Marketers discover "Carrie Prejean"

Miss California Carrie Prejean, whom the vermin Perez Hilton has singlehandedly minted as the newest and by far prettiest right-wing superstar, has complained that sponsors have told her to renounce her views opposing marriage equality. Instead, she's on a church tour.

This morning, a colleague asked me what I thought so I went to my blog to email her the post above. And that's when I spotted that automatic Google Ad associated with the post. Here it is closer up:


If you click on it, get to download a pdf of companies that "are involved in practices contrary to Judeo-Christian principles." It's an ad for a conservative investment fund called the Timothy Plan and the Hall of Shame includes, among others, pretty much every media company (including Fox News owner News Corp) for promulgating pornography. Here's their mission:

To help you exterminate the bugs from your investments using non-toxic methods, we have compiled this list of invaders who have earned the "Hall of Shame" award. These companies undermine traditional family values by becoming involved directly or indirectly in any of the following: abortion, pornography, anti-family entertainment, alternative lifestyles, alcohol, tobacco and/or gambling.

Two questions here:

* Is there a way for me to tell Google not to allow such ads to be paired with my blog?

* How is it the Timothy Plan has listed not a single gaming corporation even though there's a column on the chart for gambling? The only companies checked off are beer and amusement park purveyor Anheuser-Busch and Planet Out, the gay online media company that, so far as I know, does not provide any gambling services. Are Vegas interests just such lost causes, so beyond help that they don't even belong in the Hall of Shame?

In any event, Ms. Prejean is well on her way to full-fledged right-wing exploitation. I just hope she gets her cut, because clearly the Timothy Plan is placing these ads where her name appears without her knowledge. That would seem unethical -- immoral even! -- so maybe we shouldn't invest with them.

[P.S. If you're really into this Carrie Prejean stuff, my pal Rex Wockner, a prominent gay journalist, had a terrific Q-and-A with her posted to his blog. I only wish he'd asked her if she was a virgin since I suspect if she's dating stoner Michael Phelps she's not and that would see, as she likes to say, Biblically incorrect.]

Vermin Perez Hilton v Miss California

[UPDATE: Norm Clarke quizzed the vermin PH about this post and the vermin PH responded: "I am praying for Steve Friess." That's pretty funny.]

[UPDATE #2: Perez apparently also says he wishes he had called Ms. Prejean a cunt, too. That'll surely win the gays some friends, huh?]

I've avoided commenting on the flap over Miss California, Carrie Prejean, who answered the vermin Perez Hilton's question at the Miss USA contest in Las Vegas last weekend about gay marriage with an inarticulate response that rambled about alleged free choice -- no gay Americans can choose fully recognized marriage -- before revealing her personal view that marriage is between a man and a woman. (There she is to the right, looking awfully wholesome.)

The whole thing was disconcerting because while I obviously don't agree with Prejean, I'm not sure that political opinions are how we ought to choose beauty queens. And the vermin Perez Hilton, who heretofore has done nothing whatsoever for gay rights and didn't donate a dime to fight against Proposition 8 last year, decided this was a great time to exploit the issue by recording a video blog in which he cackles about all the attention he's gettin over this and then calls Prejean a "dumb bitch." Next thing you know, he's on Larry King Live as though he's been in the thick of this issue all along when he actually represents the worst, the grossest, the least productive and most unpleasant side of what gay America has to offer.

Worse, though, is that using that kind of nasty language is the surest way to shut down any serious debate or discourse. It's not the verbage of a thinking person, one who cares about something greater than his own fame. Once the vermin Perez Hilton attacked this young woman, she became a right-wing hero and handed the Hannitys and Limbaughs of the world a clear-cut case of politically correct aggression with which to paint all gays who argue for marriage equality. She may be wrong on marriage equality, but that doesn't (necessarily) make her dumb or a bitch. Conversely, the vermin Perez Hilton may be right but that doesn't (even remotely) make him smart or honorable.

It really, really bothered me that Prejean may actually have lost her crown on this answer. (She came in second to Miss North Carolina, whose name nobody knows or cares thanks to the vermin Perez Hilton.) That's why I'm delighted that my friend and Miles' colleague Alicia Jacobs, an entertainment reporter for KVBC and one of the vermin Perez Hilton's co-judges, explained to Advocate.Com better why the way Prejean answered cost her in the competition.



I don't know if I totally buy what she says there, but it's a better-reasoned answer than what the vermin Perez Hilton has had to say. See? You can be smart and pretty. Or you can be hideous and stupid. (And, yes, I have a bit of a chip on my shoulder over this creep. Click here to see why.)

Alicia, who talks in that video about attending gay weddings, was also at ours, as you can see:


Mostly, I wish this thing would go away. The vermin Perez Hilton did more to firm up the resolve of straight-only-marriage proponents and provide them with a widely sympathetic figure around which to rally than anything in recent memory. Nicely done!