Asterisk

I’m sitting here with fire in my eyes. You know the feeling? Like you could just explode at any second? Like your heart’s about to leap out of your chest and tap dance across the floor?

Very few things make me feel this way. Oh, I have a temper, and I can be a bit of a dick, but it’s rare for me to feel like this.

Earlier tonight, hours after New York City Mayor and multi-billionaire Michael Bloomberg ordered Zuccotti Park raided, journalists arrested, and the Constitution pissed all over, a security guard for Brookfield Properties, which owns the park, …wow this is the longest run on sentence ever. This is what happens when I’m mad.

Anyway, the security guard called comedian (?) Joey Boots a “faggot.” On camera. While trying to look tough before running away when Joey didn’t just stand there and take it.

Here are a couple shots of the bigot rent-a-cop who couldn’t control his bigotry with a camera in his face. (Uppity faggot doesn’t know his place, so he’s going to tell him.) He wouldn’t give his name, you know, because bigot tough guys hate it when people know their names.

Anybody know who he is? Send me an email or comment on the post. I want his name plastered all over the internet so future prospective employers know who they’re getting.

P.S. Who wears sunglasses like that? Bigots, apparently.

(h/t Scott Wooledge, via towleroad)

Here’s a moment from a debate between Gore Vidal and William Buckley back in 1968.

To be fair, I’d probably shout an insult too if someone called me a “crypto-Nazi.” Even if I were one.

Every once in a while I pull this video back out to puzzle over it. It’s an interview President Obama gave with NBC News’ Brian Williams on October 30, 2008, just five days before the election. I have it cued up to the relevant portion (1:38 – 2:01), but the entire question regarding Supreme Court Justice nominations is embedded if you want to see the context.

I mean, the— the right to marry who you please isn’t in the Constitution. But I think all of us assume that if a state— decided to pass a law saying, “Brian, you can’t marry the woman you love,” that you’d think that was unconstitutional. Well, where does that come from? I think it comes from a right to privacy— that may not be listed in the Constitution but is implied by the structure of the Constitution.

I’m not the only one who sees the direct contradiction between this and “God is in the mix,” am I?

Incidentally, I’ve long thought we should be using the “right to privacy” argument instead of the “love is love” one when talking about the right of civil marriage. It doesn’t hit people’s emotions as well, though, so we’ll just struggle along with “love is love.”

A friend linked me to this trailer for the documentary Miss Representation a few weeks ago, and I’m totally stoked that the film is being aired on television. Filmmaker Jennifer Siebel Newsom has gathered an impressive group of leaders and experts to explain the very real problem of the inequity women face.

Miss Representation will premiere tonight at 9PM Eastern/8PM Central exclusively on OWN, Oprah Winfrey’s (relatively) new network, so set your DVRs!

(If you don’t have time for the full eight-minute trailer, here’s a shorter version.)

From the official Miss Representation website:

In a society where media is the most persuasive force shaping cultural norms, the collective message that our young women and men overwhelmingly receive is that a woman’s value and power lie in her youth, beauty, and sexuality, and not in her capacity as a leader. While women have made great strides in leadership over the past few decades, the United States is still 90th in the world for women in national legislatures, women hold only three percent of clout positions in mainstream media, and 65 percent of women and girls have disordered eating behaviors.

Stories from teenage girls and provocative interviews with politicians, journalists, entertainers, activists and academics, like Condoleezza Rice, Nancy Pelosi, Katie Couric, Rachel Maddow, Margaret Cho, Rosario Dawson and Gloria Steinem build momentum as Miss Representation accumulates startling facts and statistics that will leave the audience shaken and armed with a new perspective.

Honestly, it’s killing me that since I don’t have access to OWN, I won’t be able to see Miss Representation until the DVD eventually comes out. I’m counting on all of you to fill me in, so get to watching!

Last weekend, every Republican Presidential candidate with a chance of winning (plus Rick Santorum) appeared on stage at the Values Voter Summit, a meeting sponsored by two certified hate groups on par with (and one with ties to) the Ku Klux Klan and the Council of Conservative Citizens.

Family Research Council and American Family Association have both been considered hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center for some time now, and with good reason; both groups push their shared agenda with dangerous propaganda and outright lies about LGBT people.

To repeat: Rick Perry, Michele Bachmann, Ron Paul, Mitt Romney, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, and Rick Santorum all accepted the invitation of these hate groups (as they have for years), hoping to get their endorsements and the votes of like-minded individuals.

Do you really need more information before you cast your vote in the 2012 presidential election? What stance on which issue could possibly make it okay to vote for a candidate who has actively courted bigotry?