And even more bigotry due to the republican right, old news before I clean the computer.

Twin brothers Blake Krenzer, 19, and Brandon Krenzer, 19, of Gambrills have been charged for alleged involvement in the vandalism of the Black Lives Matter and Pride signs at the Ark & Dove Presbyterian Church. Officers responded to the Odenton church on the morning of June 14, where they found the vandalized signs. An investigation revealed the vandalism had happened around 10 p.m. the previous evening. Police said the Krenzers were identified with the help of the public.

You Again? Gregory In Seattle2 days ago

In the same vein…

Thumbnail
While the Court’s decision only addresses expressive original designs, I’m deeply concerned that the decision could invite more discrimination against LGBTQI+ Americans. More broadly, today’s decision weakens long-standing laws that protect all Americans against discrimination in public accommodations – including people of color, people with disabilities, people of faith, and women.

S_E_P Chucktech2 days ago

Christianity is merely the religious arm of the white heterosexual male patriarchy. The current SCOTUS is its legal arm.

Chucktech S_E_P2 days ago edited

American Christianity isn’t “merely” anything. It’s a foul pestilence that should be righteously and vociferously mocked and shunned as the anti science, anti logic and reasoning millstone dragging society down to stupidity that it is.

If you want context that this is a made up political issue watch this

If Republicans are truly worried about members of the first family improperly benefitting from their name, Mehdi says there are two people besides Hunter Biden that they should be looking at: Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner.

DJ Joe in NM2 days ago

Yeah. just like this bigot did at Barneys Beanery in the heart of West Hollywood back in the day.

Thumbnail

paganheart Bungee2 days ago

Because that was the price for the top-secret intelligence documents Kushy obtained from his FIL’s top-secret stash at Mar-A-Shitto and passed on to Saudi intelligence….

At least that’s what I believe. I fear that someday, we will discover that Kushy did more damage to the US than every other convicted spy combined. No wonder Skanky is trying to distance herself from Daddy…..

Bungee2 days ago

Impeach him over allegations from an apparently non-existent “whistleblower”?

Do you have ANY idea how ridiculous you sound? WTF

DevilDog2 days ago edited

Nikki Haley says Congressional Republicans “absolutely should” impeach President Biden over whistleblower allegations.

No proof. No facts. Not even a congressional hearing. Mere allegations are enough for today’s GOP to demand impeachment.

So much for “both sides are the same.”

SkokieDaddy – wiener dog dad2 days ago

Be outraged!!
OMG – “interference” that resulted in a guilty plea?
Impeach over claims from a ‘whistleblower’ who has never testified under oath?

Go to hell Nimrata – and no I won’t use the name you “prefer” to be called, since you and your part spit on all of us.

paganheart UpNorth2 days ago

I wonder if any of her GOP opponents in the upcoming debates are going to have the guts to call her “Nimrata” and ask her why she insists on trying to pass as White…and oh by the way, why hasn’t she released her “long form birth certificate” to prove that she was really born in the USA and not India?

Todd200362 days ago

It was never about zygotes. It’s about oppressing women

And it’s succeeding

Gustav2 Todd200362 days ago

It goes back to Aristotle and Aquinas plus back to Old Testament where a man “plants his seed.” The DNA for the complete human being is in the man’s seed, just like a plant. The woman is just the furrow where the seed is planted.

You are destroying the man’s hard work.

Stultus Gustav22 days ago

Today, the Catholic Church bases their sexual ethics on Tommy. So 21st sexuality is based on 13th? century science.

Uncle Mark: HoHo-smoking homo Gustav22 days ago

That’s also why masturbation was deemed especially evil or even butt sex. Dropping all those human beings on the ground or in someone’s ass.

Thumbnail

another_steve Todd200362 days ago

Women who have autonomy over their bodies might not consent to 24/7 sex on demand. Theofascist men don’t like that idea.

Abortion bans are designed to eliminate female body autonomy for that reason.

Bungee2 days ago

#4). Keep’em Pregnant

Thumbnail

Uncle Mark: HoHo-smoking homo Max-1 🔫+cult(R)=☠️2 days ago

I’m reminded of the Comstock Act, especially as it pertained to mailing birth control or abortifacients in the 1870s. It was expressed that one of the underlying reasons for this was In reaction to the influx of the Irish Catholics (especially in NYC), and the need to insure that English Protestants didn’t become a minority.

Sam_Handwich 5 days ago edited
In my very blue neck of the woods a “controversy” has arisen after the local zoo posted pictures on FB of Pride decorations in some of the animal enclosures. Not sure this would even be an issue were it not for the right’s renewed tantrum that gay people exist. I have mixed feelings about zoos as a thing, haven’t been there in years, but might visit today or tomorrow.

jefe5084 Sam_Handwich5 days ago

righties can’t comprehend that even some animals can be “gay.”

Wintercat jefe50845 days ago

The coverage of the two dads raising a penguin chick infuriated them.

Sam_Handwich Wintercat5 days ago

How will that poor baby penguin ever learn to do dishes or dress like a whore???

TnCTampa5 days ago

This is about the only paper in the state that will say anything bad about Desantis. Thanks Orlando Sentinel

Richard B5 days ago

DeSanctimonious is a dangerous religious maniac, craven for power, and there is nothing he won’t say or do to achieve his goals.
It is a relief to see the Orlando Sentinel has stood up to this fascist bigoted governor.
More leaders need to stand up and do the same thing.

KarenAtFOH5 days ago

Floridians are not ready for a new fight to begin. They overwhelmingly reelected a fascist governor who hates us. Down here in SWFL, there is a practical news blackout on the the horrible new laws taking effect in a couple of days. Nobody seems to care. It feels like what 1930’s Germany must have felt like to live there.

Dennis5 days ago
They spent billions to indoctrinate Republican voters to become far-right extremists and conspiracy theorists and now they are trying to stop someone who is representing such views..

Rambie Dennis5 days ago

They want them to worship a new golden calf that has less of an orange tint.

Todd20036 Dennis5 days ago edited

This is all because trump lost in 2020 and his picks (mostly) lost in 2022

That’s the only reason Koch is turning against trump

Nic Peterson Dennis5 days ago

They never liked trump, they thought they could control him. That went badly. Now they see a nazi that they don’t need to babysit and they are rightly afraid the orange shit stain is gonna rain on their parade.

Elagabalus Bruno5 days ago

The only reason they want to stop Trump is because they can read the polls which say he will lose to Biden in 2024.

Yves R. Mektin 5 days ago
So they plan on doing absolute zilch nada zip for the American people or their constituents. Nothing but performative obstruction.

Darreth Nico El Azul Gato Proud & Blue5 days ago

The US House is dominated by Dominionists. So, it’s a church, too.

Jean-Marc Canada – ✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ5 days ago

I’d ask on what grounds, but it’s just petty political vindictiveness that will only serve to waste time and taxpayer money; in other words, business as usual for the GQP

Jack Frost Jean-Marc Canada – ✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ5 days ago

It’s the same thing with DeSantis in Florida. He’s used the word woke so many times. It has no meaning anymore.

GOP just keep attacking Biden cabinet officials who are technically Republicans. This is going to backfire amazingly for them.

Todd20036 6 days ago
Elections matter. Nearly all republicans want to keep this torture

Dark Qiviut6 days ago

Conversion therapy is complete and utter quackery, and it’s a crime that it’s not outlawed federally. This practice should be outlawed regardless of age, not just for minors.

At least a large chunk of states are picking up the slack.

Houndentenor Dark Qiviut6 days ago

Exactly.

1) It doesn’t work.
2) It causes harm.

We’ve been far too tolerant for all manner of quackery (Dr Oz for example) for far too long. Frauds and scammers should be put out of business. This isn’t a first amendment issue. This is an issue of lying to people (or their parents) and inflicting harm on them.

Jurgen Dark Qiviut6 days ago

It is psychological terrorism. The pray away “movement” coincided with APA’s declassification of same sex orientation as illness. Evangelicals were pissed not to have a “sick” scapegoat.

ErnestMc6 days ago

Great news. Once again, if it weren’t already obvious, LGBT rights expand under Democrats and contract under Republicans. The folks who are always saying the Dem’s do nothing aren’t paying attention.

mythictom 6 days ago
Humiliate every single Republican that tries this crap!

Hank: NO MORE WoW!!! mythictom6 days ago

Especially Tommy Tuberville, who did the same thing!

Joe in NM6 days ago

They know their voters are too stupid to know.

crewman Joe in NM6 days ago

They know their voters are captured assets. They only listen to propaganda and have inoculations in place to keep any outside information of getting in.

thatotherjean  Richard Ryan6 days ago
As Mr. Rogers told his child audience, “Look for the helpers.”
Read the full article. There’s much more. Gift link here.
This same developer has given DeSantis and wife rides on his private jet and was in the news just last week for an unreported $27,000 golf simulator he had installed at Florida’s governor’s mansion.
Read the full article.
Hunt last appeared on JMG in February 2023 when she responded to an anti-drag bill with a troll amendment that would bar parents from enrolling their children in “religious indoctrination camps.” The final April 1st tweet below is pinned to the top of the hate group’s feed.

DmR 4 days ago
I live near her district, which is in a blue pocket in an otherwise bright crimson state.
She is making quite the name for herself and the Wingers do not like the attention and support she is getting.

leathersmith3 days ago

children did not design that

Professor Barnhardt leathersmitha day ago

It does look suspiciously too well done.

Statistics Palin3 days ago

Fuck that’s tacky. If the Baptists had built the Sistine Chapel, the ceiling would be covered with vinyl siding.

Mark3 days ago

“All people, of all faiths, are welcome in our state.”

That ain’t what your driveway says.

Anastasia Beaverhousen Mark3 days ago

“All people, Except those trans people, and those dirty gays, and the lesbians, oh, I forgot the MuseLambs, and the Jews. Everyone else, come on in.”

Ohbehr in Minnesota Anastasia Beaverhousen3 days ago

Don’t think the Catholics, Unitarians, United Church of Christ, Methodists, Lutherans would be welcome either. They are not southern KKK Baptists.

Elagabalus3 days ago

Arkansas has officially become a theo-fascist state. Full Stop.

MyCityisNotaSwamp3 days ago

I’m not as disturbed by the picture at the Governor’s mansion as I am concerned for her children. The height of their creativity is a brainwashed image of a picture of torture?
Where are the flowers, magic fairies, animals?

Darreth3 days ago

This deliberate violation of church/state can’t be prosecuted either.

Evangelicals now have their required threshold majority in key places. Once they are the solid majority wherever they are they are the de facto standard and NOTHING can remove them. That’s why we’re becoming a failed nation. Once a nation is ruled by Bronze Age religious mythology it collapses.

Brian Green Serene Pumpkin3 days ago

Something tells me in coming years the entire LGBTQ community will be required to march and fight for our rights all across this country…. Even us quiet, middle aged suburban gays are needed to get more involved.

BartmanLA3 days ago

If they want to play hardball, then lets get businesses to do this!

Thumbnail
GayOldLady3 days ago
Peanuts 🥜 DeSantis trying to prove his manhood by leaning into the Pulse massacre! This bastard is a danger to our community and we ignore him at our own peril. We must proactively stand against him. 🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🌈

GayOldLady GayOldLady3 days ago edited

We will fight him in the orchards, we will fight him in the mangroves, we will fight him on the beaches, we wll fight him in the cornfields, we will fight him any fuckin place he challenges our Civil and Human rights

Thumbnail

TexasBoy3 days ago

Well, at least DeSantis has finally shown his true colors. His ridiculaous campaign has NOTHING to do with “Protect the Children” and everything to do with “Hate the Gays.” Which we knew all along.

GladysKravitz3 days ago

This is not only deranged and idiotic, it’s a not so subtle call for violence against LGBT people. The subtext is that DeFascist will get rid of these people once and for all. And of course the Log Cabin quislings are surprised the leopards are eating their faces.

Max-1 🔫+cult(R)=☠️4 days ago
With Supreme Court LGBTQ decision, marriage equality is at risk
The court’s decision demeans our nation’s aspirations to equality and inclusion and thereby diminishes us all.
By Laurence H. Tribe and Jeffrey B. Abramson
Until this week, under long-standing state public accommodations laws, if a business wanted all the benefits that came from being generally open to the public, then it had to serve all customers equally. Since 1964, this principle has applied to a motel in the heart of Atlanta, Ollie’s barbeque joint in Birmingham, Ala., and social clubs and private schools that advertised to the general public. As Justice Sonia Sotomayor noted about the historic case involving Ollie’s, it would not do for the owner to have said, “I’ll serve Blacks but only on a takeout window, not inside my restaurant because that sends a message that I endorse integration.”

By twisting free speech into a license to discriminate, the court has now carved out an exception from public accommodations law for businesses that recast their services in ways that highlight their expressive features. But the court offers no workable principle to cabin that exception in any meaningful way.

Todd20036  Max-1 🔫+cult(R)=☠️4 days ago
Sodomy laws are next
Hiv meds could be no longer covered by insurance
We could be arrested for holding hands in public or kissing in public
Don’t think that’s impossible

Uncle Mark: HoHo-smoking homo Max-1 🔫+cult(R)=☠️4 days ago edited

One would think that the court would find for the nation’s best interests to encourage a fair, equitable, and cohesive society, not to promote the very toxicity that tears society apart, no matter whether it’s disguised in “free speech” or “religion.”

Ore Carmi Jonathan Smith4 days ago

I guess the conservatives on the Supreme Court don’t care about the legitimacy of a case, if they get the opportunity to gut rights they don’t like!

Houndentenor Ore Carmi4 days ago

I knew the night RBG died that we were fucked and would be fucked for longer than I’ll likely be alive. Right wingers have made no secret that they hated anything that gave rights to minorities. They like to frame it in a libertarian argument so it sounds like freedom, but the freedom they want is the freedom to be bigots. Everything is going to be ruled unconstitutional and that’s going to affect the blue states, not just the red. And especially the blue islands in red states! So very fucked and not in the good way.

m.d.Blakely4 days ago
According to the WaPo article, MTG racked up $15,500 in fines. Remember when she complained about her measly congressional pay?

jharp4 days ago

What a terrific use of taxpayers money.

Tie up the courts, the judges, and waste lawyers time along with the time of Congress…. …for not wanting to put on a CDC recommended mask when in the company of others.

Spending other people’s money. Grandstanding.

It’s all republicans have.

Houndentenor4 days ago

It’s all very interesting that after years of these fascists whining that they couldn’t breathe when wearing a mask, so many of them now show up at protests…WEARING MASKS!

Makoto4 days ago

Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), and Ralph Norman (R-S.C.)

The other names weren’t a surprise, but I have to admit, Ralphie didn’t ring a bell for me. Had to look him up, and wow, shocker, real estate mogul old white guy. Jokes about sexual assault. Negligent with firearms. Used the supposedly MAGA hated remote voting to skip town to get to CPAC. Hates student loan forgiveness, but got some $300k+ of PPP loans forgiven. Wanted Steve King back after his boot for white nationalist comments. Wants to impeach Biden.

Weird, he hits all the same marks as the MTGs and Boeberts and such, but I had absolutely no recollection of him. Wonder if he’ll join the GOP presidential clown car next…

JoeMyGodMod JCF4 days ago

I think the fines were deducted from their salaries. MTG once boasted that she’d racked up so many fines that she was working for “free.”

northalabama  Gene Perry4 days ago
standing, schmanding! it’s 2023, you just have to invent a plaintiff out of thin air, then have enough billionaires lined up to pay your expenses for years until you win, easy peasy.

JackFknTwist4 days ago

It amazes me that these decisions so blatantly favour the rich and privileged.
Striking down Affirmative Action can only harm the less privileged.
Student loans are used by those who need them and don’t have their own resources.
and the LGBT community can now be refused services by public commercial operations.
Nothing here for the poor or the minorities can take any comfort in.
It looks like the Supreme Court has found their own ‘protected class’ of wealthy privileged bourgeoisie.

carswell JackFknTwist4 days ago

The majority judges are members of the elite working in the interest of the elite.
And for them, elite is rich, white, male, Christian and corporate.

What Paxton and his office did not say: The law firm that produced the report, Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith, has been paid more than $500,000 in public money to defend him against whistleblowers who sued the agency for wrongful termination because they went to the FBI with allegations of corruption.

TrollopeReadera day ago

but of course!

“The outside firm never interviewed Paxton or key agency leaders….

does the report say “After thorough investigation, we determined that all is fine, move along, nothing to see here”?

With Supreme Court LGBTQ decision, marriage equality is at risk

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2023/06/30/opinion/supreme-court-lgbtq-equality/

The hostility of a majority of justices to the 2015 Supreme Court case protecting same-sex marriage is so open that, until they can follow Justice Clarence Thomas’s call to overrule that decision, they are determined to strip same-sex couples of civil rights protections that other lawfully married couples enjoy.

With Supreme Court LGBTQ decision, marriage equality is at risk

The court’s decision demeans our nation’s aspirations to equality and inclusion and thereby diminishes us all.

The same-sex marriage equality decision stands for now, but it should be added to the list of endangered precedents.
The same-sex marriage equality decision stands for now, but it should be added to the list of endangered precedents.GLOBE STAFF/ADOBE

This week, the Supreme Court ruled for the first time that businesses generally open to the public can nonetheless discriminate against LGBTQ customers.

At issue in the 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis case was an evangelical Christian website designer from Colorado who did not wish to offer the same services to a same-sex wedding couple that she would offer to a heterosexual couple. The court ruled that, as an artist, the designer would be engaging in speech protected by the First Amendment by selling her customized services and thus could not be compelled to serve those whose wedding plans contradict her beliefs about marriage. Indeed, she could not be required to take down a message saying that she won’t serve gay couples.

Until this week, under long-standing state public accommodations laws, if a business wanted all the benefits that came from being generally open to the public, then it had to serve all customers equally. Since 1964, this principle has applied to a motel in the heart of AtlantaOllie’s barbecue joint in Birmingham, Ala., and social clubs and private schools that advertised to the general public. As Justice Sonia Sotomayor noted about the historic case involving Ollie’s, it would not do for the owner to have said, “I’ll serve Blacks but only on a takeout window, not inside my restaurant because that sends a message that I endorse integration.”

By twisting free speech into a license to discriminate, the court has now carved out an exception from public accommodations law for businesses that recast their services in ways that highlight their expressive features. But the court offers no workable principle to cabin that exception in any meaningful way.

One major problem with the court’s premise is that no reasonable observer would attribute to the website designer the message that she endorses gay marriage merely because, as required by a state antidiscrimination law, she designs a website for a couple regardless of their sexual orientation. The designer isn’t speaking for the couple — she just creates a medium for their message. And Colorado’s law doesn’t prevent her from making that clear to everyone.

Writing for the majority, Justice Neil Gorsuch relied on a prior case in which the court ruled that the organizers of the Boston St. Patrick’s Day parade could not be compelled to include a float bearing a banner for the Irish-American Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Group of Boston. But the unanimous opinion in that case stressed that while parade organizers could exclude the banner, they could not exclude marchers simply because they were gay or lesbian. So that case does not remotely support this decision’s radical misuse of free speech doctrine.

The court left conspicuously unanswered the sensible questions justices asked at oral argument last December: What if a website designer refused wedding business from an interracial couple because of moral objections to such marriages? Or interfaith marriages? Only Sotomayor’s dissenting opinion even mentioned the 1967 Supreme Court decision striking down bans on interracial marriage, adding: “How quickly we forget that opposition to interracial marriage” often reflected religious beliefs akin to those of the web designer in this case. What if a photographer doesn’t want business from a person with disabilities? What if a photo store doesn’t want its “Scenes with Santa” to include photos of a white Santa holding a Black child?

These questions show that there is no way to cabin the decision and limit it to LGBTQ customers or to limit the demeaning message the court’s decision itself sends to any particular category of individuals. As the dissent powerfully shows, the court’s decision demeans our nation’s aspirations to equality and inclusion and thereby diminishes us all.

During oral argument, Justice Samuel Alito tried to distinguish between “honorable” religious objection to same-sex marriage, worthy of respect in his view, from opposition to interracial marriage, which he rejected as indecent even if religiously motivated. His voice was absent from this ruling, and the majority opinion by Gorsuch avoided basing the decision on judgments about which religious messages are honorable and which are prejudiced. Every law student learns that government has no authority to decide whose religious beliefs depart indecently from the norm.

Of course, discrimination against interracial and interfaith marriage is indecent. But who is any justice to tell us that discrimination against same-sex couples is different, not really a matter of prejudice but honorable when religiously inspired?

Recently, the Boston Red Sox released a pitcher who had posted homophobic tweets about gay people being bound for hell unless they repented. The fact that the player was sincere in his religious beliefs did not keep the Red Sox from seeing the harm that his speech caused. But the Supreme Court does not see, or care about, the harm its decision portends.

The hostility of a majority of justices to the 2015 Supreme Court case protecting same-sex marriage is so open that, until they can follow Justice Clarence Thomas’s call to overrule that decision, they are determined to strip same-sex couples of civil rights protections that other lawfully married couples enjoy.

For many years, the court stopped short of overruling Roe v. Wade, until it did in 2022. For many years, the court stopped short of declaring affirmative action unconstitutional, until it did this week. The same-sex marriage equality decision stands for now, but it should be added to the list of endangered precedents.

As Sotomayor rightly concludes, “It is a sad day in American Constitutional law” when the highest court in the land closes its term with a decision that affronts the basic dignity of us all, for “the promise of freedom is empty” if government “is powerless to assure that a dollar in the hands of [one person] will purchase the same thing as a dollar in the hands of a[nother].”

Laurence H. Tribe is the Carl M. Loeb University Professor Emeritus at Harvard University. Jeffrey B. Abramson is professor of government and law emeritus at University of Texas at Austin and a former Middlesex County assistant district attorney.

Let’s talk about SCOTUS, unity, and a talking point….

Pride Month ends tomorrow, but Floridians must stand up for love year-round

Marchers cheer during the Come Out With Pride Parade in downtown Orlando on Saturday, October 15, 2022. Thousands lined the streets for the yearly event supporting inclusion. (Stephen M. Dowell/Orlando Sentinel)

User Upload Caption:
Marchers cheer during the Come Out With Pride Parade in downtown Orlando on Saturday, October 15, 2022. Thousands lined the streets for the yearly event supporting inclusion. (Stephen M. Dowell/Orlando Sentinel) User Upload Caption:
 

Any comprehensive history of Pride Month starts with savagery and defiance — commemorating the first time the nation’s gay community openly mutinied against routine oppression and casual violence. The Stonewall Riots radiated from one small bar in Greenwich Village, which was, in the late 1960s, seen as one of the few tiny havens for LGBTQ+ Americans to live their lives with some degree of openness.

Even inside those confines, any kind of openly non-heterosexual behavior could put life and liberty at risk. That’s why gay-friendly establishments, including the Stonewall Inn, were owned or controlled by organized crime-syndicates. Yes, there was a time in American history when the Mafia did a better job of protecting individual rights than any governmental agency did.

Instead, governments across the nation served as oppressors, raiding gay-and-lesbian clubs or posing as potential sexual partners as a form of entrapment. For the most part, Florida was no different. But slowly, small bastions of liberty began to emerge. And they included Central Florida, where ex-military people were transitioning into the space program.

Pride’s beachhead in Florida

Orlando’s first gay nightclub, The Palace Club, opened the same year as the riots. When Disney’s Magic Kingdom opened its gates, the City Beautiful took on added allure as a safer — though still not safe — space for non-heterosexual Americans to love and live their lives. As documented by the LGBTQ History Museum of Central Florida, a group of entrepreneurs known as the Gay and Lesbian Gang quickly established a series of nightclubs that included the iconic Parliament House. Within a decade of the Stonewall riots, Orlando saw its first Pride Picnic at Turkey Lake Park.

It still took decades to unwind Florida’s layers of hateful, oppressive laws. Every step felt hard-won: Stonewall-era law enshrined total bans on any expression of alternate sexuality. Some of those laws were not invalidated until the early 2000s, when a rapid tumble of  landmark U.S. Supreme Court rulings battered sexual-identity and orientation laws until they crumbled. And the ugliness never fully went away. Within the past few decades, Florida has seen cruel debates on whether LGBTQ people could adopt children, or marry.

The hearts and minds of Floridians, however, shifted much more quickly. By the turn of the century, most Sunshine State residents expressed support for civil unions and adoption rights. People flew rainbow flags and showed up for Pride demonstrations without fear.

Every step seemed to move things a little closer to a day when sexual orientation and non-gender-conformity were simply accepted as defining traits. When fear and hate were reviled and forced into the shadows, where love was welcome in the full light of day.

Florida saw the reflections of the fear and anger of the Greenwich Village riots shift to cheerful acceptance of sexuality in The Villages —-  saw it as a change for the better. The surge of love and alliance after the massacre at Orlando’s Pulse nightclub helped heal hearts ripped apart by an openly acknowledged act of terrorism.

But as this Pride Month draws to a close, we must ask: How is it, in 2023, that we are sliding backward?

Back, to a day when providing gender-affirming care — or simply being transgender — could mean losing access to healthcare or even at risk of arrest and prosecution?

Back, to a time when Florida teachers are warned not to talk about sexuality with their students and innocent books that merely acknowledge the differences among families are outlawed?

Back, to a place where official government sources refer to gay people as “groomers” and suggest their mere existence puts children at risk of predatory behavior? Where the governor seems to obsessed by the mere existence of drag queens, and not in a healthy way?

This is nothing to be proud of.

So as Pride Month draws to a close, Floridians must make it clear: They are ready for this new fight to begin. They are ready to rebuke those who would force shame on people who yearned so long for the right to live in safety and with dignity.

They are ready to  stand up for the right to love and be loved without fear once again — and be proud to do so.

 

Supreme Court Rules For Hate Group On LGBTQ Rights

A public business that serves only some of the public, but refuses to serve all the public, sound familiar?   Did we not have this same fight in the 1960s?  Is gay the new black?  Just who gets to sit at the lunch counter?   Look, just replace the words same sex with Black or Jews and does it seem correct now.   We don’t serve blacks, we don’t serve Jews, I won’t make a cake or a website for blacks or Jews.  Imagine the outcry if a Christian was refused service due to someone not wanting to serve, make a cake, or build a website for Christians.  I am so tired of being second class.  Being gay and paying taxes without the rights that the upper class straight people have.    Dogs that love gravy I am so tired.   Hugs

The New Republic reports:

Representing the plaintiff—303 Creative, a small business run by a Colorado woman named Lorie Smith—is Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a group whose founder dubbed it a “Christian legal army,” with a long history of opposing civil rights protections for LGBTQ people. But unlike the Masterpiece Cakeshop case, which at least involved real customers wanting a real cake, there is no wedding website. No person has hired Smith to create a wedding website. In fact, Smith has never designed a wedding website.

As such, there is no client Smith has told she is rejecting due to her stated religious beliefs that marriage is only allowed between one man and one woman. In the absence of all that, ADF has, instead, fashioned Smith as the victim of an injury that has never occurred. The group has a $76 million annual budget and thousands of attorneys in its network. The goal with 303 Creative, as it was with Masterpiece, is to redefine civil rights protections for LGBTQ people as a form of religious discrimination against Christians.

Read the full article.

Yesterday it was reported that an ADF claim that Smith [photo above] was contacted by gay man seeking a same-sex wedding website is false and that the man in question is straight, was married to a woman at the time, and says that he made no such request.

Later yesterday, however, it was reported that the claim does not appear in the filings before the Supreme Court.

As I’ve said here many times, the ADF invents these businesses with the specific intention of challenging local pro-LGBT ordinances. My first 2016 report on the 303 Creative case is here. And below is today’s ruling.

 

Sexuality is innate and religion is a choice. Yet religion gets more civil rights.

 

Facts and beliefs/opinions sadly carry the same weight in this country. Their religion says sexuality can change. You just have to pray the gay away hard enough.

That’s what happens when the highest court is the land is stacked with Opus Dei types.

Coming soon, whites only businesses.

 

Legislating from the bench.

There was no “case or controversy” here. The plaintiff should have lacked standing.

With lies presented as facts.

Where is the right screaming about “Activist Judges!”

Celebrating their activist judges.

Legal eagles, I have a question: Would a decision necessarily have to be vacated if the facts of the case are found to be a fabrication? Can there be a ruling in favor of an injured party if there is no injury? Can a decision be made in favor of a party that has based their claim of injury upon that falsehood? Can a party that claims an injury based on a falsehood be guilty of perjury? Can the party that was claimed to have created the injury in the first place have standing to sue?

I would never call myself a “legal eagle” but no, that the court recited made up facts and circumstances makes zero difference. The literal only thing that matters is the holding and the vote. The last religion case Gorsuch wrote, Bremerton, was on completely fictitious facts and the dissent even posted a picture showing that.

Sotomayor did point out the standing issue here – to wit, the plaintiff alleged a facial challenge on a potential future harm. That’s a bit speculative for these things and against the trend of requiring ‘as applied’ challenges to laws – i.e harm in fact.

No theofascist business will be blocked, now, from discriminating against our community. If and when the theofascists are challenged in court, the lower courts will be bound by today’s Supreme Court ruling.

“Shrugs and middle fingers” are irrelevant

At what point? When the Court upholds religious laws that punish infidelity – at that point the Senators who are cheating on their wives will rise up to counteract the Court’s rulings.

Only some religions, of course. Not pro-Buddhist, or Jewish, or Sikh, or Islam, or anything Native America, or Wiccan, or Taoist, or Hindu, or…well, long list.

 

To expose the christofascism of this Supreme Court, we need, for example, a case involving a non-Christian baker who won’t do a wedding cake for a Christian couple because Christianity offends the baker’s religious beliefs.

I imagine Windsor and Obergefell are next up

And Lawrence

“Today, the Court, for the first time in its history, grants a business
open to the public a constitutional right to refuse to serve members of a
protected class.” – Sotomayor

I feel sorry for Sotomayor. She knows on the deepest of levels how legally and morally wrong all these decisions are, yet she is powerless to stop them.

Yep. Her, Kagan, and Jackson.

At least Breyer retired in time to not be replaced by a Christian fascist.

 

 

No One Is Talking About What Ron DeSantis Has Actually Done to Florida

https://time.com/6266618/ron-desantis-florida-governance-essay/

https://time.com/6266618/ron-desantis-florida-governance-essay/

Media coverage of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s all-but-announced candidacy for president is already in full frenzy, and so far the script is exactly as his handlers would like it to be. The governor regularly opens up new fronts in the culture wars, sowing alarm over critical race theory, transgender rights, or border policies. In response, liberal pundits fall into the trap of accentuating the very issues DeSantis has chosen to fire up his base.

Omitted from the public debate about DeSantis’s policies is almost any discussion of his actual record of governance—what exactly he has delivered to the citizens of his state, especially those without seven-figure incomes and lush investment portfolios.

 

Even a cursory dip into the statistics of social and economic well-being reveals that Florida falls short in almost any measure that matters to the lives of its citizens. More than four years into the DeSantis governorship, Florida continues to languish toward the bottom of state rankings assessing the quality of health careschool fundinglong-term elder care, and other areas key to a successful society.

Florida may be the place where “woke goes to die”—as DeSantis is fond of saying—but it is also where teachers’ salaries are among the lowest in the nation, unemployment benefits are stingier than in any other state, and wage theft flourishes with little interference from the DeSantis administration. In 2021, DeSantis campaigned against a successful ballot initiative to raise the state’s minimum wage, which had been stuck at $8.65 an hour. Under DeSantis’s watch, the Sunshine State has not exactly been a workers’ paradise.

Read More: Why “Woke” Is A Convenient Republican Dog Whistle

DeSantis weaponizes the cultural wars to distract attention from the core missions of his governorship, which is to starve programs geared toward bettering the lives of ordinary citizens so he can maintain low taxes on the wealthy and corporations. Florida is the ideal haven for privileged Americans who don’t want to pay their fair share of taxes. It has no income tax for individuals, and its corporate tax rate of 5.5% is among the lowest in the nation. An investigation by the Orlando Sentinel in late 2019 revealed the startling fact that 99% of Florida’s companies paid no corporate income tax, abetted by tax-avoidance schemes and state officials who gave a low priority to enforcing tax laws.

This is a pattern that shows up in the statistics of many Republican-led states, which on average commit fewer dollars per-capita to health carepublic education, and other crucial services compared to their blue counterparts, while making sure corporations and wealthy individuals are prioritized for tax relief. Arizona cut taxes every year between 1990 and 2019, following up with a shift to a flat tax this year that will cost its budget $1.9 billion. Meanwhile, its public-school spending ranks 48 among the 50 states.

In Florida, the state’s tax revenues come largely through sales and excise taxes, which fall hardest on the poor and middle class. A 2018 study by the left-leaning Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy found that Florida had the third least-equitable tax system of the 50 states. In the state’s “upside-down” tax structure, the poorest 20% of Florida families paid 12.7% of their income in taxes, while the families whose income was in the top 4% paid 4.5%, and the top 1% paid 2.3%, according to the study.

Florida taxpayers get less for their money than residents of many other states. The Commonwealth Fund, a private foundation that studies health-care systems globally, found in its 2022 “scorecard” that Florida had the 16th worst health care among the 50 states. It’s no wonder that Florida ranks below the northern blue states in life expectancy and rates of cancer deathdiabetesfatal overdosesteen birth rates, and infant mortality.

Largely because of DeSantis’s obstinacy, Florida is one of 10 states that have refused to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, an act of political spite that has cost those states billions in federal health care dollars and cost thousands of people their lives. More than 12% of Floridians are without medical insurance, a worse record than all but four other states. Despite having the country’s highest percentage of retirees, Florida has the worst long-term care among the 50 states, according to the American Association of Retired Persons.

Public schools fare no better than health care in DeSantis’s Florida. Not only did Florida rank 49th in the country for average teacher pay in 2020, but the Education Law Center, a non-profit advocacy group based in New Jersey, found in a 2021 report that the state had the seventh-lowest per-pupil funding in the country. Education Week, which ranks states public school annually, looking beyond mere test scores, placed Florida 23rd in its 2021 report, a lackluster showing for a large and wealthy state.

It says something about the state of our political discourse that Florida’s denuded public sector was not more of an issue in last year’s gubernatorial campaign. In endorsing DeSantis’s Democratic opponent, Charlie Crist, the Tampa Bay Times spent so many column inches on the incumbent’s demagoguery, vindictiveness, and authoritarian tendencies that it never even got to the minutiae of his governance. “No matter what you think about the state of the Florida economy or its schools or its future…,” the paper wrote, “the choice really is this simple: Do you want the state governed by a decent man or a bully?”

To be fair to the media, DeSantis and his allies manned the trenches of the culture wars so ferociously that it was all reporters could do to keep up with all the bomb throwing. How do you delve into the state’s tax policy when your governor is flying planeloads of migrants to Martha’s Vineyard or declaring war on Disney for issuing a statement in opposition to the state’s so-called “Don’t Say Gay Law”?

But that is very much the point of wedge issues, as they have been wielded by scurrilous politicians for decades, to anger and distract voters so they won’t notice the actions of public officials that mainly benefit the wealthy and are against the public interest.

As the 2024 election draws closer, DeSantis must not be allowed to accomplish nationally what he did in his state—cloak his service to the wealthy by frightening working people with stories about transgender recruiting and “socialist” college professors. There are unmistakable signs that Americans are focused on what an activist government can do for the public good, as evidenced by Floridians’ vote to increase the minimum wage.

The failure of DeSantis to better serve the most vulnerable citizens of his state is his weak underbelly in a national campaign.

More crazy and bigoted news that drives my depression

From the linked article in the above Joe.My.God. post.   Remember, this is a Yale history grad, claiming that is OK to honor Confederate Generals that fought the US government to keep slavery because “But at the end of the day, you know, we had people that have done great things for this country,” DeSantis said.”

Ron DeSantis doubles down on restoration of ‘iconic’ Fort Bragg name

Despite the limited scope of the DoD’s renaming, the Governor likened taking Bragg’s name off the fort to moves to “take Abraham Lincoln off the statue down in Boston … take Teddy Roosevelt down in New York City” and “remove George Washington’s name from schools in San Francisco.”

“And that’s not, I think, what I want to see. I mean, I think you can look back at anybody and you could find flaws. But at the end of the day, you know, we had people that have done great things for this country,” DeSantis said.

“I’m not in a position to say that somehow I’m so much better than any of this. It’s a different time. People make mistakes. There’s different parts of our society, we look back and can say was a mistake. But this idea that we’re going to erase history, I just think, is fundamentally wrong, and we’re not going to do that.”

Brian Curtis 2 days ago
“We shouldn’t erase history,” say Republicans who support expunging all record of Trump’s impeachments.

You Again? Brian Curtis2 days ago

And no teaching the histories of minority groups unless they reflect positively on white, christian men.

That would be too traumatic for them to bear!

Rebecca Gardner2 days ago

While we’re at it, let’s also create Fort Hirohito. Why not, he was the leader of a foreign nation that attacked the United States. Let’s run with this theme Governor Fucknutz.

carswell Hayseed2 days ago edited

Fort Rosa Parks. Black, female, uppity, liberal. The GQP will have a collective aneurysm.

mkbear682 days ago

“And here’s the thing, you know, you learn from history, you don’t erase the history” and yet history that makes students uncomfortable can’t be taught in schools…right

band💋 DmR2 days ago

That’s what happens when you’re clearly running for president of the Confederate States of America.

tbj5 Yves R. Mektin2 days ago

Trump’s an elderly sociopathic narcissist, he’s spent decades refining his charisma and reflexes to lie instantly, without hesitation and with complete believability.

Ronnie isn’t, even if he’s a sociopath himself, he’s just hungry for power and clout and tries constantly to copy Trump to try and steal his thunder and his followers. But he can never be as good a liar.

🔄arithrianos🔄2 days ago edited

Wow, he first says the name of the military base did not cause him to learn any history at all, then claims keeping the name is vital to learning the history he was totally ignorant about until they removed the name of the incompetent traitorous slaver, demonstrating he is lying through his teeth. He must have experts help him prove himself a liar like that, I don’t think he’s clever enough to figure it out himself.

TK2 days ago edited

I guess he means we learn only from white history, not the black history he is censoring in the schools. That’s erasing history, asshole!! This guy is such a lying fucking hypocrite.

Watters wanted and got the Tucker spot at fox. To get it he has to appeal to the most right wing demographics sought after by media, and to win them he has to be full open racist and the most ardent supporter of the right wing conspiracies along with pushing the idea of Christian nationalism. Hugs

Sarah2 days ago edited

So, if we make DC and Puerto Rico states, will Hawaii become “real America,” since it won’t be the most recent anymore?

Anyway, well, we know why he doesn’t think Obama is a “real American.”

vap Sarah2 days ago

No. Because in MAGA land only White, Christians are “real Americans”

John L vap2 days ago

Even then you have to be the Reich kind of “Christian”

Houndentenor Sarah2 days ago

No, he means that Obama is black and therefore not a real American because real Americans are white.

SkokieDaddy – wiener dog dad2 days ago

Now that he’s been given Tuckum’s time slot, he needs to up his hate-the-black-guy game to earn his bona fides.

Uncle Mark: HoHo-smoking homo Doug10518 hours ago

I’ll check Texas for the proper roasting temperature setting

clay 2 days ago
Between her sarcasm, mental health problems, and internalized anti-Semitism, how can I take her seriously enough to even criticize her?

Hayseed2 days ago

Who cares about the tapes or even the documents case? We need to focus on what is really important…

Thumbnail

Chris Baker Reality.Bitesa day ago edited

If man sees a kid playing in the street, then notice a car driving down the street, and he shrugs and says ‘free will’ and the car hits the kid, is that man a good person or a bad person?

Yet somehow Christians want to tell you that God is good, even though he allows bad things to happen. (And he could have just stopped it all by making Adam and Eve barren, or ending the world 4000 years ago.)

NotJoea day ago

Thumbnail

Gigia day ago

Thumbnail

RR Unbordered Americana day ago

Thumbnail

TWO MEN leaving a public restroom .
Man#1 approaches Man#2 and says:
“Excuse me sir but I noticed you didn’t wash your hands after using the urinal. I’m from Texas and in Texas we’re taught you should always wash your hands after using the restroom.”
Man#2 replies: “Well I’m from California and in California we’re taught you should’nt pee all over yourself.”

bambinoitalianoa day ago

This is Biden trying to take away our electricity! I’m going full blast until it brownout! Freedum!

Sarah bambinoitalianoa day ago

I’m going full blast until it brownout!

Happens to me after I eat bean soup.

Skeptical_Inquirer bambinoitalianoa day ago

I wish non-Dem Texans would learn to blame the GQP they vote in for the shitty state of their infrastructure but if the Ted Cruz fleeing for Cancun didn’t teach them shit . . .

Serene Pumpkin Skeptical_Inquirera day ago

The GQP has had 100% control of the state for what, 20 years? And still the fascists find ways to blame powerless Democrats

IamSmartypantsa day ago

This is really a non-issue because if the power goes out and people die, nobody can sue the power company because the Republican Texas Supreme Court just held that Republican-controlled ERCOT is immune from lawsuits. No liability = No Problem.

Secure 💪🏻 IamSmartypantsa day ago

This is nothing like the giant frozen front of 2021. We did all of this last summer. If anything, it would be rolling blackouts. We will be fine.

What, me worry?a day ago

Did they ever get around to upgrading their grid? I’m guessing it will go down and stay down for days before the 4th.

bambinoitaliano What, me worry?a day ago

No, they told everyone to kiss their grid when they rejected Beto.

Strang previously appeared here when he declared that people who oppose Trump are possessed by demons and that voting against Trump is a vote for the “apocalypse.” Also, holograms and Trump’s impeachments? Both the work of Satan. We last heard from him when he appeared in a “documentary” with Dr. Demon Semen.

Ščŏŧŧ Ċ – 🇺🇦 🕊3 days ago

What’s happening lines up with God’s Word regarding what would happen in the end times before Jesus returns.

But that’s what you want, isn’t it? Shouldn’t you be happy? I mean, your imaginary friend is going to show everyone he’s not imaginary after all. That’s a good thing, right?

Chris Baker mythictom3 days ago

There was a book, “The Late Great Planet Earth” that was popular among the end times folks. “The last days are nigh!” Published in 1970. 53 years ago. And even in the late 1800s, preachers were saying the end times were near.

They literally pray “Lord come quickly!” But then complain about all the “signs of the end times” as if that’s a bad thing. They should be working -toward- the ‘one world government” and a global currency and world peace and “the mark of the beast” because that’s what will bring the rapture. (Your eschatology may vary).

Harveyrabbit 🐱3 days ago

Expelled from caucus. AKA thrown back in the pen.

Thumbnail

This is basically the attempt by white supremacists to prevent the natural decline of white majority / supremacy in the US. They are terrified over the demographics that shows the steady decline of the white majority and the increase in non-white people. It terrifies them because they fear being treated as they have treated POC all during the history of the US. They want to remain the unchallenged authority they have always been. This denies everything we understand about culture and human development, not to mention what the US has always stood for. We are better / stronger / improved the more we blend and add to our prior society. Hey if you treat others that are different from you decently, they will do the same to you. If you act like an asshole toward them, they might do the same back. The thing to understand is be a decent nice person to others. Remember race is a social construct. We are all humans. We may look different but we really are the same species. Do dogs or cats of different colors be racist against each other, and should they, as they are all dogs or cats. Hugs

Todd20036 Rex3 days ago

DeSantis is worse than trump. He’s smarter, more ambitious, and actually wants to rule the country

Trump just wants the pomp and circumstances

Darreth TexasBoy3 days ago

Yes… and look which demographic he’s coddling. They’ll fall totally in line with him. Evangelicals always find the worst in humanity to align themselves with

NorthBayFella Dave B3 days ago

I don’t do 1930s/40s comparisons lightly or often, but DeSantis could certainly be someone to take us down a
similar road, just a 2020s version of it. He’s already taking actions in that vein — shipping human beings like cargo, book bannings, etc. I’m not suggesting it could be a literal Holocaust, but he will seriously and intentionally harm a lot of Americans (and more so, people wanting to become Americans) before he would be done. A lot of people would die.

Also, I’m not not saying he wouldn’t cause a literal Holocaust, either.

JackFknTwist a day ago edited
O/T : –
At the risk of having only one tune, I don’t think it can be said often enough that in their doctrinaire zealotry the conservative Justices of the Supreme Court have betrayed their underlying hypocrisy.
In their preening self-importance all they have exposed is their lack on any integrity, their enthusiasm to lie at any opportunity and their shallow semblance of probity.
What we have on the US Supreme Court is a few liars, charlatans and those willing to prostitute themselves at the alter of the Federalist Society on the one hand and to rich ‘grooming’ billionaires on the other.
Was there ever a Supreme Court so compromised?

The_Wretched JackFknTwista day ago

Yes, 1937 or so. Towards the end of the “gilded age”, the SCOTUS was as virulently anti-decency as Alito and Thomas are now. FDR, then president, make a threat to “pack” (unfvck) the court and the court suddenly changed its tune on what the law was. Then the plan to fix the court fell apart.

There’s some suggestion that a similar thing may have happened between last term and this one with regard to KNAW, Roberts and Raspberry Baret. They have not gone along with the same degree of YOLO-ALITO that marked last year / the Dobbs Term.

SkokieDaddy – wiener dog dada day ago

“I’m in capable of crafting legislation that respects the constitution. Vote for me for president” – Ron DeSantis

[Please clap]

NotMiguela day ago

They can’t win on real issues that matter to people so we’ll have lots of noise on wedge issues over the next year. Brown people invading, drag queen groomers and Susie has to call her teacher they/them at school.

rednekokiea day ago

DeSantis keeps trying to resurrect the infamous Jones commission – which attemped to erase homosexuality from all colleges and other schools throughout the state some 50 years ago, along with the actions of Senator Joseph McCarthy, who tried it nationally. The only result was the ruining of the reputations and hopes of over 200 students and faculty in Florida.
This is evil in its strongest form.

Nic Peterson Ed B21 hours ago

Most of this is Florida law, so US SCOTUS is largely irrelevant unless there is a conflict with Federal Law. The Florida SCOTUS is packed with bigots, in a large sense the fate of Florida rests in the hands of the appellate courts.

Nic Peterson Sam_Handwich21 hours ago

That’s gonna be the kicker. We already know the FLSC is packed with bigots. The appellate courts are either going to side with a dictator or with the republic that placed them in their robes.

Ninja0980 Sam_Handwicha day ago

The 11th Circuit (thanks to Patrick Leahy’s stupidity) and SCOTUS are controlled by bigots who will uphold this shit.

Ouch It Bit Mea day ago

I feel like this is part of the whole make shit up and get it to the current Supreme Court so they can declare god and church and money or whatever. Like the website bitch in Colorado and the made up gay client.

Uncle Mark: HoHo-smoking homoa day ago

Win or lose, Tater will screech about how he’s “fighting for families* and against woke culture & a woke & woke judges.” Others will be smart enough to point out his losses or how vaguely worded his laws are, but at the end of the day, DePudding will declare himself “the great fighter for American values*”

* values & families don’t include individuals, friends or family of the LGBTQ, nonChristians, nor nonWhite racial groups. Additional exclusions not listed or implied are applicable by the tiny dictator

GladysKravitza day ago

DeFascist can indeed get the country on a different path –
Here’s what Ron DeFascist has accomplished –
– LGBT students cannot discuss their personal lives with teachers or counselors, making them feel marginalized, alone, and possibly increasing their risks of suicide. Some parents with LGBT family members are moving out of the state. State ACLU currently suing to end this.
– Universities are unsure what they can or cannot teach based on the whims of literally one man. GOP prefer students to be inculcated with cheap cheerleading America First nationalism (this shut down by a judge, results pending)
– History teachers can’t teach about the truth of American racism and black history because it might upset white people
– Some teachers are seeking employment in another state.
– A school principal had to resign because one of her teachers showed students a picture of Michelangelo’s David.
– A teacher is under investigation because she showed 13 year olds a Disney movie with a gay character.
– Women who discover they’re pregnant after 6 weeks, and are unable to have a child, can’t get an abortion in Florida, even though there should be retroactive abortion, Don Jr. lives there
– Property taxes and insurance costs are becoming unaffdable
– Million dollar contracts are given to DeFascist’s donors
– 87,141 people died of Covid in Florida. Less would have died had there been the slightest of protective measures taken, but DeFascist didn’t allow that.
– Hispanic farm and construction workers are not going to work out of fear of DeFascist’s draconian rules to punish undocumented workers and their bosses. Hispanic truckers are refusing to deliver to the state. Farm products are rotting while remaining unpicked.
– Students and companies who support diversity and inclusion are no longer allowed to do so.
– Trans children can no longer get medical care, use bathroom of pronouns of their choice (this shut down by a judge, results pending)
– a court could temporarily remove children from their homes if they receive gender-affirming care
– LGBT people who seek medical care can be denied it if they’re unlucky enough to have a religious fanatic doctor.
– Drag queens can be arrested for appearing in drag in public where children can see them. (this shut down by a judge, results pending)
– Any idiot can buy a gun without a permit, training, or with or without a criminal record.
– Disney, the state’s largest employer, is suing DeFascist because of politically motivated harassment after he started a fight with them because they don’t approve of his anti-LGBT laws. Disney cancelled a $1 billion construction project that would have brought the state over 2,000 jobs.
– More to come. White retirees probably love him because he’s getting rid of the blacks, gays, immigrants and other assorted annoyances. DeSantis calls Florida “the freest state in America.” Actually you’re free to move here, retire and die.

BartmanLA2 days ago

Fantastic news! The world is evolving, but sadly the GQP and TFG will do everything in their power to stop equality in this country from becoming pernanent and legal. I’m sure TFG is probalby labelling Nepal as one of those shit hole countries he doesn’t like.

Gianni2 days ago

Apparently, our evangelical and assorted radical Christian groups, who hate us with the love of God, didn’t know where Nepal is or didn’t know such a country existed. I’ll bet they’re boning up on their geography now.

The San Diego Union-Tribune reports:
Two protesters offended by a Pride exhibit at the Rancho Peñasquitos Library have checked out nearly all the books in the display and vowed to keep them until the library eliminates what they call “inappropriate content” for children. The anti-gay protest is the latest example of a growing national backlash against Pride exhibits, which experts say has been fueled by debates over how schools should handle transgender minors.
The Rancho Peñasquitos protest ratchets up the usual backlash San Diego library branches experience when they create Pride exhibits or host events like drag queen story times, said head librarian Misty Jones. The protesters, Peñasquitos residents Amy Vance and Martha Martin, said libraries are open, public spaces for children that should be free of references to gender identity and how adults experience sexual attraction.
Read the full article. A local city council member is raising money to buy additional copies of the books.

Phil in Colorado2 days ago

I’m starting to think this is a matter for the police. They checked them out and stated that they have no intention of returning them unless the library does exactly what they want. Last I checked, that’s called theft.

MrRobotoLA Phil in Colorado2 days ago

They get 5 renewals, unless the items have holds on them. So I urge anyone and everyone in San Diego who is disgusted by their motives to place holds. MANY HOLDS. That way they will be required to return the items or be turned in to a collections agency. That will also likely block their library privileges to borrow any other materials. If it goes beyond that, it is indeed theft.

nocadrummer2 days ago

I had a home in a small town for nearly 30 years. It had a small library, maybe twice the size of the one in my high school. The “Christians” would come in and check out ALL the non-Christian religious books and never return them. It was their way of making sure people couldn’t learn about other religions. And this was before Trump and the MAGA folks.
If your religion of “Christianity” is SO GREAT, it should be able to prove itself against the others by its merits and ideals, not by making the beliefs of others unobtainable.

astroworf2 days ago

Damn these people. A book offered me permission not to hate myself for being who I am.

*** Editor note ***  It was books that gave me my escape from my life.  It was books that let me leave the life of abuse, hurt, and fear I was living constantly at home, in my home.  It was books that let me understand I was not a horrible abomination in life that was going to do horrible things and die in a gutter as my adoptive parents (the ones beating and sexually abusing me and letting their kids do so) claimed long before they even knew I was gay, that I did not need to suffer in silence, (Which I did for most of my life).   These books that these people are trying to ban and deny to the very kids that need them meant so much to me and other kids.  Please do not let them.  Look in the 1950s these people want to revert the social and country to there were no of these kinds of books, no positive representatives in media, but gay, lesbian, and trans kids still existed.  I am going to post a video about a old long time soap opera about gay people and the damage hate can do.   Hugs.


2 days ago

When you say “wife,” “husband,” “fiancé,” “girlfriend,” etc.–all commonly heard from heterosexuals–you are inserting sexuality in public spaces where children are or may be.

Darreth weshlovrcm2 days ago

Mere gender identification on a bathroom door is the actual issue here. These delusional evangelicals are literally incapable of connecting the dots on gender/sexual expression issues.

Houndentenor Flatlander – TXPoast3 days ago

I’m currently reading a book about the John Birch Society and everything they are doing now is the same shit the Birchers were doing in the 50s and 60s. Only back then MSM and even the GOP leadership weren’t on their side.

Hank: NO MORE WoW!!! 3 days ago
Once again, the GQP TAKES AWAY RIGHTS & POWER FROM THE CITIZENS!!!!

ChipSF weshlovrcm3 days ago

They don’t care about corporations either. They only want Republicans to hold the power over everything – people, corporations, city councils, school boards, etc.

Kyle Childress3 days ago

Republicans sure don’t like people voting, do they? They’ll overturn elections, make it harder for statewide resolutions to pass, throw out elected officials they don’t like, and now this. Democrats might wish to mention this on the campaign trail.

Melissia3 days ago

Kinda like how Texas has created special rules that only apply to specific counties that vote mostly Democratic that take away aspects of self-governance from them.

Fascists love centralizing power.

Legal As Of Today In Florida: Bathroom Bill, K-8 “Don’t Say Gay,” Refusal Of LGBTQ Patients, Concealed Carry

A recap of what’s legal as of today in DeSantis’s Florida:

In public facilities, including prisons and schools, a new requirement will go into place requiring designated bathrooms for men and women, and individuals will be required to utilize facilities based on their gender as assigned at birth. It has no exceptions even for those who have fully transitioned through gender-reassignment surgery.

The Board of Education has already effectively expanded through high school a prohibition of instruction about sexual orientation or gender identity. A new law (SB 1069) codifies that at least through 8th grade. The legislation also prohibits any requirement that school officials use preferred pronouns that don’t match gender assigned at birth.

Health care providers can now turn patients away and refuse treatment based on “conscience-based objections.” DeSantis signed the new law (SB 1580) in front of a “Prescribe Freedom” sign and said it empowers physicians to act within their own morals. LGBTQ advocates label it a right to discriminate bill against gay and transgender Floridians, and the latter group has already seen restrictions on health care put into place this year by statute and the Board of Medicine.

Also going into effect today is the right to carry a concealed weapon without any permit or training, the right of hospitals to refuse care to undocumented patients, and a law allowing the state to use radioactive fertilizer byproducts in the creation of roads. That last one came about due to lobbying by the phosphate industry, which in 2021 saw a leakage of their toxic byproducts into Tampa Bay.

 

Florida bill allowing radioactive roads made of potentially cancer-causing mining waste signed by DeSantis

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/florida-radioactive-roads-phosphogypsum-potentially-cancer-causing-mining-waste-bill-signed-ron-desantis/

Florida governor and presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis signed a bill Thursday that would allow for roads across Florida to be made with “radioactive” mining waste that has been linked to cancer. 

The measure, brought forward by the state House, adds phosphogypsum to a list of “recyclable materials” that state officials say can be used in road construction. 

The list already included ground rubber from car tires, ash residue from coal combustion byproducts, recycled mixed-plastic, glass and construction steel, which officials had previously determined are “part of the solid waste stream and that contribute to problems of declining space in landfills.” 

Piney Point Wastewater Reservoir
An aerial view of the partially drained New Gypsum Stack South wastewater reservoir at Piney Point in Palmetto, Florida, on May 4, 2021. The reservoir held about 480 million gallons of water in March and was in danger of collapsing and flooding the area. THOMAS O’NEILL/NURPHOTO VIA GETTY IMAGES

But unlike most of those products, phosphogypsum is not a material that is aggregated in landfills. It’s the remains left behind from mining phosphate, which is described by the EPA as being a “radioactive material” because it contains “small amounts” of uranium and radium. 

Phosphate rock is mined to create fertilizer, but the leftover material, known as phosphogypsum, had decaying remains of those elements that eventually produce radon. That substance is known as a “potentially cancer-causing, radioactive gas,” a spokesperson for the EPA previously told CBS News. And because of that risk, phosphogypsum is federally required to be stored in gypstack systems – not landfills – in an attempt to prevent it from coming in contact with people and the environment. 

“The Clean Air Act regulations require that phosphogypsum be managed in engineered stacks to limit public exposure from emissions of radon and other radionuclides in the material,” an EPA spokesperson previously told CBS News. 

Before it can be used, the state’s Department of Transportation will need to conduct a study to “evaluate the suitability” of its use, the bill says, and “may consider any prior or ongoing studies of phosphogypsum’s road suitability in the fulfillment of this duty.” That task must be completed by April 1, 2024. 

DeSantis has not yet publicly commented on the signing of this bill, and CBS News has reached out for a statement.

Elise Bennett, Florida and Caribbean director and attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, said in a statement that the bill is a “reckless handout to the fertilizer industry.” 

“Gov. DeSantis is paving the way to a toxic legacy generations of Floridians will have to grapple with,” Bennett said. “This opens the door for dangerous radioactive waste to be dumped in roadways across the state, under the guise of a so-called feasibility study that won’t address serious health and safety concerns.” 

What makes phosphogypsum so risky?

Radon, the gas emitted from phosphogypsum, trails just smoking to rank as the second-leading cause of lung cancer, and is linked to about 21,000 lung cancer deaths every year in the U.S., according to the EPA. The agency also says it’s the “single greatest environmental source of radiation exposure.”  

Because of this threat, the EPA has banned the use of phosphogypsum in projects for decades. However, a spokesperson for the agency previously told CBS News that it is permitted for agricultural and indoor research, with restrictions, and it can be approved for specific uses if the project “is at least as protective of human health as placement in a stack.” 

In a statement to CBS News on Friday, the EPA said that the passing of the legislation, HB 1191, “does not affect EPA’s regulation of phosphogypsum,” noting the legislation specifies that the phosphogypsum be used “in accordance with the conditions” of the agency. 

“Any request for a specific use of phosphogypsum in roads will need to be submitted to EPA,” the spokesperson said, “as EPA’s approval is legally required before the material can be used in road construction.”

If it is approved, the EPA previously told CBS News it would “open a public comment period, make any applications and our technical analysis of those applications publicly available, and seek input on the proposed decision.”

Florida’s history of phosphogypsum problems

Phosphate mining has been an ongoing source of contention within Florida for decades. This issue has most recently been seen in the controversy surrounding Piney Point, a former phosphate mining facility in the Gulf Coast’s Manatee County — that after several years of problems — had a nearly “catastrophic” breach in 2021 that resulted in 215 million gallons of water with environmentally toxic levels of nutrients ending up in Tampa Bay within just 10 days.

 

It was found to be a contributor to a red tide event and massive fish kill in the area in the following months. It lead to a lawsuit from the state’s Department of Environmental Protection, and prompted Florida lawmakers to budget $3 million to clean up the site.

Ragan Whitlock, a staff attorney for the Center for Biological Diversity, told CBS News when the bill was introduced that “history has shown wherever this waste goes, environmental contamination has followed.” 

The state has 25 gypstacks, several of which have had leaks, sinkholes and other issues arise throughout their lifespans. In May, more than 20 organizations, including the Center for Biological Diversity, urged DeSantis to veto the bill

“No environmentally conscious or ‘green’ governor worth his salt would ever sign a bill into law approving roadbuilding with radioactive materials,” Rachael Curran, an attorney with People for Protecting Peace River, said in the letter urging the governor’s decision. 

And even with the promise of the state’s Department of Transportation looking at conducting a study or considering one that has already been done, Whitlock told CBS News he has “very little confidence” in the state’s “ability to manage this project.” 

“The feasibility study that the Florida Department of Transportation would create is only aimed at addressing whether this would be a suitable construction material,” he said. “The Florida Department of Transportation is not in the position to make a finding about the health and safety of this product to Floridians and our environment.”

 

For more information on the damage to the Florida environment and the harm to residents, read the following.   Sure will help get tourist dollars, won’t it.    Hugs.

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/local/manatee/2021/04/06/piney-point-retention-pond-what-you-need-know-tuesday-florida-wastewater-leak/7103334002/

Piney Point: What you need to know on Tuesday, April 6 about evacuations, Florida wastewater leak

https://www.heraldtribune.com/videos/news/2023/06/28/manatee-county-mosquito-control/12178802002/

<iframe title=”HERALDTRIBUNE-Embed Player” width=”540″ height=”350″ frameborder=”0″ scrolling=”no” allowfullscreen=”true” marginheight=”0″ marginwidth=”0″ src=”https://uw-media.heraldtribune.com/embed/video/12178802002?placement=snow-embed”></iframe&gt;

  • More than 300 hundred homes and multiple businesses in the area around Piney Point have been evacuated.
  • A state of emergency has been declared by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for Manatee, Hillsborough and Pinellas counties.
  • State and local officials are coordinating efforts.

Herald-Tribune journalists are covering the situation in Piney Point and possible impacts to the area, like we have for over 20 years. Local journalism like this is supported by our readers. If you’re a subscriber we thank you. And if you’d like to subscribe, please see our current offers here.

***

Last week, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection approved the pumping of wastewater into the Tampa Bay ecosystem from a retention pond at Piney Point – a former phosphate plant in Manatee County. A leak in the liner of the reservoir has caused a partial breach in one of the containment walls and officials hope that pumping more than 30 million gallons of wastewater out of the reservoir will relieve pressure on the walls and reduce the chance of an uncontrolled major breach.

More than 300 hundred homes and multiple businesses in the area around Piney Point have been evacuated. State and local officials are coordinating efforts and a state of emergency has been declared by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for Manatee, Hillsborough and Pinellas counties.

  
The shoreline along Tampa Bay, just north of Port Manatee and Piney Point.  Millions of gallons of wastewater are being pumped into Tampa Bay at Port Manatee in an effort to avoid a catastrophic failure of a containment wall at Piney Point.
 
 
 
 Share
The shoreline along Tampa Bay, just north of Port Manatee and Piney Point. Millions of gallons of wastewater are being pumped into Tampa Bay at Port Manatee in an effort to avoid a catastrophic failure of a containment wall at Piney Point.
MIKE LANG, SARASOTA HERALD-TRIBUNE
This still image from video shows the breach in the containment wall of the Piney Point reservoir. United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
 
 
 
 Share
This still image from video shows the breach in the containment wall of the Piney Point reservoir. United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
MIKE LANG, SARASOTA HERALD-TRIBUNE
 
Wastewater from Piney Point is flowing into Tampa Bay at this berth at Port Manatee. United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
 
 
 
 Share
Wastewater from Piney Point is flowing into Tampa Bay at this berth at Port Manatee. United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
MIKE LANG, SARASOTA HERALD-TRIBUNE
United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
 
 
 
 Share
United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
MIKE LANG, SARASOTA HERALD-TRIBUNE
Wastewater being pumped from the Piney Point reservoir flows into Tampa Bay at Port Manatee, via this water-filled ditch in the center of this image. United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
 
 
 
 Share
Wastewater being pumped from the Piney Point reservoir flows into Tampa Bay at Port Manatee, via this water-filled ditch in the center of this image. United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
MIKE LANG, SARASOTA HERALD-TRIBUNE
 
Wastewater from Piney Point is flowing into Tampa Bay at this berth at Port Manatee.  United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
 
 
 
 Share
Wastewater from Piney Point is flowing into Tampa Bay at this berth at Port Manatee. United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
MIKE LANG, SARASOTA HERALD-TRIBUNE
Wastewater being pumped from the Piney Point reservoir flows into this ditch and into Tampa Bay. United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
 
 
 
 Share
Wastewater being pumped from the Piney Point reservoir flows into this ditch and into Tampa Bay. United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
MIKE LANG, SARASOTA HERALD-TRIBUNE
Wastewater being pumped from the Piney Point reservoir flows into this ditch and into Tampa Bay. United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
 
 
 
 Share
Wastewater being pumped from the Piney Point reservoir flows into this ditch and into Tampa Bay. United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
MIKE LANG, SARASOTA HERALD-TRIBUNE
 
The wastewater containment ponds at the old Piney Point fertilizer plant property in Manatee County. A breach in a containment pond wall led to more than 200 million gallons of polluted water being dumped into Tampa Bay. Florida lawmakers have included $100 million in the 2021-2022 budget for the Piney Point cleanup effort, among other budget earmarks targeted at projects in Sarasota or Manatee counties.
 
 
 
 Share
The wastewater containment ponds at the old Piney Point fertilizer plant property in Manatee County. A breach in a containment pond wall led to more than 200 million gallons of polluted water being dumped into Tampa Bay. Florida lawmakers have included $100 million in the 2021-2022 budget for the Piney Point cleanup effort, among other budget earmarks targeted at projects in Sarasota or Manatee counties.
MIKE LANG/HERALD-TRIBUNE FILE
Congressman Vern Buchanan got an aerial tour of the Piney Point reservoir breach, pumping outflow and Tampa Bay on Monday, Apr. 5th
 
 
 
 Share
Congressman Vern Buchanan got an aerial tour of the Piney Point reservoir breach, pumping outflow and Tampa Bay on Monday, Apr. 5th
MIKE LANG
 

What is the situation at Piney Point on Tuesday?

The strategy of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and other agencies working on Piney Point is to reduce the amount water so that there is less pressure on the damaged reservoir retaining walls, in order to prevent a catastrophic breach that could send a massive wall of water into the surrounding area.

After pumping more than 30 million gallons of wastewater each day from Piney Point into Tampa Bay, the amount of water in the Piney Point retention pond has dropped to under 300 million gallons, down from approximately 480 million gallons last week at this time.

The addition of new federal and state resources should increase the rate at which water can be pumped out of Piney Point.

April 6 updates:U.S. 41 reopens; mandatory evacuation order remains in place

Is the wastewater radioactive?:Your questions about the leak answered

Wastewater being pumped from the Piney Point reservoir flows into this ditch and into Tampa Bay. United States Congressman Vern Buchanan toured Piney Point Monday, Apr. 5, 2021, getting a look at the breach in the containment wall, the pumping outflow and Port Manatee where the wastewater is being pumped into Tampa Bay.
 

Is there a second breach in the Piney Point retention pond?

While the leaking wastewater containment pond wall at the old Piney Point fertilizer plant site continues to be a critical situation, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection said Monday that concerns about a possible second breach in the wall have proven to be unfounded.

Manatee County officials said that a drone equipped with thermal imaging equipment identified a possible second breach in the wall at 2 a.m. Monday. An investigation later determined that the area identified was not another wall failure, according to the DEP.

“Our technical team and our engineers came in and evaluated and determined there was no second breach,” said DEP Spokeswoman Shannon Herbon.

DEP official says no second breach in Piney Point retention pond wall

The shoreline along Tampa Bay, just north of Port Manatee and Piney Point.  Millions of gallons of wastewater are being pumped into Tampa Bay at Port Manatee in an effort to avoid a catastrophic failure of a containment wall at Piney Point.
 

What are the environmental impacts of pumping Piney Point wastewater into Tampa Bay?

Environmental groups say they worry that recent releases from a Piney Point wastewater treatment facility will eventually fuel an algae bloom that could impact coastal Southwest Florida. 

Nutrient-rich waters from the treatment facility will offset natural balances in the coastal estuaries and will eventually end up in the Gulf of Mexico, where red tide initiates. 

The region was partially crippled during a 17-month red tide bloom that started in the fall of 2017 and lasted until the spring of 2019.

Piney Point waters may fuel harmful algae bloom along Southwest Florida coast

Gov. DeSantis updated the Piney Point situation (April 4, 2021) during a Sunday morning press conference held at Manatee County's Public Safety Department in Bradenton.
 

What will happen to Piney Point once this crisis is over?

State lawmakers are pushing a bill to fund a complete cleanup and closure of the phosphogypsum stacks at Piney Point with American Rescue Plan funds, an effort that could cost upwards of $200 million.

On Monday evening, Senate President Wilton Simpson (R-Trilby) announced that the Senate will consider a budget amendment on Wednesday when it considers Senate Bill 2500, known as the General Appropriations Act.

Florida Senate seeks to use federal COVID relief money to clean up Piney Point site

"It's leaked before and they didn't fix it -- please don't put another band-aid on this" -- local resident Bill Schafer. BILLY COX| HERALD-TRIBUNE
 

What about evacuations for people living near Piney Point?

More than 300 households and numerous businesses have been evacuated and those evacuation orders are still active.

On Monday, Manatee County Public Safety  reported that the county has had to help relocate more people among the more than 300 households that were covered by the mandatory evacuation around the Piney Point wastewater reservoir. 102 residents have now been provided shelter at local hotels with the assistance of Manatee County and the Red Cross.

DeFascist can indeed get the country on a different path –

GladysKravitza day ago

DeFascist can indeed get the country on a different path –
Here’s what Ron DeFascist has accomplished –


– LGBT students cannot discuss their personal lives with teachers or counselors, making them feel marginalized, alone, and possibly increasing their risks of suicide. Some parents with LGBT family members are moving out of the state. State ACLU currently suing to end this.


– Universities are unsure what they can or cannot teach based on the whims of literally one man. GOP prefer students to be inculcated with cheap cheerleading America First nationalism (this shut down by a judge, results pending)


– History teachers can’t teach about the truth of American racism and black history because it might upset white people


– Some teachers are seeking employment in another state.


– A school principal had to resign because one of her teachers showed students a picture of Michelangelo’s David.


– A teacher is under investigation because she showed 13 year olds a Disney movie with a gay character.


– Women who discover they’re pregnant after 6 weeks, and are unable to have a child, can’t get an abortion in Florida, even though there should be retroactive abortion, Don Jr. lives there


– Property taxes and insurance costs are becoming unaffdable


– Million dollar contracts are given to DeFascist’s donors


– 87,141 people died of Covid in Florida. Less would have died had there been the slightest of protective measures taken, but DeFascist didn’t allow that.


– Hispanic farm and construction workers are not going to work out of fear of DeFascist’s draconian rules to punish undocumented workers and their bosses. Hispanic truckers are refusing to deliver to the state. Farm products are rotting while remaining unpicked.


– Students and companies who support diversity and inclusion are no longer allowed to do so.


– Trans children can no longer get medical care, use bathroom of pronouns of their choice (this shut down by a judge, results pending)


– a court could temporarily remove children from their homes if they receive gender-affirming care


– LGBT people who seek medical care can be denied it if they’re unlucky enough to have a religious fanatic doctor.


– Drag queens can be arrested for appearing in drag in public where children can see them. (this shut down by a judge, results pending)


– Any idiot can buy a gun without a permit, training, or with or without a criminal record.


– Disney, the state’s largest employer, is suing DeFascist because of politically motivated harassment after he started a fight with them because they don’t approve of his anti-LGBT laws. Disney cancelled a $1 billion construction project that would have brought the state over 2,000 jobs.


– More to come. White retirees probably love him because he’s getting rid of the blacks, gays, immigrants and other assorted annoyances. DeSantis calls Florida “the freest state in America.” Actually you’re free to move here, retire and die.