He's the country singer who's been outed more often than Tom Cruise but Kenny Chesney told Playboy magazine just how many women he's slept with: "Man, I was over 100 several years ago...I've got a long line of girls who could testify that I am not gay."

Fine, fine, we believe you.  Now please -- finally -- GO AWAY.

Another guy we could do without, Bill Clinton nemesis Kenneth Starr is now working on behalf of the anti-gay-marriage people in California. His strategy?  Ignore the gay issue altogether and focus on whether voters can rebel against supreme court decisions.  See, it's all just policy games to guys like him -- they don't even care about the real people who want to stay married.

But here's more good reason to love living in Canada: we still have banks!

As a journalist, I'm sensitive to how hard it is to get busy people on the phone for an interview...or at least I was until this National Post reporter's public meltdown. I love how April calls him "dude."

Leading up to their upcoming two-disc greatest hits album, Erasure are back with a "2009 mix" of their very pretty classic "Always."  Damned if I can tell the difference between it and the original though:

And finally, here's something to ponder:  many gay people like cats, many don't; many gay people want to have children someday, many don't.  Depending on wherever you stand, this little girl and her book review probably won't change your opinion:

What would Kenny Chesney say?

Today is the 20th anniversary of World AIDS Day.

Woo.

There are some anniversaries you just don't want to celebrate -- even moreso when they become co-opted as a way to celebrate the legacy of George W. Bush.

Yeah, you read that right. He's getting an 'International Medal of Peace' at the Saddleback Civil Forum on Global Health in Washington today. While Bush does deserve credit for funnelling a lot of money into African AIDS relief, the strings-attached focus on abstinence has critics divided over its effectiveness. Me, I'm still reeling from having just typed, "Bush does deserve credit."

But everything about today feels upended: I'm even in vague agreement on the need for HIV disclosure with The Globe and Mail's Margaret Wente, who normally drives me bats when she takes complex social issues and boils them down to snarky, facile moralizing (hey, that's my job!!).

Wente adds to my sense of vertigo by quoting Dan Savage and Larry Kramer with approval but fortunately, I can steady myself with the way she brushes aside issues of HIV criminalization and stigma and the way notions of an "AIDS establishment" and "activist establishment" seem to make her nipples hard. Now there's the Margaret I know and love!

Personally, I'd love to see Wente have a chat with glamourous AIDS activist Brian Finch but ten minutes with him might end up like a Cronenberg movie: 

The holiday season has begun -- ho ho fucking ho. 

Call it propaganda if you must but damn, Obama knows how to work a campaign video!  This, our American friends, is what it's all about today: 

Of the many, many reasons for Americans not to vote Republican today, the most bizarre is that they can't spell!  Then again, CNN political writer Hilary Rosen points out that John McCain actually lost the election two years ago while this video looks to the future as McCain rekindles his grudge match with Sarah Palin!

The LA Times this weekend had a masterful editoral on why the California vote to revoke 'Will & Grace' creator Max Mutchnick's disturbingly perfect marriage is a "rare and terrible" thing.

Here in Canada, a counter-intuitive new study in the Canadian Journal of Economics says that straight men and women make slightly less money than lesbians and more money than gay men.  Really?  How are gay guys paying for all those iPhones?

On the set of Guy Ritchie's "Sherlock Holmes" movie, Jude Law suddenly leapt at Robert Downey Jr.'s hot, hot crotch!  Okay, he was actually helping to put out a fire caused by Downey's pipe but the image should start a couple of pants-fires of its own.

Meanwhile, the director himself was attacked by a knife-wielding 16-year-old shouting, "I love Madonna, where's Guy? I am going to kill him! I'm Madonna's biggest fan! I'm going to kill Guy." This divorce is going to be even messier than we thought!

Hopefully, such ugliness will be a thing of the past after Obama wins and ushers in a new Xanadu era of brotherhood and healing, like watching adorable dancing nerd Corey Vidal profess his heterosexual love for his pal Brent:

This morning, everyone will be sending everyone this link to Saturday Night Live's debate parody. It's just awesome. For me, the money line was Tina-Fey-as-Sarah-Palin's opinion on gay marriage: "I believe marriage was meant to be a sacred institution between two unwilling teenagers." Zing!

The next month will be a rocky one for Barack Obama -- John McCain is devoting all his resources to attack ads and the racists are coming out of the woodwork -- but he's got a solid counteroffensive with a new website detailing McCain's dreadful financial history and there's this letter from March 2007 showing how Obama anticipated the mortgage crisis and tried to take action before disaster struck. Wouldn't that be a refreshing change?

But first, we need some attack ads in Canada! Artist Fred Gaysek thinks Stephen Harper seems awfully familiar and he's betting you might think so too:

And while we all ponder how to vote out an "arsehole" like Stephen Harper, we ignore the larger danger: can John Barrowman be stopped? The gay Broadway star is filming the third season of 'Torchwood,' has kids playing with his action figure and is clearly out to conquer CHUM-FM with this mushy first single from his upcoming album:

The stock market took a big hit yesterday after the US Congress failed to pass the controversial Wall Street bailout. Democrats largely went along with Bush's plan but Republicans surprisingly shot it down in flames and then not so surprisingly blamed it on the Democrats. Openly gay congressman Barney Frank responded amusingly but right-wing pundits are saying it was his fault, him and all the gays. They're suggesting a link between banks' failures and their diversity policies and insisting that the whole financial mess can only be fixed by ending gay marriage: "The nation will right itself if it fixes sex." Now I'm confused: America should focus less on its financial problems and obsess more on gays? Isn't that what they've been doing for eight years?

A 19-year-old in Florida on trial for murder insists that being the subject of gay rumours forced him to kill. Please. If that were the case, John Baird would be a mass-murderer by now.

Heather Locklear was arrested for "erratic driving while on prescription pills." Oh Heather, you don't need this -- after starring in "Dynasty" and "Melrose Place," you're already a gay icon!

I know, I know -- still more Sarah Palin! But dammit, she's funnier than ever! Once you're done playing with The Sarah Palin Interview Generator, check out her latest interview: after embarrassing herself on the Pakistan issue, Daddy had to come in and help. The results are hilarious:

We often have to hear the lame complaint that the visibility of gay marriage will be "confusing" to children (ie. make them gay) so, by that logic, this week's nuclear-fusion wedding between Ryan Reynolds and Scarlett Johansson will end homosexuality forever!

And finally, a little something for the pervs out there. Have you been yearning to watch hardcore porn at work? Well, the fine folks at Diesel have come to your rescue with their "Safe For Work XXX" video: