From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
Little Gay Billy's BIG Gay Newsapalooza!
I'm here, I'm queer, and I brung ya some beer. And some updates from LGBT Land:
• November is Transgender Awareness Month and Kossack rserven continues publishing the most consistently excellent and illuminating posts on trans-related stories---the good, the bad, the infuriating---happening in the U.S. and around the world. Get caught up on her latest posts here.
• Our perennial reminder that, with all the gains we're making, people can still be fired for being gay in 29 states and for being transgender in 32. One state that might be moving its lardbutt to help rehabilitate its reputation is Indiana, where the Chamber of Commerce has endorsed an LGBT rights bill that a new poll shows is supported by 56 percent of Hoosiers.
• Another sign of how Canada's elections have ushered in a new era: Twitter went, um, atwitter over this pic of new Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (4th from left) with the family of MP Scott Brison (2nd from left), the new president of the Treasury Board:
Meanwhile, former PM Stephen Harper is home looking for cats to kick.
• Cheers on this Veterans' Day to Democratic presidential candidate Martin O'Malley, who released a plan for LGBT servicemembers that would, among other things, "provide long-overdue justice for LGBT veterans [by] passing legislation automatically upgrading the service records of troops discharged solely because of their sexual orientation." This is something that shouldn’t have to wait (it's been three years since 'don’t ask, don’t tell' was lifted), but good on O'Malley for putting it on the table.
• Three presidential candidates---Cruz, Jindal and Huckabee---recently attended a conference put on by "Pastor" Kevin Swanson, who advocates killing LGBT people because The Bible tells him so. For the record, Swanson is a human sewer rat who should be institutionalized. Nah, I take that back. That was a very unkind thing to say about sewer rats.
• And a tweet:
An elegant solution to unite us all. May the Flying Spaghetti Monster let joy and wonder spread throughout the land this Kwanzaa/Winter Solstice/Hanukkah/Festivus/Star Wars Episode VII season.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, November 11, 2015
Note: Due to the Veterans Day holiday, there is no bus service today. However, volunteers from the American Legion will be available to fire you out of a cannon to within a hundred yards of your destination. ---Mgt.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til the next Democratic debate (in Des Moines): 3
Days 'til the Wild Arts Festival in Portland, Oregon: 10
Number of the 99 state legislative chambers now controlled by Republicans: 69
Amount being raised by the DLCC and an affiliated super PAC to take back state legislatures next year, according to AP: $40 million
Portion of Americans who believe global warming is both real and at least partially human-caused, according to an AP-NORC poll: 2-in-3
Busiest online shopping day of the year, aka Singles Day: 11/11
Percent chance that the world's first gas station/pot dispensary, located in Colorado Springs, is called Gas & Grass: 100%
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Mid-week Rapture Index:
181 (including 5 gogs and millions of grains of sand rapidly running out of the Rapture hourglass in Michele Bachmann's castle). Soul Protection Factor 18 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
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Puppy Pic of the Day:
All about sleepytime
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CHEERS to our men and women in uniform. Today is Veterans' Day. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan---and now Syria!---have certainly burned into this generation's brain the fact that military service is a grueling, unpredictable and uncompromising challenge that often means paying a heavy and unexpected price in the pursuit of politician-selected goals that are not always noble or necessary. The military is where we go to become a trained killer-of-bad-people and destroyer-of-bad-things in defense of our country, while at the same time serving as de facto U.S. ambassadors when we're on foreign turf. And while we could go on and on about how our armed forces have been kicking ass for 239 years, we'll leave it, as always, at a simple…
JEERS to Nostrabillydamus. I really didn't have the stomach to watch the Republican debate last night, but I’m sitting here at 6:30 on Monday evening predicting what the highlights were with uncanny accuracy: candidate A criticized Candidate B and Candidate B got all huffy and was all like, "You can't say that! You Can't say that" And then Candidate C said Candidate A was guilty of the same thing and plus you abused your credit cards on hookers and blow, pal! And then Candidate D was all like, hey let's calm down and focus on the #1 issue facing this country: how Candidates A through C and E through H are total fuckups and how can you even take them seriously?!! And then Candidate F is like, I'll fix this country! I'll fix your bike, a leaky faucet, anything, you name it, I can fix it! And all the other candidates are like, shut up Jeb you lightweight. And then the moderators are like, hey we haven't even asked a question yet! And the candidates are like, shut up you libtard Hillary-loving media! And then Ben Carson stabbed everybody in the belt buckle and they all had a good laugh before Ted Cruz closed with a 45-minute prayer on his knees. I know…it's a gift.
JEERS to things that may make me do something horrible. This just in from Egypt:
Thermal scans of the Great Pyramid of Giza have revealed an "impressive" anomaly in the rock---a change in temperature that could indicate something behind the 4,500-year-old walls. "This anomaly is really quite impressive and it’s just in front of us, at the ground level," said Mehdi Tayoubi, founder of the Paris-based Heritage Innovation Preservation Institute that is conducting the Scan Pyramids experiments using a mix of infrared thermography, muon radiography and 3D reconstruction.
If it turns out to be grain inside there I'm going to give all my money to Ben Carson and then jump off a bridge.
CHEERS to Democrats from the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party. Happy 75th birthday (and many blessings on your camels) to Senator Barbara Boxer of California…..
"I think Democrats are right. We fight for the American dream, for the environment, for privacy rights, a woman's right to choose, a good public education system."
"I was a stock broker once. I think there is an absolute place for market investments. But they should never be the basis of one's retirement. They should be an additional piece on top of a basic, secure, guaranteed retirement benefit."
"Medical professionals, not insurance company bureaucrats, should be making health care decisions."
"We know no document is perfect, but when we amend the Constitution, it would be to expand rights, not to take away rights from decent, loyal Americans. This great Constitution of ours should never be used to make a group of Americans permanent second-class citizens."
Next year will be Senator Boxer's last as a legislator---an effective and dependable Democrat for 33 years in both chambers. Her successor will have some big shoes to fill. May the best Harris or Sanchez win.
JEERS to things any fool could've predicted. Remember how during the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster BP basically carpet-bombed the gulf with the dispersant called "Corexit"? Well, any old fool could've predicted that there wasn't going to be a whole lot of corexing going on:
[A] new study by Samantha Joye at the University of Georgia shows that...the dispersants failed miserably. By simulating the Deepwater spill in their laboratory, Joye's team found that the dispersants actually suppressed oil-busting bacteria and slowed their ability to degrade oil. Instead, they favored microbes that, well, excel at digesting dispersants.
“You could argue that it would have been better if we had left the organisms alone,” says Joye.
Maybe next time. And, unfortunately, there will be a next time.
CHEERS to Helmut Schmidt. The first world leader I have any recollection of is Nixon. The second is Schmidt, who was in charge when our family moved to Düsseldorf, Germany in 1976. He was head of the Socialist Democratic Party back when Germany was divided between east and west and the capital was in Bonn. I wasn't even a teenager yet, so I didn’t follow politics, but he always seemed like a take-charge kinda guy. His New York Times obituary says he was arrogant, critical and stubborn---in other words, German. He also smoked like a chimney and lived to be 96. Schmidt will be buried with widespread respect and admiration among the German people and leaders around the world…and with gobsmacked disbelief at the American Lung Association.
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Ten years ago in C&J: November 11, 2005
JEERS to slinkin' around. What does it say about an administration when, almost three years after "major combat operations" have ended against a country we invaded, our leaders---like, oh, say, the Secretary of State--still can't ride their chariots down George W. Bush Avenue in the conquered land? To paraphrase Howard Dean: You cannot trust Republicans with your wars.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to U.S. Minty freshness. Next week the last of the 2015 "America the Beautiful" series state quarters will make its debut, representing the great state of New York. Specifically, the 1777 Battle of Saratoga, which clobbered Britain (thanks in large part to not-yet-traitor Benedict Arnold) and brought the French over to our side:
The Saratoga National Historical Park quarter is the 30th release in the United States Mint America the Beautiful Quarters Program, a 12–year initiative to honor 56 national parks and other national sites. The official launch will take place at Schuylerville High School on Tuesday, November 17, at 9:30 a.m. Invited guests include U.S. Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo.
The coin’s reverse design depicts a close-up of the moment General John Burgoyne surrendered his sword to General Horatio Gates, a turning point many believe marked the beginning of the end of the American Revolutionary War.
In addition to "In God We Trust" and "E Pluribus Unum," the quarter also features the phrase, "Hey Burgoyne, c'mere and pull mah finger."
Have a nice Wednesday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
"The way I would describe Cheers and Jeers 5.0 is not just chaos, but pandemonium. We honestly have not seen anything like this before, and we still don't know what to make of it."
---Mark Showalter
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