Fmr. Sen. Alan Simpson accuses Republicans of being “homophobes”; New American Conservative Union wishes GOProud was less gay; AIDS Drug Assistance Program gets budget increase, other heath areas may lose funding; Children’s book about gay penguins once again tops list of frequently challenged books; Nicki Minaj to join Brittney Spears’ Femme Fatale tour; Victoria Jackson claims she’s not a homophobe after calling Glee kiss “sickening”; Iceland’s penis museum gets its first human specimen.
- Former Sen. Alan Simpson (R-WY) appeared on Hardball with Chris Matthews telling the host while complaining about Republicans’ fixation on social issues while “you’re diddling your secretaries while giving a speech.” ”We have homophobes in our party. That’s disgusting to me. We’re all human beings. We’re all God’s children.” He blasts former Sen. Rick Santorum for making “cruel, cruel” remarks about homosexuals and expresses his opinion that male legislators should not even vote on abortions which he calls a “deeply intimate and personal decision.”
- In a recent interview, Al Cardenas, the new head of the American Conservative Union implied that gay conservative group GOProud needs to focus less on gay issues. In response to controversy over GOProud’s involvement in the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), he said, “The ideal GOProud participation would have been, ‘You know what, guys? This is an inclusive society. We’re as interested in these fiscal issues as you are. Fill your website with fiscal issues that you’re for and be a mainstream discusser of issues. We just happen to have a different lifestyle.’ And if they’d done that, they would have laid the groundwork for things that would have been pretty good.’” However, a quick visit to the GOProud website finds only about 3 press releases, out of almost 40, regarding gay-rights issues since the first of the year.
- Despite federal budget talks almost bringing the government to a shutdown last week, funding for the AIDS Drug Assistance Program (ADAP) will actually see an increase of $48 million. HIV Plus Magazine reports that the increase “will help provide treatment for the 8,000 people in 11 states who are on ADAP waiting lists.” Proposed cuts to Medicare, the National Institute of Health, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention could hurt AIDS funding however.
- For the fifth year in a row, children’s book And Tango Makes Three has topped the American Library Association’s (ALA) list of most frequently challenged books. According to the ALA: “”A challenge is defined as a formal, written complaint filed with a library or school requesting that a book or other material be restricted or removed because of its content or appropriateness.” The book tells the true story of two male chinstrap penguins at the Central Park Zoo, Roy and Silo, who hatched and raised a chick from a heterosexual penguin couple who were unable to care for two eggs at once. Author Justin Richardson told the New York Times in 2005, “”We wrote the book to help parents teach children about same-sex parent families. It’s no more an argument in favor of human gay relationships than it is a call for children to swallow their fish whole or sleep on rocks.” Roy and Silo were paired for six years before splitting.
- Brittney Spears has announced that Nicki Minaj will officially join the Femme Fatale tour this year as a co-headliner. The tour makes regional stops in Cleveland at Quicken Loans Arena on July 26 and in Detroit at The Palace at Auburn Hills on July 28.
- After claiming that Kurt and Blaine’s gay kiss on Glee was “sickening,” former Saturday Night Live castmember Victoria Jackson wants to prove that she isn’t homophobic by appearing on Wife Swap with a gay couple. She wrote, “That would be great because then I could show the world that I love gay people and I’m not the homophobic hate-monger the media are making me out to be. The other perk is that I could afford that Tacoma pick-up truck I want and pay off my credit card.”
- Iceland’s penis museum finally has a human sample to add to its collection of almost 300 specimens. 95-year-old Pall Arason donated his penis to the Phallological Museum after his death and it officially went on display last week. His donation will be added to the collection which also contains such items as a 170-centimeter (67-inch) sperm whale penis preserved in formaldehyde, lampshades made from bull testicles and what the museum described as an “unusually big” penis bone from a Canadian walrus.
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