Thoughts Escaping Their Prison

sleeplessinsouthie:

Says The Atlantic:

The evangelical organizer who helped Michele Bachmann win the Ames Straw Poll in Iowa Saturday was previously charged with terrorism in Uganda after being arrested for possession of assault rifles and ammunition in February 2006, just days before Uganda’s first multi-party elections in 20 years.

Peter E. Waldron spent 37 days in the Luriza Prison outside Kampala, where he says he was tortured, after being arrested along with six Congolese and Ugandan nationals for the weapons, which were described variously in news reports as having been found in his bedroom or a closet in his home. The charges, which could have led to life in prison, were dropped in March 2006 after a pressure campaign by Waldron’s friends and colleagues and what Waldron says was the intervention of the Bush administration. He was released and deported from the east African nation, along with the Congolese. On Saturday, Waldron told The Atlantic in Ames that he was a staffer for Bachmann and responsible for her faith-based organizing both in Iowa and South Carolina. But he also declined repeatedly to give his name.

Others have noted that Waldron claims a personal friendship with Pastor Martin “Eat Da Poo Poo/Kill the Gays” Ssempa. So, the man responsible for the “faith-based organizing” of a legitimate candidate for president of the United States has a criminal record of supplying weapons to a regime and religious movement which are on the record with their intention to execute homosexuals and their abetters. He also pals around with that religious movement’s most fervent lunatic. Which is all pretty neat, I guess.

(via pantslessprogressive)

pantslessprogressive:

thepoliticalnotebook:

shortformblog:

Warning: There is profanity in it (so careful hopping in), but there are also good points being made about the photo in question. Our personal take: It’s funny, but it’s funny in that “I can’t believe they actually took that photo” sort of way. Ultimately, as a culture we need to have a debate about whether we should necessarily use an unflattering photo just because we can. Or whether we should hold our politicians to the same standard Perez Hilton holds celebrities. Look, people on the left dislike Michele Bachmann, but there are far better ways to prove your point than by taking photos of her eating corn dogs in an unintentionally risqué way.

I think the problem is that people find it appropriate in general to ridicule a female politician for things like this, to reduce the discussion of her campaign to an unfortunate photograph with a corn dog or her “crazy eyes.” There’s a culture of acceptance around sexualizing the women that are in the public eye and around reducing them to objects of ridicule for how they look. We have a number of reasons to invalidate Michele Bachmann: every single one of those reasons comes from her horrible politics and the uninformed things that come out of her mouth. None of them come from how she looks, or how she dresses, or how she photographs. Instead of deconstructing her lack of understanding about the debt ceiling, pointing out her stances on gay marriage and taxing corporations, or discussing her political influences, we find it acceptable, actually preferable even, to use an offensive photo as our primary tool against her. The reductionist, gendered lens through which we view female politicians is indicative of the seriousness with which we take the notion of a female candidate. This is the kind of atmosphere that bullies women out of formal politics and the kind of atmosphere that prevents us from having actual discussions of political issues. Like SFB rightly says, “there are far better ways.”

What Torie said.

What we should be talking about, over and over again:

• Bachmann has called homosexuality “part of Satan,” a “real issue of sexual dysfunction,” and a “very sad life.”
• She compared gay and trans people to pedophiles
• She said Rep. Keith Ellison, her Muslim colleague in Congress, pals around with terrorists
• She thinks government collecting taxes is like the Holocaust
• She doesn’t care about our veterans, until people actually pay attention to her horrific beliefs, so she backs off
• She thinks Planned Parenthood is responsible for trafficking underaged girls
• She wants to reduce the federal government “to its original size.”
• She lies about the Obama administration over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again.

What we’re talking about, over and over again:

• Her looks
• How she looks eating a corn dog

(via pantslessprogressive)