Trans Americans Will Be Allowed To Enlist on January 1

Despite Trump and his white supremacist fundie allies desires to mess with our ability to serve our country, on January 1, 2018 the Pentagon will allow any qualified transgender American to enlist in the US Armed Forces. 

You will have to have been on hormones for 18 months to do so.

Trans people serve  in our armed forces at a higher rate than our cis counterparts, and there are currently over 15,500 active duty trans people serving our country in various capacities. 

There are several lawsuits pending to squash the Trump transgender service ban he announced via Twitter back in July.   Two US district federal court judges have already ruled against the ban and shut down a last ditch attempt by the Trump administration to keep transgender Americans from enlisting as the cases wind their way through the federal judiciary.

Pentagon spokesperson Maj. David Eastburn stated that the enlistment of trans American citizens would commence on January 1 and would continue even as the cases are litigated in the federal court system.

So if you're a trans person who meets the qualifications for service in our armed forces and wish to do, then you can head to your nearest recruiting center to start the process.

A Historic 2017 Election Night For Transkind

Today is the first anniversary of, well you all know what tragically happened on this day.

But last night's elections were part of a Democratic tsunami that saw them regain control of the Washington state Senate, come close to taking back the House of Delegate in Virginia, sweep the executive offices in VA, keep the New York City mayor's chair, and flip the governor's mansion in New Jersey back to the Democrats.

That 2017 Democratic political tsunami also helped several trans candidates rack up historic wins.

Andrea Jenkins became the first trans person of any ethnic background to win a city council seat in a major city when she won her War 8 set with a whopping 73% of the vote..

As impressive as Jenkins win was, she could soon be joined on the Minneapolis City Council by Phillipe Cunningham who is also poised to make history.

Cunningham took on a 20 year incumbent who is also the current council president in Barb Johnson. After the first round of voting in Minneapolis' ranked choice system was only trailing her in this race by a mere 120 votes.   The winner of the Ward 4 council seat will be determined either today or in the next few days. 

Should Cunningham win, it would not only be a political earthquake level win in Minneapolis, he would become the first Black trans man in the US to be elected to public office and, like Jenkins, the first of any ethnic background to be elected to the city council of a major city.

And as many of you are already aware of, Danica Roem slayed her legislative dragon in Bigot Bob Marshall, and it wasn't close.   She beat him by ten percentage points 55%-45% to win her landmark VA 13 House of Delegates race.

There were some other trans folks who rn for office in 2017 who didn't capture the headlines, but were ultimately successful in their runs for public office 

Tyler Titus ran for and won one of the four open seats on the Erie, PA school board last night, becoming the first out trans person to win elective office in the state of Pennsylvania.

In a concrete example of every vote counts, Stephe Koontz won her race for the Doraville, GA City Council Position 3 seat by a mere six votes.

If seven of her voters had stayed home, we wouldn't be calling her Councilmember-elect Koontz today

Out west in California, there was another historic election happening with a trans candidate at the center of it. 

Lisa Middleton became the first out trans candidate to run for and win a non judicial race ( Judge Vicky Kolakowski made that history in Alameda County back in 2012) when she won a seat on the Palm Springs, CA City Council.   One of the people who endorsed Councilmember-elect Middleton was former US Senator Barbara Boxer. 

It was also a big night for Trans United Fund, who backed Roem, Jenkins, Cunningham and Browde, and had two huge breakthrough political wins with a possible third one being determined as you read this. .

TUF was on the ground in Virginia, Minnesota and New York for over a year.  The largest independent It was critical in Phillipe's Ward 4 race and may be the decisive factor should he win this race against 20 year incumbent and Council President Barb Johnson. 

The phone banking, fundraising, mailing, the canvassing all powered by a trans led political organization and its coalition partners with the goal of building and growing sustained trans political power.

It wasn't all wonderful news on this November 7 night for trans political candidates.  Chrissie Browde narrowly lost her race in New Castle, NY by a mere 264 votes.  Hope she tries again in another election cycle.

Thanks to all of the people who stepped up in this cycle to run for office in their various locales and all the folks who helped them get across the finish line.  Whether you were successful or not as a tran candidate in 2017, the message that you undeniably sent was that we are part of our various communities, and we aren't going away. 

Another message you sent to our right-wing opposition was that pushing anti-trans hate for electoral advantage may not be a wise political strategy.  A growing list of Republican ex-politicians including Pat McCrory (NC), Debbie Riddle and Gilbert Pena (TX), Lee Bright (SC) and now Bob Marshall are real time examples of transphobia costing you your political career. 

You also sent a positive message to our trans kids that helps expands their horizons concerning what is possible for a trans person born in the US. 

You 2017 trans candidates whether you spectacularly won or narrowly lost, sent the message to our trans kids that one day, should you decide you wish to go into politics, you too can run and win public office.

And that's what makes this an important and historic election night for trans kind. 

Dawn Still Needs Help To Rep Team USA In Slovenia

I posted this back on August 6 about my homegirl Dawn Wilson  qualifying for the USA veterans fencing world championship team and trying to raise $3,000 to cover the expenses for her upcoming trip to maribor, Slovenia and the FIE Veterans World Fencing tournament set to kick off there on October 15.

So far she's only raised a little over $1,200 of the $3500 she's set as the target that she wishes to reach.

I know we have had several natural disasters that have gotten people's deserved attention.   but can y'all spear $1, $5, $10, $20 or more if you can to help her reach her goal.

Help a sister out so she can get to Slovenia and have a shot at bringing home world championship  gold (or silver, or bronze)

Here's the link to the GoFundMe 

Seattle Nazi Gets Knocked The F*** Out

One of the things that I have noticed since the disastrous November 8 election that put 45 in the White House is the uptick in white supremacists feeling empowered to spout racist invective and act on expressing their bigot gene.

One enterprising white supremacist fool decided to do so in Seattle recently.  The still unidentified idiot was tracked by anti-fascists via social media as he rode the D Line and walked around the city proudly wearing a Nazi armband as he harassing people minding their own business.

After messing with a Black passenger on a Seattle bus, he got into a confrontation with other passersby who objected to his armband.

Then he made the mistake of stepping to another Black man who wasn't having it and knocked his white supremacist behind out cold with once punch.

'Master race' ,huh?  First your leader Richard Spencer gets punched, and now your weak behind gets put to sleep with one blow to the face.  

When y'all Nazis gonna learn not to phuck with Black people in this country?   Night -night white supremacist fool.

Here's another beautiful video of another Nazi getting knocked the f*** out to brighten your day.

H/T  Alternet.org, BuzzFeed

  

Help Dawn Represent Team USA!

I've talked more than a few times on this blog about the fencing exploits of my Louisville homegirl Dawn Wilson, and me getting to tag along and watch from time to time when I lived in Da Ville.

She's good at it as well.  Dawn donates her time to a lot of worthy causes in the Louisville area in addition to serving on the Louisville Metro Human Relations Commission and as an elder at her church.

But her passion is fencing.  She is one of the top five 5 ranked veterans saberists in the USA, and recently she accomplished a long sought after goal of qualifying for and making a USA Veterans national fencing team.

She now gets a long sought after opportunity to prove she's one of the best in the world.      

That USA Veterans fencing team will be competing in the FIE Veterans Fencing World Championship tournament in Maribor, Slovenia October 15-21, and it will be an expensive trip for travel and lodging while she's there.  Dawn can cover some of her expenses, but to be at her absolute best, she would also like to bring her coach with her.  

The goal is to raise $3,500 and you can click on this link to the GoFundMe page to donate whatever you can afford and whenever you can do so.  

Help her get to Slovenia for this tournament and rep Team USA to the best of her ability.

Trump Reinstates Trans Military Service Ban

Every day Donald Trump proves what those of us who were paying attention during the 2016 presidential election already knew.  That he is not only incompetent and unfit to be POTUS, but was no friend of the TBLGQ community

Today he unleashed a series of tweets in which he stated that the armed forces ban on transgender military service that had been rescinded just last year by President Obama was being reinstated citing the BS reason of costs.

It's also bitterly ironic that he did so on the same day 69 years ago that President Harry S. Truman issued the executive order that desegregated the US military in 1948.

Two studies done by the RAND Corporation in June 2016 and another that was done in September 2015 and published in the New England Journal of Medicine basically came to the same conclusions that the medical gender transition costs that Trump and Republican opponents rail against would be minimal.

The RAND Corporation study estimated that there were 1,320 to 6,630 active duty trans service members, and projected that those costs would be $2.4 million to $8.4 million, which is only a 0.04 to 0.13 % increase in the budget.  

It also pointed out that not all current active duty trans military service members would seek gender transitioning treatment, and that 0.1%  of those service members would seek treatments that could delay a deployment.

The September 2015 study estimated that it would cost $4.2 million to $5.6 million and of the 12,500 service members, less than 200 would seek medical gender transition related care.

The US military's annual healthcare budget is $47.8 billion dollars.

The brand new aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford at $13 billion cost more to build than the negligible annual transition related healthcare for trans service members.

And I feel today for all those trans veterans like Carla, who proudly served this country and fought for your right to hate us. 

One of those 15,000 military trans people you peeps are hating on, is serving out nation and currently deployed in Air Force SSgt Logan Ireland.  He had this to say about the announcement.

"For my President to deny an able bodied, fully qualified person the inherent right to raise their right hand and serve their country, potentially giving their own life for our freedoms, is doing this country an injustice. I would love for my President to meet me so I can tell him about the 15,500 honorably serving transgender military members that are fighting right now for their liberties and for their country." -Air Force SSgt Logan Ireland

It most definitely is an injustice to not allow trans Americans to serve their nation like everyone else who gets the choice to do.  18 other nations allow their trans citizens to serve in their military

It's also infuriating to me as a trans African American to hear the same lies that were told to attempt to justify Jim Crow military segregation being retooled to aim at transpeople who wish to openly serve our country.

But then again 45 and his party don't care about your human rights unless you are a white male wealthy Republican.

50th Anniversary of Loving v. Virginia SCOTUS Case

Today is the 50th anniversary of the US Supreme Court dropping the landmark Loving v Virginia case decision which killed the laws prohibiting interracial marriage in this county.

The case was brought by an interracial couple, Mildred and Richard Loving, who had gotten married in Washington DC in 1958 and returned to Virginia to live.   They were arrested, tried and convicted in the town of Bowling Green, VA for violating the white supremacist 1924 Racial Integrity Act.

They were sentenced to a year in jail, but the sentence was suspended under the condition that the Lovings leave Virginia and not return for 30 years not even to visit family.  

The Lovings moved to Washington DC, and Mildred Loving wrote a letter to then Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy appealing for help in their case.

That letter was forwarded to the ACLU,  whose lawyers subsequently filed the legal case that went to the Supreme Court.   On June 12, 1967 the SCOTUS unanimously ruled that Virginia's laws against interracial marriage violated the 14th Amendment and were unconstitutional.  

That ruling overturned similar laws still on the books in 16 states, and led to a surge of interracial marriages.  In addition, the precedent set in the Loving v Virginia case was cited in several cases holding that restrictions on same sex marriage in the United States was unconstitutional, including the 2015 Obergefell v Hodges SCOTUS decision.

In fact, Mildred Loving on the 40th anniversary of the case commented about the then same sex marriage battle that was raging and winding its way through the courts.

"I believe all Americans, no matter their race, no matter their sex, no matter their sexual orientation, should have that same freedom to marry. Government has no business imposing some people’s religious beliefs over others. Especially if it denies people’s civil rights."

Richard Loving died in 1975 and Mildred Loving died in 2008, so they didn't get to see that legal precedent they set by standing up against injustice being used to strike down injustice against another group of marginalized Americans.

And in the United States today, one in every six married couples is an interracial one and I know more than a few of those couples in my own life.

So while this case wasn't exclusively about love conquering all as the movie Loving would have you believe, this case at its core was about striking down white supremacist oppression and an unjust law.

At the same time, to borrow a line from Battlestar Galactica, you cannot declare war on love.

The Most Unfriendly LGBT President Ever

The turning of the calendar page to June also means that it's the start of Pride Month, and we have gotten spoiled over the last eight years by having a president who is cognizant of that.

It was this time last year I had gotten the invitation to go to the LGBT Pride Reception and I was scrambling to try to get to DC for it.

That's not the case with 45 despite the fact during the campaign he promised he would be 'the most LGBT friendly president in history'.

Like all his other campaign promises, that has turned out to be a lie.   We already had the best president ever when it came to LGBT rights issues in the previous occupant of the White House at that time in Barack Obama.

Trump stocking his campaign advisory team with long time LGBT haters like Mike Pence, other professional gay baiters and right wing hate pastors telegraphed to me and everyone else paying attention except the Log Cabin Sellouts that this would not be an administration that we could count on, much less would be inviting us to his White House for a Pride Reception.

If there were any folks in LGBTQ World holding out hope that Trump was going to live up to his campaign rhetoric, that died June 1 when he failed to put out a proclamation for Pride Month as President Obama had done for every year of his presidency.

And I was saying while in attendance at last year's Pride Reception that if Hillary didn't win, this would probably be the last one until possibly 2021.

Damn I hate it when I'm right.

Trump Gets Snubbed By British Parliament

One of the lies that Trump told during his scampaign is that President Obama was 'hated around he world' and he would bring honor and respect to the presidency.

Really?  President Obama left office with mad respect in much of the world,  a Nobel Peace Prize and a 57% approval rating at home.

It only took Trump eight days to undo the eight years of hard work President Obama has done to restore our international rep damaged by the GW Bush presidency.  World leaders were horrified about the prospect of you becoming POTUS even before you got elected.

There were protests across the planet including Antarctica specifically aimed at you just one day into your mispresidency.  

It must be galling to Trump, his massive ego and his fact free minions that he will not get to do something that President Obama did during his first POTUS term in speaking to a joint session of the British Parliament at Westminster Hall

President Obama, BTW was the first American POTUS ever to be given that honor.

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John Bercow, the Speaker of the House of Commons, has announced that because of his racist and sexist attitudes, he will not be extended an invitation to speak to a joint session of Parliament.  .

Speaker Bercow said he was 'strongly opposed' to Trump speaking to the House of Commons and that being invited to speak before Parliament is not an 'automatic right' but an 'earned privilege'.

In addition to this being a huge embarrassment to Trump, it's also a political headache for British PM Theresa May, who invited him come to Great Britain during her US visit    This also comes as 2 million Britons have signed a petition urging that the state visit not happen

Somewhere in northwest DC President Obama is probably laughing at you.

And so am I.

Boy Scouts To Allow Transmasculine Boys To Join

Some good news today from an unexpected source in the Boy Scouts of America.

The BSA has had a longstanding ban on transgender people joining the Cub and Boy Scouts by determining eligibility based on the gender listed on the birth certificate.  

They have announced that they will now base eligibility for joining the Cub and Boy Scouts on the gender listed on the application.

This is probably being driven by the case of transmasculine child Joe Maldonado.    He was expelled from a Cub Scout chapter in New Jersey because of his trans status, and his family is contemplating a lawsuit for violation of New Jersey's human rights law in which gender identity is a protected class.

Whatever made the BSA change their minds on their trans policy, it was overdue and necessary.

So Bernie, Stein and Johnson Voters, Enjoying The Presidency You Enabled?

So Bernie, Stein and Johnson voters, after four days of this disastrous presidency that is worse than I even foresaw, I have one question for you.

Do you still delusionally think that Hillary Clinton is 'worse than Trump'?

Hey, Clinton, her supporters  President Obama and yours truly tried to warn y'all before November 8, but y'all were all into your foaming at the mouth Hillary hate and your fee fees.  Well, your irrational hatred of her and third party votes are going to cost us all the progressive progress we've made

You had the right to vote third party and cast your votes however you wished to do so.   But 2016 was not the year for a protest vote or trying to dismiss what Hillary, President Obama and others were saying on the campaign as 'scare tactics'.

And if you're upset because I'm once again pointing out y'all are responsible, and especially if you lived in a swing state for enabling this disgusting presidency, too damn bad.

Well, after four days of this Trump misadministration, are you scared for this country now?.

America Is Going To Miss You

Goodbye Mr. President and Madame First Lady

Darkness descends upon this land at 12:01 PM EST

Why I'm Still Pissed At The Bernie Or Busters & Third Party Voters

Yep, still pissed off over the results of the 2016 election and specifically at two groups, the Bernie or Busters and third party voters.   Your talking points, excuses, and spin are getting more annoying and aggravating by the day as you realize too late just how badly you screwed this country up over your white privileged fee fees.

One of the excuses I'm so tired of Bernie or Busters regurgitating is the 'Hillary was a terrible candidate' lie.   Yeah, she was so terrible she got 3 million more votes nationally than Trumplethinskin.

The bottom line is you are responsible for greasing the skids for the election of Donald Trump

No, it's not about those who chose not to vote, who were suppressed from doing so or whatever other excuse that you are trying to float out there to make yourself feel better about greasing the skids for the Trump presidency.

I'm tired of people (and predominately far left white people) trying to riverdance away from the fact they let lies about Hillary Clinton cloud their electoral judgment and enabled his election.

I'm also tired of them ignoring the fact that white supremacist racism also played a role in his election along with a heaping helping of sexism and misogyny.

But then again, the Bernie or Busters are probably ignoring it because they engaged in those tactics themselves in the Democratic primary and gave Trump a road map to follow to attack her in his campaign.

It's about those folks who knew that Hillary Clinton was the only thing standing between us and a Trump presidency with the SCOTUS and everything else at stake, and you STILL voted third party with the dubious 'I'm voting my principles' excuse.

So I hope those vanillacentric privilege flavored 'principles' keep you comforted when the latest Trump/GOP/conservative movement outrage happens.   It is marginalized and non-white Americans who are going to suffer and have our human rights attacked first because of your 'principles'.

I have nothing but contempt for you, especially if you voted third party in a swing state knowing the potential consequences of that vote simply to salve your ego.  Your boy Sanders got his azz whipped in the Democratic primary by Hillary Clinton because he ran a campaign that didn't connect with non-white voters

I'm even more pissed off about the results because I lived through this bad movie before in 2000 when you far lefties didn't think Vice President Al Gore was ideologically pure enough for you.

Y'all went gaga for Ralph Nader, who didn't have a prayer of winning, and we ended up with George W. Bush as a result.   Now we have someone headed to the White House that's worse than Dubya.

And to comment on something else that I've heard in liberal-progressive world post election is the 'Hillary didn't excite me' comment.  Why should you have to be 'excited about a candidate' in order to vote for them? That's another bull feces laden excuse.

Black voters have had long lists of Democratic candidates at all levels of government who didn't excite them, but unlike you Green Tea Party peeps, we think and act strategically because we are quite aware that the Republican Party has been hostile to us for the last 40 years.

We would rather have someone in office we can persuade to see our policy point of view at least 80% of the time than a Republican who will ignore us 100% of the time and act as a legislative oppressor.

That person in this cycle that a majority of the Black community collectively we saw as persuadable was Hillary Clinton.   

Because we didn't want the Trumpenfuhrer to succeed President Obama, this election was deeply personal for to me and many African Americans.   That was also the case for the Latinx and Muslim community   It was also deeply personal for those of us in Trans America, because our humanity and human rights were on the ballot.   Whoever won this election would basically determine how our lives and human rights would play out over the next four years.

But you fauxgressives proved once and for all that the only thing that matters is your feelings, and not the liberal progressive causes you profess to support.

You peeps knew the stakes of this election and how important it was.  Republicans weren't enamored of Trump either, but on November 8 they got in formation and pulled the lever for him because they understand something that far too many people on the left ignorantly don't.

If you don't get your candidates elected, you can't push your policy agenda. Neither can you get liberal progressive policies from a conservative government.  

Unfortunately, that lesson is going to made crystal clear over the next four years because of your fauxgressive lack of political vision..

Happy Thanksgiving 2016

It's a bittersweet Thanksgiving for many of us in Trans World today.

While we've made some amazing progress this year, the adverse results of the 2016 presidential election will put much of that progress at rsk starting on January 20 with an incoming (yuck) Republican administration  

But today, not going to focus on that looming political drama, will have time to do that later.  I'm going to just focus on counting my blessings.

I am blessed to have good health, loyal friends, and my family blood and chosen in my life.  I have had the blessings in 2016 of traveling to every corner of the country except the Pacific Northwest and the southeast US.

I have been blessed with multiple awards and making history in getting one of them.  I have in 2016  stood inside the White House (for the fifth time), on the campus of Harvard University, outside of the site of San Francisco's Compton's Cafeteria, and on the historic Chautauqua Institution amphitheater stage with Janet Mock.

I got to attend Creating Change for the third consecutive year, the Black Trans Advocacy Conference at their new hotel, the Philly Trans Health Conference and Netroots Nation for the first time since 2012 and another Texas Transgender Nondiscrimination Summit as its keynote speaker.  I even got the opportunity on Election Night to talk politics on live television on a TV station I grew up watching in ABC13.

One of the blessings I received in 2016 is getting to meet and talk to our trans youth in Houston and around the country along with their amazing parents.

The blessing I want for our community here in the United States and around the world is to have our humanity and human rights recognized, respected and protected .

Don't know yet what 2017 has in store for me besides some trips to Austin staring in January, but hope I finally get to meet more of the transpeople on my bucket list like Lauren Foster and Caroline Cossey for starters, get to speak at a few more events on college campuses, keynote some conferences, and finally get to put my GLAAD media training and Pundit Cup Championship punditry skills to good use on behalf of this community on a regular basis.

And oh yeah, did I mention the amazing people in my life that I call my friends?

Happy Thanksgiving people!   May your holiday meal be tasty, the people you share it with be full of grace and good cheer, and you have safe travels to and from your holiday destinations.

And for those of you who will not be breaking bread with your families, may you do so with chosen family, friends and people who love you..

Joy Reid Breaks Down What Trump Voters Won and Lost

 I love Joy Reid, her AM joy MSNBC show, and her on point commentary about many issues of the day.

She breaks it down what Trump voters won and lost and what you third party voters enabled on Tuesday.

If You Voted Third Party, You Voted For Trump.

I'm not in the mood to hear today or for the next four years any weak justifications from people who voted third party yesterday knowing that the third party votes they cast was a vote for Trump.

I don't want to hear the bull feces laden excuses that 'she was a terrible candidate', 'the DNC failed', 'that's what they get for screwing Bernie'  or whatever lie du jour you predominately white peeps who voted third party are telling yourselves right now to attempt to justify to me and other non-white Americans you screwed with your vote for the unqualified white man who is your future POTUS.

Save all your excuses.  I heard them back in 2000.    Let's crunch the numbers shall we?/
Thanks to Lilly Andersen for compiling them and posting them on her FB page.

*To the 5% of people in Arizona who voted third party- if you had voted for Hillary, that’s 11 electoral votes that would have gone to her.
*To the 3% of people in Florida who voted third party- if you had voted for Hillary, that’s 29 electoral votes that would have gone to her.
*To the 5.5% of people in Michigan who voted third party- if you had voted for Hillary, that’s 16 electoral votes that would have gone to her.
*To the 5% of people in New Hampshire who voted third party- if you had voted for Hillary, that’s 4 electoral votes that would have gone to her.
*To the 3.3% of people in Pennsylvania who voted third  party- if you had voted for Hillary, that’s 20 electoral votes that would have gone to her.
*To the 5.7% of people in Wisconsin who voted third party- if you had voted for Hillary, that’s 10 electoral votes that would have gone to her.

That is 90 electoral votes, more than enough to make Hillary president.   But instead you chose to subject the country for whatever selfish reason to an unqualified white male.   You knew this man was racist, misogynistic, sexist, and was widely reviled by non-white Americans who were telling you for months we openly feared what would happen if he became president, and you still voted for Trump anyway.

There is nothing you can say to me right now to justify that and the damage that we'll be trying to clean up from this electoral mess for the next 25-30 years.

Your third party votes greased the skids for a man endorsed by the Klan to become president.   By casting those votes, you enabled and cosigned his racist campaign strategy and ensured it will be used in future GOP campaigns..

Those of us in non-white America and TBLGQ World had to explain to our crying children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews who were already being bullied at school before Trump got elected that this man was going to be the next POTUS.

So spare me from now on that American exceptionalism bull feces.  You elected another failed white businessman with no political experience to the White House over a woman who was supremely qualified for the job.   Everybody else except white men have to be exceptional for the Oval Office, that's the message you sent to me and every other non white person in this county.
Your third party votes also set up the disgusting spectacle the world will witness on January 20 of President Obama having to hand over power to the man who disrespected him and his presidency for 8 years.

You peeps who voted third party still failed to meet the target for federal funding in 2020, so congratulations, you're still in the same boat you were in prior to this election. Was it worth throwing away a shot at liberal progressive control of the Senate and the SCOTUS?   From where non-white Americans like me sit, hell no it wasn't.

So frack you Jill Stein, Gary Johnson and your third party for putting me, the TBLGQ community, Latinx, Muslims, Asians, Native Americans, the disabled and every other marginalized American in jeopardy because your vanillacentric privileged political vanity was more important than keeping an unqualified candidate in Trump our of the White House.

You get to own Trump and whatever he and the GOP control of the federal government does to the country over the next four years.

Seven More Days

The calendar has flipped to November, and we now have seven more days in this historic presidential campaign between former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

Seven more days.

Seven more days until the most contentious presidential election in modern US history s over.   Seven more days until other states without early voting get to finally choose between two vastly different candidates.   Seven more days until the trans community and everyone else discovers what direction this country is going to travel.

For those of us who are trans, or non white, or women, or marginalized, these next seven days will be nerve wracking and stress inducing.

Seven more days to make plans to get out the vote, or if you are in an early voting state like Texas, continue to bumrush the polls until early voting ends on Friday.

Seven more days until we can exhale,

 

Clinton Decisively Wins Second Presidential Debate

The second presidential debate turned out as expected with Donald Trump lying through his teeth once again in addition to having some WTF moments.

Trump at one point is standing uncomfortably close to Clinton during that debate after admitting to co-moderator Anderson Cooper that he doesn't understand what sexual assault is.

As usual, any time Trump was asked a direct question, he didn't answer it and deflected to attacking Clinton.   He also attacked a Clinton that last ran and won re-election presidency in 1996 in Bill.

But Bill isn't running, it's his wife.   What Bill Clinton did 20 years ago isn't for debate in 2016.  That was dealt with back in the 90's.   Donald is the one running for POTUS, and it's your character that is being evaluated.
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Despite the pathetic attempts of the conservative leaning pundits to attempt to call this a 'win' for Trump, it wasn't, especially when you make the jaw dropping statement that you're going to throw your political opponent in jail and you 'have the utmost respect' for women when it's been glaringly obvious in this campaign and throughout your life you don't .

While co-moderators Martha Raddatz of ABC and Anderson Cooper of CNN did yeoman's work in keeping this debate from spinning out of control and devolving into a WWE cage match, one of the things I didn't like is the fact that despite being less than 30 minutes from Ferguson, MO, not one question was asked during this 93 minute debate about police reform or #Black Lives Matter.

Neither were their any questions asked about LGBTQ rights or what either candidate would do to protect and defend the human rights of transgender Americans.

And with Chris Wallace of FOX News moderating the final debate in Las Vegas on October 19, I doubt any questions on those two subjects will be asked at that debate either.

But once again, a great night for Clinton, with another decisive debate win despite the appearance more combative but still facts free Trump.

Final debate on the UNLV campus will be interesting to see play out.