Joy Slams Sharron Angle For Racist Ad

Joy Behar called out Tea Klux Klanner Sharron Angle on The View yesterday for the new racist attack ad she released against Sen. Harry Reid.   


Angle pimps the immigration issue again, and this time she drops the maple leafed pretense about being concerned about about immigration on the 49th parallel and aimed it at Latinos.

Joy lit her teabagging azz up and had me saying a hearty 'Amen' to her commentary..

You know, if many of these Dem candidates had gone on the warpath in their races against these GOP know nothings as forcefully as Joy did yesterday, they wouldn't be trailing or tied in their races but blowing these conservafools out once again
  
Tell us how you really feel about homegirl, Joy.

Tomball Refuses To Pass Anti-Immigrant Measures

There's anti-Texas sentiment in liberal-progressive circles that is fueled in large portions due to the extreme dislike of the GW Bush misadministration and the Texas GOP being as nekulturny, homophobic, transphobic and racist as they can be.

It's something that annoys me as a proud daughter of the state who knows its progressive history and is acutely aware of the fact that current Republican control of it is only a recent phenomenon.

Thought I'd hip you Texas haters to a story that isn't getting much coverage in the national press outside of the Houston Chronicle that bolsters mine and a lot of true blue Texans faith in our fellow citizens.

It also points out that progressive attitudes just aren't ensconced in Austin, Dallas, Corpus Christi, El Paso, Houston and the Rio Grande valley.

Tomball is a 'burb in the far northern reaches of Harris County which has had an influx of Latinos throughout the years. For the last month the local Tea Klux Klan has been stirring up anti Latino and anti-immigrant animus over a ten year old day laborer center funded by the city of Tomball.

Tuesday night first term Tomball City Councilman Derek Townsend, Sr. placed two anti immigrant measures on the Tuesday city council calendar in front of a packed city council chamber filled with proponents and opponents of the measures.

Townsend told the audience the usual 'white wing' spin line that his proposals were not about racism, but about standing up for the US Constitution.

Bull feces. One proposal was to make English the official language of the city of Tomball. What was the other one? It sought to prohibit undocumented immigrants from renting, owning property or owning or operating a business there.

So Texas haters, guess which way the Tomball City Council voted? If you said in favor of both proposals, wrong. Both went down in flames.

The Tomball councilmembers besides Derek Townsend probably had in mind what happened to the Dallas suburb of Farmers Branch.

In 2006 Farmers Branch voted to make English the city's official language and followed it up in 2007 with a measure to prohibit landlords from renting property to illegal immigrants. Both ordinances got struck down earlier this year by federal judges as unconstitutional.

"I'd sure hate to take our people down that route," said City Councilman Rick Brown. "It's lawsuit after lawsuit."

Councilman Preston Dodson agreed, saying such a move could have "huge constitutionality issues."

So there you have it, Texas haters. A group of Texas politicians that did the right thing and not the 'right wing' thing.

Imagine that. Now where's my Blue Bell homemade vanilla?

The CCSF TransLatinas Club

I recently joined the Trans Role Models Facebook page and it has been great to see the diversity of the trans rainbow playing out on that site.

It has been refreshing to read about some of our community's historic figures who are being added to the page on an almost hourly basis and people around the world who are out, proud to be trans and fighting for its human rights.

It's also exposing me to people and groups I previously wasn't aware existed or were doing things because it has been happening on the local level.

One of those things happening at the local level is the TransLatinas Club on the City College of San Francisco's Mission Campus.

You don't hear much about the groups and the accomplishments of non white trans people. Black transpeople barely get a mention, and when it comes to Asian and Latino/a transpeople, even less positive news is generated.

Too many times when we do get a mention, it's in conjunction with one of our peeps being killed due to a hate crime or murder or steeped in stereotypical negativity.

The TransLatinas club was founded earlier this year on the CCSF Mission campus with the twin goals of not only combating transphobia in the cis Latino community, but inspiring more trans people from the immigrant Latino population to attend college.

That education and breaking down of stereotypes in the Latino community includes seminars hosted by the group in addition to TransLatinas meetings.

Nice to see a positive story about my Latina sisters, and may the TransLatinas idea be replicated at other college campuses across the nation.

Another PR Transwoman Found Dead

Seems like I just posted about Ashley Santiago being killed in her home a month ago.

Now comes word that Puerto Rican police are investigating another murder involving a transwoman who was reported as last being seen alive on May 20.

38 year old Angie González Oquendo, was found strangled to death with an electrical cord in her Caguas, PR home on May 24.

Carlos H. Cruz Burgos, director of the Caguas’ Criminal Investigation Corps, told El Nuevo Día he believes González was killed later that day.

Police discovered González’s body after reports from neighbors about a foul odor coming from her home. Investigators told Nuevo Día they continue to treat the case as either a hate crime or a case of domestic violence.

González’s father told Primera Hora he suspects his daughter’s boyfriend killed her.

Pedro Julio Serrano of the National Lesbian & Gay Task Force told the same newspaper he thinks local authorities should continue on the hate crime investigation track.

"At the very least, I suspect that a crime could have been committed by prejudice against the victim’s sexual orientation or gender identity," he said. "The authorities have an obligation under the law to investigate this hate angle."

And bring Angie, Michell Galindo's and Ashley Santiago's killers to justice.

Speaking of Ashley Santiago, according to Primero Hora her alleged killer Antonio Márquez recently turned himself in to authorities and confessed to her murder.

Hallelujah, Marquez is now awaiting prosecution for killing Santiago.

At any rate, the way transpeople are being killed this year, looks like we are going to be reading a long list of Latina, African-American and other POC names when it's time for our TDOR 2010 remembrances in November.

The Texas Education Massacre

There are probably those of you who read this blog and wonder or even possibly get sick of me railing about voting.

I will consistently say it until I'm placed six feet below my beloved Texas soil that it matters that you vote in every election cycle.

It is never a option for a minority group to sit out an election. You must pay attention to every race on the ballot as well, not just the big congressional, state legislative, city and presidential races.

This week's disgusting shenanigans in Austin are a prime example why I continue to rant about how important elections are.

The Texas State Board of Education had a contentious meeting in our state capital of Austin concerning the once a decade overhaul of the Texas public school social studies curriculum standards.

The hearing rooms were not only been packed with parents and educators who don't want conservadoctrine shoved down their kids throats, the protests outside the building have been just as lively. It also brought the leaders of the NAACP and LULAC to speak before the board as well.



While I have one of my high school classmates representing us on the SBOE in Lawrence Allen, Jr., unfortunately he, Mavis Knight of Dallas, Mary Helen Berlanga, Rene Nunez, and Rick Agosto are outgunned by a 10-5 all white Republican majority.

To make it even more unfortunate, five of the Republicans have a far right wing agenda that has nothing to do with promoting the education of 4.7 million Texas schoolchildren, but everything to do with conservative indoctrination of them. Many of that 'Gang of Five' aren't even educators.

It was a point that Republican Rod Paige, the former U.S. Secretary of Education under President George W. Bush, made when he ripped the new curriculum on Wednesday.

"We have allowed ideology to drive and define the standards of our curriculum in Texas."

The 'Gang of Five' have ignored education experts in cramming through a curriculum that is a naked attempt to whitewash minorities out of history.

They want to commit crimes against history such as excising Founding Father Thomas Jefferson, rename the triangular slave trade 'the Atlantic trade', downplay the Civil Rights Movement, the existence and history of Latinos and women's suffrage moments while elevating Phyllis Schafly and the rise of conservatism.

“We might as well say Hispanics don’t exist,” said board member Mary Helen Berlanga (D). “We have hidden information, we have tried to cover up a lot of information. I guess there are people that have a difficult time with the truth.”

"I feel that I have let down the students in our state.”

Fortunately there are educators and other persons in the Lone Star State pissed off enough to where they decided to run for the SBOE and unseat the 'Gang of Five'. Don McLeroy, the most outspoken conservafool on the SBOE has already gone down to defeat to a more moderate person in the March GOP primary.

The various Democratic SBOE candidates have already pledged they will revisit the issue should they be successful in the upcoming November elections in getting on the board.

The misguided standards will be effective for the 2013-2014 school year. If you're a parent of a Black or Brown child, better plan on teaching your child a lot of Black and Latino history this summer and throughout the school year to counteract the conservalies they'll be fed.

The partisan hijinks have gotten the attention of state legislators, who may move to rein in the power of the SBOE when the Lege opens for 'bidness' in January 2011.

"They have ignored historians and teachers, allowing ideological activists to push the culture war further into our classrooms." said Rep. Mike Villareal, (D-San Antonio) "They fail to understand that we don't want liberal textbooks or conservative textbooks. We want excellent textbooks, written by historians instead of activists."

May I add, Rep. Villareal, we Texas of all ideological stripes want historically accurate textbooks as well.

Black-Brown Cooperation-The GOP Nightmare

Contrary to the popular meme that is pushed in the MSM and with conservafools, relations between African-Americans and Latinos are not fraught with angry tension.

Over the past five years, numerous polls have shown that the belief in disunity between Blacks and Latinos is far more prevalent among White Americans than any groups of color.

For example, a 2008 Gallup poll reported that 67 percent of Blacks and 60 percent of Latinos consider Black/Brown relationships to be positive, as opposed to only 43 percent of Whites.

These polls, combined with the overwhelming public support of Sen. Barack Obama by Latinos in the 2008 presidential election, suggest that much of the beef between Blacks and Latinos exists solely in the imagination of the White majority.

In the home state, there was reciprocity. As actress Rosie Perez and comedian George Lopez were traveling across Texas stumping for Sen. Obama, African-American voters supported and overwhelmingly voted for Rick Noriega in his 2008 US Senate race to unseat John Cornyn.

African-American Texans were returning the favor for the overwhelming support from Latino voters former Dallas mayor Ron Kirk received in his 2002 US Senate race against John Cornyn.

One thing both groups bitterly remember, especially in Texas, is that not so long ago both groups were hated on by the white majority. Signs were posted that freely expressed that hatred of both groups.

While the Texas GOP tried to mend their ways, the anti-immigration backlash may undo what George W. Bush and Rick Perry painstakingly tried to build politically with Latinos in the Lone Star State by passing this unjust law in Arizona.

We already have conservative Republican state legislators such as Debbie Riddle chomping at the bit to pass in Texas similar legislation when the 2011 legislative session kicks off.

But they may want to consider focusing on keeping that two seat GOP majority in the Texas House before they start flapping their gums about unjust legislation they wish to pass in 2011.

In addition to pissing off Latino voters, the GOP may have also set off their worst political nightmare: Long overdue and permanent socio-political cooperation and alignment between Blacks and Latinos

Last week, Alpha Phi Alpha, the nation’s oldest African American Greek letter fraternity, sent a powerful message to the state of Arizona. In response to the draconian new immigration legislation that compromises the civil liberties of its documented and undocumented Latino residents, the fraternity unanimously voted to relocate its annual conference from Phoenix, AZ to Las Vegas, NV.

Right on, Alpha Phi Alpha!

By making that serious public gesture in defense of Latinos, the Alphas may have provided the impetus to start the dialogue with leaders in both communities on how best to continue down the road of mutually beneficial Black-Brown solidarity.