wife Elizabeth is waiting on the other side of bridge, of course, since she favors the right of gays and lesbians to marry.

Sen. Edwards has said his opposition to gay marriage has been influenced by his Southern Baptist background. We know religion was once used to justify slavery, segregation and women not being allowed to vote, all of which today are recognized as unconstitutional and socially and morally wrong. So why is it still acceptable to use religion to justify denying gay and lesbian American their full and equal rights.

Also:
* Pro-LGBT black clergy ad counters misinformation on hate crimes legislation

I posted this last night at my pad, but it still has entertainment value today…

Pull out the tiny violin for the Republican Senator from Louisiana and DC Madam customer, who puts his wife before the cameras (and doesn’t take any questions) at the news conference. He firmly denies the Louisiana brothel tales (and ostensibly the diaper fetish rumors, though he didn’t bring that up).

Since then, I’ve gotten up every morning, committed to trying to live up to the important values we believe in. If continuing to believe in and acknowledge those values causes some to attack me because of my past failings, well, so be it.

Unfortunately, my admission has encouraged some long-time political enemies and those hoping to profit from the situation to spread falsehoods too, like those New Orleans stories in recent reporting. Those stories are not true.

WENDY VITTER: To those of you who know me, are you surprised that I have something to say? You know, in most any other marriage, this would have been a private issue between a husband and a wife — very private. Obviously, it is not here…Last week, some people very sympathetically said to me, “I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes right now.” I stand before you to tell you very proudly, I am proud to be Wendy Vitter.

More after the jump…
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Here’s a follow-up to the story about the homo-obsessed mayor of Ft. Lauderdale, Jim Naugle, who has advocated for the installation of $250K robojohns to halt imaginary beach restroom sex (gay male sex, that is).

Naugle enraged the gay community (and thinking people everywhere) with the ludicrous assertion that a timed potty paid for by the taxpayers is essential in order to stop “an attempt by gays to take over Fort Lauderdale.” He claimed that:

“We’re trying to provide a family environment where people can take their children who need to use the bathroom without having to worry about a couple of men in there engaged in a sex act.”

UNITE Fort Lauderdale is planning a rally on July 24, at 4:00 PM, on Tuesday, July 24th on the steps of City Hall to say that “Mayor Naugle does not speak for me.”

Equality Florida has a campaign to send a roll of toilet paper to the mayor to show appreciation for his thoughtful gesture to protect the beaches from the phantom scourge of gay sex.

Read about the rally and send a e-roll of toilet paper to him after the jump.
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In response to the ads run by anti-gay black ministers fronted by Bishop Harry Jackson of the High Impact Leadership Coalition, which paid for spots in Roll Call USA Today spreading disinformation about the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act, a group of pro-LGBT pastors have responded in kind.

In a new ad appearing in USA Today (PDF), the National Black Justice Coalition, Human Rights Campaign and the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, black religious leaders counter the claim of the puppets of the white evangelical bigots that the passage of the measure would muzzle pastors like Jackson from spouting homophobic sermons from the pulpit.

Bishop Harry Jackson believes passage will result in the imprisonment of  pastors for quoting Leviticus; gays are simply taking over…

[G]ay activists around the country are getting nervous that they are about to experience an embarrassing political setback. Instead of amending the hate crimes legislation that protects churches in a substantive way, they are simply crying out in a louder, more threatening manner. Gay advocates are not looking for fairness; they are looking for an upper hand.
– Jackson, in a Town Hall column.

We saw them completely make up bogus hate crime statistics out of thin air to try to prove that gays and lesbians aren’t hate crime victims. But they won’t tell you that sexual orientation is the third most common motivation for hate crimes, running a virtual tie with religious bias. Further, the Justice Department’s National Crime Victim Survey (NCVS) shows that 58% of hate crimes based on sexual orientation go unreported.

…We saw them falsely claim that the legislation would “punish some crimes more severely against gay people than they would against any other person,” even though it would cover everyone — gay or straight — regardless of sexual orientation. Otherwise, the FBI’s own hate crime statistics would not have bothered to count 935 anti-White, 58 anti-Protestant, or 23 anti-heterosexual hate crime incidents in 2005.

Parenting — a responsibility and joy so important to the shaping of this country’s future that some  feel it should be restricted to heterosexual couples only. Time and again, we find proof that good parenting has nothing to do with the superiority of an opposite-sex couple procreating or adopting. (AP):

The children of Michael and Iana Straw, a boy age 22 months and a girl age 11 months, were severely malnourished and near death last month when doctors saw them after social workers took them to a hospital, authorities said. Both children are doing well and gaining weight in foster care, prosecutor Kelli Ann Viloria told the Reno Gazette-Journal.

Viloria said the Reno couple were too distracted by online video games, mainly the fantasy role-playing “Dungeons & Dragons” series, to give their children proper care. “They had food; they just chose not to give it to their kids because they were too busy playing video games,” Viloria told the Reno Gazette-Journal.

Police said hospital staff had to shave the head of the girl because her hair was matted with cat urine. The 10-pound girl also had a mouth infection, dry skin and severe dehydration.

Her brother had to be treated for starvation and a genital infection. His lack of muscle development caused him difficulty in walking, investigators said.