From the ‘One-More-Reason-Republicans-Are-Crazy’ file: The Chicago Tribune (Oct. 7) comments on Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s anti-medical marijuana view. ‘Recently the journal Neurology published the results of one clinical trial of HIV patients,’ the Tribune article stated. ‘It showed that pot ‘effectively relieved chronic neuropathic pain from HIV-associated sensory neuropathy with no adverse side effects.” Columnist Steve Chapman said, in so many words, that McCain (who is totally against medical pot, even when the patient is dying in front of him) is a total ignoramus on the subject.
From the heavily laden ‘Nature-Or-Nurture’ file, the Chicago Sun-Times (Oct. 16) reports on the new study of 1,000 pairs of gay brothers by Chicago researchers who will look for genetic evidence of homosexuality. The researchers suspect that more than likely there’d be several genes and of course the homophobes are gathering in the wings to counter-attack already: evangelical Christian Stanton Jones, a psych professor perched at Wheaton College, says his study indicates gays can convert and that those other researchers have a pro-gay agenda that’ll produce biased results.
Did you catch the cover of the Oct. 8 New Yorker? We’ll call this the ‘Craig’s-List’ file: It shows a cartoon of Iran’s prez, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in a public bathroom stall reading a newspaper and looking suspiciously at a foot nudging him from the next stall. Apparently Sen. Craig’s whole cruising shtick is stuck in the culture forever. Guess all those darn rural homosexuals will just have to up and come out—their cover is blown, so to speak.
R.I.P. X 2: The New York Times (Oct. 4) reports the death of Herbert Muschamp, the paper’s former architecture critic. Muschamp ‘often reflected on the central role that gay men played in New York’s cultural history, specifically the world he entered as a young gay man escaping the homogeneity of suburban Philadelphia.’ He was known for championing new architects such as Frank Gehry, Rem Koolhaas and Zaha Hadid; he was 59. The Chicago Tribune (Oct. 11) covered the death of F. Robert ‘Zack’ Stiglicz, who made films ‘that usually dealt with issues of desire and male narcissism.’ He was also a painter and taught film at Columbia College. ‘Going to his class was like going to a rock concert,’ said one of his teaching assistants. The Trib reported he lived a ‘gay lifestyle’ in the ’80s and ’90s, and then married Shellie Fleming. His wife survives him; he was 54.
From the ‘Irony’ file: Happy 50th anniversary to gay poet Allen Ginsberg’s legal OK for his classic poem Howl. A court ruling in 1957 said the work had ‘redeeming social importance’ and, hence, was not obscene. Unfortunately, plans to read it aloud on the radio to celebrate the anniversary were scuttled for fear the FCC would declare it indecent and bankrupt the radio station with fines.