Women Born Transsexual

Just when you thought it was impossible for the Nazis formerly known as Republicans to stoop much lower in their denigrating, scapegoating and abuse of LGBT/T people along comes yet another storm trooper/concentration camp guard wannabee to drag the discourse even lower.

The right wing Nazi scum have turned LGBT/T people into their Jews, second class citizens to be blamed for their own immorality and short comings.

But Muslims, Jews and people of color shouldn’t rest comfortably, thinking, “Oh it’s only the queers and not our concern.”  You see the lesson history teaches is that when the Nazis come to power it may start with the queers or another chosen targeted group but eventual it comes down to minority ethnic, racial or religious groups.

As an Anti-Fascist I do not hesitate to call a Nazi a Nazi.  I don’t give a shit if they don’t match the German Nazis of the 30s-40s exactly.  After all left wingers in this country are called communists and compared to Pol Pot for suggesting equality between the races, an end to the abuse of women, equality for LGBT/T people and a Public Health Insurance option. They should have considered that not all left wingers are sniveling pacifists who respond to right wing threats by chanting, “Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Dalai Lama.”

So Nazi Boy… I’m calling you on your filthy lie.  Your Blood Libel.

You are not only unfit for office.  You are unfit to be an American.

Tennessee Rep. Says It’s ‘Virtually Impossible’ To Contract AIDS Through Heterosexual Sex

From Addicting Info:  http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/01/26/tennessee-rep-says-its-virtually-impossible-to-contract-aids-through-heterosexual-sex/

By Wendy Gittleson 
January 26, 2012

Rarely a day goes by anymore when we don’t read a particularly bigoted comment aimed toward the LGBT community. It fills so many headlines that if it wasn’t so terrifying, especially to those who are bullied, it would almost be boring. Just today, our own Mitch Gilbert reportedthat a Tennessee Rep., John Ragan told him that:

“A person is a heterosexual because of the presence of genitalia of one sex or the other.  No one except a very few with an exceedingly rare congenital deformity have both kinds of genitalia.”

Apparently, biology isn’t required study in Tennessee’s high schools, because another Tennessee GOP lawmaker, Sen. Stacey Campfield said this today (from Raw Story):

“Most people realize that AIDS came from the homosexual community,” he told Michelangelo Signorile, who hosts a radio program on SiriusXM OutQ. “It was one guy screwing a monkey, if I recall correctly, and then having sex with men. It was an airline pilot, if I recall.”

“My understanding is that it is virtually — not completely, but virtually — impossible to contract AIDS through heterosexual sex.”

Continue reading at:   http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/01/26/tennessee-rep-says-its-virtually-impossible-to-contract-aids-through-heterosexual-sex/

From The Guardian UK:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jan/24/zombie-banks-ireland-debts-cancelled

Just like many African nations, Ireland’s debts must be cancelled or a ‘financial bomb’ will go off in its most deprived communities

Nick Deardenguardian.co.uk, Tuesday 24 January 2012

Activists more accustomed to campaigning against the debts of countries like Zimbabwe, Egypt, Ecuador and Indonesia were instead outside the Irish embassy this morning. Dressed as zombies, we hoped to shed some light on the so-called “zombie banks” whose debts continue to drain resources from an Irish public sector that is being slashed to the bone.

Ireland’s financial crisis has much in common with scores of countries across the developing world. The country has been brought to its knees by an enormous debt, which originated not with excessive public spending, but a footloose financial sector that gambled with the future of the country. Without so much as a vote, Ireland’s people found themselves on the hook for tens of billions of euros of reckless investments.

The ultimate symbol of this form of crony capitalism in Ireland is Anglo Irish, the bank that started Ireland’s slide into the abyss. Anglo Irish lent vast sums of money to fuel Ireland’s property bubble, in the process making fortunes for rich speculators. Anglo is believed to have 15 customers who owe the bank more than €500m each.

When the bubble burst, the Irish government stepped in to underwrite the bank – ultimately being forced to nationalise it. This disastrous decision was not based on any assessment of the use of Anglo to the economy. Economics professor Morgan Kelly said at the time that Anglo – as well as Irish Nationwide, which was also brought into public ownership – “were purely conduits for property speculation. They fulfil no role in the Irish economy.” He said it would be “better to incinerate €1.5bn than squander it on Anglo Irish Bank”.

Today Anglo Irish, rebranded as the Irish Bank Resolution Corporation, is a zombie bank – a bankrupt institution that exists to channel government money to a group of bondholders who the Irish people can’t know anything about, and who themselves were fuelling Ireland’s increasingly speculative economy.

Continue reading at:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jan/24/zombie-banks-ireland-debts-cancelled

From The Daily Mail UK:  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2091190/George-Soros-predicts-U-S-riots-insists-Euro-saved-global-economy-collapse.html

• Billionaire New York investor warns of impending economic meltdown
• Backs euro and buys Italian bonds from Jon Corzine’s failed MF Global
• Warns it’s ‘difficult to know right decisions to make’ after boom years
• Supports Occupy Wall Street, Democrats and Obama re-election efforts

By Mark Duell
25th January 2012

From The New York Times:  http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/27/us/a-ballot-push-to-legalize-marijuana-with-alcohol-as-the-role-model.html

By KIRK JOHNSON
Published: January 26, 2012

DENVER — Proponents of marijuana have argued for years that the drug is safer than alcohol, both to individuals and society. But a ballot proposal to legalize possession of marijuana in small amounts in Colorado, likely to be on the November ballot, is putting the two intoxicants back into the same sentence, urging voters to “regulate marijuana like alcohol,” as the ballot proposition’s title puts it.

Given alcohol’s long and checkered history — the tens of thousands of deaths each year, the social ravages of alcoholism — backers of the pro-marijuana measure concede there is a risk of looking as if they have cozied up too much, or are comparable, to old demon rum.

“Why add another vice, right?” said Mason Tvert, a co-director of the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol, which has led the ballot drive. “But we’re not adding a vice; we’re providing an alternative.”

The goal of legalization, Mr. Tvert added, is not to make access to marijuana easier, but rather, “to make our communities safer by regulating this substance, taking it out of the underground market, controlling it and better keeping it away from young people.”

The debate here and in Washington State — where members of a pro-legalization group have also submitted what they say are more than enough signatures to secure a spot on the ballot — is premised on the idea that marijuana has become, if not quite mainstream, then at least no longer alien to the average voter. Medical marijuana is already legal in both states.

Continue reading at:   http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/27/us/a-ballot-push-to-legalize-marijuana-with-alcohol-as-the-role-model.html

From Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/26/rick-santorum-says-the-le_n_1233820.html?1327598453&ncid=edlinkusaolp00000009

01/26/2012

According to Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum, America has lost not only its entertainment industry, but also its higher education system. “Higher education was the first to go, a long time ago,” he said.

While speaking at the First Baptist Church in Naples, Florida on Wednesday, Santorum claimed that the Left uses universities to “indoctrinate” young people for the end purpose of maintaining power. “It’s no wonder President Obama wants every kid to go to college,” he said.

He also argued that colleges and universities would receive no funding if they taught Judeo-Christian principles, but by teaching radical secular ideology, these schools are given government backing. He then asserted that 62 percent of young people who enter college with a set of religious beliefs leave without one. The presidential candidate concluded his speech by urging his audience not to give their money to universities that are undermining that country by spreading left-wing ideology.

Complete article at:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/26/rick-santorum-says-the-le_n_1233820.html?1327598453&ncid=edlinkusaolp00000009

From Alternet: http://www.alternet.org/sex/153893/why_evangelicals_don%27t_care_when_rich_white_conservatives_defile_marriage/

Gingrich doesn’t live by the strict sexual rules laid out by conservatives, because those rules are meant for other people: the poor, Democrats, gays, and minorities.

By Amanda Marcotte
January 25, 2012

Newt Gingrich’s win in the South Carolina primary looks like it may not be an outlier; Gingrich’s poll numbers are rising rapidly in Florida, and he has a good chance of beating Romney there as well. Gingrich is doing well in no small part because he has so much support amongst evangelical Christians; so much so that many evangelical leaders refused to go along with an attempt to unify the Christian right behind Santorum.

In South Carolina, evangelical Christians voted for Gingrich 2-to-1 over boring family man Mitt Romney. For anyone who takes seriously the notion that evangelical Christians actually care about things like family and fidelity, this support for Gingrich is baffling, since he has a history of serial adultery that he barely bothers to disavow. But a closer examination of the situation makes clear what’s going on: for the Republican base, “family values” don’t actually matter, but are just a gloss painted over what really motivates them: reactionary rage. They love Gingrich because he’s a flaming ball of rage they can wield against everyone they hate.

The sexual double standard is the most obvious way the us vs. them mentality works. There’s nothing the modern American conservative loves more than to decry our country’s supposedly declining sexual morals. Once the Republicans swept state legislatures and the House of Representatives, punishing sexual freedom became their number one priority, which manifested in nearly 1,000 bills restricting reproductive rights in state legislatures and a bill attacking private insurance funding of abortion in the House. Eventually, House Republicans threatened to shut down the federal government in order to defund family planning clinics, basically because they’re in the business of providing contraception and STD prevention and treatment. All this while the base continues to push abstinence-only and reject gay marriage on the grounds that it’s not “traditional.” But when it comes to a serial adulterer like Gingrich, he gets a pass. After all, he’s one of theirs, and if you’re in the tribe, you get a lot more leeway.

Nowhere is this more obvious than in the reaction to Marianne Gingrich sticking her head out, as she periodically does, to remind the world of what a terrible man her ex-husband is. This time she added the juicy detail that Newt basically demanded that he get to have both his wife and his mistress at the same time. It was a reminder that while this flagrant cheating was going on, Gingrich was repeatedly moralizing in public over President Clinton’s adultery. To this day, the GOP base still regards Clinton as some kind of perverted sex maniac. But Gingrich? Well, during the South Carolina debate when Marianne’s interview with ABC was brought up, the audience loudly booed the mere mention of her name. For the Republican base, Gingrich not only gets to cheat, he also gets to flaunt it in his wife’s face; but a Democrat like Clinton’s more secretive and brief affairs are unforgivable.

Continue reading at:  http://www.alternet.org/sex/153893/why_evangelicals_don%27t_care_when_rich_white_conservatives_defile_marriage/

From Socialist Worker: http://socialistworker.org/2012/01/23/a-cold-blooded-creature

NEWT GINGRICH and his toxic brew of bigotry and reaction are back in the limelight following a resounding victory in the January 21 Republican primary in South Carolina.

Despite trailing in the polls by double-digit margins less than a week before, Gingrich handily beat frontrunner Mitt Romney, with 40.4 percent of the vote to Romney’s 27.8 percent. Now Romney, who hoped to sew up the nomination with a win in South Carolina, will have to continue on to Florida at the end of the month, and perhaps other primary contests as well.

So how did a man who was so universally despised in the late 1990s that he was forced to resign as Speaker of the House–and whose campaign for the Republican presidential nomination once before shot to the front of the pack, only to collapse–claw his way back one more time?

Part of the answer lies in the weakness of the other candidates for the GOP nomination. The field of contenders vying for the affections of the Republican Right has been crowded, but one after another–Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, Herman Cain and now Rick Santorum–has scrambled into the spotlight, only to crumble after a few weeks. Ron Paul has a fanatical following among libertarians, but nothing more. That leaves Romney, who is generally despised by large numbers of conservatives for being “too liberal”–even though he is nothing of the sort, as he has sought desperately to prove.

Continue Reading at:  http://socialistworker.org/2012/01/23/a-cold-blooded-creature

From RH Reality Check:   http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/article/2012/01/25/america-doesnt-want-gops-god-in-office-1

by mycultlife, My Cult Life
January 26, 2012

I’m part of a growing movement of men and women who’ve left Christian fundamentalism. Yes, it’s possible to leave Crazy Town and we are absolutely enjoying all that life has to offer outside of a movement that controlled our lives, but most importantly controlled our minds.

Lately I’ve been writing about the abuse that I experienced in my fundamentalist group, which is a group my therapist labeled a“cult”(The politically correct and academic term is ‘new religious group‘ although I feel that term doesmoreto protect the abusive and destructive groups from the government than it does to protect victims. More on that later.). Along with leaving a cult, or destructive group, comes many challenges: immersion into “normal” society, behaviors and media;ostracism from old friends and the loneliness that comes from that process; and a struggle to maintain faith in God that often comes from duty, obligation and fear. For those who depart from their faith in God, like me and many of us (perhaps because our spiritual abusers convinced us that theywereGod; perhaps because we’ve seen the inside of a dark temple), the road to labeling yourself atheist or agnostic is riddled with fear of judgement, secrecy and finally gaining your own footing with your new set of beliefs.

To me, it’s less important whether I’m labeled an atheist or agnostic or spiritual because none of those labels accurately describe me. What is important to me is that I’m not labeled a Christian, and there’s a clear distinction between my ethics and beliefs and those of modern day fundamentalism. Because I don’t endorse gay bashing, homophobia, removing women’s rights/voices or controlling women’s bodies, I’ve become sort of staunchly liberal. I’m that annoying political friend on Facebook who’s always sharing her liberal news articles with you. The one I’d be tempted to delete, if she were Conservative. There you have it–I’m a hypocrite but a happy one.

All joking aside, upon recent examination of the rhetoric and ideologies of the GOP candidates, I realized that they have been spouting some of the same ideology as my old abusive spiritual leaders. The other day, as I was watching Newt Gingrich accept his win in South Carolina he began bashing a judge for making a secular decision, calling him an “anti-religious bigot.” Many of the candidates beliefs stem from a faith in God that’s more similar to fundamentalism than to anything else. For example, Rick Santorum, who’s been known to say some off-the-wall things lately,recently said:

Continue reading at:   http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/article/2012/01/25/america-doesnt-want-gops-god-in-office-1

From Creators.com:  http://www.creators.com/opinion/jim-hightower/by-axing-parks-politicos-are-stealing-the-people-s-property.html

Jim Hightower
January 23, 2012

“Sorry, we’re closed.” In one of the saddest signs of the times, this message is popping up all across the country, as governors and legislators are cutting off funds (and shutting off access) to one of the finest, most popular assets owned by the people of our country: state parks.

More than 6,600 of these jewels draw some 700 million visitors a year to their grand vistas, historic sites, abundant wildlife, majestic forests, cascading waters, expansive beaches, nature trails, campgrounds, educational centers and lodges. Parks are a tangible expression of America’s democratic ideals, literally a common ground for every man, woman and child to enjoy, learn, absorb … or just be. Especially for the middle class and the poor — the great majority of our people who can’t jet off to luxury resorts for a getaway for vacation — these spaces offer a form of real wealth, something of great value that each of us literally “owns,” knitting us together as a community and nation.

Yet so many spiritually shriveled, small-minded and short-sighted state officials are snuffing out this invaluable, uniting social force. They are stupidly treating parks as nothing but a budget number or a piece of the “nanny state” to be axed in the name of ideological purity. Worse, they are sacrificing parks in order to keep the tax-dodging moneyed elites who pay for their campaigns from paying even a dime more in taxes.

The majority of states have been closing many of their parks, slashing hours and services at others or simply handing the public’s asset to profiteering corporations. Idaho’s governor has proposed eliminating the entire parks department; California shut the gates of a fourth of the state’s parks last year; officials in Arizona and Florida intend to privatize their parks; Washington state has cut off most of its park funding; and Ohio has okayed oil drilling in its parks to replace state financing.

Continue reading at:   http://www.creators.com/opinion/jim-hightower/by-axing-parks-politicos-are-stealing-the-people-s-property.html

From San Francisco Bay Guardian:   http://www.sfbg.com/2012/01/24/occupy-back-horns-and-glitter?page=0%2C0

An energetic day of action shows that the movement is very much alive

Yael Chanoff
01.24.12

On Jan. 20, hundreds of activists converged on the Financial District in a day that showed a reinvigorated and energized Occupy movement.

The day of action was deemed “Occupy Wall Street West.” Despite pouring rain, the numbers swelled to 1,200 by early evening.

Critics have said that the Occupy movement is disorganized and lacks a clear message. Some have decried its supposed lack of unity. Others have even declared it dead.

But the broad coalition of community organizations that came together to send a message focused on the abuses of housing rights by corporations and the 1 percent sent a clear message:

The movement is very much alive.

Continue reading at:  http://www.sfbg.com/2012/01/24/occupy-back-horns-and-glitter?page=0%2C0

From Liberation:  http://www.pslweb.org/liberationnews/news/occupy-wall-street-west-shuts.html

Militant protest targets capitalism

In response to the coordinated assaults on the Occupy encampments, the Bay Area Occupy movement declared Jan. 20 to be “Occupy Wall Street West”—a shutdown of San Francisco’s financial district. Due to a large turnout, the San Francisco headquarters of three of the largest banks in the nation were forced to close for the day.

Despite pouring rain, protesters were already busy as early as 6 a.m. when activists, including members of the Party for Socialism and Liberation, blocked the entrance to the Goldman Sachs building in downtown San Francisco. A breakfast of grilled squid was served, as the company has been described as a “great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity.”

Between 7 and 9 a.m., hundreds of Occupy protesters set up camps in front of the downtown headquarters of Wells Fargo, Chase and Bank of America, making it impossible for employees to enter and for the banks to open. They remained closed the entire day. At times, police attempted to break up the occupations but were met with militant resistance and driven back.

At 8 a.m., the ANSWER Coalition (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism), of which PSL is a member, organized a shutdown of a Bank of America branch at Powell Square, one of the busiest intersections in the city.

Outside the bank, ANSWER speakers noted how the 2008 bailouts of the largest banks, overseen by both the Bush and Obama administrations, had handed over billions in taxpayer money to parasitic financial institutions, when that money could have been paid back to the workers in the form of investments in education, housing and jobs.

Continue reading at:   http://www.pslweb.org/liberationnews/news/occupy-wall-street-west-shuts.html