Israel strikes ambulance near Gaza hospital, 15 reported killed

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/health-ministry-gaza-says-israel-targeted-convoy-ambulances-leaving-al-shifa-2023-11-03/

Medical vehicle. More dead people. Is that allowed in war. NO! but Israel is doing it and getting away with it. All they have to say to excuse what they do is Hamas. Say it to all the kids killed, all the women bombed, over 10,000 Palestinians civilians killed, a third of them children. But Hamas, it is OK Hamas attacked us and killed about 1,400 people. Maybe 40 were children. But Hamas … but never show proof it was Hamas where they targeted. Just leave the area Israel says as they bomb the only ways out. This is the deliberate killing of a people to drive them out of a land and to somewhere else, and that is terrorism in the highest level. Hugs. Scottie

November 3, 20238:01 PM EDTUpdated 14 hours ago

GAZA, Nov 3 (Reuters) – An Israeli air strike on an ambulance being used to evacuate the wounded from besieged northern Gaza killed 15 people and injured 60 others on Friday, the Hamas-controlled enclave’s health ministry said.

Israel’s military said it had identified and hit an ambulance “being used by a Hamas terrorist cell”. It said Hamas fighters were killed in the strike, and accused the group of transferring militants and weapons in ambulances.

Hamas official Izzat El Reshiq said allegations its fighters were present were “baseless”. Ashraf al-Qidra, spokesperson for Gaza’s health ministry, said the ambulance was part of a convoy that Israel targeted near Gaza City’s al-Shifa Hospital.

Qidra said Israel had targeted the convoy of ambulances in more than one location, including at al-Shifa Hospital gate and at Ansar Square a kilometer (0.6 miles) away.

In a statement on the incident, Israel’s military gave no evidence to support its assertion that the ambulance was linked to Hamas but said it intended to release additional information.

“We emphasize that this area is a battle zone. Civilians in the area are repeatedly called upon to evacuate southwards for their own safety,” the military said.

Reuters was unable to independently verify either side’s account.

Video shared on social media, which Reuters has verified, showed people lying in blood next to an ambulance with flashing lights on a city street as people rushed to help.

Another video showed three ambulances standing in a line, with about a dozen people lying either motionless or barely moving next to them. Blood was pooled nearby.

World Health Organisation Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a social media post he was “utterly shocked by reports of attacks on ambulances evacuating patients”, adding that patients, health workers and medical facilities must be protected.

Earlier on Friday, Qidra said ambulances would send critically injured Palestinians who urgently need to be taken to Egypt to be treated from besieged Gaza City to the south of the enclave.

Israel, which has accused Hamas of concealing command centres and tunnel entrances in al-Shifa hospital, ordered all civilians to leave the north of Gaza last month and its military encircled the area on Thursday.

Despite its order for civilians to leave northern areas of Gaza, Israel’s military has continued to bombard the south of the strip as well.

Hamas and al-Shifa hospital authorities have denied the facility is used as a base by militant fighters.

Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi; Writing by Angus McDowall; Editing by Alison Williams, Alistair Bell and by Sandra Maler

Bassem Youssef vs Piers Morgan ROUND 2 (incredible conversation)

Great history lesson on how Israel was created and the people already in Palestine. The person being interviewed, Bassem Youssef, goes back to 1914. Lance gives more information towards the 42 minute mark. This is a great listen if you want to know about this conflict. Hugs. Scottie

While most (myself included) thought this would be another satire filled embarrassment for Piers Morgan, Bassem Youssef uses the platform to educate the world on Palestine.

Got home at 7 am

Tried to write this three times from the ER. My old tablet simply wouldn’t let me log in to my blog. My phone would, but each time I finished typing I would try to set the categories and lost it all three times. So my morning.

I did not get much sleep but that is OK, I did not expect to the day after steroid shots. I woke at 3 am, rolled over to see Ron was laying there awake. I moved to snuggle, and he said he was in trouble. I asked him what was going on, thinking his leg he twisted several weeks ago was acting up from the four hours or more of going shopping at only three stores yesterday morning. Spent over 400 dollars on groceries, but we hit good sales on large packages of meats that Ron could split up and wrap, then put in the large freezer. We will have thick pork chops, pork strips, steaks, ham steaks, different kinds of chicken, ribs, hamburg, and a lot of other meat I can not remember. But Ron couldn’t walk by the time we headed home and I had to help in the house while I carried the bags in with my damaged shoulders I just Thursday had steroid shots in, my back, and my legs. But I had made sure the bags were light enough, except the freezer insulated bags Ron shoved all the meats packages in. Those were single two handed carrying while walking slowly. Couldn’t use my cane with both hands full.

But that was not his main problem. A couple of years before Ron retired and while we had dental insurance Ron’s dentist retired. I was having a lot of dental work done with the idea of having it finished before he retired. But he had to retire a year early. But Ron refused to see my dentist or get another. Recently he broke a tooth and still wouldn’t see a dentist. On and off it has been bothering him, he doesn’t eat hard food much, and used a lot of tooth pain stuff.

This morning at 3 am he told me he couldn’t swallow and his mouth, gums, and teeth were really hurting bad. He was sure he had an infected mouth. First he said he wanted to go to convenient care. We got up, I started the coffee and fed the outside cats, Tupac came in for the morning. Ron called the closest ER, which was the Cape Coral hospital, and asked if convenient care was open and would handle his need. They told him no, he would have to come to the ER. So at 4 am we pulled into the ER parking lot. We were the only people in the waiting room, and Ron got triaged right away. After about 30 minutes, Ron and I were taken to an exam room. After the nurse checked him in for both his infected mouth and his twisted leg we had a short wait until the doctor came in. He looked at Ron’s mouth saying it was very inflamed and infected, and then looked at Ron’s leg. He said he did not think Ron had anything broken but the leg was swollen. He ordered X-rays, and a prescription for antibiotics such as penicillin. We waited for the portable X-ray person. Soon she arrived and took the X-ray, so then we waited for the doctor to read it and come back. The doctor said it was not broken but as he suspected there was soft tissue damage. He recommended a dentist and an orthopedic doctor check. He left and we waited for the nurse. She came in with pills for Ron and his discharge orders, along with a couple pages of dentist places for low income people along with regular dentist offices and the same with orthopedic doctors. We left with Ron hobbling out using one of my canes. We arrived home at 7 am.

I helped Ron into bed, made a new pot of coffee and sat to type this. Ron’s stubborn refusal to do what is needed is seriously affecting our money situation. I have tried to address that with him, but as he has aged he has gotten more anxieties and more reluctant to take care of things that need doing. Especially about his healthcare. But now I am going to get something to eat. Hugs. Scottie

Stop Trying to Hide S-E-X From Students in School – They Already Know All About It From the Internet

Stop Trying to Hide S-E-X From Students in School – They Already Know All About It From the Internet

A wonderful post. I got the link from https://poodyheads.wordpress.com/2023/11/02/stop-trying-to-hide-s-e-x-from-students-in-school-they-already-know-all-about-it-from-the-internet/ and adult who thinks kids own bodies are not driving their innocent angels to pleasure are beyond stupid. Most of them deny their own preteen / teen years. Heck, can any of us at any number claim to know that we did not know that rubbing and touching ourselves felt good. I remember as a 14 yr old seeing a classmate rub his junk on a counter and I wondered if he knew he was doing it. He knew it felt good, or he wouldn’t have been doing it. But yes kids often younger than age 8 know it feels good to touch themselves. Why do you think adults get so upset and punish toddlers for doing that in public, because the youngest kids know it feels good, and the adults want them to feel shame over it and do it sneakily in private.

Of course as the post hints to abused kids like me knew all those things. I can not remember the first times I was abused sexually I was so young. But I knew about touch, how to touch, what happened at the end that made the abuser happy when the white stuff came out. You know what I did not know? That I could have gotten help! That it could have stopped! The reason I did not know that is because the right to my body was not taught in my schools back in the late 1960s. The idea of consent or where to go if an adult uses you was not taught. No kid knows about that so lets not burden with it, was the idea. Think of the abused kids lives could be saved and changed if the fundamentalist Christians would move aside and let schools educate kids. Then I remember, a lot of the Christian churches have huge sexual abuse of children scandals. Then I remember that every attempt to raise the age young girls can be forced into a legal marriage, which in many red / religious states is 12, and the Christian religious leaders come out strongly to defeat those bills / laws. I wonder why? Would they be just as happy with a 12-year-old boy being required to marry an adult man? Anyway here is the post and it is a great one. Hugs. Scottie

“Mr. Singer, do you know what foot finder is?”

“No,” I said to the 5th grade girl in the class where I was substitute teaching.

Her friends and her giggled through an explanation of the Website where people post pictures of their feet for sexual gratification.

***

Several days later, I tried to play a video on ancient Rome for my students, but before it even began the 8th grade class burst into laughter over the station identification.

The video was produced by the British Broadcasting Company. The BBC.

I looked at them in confusion until I heard some of them muttering about “Big Black Cock” – a class of porn video many of them had seen online identified with the same abbreviation.

***

Yesterday I overheard some of the girls in my 7th grade homeroom talking. One girl was saying how she really liked a certain boy but wasn’t sure if she was ready.

I smiled thinking about my first kiss. Then I heard her ask a friend, “Can you get pregnant from swallowing it?”

This is middle school, people.

Most of the kids here already know about sex. They know way more than I did at their age. But what they know is a jumble of images and details without the big picture.

And here come Republicans with a bunch of copycat laws to make sure public schools do nothing to dispel children’s ignorance.

In my home state of Pennsylvania, GOP lawmakers are taking action once again to hide any mention of S-E-X in schools throughout the Commonwealth.

They’re sending Senate Bill 7 to Harrisburg, another piece of legislation pumped out by the American Legislation Exchange Council (ALEC) following in the fundamentalist footsteps of fascist Florida.

The latest bit of dark ages lawmaking would require parent authorization before schools from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia could provide students with materials that contain anything that might be considered sexually explicit.

For kids in kindergarten through 8th grade, this even includes books with depictions of any kind of nudity.

God forbid they saw a wee wee or a va-jay-jay!

Fun fact: did you know that most public school students have genitals?

It’s true.

Many boys have access to a penis anytime they want – in their underwear.

Many girls have access to even naughtier bits.

And don’t even get me started on nipples! Under their shirts, the Devil’s raisins!

Thankfully the GOP legislation only prohibits depictions of these things in books. Kids are still allowed to look at their own bodies.

For now.

The bill passed the Senate in a 29-21 vote nearly along party lines, with only one Democrat supporting the proposal. It faces an uncertain future in the House where Democrats hold a one seat majority and would also require the signature of Democratic Governor Josh Shapiro before becoming law.

A similar measure was passed before Democrats took the House last year but was vetoed by the previous Democratic Governor Tom Wolf.

If the new bill became law, districts would need to go through all books in their libraries and classrooms and list any that contain potentially sexual material. These would be books used in classroom instruction or available in the library that would then require parents to sign an opt-in form to grant permission for their children to access the books.

The bill defines sexually explicit as showing “acts of masturbation, sexual intercourse, sexual bestiality or physical contact with a person’s clothed or unclothed genitals, pubic area, buttocks, or, if the person is a female, breast.”

It is beyond ridiculous.

Not only is it closing the stable door after the horse has bolted, but it’s a transparent attempt to quash any discussion of LGBTQ issues.

What better way to discourage certain lifestyles than to legislate them out of existence?

Schools can provide a safe place to discuss issues kids may be uncomfortable talking about with other adults. Books provide a safe way to mentally grapple with concepts and ideas of the adult world.

For example, in my 7th grade classes, we read “Silent to the Bone” by E.L. Konigsburg. The book is about a middle school age boy who has gone mute after a questionable interaction with an adult.

There’s nothing very graphic in the text, but among other issues it does discuss physical attraction, sexual coercion and an erection.

The book was approved by the school board and has helped foster many productive – if uncomfortable – conversations that help kids put their thoughts on these matters into words.

In my daughter’s school, in 9th grade she read “Speak” by Laurie Halse Anderson. The book is about a high school girl dealing with being raped and the stigma of trying to talk about it.

The text does a marvelous job of getting into the point of view of the girl and the trauma she endures while still being humorous, touching and empowering.

Narratives like these are absolutely vital. They allow kids to relate to issues many of them have not directly experienced (but some have) and find a common language to discuss it. When we censor sex and sexuality and paint all of it as something dirty that can’t be talked about seriously, we do our children a major disservice.

Conservatives complain that talking about these things grooms kids for greater sexual activity, but that’s nonsense. Kids grow into adults many of whom become sexually active. That’s positive and healthy. Meeting that in the safe places of the classroom and books helps kids prepare for adulthood without becoming victimized.

But nothing grooms a victim more than the prohibition against talking about trauma.

Finally, let’s consider the amount of ridiculous extra work this bill demands of schools and teachers. You really expect every educator with a classroom library to go through every book in it looking for anything that someone might consider sexually explicit!? Some people might think a book about a kid with two daddies is sexually explicit. You want teachers to become your perverted morality police!? Please!

I dearly hope this bill has little chance of passing.

It’s just another example of the Republican culture war against reality.

It’s a way of insinuating that public schools are doing things they aren’t.

No school is indoctrinating kids to be sexually active. But kids are coming into contact with sexually explicit material – usually on the Internet – and they have few tools to deal with it.

Taking away public schools’ power to combat this ignorance is the worst way we could respond.

The Birthing Persons SAGA will never end (Ana Kasparian on PBD podcast)

This is again another video on Anna’s hard right turn on trans people, which I guess is only to get her a better gig else where. She keeps going on that she objects to doctors forms or offices calling pregnant trans males birthing persons. But Anna has fervently claimed she doesn’t want kids and won’t have them. So the term doesn’t apply to her at all. She tries to claim the term is the same as the N word, but that is not used in any medical setting or forms at all. She is tilting at windmills here. She says she wants to be called a woman, and yes that is her right. And if she was ever pregnant her doctor would honor that. So why is she against what other people want to be called. Her stance makes no sense when you look at it. She got her plastic surgery nose out of joint and is making that the hill to die on. Again the question is why? But it is getting her a lot of attention and air time play on right wing podcasts / blogs. So you ask why she has gone so far out on this that no one is calling her and making it her claim to fame? Is she the new Riley Gaines, who made an entire media career over complaining she tied with a trans woman for fourth place! Hugs.

Before he became a politician, House Speaker Mike Johnson partnered with an anti-gay conversion therapy group

https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/01/politics/mike-johnson-kfile-invs/index.html

Every major medical association affirm that conversion therapy is torture and not medically sound. It doesn’t work and creates lifelong issues and problems. It is abuse. Sexual orientation is something one is born with. No matter who you find sexually attractive, ask your self when you choose that? Who sits down with a bunch of different pictures of men and women and says you know I think I will be sexually attracted to these. It is a body reaction, not a mental one. My dogs that love gravy these people understand that because they use torture methods including some put electrodes on kid’s scrotum to shock them if they get excited over male nudes. WTF, no one chooses and these people did not choose who they are attracted to and get the tingles from. The fact is they demand we all ignore reason and medical science so their holy book written 2,500 years ago when people were ignorant even of germs that caused sickness is correct. Yes they tell us, just ignore everything that makes sense and the medical people are telling us to that the desert nomads of 2,500 years ago are correct. The want an old dusty geopolitical warlord text to relate to our modern life. Why did their god not know about cell phones? Why wait to give life-saving health information to the people. Because their god only knew what the people 2,500 knew. Do they really want to claim that is the highest pinnacle of human knowledge? But what is telling is his organization tells kids / teens they don’t need to accept kids who are different. He is telling kids to not be tolerant or even accepting of LGBTQIA kids in schools. Just like he doesn’t want to accept or tolerate that there are LGBTQIA people in society he has to accept are there. Kill them all, or if you can not do that, just make don’t say gay laws that erase them from society. Hugs. Scottie

By Andrew Kaczynski

5 minute read

Updated 9:23 AM EDT, Wed November 1, 2023

Newly elected Speaker of the House Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) in the House chamber after his election at the US Capitol on October 25, 2023 in Washington, DC.

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson closely collaborated with a group in the mid-to-late 2000s that promoted “conversion therapy,” a discredited practice that asserted it could change the sexual orientation of gay and lesbian individuals.

Prior to launching his political career, Johnson, a lawyer, gave legal advice to an organization called Exodus International and partnered with the group to put on an annual anti-gay event aimed at teens, according to a CNN KFile review of more than a dozen of Johnson’s media appearances from that timespan.

Founded in 1976, Exodus International was a leader in the so-called “ex-gay” movement, which aimed to make gay individuals straight through conversion therapy programs using religious and counseling methods. Exodus International connected ministries across the world using these controversial approaches.

The group shut down in 2013, with its founder posting a public apology for the “pain and hurt” his organization caused. Conversion therapy has been widely condemned by most major medical institutions and has been shown to be harmful to struggling LGBTQ people.

At the time, Johnson worked as an attorney for the socially conservative legal advocacy group, Alliance Defense Fund (ADF). He and his group collaborated with Exodus from 2006 to 2010.

For years, Johnson and Exodus worked on an event started by ADF in 2005 known as the “Day of Truth” – a counterprotest to the “Day of Silence,” a day in schools in which students stayed silent to bring awareness to bullying faced by LGBTQ youth.

Trump ally Mike Johnson elected House speaker three weeks after McCarthy ouster

The Day of Truth sought to counter that silence by distributing information about what Johnson described as the “dangerous” gay lifestyle.

“I mean, our race, the size of our feet, the color of our eyes, these are things we’re born with and we cannot change,” Johnson told one radio host in 2008 promoting the event. “What these adult advocacy groups like the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network are promoting is a type of behavior. Homosexual behavior is something you do, it’s not something that you are.”

In print, radio and on television, Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, frequently disparaged homosexuality, according to KFile’s review. He advocated for the criminalization of gay sex and went so far as to partially blame it for the fall of the Roman Empire.

“Some credit to the fall of Rome to not only the deprivation of the society and the loss of morals, but also to the rampant homosexual behavior that was condoned by the society,” Johnson told a radio host in 2008.

Johnson’s office did not respond to a CNN request for comment asking about his work with Exodus.

A close collaboration

Exodus International joined ADF’s Day of Truth event in 2006 and the groups worked together on promotional material for the event, including a standalone website which pointed users to Exodus’ conversion ministries. Documents on that website cited the since-repudiated academic work in support of conversion therapy. Exodus Youth, the group’s youth wing, promoted the event within its blogs.

Videos put out by Exodus and ADF on their standalone Day of Truth website featured two Exodus staffers speaking about how teens didn’t need to “accept” or “embrace” their homosexuality. The videos featured testimonials of a “former-homosexual” and “former lesbian.”

Documents on the website were not archived online but were saved by anti-conversion therapy groups such as Truth Wins Out in 2007 and 2008. The website featured a FAQ on homosexuality provided by Exodus and sold t-shirts saying, “the Truth cannot be silenced.”

One video featured Johnson, who was later quoted in a press release on Exodus International’s website ahead of the event, saying, “An open, honest discussion allows truth to rise to the surface.”

Johnson promoted the event heavily in the media – through radio interviews, comments in newspapers, and an editorial. In interviews, he repeatedly cited the case of a teen who went to school after the Day of Silence wearing a shirt that read, “Be ashamed. Our school has embraced what God has condemned” and “Homosexuality is shameful.” The teen was suspended and ADF represented him in legal action over the incident. The case was dismissed because the teen graduated, and the court found he no longer had standing to challenge the dress code.

“Day of Truth was really established to counter the promotion of the homosexual agenda in public schools,” Johnson told a radio host in 2008.

Those who worked to counter ADF and Exodus at the time, said the event was dangerous to confused youth.

“This directly harmed LGBTQ youth,” Wayne Besen, the executive director of Truth Wins Out and an expert on the ex-gay industry, told CNN. “This is someone whose core was promoting anti-gay and ex-gay viewpoints. He wouldn’t pander to anti-gay advocates, he was the anti-gay and ex-gay advocate.”

Randy Scobey, a former executive vice president at Exodus, who worked on the Day of Truth in the organization’s collaboration with ADF, called the event one of his biggest regrets.

“It was bullying those who were trying to not be bullied,” said Scobey, who now lives openly as a gay man. “That was one of the public ways that the Alliance Defense Fund worked with us.”

Ties between Exodus and ADF extended beyond the event.

ADF, which has since changed its name to the Alliance Defending Freedom, touted Exodus International in promotional brochures in 2004, crediting it as an organization that “played an instrumental role in helping thousands of individuals come out of homosexual behavior.”

Scobey recalled Johnson as quiet, but firm in his beliefs that homosexuality was wrong. He said Johnson and ADF provided crucial legal advice to Exodus and its “member ministries.”

“We worked with them behind the scenes a lot,” Scobey told CNN, saying the group offered them legal guidance over their ex-gay counseling. “They were very important to us as far as helping us to feel more secure legally and politically.”

Exodus International stopped sponsoring the Day of Truth event in 2010, saying it became adversarial and counterproductive.

Mike Johnson Collaborated With Ex-Gay Torture Group

Read the full article. There’s much more. No paywall.
As I previously reported, Johnson and Alliance Defending Freedom helped create the so-called Day Of Truth as an on-campus Christian counter protest to GLSEN’s annual anti-bullying Day Of Silence.
Per CNN’s new reporting, Mike Johnson collaborated with Exodus for years on the Day Of Truth.
When Exodus finally collapsed in 2013, founder Alan Chambers issued a lengthy apology and admitted on CNN that ex-gay torture had never turned any of his thousands of victims heterosexual. Not a single one. Video below.

NEW: In the 2000s, Mike Johnson worked collaborated closely with a conversion therapy group on an event aimed at high school teens telling them homosexuality was behavior they could change – and pointing them to "ex-gay" conversion therapy ministries.https://t.co/ki5bX6LfGq
— Andy Kaczynski (@KFILE) November 1, 2023

Nic Peterson6 hours ago

Exodus was a steaming pile of self hating homos hitting on each other. If Johnson was working with them, he was likely fucking around with one or more of them. There is tea that needs to be spilled.

Nic Peterson Darreth6 hours ago

A Netflix documentary call Pray Away dropped earlier this year. Tip of the iceberg stuff. There is another (now out) gay man that spent his professional life working for the LDS church and living a lie. He is now speaking his truth. Johnson has got gay face to the level that breaks my gaydar machine to a smoking ruin. I grew up among people just like him.

John Nic Peterson5 hours ago

Exodus is an example of that fine xstian love bullshit. This presumably straight guy and his ilk should be forced into homosexual conversion, although, I suspect that they are, in reality, self-hating (for whatever reason) Gays who tried to convince themselves and the desperate Gays and/or their families who attended conversion camps that it could be done. If by some chance you have not seen “Boy Erased” I highly recommend it. It’s a very well done feature film on this very subject. IMHO it’s a 5 star winner. “Fair Haven” is another good one. There are a number of films on the subject. https://en.wikipedia.org/wi…

Nic Peterson John4 hours ago

In the Netflix documentary, Pray Away, your assertions are confirmed. There wouldn’t need to be any homosexual conversion because most of them were gayer than geese the entire time. Imagine that. Several of the leaders admit to the lie. Boy Erased was heartbreaking, and Fair Haven really drove home the isolation and self hatred that many of us have been forced to carry.

Forteaneye Nic Peterson7 hours ago

I hope his “adopted” African American son steps forward with clarification on their relationship. I have a strong suspicion Johnson does not want that to happen.

B Snow Nic Peterson5 hours ago

I think he’s 40/in his 40s now? The article I read said he went into Johnson’s “custody” when he was 14 and Johnson was something like 27. Or maybe younger. It was before he was married. Strong “Nestor” vibes there.
That’s not to say that a young, single man can’t adopt a teenager he wants to help, just that it’s unusual enough that there should maybe be some extra scrutiny of the situation.

Swamp Yankee8 hours ago

Republicans were actually really smart about how they slipped this guy in under the radar. People actually believed that the chair would remain vacant because the GOP couldn’t get their shit together… but in fact, they were just holding out for a true Nazi to install.

JoeMyGod Mod8 hours ago

There’s a couple of TikTok videos going around in which Louisiana locals claim that Johnson was once a well-known patron at the Baton Rouge gay bar Central Station. I’ve found no reputable reporting on this, but nothing would be surprising when it comes to closeted Republicans.

JoeMyGod Mod JoeMyGod8 hours ago edited

Here’s one of those TikTok clips: https://www.tiktok.com/@mam…

Wintercat JoeMyGod8 hours ago

Methinks He Doth Protest Too Much is entirely a thing.

BensNewLogin JoeMyGod8 hours ago

maybe that is why he has a covenant marriage, so he can’t get out of it.

William JoeMyGod8 hours ago

The Apache Drive-In over in Tyler, Texas is closer. It’s long been a hookup spot for the sexually frustrated from East Texas and northwest Louisiana.

Michael8 hours ago

As someone pointed out he adopted a 14yo boy when he was 25 or 26 and then married a conversion therapist 2 years later.

Hmmm. Wonder how long it took him to seek out the therapy?

Steven in TX 🏳️‍🌈sad ISOLATION Michael8 hours ago

You seem to think he sought therapy, instead of the obvious, got a beard

Tim 🇺🇦8 hours ago

kladinvt 8 hours ago

So, it’s confirmed Johnson is in favor of mentally abusing teens all to convert and satisfy his perverted version of “Christianity”.

eddiebeskeddie kladinvt7 hours ago

Oh of course. Because they know that eventually many of these confused gays will commit suicide and nothing would make them happier than for all homos to knock themselves off of the planet .

True Facts: Incredible Crab Stories

Paul Krugman: There Are No GOP Moderates in the House of Representatives

Paul Krugman: There Are No GOP Moderates in the House of Representatives

Mike Johnson Conducted Seminars Promoting the US as a “Christian Nation”

Mike Johnson Conducted Seminars Promoting the US as a “Christian Nation”

The new House speaker called for “Biblically-sanctioned government.”

This is a very dangerous time to have someone like him in such a possition of authority. He really doesn’t want democracy. He is not OK with everyone doing their own thing, living their own lives, worshiping in their own way, being who they are. Nope, he doesn’t favor that at all. He insists on the right, demands it, to force everyone to worship as he does, live as he church doctrines say, have only the kids of sex he wants you to have, raise your children the way he demands, structure your home in a “Christian way” which means wives summit and be submissive to your husbands like good little half humans. Get the point! He wants to force his god down your throat. These same people once claimed gays wanted to force our lifestyle on everyone, but that is what he is demanding to do to the entire country! Think how now the Christians want special rights to discriminate and to be exempt from laws they don’t like because they are Christians. Think how they have screamed about being forced to live in a secular society, but they want the right to force everyone to live a religious lifestyle. Think how they would react if other religions demanded the same special rights or the right to force everyone to live as a devote Muslim? Very scary, these people are. Hugs. Scottie

Mike Johnson is wearing glasses, a dark suit with a checkered pattern, a white shirt, and a bright red tie. He stands in front of the American flag, in front of a microphone, with one finger raised as if making a point or emphasizing something during his speech. He looks earnestly towards his audience, his fellow House members, from the elevated rostrum of the House of Representatives.

“The government has replaced the Creator,” Mike Johnson said in a 2019 seminar appearance. “Government is becoming God.” He is pictured here addressing the House chamber after winning the speakership this month.Tom Williams/Zuma

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Rep. Mike Johnson, the newly elected Republican House speaker, used to conduct a seminar in churches premised on the idea that the United States is a “Christian nation.” This ministry, as he has referred to it, is yet more evidence that Johnson is committed to a hardcore Christian fundamentalism that shapes his views of politics and government.

The seminar, titled “Answers for Our Times: Government, Culture, and Christianity,” was organized by Onward Christian Education Services, Inc., a company owned by his wife, Kelly Johnson, a Christian counselor and anti-abortion activist who calls herself a “leader in the pro-family movement.” The website for her counseling service—which was taken down shortly after Johnson became speaker—described the seminar, which featured both her and Johnson, as exploring several questions, such as, “What is happening in America and how do we fix it?” The list includes this query: “Can our heritage as a Christian nation be preserved?” There were different versions of the seminar running from two-hour-long lectures to retreats lasting two days.

Mike and Kelly Johnson, each a fundamentalist Christian and culture war battler who advocates adhering to what they call a “Biblical worldview,” launched this initiative in 2019. After one such presentation on February 24, 2019, at the First Baptist Church in Bossier City, Louisiana, where they are members—an event that also featured Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council—a local television news show reported that the seminar’s goal was to “keep God in Government.” Johnson posted the article on his congressional website.

According to a Louisiana Baptist newsletter, the Johnsons intended to first pitch their seminars to Baptist churches in the Pelican State before expanding to other states. The publication reported that the couple’s goal was “to equip churches to take a stand against the cultural attacks now being directed at people of faith, the traditional family and basic freedoms embedded in the U.S. Constitution.” It noted that Johnson said he was compelled to create this new ministry while serving in the US House because he was concerned “that too many believers today feel ill-informed to provide substantive answers to fake arguments.” It quoted Johnson: “Our nation is entering one of the most challenging seasons in its history and there is an urgent need for God’s people to be armed and ready with the Truth.” He was referring to what fundamentalists call “Biblical truth.”

A promotion blurb for the seminar described it this way: “As polls show that Christianity is in rapid decline in America, and the culture is growing more secularized and more coarsened, many believers feel ill-informed and ill-prepared to do anything to reverse these trends. Scripture is clear that we have an obligation to provide substantive answers… But HOW?”

At a “Answers for Our Times” seminar held at the First Baptist Church of Haughton, Louisiana, in April 2019, Kelly Johnson proclaimed that “Biblical Christianity” is the only “valid worldview.” Nothing else, she said, “makes sense.” She contended that guidance to the problems of today can be found in the “simple answers in the Bible.” Mike Johnson referred to the Bible as the “owner’s manual” for “how things are supposed to operate” and called for “Biblically-sanctioned government.” Johnson complained that there is now “total chaos on the street… God’s not at the top anymore.” He added, “The problem is most people” want “the government to take care of us now, we want the government to provide us everything… It will not work because it defies the created order of the Creator… The government has replaced the Creator. Government is becoming God.”

Mike Johnson ran through a quick version of US history, in which he insisted, “We began as a Christian nation.” He pointed out that Christopher Columbus said that he journeyed to the Americas “to bring the gospel to unknown coast lands and people.” Johnson added, “We would call him an evangelical today.” Fired up, he offered a litany of statements from the nation’s founders, government officials, and Supreme Court officials who cited God or religion as essential to the United States. “Is this a Christian nation?” he asked. “Yes, we live in a post-Christian culture. I think that’s beyond dispute. You can’t even argue with a straight face that this did not begin as a Christian nation.”

At this seminar, Mike Johnson groused that few of his colleagues in government abide by or even recognize God’s principles—that is, his view of God’s principles—and he expressed great cynicism about his fellow politicians:

A shocking number of elected officials in this country and state do not have a fully formed philosophy of government. They don’t know what their world view is. They’re just moving around waiting for whatever the loudest voice or the most powerful lobbyist tells them how to vote. God help us. That’s why we’re in the situation we’re in… They poll it. It’s not necessarily what his constituents want. I try to do every day what my constituents want. But sometimes what your constituents want does not line up with the principles God gave us for government. And you have to have conviction enough to stand [up] to your own people in a town hall and say, “I know you feel that way, but this is what you’re missing.” And I’m telling you, there’s a tiny percentage of elected officials who are willing to do that.

Mike Johnson sees himself as part of small band of righteous officials who take on the hard task of governing strictly according to the tenets of Christian fundamentalism. He and Kelly are true believers. He has long associated with Christian nationalism; crusaded against gay rights and same-sex marriage; decried no-fault divorce; and pushed for a total ban on abortion. Her Christian counseling practice has compared homosexuality to bestiality and incest. They share a dark view of the modern world. In a sermon he preached in 2016, Johnson declared, “We’re living in a completely amoral society.” And during a podcast last year with Jordan Peterson, the Canadian conservative provocateur, he said that “sinister” elites were responsible for orchestrating climate change as an issue to achieve global “control.”

In a time of political upheaval, cultural clashes, and war, it’s clear that Mike Johnson believes he has the solution. It’s not government of the people, but government shaped by his fundamentalist worldview. As his wife and partner-in-preaching says, nothing else makes sense. They possess the truth, and now, as he has become second in the line of presidential succession, he has the opportunity to meld power to this truth and serve the goal of making America a Christian nation.

Is My Child Too Young To Learn About Being Gay? | Tim Ramsey | TEDxOxford

This is 4 years old and I guess the person speaking is from England. But this is a great talk. It covers so much of what I want to say. It explains why the don’t say gay laws that in so many red states are so dangerous and harmful. Please take 13 minutes and 41 seconds to learn about this issue, learn why it is so important to gay kids to see themselves in the surrounding society, and that yes there are gay kids, even young kids that know they are different, know they are gay, and are scared / worried about it that need support with love. I love the question he asks, when was your child too young to learn about being straight? Because from birth all around them kids see straight couples and symbols of being straight in society. The same with gender, the haters say they don’t want the children to be taught gender in schools as they claim it sexualizes them. But society is structured around gender. We learn it from birth with nursery colors, types of toys, and the clothing we are put in. Hugs. Scottie

Can a child be too young to learn about being LGBT? The answer: no child is ever too young. In this humorous and moving talk, Tim Ramsey argues that only when every parent explores about LGBT identities with their child from birth will we address the well being crisis facing LGBT young people.

Tim Ramsey, the founder of award-winning non-profit Just Like Us, grew up believing that being gay was the worst thing he could be. Having come out, Tim launched Just Like Us to change the lives of other LGBT+ school students by empowering young people to challenge prejudice and champion LGBT+ equality at school and work. As the founder of School Diversity Week, the national celebration of LGBT+ equality in education, Tim has involved over 650,000 school students and teachers work to ensure every young person can be themselves and their best at school.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx Can a child be too young to learn about being LGBT? The answer: no child is ever too young. In this humorous and moving talk, Tim Ramsey, Founder of award-winning LGBT non-profit Just Like Us, argues that only when every parent explores about LGBT identities with their child from birth will we address the wellbeing crisis facing LGBT young people. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx