The Quisling Sellin' Out On HB 235

They say a picture is worth a thousand words.

It is a not a well kept secret in trans community circles that there is no love lost between myself and NTCE ED Mara Keisling.   Some of it is personal, but a lot of the animus comes from the fact that she has either been an impediment, silent or been on the wrong side of trans civil rights issues.

And I'm not the only voice in the trans community that has no love for her.

It infuriates me because as someone who cares about the well being of the trans community, I am painfully aware that every day we don't have trans civil rights coverage means some transperson faces discrimination, violence, is made homeless, or dies.   The folks that take the brunt of that discrimination don't look like Ms. Keisling.  
 
After weeks of silence, we finally discovered what side she's taking on the contentious Maryland HB 235 trans rights bill that doesn't have public accommodations language in it.

Note the button she's wearing.    She and her organization supports it.

To paraphrase the late Texas trans activist Dee McKellar,  why am I not surprised?

Joe Lieberman, You Are NOT JFK

I watched with amusement Joe Lieberman's press conference announcing he would not seek reelection in 2012 to the US Senate.   He was going to have a problematic road to reelection to begin with since he's an independent and liberal Dems in Connecticut have been pissed at him since 2002.

They and the rest of us in the country haven't forgotten Ned Lamont beat him in the 2006 Democratic primary and instead of taking his butt whipping and moving on, he filed as an independent.  Republicans sandbagged their own nominee in order to cross over and vote for Lieberman to put him back in the Senate.

And Connecticut Democrats haven't forgotten it or his sellout appearance at the 2008 Republican convention.
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So as I watched his press conference, I was happily watching him make that retirement speech until he tried to take another swipe at the party by spouting the same tired right wing spin line that John F. Kennedy would be a Republican today and he was in the mold of John F. Kennedy..

 But if by a "Liberal" they mean someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people -- their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights and their civil liberties -- someone who believes we can break through the stalemate and suspicions that grip us in our policies abroad, if that is what they mean by a "Liberal," then I'm proud to say I'm a "Liberal."

Sen. John F. Kennedy  What Is A Liberal Speech  September 14, 1960


To paraphrase the late Sen. Lloyd Bentsen, you are no John F. Kennedy and how dare you even part your lips to say that GOP lie.  


Goodbye and good riddance to Joe Lieberman.  Don't let the door hit you in your behind on the way out.

Alveda King Does Not Speak For Dr. King

I have never liked that Oreo cookie chomping sellout Alveda King, and had the displeasure of crossing paths with her while I lived in Louisville.

Back in 2004 when we were trying to get the GLBT protective Fairness Ordinance reauthorized because of the city-county merger that happened in 2002, she was brought to town along with three other conservafools by our opponents who laughably tried to pass them off as Louisville 'residents' arguing against the reauthorization by Metro council.

Hell, I had more credibility as a Louisville resident at the time than Alveda King ever did and was pissed I couldn't participate because I had to work.

King got called out by Dawn that night on some Scripture she misquoted during her presentation, and the subsequent reauthorization vote the next day went lopsidedly in our favor.

She surfaced again at Glenn Beck's 'I Have A Scheme' weekend in order to try to claim the mantle of her uncle martin's legacy for the conservafool movement.

Not no but HU-ELL no.

The only person who had the authority to speak for Dr. ML King, Jr. post 1968 was his wife Coretta, and she's given us more than a few clues about what he would have thought about what passes for Christianity these days or what he would have thought about the GLBT rights struggle.

Coretta Scott King said this a few days before the 30th anniversary of his assassination on March 31, 1998.

"I still hear people say that I should not be talking about the rights of lesbian and gay people and I should stick to the issue of racial justice," she said. "But I hasten to remind them that Martin Luther King Jr. said, 'Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.'"

"I appeal to everyone who believes in Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream to make room at the table of brother and sisterhood for lesbian and gay people," she said.

"Gays and lesbians stood up for civil rights in Montgomery and Selma, in Albany, Georgia, and St. Augustine, Florida, and many other campaigns of the civil rights movement," King said.

She said she saluted the contributions "of these courageous men and women" who fought "for my freedom at a time when they could find few voices for their own."

Alveda, your message of hate radically conflicts with your uncle's message.  In addition, you are on the wrong side of the moral arc of history.

I'll take what your late Aunt Coretta Scott King has to say over your sellout behind any day.