Calendar: Full 2012 Calendar
View a candidate or state Select Calendar
| TIME (All local) | EVENTS |
|---|---|
| 10:00 AM | |
| 1:00 PM | |
| 2:00 PM | |
| 5:00 PM |
Saturday, July 23, 2011
Sunday, July 24, 2011
The Marcus Bachmann hypocrisy
Published: Friday, Jul. 22, 2011 - 5:11 am
Last Modified: Friday, Jul. 22, 2011 - 8:06 pm
Marcus Bachmann, the husband of GOP presidential candidate Michele Bachmann, is having a bad month. Not only is his counseling clinic under attack for offering gay conversion therapy, he's being pursued by an angry mob. Composed of gay activists, comedians, left-leaning bloggers and members of the alternative media, this mob is not only angry about Bachmann's "pray the gay away" ideas, it's growing ever more willing to give voice to a nudge-nudge flurry of middle-school locker-room innuendo. All from people who in other circumstances would be asking for an injunction against the stuff.
It's easy enough to see why the Bachmanns are under attack from gay activists. Both have devoted much of their careers to the notion that homosexuality is a societal scourge. Michele has likened the "lifestyle" to "personal despair and personal enslavement."
Marcus has called gays "barbarians that need to be educated."
What's more, Marcus Bachmann supposedly provides that education. The notion of gay conversion has been decried by medical experts and even linked to suicide. But based on past statements, he seems committed to the idea that homosexuality is a psychiatric disorder that should be treated and that same-sex urges don't have to correlate with same-sex acts. "Just because someone feels it or thinks it," he has said, "doesn't mean that we are supposed to go down that road."
The mob on Marcus Bachmann's tail, however, has moved beyond his quotes. Although he is a husband and father in a traditional marriage and family, some of his debunkers are suggesting there's more than meets the eye in his anti-gay pronouncements.
No one has caught Bachmann in anything resembling a "wide stance." No one has come forward with an incriminating text message. No one has even said that they know a guy who knows a guy who might know something. But that hasn't stopped suggestions that Bachmann is a deeply closeted gay man.
Some of this is coming from rabid tweeters, anonymous commenters and a host of unreliable sources. But it's also coming from people who usually aim a little higher. Observing footage of the Bachmanns dancing together, Jon Stewart remarked that Marcus was "an Izod shirt away from being the gay character on 'Modern Family.'" Advice columnist and gay activist Dan Savage, who has made a point of fighting bullying with his "It gets better" campaign, nevertheless performed a campy imitation of Bachmann's speaking style on his podcast. And gay conservative Andrew Sullivan also mocked him as having a lisp, calling him a "ssuper-sserial hunter of gays."
Now, Marcus Bachmann is a grown-up. And so is Michele. Moreover, no one expects a presidential campaign to be a genteel, bully-free affair. But isn't it a little ironic that the Bachmanns are being hectored by people who regularly preach tolerance and rail against stereotypes?
In their defense, the anti-Bachmann crusaders would say that the target here isn't Marcus' perceived sexuality, it's the hypocrisy that would be exposed if it turned out he weren't as straight an arrow as he purports to be. But that doesn't mean the jeering and sneering doesn't have the potential to backfire.
Because, from the looks of things, it isn't acting gay that Bachmann deplores; it's gay acts. And there's no evidence he's broken his own rules about the latter. Based on what is known, you could call Bachmann sad, retrograde and deluded by a fantasy that devastates instead of helps the majority of gay and lesbian people who might seek his counsel. As for his own life and dancing style, what we know is that the Bachmanns have a long and apparently successful marriage. And even if there were truth to the innuendo, how do you pin hypocrisy on someone who practices what he preaches?
As odious as the Bachmanns' views are, harassment is still harassment, even in the name of fighting bigotry. That's why the mob might do well to stick to the facts. It shouldn't be too hard. Besides, when the stuff someone says is this ridiculous, there's no need to ridicule the tone of voice in which it's said.
Letter and commentary to 2012 GOP Presidential Candidates
by arizona-hispanic-republicans on Jul. 21, 2011
2012 candidates: Somos Republicans knows how to reach Latinos
As the 2012 election season approaches, we would like Republican candidates to know the Hispanic voting block can be salvaged and we know how. It seems to us, at Somos Republicans, the GOP leadership in states and national organizations have been courting the wrong voters. We felt we were on the verge of a breakthrough a few years ago when Arizona Senator John McCain, came from behind to win the Republican presidential nomination with a platform that included “Comprehensive Immigration Reform” while his losing competitors had all taken ever harder lines on immigration which insulted us personally and certainly drove away potential Latino voters in droves!
President George W. Bush won more Latino votes than any other major Republican candidate. He realized, as we do, that Latinos are naturally conservative. And since the American Latino population is the fastest growing segment of the population, we hoped the GOP would attempt to harness that incredible new voting block but they didn’t!
Instead they allied themselves, much to our dismay and occasional disgust, with isolationists, nativists, and a few verbose anti-Latino bigots. Republicans became so hated among Latinos that when we attended public functions we were treated as though we arrived with a dead skunk!
In the past education and school choice was the lead topic among Latinos in America. Today, immigration is the primary issue because it’s personal. Although I’m not an immigrant, I look like one and the unconstitutional laws proposed and passed in some states are deliberately designed to harass all Latinos, including me and my family, so much they will, as the environmentalist radicals at FAIR described it, “self deport.” For immigrants and citizens alike, that is very personal!
But the situation can be saved. Because our economy needs more, not less, immigration, Somos Republicans supports all efforts at Comprehensive Immigration Reform and opposes all unconstitutional efforts at immigration enforcement. We find it unconscionable that any Republican would find cause to attack the Bill of Rights or the Constitution in any way! At Somos Republicans, we are appalled and evidently alone in our quest to defend the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
The objective of this commentary is to expose the fact that not all Hispanic Republican groups actually have the best interest of Latinos in mind. In fact, we have found that the other groups are best classified as “sell outs” or “vendidos!” We hope Republican candidates will not seek out the dubious guidance of groups like that but instead come to us, Somos Republicans, because we do have the best interest of American Latinos in mind. We believe that is also the best interest of the Republican Party as well.
According to the Pew Hispanic Center, there are nearly 50 million Latinos in America and more than 80% of them support Comprehensive Immigration Reform. A similar percentage oppose Arizona’s unconstitutional SB 1070 and similar state level immigration enforcement measures. Somos Republicans, based in Arizona but with chapters across the nation, has thousands of members who, like the rest of Latino America, are naturally conservative, Pro-Life and determined to defend the Constitution from all attackers. Therefore, we support Comprehensive Immigration Reform and the Dream Act and always have. We; furthermore, denounce Arizona’s SB 1070 and all the variations of that travesty.
If you are Republican running for office in 2012 and you want to know what American Latinos think and you want to reach them, come to Somos Republicans. We have valuable insight you will find no where else. We’ll listen too but we’re not fools and we have long memories.
Here are some groups whose leaders are only interested in their own individual advancement and not that of the American Latino. The RNHA is small and appears to support SB 1070. LNRC is a national group based in California but has no real operation except in Texas. LNRC quickly proclaimed SB 1070 to be good policy after it was signed and the Texas contingent has defended it and a similar “sanctuary cities bill” in Texas this year. ALRA in Arizona is also very small and fervently supports SB 1070 as millions of Latinos across America denounce it. There are other groups but we do not believe any of them actually have the pulse of Latino America as easily accessible to you Republican candidates as we, at Somos Republicans, do.
Again, if you are Republican, and you are smart or forthright or, better yet, both, then you’ll come to us, Somos Republicans, to learn the truth and make good things happen for America, Americans and the American Latino. What do we want? We want only the satisfaction of knowing that we did what was right for America, our home.
Presidential purpose
In FD, Pawlenty says the way to ‘goof’ is to ‘nominate wrong candidate’
July 22, 2011
, Messenger News
In 2008, a win in the Iowa caucuses helped propel Barack Obama to the U.S. presidency.
Thus, thanks in large part to Iowa, America is saddled with a "fancy-talking entertainer," rather than a competent leader, at the helm, said GOP presidential hopeful Tim Pawlenty.
But 2012 could pave the road to redemption if Iowa Republicans back the right candidate, Pawlenty said.
Pawlenty touted his own competent leadership credentials Thursday at the Fort Dodge Public Library, where he spoke to a crowd of about 50.
According to Pawlenty, the 2012 election is the GOP's to lose, given Obama's increasing unpopularity.
"The main way we're going to goof this up is to nominate the wrong candidate," he said.
If Iowa's first-in-the-nation caucus slingshots an unelectable Republican candidate to the forefront, the end result could be four more years of Obama, Pawlenty said.
"You don't just want to be first," he said. "You want to be right."
And electability, thy name is Pawlenty, according to the former Minnesota governor.
"We need a candidate who will authentically and genuinely unite the party and the conservative movement," Pawlenty said.
Pawlenty took a swipe at two "leading candidates" in Iowa - though he declined to name names.
"One leading candidate is running away from his record," Pawlenty said. "One leading candidate has no record."
Several polls have shown former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann, Pawlenty's fellow Minnesotan, leading the pack in Iowa. Pawlenty has previously commented on Bachmann's thin administrative resume.
Repeating the mantra of "results, not rhetoric," Pawlenty highlighted his accomplishments as Minnesota's governor from 2002 to 2010.
"I was elected and re-elected in one of the most challenging environments for a conservative in the country," said Pawlenty, referring to Minnesota's status as a liberal "blue state."
As governor, Pawlenty said he oversaw spending reductions that led to budget surpluses and appointed "strict constructionists" to the Minnesota Supreme Court.
As president, Pawlenty would work to affect similar change on the national level, he said.
The Pawlenty Administration would set a 5 percent growth goal for the U.S. economy.
To aid this accomplishment, Pawlenty said he would work to reform the "moronic" nature of the federal tax system, which is needlessly complex and takes too much money out of the pockets of Americans.
A constitutional amendment requiring a balanced budget should be ratified, Pawlenty said.
He also spoke in favor of term limits for elected officials.
But first and foremost, President Pawlenty would repeal so-called "Obamacare" in its entirety, he said, drawing applause from the crowd.
"We need to get spending under control," he said.
This, said Pawlenty, will require difficult and unpopular actions, including the phasing out of most federal subsidies, including those for ethanol.
Other means, including a gradual increase in the age of eligibility for Social Security, will also likely be necessary, he said.
"We've had enough of politicians who just flap their jaws," Pawlenty said. "We need a leader who will face hard truths and identify real challenges."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)