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A Gay Dad Sounds Off On How Mike Huckabee Is Choking On The Doritos Rainbows Campaign

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Mike Huckabee is finding the Doritos Rainbows campaign a bit hard to swallow. This gay dad sounds off on the Huckabee hate legacy, and makes his own plea to Doritos about the future of the campaign.

My sons love Doritos. Jesse is a Nachos Doritos guy, and Jason, always his own man, loves the Ranch flavored.

I love the It Gets Better Project. They have provided inspiration and tangible help for teens at risk for suicide. It is a cause that no one in their right mind could be against. Yes, Mike Huckabee, you can take that for all it’s worth – you’re an idiot.

The recent campaign in which Doritos sold bags of rainbow chips to raise money for the It Gets Better Project brought smiles across our household. The campaign went well and before we could get on the computer to order our special bag, it was over. Sold out in just a day.

Mike Huckabee, a financial wizard of the Bigotry Industry has stepped in to demonize the efforts however. Huckabee does this under the guise of being “Christian.” He claims that Christianity is important to him. Unfortunately, few have done so much harm to the true precepts of Christianity as has Mike Huckabee. I would go so far as to say that Huckabee is to the heart of Christ what Judas Iscariot was to Jesus. He betrays it with a kiss.

A rich man donates to hate, Huckabee organizes a campaign to make him richer. A homophobic incestuous abuser is found out, Huckabee rationalizes away all he has done. A woman dishonors her office and tries to humiliate loving families, mocking them for wanting to be married, and there is Huckabee holding her hand in front of a stolen rock anthem. Now, Huckabee is attacking an organization that has saved the lives of thousands of teens. All of this done under the banner of “Christianity.” If you believe him, the press has gutted the soul of Christ of its love and compassion and replaced it with bigotry and homophobia.

“Meet your new sick partner,” Huckabee supposedly told Doritos, reportedly framing the It Gets Better Project as a “hate group.”  As he does so, he tweets to his legion, “Stand by me,” otherwise translated as “send money.”

How does Huckabee justify this categorization of an organization that is so profoundly good as being something so heinously bad? Two words: Dan Savage.

Dan Savage loathes Huckabee. Huckabee deserves exactly what he got. Dan’s tactics are not gentle, nor are they the type that will be discussed at the family dinner table. Dan Savage is the LGBTQ version of Donald Rumsfield. He embraces “Shock and Awe.” He seeks to appall and disgust the card-carrying homophobes to their pearl-clutching cores. He succeeds.

Savage made a recording, not for the faint of heart, that turns a Savage/Huckabee handshake into a sexual chronicle would make even the most sexually free go “Ewww.” For the sexually repressed, it just makes their head explode. You can see what I mean here. Of course, taking that piece of Savage’s work and equating it to what is being done at the It Gets Better Project, is like taking mainstream Christianity and comparing it to this.

Exploding heads are a good thing for Huckabee. He has long learned that when a homophobe gets irate, he or she goes for their wallet. So as Kim Davis no longer is of use to him, he has now taken aim at the corn chip.

As he does, so have I, in my own letter to Doritos.

 

Dear Doritos,

It was with great joy that my family and I saw your “There is nothing BOLDER than being yourself” campaign. I am happy for your success and the contribution you have made to the It Gets Better Project.

That success is not without cost, obviously. You have earned the vitriol of the people of a certain mindset, particularly those who are followers of Mike Huckabee.

Huckabee has publicly addressed you and attempted to integrate your campaign with an attack made on him by Dan Savage. The two events are non-sequiturs.

While Dan Savage came up with the idea for the “It Gets Better” inspiration to save lives, his editorials and the It Gets Better Project organization are unrelated entities.

That Huckabee does not understand the Savage piece about him is irrelevant to your efforts. Huckabee missed Savage’s intent on the recording. Savage has an in-your-face X-rated style, undisputedly. He sought to show that homophobic oppression is as vile and disgusting to families such as mine as descriptive sexual concepts are to Huckabee.

There is a big difference between the harm of Huckabee’s rhetoric and that of Savage, however. While Huckabee may be shocked at Savage’s tone and verbiage, Huckabee’s parents will not walk in finding him cutting himself or reaching for narcotics. Huckabee’s loved ones will not wake to find out that he had gotten up early that morning and stepped in front of a train.

The victims of people like Mike Huckabee have done exactly those things, and it is to them that the It Gets Better Project makes its outreach.

So thank you for your small campaign. I am confident that the viral stir it has made within progressive circles will help drive your business up. The backlash you are getting from those on the other side will die down. As they write out their protests on their Apple devices, post them on Facebook, they will soon be informed that both those entities have been far more LGBT community progressive than Frito-Lay has been able to be.

While this note is a “thank you” letter, I actually mean it to be a letter of request.

Eat your own chips. More specifically, please take your own campaign slogan to heart.  You encourage the eaters of your limited run colored chips to be BOLD.

Please, Doritos, be bold yourself. Put your rainbow chips in wide circulation. Don’t just let this be a limited campaign for the benefit of social media and a single check to the It Gets Better Project.

Let this be a message that American families see on each trip to the grocery store. Let the teen who is contemplating suicide because they fear the homophobic reaction of the world around them, that Mike Huckabee would prefer they live in, see the chips that tell them they are not alone.

As Huckabee tries to hijack the narrative and choke us all with homophobia, grab it back, and take it to the next level.

Do it. Be BOLD.

Huckabee’s hate then won’t have a chance. The mass crunching on a global scale will drown it out as a new brand of love hits the scene… one with a hint of spice, cheese and a kicky chili flavor.

 

Images:
Mike Huckabee by DonkeyHotey via Flickr and a CC license 
Doritos by Doritos

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Senator Suggests Trump Engaging in ‘Stochastic Terrorism’ Amid Pet-Eating Immigrant Lies

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September 13, 2024

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Donald Trump is on his fourth day of promoting his false claim that 20,000 undocumented Haitian migrants were dumped on Springfield, Ohio and have destroyed the townsfolk’s way of life, including by stealing people’s pet cats and dogs and eating them. Now, one U.S. Senator is suggesting the Republican presidential nominee is using “stochastic terrorism” to help his flailing presidential campaign.

A bomb threat and another, unspecified threat forced several Springfield elementary schools and one middle school to evacuate or not open Thursday and Friday. On Thursday, the Springfield city hall was evacuated and shut down, as were some state motor vehicle offices.

The emailed bomb threat on Thursday echoed Donald Trump’s and U.S. Senator JD Vance’s racist lies.

“My hometown of Springfield is becoming a thirdworld (expletive) because you allowed the federal government to dump these (expletive) here,” the email stated, USA Today reports. “We have Haitians eating our animals and then you lie and claim this is not happening when we see this happening. I’m here to send a message, I placed a bomb in the following locations…”

RELATED: ‘Hell Isn’t Hot Enough’: Fury at Trump as More School Evacuations Follow ‘Pet-Eating’ Lies

During Tuesday’s presidential debate Trump had falsely said: “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in, they’re eating the cats, they’re eating, they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”

On Thursday he used the lie to promote the candidacy of a Republican seeking to unseat Ohio Democratic U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown.

And on Friday, despite the bomb threat and other unspecified threat, Trump said in a press conference he would travel to Springfield and vowed to do “large deportations” from that city and send the legal immigrants he removes to Venezuela.

The “20,000 illegal Haitian migrants” are reported 12,000 to 15,000, ABC News reports, and they are not “illegal.” They are in the country legally, and the town as far back as a decade ago resolved to invite immigrants to help rebuild their failing economy and businesses.

Also on Friday, while reportedly not repeating the racist pet-eating lie, Trump dismissed the bomb threats as unimportant.

U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-HI) is not dismissing them, but he is asking how anyone could function again under a Trump presidency, and suggesting Trump is engaging in stochastic terrorism.

RELATED: Loomer Invokes Hannibal Lecter as Trump Triples Down on Lies About Immigrants Eating Pets

“Think about what it would be like to have four years of a President engaging in overtly racist stochastic terrorism against people pursuing the American dream and then just ask yourself what your immigrant grandparents would want you to do. Kids deserve to go to school safely,” Senator Schatz wrote.

Wajahat Ali is a New York Times contributing op-ed writer, Daily Beast columnist, and author of “Go Back to Where You Came From.” Responding to the news Friday of more school evacuations, Ali wrote: “Stochastic terrorism thanks to Trump and Vance.”

Mother Jones’s D.C. bureau chief David Corn, an MSNBC analyst, also noted: “Trump and Vance incite. Look up stochastic terrorism.”

And Mother Jones on X posted: “Days after Trump went on a racist rant during the presidential debate, the city of Springfield, Ohio, received a bomb threat that was explicitly hostile to immigrants and Haitians. This further proves that Trump’s demonizing rhetoric portends violence.”

Watch the videos above or at this link.

READ MORE: Trump Faces Increasing Calls to Participate in Second Debate

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‘Hell Isn’t Hot Enough’: Fury at Trump as More School Evacuations Follow ‘Pet-Eating’ Lies

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September 13, 2024

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For the second day in a row, elementary school children in Springfield, Ohio, were forced to be evacuated due to threats: a bomb threat on Thursday and an unspecified threat on Friday. The threats come after Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and his running mate, Ohio U.S. Senator JD Vance, have repeatedly spread lies about Haitian immigrants in Springfield this week, including that they are stealing residents’ cats and dogs and eating them.

Thursday’s bomb threat specifically mentioned the false claims about Haitian immigrants eating people’s pets, USA Today reported.

“Three schools in Springfield were evacuated or closed Friday, based on guidance from police, school officials said,” local NBC affiliate WLWT reports. “Officials with the Springfield City School District said that based on information they got from the Springfield Police Division, students at Perrin Woods and Snowhill Elementary were evacuated and moved to another district location.”

A Springfield middle school was also ordered closed Friday morning, before classes began, and “at least one Springfield location of the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles is closed.”

READ MORE: ‘Screaming About Eating Cats Is Not a Solution’: Walz Rallies Michigan Crowd, Slams Trump

On Thursday, a bomb threat targeting Springfield city hall and an elementary school forced evacuations of those buildings.

“Police Chief Allison Elliott said that due to the seriousness of the threat, officials evacuated multiple buildings in addition to City Hall, including BMV Springfield Driver’s Exam Station, Ohio License Bureau Southside, Springfield Academy of Excellence and Fulton Elementary School.”

Despite the reports of the bomb threat on Thursday, hours later Donald Trump used his Truth Social platform to promote the Republican nominee working to unseat Democratic U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio, by spreading more anti-Haitian immigrant racism.

“Bernie Moreno has a very good chance of winning Ohio against a Radical Left Democrat, Sherrod Brown, with what is happening in Springfield, and other parts of the State,” Trump declared Thursday afternoon, referring to the far-right extremist Republican who is currently leading in the polls by low single digits.

Trump then invoked his racist Haitian immigrant lies.

“Ohio is being inundated with Illegal Migrants, mostly from Haiti, who are taking over Towns and Villages at a level and rate never seen before.”

On Truth Social, Trump on Thursday also posted memes of cats, including one with them holding a sign that says, “Don’t let them eat us, vote for Trump.”

RELATED: Loomer Invokes Hannibal Lecter as Trump Triples Down on Lies About Immigrants Eating Pets

During Tuesday’s presidential debate, Trump had falsely claimed, “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in, they’re eating the cats, they’re eating, they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”

USA Today also reported that the “false rumor that Haitian migrants were stealing and eating pets began to circulate in the days leading up to the debate and was further popularized through posts from running mate J.D. Vance about his own state and AI-generated images shared by Trump, Elon Musk and the Republican House Judiciary Committee.”

J.J. Abbott, former press secretary to then-Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf, responded to ABC News immigration reporter Armando Tonatiuh Torres-García’s viral social media post reporting Friday’s threat and evacuations:

“In 2018, the GOP and Trump’s anti-immigrant conspiracies led to the deadliest mass shooting in recent PA history at a synagogue in Pittsburgh. The gunman took him seriously and literally. There’s nothing funny or intriguing about this dangerous racism.”

Many others responded to that reporter’s post.

“No sanitizing this. @jdvance and @realDonaldTrump bear full responsibility. They’re promoters of terrorism; and they did it intentionally,” wrote columnist, reporter, and former editor in chief of Crooked Media Brian Beutler.

“Ohio should look at this insanity and vote accordingly. Conspiracy peddling has real consequences. You can’t unring that bell. Donald Trump and JD Vance don’t care,” noted constitutional law professor and political scientist Anthony Michael Kreis.

“Donald Trump and JD Vance are terrorizing schoolchildren. They are unfit for any public office, let alone the highest,” responded attorney Andrew L. Seidel.

“JD Vance and MAGA influencers whipped up a blood libel panic and now children in Springfield are being traumatized by their lies. Hell isn’t hot enough,” commented the co-executive director of the progressive group Indivisible, Leah Greenberg.

“There’s a line from Charlottesville to Jan 6 to this. Trump speaks, his supporters act,” wrote political analyst and researcher Arieh Kovler.

“Trump could stop this but he won’t because he believes it serves his interests. It’s the same J6 behavior of spreading false conspiracy theories to inflame his supporters and then sitting back and watching instead of stopping it,” noted political science professor Michael McDonald.

READ MORE: Trump Faces Increasing Calls to Participate in Second Debate

 

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‘Screaming About Eating Cats Is Not a Solution’: Walz Rallies Michigan Crowd, Slams Trump

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September 13, 2024

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Minnesota Governor and Democratic Vice Presidential nominee Tim Walz took aim at Donald Trump Thursday night at a rally in the battleground state of Michigan, where the Harris campaign is leading the ex-president by an average of less than two points.

The Detroit News’ Craig Mauger posted a photo of the overflow crowd at the Grand Rapids Public Museum:

Gov. Walz’s speech (full video here) was decidedly down-home and neighborly, but he had no trouble going on the attack as well.

He told the audience that their friends and neighbors had watched Tuesday night’s presidential debate, during which Trump had lied that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, are “eating the dogs” and “eating the cats. They’re eating — they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”

Walz did not denigrate Trump supporters. Instead, he said that after the debate, “I don’t hear them out there much. I don’t see them out there much. They’re a little bit – because they’re good people. They’re our neighbors. They’re like, ‘that didn’t look very presidential.’ Screaming about eating cats is not a solution. It’s not a solution.”

RELATED: Loomer Invokes Hannibal Lecter as Trump Triples Down on Lies About Immigrants Eating Pets

“Well,” Walz continued, “what Kamala Harris was talking about is things that you actually care about. They might not be sitting down at the bar talking about banning books, but they might down there be talking about, ‘how can I afford a house? I’m working hard. I’m working hard. I want to have a house,’ and because that house becomes a home to some of these folks. Your real estate mogul, venture capitalist, whatever, that’s just an asset to be traded and sold to whoever you want. For us, it’s a place we gather around the kitchen table to talk to our kids about what happened in school. That’s what Kamala Harris wants for you. That’s what she wants for you.”

The 60-year old governor who is the only one of the four candidates on either ticket with a positive net approval rating (Harris comes in second), focused on midwestern values.

“What I am most proud of is because of all the things Donald Trump has stolen and all the things he did, what is unforgivable, is him stealing our joy. So here’s the thing, Kamala Harris is bringing not only solutions that focus on you. She’s doing it with a smile and joy on her face.”

“This guy, this guy on purpose, and make no mistake, it’s on purpose. He broke our political system. He tried to break our faith in one another. He tried to break the thing that makes Midwesterners stick together. We’re positive people, for God’s sakes. We walk on water half the year, we have to be it’s cold as hell,” Walz said. “We don’t care. We dig our neighbors out. This guy is trying to tell you your neighbors the enemy. This guy’s trying to tell you that he knows best about what folks in Grand Rapids need. Well, trust me, nothing could be further from the truth.”

“So here’s the deal, we’re nice folks. We’ll dig you out after a snow storm. We’ll say ‘hi’ at the store. Some of us might even let you merge on the highway. Not all of us,” he joked. “We have a saying for that. It’s Minnesota Nice, is what we call it. I’m sure you have it too. But the one thing I’ll tell you about Midwesterners that stretches across that beautiful blue wall of Northern America here, the one thing about us is, don’t ever mistake our kindness for weakness.”

READ MORE: Multiple-Location Bomb Threat Follows Trump and Vance’s False Dog-Eating Immigrants Claims

Walz also went after school shootings while reassuring supporters Democrats support the Second Amendment.

“Leaves are changing,” Walz said, as The Detroit News reported. “Friday night football’s back. Our kids have a new start and they’re going in. It’s a time of excitement and hope. Everything we want. That’s what we want for our kids.”

“But too many of our kids, these first days of school, are a time of sheer terror. A time that is going to stick with them forever,” he said, referencing school shootings.

“I know guns, you know guns,” he said. “Kamala Harris is a gun owner, by the way, which you found out. I’m not going to take any crap (from Republicans) about the Second Amendment. We support the Second Amendment.”

“But our first responsibility,” Walz continued, “is keeping our children safe. And you can have both.”

He also referred to shootings as “that crap,” and reminded the crowd that it “does not happen in other places in the world.”

Walz, a former U.S. Congressman who served for 24 years in the U.S. Armed Forces, called Donald Trump a “criminal.” Trump was convicted of 34 felony counts in New York for business fraud in an attempt to subvert the 2016 election.

He told the crowd Vice President Harris’s debate performance should have not been a surprise.

“She took on the predators. She took on the fraudsters,” Walz said. “She took down career criminals and powerful corporate interests, which, by the way, was on the stage the other night, all those things so, so this time, just to be clear, that criminal being on the stage got put in his place.”

“And this is what true leadership looks like. And she says this time and time again, and I love it. A mark of true leadership is not who beats people down, it’s who lifts people up, who lifts them up. So so when it’s a bully, and there’s a time she proved she can beat some people down if they need it.”

Watch the videos above or at this link.

READ MORE: Trump Faces Increasing Calls to Participate in Second Debate

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