Gay Boy Scouts

There always have been gays in the Boy Scouts, beginning with founder and Boer War hero, Lord Baden-Powell.  I remember a court case from, perhaps, the eighties, where some teen was outed and thereby denied his Eagle Scout award.  His big problem, of course, was that he was outed.

So, the big problem with the Boy Scouts, for gay boys and leaders, is that they just can't come out.  Okay, Boy Scouts, do you want them in or out of the closet?  (My guess is that they'd prefer their gays remained inside.)

Now the National Council has postponed the decision for a few more months, but the problem won't get any easier — and the problem, needless to say, is money.  Whatever Scouting's decision, it will lose sponsors and donors, even though the plan was to weasel through by letting individual sponsoring institutions decide.

There will be corporate and institutional donors that will not want to be perceived as supporting an institution that permits discrimination (and it probably was pressure from such groups that started the current controversy); then, there are all those churches that sponsor individual troops, who insist on discrimination.

Did you know that every Mormon boy is enrolled in the Boy Scouts?  Mormons are very big on "God and Country."  Maybe the Church of Latter Day Saints should just start financing the Scouting movement on its own.  It's rich enough.

Romney in Israel

Demonstrating his usual absence of anything resembling sensitivity, Mitt Romney kissed Binyamin Netanyahu's ass a couple of days ago, noting how Israeli "culture" must be superior to the Palestinian "culture next door" because the Israelis have more money.  A lot of journalists and others have pointed out that it's hard to attain economic success while under occupation — but why belabor the obvious?

What I heard was the old stereotype of the "shrewd" Jewish businessman.  Okay, that "shrewd" label, in the case of Jews, tends to include "cheap," "cutthroat," "greedy," "selfish," and "corrupt."  Hey!  No wonder Romney admires them so much!  I wonder if anyone from AIPAC noticed.

Israelis and Palestinians, however, are not the only "neighbors" Romney cited with regard to one being economically superior to the other.  Another comparison, of course, was the USofA v. Mexico; yet another was Chile v. Ecuador.  For those accusing Romney of racism, those comparisons offer only more ammunition.

The USofA, as Sheriff Joe Arpaio clearly has observed, is a hell of a lot whiter than the predominantly mestizo Mexico.  Chile, where the indigenous population was pretty much wiped out by the Conquistadores, had its "white" population greatly "enhanced" by emigrant Germans and Italians.  Ecuador still is pretty much mestizo and Indio.

Nice examples, Mitt.  As I recall, your quasi-Christian cult first allowed black members to be admitted to your priesthood way back in 1978, when you were in your early thirties.  Given all of the above, it just might be reasonable to wonder if you might be a racist.

Whatever.  Clearly, you want to attract many more big big bucks from Sheldon Adeldon — who accompanied you to Israel — and also from as many other right-wing corporatist Jews as you can suck into your bottomless maw.  Most Jews, however — those who are not millionaires — remain pretty strong for Obama

Sexual Politics

CNN informs me that Rick Santorum just won Alabama and Mississippi — albeit the count shows Romney and Gingrich not very far behind. Whatever. It's time to look at the politics of abortion, contraception, and (not yet mentioned in this campaign) masturbation.

For all human groups, throughout history, survival has depended on numbers. When two tribes had to work out who got the river valley and who got the desert, the big tribe got the prime real estate and the small tribe got to wander in the wilderness. It's no different with religions. The more adherents to a faith, the more likely it is to survive. "Be fruitful and multiply," sayeth the Lord. If you don't, those damnable Egyptians or Hittites or whatever will wipe you out.

Increasing your group's numbers depends on keeping your women pregnant. Naturally, it follows that religions competing with other religions for population will have "moral" prohibitions against birth control, abortion, and that "sin of Onan," which "wastes" what could be used to keep the group's women perpetually pregnant (and don't forget to kill the queers.)

In the United States, "mainstream" Protestants, secularized Jews and Catholics, and those with no particular interest in any religion are failing to be fruitful and multiply, perhaps under the impression that they can do more for one or two children than for seven or eight — while traditional Catholics and Muslims, Mormons, and many Evangelicals are breeding like bunnies.

In a democracy, the breeders, eventually, will win.

Re: Willard Romney

I was just reading the Wikipedia entry on Willard Mitt Romney, and I'm 99.6% certain it was written (or rewritten) by one of his PR people. Well, what the hell — that's Wikipedia. The last one to get there gets the last word, and I imagine Mitt's people get there several times a day.

One thing Wikipedia does not mention is that Romney is the test case for whether or not a shitload of money can buy an election. The funny thing is that nobody in the Republican base actually seems to like him, but he seems to have locked up the 25% who consider him the candidate most likely to defeat the heartily hated Obama. Well, the Democrats, too, consider him the candidate most likely to defeat Obama. There are two reasons why that probably is the case. First, he has a ton of money behind him and, second, his chameleonlike ability to shift in the political winds should make him especially attractive to so-called "independent" voters.

(Long-time readers will remember that my take on so-called "independents" is that they are those who don't know shit from Shinola, and therefore are most likely to be persuaded by 30 second spots on TV.)

The Romney superpac, "Restore Our Future," outspent the Romney campaign 2 to 1 in Iowa — and did a devastating job on Newt Gingrich. Mind you, pretty much everything they said about Newt was true but, nevertheless, I believe Newt is enough of a son-of-a-bitch to get even. His own presidential hopes may be down the toilet now (albeit his book sales have surged), but it's pretty clear that Newt is pissed. Needless to say, in the light of the Citizens United decision, the "Winning Our Future" superpac that supports Newt will not in any way "coordinate" with Newt's pissedness, but nevertheless will spread some significant negativity on the former Mormon missionary to France. (France?!! Jesus in a manner of speaking Christ!)

While it seems likely that Rick Santorum will turn out to be the Mike Huckabee of 2012, there's no telling how the evangelicals of South Carolina and Florida may vote later in the month. I'd like to see Mitt and his moneyed buds go down in flames, of course, but "Restore" is much better funded than "Winning" — and if Santorum has a superpac, its budget probably is around $12.95.

Oddly enough, I think there still might be a slim chance for John Huntsman, who also has a rich Mormon father but a lot less ideological baggage than Mitt. At the moment, though, my money still is on Obama this year.