The more you learn about this boob, the scarier he gets...a perfect candidate fer the GOP.

Mitt and Rudy had better move it on over, the real nut dog is movin' in.

This guy really is perfect for the GOP.
Even Hillary could beat him.

As I said in the other thread, this is his religion (and in this case, his fears due to that religion) making policy for him. Can't stand it.

Huckabee said, "I feel homosexuality is an aberrant, unnatural, and sinful lifestyle, and we now know it can pose a dangerous public health risk."

Maybe that is red meat for the religious right but it won't fly in the big moderate states that Rudy leads in by double digits.


It may even knock him out of the running for VP.

Best way to stop AIDS is to figure out how it is transmitted and stop that. Near as I can figure out, don't Butt &&&& and don't use dirty needles. If you'r feelin spunky, cover your monkey. What is so damn difficult about life in this world?

He FEELS. Nice. Too bad like so many of his ilk, he doesn't THINK.

It's astonishing that anyone was saying things like that as late as 1992.

Huckabee did not return messages left with his campaign.

It comes down to whether you were truly interested in saving lives or doing the politically correct thing and doing nothing.

Nothing was done, AIDs spread unabated because the morality of the left is to have no morals.

The great sin of the left is for anyone to look at the consequences of personal behavior.

Ironically, the results of political correctness result in the deaths of the very people the left claims to be concerned the most about.

Homosexuals have died in droves because the left didn't want anyone to connect the moral dots. Having anal sex with strangers can kill you, sharing needles can kill you. Conservatives do not approve of men having anal sex or using drugs, Liberals don't feel anyone has a right to judge another's lifestyle.

Huckabee said homosexuality could 'pose a dangerous public health risk' and I would love anyone to show how it isn't.

Having anal sex with strangers can kill you, sharing needles can kill you. -- Zulu

Indeed! Many of us, though, don't need HIV+ people locked up to keep us from sharing needles or having anal sex with them.

I wonder why it is A-OK to quarantine someone with TB but not someone with HIV. If they had done that in the early 80's when they found out how deadly it was, less than 100 would have been quarantined. BUT since they were homosexuals, they couldn't have their rights infringed upon. Thus thousands of deaths later the same press bashes anyone with the idea HIV/AIDS be treated as any other deadly, contagious disease.

the rape victim approached Huckabee and put her face against his, she said "I was this close to the rapist, I wll never forget his face, if you help to free him I hope you never forget my face" The rapist claimed he was born again and with Huckabees help wes released. Within a year of being released, the rapist murdered 2 women.
Good choice for president as he has a track redord of being influenced by his religion! Maybe Bin Lagen will claim born again

I wonder if he remembers that woman's face?

Renamblacan icon Roy Cohn must be spinning in his grave.

Homosexuals have died in droves because the left didn't want anyone to connect the moral dots. Having anal sex with strangers can kill you, sharing needles can kill you.

What's the concern? That's an issue that takes care of itself.

" Near as I can figure out, don't Butt &&&& and don't use dirty needles. If you'r feelin spunky, cover your monkey. What is so damn difficult about life in this world?"

Well, when you have the number one influence (the Catholic Church) in the number one AIDS-infested area of the world (sub-Saharan Africa) decrying the use of condoms, it makes it very difficult.

Plus, you realize, don't you, the majority of AIDS cases are contracted via heterosexual sex....

"Conservatives do not approve of men having anal sex or using drugs"


I'd comment, but the line is laughable enough on it's own.

ZULU said "Homosexuals have died in droves because the left didn't want anyone to connect the moral dots"

as many gays (Larry Craig) are republicans as are the Log Cabin Reublicans, the statement above seems rather stupid!

That is of course unless they are conservatives.

The politically correct atmosphere of the left prevented any real containment of the disease because the left is POLICTALLY FORBIDDEN from even APPEARING to condemn homosexuality.

does he make this stuff up or does he get talking points from Rev. Right, bet he believes the earth is only 6000 years old like Huckabee ("help free the born again rapist")

I guess ignorance knows no bounds

And now you leftists have the hubris to attack Mike Huckabee? Incredible.

Zulu, Given that it was known as early as 1984 that AIDS could not be transmitted through casual contact, what purpose would it have served to isolate and quarantine millions of the afflicted from their friends, families, and all of the rest of humanity as Huckabee suggested in 1992?

Zulu,

Your "facts" are limited the numbers to the US. You're ignoring the rest of the world, Einstein.

Get some facts, then come back.

Zulu's right. The way the very debate has been framed has cost hundreds of thousands of lives, primarily those of homosexuals. Were AIDS initially a disease that primarily infected heterosexuals, the victims would have been quarantined. But because to do so would have singled out the homosexual community, AND because so few heterosexuals were infected, public policy went another direction: gays complained that they were being stigmatized; heteros didn't really give a damn, because it didn't affect us. Now, nearly half a million Americans are died or will die of the disease.

Ironic, really, that the people who were the most vocal in their support of the so-called homosexual lifestyle are those most responsible for the spread of the disease. Law of Unintended Consequences, and all that. Or, maybe not unintended?

Zulu's right. The way the very debate has been framed has cost hundreds of thousands of lives, primarily those of homosexuals. Were AIDS initially a disease that primarily infected heterosexuals, the victims would have been quarantined.

RiR, I'll ask you the same question I asked Zulu, "Given that it was known as early as 1984 that AIDS could not be transmitted through casual contact, what "public health" purpose would it have served to isolate and quarantine millions of the afflicted from their friends, families, and all of the rest of humanity as Huckabee suggested in 1992?"

Cohn was a self loathing homophobic scumbag who tried to keep his AIDS diagnosis secret. I'm sure he would have approved of a quarantine for those who are HIV positive.LOL

"The politically correct atmosphere of the left prevented any real containment of the disease because the left is POLICTALLY FORBIDDEN from even APPEARING to condemn homosexuality."

What a farkin' idiot. You don't even know it was Reagan in charge at that time, do you? Reagan, who wouldn't even say the word "AIDS" for years.

What a partisan revisionist tool...blaming "the left" for Reagan's inaction.

"Ironic, really, that the people who were the most vocal in their support of the so-called homosexual lifestyle are those most responsible for the spread of the disease. "

Bullshit. There's no way on earth the Roman Catholic Church was "the most vocal in their support".

BTW: RiR, while I think that AIDS more then any other disease that I can think of forced local, state and federal governments to make difficult decisions between protecting privacy vs public health -- and I think given the circumstances and the gravity of the disease -- our nation did an admirable job at trying to combat the spread while not at the same time providing government sanction to the villification of specific groups of people.

"Were AIDS initially a disease that primarily infected heterosexuals, the victims would have been quarantined."

Ding ding. We have a winner.

"What a partisan revisionist tool...blaming 'the left' for Reagan's inaction."

And what did Tip O'Neil do? How about the DNC? Are you saying you wish Reagan had quarantined everyone with AIDS?

Gee, that was a weak Reagan deflection. Carter deflections are better, the truth actually hurts.

RiR, I'll ask you the same question I asked Zulu, "Given that it was known as early as 1984 that AIDS could not be transmitted through casual contact, what "public health" purpose would it have served to isolate and quarantine millions of the afflicted from their friends, families, and all of the rest of humanity as Huckabee suggested in 1992?"

Posted by Bowa
* * * * *

Why was the proposal to mark the infected persons somehow, to warn off future partners, so objectionable?
I'll turn the question around: given that the only way to catch AIDS was from non-casual contact, how do you explain an additional million cases? Is it possible that many--if not most--of them might not have contracted the disease, had they known they were sexually involved with a carrier of the virus?
I remember the scandal that erupted earlier this year, when a TB patient got on an airplane. He didn't infect anyone, but that wasn't the point: he could have. There are hundreds of thousands of AIDS victims walking around--is it too much to ask of our government that they ensure no further spread of the disease? Or, at the very least, a sexually active partner is fully aware of what he or she is at risk for?
Nah. Easier to do it this way, I guess. And the body count continues on.

Huckabee, a pastor believes in a young earth that the earth is only 6000 years old, you can ask him if it is in dog ears. he does't think it's funny

and any one that condems homosexuals is an asshole, there is no political correctness involved. Why don't you join rev Phelps, if you know who he is. if it comes to forbidden, you should be fobidden from being an asshole.

"'You're ignoring the rest of the world'

Those number(sic) kind of hurt you didn't they? To(sic) bad."

No, they didn't hurt me; what a laugh...they just demonstrated how full of shit you are. After referencing the world, and pointing out the majority of AIDS cases are passed via heterosexual contact, you try to rebut my point with US-only stats.

Nice, if laughable, try.

"Are you saying you wish Reagan had quarantined everyone with AIDS?"

No, Mr. Strawman. I'm saying I wish Reagan wouldn't have been so afraid of addressing the problem head-on; he didn't even say the word AIDS until, iirc, 1985.

I guess ignorance knows no bounds

Posted by onna

At least everyone else references other people's quotes instead on just pasting them as though they are your own.

"while not at the same time providing government sanction to the villification of specific groups of people."

RIGHT! That's the job of the anti Gay-Marriage amendment.

Huckabee wants to clear the prisons of rapists and replace them with AIDS patients. Another compassionate cancervative, no doubt.

Onna didn't invent that? Are you serious?

550,394 people are DEAD. DEAD. DEAD.

It is a deadly disease Zulu. I know at least 4 people who have lived with it for more then 10 years so thankfully it is not a death sentence anymore like it used to be.

But you never answered the question. Given that it was known as early as 1984 that AIDS could not be transmitted through casual contact, what "public health" purpose would it have served to isolate and quarantine millions of the afflicted from their friends, families, and all of the rest of humanity as Huckabee suggested in 1992?

Huckabee said homosexuality could 'pose a dangerous public health risk' and I would love anyone to show how it isn't.

Posted by zulu at 2007-12-08 06:24 PM | Reply | Flag:

Are you arguing that we should somehow mark or round up (quarantine) homosexuals?

'I'm saying I wish Reagan wouldn't have been so afraid of addressing the problem head-on'

So Huckabee should be hailed as a hero who was willing to address a disease crisis that Reagan was afraid to confront?

Interesting.

"I guess ignorance knows no bounds"
I said this first in 1959 to describe a sargent in the marines, if others said it since, they should quote me.

At least everyone else references other people's quotes instead on just pasting them as though they are your own.

Posted by eberly

Eb, what is your point?

RIGHT! That's the job of the anti Gay-Marriage amendment.

danforth, when you compare physically isolating millions of people from humanity equally with defining the term "marriage" as between a man and a woman then I think you are just as extreme and out of touch in your views as zulu seems to be.

Bowa and Danfoth's comments on this subject have been admired as I lurked on this subject. It's nice to see a couple of people with both souls and the ability to reason and communicate effectively.

I was living in the Bay area in 1989-1991, and AIDS was on the front page of practically every issue of the Chronicle-Examiner. And I had a feeling even then that the homosexuals were being spoonfed a bunch of BS. There isn't a single viral disease on planet earth that has a vaccine, yet they were promised one was "just around the corner". There are few viral diseases that are fatal that the public health system didn't deal with very, very harshly in terms of limiting more contact, yet they were allowed to go on, infecting more and more victims. And there was no "community", for whom the interests of the leadership was so divorced from the interests of those it pretended to serve, or the interests of the country at large.
And five hundred thousand victims later, they still drive the boat in terms of how to deal with the disease.
Well, I frankly don't consider it my problem. The time that we could have done something about it has come and gone.

"There isn't a single viral disease on planet earth that has a vaccine"



Ever hear of polio?

One of my closest friends just found out he's HIV positive, but he's known for years how he could've avoided getting the virus. He just didn't. So whose fault is that? Maybe nobody's. Maybe his. Maybe everybody's. But it's hard to see how letting the disease run unchecked in the early years helped him, or his family, or his loved ones. Let alone for hundreds of thousands of others.

Let me ask Danforth and Bowa a simple question, to which hopefully I won't get a deflection to the Catholic Church, the Defense of Marriage Act, or Reagan: if you were in charge of public health policy in 1990, AND you knew then what you know now about AIDS and how many victims it would claim over the next 17 years, what would you have done differently?

"There isn't a single viral disease on planet earth that has a vaccine"



Ever hear of polio?

Posted by Zatoichi a
* * *

Sorry. Meant to say there's no cure available for those with viral diseases. Which means that an AIDS vaccine would be fine for everyone else, but not anyone who currently has HIV.

'Are you arguing that we should somehow mark or round up (quarantine) homosexuals?'

That's the disjointed thinking that has killed so many.

Yes, anyone with a disease that has so far killed over 500,000 Americans should be quarantined.

That the disease is AIDS is not pertinent, unless you are constrained by a political dogma.

Again, AIDS is a disease problem the left has turned into a homosexual rights debate.

Again, the bottom line is the left is POLICTALLY FORBIDDEN from even APPEARING to condemn homosexuality.

And 500,000 Americans have died.

Perhaps you might want to talk to the family of a person who has died from AIDS. -- Zulu

Self-righteous blather. The people I know with family members who died from AIDS are the last people who would ever call for a quarantine. If you want to do something for them, treat their loved ones with compassion and dignity.

Too late.
You're infected.

Yes, anyone with a disease that has so far killed over 500,000 Americans should be quarantined.


influenza?

"so far killed over 500,000 Americans"

Tobacco every year.

Zulu-
It's your thinking, and Huckabee's according to your post.

Huckabee said homosexuality could 'pose a dangerous public health risk' and I would love anyone to show how it isn't.

Posted by zulu at 2007-12-08 06:24 PM | Reply | Flag:

If you agree with the statement that "Homosexuality could 'pose a dangerous public health risk'" then shouldn't we tag or quarantine homosexuals?

'The time that we could have done something about it has come and gone.'

Cold hard reality.

rightisright Q: 'what would you have done differently?'

Danforth and Bowa: A: We would have invented a cure, but that damned Reagan stopped us.

Maybe if the POTUS at the time had gone on TV and talked about AIDS(saying the word, hello?) he could have saved lives.

As it is, even the biggest reagan sycophant will agree that the gipper waited too long to even TALK about AIDS with the public.

Who knows how many died in ignorance because they POTUS didn't attempt to inform the country?

Yes, anyone with a disease that has so far killed over 500,000 Americans should be quarantined.

But zulu, you never answered the question. Given that it was known as early as 1984 that AIDS could not be transmitted through casual contact, what "public health" purpose would it have served to isolate and quarantine millions of the afflicted from their friends, families, and all of the rest of humanity as Huckabee suggested in 1992?

Just because the disease kileed 500,000+ people is tragic -- but how will or would have rounding up millions of people with the virus and isolating them from the rest of humanity have been effective at combating the disease.

What you seem to be suggesting is that government be used to punish people for having the disease itself-- and that is not what "quarantine" is for.

Quarantine is for those infectious diseases in which even casual contact results in infection -- it is the last resort in a public health crisis when there is no way to treat a patient safely in an open environment.

You and Huckabee apparently think it shoudl have been the first thing that was done.

And that is just crazy.

Zulu-
Returning to your statement that "Huckabee said homosexuality could 'pose a dangerous public health risk' and I would love anyone to show how it isn't.", and your use of the present tense (isn't), shouldn't gays be marked or quarantined somehow?

Finding myself in agreement with Bowa here.

You don't quarantine people for diseases that can't be spread quickly and easily. HIV doesn't live outside the body for very long, and short of extreme bodily fluid contact, it does not spread.

So Huckabee would just be keeping people from having sex, on suspicion of having AIDS. Sounds like a puritans wetdream...

Who knows how many died in ignorance because they POTUS didn't attempt to inform the country?

Posted by Alexandrite
* * * *

By the end of Reagan's second term, nobody was dying because of ignorance. But after that, hundreds of thousands died because of politics.

Still waiting on Bowa and Danforth's answer, as to what they would have done differently. What's curious is that if the most cold-hearted, anti-homosexual activist in America had designed public policy vis a vis the AIDS crisis, you would have seen fewer AIDS deaths. So who's really the compassionate ones?

Like I said, not my problem. The gays wanted to make AIDS a civil-rights issue, and the result has been the decimation of five hundred thousand human beings, with another half million to go, just here in the United States. So as a righty-tighty, I'll continue to do as I decided over ten years ago: back out of the debate completely. I'm irrelevant. My views aren't welcome, I can't "relate", and if the homosexual community don't want to do the things that limit the spread of the disease to others like themselves, there's nothing I can do about it.

'influenza?'

'Tobacco every year.'

Equivocation so as to absolve guilt and evade responsibility.

'If you agree with the statement that Homosexuality could 'pose a dangerous public health risk' then shouldn't we tag or quarantine homosexuals?'

Tag them, nice visual - poor debate tactic.

Or we could do what we've all done up until now, the resulting 550,394 dead are gone and nothing can bring them back anyway.

"Sounds like a puritans wetdream..."


I'm not touching that with a 99 and a half foot pole. But I'm laughing, and wiping coffee off of my keyboard.

"...what they would have done differently. "

Not stigmatized the victims, for one.

Not ignored the problem for a half-decade, for another.

"if the homosexual community don't want to do the things that limit the spread of the disease to others like themselves"

Again, you're aware the majority of the worldwide AIDS cases are spread via heterosexual activity...yes?

Or we could do what we've all done up until now

The point was WE DIDNT do all we could do until now.
One- due to ignorance of the disease and the POTUS at the time not stepping in.
Two- Because the victims were largely homosexuals in the beginning.(see #1)

SORRY...

The point was WE DIDNT do all we could do until now.
One- due to ignorance of the disease and the POTUS at the time not stepping in.
Two- Because the victims were largely homosexuals in the beginning.(see #1)

Posted by Alexandrite at 2007-12-08 08:28 PM | Reply | Flag:

There.

Zulu-
So you disagree with your statement that "homosexuality could 'pose a dangerous public health risk' and I would love anyone to show how it isn't." ?

Because if you do think that homosexuality is a "dangerous public health risk" and stand mute, then you are culpable in the consequenses of allowing a "dangerous public health risk" to go unchecked due to your inability to confront the problem head on.

Betelguise- yeah, you've pointed out the obvious logic here.

But it seems Zulu doesn't want to go THERE for some reason. I could speculate, but i don't know him well enough to, so I'm not going to build a strawman.

So what gives, zulu?

Huckabee said homosexuality could 'pose a dangerous public health risk' and I would love anyone to show how it isn't.

Posted by zulu at 2007-12-08 06:24 PM | Reply | Flag:

I'll take you up on that challenge.

AIDS is now more prevalent in straight people than gay. Using your logic (and Fuckabess), straight people are also a 'public health risk", right?

Zulu, you make this too easy.

Equivocation so as to absolve guilt and evade responsibility.

Tobacco users choose to smoke.

Doesn't mean we shouldn't do everything we can to help them.

Just saw this gem of yours, zulu:

"Conservatives do not approve of men having anal sex or using drugs"

AHAHAHAHAHA!

"Tobacco users choose to smoke."

Same for the customers of McDonalds, or Baskin-Robbins.

Does it count if someone nails their wife in the rear?

And I could probably name dozens of career conservatives that may not "approve" of those action while doing them in private.

Danforth- well, except the two you mentioned aren't addictive. normally.

"Tobacco users choose to smoke."

So do junkies.
First time.

Buy a clue.

AND you knew then what you know now about AIDS and how many victims it would claim over the next 17 years, what would you have done differently?

Obviously, if we knew then what we knew now we would have found the drugs which have proved effective in combating the disease immediately instead of the years of researchit has taken - that is still ongoing.

But I believe you are talking about what we would do differently froma public policy standpoint.

All I can say, is not much. I think local governments -- even in san francisco and NY were very quick to institute and enforce public health codes and close down bathhouses etc.

Probably the most drastic difference in what I would do from what was done is that I would have made AIDS testing mandatory for anyone arrested and entering a contained and publicly run facility that housed people together such as homeless shelters and jails.

I also would have begun a program whereby people getting an aids test who had the disease could voluntarily list the names and addresses of their partners and have an unmarked letter sent from the locality telling them that they may have been exposed to the virus and should come in for an anonymous test.

Both of those things obviously would have been controversial from a "privacy" standpoint, but I believe that they were not all that drastic and extreme given how many lives the measures would have saved.

It's certianly not quarantining millions of people as Huckabee would have done.

Zatoichi- You can quit smoking. There's a lot of ways to do it, and this is coming from a former smoker.

No painful withdrawls like heroin or the like.

And you do NOT get addicted to ciagrettes the first time you smoke them, either.

Huckabee said homosexuality could 'pose a dangerous public health risk' and I would love anyone to show how it isn't.

Zulu, what Huckabee should have said is that "unsafe sex" 'poses a dangerous public health risk'. And that is true. Any sex between partners who don't already know they are not infected, where there is an opportunity for bodily fluids to enter the blood stream is unsafe.

'Given that it was known as early as 1984 that AIDS could not be transmitted through casual contact, what "public health" purpose would it have served to isolate and quarantine millions '

What makes you think 'millions' in the U.S. were infected with the AIDS virus in 1984? Do you have a link to support that claim or is that just your creative mind hard at work?

Let's say there had only been 50,000 people with AIDS in the U.S. in 1984.

Now, just to illustrate a point, let's say a genie had appeared and had magically deposited those 50,000 people into the Huston Astrodome.

Now the reason I would have wanted them so quarantined would have been to STOP THE SPREAD OF THE DISEASE. I repeat - STOP THE SPREAD OF THE DISEASE.

Who would argue they should be released?

And I don't care if AIDS could only be spread by left handed french kissing mimes, doing nothing has resulted in 500,000 deaths. For a disease that can't be transmitted through casual contact' the damn thing sure kills a lot of people.

There are two possibilities:

1. The magnitude of this crisis is beyond the ability of lefties to process.

2. The left is POLICTALLY FORBIDDEN from even APPEARING to condemn homosexuality.

You choose.

"except the two you mentioned aren't addictive. normally."

Speak for yourself.

I used to argue with my dad that, had the pendulum swung a slightly different direction, cops would be pulling people over for ice cream sundaes, and checking automobiles for traces of sugar cone fragments.

"Jamoca Almond Fudge?!? You're busted!"

Let's just be honest here. Huckabee doesn't like homosexuals from a religious standpoint. That's the bias he's starting with...arguing over the rationale of his "ideas" is ludicrous because they are not rational. They are based on the dogma of his particular faith and socialization. Period.

"Zulu, what Huckabee should have said is that 'unsafe sex' 'poses a dangerous public health risk'. And that is true. Any sex between partners who don't already know they are not infected, where there is an opportunity for bodily fluids to enter the blood stream is unsafe."

Sure, whatever. That pretty much ignores what group of people were most vulnerable and did get / died from AIDS, but it would have been the politically correct thing to say. Yes, a much more sensitive way of not appearing to condemn homosexuality.

And to be an asshole:

Mr. Huckabee, please describe the public safety issues in releasing known rapist/murderers back into the public, then lying repeatedly about your involvement in their release?

Now the reason I would have wanted them so quarantined would have been to STOP THE SPREAD OF THE DISEASE. I repeat - STOP THE SPREAD OF THE DISEASE.

So zulu -- why bother quarantining them -- why not just kill them all. There's no cure even now.

And you are basically saying that even with proper education about the disease, an infected person cannot be trusted to ever rejoin humanity without knowingly and intending to spread it.

So why bother spending all the money to quarantine the infected -- why not just exterminate them?

'Huckabee doesn't like homosexuals from a religious standpoint.'

Right. Liberals do like homosexuals, but their fear of appearing to condemn homosexuality has lead to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans.

So, just to review, Huckabee is the bad guy here because he said something politically insensitive.

If the U.S. had done what Huckabee suggested homosexuals who are dead today would still be alive.

Got it.

'So why bother spending all the money to quarantine the infected -- why not just exterminate them?'

They have been.

but their fear of appearing to condemn homosexuality has lead to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans

Excuse me numbnuts, but "liberals" weren't in charge when AIDS really hit hard. Your hero reagan was. And then there was ANOTHER republican after him.

Just because the thread doesn't agree with you and huckabees draconian and stupid ways of dealing with a disease, doesn't mean we are letting people die.

using your logic, we should just cut the genitals off of any AIDS patient to prevent disease, and if ou disagree with that: you're helping Americans die.

if you're going to play partisan games, at least know who is in charge, fool.

Zulu- Who is "they"?

President from 1980-1988 Reagan
President from 1988-1992 Bush I
President from 1992-2000 Clinton
President from 2000-2007 Bush II

Damn those libruls, they're always in charge!

Magic Johnson was exterminated? How did the librul media miss that blockbuster.

Yes, a much more sensitive way of not appearing to condemn homosexuality.

Zulu, it's not about political correctness -- it about the truth of the disease. Homosexuality is not inherently the problem -- certainly Lesbians are homosexuals and they have been infected with AIDS at a much lower rate then their hetero-female counterparts. In fact, through 2005 there had not been even one confimed case of female-to-female sexual transmission of the disease (To date, there are no confirmed cases of female-to-female sexual transmission of HIV in the United States database (K. McDavid, CDC, oral communication, March 2005 ).

So "homosexuality" is not in and of itself a risk.

To the extent that presumably male homosexuals engage in anal sex which provides a greater risk for semen/blood contact, then they are more at risk.

But heterosexuals males and females who also engage in anal sex are equally at risk.

That's because it is the sexual act itself, not the sexuality of the participant that creates the risk.

You just seem intent on using AIDS as an opportunity to condemn homosexuality in genreal because it conflicts with your religious beliefs and or worldview

How did the librul media miss that blockbuster.

Posted by reinheitsgebot at 2007-12-08 09:03 PM | Reply | Flag:

Obviously because he was a well-to-do black that screwed white women! Just ask the DR poster "johnson".

Fuck, stop agreeing with me, bowa.

Creepin me out.

Fuck, stop agreeing with me, bowa. Creepin me out.

LOL

I'm fairly "progressive' on social issues -- but most people here have me pegged as some right wing nutjob because of my views on Iraq and the war.

I've been called a RINO enough times on "conservative" blog sites to know that overall I am well within the margin of a GOP moderate.

'Excuse me numbnuts'

Okay, do you want to be called alexandrite or numbnuts?

'Your hero reagan was'

The reagan deflection has already been used, you were about 15 posts late.

'Just because the thread doesn't agree with you and huckabees draconian and stupid ways of dealing with a disease, doesn't mean we are letting people die.'

Well make up your mind, either you are in charge or you're not.

If you aren't intentionally trying to kill people you must just be gifted because 500,000 are.

The 'draconian and stupid' option to what was done (nothing) that has resulted in the deaths of 500,000 fellow Americans is called quarantine.

Nobody has proposed constructing internment camps like Franklin Roosevelt did during WW2.

It really doesn't matter, the left is POLICTALLY FORBIDDEN from even APPEARING to condemn homosexuality.

And hundreds of thousands are dead.

It really doesn't matter, the left is POLICTALLY FORBIDDEN from even APPEARING to condemn homosexuality.

Zulu, and how do you believe that our governemnt should officially condemn homosexuality?

'So "homosexuality" is not in and of itself a risk.'

Damn, the numbers just don't seem to support your conclusions:

AIDS deaths:
Male-to-male sexual contact 452,111
High-risk heterosexual contact 163,60

Now, granted, it seems as though a hell of a lot of heterosexuals have died of AIDS. But for every 'high-risk heterosexual' who dies four(4) homosexuals die.

The numbers say 'homosexuality is a risky 'lifestyle'. It is the left who let it turn into a deadly lifestyle by ignoring any means to prevent its explosion in the homosexual community.

There is the unvarnished truth, and avoiding it in the name of political correctness has resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands.

No matter what you might say about Mike Huckabee he is only guilty of saying what should have been done.

Hundreds of thousands of Homosexuals have died of AIDS because the left turned AIDS into a debate on homosexuality instead of treating it as a disease crisis.

Zulu, and how do you believe that our governemnt should officially condemn homosexuality? - Bowa

Oh, you know, Bowa, by chopping off their hands and stuff like that, making all "homosexual" acts punishable by beating, maybe death.

Zulu has an appropriate imagination to come up with something, I'm sure.

Male-to-male sexual contact

Oh I get it Zulu, you believe that "homosexuality" is synonymous with "male-to-male sex"

How quaint and outadated.

Now, granted, it seems as though a hell of a lot of heterosexuals have died of AIDS. But for every 'high-risk heterosexual' who dies four(4) homosexuals die.

So don't you think that heteronsexuals deserve at least say 25% of the condemnation that homosexuals get ? yet you have singles out homosexuals for 100% of the condemnation. Why is that?

No matter what you might say about Mike Huckabee he is only guilty of saying what should have been done.

Right, isolating 50, hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of people away from their families, friends and all of humanity for the rest of their lives. "Bring back Leper Colonies" Vote for Huckabee. Does that about sum it up?

Hundreds of thousands of Homosexuals have died of AIDS because the left turned AIDS into a debate on homosexuality instead of treating it as a disease crisis.

No. Hundreds of thousands of homosexuals died of AIDS because they engaged in an activity which they became infected from. It was the activity itself not the sexual orientation of the person that created the risk. As I said, if "homosexuality" itself was the problem, one would expect Lesbians to have been dying at the same rate as homosexual males -- but that was an is not the case.

Now, whether or not the AIDS crisis brought the topic of homosexuality onto the front page is a different issue entirely as is the argument that the AIDS crisis itself mobilized and politicized the homosexual community in a way that only a life or death crisis can ever mobilize any community.

But those are all separate issues and arguments from the reality of the disease itself, and what the best way to handle it from a public health perspective was and is.

Hundreds of thousands of Homosexuals have died of AIDS because the left turned AIDS into a debate on homosexuality instead of treating it as a disease crisis.

Posted by zulu at 2007-12-08 09:35 PM | Reply | Flag:


Right. So when left wingers fought for money and education for AIDS research, they were killing people.

And you'd be surprised to know who fought AGAINST money for the research. PS- It wasn't the left.

zulu, I have to say as someone who really likes Huckabee in general-- and has thought up till now he would make a fine VP as part of a Rudy/Huckabee ticket -- your insane defense of his 1992 comments really makes me wonder about him.

I have got to believe that when Huckabee is called upon to explain these comments he is not going to make the same kind of inhumane, insensitive neanderthal defense of them as you do.

If he does, then I am kicking him to the curb -- the wacko religious right has hijacked the republican party for far too long -- it's about time for us GOP moderates to lead the way now.

'Oh I get it Zulu, you believe that "homosexuality" is synonymous with "male-to-male sex"'

Okay, you have my attention. What is this new 'homosexuality' that doesn't include sex?

All the fools hear it hatred for Homosexuals when anyone uses the word quarantine.

Nothing was done because nobody would talk about the real solution to the problem, and over 500,000 Americans are dead.

It's to late now anyway.

At least all the politicians who feared the potential blowback can rest easy tonight knowing they did the politically correct thing by doing nothing.

Reagan was just ahead of his time.

You can't Bowa,because you GOP "moderates" are a small minority. Of course you think Rudy is a "moderate" but he isn't. Like Romney in Massachusetts, he pretended to be a moderate in New York, but now, like Romney, he is courting the true Republicans. You, Bowa, are in a tiny minority.

Zulu - bigoted idiot that you are - "Nothing was done because"... nobody knew what to do. As is usually the case.

Times have changed...I remember as a kid the "quaratined" signs on the doors of residences where there was a case of chicken pox, measles, mumps or the like. Some mothers even purposely brought their kids over anyway...to get it over with and have them become immune, I think. Nowadays, we can't even identify the AIDS carriers among us even though the disease is FATAL. How many cases of intentional infection of another person from an AIDS carrier has taken place? We'll never know.

'nobody knew what to do'

No. Nobody has the political will to take the steps needed to save the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans.

President Reagan's communications director Pat Buchanan expressed the right's position when he declared that "AIDS is nature's revenge on gay men."

Okay, you have my attention. What is this new 'homosexuality' that doesn't include sex?

I never said it didn't include sex. It's just not synonymous with "male to male sex". Sexuality is more complex then that and is more then jsut about sex. I assume you are a heterosexual...is your entire being defined by any any one sexual act? I would hope not. A persons sexuality informs our being -- and helps to define who we are -- but it can't nor should it be reduced to mere sex acts. Human beings are more complex then that.

You are trying to connect an infectious disease to homosexuality in order to pass some all encompassing moral judgement on it that would translate into government condemnation of all homosexuals and physical removal of those homosexuals infected from all contact with everyone else. You entirely ignore the fact, that homosexual women, engage in sexual acts in which not even one case of female-to-female sexual transmission of the disease has ever been reported to the CDC-- yet you condemn them and pass moral judgement on them as well.

You entirely ignore the fact that heterosexuals can engage in the same kind of sexual acts and transmit the disease yet you pass no moral judgement whatsoever at them.

What is wrong with you? Seriously. What kind of twisted brain must you have to believe that you can attach "morality" to a microbe, a virus. Do you believe that you can know the mind of God? Are you one of those sickos?

from reading your posts, I get the feeling that what you are really pissed off at is that before the AIDS virus, more homosexuals were happy to stay closetted and out of sight -- but then when this disease threatened their entire community because it was transmitted by a sexual act that was more common to engage in by homosexuals then heterosexuals -- that homosexuals as a group had no choice but to organize, mobilize, and yell to make sure that they got attention.

They did -- and now "homosexuals" as a special interest group wield considerable political power.

So you blame the Left for politicizing homosexuality over the AIDS issue --when in fact, homosexuals politicized the AIDS issue because they had no other choice -- and the Left took up their cause, at the same time the Right, and especially the religious right was trying to demonize them and use the virus to pass moral judgement on their lifestyle.

'AIDS is nature's revenge on gay men.'

For hundreds of thousands of Americans death from AIDS has been the consequence of political correctness.

"For hundreds of thousands of Americans death from AIDS has been the consequence of political correctness."

True...and those anonymous AIDS patients have infected innocent hemophiliacs, dentists have infected patients etc. It's a pitiful shame and the innocent vitims are the ones deserving of pity.

Jestgettingalong-
By "innocent vitims [sic]", you meant the non-gay victims I assume.

'You are trying to connect an infectious disease to homosexuality in order to pass some all encompassing moral judgement'

No. I am trying to separate the two. It is my contention that is the reality that AIDS being linked to homosexuality that has lead to the disaster because the left turned the issue debate into a debate on homosexuality.

The left stands accused of neglecting the reality of what needed done because taking any real action would have been seen as a condemnation of homosexuality.

The operation was a success, but the patient has died. .

'heterosexuals can engage in the same kind of sexual acts and transmit the disease yet you pass no moral judgment whatsoever at them.'

Where have I condemned homosexuality in this thread?

If I was ruler of the universe and could go back in time I would go back in time and quarantine the people who carried AIDS thereby saving the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans - many of those people being the homosexuals you claim to care so much about.

'what you are really pissed off at is that before the AIDS virus, more homosexuals were happy to stay closetted and out of sight'

????

'homosexuals politicized the AIDS issue because they had no other choice'

Well they didn't have much of and end game did they? Politicized in what way? Had marches and talked a lot? Big whoop, they weren't very effective in saving lives.

'So you blame the Left for politicizing homosexuality over the AIDS issue'

No, I blame the left for saying they cared and not taking the steps required to actually stop the spread of the disease.

Huckabee at lease understood what needed to be done. But he's the bad guy for actually saying it.

"By "innocent vitims [sic]", you meant the non-gay victims I assume."

No...you know what they say about ass-u-me when you use "assume," don't you? If a gay person contracts AIDS from a partner who's hiding his own infection, I'd consider him an innocent victim. Same with unsuspecting women and I know you are aware of such cases.

Zulu-
Regarding your recent statement, "Where have I condemned homosexuality in this thread?":

Are you joking?

Is this some kind of blog-wide joke I don't get, where Zulu rants for hours about the immorality of homosexuals and then pretends that he never said any of that?

Really?

Just-
That's a very refreshing statement, and I thank you for it.

'Zulu rants for hours about the immorality of homosexuals and then pretends that he never said any of that?'

I said in this thread. For the record, I do not approve of men having anal sex with men.

There is little evidence to suggest that, as a lifestyle, homosexuality is nothing less that a death sentence.

So it is with utter disbelief that I see where most liberals, who never stop gushing about how necessary it is to protect the rights of homosexuals, are perfectly content in doing nothing to prevent the deaths of so many.

Hundreds of thousands of Americans dead, a vast majority of the homosexuals, and Mike Huckabee and me are bigots because be have the brevity to propose steps that would save lives.

Which would be worse, having your life saved by the actions of a bigot or being killed by the inaction of an ally?

Zulu, are you saying Reagan didn't address AIDS publicly until May of 1987 because of liberals?

Zulu-
"Where have I condemned homosexuality in this thread?"


Repeatedly, and with a zeal generally confined to those who secretly solicit sex in public restrooms and then return home to their wives and children and rant about the liberal/gay agenda to whomever may be listening after four hours.

'Zulu, are you saying Reagan didn't address AIDS publicly until May of 1987 because of liberals?'

Are you saying he didn't mention AIDS because he wanted homosexuals to die?

Measure the results, what has anyone really ever done to prevent the spread of AIDS in the United States?

500,000+ are dead.

The advocates of homosexual rights have done nothing, Reagan did nothing. Advocates of homosexual rights make promises, but have run away from any real steps that would stop the spread of the disease because there is only one course of action that would have helped - quarantine.

And liberals are POLICTALLY FORBIDDEN from even APPEARING to condemn homosexuality.

It is shameful to condemn Mike Huckabee for saying what should have been done because quarantine would have saved the lives of thousands of homosexuals and others.

Screw results, take the politically correct path. Many will die, but you will keep your office.

Homosexuals trusted the left to help them, it was a death sentence.

Well they didn't have much of and end game did they? Politicized in what way? Had marches and talked a lot? Big whoop, they weren't very effective in saving lives.

You are kidding right? 500,000+ lives have died in the USA -- but at least here it is under control now -- and that is due in large part to the visibility which the homosexual community gave it. Just look at Africa and the developing world (100 million people infected by 2010) if you want to see where America could be with the AIDS crisis had not the gay community brought it to the forefront and helped make funding for research, education and awareness a priority. There are 40,000 new cases in the USA each year, and they are not from a single community to be condemned as you are wont to do.

While that is not a number to be ignored, it pales in comparison to the 14,000 news cases per day in africa. So I would say that the gay community had quite an "end game" when viewed from that perspective.

Bowa-
You've had some very good and thoughtful posts on this thread, but in arguing with "Zulu" don't lose sight of his only true argument:

Homosexuality is an abomination before God and it makes Zulu feel a bit frightened and queasy. AIDs is merely a vehicle for his visceral and most probably deeply projected hatred of gay men -- in the name of God, of course.

First you say: '500,000+ lives have died in the USA -- but at least here it is under control now'

Then you say: 'There are 40,000 new cases in the USA each year'

Your definition of 'under control' is quite different than mine.

'14,000 news cases per day in africa'

Well, hell those 109 (40,000 / 365) cases per day in the states just look all better now. You do understand Africa is a continent and not a country right?

'Homosexuality is an abomination before God and it makes Zulu feel a bit frightened and queasy.'

I'm pretty agnostic really. If it makes you feel better to believe only a evangelical christian would hold my position on this issue you go ahead.

That would be an indulgence in faith on your part.

Zulu-
You do understand that you are a homophobic lunatic who is too cowardly to state openly what he believes, right?
Even when called on it you deflect, and can't own up to even what you have stated clearly on this very thread.

Zulu-
If it makes you feel better to believe only a evangelical christian would hold my position on this issue you go ahead.

What is your position?

Let's get it straight, Zulu. What is your position on homosexuality, and what should be done with homosexuals.

Quarantine everyone that's gay, or everyone that contracted AIDS?

They didn't even have a reliable test for AIDS for years. For years they didn't know if it killed everyone, or if people got it and most recovered. It was a very confusing few years. It was problematic to say the least, and the blood supply had already become tainted.

If your quarantine only people that tested positive, well you'd miss the infectious stage when no symptoms showed. Would you require everyone to be tested (when a test finally was developed - years later)? What do you do in the meantime? Round up all suspected homosexual males?

Besides, I don't even know how you could find everyone that was gay. Would you round up people at gay bars? Turn to rumor, neighbor turning in neighbor? Given how long it took for symptoms to appear none of this seems even possible. After the first gay bar was hit, no one would go to gay bars. It'd all go underground (again).

Besides all that, all you could do is quarantine "suspected" homosexuals in the U.S. What good would that do? You have Africa where it started, from chimpanzee butchering. Now we know it's been found in blood from people back in the 1950's.

If is was even possible, you'd think that authoritarian regimes could have eradicated it within their own countries - places like Iran. No luck so far. No luck in China either.

Rounding up the homosexual men (no need to bother with lesbians - no transmission) would only be a start. Then you'd have to go after all the intravenous drug users. Next you'd have to get bisexuals to come out of the closet and round them up. Good luck with that.

Next you'd have to round up the hemophiliacs. Anyone that got a blood transfusion would have to be suspect.

You're looking at one unwieldily mess, not to mention civil rights challenges.

I understand that Zulu has quite clearly stated that homosexuality is an accursed moral abomination that is deserving of disease and death, but I wanted to read it in one paragraph, so we'll see.

I said in this thread. For the record, I do not approve of men having anal sex with men.

There is little evidence to suggest that, as a lifestyle, homosexuality is nothing less that a death sentence.

Queer.

'What is your position?'

My position is a work in progress. I like women, and for the life of me I haven't found one I couldn't have a meaningful conversation with after sex.

So, to a degree, I find homosexuality the height of sexism, aren't women good enough? Why aren't more women offended?

Lesbianism I find more easily explained, young men can be assholes and I can't blame a woman for turning to another woman after enough bad encounters with the opposite sex.

I am also leaning towards a biological component in homosexuality.

But how is homosexuality supported biologically? Obviously the trait would be difficult to pass genetically.

I have no deep seated desire to place all the homosexuals in the United States in concentration camps, which is how I believe quarantine is interpreted by the left.

I don't believe homosexuals should be allowed to serve in combat military roles for the same reason I don't believe women serve in combat military roles. No, I don't believe anyone is professional' enough to leave their sexuality at home. If people are attracted to each other then it is inevitable decisions will be made based on affection.

Do I believe homosexuals should be allowed to die due to the presence of a disease because they are homosexuals? No. I find politically correct the hands off' approach to be a failure, and I feel it is eminently logically to identify a solution to a problem and act on that solution.

To stand by and watch people die at the hands of those who purport to support them is horrifying, though predictable.

I think most of us on the right wing has learned our lesson. The gay community wanted no controls, no quanrantines, no policy by which there was mandatory testing, no mandatory notification of partners AFTER a positive diagnosis, and so on. So now, five hundred thousand deaths and an additional four hundred thousand infections later, they still pretend that their politically correct way of dealing with the scourge of AIDS was right.

Whatever. I don't really think I have a dog in the fight at all. I have several gay friends who uniformly believe that the Republicans were evil to have not spoken publicly about HIV until the late 1980's, yet they admit to engaging in high-risk behaviors, now that they acknowledge what all the risks are. They say we're not spending nearly enough money on AIDS research, then when confronted by statistics that show a hyperbolic rise in public funding, which is way out of whack with spending on cancer, heart disease, leukemia, diabetes, etc., they shrug and say, still not enough.

Easier to wash our hands of it. IMO, the positions the left have with respect to AIDS just staggers the imagination--hard to believe that if they could rewind the clock, they wouldn't have done EVERYTHING differently. After all, isn't it better to live, than to die? Isn't fewer victims preferable to more of them? But, no. Ignorance might have killed hundreds. But blind partisanship on their part killed hundreds of thousands. Which seems stupid.

I have no deep seated desire to place all the homosexuals in the United States in concentration camps,

So Zulu, when Huckabee said, "If the federal government is truly serious about doing something with the AIDS virus, we need to take steps that would isolate the carriers of this plague," where exactly did you think he was planning to "isolate" them to?

Would it be possible to quarantine everyone that has the HIV virus in the United States? Probably not. But is it so wrong to even discuss it as an option?

Again, Zulu, what makes your position so "wrong" is that you, like Huckabee condemn "homosexuality" instead of the specific risky sexual acts and other behavior like sharing needles which leads to the spread of AIDS and which cannot be confined to a persons sexual orientation.

That said, if this were Nazi Germany, Stalin's soviet Union or Mao's China -- no doubt all those who were discovered to be infected would just be exterminated. Why even waste all the time, money and effort on quarantine -- after all there is no cure -- still isn't.

But here in America and thankfully most of the rest of the world I believe, governments and people have made a decision that through education and proper awareness the spread of the disease can be limited through the use testing, condoms, contraceptives, etc.

In the industrialized world this has worked well -- in the developing world it has not.

In either case, quarantining people for the rest of their life or until some cure is found seems a cruel and inhuman way to deal with people with a disaease that cannor be transmitted at all by casual contact.

Hospitals? Treatment centers? At least, identify them so that their potential partners know the risks involved?

You know, something more than nothing whatsoever?

I'm no fan of Huckabee, and won't be voting for him unless he wins the nomination and the Dems put up somebody in the mix right now. And I'll bet that if you asked him today, honestly, what would he have done about it back then? He would say, nothing. Nothing would have mattered. Why do I know this? Because if you ask people today what could have been done, they say the same thing.

AIDS has been a more or less permanent feature in the gay community now for nearly 20 years. And four hours ago I asked of Danforth and Bowa: if you know what you know NOW, what would you have done differently? And Bowa offers up things that were tried and failed (voluntary testing, voluntary notification). And Danforth just clicks off some things he would NOT have done.

And here we are. You're no less clueless than the most bigoted, homophobic, Bible- or Koran-thumping religious nut. But at least he knows which side he's on.

What it all comes down to it this: Huckabee never gave serious thought to the problem. He didn't need to, his value system said homosexuals were/are a threat. Next, he moved to demagoguery. Politically expedient with the people he politically depends.

The reality is everything was thrown at this problem. Every option was looked at and evaluated. There were wars about how to handle this best, and all the while the state of the disease was changing.

No solution would have worked 100%. All that could be done is to go with the best probabilistic approach. There was great fear in the NIH that further stigmatizing anyone with AIDS would drive all those that weren't showing sign but were positive - under ground. They wouldn't get tested (when testing became available) and we'd have a much worse problem than we have today. There were epidemiological studies showing that that was indeed the case.

I can't imagine the magnitude of the problem we'd be facing now if some of the draconian measures reviewed had been instituted.

The US might look a lot more like Africa had that been the case.

"But blind partisanship on (the left's) part killed hundreds of thousands."

Remind us...what, exactly, did "the left" do to Reagan to keep him from addressing AIDS all those years?

It was identified in 1982. There was no supplemental funding for it in '82, because it was seen as "a gay disease". And no funding at all in 1983.

Imagine if the bird flu hit the US in 2008. How many years before the government would begin to undertake a cure?

'So Zulu, when Huckabee said, "If the federal government is truly serious about doing something with the AIDS virus, we need to take steps that would isolate the carriers of this plague," where exactly did you think he was planning to "isolate" them to?'

The term used, I believe, is hospital; or hospice, depending on the stage of the infection.

If nothing was done over 500,000 people would die - Oh right, that is what happened.

I can't imagine the magnitude of the problem we'd be facing now if some of the draconian measures reviewed had been instituted.

The US might look a lot more like Africa had that been the case.

Posted by YAV
* * * *

Maybe. Or the disease may have been stopped in its tracked. It's hard to prove a negative.

Now I'm a total libertarian on the issue, and frankly I feel that's true of most of us on the right. I don't care who you have sex with or how often. For that matter, I don't even care if you get married or not, or, let's be honest, whether you even live or die. After all, if you don't, and if the people who represent the so-called "gay community" don't want to take any steps whatsoever to save you, why should I give a damn?

And that's where we are. I scratch my head in bewilderment, at how the gay activists managed to let AIDS ravage the gay population while they resolutely denied any attempt to stem the rising pile of bodies. I feel sorry for them, for their victims, for the hundreds of thousands of people who believed the lies they were told. But ultimately everyone is responsible for what they do, and even for what they believe. So, like I said, it's not my problem.

What's more, I doubt that Huckabee really gives a damn--how many votes was a fundamentalist Southern Baptist preacher likely to pick up among the gay community in the first place?

The gay community wanted no controls, no quanrantines, no policy by which there was mandatory testing, no mandatory notification of partners AFTER a positive diagnosis, and so on.

RiR, I don't remember it that way at all. I thing the gay community ws very divided on closing the bathouses, testing etc. I don't remmber any talk of "quarantine" since very early it was recognized that the disease could not be transmitted through casual contact.

I agree with you that that the aggresive protection of privacy rights of those infected with AIDS which prevented notification of their partners led to many more deaths in the gay community and beyond -- so I would certainly have done that differently if we could turn back the clock. But vilify "homosexuality" because of it -- I just don't think that is fair.

As for funding relative to other diseases -- well that is America for you -- the "squeaky wheel gets the oil" and when a disproportionate number of the victims of this disease are from the entertainment community or have celebrity friends etc. then the money is going to go with the people who have the microphone -- and when Rock Hudson suddenly dies, and Liz taylor is a spokesperson for the disease -- then a lot of politicans in DC open up the purse strings -- I can't fault the gay community for trying to get every dime the could when AIDS was the disease du jour --but it is up to us to hold our represtatives feet to the fireand distribute these limited fundws for research fairly across many areas.

Yav,

First you describe Huckabee as a man who really didn't care anyway and then you throw a couple of intellectual stones at anyone who voted, may vote, for him.

Then you obfuscate yourself into a corner on how great people everywhere discussed the situation and did nothing and doing nothing was brilliant.

So I am going to go to roost.

Remind us...what, exactly, did "the left" do to Reagan to keep him from addressing AIDS all those years?

It was identified in 1982. There was no supplemental funding for it in '82, because it was seen as "a gay disease". And no funding at all in 1983.

Imagine if the bird flu hit the US in 2008. How many years before the government would begin to undertake a cure?

Posted by Danforth
* * * *
What, is there only one microphone in the United States? Is the only camera sitting in the White House?

Typical, again, of how lefties like to blame everyone but themselves. But fair enough. How many times did Ronald Reagan talk about chlamydia? Or gonorrhea? What kind of funding did Herpes 2 get in 1983 and 1984?

OK, Danforth. Let's assume you're right. And Ronald Reagan calls a special address to the nation, and says that "AIDS is a disease that will kill 500,000 Americans over the next ten years. What we need to do, as a nation, is ___________________"

What would you put in the blank? And answer in the affirmative this time, so I'll know you've put some thought into it. After all, you've had 20 years to come up with something.

'And that's where we are. I scratch my head in bewilderment, at how the gay activists managed to let AIDS ravage the gay population while they resolutely denied any attempt to stem the rising pile of bodies.'

Yes! That's the point. When you say this it doesn't mean you hate gays, you just analyzed the situation and are reporting on the reality.

Excellent.

'What would you put in the blank? And answer in the affirmative this time, so I'll know you've put some thought into it. After all, you've had 20 years to come up with something.'

I can't wait. This should be good.

Feel free.

You've missed so many points, failed to acknowledge even your basic premise is wrong. What kind of idiotic statement is it to say nothing was done?

You conveniently, and falsely state that the current situation is the worst case scenario. RiR joins in with a "you can't prove a negative" while ignoring that it isn't proving a negative when you can compare to other nations and the approach they've taken.

This entire discussion has been about you justifying and rationalizing your visceral disgust with homosexuality. If you believe you've accomplished something in proving some point, good on you.

Enjoy your roosting.

The evidence clearly shows homosexuality is a dangerous lifestyle

Yet according to the CDC , not one homosexual women has ever been reported to have contacted AIDS through lesbian sex.

If Homosexuality itself is a dangerous lifestyle how is that possible?

I think what you mean is that certain specific sexual activities which both women and men can engage in with one another are more risky then others when it comes to contracting AIDS.

You also might mean that a promiscuous lifestyle in which a person engages in unsafe sexual behavior with multiple partners is more risky then others when it comes to contracting AIDS. Of course, both heterosexuals and homosexuals can enage in promiscuous lifestyles.

So for you to just limit your condemnation to "homosexuality" in general is just completely wrong. That more homosexual men died have from the disease then heterosexuals should not be a condemnation of a person's sexuality but rather an acknowledgement of the efficacy of the disease to be transmitted through specific sexual acts that may be more common to homosexual men, but nevertheless can be engaged in and are by heterosexuals as well.

And in fact, in the developing nations around the world transmission among heterosexuals far exceeds that of transmission among homosexuals.

Yav,

'failed to acknowledge even your basic premise is wrong'

Well what's new there?

'This entire discussion has been about you justifying and rationalizing your visceral disgust with homosexuality'

Now that is uncalled for, my disgust is not visceral. I can assure you steps will be taken. I will have satisfaction. A blue ribbon committee will be formed immediately to take on your baseless accusation.

'If you believe you've accomplished something in proving some point, good on you.'

Oh, well in that case I will motion that the committee not be formed to pursue your slur against my good character.

'Enjoy your roosting.'

Will do.

G'night all.

Bowa,

Enough already. Good night.

Hatton KO'd in the 10th.... Mayweather still undefeated! Woohoo!

Huckabee... Another evangelical prick... I'll admit he's got his charm and that he's far more intelligent than shit for brains Bush, but he's economically liberal, as he loves to tax. I'm also frightened over how much religion a former baptist minister would love to pump into the government. We've already dealt with a president who thinks that god told him to go to war, I don't think we need another god obsessed freak in office.

Religion and politics are supposed to be kept separate for a reason. Why don't we try to keep it that way.

"What would you put in the blank? "

Embrace the victims, comfort the sick, and race to a cure, together.

But Reagan had worked in Hollywood for years, had even been the President of SAG, as well as Governor of California. Don't you think he ever knew anyone who was gay?

Ignoring it was a political decision, specifically calculated to avoid blowback from their voters.

What would I put in the blank?
"My fellow Americans, I come to you tonight at a time of great national challenge. There is a new type of disease, and it's only afflicting gay folks. Now I've been around gay people all my adult life, worked side by side with them day after day, and I can tell you they're just as good, and just as bad as everyone else. They're just as loyal, just as friendly, just as honorable, and just as moral. Well, they need our help right now, and I've always believed America should be judged by how we treat those most in need. So I'm asking you to support however you can: donations, volunteering your time, whatever you can do. The government will also take the following pro-active steps: we will immediately begin the search for a cure, enlisting blue-ribbon doctors and researchers wherever we can. We will do everything we can to educate the populace on high-risk behaviors, like unprotected sex of all kinds, and sharing needles. And we will champion the use of condoms, since that has been shown to reduce the spread of the disease. Now I know that'll rile some folks, but I've got to believe God wants us to save lives wherever we can. And I vow to return to you every month to keep us all updated on the fight against this killer. Goodnight, and God Bless America"

Randy Shilts wrote a very telling book about the purposeful avoidance of the Reagan Administration, and others: And The Band Played On. I'd recommend it.

You conveniently, and falsely state that the current situation is the worst case scenario. RiR joins in with a "you can't prove a negative" while ignoring that it isn't proving a negative when you can compare to other nations and the approach they've taken.

This entire discussion has been about you justifying and rationalizing your visceral disgust with homosexuality. If you believe you've accomplished something in proving some point, good on you.

Posted by YAV
* * * *
YAV, if a truly bigoted homophobe were dedicated to the annihilation of as many gays as possible, he would be hard put to come up with something better than the politically correct public health policies the country has employed since 1987. The fact that AIDS has taken 500,000 lives while infecting another half million Americans is a tribute to the power of the so-called gay lobby, and to their monumental poor judgment.

I don't understand homosexuality. And, I'll admit, I find the idea of sex with another man to be disgusting. But you prove my point for me: the rhetoric has become so poisoned that it is now considered unreasonable to voice these questions at all. I question whether you can put openly gay men in frontline military units without compromising unit cohesion, that makes me a homophobe. I reserved the right, as a landlord, not to rent my home to a gay couple, just as I refused to rent to an unmarried couple, that makes me a homophobe. On the issue of gay marriage, I'm an agnostic--I really don't give a damn at all--but in this age you're a homophobe if you even demonstrate indifference.

So I just don't care. And I'll bet Huckabee doesn't either. It's unlikely a fundamentalist Southern Baptist preacher was likely to take away many gay votes from Rudy or Hillary.

Still waiting on what you guys would've done, btw. For all your talk about how this conversation has only rationalized hatred or disgust or whatever the hell you're talking about, why not ring in with what you, yourself would have done? Suppose you're president of the United States, YAV, from 1984 through, say 1992? WHAT WOULD YOU HAVE DONE DIFFERENTLY?

Sure, whatever. That pretty much ignores what group of people were most vulnerable and did get / died from AIDS, but it would have been the politically correct thing to say. Yes, a much more sensitive way of not appearing to condemn homosexuality.

Posted by zulu at 2007-12-08 08:50 PM | Reply | Flag:

You just don't get it, do you?

AIDS is far more prevalent in straight people than gays.

What about that FACT do you not understand, except that it doesn't help your rant.

Huckabee... Another evangelical prick...

You said it, incredibleplum.

The Nail on the Head.

AIDS is far more prevalent in straight people than gays.

What about that FACT do you not understand, except that it doesn't help your rant.

Posted by COMMONSENSE
* * * *
That's completely false. It's one thing to say that most of the new cases are in straights, another to say it's more common.

Ricky Hatton claims that Floyd Mayweather's left hand could knock aids out of any man Gay or Straight.

Good speech Danforth, I'll give you that.

I'll put aside for the moment the idea that there is a cure for AIDS, seeing as how there are no cures for any viral infections on planet earth. But besides more Trojan ads, and changing the "Just Say No" ads to "Just Say No, Especially If It's A Shared Needle", is there anything else? Would you close gay bathhouses and, so as not to appear to be homophobic, hetero swing clubs? Would you push for mandatory testing? How about mandatory notification? How about prison sentences for those who knowingly infect another person?

Hard to see how your speech did much of anything. Reagan is already widely accused by the lefties of being more form than function. I fear this would have only been more of the same.

Who cares whether it's gays or straights who are most to blame for AIDS? Either way the largest blame is on you parents who are too much of pussies to teach your kids about real safe sex (not abstinence!!!). As much as we don't want our kids to fuck at a young age, sex at age 12 or 13 is natural. The more we suppress nature the more we fuel sexual predation...

RIR,

In order: yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes.

"Good speech"

Thank you...and with that, I'll take my bow and leave.

(I know a good exit line when I hear it.)
Nite, all.

It seems the majority of the AIDS victims are women. Since lesbians don't transmit it (as per the CDC), doesn't it follow the majority of worldwide AIDS victims are straight?

Posted by Danforth
* * * *

Maybe, maybe not. Either way, it hardly means AIDS is more prevalent among straights than gays.

Suppose you have 100 gay men, and 5 are HIV positive. And you have a group of 1,000,000 straights, of whom 1,000 are HIV positive. In which group is AIDS more prevalent?

As much as we don't want our kids to fuck at a young age, sex at age 12 or 13 is natural. The more we suppress nature the more we fuel sexual predation...

Posted by Incredibleplum
* * * *
Sex at age 12 or 13 is not natural, you sick bastard. And if you think so, and further that it "fuels sexual predation", please feel free to drop dead.

The ultimate point is this: the virus has nothing to do with sexuality. That it happened to be most easily transferred via a practice prevalent among gays was nothing more than a tragic coincidence.

Again, it doesn't matter among what group: the virus has nothing to do with sexual orientation, and the fact the group getting it the most by far are straight, can't be dismissed.

I don't know about that either. I just read a UN report which dramatically reduced the number of AIDS victims in Africa, because they realized that they were attributing AIDS to all kinds of diseases that weren't AIDS.

From same link:
In fact, in all cases THROUGH 2005 in the United States, the breakdown is as follows:

Male-to-male sexual contact, 452,111
Injection Drug Use, 241,364
Male-to-male contact AND injection drug use, 65,881
High-risk heterosexual contact (defined above), 163,609
Other, 20,560

So to date, 20,560 out of a total of over 920,000 cases have been either from heterosexual sex of a non-high-risk nature, or from indeterminate origin. Which is one in 46 out of the total cases? and 20,000 out of a population of 300 million?

Gee, Sheep is a moron. Who said anything about concentration camps? Did this thread bring out the Nazi in you?

Quarantine for HIV positive people would mean that you have to test every citizen even against his will.

Or do you really think that anyone will step forward and announce his infection when he faces a life in a concentration camp?

I think RiR sees a chance in this (nonsense) debate to stigmatize people, whose way of life he does not want to tolerate.

He just hides it behind a lot of numbers.

"So which one is more common again?"

You're joking, right? The majority of the world's AIDS cases come from one area, among the straight population. Why does anyone insist on concentrating on gay folks, when sexuality has nothing to do with the virus itself? And why only use US numbers, when the world numbers show the entire picture?

Sub-Saharan Africa proves AIDS has nothing to do with sexuality. Those who continue to point towards gays are doing so to dehumanize.

Zuzu keeps singing the same refrain about forbidden political appearances, while using the magic 500,000 number as the punchline to the joke.

And as he's fired up the "What If" machine, I'll take it for a spin too.

There's no arguing the 500,000 dead Americans figure. The CDC, I believe, is a fairly credible source for this kind of information, so if Zuzu is going to use it as a baseline, I will too.

For brevity's sake, let's say that AIDS began it's march through our little slice of heaven right at the start of 1980. With a quick google search, we find that there were 31 confirmed deaths due to AIDS that year. Fast forward to 2007. There are now over a half a million in 27 years. Now comes the "equivocation."

Also according to the CDC, smoking kills over 400,000 Americans a year. A quick jumbling of the keys on my official Vernon calculator (they're never wrong, you know), tallies up...10,800,000 dead Americans from smoking since 1980. Smoking has killed over 10 million more Americans than AIDS in the same time frame.

So why isn't Zuzu or that knucklehead xian fuckstick candidate with his xenophobic views screaming for smokers to be rounded up and "quarantined?" Because it's so much easier to fag bash than go up against big tobacco, and there's no mystery as to which political party the majority of tobacco pac money gets funneled into, now is there?

AIDS is a horrible way to go. Those afflicted need our compassion, not incarceration.

Be smart...put a raincoat on your Johnson and stop smoking.

I don't support Mr. Huckabee, but why traditional quarantine methods were abandoned in respect to AIDS bears scrutiny. What political considerations overrode established public health practices?

Many homosexuals died because others were permitted to be free to transmit the malady.

Some scientist remarked on the beneficial impact of AIDS on population growth, stating that the point, is it 2050, when the world population is projected to be 9 billion, would have been a projected 12 billion but for AIDS.

I don't know if his observation is true or not, but if it is then, does every cloud have a silver lining?

This planet can better survive the selective elimination of AIDS victims than the burden of such massive overpopulation. But then, "AIDS" can mutate so that it is spread by far less controllable methods, and then ... disaster.

Danforth, you'll have to play that tune somewhere else. I can read a statistical table, and surmise what it means: if you're a heterosexual, non-drug-using male, the chances of your contracting AIDS is nearly zero. If you disbelieve that, then your problem is with the CDC, not with me: 20,000 out of a population of 300,000,000, and one victim out of the 42 or so who contracted the disease.

Now if you're in Africa, where you have witch doctors saying that the cure to AIDS is to have sex with virgins, and where you have tribal warfare using mass group rapes as part of their ethnic cleansing, and UN officials putting down any viral infections they run across as AIDS, even though the victims haven't even been tested--then you're free to believe whatever you want.

But in the industrialized world, AIDS is a gay disease. Which is why the gay community was able to wield so much power on this issue over the years. Don't really care, though. Like most straights, I've lost interest, courtesy of the demagoguery and false statistics and lies put out by the people who pretend to care about the gays, as the bodies keep piling higher and higher.

the annual "Hate the Gays" march will be held on Feb 30th. Please join us and the loving Christains as we shout "Hate Gays, God Hates them". During the March we will recite all the "hate gay" speach in the New Testament, especially those made by Jesus.

should be a very quiet march!

"Imagine if the bird flu hit the US in 2008."

Bird flu is a tad more complex.

Can one abstain or stay monogamous to prevent bird flu? Can people just wear protection to prevent transmission of the bird flu?

No...that is apples and oranges.

"I can read a statistical table, and surmise what it means: if you're a heterosexual, non-drug-using male, the chances of your contracting AIDS is nearly zero."

True. But you're only using one piece of the puzzle. Africa proves your "chances" only a tragic coincidence. And enough African males are infected to cause the infection of the majority of the cases---women---in the world. If it were bird flu, no one would be stigamtizing travelers. But because the easiest method of viral conveyance is used by---gasp!---gay men, bigots use that opportunity to dehumanize once again.

The main problem with using AIDS to terrify heterosexuals into chastity is that it requires gross exaggeration of the risk

Since when is using "condoms" or having sex with partners after both get tested considered "chastity".

RiR, I don't think anyone is arguing that "anal sex" is a particularly effective means to spread the disease -- but to use the MO of a virus in order to then pass some moral judgement on "homosexuality" in general is pretty disgusting if you ask me. And one of the main reasons I am proud to be called a RINO by religious conservatives.

But I can at least live with the fact and accept that a person has a right to their religious beliefs no matter how much I don't personally agree with them. So I am fine with christians passing judgements on gays, athieists passing judgements on christians, afro-centrist churches making their race and commitment to Africa central to their faith etc. etc. etc.

But what I can't abide, and don't believe I should ever accept is when a candidate for President takes those religious biases and prejudices and tells me that he desired to translate them into a demonstrably injurious public policy. In this case Huckabee seemed to conclude that infected homosexuals should have been quarantined because of their sinful lifestyle, not because of any threat they posed from infecting the public through casual contact which would be the normal reason that spmeone would have to be quarantined.

So Huckabee has some explaining to do in my book.

Huckabee doesn't believe in evolution.

Strike one.

Huckabee released a known rapist purely to spite the Clintons and their supporters. The guy offended again, as the parole board originally ruled he would, before Huckabee leaned on them to "rethink" their decision to not release him.

Strike two.

And Now? Huckabee uses scare tactics and his own religious based intolerance of gay folks in order to "scare people straight"? Wanted AIDS patients "isolated"?

Strike three.

Yer out of there!

Time fer this hypocritical hater to take his Christo-fascist Wing-nut philosophies and leave the political stage.

Oh, ...and take Mittens the magical underwear wearing Romulan with ya when ya go.

Thanx a bunch.

Be Well.

Huckabee doesn't believe in evolution.


I don't think creationism and evolution are mutually exclusive. I'm a Christian, but I believe that God created the world" and God created life but He also created what we know as evolution, which is the process which has transformed that God created life over billions of years into the world we know today.

There are plenty of scientists living in the world today who beleive similarly. faith in God and science are not necessarily contradictory. And frankly, I think the more we know about the complexity of the world we live in, the harder it is to believe (for me at least) that it is just the result of the random interplay between matter and energy over billions of years.

If Huckabee is one of those people who thinks that the world is only 6000 years old when there is so much evidence which says otherwise, then that certainly is a a type of Christianity I have not been exposed to here in the Northeast.

But as weird as that might seem to me, I still don't see it translating into any injurious public policy decisions like his religious beliefs on homosexuality would have if he was leading the nation at the beginning of the AIDS crisis.

"There are plenty of scientists living in the world today who beleive(sic) similarly. faith in God and science are not necessarily contradictory. And frankly, I think the more we know about the complexity of the world we live in, the harder it is to believe (for me at least) that it is just the result of the random interplay between matter and energy over billions of years."


Gee
Bow Wow doesn't understand it, so it must be magic.

Self-organization in complex systems far from equilibrium is mathematically inevitable. No magic required. Been understood for decades.

As for the first assertion:

"Most scientists I know don't care enough about religion even to call themselves atheists."
-- Steven Weinberg

I don't think creationism and evolution are mutually exclusive. I'm a Christian, but I believe that God created the world" and God created life but He also created what we know as evolution,

Standard Christian practice. For a hundred and fifty years, they fought evolution with everything they had. When it finally proved futile, they took credit for it. Fortunately for Darwin, they couldn't imprison him like they did Galileo.

There are plenty of scientists living in the world today who beleive similarly. faith in God and science are not necessarily contradictory.

People live with contradictions all the time. The bedrock of science is the absence of supernatural explanations. The instant you try to reconcile them, it becomes pseudo-science.

"I didn't come from no primates" Hackabee doesn't know his parents were primates. To have a preident willing to takes us back to the "dark ages" is scary. That many republicans believe as he does is even more scary.

Well, one thing that the AIDS lobby did accomplish was to generate a huge amount of funding for biological research, so much so that there has been a quantum leap in knowledge of that field of science.

It's unfortunate that so many people needed to suffer to generate the impetus for the research programs.

Huckabe, in relation to church shootings, just said "And the reason we have so much broken humanity is because sin reigns in the hearts and lives of human beings instead of the Savior."

so his message as president is to repent!

Why was the proposal to mark the infected persons somehow, to warn off future partners, so objectionable?
I'll turn the question around: given that the only way to catch AIDS was from non-casual contact, how do you explain an additional million cases? Is it possible that many--if not most--of them might not have contracted the disease, had they known they were sexually involved with a carrier of the virus?
I remember the scandal that erupted earlier this year, when a TB patient got on an airplane. He didn't infect anyone, but that wasn't the point: he could have. There are hundreds of thousands of AIDS victims walking around--is it too much to ask of our government that they ensure no further spread of the disease? Or, at the very least, a sexually active partner is fully aware of what he or she is at risk for?
Nah. Easier to do it this way, I guess. And the body count continues on.

Posted by rightisright at 2007-12-08 07:34 PM | Reply |

I thought you wanted the government out of your life ?!??! Now you want welfare, when you could be providing for your own protection...

BBC
Anal sex could be a major cause of the HIV/Aids epidemic in Africa, according to new research.

Posted by kerrin57 at 2007-12-09 02:20 PM | Reply |

Unfortunately rape is a major cause of anal sex in africa...

I thought you wanted the government out of your life ?!??! Now you want welfare, when you could be providing for your own protection...

Posted by KnightHawk
* * * * *

Um, what? The right to have an informed decision isn't the same as welfare.

Point taken, though--and I do provide for my own protection. AIDS is a disease that is overwhelmingly spread through homosexual contact, or through sharing needles. I do neither, and I'm fine. My point was that the activists on this issue wanted no policy changes at all, except more money. Which makes THEM the ones looking for a welfare handout. Not I.

Great. Another candidate who receives his instructions from God on a daily basis. Did we warp back to the Middle Ages while I wasn't looking. Another problem with these guys is, the first thing God tells 'em to do is start a war.

I guess you all would count me as a lurker.... but I finally have to say something.....


YOu all fail to realize that through education and the advancment of drugs that AIDS is not seen as a threat by young Americans. There are people that are living 20+ years with HIV and are living fully productive and healthy lives.

Gay porn from the larger studios have instituted a zero tollerance of unsafe sex. Straight video has not. As a result in the '90's gay infections went way down and you saw the rise in heterosexual infections.

Now with the abstinance push (lack of education) and better meds its not seen as a threat by the younger generations. As a result if you go to xtube or any other small pron site you will find "bare-backing" back in promminance. And the gay's that I know (younger) have said it dosent matter, if the straights dont worry why should I???

Its still a mattter of education. If you dont talk about it then nothing will be done. I dont like fuckaby, but his narrow views have brought it back in to prevailance....

(shamless hand off) and if the christian right wasnt so against alternitave medicine (stem cells) vaccienes and possible cures may have already been found.

Last chance, vote Ron Paul. Or ya all get bush/clinton/bush/clinton

Gay porn from the larger studios have instituted a zero tollerance of unsafe sex. Straight video has not. As a result in the '90's gay infections went way down and you saw the rise in heterosexual infections.

* * * * *

There hasn't been a rise in heterosexual infections. It's the same ratio it's always been. So you'll have to peddle your mythology elsewhere.

As to your characteristic bashing of the Christian right, mind telling me what cures have been found for any other viral disease, EVER? Oh, that's right--none of them. Because they don't exist. And just because some of us righty tighties demur at having our tax dollars used to find vaccines for disease when there is a massive market for doing so in the private sector, hardly suggests that you would have a vaccine--let alone a cure--were it not for stingy Christians.

So, you've managed a twofer--bad information, followed up by bad logic.