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LGBTQ Leadership: Gone The Way Of America’s Automakers

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Remember the Big Four Automakers? Who are now the Big Three Automakers? Maybe soon the Big Two Automakers, now that GM has declared bankruptcy? They had their glory days, but failed to see the coming change, spent too much time and money on misguided efforts, and ultimately lost relevance, credibility and the support of their customers. They grew too big, became loath to change, and are dying a slow death. The automobile will live on, but those companies that drove it into the twenty-first century, and themselves into bankruptcy, may not.

Just as the automobile itself was truly a vehicle for social change during much of the twentieth century, so were the Big Four. Not the automakers, but the main LGBTQ activist organizations: Human Rights Campaign (HRC), American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (NGLTF). The LGBTQ community now has grown up strong, thanks to our leaders, the Big Four. And I say thank you to the The Task Force, the oldest LGBTQ activist organization. Thank you to HRC. Thank you to the ACLU. And thank you to GLAAD. I say thank you, and I say, goodbye.

Now, for the first time, the LGBTQ community is in a position of power. We are winning marriage equality, slowly but surely. Our goals are well-defined. They include passage of the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Bill, repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT), passage of the Employee Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), and repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), as well as full marriage equality in all 50 states, all territories, and in Washington, D.C.  We’ve won marriage equality in six states, hopefully seven (New York) before month’s end. And yet, despite a clearer path and major successes, despite increasing public attention on our issues and rising public support, despite a Democratic Congress and Democratic President, the ire and anger within our community is at a level not seen, many would say, since Stonewall. And the big difference now, the sign that we’ve achieved critical mass: the anger is directed at our allies. Why? Because, when you’re so close to achieving your goals, when you succeed despite the efforts of your leaders, and sometimes fail because of them, it’s clear you need new ones.

The Big Four did their job. They drove us to the twenty-first century. But they didn’t push themselves into it. Collectively, like the American automakers, they are old, outdated, ineffective, over-lapping behemoths whose lack of achievement demand they either declare bankruptcy, then refocus on their core competencies and truly re-create themselves, or turn over the wheel to the new leaders of our community: national grassroots organizations like Join the Impact, and local ones, like Mass Equality, Equality Maine, and One Iowa.

These are the groups that are able to mobilize hundreds of thousands, to get the attention of the media and voters, focus our energy and our message more efficiently, more effectively, without concern for the ways of the past, and without concern for their boards of directors. These groups are inter-dependent, act quickly, and can attack an issue from many different angles, because they’re down in the trenches and accessible. They aren’t thinking of themselves as leaders, but as partners, forging new ground. And they’re successful because they care more about our cause than about their corporate boards and sponsors, if they even have any.

Contrast them with the old guard, the Big Four. The Task Force’s main focus is developing and educating at the grassroots level. But they have fourteen different focuses and address too many tangential issues that have little to do with the success of our mission. For example, the murder of Dr. George Tiller. An atrocity, to be sure. But it has little to do with DADT, ENDA, DOMA, or, even, the Hate Crimes bill. And yet, the Task Force was quick to release a statement condemning it. Why? How much energy and time was spent on that issue, especially when three days earlier they had just begun their Twitter social media effort. Why has it taken them so long to begin to harness social media?

Or the Human Rights Campaign, which focuses on thirteen different issues. Which actually has had to start sending out emails that read “What has HRC done for me lately?”. Which, recently, has been forced into the position of denying a close relationship with the White House and Congress, when it should be touting its ability to access and to partner with government on planning and executing strategy.

GLAAD, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, has done little to attack the Right Wing or to change the tone and perception of anti-gay Conservatives. How can I say this? Their websites do not even mention extreme Right-Wing blogger Michelle Malkin, barely mention Maggie Gallagher, President of the National Organization For Marriage, and only once mention Michael Savage, whose views are so outrageous he was actually banned from entering Great Britain. Can you name any three people in the media who have had more to do with defamation of the LGBTQ community?

The ACLU, which is not solely an LGBTQ-focused organization, has had its share of successes and failures, but overlaps many efforts and suffers an overextended focus.

And now, we have countless LGBTQ activists and organizations. Hundreds of dedicated bloggers. All acting independently. All acting on their own agenda. Most, if not all, looking for attention and funding. Most, if not all, overlapping efforts. Our diversity, which has always been our greatest strength, is now threatening to become our greatest weakness.

Here’s what needs to happen:

Organizations like HRC, GLAAD, the ACLU, and the Task Force need to look at themselves and strip down to their most basic assets. Be the support services for legal, educational, media, and lobbying national issues. Embrace all the twenty-first century has to offer, starting with social media opportunities like Twitter and Facebook, YouTube and MeetUp. And act as background, technical support and capacity-building for the grassroots groups that are in the trenches, truly making a difference.

The ACLU should attack all our legal issues and court cases that deal with discrimination, hate crimes, the military, and marriage equality.

GLAAD should be our media arm, but partner with the Task Force, the ACLU, and the HRC. Let’s get our messaging clear and into the right media outlets.

The Task Force should focus only on educating grassroots organizations.

Finally, the HRC, with new, better leadership, should be our representatives to government. They should be lobbying and creating legislative strategy to ensure successful outcomes on DADT, ENDA, DOMA, and the Hate Crimes Bill.

The Boards of Directors and CEOs of the Big Four should be in regular contact. The CEO of The Task Force should sit on the Board of HRC. The ACLU’s CEO should sit on the Board of GLAAD, and so on.

It’s time the Big Four start working together. End whatever old animosities they harbor, for the good of the community. Step back, give their power to the grassroots. The LGBTQ movement has once again become a grassroots movement. We no longer need the old guard, the Big Four. But it would be nice to have them, if they can learn to adapt. If not, we’ll be happy to remember them fondly. Like General Motors.

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News

Trump Stands Silently for ‘God Bless the USA’ Then Trashes Detroit to Detroit Economic Club

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October 10, 2024

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Donald Trump gave what was billed as a speech on economic policy Thursday afternoon at the Detroit Economic Club, but he spent a good portion of his time focused on attacking the federal government’s response to Hurricane Helene, attacking his Democratic presidential opponent Vice President Kamala Harris, attacking the city of Detroit, appearing to be unaware foreign auto manufacturers build cars in the U.S., announcing one of his daughters is expecting, and standing silently for several minutes for his own theme song, “God Bless the USA,” “like it was the national anthem,” according to one reporter.

“The whole country is going to be like—you want to know the truth? It’ll be like Detroit. Our whole country will end up being like Detroit if she’s your president,” Trump said, referring to Vice President Harris. “You’re going to have a mess on your hands.”

The city’s Democratic mayor, Mike Duggan, hit back: “Detroit just hosted the largest NFL Draft in history, the Tigers are back in the playoffs, the Lions are headed to the Super Bowl, crime is down and our population is growing. Lots of cities should be like Detroit. And we did it all without Trump’s help.”

READ MORE: ‘On January 20’: Trump Exploits Hurricane Milton to Rally Floridians for Votes

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel commented, “This guy is calling us ugly and then asking us out on a date. Detroit and the rest of Michigan is ready to show Trump the exit when we overwhelmingly elect @KamalaHarris president.”

Michigan State Senator and Majority Whip Mallory McMorrow added: “As a proud elected representative of tens of thousands of Detroiters: Fuck this guy. Don’t come back.”

David Rothkopf, the noted foreign policy, national security and political affairs analyst and commentator had a different take on Trump’s remarks:

“Not only is this politically tone deaf, it’s something else. Can you tell me what it is? Can you tell me what he is saying when he says the whole country will be like Detroit, the city with the highest percentage of black residents of any in the U.S., if you elect the black woman to be president? Could it be racism?”

Trump also declared the American auto industry is going out of business.

READ MORE: ‘Sick’: Dem Mom Who Lost Son to Gun Violence Horrified to See Herself in Anti-Harris Ad

ClickOnDetroit reports that “Trump also falsely claimed that his administration had the highest job numbers during his speech in Detroit. The unemployment rate fell slightly lower under President Joe Biden — to 3.4% early last year, the lowest in a half-century, below 3.5% before the pandemic under Trump.”

Trump did offer some economic remarks, including wanting to make interest on car loans tax deductible.

Former Chief Economist for the White House Council of Economic Advisers Ernie Tedeschi responded to the news (via Trump’s prepared remarks): “Add this to the list of Trump’s policies that will raise your cost of living. If the after-tax cost of financing a car becomes cheaper, that savings will be at least partially capitalized in the price of the car itself.”

He also vowed to impose massive tariffs.

“I will impose whatever tariffs are required — 100 percent, 200 percent, 1,000 percent,” he said, according to Washington Post White House economics reporter Jeff Stein.

Watch the videos above or at this link.

READ MORE: Trump’s Upcoming Madison Square Garden MAGA Rally Sparks Comparisons to 1939 Nazi Event

 

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‘On January 20’: Trump Exploits Hurricane Milton to Rally Floridians for Votes

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7 hours ago

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October 10, 2024

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As Floridians begin to assess the damage and loss of life after Hurricane Milton hit Wednesday night, bringing with it a historic 150 tornadoes and causing power outages for millions, Donald Trump recorded and posted a video suggesting Floridians will be better off on “January 20,” Inauguration Day, implying they should vote for him.

“Hello, Florida, this is President Donald J. Trump,” the Republican ex-president began his video (below). Some of his supporters praised him on social media for acting as if he were the current president.

“Melania and I are praying for you as you face the aftermath of Hurricane Milton. We are deeply saddened by the devastation being reported and it sounds like it’s a bad as it gets and, ah, we feel so sorry for you and we want God to be with you and we know God is with you, our hearts go out to each and every one of you to those who’ve lost so much, know that you are not alone,” Trump says, before making his election pitch.

“We’ve seen you stand tall against storms before, and you will stand tall now and hopefully on January 20th, you’re gonna have somebody that’s really going to help you and help you like never before. Because help is on the way,” he says. “Together, we will rebuild, we will recover, and we will come back stronger, bigger, better than ever before.”

READ MORE: ‘Sick’: Dem Mom Who Lost Son to Gun Violence Horrified to See Herself in Anti-Harris Ad

Trump has been spreading massive lies about Hurricane Helene, and has continued those lies as Floridians prepared to be hit by Hurricane Milton.

“Donald Trump has decided to close the election with a flurry of disinformation, lies and deliberate cruelty relating to the massive hurricane relief effort in the wake of Helene, which struck the southeastern United States in late September,” The Washington Post‘s Jennifer Rubin wrote Thursday.

On Monday, CNN published “Fact check: Six days of Trump lies about the Hurricane Helene response,” revealing how the former president has “delivered a barrage of lies and distortions.”

Among the lies, according to CNN:
“Trump falsely claims Biden hasn’t answered calls from Georgia’s governor”
“Trump cites baseless ‘reports’ about anti-Republican bias in the North Carolina response”
“Trump falsely claims the Biden-Harris response had received ‘universally’ negative reviews”
“Trump falsely claims Harris spent ‘all her FEMA money’ on housing illegal migrants”
“Trump falsely claims $1 billion was ‘stolen’ from FEMA for migrants and has gone ‘missing’”
“Trump falsely claims the federal government is only giving $750 to people who lost their homes”
“Trump falsely claims there are ‘no helicopters, no rescue’ in North Carolina ”

In his video, Trump goes on to promise, “You’re gonna be better than before. And just keep your chin up and God bless you all, and God bless the great state of Florida, your governor is doing an excellent job. I’ve been talking to him and watching, Ron is doing a really good job. We’re proud of him and we’re gonna have something very, very special in the end. I think it’s gonna turn out a lot better than people thought, but this is a big one, so be very, very careful. Thank you very much.”

READ MORE: Trump ‘Let Americans Die’ By Secretly Handing COVID Testing Machines to Putin: US Senator

Florida Politics, reporting on Trump’s video wrote: “Less than a day after landfall, Donald Trump casts doubt on federal response to Milton.”

Marc Etzold, the U.S. correspondent for Germany’s Stern magazine, pointed to Trump invoking January 20, Inauguration Day, and remarked (according to Google translate): “Abusing a natural disaster for such electoral purposes is practically a must-do in Donald Trump’s world.”

Jonathan Boucher, the chief of staff to a New York City Council Member, commented: “Nooooo Trump isn’t politicizing a storm or anything. Not a peep from republicans.”

Watch Trump’s video below or at this link.

READ MORE: Trump’s Upcoming Madison Square Garden MAGA Rally Sparks Comparisons to 1939 Nazi Event

 

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‘Sick’: Dem Mom Who Lost Son to Gun Violence Horrified to See Herself in Anti-Harris Ad

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9 hours ago

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October 10, 2024

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Kimberly Burrell, a life-long Democrat who will be voting for Vice President Kamala Harris for President, lost her 18-year-old son Darryl Pray Jr. in 2009 to gun violence. In July, around the anniversary of his death, she sat down with a group of Philadelphia mothers who also lost loved ones to gun violence, for an interview with MSNBC’s Yasmin Vossoughian.

“Burrell was a bundle of raw emotion” during taping, Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Helen Ubiñas wrote Wednesday.

“I was a mess,” Burrell, a 53-year-old paralegal, told her. “I couldn’t stop crying.”

During the two-hour MSNBC interview, which Burrell wanted to keep non-political, she was asked about inflation and made a short comment.

“Imagine the mother making minimum wage trying to feed children,” a “choked up” Burrell said, “They’re killing us without killing us.”

READ MORE: Trump ‘Let Americans Die’ By Secretly Handing COVID Testing Machines to Putin: US Senator

Those comments showed up in an anti-Harris ad from a right-wing Super PAC.

Then, “a split screen juxtaposes an emotional Burrell with a cheerful Vice President Kamala Harris declaring: ‘That’s called Bidenomics!’ before ending with the candidate’s signature laugh,” The Inquirer wrote.

Burrell was shocked to see that out-of-context clip in the ad by a Super PAC that spends 98.86% of its expenditures attacking Democrats, according to Open Secrets.

Ubiñas writes, “Burrell was horrified. How could a passionate supporter of Kamala Harris for president become the face of a political attack ad for Trump that had co-opted her image and words in one of her most vulnerable moments?”

“I’m distraught,” Burrell said. “They can just steal your image and comments and twist it the way they want it to be twisted.”

“It’s just really sick.”

“Even if she wasn’t a Democrat, she said,” Ubiñas writes, “voting for Trump — a man whose character and values she deplores — would not be an option. The tears she shed during the interview were about the loss of her son, she said, not the price of peppers.”

The Super PAC that produced the attack ad, Restoration PAC, currently has the video (below) pinned to the top of its page on the social media site X.

Ubiñas says she reached out to Restoration PAC.

“Your X feed indicates you are a hard-partisan with a strong case of Trump Derangement Syndrome,” Dan Curry, Restoration PAC spokesperson responded, “therefore you don’t need my help in cobbling together your biased column. Have a blessed day.”

Restoration PAC is largely funded by the billionaire founder of Uline, an $11 billion shipping and packing materials business.

Dick Uihlein, The New York Times reported in 2020, is a “Midwestern packing supply magnate and Trump donor who has a history of giving to combative, hard-right candidates, like Roy S. Moore of Alabama.”

Moore, of course, as NCRM reported, is the twice-former, twice booted former Alabama Supreme Court chief justice who became the twice-failed GOP U.S. Senate candidate. Uihlein supported him even after the multiple, credible accusations of rape and harassment came out against him, according to Blue Virginia.

READ MORE: Trump’s Upcoming Madison Square Garden MAGA Rally Sparks Comparisons to 1939 Nazi Event

The Daily Beast has reported Uihlein “gave millions to groups associated with overturning” the 2020 election:

“Uihlein’s nonprofit—the Ed Uihlein Family Foundation—poured millions of dollars in 2020 into a sprawling number of groups connected to efforts to challenge Joe Biden’s victory and reimagine election law, as well as other right-wing extremist organizations, including ones designated as hate groups.”

“Kyle Herrig, president of left-leaning watchdog group Accountable.US, told The Daily Beast that money from Uihlein and his wife, Elizabeth, has ‘promoted hate and sedition.'”

“In 2020, as workers and families struggled to get by, Dick and Liz Uihlein’s company cashed in on pandemic aid—then turned around and funded hate groups pushing COVID conspiracy theories, bigotry, and efforts to undermine democracy,” Herrig said. “By signing away more than $1 million to groups that have promoted hate and sedition, Dick and Liz Uihlein have made it clear where their company’s values truly lie.”

Kimberly Burrell, meanwhile, has contacted both the Trump campaign and Restoration PAC, “so far to no avail. She’s also contacted a lawyer and is crafting a cease and desist letter.”

“This is what we’ve allowed this country to become, a place where lies can be told and go unchallenged” Burrell told Ubiñas. “We give them power by not calling them out on anything.”

Watch the Restoration PAC ad below or at this link.

READ MORE: Top GOP Strategist Names Three Key Issues That Will Get Republicans to Vote for Harris

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