The Dish

Jon Rauch writes:

Forty years ago, civil-rights pioneer, Frank Kameny, came to the aid of a frightened Library of Congress employee who was accused of "enjoying" the embrace of men. (I am not making that up.) On Oct. 6, that same Library of Congress accepted Kameny’s papers and cemented his place in history’s pages. Professional archivists will now painstakingly sort thousands of documents – the gift of Charles Francis’s Kameny Project, which raised $75,000 to purchase and donate them – and will ensure their availability to generations of students of U.S. civil rights. There is no better record of the torment that homosexuals endured at the hands of their government in the 1950s and 1960s. And there could have been no finer tribute to Kameny than the ceremony at the Library. If there were any dry eyes in the house after Frank accepted the tributes and took his seat, mine weren’t among them.

Frank Kameny, fired by the federal government for being gay, fought for justice and equality with a tenacity and integrity that has inspired all of us honored to follow in his steps. Here are some of the pickets that the polite protestors in suits and ties held aloft outside the White House in 1965, 1966, and 1968. Notice that all this happened before the Stonewall riots. The gay rights movement pre-dated the New Left. Kameny’s courage helped kick-start the freedoms I now enjoy. Thank you, Frank. And keep fighting.

A devastating dissection of an anti-Casey Santorum ad. The champion of moral values has no problem with bearing false witness. The local TV station has a variety of labels to judge the accuracy of campaign ads. This Santorum one got the worst label possible: false.

What a way to go:

"There is a certain poetic irony to his death," Christopher Janson said. "He died doing what he loved, which was being on the stage and in a play he was so proud of." In the Gore Vidal drama, Janson portrayed a fictional former U.S. president who dies unexpectedly. Bohnen said the role was one of Janson’s finest in a 50-year career.

A reader writes:

I was a Congressional page in the summer of 1992.  (By the way, it is an incredible program that should be protected from anyone who calls for its elimination, as some reactionary Members are now grumbling.)  I was 17, from a small town in the West, and I was realizing that I was gay.  Based on my experience, I‚Äôm saddened for these young men in this scandal, some who by the content of their IMs with Foley are most likely gay. They were preyed up on by this powerful hypocrite. Remembering my summer on Capitol Hill, I‚Äôm sure I would have been a bit star struck by this Congressman – pages were always impressed by a Member of Congress who took the time to learn our names, thank us for our work, and was open to saying ‚Äòhi‚Äô in the hallways.  I‚Äôm also sure that as a young person questioning my sexuality, and full of testosterone to boot, I would have been intrigued by Foley‚Äôs continued advances.  Foley knew this, which is why he did what he did, and he was wrong to do it.

I now live as an out gay man and this scandal affirms my belief that the closet is a horribly destructive social control mechanism.  If those young pages felt that they could be open about their sexuality they might have been more likely to have come forward about Foley‚Äôs advances to their superiors, without fear of being stigmatized, instead of playing his creepy secret games.  And more important – because Foley is in the position of power here ‚Äî if Foley had lived his life with integrity as an out gay man this scandal would likely never have happened.  He wouldn‚Äôt have turned to the most vulnerable and impressionable men regularly in his sphere, the young pages.  Foley‚Äôs closet will be his tomb.

By the way, I was a Republican page, owing to the fact that my Congressman was a Republican.  I hadn’t figured out my politics at the time.

This Rolling Stones tune has to be the winner:

I can see that you’re fifteen years old
No I don’t want your I.D.
I can see you’re so far from home
But it’s no hanging matter
It’s no capital crime

Oh yeah, you’re a strange stray cat
Oh yeah, don’tcha scratch like that
Oh yeah, you’re a strange stray cat
Bet your mama don’t know you scream like that
I bet your mother don’t know you can spit like that.

You look so weird and you’re so far from home
But you don’t really miss your mother
Don’t look so scared I’m no mad-brained bear
But it’s no hanging matter
It’s no capital crime
Oh, yeah
Woo!

I bet your mama don’t know that you scratch like that
I bet she don’t know you can bite like that.

Greg Gutfeld has the fatwa-scoop.

"Where does post-modern American ethics place Mark Foley’s homosexuality on a scale of 1 to 10 – a 1 being just another gay guy and a 10 being a compulsive, predatory sex offender?" – Daniel Henninger in the WSJ.

Hmm. Where would one put Charles Carl Robert IV‘s heterosexuality on a scale of 1 to 10 – a 1 being just another straight guy and a 10 being a compulsive, predatory sex offender and murderer of little girls? Just asking. I mean heterosexual men are all on the same spectrum, aren’t they?

Talking of lyrics about sex with teens, here’s an album cover worth posting:

In a book by former Canadian prime minister Jean Chretien’s closest adviser, president Bush is described as telling Chretien in March 2002:

"If I catch anyone who leaks in my government, I would like to string them up by the thumbs – the same way we do with prisoners in Guantanamo."

Today, we hear that in a sworn statement by a Marine sergeant at the base, beatings of prisoners were routine and bragged about:

The lawyer sent the statement on behalf of a paralegal who said men she met on Sept. 23 at a bar on the base identified themselves to her as guards. The woman, whose name was blacked out, said she spent about an hour talking with them. No one was in uniform, she said.

A 19-year-old sailor referred to only as Bo "told the other guards and me about him beating different detainees being held in the prison," the statement said.

"One such story Bo told involved him taking a detainee by the head and hitting the detainee’s head into the cell door. Bo said that his actions were known by others," the statement said. The sailor said he was never punished.

The statement was provided to the AP on Thursday night by Lt. Col. Colby Vokey. He is the Marine Corps’ defense coordinator for the western United States and based at Camp Pendleton.

The more we know, the worse it looks. And that’s the Bush administration in a nutshell.

(Photo: Mark Wilson/Getty.)

The United Church of Christ hits back against the Family Research Council’s bigotry.