Q-Seattle Events: Tacky Tourist Clubs

Some local and local-ish gay news you might have missed:

• Bullying starts at home: A few Olympia parents upset by school's pro-tolerance program -- Olympian

Some parents of students at Olympia's Washington Middle School were "livid" after their young'uns had to sit through a school assembly that advocated tolerance of gay and lesbian folk among them.

And these are the folks who get "special rights" under our current marriage laws.


• Justice Bobbe Bridge to retire; Wrote dissent in gay marriage ruling -- KOMO (AP)
  Bobbe Bridge will retire from the Washington Supreme Court at the end of the year. Bridge wrote a stinging dissent in the 2005 Andersen case, in which a plurality on the Court upheld Washington's special-rights-for-heterosexual-marriage law, aka "Defense of Marriage Act."



• Smith and Cantwell offer bill to fix federal taxation of domestic partners -- 365Gay.com
  Two northwest senators -- Oregon's Gordon Smith (R) and Washington's Maria Cantwell (D) -- introduced a bill that would give domestic partners the same federal tax advantages on employer-provided health benefits now enjoyed by married couples.



• Eli Sanders goes south to visit YouTube star; Southerners upset -- The Stranger + Towleroad
  
  
  
  The Stranger's Eli Sanders traveled into unfamiliar territory last week when he went south to visit with YouTube phenom Chris Crocker. He came back with a great story about how the web gives queer folk access to a much wider world even when they live in a small Southern city. Sanders calls it "one of the most fun and heartbreaking stories I've ever had the chance to write for The Stranger."
  
  Andy Towle has been featuring Crocker's videos for months on his great news blog, but when he posted a link to Sanders' story, Towleroad readers from the South erupted with wounded Confederate pride. Something (and we can't figure out what) about Sanders' story or Crocker himself offended several Towleroad commenters.
  
  Commenters on Crocker's MySpace page responded more favorably.



• Is Sally Clark just too darn nice? -- Seattle Weekly
  
  The town's conglomerate-"alt"-weekly did a story on "Seattle nice" a few weeks back and featured the city council's out lesbian is the best current example of the phenomenon. But that's probably because the even-nicer Richard Conlin (who is neither out nor lesbian, by the way) isn't running for re-election in this cycle.



• Tina Podlowdowski to leave Lifelong AIDS Alliance -- SGN
  
  Clark's former boss and former (and not so nice, according to some reports) city council member Tina Podlowdowski has resigned from her post as executive director of Lifelong AIDS Alliance. David Richart was appointed interim executive director of the service/advocacy agency.

Updating Hutcherson and Latvia:
Redmond's Pastor Ken apparently didn't make it to Latvia for Riga's (finally) successful gay pride observance. Or if he did, he didn't tell his "prayer warriors" about it -- which would be surprising. He has, however, asked them to "Pray for my attempt to get a meeting with President Bush and Condaleeza Rice to discuss issues with the American Embassy in Latvia."

That must mean that he is, once again, upset that the US embassy joined with just about every original EU country to urge Latvian authorities to protect the right of peaceful assembly.

We post news items more quickly on two Squidoo pages: Gay Seattle (northwest items) and Gay News (national and international items).

Labels: gay news, Gay Seattle, latvia, marriage equality, youtube

So, then... we offer the embarrassed video of a lip sync attempt below. Not because it's a particularly good attempt. Not because it's a better dance attempt than what Sanjaya might come up with. Not because we're all that fond of Dolly Parton's 9 to 5.

We offer partly because it's kinda cute to see how embarrased the guy is about doing it at all. But then... he posts it despite his embarrassment.

But, mostly -- let's be honest here -- we post it because the lip sync is done by our all-time favorite in the collection of hunks over in the Rumor Machine, Jonathan Jesensky who we've mentioned (and pictured) before. He is, by all reports, a nice guy, a carpenter, a bar-tender, a model. He was a Marine. He is, above all, an uber-hunk. Find more pictures here and here and here [work warning: The latter two links play audio].

If the name isn't familiar, you might not recognize him in the video with his shirt on and with the glasses. So we offer this reminder:

And so here's the other, innocent view from a post on Jonathan's MySpace blog (at http://www.myspace.com/jesensky since it's virtually impossible to link directly into that place) :

Labels: eye candy, link bites, shirtless hunk, video, youtube

We posted this Daily Show clip last week by the show's rising star, Jason Jones, because we thought it was funny.


[link to part 1] [link to part 2 (above)]

But if we'd looked at our feeds that day, we would have noticed that something odd was happening to the "ex-gay" "therapist" featured in Part 2 of the clip. The self-described "psychotherapist and educator" Richard Cohen was disappeared from the web sites of two "ex-gay" activist groups that had previously served as his organizational cover.

On March 31, writer David Robinson described on the Ex-Gay Watch blog the odd disappearance of Cohen from sites that had been primary proponents of his controversial "therapies."

Over the past couple of days, The National Association for the Therapy of Homosexuals (NARTH), and Parents and Friends of Gays and Ex-Gays (PFOX), have quietly removed all traces of any affirmation of Richard Cohen. PFOX has removed all references to him entirely, while NARTH has left only historical events which included his name - all his articles are gone and his books no longer appear in their online bookstore.

We missed the post along with mentions of it by Pam Spaulding and others. Fortunately, though, the virtual versions of the paper gay press is out there to catch -- a week or two later -- things that fall through the quickly-revolving blog cycle. Bar Area Reporter rehashes the purging in this week's issue:

As recently as last year Cohen had been president of Parents and Friends of Gays and Ex-Gays, whose slogan is "supporting the right of homosexuals to choose change." PFOX believes that individuals can change their sexual orientation and has paid for a series of controversial billboards promoting that idea.

The name of the anti-gay group was chosen as a twisted alternative to the pro-gay group Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays.

Cohen had been expelled from the American Counseling Association in 2003 for violating its code of ethics. He continues to offer counseling in Maryland without a license.

One of the most recent of his frequent media appearances was a "Diagnosis Mystery" segment on The Daily Show, on March 20. Words cannot describe how hysterically bizarre the segment was.

Two days after the segment aired, Cohen sent out a fundraising appeal for his International Healing Foundation. In it he said he did such media appearances "in an effort to reach people who would normally never hear our message."

He called The Daily Show experience "the most degrading experience I've ever had in the media. I unknowingly allowed myself to be manipulated and coerced by the producer and the host. I take full responsibility for this mistake." He accused the program of taking comments out of context and making him look like a fool.

The Daily Show segment appears to have been too much for Cohen's ex-gay allies.

Even before Cohen's former sponsors had purged references to him, another "ex-gay" group, Exodus International, which claims to be the largest organization in that "movement," had criticized Cohen:

Randy Thomas, vice president of Exodus International, is rightly embarrassed by Richard Cohen?s appearance on the Daily Show:

The guy on the video announces Richard as the foremost expert on "healing the gay" or something like that. Richard is not the foremost of anything except making a spectacle of himself and completely misrepresenting the larger "ex-gay" movement. He is not a part of Exodus and apparently not willing to take our private feedback and accountability to heart.

But if the Daily Show appearance was finally just too much for Cohen's fellow activists, there were plenty of other bizarre appearances by the man before that:



On ABC's Jimmy Kimmell On CNN's Paula Zahn

Truth Wins Out founder Wayne Besen who appeared on the same Daily Show report as Cohen details his downfall in a syndiated column that appeared this week in several papers, including SGN.

The wheels began to fall off the car when I got a tip that Cohen had been kicked out of the American Counseling Association in 2002. He managed to hide this career suicide from the public until I informed the media in 2005.

With his counseling career in ruins, Cohen turned to the media as his only channel to attract new clients to his "healing" seminars. However, his act that played so well at the NARTH convention made him look like a quack to mainstream Americans. On his appearance on CNN's Paula Zahn Now earlier this year, Cohen actually performed his tennis racket routine to the guffaws of million of viewers. He made a further buffoon of himself on ABC's Jimmy Kimmel Live where boxer George Foreman looked as if he wanted to give him a left hook. He further disgraced his image on Showtime's Bullshit, starring comedians Penn and Teller.

However, Cohen's "jumping on Oprah's couch moment" came on his appearance with me on Comedy Central's The Daily Show with Jon Stewart . To prove he was heterosexual, Cohen belched and cursed and when he was feeling the heat, he got up in the middle of the interview to "shake it off."

Cohen's antics were even more than PFOX and NARTH could take and they heaved him overboard, purging their websites this month of his kooky books and articles. The largest ex-gay group, Exodus International, even put out a statement saying they do not endorse the counselor's work.

But taking his name off the websites may not be enough to get Cohen and his bizarre techniques off the cable news shows. He appeared as part of a long documentary about "Conversion Therapy" on Australian network ABC. Although the documentary was probably taped months ago, CNN International re-aired it recently. Raw Story has the video. Snippets of the documentary showed up again this Friday on Anderson Cooper 360.

Labels: activism, celebrities, news bites, TV, youtube

Leave it to John Waters to find a whole different way to approach the marriage issue.



Waters plays the "groom reaper" on a new show, 'Til Death Do Us Part that will premier Monday on Court TV at 10pm. They're currently running a promo on that link and also feature outtakes, sneak peaks, and interviews with Waters.

This one is a "reality-based" series in which actors portray the characters in true-crime stories of spousal murders. And it's sure to be filled with Waters's gallows humor as he demonstrates in his interview (above) with Jon Stewart.

It's bound to leave bizarre state Sen. Stevens apoplectic. And that's a good thing.

Labels: celebrities, TV, video, youtube

While gay activists were complaining that a Super Bowl ad and supporting website for Snickers candy were obnoxiously homophobic, the FCC was getting a barrel full of complaints that the game broadcast was promoting gay sex. Oh, the horror!

Smoking Gun has compiled some of the stranger letters to the broadcast regulators. [via AOL Sports] Both the Snickers ad and the halftime performance by Prince shocked many of the letter writers who asked, "What about the children?"

One letter writer was convinced that the CBS broadcast of Prince's performance would turn her son gay because it included a shadowy outline of the singer with his guitar straddled at the hip. (Page 4):

It was obscene to show Prince, a HOMOSEXUAL person through a sheet, as to show his siluette [sic] while his guitar showed a very phallic symbol coming from his below-midriff section. I am very offended and I would preffer [sic] not to have showed it to my 4 children who love football. One of them has hoped to be a quarterback and now he will turn out gay. I am actually considering to check him for HIV. Thanks CBS for turning my son GAY.

My, my. Such dirty minds they have.

Labels: link bites, sports, youtube

The young Krakow Dominican monks just wanna have fun. Church officials weren't laughing.


(YouTube Link) [via Slog]

Labels: music, video, youtube

And, you've gotta admit, this is about the only interpretation of Paula Abdul's track that works these days:

(YouTube Link)

And while we're at it, did you catch Robbie's co-favorite diva, Jennifer Holliday, doing a stunning outside-the-Oscars performance last night? (via Towleroad)

(YouTube link)

Labels: music, video, WonderRobbie, youtube

[Update, 1/27: Since this post has been extensively linked, we should point out that there's more about "the question" here, including this response to The Sun: "I never talk about anything to do with my sexuality."]

Lacking comments and/or emails [sniffle], we often look to incoming search strings to get a notion about what folks are looking for here. So it is, that we were a bit taken aback to see several question-form queries of the form, "Is Mika gay?" Our first response was to say, "Well, duh!" but that would be mean, so we looked to more sources than what we linked to over the weekend.

AfterElton is usually a good resource for such questions, but (so far, at least), they have only this to say:

If I'm not mistaken, Mika is openly gay (though his MySpace page doesn't mention that). Mika is not only adorable, but to me sounds like a weird amalgamation of Elton John, Scissor Sisters, and Queen. Whoever he reminds you of, his music is damned catchy.

That's not exactly dispositive, as they say.

Back in November, Londonist (yes, it's one of their sister blogs) introduced Mika this way:

Last week we went out to watch a man from Beirut with colourful trousers and big hair, sing songs about fat girls, gay affairs, and lollipops. Tonight, we think you should do the same.

But still, they don't directly answer the question, although really... with those hip-swinging, leg-kicking moves in concert and those colorful trousers, do they need to?

UK.Gay.com comes closer with this:

In what promises to be the gay indie night of the year, new pop sensation Mika is set to perform live at Popstarz on Friday 26th January, 2007.

What seems to be happening here, is that the question just isn't at issue. He's hit #1 on UK pop charts without anyone much caring about the question, at least not after the singer/songwriter has been compared to every other queer pop star who's ever lived. (And how about some comparisons of Relax with Frankie Goes to Hollywood. Where's the love).

A US press release stoking interest in next week's release of his album says this:

Mika's first single 'Grace Kelly' has topped the UK music charts on digital sales alone, despite the fact that the physical single won't be available in stores until January 29th. 'Grace Kelly' ascended to the coveted #1 spot after unseating Leona Lewis who had held the position for four weeks. With this honor Mika joins Gnarls Barkley as the only artists to reach the #1 position before their singles were released in stores. In addition, 'Grace Kelly' has now secured the top spot as the most played video on MTV.

Being gay is not an issue in this long radio interview, or in these pop-star interviews posted to YouTube.

So then... the answer to the question seems to be "Yes," but another follows: "Why does it matter?" Enjoy:

Labels: Gay, Mika, music, video, youtube

...or Elton or Jake Shears or even Marc [T. Rex]. Fortunately for us all, however, he is Mika. Defiantly so. Behold:


[YouTube link]

ArjanWrites explains the genesis of the song:

Mika wrote "Grace Kelly" after he felt frustrated with record label executives that wanted him to change his sound to fit to the common pop mold. Mika refused and went his own way to write this song and a bunch of others. However, the label honchos came around and decided to sign Mika anyway after hearing the fabulous "Grace Kelly." How ironic.

And then, being record executives, they decided to market his unwillingness to be Idolized.

But, or so we would hope, you'll want to hear it again. So here's a piano version:

QueerBeacon has much more well-deserved fan fever with links.

Labels: Gay, Mika, music, video, youtube

Yes. That's Jake Gyllenhaal from last night's Saturday Night Live. Yes he's doing Dreamgirls drag. Gotta love it.

He's no WonderRobbie, but he is J-j-jake GyllenHot.

Mine's huge: Oh, yes... and then there's this repartee between CNN's Anderson Cooper and Larry King sit-in Ryan Seacrest.

HatTip: Oh My God blog and The Malcontent.

Labels: celebrities, drag show, Dreamgirls, TV, video, youtube

Whatever we might have said before, we are now convinced that our favorite YouTube drag queen is so good that hair, makeup, and dresses would only detract from the performances.

We first noticed him because of his amazing lip-sync to Jennifer Holiday's Broadway-cast performance of "And I Am Telling You...".

Just in time for the Dreamgirls movie release, WonderRobbie and his busy camera have released a new performance of "And I Am Telling You..." channeling the new (but never the replacement) diva, Jennifer Hudson.

Jennifer #1 is now worried that her diva status may be rescinded because Jennifer #2 is getting all the attention after the boffo box-office for the movie version of Dreamgirls. Although we haven't yet checked with authorities on diva-dom, we believe that there is room in the diva pantheon for two Efies.

Who could we ask? Unfortunately none of the Dreamgirls divas made in onto the top 10 of divadom voted by LogoOnline users. And that means they must all be dismissed as possible authorities. (And besides, they voted Whitney to the #1 spot. We're sorry, but that just doesn't jibe with our admittedly flawed divameter.)

Fortunately, though, WonderRobbie himself now answers questions from his thousands of YouTube fans. Our question is on the way: Is there room in Divadom for both Jennifers?

Labels: drag show, Dreamgirls, video, WonderRobbie, youtube

Virgin lizard mother
A komodo dragon at an English zoo has laid several fertile eggs that are expected to hatch sometime around Christmas Day. Nothing remarkable there, except that the mother has never mated.

"Essentially what we have here is an immaculate conception," said a zoo curator.

"We will be on the look-out for shepherds, wise men, and an unusually bright star in the sky over Chester Zoo," he joked.

Mary's baby
We don't think this is related, but President Bush was asked at this morning's press conference to comment again on the child that is expected by veep-daughter Mary Cheney and her long-time partner, Heather Poe. Once again, Bush declined to mention Poe. But he did offer "I know Mary and I like her and I know she's gonna be a fine, loving mother."

Maybe he thinks it's a virgin birth? But even the Christmas stories at least mention Joseph.

Good As You has the video.

Truthiness of the preacher
The whole thing has James Dobson and other wing-nut spokesmen all tied up. Dobson was offered paper and ink for a rant about Mary and Heather's baby last week in Time. But, it turns out that maybe Dobson should stick to condemning science rather than trying to use it to reinforce his exclusionist arguments.

One of the scientists quoted by Dobson, Carol Gilligan, a prominent psychologist and author of In a Different Voice, responded in a video:

"I was stunned to hear that James Dobson quoted me in Time magazine," Gilligan says in the video. "I had no idea. I was mortified." She says that there is nothing in her research that would lead anyone to agree with Dobson?s claim that same-gender families are unhealthy for children.

Another of the scientists Dobson quoted, Kyle Pruett, a professor of child psychiatry at the Yale, insisted that Dobson refrain from quoting (and misrepresenting) his work. In an interview with insidehighered.com, Pruett said Dobson's

analysis of his research on fathers was "destructive and highly prejudicial," and cherry-picked information. When people start spinning science, Pruett said, you have to respond.

More preachers fall
After the outing of Colorado Springs mega-church pastor Ted Haggard, his church asked another of its ministers to step down for unspecified sins. The church appealed to its members to tattle on any other ministers or fellow congregants who might also have sinned.

The Stranger is, of course, also concerned and has asked readers of Slog to help out with any information they might have. Of course, Dan is only concerned about the children.

But it doesn't happen only in Colorado. A Southern Baptist church in Memphis has put one of its ministers on leave in the wake of "a past, but highly concerning moral failure." (aka "child abuse".)

White-hood warning
But it's not just preachers and priests that we should watch out for. A southern GOP lawmaker is warning of trouble ahead if we don't hermetically seal off the country's borders.

[R]eacting to the controversy (among certain extreme conservatives, at least) over Muslim representative-elect Keith Ellison?s (D-MN) decision to be sworn in on the Koran, Rep. Virgil Goode (R-VA) warned that the U.S. must close its borders to guard against the influx of still more Muslims.

Yikes.
Naughty hot chick
Proving that we who use any excuse to put a scantily-clad hot guy in our posts follow the MSM in that regard, the networks were having fun all week with the stories of a pageant queen. Jon Stewart has the details.

Asking judges to be activists
In our final witch hunt item, supporters of special rights for heterosexual married couples in Massachusetts have asked the state's highest court to intervene in the business of the state's legislature. They want the Court to force legislators to vote on a measure that would put a measure about gay marriage on the ballot.

John Hanify, an attorney for Gov. Mitt Romney, said supporters are asking the Supreme Judicial Court to clarify what the obligations of legislators are under a state constitutional provision that establishes the rights of citizens to petition for an amendment.

That's something usually left to legislators in a special convention, but Romney and his anti-equality supporters hope that the judges will be more activist in this case.

But maybe they're asking the Court to save them from themselves. Last weekend, at an anti-equality rally a speaker left the stage to push a pro-equality protester to the ground.

Labels: gay news, marriage equality, news bites, youtube

J &/or K, the authors of the CapitolHillSeattle blog, appear to have become a bit tired of the frequent snipes taken by Sloggers at 43rd District House candidate Jamie Petersen. They explained the tiff much more elegantly than we did. In contrast to our overly wordy exegesis, the CapHill explanation neatly fits onto a t-shirt with a Stranger-esqe acronym: JP: TGFDS. The t-shirt even offers an acronym expansion: "Jamie Pedersen: Too Gay for Dan Savage".

Are Southern Baptists too gay?

Speaking of "too gay"... It seems incredible that anyone would find the Southern Baptist Convention too gay, but the wackos of Westboro Baptist Church in Kansas (aka "GodHatesFags.com") thought so when they sent some of their zanier members to picket the church's annual convention in Greensboro, NC.


The woman who spoke for Westboro at the convention also appeared on Fox News in early June where she seemed to be channeling Piper Laurie's character in the movie Carrie.

FYI: Seattle's gay-friendly copper-topped First Baptist Church on First Hill is a member of the more liberal American Baptist Convention and is not part of the larger Southern Baptist confederation.

Episcopal Church kind of apologizes for gay bishop

Another denomination was in the news last week as bigwigs of the Episcopal Church met in Columbus, Ohio for their triennial general convention. One of the big issues for conferees was responding to a flurry of criticism from members of the worldwide Anglican communion about the US church's consecration in 2003 of a gay man, V. Gene Robinson, as bishop of New Hampshire.

The conference sidestepped a deepening controversy when the Episcopal Diocese of California in early May voted to elect one of the four non-gay candidates as their next bishop. Three of the seven candidates for that post, including the Very Rev. Robert Taylor, dean of Seattle's St. Mark's Cathedral, were gay or lesbian priests.

An angry debate about the election of a gay bishop and the blessing of same-sex unions in the United States has frayed the church at home and threatened to fracture the Anglican communion, the world's third-largest church body. [NYT]

But then, the conference seemed to highlight their theological and cultural clashes with other Anglican conferences and some US Episcopal churches by electing a woman, Bishop Katherine Jefferts Schorli of Nevada, as their presiding bishop.

The election of the first woman to preside over an Anglican conference deepens the divide between the US church and other national conferences.

Many Anglican conferences do not even allow the ordination of women priests.

Jefferts Schorli told the New York Times

"We need to send a message that we fully intend to be part of the [worldwide Anglican] communion," she said on her way to the daily Eucharist service. "All of this calls for us to grow and stretch. I think we're willing to stretch very far indeed."

She quickly signalled that she wouldn't back down from the US Church's embrace of its gay and lesbian members.

Interviewed on CNN, Jefferts Schori was asked if it was a sin to be homosexual. "I don't believe so. I believe that God creates us with different gifts. Each one of us comes into this world with a different collection of things that challenge us and things that give us joy and allow us to bless the world around us," she said.

Later in the week, however, the conference that had elected her adopted a less tolerant stance when it accepted a preliminary resolution that apologizes for offending other national Anglican churches in 2003 when it approved consecration of Robinson as bishop.

The approved statement says the U.S. church expresses its "regret for breaching the proper restraints of the bonds of affection" with the events surrounding the 2003 convention and "the consequences which followed."

It offers the church's "sincerest apology" to those "who are offended by our failure to accord sufficient importance ... to the impact on our church" and asks "forgiveness as we seek to live in deeper levels of communion one with another."

Executions in the name of god

More disturbing religious news filtered (without much US media coverage) out of Iraq where the US military (aka "coalition forces") admitted that it was aware of the murders, but hadn't done much about religiously motivated executions of gay folk in the country. The killings had accelerated when Iraq's primary Shiite cleric, the Ayatolla Sistani, issued a stern fatwa calling for executions of homosexuals. In May, A London-based group of gay Iraqi exiles managed to get Sistani's people to remove parts the fatwa from their website, but it remained in effect and the executions apparently continued as well. (The section of the fatwa calling for execution of lesbians remained on the website.)

The Army spokesman, Maj. Joseph Todd Breasseale, who talked with the Washington Blade insisted there isn't much that the US can do about any of this.

Faced with a highly volatile atmosphere brought about by warring Islamic factions, the U.S. and its coalition allies must use caution in addressing the issue of homosexuality, Breasseale said.

"It doesn't make a whole lot of sense, when we're in a fledgling time like this, to go in and say, 'Here's these issues that are going to repel 80 percent of the population and this is what we want to inflict on you,'" he said. "We're trying not to get into too many values judgment type issues and just do the right thing."

But that attitude might not be all that surprising given the US military's own recent fatwa-light against gay folk.

Another indication of how bad things are for gay folk over there comes from the story of a Canadian peace activist, James Loney, who was kidnapped and held captive for 118 days. Loney is gay, but his partner in Toronto, his family, the Canadian government, and the church group he worked with conspired to keep that a secret, fearing that he would be killed if his captors discovered his sexual orientation.

Back home in Toronto, Dan Hunt had to endure a double dose of pain. He had to contend not only with the daily anguish of wondering whether his partner was still alive, he also had to cope with being forced back into the closet.

Shout-outs

As part of its Pride issue, Seattle Weekly finds and talks to a few gay evangelicals.

Metroblogging Seattle discovered that The Weekly's writers has now started blogging. We're guessing that they won't call it "wogging". (Metblogs also noticed our pride list. Thanks.)

Speaking of which... yesterday, we added a few more events that we missed in the original to our roundup of Pride events. And let us note for SOP's lawyers that when we put up a graphic on other pages of this site for the listing, we avoided using the term "Seattle Pride." Happy?

For whatever this kind of endorsement might be worth, the Seattle Times's Nicole Brodeur thinks that City Council member Sally Clark has stepped to the front.

We were delighted to get a shout-out from WonderRobbie, [we think that will take you to the post, but we'll admit to being often confused by MySpace] whom we featured a while back. Rob was even kind enough to thank us in an email, "I just wanted to say thank you. Who'd have ever thought this little froot with a videocamera would be the topic of a fantastic blog?? haha I'm just having fun and I'm glad people love it." Now, we just hope that he might make it over here to the left coast in early August sometime so we could feature him on the Cruise.

We mentioned CapitolHillSeattle up top. They were feeling neglected a while back on behalf of all us little local blogs. Let us mention that we display links to them and other local blogs via a secondary way via those Squidoo links over to the right. The Seattle Info page has links to CapHill and several other neighborhood blogs (most of which CapHill has pointed out to us), along with some of the local biggies. The Gay Seattle page has some feeds and links to local LGBT resources. And the Gay News page shows feeds from a few of our favorite gay-info blogs.

Tags: Link bites Washington politics, Iraq, equal rights, religion

Labels: link bites, video, WonderRobbie, youtube

The video that we posted in the previous message came to us through an email. We figured he must really be a pro somewhere, so we checked and found WonderRobbie's MySpace blog. We learn that he's a 25-year old New Yorker from Long Island. But -- amazingly enough -- he doesn't seem to be a pro or -- judging from his blog posts -- even an amateur performer.

Somehow, we're pretty sure that's gonna change sometime soon. He posts a collection of 29 of his videos showing his great range in doing divas of all stripes and eras -- even an incredible take on Rosemary Clooney.

And when Robbie and his boyfriend went to see Wicked on Broadway, Robbie showed that he knows how to work the stage line.

Watch the videos while he's still doing them for free, because we're guessing he'll be in a high-cover club somewhere real soon now. (Unless, of course, he only wants to do it for his camera and for those of us who enjoy the vids.)

Technorati tags: Divas WonderRobbie Gay Video

Labels: video, WonderRobbie, youtube

Let us clarify from the very start that we're not saying anything else about WonderRobbie, the cute guy in this great vid, except that she he sure does hit it for the lip synch part of a drag act. (And that is a rare talent, after all.)

Let's not assume anything from the cutesy fantasy print hanging on the wall behind him or from Robbie's impeccably pressed t-shirt featuring an exaggerated fantasy chick of some sort. Nothing. OK?

But if anyone wanted to offer costuming and dressing services for him, we figure you'd be hooking up with a star. Come now. Look at him. Look at those eyes. You gotta admit, getting him dragged up as Jennifer Holiday would be fun, no?



Compare his act with Jennifer Holiday's original from the '82 Tony Awards. (Jennifer's solo starts at 3:30 into the scene.) Notice that Robbie avoids doing that shaking chin bit that nearly every Jennifer impersonator falls into. A star, we say. A star.

Technorati tags: Jennifer Holiday WonderRobbie Gay Video

Labels: drag show, Dreamgirls, video, WonderRobbie, youtube