This couldn't be happening to a more deserving son-of-a-bit . . . I mean person.
From The Orlando Sentinel (by way of Yahoo News):
Gov. Ron DeSantis had a difficult weekend on the culture war front, re-doubling his defense of the state’s controversial new Black history standards as a new report revealed a now-infamous anti-LGBTQ ad was actually made within the campaign itself. A pro-DeSantis account also tweeted a video that included alleged imagery of a Nazi symbol. Though reports that it had been retweeted by a DeSantis campaign staffer before it was deleted were unconfirmed, Florida Democrats pounced. DeSantis’ continuing cultural battles come amid reports that his presidential bid is planning a “reboot” following worsening poll numbers and a major shedding of cash.
. . . “What’s happened is what might be expected, and I did expect,” said Mac Stipanovich, a former Tallahassee Republican consultant who has been a frequent critic of DeSantis. “The campaign is proving to be a clown car. Malevolent clowns, but clowns just the same.”
And this is just a small portion of a wonderful article chock full of DeSantis campaign missteps, blatant lies, and pitiful evasions, all of which gives us a front row seat of what happens when an empty suit decides to run for president without any integrity or substance to back up his verbal bravado. The DeSantis campaign is so bad, one has to wonder if it is a victim of deliberate internal sabotage.
DeSantis is also facing negative press in other areas which are not included in the article, such as his threat to sue Bud Light over its partnership with trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney and a leaked transcript from a canceled Showtime documentary about his time as a junior Navy officer at the Guantánamo prison camp. The transcript alleges that he was present at force feedings and tortures of prisoners.
I know how some folks feel about trans women and girls (strangely the concern hardly ever touches trans men and boys) competing in sports, but here is something to consider. In spite of all of the preconceived notions fueling opposition to trans female athletes, maybe there is simply no concrete evidence that trans females have an unfair advantage over cis female athletes.
From Metro Weekly:
A federal judge has blocked Arizona from enforcing a law prohibiting transgender athletes from competing in female-designated sports. U.S. District Judge Jennifer Zipps, of the District of Arizona, granted a preliminary injunction blocking the state from enforcing the Save Women’s Sports Act. The law prohibits transgender female athletes from competing in sports matching their gender identity and allows cisgender students to sue for damages if they believe they have lost out on an athletic opportunity after being forced to compete against a transgender athlete.The ban on transgender athletes was challenged by a 15-year-old volleyball player, referred to as Megan Roe, and an 11-year-old, referred to as Jane Doe, who wishes to play girls’ soccer, basketball and cross-country. Because neither has yet undergone male puberty, and both are on puberty blockers, they argue they don’t have a physical or physiological advantage and should be allowed to compete on teams matching their gender identity.In her order granting the injunction, Zipps found that the law is “overly broad” because it bans transgender female athletes, including those at the elementary school level, from girls’ sports teams, despite the lack of evidence proving that pre-pubertal athletes hold some physiological or unfair competitive advantage over other children based solely on their assigned sex at birth. She also noted that the ban treats transgender boys and transgender girls differently, noting that transgender boys — whom the state and proponents of the ban refer to as “biological girls” — are permitted to play on male-designated teams, despite the alleged physical risks that they would presumably face by competing against “biological male” athletes.Zipps also noted that, under the law, even cisgender female athletes can be investigated and forced to submit to genetic testing to “prove” their biological sex.
Florida Gov Ron DeSantis obviously didn't get the message that his law banning drag performances was a bad idea when a judge issued a preliminary injunction against it last month. So, like a hardheaded child, his administration tried to sidestep a "no."
And got knocked back.
From The Associated Press:
Librarians who feared fines for hosting drag queen story hours and Pride parade organizers who worried about citations for including drag performers can breathe easier now that a judge has ruled that his injunction blocking Florida’s anti-drag law extends to all Florida venues, an attorney who is helping challenge the law said Thursday.
A pair of orders that U.S. District Judge Gregory Presnell issued in the past month makes clear that drag performances in themselves are not lewd or lascivious behavior, said Gary Israel, one of the attorneys for an Orlando restaurant that filed a lawsuit challenging the new Florida law championed by Gov. Ron DeSantis as unconstitutional.
“The state has a very weak hand in this litigation,” Israel said.
In his first order last month, the Orlando judge granted a preliminary injunction temporarily halting enforcement of the law until a trial is held to determine its constitutionality. He also denied a Florida licensing and regulatory agency’s request to dismiss the lawsuit. The agency appealed the decision and asked that during the appeal the injunction only be applied to the restaurant that brought the lawsuit.
Presnell rejected that argument on Wednesday, saying any harm to the state of Florida is minimal if the preliminary injunction remains in place, and that all Floridians are potentially parties since free speech is at stake. He reiterated that the law is likely unconstitutional. “Protecting the right to freedom of speech is the epitome of acting in the public interest,” Presnell wrote. “It is no accident that this freedom is enshrined in the First Amendment.”
. . . The new law punished venues for allowing children into “adult live performances.” Though it did not specify drag shows, the sponsor of the legislation said it was aimed at those performances. Venues that violated the law faced fines and the possibility of their liquor licenses being suspended or revoked. Individuals could be charged with a misdemeanor crime.
. . . The lawsuit challenging the new law was brought by the owner of a Hamburger Mary’s restaurant and bar in Orlando, which regularly hosts drag shows, including family-friendly performances on Sundays that children were invited to attend. The restaurant owner said the law was overbroad, was written vaguely and violated First Amendment rights by chilling speech.
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| Former NBA player Enes Kanter turns acknowledgement about LGBTQ+ existence into some nonsense about teaching boys about oral sex. Gets dragged all over Twitter for it. |
A recent incident involving former NBA player Charles Barkley and NBA former player-turned-activist Enes Kanter illustrates the basic idiocy of anti-LGBTQ prejudice.
From Mediate:
Over the weekend, Barkley took the microphone at a Lake Tahoe, California, bar and said he bought Bud Light for everyone. He then called Bud Light critics “rednecks” and “assholes.” “If you’re gay, bless you,” Barkley said. “If you’re transgender, bless you. And if you have a problem with that, fuck you!”
Please note that Barkley said nothing about sexual intercourse, teaching kids about sexual intercourse, or anything vaguely resembling stuff like that. But apparently Kanter heard something to that effect because he sent out this tweet:
I hear what you’re saying Charles Barkley, and yes, we shouldn’t have any problems with the LGBTQ or Trans community. However the problem starts when they try to come for innocent kids.
— Enes FREEDOM (@EnesFreedom) July 18, 2023
Stop pushing this agenda on our youth!
LEAVE KIDS ALONE!!!
We do not need to have literature… pic.twitter.com/MLVXZW5qSP
His exact statement was the following:
I hear what you’re saying Charles Barkley, and yes, we shouldn’t have any problems with the LGBTQ or Trans community.
However the problem starts when they try to come for innocent kids. Stop pushing this agenda on our youth! LEAVE KIDS ALONE!!!
We do not need to have literature in schools that show boys how to suck di*k
My fellow LGBTQ+ folks, how many times has this happened to you? You simply mention (usually for a point of clarification) that you are a member of the community and instantly you get accused of trying to talk about your sex life? Or get accused of trying to "shove it down someone's throat." Or told by others that "they don't want to hear about it" (whatever it may be.)
And then when you point out their basic inanity, they either mention or send to you some cherry-picked nonsense (usually from Twitter) which they think proves their point (while usually having nothing to do with the conversation at hand.)
It's a reality that we have learned to live with it. Some folks are just damned determined to reduce our lives to matters of lurid sexual intercourse. Some folks are simply obsessed with picturing us as a constantly plotting cabal out to "groom" kids and spread communism (or whatever "ism" they fear at the moment) while having lots and lots and LOTS of sex at the same time.
If these idiots gave it a serious thought, they would realize just how ignorant they sound. Or at least envy our stamina if they actually believe we can do all of those things without getting exhausted.
Fortunately, others responding to Kanter's tweet proceeded to call out his absolutely bizarre and disgusting connecting of simply acknowledging the existence of LGBTQ+ folks to teaching kids sex acts (yeah, even I got a shot in):
Whatever, Anita Bryant. That's an ugly beard you've grown since I last saw you in the 1970s.
— Holy Bullies (@holybullies) July 18, 2023
I see you're navigating this culture war in the same way you'd navigate a pick and roll.
— Ben Collins (@oneunderscore__) July 18, 2023
“We do not need to have literature in schools that show boys how to suck di*k”
— Rashaan (@Rashaan_954) July 18, 2023
Just the boys? Why so specific Enes?
— Susan (@tlily1024) July 18, 2023
What school you going to where they teaching kids how to give head pic.twitter.com/CA44rPrpK2
— Harold Stricklin (@hdotstrick) July 18, 2023
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| Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene has made a fool out of her party again. This time with a tone deaf rap video |
While I was never a fan of the Republican party, there was a time in which I had some respect for them. But how can you respect a party whose governing philosophy is all about getting rich from lies, grievances, and the largesse of billionaires funding their naked pursuits of power? Maybe Obama becoming president did break the GOP? Maybe Trump's successful 2016 presidential campaign freed their minds from the so-called shackles of pretending to be respectable. Either way, the Republican party seems to be strapped face down on a airplane descending to the lowest depths of hell.
And the rap video below featuring Congresswoman Majorie Taylor Greene is an example of how nasty the GOP crash will be when it does happen. Greene is like the main character in the fable of The Mischievous Dog in that she is reveling in something which makes her look like a fool. Who is the person rapping in this video? Who cares. Feel free to google him if you want to, but you won't get any answers from me. All he represents is depths of filth the GOP seems to be knee deep in. Obviously, they don't seem to be embarrassed by it, so I will go ahead and be embarrassed for them. Folks may think that losing any sense of shame insulates them from being shamed, but they are generally wrong.
Hey look everyone; the Mayor of MAGAVILLE, it's the official MTG rap video! pic.twitter.com/03FwtWl8w8
— Kenny Akers (@KeneAkers) July 17, 2023
Florida activist and former state legislator Carlos Guillermo Smith got it right with this tweet about how the Ron DeSantis presidential campaign is attempting to use his wife Casey as a political asset.
And how it's actually not a good look.
Mrs. DeSantis is obviously copying Bryant's modus operandi of scapegoating LGBTQ people, even down to the 'recruiting' narrative. While I certainly don't wish ruin for the DeSantis marriage, I sincerely hope this desperate shift from Ron DeSantis to his wife as sort of fiercely protective "grizzly mother" helps to wreck his flailing presidential campaign.
It certainly appears so.
Don't let the right fool you with their false narratives about fired up parents supposedly being solely on their side. LGBTQ kids have parents too and they don't need any astroturfed groups to manufacture the fire for them. They bring their own, like this mother recently did in front of the Wilson School Board in Tennessee as she defended not only her child, but other LGBTQ students, from bigoted school board policies.
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| South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem is having problems. And she deserves those problems. |
It has always been a grift. From The Daily Beast by the way of JoeMyGod:
After Bud Light’s brief partnership with a transgender influencer sparked right-wing outrage, Kid Rock established himself as one of the brand’s strongest critics. But CNN’s recent visit to his signature bar in Nashville— Kid Rock’s Big Ass Honky Tonk & Rock ‘n’ Roll Steakhouse—told a different story. “Despite the online bravado, and talk of a boycott, Bud Light was available when CNN stopped in recently,” CNN reporter Ryan Young said in a segment that aired Tuesday morning. “It is not clear if the ban had been lifted or if there ever had been one to begin with.” The visit by CNN comes after some patrons had posted on social media about spotting Bud Light at the bar. After Bud Light sent free beer to transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney, Kid Rock filmed himself shooting up a case of the iconic beer.
This really isn't a new development. Newsweek reported the same thing last week:
Despite his vocal opposition to Bud Light, Kid Rock's Tennessee bar is still selling the beer, according to a Newsweek source. Kid Rock was one of the first to publicly dismiss Bud Light and its parent company Anheuser-Busch InBev, filming a video of himself shooting crates of the drink with an assault rifle after the brand sent transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney a personalized beer can.
This reaction made it surprising to some when it was claimed in June that the Kid Rock's Big Ass Honky Tonk Rock N' Roll Steakhouse was still selling Bud Light. another social media user seemed to dismiss this with a viral video, saying it wasn't sold there, but a source has come forward to Newsweek, showing pictures of Bud Light being sold and drunk at Kid Rock's establishment.
And that article made reference to a June tweet proving the same thing:
In other words, this is hardly a new or shocking development. If anything, it underscores just how lazy and overpaid some members of the American media are. Most likely very few will note this stunning degree of hypocrisy because the Bud Light controversy has run its course. It's no longer a hot item for the media to waste time with frivolous debates about the trans community (but talking to very few members of the trans community) while convincing themselves that they doing hard hitting work.
Cut them some slack. They're practically bending over backwards to justify to themselves the embarrassingly large paychecks they receive year after year. The real shame is that this newest revelation would create a fruitful discussion about how people can easily be manipulated into a frenzy over something as irrelevant as a little beer campaign featuring a transgender woman. And also about how it has led to more vilification against trans Americans.
But I doubt anyone is going to talk about that.
The only person who probably gained from all of this this is Kid Rock. He got an obscenely large amount of attention by helping to usher a boycott against a beer which he continued to sell during said boycott. He's probably laughing at all of the trouble he caused.
Then again, knowing Kid Rock, he's probably doing this to us all:
A victory in Wisconsin underscores just how ugly attacks against the trans community are.
From NBC News:
A federal judge has blocked a Wisconsin school district from requiring transgender students to use bathrooms and locker rooms that match the sex they were assigned at birth while a lawsuit plays out against the school. U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman said Thursday that the Mukwonago Area School District must allow a transgender student to use facilities that align with their gender identity, temporarily blocking a policy approved last month by the school board, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.
The order comes in a lawsuit brought anonymously by an 11-year-old transgender student and her mother. The judge ruled that the school’s policy was causing emotional and mental harm to the student, who was described as a boy at birth but has identified as a girl since she was three years old.
It's an 11-year-old child. Why is a policy attempting to force her to use the boys' bathroom necessary? Who is she hurting? From the way some people behave about this sort of thing, one would thing she was doing something other than normal bodily functions. Headlines from far-right publication prove that point by attempting to paint a lurid picture:
Clinton-Appointed Liberal Judge Rules Wisconsin School Must Let Trans-Identifying Biological Male Students Use Girls’ RestroomThe judge’s decision blocks the district from keeping the 11-year-old boy out of the girls’ bathroom. The temporary restraining order states that the boy has been using the girls’ bathroom since he was in third grade and is entering sixth grade. The boy is reportedly currently attending summer school and was told by school district staff that he must use either the boys’ bathroom or a gender-neutral option. The restraining order also says the boy is suffering “emotional and mental harms” due to the bathroom policy.
Saturday's ridiculous ruling by federal court ruling that Tennessee's ban on gender-affirming care for trans kids can temporarily go into effect was an anomaly. According to NBC News, a majority of the recent laws passed to undermine LGBTQ rights have been falling in courts.
A record number of bills aimed at restricting the rights of LGBTQ people have become law in the past three years, but the majority of those that have faced legal challenges haven’t held up in court, according to an NBC News analysis, legal experts and the American Civil Liberties Union, which has filed legal challenges against some of the laws.Of the 20 states that have passed into law restrictions on transition-related care for transgender minors, 11 have faced lawsuits. Five — Arkansas, Alabama, Indiana, Kentucky and Florida — have had their restrictions completely or partially blocked by federal judges who ruled they violated the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause. Oklahoma’s has been iced by a legal agreement while litigation continues.Tennessee’s care restriction was temporarily blocked by a federal court last month, but an appeals court lifted the injunction Friday, marking a rare loss in a series of legal victories for advocates fighting against transgender bans. The four other lawsuits over similar restrictions in Georgia, Idaho, Montana and Nebraska are still pending . . .
Twenty-two states have passed laws that bar transgender student athletes from participating on school sports teams that align with their gender identities, and judges last year temporarily blocked three of those in Idaho, West Virginia and Utah pending the outcome of litigation, according to the Movement Advancement Project. A federal judge in Montana also permanently struck down the state’s ban on transgender women playing on collegiate sports teams in September.Laws that explicitly restrict drag shows have been passed in two states, Montana and Tennessee, though an additional four states — Arkansas, Florida, North Dakota and Texas — passed laws that regulate “adult” performances, which LGBTQ advocates say could be used to target drag performers. Last month, federal judges declared Tennessee’s restriction unconstitutional and temporarily blocked Florida’s. Three Montanans sued the state Friday over its drag-restriction law.Paul Smith, who successfully argued the 2003 landmark Supreme Court case Lawrence v. Texas, which found the U.S.’s remaining sodomy laws unconstitutional, said the repeated victories for LGBTQ people and advocates are “a sign that these laws are mostly being thought up based on their appeal to a certain frenzied group of people in the country who were very excited about picking on LGBTQ people right now, not based on their legal merits and sustainability.
The legal experts interviewed by NBC News were split on which of the cases could make it to the Supreme Court, but most of them agreed that drag restrictions would be the least likely to hold up, and that it would be harder to predict how the court would rule on transition-related care restrictions.Craig Konnoth, a University of Virginia law professor who previously served as a deputy solicitor general with the California Department of Justice, said the drag ban cases in particular have “a pretty good chance of continuing to win, even if it goes up to the Supreme Court.”“I think that with respect to health care decisions, after Dobbs, I am hesitant to say anything about the right of individuals to be able to access health care,” he said, referring to the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade and eliminated the constitutional right to abortion.
