News: Ft. Bragg, Indiana Gay Nup Ban, CIA, Iowa Question
The European Court of Human Rights unanimously ruled that the CIA tortured, shackled, beat and sodomized detainee Khaled el-Masri, a German national they claimed had ties to terror groups.
Pennsylvania GOP state Rep. Daryl Metcalfe is going to introduce a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage there. "It is important that we support
traditional marriage and have constitutional amendments to protect it at
the state level. Marriage is a common good, not a special interest.
Special interests should not have the right to redefine marriage for all
of us," he said.
Conservatives in Texas are looking for new ways to prohibit abortion,
while liberals and concerned doctors in Wisconsin and North Carolina are
fighting back against other right-wing attacks on a woman's right to choose.
The new The Knife album is coming soon. Get excited here.
The new poster for The Wolverine movie moves!
Channing Tatum and Mark Ruffalo look beefy on the set of Foxcatcher.
Drew Barrymore debuts new baby Olive on People cover.
Matt Bomer does some pre-holiday shopping.
On marriage equality and affirmative action at the Supreme Court:
"Justice Anthony Kennedy is likely to be the swing vote in these cases,
and many are predicting he will side with conservatives to limit racial
preferences and with liberals to support gay marriage. Paradoxically,
the very reasoning that could guide Kennedy to support marriage equality
may bolster his decision to curtail race-based affirmative action,
spurring colleges to adopt new approaches."
The UK Network Rail Service turned CCTV footage of three ladies' embarrassing escalator moments into a PSA.
Expect to see a lot of nude Matt Damon for his turn as Liberace's long-term lover Scott Thorson in the biopic Behind the Candelabra: "I had to come out of the pool, go over to Michael Douglas, straddle him
on a chaise lounge and start kissing him... It's not like I
kiss him just once. We drew it up like a football plan."
Congratulations to new married couple Larry Duncan And Randell Shepherd, the Washington couple who became famous after a picture of them getting a marriage license went viral. Even though neither is particularly religious, they still married Sunday in a church. Said Duncan, "Enough people have told me, 'God hates fags. I want
someone in a church to say, 'God loves fags,' to have that stamp on it."
The University of Iowa is now asking applicants if they identify as LGBT, making it the first public university and only the second school in the nation to do so. "This is a question whose time had come. We think this will cause them to look more closely at the university because we value that part of who they are. We want students to feel we are receptive to and sensitive to their lifestyle and their description of themselves," said admissions director Michael Barron.
Stephen Saland, one of the four GOP New York Senators to support marriage equality, has conceded defeat in his November election against Democrat Terry Gipson.
Fresh Deepwater leak? "CBS News has learned that BP is set to embark Thursday on the fifth day
of a little-known subsea mission under Coast Guard supervision to look
for any new oil leaking from the Deepwater Horizon disaster."
Equality and cents: "Gov. Mitch Daniels said Wednesday he has been hearing from companies that fear that a measure that would put Indiana's ban on same-sex marriage into the state constitution might also prevent firms from offering benefits to gay couples"
Ashley Broadway believes she is being excluded from the Association of Bragg Officers’ Spouses in North Carolina, because she is a lesbian. "The facts here are simple: there is no legal need or justification for any spouse to be excluded from a group like this, which exists to provide support to the spouses and families of our military men and women and the communities they serve," said Outserve-SLDN Executive Director Allyson Robinson.
Are One Direction band members truly fascinating?




You can tell the women-falling-over-in-the-subway clips were from the UK because people went over to make sure they women were OK. In the so-called Christian nation of the US no one would have tried to help them.
Posted by: Icebloo | Dec 13, 2012 5:42:59 PM
Why does Belonsky link to that junky misandrist site Shakesville ?
Posted by: Yupp | Dec 13, 2012 5:46:39 PM
Tells you how much attention I pay: I didn't even know that Barrymore had gotten married OR pregnant.
Posted by: Jerry | Dec 13, 2012 5:58:07 PM
Matt Damon - I'm glad he's doing nudity in the film. I laughed that it would be "tasteful". That sounds like something Playboy models would say.
Posted by: Diogenes Arktos | Dec 13, 2012 6:03:45 PM
Why does YUPP or whatever other alias he/she uses b*tch so much?
Posted by: BETTY | Dec 13, 2012 6:31:21 PM
Why do YOU follow me around, "Betty" ?
Posted by: Yupp | Dec 13, 2012 6:33:00 PM
It's not hard when you whine everywhere here!
Posted by: BETTY | Dec 13, 2012 6:47:24 PM
"Betty" : I don't though. I don't comment under more than 1 out of 10 topics on here, and when I do it's the only time you post, right after me.
Posted by: Yupp | Dec 13, 2012 6:58:52 PM
The use of the word "sodomise" in the Masri story bugs me for some reason. I think it's because it's being used to distinguish a male-on-male act of rape, as if that were somehow a whole different class of crime than male-on-female rape. Seems like we should just call what was done to Masri "rape" so as not to give credence to the idea that the same-sex aspect of the rape somehow makes it inherently worse. (To be clear I don't think this is Andrew Belonsky's fault; it was in the piece he linked to and it's not used enough here to have well-delineated PC usage guidelines. Just throwing out something to think about.)
Posted by: SMC | Dec 13, 2012 9:33:00 PM
I comment on a number of topics, not just on what you post. Conceited much?
Posted by: BETTY | Dec 14, 2012 12:00:28 AM
It sounds like Indiana Gov Daniels needs to have a little chat with Pennsylvania Rep Metcalfe.
@SMC: I don't like the word "sodomy" and its cognate forms because of its inherent ambiguity. One perfectly valid definition was invoked by Dan Savage recently when he said we're all sodomites - meaning that we all participate in sexual acts other than male-female vaginal sex. I agree with you that in the el-Masri story "rape" is much better, but it is still ambiguous. I prefer the definiton that "rape" is nonconsensual sexual contact. In this case I presume it should be "anal rape". OTOH - I know people who still believe that only a male can rape a female - some even restrict it to vaginal sex. I'm curious what the legal definitions are these days.
Posted by: Diogenes Arktos | Dec 14, 2012 1:53:12 AM
Echr ruling: Hilary?
Posted by: rick scatorum | Dec 14, 2012 3:20:26 AM
I swear to God every time I see Belonsky has put up a news post with a bunch of links, he always somehow manages to link to a story that Andy or someone else has already covered. Every. Time.
I mean, it's cool. I guess we shouldn't mind hearing about, at least in this example, that the University of Iowa is asking about sexual identity on its applications twice, but it just seems so so so lazy of Mr. Belonsky to not even bother to scroll through the previous pages to see if anyone has already covered any of this plethora of news clippings--especially if they covered it more thoroughly and thoughtfully.
Dude. Pay attention.
Posted by: phil | Dec 14, 2012 6:32:43 AM
Maybe women wouldn't fall down so much if they didn't wear those damn stupid high heels.
Posted by: Jack M | Dec 14, 2012 8:02:02 AM
@ICEBLOO,
I have multiple CCTV clips of similar subway accidents [worse actually, people falling into the pit] here in Boston. Boston,MA which is a part of America last time I checked. And in every one of them, everyone in the area immediately went to the victims aid.
On the other hand I also have first hand knowledge of multiple people involved in serious accidents on the road, and 3 of the cases, NO ONE helped the victim, they just drove by. One person I know had a motorcycle accident in Cambridge on Memorial Drive near MIT. A very busy area with lots of traffic and people. He laid on the ground as traffic drove by, people walked' jogged, and biked by for 1/2 hr. This was during evening rush hour. He said people slowed as they drove by [probably suburban commuters on their way home] stared at him, and drove on.
And Cambridge is as P.C. and 'Progressive' as it gets.
Posted by: ratbastard | Dec 14, 2012 10:39:32 AM
Ratbastard : I can SO believe that. In Boston people tried to help, in Cambridge they blew it off. There's something (I can't put my finger on it) about areas that get too-p.c. where it turns the people into passive saps (generally-speaking).
Posted by: Yupp | Dec 14, 2012 11:15:19 AM
Ummm... isn't ALL "holiday shopping" generally "pre-holiday?"
Andrew, what happened? I thought we all said goodbye to you.
Posted by: Buster | Dec 14, 2012 4:23:42 PM