Archive

2012: The Year in Lesbian/Bi Politics

1. We had so many Republican primary debates, you guys.

God, do you remember how many Republican debates there were? Like maybe eleven or twelve a week for a while there, all of them with fifteen Republicans trying to out-crazy each other? That seemed to be the strategy for winning the Republican debates: Trying to max out on crazy and hate and then delicately sprinkling just a touch more crazy on top.

Based on what I saw of the debates, the perfect response to a question was:

“Jesus and I believe that if you get cancer the health care bankruptcy is your own fault and climate change is fake and all science is worthless and fake unless you are trying to build nail-studded death rays for the border and all uterumuses should be filled with minibabies at all times unless the babies or the uteruses are the LGBT kind, and no, being truly in love is not necessarily a good reason to want to get married and also can we bomb people somewhere please just anywhere I don’t care and now I would like to indignantly deny being mean or a fringe candidate or a bigot because I’m just doing what Jesus said, which is to judge thy neighbor and cast the first stone, but let’s wrap this denial up because the next debate is in 45 seconds.”

For a hot minute there, it looked like we might have the incredibly terrifying Rick Perry as a presidential candidate, but then he went from pandering-crazy into worrisome-crazy and started cuddling syrup.

Rick Santorum also looked like he might have a shot, even though he “loves” the gay community, which apparently means “wishes did not exist, or at least could not get married or have jobs.”

Fortunately, everybody remembered that Santorum is a dweebmonster and the media was just pushing him as a viable possibility so people would keep watching the news even though Karl Rove had already picked Mitt Romney months and months ago. [Spoiler: That turned out to be the last time Karl Rove was good at picking something.]

Romney, who looked like the guy who would get cast as the President in a 1950’s movie but had way less human warmth and empathy than the Crocodile Men who would attack the Earth in that same movie, tacked hard right during the debates, especially on immigration, which [Spoiler!] turned out to be a bad idea.

Romney’s staffers also taught us that an Etch-a-Sketch is a great holiday present, but a terrible campaign plan.

2. The GOP was obsessed with your ladybits.

Seriously: Check right now and make sure that there’s not a Republican Congressman down there trying to install a kryptonite lock. Continuing on 2011’s enormous legislative bender, rabidly anti-choice politicians at the state and national level joined forces and took the phrase “boxing in” to a whole new level.

There were mandatory, medically unnecessary transvaginal ultrasounds; TRAP laws that sought to make clinics impossible to keep open through sheer numbers of legal hoops to jump through; “heartbeat” bills and 20-week limits that flew in the face of science; attempts to keep women from getting ordinary birth control; and refusals to understand that even married women might want birth control, and that even women who don’t sleep with men can want birth control, because not all of the medical uses for birth control are about controlling birth. And Michigan lawmakers were informed that they were not allowed to say the word “vagina” while in the process of discussing new laws that affected those very body parts.

Thank goodness for sarcastic female legislators who cheerfully introduced bills mandating digital rectal exams, affidavits of necessity from a partner, or proof that one’s life was in danger before a man could get a Viagra prescription.

Rush Limbaugh called Sandra Fluke a slut for trying to explain that birth control can have medical uses that have nothing to do with sex, and thus it would be extra nice if medical insurance would cover it. And then Rush revealed that he thinks you have to take a birth control pill every time you have sex. Personal to Mr. Limbaugh’s one million ex-wives: What on earth did you tell him? Did this have something to do with at least getting him to eat a Tic Tac beforehand?

These GOP dudes (and some Democrat dudes, and even some women) definitely dislike ladybits because of the ladyflower’s ongoing destruction of society through facilitating female pleasure and constantly tempting everyone, but it’s also possible that many GOP members were so terrified of ladybits because they think our tinderboxes are studded with laser beams, plutonium and ninja werewolf guards. Because, as you may have noticed…

3. Holy crap, were Republican politicians ever plateheaded about rape.

In the process of trying to chip away at reproductive rights, Republican men tried to narrow the definition of what was “legitimate” rape. Paul Ryan referred to it as just a “method of conception” and his legislative pal Todd Akin theorized magical pregnancy-prevention powers and another dingleberry said that from a father’s point of view, having his daughter get pregnant from a rape was pretty much the same as having her get pregnant out of wedlock. And let’s not forget the House GOP attempt, led by Eric Cantor, to stop Native women on reservations from being able to prosecute their attackers in tribal courts.

I have honestly been fretting for days over writing this section because the number of political candidates and actual elected lawmakers who said such boneheaded things about rape that it made one wonder whether they had been huffing condensed stupid was so enormous that I was actually worried that I would miss some, or that this section would dwarf everything else. So instead of trying to organize the stampede of idiocy into lists and bullet points, I’m going to take a deep, cleansing breath, refuse to root for an invasion of guy-curious probe-happy aliens, and refer you to Mr. Stephen Colbert.

4. Martha Raddatz won all the debates.

Yes, even after we got through the primaries, there were still more debates! A few between Mitt Romney and Barack Obama and then one with Joe Biden and Tony Horton with a bad hairdo Paul Ryan for luck.

The first debate was moderated by a Raggedy Andy doll and President Obama spent most of the time in Jedi Meditation. All the news pundits claimed that Romney won because even though he told so many baldfaced lies that Baron Munchausen clawed his way out of the grave just to look shocked at him, Romney looked totes forcefull while lying! And apparently just making shit up equals a policy debate win now. Nerds everywhere spent the next two days whacking themselves in the head with breadboards.

Then came the vice presidential debate, in which Paul Ryan learned — all too late — that sometimes in a debate you have to know things and think on your feet and answer the question that the mean lady asked. Joe Biden spent most of the time giving Ryan noogies and grabbing Ryan’s arm and doing that “Stop hitting yourself!” thing.

Martha Raddatz shocked everyone by committing thoughtful, prepared, bad-ass journalism, which many Republican politicians said was totally unfair, while nerds everywhere doodled her name on the covers of our history books and then mailed her early drafts of our New Year’s resolutions so she would hold us accountable.

And then Joe Biden gave us the most magical gift of all: One million delightful gifs.

During the second presidential debate, Candy Crowley corrected Mitt Romney on one of his 8,000 lies, narrowly keeping Jiminy Cricket from committing seppuku right on stage.

Of course, Crowley stating a checkable objective fact during a debate meant that pundits said she was biased and aggressive and inappropriate. Rock on, Candy Crowley: Reality fans found it a breath of fresh air.

It was during this debate that we learned that during his wild and crazy Massachusetts days, Mitt Romney collected binders full of women.

In the final presidential debate, Mitt Romney disastrously misinterpreted the advice “everyone likes a nice sweater.”

It was the foreign policy debate, so the candidates were confined to three topics:

1. Domestic policy, as long as it had nothing to do with women’s issues, the working poor, gay rights, infrastructure, or jobs.

2. Israel.

3. Countries that Mitt Romney didn’t know much about except that he thought they might or might not exist (Prussia?), but either way he was pretty sure he wanted to bomb them.

5. The nation embraced Hillary Clinton as our favorite bad-ass.

We always knew she was full of fire, moxie and dragon blood, but this is the year the rest of the country caught up with us. God, she was cool. She was smart, tough, and in charge. And somehow through it all she also let it slip that she was fun.

Retire for a little bit if you must, but please don’t go too far, Hillary. We already miss you so much that our faces start to melt whenever we even think about it. Fortunately, you taught us to wear sunglasses like a boss. A world boss.

6. Barack Obama and Joe Biden supported same-sex marriage right out loud.

…After Joe Biden pushed a little bit. Thanks, Mr. Vice President. We know you never touch alcohol, but I’m pretty sure you’re getting your club sodas paid for any time you want it.

The President followed suit shortly after, making him the first United States president to ever do so.

We were a little bit excited.

7. OMG, did you see that election?!?!

So after 115 months of wretched, corrupt, irrelevant sound-biting build-up that was so horrible it made everyone in the United States and way too many people in other countries stop making their savory fall stews and try to stuff turnips directly into their ears just so they could stop hearing it for a few minutes, we finally went ahead and had an election, and land o’ Goshen, was it ever fun!

And I am not even talking about the part where Karl Rove thought he had Ohio in the bag and Ohio was all “Nuh-uh, Dude, there’s a hole in this bag,” and then Fox called Ohio for Obama and Karl Rove’s head started popping out sparks, spiders, and gold coins and he just kept talking and pointing at tinier and tinier sections of the Ohio map until he was pointing at individual houses and then at Republican-leaning dollhouses inside those houses and the Fox anchors figured he must know something because when has Karl ever been wrong, right? So Fox News, which claims to be a legitimate, objective news organization, un-called Ohio because a Republican political operative told them to.

And then a few minutes later they realized they had to re-call Ohio for Obama and Karl Rove turned bright puce and spent the next 20 minutes screaming “Do overs!” “Take back, Jack!” and “OK, for real this time! Election starts… Now! Ohio is mine! Ohio is mine! I paid for it fair and square! Mine mine mine mine mine mine mine mine mine mine mine!” over and over until everyone just quietly tiptoed away and they left one light bulb on over his head and a dead camera pointed at him and hoped he would tire himself out.

OK, yes, I take it back: That was really, really fun.

But even more fun was the actual results part. Wonderful, practical, earnest ultranerd Elizabeth Warren won a Senate seat! Tammy Baldwin became our first out lesbian senator! Kyrsten Sinema became our first out bisexual congresswoman! (And she’s an atheist! According to Pat Robertson, she can personally cause hurricanes!) Tulsi Gabbard became our first Hindu Congressional Representative! Mazie Hirono became the first female Asian-American Senator!

Team Rape took enjoyably humiliating defeat after enjoyably humiliating defeat right to the teeth!

And overall we elected a record number of women to Congress: The 113th Congress will have 20, count ’em 20, women in the Senate and 81 women in the House of Representatives!

We were lucky enough to have a levelheaded guide – who just happened to be an out lesbian – to guide us through the election craziness and help make sense of it all. Rachel Maddow was the voice of reason in the face of political lies and bluster, your funny best friend who knew just what to say on a rough political day, a firm hand on the tiller who totally took charge of MSNBC’s debate and election coverage, and always, always, the smartest person in the room.

And man, could she sum up an election result.

Are we done yet? No!

After 32 straight defeats at the ballot box, marriage equality finally, finally won big in an election. The good people of Minnesota refused to ban it, and Maine, Maryland, and Washington decided that, yeah, being in love was a pretty good reason to get married after all.

Here’s hoping for less of the awful politics in 2013 and a whole lot more of the brave, the funny, and the mushy.

And here’s wishing you a happy 2013 as well.

Now somebody please go turn off Karl.

Lesbian Apparel and Accessories Gay All Day sweatshirt -- AE exclusive

Related Articles

Leave a Reply

Back to top button