Boy in Bushwick lands in Las Vegas

It's as though Times Square threw up on the desert.

This is the description I texted to my upstairs neighbor earlier today as I walked down the Las Vegas Strip for the first time. Replicas of the Brooklyn Bridge, the Eiffel Tower and the Statue of Liberty, groups of men and women who aggressively hock escort cards to weary tourists and even a sudden downpour are among the many things I encountered during my first few hours in Sin City.

I've been up for nearly 20 hours so I am going to keep this blog short, but here's a video clip of the descent into McCarran International Airport this afternoon.



A particularly friendly cab driver welcomed me to Las Vegas, but I will share his story later...

Key West canine officer stops would-be burglar

The Key West Police Department announced earlier today a canine unit stopped a would-be burglar from breaking into a woman's home early Saturday morning.

Ferro detained a man who a police spokesperson said had tried to break into the Fleming Street house through a sliding glass door. The KWPD said Ferro "moved forward and apprehended the suspect by taking hold of his forearm in his jaws." The department further said the suspect, whom it identified as Jacob Fred Kaiser, 33, of Seattle, tried to fight Ferro, but his partner, KWPD officer Thomas Aglin, commanded him to force the man to the ground.

“Our K-9 Unit is a vital part of an efficient police department,” KWPD acting chief Scott Smith said. “Ferro’s quick response and his level of training were important in apprehending this suspect.”

Kaiser remains in custody in the Monroe County Detention Center, but it goes without saying the Conch Republic will continue to have a lot of fun at his expense.

Monday morning wrap-up: Saints, Palin and Paterson

A broken pipe in the basement caused quite the scene here in Bushwick over the weekend, but a steady stream of news kept this news junkie entertained as he eagerly awaited the return of running (hot) water.

Voulez vous le bon temps rouler! I certainly did not follow each play in the Super Bowl, but the New Orleans Saints' come-from-behind victory against the Indianapolis Colts remains nothing short of breathtaking. This win is surely a shot in the arm for the Crescent City as it continues to regain its footing after Hurricane Katrina. And Americans will undoubtedly continue to rejoice with Who Dat nation in the coming days and weeks.

On a decidedly less festive note, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin gave a rousing speech to Tea Partiers in Nashville over the weekend. I am certainly not a Palin fan; nor have I ever described her in favorable terms outside of the fact she looks great for a mother of five and for her appearance on Saturday Night Live alongside Tina Fey. And the steady stream of sound bites of Palin's speech that the Sunday morning talk shows played sparked the predictable tweets.

"With all due respect to Sarah Palin, what the hell does she know about foreign policy?," one read in response to the former Alaska governor's assertion the White House should declare war against Iran. "You can't see Iran from Alaska after all..."

I guess crib notes qualify her to run for president in 2012. Perhaps New York Gov. David Paterson may have some new found time on his hands, however, if rumors of his possible resignation pan out.

Stay tuned...

Preliminary hearing for gay Puerto Rican teenager's alleged killer continues

As the preliminary hearing of the man who allegedly decapitated and dismembered Jorge Steven López Mercado continues in a Puerto Rico court room, details about the murdered teenager's life continue to emerge.

David José Medina Quiñones told the court on Tuesday he and López went to a Caguas street to prostitute themselves in the hours before Juan José Martínez Matos allegedly murdered the gay teenager. Martínez reportedly said he killed López after he discovered he was a man. And his lawyers tried to insinuate in court yesterday the teenager had agreed to have sex in exchange for drugs. There is obviously nothing that can ever justify this horrendous murder, and Pedro Julio Serrano of Puerto Rico Para Tod@s made this point explicitly clear in a blog he posted earlier this morning.

“We cannot allow anyone to indict a victim who is no longer alive and can no longer defend himself,” he wrote. “We cannot forget there was a criminal who committed this hate crime: Juan Martínez Matos.”

Irregardless of whether López prostituted himself or took drugs, the fact remains a brutal crime took place. His family and friends have suffered a tremendous and entirely unnecessary loss. And they deserve nothing less than full justice under the law.

California Congressman evokes bathrooms, showers and hermaphrodites to defend Don't Ask, Don't Tell

As the debate over the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” continues on Capitol Hill, Congressman Duncan Hunter [R-Calif.]’s dependence upon arcane homophobic stereotypes during an interview with National Public Radio is nothing more than an utterly desperate attempt to defend a failed policy.

“It’s not the time to do it,” he told Melissa Block yesterday afternoon. “I think it’s—the military is not civilian life. And I think the folks who have been in the military that have been in these very close situations with each other, there has to be a special bond there. And I think that bond is broken if you open up the military to transgenders, to hermaphrodites, to gay and lesbians.”

I truly wish I could make this you know what up, but the failed presidential candidate’s defense of DADT became even more foolish as he highlighted the ‘young kids’ who comprise the majority of those who enlist in the military.

“They usually have more conservative families, more conservative backgrounds and I think that it would go against their principles and it would frankly make everybody a little bit uneasy to be in these close situations, how you go into combat, you know, the shower situation, the bathroom situation, just, you know, very mundane details—things that we have men and women separated, you know, because we don’t want to have that sexual distraction,” Duncan rather nervously said.

The shower situation? The bathroom situation? Sexual distraction? Again, you truly can’t make this you know what up, but Congressman Joe Sestak [D-Pa.,] who is a retired Navy admiral, pointed out to Brian Lehrer earlier this morning the average age of the 5,000 sailors he commanded on an aircraft carrier were 19 and a half.

“That generation doesn’t have concerns over serving with or alongside a gay sailor,” he said.

Sestak also responded directly to Duncan.

“When you’re out there in a fox hole and people are shootin’ at ya, you’re not concerned whether the person next to you is anything but good—and these sailors are good,” he said.

There you have it…

Haiti should not fade from the headlines

Nearly three weeks after an earthquake rocked Port-au-Prince and surrounding areas, a simple tweet provided an all too powerful reminder the devastated country should not fade from the headlines.

Garry Pierre-Pierre, editor and publisher of the Brooklyn-based Haitian Times, highlighted the plight of reporters in his homeland in a blog the Committee to Protect Journalists posted on its Web site. The first sentence provides an all too blunt assessment of the reality on the ground for Haitian journalists and the vast majority of their countrymen.

"The earthquake that rocked Haiti didn't spare anyone, including the media," Pierre-Pierre wrote.

An accompanying caption to describe Reuters' photographer Eliana Aponte's pictures paints an disturbingly ironic juxtaposition.

"Foreign journalists, seen here working in Port-au-Prince, have flooded into Haiti after the earthquake, but the local media is in tatters," it read.

Mandalit del Barco from NPR just discussed the arrest of 10 American missionaries along the Dominican-Haitian border late Friday for allegedly trying to take orphans out of the country during a live shot from Port-au-Prince. Katie Couric, Diane Sawyer, Brian Williams and other anchors, however, have returned to their cushy Manhattan studios to cover the story from much more comfortable surroundings. The Haiti earthquake remains the third most popular "hot topic" on CNN.com, but the only other item on its home page as of this writing was a video clip headlined "Haiti food lines for women only" placed between a report on a woman's missing sister and the Toyota recall.

Anderson Cooper himself lamented to the New York Times more than a week ago the fact people would soon lose interest in this story. Port-au-Prince and its environs, which are roughly a two hour flight from Miami, remains in ruins. The vast majority of their inhabitants continue to endure unimaginable suffering, but partisan Washington battles, Grammy fashions and even the upcoming Super Bowl are among the stories that have sadly begun to push the earthquake victims' plight from the headlines.

The Haitian people deserve far better.

State of the Union fails to inspire

Deadlines have kept me away from the blog for a couple of days, but President Barack Obama's State of the Union address the other night certainly remains a topic of conversation, heated debate and even consternation.

Reading through the scattered notes I scribbled down during the speech, a couple of points stick out -- jobs, jobs, jobs and public trust. The following quote certainly highlights one of the messages the White House clearly wanted to send to a country that remains extremely distrustful of its political establishment.

"They [the American people] are tired of the partisanship and the shouting and the pettiness," the president said.

The speech was a supermarket of hopeful and idealistic rhetoric, promises and even lecturing as one commentator correctly pointed out, but one of the primary takeaways from Wednesday night is the fact the president sought to reconnect with the American middle class that continued to experience significant economic hardships during the first year of his administration. A gay Republican contact described the speech as a reflection of a "desperate president." He and many others obviously made up their minds long before Obama delivered his first SOTU, but the president certainly appeared quite vulnerable in the days leading up to it. And the speech did painfully little to inspire an increasingly skeptical public to feel hopeful about the White House and its agenda.

Solidarity with the Cuban blogosphere

A vacation in Havana is certainly an enticing proposition for this winter-weary New Yorker, but it is important to remember the vast majority of Cubans continue to
endure unnecessary hardships in their own country.

Boy in Bushwick highlighted the growing Cuban blogosphere last month, but Yoani Sánchez and her colleagues are able to provide an uncensored picture of daily life in the country on a literal shoestring. Pedro Luis, a blogger who maintains Fotos desde Cuba and La Habana llora, updates them at hotels and Internet cafes throughout Havana. It costs roughly $6 an hour to access the Internet in these locations, but Pedro Luis pointed to a number of things that would make his work easier. These include blank CDs, flash drives, SIM cards and even a camera.

His contact information is below for anyone who may want to connect with him.

5352731727 (can receive text messages or MSM)
internetencuba@gmail.com

My conversations with Pedro Luis over the last few months have truly reminded me of the important role journalists, bloggers and other media professionals play in a given society. He and his colleagues provide a vitally important glimpse into the daily struggles of the Cuban people. And it remains crucial to stand up in solidarity with them.