Moe, Larry & Curly

There was a lot of anticipation (at least in Blog World) for this past Friday's Real Time with Bill Maher, namely because a certain member of the White House Press Whores was scheduled for an appearance. Unfortunately, Maher tossed softballs at JimmyJeff and JimmyJeff (unsurprisingly) answered them with a lot of evasive nonsense accompanied by severe eye blinking. (If you must, you can watch the full interview over at Crooks and Liars or, to save your valuable time, you can watch my condensed highlights by clicking on Guckert/Gannon's studly picture above.)

The show did feature some genuine highlights: Click on Martin Short for the funniest one and click on Bill Maher for what I thought was the most interesting one. Because it's Sunday and I'm too lazy to write something new, I've included my comments about the segment along with a response, both of which were posted on AMERICAblog's open thread about Friday's Real Time show:

I'm amazed that no one commented on the one truly must-see moment of last night's Real Time: After "choking" on Gannon/Guckert, Maher switched the topic to why Bush received more votes from African-Americans in 2004 than he did in 2000. Maher's take (and I agree) was that there is a lot of homophobia in the African-American culture, especially with religious African-Americans. I thought Maher showed a lot of guts to say this, especially to two African-American panelists, Lt. Gov. Michael Steele (wanker), and writer Farai Chideya (who I liked except for when she shamelessly plugged her book). Steele at first tried to sidestep the issue and then pretty much admitted that it was true (he cited an example of Jesse Jackson talking about gay marriage in a church where apparently half the congregation walked out). Chideya, if I recall correctly was more forthright about the "accusation" if that's what you want to call it. It's pretty sad if anyone (black or white) chose their fear of two men doing it over losing their children in Iraq, seeing their personal incomes go down, living with unsecured ports and lax airport security, tax cuts for the rich, raping the environment...the list goes on and on. It makes me want to soil my magic underpants.

Krup,

Thank you for making an excellent point. Bill showed a great deal of courage by addressing something that many liberals have been to afraid to mention, namely, the deep hatred of gays expressed by a significant percentage of African Americans. We seem to have a hierarchy of the oppressed in America with gays designated as scapegoats and African Americans as sacred cows. I know that sounds harsh but many on the liberal side of the political fence seem to be afraid to stand up to homophobes if the homophobe is a person of color. Why is it okay for some people to attack gays and lesbians? Why don't liberals mention that there are many gay and lesbian people of color?

There is a growing hypothesis that one reason African American women are 23 times more likely to contract HIV than white women is due to the fact that African American men are afraid to live openly as gay men due to the fear of this horrible hatred of gays within the African American Community.

Because of this pathological hatred of gays within the African American Community, gay men and women are largely invisible. Think of how much damage is being done to gay and lesbian people growing up in these hateful churches and homes. A large percentage of homeless youth represent sexual minorities who are thrown out of their homes by their families.

African American hatred of gays is hurting the most vulnerable members of their own community, their women and children. Pretty crappy family values if you ask me.

So Bill, thank you for mentioning what has remained unmentionable for such a long time.