If you ever wanted to see what the Pope looks like in a baseball cap, well, now’s your chance.

50. Kingsley Crawford
49. Harry William Cyphers IV
48. Leckie Roberts
47. Madison Calvert
46. Victoria Alfred-Smythe
45. Chase Rowan
44. Taylor Alexandra Karns
43. Brynne Ashton
42. Jaxon Reilly
41. Ashton Abbot
40. Zachary Logan Gould
39. Devon Claire
38. Wynn Smith
37. Olivia Thacher
36. Thomas Burroughs Babcock
35. Bradford S Beckerman
34. Zachary James Fraser
33. Hunter Merghart
32. Jordan Winters Brock
31. Nils Vanderlip
30. Packy Burke
29. Thorson Rockwell
28. Blake T. Davis
27. Anne de la Mothe Karoubi
26. Emery Holton
25. Lisa Pilkington Brown
24. Craig Bradley Gibson Jr.
23. Jack Fennebresque
22. Welyn Craig
21. Megan Thumper Glynn
20. Townsend Ambrecht
19. Frances Browning Cain
18. Keeley Weir
17. Tyler Johnson Brock
16. Margaux Rogers
15. Alexandra Hancock
14. Wetherly Collins
13. Lindsay Torpey-Cross
12. Oliver Ames
11. Morgan DeChiel Glasebrook
10. Reeve Ballard
9. Briggs Elwell
8. Peer Pedersen
7. Missie B. Walker
6. Bodhi Ryan
5. David Archibald Sparrows
4. Kiely Turgeon
3. Trip Todd
2. Parker William Brickley
1. Devon Worthington

Jolie Kerr is not an actual name, but she encourages you to save the date now.

by Abe Sauer

Last week, after we profiled Minnesota gubernatorial candidate Tom Emmer, we asked why retailer Target would support Emmer, by way of a PAC called MN Forward. Target’s statement to us argued that “Target supports causes and candidates based strictly on issues that affect our retail and business interests.”

Meanwhile, outrage continues to build within the gay community and within communities that support gay rights, directly challenging Target’s interpretation of its best “business interests.” Unfortunately for Target, the story is now spilling out of the state and getting national media attention.

But Target, long a supporter of gay equality in both its own organization and within Minnesota, maybe deserves a second chance. Some of the details about Emmer’s anti-gay positions are only now getting more attention. For example, while his position against gay marriage was well known, his direct support for a group that advocates the execution of homosexuals overseas is just now receiving wider exposure (even though his possible finance violation associated with this group was known back in May).

We reached out to Target again, to see if, a week later, the corporation is starting to see its “retail agenda” in a different light. Target public relations gave us the below internal memo which CEO Gregg Steinhafel distributed to Target headquarters team members today:

Dear Target Team,

In the past week I’ve heard from some of you, including our GLBT team members, regarding your concerns with Target’s recent contributions to MN Forward, an independent expenditure committee that is supported by a broad coalition of large and small businesses throughout the state, including the Minnesota Business Partnership and the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce.

As you know, Target has a history of supporting organizations and candidates, on both sides of the aisle, who seek to advance policies aligned with our business objectives, such as job creation and economic growth. MN Forward is focused specifically on those issues and is committed to supporting candidates from any party who will work to improve the state’s job climate. However, it is also important to note that we rarely endorse all advocated positions of the organizations or candidates we support, and we do not have a political or social agenda.



In the context of this contribution, some of you have raised questions regarding our commitment to diversity, and more specifically, the GLBT community. Let me be very clear, Target’s support of the GLBT community is unwavering, and inclusiveness remains a core value of our company. Some current examples of that support include:

• Domestic Partner Benefits
• Sponsorship of Twin Cities Pride
• Sponsorship of Minnesota AIDS Walk

In addition, Target’s rating of 100% on the 2009 and 2010 Human Rights Campaign Corporate Equality Index further demonstrates the reputation our company has earned.



As CEO, I consider it my responsibility to create conditions in which Target can thrive, and I promise to do so with the best interests of our guests, team, shareholders and communities in mind. I appreciate your input and understanding.
 


Sincerely,

Gregg

Is Target CEO Gregg Steinhafel sincere? I would hope so. Certainly, being the CEO of a billion-dollar corporation is no small task, and I can only imagine, for such a man, that black and white is a luxury.

Of course, Steinhafel’s case for his sincerity isn’t helped by his personal recent contribution record. That he donated $5,000 to outgoing Republican Minnesota governor, and possible Presidential candidate, Tim Pawlenty’s “Freedom First” PAC is no surprise. And the $5,000 of his money that went to the Retail Industry Leaders Association PAC seems a responsible move for a Target CEO.

But then there is the March 2010 donation of $5,000 (the individual limit allowed by the FEC) to Michele Bachmann’s Bachmann Victory Committee.

Bachmann, the incumbent Republican representative from Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, is maybe the only Minnesota candidate to make Emmer look oh-so-gay-friendly. Bachmann, who supports a constitutional amendment banning same sex marriage, has warned that gay marriage would lead to schools where “little children will be forced to learn that homosexuality is normal, natural and perhaps they should try it.” She has asserted that gay men and women suffer a “dysfunction” and that the gay community targets American children as “prizes” to be recruited. Steinhafel’s support is especially bizarre given that Bachmannn has bashed corporations that “support the pro-homosexual agenda.”

A titan of business makes tough decisions. Priorities must be identified. Target’s Gregg Steinhafel seems to have chosen his priorities both for Target and for himself. So what exactly does he mean when he tells his own employees, “Let me be very clear, Target’s support of the GLBT community is unwavering…,” while at the same time maxing out his personal donation to a pinnacle of crazy and gay hate? Is he a bigot? Probably not. More likely is that he’s just a typical CEO, for whom the only “unwavering” thing is money.

Giving the retailer a final opportunity to be clear, we asked if Target could “guarantee consumers it will no longer fund MN Forward if that money will be going to Emmer.” Their reply: “Target political philosophy is to support causes and candidates based strictly on issues that affect our retail and business objectives. We can’t speculate on the nature of future contributions.”

So, there you have it. Target leadership, at both the corporate and individual top executive level, affirms its “unwavering” support for the GLBT community as long as that support comes after all other support. Given the chance for a small PR victory, the brand even declined the opportunity to stop donating to MN Forward.

And it’s not like the PAC needs any more of Target’s money. Another Minneapolis-based retail giant’s name just popped up on MN Forward’s supporter list. Best Buy has also forked over $100,000 to the PAC backing Emmer. Another shock for the gay community, as Best Buy has for years supported many of the same events as Target.

And an update: Reporter David Brauer, at the excellent MinnPost, points out that both Steinhafel and his wife have personally maxed out with contributions directly to Tom Emmer’s campaign.

Abe Sauer knows when someone is being thrown under a bus.

“The art of filling a bookcase is in knowing when to add a lamp, a picture, or even a model boat among the volumes.”
–Sigh.

“This incident is a total misunderstanding. Our police officers never realized that they beat the wife of a senior leader. A strong wave of fists rained down on her for more than 16 minutes.”
-The Communist Party chief of the district bureau of Hubei, China, explains the accidental assault on Chen Yulian which resulted in a concussion and brain damage. Yulian was attempting to visit her husband, a provincial official, at his workplace when she was confused for an average citizen petitioning for redress of grievances and set upon by six security officers.

by Jordan Carr

Barack Obama just about never wears shorts. So far as I can tell, there were two instances at a beach in Hawaii, one time when he went golfing, and another when he was playing basketball, that he has been photographed wearing shorts. (And yes, “board shorts” are swimsuits and they don’t count.)

In December of 2008, a shorts-wearing Obama got some unwanted tabloid attention on what was actually a trip to say farewell to his recently deceased grandmother. (He got attention for this trip on blogs as well-according to the Free Republic boards, he killed her because she knew the truth about his fake birth certificate.) Since then, it’s been pretty much all slacks, jeans and track pants all the time, whether he was playing a game of basketball…

…just shooting around by himself…

…preparing to hoist adorable children…

…golfing by himself…

…playing football with a dog…

…throwing a baseball…

….or most recently, hiking through the hills of Maine.

Barack Obama tries to avoid wearing shorts, even when the situation would seem to be appropriate. Why is this the case, that President Obama should almost never wear shorts, even when the situation completely calls for it? A few theories:

He’s too manly.
“The time has come to set aside childish things.” -Barack Obama at his inaugural address.

Perhaps because he’s a grown man and the leader of the free world, President Obama tries to not be dress like a plump German schoolboy from a Brothers Grimm story, or worse like those goddamn Cubs fans.

9/11 The financial crisis changed everything and ushered in a new era where Americans demanded serious adults as their political leaders. As such, shorts were out.

He has something to hide.
Perhaps he has gangrene, or really bad eczema or some other condition that he wants to keep from the public. The most likely scenario is that he is hiding his type 2 diabetes from his wife, hater of fat kids everywhere. Also maybe the Muslim tattoos.

A break from the past.
George Bush wore shorts.

Reaching out to the global community.
You don’t really see a lot of world leaders, particularly in the Middle East, wearing shorts all the time. If we are going to build Iraq and Afghanistan into permanent allies, and perhaps improve relations with Iran, we need to be able to empathize with them and relate to their culture, and part of that is wearing long pants even when it’s hotter than two rats fucking in a wool sock.

Redeeming a gift.
Maybe some foreign diplomat gave him a box of sweatpants for his birthday (but not for Christmas!) and now he has to wear them every time he’s doing something vaguely athletic and being photographed. Getting gifts when you are president must be the worst-you have to pretend to like it, and most likely be photographed using it. No wonder he gives intentionally shitty gifts to our closest allies.

Are you a “selfish elite” or an “independent geek”? It all depends on your attitude toward the iPad!

Consumer research firm MyType conducted the study, in which opinions of 20,000 people were analyzed between March and May. The firm’s conclusion was that iPad owners tend to be wealthy, sophisticated, highly educated and disproportionately interested in business and finance, while they scored terribly in the areas of altruism and kindness. In other words, “selfish elites.”

They are six times more likely to be “wealthy, well-educated, power-hungry, over-achieving, sophisticated, unkind and non-altruistic 30–50 year olds,” MyType’s Tim Koelkebeck told Wired.com.

Those most likely to criticize the iPad, on the other hand, don’t even own one. This group tends tend to be “self-directed young people who look down on conformity and are interested in videogames, computers, electronics, science and the internet,” Koelkebeck said.

There is also the possibility that you’re not brainwashed enough to shell out for whatever new shiny device they crap out at the Steve Jobs factory, but it’s always easier to go with a binary division. So “selfish elite” or “independent geek” it is!

Old news, but always worth repeating: “Mobile phones can harbour 18 times more living bacteria than a flush on a men’s toilet, according to research for consumer group Which?. A hygiene expert who swabbed and analysed 30 handsets for the study found seven had warning or high levels of environmental bacteria. One harboured levels of bacteria, including faecal coliforms, high enough to give its user a serious stomach upset.”

by Charlie

Perhaps Ieshuh Griffin didn’t know any better when she attempted to use “NOT the whiteman’s bitch” to describe herself on the ballot in Wisconsin. She was called to task by, uh duh, six old white men, retired judges who serve on Wisconsin’s Accountability Board in charge of regulating elections. Three of them said (in so many words), “We don’t want you to be our bitch anyway, ho” and two of them said, “Not so fast, Beloved.” Griffin needed four of the former in order to get the language on the ballot so she could become a state assemblymember. As one of the judges was absent, her name will appear on the ballot without her snappy slogan. The board, under “staff recommendation,” told Griffin her word choice was pejorative, which, along with the profane, discriminatory and obscene, is not allowed. Concerned FoxNews.com commenter George W wanted to know, “Why would anyone in any state actually allow a hooker to run for any position of power.”

Griffin isn’t a hooker, but she is turning a few heads. Board chair member Judge Gordon Myse said, “Isn’t she saying, ‘I’m not under the white man’s direction? I’m independent of that.’ Isn’t that what she’s saying?”

Griffin argued that her word choice was “a freedom of expression” and “not racial”:

“’Whiteman’s bitch’ is in quotations. It’s not geared towards a person. The whiteman is a compound word put together. A bitch is a dog or a rollover. [I have no idea what she’s talking about here but PRRRREACH, sister!] I’m making a statement that says, ‘I’m not an average politician.’”

Why Griffin didn’t use “I’m Not An Average Politician” to describe herself using the 5 words allotted to independent candidates is up for debate. She is, however, reportedly suing in federal court. According to Griffin, “everyone I spoke with, elderly and young, understand my point of view.” Me too, I guess. Well, sort of?

Griffin’s story made me stop and think about modern day white man’s bitchdom. Aren’t we all used to being the white man’s bitch by now? Aren’t you? Probably. I mean, who isn’t, right?

Even white men are used to being the white man’s bitch these days. Some people are so immune to the white man’s “bend over, take it and like it” drill that they have no idea what I’m talking about right now. “Me? Noooooo! I’m white and privileged. I have my own bitches.” Sure, but I’m not talking about your garden variety stank bitch. I’m talking about the bitches that do what they’re told because they can’t imagine doing things differently or deviating from the norm and exiting the White Man’s purview, even though they may have the desire to do so.

People don’t because, guess what? There’s rarely any money in it and it usually involves conflict, which, who needs that?

Standing up against The Man is easy to talk, write, think and dream about, but rarely experienced, witnessed, done intelligently or well-executed. When The Man (he looks white from here but I suppose he could be any color?) makes egregious mistakes, we all tend to heave a collective sigh of rebuke before we’re reminded of our bitch status and then we move on to the latest in celebrity gossip. It’s simple to forget, being so lazy and all.

“The white man’s bitch” is just another way of saying “desensitized tool” and everyone is at least occasionally guilty of accepting this role. That’s why I found Griffin’s choice of words at once charming and terribly misguided. She could only use five words on the ballot to describe herself to voters and she went with the most poignant, garish, controversial and naive. “She says a lot in five words,” said board member Thomas Barland. “It wasn’t pornographic, it wasn’t obscene and I didn’t interpret it as racial.”

I doubt I’d have been nearly as creative as Griffin and my description would most certainly have been pornographic. So hats off. Think about it, Griffin only needed five words to say what it’s taken Tipper Gore decades to articulate.

NOT the whiteman’s bitch will not be elected to office, but I do think what she did was BRAVE. And now if you’ll excuse me, I have a number of episodes of Friday Night Lights to watch and several wars to ignore.

Charlie is the pen name of a woman who works in New York City in a place that is far too professional to discuss being the white man’s bitch.

You know what the police in Howell, New Jersey were thinking July 12th, when they got the APB about $500 worth of scrap metal being stolen from an auto repair shop on Route 9: Bubbles is using again. But lo, further details emerged.”Police say they are on the lookout for suspects in a theft of about $500 worth of scrap metal from a Route 9 auto repair business,” reports the Asbury Park Press. “They may have been driving a pickup truck with a number of distinct markings and adornments, including a bullhorn hood ornament, said Detective Anthony Romano on Monday.” So police in New Jersey are on the lookout for Boss Hogg.