Misleading Article of the Day: AMERICAblog's "Howard Dean pulls out of DNC gay fundraiser"

I'll be nice and change the original title from "Dumb" to "Misleading". But here's the story.

The former chair of the Democratic party now has a "scheduling conflict" for a fundraiser on behalf of the organization he used to run. Dean is one of the four top names on the invite - he's throwing the event, and now even he's not going.



It's interesting that the very heterosexual Howard Dean is willing to take a stronger stand for civil rights than our own gay elected representatives, Barney Frank, Tammy Baldwin, and Jared Polis. That Howard Dean is willing to take a stronger stand for the gay community

So where did Howard Dean say he's boycotting the event? Where is his article stating the crimes of democracy? There is not article, but there is a statement.

A Dean spokeswoman, Karen Finney, stressed that Dean's move was a scheduling conflict due to a "family commitment."

That's his statement. That's the deal. So why would you trick us into thinking Howard dropped out for other reasons?

He said it's a family commitment, then it's a family commitment. Stop creating storylines that don't exist. This ain't Days of Our Lives! Stop playing, John or AMERICAblog or whoever.

I'm telling you, the theme of this mess is Misconceptions, Misinformation and Assumptions.

Source

Law Dork weighs in On the DOMA Drama

Chris Geidner is known as the blogger, Law Dork. He is a lawyer who writes about LGBT issues, policies and the fun stuff (politics). He's also very realistic which I greatly appreciate.

Today, Chris provided some interesting info that is...well interesting. John Aravosis, from AMERICAblog has been a strong critic of Obama for a hot minute (actually longer than that). However, yesterday the truth was in the pudding or rather in Chris' blog.

According to Chris, John's piece about Barney Frank throwing us under a bus is very misleading and borderline false.

I'll share:

Soon thereafter, John Aravosis published a piece that just went round the bound. I have tried to keep my blog as forward-looking as possible, but it’s clear that Aravosis’s heavy popularity at his blog and media contacts have allowed his false statements about what the filing means to push the debate into the twisted, contorted view he is giving it.

The two main problems that I have with Aravosis’s coverage are:

1. His continued misstatements regarding whether Justice should have filed a brief in this case.
2. His “comparing us to incest and pedophilia” claim is overstated and does not withstand any serious, legal scrutiny.

Also...

The brief does not ever use the words “incest” or “pedophilia.” And, by the way, the American Psychiatric Association Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition Text Revision (DSM-IV-TR), the standard for diagnosis, defines pedophilia as involving “sexual activity with a prepubescent child or children (generally age 13 years or younger).” Under that definition, there is not even a case involving pedophilia appearing in the brief at all — which is likely the reason that no mainstream publication has repeated that claim.

Despite all that, this is what Aravosis concluded this evening about Chairman Frank:

Barney thinks the language of the brief was great. He even, between the lines, defends the invocation of incest and pedophilia.

No, he clearly did not think the brief was great, as his statement made clear. Moreover, he never defended anything that isn’t in the brief, despite your constant claims to the contrary.

It is Aravosis’s spreading of this continued falsity — particularly to demean the smart, legitimate statements of members of Congress — that lead me to continued reporting about why it’s false.

This was helpful and scary. AMERICAblog has a lot of readers and followers, and after I commented on other articles, I was attacked...Big time.

I had to use the Phoenix Force up in there just to survive.

Anywho, with so many folks following that blog, I hope they are checking up on the content. What Chris reveals is disturbing, however I'm glad there's someone looking out for our best interest.

Please check out his blog, here