The Evil Petting Zoo

I was out of the country when Jesse Helms died, and by the time I got Internet access again, it was a little late to comment. Now, a while back, I said I would hold a big fuck-off party when he died. Then, some time later, I said that I'd realized it was wrong to celebrate the death of any one person.

So, now that Helms is dead, all I can say is: Good fucking riddance. Yes, look at me, I changed my mind again. That's one of the few benefits of being young and trying to figure out where your ideology lies. But seriously, fuck Jesse Helms. Fuck that racist, homophobic piece of trash. If he hadn't fought for the Klan vote so fucking hard, integration might have gotten here sooner. Hell, if he hadn't treated us gays like lepers, who knows how many people could still be alive because they'd gotten AIDS medicine. But no, we were disgusting little fags, and he was proud to watch us die.

Which is where we come around to what really drives me fucking crazy when little shit stains like Helms die: There will be people who aren't willing to admit that their ideological allies were pathetic little trolls. Instead, they will eulogize, nay, canonize their brothers in politics, no matter how bigoted, how twisted, how fucking disgusting they were.

But I've got to admit, it takes some fucking gall to want to stick Helms's name on an AIDS relief bill. But Elizabeth Dole has that gall, or just the general cluelessness, to attempt it. Dole, who has never seen her people decimated by a plague that everyone else wanted to ignore, thinks that it's perfectly appropriate to honor a man who helped that plague spread to every corner it could by sticking his name on a bill meant to help its victims.

I say we let her know exactly what we think about that, don't you?