Black Homophobia - and Hypocrisy - Again Rears Its Ugly Head

Unfit for his position - LaKendrick Coburn El.

This blog has addressed this topic in the past and two recent events have prompted me to address it again.  The issue?  Black homophobia and the double standard that some - and I stress the word "some" - in the black community apply to others, gays in particular.  On the one hand, these individuals demand that others, including the gay community, support their civil rights, disavow racial bigotry and condemn racial discrimination, yet refuse to extend similar support to the civil rights of others and refuse to condemn homophobia - something that remains far too rampant in the black community and which is skillfully played by anti-gay white supremacists such as those at The Family Foundation here in Virginia, and groups like Family Research Council at the national level to induce blacks to vote against their own best interests by playing the anti-gay card and/or appealing to ignorance based religious belief.  

The first involves shockingly homophobic Facebook posts by Brother LaKendrick Coburn El, a member of the Virginia Beach Human Rights Commission, in which he described homosexuality as a “mental illness” and “abomination.”  WAVY TV reported on these toxic statements.  One such post read that “Men trying to be women and women trying to be men is really confusing our children and I’m tired of seeing this nonsense promoted to our children.” Kenick El went on to write “Homosexuality is an abomination to the Human Race.”  In a typical dodge by bigots like Kenick El, while refusing to return multiple requests for comment from WAVY 10 On Your Side, he wrote on his Facebook that his views were written on his “personal page” and “express my personal views.”  Kendick El appears clueless to the reality that when he accepted appointment to the Human Rights Commission, he assumed certain responsibilities for ALL citizens and forfeited his ability to express his "personal opinions." If he wants to denigrate the rights of others, then he needs to get off the Commission. He doesn't get to have it both ways. Neither do others in the black community who push a double standard.  You want my full support, I expect nothing less in return. 

The second instance involves the findings of internal focus groups conducted over the summer by Pete Buttigieg’s presidential campaign that reveal that Buttigieg may face a struggle with African-American voters in South Carolina because of his sexual orientation.  Applying this bigoted (and, in my view, hypocrisy fraught) standard, no gay - or non-black for that matter - should vote for a black candidate.   A piece in Metro Weekly looks at the bigotry and homophobia still so pervasive in some portions of the black community.  The irony, of course, is that this homophobia fuels black men "being on the down low" - and there are LOTS of them - which has been a major cause in the spread of HIV/AIDS to black women.  Here are article highlights:

Internal focus groups conducted over the summer by Pete Buttigieg’s presidential campaign reveal that the South Bend, Ind., mayor may struggle with African-American voters in South Carolina because of his sexual orientation.

In a 21-page report, the Benenson Strategy Group, which conducted the focus groups with black self-identified Democratic voters in South Carolina, noted that “being gay was a barrier for these voters, particularly for the men who seemed deeply uncomfortable even discussing it…. [T]heir preference is for his sexuality to not be front and center.”

While the report finds that Buttigieg’s sexual orientation is not a “disqualifier” for those voters, some participants questioned why Buttigieg has bothered to bring up or acknowledge his sexuality or his marriage to his husband, Chasten.

“That’s not my thing but I wouldn’t want to know that as a candidate,” one female participant under 40 said. “Too much information.”

Other voters are concerned whether Buttigieg’s sexuality could be a detriment when dealing with foreign leaders who represent countries where homosexuality is illegal or frowned upon.

Of all members of the focus group, older women (those ages 40 to 65) were the most capable of moving past Buttigieg’s sexual orientation, but even they preferred that he not emphasize it as much.

The focus groups found that most voters in all subgroups were able to get past Buttigieg’s sexual orientation, due in part to his demeanor and speaking style, which some compared favorably to Obama. But they expressed the need to see significant endorsements from prominent African-Americans, which would be more helpful in convincing them that “other” people won’t have a problem with Buttigieg’s sexual orientation and that it wouldn’t become an issue in the general election.

I'm sorry, but to those who wish he had not brought up his sexual orientation I ask, what planet are you living on?  Do they seriously believe that his opponents and/or Republicans will not bring it up? 

Franklin Graham Attacks Pete Buttigieg, Calls Melania Trump "Classiest First Lady"

Blogger friend Joe Jervis calls out Franklin Graham's hypocrisy for attacking Pete Buttigieg while calling Melania Trump "the classiest First Lady our country has ever had."  Even hysterically anti-gay (and closeted) Rick Santorum condemned Graham's hypocrisy for supporting Trump notwithstanding Trump's embodiment of everything a true Christian should eschew.  First, this from Joe's blog:

Earlier this week evangelist Franklin Graham declared that Pete Buttigieg will face eternal damnation if he doesn’t repent from his “flaunting homosexuality.”

Last year Graham shrugged off Donald Trump’s multiple adulterous affairs, telling the Associated Press, “This thing with Stormy Daniels and so forth is nobody’s business.”

And now today Graham is wishing happy birthday to Melania Trump, “the classiest first lady our country has ever had.”

You can be very sure that if Michelle Obama had ever appeared nude in lesbian porn shoots, Graham would have been standing outside the White House day and night with a flaming pitchfork.

As for Santorum's surprising condemnation of Graham, LGBTQ Nation reports as follows:

Out presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg has found an unlikely defender after evangelical leader Franklin Graham called on the candidate to “repent” of his homosexuality.

Rick Santorum, one of the most conservative religious politicians and a former Republican presidential candidate, found himself actually pointing out the hypocrisy of the religious right during an interview with CNN’s New Day.

After host John Berman asked Santorum about the dustup, Santorum first defended Graham’s right to say what he did.

After Berman pointed out the hypocrisy of Graham “calling on Pete Buttigieg to repent for being gay, yet [being] one of the most ardent supporters of the thrice-married President Trump,” Santorum shocked the host by agreeing. Graham has been on the biggest supporters of the decidedly un-Christian president.

“I would say that you have every right to call him out on that. Because if he’s gonna say that about Pete Buttigieg, then he needs to when Donald Trump’s accusations come up about marital infidelity and other things that is equally as sinful,” Santorum said. “He should be equal and vociferous in calling out a similar sin.” 

The British version of GQ has some of Melania's "classy" photos here.  Personally, give me Jackie Kennedy - a truly class act with no borderline porn in her past.

Karen Pence Again Proves She's a Self-Centered Hypocrite

Karen Pence - Hypocrite badly
in need of gay friends for fashion advice.

As readers may recall, Karen Pence, the wife of the sinister Mike Pence, works at a school that bars gays and their children.  She also proudly parades around supporting other aspects of Christofascist hatred towards others while putting on a show of feigned piety. Thus, it is no surprise that she got her (likely ugly) panties in a wad over Pete Buttigieg’s comments this week (i) challenging “the Mike Pence’s of the world” for believing homosexuality is a choice, and (ii) noting that the form of "Christianity" practiced by evangelicals bears little resemblance to Christ's social gospel message.  Ms. Pence whined that people should not be attacked for their religious beliefs no matter how toxic and hypocrisy laden and that children need to learn that at a young age that it is "okay what faith people have," again, no matter how toxic and hate driven. Meanwhile, she thinks it is perfectly fine for evangelicals to abuse and attack those, including gays, who do not share her blind allegiance to Bronze Age myths. 

Sadly, Ms. Pence is the face of Christofascists' self-centered and hypocrisy-filled belief system.  They want one standard of tolerance and respect for themselves but see no one else as deserving similar respect or tolerance. Plainly put, she is not a nice individual no matter how much she pretends otherwise.

Why Does the Far Right Demand Respect It Doesn't Give to Others?

Whether the issue be gun control or the right's false flag of "religious liberty," conservatives demand that their beliefs and sensibilities be afforded respect even when they are directly controverted by empirical and objective fact, yet  they afford no respect to the beliefs of others.  Being gay, one sees the double standard all the time, especially from ignorance embracing Christofascists who want respect for their "deeply held beliefs" yet who attack anyone who rejects such antiquated and  scientifically impossible beliefs.  Then, of course, there are working class whites who voted for Trump and Republicans even though they advance policies that directly harm such voters.  Personally, I am over respecting the beliefs of  those who are bigots or simply dumb as bricks when facts do not support their claimed beliefs.  Deciding to embrace ignorance and bigotry is a choice and deserves no deference or respect. This is especially true of "conservatives" who slime those (i) who refute their beliefs, or (ii) with whom they disagree.  A prime example is what is being done to the Parkland high school students now being dragged through the mud by right wing sites and conspiracy theory formenters.  A column in the Washington Post looks at the hypocrisy of gun fanatics who want respect from others while giving none in return.  Here are excerpts:

Supporters of even modest restrictions on firearms are regularly instructed that their ardent advocacy turns off Americans in rural areas and small towns. Those in favor of reforming our firearms laws are scolded as horrific elitists who disrespect a valued way of life.

And as the mass killings continue, we are urged to be patient and to spend our time listening earnestly to the views of those who see even a smidgen of action to limit access to guns as the first step toward confiscation. Our task is not to fight for laws to protect innocents, but to demonstrate that we really, honestly, truly, cross-our-hearts, positively love gun owners and wouldn’t for an instant think anything ill of them.

What is odd is that those with extreme pro-gun views — those pushing for new laws to allow people to carry just about anytime, anywhere — are never called upon to model similar empathy toward children killed, the mourning parents left behind, people in urban neighborhoods suffering from violence, or the majority of Americans who don’t own guns.

Depending on the survey, somewhere between 58 percent and 68 percent of us live in households without guns. But no one who belongs to the National Rifle Association is ever told to prove their respect for our way of life. Rarely is it pointed out that the logic of the gun lobby’s position is to create a world in which everyone will need a gun, whether we want one or not. 

The students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, an institution that suffered the worst effects of our inaction on guns, have not gotten the memo that they are supposed to shut up, and may they be blessed for this. You can tell their angry outspokenness is having an impact, and not only because President Trump has taken modest steps to suggest he hears the message. More telling is that some of the same right-wingers who demand deep respect for gun culture have shown no scruples about trashing the kids.

Bill O’Reilly was so upset at the attention their protests are drawing that he accused the media of “promoting opinions by teenagers who are in an emotional state and facing extreme peer pressure in some cases.” The condescension is revolting, and never mind that without emotionalism and peer pressure to conform, O’Reilly’s former employer, Fox News, would go out of business.

Former representative Jack Kingston (R-Ga.) doubted the capacity of these students to think or act for themselves. “Their sorrow can very easily be hijacked by left-wing groups who have an agenda,” he said on CNN. Young people who disagree with him can’t possibly have minds of their own.

No wonder the foes of gun sanity are worried. On Wednesday, the students and supporters gathered at the state Capitol in Florida shouting “vote them out!” — a day after the state’s Republican-led legislature voted down a ban on many semiautomatic guns and large-capacity magazines.

How come only one side of the supposed culture war on guns is required to exude respect for the other? Because the culture-war argument is largely a gimmick pushed by the gun lobby as a way of demonizing its opponents. None of us who endorse stronger gun laws wants to disrupt anybody else’s way of life. And none of the measures we are proposing would do that.

What truly alarms the gun lobby is that many steps to curb the scourge of gun violence enjoy broad support, from those who own guns as well as those who don’t. A Quinnipiac pollreleased on Tuesday, for example, found that 97 percent of Americans favor background checks for all gun buyers. 

I am all for Americans reaching out across our cultural divides. But if we wait to act until our cross-cultural understanding is complete, many more who might have been saved will die.

Hypocrisy Filled Republicans Accuse Protesters of "Organizing"

Back when the Tea Party was organizing, Republicans thought it was great since the target of the venom was Democrats and progressive policies. Once the aim was shifted to incumbent Republicans, the GOP love affair for the Tea Party became something different.  Indeed, much of the GOP is now controlled by the very same Christofascists and white supremacists who used the Tea Party moniker to hide their real agenda.  Now that these same pitch fork carrying reactionaries control the Republican Party and have Der Trumpenführer as their anointed leader, suddenly organizing for political change is something abhorrent - at least if the organizers and protesters are liberals and progressives rather than right wing Christian extremists and would be KKK members and white nationalists.  A piece in New York Magazine looks at the hypocrisy filled Republicans now decrying what they applauded when the insurgents were "conservatives."  Here are excerpts:Last night, congressional Republicans came home to rooms full of angry people. At town halls across the country, conservative lawmakers were protested, heckled, and shouted at. A few unfortunate souls were even asked to explain — in detail — the GOP plan for replacing the Affordable Care Act.

But Republicans aren’t worried. They’re onto liberals’ cute little game. They’ve realized that these so-called “protests” are, in truth, tactical demonstrations — planned, in advance — by people who want to bring about political change.

“The so-called March on Washington was actually, in numerous cases, planned out by civil-rights activists.”

And yet, this seems to be a genuine Republican talking point. Two days before Trump’s tweet, Texas senator John Cornyn shared a New York Post article that also tries to discredit the protests by claiming that they are strategically organized.

To be fair, “the protests are planned” is a considerably more honest line of attack than the “paid protesters” claim that preceded it. 

So, liberal activists are conscious of optics and, when possible, try to engineer an impression of widespread opposition via such nefarious tactics as “not all sitting together.”

It’s legitimate for conservative commentators and politicians to highlight these tactics. And, for many Republican House members, it’s probably true that town hall protests give a false impression of the scale of dissent in their red districts.

But there’s still a certain comedy to these complaints. The “training manual” Sperry stumbled upon has been proudly shared by Democrats and liberal activists over social media for months. The central charge of Sperry’s op-ed is that Organizing for Action is, in truth, an Obama-aligned front-group whose true purpose is … organizing for action.

Of course, the audiences at these town halls aren’t perfect representations of district-wide public opinion. And of course, professional political organizers are trying to channel liberal outrage in productive directions. This is how politics is practiced on both sides of the aisle. Earlier this month, the tea-party-aligned outside group FreedomWorks announced that it will be organizing rallies and town hall counter-protests in support of Obamacare repeal.

OFA’s “training manual” isn’t what’s unusual here. What’s unusual is the number of people eager to study it.  Activists do try to create an exaggerated impression of public support for their goals. But the more people they organize, the less hyperbolic that impression becomes.

The anti-Trump and anti-GOP protests need to continue to grow and make sure that Trump's approval numbers tank further and to insure the Congressional Republicans start worrying more about their own re-election prospects supporting the delusional, if not insane, standard bearer of their party.

The Double Standards/Hypocrisy of the Christian Right

I have not received any death threats in a while from members of the "godly Christian" crowd - perhaps because I have made in more difficult to leave anonymous comments on blog posts - but outside of Islamic extremists, there are few people who adherent more to double standards and exhibit hypocrisy more than those I refer to as Christofascists.  Despite all of their disingenuous claims of piety and self-centered than the godly folk.  feigned support for "Christian values," there are few who are more selfish.   Nowhere do we see this more than in the context of  alleged concerns over freedom of religion or "religious freedom" as they like to term it.  A piece in Huffington Post looks at this hypocrisy.  Here are highlights:

When a gay person is fired for being gay, we hear from conservatives that "it's freedom of association." However, when a fundamentalist Christian is fired with cause, for misusing their workplace as a pulpit for anti-gay hate, the same conservatives drop the "freedom of association" argument and pick-up the sledgehammer of "freedom of religion." 

Apparently "freedom of religion" is so widely interpreted as to justify absolutely anything a fundamentalist Christian does. 

There is a double-standard the Religious Right indulges frequently. It's a right when they do it, it's persecution when you do. 

Of course, the Religious Right long have been masters of hypocrisy and double standards.

The newest such hypocrisy is the case of Dr. Paul Church who worked at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. The urologist thought it wise to use the hospital's internet system to post anti-gay rants to all staff. 

Church tried to pretend his concerns were "medical" in nature because the gay "lifestyle" is deadly. Oddly, he accompanied this with quotes from the Bible -- hardly a source of medical wisdom. 

He was told sending such material to other staff violated hospital harassment policies and to stop.

Of course, he refused and posted several more anti-gay tirades referencing the Bible. His lawyers, from the anti-gay group Liberty Counsel, claimed that Church "made known his objections in a medical capacity" and was thus free to do what he did. The medical textbook he used... oh, wait, it wasn't a medical textbook, it was the Bible.

After repeatedly violating hospital policy, Church's right to practice at the hospital was revoked.

Of course, Religious Right sites were apoplectic about the decision.

The Religious Right has never advocated freedom of association, or liberty. Such rights, in their minds, are exclusive reserves guaranteed to fundamentalists alone while denied to others, particularly "godless sodomites."

One of the more blatant examples of this "rights-for-me-not-for-thee" view was the attempt by Republican legislators in Washington state. They filed a bill to provide exemptions to discrimination laws for those with "sincerely held religious beliefs."

So, what was the purpose of the bill? It would legalize anti-gay discrimination for Christians, but would prevent discrimination against Christians. It would not apply to race, religion or disability, but gays are not a protected class in federal law. They were the target of the bill. It was legislation meant to grant Christians the right to discriminate against gays, but God forbid, gays were never to have a reciprocal right regarding Christians.

Fundamentalist Christians demanded the right to discriminate as they wish, while simultaneously retaining the privilege of being protected from discrimination. Yet, they accuse the LGBT community of demanding "special privileges." . . . another self-serving attempt by fundamentalist to twist the law to grant special privileges to themselves, and only to themselves -- all others be damned, literally.

As I frequently note, far right Christians are NOT nice or decent people.  Their main stock in trade is hate, division, and hypocrisy.  The sooner the rest of society recognizes this reality and says a loud "no" to their quest to secure special rights to themselves - or better yet, makes them social outcasts -  the better off the nation will be.

The Hypocrisy of Anti-Muslim Rhetoric

Statistically, the vast majority of mass shootings and acts of terrorism in America are committed by white, male Christians.  This inconvenient reality is ignored time and time again by those on the right who always describe the shooters as "lone wolves" and reject any suggestion that terrorist acts by Christians and gun loving, knuckle dragging whites is a problem.  The shootings at the Colorado Springs Planned Parenthood center by Robert Lewis Dear, reportedly an end times Christian, and the right's reaction are an example.  Yet, after the shootings in San Bernadino, the right is in a frenzy depicting all Muslims as would be terrorists.  A column in the Washington Post lloooks at the hypocrisy and double standard at play.  Here are highlights:

The most recent act of horrific violence in the United States — in San Bernardino, Calif. — was reportedly perpetrated by a Muslim man and woman. There are about 3 million Muslims in the United States, almost all of whom are law-abiding citizens. How should they react to the actions of the couple who killed 14 people on Wednesday? 

The most commonly heard response is that Muslims must immediately and loudly condemn these acts of barbarity. But Dalia Mogahed, a Muslim American leader, argues eloquently that this is unfair. She made her case to NBC’s Chuck Todd.

“According to the FBI, the majority of domestic terrorist attacks are actually committed by white, male Christians. . . . When those things occur, we don’t suspect other people who share their faith and ethnicity of condoning them. We assume that these things outrage them just as much as they do anyone else. And we have to afford that same assumption of innocence to Muslims.” 

Muslims face a double standard, but I understand why. Muslim terrorists don’t just happen to be Muslim. They claim to be motivated by religion, cite religious justifications for their actions and tell their fellow Muslims to follow in their bloody path. . . . .it is important for the majority of Muslims who profoundly disagree with jihad to speak up.

But it is also important to remember that there are 1.6 billion Muslims on the planet. If you took the total number of deaths from terrorism last year — about 30,000 — and assumed that 50 people were involved in planning each one (a vastly exaggerated estimate), it would still add up to less than 0.1 percent of the world’s Muslims. 

While I believe that Muslims do bear a responsibility to speak up, non-Muslims also have a responsibility not to make assumptions about them based on such a small minority. Individuals should be judged as individuals and not placed under suspicion for some “group characteristic.” It is dehumanizing and un-American to do otherwise.

What is most bizarre is to hear this anti-Muslim rhetoric described as brave truth-telling. Trump insists that he will not be silenced on this issue. Chris Christie says that he will not follow a “politically correct” national security policy. They are simply feeding a prejudice. The reality is that Muslims are today the most despised minority in America. Their faith is constantly criticized, and they face insults, discrimination and a dramatic rise in acts of violence against them, as Max Fisher of Vox has detailed superbly. And the leading Republican candidate has flirted with the idea of registering Muslims, a form of collective punishment that has not been seen since the internment of Japanese Americans in the 1940s. 

This is the first time that I can recall watching politicians pander to mobs — and then congratulate themselves for their political courage.

If the right wants to apply this standard to Muslims, lets apply it to right wing Christians as well.  Let's assume they all support attacks on Planned Parenthood facilities - I suspect many, in fact do - the murder of abortion providers, and the murder of gays.  And let's start demanding that other Christians repeatedly and loudly condemn them.  And if they fail to do so, then let's start treating them all as would be terrorists too.

Jeb Bush’s South Korean Sugar Daddy

The Republicans seeking to attack Hillary Clinton for her husband's speaking fees and alleged conflicts of interest may need to tread cautiously.  As noted before, Jeb "Jebbie" Bush may have problems of his own in this regard, including largess doled out by those benefiting form his idiot brother's failed regime.   Of particular note is Poongsan Corporation, and its CEO Jin Roy Ryu have been generous patrons of the Bush family over the years. In return, the company won more than $1 billion in contracts from Jebbie's brother’s presidential administration.  Politico looks at what it calls Jebbie's South Korean sugar daddy.  Here are highlights:

As he amassed wealth after leaving the governor’s office, Jeb Bush delivered 10 separate paid speeches to a South Korean metal company that won more than $1 billion in contracts from his brother’s presidential administration, according to disclosures released Tuesday.

The company, Poongsan Corporation, and its CEO Jin Roy Ryu have been generous patrons of the Bush family over the years, raising about $1 million for the presidential library of Bush’s father George H. W. Bush, while also helping to organize trips to South Korea for Jeb Bush and his presidential relatives.

The first speech was in 2007, just months before George W. Bush’s administration awarded Poongsan a coin-production contract with the U.S. Mint worth as much as $1 billion. Jeb Bush delivered nine more speeches between then and 2013, when he delivered two separate speeches to Poongsan..

Bush’s association with Poongsan dates back to the mid-1990s, when he was the president of his father’s presidential library foundation, where Ryu sits on the board of trustees.

Jeb Bush served as Florida governor from 1999 to 2007, after which he began giving paid speeches to Poongsan and other companies and non-profits during a period of rapid wealth accumulation.

His net worth mushroomed from $1.3 million to $19 million, according to tax returns and other documents released by Bush’s presidential campaign on Tuesday. The document release – which included a list of 277 speeches that paid a total of nearly $10 million – seemed intended partly to highlight Bush’s commitment to transparency and also to head off a damaging trickle of stories about his ties to controversial businesses.

But the documents also contain fodder for Bush’s critics, who have sought to cast him as a privileged scion of a political dynasty with little in common with middle-class voters. Democrats highlighted affiliations Bush’s allies would rather avoid – such as his work as an adviser for Lehman Brothers, which paid him $1.3 million a year before it went bankrupt and helped spur the financial crisis.

And, while the list of speeches does not contain precise dates or amounts for each speech, it does in some ways shed light on how Bush traded on the political clout that comes with being a former governor who is the son of one former president and the brother of an outgoing one.

Neither Jeb Bush’s campaign spokeswoman nor PMX representatives responded to questions about the speeches or the Bushes’ relationship with Poongsan or Ryu.

Overall, the company has received $1.6 billion in federal contracts, primarily from the U.S. Mint, but also from the U.S. Army.   In addition to coins, Poongsan manufactures ammunition, including land mines and cluster bombs that have run afoul of international human rights standards.

Perhaps those who live in glass houses - i.e., Jeb Bush - should be careful about casting stones.

Why the Right Doesn't Want to Call Charleston an Act of Terrorism

Had the murders in Charleston the night before last been committed by a Muslim, Fox News and other right wing outlets would have been screaming about terrorist attacks to the high heavens.  However, since the apparent shooter was white, there is either silence from these mouth pieces or attempts to dissemble and avoid calling Dylann Storm Roof what he is - a domestic terrorist.  Be he mentally imbalanced or not, his actions were certainly no more insane than that of Islamic suicide bombers.  The real issue is that the right doesn't want to admit that their ideology encourages extremist to commit acts of violence and fans hatred.  A piece in the New York Times looks at this hesitancy to admit that acts of terrorism are committed by right wing Americans.  Another looks at Roof's growing adherence to white supremacy views.   Here are highlights from the former:

The massacre of nine African-Americans in Charleston has been classified as a possible hate crime, apparently carried out by a 21-year-old white man who once wore an apartheid badge and other symbols of white supremacy. But many civil rights advocates are asking why the attack has not officially been called terrorism.

Against the backdrop of rising worries about violent Muslim extremism in the United States, advocates see hypocrisy in the way the attack and the man under arrest in the shooting have been described by law enforcement officials and the news media.

Assaults like the Boston Marathon bombing in 2013 and the attack on an anti-Islamic gathering in Garland, Tex., last month have been widely portrayed as acts of terrorism carried out by Islamic extremists. Critics say, however, that assaults against African-Americans and Muslim Americans are rarely if ever called terrorism.

Moreover, they argue, assailants who are white are far less likely to be described by the authorities as terrorists.

“We have been conditioned to accept that if the violence is committed by a Muslim, then it is terrorism,” Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a civil rights advocacy group in Washington, said Thursday in a telephone interview.

“If the same violence is committed by a white supremacist or apartheid sympathizer and is not a Muslim, we start to look for excuses — he might be insane, maybe he was pushed too hard,” Mr. Awad said.

“We have a man who intentionally went to a black church, had animus toward black people and assassinated an elected official and eight other people,” he said. “It seems he was motivated by a desire to terrorize and kill black people.”

Webster’s New World College Dictionary defines terrorism as “the use of force or threats to demoralize, intimidate and subjugate, especially such use as a political weapon or policy.”

Civil rights advocates said the Charleston attack not only fit the dictionary definition of terrorism but reflected a history of attempts by the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist groups to terrorize African-Americans.

“The first antiterrorism law in U.S. history was the Klan Control Act, so really, this has been the definition of terrorism,” William Jelani Cobb, a writer and director of the Africana Studies Institute at the University of Connecticut, said in a Twitter post.

Abraham H. Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, a venerable civil rights group, said the Charleston massacre looked like terrorism to him.

“While the terrorist label is often applied to attacks, plots and conspiracies carried out on behalf of designated terrorist organizations such as ISIS and Al Qaeda, politically motivated violence is not the sole domain of supporters of designated terrorist groups,” Mr. Foxman said in a statement.

Expect more dissembling from the right as it tries to dodge the consequences of its own rhetoric.

 

Bush Foundation Accepted Foreign Donations Too - Where's the Media?

The right wing slime machine has had near orgasms and provided breathless reports about the Clinton Foundation accepting donations from billionaires and foreigners.  As past posts have noted, despite all of the hoopla and hysteria, no "smoking gun" of wrong doing has been revealed.  What the right wing media is ignoring is the fact that the Bush Foundations have likewise accepted money from big donors and even foreign governments no doubt seeking influence.  Occupy Democrats notes in part as follows:

As the conservative media networks drive themselves into a muckraking feeding frenzy over the prospect of the upcoming work of fiction titled Clinton Cash, written by a professional right-wing conspiracy theorist and political hitman, the rest of America has picked up the question of foundation accountability out of curiosity and the tempting allure of scandal. But, in one of the countless hypocritical reversals that are all too common in modern American politics, it turns out that the Bush family foundations have been acting like they have something to hide, while the Clintons have publicly released key information about all their donors, such as identity and approximate amount donated. In typical Republican fashion, they are projecting their own corruption onto Democrats and accusing the transparent Clinton Foundation of accepting the same kinds of secret bribes that the Bush Foundation has been taking for years.

Nonprofits are not obligated to reveal their sources, but the Clinton Foundation has been revealing their donors since 2008, ever since Hillary Clinton became Secretary of State, to avoid the very allegations her campaign is now being falsely smeared with. Foreign governments could have donated to her foundation in secret, as the “investigative author” fictitious propaganda writer Peter Schweizer has alleged- but the donor list, made public in a searchable database, reveals that the foundation is clean. Tom Watson of Forbes even wrote that “in truth, the Clinton Foundation is among the most forthcoming of major charities and nonprofit foundations—especially those headed by public figures.”

On the other hand, the George Bush Foundation raised $361.8 million dollars between 2010-2013 with no attempt at accountability or transparency.

David Corn of Mother Jones puts it in perspective: “Anyone who wanted to gain favor with the Bush clan while George W. Bush was president could have anonymously donated an unlimited amount of money to his father’s foundation, and now that Jeb Bush is in the hunt, anyone looking to fashion a relationship with the Bushes can contribute millions to either of these Bush foundations and keep that connection a secret.”

Similarly, the George Bush Presidential Library has assets of $47 million and receives $3 million a year from undisclosed donations, functioning as yet another vehicle to funnel campaign and influence money through with no record or transparency, and was accepting donations all throughout George W. Bush’s presidency- another way for the millionaires of America to buy power and favors while trampling over the American democracy.

It’s worth repeating; the Clinton Foundation publicly releases the names of every donor and the amount of each donation, while the Bush Foundations accepted secret, anonymous donations of undisclosed quantities.

Here are a few highlights of what the Dallas Morning News discovered about Bush Foundation donations:

The secretive nature of high-dollar donations to presidential libraries often raises questions, though legislation to require more transparency has repeatedly fizzled.

Meredith McGehee, policy director for the Campaign Legal Center watchdog group, said the biggest issues are presidents raising money in office and the “pitfalls of access, influence and conflict of interest.”

Unlike political campaigns, presidential library fundraisers can take foreign donations. Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, for instance, each gave the Bush Center $1 million or more after Bush left office.

[A] top Bush Center booster, California investor Elliott Broidy, pleaded guilty in 2009 to a role in a corruption scandal. Another big donor, Dallas oilman and major SMU supporter Edwin L. Cox, had his son pardoned by former President George H.W. Bush.

Bill O’Reilly’s War Lies Exposed - When Will Fox Suspend Him?

With NBC News' Brian Williams on a 6 month suspension, the hypocrisy one hears from other so-called journalists is stunning.  Moreover, if Williams' suspension is justified - I personally don't believe it is - then that same standard needs to be applied across the broadcast spectrum.  If that occurred, of course, every anchor and reporter at Fox News would need to be suspended immediately given the way in which they lie with abandon and rewrite facts and events.  One of the top blowhards at Fox is Bill O'Reilly.  As Salon reports based on an investigation done by Mother Jones, O'Reilly has lied about his war correspondence experiences for years.  Here are excerpts:

NBC News anchor Brian Williams is no longer the only prominent anchor who faces serious credibility questions for misleading the public about his experiences in war zones. In an extensive new investigation, Mother Jones’ David Corn and Daniel Schulman detail how for decades, Fox News host Bill O’Reilly has told gripping accounts of his own war reporting that don’t mesh with the facts.

O’Reilly’s tall tales concern his experiences as a CBS News reporter covering the 1982 Falklands War between Great Britain and Argentina, as well as his dispatches from El Salvador’s civil war. The conservative commentator has cited his supposed wartime experiences numerous times as evidence of his journalistic gravitas, as Corn and Schulman document.

O’Reilly also related a tale of his harrowing Argentine experience following the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, saying on air:

I was in a situation one time, in a war zone in Argentina, in the Falklands, where my photographer got run down and then hit his head and was bleeding from the ear on the concrete. And the army was chasing us. I had to make a decision. And I dragged him off, you know, but at the same time, I’m looking around and trying to do my job, but I figure I had to get this guy out of there because that was more important.

But Corn and Schulman find crucial inconsistencies between O’Reilly’s stories and the factual record.

[H]his own account of his time in Argentina in his 2001 book, The No Spin Zone, contains no references to O’Reilly experiencing or covering any combat during the Falklands war. . . . .

There is nothing in this memoir indicating that O’Reilly witnessed the fighting between British and Argentine military forces—or that he got anywhere close to the Falkland Islands, which are 300 miles off Argentina’s shore and about 1,200 miles south of Buenos Aires.  

Given the remote location of the war zone—which included the British territory of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, more than 1,400 miles offshore—few reporters were able to witness and report on the combat that claimed the lives of about 900 Argentine and British troops. The government in London only allowed about 30 British journalists to accompany its military forces. 

American reporters were not on the ground in this distant war zone. “Nobody got to the war zone during the Falklands war,” Susan Zirinsky, a longtime CBS News producer who helped manage the network’s coverage of the war from Buenos Aires, tells Mother Jones. She does not remember what O’Reilly did during his time in Argentina. But she notes that the military junta kept US reporters from reaching the islands: “You weren’t allowed on by the Argentinians. No CBS person got there.”

Longtime CBS correspondent Bob Schieffer corroborates those accounts, telling Mother Jones, ”Nobody from CBS got to the Falklands. I came close. We’d been trying to get somebody down there. It was impossible.”

There's more that is worth a read.  Not surprisingly, O'Reilly has condemned NBC's suspension of Williams.   That said, for all those lauding Williams' suspension, they need to be demanding O'Reilly's suspension - and the suspension of every other journalist who has embellished their experiences as Williams is said to have done.  If that were to happen, I suspect that there would be few anchors left, particularly at Fox News.

A Homophobic Double Standard for Gay May-December Relationships?

In the interest of full disclosure, my first long term boyfriend was 22 years younger than me.  It lasted for three years and ended badly, but not because of the age difference.  The husband - who is four years younger than me - and I know several very happy couples where there is a significant age difference.  Yet, seemingly such couples face a double standard all too often compared to heterosexual couples where financially successful men often ditch their first wife for a so-called trophy wife.  There were several such couples in my old neighborhood in Virginia Beach. Think of the reaction from some to the relationship of Tom Daley and Lance Black.  And now, the same homophobia snark is revealing itself over the planned marriage of comedian Stephen Fry, 57, and 27-year-old comedian Elliot Spencer.  A piece in The Daily Beast looks at this unfortunate double standard.  Here are highlights:

When news broke earlier this week that British actor and comedian Stephen Fry, 57, is now engaged to 27-year-old comedian Elliot Spencer, homophobic social media users suddenly decided they should try to be comedians, too. There have already been innumerable and equally unfunny variations on the joke that Spencer looks young enough to be Fry’s son, as Hannah Jane Parkinson relays on the Guardian. (And yes, someone has already called Spencer a “Small Fry,” har har.) The Internet reaction took an even darker turn when “Stephen Fry disgusting” reportedly trended on Twitter for a brief time following the announcement.

In the media, the couple’s age gap has been treated less like a scandal and more like a spectacle, with headlines predictably highlighting Spencer’s youth. The major outlets have remained more or less respectful beyond these gawking headlines but, as the Advocate reports, tabloid and entertainment sites have taken a more sensationalistic approach which has only been amplified by their comments sections, where people have been calling Fry a “pedophile,” a “pervert,” and a “dirty old man.”

If it’s not obvious by now, the outsized reaction to Fry and Spencer’s age gap is deeply homophobic. Plenty of straight men—especially famous straight men—have wives that are decidedly their juniors: Harrison Ford is 22 years older than Calista Flockhart, Michael Douglas is 25 years older than Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Clint Eastwood is a whopping 35 years older than his ex-wife. George Clooney’s paramours, too, have waxed ever younger over the years. Sure, these Hollywood May-December relationships are surrounded by plenty of hubbub about “trophy wives” and “gold-digging,” but no one thinks that Clint Eastwood is a pedophile just because he married a much younger woman. However much we gossip about heterosexual couples with large age gaps, we at least refrain from calling them sex offenders.

The news of Fry’s engagement, on the other hand, has done nothing but stoke the flames of a particularly virulent brand of homophobia that sees male homosexuality as a synonym for pedophilia and pederasty.
University of California at Davis psychology professor Gregory M. Herek has meticulously documented (and discredited) the history of this unfounded association.  . . . . Today, it continues to circulate freely on the far Right.

When Bradley Cooper, now 40, started dating the now 23-year-old model Suki Waterhouse, the Daily Mirror called them “the sweetest celebrity couple ever” and repeated the old adage that “age is but a number.” This same outlet worked the phrase “engagement to toyboy lover” into the headline of their article on Fry. What happened to true love knows no boundaries and all that?

[F]ew gay eyebrows seem to be rising, likely because large age gaps are relatively common among same-sex couples. A Facebook study from last year found that both gay and lesbian couples tend to have much higher age gaps than their heterosexual counterparts with the difference—or the age gap gap—widening as people leave college and start new relationships in adulthood. The reasons for a gay age gap are as varied as the couple. For some, it’s about finding stability and maturity. For others, it’s simply about accepting love wherever you find it.

As always seems to be the case, gays face a different standard that do heterosexuals.  One can only hope for the day when we are all judged by one standard.