Free(ballin') Man in Paris

Pole Vaulter Runs Naked PR Run in Paris

As the global economic downturn begins to impact on the world of sport, one French athlete has come up with an unusual way to try to secure a new sponsorship deal. Pole-vaulting champion Romain Mesnil, whose contract with the sports brand Nike was not renewed when it expired last year, has run naked with his pole through the streets of Paris and posted a video of his caper online.


The musclebound 31-year-old is seen loping through the streets with his pole as if preparing for a vault at tourist spots like Montmartre and the Pont des Arts across the river Seine. A black square has been tactfully added to the footage to cover his private parts.

Mesnil, who won a silver medal at the 2007 Athletics World Championships, in Osaka, wrote on his website of Nike's decision not to renew his contract: "It was probably for budgetary and strategic reasons. It's the crisis."

Many athletes have reported difficulties obtaining corporate sponsorship as companies cut costs because of the world financial crisis. So far, Mesnil's stunt has earned him coverage on prime time state TV news bulletins. It may win him some new fans, more impressed by his physique than his sporting prowess. But will it get him a new deal?


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One of my big disappointments at Chicago's Gay Games VI in 2006 was not being able to compete in pole vault, since I'd cracked a rib in wrestling the day before. I could only vault 6 feet tops, which is rather lame. The other four track events I competed in were less painful. Oh, I was also doing a ton of media interviews and taking photos. Over-extended much?

SF's Track and Field team will host their third annual track meet this summer at San Francisco State University's Cox Stadium.

Mesnil's stunt might be a great promotional event for our tracksters. However, I don't know how many other teammates would go for it!

Psycho Killer

Gawker looted the MySpace page of John Katehis, the alleged violent murderer of NYC radio journalist George Weber, before MySpace censoriously deleted his profile.

Gee, what's the policy? Only highly publicized alleged (he's confessed and pled not guilty, whatever psycho logic that has) murderers get canned? What about less glamorous felons?

YouTube still has his page up, with him playing back inane prank calls. Check out the horrific antigay comments, piling up like cow dung. Wow.

The 16-year-old who's confessed to killing radio newsman George Weber — identified as John Katehis by the New York Post — used MySpace to profess his love for sex, violence, knives and Satanism.

On his MySpace page, he warns that "if you disrespect me, then I will break your neck." The page also features an entire section of "Satanic" images, and, even worse, another photo album of "My Swords n Knives."

From his MySpace profile:

My name is John, I am sixteen years of age and live in Queens, New York. I enjoy long conversations, drinking, bike riding, hanging out, roof hopping, hanging off trains, any type of Parkour exercise, Extreme Violence (chaos, Anarchy, ect..) Video Games, Violent Movies and listening to my ipod. I am a very easy person to talk to. I like to do crazy and wild things.im like an adrenaline junkie, I'm always looking for a big thrill, I'm a big risk taker and like to live life on the edge.I am an Extremist, an Anarchist,and a Sadomasochist. As long as you show respect for me i will show respect for you, if you disrespect me, then i will fucking break your neck. To learn more about me just send me a message or catch me on aim, my screen name is johnkatehis92, my yahoo is greeksatan92@yahoo.com, johnkatehis92@yahoo.com and my msn is greekjohn92@hotmail.com. You can ask me any kind of questions, I am always happy to chat with a new person.

And on his profile on cruising site Xtube, where he claims to be 18: Hobbies: Buying swords, playing video games, fighting, and sex.

Why are the prettiest ones always so completely bonkers?

Short Attention Span Theatre

Gay History (and future?) in five minutes.

Making a (West) Point

Nearly 40 West Point graduates have come out and formed a group called Knights Out to protest antigay military policies like Don't Ask, Don't Tell.

The Navy Times reports on this interesting development.

"We’re publicly announcing our sexuality, our orientation,' said 1st Lt. Dan Choi, a National Guardsman with the 1st Bn., 69th Infantry, based in Manhattan. 'It’s just one part of who we are in saying that we are standing to be counted.' In forming Knights Out, its 38 members are following the example of similar support and education groups formed by graduates of the U.S. Naval Academy and U.S. Air Force Academy, known respectively as USNA Out and Blue Alliance. Most if not all of these groups’ members also belong to the Service Academy Gay and Lesbian Alumni social network, a group that Knights Out claims includes some active-duty commanders serving in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"Choi, a Korean by descent, is a combat veteran of Iraq who graduated from West Point in 2003 with a degree in Arabic language. He said his unit is aware that he’s a homosexual and added, 'I’m very comfortable with all the repercussions right now. To me, it’s about doing the right thing, not about trying to fit into the process that gets you the rank or prevents you from getting a discharge. If that’s the repercussion, I’m ready to take it,' he said. 'I think it’s more important that I let everybody know that … it is a wrong policy.' Choi said the group has contacted West Point leadership and gotten “a very warm response.” An academy spokesman couldn’t confirm that assertion, noting that today was the first day of West Point’s spring break and that the campus was nearly empty."

McStupid

Not breaking news: Bigoted old cranky alcoholic Hibernians still won't let gays into their parade in NYC. Drunken, green beer-vomiting leprechauns are okay, though.

MSNBC:
Anger under the surface at St. Patrick’s parade
Celebration’s chairman compares gay Irish-American activists to neo-Nazis

NEW YORK - The bagpipe bands bellowed as usual up Fifth Avenue. The sidewalks overflowed as they always do with spirited spectators. The avenue was awash in Irish green: carnations, shamrocks, hats and even hair.

Meanwhile, a more recent St. Patrick’s Day Parade tradition — the ongoing clash between parade organizers and gay-rights groups — burned a little hotter, thanks to anti-gay comments this week by the event’s chairman.

John Dunleavy, in remarks to The Irish Times, compared the parade’s ban on gays marching under their own banner to an Israeli parade keeping out neo-Nazis, or blacks excluding the Ku Klux Klan. Referring to the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organization, he also said, “If we let the ILGO in, is it the Irish Prostitute Association next?”

The remarks drew the wrath of scores of protesters who have long been angered that the parade has not been inclusive of gays.

“The comments bring to the forefront a longstanding bigotry,” said graduate student Emmaia Gelman, 31, who hoisted a sign that read, “Troops Out, Queers in” — a reference to military groups participating in the parade.

Sporticus

So, I've been really busy at work, and my own writing projects. Really no time for re-blathering, nor even linking, the day's gay political etc. news. Go to JoeMyGod and Towleroad and my paper for local news. That's it.

But I did archive some great pics. Here's a few unused, yet cherished, selections from 90s Sports Complex columns. Maye I'll repost some of those, too.

Guess Arnold's Hair Shade

I vote Burnished Beechnut.

Cens(or)us

2010 Census To Ignore Married Gays

All you legally gay-married folks will not be counted in the 2010 U.S. census.

Census takers will ask same-sex couples who live together to define themselves as "unmarried partners," as they did in 2000 before some states - currently only Connecticut and Massachusetts - allowed gay marriage. "This is all about the numbers. This not about lifestyle or anything else," says U.S. Census spokeswoman Cynthia Endo. The omission of gay marriage and sexuality questions on the census bothers some gays and lesbians, who argue that a proper accounting would give them the same visibility as minorities, who gain political power when their numbers increase. "I am a sociologist and census data is very important to our existence, and I don't like it when they leave things out, it causes an undercount," says Sharon Raphael, 67, who teaches gerontology at Cal State Dominguez Hills. "Certain numbers of us are not out, and when they hide us under these general descriptions ... it just makes us more invisible."

via JoeMyGod.blogspot.com:

"By law, Congress cannot change census questions within two years of the count, making it too late to update the form (not that conservatives would allow that to happen). The government is asking tens of thousands of legally married gay couples to lie to census takers."

A Love Supreme?

The helicopters are flying again. And that doesn't mean it's an X-Files episode, but overhead visuals are needed by the news crews down at San Francisco's Civic Center, where a vigil for gay marriage justice is taking place.

There also events taking place in Los Angeles and in other California cities.

According to the LA Times:

The California Supreme Court may reveal Thursday whether it intends to uphold Proposition 8, and if so, whether an estimated 18,000 same-sex marriages will remain valid, during a high-stakes televised session that has sparked plans for demonstrations throughout the state. By now, the court already has drafted a decision on the case, with an author and at least three other justices willing to sign it. Oral arguments sometimes result in changes to the draft, but rarely do they change the majority position. The ruling is due in 90 days.

Chief Justice Ronald M. George, who wrote the historic May 15, 2008, decision that gave same-sex couples the right to marry, will be the one to watch during the hearing because he is often in the majority and usually writes the rulings in the most controversial cases. Most legal analysts expect that the court will garner enough votes to uphold existing marriages but not enough to overturn Proposition 8. The dissenters in May's 4-3 marriage ruling said the decision should be left to the voters.

It doesn't look good, and a long road ahead for activists, lawyers, and No on 8 campaign failures.

Secret Agent, Man.

Secret Bush memos made public by Obama

Document says no warrant needed to search and seize terror suspects

The Associated Press

updated 5:14 p.m. ET, Mon., March. 2, 2009

WASHINGTON - The Justice Department on Monday released a long-secret legal document from 2001 in which the Bush administration claimed the military could search and seize terror suspects in the United States without warrants.

The legal memo was written about a month after the Sept. 11 terror attacks. It says constitutional protections against unlawful search and seizure would not apply to terror suspects in the U.S., as long as the president or another high official authorized the action.

Even after the Bush administration rescinded that legal analysis, the Justice Department refused to release its contents, prompting a standoff with congressional Democrats.

The memo was one of nine released Monday by the Obama administration.

Another memo showed that, within two weeks of Sept. 11, the administration was contemplating wa--

Here's where the text cut off at a jump from a link.

I thought it would finish: "...contemplating war with Iraq."

Because that's the Conspiracy Theory 101, i.e. motive, for any suspicions of Bushco's actions.

But the article says the memos merely says Bushco sought "ways to use wiretaps without getting warrants."

Eitherway, their evil deds are getting another airing.

They've unleashed their jowly Jabba the Limbo on the airwaves from ReichWingClapTrap convention that went on last week. That's supposed to distract you. "Bush who?" they bleat.

They want you to forget the past eight years.
I say, Rethugs, you didn't even bury the bodies.