Blaming the Victim: Portrayal of Florida Man Killed for Being Gay Doesn’t Ring True

William Brown, left, and Joseph Bearden, after their arrests in the killing of Ryan Skipper
William Brown, left, and Joseph Bearden, after their arrests in the killing of Ryan Skipper

It sounds like the Matthew Shepard story all over again, this time in Florida.

The body of a gay man, 25-year-old Ryan Keith Skipper, was found dumped on the side of the road last week in the flyover country between Tampa and Orlando, stabbed 20 times. Two men have been charged with the killing, which police are investigating as a hate crime.

The local paper, the Lakeland Ledger, quotes Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd as being unequivocal on the victim’s intentions.

“What we do know is that Ryan was out looking to pick up someone that evening,” Judd said.

The scenario doesn’t add up, friends say

Skipper was driving around Wahneta on Tuesday night when he found [21-year-old Joseph] Bearden walking along Sixth Street in Eloise about 11 p.m. Tuesday, and offered him a ride. The two went back to Skipper’s house, where they smoked marijuana and discussed using Skipper’s computer to copy checks, according to the Sheriff’s Office.

The scenario from the local news being disseminated to regional and national outlets, is that the victim, himself a lowlife, was out trolling for a hook-up and made a move on the wrong hombres. But almost nothing in that story adds up, according to people who knew him.

That’s where it starts to get kind of Pulp Fiction.

They left Skipper’s house with his laptop and went to another home, at 110 First St. in Wahneta, to meet [20-year-old William] Brown.

“At this time, they decided to rip Ryan off for his car and his laptop,” Judd said…

Judd said Brown and Bearden attacked Skipper inside his own car. His body was left by the side of the road, stabbed nearly 20 times.

The two suspects then drove to another home at 2131 Cypress Gardens Road, where they discarded some papers from the car. Their next stop was at 16 28th St. S. in Haines City to try to clean up the vehicle.

“The car was full of blood because the homicide had occurred in the vehicle,” Judd said.

Eventually, the paper said, after “parading” the car around and bragging to friends, the suspects abandoned it on a dock near a lake in the town of Winter Haven.

After they were taken into custody, homophobia was introduced as the motive for the murder and robbery.

Several more witnesses also were interviewed Friday night, and it was during one of those interviews that Brown’s admission was revealed.

“William Brown told (a witness) that Ryan Skipper was messing with him, that Ryan Skipper was a homosexual, so (he) killed him,” Judd said.

So much for the official story. […]

Testimony in ‘Denver Three’ Case Reveals White House Deceptions

Last month, testimony in the Scooter Libby trial revealed that former White House spokesman Scott McClellan knowingly lied when he told reporters that neither Libby and Karl Rove had anything to do with leaking of the name of a covert C.I.A. agent. This week, testimony in another court case, this one in Denver, has exposed another deliberate on-the-record lie by McClellan, as well as the legally questionable practice of White House operatives allegedly impersonating Secret Service agents at public events.

Results of a separate investigation into whether White House staffers impersonated Secret Service agents were swept under the rug by the U.S. Attorney’s office in Denver.

The case concerns the expulsion by White House operatives of three non-Republicans, Leslie Weise, Karen Bauer and Alex Young, from a January 2005 appearance by Pres. George Bush in Denver. The event was taxpayer-funded, and the three taxpayers had tickets. Nonetheless the “Denver Three” were escorted out of the area by volunteer Republican Party operatives. Later, men dressed like Secret Service agents told them that they were tossed out because they had arrived in a car with a bumper sticker that read, “No More Blood for Oil.”

On March 30, 2005, McClellan blamed the expulsion of the three suspected liberals on the Republican volunteers:

… I did look into that a little bit more yesterday … My understanding is that it was a volunteer involved in that matter. My sense is that the volunteer thought that these individuals, these three individuals were coming to the event to disrupt it. And those individuals — I think if you look at some of the early news reports even said something to that effect.

Questioned under oath last week, the volunteers said their orders came from the White House staff members. Reporters contacted the staffers who both said they were following White House policy:

A former White House official who ordered three activists expelled from a 2005 Denver public forum with President Bush says it was White House policy to exclude potentially-disruptive guests from Bush’s appearances nationwide.

The former official, Steve Atkiss, revealed the policy today in an interview after two volunteer bouncers identified him and a current White House staffer, Jamie O’Keefe, as the officials who ordered the so-called “Denver Three” activists sent away.

Atkiss is now a U.S. Department of Homeland Security chief of staff.

McClellan cast blame on the volunteers knowing that they were just following orders — knowing all along that it that suspected dissenters were always barred from Dear Leader’s presence.

An earlier investigation in the matter revealed that the Secret Service agents were actually White House staffers:

The Secret Service later investigated whether a Republican volunteer committed a crime of impersonating a federal agent. The U.S. Attorney’s office in Denver declined to press charges, giving no explanation.

Swept under the rug.

Saving Marriage: Life Sentences for Adulterers, Forced Annulments for Childlessness

There have been two exciting developments recently in the campaign to protect marriage. In Ohio and Michigan wingnuts are pushing adultery laws with life-sentence penalties. In Washington state, liberals have proposed a law that prohibits infertile couples from marrying and annuls marriages that have not produced children after three years.

Count me in. I’m strongly in favor of both these efforts, and believe they warrant serious debate.

Criminalizing Adultery

Rightwing anti-marriage activists say that allowing same-sex couples to wed would destroy the institution of marriage.

But any rational observer would say that it isn’t homos who are wrecking marriage, it’s adulterers who cause most marriages to fail. And since about half of marriages end in divorce, we can surmise that there is a whole lot of adultery going on.

If conservatives feel as strongly as they say they do, why not make adultery punishable by death?

I have long been an advocate of taking the anti-marriage right at its word and criminalizing adultery — after all, it’s in the Bible. One of the Big Ten: Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery.

Conversely, nowhere in the Ten Commandments does it say Thou shalt not be gay. In fact, there is nothing of any consequence about gay sex in either Testament.

I was surprised to learn last week that several states already (or, rather, still) have laws on the books against adultery. In Michigan, the penalty for sexual misconduct is a life sentence.

Now we’re talking!

[…]

Wingnut Crackpot Encourages Crystal Balling – Flood his Web Site, Please

Right of right: Our favorite Goldwater conservative, Richard Viguerie, has issued a challenge to the dozen or so idiots who subscribe to his e-mail newsletter (disclaimer: I just do it for Pensito Review) to gaze deeply into their crystal balls and predict the outcome of the midterms. If you’re a good prognosticator, you’ll get your name posted on Viguerie’s Web site (a dubious achievement sure to wreck your future career opportunities, love life and social network).

So, gentle reader, go to the Vig’s site and lodge a ludicrous prediction (Mark Foley ascends to the presidency! John Kerry doesn’t blow the election for the Democrats!) to consume bandwidth and hopefully aggravate Richie’s hemorhoids. Come on, it will be fun! Let’s get out there and betray some conservatives, kids!

Dear Concerned Citizen,

Regardless of how you’d like the November 7th election to come out, what do you think the results will actually be?

Go to the Conservatives Betrayed website at http://www.conservativesbetrayed.com/survey_110106.php and make your predictions on the key races around the country for Senator, House of Representatives, and Governor.

The top five predictors can have their names and pictures on the websites to recognize their abilities and election seers.

Good luck in predicting the outcome of the elections!

Cordially,

Richard A. Viguerie

Foley, Gannon Gay GOP Scandals Are Minor Compared with 1989 Call Boy Sex Ring with Ties Inside Bush White House

(Via BuzzFlash.net and The Law Party)

In a February 1989 raid on a gay escort service, the Secret Service showed up and confiscated key evidence. Law enforcement officials said that involvement of the Secret Service in a local operation was highly unusual and had never happened before.

Forget Mark Foley’s electronic dalliances with underage pages and the dozens of White House visits by gay GOP prostitute, Jeff “Bulldog” Gannon — the biggest gay Republican scandal to date was the uncovering in 1989 of multiple gay prostitution services that billed tens of thousands of dollars to credit cards belonging to powerful men inside the Bush and Reagan administrations — including top staffers, military officers and lobbyists. The scandal was revealed in late June 1989, and then just as quickly was swept under the rug and has barely been mentioned since.

If you think this sounds outlandish, consider the original source: The story was broken on June 29, 1989, by the ultraconservative Washington Times newspaper, which is of course owned by Korean rightwing cult leader, Rev. Sun Yung Moon. The lead reporter on the story was Paul M. Rodriguez, who is known for the rightwing slant of his reporting.

The article was edited by Wesley Pruden, then the Times’ managing editor, now its editor-in-chief. In it, Pruden, who makes on secret of his conservative, even neo-Confederate, views, made it clear that higher-ups in the Reagan and Bush administrations would be protected — the paper would only reveal the names of subordinates:

“There is no intention of publishing names or facts about the operation merely for titillation,” said [Pruden].

The Times ran the story above the fold, with a banner headline that read, “Homosexual prostitution inquiry ensnares VIPs with Reagan, Bush,” with the subheading, “‘Call boys’ took midnight tour of White House.”

Reading through the story (which we have transcribed, in part, below), it appears that the investigation into the call boy sex ring had begun about nine months earlier, arising from an attempted blackmail and charges of credit card fraud. Apparently the gay prostitutes routinely videotaped and photographed their encounters with their clients, especially those who had powerful positions in the government, which meant there was plenty of fodder for extorting money.

In February 1989, as Washington D.C. police were conducting a raid on an out-call center operated by several gay escort services in a residence on 34th Place NW, the Secret Service made a surprise appearance and confiscated some of the evidence, according to The Times:

Although the confiscated material was turned over to District police on the scene, witnesses and law enforcement agents say the Secret Service kept one box containing names and other information about high-level government officials who were clients of the male escort business.

District police officials say that, to their knowledge, this is the first time the Secret Service has ever become involved in such a raid in this area.

Initially, the Secret Service denied it was involved in the raid, but after a second raid of the 34th Place house on May 18 [1989], the agency acknowledged its involvement in the investigation.

Secret Service spokesman Bob Snow said the agency participated in the search and seizure operation because of its jurisdiction over credit card fraud. “We come into such operations usually at the request of a U.S. attorney … if the fraud involves $10,000 or more … We are not involved in any local prostitution investigation,” said Mr. Snow.

GOP lobbyist Craig Spence spent upwards of $20,000 per month on gay prostitutes.

The paper named Craig J. Spence as a central figure in the sex ring:

One of the ring’s big spending clients is Craig J. Spence, Washington socialite and international trade consultant, according to documents and interviews with operators and prostitutes who say they engaged in sexual activities with Mr. Spence.

Mr. Spence spent upwards of $20,000 a month for male prostitutes who provided sex to him and his friends, said to include military personnel who also acted as his “bodyguards.” It was Mr. Spence who arranged the nocturnal tour of the Reagan White House. Repeated attempts to reach Mr. Spence by telephone, fax machine and personal visits to his home, were unsuccessful.

Credit card vouchers confirm that Mr. Spence charged thousands of dollars on American Express and Visa cards, sometimes making $600 charges against his cards several times a day, drawn in behalf of an escort service called Professional Services Inc.

A few months after the story broke, Spence committed suicide, but in an interview with the Washington Times (which we have not yet located), he allegedly told the paper that he was given access to the White House that night by Donald Gregg, who was a top Bush adviser.

Other underlings named by the newspaper included Charles K. Dutcher, former associate director of presidential personnel in the Reagan administration; Paul R. Balach, Labor Secretary Elizabeth Dole’s political personnel liaison to the White House; and Todd A. Blodgett, a former assistant to President Reagan.

[…]

Ann Richards: ‘How To Be a Good Republican’

Former Texas Gov. Ann Richards died yesterday after being diagnosed with cancer six month ago. She was Texas’ last Democratic governor, and was replaced after one successful term by George W. Bush.

Richards was a master of memorable rhetoric. At the Democratic Convention in 1988, she famously said of the first Pres. Bush, “Poor George. He was born with a silver foot in his mouth.” She could have said the same thing about the current Pres. Bush.

Here are Ann’s rules for How to Be a Good Republican. Written late in the Clinton presidency, in 1999 or 2000, they are still true today:

1. You have to believe that the nation’s current 8-year prosperity was due to the work of Ronald Reagan and George Bush, but yesterday’s gasoline prices are all Clinton’s fault.
2. You have to believe that those privileged from birth achieve success all on their own.
3. You have to be against all government programs, but expect Social Security checks on time.
4. You have to believe that AIDS victims deserve their disease, but smokers with lung cancer and overweight individuals with heart disease don’t deserve theirs.
5. You have to appreciate the power rush that comes with sporting a gun.
6. You have to believe…everything Rush Limbaugh says.
7. You have to believe that the agricultural, restaurant, housing and hotel industries can survive without immigrant labor.
8. You have to believe God hates homosexuality, but loves the death penalty.
9. You have to believe society is color-blind and growing up black in America doesn’t diminish your opportunities, but you still won’t vote for Alan Keyes.
10. You have to believe that pollution is OK as long as it makes a profit.
11. You have to believe in prayer in schools, as long as you don’t pray to Allah or Buddha.
12. You have to believe Newt Gingrich and Henry Hyde were really faithful husbands.
13. You have to believe speaking a few Spanish phrases makes you instantly popular in the barrio.
14. You have to believe that only your own teenagers are still virgins.
15. You have to be against government interference in business, until your oil company, corporation or Savings and Loan is about to go broke and you beg for a government bail out.
16. You love Jesus and Jesus loves you and, by the way, Jesus shares your hatred for AIDS victims, homosexuals, and President Clinton.
17. You have to believe government has nothing to do with providing police protection, national defense, and building roads.
18. You have to believe a poor, minority student with a disciplinary history and failing grades will be admitted into an elite private school with a $1,000 voucher.

Cheney-Poe Amendment Fails

The Senate failed to pass a constitutional amendment today that would have banned the marriage of the daughter of the vice president of the United States, Mary Cheney, to her lesbian partner, Heather Poe.

Senators voting against the anti-gay “Federal Marriage Amendment” were all members of the Cheneys’ own party, except for Robert Byrd of West Virginia, a former member of the Ku Klux Klan, and Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, whose toupee may be on a bit too tight. Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who is 50 years old and unmarried, and about whom gay rumors have been swirling, voted for the bill.

Senators voting for the gay-bashing amendment:

Alexander (R-TN)
Allard (R-CO)
Allen (R-VA)
Bennett (R-UT)
Bond (R-MO)
Brownback (R-KS)
Bunning (R-KY)
Burns (R-MT)
Burr (R-NC)
Byrd (D-WV)
Chambliss (R-GA)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Coleman (R-MN)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Craig (R-ID)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
DeWine (R-OH)
Dole (R-NC)
Domenici (R-NM)
Ensign (R-NV)
Enzi (R-WY)
Frist (R-TN)
Graham (R-SC)
Grassley (R-IA)
Hatch (R-UT)
Hutchison (R-TX)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Isakson (R-GA)
Kyl (R-AZ)
Lott (R-MS)
Lugar (R-IN)
Martinez (R-FL)
McConnell (R-KY)
Murkowski (R-AK)
Nelson (D-NE)
Roberts (R-KS)
Santorum (R-PA)
Sessions (R-AL)
Shelby (R-AL)
Smith (R-OR)
Stevens (R-AK)
Talent (R-MO)
Thomas (R-WY)
Thune (R-SD)
Vitter (R-LA)
Voinovich (R-OH)
Warner (R-VA)

Poll: Arnold Loses GOP Support, Overall Popularity Down to 35%

He Has Less Support Than President Bush at 36%

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s abrupt left turn this year has cost him support among California Republicans, while doing little to gain traction with the state’s liberal majority, according to a new poll:

Pandering to the left was Maria’s hail-mary pass. It didn’t work. The Terminator is toast.

Schwarzenegger’s approval rating fell to 35 percent among adults in the Public Policy Institute of California poll, down five points from last month…

Schwarzenegger now gets less support from Republicans in California than President Bush, whose approval rating is at a near record low of 36 percent.

Just 66 percent of Republicans said Schwarzenegger was doing a good job, while 74 percent said that of Bush. Last month, 72 percent of Republicans thought Schwarzenegger was doing a good job.

Schwarzenegger’s 35 percent approval rating puts him close to the 33 percent approval rating he had in October, when he was being pummeled by television ads decrying his special election.

Pandering to the left was Maria’s hail-mary pass. It didn’t work. The Terminator is toast.

Governor, please drop out of the race. You can start principal photography on T4 in January. It’s a win-win-win for you and the state and fans of your movies, if you have any left.

Obama Posts the Letters; See What an Ass John McCain is For Yourself

First of all, the snarky, snarly, nastiness of Sen. John “Please W., Screw Me a Little Harder Just So Long As You Let Me Be President Next” McCain (R.-Ariz.) is way understated in the news reports about his attack on Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill).

Everyone that frames this as “an exchange” in which one side is just as bad as the other, ala the Refrickinpublican Abramoff scandal, is just flat wrong.

Second, everyone including NPR’s Day to Day, that frames this as “an exchange” in which one side is just as bad as the other, a la the Refrickinpublican Abramoff scandal, is flat wrong.

Don’t take my word for it. Sen. Obama has posted the actual letters for the world to see. If you don’t walk away from reading John McCain’s sarcastic, insulting, and belittling missive feeling like he’s a complete — forgive my French — shithead then check your voter registration card. It must say “Republican.”

Here’s what Obama said that Johnny evidently took such exception to:

I know you have expressed an interest in creating a task force to further study and discuss these matters, but I and others in the Democratic Caucus believe the more effective and timely course is to allow the committees of jurisdiction to roll up their sleeves and get to work on writing ethics and lobbying reform legislation that a majority of the Senate can support.

And here’s just a sample of “Hothead” McCain’s vitriol in return:

I understand how important the opportunity to lead your party’s effort to exploit this issue must seem to a freshman Senator, and I hold no hard feelings over your earlier disingenuousness. Again, I have been around long enough to appreciate that in politics the public interest isn’t always a priority for every one of us.

Are you feeling it yet? Barack “Real Deal” Obama took all that and still turned the other cheek, in a new letter dated today.

I confess that I have no idea what has prompted your response. But let me assure you that I am not interested in typical partisan rhetoric or posturing. The fact that you have now questioned my sincerity and my desire to put aside politics for the public interest is regrettable but does not in any way diminish my deep respect for you nor my willingness to find a bipartisan solution to this problem.

Visit the site for updates, if McCain still has the heart for showing his ass to the world.

GOP Investigated Pres. Clinton’s Cat But Only Plans ‘Oversight’ on Pres. Bush’s Admitted Illegal Spying

Compare and contrast:

  • 1995: Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.), then chair of the House Government Reform and Oversight Committee, investigated whether taxpayers were footing the cost of stationery and postage for the fan club dedicated to President Clinton’s cat, Socks. (They were not – and it turns out Barbara Bush’s dog Millie had a fan club too.)
  • 2005: Two weeks ago, President Bush admitted he willfully flouted a law that requires him to get warrants before wiretapping U.S. citizens. His justification for ignoring the law appears to be LÉtat, c’est moi. In reaction, Republicans in charge of the Senate Judiciary Committee announced on Friday that they are planning “oversight” hearings into the matter.

The president has admitted he broke the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) hundreds of times. Isn’t it a bit late for “oversight?”