Blogcabin California

March 27, 2007

LCR’s POLITICAL MUSCLE

Posted by Kevin Norte at 10:40 pm .
Filed under: Gay Rights, California Politics, Log Cabin News

The following is taken from The Los Angeles Times On-Line Political Muscle Column by Robert Salladay

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/politicalmuscle/

Doug LaMalfa: Definitely Not Gay

Garcia_5 The gayest Republican district is no surprise. It belongs to Assemblywoman Bonnie “Hot-Blooded, I Would Bed Arnold Schwarzenegger” Garcia of Palm Springs. Go figure.  

But some fairly conservative Assembly members have relatively large numbers of gay couples in their midst, according to a new Log Cabin California survey. The report was the brainchild of James Vaughn, the group’s California executive director, who has long heard fellow Republicans say “they didn’t think there were many gay or lesbian people in their districts.”

So he culled data from ePodunk.com to create a chart of Assembly districts with the most same-sex couples, based on 2000 Census data. “We want to build a farm team of candidates to run for office. I wanted to see where the most likely places would be to target,” Vaughn said. (Currently, the only publicly gay Republican elected officials come from Cathedral City, Signal Hill, Redondo Beach and San Diego.)

Lamalfa In April, Vaughn plans to meet with California lawmakers to show them the survey and lobby for new legislation that would provide some domestic partners a property tax break. “We all know that knowing someone gay changes views on equality for gays and lesbians,” he said.

While Garcia appears to have the gayest district, Assemblymembers Rick Keene and Doug LaMalfa (pictured), among others, have communities below the national norm of same-sex couples. Although, something is going on in Live Oak, represented by LaMalfa. Check out the chart here, listed in order by district.

(Photo: Rich Pedroncelli / AP)

Kevin

March 26, 2007

LCR History:Patrick Sammon on CNN

Posted by Kevin Norte at 11:04 pm .
Filed under: National Politics, Gay Rights, Log Cabin Events

Patrick Sammon

Patrick Sammon II

March 20, 2007

Gonzales Did Away With Checks & Balances & That Is Why He Should Go.

Posted by Kevin Norte at 4:43 am .
Filed under: National Politics

AlbeBefore Gonzales slipped in amendments to the 2006 renewal of the Patiot Act, a US Attorney could be appointed by the AG for up to 120 days pending Senate Confirmation.  After that period, the District Court could renew it.  It was a terrific REAGAN policy and there was no immediate threat from hostile forces to change it.  After Gonzales, Myers, and Rove did their little amendment (which was voted on in committed without democrats so i can’t blame them), A US attorney could be confirmed by the Senate and the immediately fired and replaced by the AG for an INDIFINITE DUTATION.

I believe in checks and balances and this seems to be definetly out of wack.  The backbone of the country I so love is breaking. 

I will support the policies of my party that I can justify but this one well, this one scare the hell out of me.

Gonzales allegedly spelled out fears in the Bush administration that the dismissals of eight U.S. attorneys might not stand up to scrutiny.

Particularly worrisome, according to some references in the 3,000 pages of e-mails and other material released late Monday, was the prospect of former U.S. Attorney Bud Cummins testifying before Congress.   

“I don’t think he should,” Gonzales’ chief of staff, Kyle Sampson, wrote in a Feb. 1 e-mail. “How would he answer: Did you resign voluntarily? Who told you? What did they say?”

Cummins was relieved as U.S. attorney in Little Rock, Ark., and replaced by Tim Griffin, a former assistant to )SUPRISE) top White House aide Karl Rove.

Neither of the two most senior Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee are stepping forward to endorse Gonzales, but likewise are not calling for his ouster. Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania said he will reserve judgment until he gets all the facts. Sen. Orrin Hatch  of Utah has not given interviews on the subject, his spokesman said.

The White House still offered support for Gonzales on Monday, but spokesman Tony Snow said he didn’t know whether the embattled attorney general had contained the political damage. Snow said the White House hopes Gonzales will stay.

Among the e-mails released Monday was one McNulty received on Feb. 1 from Margaret Chiara, the U.S. attorney in Grand Rapids, Mich.

“Why have I been asked to resign?” she asked.

Early this month, a former US attorney wrote, saying that “I respectfully request that you reconsider the rationale of poor performance as the basis for my dismissal. It is in our mutual interest to retract this erroneous explanation.”

She added: “Politics may not be a pleasant reason but the truth is compelling.”

In one, aide Mike Elston said, “our only choice is to continue to be truthful about this entire matter.”

The e-mails provide details on what got some of the U.S. attorneys in trouble with their overseers in Washington.  The link is there (or the SMOKING GUN).  Decide for yourself.

We need checks and balances.  Taken to an illogical extreme, replace the words “U.S. Attorney” with “Federal Judge” and you see what i mean.  The Senate Confirmation process basically has been turned into a SHAM and lip service by Gonzales, Myers, and Rove and should not be tolerated.

I want the Reagan rules back and if  i could I want the man back too.

Kevin

March 14, 2007

For General Pace: A Blast from the Past by Arlo Guthrie

Posted by Christopher Gilbertson at 7:04 pm .
Filed under: National Politics, Gay Rights

They got a building down New York City, it’s called Whitehall Street,
where you walk in, you get injected, inspected, detected, infected,
neglected and selected.  I went down to get my physical examination one
day, and I walked in, I sat down, got good and drunk the night before, so
I looked and felt my best when I went in that morning.  `Cause I wanted to
look like the all-American kid from New York City, man I wanted, I wanted
to feel like the all-, I wanted to be the all American kid from New York,
and I walked in, sat down, I was hung down, brung down, hung up, and all
kinds o’ mean nasty ugly things. And I waked in and sat down and they gave
me a piece of paper, said, “Kid, see the phsychiatrist, room 604.”

And I went up there, I said, “Shrink, I want to kill.  I mean, I wanna, I
wanna kill.  Kill.  I wanna, I wanna see, I wanna see blood and gore and
guts and veins in my teeth.  Eat dead burnt bodies. I mean kill, Kill,
KILL, KILL.”  And I started jumpin up and down yelling, “KILL, KILL,” and
he started jumpin up and down with me and we was both jumping up and down
yelling, “KILL, KILL.”  And the sargent came over, pinned a medal on me,
sent me down the hall, said, “You’re our boy.”

Didn’t feel too good about it.

Proceeded on down the hall gettin more injections, inspections,
detections, neglections and all kinds of stuff that they was doin’ to me
at the thing there, and I was there for two hours, three hours, four
hours, I was there for a long time going through all kinds of mean nasty
ugly things and I was just having a tough time there, and they was
inspecting, injecting every single part of me, and they was leaving no
part untouched.  Proceeded through, and when I finally came to the see the
last man, I walked in, walked in sat down after a whole big thing there,
and I walked up and said, “What do you want?”  He said, “Kid, we only got
one question. Have you ever been arrested?”

And I proceeded to tell him the story of the Alice’s Restaurant Massacre,
with full orchestration and five part harmony and stuff like that and all
the phenome… - and he stopped me right there and said, “Kid, did you ever
go to court?”

And I proceeded to tell him the story of the twenty seven eight-by-ten
colour glossy pictures with the circles and arrows and the paragraph on
the back of each one, and he stopped me right there and said, “Kid, I want
you to go and sit down on that bench that says Group W …. NOW kid!!”

And I, I walked over to the, to the bench there, and there is, Group W’s
where they put you if you may not be moral enough to join the army after
committing your special crime, and there was all kinds of mean nasty ugly
looking people on the bench there.  Mother rapers.  Father stabbers.  Father
rapers!  Father rapers sitting right there on the bench next to me!  And
they was mean and nasty and ugly and horrible crime-type guys sitting on the
bench next to me. And the meanest, ugliest, nastiest one, the meanest
father raper of them all, was coming over to me and he was mean ‘n’ ugly
‘n’ nasty ‘n’ horrible and all kind of things and he sat down next to me
and said, “Kid, whad’ya get?”  I said, “I didn’t get nothing, I had to pay
$50 and pick up the garbage.”  He said, “What were you arrested for, kid?”
And I said, “Littering.”  And they all moved away from me on the bench
there, and the hairy eyeball and all kinds of mean nasty things, till I
said, “And creating a nuisance.”  And they all came back, shook my hand,
and we had a great time on the bench, talkin about crime, mother stabbing,
father raping, all kinds of groovy things that we was talking about on the
bench.  And everything was fine, we was smoking cigarettes and all kinds of
things, until the Sargeant came over, had some paper in his hand, held it
up and said.

“Kids, this-piece-of-paper’s-got-47-words-37-sentences-58-words-we-wanna-
know-details-of-the-crime-time-of-the-crime-and-any-other-kind-of-thing-
you-gotta-say-pertaining-to-and-about-the-crime-I-want-to-know-arresting-
officer’s-name-and-any-other-kind-of-thing-you-gotta-say”, and talked for
forty-five minutes and nobody understood a word that he said, but we had
fun filling out the forms and playing with the pencils on the bench there,
and I filled out the massacre with the four part harmony, and wrote it
down there, just like it was, and everything was fine and I put down the
pencil, and I turned over the piece of paper, and there, there on the
other side, in the middle of the other side, away from everything else on
the other side, in parentheses, capital letters, quotated, read the
following words:

(”KID, HAVE YOU REHABILITATED YOURSELF?”)

I went over to the sargent, said, “Sargeant, you got a lot a damn gall to
ask me if I’ve rehabilitated myself, I mean, I mean, I mean that just, I’m
sittin’ here on the bench, I mean I’m sittin here on the Group W bench
’cause you want to know if I’m moral enough join the army, burn women,
kids, houses and villages after bein’ a litterbug.”  He looked at me and
said, “Kid, we don’t like your kind, and we’re gonna send you fingerprints
off to Washington.”

An Evening with History

Posted by Christopher Gilbertson at 6:54 pm .
Filed under: National Politics

In this morning’s LA Times was a reasonably accurate story by James Ricci regarding former President George H.W. Bush’s speech at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion Monday evening http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-bushtalk14mar14,1,695694.story?coll=la-headlines-california&ctrack=1&cset=true.

 Through the kind efforts of Kevin Norte I was able to attend this event with the Nortes and the ever charming Andrew Dick. We had met up earlier at Kenton’s to fortify ourselves for a long evening and then preceded into the Pavilion. The Nortes entered on the right and Andrew and I entered on the left where we were seated 12 rows from the stage, so we had an ample view.

The former president is still an imposing figuring, slightly stooped from his 82 years but still sharp as a tack. Gone was the broken syntax that made his presidency a running skit on Saturday Night Live. This was proven when one of two ill behaved men from the lower classes thought it was the height of social elegance to interrupt the questioning with their own rude and uncouth remarks. The former president would have nothing of it and masterfully silenced them before they were disgracefully frog marched out of the Pavilion by security. The former president receive accolades from a grateful audience.

The thrust of Mr. Bush’s speech was about values, and how they were instilled in him by his parents. He spoke of several achievements during his tenure and said never a derogatory word about his successors. He spoke very affectionately of President Reagan and President Ford. His most pointed barbs were directed towards wife Barbara who was not in the audience.

Mr. Bush also spoke at length about the criticism he has received for his bipartisan efforts with former President Clinton, explaining that there are many problems in American life that can not be solved by partisanship, that both sides had to reach a concensus and move.

In toto, it was an evening well spent.

 

March 13, 2007

General Pace and Reflections On How Far We Have Not Traveled

Posted by Kevin Norte at 11:00 pm .
Filed under: National Politics, Gay Rights
  • RmyGeneral Pace has made it perfectly clear.  The gays and lesbians who quietly and honorably serve under him are “immoral”.  As a leader General Pace should not put down ANYONE in the armed forces, especially in a time of war. The General should keep his personal beliefs to himself when he knows that his words hurt and demoralize troops in a time of war.  It is EXTREMELY irresponsible and I believe an apology is insufficient because your troops already know you passed judgment on them.  General, at least I know that you are not the final one who will pass judgment on people who are willing to give up their lives for this country.  For the ones we have lost beginning with the very first blood shed at Lexington and Concord, do you not think gay people ever died for this Country? The fallen ones who have already passed on, do you believe they, who died for their country, were so immoral that they were shut out of thier final resting place because they were immoral even though they died saving people and the American Dream?  Is that what you REALLY think of us at night behind closed doors!  I have my faith too Mr. General Peter Pace and that so called immorality is no greater a biblical sin (if it even is) as drunkenness or lying or cheating.  Pace also explained the sin of adultery should disqualify both Republican presidential candidates Rudy Rudy Giuliani and Newt Gingrich.
  • In my faith I believe HE has already passed judgment on the so called “immoral” who have become before HIM since the first gays and lesbians died and as for America, judgment began here when we began our quest for freedom.
  • HE has shown great compassion to this great nation, which is one nation under GOD with liberty and justice for all.
  • I believe HE is and has and will be compassionate and show mercy when judgment has been or is passed. 
  • We havel recruiters are looking the other way when drug abusers enlist and they don’t even care in the army if you have a criminal record.  But when it comes to being immoral, America seems like it would rather have drug addicts and ex-cons be the way to increase the numbers in our military rather than the so called “immoral” homosexuals.
  • Gay and lesbian soldiers have died  in your version of “immorality” for years. Now in the Genreral Peter Pace Doctrine of Heavenly Rewards, do you honestly believe HE by-passes up  intelligent dignified, loyal, gays and lesbians who gave up their lives to this country because of the Clinton Don’t Ask Don’t Tell Policy?
  • Or because of your selective guide to “immorality”?
  • Do you, General Pace, honestly believe that the dead gay and leabian service members go to HELL?
  • Is that what you really think of us?
  • What is wrong your your sence of “immorality”?
  • Didn’t you learn not to pass judgment?
  • Thankfully, and in Mercy, Sen. John Warner,R-Va., one of Congress’ most respected authorities on military matters and a former Navy secretary, said, “I respectfully but strongly disagree with the chairman’s view that homosexuality is immoral.”  There, John Warner does not believe you.  I believe John Warner. He does not believe we are immoral.  Thank you, Senator Warner.  It took great leadership to state that.
  • Now as for Presidential contender Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who spoke to reporters outside a fundraiser in Beverly Hills, Calif., MaCain, said Pace “should be given a chance to explain himself.” Asked for his own view on homosexuality in the military, McCain said he believes the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy is “successful and should be maintained.”  At least I know where McCain stands on the issue bit I believe TIME is on LCRs and our side and we might be able to get him to come around.  I do not agree with McCain but he is on the record for keeping the current policy in place. I respect the man.
  • I am satisfied right now that McCain did not call us immoral. I am keeping quite on the  McCain issue right now.
  • Now as for Presidential contender Sen. Brownback, he supports Pace’s belief that we are immoral.
  • As for contender Romney, he supports “Dont’ Ask, Don’t Tell” but right now it is only his position.  Remember, he does not have a vote.  [EDITORILIZING-If I have my way, he won’t either.]
  • Anaheim Mayor, Curt Pringle, has announced his support for Giuliani.
  • When asked by ABC NEWS, Senator Hilary Clinton was asked if she believed homosexuality was immoral, Clinton declined to answer the question in a television interview this morning and said it was for “others to conclude.”
  • SINCE THEN LADY MCCLINTON “flip flopped” AND NOW WE ARE NOT IMMORAL.
  • Do I feel better?  Perhaps, and I do have FAITH IN AMERICA
  • And that faith assures me that the gays and lesbieans who have died for this county have not died in vain because there are no “immoral” soldiers merely because they are gays and lesbians.   
  • And if you are of a different faith or of no faith, I personally believe that the souls of the true heroes go to a place of divinity.
  • Generl Pace, if I was you I  would ask for a desk assignment real soon and spend you last days behind them.  “And if you do not want to stay, You can just clear out now.”
  • My reflection may not be reflective of LCR’s overall pollicies but it is my personal belief-Kevin and I know that my buddies, my wondersful buddies at LCR will fight for the right to express it-regardless if they disagree with it.
  • It is what makes us strong.
  • Mil
  • If you enlarge this photo it is pretty amazing.GunBiys
  • March 12, 2007

    P.S.A. RE: 10Couples.org-The Campaign for Same Gender Marriage

    Posted by Kevin Norte at 11:38 am .
    Filed under: National Politics, Gay Rights

    Today 10Couples.org was launched to support the 
    campaign for same-sex marriage.

    In order to put a human face on the issue of marriage for same-
    sex couples, and to reach a wider audience using new media tools, 
    a new video campaign was launched via a new web site, www.10Couples.org

    On the site, viewers are invited into the homes of ten ordinary 
    couples who explain why marriage protections are necessary for 
    themselves and their families, and, in doing so, draw attention to the 
    many protections reserved in America exclusively for married people. 
    Viewers can tell their friends about the site using an embedded email 
    feature, and can find tools for turning these stories into meaningful 
    action. The videos are also available on YouTube.

         Currently, 26 states have amendments in their constitutions 
    permanently barring same-sex couples from marriage. Many of these 
    amendments prohibit many other forms of legal protections for the 
    families of same-sex couples as well.

    –PS. A Special Thanks to a once in a lifetime encounter with Boton Photographer Adam Tanner  for alterting me to this site.