I Feel Pretty and Witty and…
A few final words as we say farewell to Pride Month:
“As I said in my State of the Union Address—especially to our younger transgender Americans—I will always have your back as your President so that you can be yourself and reach your God-given potential. Today and every day, my Administration stands with every LGBTQI+ American in the ongoing struggle against intolerance, discrimination, and injustice.”
—President Biden
“We thought maybe two or three students might join us and we could talk, but fifty students showed up. ... I hope people will listen more to young people. Ask them questions about how they are feeling and realize we need to support all of our students and create an environment where they feel safe and welcomed, loved and included.”
—Bob Parlin of Newton South High School in Boston, the teacher who created the first public school Gay-Straight Alliance. Parlin came out in 1992 and retired this year. Gay-Straight Alliances now exist in 10,000+ public schools.
Continued...
“The anti-abortion playbook and the anti-LGBTQ playbook are one and the same. Both are about denying control over our bodies and making it more dangerous for us to live as we are. Both divide our country into free and less free, the opposite of what the United States should be. Our bodies, healthcare and our future belong to us, not to a meddling politician or extremist Supreme Court justices, and we will fight back.”
—GLAAD president Sarah Kate Ellis
If homosexuality is a disease, let's all call in queer to work: Hello? Can't work today. Still queer.
—Robin Tyler
10 years ago, my dad left highlighted bible passages on the kitchen table for me to find re: abomination, hellfire, “you shall not lie with a man,” etc. Today, he drove my partner to work early this morning because it was raining and he didn’t want him to get wet.
—Tweet by University of Florida student Matt Vekakis, which went viral and received over 132,000 likes.
“I am so incredibly grateful. Hopefully I can send a positive message to the nerdy trans girl who wants to be on the show, too.”
—Openly-trans Jeopardy! champion Amy Schneider, who won 40 games (2nd-longest streak in the show’s history) and racked up winnings of $1.3 million.
And our perennial favorite...
“I had the experience with The Joy of Gay Sex, when it was being distributed in Canada, that a woman thought she was buying The Joy of Cooking. She went home and looked up "chicken" and was absolutely appalled. She created a tremendous fuss.”
—Author Edmund White
A tip 'o the tiara to the legion of straight supporters here at Daily Kos for your unequivocal support of the LGBTQ community, both within and beyond these crazy orange walls. Achieving equality isn't possible without you on board, and every victory we celebrate is yours, too. So, thanks. I've begun the paperwork to adopt all of you.
And now, our feature presentation...
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Cheers and Jeers for Thursday, June 30, 2022
Note: Here's the posting schedule for ye olde holiday. Tomorrow evening we'll post our usual evening C&J, followed Monday by our annual July 4, 1776 edition. (Fair warning: we link to a painting that shows a woman's boob, so be sure to gather all the children around to read it with you.) Then back to normal C&Js Tuesday. And what is C&J exactly? In the immortal words of Ben Franklin: "A blog post…if you can keep it."
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til Video Game Day: 8
Days 'til the Corn & Clover Carnival in Hinckley, Minnesota: 8
Percent chance that the G-7 leaders meeting in Germany agreed to impose 'severe and immediate economic costs' on Russia: 100%
Ghislaine Maxwell's sentence for helping Jeffrey Epstein run his underage sex trafficking ring: 20 years
Amount Ernst & Young was fined by the government for allowing some of its auditors to cheat on exams for several years: $100 million
Age of Mel Brooks as of Tuesday: 96
U.S. towns with Independence in their name: 11
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Your Thursday Molly Ivins Moment:
Happy birthday, America! Ye Olde Fourth of July rolls around again and finds the Great Nation in, frankly, a somewhat pissy mood. Lots of blame game, name-slinging and general unpleasantness. But there's always an upside. The vice president reports that if you go ahead and let fly with the f-word, it makes you feel better. Anything to get that fun Dick Cheney back to his usual sunny self, I always say.
True, we seem to have had more halcyon national natal days, but if we ignore Iraq for the weekend, we should be able to celebrate our national heritage without punching each other in the eye.
So let's salute all that makes America special, starting with us, the people. Here's to all the musicians from country to hip-hop to rock to classical to jazz to folk to be-bop to norteno to polka to reggae, and to all the fusion forms thereof. Here's to all the artists who get no respect—the washboard players and lute strummers, harmonica blowers and banjo pickers. Here's to their endless generosity in playing special benefits for retired musicians who are ill and have no health insurance, all over America, every night. And here's to the great Ray Charles, bless his heart. May we all hear his version of "America the Beautiful" this holiday.
—July 2004
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Search and rescue…
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CHEERS to the ongoing Trumpocalypse. In the wake of White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson's Tuesday testimony before the House Jan. 6 Committee, during which she confirmed that the attempted armed insurrection was both pre-planned and directed by President Trump, let's see how the ex-president is handling the news at whatever pleasure palace he's hiding out at:
Splot! Splot! Crash! Splot! Crash! Splot! Splot! Splot! Crash! Splot!
Crash! Splot! Splot! Splot! Crash! Splot! Crash! Crash! Splot!
Hello, room service? We’re gonna need more ketchup.
JEERS to the next plague. I don’t want to worry anyone about monkeypox. There's no cause for alarm about monkeypox. The adults are in charge of monitoring monkeypox. We should all just deal with this calmly and oh who am I kidding PANIC PANIC PANIC GET OUT OF MY WAY IT'S THE EFFING MONKEYPOX!!!!!!!!
As cases of monkeypox virus surge in the U.S., the Biden administration will start distributing the monkeypox vaccine across the country, focusing on people most at risk and communities with the highest numbers of cases, White House officials announced Tuesday.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services will send 56,000 doses of the Jynneos vaccine immediately to areas with high transmission. An additional 240,000 doses will be distributed over the next few weeks, with even more to come this summer and fall. Officials expect to make at least 1.6 million doses available by the end of the fall.
States with the highest numbers of cases include California, New York, Illinois and Florida, as well as Washington, D.C., according to the latest count from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In the meantime, I spoke with independent medical expert Dr. Deborah Birx, and she recommends taking these proactive steps to avoid the virus: Ivermectin, bleach injections, and make sure your monkeys sing Happy Birthday To You twice while washing their paws. If all else fails, think Jesus. Together, we'll get through this. But if not, I call dibs on all your stuff.
CHEERS to leveling the playing field. 58 years ago this week, in 1964, President Johnson signed into law a sweeping civil rights bill originally introduced by JFK that secured "equal rights in voting, education, public accommodations, union membership and in federally assisted programs—regardless of race, color, religion or national origin." And that sure pissed off the asshole wing of the American public:
During the debate on the bill, segregationist politicians from America's deep south expressed their disappointment and anger.
Congressman Howard Smith of Virginia called it a "monstrous oppression of the people."
How sweet to know that today's racist apples don’t fall far from the crazy tree. Even with the murders, racial profiling, voter suppression, and church burnings, a huge swath of today's conservatives seem to believe that overt discrimination against minorities is a thing of the past, and America is now guilty of discrimination against the poor, defenseless white people. Frankly, I believe that, too. But only when I'm smokin' something really wacky.
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BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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END BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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CHEERS and JEERS to gettin' outta Dodge. Triple-A (Motto: “Three times more A’s than the leading A") is out with its July 4th weekend holiday traffic prediction. Nearly 48 million people will be driving, flying, and riding the rails to get to their vacation destination at exactly the same time and at exactly the same place as you. That's up from last year as...
...car travel volume, even with national average gas prices going over the $5 mark, will break previous records as 42 million opt to drive this Independence Day.
Recent issues with air travel and ongoing concerns of cancellations and delays may be driving this increase. In fact, the share of people traveling by air will be the lowest since 2011.
Independence Day will be the second busiest since 2000, as travel volumes continue to trend upwards with no sign of slowing down.
Drivers should expect the longest travel delays heading into the holiday weekend, particularly during the afternoons on Thursday, June 30 and Friday, July 1 as commuters leave work early and mix with holiday travelers.
Triple-A also predicts that it will rescue a couple hundred thousand motorists during the July 4th holiday weekend. For reasons that will eventually be traced back to blind devotion to their GPS instructions, half of them will be rescued from lakes, trees, and quicksand.
CHEERS to he who is laughing last. On June 30, 1520, Montezuma II was murdered as Spanish conquistadors fled the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan. Today he gets his "revenge" by inflicting a certain embarrassing malady on tourists who visit Mexico and drink the water. Now pay attention, class:
When you're slidin' into first and you feel something burst—Diarrhea! Diarrhea!
When you're slidin' into third and you lay a juicy turd—Diarrhea! Diarrhea!
When you're slidin' into home and your shorts are filled with foam—Diarrhea! Diarrhea!
When you're sitting in your Chevy and your pants are wet and heavy—Diarrhea! Diarrhea!
Look at that: history, sports, biology, and industrial engineering. At C&J, school's always in session.
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Ten years ago in C&J: June 30, 2012
CHEERS to infrastructure madness!!!! Like so many spans around the country, the old Veterans Memorial Bridge that crosses the Fore River here in Portland was one scary piece of rusting rivets and crumbling concrete. And for pedestrians and bikers it was a miserable thing to cross. But yesterday officials cut the ribbon on a shiny new replacement. But even though Republicans attended the ribbon cutting, there's no question that the new Veterans Bridge was conceived by Democrats. It actually goes somewhere.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to the titans at the top and JEERS to the buttheads at the bottom. With America's birthday just 4 days away, it seems like a good time to check in and see how the book-learn'd eggheads among us view our leadership in the rearview mirror. For 40 years, Siena College has surveyed over 140 presidential scholars during the second year of the POTUS's first term, asking them to thoughtfully consider their accomplishments in office and rank them accordingly. The top five are pretty much etched in granite, occasionally moving up or down a notch. The top of the class of 2022: FDR, Lincoln, Washington, Teddy Roosevelt, and Thomas Jefferson.
Modern-era Democrats do very well, with Harry Truman at #7, Lyndon Johnson at #8, John F. Kennedy at #9, Barack Obama at #11, and Bill Clinton at #14. And what of our current commander-in-chief?
Joseph Biden enters the ranking after only a year in office at 19th, rated highly on his ability to compromise (9th), court appointments (10th), executive appointments (10th) and integrity (12th), but lower on luck (34th), his relationship with Congress (31st) and his communication ability (30th).
As for modern Republicans? The most favorable of the bunch is Ronald Reagan at an anemic #18, with George Bush Sr.at #20, Nixon at #28, Ford at #30, and George W. Bush at #35. And lest anyone think we judged the previous POTUS too harshly, the panel places Donald Trump nearly dead-last at #44. But in the category of "treason" he's in a class all by his White House china-hurling, limo driver-choking self. Only the best treason, believe me, believe me.
Have a nice Thursday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
Where Things Stand: Bill in Portland Maine Shrugged Off Splashing in the Cheers and Jeers kiddie pool less than 30 minutes after eating. He Then Asked For A Pardon
—TPM
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