Right-Wing Closet Case Rick Perry Says He's Being "Called" To Run For President-- But Not All Republicans Are Singing Hosannas

And speaking of callings, Perry went on the record to say, perhaps a tad condescendingly, that "our friends in New York six weeks ago passed a statute that said marriage can be between two people of the same sex. And you know what? That's New York, and that's their business, and that's fine with me. That is their call. If you believe in the 10th Amendment, stay out of their business." Staying out of other people's business is so old fashioned and passé for today's Republican Party. They don't roll that way no more-- especially not when it comes to bedrooms and the Bronze Age morals they learn from their millionaire shamen.

I'm not ruling out he could be the Fred Thompson of the 2012 cycle, but there's a lot of right-wing money ready to deploy-- we're told-- for someone as malleable and shallow as George W. Bush. Even if few normal Americans do, that big right-wing money remembers the good old days fondly. While some Republicans suspect that he doesn't stand for anything, the money men urging him to run, don't care see that as a definite positive, the cherry on the cake. Now they just have to sell it to the morons Murdoch's media empire has molded. Right-wing talk show host David Zublick poked around a little for Digital Journal and he's nervous that so "many conservatives and Tea Party activists see [Perry] as a very attractive and viable candidate, one who would liven up a field that seems devoid of exciting prospects."

But before Republicans start salivating too heavily, it is important to examine Perry closely. His conservative bonafides leave much to be desired.

Let's examine his record.

Prior to 1989, Rick Perry was a Democrat, who supported Al Gore for president. Perry was Gore's campaign manager in the state of Texas that year.

As Governor of Texas, Perry would have us believe he is a small government guy. But the facts say other wise.

Total spending in Texas the year he became governor in 2000 was approximately $49 billion. Last year it was approximately $90 billion. That is hardly reducing the size of government over a 10 year period.

The total debt of the state of Texas has more than doubled since he became governor. The debt to GDP ratio in Texas is 22.9% and the debt per citizen is $10,645. That's worse than California.

Perry claims he is for keeping taxes low. Not true. He has raised taxes repeatedly during his tenure as governor. Texans have higher taxes and fees than they had before he was elected.

While everyone lauded Perry's leadership by pointing to the low unemployment rate in the Lone Star State, it should be noted that 23 states have a lower unemployment rate than Texas. And Texas has the highest percentage of workers making minimum wage out of all 50 states. In 2007, 221,000 residents of Texas were making minimum wage or less. By 2010, that number had risen to 550,000.

The education system in Texas is abysmal. Barbara Bush, in an op-ed piece in the Houston Chronicle, wrote:

• We rank 36th in the nation in high school graduation rates. An estimated 3.8 million Texans do not have a high school diploma.

• We rank 49th in verbal SAT scores, 47th in literacy and 46th in average math SAT scores.

• We rank 33rd in the nation on teacher salaries.

What does that say about the stewardship of Rick Perry with regard to education?

Rick Perry also claims to have a tough stance on illegal immigration. But the facts indicate otherwise.

He signed the DREAM Act in 2001, giving in-state tuition to undocumented students. Perry said at the time, "We must say to every child learning in a Texas classroom, ‘We don’t care where you come from, but where you are going, and we are going to do everything we can to help you get there". This measure is similar to the one the Democrats are pushing at the federal level, one which conservatives vehemently oppose.

Perhaps the biggest issue people opposed to the nanny state should be concerned about is Perry's issuance of an executive order back in 2007 that would have forced almost every single girl in the state of Texas to receive the Gardasil vaccine before entering the sixth grade. Perry was in the tank with Merck. There were apparent financial connections between Merck and Perry reported by news outlets, such as a $6,000 campaign contribution and Merck’s hiring of former Perry Chief of Staff Mike Toomey to handle its Texas lobbying work.

The Texas legislature put the kibosh on that idea by crafting a bill that overturned the executive order.

Subsequently, very serious safety issues with the vaccine came to light. The biggest problem with regard to the Gardasil issue was that Perry appeared to be condoning premarital sex, or at least assuming that middle school girls were going to be engaging in sexual activity, which is the only way that the cervical cancer that the vaccine prevents can be contracted. Many parents and conservatives were justifiably outraged.

When one takes into account these facts about Rick Perry, the only conclusion that can be reached is that Perry is for the expansion of government and its intrusion into our lives.

On Perry's possible run for the White House? No thanks. I think I'll pass.

Republicans Have Good Reason To Worry That Gays Are Taking Over Their Party

And the worst kind of gays, frustrated, self-loathing, deranged and mentally unbalanced closet cases. And I'm not just talking about the spate of Republicans who have come out recently, like Ken Mehlman and Lindsay Graham, or even just potential First Lady Marcus Bachmann. As Rick Perry promises to make his intentions-- in terms of the Republican presidential race-- known within the next couple of weeks, the discussions of his use of male prostitutes and of his affairs with other closeted Texas Republicans is coming back to haunt him. But first a little wrap up on ole Marcus and how that could impact the campaign of dedicated homophobic fanatic Michele Bachmann.

If you aren’t yet familiar with the growing whispers about Michele Bachmann’s campaign—the uncorroborated speculation that the candidate’s profoundly antigay hubby, Marcus, is a closeted gay man—you will be. The chatter has already made its way from the blogs and Twitter (Cher tweeted that Marcus has tripped her exquisitely tuned gaydar) to the alternative press to The Daily Show, where Jon Stewart and Jerry Seinfeld left each other in stitches this week taking shots at Marcus Bachmann’s effeminate manner and “center-square gay” voice. (Anyone out there old enough to remember Paul Lynde?) As Stewart joked, the guy is “an Izod shirt away from being the gay character on Modern Family.” Clips of the comedians’ faux “comedy repression” session promptly popped up on the websites of such stodgy outlets as the Washington Post and The Atlantic.

The wringing of hands about whether it’s fair for the respectable media to promote this sort of salacious chatter is as inevitable as the chatter itself. But this particular assault on Marcus is about more than critics lobbing generic bombs at a fiercely conservative presidential combatant. Michele Bachmann has long been one of the most aggressive anti-gay-marriage crusaders in politics, while Marcus runs a Christian-based therapy clinic accused of dabbling in “reparative therapy,” a controversial counseling technique premised on the notion that you can "pray away the gay." (One clip making the rounds from an undercover video shows a potential clinic patient being assured that, among other things, God had made men’s eyes to appreciate the form of a woman.)

The Minnesota congresswoman has lamented that involvement in “the gay and lesbian lifestyle” is a life of “personal bondage, personal despair, and personal enslavement,” while her husband has charmingly likened bi-curious youth to “barbarians” who must be “educated” and “disciplined”-- parenting advice that manages at once to sound both draconian and pervy.
In short, we’re talking here about a couple that has planted its flag on the lush green fields of militant anti-gaydom and dared the deviants to take their best shot.

Which is precisely what is happening now-- and is likely to accelerate as the congresswoman’s profile and poll numbers rise.

Not sharing the Bachmanns’ squeamishness about homosexuality, I don’t give a pig’s lip which way Marcus rolls. I can’t even get worked up about the hypocrisy angle, always a favorite cudgel in politics. After all, if someone as religiously conservative as Marcus Bachmann were gay, of course he’d cling to the idea that a person can pray away his supposedly satanic urges. It’s human nature to flip out most about the things that affect us the most personally.

But while Marcus’s sexuality holds little interest for me, I am interested to see how the Bachmann camp will handle the still-below-the-radar-but-getting-tough-to-ignore buzz. It’s one thing to be attacked during a campaign for your political positions or personal quirks. Most big-league candidates make their peace with the possibility that their beliefs, character, and personal lives will be publicly shredded before they opt to enter the game (or not, as in the case of Mitch Daniels).

But in Bachmann Land, where politics is so personal, what will be the reaction to the suggestion that Marcus is the very thing he has long devoted himself to fighting against? Slamming the congresswoman as a Jesus freak or an antigovernment extremist only fills her with pride. But how will she and her camp deal with her husband being lampooned as a closet case? It’s like Ronald Reagan being tarred as a down-low commie-- or Grover Norquist being accused of harboring big-government impulses. Harsher still, as the FrumForum has noted, Bachmann’s fellow righties have thus far not been leaping to her defense on this most ticklish of issues. She and Marcus have been left to twist in the wind as outlets like Gawker compile the increasingly brutal commentary.

But here’s where Bachmann has the edge over many other pols: as a conservative Christian, the more she and hers are attacked-- especially on something she considers a core moral issue-- the more she will be convinced that she’s doing God’s work.

Among devout evangelicals, ferocious attacks-- including people bearing false witness against you-- are brandished as a badge of honor. It shows that you are willing to be despised and persecuted for your faithfulness, as were Jesus and his early followers. “They’ve heard the sermon over and over again, ‘You will be persecuted for righteousness' sake,'” observes Michael Cromartie, head of the Evangelical Studies Project at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. “So the idea of being misrepresented or persecuted is not new.”

The degree to which Christians should anticipate or even pine for persecution has long been a common debate topic. (“You know if you are never persecuted for your beliefs then you are probably not bothering Satan too much,” asserts this poster at ChristianOvercomers.com, adding that “being delivered up to Satan and the rules of his beast system is your DESTINY as one of God’s elect.”) The tendency of some religious conservatives to see themselves as a political minority under siege has even been given its own cheeky moniker, Christian Persecution Complex.

In modern-day America, chances for actual religious martyrdom are few and far between. For the pious like Bachmann, political martyrdom can be the next best thing.
Bachmann has already pointed to religious bigotry as a source of her political opposition. “I was attacked repeatedly for my religious faith, and the media was a willing accomplice,” she told the Minneapolis Star Tribune of her 2006 House race. “I’m really disturbed by the media’s lack of tolerance and understanding for the belief of a committed Christian.”

The more personal the persecution of her husband gets, tied as it is to his antigay labors, the more likely it is to steel Michele’s spine and persuade her to stay the course. “Most social conservatives agree with her about the homosexual issue,” asserts Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, predicting: “Not only is it not going to faze her, it will build sympathy for her among her supporters and admiration that she doesn’t back down.”

In which case, it could be the congresswoman who winds up having the last laugh.

And don't think for one moment that Rick Perry and his handlers don't know that. Kay Bailey Hutchison learned how hard it was to use Rick Perry's status as a closet case against him among Texas religious nuts. Yesterday Aaron Blake asked in his Washington Post column just how Perry's candidacy could be a game changer for the GOP nomination race. Blake outlines how his coming nomination will impact each of the other candidates:

* Uniting the coalition: While Rep. Michele Bachmann and Herman Cain may get some establishment support, and former governors Mitt Romney (Mass.), Tim Pawlenty (Minn.) and Jon Huntsman (Utah) may get some tea party support, no candidate can cross over as easily as Perry.

Just as we’re talking about how the tea party-and-business coalition of the GOP is breaking down, here comes a candidate who can unite them. Perry was talking about the tea party long before most other big-time elected Republicans were, and that gives him cache with the movement.

But he’s also gotten support from the business community and more traditional Republican bases. That makes him more of a double threat than any other candidate.

* Challenging Bachmann: Just when it’s looking like nobody is competing with Bachmann in Iowa, here comes Perry.

He can speak to social conservatives with the best of them, and his speech at the Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans last month is proof of that. While other non-candidates like Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee urged activists to be pragmatic about their nominee, Perry urged them to be uncompromising on social issues.

Bachmann may still be the favorite in Iowa with Perry in the race, but her path isn’t as clear.

* Competing with everyone: Because Perry’s base is so diverse, he is capable of stealing votes from just about anybody.

While he competes with Bachmann in Iowa, he could also steal the role of Bachmann’s chief competition from Pawlenty. And if he does that, Pawlenty’s path to victory becomes much more difficult.

There is also some thought that Perry getting in the race may draw Romney out of his shell. For now, nobody is forcing Romney to take positions and start defining his candidacy in detail. If Perry gets in, it helps force the issue.

“Romney stays a slight favorite, but he can no longer play it safe and has got to get more aggressive,” said Democratic consultant Ed Peavy.

* Frontrunner?: Sometimes, we may be a little careless with the term “frontrunner.” So far, the likes of Pawlenty and Huntsman haven’t earned that mantle. And all you have to do is look back at Fred Thompson in 2008 to see the blueprint for what some think could be a Perry flame-out. (The main question with Perry, of course, is his desire to be president, which he had previously and repeatedly denied-- so much so that people believed him.)

But with Perry, it’s hard not to think about the label at this point. He’s fresh off a win over a popular GOP senator in his 2010 primary and a moneyed Democratic opponent in the general election, and he’s already cracking double digits in a national poll, despite having pretty low name ID.

Will Rick Perry Ride To The Rescue?

The Republican Establishment is determined to roll the dice on Mitt Romney. He's rich; he has rich friends; he's vanilla and predictable, doesn't look like a freak and, most important, it's "his turn," always an important consideration in a dead-end bureaucracy like the Republican Party. But there's a problem: other than fellow Mormons and fellow vulture capitalists, no one likes him-- and the religious right just hates him. Sure, Republicans think he's better than Obama and many other people think he's no worse than Obama-- which is a helluva lot more positive than, say, Michele Bachmann, Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum, Herman Cain, Sarah Palin or any of the other dwarves offering themselves up for the task. But still, there's something uncomfortable in everyone's craw about Romney. He's trying desperately to come off like an everyman, but he's even less successful at it than David Cameron was in the U.K. But if not Romney, who?

Enter Governor Rick Perry of Texas, either as a candidate of the religionist nuts in his own right (no one in the early states cares much about him yet) or as the one who can derail the dreaded Bachmann. No doubt some people do like him for some reason. I won't speculate on that and everyone I know in Texas just hates his guts-- but that's probably a good indication of why he's popular, or even just potentially popular, among Republicans, especially of the far right-wing variety. He's not as unpopular as Rick Scott, Republican governor of Florida, or Scott Walker, Republican governor of Wisconsin. And his July 11th polling numbers were actually even a point above Obama's. Let me go off on a little tangent for a minute and I'll circle back to Rick Perry in a moment. The tangent is Karl Frisch's brilliant analysis yesterday about how the deadbeat congressional Republicans manufactured the default crisis for their own political ends.

During the previous dare not speak his name presidency, both parties increased the debt ceiling so that we could pay our creditors for money borrowed to fund things already approved by Congress and the President. Nothing new there, the debt ceiling has been raised 72 times over the past half century.

Now, with Republicans in control of the House and with a filibuster in the Senate, suddenly we find ourselves in the midst of a debate, this time under President Obama. Which only goes to show you that nothing Obama does will be met without controversy from conservatives. He could take his young daughters ice-skating for Christmas and the right would accuse him of imitating Jesus by walking on water.

A group of 235 economists-- six of them Nobel Prizers-- have written Congressional leaders imploring them to promptly raise the debt ceiling, or risk “substantial negative impact on economic growth at a time when the economy looks a bit shaky. In a worst case, it could push the United States back into recession.”

Pair that warning with comments by Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell that the “most important thing [Senate Republicans] want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president” and things begin to smell rotten.

If you doubt the penchant of Republicans to hold our economy hostage, perhaps Kentucky Senator Rand “Libertarian Magic Dust” Paul can change your mind. He threatened to filibuster everything in the Senate until there was a floor debate on the issue. Now, he never made it clear what he wanted to debate, but Majority Leader Harry Reid gave him that opportunity anyway by introducing a bill doing what he’d requested and wouldn’t you know it? Paul and 21 others voted against allowing debate on that bill. See, he’s so serious about the filibuster, he’ll even filibuster what he wants.

Republicans are banking on back-to-back economic collapses-- the first because of their Bush-backed policies, and the second because of partisan inaction-- but there couldn’t be anyone in their midst angling to benefit from the inability to act, could there?

Meet House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, who has invested thousands of dollars with his friends on Wall Street in a fund that stands to make serious bank if we default on our obligations.

Cantor is betting against the American government, which I guess shouldn’t be all too surprising since Republicans have been betting against the government for generations. Heck, nearly every GOP campaign is premised on attacking the government. And when they do wrestle control away from the Democrats, Republicans govern in a way that would make anyone question our government’s purpose.

Current Beltway Republicans are just like their Bushian predecessors that got us into this mess in the first place. If we fail to meet our debt obligations, we will lose our perfect credit rating, which would, in turn, add billions of dollars to our debt each year in the form of increased interest. Talk about economic conservatism.

Well, talk about economic conservatism and talk about things Bushian and how could Texas not come to mind? Conservatives like to point to Texas-- Bush's and Perry's Texas-- as the model for how to do it the right way. Well... it may be how to do it the right wing way, but the correct way? That's a joke-- and Texans know it better than anyone.

For all the controversy over the national debt ceiling, here's a surprise: Since 2001, the debt load in conservative Texas has grown faster than the federal debt.

Texas has been borrowing more than most other states, too. And local entities, from cities to school districts to transit authorities, have been piling up even more debt.

From 2001 to 2010, state debt alone grew from $13.4 billion to $37.8 billion, according to the Texas Bond Review Board. That's an increase of 281 percent. Over the same time, the national debt rose almost 234 percent, with two wars, two tax cuts and stimulus spending.

The sets of numbers are not easily comparable, and not just because one is counted in billions and the other in trillions. National figures exclude some obligations, and the Texas total includes so-called conduit bonds, for which the state is not necessarily liable if the borrowers default.

Still, the trend is undeniable. While Texas lawmakers have refused to raise taxes-- and often criticize Washington for borrowing and spending-- the state has been paying for much of its expansion with borrowed money.

That's not a bad thing, if everybody can handle the debt service and spend the money prudently. Texas' population grew almost twice as fast as the nation's in the past decade, so it needs new highways, schools, prisons and more.

Local borrowing accounts for almost 85 percent of public debt in Texas, because the government is so decentralized. Combine state and local borrowing, and Texas ended fiscal 2008 with $216 billion in total debt, up from $98 billion in 2001, according to census figures. (The latest census data for local debt is 2008.)

The borrowing isn't slowing. New issues expected for 2011 include $2 billion for transportation, $434 million for water projects and $235 million for cancer research. All those are paid from the state's general fund.

Much more borrowing is planned for debt that's supported by revenue and user fees. And local borrowing dwarfs all the categories.

...Conservative writer Christopher Chantrill presents publicly available data on government finances and his estimates. Measured as a percentage of state product, he ranks Texas among the lowest on state debt and among the highest on local debt. Combine state and local, and in 2010, he estimates that Texas had debt of $8,943 per person, $380 more than the average for all the states. In 2001, the Texas debt load was $4,608 per person-- and $843 lower than the states' average.

Meanwhile Perry's in the news today-- not because of his secessionist/Confederate leanings but because he's being sued by a religious freedom group "in an effort to block his promotion of and participation in an all-day Christian prayer event to be held Aug. 6, arguing that it violates the constitutional separation of church and state."

The Freedom From Religious Foundation, which claims more than 16,000 members, including 700 in Texas, filed the federal lawsuit Wednesday in Houston, contending that Perry’s actions violate the Constitution's Establishment Clause by “giving the appearance that the government prefers evangelical Christian religious beliefs over other religious beliefs and non-beliefs.”

“We always say, beware prayer by pious politicians,” said Annie Laurie Gaylor, who co-directs the group with her husband, Dan Barker, a former evangelical Christian minister who is now an atheist.

“Nothing fails like prayer,” she said. “It’s the ultimate political cop-out.”

The lawsuit, which comes as Perry flirts with joining the field of GOP presidential contenders, notes that the plaintiffs are “nonbelievers who support the free exercise of religion, but strongly oppose the government establishment and endorsement of religion, including prayer and fasting, which are not only an ineffectual use of time and government resources, but which can be harmful or counterproductive as a substitute for reasoned action.”

...“The answers for America’s problems won’t be found on our knees or in heaven, but by using our brains, our reason and in compassionate action,” Barker said. “Governor Perry’s distasteful use of his civil office to plan and dictate a religious course of action to ‘all citizens’ is deeply offensive to many citizens, as well as to our secular form of government.”

Perry has mixed religion with politics before. In April, he called on all Texans to pray for rain for three days as most of the state battled an extreme drought that led to massive wildfires that scorched more than a million acres this year, claimed the lives of two firefighters and destroyed nearly 400 homes.

It didn't work. Instead he called Obama and begged for relief for parched Texans.

Republican Presidential Race Focuses On The Issue Their Base Obsesses Over: Homosexuality-- Will It Destroy Romney Or Bachmann... Or Both?

Not many people are paying attention to Santorum (except on Google's search engine), even though the former Pennsylvania senator and far right fanatic claims to be running for president... of the United States. He fancies himself in a battle royale with Michele Bachmann for the hatred and bigotry portion-- which seems to be the biggest portion-- of the Republican Party base. Both are more or less ceding the selfishness and greed portion of the base to former vulture capitalist Mitt Romney. The GOP Establishment-- the political hacks with the connections to the Big Business special interests that keep the loathsome party afloat-- know Romney is their only shot at beating Obama. And now they're worried because Bachmann is starting to catch up to him in polls. Her brand of hysterical Know Nothing stoopid passes for charisma in GOP precincts, especially in the backward, fear-and-hate-driven parts of Iowa where she's beating the striped pants off Romney. And now Romney, who has failed to sign the anti-gay pledge that Santorum and Bachmann enthusiastically embraced, faces a nightmare scenario inside GOP politics of being branded as the pro-gay candidate. It's happened to him before. And conservatives are absolutely obsessed with homosexuality.
I got this story from BoingBoing a few years ago. It's just as relevant today.

Wikipedia is "The Free Encyclopedia." What's on the mind of Wikipedia its readers? Here are the top ten most viewed pages on Wikipedia:

     1.     Main Page [30,090,900]
     2.     Wiki [904,800]
     3.     Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows [413,400]
     4.     Naruto [401,400]
     5.     Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock [396,000]
     6.     United States [330,000]
     7.     Wikipedia [329,400]
     8.     Deaths in 2007 [321,300]
     9.     Heroes (TV series) [307,500]
     10.     Transformers (film) [303,600]

Conservapedia is "The Trustworthy Encyclopedia." What's on the mind of its readers. Here are the top ten most viewed pages on Conservapedia:

     1.     Main Page [1,906,729]
     2.     Homosexuality [1,572,713]
     3.     Homosexuality and Hepatitis [517,086]
     4.     Homosexuality and Promiscuity [420,687]
     5.     Gay Bowel Syndrome [389,052]
     6.     Homosexuality and Parasites [388,123]
     7.     Homosexuality and Domestic Violence [365,888]
     8.     Homosexuality and Gonorrhea [331,553]
     9.     Homosexuality and Mental Health [291,179]
     10.   Homosexuality and Syphilis [265,322

The GOP Establishment's hope that Santorum could derail Bachmann-- the candidate Obama would most like to run against, the one who would assure him the biggest landslide-- is falling flat... everywhere. Next up: Palin. It looks like they've persuaded her to jump in and drain votes away from Bachmann and ruin her candidacy so Romney can limp through the brutal GOP primaries and caucuses and give the GOP a relatively mainstreamish nominee. (Palin may be an idiot but even she can read polls and knows she isn't going to be president. If she jumps in, it's to destroy Bachmann, who she detests and is jealous of.)

Meanwhile, Bachmann is playing the gay card in Iowa relentlessly. And now the national media has started picking up on it. The L.A. Times, ABC-TV News and CNN were all over the angle this week. Last night Anderson Cooper just devastated her:

In her campaign for president, Michele Bachmann touts her background as a small business owner.

"A small business job creator," is how the Minnesota Congresswoman and Republican Presidential candidate described herself in her first campaign ad in Iowa.

That business is Bachmann and Associates. It's a Christian counseling service located outside Minneapolis. Bachmann started the center with her husband, Marcus who is the lead counselor at the clinic. The aspiring First couple and their children are pictured on the center's web site.

For at least five years, Bachmann and Associates has faced accusations it uses a controversial therapy that encourages gay and lesbian patients to change their sexual orientation.

Andrew Ramirez, a former patient at Bachmann and Associates, said in an interview with CNN he witnessed the practice first-hand. In 2004, Ramirez turned to the clinic at the urging of his mother who wanted him to talk about his homosexuality.

Just 17 at the time, Ramirez said he was immediately skeptical of what one of the clinic's counselors told him.

"It was therapy that would help me change from being homosexual to straight," Ramirez said. "If I did this and worked his therapy program, God would perform a miracle and I could no longer be gay," Ramirez added he was told.

Ramirez was assigned a therapy program consisting of prayer, reading Bible passages, and mentoring with an ex-lesbian minister. If none of that worked, Ramirez said the counselor had another suggestion.

"Not acting out on my same sex attractions and living a life of celibacy," Ramirez said.

After the second session, Ramirez told his mother, Beth Shellenbarger, he wanted to stop the therapy.
"And I could just hear his voice quiver and I just said, 'you know, Andy, if you're good with being gay then I am too,'" Shellenbarger said.

The American Psychological Association is sharply critical of efforts by counselors to change a patient's sexual orientation, what's known in the mental health community as "reparative therapy."

"There is insufficient evidence to support the use of psychological interventions to change sexual orientation," one APA report said.

Marcus Bachmann has suggested parents of gay teenagers can turn to religion for help.

In an interview last year with the "Point of View" talk radio program, Bachmann was asked how parents should deal with a teenager who thinks he or she is gay.

"I think you clearly say 'what is the understanding of God's word on homosexuality,'" Bachmann said.
"We have to understand barbarians need to be educated. They need to be disciplined and just because someone feels it or thinks it doesn't mean we're supposed to go down that road," he continued.

In 2006, Bachmann denied his clinic engaged in reparative therapy to "City Pages," a Minneapolis newspaper. "That's a false statement," Bachmann said. "If someone is interested in talking to us about their homosexuality, we are open to talking about that. But if someone comes in a homosexual and they want to stay homosexual, I don't have a problem with that," he continued.

This week, a gay rights group called "Truth Wins Out" released to CNN a hidden camera video recorded by one of its activists who posed as a patient at Bachmann and Associates.

In the video reviewed by CNN, a counselor can be heard suggesting homosexuality can be treated at the center, to varying degrees of success.

"You can actually leave homosexuality completely and become heterosexual?" the undercover activist asked on the video. "Definitely," the counselor responded. "It's happened before. It really has," the counselor added.

But the counselor cautioned he is not an expert on the subject.

"I don't have a ton of experience with this. I mean, a little bit here and there," the counselor added.
Michele Bachmann has a long history of controversial views on homosexuality.

As a senator in the Minnesota legislature in 2004, Bachmann called for an amendment to the state constitution that would block gay marriages in other states from being recognized in Minnesota.

"If we allow this to happen, group marriage, polygamy, and much worse would not be far behind," Bachmann said in a video to her supporters.

In an appeal to socially conservative Iowa voters earlier this month, she signed a "Marriage Vow" pledge that also equated same sex couples with polygamists.

Both Bachmann and her husband declined to discuss the clinic's practices. A secretary at the clinic referred all questions to the Bachmann presidential campaign. A sign on the center's door says "no media."

A statement released by her presidential campaign said the Bachmanns were unable to comment on the clinic's practices out of respect for its patients.

"The Bachmann's are in no position ethically, legally, or morally to discuss specific courses of treatment concerning the clinic's patients," the statement said.

The issue has followed Bachmann onto the campaign trail. Asked about the clinic's practices at an event in Iowa Monday, Bachmann dodged the question.

"Well, I'm running for the presidency of the United States. And I'm here today to talk about job creation," Bachmann told WHO-TV. "We're very proud of the business that we've created," she added.

And the irony, one the media won't touch (other than Jon Stewart on the Daily Show last night), is that Marcus Bachmann himself is a notorious closet case, a leather queen. I wonder if he and Palin's first dude will ever debate.



Or maybe the gay issue won't be all that important in Romney's campaign. He has one of the worst records of any politician in America... and it's starting to get out. Massachusetts voters hate him and they're very familiar with this series of ads from Kennedy. Watch them all 'cause it's important to remember, as disappointing as Obama is... there's even worse:

Mitt Romney Is More Of An American Girl Than Michele Bachmann

I'm torn when it comes to exposing witless reactionary neanderthal Michele Bachmann's unsuitability as a major party presidential nominee. First of all, she's perfectly suited for the Republican Party nomination; she is what they have turned themselves into. Second... well, what would be the point? To make it easier for Romney to paint himself as the moderate alternative between the Communistic Obama and the fascist Bachmann, when in fact Romney is a pluperfect fascist candidate and Bachmann is just stark raving mad or, as Chris Wallace put it in what may or may not have been a moment of candor, "a flake."

All week I've been meaning to comment on Bachmann's intellectual property theft of the Tom Petty song, "American Girl." But, again, to what end? Let Romney do his own campaigning. Republicans always steal song usage from liberal musicians. Bush (Petty's "I Won't Back Down"), Palin ("Barracuda" by Heart), Reagan (Springsteen's "Born in the USA"), McCain (Jackson Browne's "Running On Empty" and John Mellencamp's "Pink Houses"). And they get cease and desist orders and get sued but they just keep on stealing. It's what Republicans do. It's in their political DNA. By the way, Hillary Clinton asked Petty for permission to use "American Girl" in her campaign, and he agreed and she used it.

While trying to research the Petty-Bachmann brouhaha, I came across another Rolling Stone feature that I thought worth referencing. It's the real Michele Bachmann story-- and written by America's most perceptive political commentator, Matt Taibbi. And it's decidedly not the story Petty told in "American Girl," the song that started to break the unknown Florida boy's career wide open nationally.

Young Michele found Jesus at age 16, not long before she went away to Winona State University and met a doltish, like-minded believer named Marcus Bachmann. After finishing college, the two committed young Christians moved to Oklahoma, where Michele entered one of the most ridiculous learning institutions in the Western Hemisphere, a sort of highway rest area with legal accreditation called the O.W. Coburn School of Law; Michele was a member of its inaugural class in 1979.

Originally a division of Oral Roberts University, this august academy, dedicated to the teaching of "the law from a biblical worldview," has gone through no fewer than three names-- including the Christian Broadcasting Network School of Law. Those familiar with the darker chapters in George W. Bush's presidency might recognize the school's current name, the Regent University School of Law. Yes, this was the tiny educational outhouse that, despite being the 136th-ranked law school in the country, where 60 percent of graduates flunked the bar, produced a flood of entrants into the Bush Justice Department.

Regent was unabashed in its desire that its graduates enter government and become "change agents" who would help bring the law more in line with "eternal principles of justice," i.e., biblical morality. To that end, Bachmann was mentored by a crackpot Christian extremist professor named John Eidsmoe, a frequent contributor to John Birch Society publications who once opined that he could imagine Jesus carrying an M16 and who spent considerable space in one of his books musing about the feasibility of criminalizing blasphemy.

This background is significant considering Bachmann's leadership role in the Tea Party, a movement ostensibly founded on ideas of limited government. Bachmann says she believes in a limited state, but she was educated in an extremist Christian tradition that rejects the entire notion of a separate, secular legal authority and views earthly law as an instrument for interpreting biblical values. As a legislator, she not only worked to impose a ban on gay marriage, she also endorsed a report that proposed banning anyone who "espoused or supported Shariah law" from immigrating to the U.S. (Bachmann seems so unduly obsessed with Shariah law that, after listening to her frequent pronouncements on the subject, one begins to wonder if her crazed antipathy isn't born of professional jealousy.)

This discrepancy may account for why some Tea Party leaders don't buy Bachmann as a champion of small government. "Michele Bachmann is-- what's the old-school term?-- a poser," says Chris Littleton, an Ohio Tea Party leader troubled by her support of the Patriot Act and other big-government interventions. "Look at her record and see how 'Tea Party' she really is."

When Bachmann finished her studies in Oklahoma, Marcus instructed her to do her postgraduate work in tax law-- a command Michele took as divinely ordained. She would later profess to complete surprise at God's choice for her field of study. "Tax law? I hate taxes," she said. "Why should I go and do something like that?" Still, she sucked it up and did as she was told. "The Lord says: Be submissive, wives, you are to be submissive to your husbands."

Nope, not Petty's American Girl by any stretch of the imagination... except in Michele Bachmann's.

P.S.: NOAH'S BEEN THINKING ABOUT MICHELE TOO

Coming up at 10am PT: "It’s The Bachmanns! A Brand-New Show in a Brand-New Genre: Horror-Comedy!"

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Joe McCarthy Would Have Loved The Republican Presidential Debate Last Night

If the clowns running for the Republican presidential nomination can be taken seriously... well, who couldn't be? I'm in China, and the TV stations in my hotel room didn't carry the thing live, but they showed excerpts. And I don't think they hunted around looking for segments to make the candidates out to look like idiots. That just came naturally. Actually, I just shut it off right after I saw a semi-dustup between Herman Cain and Newt Gingrich over the suitability of American Muslims to serve the country. Cain was bad enough... trying to cover his ass after coming out like a bigot a week or two ago. But Newt... Jesus! This is supposed to be an idea man and a historian!

He started bellowing about how we would have to give certain people-- and since the topic was Muslims, they were clearly the certain people he had in mind-- some kind of loyalty test. He didn't mention-- at least not in the excerpt-- that they could be called the Joe McCarthy Memorial Loyalty Tests.

And he got worse. He was hyperventilating about how Nazis infiltrated the U.S. government during World War II. But he didn't mention that they infiltrated through their ideological brothers in the Republican Party. I happened to bring my copy of The Nazi Hydra in America by Glen Yeadon with me to China. Republicans in Congress and their media and corporate allies did everything they could to undermine the U.S. and the war effort again their beloved Nazis-- even passing along military secrets.

Rainbow 5 was the battle plan developed by the military in case war broke out. Publishing the plan [by the right-wing Chicago Tribune, a GOP mouthpiece] or leaking information about the plan would be the equivalent of publishing or leaking the battle order of the Pentagon during the Cold War. Unquestionably, leaking such a plan was an act of treason. ... Amazing as it may seem, no one was charged with treason or sedition, not the Chicago Tribune, not Sen. Wheeler and not the army officer that delivered the papers to Wheeler despite an FBI investigation. Remember this was the battle plan in case war broke out. It was top secret and fewer than a dozen copies of the report were ever produced.

...The most astonishing aspect of the publication of the Rainbow Plans was that charges of treason were never brought to bear, even after the end of the war. Most Americans are unaware of the plans ever having been leaked, and is yet another example of how high-level fascists within the United States were immune from prosecution. This brief look at Wedemeyer and his circle of friends reveals that even within the Army there was a group of officers sympathetic to the fascist cause.

However, the majority of support for fascism and opposition to the war came from the leaders of corporate America. It was the leaders of corporate America who were behind the plot to seize the White House and install a fascist government. It was the leaders of corporate America who were building the Third Reich's war machine as the statement from the US Ambassador to Germany, William Dodd, noted. And it would be the leaders of corporate America who went on a sit down strike to prevent the production of war munitions first for the Lend Lease program and then for our own troops once war was declared.

Between 1940 and 1945 there was a dramatic evolution in the tactics employed by the native fascists within America. The first phase of this evolution was marked by the sit-down strike during the summer of 1940. Prior to this time and throughout the remainder of 1940, corporate America opposed the entry of the United States into the European war. Considerable opposition was raised against Roosevelt's Lend Lease program and several contracts to supply Britain with war munitions were rejected outright by corporate America. One such example being the rejection of a contract to build Rolls Royce engines for the RAF by Ford Motor Company. Other corporations hid behind the terms of the cartel agreements with I.G. Farben and other German corporations. Such was the case of du Pont furnishing the British with inferior cartridges lacking tetrazine. However, by far the most damaging aspect of this phase was the sit-down strike of 1940, which reveals the complacency of corporate America toward Nazi Germany.

The need for aircraft was one of the most pressing needs as the ominous clouds of war gathered on the horizon. Aircraft production required massive amounts of aluminum. However, aluminum production in the United States was controlled by a virtual monopoly held by the American Aluminum Company of America (Alcoa). Alcoa had signed a cartel agreement through a slight of hand with German interests in the late 1920s. Alcoa was controlled and owned by Andrew Mellon, one of the participants in the plot against FDR and steadfastly delayed increasing production. George Seldes recorded the following quotes about Alcoa: "If America loses the war it can thank the Aluminum Corporation of America" Secretary of Interior Harold Ickles, June 26,1941.

By its cartel agreement with I.G. Farben controlled by Hitler, Alcoa sabotaged the aluminum program of the US air force. The Truman Committee heard testimony that Alcoa's representative, A.H. Bunker a dollar a year head of the aluminum section of the OPM prevented work on our $600,000,000 aluminum expansion program.

Congressman Pierce of Oregon said in May 1941: "To date 137 days or 371/2% of a year's production has been wasted in the effort to protect Alcoa's monopolistic position. This delay translated into planes means 10,000 fighters or 1,665 bombers."

...Wrapped up in an electioneering jingle and cloaked behind a false flag of patriotism, Lamont du Pont had concealed the very heart of fascism. Hidden behind this thin veil of false patriotism of free enterprise was the root of fascism, corporate rule. Thus began the most blatant fraud ever perpetrated against the American people; in effect, du Pont had dressed up fascism with a smiley face to appeal to the American people. To accomplish this horrific swindle of freedom and liberty, all resources were to be deployed. It would become a full-scaled assault on the rights of the American people for the remainder of the century. This was the forgotten third front of the war, the battle for the minds of the American citizen. Under the banner of this new feckless goddess of free enterprise, a multiprong attack was launched against our freedoms. One prong would question the patriotism of anyone not subscribing to unbridled corporatism, another prong would attack unionism and the third prong would be launched against socialism and communism.

This often forgotten event launched by one of the most notorious fascist of his time is imperative to the understanding of fascism in America following the war. It clearly marks the beginning of the adoption of the fascist ideology by the right-wing in the country. Before Eisenhower's troops ever started to march across North Africa and before the Marines ever started island hopping one bloody atoll after another toward the Japanese homeland a third front of the war was raging in the American homeland, for the control of the people. Tragically, the heroic efforts of the war against fascism were lost as quickly as the Third Reich crumbled into ashes. While our armies were victorious on the battlefields of Europe and the South Pacific, the battle for the homeland would be lost. The new goddess of free enterprise would replace democracy in America. The war against fascism would be lost. Instead of corporations serving the general interest of society, society would now be forced to serve the general interest of corporations.

The American lexicon was expanded in 1942, never before had the term free enterprise been used. There is no such right listed in the constitution nor does the constitution grant any rights to corporations. While the founding fathers believed in an economy based on capitalism, they were hardly the fools to allow trade to go on unregulated. With one-third of the populace at the time of the revolution being former indentured servants to British corporations, corporations were closely regulated as the chapter on corporate law detailed. However, unregulated corporationism was precisely what Du Pont envisioned in his call for free enterprise. The best summary of free enterprise as envision by Lammont du Pont comes from his speech before a secretive meeting of the resolution committee for the National Manufacturers Association (NAM) on September 17, 1942.

"The way to view the issue is this: Are there common denominators for winning the war and the peace? If there are, then, we should deal with both in 1943. What are they? We will win the war by reducing taxes on corporations, high income brackets, and increasing taxes on lower incomes, by removing unions from any power to tell industry how to produce, how to deal with their employees or anything else, by destroying any and all government agencies that stand in the way of free enterprise."

Du Pont's words are clearly treasonous as he calls for the destruction of any government agency that may stand in his way. It is the same agenda followed by Hitler on assuming power. In addition, as we enter the 21st Century it is the same agenda being put forward by the Republicans and the right-wingers.

...According to Seldes, the thirteen most powerful families in the United States and members of NAM are as follows: Ford, du Pont, Rockefeller, Mellon, McCormick, Hartford, Harkness, Duke, Pew, Pitcairn, Clark, Reynolds and Kress. Of these, five were involved in the plot of against Roosevelt: du Pont, Mellon, Pew, Pitcairn and Clark. With the possible exception of three, all of these families had close connections with fascism and arming Hitler... Men could be drafted to serve the country, but capital was exempt. Any attempt to draft capital would have been met with immediate cries of communism from the right-wing and pro-Nazi groups. The nation's security was held hostage by the same corporations that built Hitler's war machine and whose senior management and owners supported many of the pro-fascist groups.

And the biggest of the pro-fascist groups was then-- as it is now-- the Republican Party.

No, this isn't a group "wanted" poster. It's the Republican presidential field as represented last night in New Hampshire. Just think: One of these people could be our next president.

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Who IS Herman Cain? Um... A Stalking Horse For Jeb Bush?

A Ron Paul supporter was probably unhappy that morons in Frank Luntz' focus group made headlines by voting Herman Cain, a lackey of the Koch Brothers, the winner of Thursday's GOP "presidential" debate. If only they knew who Herman Cain really was...

Just as in 2008 with dud-candidate Fred Thompson, Luntz used the perception of a quick turn-around of support to promote the candidate as a possible front runner. Luntz declared the reaction to Cain as “unprecedented” and suggested a spontaneous surge in his viability.

Fox News’ website coverage of the debate features a poll-- but on top issues rather than candidates. This effectively obscures the already existing base of substantial support for Ron Paul, which does not exist for the other candidates on the stage. A CNN poll released Thursday (prior to the debate) found Ron Paul did best against President Obama, garnering 10% next to potential candidates like Gingrich, Huckabee, Romney, Trump and Palin.

Fox New’s hoax that Herman Cain won the debate is but an opening salvo in a familiar pattern of downplaying Ron Paul’s bid for the presidency to restore sound money and the Constitution. Perhaps that is why Ron Paul snubbed a post-debate interview with Ron Paul, instead going to a Tea Party event.

However, a sober look at Cain’s statements tonight and his past record show little to be enthused about. He stands diametrically opposed the fundamental positions of pro-liberty candidates like Ron Paul. Cain is pro-war and appears to be pro-Empire, against a Federal Reserve audit, and has been supportive and apologetic about the bailout. Free market is incompatible with crony capitalism and Fed intervention.