God's Own Party Run Amok

South Carolina is one of those bizarre Bible-belt states. Normally it is as bat-shit crazy as Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi or Texas but it can get nutty. Of course, this is most likely the case with God's Own Party (GOP).

The Lauren County Republican Party has decided to try to get candidates to sign morality pledges straight out of some back-woods tent revival, absent the handling of rattlesnakes. Their pledge was adopted unanimously by the local Republicans who, given the demographics of the country,probably couldn't unanimously spell unanimously. The county has a median family income well below normal. Unemployment is officially over 11%, and 1 in 7 are officially living below the poverty line. Next consider the ability of locals to complete high school. Compare this graph of US dropout rates to the rates in Laurens County.

If we look at the rates for the same years we find that the local yokels in Laurens are far more unlikely to be graduate high school—which means prime hunting territory for the GOP, maybe. You will see that almost 37% of Laurens students, who should have graduated during the 1994-1996 period, dropped out of high school instead. That is just over three times the national average during the same period. One out of ten white males, ages 25-34, didn't even go to high school and have less than a 9th grade education.

Of those who did complete high school 42.5% took the Scholastic Aptitude Test in the year 2000. The average Verbal score in Laurens was 466; it was 505 for the United States as a whole for the same year. The average Math score in Laurens was 436 while the US averaged 514. The county is poorer than the average county in South Carolina and has a higher suicide rate than the state. More people die in the county than are born there and two-thirds of "adherents" there are Southern Baptists.

And, apparently, the local GOP has confused their political party with a Southern Baptist Church. The local GOP executive committee, or 13 of the 20 members, held a secret meeting which lasted 30 minutes and then unanimously adopted a resolution which stated what kind of Republicans they felt should be allowed to run for office. They said that they didn't think any candidate should be allowed who was contrary to the state Republican Party platform. But here is how the local newspaper listed the qualifications "consistent" with the Republican Party:

You must favor, and live up to, abstinence before marriage.

You must be faithful to your spouse. Your spouse cannot be a person of the same gender, and you are not allowed to favor any government action that would ALLOW for civil unions of people of the same sex.

You cannot now, from the moment you sign this pledge, look at pornography.

The local paper was surprised and contacted the State Chairman of the Republican Party, Chad Connelly. Connelly seemed supportive. He said that technically the party can't stop someone from running for office but that the GOP has to be able to vet candidates to see if they "recognize our core values." Core values? The County resolution says that all candidates must present themselves to the Holy Inquisition for questioning, that is a committee from the GOP, "within 24 hours of the closing of the file period," to see if the candidate is qualified. Connelly said this is important "now that the Republican Party is in such a dominant position in state politics and government."

Apparently the purported, though rarely lived-up-to, morality lectures of your typical fundamentalist sect is now the core values of the Republican Party. Barry Goldwater warned what would happen if these religious kooks and preachers got their hands on the Republican Party, but he own party ignored him.

Here is a county, dominated by Republicans, that can't even educate its own young people up to the pathetic levels of the rest of the country. When your school system is below average, and when you consider how bad is the actual average, then you have a real problem on your hands. But Republicans are pushing abstinence not education, and theology not science. These are people who think there is only one book, the Bible, and just as long as you can figure out what the verses say, you are educated. But, at least you would think they would worry about the poverty rates and the high-than-average unemployment in the country.

No, what inspires this Republican Party outfit isn't the horrible way they run their schools or the problems endemic in their county—what worries them is what someone might look at in their free time or whether or not they love someone of the same gender.

This is party that has their head so far stuck up their own ass, that the mistake the shit they are looking at for brains.

Sure, they might get the so-typical fake Southern Baptist wannbe politician who parades his high-haired clueless wife and butt-ugly children before them. Then he'll sneak out to the local rest stop to expose himself to some undercover cop. He'll swear by the Bible that he doesn't look at porn but will beat his children abusively, and later blame the fondling on too much booze. They will promise they don't love another man, and then for good measure try to prove how much they hate immigrants, gays and Muslims. They'll push their moralistic candidates who will get caught in some scandal.

But that's okay. He'll stand in the pulpit with Hollywood-style tears flowing down his cheeks. His numb-faced wife, clutching her Bible will stand silently and dutifully beside him, one step back, with her confused looking children at her side while he cries out, "I have sinned." He'll beg for forgiveness and the congregation, or is it the party, will yell, "Thank you, Jesus," and wave their hands in the air so God can see them. Everybody will have a good cry, pray a little, sing a little, and then return to their poverty stricken homes while the repentant sinner calls his secretary to tell her which hotel he rented for them.

Faked Scandal Against Warming Skeptics Backfires Badly.

In the middle of the month a set of documents made the rounds of the media claiming to expose “climate change deniers” at the Heartland Institute. Most of the set of documents were rather innocuous memos for the Heartland Board, and really of no significance. But attached was a “strategy” memo that supposedly outlines plans by Heartland to prevent the teaching of “science” in government schools.

Heartland immediately said that the board documents appeared genuine but that they had to verify them against the original but also said the “strategy” document was fraudulent. This immediately raised the specter of “climategate” when hundreds of emails by warming activist-scientists discussed matters such as preventing scholarly papers refuting their theories from being published. Those emails were later confirmed to be genuine, even though they blustered at the start that they might be fakes. But, what struck me during that scandal was how often defenders of warming alarmism said the issue isn’t so much the validity of the emails in question, but the issue that they were stolen.

The best theory at the time was the theft of those emails was more an individual stumbling upon an open access online that allowed them to access them. They didn’t engage in deception to obtain them, though you might question whether going through an unlocked door online is an ethical problem. I’m not sure myself and am open on that question.

Yet, I’ve not seen any discussion by the alarmists about the deception used to obtain these documents. When “theft” was the issue during climategate, and content wasn’t, they have now reversed course, ignore the theft and concentrate on content. Unfortunately for them, the content they concentrate on was the one fraudulent document. I will shortly go into how we know the piece is fraudulent, as it gives us clues to the perpetrator of the deception. And, now we have even more evidence as to who is the guilty party as well.

Earlier, Ross Kaminsky, a Senior Fellow at Heartland, posted a blog article at American Spectator, which suggested that the likely culprit was warming activist Peter Gleick of the Pacific Institute—not the libertarian Pacific Research Institute—bit an environmentalist group instead. After Kaminsky named Gleick as the likely culprit Gleick issued a statement through Huffington Post confessing his role in this escapade.

Gleick has closed comments to his confession and said, “I will not comment on the substance or implications of the materials.” Convenient. I will get to Gleick’s confession in a moment. First, we need to see what indicated the strategy document was a fraud and then we can see how Gleick appears to be lying about what he claims happened and his role. Don’t misunderstand; I think he is the guilty culprit. I just think the evidence shows he has only confessed part of his deceptive practices and is hiding the rest. But, in order to show that, we must first understand the indications this strategy memo was a fraud.

Some of the documents were genuine board notes. How were those obtained? Someone called the Heartland Institute and claimed to be a particular board member. He claimed that he did not receive the email with the PDF document for the board and would this employee resend it to a new email address. That was done and then the email address was deleted.

All the original documents were the more innocuous material and were no “smoking gun.” All were created in PDF format and emailed to board members. The real documents were created originally as PDF documents. The so-called memo was a paper document that was then scanned and turned into a PDF document. The memo was the only one with no author listed, and it was produced well after the other documents and only shortly before it was sent to an environmentalist website which immediately announced it to the media, without checking if the document were legitimate.

But they are electronic tags in PDF documents. And the tags in the original, real documents show they were produced at the Heartland offices January 25^th. The fraudulent memo was created on February 13^th and produced via an Epson printer. And the tags show in which time zone the document is produced. The real ones are in Central Standard Time while the fraudulent one is in Pacific Standard Time; Gleick’s office is in California.

The memo not only concocts a fake strategy but also makes claims that can be verified to be false. For instance, it tries to demonize the Koch brothers by claiming they donated $200,000 in 2011 to Heartland. In fact, the Koch Foundation donated $25,000 for a health care project and nothing else. In addition, in 2010 they gave nothing to Heartland. Surely a Heartland memo wouldn’t fake donations figures for the Board to see, especially since they would see the full budget and know this figured was faked.

In his admission Gleick claims that, “at the beginning of 2012, I received an anonymous document in the mail describing what appeared to be details of the Heartland Institute’s climate program strategy.” He says that to “confirm” this document “I solicited and received additional materials directly from Heartland Institute under someone else’s name.” In other words, Gleick was the one who fraudulently pretended to be a board member in order to get the board documents. He then forwarded “anonymously, the documents I had received to a set of journalists and experts working on climate issues.”

So, he combined genuine, innocuous Board notes with a memo he claims he anonymously received, or so he claims. Yet, he had zero evidence that the memo was genuine. And strangely, when Heartland thought they were sending material to a Board member they did NOT include this memo. That should have been a red flag that the memo was not part of the Board packet and was not genuine.

Here is my theory. I think Gleick contacted Heartland as he said. He got the Board packet and then concocted a “strategy memo” to go along with it. He scanned the document into PDF format. The real documents were already in PDF format and sent to the fake email account he set up and then deleted.

I suspect he did not realize that the PDF tags existed and would reveal the location of the forger. Once that evidence came out, he realized that the investigation into the fraud was narrowing down in his direction. Then, when Kaminsky publicly stated that the believed Gleick was the culprit, he had to confess. The problem he faced was that the “memo” was not a stolen document but a forged one. And, while committing fraud to obtain the documents were a problem, the forgery was even more of a problem. He had to find some way to explain how a fraudulent PDF file was produced via what we have to assume was his Epson printer.

That was when he concocted the story that the memo was mailed to him anonymously. Nothing on the memo indicated it was genuine and a cursory reading of it indicated it was not. Whether your like them or not, the warming skeptics, don’t describe their position as anti-science, quite the contrary. Anyone wish to bet that Gleick doesn’t have the original envelope anymore? I suspect that he made no effort to discover the source of this piece of paper because he knew the source. He wrote it. After fraudulently obtaining the Board documents he went through them and found no smoking gun, as he had hoped. But with the genuine documents he thought he could slip a bogus document into the mix and cause trouble for people he hated. That is when I suspect he forged the “memo” and the rest is history.

New York Times writer, Andrew Revkin, himself an alarmist on warming issues, called Gleick an “aggressive critic” of skeptics. He writes that Gleick’s “admitted to an act that leaves his reputation in ruins and threatens to undercut the cause he spent so much time pursuing. Revkin also notes that Gleick’s “acts of deception… will sustain suspicion that he created the summary, which Heartland’s leadership insists is fake.” He says this means Gleick “has destroyed his credibility and harmed others.” True enough.

I’m wondering how many of the sites that published the original memo as genuine are at least cautioning readers that the indications it was faked are overwhelming, and letting them know a prominent warming alarmist used deception to concoct a scandal that ended up backfiring on himself instead? I suspect the answer is: Not many.

The Climategate leaks made the alarmists look bad. And then a scandal comes along to make the skeptics look bad, but when the truth comes it, it too bit the alarmists in the ass.

Conservatives Shouldn't Drink and Drive Gay

Houston police have an incident report ID 32377, regarding an "INCIDENT INVOLVING A PROMINENT CITIZEN." The prominent citizen in question was Right-wing radio pundit Michael Berry, a fixture in the Houston area.

Berry goes into fairly typical right-wing rants on his show, including those which demand that some groups of Americans have their right curtailed for the betterment of society. Various sources in the Houston area say that Berry has gone into anti-gay rants on his show, but I will continue to to attempt to pursue that. I prefer firm facts and will report more if I can find it.

What we do know, from the police report, which I have in front of me, is that Michael Berry, was leaving a bar and hit a car while pulling out. The car belonged to the bouncer for the bar. This took place on the 2400 block of Converse. The bouncer saw an SUV back into his car. The bouncer, with a flashlight in hand, walked up to the car and got a good look at his face. He also got the vehicle's license place. The driver looked at the bouncer and fled the scene. Police ran the plate and it belongs to Berry. So the plate confirms Berry's car was there, the bouncer say Berry there and security video confirms his presences inside the gay club as well.

The bouncer said the driver had just left the gay club minutes before and security tape from within the club confirms that ultra-conservative Berry was inside the gay venue. Berry is refusing to say anything about the incident. The bouncer thinks that Berry is being silent because, "If you're going to stand up and say anti-gay things and be conservative and be Mr. Good Guy, and then when something happens that points you out and puts you in a place with the exact business that you aim to shut down, it kind of makes it seem like I need this to go away and I need it to go away quickly." Berry continues to refuse to speak to the incident. He would not only have to explain his visit to his right-wing listeners, but also to his wife.

Now this blog doesn't know how gay Mr. Berry may or may not be, but the evidence at least shows he can't drive straight. In case you have doubts about the club, here is one of their flyers. Berry knew exactly where he was going.

Republican Sex Scandal of the Day

Daniel Lucas was a candidate for state representative in Colorado. More precisely he was a failed candidate. A long-time Republican, Lucas lost to the incumbent by almost a two-t0-one margin.

Lucas told a local paper that he's an "open book" and said that he were stranded on a isalnd he would want, "water, food, and a girlfriend."

Perhaps he might adjust that wish to food, water and the pizza delivery boy.

Mr. Lucas is appearing in court in February. The pizza delivery boy says he delivered the pizza but Lucas was acting weird. He was paid for the pizza and then asked if he could get some extra Parmesan cheese. The delivery boy went to the car and got the items. When he returned he found Lucas on his knees. The former Republican politician asked suggested an exchange of money for oral sex on the young man. Lucas denies it all. He says they had friendly banter and that in one comment the delivery boy intimated Lucas was gay so Lucas claims he "began acting gay." Yep, gay guys always are on their knees in front of pizza delivery boys.

The delivery boy says that he backed out of the door immediately and that Lucas tried to grab his arm to prevent him leaving. Lucas may already have started working on a defense when police arrived after the delivery boy complained.

Lucas "appeared nervous and his train of though was not linear, as he bounced between several topics." (Hmm, this sounds like the majority of the GOP presidential candidates.) Lucas claimed his mother wanted the extra condiments for the pizza but when police asked to speak to her they were told she wasn't even there. Lucas did tell police he had "probably done something inappropriate that he should not have done." Lucas later changed his story claiming that the delivery boy had come on to him and that he must have done something to the pizza and that he (Lucas) was keeping it for DNA evidence. Lucas then told police he "won't do it again" and was willing to drop the whole thing. I bet he would.

Now, to be clear, assuming the delivery boy is competent, and I assume he is, then Mr. Lucas did nothing that ought to be a crime. He made a monetary offer for sexual favors. I don't think that should be a criminal offense. But once again the Republicans are proving the difficulty that comes with being the party of "morality" and "family values." The hypocrisy is so obvious that each case will be noticed. If the GOP would just get behind a live-and-let-live philosophy, stop pretending they speak for God, and chuck the fundamentalists out into the street, things would be much better.

The Continuing Saga of Family-Values Republicans

Another conservative "family values" Republican can kiss his career good bye, though apparently he would be rather kissing men anyways.

Greg Davis, is the right-wing mayor of Southaven, Mississippi. He was a Republican candidate for Congress in 2008. He is married, has kids, and ran on anti-gay platform.

But Davis has a problem. He is under investigation for using city credit cards improperly. Apparently we are talking significant amounts of money as Davis has already had to pay the city back $96,000 so far, and it another $170,000 are in dispute.

As part of the investigation receipts for expenditures were required. One of the receipts got the attention of the media. It was from a store in Toronto, Canada named Priape. To be precise, the store is a porn shop, but only with gay porn. Well, with the receipts in public there wasn't much Davis could do. He told a press conference, "I think that it is important that I discuss the struggles I have had over the last few years when I came to the realization that I am gay."

Bishop Reminds God what God is Supposed to Believe

I am always amazed that any human being pretends to speak for God. I am most amazed when those that have covered-up child abuse for decades pretend to do so. And, to make it worse, pretend they have some moral authority to do it. Anyone who claims to be a "man of God" is a fraud, a liar, and probably after your wallet or your obedience. Certainly, many who have claimed it within Catholicism were also after your kids.

John Nienstedt plays at being an "archbishop," a rank within Christianity unobtained by Jesus during his life time which, I guess, makes Nienstedt his superior.

Nienstedt, who wears the funny little outfits that the Vatican thinks makes them look pretty, has issued a "marriage prayer" for Catholics. His whole purpose of the prayer is not as a prayer at all but to push his own political agenda on Catholics, most of whom actually know the Church has no moral capital left to spend.

Prayers, in my opinion, are not actually meant for some god. They are meant for the person praying. They give the supplicant a false sense of being in control, it is an assurance they are "doing something," even when they are just talking. None of it makes sense to me, even if I were to accept the premise that there is a magic man in the sky. The Christian concept of prayer contradicts basic Christian theology.

First, the supplicant can not, according to the nonsense theologians vomit out, tell God anything he doesn't already know. You can't tell God what you need, or what terrible thing needs righting. He already knows. And, you sure as hell can't manipulate God and force him to act in ways that he doesn't want. So, you can't tell him anything he allegedly doesn't know, and you can't get him to do anything he doesn't already want to do.

And since he knows all this before you get down on your knees (Please note I do not recommend allowing children to be on their knees in front of priests or even archbishops), and since he already knows what he's going to do, then your entire prayer is an exercise in futility.

Of course, it does appear that a lot of believers actually do think that they can use prayer to manipulate God into acting in new ways. They can get him to change his mind by harassing him with whinny supplications, especially if they throw the right combination of words at him. In the Nienstedt's "prayer" the right combination is "We make our prayer through Jesus Christ, who is Lord forever and ever. Amen."

The problem with that is that a god who is all-knowing would already know his final decision. And since he would know instantly, you can't even call this a decision. There is no process of mulling things over. He doesn't have to say: "Let me research that and get back to you." He already knows all the relevant facts and has made a decision instantly. And he did that an eternity ago, already setting the course of action as to what would happen.

In fact, I pity the Christian God. He can't learn anything. He can't discover new ideas or even change his mind. Everything is now an eternity old for him. He's already made all the decisions he will ever make and set into motion all the actions he decided upon. He makes no effort to do anything. There can be no sense of accomplishment as it takes no effort for him. Spewing out universes, for him, is like stepping on an ant—something we do with little thought and no effort. His entire existence is a pretty boring one. Me, I'd be thrilled with exploring the universe, but I don't pretend to know everything already. I would be learning new things constantly. He just has the same old stale information, knows the answers to every riddle, can't find something new and can't change his mind. God goes for eternity without the wonder of surprise. That's the drawback of perfect knowledge.

If God could change his mind, then what he previously "knew" regarding his action would be wrong. He would lack perfect knowledge. And if he lacks perfect knowledge, then like us, he could make mistakes. Which, might explain Nienstedt and the Vatican—big mistakes made by an imperfect God who didn't know what was the right way to go.

Nienstadt's entire prayer is directed against the right of gay couples to have legal marriage contracts. In Nienstadt's prayer there are "holy marriages and holy families," that would be anyone who fucks to have babies and for no other reason. And that excludes gay couples because they don't procreate together and the ONLY justification for an orgasm, in Catholic theology, is to make babies. Otherwise sex is evil and disgusting. And if there are "holy marriages and holy families" then there are unholy marriages and unholy families—and if you think Catholic theology ONLY means gay couples in that "unholy" category, you are in for a surprise.

In the so-called New Testament, Paul told the Corinthians that he wished they were all celibate. In truth, the Vatican has never given up the idea that a sexual, loving relationships is second best. Celibacy, like what priests are supposed to obtain, is superior. Paul said that marrying was only preferable to burning. To quote the book, From Sacrament to Contract, "Augustine regarded marriage as less virtuous than virginity and chastity and sexual intercourse as per se sinful. But marriage, as a creation of God, had its own inherited goods, which at least mitigated the sinfulness of sex." Marriage was a suboptimal choice left for those who couldn't resist the temptations of sex. So, Vatican, how did that work out for you?

In the ideal Catholic world everyone would be celibate, which would sort of bring about the end of the world. But before the last celibate Catholic died a lonely death, we would all be sexless, souless people. Imagine that the perfect world is one where all men are like priests and all women are like nuns: angry, drunken, frustrated, hateful, dried-out hypocrites. At least in this world the "children" would be safe because their wouldn't be any. No kids for nuns to smack around, none for priests to offer a little extra communion wine to, in exchange for a quicky in the confessional. What an awful world it would be. Now, I happen to favor celibacy for Christians. I can't think of a faster way for their religion to die out.

The so-called Shakers tried this model. They relied on other people having children that they could adopt, in order to stay in existence. But since adoption by religious groups was banned they have dwindled down to three celibate members in one location. Otherwise the religion has totally died out.

But, back to this Nienstedt fellow. His prayer includes the supplicant saying: "Grant to us all the gift of courage to proclaim and defend your plan for marriage, which is the union of one man and one woman in a lifelong, exclusive relationship of loving trust, compassion, and generosity, open to the conception of children." (See, that last bit about conception is necessary since any sex without it is from the pits of hell, demonic and evil.)

But, what gets me is that the supplicants are telling God what his "plan for marriage" is, as if God didn't already know what he planned, and know it before Nienstedt even started running around in red dresses.

If they want to play dress-up, chant, swing stinking incense around, and pretend to manipulate the creator of the universe, that is their right. They can even imagine that they are doing so on behalf of magic men in the sky. But they are insisting that their religious delusions be the foundation of secular law. Now, given that I can't think of an institution with more sexual pathologies and problems than the Catholic Church, I really think they should mind their own fucking business. Before they start interfering in the loving relationships between adult same-sex couples, maybe they ought to stop lying about their priests raping kids. Maybe they should tell their frustrated nuns to ratchet things down a bit, put the rulers down, and leave the kid's knuckles alone. Maybe they should worry about the beam in their own eye before bitching about the splinters in the eyes of others.

Catholic Priests and Nun Steal Babies

The story is shocking. Even now as the Catholic Church is pouring money into a campaign against marriage equality in Minnesota new revelations look at the the Church in Spain literally stole babies and sold them for cash.

The BBC says that the story broke when one of the babies, now an adult, was told by his dying father that he was not actually the biological son of the man and his wife, but that he had been purchased from a Catholic priest. The man, Luis Moreno, discovered that the same thing had happened to a friend of his, Antonio Barroso.

They sought out an adoption lawyer to try and explain what happened. The attorney told them he had run into similar cases. And then the men went to the media with their story and the floodgates opened.

The Spanish government says that their investigations shows that nuns and priests did steal babies. Angel Nunez of the justice ministry said they don't how many, "But from the volume of official investigations I dare say that there were many."

The practice began under the fascist rule of Francisco Franco but continued after his death. At first, the children stolen were taken for political reasons and handed over the supporters of the regime. But soon the clergy and nuns were taking children because they considered the parents morally unfit.

Children would be taken for exams and then the mothers were told the infant died suddenly. Parents were sometimes told that they were not allowed to see the infant. One magazine report claims that one clinic kept a dead baby in a freezer and would bring it out to show grieving mothers as proof.

One doctor who was implicated threatened a journalist with a metal crucifix telling him, "I have always acted in his name. Always for the good of the children."

DNA tests have been used to find missing children, now adults, and introduce them to their real parents.

What is so truly shocking is that the Catholic Church continues to misuse its tax exempt status to mount political campaigns to attack the rights of others, in the name of preserving the family. Yet this sect has covered abuse of children by priests and engaged in child stealing in Spain. What moral authority does the Vatican actually believe it has?

Republican says nude photos to document weight loss

Part of the American empire is Puerto Rico, which isn't quite a state, but is part of the country, something immigration officials periodically forget due to their lack of education.

Roberto Arango is a senator in the legislature there and a top official in the Republican Party. He was also revealed to have posted naughty pictures of himself to a gay website. His excuse is a gem:

You know I've been losing weight. As I shed that weight, I've been taking pictures. I don't remember taking this particular picture but I'm not gonna say I didn't take it, I'd tell you if I remembered taking the picture but I don't.

The problem with this excuse is that a photo of one rectum doesn't quite document weight loss. I don't have problem with nude photos or even people documenting weight loss with said photos. But really, this is not the pose that one would expect under those circumstances.

Meanwhile, for an update on another Republican hypocrite go below the asshole below:

You will remember that we recently posted about anti-gay Republican Phil Hinkle, a representative in the Indiana state legislature. Hinkle tried to hire a young man for a sexual encounter recently and instead found the young man rather upset by his aggressive gropes and his bragging about his political position. Hinkle didn't want to let the young man leave the hotel room as the nude Republican started fondling the clothed young man. Well, that didn't work out well as the young man fled the scene and the sister of said young man went to the media about it.

Indiana House Speaker Brian Bosma, trying to protect the hypocritical image of moralistic Republican assholes (see above) called on Hinkle to resign his seat, as opposed to fondling the seat of the said young man. Hinkle recently meet with a reporter and rambled on for 90 minutes. He admits he offered to pay the youth for a "really good time," and admits he sent the emails soliciting him, and rented a hotel room for the romp he was expecting. But, he absolutely denies offering anything to the young man to keep the incident secret, which is hard to explain after he gave the young man some valuable items to try to buy his silence.

The reporter asked Hinkle if he has done this before, with young men. Hinkle refused to answer saying, "We're not going there." Hmm, I take that to be a yes.

The reporter says Hinkle fluctuated between quoting the Bible and condemning "judgmental Bible thumpers." I guess the problem Hinkle has is who gets thumped. When he thumps gay people with the Bible that's just peachy. When his feel Bible-thumpers thump him, for precisely the same thing, he gets defensive.

He didn't pretend he was in the room for a weight-loss therapy session. He instead says he is now in therapy because something "upstairs in my brain went off that sent me down a road to self-destruction. Somewhere upstairs a button got pushed and I want to know why. People keep asking: 'What were you thinking?' I honestly don't know. It's as simple as that." Ah, no, it is more simple than that. No button was pushed, Mr Hinkle, you just went out and hired a male for sex and got caught you hypocritical fucktard!

Hinkle insists that he and the young man only talked about baseball. He doesn't explain why he was nude to talk about baseball. He says he went to the bathroom and the young man vanished with the very items the young man says he was given as an attempt to bribe his silence. Of course, Hinkle, being the forgiving conservative that he is, won't file charges against the young man for theft. How convenient. But Hinkle will not resign, though he won't run for office again.

Another Republican in a "morals" scandal.

The French comedy film, Le Cage aux Folles, has the son of two gay men engaged to the daughter of the deputy leader of a French version of the Moral Majority. The deputy leader just learns that the leader of the moral order has died of a heart attack while in bed with a prostitute, who was both underaged and black. Not knowing the truth about his daughter's fiance's family he concocts the idea that a nice, wholesome wedding would save their image. From this premise all humor flows.

Republicans are the organized political party of the moralistic crowd in America. They promote "family values," which is code for "we hate gays." Taking their clues from insane American fundamentalists the GOP assumes that hating gays is the height of morality. Doing unto others, in their mind, requires punishing people for their perceived moral shortcomings.

I have long contended that the conservative obsession with morality is the direct result of these individuals knowing their own heart all too well. They fear "sin" in others because they know exactly how corrupt they themselves happen to be. Conversely, the desire of those on the Left to impose charity, via the state, on others, is the result of their knowledge that they are not charitable when given the opportunity. Political groups tend to want the state to compensate for the moral shortcomings that they themselves possess.

And once again a Right-wing, moralistic Republican politician has stepped forward to prove my thesis. The Republican in question is Indiana state representative, Phillip Hinkle. An 18-year-old male had placed an online ad looking for a "sugga daddy." The implication was clearly an exchange of sex for cash, which certainly is a far more honorable profession than, say, being a state representative.

Hinkle emailed the man saying, "Cannot be a long time sugar daddy, but can for tonight. Would you be interested in keeping company for a while tonight?" In keeping with his "fiscal conservative" nature Hinkle actually went on the cheap. He offered the young man $80 to spend time with him at a local Indianapolis hotel. He told the young man that he would give him an additional tip of $50 or $60 "for a really good time." Hinkle told the young man, "I am an in shape married professional, 5'8", fit 170 lbs, and love getting and staying naked."

The young man, Kameryn Gibson replied, "Yes, I can!" Hinkle offered to pick up the young man at his home and drive him to the hotel. He also suggested, "If u want to consider spending night u might tell ur sis so she won't worry. Would have u back before 11 tomorrow. No extra cash just free breakfast and maybe late night snack." No extra cash! For a full night! He's not only a hypocrite but a cheap hypocrite to boot! Gibson gave his address and Hinkle picked him up.

At the hotel Gibson was told to go to the room by himself first, so that that the two would not be seen together. Hinkle waited about 15 minutes and entered the room and stripped and then wrapped a towel around his waist. At this point he mentioned to Gibson that he was a legislator and showed an ID card. Gibson, perhaps realizing he was dealing with a particularly loathsome and low class of human being—a politician—did what any self-respecting prostitute would do; he told Hinkle, "I don't want to do this."

Hinkle got upset that Gibson wanted out and supposedly him "You need to do this, because I came and got you, and I'm not taking you back until we do what we need to do."

Gibson made a beeline for the bathroom and called his sister who said she would be there momentarily to pick him up. Upon leaving the bathroom Gibson was told by Hinkle that he couldn't leave. Gibson called his sister again who read the riot act to Hinkle and told him that he didn't let her brother leave she would call the police and the media.

According to Gibson, when the pair hung up, Hinkle grabbed Gibson's upper arm to stop him, reached around to grab the young man's ass and then dropped his towel to put his Republican jewels on display. When Megan Gibson arrived to pick up her brother she again cussed out Hinkle telling him she was calling the police and the media. Hinkle panicked and offered her his iPad, BlackBerry and $100 in cash. Stupidly, in my opinion, she took what Hinkle offered and left with her brother.

She says she started getting calls on the BlackBerry from a woman who said she was Hinkle's equally Republican wife. Megan responded, "Your husband is gay." Mrs. GOP said, "You have the wrong person." Megan recounted the email address used to solicit her brother and the wife went silent and then said, "Please don't call the police."

Megan says that various family members of Hinkle started calling demanding to see proof of the email exchange between the politician and her brother. Megan dropped Kameryn off at home and was asked to come back to the hotel to meet Hinkle's daughter who wanted to see the emails. They were shown to her. Shortly Hinkle's wife called Megan and offered her $10,000 to remain quiet. Then Hinkle himself called Megan. Megan told him that she had told his wife and family that he was gay. She said Hinkle said, "You just ruined me." No, she didn't! The ruin of Hinkle was entirely self-induced.

When the media questioned Hinkle about the incident he did not deny the email exchange but described the encounter as a "shakedown." Shakedown? Isn't that what Republicans and Democrats do to taxpayers on a regular basis? His attorney wouldn't clarify what "shakedown" meant, would only say they were "investigating" the matter and then appealed to everyone to "respect" his client's privacy. Privacy? Really! Think about it for a second. Hinkle is a moralistic Republican who supports the laws that criminalized his own proclivities. Sure, if the law only applied to moralistic assholes in office that would be one thing, but these laws apply to everyone in the whole state. When you criminalize the sexual activities of consenting adults you are invading the privacy of every adult in the state.

Hinkle had no respect for the private lives of others. He was hoisted on his own petard.

Now, let us look at what was going on here, and not at the spin that Hinkle is trying to use. Gibson placed an ad on Craigslist making it clear that he would like to meet other men for sexual encounters. He had no knowledge that Hinkle would respond. Hinkle contacted him and expressed a desire to meet. Gibson asked why they should meet and Hinkle offered him money and said he would pick him up. If this were just an innocent friendship there would be no offer of cash by Hinkle and no promise of a tip for a really "good time."

Hinkle, knowing he was soliciting a teen-aged male for sex sent Gibson to the room by himself to avoid being seen entering the hotel together. Upon getting to his room Hinkle strips naked and wraps a towel around his waist. He was ready to go and making it clear. Hinkle stupidly says who he is sending Gibson into a panic who says he wants to leave. Hinkle won't allow it, he did, after all, drive to pick Gibson up and wanted what he contracted for before he would let the young man leave.

Once Hinkle, and then his family, realized that they had a potential scandal on their hands, he and they started offering things to Gibson, and his sister, to try and buy their silence. Let us be clear, it is obvious that Hinkle knew he soliciting a young man for sexual purposes. Everything he did implied he was fully aware of what he was doing. This was no miscommunication. And, it was no shakedown, since Gibson had no way of making Hinkle respond, did not know Hinkle was a politician until Hinkle stupidly revealed that fact—perhaps in the hope of thinking it would impress the young man he was trying to get into his bed.

The offer of $10,000 cash was not accepted and it was Megan Gibson who went to press, saying she thought Hinkle was "creepy" and that since he was a politician the public should know what he was up to. Gibson provided the emails to the press and allowed them to inspect them, as well as showing them the phone log to verify calls from Hinkle. Hinkle, in his "illustrious" career as a political bottom-feeder, has pushed for prayer in state schools, supports "abstinence-only" sex education, was a co-sponsor of legislation to deny marriage rights for gay couples, and pushed through legislation to put "In God We Trust" on car license plates. He is anti-abortion rights, supported a state-wide ban in public places, wants to punish private businesses for hiring "illegal" immigrants, and supported mandating seat belts. He is also anti-gambling. I can see why. He took a bit risk calling a teenaged male for sex, and he lost big time.

Religious Right Leader Relieves Himself in Public

Rev. Grant Storms has made something of a pest of himself in that he has been involved in constant campaigns denouncing gay people as immoral. He was one of these God-judged-New-Orleans-and-sent-a-hurricane types. In particular he was upset by the Southern Decadence festival which attracts gay people from around the country. He and his fundamentalist followers have gone to the festival to try and harass attendees. But, it appears, the Bible isn't the only thing that Rev. Storms beats.

He was recently parked at playground watching children while he masturbated. He had the windows of his car open so he could easily be seen. A woman who brought her kids to the park had parked next to him when she saw what he was doing. She got her kids back out of her car and told another woman what had happened. The second woman walked past Storms vehicle and verified that he was indeed masturbating while watching the children. She called a park employee who called police and then detained the self-proclaimed "Christian patriot" until law enforcement arrived.

In the above photo Rev. Storms is leading an anti-gay march through the French Quarter. He is the man with the broom, allegedly showing how God's people will "sweep the city clean" of perversion. Given his arrest record perhaps he should bring a mop next time.

Save-the-Kid- from-Gays Pastor Arrested

Rev. Tom Daniels is pastor of the Rio Linda Baptist Church, a fundamentalist church in northern California. He was also an activist who urged the passage of Proposition 8, to ban gay couples from being allowed to marry one another. Somehow preventing gay people from marrying is supposed to protect children, from something.... what is never quite made clear to me.

Rev. Daniels in in jail and charged with lewd and lascivious acts with a child under the age of 14 as well three or more acts of sexual conduct with a child. But, the good news, Rev. Daniels isn't gay so the kid was protected! The molestations supposedly took place between 2004 and 2007. Originally Daniels was investigated in 2008 for molestation charges but police said they couldn't find enough evidence. A second child has since come forward with similar accusations and the two together apparently were sufficient to file charges this time.

Wasn't denying gays people from marrying supposed to magically stop children from being molested?

It hasn't been a good week for Religious Right types and their sexual hypocrisy.

If we go to the hotbed of Right-wing Republicanism, Maricopa County, Arizona another scandal is brewing. Fulton Brock is a far Right Republican Mormon. He is a member of the County Board of Supervisors.

In the last few days his wife, Susan, was arrested. Apparently Susan meet a member of her church and decided to seduce him. The problem was that this young Mormon was 14 years old at the time. For the last three years Susan has been engaging in sexual activities with the boy, though not full-on intercourse. In Bill Clinton lingo, it all depends on what sex means and this ins't sex, since it apparently was only blow jobs and masturbation.

Now, I am not one who thinks teenagers are children. But Republicans do, and Republicans support these laws, so the point about moral hypocrisy stands.

Brock, who has served as chairman of the board of supervisors three times, called on the public to pray for his family, of course. Apparently those prayers feel on deaf ears, if anything they made matters worse. A few days later Brock's daughter was also arrested for having several sexual encounters with the same boy. Arizona, being a conservative Republican state, has an absurdly high age of consent, well above the national average of 16. It is 18 in Arizona and the teen in question is now just 17.

It seems a bit kinky that both mother and daughter were fighting for the carnal pleasures of the same teenage boy. Admittedly, alleged photos of the "victim" indicate he is a piece of eye candy (see photo above, allegedly of the boy, photo by Rachel Brock). And I guess these Mormon Republicans couldn't resist but to lick the lollypop. Daughter Rachel, was charged with sexual conduct with a minor as well as furnishing him with obscene material. I can assure you it wasn't a photo of Mormons in their sexy (sic) magic underwear. Apparently she started first with the boy since the charges say he was 13 when she went after him. She also sent a video of herself masturbating to the boy's cell phone.

Of course, Mormons publicize themselves as advocate of family cohesion, and talk about the importance of family during times of trauma and difficulty. So how is this Mormon handling the situation. I'm sure that Fulton Brock will be there at his wife's side, condemning the sin but loving the sinner, forgiving her and working to heal their relationship. Oops! That doesn't seem to be the case. Almost as soon as the charges were filed, he was doing a little filing of his own, filing for divorce.

Supervisor Brock told the waiting press: "I have filed to divorce my wife. I cannot divorce my daughter." Wow! Please note that there has been no conviction for anything, not yet anyway. I would think that people who bashed gays so heavily on Proposition 8, in the name of family cohesion, would at least wait until there was a conviction before thrown the wife and daughter under the bus.

Apparently Susan Brock had access to the boy's on-line email account. To avoid them sending messages to each other she would go into his account and type a draft message to him. He would then type a draft message to her. They were never sent so the emails never showed up in an in-box or out-box, where they might easily be noticed. Mrs. Brock realized that these draft messages might be considered evidence.

So, she had some help from another conservative Republican activist, named Christian Weems. Mrs. Weems is also a member of the same Mormon church as Susan Brock. Weems came to Brock, in jail, and started hinting that if Brock gave her the password she could delete the messages.

Weems kept asking Brock for the "password" for a gate to a beach house. At first Brock was clueless (it comes with the territory). Brock said, "I don't remember a beach house, what are you talking about?" When Weems started suggesting passwords Brock figured it out and supplied her the password to the boy's account. Weems intended to go to the account and remove the evidence on behalf of her friend, but she was arrested before she could do that.

This implies that Weems was fully aware that Mrs. Brock was licking her eye-candy. Certainly she knew about the message system that Brock and the boy had set up. So it would appear she was aware of the relationship since Brock was then in prison and couldn't inform her after the fact. That Weems came to Brock to try to help her clearly indicates prior knowledge on her part. Newspapers report that numerous "high ranking" members of the Mormon Church will be called as witnesses.

Rahcel Brock published photos of the alleged boy on her website with comments that described him as "AWESOME!!!" wishing that "his awesomeness would rub off onto me," apparently something was rubbed off, just not the awesomeness. She said he knows how to "strut" his "studly stuff."

So, the coalition that passed Prop 8 were Catholics, Baptists and Mormons. And they were going to protect kids from married gays. Exactly who is protecting the kids from priests, Baptist preachers, and Mormon housewives? I'm waiting for Joe Arpaio to hold a press conference and tie the whole thing to undocumented Mexicans.

Anti-gay preacher sued over sex with young men.

This is not personally surprising to me. This has happened so often that I have come to expect it. I generally assume that any anti-gay bigot is going to be exposed eventually. Bishop Long is a fundamentalist Baptist, a leading black conservative, and an active opponent to equality of rights for gay people.

This report indicates that two young men from Long's church have said he regularly seduced them and offered them material goods in exchange for sex. As I understand it, a third law suit, from yet another young man, has been filed well. Catching an anti gay conservative in bed with men is about as rare as finding out that the priest has been molesting children.

It must be Christmas 'cause the goose is cooked.

That would be George Rekers' goose, of course. He is surely stuffed, roasted, and on the table for serving. Ever since the professional anti-gay activist was caught returning from a European vacation with a 20-year-old sex worker things have gone from bad to worse for Rekers. His changing stories, however, have not helped the matter.

The Miami New Times, which broke the story, has been threatened by Rekers with legal action. Actually he threatened them for slander when he meant libel, slander is only spoken, lible is written, but Rekers didn't know that. But the latest revelations would seem to pull the rug out from under that threat.

The young man, who the paper refers to as Lucien, received a phone call from Rekers. Unbeknownst to Rekers the reporters were sitting in the room with Lucien interviewing him. As bad as that was for Rekers what made it worse was the entire conversation was held on a speakerphone so the reporters could hear every word that Rekers uttered.

The call came after Lucien had admitted that he was hired to give Rekers nude massages on a daily basis, which included stroking his genitals and anal region. Lucien also has been candid saying that Rekers contacted him via a website set up for male prostitutes. Rekers never challenged Lucien about either of those claims during the phone call. Yet Rekers has claimed he didn't know the young man was a prostitute, in spite of going to Rentboy.com to hire him. And he has claimed that they never had sexual contact. Perhaps he thinks having his penis stroked is not sexual—hey, didn't Bill Clinton try that one?

Now I honestly feel sorry for Lucien, not Rekers. Lucien is a 20-year-old young man separated from his family in Puerto Rico. His family didn't know he was gay and his friends didn't know he was a sex worker. He had no idea who Rekers was and has been thrust into the middle of a media frenzy merely because of Rekers hypocrisy and continual lying.

In the phone call Lucien told Rekers he was offended when he learned how active Rekers had been in attacking gay people. Rekers told him: "I just stay in the background" and said about gays: "I've never picked a fight with them." Apparently Rekers thinks that telling courts that gay people shouldn't even be allowed in the same room with children is not picking a fight. As we outlined yesterday, Rekers has testified in court that he believes that no child should be allowed to live with anyone who is gay, including living in the same house as a gay sibling.

Rekers wanted to know if the media had been calling Lucien on his cell phone or house phone. Lucien told him "Both!" The reporters say that Lucien was clearly upset throughout the coversation.

At one point Lucien said: "We did the whole massage thing, and I don't know what to think about it." Instead of telling Lucien that no such thing happened Rekers said: "Yeah, just say 'no' and just say 'I've already [mumbled] to the press and that's it. 'Cuz if you keep answering, it'll keep the story alive." Lucien replied: "This isn't something I can just be silenced about." Rekers keep asking him to be silent and blamed the whole kerfuffle on gay activists with an agenda. Apparently he sees no connection between his conundrum and his trawling websites for male prostitutes.

Lucien told Rekers that perhaps the media was correct and that Rekers actually had harmed gay people and suggested that he (Lucien) might speak to the press. Rekers pleaded: "Well, don't do that. It just causes more harm." To whom, does it cause more harm? Rekers?

Lucien then asked Rekers: "What was going through your mind when you went on that website?" This referring to the Rentboy.com website, a site which no doubt is experiencing record hits due to the publicity. Rekers didn't deny it. He just said: "Well, I'd be happy to sit down and to talk to you more about that. We have to deal with the situation that we have and make sure it doesn't get worse." Ooops, too late, talking on the speakerphone already made it worse.

Lucien again said: "Sometimes I feel like I should just tell [the media] what happened on the trip." That panicked Rekers who pleaded: "No, Please don't do that. Please don't let them pressure you into it."

Lucien then told Rekers that gay friends are pushing him to tell the truth and he was worried that any defense of Rekers would harm him within his own community. "But I'm getting pressured out of the gay community! If I ever wanted to be with someone—it wouldn't work out! This is my fucking name!"

Rekers then assured him to not worry saying: "I've been through things like this in the past..." Lucien cried out: "Well, I haven't. I'm 20 years old! If you've been through this, you shouldn't have gone to that website, you shouldn't have hired me—why did you make so many choices?"

Merry Christmas. I don't need a present this year, I already got mine.

Update: The Florida Attorney General's office has released a statement regarding their hiring Rekers at taxpayer's expense to witness in court as to why all gay people are threats to children and must be kept away from them. They claimed that "after an exhaustive search for potential expert witnesses who were willing to testify" about the dangers of gay people to children, that Rekers was their best option. No doubt that is true. They might find it equally difficult to attract expert testimony on the nature of unicorns.

As for the $87,000 that Rekers got from taxpayers for his "testimony," well, it turns out to be a much higher amount. Records now show that Rekers got two payments for his anti-gay testimony. The first was for $60,900 and the second was for $59,793. The total was just over $120,000. Why so much? I would think most fundamentalist Baptist ministers would slander gay people for free. And people think Lucien is the prostitute!

Further Update: I have been told that the young man who is either a "luggage lifter" or a male sex worker, will appear on Anderson Cooper's show AC360 this evening on CNN. If this takes place and the young man's actual name is used on the show I will take his voluntary appearance as an indication that he has given up the right to privacy.

Yet Further Update: The CNN interview was pathetic. First, nothing CNN reported hasn't been on the Internet already. During the interview "Lucien" did not use his actual name so I will continue the policy of not identifying him by the name. CNN asked if Lucien and Rekers had sex. Lucien said "no" but mentioned the massages. Given how so many people define sex narrowly this gives a false impression. According to Lucien in other interviews he was asked to massage Rekers's penis. Give the Puritanism of the media they refused to ask for details about the massage. After all, Clinton claimed that having oral sex with Monica meant he didn't have sex.

Proper follow up questions would have been asked whether Lucien had been asked to touch Rekers' genitals and whether Rekers became aroused or had an orgasm. But they would never ask that sort of question.

Curious George and the Case of the Long Stroke

I have already covered the initial revelations about anti-gay fundamentalist Baptist minister George Rekers. As I suspected this story has more to it than meets the eye, and none of it is good for Rev. Rekers.

First, let me make clear that Rekers is a proper subject for scrutiny. You will remember I did a post on why I would have nothing to say about the sex life of Tiger Woods. I wrote:

Mr. Woods does nor take it upon himself to try to arbitrate the morality of others, as do the Catholic hierarchy and fundamentalist Christians. Mr. Woods does not attempt to pass laws to control the sex lives of others as do the Republicans and various conservatives. Mr. Woods has, to my knowledge, never publicly expressed an opinion attacking others for their sex lives. In other words, Mr. Woods has basically respected the rights of others to live their own lives according to their own values.

Rekers is precisely a legitimate target for the very reasons that Woods was not. Rekers does attempt to pass laws to control others, he does publicly denounce the private lives of others, he doesn't respect the rights of others to live their own lives according to their own values. He attempts to force his values on others. And Rekers uses tax fund to push his bigotry and prejudice (and apparently self-loathing). Rekers was a paid "expert" brought in by the Republican Attorney General of Florida to testify as to why gay people should be forbidden by law to adopt children. Rekers and an associate were paid a total of $87,000 in tax funds to legitamize anti-gay legislation. Now we know how he can afford to put a male prostitute on the clock for ten days.

The judge in the case dismissed Rekers' testimony saying: "Dr. Rekers’ testimony was far from a neutral and unbiased recitation of the relevant scientific evidence. Dr. Rekers’ beliefs are motivated by his strong ideological and theological convictions that are not consistent with the science. Based on his testimony and demeanor at trial, the court can not consider his testimony to be credible nor worthy of forming the basis of public policy."

In another case Rekers was the "professional" witness brought in to testify against gay adoption. He says he "has treated gay patients to try to change their sexual orientation, some of such patients being minors brought in by parents." He said he "would not allow openly homosexual people to spend time with [children] unsupervised" and that "a homosexual household is an inferior family structure." But the judge wrote that:

It was apparent from both Dr. Rekers' testimony and attitude on the stand that he was there primarily to promote his own personal ideology. If the furtherance of such ideology meant providing the court with only partial information or selectively analyzing study results that was acceptable to Dr. Rekers.

The judge also said Rekers "was either unable or unwilling to directly answer questions" and sdaid his "willingness to prioritize his personal beliefs over his function as an expert provider of fact rendered his testimony extremely suspect and of little, if any, assistance to the court in resolving the difficult issues..." Even after this fiasco the Republican Attorney General was still willing to hire Rekers to be an "expert" on why gay people shouldn't be allowed near children.

Along with another thoroughly discredited and dishonest fundamentalist nutter, Paul Cameron, Rekers created a fake "academic" journal (available on-line only) called the Empirical Joural of Same-Sex Sexual Behavior. And he wrote a piece for a right-wing group entitled: An Empirically Supported Rational Basis for Prohibiting Adoption, Foster Parenting and Contested Child Custody by Any Person in a Household that Includes a Homosexually-Behaving Member. Wow! He seems to be saying that in custody cases all gay people should be excluded automatically. But he is saying more since he would deny custody to a straight person if that person lives in household with a "homosexually-behaving member." So, if a couple divorces and the custody rights to the youngest child are disputed, and if that household includes a gay sibling, then Rekers would automatically grant custody to the parent who doesn't allow the gay child in the house. This man is a nasty piece of work.

What Rekers is saying is that parents who want custody of one child must throw out of the house any other child who is gay. He is literally encouraging making gay adolescents homeless. I quote the introduction to his article:

There is a strong rational basis for laws or regulations prohibiting adoption or foster parenting of a child by any person engaged in sexual behavior with another individual of the same sex and to any person living in a household in which there resides an adult or adolescent household member who engages in sexual behavior with another individual of the same sex.

If Rekers' recommendation were made law it would give all parents of gay children an awful choice in any custody battle. His regulations would require them to expell their gay child or lose custody rights to all their other children. He would put a real Sophie's-choice scenario into effect.

I should note that teens thrown out of their home for being gay are far more likely to end up in street prostitution. No doubt Rekers would see that as a win-win situation for himself.

Rekers is not the proper object of pity as he is an adult who chooses to believe fundamentalist garbage. His problems are self-inflicted. He has testified that the believes the Bible is the inerrant, inspired word of some deity. That is his problem alone. The self-hatred he suffers from, and which he then has tried to inflict on others, is the direct result of beliefs Rekers has chosen for himself. Rekers has been a long-time professional bigot who goes out of his way to try to make the lives of gay people miserable. That he himself was secretly gay explains the extremity of his bigotry.

Rekers has given several conflicting stories as to how he met the young male prostitute. In one scenario he claims he never knew the young man sold sexual services until after he hired him to carry luggage for him. In another he claimed he was merely "ministering" to prostitutes the way that his "hero Jesus Christ" had done. He was gone between the two stories even though they don't jive with each other. The claim that he was "ministering" to a prostitute would at least explain why he went to a website for male prostitutes to hire a luggage handler. But if he went to the site to hire the man, he can't claim he found out he was a prostitute at a later date.

But his ministering to prostitutes doesn't seem to correspond with what the New Testament describes Jesus as doing. As I previously noted Jesus didn't minister while paying the prostitute's hourly rate. But even more damning is the fact that the young man has spilled the beans.

According to the male prostitute Rekers required him to "provide body rubs once a day in the nude." I suggest you will find that means both Rekers and the young man were in the nude. Did Jesus have nude body rubs with the prostitutes he ministered to?

But, of course, it didn't end there. Rekers wanted more and preferred a technique referred to as the "long stroke" where the young man was asked to caress "across his penis, thigh, and his anus over the butt cheeks." The young man said: "Rekers liked to be rubbed down there." No doubt he did. The young man was reffered to as Lucien in the original story. That is not his real name but one the newspaper assigned to him to protect his identity. However, Lucien's real name was easily found but I see not reason to reveal it. The Miami New Times says:

Lucien decided to speak out after a heart-to-heart with a friend, Michael, who alerted him to the grim realities of his client's anti-gay activities. Lucien, who had originally declined to speak about the trip, now says he can do little good by protecting his erstwhile, fundamentalist client.

The paper promises to reveal documents that Rekers prepared for Lucien to sign to deny that anything sexual happened on the trip. No doubt they will drip-fed the information. Rekers, however, does have a chance, if he can present a reasonable explaination as to how he met this young man. So far he has refused to do so. Lucien says he was contacted through the Rentboy web site. All Rekers will say is that he interviewed several young men and won't say where he found them. My guess is that he can't say. And, if he used the website then smoking guns may exist in the form of emails Rekers sent to Lucien via the Rentboy website.

Curious George is a nasty piece of work but he is being hoisted by his own petard. And all I can do is enjoy the spectacle.

This raises the issue that many have noticed: antigay prejudices continually arise in individuals who are themselves later found to engage in same-sex activity. This matter was actually studied and confirmed to be true. The American Psychological Association published a study done at the University of Georgia. Men were asked to reveal their feelings toward gay people and then dived into two groups: those who were highly prejudiced against homosexual and those who were not. A press release from the APA describes the study and the results:

Each participant was exposed to sexually explicit erotic stimuli consisting of heterosexual, male homosexual and lesbian videotapes (but not necessarily in that order). Their degree of sexual arousal was measured by penile plethysmography, which precisely measures and records male tumescence.

Men in both groups were aroused by about the same degree by the video depicting heterosexual sexual behavior and by the video showing two women engaged in sexual behavior. The only significant difference in degree of arousal between the two groups occurred when they viewed the video depicting male homosexual sex: 'The homophobic men showed a significant increase in penile circumference to the male homosexual video, but the control [nonhomophobic] men did not.'

Broken down further, the measurements showed that while 66% of the nonhomophobic group showed no significant tumescence while watching the male homosexual video, only 20% of the homophobic men showed little or no evidence of arousal. Similarly, while 24% of the nonhomophobic men showed definite tumescence while watching the homosexual video, 54% of the homophobic men did.

When asked to give their own subjective assessment of the degree to which they were aroused by watching each of the three videos, men in both groups gave answers that tracked fairly closely with the results of the objective physiological measurement, with one exception: the homophobic men significantly underestimated their degree of arousal by the male homosexual video.

The researchers do say the antigay men may have been anxious and that caused the arousal. But given the consistency of antigay closet cases like Rekers I'm not so sure that the most obvious explanation is the correct one. George Rekers is just another example of that theory. And while he may be in denial about his trip at the moment, the evidence is accumulating at such a pace that he will no longer have any place to hide. But, no doubt, he will eventually "repent" and claim to be cured of the attractions he now claims not to have had, in spite of paying a young man to give him the "long stroke."

One fascinating thing about the Rekers case is that we may have just witnessed the birth of a new euphemism. Previously individuals who wished to describe activities that sexual aroused others would use a euphemism like "whatever floats your boat." Perhaps, thank to Rev. Rekers, we can add to that list, "whatever lifts your luggage."

This is getting so routine as to be comedic.

The young man to the left is looking for work: he is willing to trade value for value. Fair enough. His employment ad mentions his skills and sought after attributes. He offers "good times," "escort for days" and is "uncut, versatile, nice ass." He is "For a sensual meet or companionship" and promises to "do anything you say as long as you ask." He says he is bisexual, has a "large" cock and has specialties: "Vanilla, Leather, Anal, Oral, Shaving, Spanking, Role Playing, Kissing, Toys, Feet." He is also available for modeling, go-go dancing, stripping and massage. He is multi-talented clearly.

Apparently we are also supposed to believe his most sought after talent is carrying luggage.


This young man, in case you wonder, advertises his services exclusively at a site called Rentboy.com. The site advertises the services of men willing to trade their sexual services for cash. As long as its peaceful, voluntary and doesn't happen in the street and scare the horses, I don't give a damn. It is far more honorable than a lot of things: like being a congressman or taking bailout money. My concern here is not the young man in question but one his clients.

A few days ago this young public servant flew into Miami International Airport after a ten day trip to Europe. His services and his airplane fare and expenses were all paid by George Alan Rekers, who has been a full-time anti-gay activist from the Christian Right for some time. I know, this is getting tedious. One has to wonder if any of them are actually NOT closet cases.

Rekers told the media that the reason he hired a male escort from a web site that specializes in male escorts was that he had surgery "and I can't life luggage. That's why I hired him." I just had to move some heavy items into the hotel on one day and out again a few days later. I tipped the bellboys $20 each to do it for me. It just never occurred to me to hire someone who charges a couple hundred per hour to do the same thing—and more no doubt.

Rekers claims he had no idea that the young man he hired was a male prostitute. But the only site on which the young man advertises is quite openly named Rentboy.com. That is hard to miss. And certainly the moment you check into the site you can't miss the purpose of the site. And the young man's ad discusses such luggage-friendly traits as the size of his penis, that he performs anal and oral sex and will spank.

Even worse for Rekers was that when he flew into Miami with his rent boy, it was Rekers, not the boy, who was moving their luggage.

Rekers was a founder of the Family Research Council and involved with a Christian-Right group that promises to help "cure" gay people. He has testified in favor of legislation denying gay couples the right to adopt. Rekers is a fundamentalist Baptist minister and claims to be an expert on teenage sexuality. He has written books on how to make sure your children grow up heterosexual.

The young man admits that the two met through Rentboy.com but will adamantly deny having sex. But then admission could open him to criminal prosecution since the exchange of money for sex is a crime, in part thanks to men like Rekers. The young man says that Rekers does like to be surrounded by young males. In fact, while wanting to deny adoption rights to people who are gay Rekers went out and adopted a 16-year-old boy for himself. The adopted son is now 20, making him the same age as the male prostitute that Rekers hired to move luggage at extremely high costs.'

The latest is that Rekers, who previously claimed he did not know the boy was a male prostitute, now claims he did know but was trying to save the boy's soul. Rekers says: "My hero is Jesus Christ who loves even the culturally despised people, including sexual sinners and prostitutes." "I deliberately spend time with sinners with the loving goal of to try to help them." Hmm, anyone think he was onhis knees only because he was praying? Rekers claims to have "a loving Christian ministry to homosexuals and prostitutes in which I share the Good News of Jesus Christ with them." As far as I know when Jesus spoke with prostitutes he didn't do it on the clock while paying their escort rates.

Originally Rekers said he did not know the boy was a prostitute when he hired him and only found out half-way through the trip. Now he claims he knew all along and did it because he wanted to preach to the boy, while sharing hotels rooms with him around Europe for ten days. I guess Rekers figures that people who accept the virgin birth with accept any claim. Me, I'm just a skeptical atheist and suspect he paid for a good fuck.

Update: Here is a photo of Rekers at the airport with the young man in question. The "luggage handler" is standing on the sidelines while Rekers deals with the luggage. But then, who really thought this was about luggage, unless luggage is what they are calling it these days? Would a quickie be "carry-on luggage?" Would masturbation be called "hand luggage?" Are chubby chasers into "excess baggage?"

Conservatves come to defense of gays so he can bash them.

A conservative writer at Breitbart's Big Journalism site, Bruce Carroll, has come to the defense of gays, sort of, in order to bash them along with liberals for hypocrisy. Carroll blogs about three men who went to San Francisco in order to assault gay men. The three cousins were Shafiq Hashemi, Sayed Bassam and Mohammad Habibzada.

The trio of budding bigots took a BB gun in to the city and picked a man they assumed was gay. They shot him in the face and were proud enough of their assault that they video taped the incident. Police were called and found the men a short time after the incident and confiscated the tape. As far as I know the police, when they arrest individuals, do not ask them their religion. And the news media reported on the incident based on information given out by the police.

But Big Journalism is livid because the the media, gays and liberals report neither "the identity group, nor the motives...." By identity group Carrol means Muslim. There is a decent chance these bigots were Muslim, based on the name. But I can't find anything to confirm that to be the case. It is an assumption. It may be a good assumption, but until we have confirmation, it is only an assumption. Journalists shouldn't make assumptions in news stories. To do so does bias the report according to the journalist's personal opinions. Normally conservatives would condemn journalists if they did make assumptions not in evidence.

Carrol, of course, is not concerned about gays. He just wants to bash journalists, liberals and gays in general. He went looking to see if gay media sites reported that the men were Muslim, because he assumes they are—and they may well be, I assume they are, but don't have proof. Most of Carrol's attack on various gay sites is entirely based on their refusal to brand the assailants as Muslims. This is a "head-in-the-sand approach in the reporting of this Muslim-on-gay violence in America's homo mecca" says Carroll. He specifically condemns various web sites for this alleged approach.

The sites in question don't have journalists stationed in San Francisco who could possible ferret out the religion of the assailants, in light of the police not identifying suspects by their faiths. What these sites apparently did was report on the story, based on the news stories on the wire from San Francisco. Is it hypocrisy? Is that head-in-the-sand, or is that actually good reporting based on only the facts in evidence and not on personal assumptions?

Carroll claims:

Folks who aren’t in tune with the American gay community need to understand something fundamental. The gay liberal activists and thought leaders that make policy and advocacy decisions have long ignored the existential threat to gays and lesbians by Islamic extremism. Liberal “gay rights” groups such as the Human Rights Campaign, the Gill Foundation, and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force are far more concerned about attacking American Christians on a daily basis than facing the real threat to gays around the world.

Carroll mentions the barbaric penalties imposed on gays by Muslim nations. All that is true. All that has been widely reported in the very sites and media outlets that Carroll is targeting in his tirade. But Carroll, in typical hysterical conservative mode, pretends that gays are "too concerned about court-forced marriage, educational indoctrination of kids and Federal funding to worry about such trivial matters as systematic killing of gays by Islamic regimes. Or the looming threat to American gays and lesbians on our shores." Wow! And you thought only the Greens got hysterical!

Carroll seems pretty silly to me. There is no "court-forced marriage" as far as I know. Allowing gays to marry is not forcing marriage. What a bizarre definition of force! And all the gay media has routinely reported on the killing of gays by Islamic regimes, including the very sites that Carroll bashes.

As someone who has condemned religious extremism, be it Islamic or Christian, I have to say that Carroll is going overboard. Muslims are not a "looming threat to American gays and lesbians on our shores." Yes, some individual Muslims in America will commit crimes of hate against gay people. But they are a small percentage of the population. There are more fundamentalists Christians in America who think gays need to be put to death, than there are Muslims in America holding that view. Yes, there are more fundamentalist Muslims in the world, who take that position, than there are Christians who take that position. But in America the odds are reversed.

And it is fundamentalist Christians who have the Republican Party by the balls, not Islamic fundamentalists. On a world-wide basis, Islamic fundamentalism is the bigger threat. Within the United States it is Christian fundamentalism that is a threat. This blog has reported on Christian fundamentalist clerics who have publicly called for executing gays under Biblical law. And the Bible does say that gay men should be killed, not that Carroll would admit it does.

If there is evidence, besides their names, that these three men were Muslims engaged in a religious attack on gay people, then it should be reported. Carroll unfortunately doesn't offer any.

What about the conservative head-in-the-sand approach to the extremism of their fundamentalist Christian allies and their antigay agenda? Fundamentalist Muslims and Christians both stand guilty of bigotry. Carroll blasts the purported hypocrisy of gays, liberals and the media in not reporting antigay animus among Muslims, but what about the conservative media ignoring antigay animus among Christians? Carroll's accusations are hollow. The groups he condemns have reported on verified Islamic attacks on gays. They didn't report that the three assailants were Muslims in this case, because so far no one has offered any real evidence that they are. But certainly commentators on the various sites have made the same assumptions that Carroll made.

I actually make the same assumption, but I wouldn't report it as fact without actually knowing it is a fact. Carroll doesn't know it is a fact, he just assumes it is, and no doubt hopes it is.

I did notice that Carroll left off one gay media site that I found in my search of stories on the case. On March 5th the Edge reported on the case and said that various conservative sites said the "three attackers are Muslim." Edge then discusses Islamic views toward gay people including calls for death. That was five days before Carroll wrote his piece. That article reported what it knew, that some people think it was a religiously-motivated attack, but it didn't offer it as if it were proven. Carroll's whole attack on gays, journalism and liberals relies on no one mentioning that the attackers might be Muslim so he has to ignore gay sites that did mention that very thing.

I have to say, as someone unhappy with both modern liberals and modern conservatives, that conservatives are the most hypocritical bunch in this debate. Conservatives like Carroll don't routinely report the wide-spread hatred against gay people within Christian fundamentalist circles. They ignore it. The groups Carroll attacks do report on that and they also report on Islamic assaults on the rights of gay people. Conservatives only discuss Islamic assaults on gays in order to bash Muslims, not because they actually care about the victims of those assaults. In Carroll's case he reports on Islamic gay bashing specifically so he can verbally bash gay people himself. His motivation is hardly pure, or honest, in my opinion.

By the way, to bolster his case, Carroll has a video of an antigay remark by a Muslim scholar, telling a black Muslim group in the US that gays ought to be killed. That video appeared at the Edge five days prior to Carroll's reporting it. Carroll never mentions that Christian fundamentalist have said precisely the same thing. But don't hold your breath waiting for Carroll to mention it.

Photo: I sincerely doubt that the holder of the sign is Muslim. I assume he is Christian and conservative, what does Carroll have to say?