Daniel Hernandez Jr., the former intern credited with helping to save Rep. Gabrielle Giffords’ life when she was shot in 2011 and now an elected member of a Tucson-area school board, is facing a nasty recall election in which his opponents are attacking him for being openly gay and for his advocacy on behalf of gun violence prevention.

The story behind the recall is the kind of byzantine saga found only in local politics. Four of the five members of the Sunnyside Unified School District, which includes parts of Tucson and surrounding areas, are now facing recall petitions – two members who faced recall for their support of an embattled schools superintendent turned around and filed recall petitions on two members, including Hernandez, who opposed the superintendent.

But the tactics being used against Hernandez are clear as day. A source in the district sends us two flyers that Hernandez’s opponents are reportedly handing out to parents dropping their children off at schools in the district. Right Wing Watch repeatedly tried to contact Marcus Castro, the manager of the effort to recall Hernandez and brother in law of school board president Louie Gonzalez, to discover whether the flyers came from his campaign, but Castro refused to take our calls.

The first attacks Hernandez for being openly gay, imploring, “Put a REAL Man on the Sunnyside Board...Daniel Hernandez is LGBT...We need someone who will support Sports and cares about our kids. We don’t need someone who hates our values.”

http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/daniel-hernandez-former-intern-who-saved-giffords-hit-nasty-homophobic-recall-campaign

I wonder if they think Jared Lee Loughner is enough of a 'REAL Man' for them.

For two years an Oregon woman tried without success to get mistakes in her Equifax credit report fixed. Now a jury has awarded her $18.6 million for her trouble.

Miller's troubles began in 2009, according to her complaint, when she was denied credit from Huybbard Bank based on her Equifax credit report. She requested and eventually received a copy of her report, which, she discovered, contained false identifying information, an incorrect Social Security number, a false birthday and false, derogatory collection accounts attributed to her. Later in 2010 Miller was denied credit by Key Bank, based on her Equifax report.

After filing further protests with Equifax about the inaccuracies in her report, Equifax representatives told Miller her data had become "mixed" with another person's. They told her she would need to dispute the false information directly to her creditors. In all, Miller tried eight times to get her report corrected. Finally, she brought suit in Oregon Federal District Court in October 2011.

Baxter says Miller's failure to qualify for credit cost her several ways. She wasn't able to help her brother, who is disabled and who wasn't able to get credit on his own. She was unable to help her husband, who needed a shop added onto the Miller's home.

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/equifax-loses-186-million-lawsuit/story?id=19803421

This is the phrenology of the 21st century, a measure of your 'worth' that everyone from banks to employers use, the problem here is that at least phrenologists didn't read the bumps on the head of the wrong person to analyze you. Credit reports and their usage need to be regulated.

A handful of fringe anti-gay activists are having a meltdown over a “report” that alleges Fox News harbors a “growing pro-homosexual bias,” ignoring the network’s ongoing track record of smearing and stoking fears about LGBT people and LGBT equality.

On August 14, the xenophobic, Islamophobic, and homophobic right-wing group America’s Survival published a “report” documenting Fox News’ alleged “growing pro-homosexual bias,” citing the network’s ties to the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association (NLGJA) and occasionally favorable coverage of marriage equality by personalities like hosts Megyn Kelly and Shepard Smith.

The rambling, 40,000-word report was written by Peter LaBarbera, president of one of the fringiest anti-gay hate groups in America – Americans for Truth About Homosexuality (AFTAH). It’s already being touted by other anti-gay hate mongers, including the American Family Association’s (AFA) Bryan Fischer.

As Mother Jones points out, it should go without saying that Fox News has “not in the least bit ‘gone gay.’” The network’s inaccurate and often times bigoted coverage of LGBT issues is extensive and well-documented. Some of the worst examples from just the past two months include:
* Attacking a California law that would protect transgender students as “anarchy and madness”
* Accusing President Obama of being secretly gay
* Peddling lies about a proposed LGBT non-discrimination ordinance in San Antonio
* Mocking “transvestites” and “gays” at a historic New York parade
* Predicting that marriage equality will cause the collapse of civilization
* Referring to a transgender woman as a “burly man wearing a dress”

http://equalitymatters.org/blog/201308150004

"Huh... so, gays might be people too?"
"INDOCTRINATION! INDOCTRINATION!!!1!"

Texas and all the other anti-choice state need to get hospital bills for baby deliveries sent to them. And why not?

"You want me to deliver my baby, so you should have no problem covering any costs, care for the baby, maternity leave if I need it, diapers, clothes, etc. Don't tell me to 'go to the Church or some (non-existent) Charity', if YOU want me to deliver the baby, then YOU can pay for it."

Tell the hospitals that deliver your babies if you live in an anti-choice state, just send the government the bill.

Let's see how fast this turns into... SOCIALISM!

Benjamin Ernest "Ben" Linder (July 7, 1959 – April 28, 1987), was an American engineer who was working on a small hydroelectric dam in rural northern Nicaragua when he was killed by the Contras, an affiliation of rebel groups funded by the U.S. government/CIA. Coming at a time when U.S. support for the Contras was already highly controversial, Linder's death made front-page headlines around the world and further polarized opinion in the United States.

On 28 April 1987, Linder and two Nicaraguans were killed in a Contra ambush while working at the construction site for a new dam for the nearby village of San José de Bocay. The autopsy showed that Linder had been wounded by a grenade, then shot at point-blank range in the head. The two Nicaraguans — Sergio Hernández and Pablo Rosales — were also killed at close range. He was posthumously awarded the Courage of Conscience award September 26, 1992.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Linder

This wasn't a guy who was fighting the contras, he was providing electricity to Nicaragua's poorest people. The contras didn't like the poor getting access to electricity, education, and medicine, and they blocked it with guns and money supplied by the Reagan Administration.

If Obama and Clinton truly have any responsibility for what happened in Benghazi, then doesn't mean that Oliver North, Elliott Abrams, and the other players in the Iran-Contra scandal have responsibility for his death? Doesn't that make the conservative man-god Ronald Reagan a murderer?

Come on, let's hear what the difference between Ben Linder and Benghazi is.

Michigan GOP National Committeeman Dave Agema’s doggedly stubborn refusal to back down from his decision to post the essay “Everyone Should Know These Statistics on Homosexuals” on his Facebook page has created a furious debate about the accuracy of the claims made by the essay’s author,“Frank Joseph, M.D.”

But now it’s time to scrutinize the source of those claims. In one case, it looks quite ugly.

Consider this dubious bullet-point from the essay: “The median age of death of lesbians is 45 (only 24% live past age 65). The median age of death of a married heterosexual woman is 79 (8)."

That “(8)” is footnote #8. It refers to a pamphlet entitled “Is Homosexual Activity Normal?” by Dr. Edward R. Fields of Marietta, Ga. Fields is cited as the source for eight bullet points in the essay that Agema circulated.

From the Jewish Anti-Defamation League on the very same man:

“Edward Fields has been active in white supremacist and anti-Semitic groups since he was a teenager in the late 1940s ... Fields was a significant force in the racist world ...”

“In 1991 he organized a Klan rally in Montgomery, Alabama, along with Thom Robb of the Knights of the KKK.”

“In February 2001 he attended the funeral of Byron de la Beckwith, murderer of civil rights activist Medgar Evers ...”

http://www.mlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2013/04/ken_braun_dave_agemas_facebook.html

Two people go shopping at the same store and they buy the same things, the only difference is their economic status, one is a rich person and has worked himself out of paying any taxes via tax cuts and tax shelters, and the other person is in poverty and is in the safety net with food stamps.

Now let's see the reactions of the fellow shoppers and the store employees if if they knew of their statuses and the things they receive from the government, be it tax cuts or food stamps:

The rich shopper:
"We better be nice to him and give him discounts or else he'll take his business elsewhere."
"It's like he's injecting new blood into the economy."
"Think of all the jobs he created by buying that one shirt."

The poor shopper:
"Ugh... Do I really have to serve this guy?"
"Does he really need a new shirt? The one he has on looks just fine."
"Is he buying candy... for his kids? *RAGE*"

The root of the problem isn't the rich and it's not the poor, it's the ideological mindset that it's acceptable to make life easier on the rich and they'll work harder in this economy while make life harder on the poor and thinking they'll also work harder in this economy. Sure, a lot of this thinking can be seen in the Tea Party, but it can be seen in other places as well, and liberals and progressives could be the first group that sees this thinking in the Tea Party, in the media, in the government, and more; and step up and oppose it.

Rich people may not be rich forever and poor people may not be poor forever, but as long as this mindset remains, we will all be hurting because of it.