1. Never thought I would see director Roman Polanski in handcuffs.

2. What does it mean that Bill Clinton now supports gay marriage?

3. If any old head goes on some “the young these days” rant, tell her to put a sock in it. The kids are going to be all right.

4. Any Detroit Lions fans out there?  How ya feeling this morning?

5. Looks like the police from  New York City are dropping the ball when it comes to protecting and serving the gay community.

6. RIP Bill Safire.

7. Can’t lie. Shocked that Michael Steele is still the head of the RNC. Was convinced he would be gone by now.

8. October 11 is barreling down on us. Any ideas on how many show up?

9. Bronx’s favorite daughter, Supreme Court Justice, Sonia Sotomayor, threw the ceremonial pitch at Yankee Stadium on Saturday. This year could only get better for the associate justice if the Yankees, she’s a fan, win the World Series.

10. You know New York governor David Paterson is in trouble when he can’t get love from a sports columnist.

I tire of Republicans and their racial miscues. I take them at their word when they announce the party is ready to start a new chapter when it comes to racial politics; however, the talk is just that.

Take this story. Audra Shay, an up and coming young Republican operative has a Facebook page. A yahoo left some kooky words about “mad coons, illegals, Obama bin-Laden, and warning blacks not to allow the sun to set while they are in southern towns.” Shay typed  LOL and told her Facebook nut to keep up the good fight. People expressed dismay she would tolerate such language and Shay defriended (I love how that is a word) them. The racist nut remained a dear buddy. Finally after 36 hours of  inside baseball buzz, Shay sent out an email proclaiming how racism offends her sensibilities.

You would think after a beat down in last year’s election and a party leader who looks like one of the “mad coons” Shay’s Facebook friend despises, the GOP would do its best to clean house and kick all the crazies out. And even if you don’t want to do that, how about a lesson in how this internets thing works. For instance, if you have some great “darky joke” you need to share, it’s probably best not to send it out via your work email.

I’m not a party member but these troglodytes take the spotlight off the folk who are doing the work to expand the base. At some point the GOP is going to have to walk away from its diet of intolerance (Republican ranks would swell if it gave up its anti-gay stance). If not, Republicans will be on the losing end of all future national elections.

P.S.: For some giggles here are some recent GOP racial gaffes. My personal favorite is Carol Carter from Florida. She sent out some bigoted email right before Barack Obama’s inauguration. When she got called on it, she initially complained about the people who made it public. According to her they were “not team players.”

Steele said that was just an example of how the party can retool its message to appeal to young voters and minorities without sacrificing core conservative principles. Steele said he used the argument weeks ago while chatting on a flight with a college student who described herself as fiscally conservative but socially liberal on issues like gay marriage.

“Now all of a sudden I’ve got someone who wasn’t a spouse before, that I had no responsibility for, who is now getting claimed as a spouse that I now have financial responsibility for,” Steele told Republicans at the state convention in traditionally conservative Georgia. “So how do I pay for that? Who pays for that? You just cost me money.”

As Steele talked about ways the party could position itself, he also poked fun at his previous pledge to give the GOP a “hip-hop makeover.”

“You don’t have to wear your pants cut down here or the big bling,” he said.

Vermont and Iowa have legalized gay marriage in recent weeks, and a Quinnipiac University poll released in April found that 57 percent of people questioned support civil unions that provide marriage-like rights. Although 55 percent said they opposed gay marriage, the poll indicated a shift toward more acceptance.

The chief of the Republican National Committee has been criticized by some social conservatives in recent weeks after GQ magazine quoted him as saying he opposed gay marriage but wasn’t going to “beat people upside the head about it.”

Steele, a Catholic and former Maryland lieutenant governor, was elected chairman of the committee earlier this year.

1. Saw two blond women stopped by the police on Saturday. The officers, four of them, were all smiles. The women were laughing. Wish my encounters with the police were such jocular events.

2. There’s a guy in my office who doesn’t wash his hands after he uses the urinal. Nasty.

3. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has a lot of ’splaining to do.

4. I so want to buy the “I Love Lucy” DVD set.

5. Any AIDS Walk stories?

6. To march while gay seems to be against the law in Moscow.

7. I prefer my local watering hole on Sunday night as opposed to Saturday.

8. Is it wrong to lust after the local coffee boy?

9. RNC chairman Michael Steele is giving Richard Pryor a run for his money.

10. No bad dogs. Just terrible owners.

I’ve been searching for hours to find something to ruminate about, and nothing is coming to me. So here is a list of 10 unrelated thoughts, some serious others not so much. This could be a semi-regular feature depending on the responses.

1. Is it naive to wonder why folk who hate gays and lesbians, actually take the time to write a comment and post it on a gay web site. I really hate Duke University basketball, but would never think of going to a site that celebrates Coach K to say something nasty.

2. I’m liking Beau Breedlove more and more. There’s the name. His Unzipped cover. Now he is judging a penis size contest. Can’t blame a boy for working it.

3. Someone needs to tell RNC chair Michael Steele to stop giving interviews because every time he opens his mouth something kooky comes out.

4. Saw Defense Secretary Robert Gates’ Fox News interview when I was at the gym. His comments about DADT weren’t that surprising. President Obama is not going to use any political capital, without being prompted, when it comes to gay and lesbian issues.

5. Why doesn’t my fat tummy recognize I go to the gym?

6. At work (blogging for you lovely readers is freelance; the day job is another media behemoth) the boss gave me props for doing something extra. I thanked him but I wanted to say, “Man have you looked at the newspapers. An old hack like me isn’t going to find a job in this economy so I’ll do anything to keep this gig.”

7. I’m not getting the whole West Virginia thing. When did that state become the epicenter for same sex marriage?

8. Christopher Smitherman, the Cincinnati NAACP chapter president, warned gays and lesbians about consequences if people kept giving him grief about picking homophobe Chris Finney to be his group’s legal advisor. Smitherman, you are no Michael Corleone. Keep the empty threats to yourself. Really.

9. There is nothing deadlier than conversations on race. Nothing. Okay maybe High School Musical 3 but it’s close.

10. You want to see this again, or should it be a once in a lifetime thing?

“So if I do something, there’s a reason for it. Even, it may look like a mistake, a gaffe. There is a rationale, there’s a logic behind it.”

Not much to add to that is there?

A leading conservative called Steele’s remarks in the magazine “cavalier and flippant,” underscoring the new chairman’s precarious position with party regulars concerned about his off-the-cuff style and penchant for miscues.

Steele, who was adopted, told GQ magazine that his mother had the option of getting an abortion or giving birth to him.

“The choice issue cuts two ways,” Steele said in the wide-ranging interview published online Wednesday. “You can choose life, or you can choose abortion. You know, my mother chose life.”

Asked whether he thought women had the right to choose abortion, Steele said: “Yeah. I mean, again, I think that’s an individual choice.”

On Thursday morning, Steele attempted to clarify his remarks in a statement.

“I am pro-life, always have been, always will be,” he said. “I tried to present why I am pro-life while recognizing that my mother had a ‘choice’ before deciding to put me up for adoption.”

Both in the interview and in his statement, Steele said he believed Roe v. Wade was “wrongly decided.” He said the Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion should be overturned and the decision left to the states.

In the GQ interview, Steele said he was opposed to gay marriage but wasn’t going to “beat people upside the head about it.”

Steele, a Catholic and former Maryland lieutenant governor, was elected chairman of the National Republican Committee nearly six weeks ago.

Since then, Steele has compared Republicans to alcoholics on a 12-step program and called Rush Limbaugh “incendiary and ugly,” though he has apologized to the conservative radio host. Steele has also promised to give the party a “hip-hop makeover” that would be “off the hook” and would attract even “one-armed midgets.”

Tony Perkins, president of the conservative Family Research Council, said in a written statement that he was disappointed with Steele’s remarks to the magazine on abortion and gay marriage.

“This only serves to reinforce the belief by many social conservatives that one major party is unfriendly while the other gives only lip service to core moral issues,” Perkins said, “which is why many have dropped their affiliation with the GOP.”

The Republican platform asserts the GOP’s opposition to abortion, saying that “the unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed.”

In his statement, Steele said he supports the platform. “The Republican Party is and will continue to be the party of life,” he said.

Steele said in the magazine interview that he believed marriage should be reserved for a man and a woman. “I just draw the line at the gay marriage,” he said.

“And I’m not gonna jump up and down and beat people upside the head about it, and tell gays that they’re wrong for wanting to aspire to that, and all of that craziness,” he continued.

Steele said states should address gay marriage.

“Just as a general principle, I don’t like mucking around with the Constitution,” he said.

I’ve tried to stay away from the train wreck known as RNC chair Michael Steele, but one thing is becoming clear in his brief tenure. He really doesn’t want the gig.

Whether it’s using language that was in style 30 years ago or going after Rush Limbaugh (and then going on Rush’s show to kiss his ring), Steele has stumbled around and done very little in making a viable opposition. Now he’s stepped in it again by going after the GOP’s main anti-abortion plank. In an interview in GQ magazine, Steele seems to suggest that abortion should be left to the states.

Sure Steele went crazy in a previous interview when he was asked about civil unions, but with GQ he says something that will need to be explained to a number of his Republican peers.

“Um, you know, I think that there’s a whole lot that goes into the makeup of an individual that, uh, you just can’t simply say, oh, like, ‘Tomorrow morning I’m gonna stop being gay.’ It’s like saying, ‘Tomorrow morning I’m gonna stop being black.’”

Pause for a moment and listen please. The sound you just heard were the Exodus folk throwing a hissy fit.

While there are many Republicans who are pro-choice and have no issues with gays or lesbians, the base of the party isn’t there yet. And they are not going to get there with their leader thinking out loud in a national magazine. Steele’s musings are not going to garner him any good will at the GOP and it wouldn’t surprise if he were gone in the next few weeks. Or he’ll make another apology. Or blame the media for taking his words out of context. Or say his troubles are Obama’s fault.

UPDATE:  Steele is already on the apology tour.

My Log Cabin brothers and sisters are in deep doo-doo if I’m defending them; however, it is hard not to recognize the loony tunes in Peter LaBarbera’s screed against the group. The president (translation: professional bigot) of Americans for Truth About Homosexuality (translation: homophobes who publish crappy scholarship) sent RNC chair Michael Steele a letter asking him to keep gay Republicans at arm’s length.

“If the Republican Party is to turn itself around, it must reach out aggressively to real, pro-family minorities like Steele himself — not homosexual activists whose agenda would restrict our precious religious and First Amendment freedoms by using the government to promote aberrant sexual lifestyles.”

Let’s leave aside the LaBarbera’s blatant plea to pit gays and lesbians against conservative people of color (a smart political move by the way); his description of his gay brothers and sisters as “homosexual activists” is the standard hyperventilation of a Republican who wants to remain in the political hinterland

LaBarbera and his ilk are not going to listen to me (unless to call me a dirty sodomite), but I’ve spoken to gay Republicans. Ate with them. Drank their booze. Don’t know if I slept with one but it is possible. In all of this interaction, the phrase “homosexual activist” has never come to mind. Not once, even when I imbibed a large quantity of  gay Republican purchased liquor. What activist extols  the greatness of Ronald Reagan and hates everything Kennedy? Name an activist who wishes for fiscal restraint and a smaller federal government?

At its heart, LaBarbera’s pitch shows why the Republicans are out of power. The GOP loves to snipe its own. Instead of recruiting soldiers to fight the three headed beast Obama, Pelosi, and Reid, Republicans now spend their time trying to decide who is GOP pure and who fails the test. Political purity is a fools game (ask the Democrats) and a big tent, even with serious disagreements, is the path to political power.

As a bigot though, this idea has too many syllables for the LaBarbera.