GCL Is Human, Too

He ages like everyone else. See for yourself.

The Concession Stand

In case my opinion on politicians' flip-flopping ways isn't enough, check out today's Daily News and Washingon Post.

Both articles highlight the obvious: we're in the final stretch of the party nomination race. That means the candidates are doing everything and anything to make a mark. Mama Rose said it best: you gotta get a gimmick.

But this race is going to come down to two things: the war and family values. We saw this in 1980 when Reagan came to power and ushered in TWELVE years of Republican rule. Americans want a leader who can bomb a village and make it home in time for dinner and Sunday service with the wife and kids. An armed-to-the-teeth Ward Cleaver if you will.

And neither Hillary nor Rudy, the front runners in this race, fit that model. That's why they're at the concession stand, making excuses for their personal beliefs just to stay in the running. I fear that someone a little more straight forward and under the radar can steal this race from both of these guys. That's not a morning I would want to wake up to.

Old-school joint of the day:

Folsom Street: Last Supper Indeed

From my girls at Jezebel: The gays have pissed off well-intentioned war-mongering Christians yet again with an ad for the Folsom Street Fair.

To promote the yearly leather fest, Leonardo DaVinci's The Last Supper was recreated to depict a bunch of gays before a table of sex toys. Dangerous sex toys if I might add.

The hardcore Christians are saying that if you can't mock Mohammed you can't mock Jesus.

Fair enough, I guess.

But here's the thing. Ask any Gucci-bag-toting, career-minded, skinny-jeans-wearing, self-and-cardio-obsessed queen in his 20s here in New York about the Folsom Street Fair and you're going to get a look of shock, awe and disbelief.

Kudos to Susan Jones at Cybercast News Service for her to-the-point headline about the controversial ad: "Homosexuals Mock 'Last Supper' With Sex-Toys Twist." But guess what, Suz, this homosexual aint never been to Folsom Street and he certainly has better things to do than mock the Last Supper.

Either I've gone soft or I'm just too busy with my life to care either way about EGS (Extreme Gay Sex), but in short, I think the Folsom Street Fair is the last thing the Christian Right needs to worry about. Instead of worrying about the mocking of a painting why don't they worry about that "thou shalt not kill" commandment they keep on breaking when they support the war in Iraq?

At the same time, I do see a lot of anger at Christianity in this ad. There isn't a need to promote S&M by mocking what many, including myself, believe to be the expiatory sacrifice of Jesus Christ. It's a repetitive cycle of hate and recrimination...

Me, I'm Christian and I'm gay. My only plea to my fellow gays is to leave Jesus alone. Go and hate the Pope and anybody else you think has wronged you, but Jesus is love and it's unnecessary to bring him into the same conversation as this that and the other.


One choice that does come easy for me, though, is the choice between normal sex and dangerous sex. I mean, take a good look at the ad for the fair -- they've got rubber fists and all sorts of painful-looking stuff that can wreak major havoc on delicate male orificies. Is that my cup of tea? No. And it doesn't float the boat of the gays I hang with either.


To purge my head of all this useless garbage I'm listening to and watching this:

Something You Can Play With

I thought I was on team Barack, but the results of an online quiz at WQUAD.com place me on team Kucinich. Huh?

Who's your dream candidate?

Two Guys In New York

One favors Prada suits, the other favors capital punishment as sport. One wants to be America's friend, the other has engaged in combat against American troops. One has all but declared war on the other.

And both will appear before the United Nations this week to make a case for their country's relevance in the world. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has already sparked a new Right Left debate by being scheduled to appear at Columbia University on Monday -- how dare an institution of higher learning engage one of the most controversial figures of our time in a debate, on American soil, about his policy? (Without the risk of anyone being hung for asking the wrong kind of question either)

On the other hand French President Nicholas Sarkozy is the subject of a glowing profile in today's New York Times, and his address before the UN this week is expected to mark the beginning of a beautiful friendship between France and the U.S.

This is what I love about New York. History is happening here, right now, and our citizens and press are exercising their right to speak up, not only for and against our leaders, but against foreign leaders who want to come and talk policy here. Ahmadinejad has taken up the tabloids' attention, and the headlines have been priceless, especially over his request to lay a wreath at Ground Zero.

Do I think Ahmadinejad belongs at Ground Zero? No.

Do I think he should be allowed to speak at Columbia? Absolutely. I think we're especially privileged as a city to show off how freedom of speech works. Every anti-Semitic, homophobic, anti-American statement the Iranian President makes, I trust, will be met with a thoughtful and fact-based retort by the students and faculty of Columbia University. We're doing a favor to the people of Iran by showing their leader that dissent is a good thing, a thing that need not be punished by death and torture.

And should Sarkozy and Ahmadinejad cross paths, the French leader should make a case for metrosexuality. Hair product and sartorial awareness are nothing to fear either.

Egg on My Face

And yet another candidate I was sort of interested in has lost any hope of winning my vote in the 08 elections. This time around Rudy Giuliani disavowed the great work he did for New York by way of gun control just to please a couple of trigger-happy right wing nut jobs in the middle of nowhere.

OK, I gave Rudy a major plug and said I'd vote for him. But not anymore. I feel so let down.

Rudy tried to assuage the gun lobby's fears that the "right" to own deadly weapons, even in spite of the "war on terror" and the deaths caused by guns, will be taken away if he comes into office.

That's just disgusting. But what can you expect from a smarmy individual who dumped his wife and kids to shack up with a modern-day Evita?

This is what I get for being open-minded and looking beyond party lines. No vote for Rudy. Which doesn't mean I'm voting for Hillary either. Team Barack here.

On the Jena 6

Martin Luther King Jr. never advocated stomping your opponents to near death. And yet his image looms large over the protests in Jena, a small town in Louisiana, where the descision by an all-white jury to try six black teens as adults for the beating of a white classmate has brought kerosene and fire together under the leadership of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.

The Lede blog at the New York Times sums it up: some racist white kids had a "whites only" tree, a black kid broke convention, and then nooses sprung up. No one can argue that that is brazen intimidation.

Implied violence, however, is one thing. Beating up a fellow student is another. And that's what six black students did.

This is not a civil rights issue. This is not a throwback to the Civil Rights Movement. This is tucked-under-the-rug ignorance that black and white politicians don't care about because these groups exist on the fringe of more developed, urban communities. None of these folks matter to us in the big city, nor do our laws of civility matter to them.

I grew up getting called "faggot" by every other guy on my block in Brooklyn. It hurt. And I remember wishing all sorts of horrible things on my tormentors, but it mostly revolved around me sentencing them all to decapitation on the set of the Oprah show. Alas, not every fairy's dreams come true.

My point is that violence is not the answer. And the "Jena 6" are not martyrs, they're messed up kids who need guidance, correction, and yes, jail time. True, the justice system in the South has condoned the killings of countless of innocent black people through the present day. Does that mean, then, that we just apply justice to the degree that the media is willing to investigate the actions of our lawmakers?

And does a history of botched justice set a precedent for lax laws for the descendants of people who have been wronged by the legal system? Is that why OJ Simpson continues to piss all over the law?

I think all of these kids are a bunch of punks that need correction. And shame on the politicians and talking heads that are playing the victimized colored people card for ratings. The Jena 6 belong in jail and so do the kids who hung the nooses from the trees.

The Revolution Will Be Blogged About

Interesting article in today's Washington Post about the low turnout to pro and anti war rallies in Washington. Clearly the blogosphere is atwitter with opinions about the (massive failure and waste of money and human life) war in Iraq, but online ranting and raving do not a March on Washington make.

And it's not because people don't care. It's because most Americans want to talk about the issues affecting our country in a somewhat civilized fashion (at a cocktail party, at the DMV, during a job interview or during a business lunch)not around the likes of these folks:








Note: Images property of The Victory Caucus.

It's hard to tell these yahoos apart isn't it?

It's unfortunate to see those upside down flags -- I grew up being told to respect our flag even if I wasn't supposed to salute it. Being anti-war isn't the same as being anti-American. At the same time, what exactly would we be surrendering to by leaving Iraq? Common sense?

I don't like fanaticism and these rallies just bring out the crazies from both sides of the political fence. Not that the Internet is all tea and biscuits either, but here, at least, crazy comes with a "sign off" option.


And when I do sign off, I go about my way gay day. Have a look:



Breakfast of champions -- James and I are dieting post-cruise and pre-Miami. Egg whites for him, half a bagel for me.



Tyra Mail!



Gay church, then off to the opera to catch La Boheme. $25 seats! And now that James and I aren't eating anymore, this is the cheapest date we've ever been on.




Of course, I can stop eating til you can see my heart beating through my shirt, but I don't know if I'll ever look like this:




Fortunately, autumn is sorta here. And everyone looks good in layers.

Where my girls at

James says he can't listen to his iPod while walking down the street because he's afraid of walking into a taxi. Not me. I rock it out while I walk it out. And it's usually to something millions of people in Latin America have heard on our version of American Idol -- Cantando Por Un Sue~no. Instead of singing for a record deal, though, people sing to have cancerous tumors removed or to have siamese twins separated.

If this isn't your speed, try this .

Some of Y'alls Are Comin' Home

So said W to the nation tonight in what no spin master can dub as anything but an admission that the war in Iraq is not worth the continued loss of life and erosion of America's influence as a force of peace and change.

On the one hand, great for the soldiers who are coming back home and for those who won't be sent back. But what about those who didn't come back? And I mean the dead as well as the maimed.

For many on the Right, troop withdrawl reeks of surrender. For those of us who were opposed to this war in the first place, it just screams bloody murder. Why the hell did we send thousands of young men and women to die in a place that doesn't want our help? Why was 9-11 used as an excuse to bomb Iraq when our best friends the Saudis were the ones behind the attacks on New York and Washington?

And you know what kills me? This generation's kids are probably going to backpack through Baghdad and Basra and will read about this war in their Lonely Planet guide book with no idea about the anguish its put us all through. At some point our nation's attention will shift from Iraq and our military prowess will be focused on a new enemy. Who will it be? Venezuela? Iran? Sudan? Everyone except heterosexual WASPs?

The troop withdrawl doesn't mark anything except the slow diversion of our own over-funded military to another target. Watch out.

When You Believe

As a person of faith, it's hard to process the events of the day without wondering what God thinks about all the mayhem down here.

That's my big, naive question on the anniversary of the 9-11 attacks. I could go into my thoughts about the MoveOn debacle (but it would only matter to crazy right wingers) or I could give kudos to Barack Obama for calling for the return of our troops from Iraq, but what I really want to know is where is this world headed?

Differing points of view on "God's plan" for mankind have left millions dead and billions more confused. (If) God is love, how much longer will it take for him to set the record straight on what he wants from us (if he wants anything at all)? Someone has to be on to something here, so who is it? Is it the jihadists? Is it the Christian right?

These questions are bigger, and more important, than our pithy elections and our over-publicized culture war. There are many points of view on how God wants us to live our lives, and these are all shaping the world we live in today.

Wouldn't it be nice, then, if we just got the facts straight up from the man in charge?

It's Fashion Week, Bitch

Instead of forcing yourself to love yourself, force yourself to look this fierce.

Uh-oh, what if Chavez turns out to be useful?

Hugo Chavez is in Colombia to broker negotiations between the country's pro-US government and the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces.

It's a great PR stunt, but it makes me think of the question that cracked egg over Obama's face -- how much can a government entertain the likes of Chavez before it becomes complicit in the dictator's self-aggrandizement?


And the same can be said of the FARC who have entertained other Colombian presidents and have pretended to make overtures at peace. In the end, though, the kidnappings don't stop and hostages like Ingrid Betancourt have yet to be released.

So who's using who here? And what does the U.S. stand to lose if someone like Chavez can trump the billions of dollars we've spent in Colombia by talking sense into the guerrilla group?

The latter just won't happen. After all, the FARC became a narco-terrorist group a long time ago and their new goal is to run the country's drug trade. None of those creeps is out for socialism anymore.

In the meantime, as the group makes weak attempts at legitimacy, neither Chavez nor the guerrillas stand to gain much from these very well publicized meetings.

Unfortunately, there are countless people's who's pain is only dragged out further. I suspect, though, that the families of the hostages, and the Colombian people in general, see right through this budget version of diplomacy.

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

Larry Craig announced that he would resign on September 30th -- W is supporting him, and with that, Craig gets to collect a paycheck for another month in spite of having broken the law. Another drawn-out departure by a criminal Republican.

Not that that's outraged anyone 'round these parts -- all the gays are at the Barney's Warehouse Sale.

Craig's misdeeds, as we all know by now, aren't uncommon among men in the closet. What y'all probably didn't know, however, is that the gays were in the Republican Party's woodwork long before they even thought to build themselves a log cabin.

This summer I've been reading TR: The Last Romantic and I'm telling you now, TR was as gay as a $500 (on sale) Marc Jacobs poncho.

TR's latent homosexuality hit a fever pitch when he got to Harvard. In fact, his letters home during his school days speak to an impossible case of blue balls as well as the self-loathing that comes with a life lived in the closet. We also get a glimpse into a budding gay whore:

Tom Nickerson started our table. He is quite handsome with a truly remarkable mustache. At first he gives one the impression of being effeminate, but is not a bit so in reality, being one of our best football players. (p.61)

Bob Bacon is the handsomest man in the class and is as pleasant as he is handsome. (p.61)

All I'm saying is that TR would have LIVED in the 70's, girl.

But before TR cast eyes on Tom Nickerson and Robert Bacon, Abraham Lincoln was sharing a bed with a storekeeper in New Salem, Illionois.

Fast-forward to the present, past Ray Cohn, Tom Foley and Ted Haggard, and you've got a party that's more festive (and effeminate) than the dudes at the Rawhide. Except for Mary Cheney, who's like, way more of a man than I'll ever want to be.

My advice to the shamed again Republicans: Give up the act, girls. You're not fooling anyone. Anti-gay legislation is closet case behavior -- let's see if you're man enough to give everyone the rights they deserve without feeling the slightest bit threatened.