Hillary Clinton Calls Out Trump In San Diego Speech

"He's not just unprepared-- he's temperamentally unfit to hold an office that requires knowledge, stability and immense responsibility."
--Sec. Hillary Clinton 

For those of you who wondered why I endorsed Hillary Clinton back in February and said she was the best qualified person for the job of replacing President Obama, yesterday in calling Donald Chump Trump out  in a San Diego campaign speech unqualified for the job on national TV, she justified my confidence in her to be the next POTUS.

But hey TransGriot readers, see it for yourself if you missed it.

What's The Holdup For Open Trans Military Service?

There are over 15,000 trans people serving in the US Armed Forces, and they and their trans siblings on the home front are wondering what is taking so long for the US Department of Defense to get on the job and create the rules and policies necessary in order for them to not have to hide who they are and serve our country.

According to a published August 25 USA Today report from Pentagon documents  the US ban on transgender troops serving openly in our armed forces would end on May 27.  Yeah we know it's an election year, but if y'all had not throw us under the bus during that lame duck 2010 session, you'd already have that mission of open trans military service accomplished by now

The clock is ticking toward that date, and inquiring minds in Trans World and our siblings currently serving in our nation's armed forces want to know what's up and is the Pentagon still on schedule to make that open trans service happen?.

Guess we'll find out in a few days.

Why U Mad Because Moi and Other Black People Aren't Supporting Bernie?

Ever since I put up that February 16 post announcing that I was supporting Sec. Clinton in the Democratic primary, like anyone else who is #NotFeelingTheBern, I've ended up blocking 10 people (and counting), had my cognitive abilities attacked by rabid Sanders supporters, and had comment threads n my FB page inundated at times with facts free anti-Hillary articles mixed with insults aimed at moi.

Not a smart move, people.  Never mind the fact that I pointed out in the original Clinton support article I wrote that I was moved from neutral to supporting Clinton because of the initial red flag of Sen. Sanders being supported by Cornel West, and my disgust at a civil rights icon like Rep. John Lewis being disrespectfully attacked.

Bernie Sanders has failed to make the case to me and a wide variety of Black voters, including ones from the trans, bi and SGL community as to why we should support him over a longtime Democrat in Sec. Clinton that we have seen repeatedly take the best punches the right wing can throw at her and is still standing.  

And the Republicans are 'scurred' to face her in a general election, which is why they have attacked her nonstop.   They know she came agonizingly close to winning the Democratic nomination in 2008 and made them look like fools in the Benghazi hearings last year..

They aren't scared of Sanders and are eager to yell SOCIALIST! at him from now until November, but are just holding their fire on him for now until we finish our Democratic nomination business.  

Many of us who support Clinton have serious doubts in this critical 2016 election cycle that Sen. Sanders can withstand the negativity onslaught that he would get from the GOP if he was the nominee, and that electability question matters.

Something else that matters is the fact that Hillary has been a Democrat since 1972 and is the most qualified candidate ever for the presidency, especially when it comes to foreign policy..

When did Sanders join my party again?

And now, in the wake of yesterday's launch of the Trans United For Hillary page, I'm seeing trans Bernie supporters attack people that I know and respect as 'corporate sellouts'?

Really?

Bottom line is you can support whoever you wish in this primary.  You can even attempt to continue to state your case as to why you feel Sen. Sanders is the better candidate.  But do it with facts, not insults I've repeatedly seen and heard about her in my lifetime from right wing idiots on FOX Noise and will elicit nothing but an eye roll from me and swift deletion from my page.

I'm tired of anti-Hillary people trying to paint her as a 'Republican' or worse than Ann Coulter when the facts don't bear that allegation out.

At the same time, these people who are demonizing her are trying to hold up Bernie Sanders as some kind of political messiah when he has flaws and problematic policy positions just like Sec, Clinton does.


Moi expressing my First Amendment free speech rights to call you on your loud and wrong attacks on Sec. Clinton, pointing out the fact your candidate supported the same legislation you're excoriating her on, or expressing the fact Sen. Sanders' failure to get Black voters support is going to cost him dearly tomorrow in South Carolina and on Super Tuesday is not 'bullying', it's telling it like it T-I-S is.

Funny y'all don't seem to mind when I'm calling people out on BS any other time, but now that I'm doing my job and turning my inquiring mind toward pointing out his overwhelmingly white millennial support, asking valid questions about questionable stances your candidate needs to answer or asking you to come up with reasons why you support Sanders instead of  'because I hate Hillary', y'all wanna hate.

"She's a liar" isn't going to cut it with me and any other person who bases their decisions on what candidates they support with logic and reason combined with their life experiences, or who may still be trying to figure out who to vote for in the Democratic primary

The bottom line for me is I want the Democratic candidate to win on November 8, and I want my party to get control of Congress back, starting with a Senate we are only four seats from getting out of the clutches of Mitch McConnell.

So don't hate because me and other people aren't feeling the Bern in this primary election season, and we're with her.

2016 CONCACAF Women's Olympic Qualifying Tournament Happening In Texas

While I have been busy with other events, on opposite ends of 1-45 we have had eight CONCACAF women's teams battling to get the two spots available from our FIFA region for the upcoming Rio Olympic Games women's tournament.

The tournament started on February 10 with the Group A teams, the USA, Puerto Rico, Mexico, and Costa Rica playing their games at Toyota Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Frisco, TX while the Group B teams Canada, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana and Guatemala started a day later at BBVA Compass Stadium here in Houston.

Team USA got their Olympic qualifying campaign off to a flying start with a 5-0 win over Costa Rica as Carli Lloyd scored the first of her two goals just one minute into the game to get the USA off to a 3-0 halftime lead in a match they never trailed in as Mexico was thumping Puerto Rico 6-0.

That set up a crucial clash on February 13 in which the USA prevailed 1-0 over Mexico thanks to the game winning goal from Carli Lloyd in the 80th minute on a penalty kick while Costa Rica recovered from their loss to the USA by spanking Puerto Rico 9-0.

The win also gave the USA the top spot in Group A with two wins and a +6 goal differential.

Yesterday Group A play concluded with the USA clinching the group and their trip to the semis here in Houston with a 10-0 win over Puerto Rico in which Crystal Dunn scored five goals.

In the battle between two 2015 World Cup squads to determine the runner up in the group, Costa Rica prevailed 2-1 in which Raquel Rodriquez scored two goals, with the game winner being on a penalty kick in the 57th minute to clinch the runner up spot in Group A and their ticket to Houston for the semifinals.

Group B play started on February 11 at BBVA Compass Stadium, with Trinidad and Tobago shocking Guatemala 2-1 and Canada behind an Ashley Lawrence hat trick spanking Guyana 5-0.

On February 14 Guyana sent Guatemala packing with a 2-1 victory as Canada clinched Group B with a 6-0 victory over Trinidad and Tobago.

Later today while Canada closes out group play with homeward bound Guatemala, Guyana and Trinidad and  Tobago will play to see who will be the Group B runner up and get the unenviable task of taking on the world champion USA in a knockout round semifinals on Friday at BBVA Compass Stadium.

Canada will play this final group game knowing that they will face Costa Rica in the knockout round on Friday with an Olympic berth on the line.

The Friday semifinal game winners will get both CONCACAF berths to the Rio Olympic Games women's soccer tournament, and play each other on Sunday for the tournament title.

And The 2016 Iowa Caucus Winner Is...

Nobody yet.   It's still a razor thin race between former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Senator Bernie Sanders with several precincts outstanding..

The first event of the 2016 presidential primary season happened last night in the Iowa Caucuses. In the 99 counties across the state, both Democratic and Republican voters headed to 1061 locations all over the state to support their respective candidate choices for their party's presidential nominations.


They started at 7 PM CST, and while the GOP one was over early with the junior senator from Alberta in Ted Cruz upsetting Donald Trump for the win.

As of this writing the Democratic contest between Clinton and Sanders is razor thin and has yet to be called.

One of the other results from tonight is that former Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley suspended his campaign after his poor showing in the Democratic caucus, and Mike Suckabee Huckabee finally exited the GOP race after his poor showing in the GOP one.

With 97% of the precincts reporting, Clinton is up by a razor thin 49.8% (22 delegates) to Sanders 46.6% (21 delegates) with O'Malley capturing just 0.6% of the vote percentages.  

The 2016 race to the White House is now in the vote casting stage and the next battle in which actual ballots will be cast will be next Tuesday, February 9 in the first in the nation primary in New Hampshire.   There will be a crucial Democratic debate moderated by MSNBC's Rachel Maddow on Thursday which should be fun to watch.

We'll know who won this on the Democratic side in a few hours.

TransGriot Update: The winner is Hillary Clinton.  But doing so, she made history by becoming the first woman to win the Iowa caucus.   Hopefully she'll be making more history as this continues.

30th Anniversary Of Challenger Disaster

Today is the 30th anniversary of the space shuttle Challenger disaster.   It ,exploded 73 seconds after it was launched from Cape Canaveral on a chilly January 28, 1986 winter day with a large live TV audience of schoolchildren looking on in horror.

One of the people who was part of that Challenger crew on that STS-51L mission was Sharon Christa McAuliffe, a Concord, NH schoolteacher who was set to become the first civilian launched into space and was going to once the shuttle got into orbit do some teaching from space.

But that broadcast never happened.  The collapse of the external fuel tank caused an explosion that broke the shuttle apart and sent the crew cabin in a fall from 46,000 feet altitude to the Atlantic Ocean below that killed all seven crew members.

The mission crew that perished that day were Mission Specialist Ellison Onizuka, Teacher In Space Christa McAuliffe, Payload Specialist Greg Jarvis, Mission Specialist Judy Resnik, Pilot Mike Smith, Mission commander Dick Scobee, and Mission Specialist Ron McNair.

Like the 1963 Kennedy assassination or the September 2001 terror attacks, people of my generation and who were kids watching the launch in their classrooms across the nation remember what they were doing when it happened at 10:39 AM CST.

I was getting ready for a job interview, and my space junkie self had forgotten for a moment that the launch was happening after two prior postponements.   So I flipped the TV on CNN and was listening to the commentary as I got dressed.

The CNN commentators hadn't mentioned the explosion at the time I turned on the television, and I said to myself, "'Damn, the way they're talking, something must have happened to the Challenger."

A few minutes later I would see the horrific video of that shuttle launch gone horribly wrong.  The shuttles were grounded for nearly three years as NASA and the Rogers Commission sought to find out what happened and make the necessary corrections to the shuttle's design to make it safer.

It was later determined that the cold snap that affected the Cape Canaveral area plus a design flaw in one of the solid rocket boosters combined with violations of NASA launch procedures and protocols caused the accident.

As President Ronald Reagan said in his speech to the nation that night, "The future doesn't belong to the faint-hearted; it belongs to the brave.  The Challenger crew was pulling us into the future and we'll continue to follow them."

And may the souls of the Challenger 7 continue to rest in power and peace, and inspire this generation and future ones to continue to look to the stars.

.      

President Obama's Last SOTU Speech Tonight

The reality that 2016 is not only an election year, but President Obama's last as our president will become crystal clear at  8 PM CST when he gives his final State of the Union Address to a join session of Congress and what is sure to be a large television audience.

President Obama gave a preview of his upcoming speech in a video in which he stated he wanted to focus "not just the remarkable progress we've made, not just what I want to get done in the year ahead, but what we need to do together in the years to come:  The big things that will guarantee an even stronger, better, more prosperous America for our kids.  That's what's on my mind."

What's on our mind is the upcoming November 8 presidential election and coming to grips with the fact that on January 17, 2017 you and your family will be leaving the White House.  I'm definitely not ready to think about that near future event.

Well, it's still January, and we still have him, the FLOTUS and the First Family living at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. until then.

Eyes On The 2016 White House Prize, People

In a few days we'll officially be in the year 2016 and the vote casting stretch of the presidential election will start.  The Iowa caucuses will happen February 1, followed by the New hampshire Primary on February 8

On the Democratic side of the contest to succeed President Barack Obama are former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Sen. Bernie Sanders, and former Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley.

As far as I'm concerned, any of these candidates would be ready to handle the nation's business on January 20, 2017 far moreso than any of the Cirque de GOP ones competing for their party's nomination.

And my vote, like the votes of many African-Americans are up for grabs in this 2016 Democratic Presidential primary after having our once in a lifetime pleasure of voting for a POTUS who looks like us twice and having our faith in his abilities rewarded.

In this 2016 cycle, I'm leaning toward Hillary Clinton.  I'm not feeling the Bern or sold on Bernie Sanders yet.   I still have questions about Martin O'Malley that many of the Maryland peeps who had him as their governor can answer for me.   But the bottom line is that push come to shove, I would rather have Clinton, Sanders or even O'Malley in the White House than ANY GOP anti-human rights chickenhawk warmonger.

So hearing you vanillacentric privileged Sanders peeps say like petulant children that you'll sit out the election if he doesn't get the nomination is not only childish, but mindbogglingly stupid and alarming to me as a non-white trans American.

The quality of my life for the next four years depends on a Democrat getting elected to succeed President Obama in November, and I really don't give a rat's anus which one it is.
 
It is non-white Americans whose human rights will take the brunt of the suffering if we have a GOP candidate get elected to POTUS in November 2016.   You folks who benefit from white privilege can take the cavalier position of  'both parties are the same' (which is BS to any non-white person) because no matter what happens, the policies that come out of those administrations will primarily benefit you as white Americans.

But non-white Americans don't have that luxury.  We know the predominately conservative white male Republicans hate us and have been building their popularity in GOP primary circles by attacking and demonizing us.   We also realize that because of the 'hate on non-white Americans' rhetoric they are spewing, their policies will not benefit us or our communities, but be punitive towards us while continuing to enrich the 1% superbillionaires that fund their campaigns.  

So it's why we'll be voting for the Democratic presidential nominee and Democratic candidates on November 8 by a nearly 3-1 margin.
  

Y'all need to focus on the big picture and the White House prize.  The Republicans are desperate to win in 2016 because if they don't, they are staring at 12, and potentially 16 years of not having a Republican head the executive branch of government, and that is more than enough time for a President Clinton, Sanders or O'Malley to build on Obama's eight year legacy after cleaning up the mess that George W. Bush left domestically and internationally and continuing the liberal progressive policy shift at the executive branch level.      

The next president will select at least 4 Supreme Court justices and either continue the progress of cleaning up the federal judiciary started under President Obama or lock us into a 7-2 conservative majority that will make our lives miserable for the next 25-30 years.
 
I'm not down with the Supreme Court for the rest of my life being under a conservative majority so they can finish the job of eviscerating and rolling back all of the progressive legislation that was passed in the 20th century.  I'd rather have a 6-3 or 7-2 LIBERAL SCOTUS majority, and that ain't happening under a President Trump.

It's not just the Supreme Court that is in the balance. We are on the verge of flipping many of the US circuit courts districts like the 5th Circuit to progressive control because the conservative judges appointed by Reagan and Daddy Bush are hitting retirement age.

That is critical to those of us stuck with oppressive GOP state governments and clueless Republican governors in Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi and elsewhere in circuits covering other GOP ruled states to at least have the federal court system as a backstop to roll back their unjust, unconstitutional and fascist laws and executive orders. 
You want universal health care?  An end to the attacks on a woman's right to choose?  Election Day being a national holiday and the end of voter suppression laws?  More federal funding for public transit, rail and rebuilding our infrastructure?   Increased funding for STEM education and public schools?  That won't happen under a GOP administration.

And y'all need to realize you can't get liberal-progressive policies under a conservative government, so you need to vote for progressive candidates all the way to the end of the ballot.

So eyes on the big 2016 White House prize people.

Why Texas Isn't Seceding

“[The] answer is clear. If there was any constitutional issue resolved by the Civil War, it is that there is no right to secede.”-SCOTUS Justice Antonin Scalia

I know many of you folks who love to bash Texas at every opportunity have heard the repeated cries of Texas Teapublicans to secede from the United States and are loudly egging them on to do so.

And yes, another Texas Republican has called for a secession vote during their upcoming 2016 presidential primary that thankfully failed Saturday.   But let this native Texan point out why secession isn't likely to happen.

Major reason number one is while the idea is popular with the Tea Party ignorati, the national Republican Party doesn't.  75% of reality based Texans oppose it, and especially non white Texans like myself.  

I like being part of the USA.   That way I still get the Social Security benefits I paid into the system for along with  Medicare, Medicaid, and all the other things I'm eligible as an American for.

These Tea Klux Klan clowns probably haven't heard of a 1869 SCOTUS case called Texas v. White which stated the Constitution didn't permit states to unilaterally secede from the Union, and ordinances of secession were absolutely null and void.

Major reason number two and the reason sane Republicans don't like it is because Texas has 38 electoral votes, and serves as the base for Republican presidential candidate electoral vote scenarios like California's 55 electoral votes  does for the Democratic Party presidential candidates in addition to being a political ATM for both parties.

 A Texas secession happens, and the GOP immediately loses those 38 electoral votes and can kiss any chance of regaining the White House goodbye since they have a narrower electoral vote path to the presidency.  There will also be 25 less GOP House seats, 11 less Democrats and two less GOP Senators.

Then there's the other fiscal costs.  An independent Texas would now have to maintain that 3,240 miles of interstate highway that crisscross our state and come up with the funding to do so.

The Republic of Texas would have to set up embassies and consulates in the nations that recognized it, customs facilities in Texas ports and airports, border checkpoints and create a military to defend its long borders with Mexico and the USA. All those nation building tasks cost money.

Other questions that come to mind is what is the Texas share of the US national debt?  What happens with the Strategic Petroleum Reserve locations inside our state's borders?

Naw Tea Klux Klan boo boos, all that military equipment at the current military bases in this state like Ft. Bliss and Ft. Hood for example, would go back to the US or have to be bought from the feds at a steep price.

Teapublicans would also find out the hard way that Texas receives far more in federal money than it sends to the feds, and with the US federal fiscal spigot cut off, the Republic of Texas would have to make up that lost revenue somehow.  So say hello to your taxes going up, paying taxes to the federal government in Austin and not getting the level of services you get now.

Let's be real, much of this racist Texas secession talk has only cropped up because the current POTUS shares my ethnic background, our state since 2009 has had a predominately non-white majority and Latinos will become the Lone Star State's largest ethnic group starting next year.

In the USA, we persons of color at least have a Constitution with some protections of our human rights.  I'm not guaranteed of the same thing in a Teapublican run Republic of Texas.

And yeah, we already tried the independence thing and failed at it, which is why we sought to become a US state in 1845 after a decade of it from Mexico.

That's just the short list of reasons why I don't see a Texas secession happening, and I chuckle when the Texas GOP pushes that non-starter idea.



 

Happy Thanksgiving 2015!

Happy Thanksgiving peeps!  Today is the day in which we get our grub on and give thanks for the blessings we have received this year.

It has been an up and down year for me in that department.  While I've been blessed to finally restart my HRT, it also came with finding out that I'd blown up to 275 pounds, my blood pressure was elevated and I was too close to crossing over into diabetic territory.  But it led to me dropping 35 pounds and changing my diet to make that happen.   I'm getting closer to my goal of being down to 210 pounds, and I'm much happier these days now that I'm back to consistently being on my hormones.

Now if only that positivity would cross over into my dating life.

TransGriot is not only approaching its 10th anniversary on January 1, I passed the 6 million hit milestone this year.  Still trying to figure out how I wish to celebrate that 10th anniversary

It also continues to get attention as an informative go to blog, and I thank you TransGriot readers for that.   Megathanks also to those of you who drop some change from time to time in the TransGriot Tip Jar.

I was also blessed to get to attend and participate in a few major conferences this year.  I got to attend Creating Change for the second straight year in Denver, another LGBT Media Journalists Convening that happened in Philly, an anti violence conference in Chicago that coincided with the reveal of this year's Trans 100, the Black Trans Advocacy Conference in Dallas, and OUT on the Hill in DC for the first time since 2012 along with invitations to speak or participate in panels here and elsewhere around the country.

It was an honor, pleasure and a blessing to go to Fantasia Fair for the first time ever and make a little history as the first African-American transperson to be given the Virginia Prince Transgender Pioneer Award.  

I also got to head to the White House again and see some of my trans family at different events and conferences.   I look forward to the next time I get to spend some quality time with y'all at another event inside or outside the Houston area in 2016.

Speaking of family, I realize the holiday season can be a serious downer for many members of the trans family who have been rejected by their blood family.  Their loss.   Do yourselves a favor and hang out today and during this 2015 holiday season with your chosen family and people who unconditionally love you.

And trans fam, be looking out for our trans peeps that may be feeling depressed.  If you can, spend some quality time with them.  You may be preventing a suicide by doing so.

Well, need to figure out where I'm going to get my grub on later.  Hope you TransGriot readers have a wonderful Thanksgiving Day.

Did You Do Your 2015 Fall Back?

Did you set that clock back one hour before you went to bed?   Daylight savings time is ending today until March 13, 2016 when we move those clocks forward again in the USA.

If you don't, you'll be an hour early for everything today and pissed off you didn't take advantage of the time change to get your extra hour of sleep. 

If you're a Republican, set your clocks back one hour, not 100 years.

Thinking About Two Elections

While I'm up here in Provincetown about to spend an enjoyable week here at Fantasia Fair that I am treating like a working vacation.  

I'm also thinking about two elections today

Back home early voting is starting in our mayoral election, and will continue until October 30 in advance of the big day on November 3.  I will be handling my electoral business when I return to H-town to vote YES for Prop 1 and the best candidates to lead my hometown for the next two years.

The one back home is high stakes and will remain contentious until November 3,

But just to the north of me is another high stakes election.  Canadians will be heading to the polls for their federal election today to determine who will get the lion's share of the 338 seats up for grabs in ridings across our northern neighbor and get control of the House of Commons.  Magic number to form a majority government is 170 seats

The polling over the last week seems to indicate that the Liberals and their leader Justin Trudeau are poised to make a historic comeback and either take enough seats to form a majority government or enough to form a minority one.

That was after the polls were showing a virtual tie between the NDP, Grits and Tories back in early August   That's also assuming the polling is accurate.

It is also fortuitous for me that while I am here at Fantasia Fair I will get a chance to discuss the election resullts and the current state of Canadian politics with Miqqi Gilbert.

But you can't count the Conservatives out, especially since they dominate Alberta and Saskatchewan. Nor can you count out the NDP, who are the current Official Opposition thanks to Quebec going NDP in the 2011 cycle and being the beneficiaries of the Liberal and Bloc Quebecois collapse in that cycle.
 

What is clear in 2015 is that Canadians are sick of PM Harper and his Conservative party.   Quebec is a battleground province this time, along with Ontario and the GTA.

The GTA for you Yanks not paying attention to our north of the border neighbors, is the acronym referring to the Greater Toronto Area, in which the Conservatives surprisingly picked up seats in during the 2011 election on their way to collecting enough seats for their majority government.  

The other wild card in this election cycle is this is the first Canadian federal election since 38 seats were added to Parliament.  The new seats added were in British Columbia (6), Alberta (6), Ontario (15) and Quebec (3).

As a result, 87% of the boundary lines for previously existing ridings changed.  We'll have to see what happens politically in not only the 38 new ridings, but the ridings that experienced boundary changes.

And the interesting question that will be answered later tonight is how many people in the respective Canadian major parties will join those party leaders in Parliament?    

Here Comes The SCOTUS 2015-16 Session

It's the first Monday in October, and that means a new Supreme Court term is about to commence that will run until June.

We saw what happened at the end of the 2014-2015 term last June with the landmark Obergfell ruling that legalized same sex marriage across the nation and still has the wingers in a tizzy.  

What SCOTUS ruling will come out of this 2015-16 session and cases they have agreed to hear that will please some people and piss others off since we are still stuck with a 5-4 conservafool leaning majority?  

Will there be another landmark ruling in this 2015-16 session?.

This is also where I remind y'all that the upcoming 2016 presidential election is all about what shape the SCOTUS takes for the rest of your lives and much of your children's lives.

So here come the SCOTUS judges in a few hours.

Not Feeling Pope Francis' USA Visit

While I was in Washington DC, I discovered that I was staying a mere two blocks from St. Matthew's Cathedral, where Pope Francis is scheduled to have a private prayer event at noon with the US bishops.   St. Matthew's Cathedral FYI was where President John F. Kennedy's funeral was held after his assassination in 1963.

St. Matthew's Cathedral is also two blocks down Rhode Island Ave NW from HRC headquarters. After I noticed in the waning moments of a Thursday #OOTH2015 panel discussion news cameras rolling up and taking shots of the side of the headquarters building, I went outside and noticed this huge banner hanging on the side of the building facing St. Matthews.

While the media and many people are going gaga over Pope Francis and think he is this progressive figure vis a vis Pope Benedict  in the Catholic Church, frankly I and some of my trans kindred aren't feeling him and the hoopla surrounding the pontiff's trip and today's stop in Washington DC.

While I agree with Pope Francis on some of the things he has called out, I have a major problem with his anti-trans rhetoric. When it comes to transgender human rights issues,.many trans folks see no difference between Pope Frank and his predecessor.

We trans peeps haven't been feeling the love from the Roman Catholic Church since 2003, when Paul McHugh successfully implanted anti-trans dogma into the Vatican, and that anti-trans hate has spread to the flock.

It's difficult to nearly impossible to feel warm and fuzzy about someone who has publicly compared your very existence to nuclear weapons. and has done little to reverse or cease and desist with the anti-trans dogma contaminating the Roman Catholic church conversations about trans people since 2003.

It's even more problematic for me because I am a Christian.

Y'all and the media may consider him 'the people's Pope', but it's obvious from the Roman Catholic Church perspective that trans people aren't included in being considered people.  I'm finding something else to watch because the all pope at the time saturation news coverage is irritating me.

The anti-trans hatred preached from Catholic pulpits and uttered by Pope Benedict, Pope Francis and other Catholic leaders from the Vatican to the local parish I believe is a factor in why trans murders in Brazil, Central America and much of Latin America have exponentially increased.

And I hope the trans folks who get to meet him at the White House convey to Pope Francis and others in that room just how pissed off we trans folks worldwide are about those comments and how they contribute to anti-trans hatred and violence not only here in the US but around the world.

The rest of y'all can go swoon over Pope Francis and succumb to Popemania.   Because frankly, I'm not feeling him,