Melissa Etheridge and John Edwards

Let’s hear it for Melissa Etheridge. She didn’t waste any time at the gay forum for presidential candidates Thursday night by hitting candidate John Edwards with his own words right in the face. She said he’d been quoted as saying he was uncomfortable around gay people. Then, she asked, “are you okay now?”

Edwards laughed nervously and then made a feeble attempt to set the record straight…or at least I think that’s what he was doing. First of all, he said, “that was said by a political consultant….” Excuse me, does he mean that automatically implies the fellow was lying? If not, what does it mean? Then, Edwards said, “That is wrong.” I think he even repeated the phrase, “That is wrong.”

Once again, what did he mean by “that is wrong.” If he meant to say it was a lie, that he had been misquoted, that he never said he was uncomfortable around gays, it’s too late for that. His own consultant, Harrison Hickman, has confirmed that he was in the room when Edwards had the exchange with Bob Shrum in 1998 and that it did take place. On the other hand, if he meant to say he never should have said that, well, too late for that too. He DID say it and it casts a shadow over all his other progressive proclamations. How about an apology for ever thinking such thoughts? I doubt we’ll ever hear that from a politician in our time.

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I was not able to see the LOGO broadcast where I live, so I’m relying solely on video clips on their website and excerpts published in the New York Times and elsewhere. However, there does seem to be some confusion lingering about “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.” This was not the policy of President Bill Clinton. Clinton had pledged during the campaign that he would do away with the military’s ban on homosexuals, period. However, once he was inaugurated and announced he was going to issue an executive order carrying through with this, the shit hit the fan in the Pentagon and Congress. The reactionary forces were not lead by some rabid Republican, but by Democratic Sen. Sam Nunn of Georgia. A Coast Guard veteran, Nunn suddenly emerged as the macho defender of all things military. He set out to block the move to remove the ban on homosexuals altogether. He succeeded in getting the compromise now known as “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.” President Clinton had no choice but to accept it as a step in the right direction.

It is an absurd policy that simply does not work. It is also bad for morale among straights and gays in the military. It encourages people to lie by saying it’s okay to be gay so long as you don’t tell anybody about it. What an absurd way to live. It puts straight military personnel in the position of having to report it if a colleague does talk about being gay; and, as I said, it puts gays in the same old societal position of having to lie about who they are in order to do their job.

A survivor of the Nazi death camps said it best: “Freedom is not having to lie about who you are.”

Having said all of the above, I should add that for a person born homosexual when I was, 1941, it is heartening that we even had such a forum. It’ll be another hundred years before the Republicans have such a forum. The Democrats who participated are to be congratulated for just showing up. And the panel is to be applauded for bringing the debate to a national audience and asking all the right questions.

"What's Wrong with this country?"

Blogspot 8-9-07

What’s Wrong with America?

That was the question asked and answered at Tuesday night’s Democratic debate before the AFL-CIO at Soldier’s Field in Chicago. It was asked by a tearful woman who told about her husband’s death in the Sago mine disaster and how the Bush administration had turned its back on workers and allowed business owners to totally ignore workplace safety. What are you going to do about it? She asked, echoing the sentiments of all others at the event. The most poignant moment in the evening brought the entire crowd of 16,000 to its feet in the only standing ovation—not for one of the politicians but for a poor working man. He had devoted 35 years of his life to a company that declared bankruptcy and removed more than a third of the pension he’d paid into all these years. And, now, he said with his voice choking up, he sits across the kitchen table from his wife and wonders how he will pay for his wife’s health care after she has devoted her life to him and his children. “What’s wrong with America?” He asked, and “what are you going to do about it?” The answer may lie in the Neilsen ratings: less than 1 million people watched this the most important, liveliest and most interesting of the many debates.

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A few weeks ago, the Independent Weekly asked readers for dog stories to accompany a “dog days” issue. My own memoir of Duke the Pacifist Dog was published in the August 8, 2007 Independent. My story is below. For other dog days stories, go to www.indyweek.com

Duke the Pacifist dog
Perry Deane Young

The first time we saw Duke the Dog, he was riding a bright red surfboard into China Beach in front of the general’s beach house.

The heavily guarded military compound, with high walls topped with razor wire was right next door to the Pink House, a busy little operation where the Mama-san could get you just about anything you were willing to pay for. It was our own private little press retreat on the beach. There had been a big lull in the war that summer of 1968—dog days even there--after all the excitement of Tet and Mini Tet. My news buddies and I reacted instantly to the surfing dog: Great pictures. Great story.

I interviewed three of the Marines who had been wounded enough times to get re-assigned to the beach house, but not enough times to get sent home. They said they’d rescued Duke. He was a combat dog who couldn’t hack it with all the killing.

Like Duke, they had had enough of the war, too. They worried that Duke
was going to get left behind when they finally got shipped back to the world. A photographer took some great pictures of the young Marines and good ol’ Duke riding the surfboard and I quickly dashed off the story and sent it into UPI/Saigon.

I had been in the war for several months at that point, but nothing I wrote about human beings killing each other got near the play this story got. The story of “Duke the Pacifist Dog” must have been printed in nearly every paper in the country.

The response was overwhelming. People sent money into UPI’s New York office. Jack Parr said on his show that he’d pay whatever it cost to bring home this noble warrior dog. People were outraged that a patriotic American dog had been trained to serve his country, but was being abandoned once he’d done his duty. Some people were also surprised the Marine general even had a beach house in the midst of a war.

Great story, it turned out, but not quite true. A bevy of Marine information officers summoned me into their office in Danang. They clearly wanted to lay into me the way they’d verbally attacked the three Marines. With great restraint, they explained that I should know that these combat patrol dogs could never be de-trained. When they were no longer good for service, they were euthanized on the spot. Furthermore, Duke was not one of these American-trained dogs, he was a native Vietnamese dog!

The story went on for several news cycles and the Marine command grew more and more mortified with the inquiries from back in Washington. Finally, they called in the three Marines and told them they were all being given an “early out,” being shipped home weeks and months before they were supposed to leave. “And you WILL take that goddamn dog with you.”

Three very happy Marines stopped by to see me at the UPI office in Saigon on their way home. One of them said Duke would live out his days with his family on Long Island. Would that all my war stories had such a happy ending.

John Edwards on Gay Rights

The column published in yesterday's or the day before's blog, "No Longer Conflicted over Edwards," was published in the August 1, 2007 Chapel Hill News. Incredibly, nobody responded to it in the Letters to the Editors section of the paper. I think a lot of people here are as conflicted over supporting Edwards as I am; but, especially politicians and business people don't dare speak out. I mean, hell, he MIGHT win! And then where would we be with a President living next door. HOWEVER, several people did stop me on the street and telephoned and e-mailed their overwhelming agreement with my sentiments expressed in the column.

One Chapel Hill grande dame called to say how important the column was "because nobody is saying these things...and they simply must be said." she said she was mailing the column to everybody she knows. Another oldtime Chapel Hill figure from the 1960s left an e-mail message saying: "I knew I didn't like the guy, I just didn't know why. Thanks for the column; now I know." And, a longtime feminist activist in Democratic politics wrote to say thanks for helping make up her mind against Edwards.

I think we all had our suspicions about Edwards' raw opportunisim and this is just another outward and visible symbol of his hypocrisy and blatant ambition at any cost. The editor of the Columbia, S.C., State newspaper has a column this week entitled "Edwards is a phony." He goes into the primping and the hair, and three or four specific local incidents that were just as symbolic to him. [The primping and the hair don't tell us everything, but they do tell us some very important things about the man.]

The most damning of all is the news that while Edwards was supposed to be running an anti-poverty institute at the UNC LAw School, he was also working for a hedge fund in New York; and that he and Elizabeth have upwards of $500,000 in offshore accounts--meanwhile claiming he'll stop such accounts if elected president.

And, yes, Hillary is looking better all the time--and I mean that literally. I deplore her waffling on The War, the issue above all other issues in our country right now. But, I honestly feel she's come around. She is the only one of the candidates who truly comes across as "Presidential" in the debates. She's tough, she's intelligent, she knows what she's talking about.

I feared a Hillary candidacy at first because I thought she couldn't win. Now, I think she's the only one who can win. For a long time, I felt Edwards was the only one who could win and you'll find many earlier blogs where I rave on in praise of the man and his candidacy. However, the beauty of these long running campaigns is that everything comes out. I think Edwards may indeed be sincere, but it's a superficial sincerity fueled only by incredible ambition. That is not enough. The times cry out for a real leader with experience. That leader is Hillary.
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It is with deep sadness that I report the passing of our beloved Chloe, the magnificently beautiful fish who graced our backyard at the Women's Center where I live for almost 10 years.

It was perhaps because of the heat or that the filter system wasn't working right while I was off for a week in Bucks County, Pa. Whatever the cause, Chloe the koi passed on early Sunday morning, August 5, 2007. We must pray that Chloe has gone onto a bigger pond in the sky, a happier place where the weather stays mild and the water will be cool forever. To all those who extol the virtues of a big fish in a little pond, Chloe offers her own experience to the contrary; there was just too much Chloe for such a small amount of water.

The Story of Chloe:

Several years ago, there was an ice storm, not the Great Ice Storm but still bad enough to cancel everything. My friend Thom Mount [who produced Bull Durham, among other movies] was scheduled to speak at UNC but that was canceled or postponed. He called and asked if I'd meet with him and his wife, Chloe King, a very successful screenwriter. Chloe had just been paid $250,000 to re-write a vicious murder tale set in and called "Chapel Hill." The only problem was Chloe had never been here, knew nothing about the place.

And so I invited them to breakfast and we sat around the table and discussed plots and characters and all that stuff. I told them I'd just been down for my annual trip to Key West and faced a backyard disaster when I returned. Brenda Baker had given the Women's Center 14 beautiful koi from the huge pool that wraps around and under her deck in Durham. They thrived for a year or two, then they were just gone. I got back and faced a pool that was either half empty or half full, but with no sign that any fish had ever lived there. At first, as some may remember, I thought some greedy Republican had sneaked in and stolen our beautiful fish. That was because there was no sign of murder or mayhem where the 14 koi had once lived; somebody must have stolen them. Then, folks started telling me, "Perry, you should have been here, there was this HUGE bird hanging out in the back yard all week."

Great Blue Heron. I knew in an instant. ANybody who knows about fish pools knows that this huge bird --6 foot wingspan--regards backyard fish pools as their private hors d'oeuvres platter. They not only swallow fish whole; they also swallow turtles whole! What a digestive system they must have.

Well, it was--if I do say so--a delicious breakfast I served up to my friends from L.A. They thanked me profusely and slowly exited the icy parking lot. About 3 hours later, they came slipping and sliding back in, with happy smiles on their faces. They had been all over town looking for a pet store....and finally found one open at University Mall. They presented me [us] with four very small koi. The most beautiful one was a tiny 3 or 4 inches, a glistening white and orange. She was Chloe from then on. She grew into a grande dame of 10 pounds, 26 inches. One of her sisters disappeared; her brother Joshua leaped out to his death; and her brother Jake [black and orange and white] survives.

Out of consideration for Chloe's wishes, there will be no religious service and no kind of marker or tombstone. Chloe would rather be remembered in our hearts. She was one of such exotic beauty and size everybody exclaimed when they saw her. The management is currently searching for another white and orange koi. Long live Chloe II.

The philosophy of the grounds and security and housekeeping crew, in case you hadn't noticed, is: plant more daisies. If the koi dies, buy another one; if the zinnias die, buy some lantanas. [The lantanas are thriving in the heat and drought!]

No longer conflicted over John Edwards

No longer ‘conflicted’ over Edwards

Perry Deane Young


It was one of those rare moments on national television when a North Carolinian stood up and made you proud to be from the same state.

For once, it was not the Duke Lacrosse scandal or the ghost of ol’ Jesse Helms’ brand of bigotry raising its ugly head. Here was an African-American, the Rev. Reggie Longcrier of Hickory, speaking eloquently from our shared history in the South. Appearing in one of the You Tube videos on CNN’s Monday night debate among Democratic presidential candidates, Longcrier cited the long history of religion’s being used to justify slavery, segregation and men-only voting. Longcrier then pointedly asked John Edwards how he could justify using religion “to deny gay Americans their full and equal rights.” Edwards had said he was “conflicted” about gay rights and gay marriage “because of my Baptist background.”

Edwards stammered around in a manner that made you cringe for a fellow Tar Heel caught with his red neck showing. He said he would never impose his religious views on anyone else. That was the public, political him, “but if you ask me personally if I’m for gay marriage,” he said with sudden passion: “The answer is NO!”

His bumbling response was followed by the remarkably common sense answer to the same question by Barack Obama, who said that “marriage is a religious ceremony and should be left to the various denominations; however, in matters where the government is involved—like property rights and visitation in hospitals—homosexual couples deserve the same rights as heterosexual couples.”

All this comes on the heels of a shocking revelation in a new book by Edwards’ former campaign aide, Bob Shrum. In the book, “No Excuses: Concessions of a Serial Campaigner,” Shrum recalls putting the question to Edwards at the beginning of his 1998 senatorial campaign in North Carolina. “What is your position, Mr. Edwards, on gay rights?”

“I’m not comfortable around those people,” Edwards responded.

Elizabeth Edwards, to her credit, is quoted as saying: “John, you know that’s wrong.” Edwards’ pollster, Harrison Hickman, was in the room when this discussion took place. Unfortunately, his defense of Edwards was even more damning than the original quote: Hickman said Shrum “is sensationalizing and taking out of context what was an honest discussion about [Edwards’] lack of exposure to these issues and openly gay people. I don’t remember any kind of venom or judgment about gay people.”

Well, you have to ask yourself, what manner of country club cocoon was Edwards hiding in all these years that kept him from being around “these issues and openly gay people.” Forget his mill town childhood, how could anybody born in 1953 say he was not aware of the issues affecting the lives of gay and lesbian men and women. Is he truly not aware that the suicide rate among homosexual teenagers is several times that of heterosexual teens? How could anybody go through the University of North Carolina in the 1970s as Edwards did and not be “exposed to” openly gay people?

And if this man presuming to assume the leadership of the free world is “uncomfortable” around such a huge segment of our society, don’t we have every right to ask: for God’s sake, WHY? What’s his problem?

How dare he fall back on his “Baptist background” as an excuse for his bigotry regarding homosexuals. Millions of us came out of that same background and learned from it. My own mother was reared by a tyrannical Baptist preacher, but if anything, that wretched experience made her a far more tolerant and compassionate person. When I wrote to her about my own homosexuality, she responded: “Having loved you since before you were born, I cannot love you less now. Come out of the shadows of shame and guilt and live your life in the sunshine.”

After Monday night’s debate, one of Edwards’ aides sent out a message saying this was a “turning point” for the campaign. Well, for this particular gay citizen of North Carolina and America, it was a turning point all right.

For a long time I felt guilty that I was not doing more to help the Edwards campaign since its main office is right here in our town. But, I am no longer conflicted on this point. If John Edwards is still uncertain about gay rights after all we’ve been through in the past few decades, then he is not my candidate. If he is uncomfortable around people like me, he simply does not have the strength of character to be president of the United States.

Perry Deane Young was press aide to Richardson Preyer in his 1964 gubernatorial campaign. He is the author of the Vietnam memoir, Two of the Missing, and was co-author with gay pro football player David Kopay of The David Kopay Story, which was on the New York Times bestseller list for 9 weeks in 1977. He can be reached at www.perrydeaneyoung.com