More Tuesday Male Beauty

Brad Pitt'sLatest Statement on Marriage Equality

I will confess that I have been a fan of Brad Pitt ever since I first saw him on the big screen. His social consciousness and philanthropic endeavors certainly help seal the deal. The icing on the cake is his strong stance on marriage equality. Pitt has released the following statement to People magazine in the wake of the New York marriage equality vote on June 24th. Here is the statement:

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"It is encouraging that New York has joined the movement to grant equal marriage rights to its citizens. But it is each American's Constitutional right to marry the person they love, no matter what state they inhabit. No state should decide who can marry and who cannot. Thanks to the tireless work of so many, someday soon this discrimination will end and every American will be able to enjoy their equal right to marriage."
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Pitt has previously stated that he and Angelina Jolie will not get married until everyone had the same right.

Trial of Larry King Murderer to Begin

At long last the trial of Brandon McInerney, the 14 year old who brought a gun to school with premeditation and shot classmate Larry King in the back of the head, is about to begin. In a display of just how sleazy and unethical some criminal defense attorneys can be, McInerney's attorneys plan on possibly using a "gay panic defense." A defense that even though bogus requires a "in the heat of the moment" context. Never mind that McInerney planned ahead, brought a gun to school, positioned himself directly behind King during a morning computer class and fired twice into the back of Larry King's head. Frankly, in my opinion, if defense counsel try that shameless defense, disbarment would be to lenient a punishment. The Los Angeles Times looks at the upcoming trial and has these highlights:
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When he was just 14, Brandon McInerney walked into an Oxnard classroom, took his seat, pulled a .22-caliber handgun out of his backpack and shot the student sitting in front of him. Then he tossed the weapon to the floor and walked out. The victim, Lawrence King, was an openly gay student who McInerney reportedly thought had a crush on him.
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Prosecutor Maeve Fox says she will outline a straightforward case in opening arguments set to begin Tuesday in a Chatsworth courtroom. The Oxnard teenager carefully planned and carried out the Feb. 12, 2008, execution of his eighth-grade classmate, she said. He brought a gun to school, positioned himself directly behind King during a morning computer class and fired twice into the back of the 15-year-old's head.
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McInerney is being tried in adult court under the provisions of Proposition 21, which allows prosecutors to bring murder charges against juveniles as young as 14 for certain serious crimes. McInerney's lawyers, Scott Wippert and Robyn Bramson, say their client doesn't deny the killing. But they argue it was voluntary manslaughter because the adolescent was provoked by King's repeated sexual advances.
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A voluntary manslaughter conviction would prevent a life sentence, Wippert said, making McInerney eligible for release before he's 40. Even a finding of second-degree murder would virtually assure that he wouldn't be eligible for parole until he was in his 70s, his lawyers said.
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The defense could face a challenge in portraying McInerney as a naive youth. At the time of the shooting, he looked young and sweet-faced. In court recently, the defendant was a tall, lanky young man dressed in crisp Oxford shirts and khaki pants.

Will Marcus Bachmann Be a Gift the Keeps on Giving?

While some Democrats have issued statements to the effect that commentators such as me should cease speculation about the possibility that Marcus Bachmann might be a closed gay - never mind that his lisp makes most drag queens sound uber-butch - it increasing looks as if Marcus "Gays are Barbarians" Bachmann may be a source of other ongoing embarrassment to his unhinged wife. You know, little things like running a clinic without a license, receiving lots of Medicaid money and sucking up federal agriculture subsidies like a bloated hog. Things that go a good way towards exposing Michele Bachmann as a hypocrite. Politico and Time magazine both have articles that look at the liability Marcus Bachmann may yet become for his wife a/k/a Crazy Eyes. First these highlights from Politico:
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Now the question is how much influence he will have on her presidential prospects. Already, his clinic has come under fire for taking Medicaid payments, but there are more questions surrounding the Christian-centric therapy. Among them are Marcus Bachmann’s credentials: He is not registered with any of the three boards that certify mental health practitioners and professions in the state. The Minnesota Board of Psychology and the Board of Marriage and Family Therapy confirmed to POLITICO that Bachmann is not licensed with them. And a search of the Board of Behavioral Health and Therapy license database returns no result.
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Trisha Stark, of the Minnesota Psychological Association, said that the title “clinical therapist” is not widely used in professional circles and that Bachmann is able to operate his clinic because of state rules regarding mental health practice. “Minnesota is one of the only states in which you can practice mental health without a license,” Stark said. The Bachmann and Associates office declined to comment on his professional credentials, and the campaign did not respond to requests for comment.
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But it gets better as described in the Time article which includes these highlights:
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There’s also been controversy over Bachmann’s use of government subsidies, which cuts against his wife’s Tea Party message. Marcus’ unlicensed clinical practice has received roughly $30,000 in state funds, according to public records, and NBC News reports that it has taken $137,000 in Medicaid payments since 2005. There’s also the issue of Marcus Bachmann’s family’s farm, which has benefited from some $260,000 in agriculture subsidies.
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This kind of baggage might not have meant much in Bachmann’s bids for Minnesota State Senate or the 6th District House seat, but it is getting more attention now that she’s under presidential-level scrutiny. As a rare “First Gentleman” prospect, Marcus Bachmann is liable to be treated with more interest and intensity than many other candidates’ spouses.

NOM and Its Spokesmen Are Skating on Legal Thin Ice

Time and time again the Christianists - and in my view that includes the Catholic Church hierarchy - believe that they are above law. Indeed, the rule of law applies to everyone else, not them. In fact, they constantly claim special rights not given to anyone else even as they accuse others of doing what they are guilty of themselves. A perfect example of this arrogant mindset is the National Organization for Marriage ("NOM") which in state after state refuses to comply with election finance disclosure laws. NOM needs to either be shut down or forced to comply with the same disclosure laws as everyone else. And if NOM refuses to comply, then put its leadership behind bars or at a minimum fine the living Hell out of them (Yikes! Imagine how immensely fat Maggie Gallagher would look in horizontal stripes!). Fred Karger has a column at Alan Colmes' blog that lays out the case against NOM. Here are highlights:
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Poor Maggie Gallagher and Brian Brown; what a sad couple. The front group they run for the Mormon and Catholic Churches, the National Organization for Marriage (NOM), is under an active investigation for money laundering in Maine. This investigation by the State Attorney General and the Maine Ethics Commission has been underway for nearly two years, because NOM likely believes that it is above the law.
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Well, one or both of these alleged lawbreakers could end up in prison if there was “intent” when they decided not to report the source of the $1.9 million that they raised to take away Maine’s marriage equality law back in November 2009.
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You see, they decided not to report the names of any of their donors as required under Maine’s election law. That must be because they promised their contributors that their names would be kept “secret” in dozens of emails that I turned over to that state’s Ethics Commission.
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Maggie and Brian are now threatening to spend $2 million to defeat the four Republican State Senators in New York who absolutely did the right thing and voted for gay marriage just 10 days ago. Wonder if they plan on laundering that money, too? NOM has sued 23 states to invalidate their election laws so they can bully anyone who goes against them, and they do it with secret money.
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Maggie and Brian, you lost in New York, Washington, DC, New Hampshire, Vermont, Connecticut and Massachusetts. The tide has turned against you and your secret backers. The public has turned on you, too. Polls show a majority of Americans support marriage equality and the support keeps growing. So before the ice breaks beneath you two, if you’re so concerned about marriage, why don’t you tackle the growing divorce rate, and leave happy gay and lesbian couples alone?

Tuesday Male Beauty

Will GOP Congressional Freshman Be Short Timers?

I've noted before that the Republican Party has created two Frankenstein monsters that plague the party and which may well be it eventual undoing: the Christianist faction and the so-called Tea Party. Neither of these factions deal in facts and an objective reality and sooner or later the short term advantages of embracing these poisonous groups will likely have a very real negative consequence. In the short term, as an article in the New Times notes, the current class of GOP freshman in the House of Representatives may be unseated - often by someone even more untethered from reality than the current crop of GOP loons. But for the danger the trend bodes for the country in the short term, there would almost be some perverse pleasure to be had in watching the self-demolition play out. Here are some article highlights:
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WASHINGTON — Just when freshman House Republicans have finally learned their way to the Cannon Caucus Room, how to vote on a motion to proceed and which commissary serves the best tuna sandwiches, someone back home — worse, someone from their own party — wants to take it all away.
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It is miles to go before the 2012 Congressional races begin in earnest, but already some of the 87 freshmen who helped the Republicans win back the House last year are bracing for a challenge from within the party. At least half a dozen potential primary challengers to freshmen are considering a run, and there is heated chatter about more.
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In some ways, the freshmen are responsible for their own predicament. Many won their seats after successfully challenging establishment Republicans in primaries . . . . Now, to some of the impatient and ideological voters who sent them to Washington to change things, the new House members may be seen as the establishment, and they face the disconcerting prospect of immediately defending themselves in the political marketplace.
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[G]roups aligned with the Tea Party movement, which helped push many new-to-politics candidates into House seats, are disenchanted with some of their new hires and are pondering if they can raise the money, and the firepower, to find someone to take them on. “I do think it is going to be more competitive,” said Jenny Beth Martin, a co-founder of the Tea Party Patriots. “With the freshmen who claim to be Tea Party or claim to support the ideas of the Tea Party movement but haven’t kept their promise, I think it will be tough for them.”

How Do We Restore Civics/History Education?

I often bemoan the sad state of knowledge of history and the structure of the government in this country - a state of affairs that plays directly into the hands of demagogues of the Christian Right, the so-called Tea Party, and of course the Republican Party. A piece in the Daily Beast laments that less than half of the American public can name a single Supreme Court justice, yet more than 80 percent of Americans know Michael Jackson sang “Beat It” and “Billie Jean.” And that's but one example of the idiocy that is all too pervasive. How can one make even a remotely informed vote when they don't know how the system is supposed to work, who people are, and where places are in the world? Yet, that is what the USA is faced with. Former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor is working with the U. S. Department of Education in the hope of addressing the problem. Here are some highlights of why O'Connor believes we need to retool our education system:
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As families gather to celebrate Independence Day, it is time to rethink the notion that civics instruction is less than vital in the global economy of the 21st century. . . . . we believe it is a great mistake to push civics to the sideline in schools. From the dramatic uprisings for democracy in the Mideast to the tragic shootings in Tucson at a Congress on Your Corner event, Americans have been reminded once again that freedom matters—and that informed citizens are the lifeblood of democracy.
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Unfortunately, a staggering number of Americans today know dismayingly little about the basic history and traditions of our democracy. . . . . Nationwide, more than a third of all high school seniors today lack even basic civics knowledge and skills. High school seniors that score below the basic level cannot, for example, describe the structure and functions of American government or identify an activity that is a part of civic life.
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Not surprisingly, civic ignorance has current consequences. In February, a Kaiser Family Foundation poll found that nearly half of the public was either unsure if the health-care law was still the law of the land or mistakenly believed it had been repealed.
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A number of organizations are leading the way to producing the next generation of civics instruction. iCivics, founded by Justice O’Connor, offers web-based education projects and an array of interactive games and activities that students can use in class or at home.
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While civics education needs to be reinvigorated and updated, its mission remains largely unchanged. The founders, from George Washington to Thomas Jefferson, understood that informed citizens were a bulwark against tyranny and vital to a functioning democracy. When the founding fathers exited Independence Hall after drafting the Constitution, a woman asked Benjamin Franklin, “What have we got—a republic or a monarchy?” “A republic,” Franklin replied, “if you can keep it.”
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When done well, civics education in fact equips students with the very skills they need to succeed in the 21st century—the ability to communicate effectively, to work collectively, to hone critical questions, and to appreciate diversity. . . . a world-class education requires a well-rounded curriculum. Civics learning is essential to ensuring that future generations will keep our republic and nourish the freedoms to help America move forward. In 2011, a strong foundation in civics is not a luxury but a necessity.

More Monday Male Beauty

Marcus Bachmann's Silver Daddy's "Profile"

Someone obviously has a great sense of humor and, after hearing Michele "Crazy Eyes" Bachmann's lisping husband ranting about gays being "barbarians," it doesn't seem all that improbable that good old Marcus in his heart is lusting for some hot man on man action. The photo above is via Joe.My. God. This is the link to Bachmann's faux profile which reads in part as follows:

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Hi, I am a fun over-forty flamer who just wants to try IT ALL! I'm looking for some CRUDE BARBARIANS who will put me in my place, honey! Spank me, Spank me, and don't forget to thank me! I am just a "gal" who can't say no! Professionally I am a psychologist, which is funny because I am really into "mind games". My hobbies include doing Ethel Merman imitations, antiquing, and wearing my wife's clothes when she isn't around! If any of this interests you, please "ring my bell"! I'll have lots of time on my hands as my wife Michelle will be traveling a lot this year!