Boycott WIN! (And chimp FAIL!)

Reuters photo

Repugnican Tea Party Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer claims that she doesn’t want to see President Barack Obama’s circumcision certificate. (Of course, even if he did make it public, the wingnuts would call it a fake…)

Boycotts work. That’s why boycotts — even though they exemplify both free speech and the so-called “free market” — so often are criticized.

Take Arizona (I prefer to leave it. I did, actually, in 1998, after three decades there…): Repugnican Tea Party Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer yesterday vetoed a bill that would have required any individuals appearing on the state’s ballot for U.S. president to provide his or her birth certificate to the state’s top elections official, its secretary of state. Brewer wrote in her veto letter:

I never imagined being presented with a bill that could require candidates for president of the greatest and most powerful nation on Earth to submit their “early baptismal or circumcision certificates,” among other records, to the Arizona Secretary of State. This is a bridge too far.

I don’t believe for a nanosecond that that is the real reason that Brewer vetoed the bill. I have precious little doubt that she vetoed the bill primarily or even solely because the tourism-heavy state already is reeling from lost revenue from the political fallout (including, of course, the resultant boycott of the state) from S.B. 1070, the state legislation passed a year ago making it a crime to breathe while brown in Arizona whose key provisions the federal courts won’t allow the state to implement because they violate the U.S. Constitution.

With Arizona already known around the world as the South Africa of the American Southwest, no doubt Brewer thought it imprudent to sign a bill that targets one black man, Barack Obama, no matter how much the bill’s supporters, most of them stupid white men, lie to the contrary.

It’s a sign of how far gone Arizona is, however, that a (if not the) main problem of the bill that Brewer picked out is that one of the documents that the bill mentions as establishing citizenship is a circumcision certificate. Oooo! It’s penis-related! Can’t have that! Must! Veto! Anything! Related! To! The! Penis!

Brewer doesn’t want to alienate her base of white supremacists and xenophobes, so of course in her veto letter she didn’t say anything about racism or xenophobia or the probable unconstitutionality of yet another mean-spirited, white supremacist, racist bill passed by the Arizona Legislature. She didn’t even mention (not directly, anyway) how damaging to the state’s tourism industry (and its economy in general) its blatant white supremacism and racism have been.

Gay is the new black, however, and while the Repugnican Tea Party traitors use code words for “nigger” — such as “socialist,” “Muslim,” “Barack Hussein Obama” and “He wasn’t born here” — because blatantly open racism and white supremacism are taboo even in backasswards red states like Arizona, it’s still wide open fucking season on us non-heterosexuals.

While Brewer vetoed the so-called “birther bill,” yesterday she did sign a bigoted, homophobic, probably unconstitutional bill mandating that married heterosexual couples be given priority consideration when state agencies are placing children for adoption or foster care. So her hordes of red-state haters did get some red meat this week.

On the topic of the Repugnican Tea Party, don’t let me pick on Arizona where racism and white supremacism are concerned. An Orange County (California) Repugnican Tea Party official made the news this week for having sent out an e-mail portraying Barack Obama as a young chimpanzee with his chimp parents (thus explaining his supposed lack of a birth certificate, ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!). In a statement, the incredibly fucktarded Repugnican Tea Party official, Marilyn Davenport, wrote:

I’m sorry if my email offended anyone, I simply found it amusing regarding the character of Obama and all the questions surrounding his origin of birth. [How does portraying Obama as a chimpanzee relate to his “character”? And “all the questions surrounding his origin of birth”? “Questions” only in the minds ofracist/white supremacist crackpots, but whatev…] In no way did I even consider the fact he’s half black when I sent out the email. In fact, the thought never entered my mind until one or two other people tried to make this about race. We all know a double standard applies regarding this president. I received plenty of emails about George Bush that I didn’t particularly like, yet there was no “cry” in the media about them.*

Not to defend a Repugnican Tea Party traitor, but “President” George W. Bush was routinely compared to the chimpanzee. (Go to images.google.com and type “bush chimp” in the search field and you’ll see plenty of hits.) I seem to remember having engaged in such a comparison myself, and there was (still is?), if memory serves, even a whole website dedicated to comparing Bush (and sometimes his kin) to chimps.

However, this was a clear statement about Bush’s level of intelligence, not a statement about his race.

Context is everything, and thus there is a difference between comparing a white person to an ape and comparing a black person to an ape. Comparing a black person to an ape hearkens to the days of slavery (and afterward…), when blacks were treated like animals. While comparing Bush to a chimp is a fairly clear statement as to his intelligence, comparing Obama to a chimp at least raises the possibility that the individual making the comparison is making a statement as to the fullness of Obama’s humanity and/or the inferiority or superiority of certain races.

And that’s a fucking problem, because once you relegate an individual or even a whole class or race of individuals to sub-humanhood or even animalhood, you then can justify the perpetration of all kinds of evils upon him or her or them.

Aside from the rather obvious racist/white supremacist overtones of it, if you are going to compare Obama to a chimp — if you must do it — shit, at least do it well.

The image that Davenport used in her e-mail —

— not only is utterly unfunny, but it’s a piss-poor PhotoShop job.

And that is almost as unforgiveable as is blatant white supremacism and racism. (Almost.)

With the upcoming release of “Planet of the Apes” prequel “Rise of the Planet of the Apes,” brace yourself for even more Obama-chimp comparisons. Hopefully they at least will be technically well done, but of course they won’t be, since the Repugnican Tea Party fucktards aren’t funny, creative, intelligent or technically masterful. They’re not even intelligent enough to reflect upon the fact that all of us humankind rose from the apes, since they incredibly stupidly still believe in hocus-pocus flat-earther creationism instead of evolution.

Which makes you wonder who the real chimpanzees are…

That’s not to bash our primate first cousins, for whom I have much more respect than I do the Repugnican Tea Party traitors, who, because of evolution, have no fucking excuse…

—

*And true to wingnut form, Davenport tried to make the leaking of her e-mail the story instead of the e-mail itself — even though she talks of Obama’s “character.” Reports The Los Angeles Times:

County GOP Chairman Scott Baugh has called for the resignation of … Davenport, an elected member of the party central committee who sent the e-mail to some committee members and others last week. Baugh said he received it Friday afternoon and quickly responded with an e-mail telling Davenport it was “dripping with racism and is in very poor taste.” He said the issue should be referred to the Orange County GOP’s ethics committee.

According to an e-mail Baugh sent to committee members Saturday, Davenport described the Obama photo as a “joke” and wanted to know who had leaked the email to the OC Weekly’s R. Scott Moxley, who broke the story. She called the leak “cowardly” and wrote, “Anyone brave enough to come forward?”

Hmmm. If the e-mail were innocent, then why would its having been leaked be any problem?

Can we start the civil war now, please?

Associated Press photo

Barack Obama, shown above during his Lincolnesque formal kick-off of his candidacy for president in February 2007 at the Old State Capitol in Springfield, Illinois, now finally concedes that with the Repugnican Party, “The day has passed when I expected this to be a full partnership.” Yup. Attempting bipartisanship with Repugnicans, who respect the results of the democratic process only when those results go their way, is bullshit and it’s time to open a can of blue-state whup-ass, because that’s all that the fucktarded red states can understand. 

They say that the Civil War even pitted family member against family member.

Yeah, I can see that.

My mother and I today exchanged some pointed e-mails about Arizona’s handling of its “illegal immigrants.” She still lives in Arizona, where I was born and raised and from where I escaped in 1998 to my new home state of California.

I haven’t set foot back in Arizona since I left it, and I don’t plan to any day soon.

In fact, I support boycotting Arizona, and I am delighted that my city of Sacramento is expected to add itself to the list of cities boycotting the racist, white supremacist state of Arizona.

In fact, today I saw Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson (himself also a former resident of Phoenix; he used to play for the Phoenix Suns) eating lunch outdoors here in Sacramento. I almost stopped and attempted to speak to him, but I didn’t want to disturb his lunch (he was eating with some other people). Instead I e-mailed him later that I support the boycott, even though he already leans toward it.  

My mother, on the other hand, apparently has imbibed the right wing’s Kool Aid that the nation’s ills have been caused primarily by the poor and powerless brown-skinned peoples from south of the border.

Gee, I didn’t know that the “illegals” were responsible for the nation’s economic meltdown. I’d thought that it was the mostly white white-collar crooks, such as the crew of Goldman Sachs, who did that.

Of course, the reason that the right wing pushes hatred of the “illegals” is not only because the “illegals” are powerless and poor, and can’t fight back, but because it’s a great diversion from the nation’s real enemies: the white-collar criminals, most of whom are Repugnicans and whom the Repugnican Party aids and abets.

I mean, for instance, who’s responsible for the oil that continues to fill the Gulf of Mexico? The Mexicans?

I’m beyond sick and fucking tired of the red-state bullshit. We have Alaska’s Repugnican Sarah “Drill, Baby, Drill!” Palin-Quayle now saying that President Barack Obama is too chummy with Big Oil; we have Arizona’s Borg Queen governor, Jan Brewer, Sen. John McCainosaurus, and McCainosaurus’ primary election opponent, J.D. Hayworth, all Repugnicans, of course, all trying to out-hate each other where it comes to the “illegals” for their personal political gain; and we have Kentucky’s Rand Paul saying that he disagrees with at least some of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and that criticism of British Petroleum is “un-American.”

While my mother is pontificating in her e-mails to me about how much the “illegals” are costing us, it’s funny, because not only do the billions of dollars in taxpayer-funded bailouts go to the corporatocrats, and not only do we, the people, also always end up paying for shit like the Vietraq War and the British Petroleum debacles — both of which Dick Cheney’s Halliburton has had an oily hand in — but Arizona itself is a welfare state.

As I noted in April 2009, Arizona gets back from the federal government about $1.20 for every dollar that it puts into the federal government.

My home state of California gets less than 80 cents for every $1 that it puts into the fed.

Palin-Quayle’s Alaska approaches two dollars back for every dollar that it contributes, and Rand Paul’s Kentucky gets about a buck and a half from the fed for every buck that it puts into the fed.

Yet here are these right-wing asswipes bitching and moaning about the evils of welfare when their states are sponging off of us blue states. The majority of the blue states get less from the federal government than they put into it, while the majority of red states get back more from the federal government than they put into it.

And they hate our president, too, primarily because he’s black.

Well, fuck off, red-staters, because 53 percent of Americans voted for Barack Obama, more than who ever voted for your precious George W. Bush in 2000 (less than a full 48 percent) or in 2004 (less than a full 51 percent).

I’ve had it with the right wing and the red states, and I’m ready for a second civil war.

Of course, the red states can prevent that and secede, and we blue states should fucking let them. They only drag us down anyway.

Texas, a.k.a. Bushland, whose Repugnican stupid-white-male governor already has raised the specter of secession, can be home to the New Confederacy’s capital. Texas, which loves to rewrite American history, would be the perfect headquarters for the coalition of states that don’t want to follow the wishes of the majority of Americans who voted for Barack Obama.

Speaking of whom, since Obama has compared himself to Abraham Lincoln — he formally announced his candidacy for president in Lincoln’s Springfield, Illinois, and he even was sworn in on the same Bible that Lincoln used (I saw the Bible when it was on display here in Sacramento as part of a Lincoln museum exhibit) — Obama could preside over the Second Civil War, if it comes to that. It would be fitting that the nation’s first black president should finish the red-state ass-kicking that Lincoln should have finished but did not.

If the secession of the racist red states won’t happen, I’m fine with another civil war.

I’m fighting fucking mad.

Ethnic cleansing continues in Arizona

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer will assimilate you.

So I’m thinking of Repugnican Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer as something like the Borg Queen, telling Arizonans: “You will be assimilated! Resistance is futile!”

I mean: WTF?

Arizona is out-Texasing Texas.

This from The Associated Press:

Phoenix – Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer signed a bill targeting a school district’s ethnic studies program on Tuesday, hours after a report by United Nations human rights experts condemned the measure.

State schools chief Tom Horne, who has pushed the measure for years, said a Tucson school district program promotes “ethnic chauvinism” and racial resentment toward whites while segregating students by race.

“It’s just like the old South, and it’s long past time that we prohibited it,” Horne said.

The measure prohibits classes that advocate ethnic solidarity, that are designed primarily for students of a particular race or that promote resentment toward a certain ethnic group. It also prohibits classes that promote the overthrow of the U.S. government. [Um, any such class exists anywhere?]

The Tucson Unified School District program offers specialized courses in African-American, Mexican-American and Native-American studies that focus on history and literature and include information about the influence of a particular ethnic group.

For example, in the Mexican-American Studies program, an American history course explores the role of Hispanics in the Vietnam War, and a literature course emphasizes Latino authors.

Horne said he believes the Mexican-American studies program teaches Latino students that they are oppressed by white people. Public schools should not be encouraging students to resent a particular race, he said.

Brewer’s signature on the bill comes less than a month after she signed the nation’s toughest crackdown on illegal immigration — a move that ignited international backlash amid charges the measure would encourage racial profiling of Hispanics.

A Republican running for attorney general, Horne has been trying to restrict the program ever since he learned that Hispanic civil rights activist Dolores Huerta in 2006 told students that “Republicans hate Latinos.”

District officials said the program doesn’t promote resentment, and they believe it would comply with the new law.

About 1,500 students at six high schools in the district are enrolled in the program. Elementary and middle school students also are exposed to the ethnic studies curriculum. The district is 56 percent Hispanic, with nearly 31,000 Latino students.

Sean Arce, director of the district’s Mexican-American Studies program, said last month that students perform better in school if they see in the curriculum people who look like them.

“It’s a highly engaging program that we have, and it’s unfortunate that the state Legislature would go so far as to censor these classes,” he said.

Six UN human rights experts released a statement earlier Tuesday expressing concern about the measure. All people have the right to learn about their own cultural and linguistic heritage, they said….

Jesus Fucking Christ.

White culture is taught every fucking day in the public schools, but for any other culture to be taught is equated with an attempt to overthrow the fucking government –– and, incredibly, perversely and insanely ironically and hypocritically, even to how whitey traditionally has treated others in the South.  

This latest new law signed by Arizona’s Borg Queen is white supremacism and white paranoia and the continued suppression of minorities by whites in Arizona — plain and simple.

And I should know whitey, because I’m white myself.

And boy, is whitey stupid. A law passed by terrified whites trying to disempower non-whites is, I believe, only going to empower these non-whites even more in the long run; when they feel that they are under attack from the whites (because they are), they’re only going to have more solidarity and even more resentment toward whites, not less, yet the genius authors of the law claim that they’re trying to prevent the resentment of whites by non-whites.

Arizona not only violates the civil rights of non-whites by deeming the teaching of their culture to be akin to attempted governmental overthrow, but Arizona cripples its students by refusing to teach them about a diverse world in which more and more is going global.

All students benefit by learning about other cultures and not just about the Borg — er, the white — culture.

Until and unless the insane white supremacists no longer run Arizona’s state government, there’s no way in hell I’m setting foot in Arizona again unless a close family member of mine who lives there should die.

I am ashamed that I was born and raised in the un-American state of Arizona, and I consider California — where diversity is cherished and, because it is cherished, taught — to be my home state.