Target and ICE

A coalition of justice and religious organizations asked people to contact Target on February 11 to protest its cooperation with the assault on the people of Minneapolis by ICE and CBP. 

The following is my contribution, sent to the managers of the two Target stores closest to me. 

-

February 11, 2026

To the Manager:

I can remember a time just a few years ago when I spoke to the manager of my local Target to thank them for resisting the fear mongers and bigots who were demanding the chain strip down all its LGBTQ+ clothing and items on display for Pride Month. 

I wish I could still visit the stores of that corporation, the one that had a tradition of advocating for the rights of LGBTQ+ people, of Black and other nonwhite people, and of advocating for social and racial justice.

I don't know what happened to that company, I don't know just how or when the change occurred, but I do know it collapsed, it caved, as soon as the right wing and later the Trump White House turned its baleful glance in its direction. 

It scaled way back on its admired DEI programs. Its LGBTQ+ merch for Pride Month was stripped from the front of store, stuck all but hidden in the back - where there was any at all. (There was none in the particular store I mentioned at the top.)  

And now it has not only turned its back on those whose rights it previously championed, it has actively supported the denial of Constitutional and human rights to immigrants - including those lawfully present, not just the vilified "illegal aliens" - by allowing the violent thugs who have become the face of ICE and CBP to stage in its parking lots and standing silent in the harsh light of the racism and xenophobia of the current White House, as loudly declaimed by Stephen Miller, who in an undeniable echo of Hitler's henchmen, declared "America is for Americans and Americans only." 

I would wish to be able to add Target back on my list of places to shop. Right now, I can't. But you can help me take a step in that direction. I realize that you do not speak for the company but as a manager of a Target you are a, perhaps the, face of the company in this community. 

A number of organizations concerned with justice for immigrants have come together with a list of actions we wish to see Target take to disentangle itself from the noxious web of oppression in which it has ensnared itself. As part of that, people have been urged to express in some way on February 11 their concerns about Target's policies. This letter is my small act toward that end. 

I strongly urge you to pass on these demands (and if you wish a copy of this letter) to higher-ups in the company. Target should:  

- publicly call for an immediate end to the ICE “surge” into Minnesota and for ICE and the CBP to leave the state;
- affirm Target as a 4th Amendment Workplace, that is, exercise its 4th Amendment rights and publicly post signage denying entrance to immigration agents who do not have signed judicial warrants as required by law, as well train staff on how to respond when immigration agents arrive at stores;
- publicly call to shut down ICE and lobby Congress for no federal funding for ICE in the budget negotiations; and
- demand any federal officer who kills or harms a civilian be held legally accountable, starting with legitimate investigations and charges by local officials. 

I look forward to any response you wish to offer. My contact information is below.

Free Speech: $35,000 and up

A GOPper in the Florida Senate by the name of Jason Brodeur has introduced a bill, SB1780, "that would deal a devastating blow to freedom of speech in the Sunshine State" in the words of The New Republic.

The bill would make calling someone a racist, sexist, homophobe, or transphobe "defamation per se," that is, by definition, making them grounds for a civil suit of "at least" $35,000 plus attorney's fees and court costs. At the same time, it would restrict defenses available to the target of such a suit by, for example, limiting who could be considered a "public figure" and making it easier to find "actual malice" in the accusation.

In the case of a transphobic or homophobic bigot, as Erin Reed noted, it's even worse.

The bill says that in cases of "sexual orientation or gender identity," a person can't defend themselves against a suit by "citing a plaintiff’s constitutionally protected religious expression or scientific beliefs" (lines 135-145). What that means, in practical reality, is that truth is no defense.

Bigot: "Homosexuals should be killed!"
You: "You're a bigot."
Bigot: "I'm suing you for defamation."
You: "But it's true! You are a bigot!"
Bigot: "Doesn't matter, that's my 'constitutionally protected religious expression.' Pay up."

Upon reading about this bill, I fantasized about someone saying this during debate:

"If it please the Chair, I rise to propose a friendly amendment to my esteemed colleague's bill, one to which I'm sure he'll agree as it pursues the same object of his own. The amendment would add to his list of terms to be presumptively defamatory accusations of 'groomer' and 'pedophile' plus claims of connections to 'the deep state,' in each case whether directed at an individual, group, or organization. I will yield to Mr. Broder for his response."

It wouldn't be accepted, of course, but it would serve to make the actual purpose of the bill even clearer than it already was.

One other thing: The bill is almost a carbon copy of one introduced last session, which died in committee. Hopefully this one will meet the same fate.

But if this did pass and was challenged in court, don't be surprised if the defense included claiming there is no First Amendment issue because the accusations aren't banned, the state is doing nothing to impede your speech, it's merely a matter of defining the legal meaning of certain terms. If the response is that there's a penalty for using those terms, the comeback would be "Maybe so, but the state isn't the one imposing the penalty, so nothing to do with us."

This style of argument - don't actually do it, just enable others to sue over it and so impose self-censorship - is central to the "Don't Say Gay" bill and Florida has become saturated with it even though the roots, if I recall correctly, lie in a Texas bill about abortion.

34.9 - For the Record: UN death penalty vote, IRS no-bid contract, Warren torches Equifax executive, Yahoo data breach growing

For the Record: UN death penalty vote, IRS no-bid contract, Warren torches Equifax executive, Yahoo data breach growing

Next up, we have one of our occasional features. This one is called For the Record, where we cover a few things quickly just to make sure the don't get ignored.

So first, For the Record: On September 27, the U.N. Human Rights Council adopted a resolution on the death penalty. It called on countries "that have not yet abolished the death penalty" not to use it for "crimes" such as apostasy, blasphemy, adultery, and consensual same-sex relations; to ensure that it is not applied in a discriminatory fashion; and not to apply it to persons with mental or intellectual disabilities or who are under 18 or to pregnant women.

That is, it didn't even call for an end to the death penalty but only that those nations that have it do not apply it unjustly. The resolution passed 27-13. The US voted no.

Note that homosexuality is illegal in over 70 countries. In 13 of them, the penalty is death.

For the record: On September 30, the IRS issued a $7.25 million no-bid contract for services to "verify taxpayer identity" and "assist in ongoing identity verification and validations" at the IRS.

The contract was given to Equifax.

For the record: As a natural follow-up that, at a hearing of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs on October 4. Sen. Elizabeth Warren scorched former Equifax CEO Richard Smith, who retired after the September disclosure of a massive security breach that exposed personal information of nearly 150 million Americans.

She forced Smith to admit that Equifax actually profits from data breaches because they create business opportunities for the company to sell services such as credit monitoring to people who now face increase risk of fraud and identity theft.

She was even able to quote Smith as calling fraud a "huge opportunity for us" and noted that Equifax's profits had gone up 80% since 2013 despite having admitted to four separate data breaches in that same time.

Smith didn't even try to refute Warren's argument, perhaps because he doesn't care: Despite being CEO at the time of the breach, he still will collect a $90-million retirement payout.

Finally, For the record: On the other hand, perhaps Smith could have tried to insist the breach was no big deal: After all, it only affected nearly 150 million people.

Meanwhile, the number determined to be affected by Yahoo's 2013 data breach keeps growing. It's now thought to encompass all user accounts, which brings the number of compromised accounts to something like three billion.

32.7 - Outrage(s) of the Week

Outrage(s) of the Week

Finally for this week is our other regular feature, the Outrage of the Week.

I had two possibilities this week, one of which is overall potentially much more significant that the other but that other one is just so cheap, so low, that I found it hard to choose.

So I'll lay them both out. You can decide.

The cheap, low one is from last month.

In November 2016, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services adopted a rule that prohibited nursing homes that accept Medicare or Medicaid funds from including forced arbitration language in their resident contracts.

Forced arbitration - I have talked about this before - is where in order to use a product or service you have to forswear your rights to go to court even as a member of a class action suit and agree to let any dispute be settled by a supposedly neutral arbiter chosen by the corporation whose income depends on being contracted by corporations to handle such arbitrations - which is a good part of the reason why corporations win 93% of the time.

More specifically, it means, in this instance, that in order to get admitted to the nursing home, prospective residents and their families would have to sign away their rights to take the corporation to court and agree that any dispute, even up to allegations of abuse, neglect, or sexual assault, would be settled by such a "neutral" arbiter. Don't agree? You don't get in. Take it or leave it; if you don't, there are others who will so we don't give a damn.

So as of last November, the rule became that nursing homes couldn't do that. Now, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services want to undo that rule and again leave the elderly and their caretakers, at a time when they are under great emotional stress, to the tender mercies of the nursing home industry, which of course has been lobbying and suing over the rule ever since it went into effect.

There is just no other word for this but "low." It is so unfeelingly despicable, so morally outrageous, so ... low, that I don't know what else to say about it.

So let's move on the other other case.

First, you may know this but just to be sure: An amicus brief - properly, amicus curiae, literally "friend of the court" - is a legal brief filed by someone who wants to address some aspect of a case but who is not a party to it. Usually they are filed as support for one side or the other.

The ACLU reports that the TheRump administration has filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court arguing - follow me here - that businesses have a constitutional right to discriminate against LGBTQ people, that a business could properly and rightly put out a sign saying "We Don't Sell To Gays" even if a state or Congress says such discrimination is illegal.

The case revolves around a baker who ran afoul of Colorado's anti-discrimination laws when he refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple and who now wants SCOTUS to free him from any consequences of that. And now the White House has weighed in on his side because they insist it is his constitutional right to be a bigot, not just personally, but in his business dealings.

What makes this especially outrageous - and dangerous - is that the baker and the White House are not even "just" making the hackneyed claim that it's a freedom of religion issue: The baker insists - with White House backing - that creating a wedding cake is an act of creative expression to the point where it makes him a participant in the event, in the celebration, and anyone attending would assume that the cake meant he approved of the union.*

Therefore, the argument goes, denying him the "freedom" to be a bigot, denying him the "freedom" to refuse to serve a same-sex couple, becomes "compelled speech," he is "compelled" to say he supports same-sex marriage, and compelled speech violates the First Amendment.

In other words, they are claiming that not only his freedom of religion is at stake, but his freedom of speech as well.

But where does this logic end? If it's a violation of First Amendment rights to say that you cannot discriminate against others, that you can't be a bigot in your dealings with the public, where does it end? How can it be unconstitutional to say you can't discriminate against LGBTQ people but constitutional to say you can't do it in the case of blacks? or women? or Jews? or Muslims? or anyone else you happen to dislike or disapprove of?

The White House brief tries to thread that needle, claiming that this exemption for bigotry would not apply to discrimination based on race by arguing, in effect, that discrimination based on race is really, really bad - but discrimination based on being LGBTQ? Eh, not so much.

Which just proves that they are as bigoted and un-American as the baker - and every bit as much an outrage.

*Because after all, whenever you see a wedding cake, don't you immediately think about the baker's opinion of the marriage? Yeah, me neither.

32.2 - Clown Award: Nigel and Sally Rowe

Clown Award: Nigel and Sally Rowe

So it seems appropriate that this brings us to our next item, the Clown Award, given as always for meritorious stupidity.

Appropriate because one of our nominees this week is right-wing talk radio host Mark Levin, who recently came out with what may be the stupidest denial argument ever.

On his August 30 show, he listed several scientists: Aristotle, Archimedes, Galileo, Tesla, Faraday, Newton, Pasteur, Einstein, and Edison, mispronouncing Archimedes as "Archie-medes," then asked "What do they all have in common?"

His answer was that none of them ever wrote about human-caused climate change, which, he said, proves that climate change is not about science but about importing "a foreign ideology."

Then we have Kimberley Paige Barnette, a candidate for mayor in Charlotte, NC, who had a big "Vote for Me!" post on her Facebook page which listed among her qualifications "Republican," "smart," "traditional," and "white."

She was running far behind the other candidates. Happily, she stayed there, finishing last.

Next, we have Rand Paul, auditioning for the next remake of Stephen King's "It," proposing that we pay for relief for victims of Harvey and Irma by making equivalent cuts in foreign aid, because after all why shouldn't we let those damn foreigners suffer.

Notably, we have Hillary Clinton, proving yet again that she still doesn't get it. In her new book, she again blames pretty much everybody except herself for losing to the most unpopular presidential candidate ever. Not only the expected targets like sexism and Bernie Sanders - I mean, apparently just that he ran in primaries against her was in and of itself just such a mean, horrible, destructive thing to do - but pretty much everyone and everything within reach.

In fact, she even blames what she calls her biggest gaffe - the bit about "putting coal mines out of business" - on Barack Obama, who she also blames for getting her to "go easy" on Sanders - as if the accusations and innuendos of racism and sexism were "going easy."

She even blamed the energized anti-Trump women-lead marches and demonstrations, asking why weren't they there for her, sniffle.

Nigel Rowe

The only reason she isn't the Clown - well, two reasons, because yes there was someone worse, but this is one - is that the institutional Democratic Party seems at long last to have had enough of her, with even people like Chuck Schumer, Elizabeth Warren, and Joe Biden criticizing her and there appears to be a general feeling, including among donors, that she should just go away. Here's hoping she will take the hint.

Which leaves this week's winners of the Big Red Nose and they are Nigel and Sally Rowe (I only have a picture of Nigel), the Bible-thumping Christian parents of a six-year-old boy attending an unnamed Church of England primary school near Portsmouth, England who are threatening to sue the school because it allowed a boy in their son's class to wear a dress.

They intend to argue that the school has acted without due regard to pupils and not respected their rights to bring up their children according to their biblical beliefs.

In other words, they are saying the school was obligated to insure that every other parent made sure that their own children acted in that school according to the Rowes' beliefs, and those parents' own religious (or lack of religious) beliefs be damned. Only the Rowes' beliefs mattered. And it's hard to imagine anything more transparently clownish than that.

And yet there is more. To top it off, they said it was "simply not the case" that they were demonstrating prejudice against transgender people - even as Nigel Rowe went on BBC to insist that boys are boys and girls are girls and the "way we are" is "within our DNA" and all this transgender nonsense is "a political agenda."

Nigel and Sally Rowe. Yeah. Clowns.

20.9 - Clown Award: Mick Mulvaney

Clown Award: Mick Mulvaney

[Note: Due to time constraints, only Mark Green and Mick Mulvaney were included in the program as broadcast.]

This was a tough week. I felt overloaded with clowns. I kept having more and more clowns and there were simply not enough red noses for all of them. But a choice had to be made, so I did. So first, our runners-up.

The first nominee is former US Rep. Joe Walsh - that's the bad Joe Walsh, not the good Joe Walsh. After Jimmy Kimmel's monologue about his newborn baby needing open heart surgery, which concluded with an appeal for affordable healthcare for all Americans, Walsh took to twitter to say:

"Sorry Jimmy Kimmel: your sad story doesn't obligate me or anybody else to pay for somebody else's health care."

Which is bad and cruel enough and was roundly condemned on Twitter, but Walsh's nomination is based on the fact that a few years ago he was the nation's most notorious deadbeat dad, owing, his wife charged, $117,000 in child support payments. He himself admitted that at one point he didn't pay child support for over two and a-half years.

They reached a settlement in 2012, the details of which are secret, but at the time, his Congressional pay was being garnished for child support to the tune of $2,136 every month.

Care about other people's kids? Why should he when he didn't care about his own?

Our next nominee is Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross.

Mark Green

Speaking at the Milken Institute Global Conference on Monday before an audience that had each paid a minimum of $12,500 to be there, Ross described how TheRump told visiting Chinese President Xi Jinping about the cruise missile attack on Syria on April 6 while the two were have dessert.

The news of the attack, the news of a military assault with all the destruction, death, and risk that involves was, Ross said, "in lieu of after-dinner entertainment."

Okay, I don't need to go on with that one.

Let's not forget Tennessee state Sen. Mark Green, TheRump's nominee for Secretary of the Army.

Green maintains that the purpose of the Second Amendment, despite what it says about being to intended to maintain a militia, is actually about the citizens being able to overthrow the federal government. He's not the only to operating under that particular delusion, but give him credit, he at least is willing to go the whole way, insisting that, quoting:

The citizenry should be allowed to maintain whatever weapon the federal government has. If they can have an aircraft carrier, I ought to be able to have an aircraft carrier.

So that backyard nuke you wanted to build? Totally cool according to Mark Green.

Mick Mulvaney

Oh, by the way, he withdrew due to opposition but not over this - over the fact that he is not only an extreme gun nut, he's also a raging lunatic on LGBTQ issues, including opposing transgender restroom rights because he has a mission to "crush evil."

Much offensiveness and inanity there, but for outright dumb, they all got beat. So this week the winner of the Big Red Nose is Budget Director Mick Mulvaney.

On May 2, he gave a press briefing on the current state of federal budget negotiations, where he spent most of his time talking about the border wall with Mexico even though that amounts to - literally - 0.035% of the budget, during which time he showed a picture of wall construction and then immediately admitted he didn't know where the picture was taken.

But what sold his nomination for me was his statement that, referring to the TheRump administration, "We are competent and we know what we're doing." Which is much like saying "I am not a crook" in that if you feel it necessary to say it, it's really, really, really not a good sign.

Except, that is, a sign that Mick Mulvaney is a clown.

18.2 - Clown Award: Minister Kenneth Adkins

Clown Award: Minister Kenneth Adkins

Next up, the Clown Award, given as always for meritorious stupidity. And this week we had what can only be called a cavalcade of clowns.

I thought of going for the obvious and giving the Clown Award to presidential mouthpiece and Melissa McCarthy impersonator Sean Spicer for his observation that Hitler never used gas on his own people - but you know what, everybody got him for that and I wanted to pick a less-painfully obvious target.

The next possibility was another one that you may already know about. It arises from the fact that "InStyle" magazine used a picture of Amy Schumer in a one-piece swimsuit for its May cover.

Swimsuit designer Dana Duggan took offense at that, tweeting "You could not find anyone better for this cover? Not everyone should wear a bathing suit."

After she got major flak for that trash talk, she ran behind the "It's my freedom of speech" defense. Yeah, Ms. Duggan, but what people like you seem always to forget is yes, you have freedom of speech - but so do we. So quit your whining.

But what makes this especially clownish is that Duggan, who admits she doesn't use plus-size models, said Schumer should not be on the cover, should not be in a swimsuit, that it's a matter of "beauty," and that she's "tired of the media and publications trying to push the FAT agenda," which is "not pretty and not healthy," all while insisting that she was not fat-shaming anyone.

Amy Schumer cover

Dana Duggan

Yeah, well, Dana Duggan, I'm not a particular fan of Amy Schumer but at least whatever fat she may have is spread over her whole body, unlike than yours, which is all in your head.

The next candidate was Jeffrey Lord, a frequent commentator on CNN.

TheRump told the Wall Street Journal this week that he was considering cutting funding for the subsidies that help to cover deductibles and co-pays for low-income people under the AHCA. The idea is that cutting those subsidies would threaten the survival of the program's system in the near term and so would force Democrats to negotiate on repealing the whole act.

In other words, he's threatening to destroy whatever good has come out of the Affordable Health Care Act in order to force Democrats to cooperate in destroying whatever good has come out of the Affordable Health Care Act.

And in a discussion of health care legislation on CNN, that plan, according to Jeffrey Lord, makes Donald TheRump "the Martin Luther King of healthcare."

Sometimes the clownishness just goes without saying.

Here's a good possibility. Valeri Cordón, an elder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints - the Mormons - gave a speech at the church's biannual General Conference the first weekend in April in which he declared that your promise to tithe - that is, to give 10% of your income to the church - outweighs all other obligations, even to the point of letting your children go hungry.

Jeffrey Lord

Of course, Jesus declared "Blessed are the poor, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven" (Luke 6:20-21), told a rich man that to be sure of being saved he should keep the commandments and "go and sell what you have, and give to the poor" (Matthew 19:21), and said "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God" (Matthew 19:24), but when your church is making an estimated $7 billion a year by tithing, who's gonna let a few hungry children spoil things?

But even he could not match the combination of inanity and venality of our winner. So this week the Big Red Nose goes to a Georgia-based preacher named Kenneth Adkins.

It's been not quite a year since Omar Mateen shot up the LGBTQ-oriented Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, killing 49 people and wounding 53 others in the worst mass shooting in US history.

In response to the attack on the nightclub, Adkins tweeted out "Dear Gays, Go sit down somewhere. I know you want some special attention," but "You are sinners who need Jesus."

Valeri Cordón

He came back later to add that the victims got "what they deserve."

Earlier, in 2014, Adkins had helped lead a fight against expanding Jacksonville’s anti-discrimination law to protect LGBTQ people, during which he, among other offenses, portrayed black church leaders who supported expanding the law as slaves being sold on auction blocks. He also - of course - is opposed to transgender rights because of the "sexual predators in the bathroom" nonsense.

Which related to why he is here, because sexual predation is something he was familiar with.

On April 10, Kenneth Adkins was convicted in Brunswick, Georgia of eight counts of sexually molesting a minor: five counts of child molestation, two counts of aggravated child molestation, and one count of enticing a child.

Kenneth Adkins

The jury took just an hour to reach its verdict.

Thus is demonstrated the principle of Karma.

And I would call it an act of, if you will, Christian forbearance that I only call him a - and if you have any doubt about the rightness of the award, consider that one point during the battle over expanding Jacksonville's anti-discrimination ordinance, a fight that, by the way, was won by the good side, Adkins dressed in drag and said on Facebook "I am gonna 'pee' next to your women in the women's bathroom and let's see how you feel," apparently, it appears, blissfully unaware that women's bathrooms do not have urinals and hey, bro', "your women" have undoubtedly already shared a restroom with a transgender women and never knew it.

Call him a bigot, call him a hypocrite, call him a predator, it doesn't change the fact that Kenneth Adkins is a clown.

What's Left #18

Left Side of the Aisle
for the week of April 13-19, 2017

This week:

Good News: NY advances free college tuition
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/education/new-york-becomes-first-state-offer-free-four-year-college-n744561
http://money.cnn.com/2017/04/10/pf/college/suny-cuny-tuition-free-college/index.html
https://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/college-for-all-act-introduced

Clown Award: Minister Kenneth Adkins
http://www.inquisitr.com/4123093/amy-schumers-white-swimsuit-draws-harsh-criticism-does-dana-duggan-wish-she-had-a-bigger-size/
http://toofab.com/2017/04/09/amy-schumer-fires-back-at-designer-who-shes-too-fat-for-a-swimsuit/
http://www.patriotledger.com/entertainment/20170409/scituate-bathing-suit-designer-swimming-in-online-controversy
https://www.aol.com/article/news/2017/04/13/cnn-commentator-called-trump-the-martin-luther-king-of-healthca/22039137/
http://www.cnn.com/2017/04/13/politics/jeffrey-lord-donald-trump-martin-luther-king-cnntv/index.html
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2017/04/03/mormon-leader-tells-followers-to-always-pay-their-tithes-even-if-it-means-their-families-starve/
http://investigations.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/08/13/13262285-mormon-church-earns-7-billion-a-year-from-tithing-analysis-indicates
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2017/04/12/this-pastor-called-gays-sinners-after-pulse-shooting-now-hes-convicted-of-child-molestation/
http://www.watermarkonline.com/2014/08/12/gender-identity-and-expression-added-to-orlandos-anti-discrimination-ordinance/
http://mobile.eurweb.com/2017/04/anti-gay-pastor-who-said-orlando-victims-got-what-they-deserved-found-guilty-of-molesting-teens/

The little Thing: US leads in cyberwar
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-39553250

For the Record: various items
https://www.aol.com/article/news/2017/04/05/influential-conservative-groups-attack-republicans-amid-a-fight/22027641/
https://www.aol.com/article/news/2017/04/04/isis-spokesman-says-the-us-is-being-run-by-an-idiot-in-first-s/22025790/
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-islamic-state-idUSKBN17625H
https://www.aol.com/article/finance/2017/04/05/nivea-is-under-fire-for-an-ad-promoting-the-phrase-white-is-pur/22027158/
https://www.aol.com/article/news/2017/03/29/pair-behind-fake-anti-abortion-videos-charged-with-15-felonies/22017199/
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/27/us/last-charges-dropped-against-abortion-opponents-in-planned-parenthood-case.html?_r=0

Outrage of the Week: militarism unleashed as national policy
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2017/04/13/u-s-military-drops-22000-pound-bomb-on-islamic-state-forces-in-afghanistan/?utm_term=.02e82c45add0
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/04/mother-of-all-bombs/522960/
http://fusion.net/theres-only-like-a-35-chance-trump-knew-about-the-giga-1794306777
http://www.dailykos.com/stories/1652928
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2017/02/09/top-u-s-commander-in-afghanistan-opens-door-to-a-few-thousand-more-troops-deploying-there/
https://www.aol.com/article/news/2017/04/04/trump-is-ordering-airstrikes-at-5-times-the-pace-obama-did/22025999/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/panic-spreads-in-iraq-syria-as-record-numbers-of-civilians-are-reported-killed-in-us-strikes/2017/03/28/3cbce7f8-13bb-11e7-bb16-269934184168_story.html?utm_term=.0548a0adbfbc
http://blogs.cfr.org/zenko/2016/01/07/how-many-bombs-did-the-united-states-drop-in-2015/
http://blogs.cfr.org/zenko/2017/01/05/bombs-dropped-in-2016/

250.7 - Orlando and terrorism

Orlando and terrorism

[Note: I have broken my discussion of the Orlando shooting into four parts for convenience.]

But as the saying goes, "facts are stubborn things" and I have been somewhat encouraged by the fact that over the past day, that is, as I do this on Wednesday, the storyline is slowly, reluctantly, but clearly being dragged toward describing the heinous event as a hate crime rather than one of terrorism, particularly Islamic terrorism.

The difference matters in more than legal technicalities of what defines either hate crime or terrorism. It matters in understanding what happened and what is means for our society.

Calling something terrorism suggests that it was intended to affect more than the immediate target - that, in this case, it was intended to terrorize the entire LGBTQ community with thoughts of similar fates.

But frankly, I wonder, based on my reading of Omar Mateen, if such terrorizing was part of his motivation. Maybe it was, in which case this reasonably could be called terrorism, but I wonder if it wasn't more strictly, as I described it earlier, an explosion of self-loathing turned outward. An act of pure, unrestrained, blind, hatred.

There is also more than a hint here of what is called "suicide by cop," which refers to situations where someone acts in a way where they appear to be deliberately provoking police to shoot them, to carry out the death sentence they feel unable to impose on themselves.

If Omar Mateen had wished solely to carry out an act of terrorism, particularly one in support of some religious fundamentalism or another, he could easily have fled the scene, as the attackers in Paris, for example, or the Boston Marathon bombers, did. He had more than enough opportunity. But he didn't. Instead he stayed, he holed up, he announced via that 911 call that he was an ISIS terrorist, in subsequent conversations with cops he claimed things like he was going to strap bombs to various people and place them around the building, he did pretty much everything short of saying "Come get me, coppers!"

Until finally, perhaps to his ultimate relief, they did.

So why it is important that we see this more as a hate crime than terrorism? Because as long as we maintain the "terrorism" narrative, we can continue to tell ourselves that it is primarily a case of the "other," the "alien," not by citizenship but by nature, the "alien" in our midst, that it is not about us in any way other than as victims.

But if we face the fact, as we should, that this was not an act of terrorism by any but the most general meaning of the word, that this was an act of hatred based in homophobia, then we have to recognize that for all the strides that have been made over the past couple of decades, for all the celebrations we have been able to have over gains of rights, for all the gains in acceptance we have been able to watch, still, as Phil Ochs sang in a different context but still it fits, "beneath the greatest love is a hurricane of hate."

Orlando was a bursting forth of the hurricane of hate which our LBGTQ brothers and sisters still face, a hurricane of hate perfectly illustrated by a Baptist pastor from Sacramento, California named Roger Jimenez who just hours after the massacre preached to his congregation "Are you sad that 50 pedophiles were killed today? I think that's great. I think that helps society. I think Orlando, Florida's a little safer tonight."

A hurricane of hate of which Orlando is but one gale. A hurricane of hate that despite the gains has yet to blow itself out.

And that is what should be the lesson of Orlando - that, and that we have too damn many guns and they are too damn easy to get.

Sources cited in links:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFi7_U1a9VA
http://www.aol.com/article/2016/06/14/baptist-pastor-applauds-orlando-shooting/21395110/

250.6 - Orlando and the media

Orlando and the media

[Note: I have broken my discussion of the Orlando shooting into four parts for convenience.]

So it does look like Omar Mateen was a disturbed individual, disturbed in a way that makes him almost a poster boy for our "violence has nothing to do with us" evasions.

But unlike so many other mass killers, he is being denied that narrative as another narrative is foisted on us. And I can tell you exactly when that happened: when we found out his name was Omar Mateen.

Initially, news accounts called the tragedy a "shooting" and continued to do so for hours after officials said it was being investigated as an possible act of terror. But as soon as they knew his name, as soon as they knew that while he is a US-born citizen, his parents are from Afghanistan, the storyline changed.

For example: At 9:01am the morning after the attack, CBS News tweeted that the shooter has been IDed as Omar Mateen. Just 10 minutes later, its description of the event had changed from a "shooting" to a potential case of "Islamic terrorism."

Other media outlets quickly fell in line and what had been a "shooting" became a possible and soon thereafter an unquestioned act of Islamic terrorism. Once they knew the accused murderer was named Omar. That's all they needed.

In fact, an early version of Reuters' article about the shooting (since changed) spent the first two or three sentences going on about "missed red flags" of "Islamist leanings" and the need for "better security," and then immediately thereafter - literally the very next words - said quote "much remains unknown" about Mateen's motives. We don't know why he did it, but so what? Red flags! Islamist leanings! Security! Be afraid!

Every hint of some possible connection to some radical Islamist individual or group was reported breathlessly. Past FBI investigations were mentioned over and over and over. The fact that the FBI investigated him and found nothing there could not be allowed to be an indication that there is nothing there, it had to be proof of "missed red flags."

A big deal was made out of the report that Mateen and his wife Noor Zahi Salman visited Walt Disney World in April. Oh my God! He was scouting the site! The idea that maybe he was just going to Disney World with his wife and kid was beyond the imagining of our media moguls. I'm sure at some point went to local supermarket, another place where there can be a lot of people around with minimal security. Scoping it out!

But of course the big deal was that he claimed to be a supporter of Daeah - of ISIS - in a 911 call he made during the attack. Proof it's Islamic terrorism!

Except: He had previously claimed to be a supporter of both al-Qaeda and al-Nusra front, even though the three - al-Qaeda, ISIS, and al-Nusra are all bitter rivals, in fact the latter two are fighting each other in Syria - but he also claimed to be a member of Hezbollah, even though Hezbollah is Shiite and the other three are Sunni!

FBI Director James Comey said "It's not entirely clear at this point just what terrorist group he aspired to support." Or, as a senior US official put it more pointedly to the Wall Street Journal, "He seems to be looking for any opportunity to associate with the terrorist group du jour." Which sounds less like some religious fanatic and more like someone who feels powerless trying to feel more powerful by connecting to something "big."

Oh, and speaking of religious fanaticism, recall the description of him going to Pulse and getting drunk. You do remember hearing at some point that getting drunk is forbidden in Islam, don't you?

But of course none of that could be allowed to derail the narrative, so we had some "expert" saying that his conflicting claims of loyalty are to be expected from a "low-level" follower. That is, if you claim allegiance to some radical Muslim group, that proves you're an Islamist terrorist. Claim to follow a bunch of different, conflicting, groups, and that really proves you are an Islamist terrorist.

Likewise, the failure to find any connection between Mateen and any group simply proved he had been "radicalized online." The idea that, whatever his political belief may or may not have been, the idea that his murderous was not driven by religious fanaticism or indeed by any fanaticism other than fanatical hatred, hatred of LGBT people, simply was not entertained.

Our media has been, as is all too common, a miserable failure.

Sources cited in links:
http://fair.org/home/when-media-learned-killers-ethnicity-then-they-knew-to-call-it-terrorism/
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-florida-shooting-gunman-idUSKCN0YY11B
http://www.aol.com/article/2016/06/12/fbi-gay-nightclub-shooter-investigated-for-having-ties-to-suici/21393853/
http://www.aol.com/article/2016/06/13/report-orlando-shooter-scouted-disney-world-for-potential-attac/21394481/
http://learningenglish.voanews.com/a/was-the-orlando-shooting-at-gay-nightclub-terrorism-or-a-hate-crime/3375985.html
http://www.opednews.com/articles/If-Omar-Mateen-were-white-by-Trevor-Timm-Guns_Isis_Orlando-Shooting_Shootings-160613-448.html
http://www.businessinsider.com/james-comey-orlando-shooting-omar-mateen-fbi-2016-6
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/06/13/police-orlando-gunman-was-cool-and-calm-during-hostage-standoff/

250.5 - Orlando, Omar Mateen, and homophobia

Orlando, Omar Mateen, and homophobia

Omar Mateen

[Note: I have broken my discussion of the Orlando shooting into four parts for convenience.]

But having said all that, the thing is that the more we learn about Omar Mateen, the more the description of "troubled" seems to fit this case.

His first wife, from a marriage that lasted just four months until, in her words, her famiy rescued her, described Mateen as bipolar, as being violent, as having beaten her.

A co-worker at G4S Security described Mateen as "unhinged and unstable" and said he frequently made homophobic and racial comments. The co-worker said he quit after Mateen began sending him multiple texts a day.

A woman who went to middle school with Mateen called him a "troublemaker in school," including having "punched a teacher." Other stories and accounts along similar lines have emerged.
   
And then there is the issue of his sexuality. Multiple witnesses said Mateen was seen at Pulse, the club where the shooting occurred, on as many as a dozen occasions, with one person saying "Sometimes he would go over in the corner and sit and drink by himself, and other times he would get so drunk he was loud and belligerent."

He is also reported to have used the gay chat and dating app called Jack'd, including exchanging messages on and off for a year with at least one man.

Others reported related experiences, including one man who said Mateen asked him out on a date.

But the same time, there was that co-worker at G4S who said Mateen made homophobic statements and the claim of Mateen's father that Mateen had become enraged a few months before the shooting when they were in downtown Miami and he saw two men kissing each other.

And there of course was the blunt fact of the shooting. The shooting carried out at a LGBTQ nightclub of which he had been a patron.

What all this adds up to, to me, is someone brought up in a home that condemned homosexuality (In a recent video, his father declared "God will punish those involved in homosexuality.") and who hated and struggled with his own homosexual or bisexual desires and leanings until finally his own self-loathing was turned outward.

That is, it seems that this is a case where the label "unstable individual" we like to attach to mass murder actually seems to apply.

Sources cited in links:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/ex-wife-of-suspected-orlando-shooter-he-beat-me/2016/06/12/8a1963b4-30b8-11e6-8ff7-7b6c1998b7a0_story.html
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/283216-former-co-worker-of-orlando-nightclub-shooter-he-was-unhinged
http://www.aol.com/article/2016/06/12/what-we-know-about-orlando-nightclub-shooter-omar-mateen/21393742/
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/14/omar-mateen-gay-men-terrorism-pulse-jackd-sexuality
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-orlando-nightclub-shooting-20160613-snap-story.html
http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/ex-wife-pulse-patrons-omar-mateen-was-gay-regularly-attended-lgbt-nightclubs

250.4 - Orlando and guns

Orlando and guns

[Note: I have broken my discussion of the Orlando shooting into four parts for convenience.]

The topic of guns just leads us to the elephant in the room: Orlando. Orlando. Which will now be invoked in the same tones as Newtown, Aurora, San Bernadino, Columbine, and the rest.

In the early hours of Sunday, June 12, a man named Omar Mateen walked into a LGBTQ nightclub called Pulse in Orlando, Florida, armed with a Sig Sauer MCX, reasonably described as an "AR-15 type" semi-automatic assault rifle, and a .9mm Glock pistol. He opened fire.

When it was all over three hours later, 50 people, including Mateen, were dead and 53 more wounded.

And once again we have to face up to the reality, the reality we try so hard to ignore, to forget, of mass violence in America. And the reality that the common denominator in almost all of these cases is an "AR-15 type" assault rifle and don't give me any crap about "there's no such thing as an assault rifle" or the fallback that it isn't an assault rifle because it's not fully automatic and the rest of the evasive, self-serving bull. The fact that it can fire repeatedly as fast as you can pull the trigger - about 45 rounds a minute - and the fact that it can carry high-capacity magazines and that it has repeatedly proved its value in committing mass murder are more than enough to overcome those weasel word objections.

The exact number of mass shootings we experience and have experienced depends on how you define the term: how many have to die to call it a mass shooting; how many injured; do any of the victims have to die for it to be a mass shooting since the victims were, after all, shot; does it have to be a single incident or can it be multiple incidents - think the Virginia Tech shooting - and if multiple how close do they have to be geographically or chronologically; the arguments about the details of definitions go on. But what is clear is that by any definition, the home base of mass shootings is the US.

Using its own measure of mass shootings, the FBI found that from 1966 to 2012, just under a third of all the mass shootings that took place anywhere in the entire world too place in the US - even though we have just 5% of the world's population.

We have too damn many guns and they are too damn easy to get.

And even that dramatically understates the daily carnage guns bring to the US, the vast, vast majority of which do not involve mass killings or shootings but are the slow daily grind of blood.

The graphic comes from work compiled by the Washington Post and reflects figures for the US for the year 2015.

25,000 gun-related injuries. That's more than 68 a day.
12,000 gun-related deaths, half of them suicides. That's nearly 33 a day.
But just 39 deaths from mass shootings: just over 0.3% of total gun deaths.

Mass shootings, mass tragedies such as at Orlando, get our attention, but they do not truly reflect the daily death toll of guns.

We have too damn many guns and they are too damn easy to get.

And even when we are faced with the latest atrocity, when we are faced with such as Orlando, we have our escape clause, our one-size-fits-all excuse for gun-enabled mayhem: Oh, the shooter was mentally disturbed, not normal, they were "troubled," and what we really need to do is focus on better mental health treatment, certainly not guns!

But that's largely a myth. A satisfying myth that enables us to ignore the looming presence of guns, but a myth nonetheless.

Best and recent research shows no reliable predictive value in associating mental health and gun violence. Put another way, the research says that people with mental illness are no more likely to be violent toward others, especially to commit mass violence, than anyone else is.

We can't simply dismiss the harsh truth of mass violence with the slogan "better mental health programs." They are justified on their own account - but not because they will address the issue of mass shootings, because they will not. They are a gun lobby-pushed distraction.

Sources cited in links:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Orlando_nightclub_shooting
http://www.tampabay.com/news/publicsafety/crime/washington-post-gun-used-by-omar-mateen-a-sig-sauer-mcx-not-an-ar-15/2281735
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/san-bernardino-shooting-assault-weapon-is-common-denominator-in-mass-shootings/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Tech_shooting
http://wgntv.com/2016/06/14/us-home-to-nearly-a-third-of-worlds-mass-shootings/
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/23/us/americas-overlooked-gun-violence.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/national/mass-shootings-in-america/
http://www.care2.com/causes/the-media-is-promoting-a-dangerous-mental-illness-and-violence-myth.html
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4318286/

Left Side of the Aisle #250

Left Side of the Aisle
for the week of June 16-22, 2016

This week:

Good News: LIBOR suit moves forward
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2012/07/left-side-of-aisle-66-part-1.html
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2012/07/left-side-of-aisle-65-part-2.html
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-23/banks-are-ordered-by-court-to-defend-libor-antitrust-lawsuit

Good News:  Supreme Court upholds restrictions on mercury pollution
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/06/13/supreme-court-rejects-case-challenging-key-white-house-air-pollution-regulation/

Good News: Court of Appeals says no right to concealed carry
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/9th-circuit-court-appeals-says-no-right-concealed-gun-carry-n589041
https://pacer-documents.s3.amazonaws.com/3/10-56971/009128111226.pdf
http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/09/politics/concealed-carry-second-amendment/
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2012/12/left-side-of-aisle-87-part-1.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_in_California#Open_carry

[Note: I have broken my discussion of the Orlando shooting into four parts for convenience.]

Orlando and guns
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Orlando_nightclub_shooting
http://www.tampabay.com/news/publicsafety/crime/washington-post-gun-used-by-omar-mateen-a-sig-sauer-mcx-not-an-ar-15/2281735
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/san-bernardino-shooting-assault-weapon-is-common-denominator-in-mass-shootings/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Tech_shooting
http://wgntv.com/2016/06/14/us-home-to-nearly-a-third-of-worlds-mass-shootings/
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/23/us/americas-overlooked-gun-violence.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/national/mass-shootings-in-america/
http://www.care2.com/causes/the-media-is-promoting-a-dangerous-mental-illness-and-violence-myth.html
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4318286/

Orlando, Omar Mateen, and homophobia
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/ex-wife-of-suspected-orlando-shooter-he-beat-me/2016/06/12/8a1963b4-30b8-11e6-8ff7-7b6c1998b7a0_story.html
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/283216-former-co-worker-of-orlando-nightclub-shooter-he-was-unhinged
http://www.aol.com/article/2016/06/12/what-we-know-about-orlando-nightclub-shooter-omar-mateen/21393742/
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/14/omar-mateen-gay-men-terrorism-pulse-jackd-sexuality
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-orlando-nightclub-shooting-20160613-snap-story.html
http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/ex-wife-pulse-patrons-omar-mateen-was-gay-regularly-attended-lgbt-nightclubs

Orlando and the media
http://fair.org/home/when-media-learned-killers-ethnicity-then-they-knew-to-call-it-terrorism/
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-florida-shooting-gunman-idUSKCN0YY11B
http://www.aol.com/article/2016/06/12/fbi-gay-nightclub-shooter-investigated-for-having-ties-to-suici/21393853/
http://www.aol.com/article/2016/06/13/report-orlando-shooter-scouted-disney-world-for-potential-attac/21394481/
http://learningenglish.voanews.com/a/was-the-orlando-shooting-at-gay-nightclub-terrorism-or-a-hate-crime/3375985.html
http://www.opednews.com/articles/If-Omar-Mateen-were-white-by-Trevor-Timm-Guns_Isis_Orlando-Shooting_Shootings-160613-448.html
http://www.businessinsider.com/james-comey-orlando-shooting-omar-mateen-fbi-2016-6
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/06/13/police-orlando-gunman-was-cool-and-calm-during-hostage-standoff/

Orlando and terrorism
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFi7_U1a9VA
http://www.aol.com/article/2016/06/14/baptist-pastor-applauds-orlando-shooting/21395110/

Update: what to expect from Hillary Clinton
http://www.salon.com/2016/05/09/hillary_clinton_is_wall_streets_preferred_candidate_financial_execs_pouring_millions_into_her_campaign_to_defeat_trum/
http://www.salon.com/2016/04/26/a_progressive_in_name_only_charles_koch_joins_a_long_list_of_right_wingers_who_have_lauded_hillary_clinton/
http://www.salon.com/2016/06/10/another_neocon_endorses_clinton_calling_her_2016s_real_conservative_and_the_candidate_of_the_status_quo/
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/24/magazine/how-hillary-clinton-became-a-hawk.html?_r=0

240.6 - Clown Award: Immigration Judge Jack Weil

Clown Award: Immigration Judge Jack Weil

Now for one of our regular features; it's the Clown Award, given as always for meritorious stupidity. And this week we again had multiple contenders, narrowed down to two finalists.

First up: So, you think that same-sex couples have the right to get married? Well, yeah, they do, but do they have the right to get matrimonied?

Kentucky State Rep. Joseph Fischer has introduced a bill called the "Matrimonial Freedom Act" that creates the new status of "matrimony" which is legally separate from "marriage" because any two adults can marry, but only if they are of the opposite sex can they have a "matrimony."

The bill then proceeds for 450 pages, meticulously adding language about "matrimony" to any provision in state law that defines the basic parameters of marriage - and then, in any provision that describes a privilege, benefit, or responsibility of marriage, the word "marriage" is replaced by the word "matrimony," effectively stripping same-sex couples of any and all benefits of marriage.

The reason this is so laughable is that it is painfully obvious that this would never fly in the courts, but I imagine Fischer sitting alone in his dark, silent, office late at night going through the entire state legal code line by line, his brow furrowed in concentration, a bottle of scotch on the desk, a single high-intensity lamp lighting his weary work.

Of course I'm sure he did the whole thing by computer search, but that image just seems more fitting to the undertaking, especially since the bill declares that the Supreme Court has established an "absolute Tyranny over these States," and includes the line "with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor," which, in case you don't recognize it, is the conclusion of the Declaration of Independence.

But believe it or not, he got outclassed.

So this week the Big Red Nose goes to federal immigration judge Jack Weil.

The ACLU and immigration rights groups have filed a class action suit against the federal government, demanding that the government provide appointed counsel for every indigent child who can't afford a lawyer in immigration court proceedings, contending by failing to insure they had access to counsel the Justice Department had violated both due process and the children’s right to a fair trial under the Immigration and Nationality Act. The Justice Department is contesting the suit and this bozo, who has the responsibility of training other immigration judges, is one of the government's chief witnesses.

So what did he do? In a deposition taken in October but just recently released, he declared that providing counsel is unnecessary because "you can do a fair hearing" even with toddlers representing themselves in court, claiming he has "taught immigration law" to 3- and 4-year-olds.

I was going to take down his lame attempt at a defense, his claim this was "not representative of [his] thinking" and was "taken out of context" even though he said much the same thing five different times during the deposition, but then I stopped.

Because I really don't have to go on, do I?

Federal immigration judge Jack Weil: Good gosh, what a clown.

Sources cited in links:
http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2016/03/02/3756017/stupid-kentucky-matrimony-bill/
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justice/2016/0306/Can-toddlers-defend-themselves-in-immigration-court-One-judge-says-so
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/can-a-3-year-old-represent-herself-in-immigration-court-this-judge-thinks-so/2016/03/03/5be59a32-db25-11e5-925f-1d10062cc82d_story.html

227.2 - Clown Award: Rep. Louie Gohmert

Clown Award: Rep. Louie Gohmert

Now for one of our regular features, the Clown Award, given for meritorious stupidity.

Again this week we have a repeat amuser or if you prefer offender. In this case, it is the man who has got to be the stupidest person in Congress, Texas - where else - Congressman Louie Gohmert, the man who puts the Gomer in Gohmert.

He recently gave a speech to students at Liberty University, an ostensibly Christian school founded by Jerry Falwell in Lynchburg, Virginia. In the course of this, he continued his increasingly-lonely crusade against same-sex marriage, which he once compared to bestiality.

He cited the Bible - of course - but then took what he called a "totally secular approach" which should convince even those who don't believe in God that homosexuality is "unnatural." He proposed an "experiment" because, he said, "Congress is good about having studies."

How about if we take four heterosexual couples and put them on an island where they have everything they need to live and exist, and we take four couples of just men and put them on an island where they have all they need to survive, and then let's take four couples of just women and put them on an island. And then lets come back in 100 years and see which one nature favors.

Rep. Louie "Gomer" Gohmert

I would spend a minute explaining why this isn't even a valid experiment (Hint: the conditions on the islands have more than one variable), but that would mean taking seriously for even that time a man who has claimed that opponents same-sex marriage face the same level of persecution as Jews in Nazi Germany, put forth a "Terror Babies" idea where terrorists are coming to the US to have their children born here so they will be citizens who can be raised to commit acts of terror decades later, and supported a pipeline through Alaska because if that flow of warm oil through the pipeline ever stopped, it would be harmful to the sex lives of caribou.

Instead, I'll note that in quoting the Bible on marriage, he mentioned that Jesus said "what God has joined together let no one separate." Now when someone can show me all the times Gohmert condemned and railed against all his conservative colleagues who have had affairs, gotten divorced, or both on the grounds that they were defying God's law, then it might be possible, just possible, to see his drooling antipathy to same-sex marriage as an outgrowth of his extremist fundamentalist convictions rather then out of plain old bigoty against homosexuals, with the Bible the excuse, not the reason.

I do not expect that to happen. Which is why Louie "the Gomer" Gohmert, the stupidest person in Congress, will always remain a clown.

Sources cited in links:
http://www.cnsnews.com/blog/michael-w-chapman/rep-gohmert-put-gays-one-island-straights-another-island-well-see-which-one
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/04/liberty-university-guns-on-campus_n_3017005.html
http://www.politico.com/story/2013/04/louie-gohmert-gay-marriage-comments-089582
http://www.sacurrent.com/Blogs/archives/2015/11/06/bonehead-quote-of-the-week-louie-gohmert-and-the-great-desert-island-experiment

Left Side of the Aisle #227

Left Side of the Aisle
for the week of November 12 - 18, 2015

This week:

Good News: Keystone XL pipeline rejected
http://www.state.gov/secretary/remarks/2015/11/249249.htm
http://climateobserver.org/open-and-shut/indc/
http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21678157-barack-obamas-rejection-oil-pipeline-blessing-and-curse-new-prime
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/259611-keystone-xl-not-dead-yet

Clown Award: Rep. Louie Gohmert
http://www.cnsnews.com/blog/michael-w-chapman/rep-gohmert-put-gays-one-island-straights-another-island-well-see-which-one
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/04/liberty-university-guns-on-campus_n_3017005.html
http://www.politico.com/story/2013/04/louie-gohmert-gay-marriage-comments-089582
http://www.sacurrent.com/Blogs/archives/2015/11/06/bonehead-quote-of-the-week-louie-gohmert-and-the-great-desert-island-experiment

Outrage of the Week: SCOTUS makes it almost impossible to sue killer cops
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/evan-bernick/hollowing-out-civil-right_b_8517138.html
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-supreme-court-police-shootings-20151109-story.html
http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/15pdf/14-1143_f20h.pdf

Hero Award: 11-year-old Will Smith
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/exclusive-sale-daniel-murphy-bat-nixed-historic-hr-article-1.2410947
http://www.foxbusiness.com/industries/2015/10/28/11-year-old-mets-fan-duped-by-topps-gives-refund-to-jackie-robinson-foundation/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Murphy_%28baseball%29
http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/mets/billy-bean-mlb-inclusion-ambassador-visits-mets-article-1.2135840
http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/mets/young-mets-fan-signed-daniel-murphy-bat-article-1.2411779
http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/jackie-robinson
http://www.jackierobinson.org/

Heroics: Soldiers are not heroes
http://www.military.com/daily-news/2015/11/11/veterans-group-wants-return-of-armistice-day.html
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2008/06/heroics.html
http://crooksandliars.com/2008/06/10/sen-webb-on-the-daily-show-john-mccain-voted-against-a-first-class-future-for-our-veterans
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chickenhawk_%28politics%29
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vI7r6Rjp-g
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ngl33ucB7oE&feature=related
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgNInWQI-qU&feature=related
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rXPrfnU3G0
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2008/02/untucked.html

Left Side of the Aisle 223

Left Side of the Aisle
for the week of October 15-21, 2015

This week:

Company introduces (almost) zero pollution electric bike
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/11904005/French-unveil-world-first-hydrogen-powered-electric-bike-emitting-only-pure-water.html

California adopts Death with Dignity law
http://www.latimes.com/local/political/la-me-pc-gov-brown-end-of-life-bill-20151005-story.html
http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/05/us/california-assisted-dying-legislation/

Signs of acceptance of transgender people
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/10/08/1429134/-Westboro-Baptists-Protest-Transgendered-Homecoming-Queen-High-School-Kids-Force-them-to-Leave
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqG1Ma_NCgs
http://revolution-news.com/westboro-baptist-church-run-out-of-town-high-school-students-in-missouri/

The rise of Indigenous Peoples' Day
http://usuncut.com/black-lives-matter/these-8-cities-just-abolished-columbus-day/
http://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2014/10/12/354274630/seattle-swaps-columbus-day-for-indigenous-peoples-day
http://www.startribune.com/april-26-mpls-city-council-votes-to-recognize-indigenous-people-s-day/256788831/
http://time.com/3495071/indigenous-peoples-day/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbus_Day
http://www.denverpost.com/ci_16158140
http://www.pc.gc.ca/eng/lhn-nhs/nl/meadows/index.aspx
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_among_Native_Americans_in_the_United_States
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardashev_scale
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Borg
http://www.augustana.edu/academics/history/department/witchcraft/tor1.htm
http://io9.com/the-10-most-gruesome-torture-techniques-from-medieval-e-1626942115

Clown Award: Commissioner Karen Miller of Blount County, Tennessee
http://wate.com/2015/10/05/tennessee-equality-project-fights-blount-county-resolution-to-save-county-from-gods-wrath/
https://mgtvwate.files.wordpress.com/2015/10/resolution.pdf

House repeals ban on export of US crude oil
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/10/09/house-oks-lifting-40-year-old-us-ban-on-crude-oil-exports/?intcmp=ob_article_sidebar_video&intcmp=obinsite
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/10/09/republicans-fuming-after-obama-threatens-to-veto-major-energy-bill/

States continue to demonize poor as drug abusers
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2015/10/07/3710190/tennessee-welfare-drug-tests-year-one/
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2015/02/26/3624447/tanf-drug-testing-states/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/welfare-drug-testing_56156d38e4b021e856d344cd
http://www.camh.ca/en/hospital/about_camh/influencing_public_policy/public_policy_submissions/mandatory_drug_testing/Pages/manddrugtesting.aspx

Cleveland prosecutor lays grounds to whitewash killing of Tamir Rice
http://www.cdispatch.com/news/article.asp?aid=45365
http://www.ibtimes.com/tamir-rice-cleveland-shooting-reasonable-independent-probes-what-constitutes-213970

Something about guns
http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/06/04/a-minority-of-americans-own-guns-but-just-how-many-is-unclear/

219.1 - Kim Davis and the religious right

Kim Davis and the religious right

I'm going to go on about this at some length this week because after this I hope to put it aside until there is some real development.

Kim Davis

So Kim Davis has been set free because Judge David Bunning, who jailed her for contempt, said he was satisfied that in her absence her assistant clerks were following the law and issuing marriage licenses to all qualified couples, including same-sex ones.

He did this, I think mistakenly, without obtaining any promise from her that she would not interfere with those assistant clerks continuing to do so, although he did warn her against doing it. Frankly, I don't expect her to follow the law now any more than she did before, particularly since Davis has already told Bunning that she would not allow any same sex marriage licenses to be issued from her office, even if she wasn't the one signing them. So I strongly suspect we will be right back here before too long.

Anyway, she was freed to the cheers of a throng of supporters crying "Amen" and "Praise Jesus" with - get this - "Eye of the Tiger" blaring from the PA.

Which, when you come down to it, is the real issue here: not Kim Davis, but her supporters and what they tell us about the desires and intentions of the right wing and the religious fanatics who have a significant voice in driving it. Kim Davis is not the issue, she is just the current focus of the issue.

So no, Kim Davis is not the real issue. She is one person, but what's significant is that she is one person who is being turned into the symbol, the poster child, for anti-gay bigotry and don't let anybody try to tell you that it's anything else.

Mike Huckabee

Mike Huckleberryhound was at the rally when Davis was released and he said “We don’t gather here because we hate anybody. We gather here today because we love God and this country. And we do not want to see this country become the smoldering remains of a great republic."

And what will make for the US being reduced to smoldering remains? By all appearances, it's being unable to discriminate against LGBT people.

So again, Kim Davis is not the issue. But I want to pause there because there are some things I do want to say about her.

First, I can accept that Kim Davis really does believe what she is saying about same-sex marriage. She is hopelessly, totally, perfectly wrong, morally, ethically, and legally, but I can accept that she really does believe it. What I am curious about is what she believed on the topic before what she calls her conversion experience, which she dates to about four years ago.

Which before I go on brings up something else. I mentioned last week, lots of people mentioned, that she is on her fourth husband - although you could say it's her third because she married the first one, then the second one, then the third one, and then the second one again - and she had twins as the result of an extra-marital affair while married to her first husband.

Now while I think it is relevant to mention all that, it is part of the context, it is part of the history, I don't think we should dwell on it because she will say (and has said) that as part of her conversion she was "forgiven" for all that and that she is a different person now, the latter of which you can accept may well be true even if you don't believe in the former.

However, I still wish someone would ask her what were her views on same-sex marriage before her conversion. Frankly, I would suspect that she held an "anti" view even then - which would mean that she is not against it now because of the Bible but rather that the Bible is now the justification for that prejudice.

Obviously, I don't know that for certain but I'm reasonably confident. First because polls say a majority of those in Kentucky even now are against same-sex marriage and it would be reasonable to expect the figure was even higher four years ago, so she would be part of a heavy majority. And second, because it is a pretty constant pattern for people who have such conversion experiences to not change their social and political opinions in its wake. People generally don't find that if they were tolerant of various things before they suddenly are against them or that if they were intolerant of those things before that now they are suddenly much more open-minded. As a general rule, those sorts of attitudes don't change much. There might be some degree of shift in one direction or the others, some change in emphasis, but overall, not a lot of difference.

So the idea that Kim Davis could be using the Bible as an excuse for her prejudice is not at all unreasonable.

But even so, I can believe that, with all the passion of the new convert, she is sincere in believing it's all about "God's authority." I can believe, that is, that she believes this is for her a matter of conscience. I believe in the power, the dignity, of the human conscience and I believe in the inviolability of the human conscience. As a result, I can respect, even admire, her willingness to go to jail rather than do something she honestly believes is against her conscience.

What I can't accept is her insistence that she should be able to continue as a county clerk, that she should get exactly what those of her ilk are always claiming same-sex couples are after: special treatment, special rights. Which of course same-sex couples aren't, they are only looking for equal rights, but special treatment is exactly what she is demanding.

Your conscience says you can't do the job? I understand - perhaps more than you think, because I have in the past quit a job over a matter of conscience. Which is exactly what she should do: You can't do the job, you quit and do something else. But no, not Kim Davis, not her lawyers, not her supporters, no, they say she gets to keep the job, the rest of us just have to change the rules to suit her.

Rev. Emily Heath

That is what she and her lawyers are demanding: special exemptions carved out for her convenience, special treatment for her so she can deny equal treatment to others. That is hypocrisy.

At least partly in response, Rev. Emily Heath of the United Church of Christ recently wrote about her own decision to not apply for a job as a chaplain in a federal prison because of her opposition to the death penalty, deciding she could not work in a system that upheld the option of killing someone:

"Religious liberty is guaranteed in this country. But that does not mean that every job needs to bend to your particular interpretation of your faith. If you really believe doing your job is violating your faith, then stepping aside would be a small price to pay for the love of the Gospel."

But apparently quitting her $80,000-a-year job is too big a price for Kim Davis.

You want more proof of the hypocrisy? Her lawyers have gone to the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, the same federal court system whose orders she openly and repeatedly defies, demanding it order Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear to let Davis refuse to issue same-sex marriage licenses.

On the other hand, I have to add that maybe, just maybe, its not hypocrisy; maybe its something else. After Kim Davis was jailed, her husband Joe emerged to say "They have illegally put my wife in jail so we’re gonna ask Beshear to do his job or step down.” The lack of self-awareness truly is astounding.

Her supporters have made comparisons to Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks. Are they kidding or just nitwits, I say before noting they are not famed for their sense of humor.

Rosa Parks was a private citizen defying what she knew to be the law for the purpose of challenging it for the benefit of an entire community. Kim Davis is a public official, charged with following the law, who wants an exemption from her duties just for herself. As John Culhane put it at Politico.com, Kim Davis is "Rosa Parks' bus driver, denying a service to the public."

The comparisons to Dr. King are, if possible, more absurd. Not only was King, like Parks and unlike Davis, acting on behalf of many, but if Kim Davis feels a conflict between the law and her conscience, she is free to stop being a county clerk. When black Americans experience a conflict between the law and their conscience, their dignity as human beings, they are not free to stop being black. There simply is not comparison.

"You will follow my Bible!"

But this brings us back around to what I said was the real issue: not Davis, her supporters. Because like the man in the play said, "Ignorance and fanaticism are forever hungry and need feeding." And Kim Davis is the caterer of the moment.

Because with all their "Praise Jesus"'s and all their woo-hooing of Davis's invocation of "God's law," Davis's supporters are emblematic of the fact that there are those, too many of those, there are those who hold that members of government in their official duties must be allowed to carry them out in accordance with their personal understanding of the Bible - more properly, with the fundamentalists' understanding of the Bible. That is, what the shouted "Amens!" of the Bible-thumpers amount to is a declaration that the Bible, their interpretation of the Bible, overrules civil law - which, if it's not a working definition of a theocracy, I can't imagine what would be.

Oh, but "Wait, wait!" we'll get told! "It's the other way around! Its religious freedom! You're oppressing our religious freedom!"

Rev. Heath had a good response to that nonsense:

When someone is being asked to follow the law, and issue a marriage license, and they say they are being persecuted, I just don't buy it. You are being no more persecuted than I was when I decided not to be a prison chaplain. If you really believe doing your job is against your faith, then quitting would be an act of faith. Defying the law so two people you will never see again can't get married? Not so much.

Unfortunately, there are those, not many but even a handful is too many, there are indee3d those in government who hold that being expected to live up to their oath of office is religious persecution from which they should be freed by being able to decide what parts of that oath they will follow.

A few examples: In  Oregon, in the wake of a May 2014 federal court ruling that made same-sex marriage legal in that state, Marion County Judge Vance Day instructed his staff to refer same-sex couples to other judges and then, apparently wanting to avoid a discrimination claim even though discriminating was exactly what he was doing, stopped performing weddings altogether.

Two other clerks in Kentucky - Casey Davis, no relation, in Casey County, and Kay Schwartz in Whitley County - are also refusing to issue marriage license to same-sex couples based on the same bogus religious-freedom argument. You haven't heard about them because they have not yet been the target of any legal challenges.

And last month, the Ohio Supreme Court’s Board of Professional Conduct found it necessary to say judges can’t refuse to marry same-sex couples on personal, moral, or religious grounds - that is, they can't refuse to do their jobs. The very fact that they had to say it shows just how deep is the determination among some to refuse to face the reality of social change.

Because that's what this is: a refusal to face reality. We knew - or we damn well should have known - that the victory on same-sex marriage at SCOTUS would not be the end of the issue, that the dead-enders would throw up every roadblock they could. And they are doing just that. There is still a fight to be fought on same-sex marriage and even more on the broader question of LGBTQ rights.

But at the same time, let's keep in mind and take heart from what that reality is: The fact is that in most places in this country, same-sex couples can get married without problems, that most of those judges and magistrates and county clerks and whatever who do disapprove of same-sex marriage are saying "my job is to uphold the law so I will," and most of all that the reason Kim Davis is such big news is precisely because she is by far the exception.

Justice is coming, justice will come.

Sources cited in links:
http://time.com/4025308/kentucky-clerk-kim-davis-release/
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/judge-orders-kim-davis-freed-kentucky-jail-n423541
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rev-emily-c-heath/religious-liberty-marriage-licence_b_7985894.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/kentucky-clerk-asks-court-to-force-governor-to-let-her-deny-gay-marriages_55edc301e4b03784e27637ed
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/09/kim-davis-is-no-rosa-parks-213127
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inherit_the_Wind_%28play%29
http://time.com/4023824/oregon-judge-gay-marriages-refusal/?xid=gonewsedit&google_editors_picks=true