RI Governor Supports NOM

Just a hunch: The anti-gay gov wants to be President

or Senator form RI. He is term limited and cannot run in 2010

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

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by: MauraHennessey @ Fri Apr 10, 2009 at 16:19:36 PM CDT

He's also Republican and Catholic.

RI filled with Democrats who are Catholic culturally, especially Italian.  This is not a big surprise.

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by: Karen in Kalifornia @ Fri Apr 10, 2009 at 21:02:24 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

He has to have some other office in mind,

  Being done in 2010 and coming out swinging like this.  After Jindal, Sanford and Palin had to give in to political pressure regarding the stimulus money, he could be the new front runner of the party of NO.

If I make sense? it was quite by accident.

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by: HappyCat @ Fri Apr 10, 2009 at 23:12:06 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

I doubt it

Rhode Island resident here. No, I really don't think Carcinogen (my name for him) has ambitions toward the presidency or anything else in government that isn't basically a no-show job. He is a golden-parachute retiree (previously in the banking industry) who basically ran for governor because he was bored. He won partly because the Democrat who ran against him was weak and partly because RI voters wanted a balance to the overwhelmingly Democratic General Assembly (less than 10% of our legislators are Republicans.) He touted his business experience, and people thought he would keep their taxes down and manage a budget well. When he first ran, he also came across as a likable, grandfatherly type and downplayed his social views.

But as governor, he has been totally ineffective. He likes to grandstand on talk radio about divisive issues like immigration instead of working with the legislature to try to solve our state's problems. At times he seems uninterested in the work of government. For example, he doesn't bother to appoint judges and commission members even though there are deadlines for him to do so; he has claimed that the deadlines are "advisory" even though this is not true. He claimed he would do a "Big Audit" and uncover all kinds of waste in government, but he really uncovered very little. He is slashing funding for social programs and also aid to cities and towns. Our state has one of the highest unemployment rates in the country, but he would rather grandstand about immigration or abortion or bash LGBT people than fix our state's problems. He spends a lot of time on vacation in Florida or elsewhere out of state and was even ridiculed by Jay Leno for being in Florida when RI had one of our (typical, but it was big) blizzards the first month he was in office. Oh, and another time, he went on a trip to the Middle East and didn't bother to tell the Lieutenant Governor that he was gone. Then we had a nasty snowstorm, and no one was in charge. Right now his approval rating is very low, and his party lost several seats in the mid-term General Assembly elections. He has no future in the national party and really just wants to go away and play with his grandkids. I wish he would go do that now.

I'm not sure where you get the idea that he had been vague about his anti-abortion views until recently. He's actually been quite open about them from the beginning, and I am pretty sure this isn't the first time they've had an anti-Roe event at the Statehouse with the gov and his wife. The Statehouse rotunda is open to any group that wants to use it, and Marriage Equality RI has rallies there every year.

I could write at much greater length about the complexities of RI politics, but I'll spare everyone for now. Suffice to say that while our legislature is overwhelmingly Democratic, those Dems are not by a longshot overwhelmingly liberal. At the same time, our House Majority Leader is openly gay, and so is the mayor of Providence. We are eagerly awaiting the 2010 gubernatorial election because most of the probable candidates are supportive of marriage equality.

If you want to see the local newspaper's coverage of the NOM event with the gov, here's the link for that:

http://www.projo.com/news/cont...

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by: DubNotDubya @ Sat Apr 11, 2009 at 00:42:57 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Thanks for that info and link.

What I know about Rhode Island: parts of it are supposed to be really corrupt; I traveled there with my high school band back in the way back times and had a fun trip; everyone there speaks with funny accents; most everybody is Catholic; something about Roger Williams and religious freedom.

Re the Providence Journal article:  What's with the presumably gay guy and his presumed partner holding up the heart-shaped sign which says "together 218 years"?  Huh?  What does that mean?............Never mind, I just Googled it, and it has something to do with the Constitution.  I guess you'd have to live there?

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by: Pollyanna @ Sat Apr 11, 2009 at 01:55:31 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

about his sign

Actually, I wondered about his sign, too, and only got an answer when I watched a video that accompanied the article. He said that he originally made the sign three years ago, when he and his partner had been together for 18 years. When he heard that Gov. Carcinogen was participating in the NOM news conference, he was pissed and decided to dig out his sign from the basement and attend the event. Instead of marking out 18, he marked out the 8 and put a 2 before the remaining 1 to make 21, which is how long they've been together as of now. It's really hard to see that in any of the pictures, so I think it would have been better if he had been clearer in his message. But I'm really glad that he went and bore witness, plus got media attention for our side. Another gay man who attended the event said that when Ken (the guy with the sign) was being interviewed by TV news afterwards, some of the priests who had attended the event started yelling that Ken was lying, trying to disrupt the interview. The other guy firmly told the priests that they had had their moment in the media, and it was Ken's turn now, and they shut up after that.

Interestingly, the other guy standing with Ken in the picture is actually a straight guy who currently runs the local progressive blog, Rhode Island's Future. He went to the event because he likes to show up and make the governor angry, nervous, whatever. Before the 2006 election, he used to follow the gov and the then-Republican then-Senator (who was running for re-election and lost), Lincoln Chafee, around while wearing a Bush flight suit costume and Bush mask. Ha ha!

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by: DubNotDubya @ Sat Apr 11, 2009 at 02:54:27 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

The Catholic Right has not felt

that he is anough of a "Blood and Iron True Believer"
This according to a colleage with relatives in the Blue Army in Providence.


I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

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by: MauraHennessey @ Sat Apr 11, 2009 at 08:23:18 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Ok, now I feel verklempt!

Talk amongst yourselves. Rhode Island; it is neither a road nor it is an island. Discuss.   :-)

Let's not forget that VT governor also opposed SSM but it didn't quite go his way.  Let's give the progressive people of RI the benefit of the doubt until they prove otherwise.

Peace.

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by: peacemonger @ Fri Apr 10, 2009 at 22:26:31 PM CDT

Nonprofit?

"National Organization for Marriage, "a nonprofit organization"

*************

Is he sure about that?

Sorry, but I'm having flashbacks of Sally Struthers hoarding all the food in Etheopia.

Maggie doesn't look like a nonprofit person to me.

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by: bluegrassfool @ Fri Apr 10, 2009 at 22:51:27 PM CDT

RE: R.I. Politics

DubNotDubya, I lived in Rhode Island for 23 years, in Wickford, to be precise, so it came as no surprise to hear of the current Governor's antics.

Never thought I'd be nostalgic for Buddy Cianci! If he'd been just a LITTLE more discrete and circumspect, he'd have been Governor.

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by: Chris Tucker @ Sat Apr 11, 2009 at 02:03:16 AM CDT

RI politics

Yep, Chris, RI politics is truly bizarre at times. Now Buddy Cianci has a talk radio show in which he spends a lot of his time trying to take down the current Providence mayor, David Cicilline. For those not keeping score, Cicilline is openly gay, half Italian and half Jewish. When he first ran for mayor in 2002, the conventional wisdom at first was that there was no way an out gay man could win as mayor, but he proved everyone wrong. He hasn't been a perfect mayor (of course, there are no perfect politicians, especially not in RI!), but people's complaints about him mostly have nothing to do with his being gay, which is refreshing.

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by: DubNotDubya @ Sat Apr 11, 2009 at 03:07:22 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Ah, Buddy...

...I've met him a couple times.  Not a pleasant person.

I guess by "met" I mean his body guard shoved me out of the way of something :)

Your story about Cicilline reminds me, by the way, of something funny that happened in Brattleboro, VT about a decade ago.  The rabbi of a well-known synagogue came out of the closet.  She got in a bit of hot water.  Not because she was lesbian, though.  It was because she was living with a Shisksha.  

I'm only a click away.

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by: JulieWaters @ Sat Apr 11, 2009 at 04:29:20 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

I thought it was 2M4M

So is he one of the first two men who are looking for another or is he the lonely guy into polygamy?

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by: Margaret @ Sat Apr 11, 2009 at 08:36:54 AM CDT

Rhode Island Governor's comments

Governor Donald Carcieri and his wife have in fact joined NOM. From OnTop:

Carcieri called himself a "traditionalist," saying a child is better off in a home with a mother and father, and called for a vote on the issue.

"In Massachusetts it was the court. In Vermont it was the legislature. I believe the issue ought to be dealt with by all of our citizens. ... And let them decide," Carcieri said.

His position might be fueled by a study posted on 536Right.com indicating that year by year the number of people opposed to same sex marriage is dropping, state by state and that instead of a winning political tactic, marriage bans might in fact become a damaging tactic:

Marriage bans, however, are losing ground at a rate of slightly less than 2 points per year. So, for example, we'd project that a state in which a marriage ban passed with 60 percent of the vote last year would only have 58 percent of its voters approve the ban this year.

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

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by: MauraHennessey @ Sat Apr 11, 2009 at 09:35:44 AM CDT

I'm not surprised to learn that pollsters can track the rate at which this issue is losing support.

It's been abundantly clear for years now that the younger an American you are the less squicked out about homosexuality you are.  The next generation, the one now in its early and mid twenties, has been lost to dolts like NOM.  

Their days are already numbered, and they have already been measured and found wanting.

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by: oddjob @ Sat Apr 11, 2009 at 15:05:31 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

FROM CHRISTOPHER DEL SESTO TO THE CARNINOGEN...

My wife and I served in the Episcopal Diocese of RI for several years. It is my native state, and at age 65, have seen much in my state.

The first Republican Roman Catholic Italian descent governor was Christopher Del Sesto (1959-61). He was the first Republican governor in twenty years, the previous having been a Vanderbilt - Anderson Cooper's grandfather - from 1939-41.

The RC Diocese of Providence encompasses all of Rhode Island. It is not difficult to add that the majority of the population is culturally and nominally Roman Catholic...only if they go to Mass on Christmas and Easter.

In my Episcopal parish, the minority population of "Protestants" or WASPS are traditionally Republicans...albeit liberal to moderate.

I expect some Papal decoration for the governor if he prohibits RI to join the other New England states in providing ANY documentation. He has been unable to stop the state's recognition of Canadian, MA, CT and now VT and IA marriages, Canadian marriages too. It is the way in which Catholics are rewarded for staying on the plantation, be they Democrats or Republicans.

My wife and I are heterosexuals - LOL. We have a gay daughter who has a wonderful spouse. They live in CT. We are grandparents, too from this union. We are PFLAG. My brother's son is also gay. My brother is a homophobic heterosexist. I am still working on him. We are all works in progress, and he definitely is.

 

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by: EPISCOPAL PRIEST @ Sat Apr 11, 2009 at 09:39:57 AM CDT