Day: April 22, 2006

Bush to California: Drop Dead

Jon Ponder

He Won’t Provide Emergency Aid to Fix Vulnerable Levee System

President Bush is in the Bay Area this weekend. So far, the trip is not going well. His approval rating in California is at 32 percent, and has been in the low 30s for quite a while — we’re such trendsetters here, aren’t we?

An event that was to have taken place at the famed Hoover Tower on the campus of Stanford University had to be moved to a private residence because over a thousand or so protesters showed up and blocked the entrance.

The president also found himself placed in an akward situation by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, whose popularity has been as low as the president’s but is now slightly ahead.

[Schwarzenegger] pressed his case Friday in a private meeting with President Bush — a visit that carried some political risk for the governor, given Bush’s ebbing popularity among California voters.

The two spoke for about 15 minutes … with the governor calling for more money to fix California’s aging levee system…

Word from the White House was mixed. In a conference call with reporters before Air Force One even landed in California, a Bush advisor said federal officials would speed environmental permits so repairs could begin on 29 vulnerable levees in the Central Valley.

White House officials also said the federal government might share the cost of fixing the levees, which has been a priority of Schwarzenegger’s in his third year in office.

But the Bush administration declined to issue a federal disaster declaration — a vehicle for additional federal funding and something that Schwarzenegger had requested.

It is “legally inappropriate” to declare a disaster before it happens, said James L. Connaughton, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality.

The idea of a Bush official worrying about what is legally appropriate is a bit of hoot. As Fabian Nuñez, the speaker of the state Assembly, put it, Bush’s response to the request was, “Bush to California: Drop dead.”

Still, the governor’s actions are curious. Usually these matters are worked out in advance so that actual meetings are pro forma. It appears that Schwarzenegger staged the confrontation, hoping to distance himself from the unpopular president by making a request he knew Bush would have to refuse.

Cheney Naps During Meeting with Chinese President

Jon Ponder

Raw Story:

Getty images caught Vice President Dick Cheney napping as other administration officials left a briefing by President Bush and Chinese leader Hu Jintao.

The New York Post featured the image prominently in today’s edition, with a caption explaining, “The veep’s people later insisted he was reading his notes, but if you ask us, it sure looks as if he’s dreaming of quail hunting – and maybe bagging some birds this time.”

Utah Theatre Owner Who Banned ‘Brokeback’ Rethinks His Homophobia after Session with Gay Students

Jon Ponder

Every now and then, a homophobe sees the error of his ways:

Larry Miller, the Utah theater owner who pulled Brokeback Mountain from his theaters last January, met with about 30 gay and lesbian students at the University of Utah who enlightened him about what it’s like to be gay. According to the Salt Lake Tribune, students told Miller about the difficulties of coming out and the fear of being physically harmed. The discussion appeared to change Miller’s previously unwavering stance on his decision to pull the movie.

Said Miller: “Now, I understand how something I said inadvertently made them feel demeaned as individuals. Maybe their well-being trumps my beliefs, my rights to express myself…In 2006, it’s wrong that they have to live in that fear.”

We’ll give Larry a pass on the fact that he expressed his homophobic views deliberately, not “inadvertently,” but can’t resist pointing out that in addition to the cineplex, Miller also owns a huge car dealership in Stalt Lake City as well as part of the Utah Jazz basketball team, which makes his change of heart illustrative of the fact that bigots who make their fortunes from consumer-oriented services are the most vulnerable to being flipped.