As discussed yesterday, we mourned the death of Bea Arthur because she was one of the great comedians and a classy dame!  But what is this "classy?"  Like pornography, do we only know it when we see it?  Well, here's a handy guide:

CLASSY!
Journalist Rex Wockner, who sat down (in a church!) with Miss USA pageant contestant Carrie Prejean to discuss her opposition to gay marriage.  Watch Wockner display the patience of, well, a saint as Prejean blames her blissfully unthinking bigotry on judge Perez Hilton's "hidden agenda."  Umm...have you seen that guy?  There's nothing hidden about him!

NOT CLASSY!
Francis Begbie, the violent thug in "Trainspotting," who actor Robert Carlyle now says he played as a repressed homosexual.  Great -- a movie that features Ewan McGregor and Jonny Lee Miller and the gay character is Begbie?  There really is no justice!

CLASSY! 
Neil Patrick Harris, the hilarious and hot host (literally!) of last Sunday's TV Land Awards.  Let him host the Oscars already!

NOT CLASSY! 
The vaguely creepy but hilarious website Heavypetting, which features amateur porn photos (made colourfully PG-13) that accidentally include the family pet.  Inappropriate!

 

CLASSY! 
The students and teachers at Walt Whitman High School in Bethesda, Maryland, who staged a counter-protest against the odious Fred Phelps clan (or is it 'klan?').  Phelps was protesting the school being named after a homosexual. Wow -- Whitman died in 1892. We knew Phelps' people hated the 21st century but we had no idea they still think it's the 19th!

CLASSY/NOT CLASSY/I'M NOT SURE 
Larry Kramer, gay visionary and self-described "famous big deal loudmouth activist" uses an award acceptance speech to deliver a long-deserved "fuck you" to Yale University.

NOT CLASSY! 
Fans of the online 'Star Wars' roleplaying game discovered that the words "homosexual," "lesbian" and "gay" are blocked from any kind of use.  Players argued about this in the game's forum until "community manager" Sean Dahlberg bluntly wrote:

"As I have stated before, these are terms that do not exist in Star Wars. Thread closed." 

Ouch! But no gays in 'Star Wars?'  I've got three letters, one number saying otherwise (figure it out, nerds!) and the lads at 'Robot Chicken' revealed what bounty hunter Boba Fett gets up to when he's alone:

CLASSY! 
The people of Iceland, who elected Johanna Sigurdardottir as the country's first female prime minister and the world first openly gay leader!  Of course, since the country's bankrupt, they may not have been doing her a service but it's still a great thing to see.

But a final NOT CLASSY! for the hideous Tiffany Wellsley, who -- despite her born-to-drag name -- penned the disgusting editorial:

SWINE FLU: GOD’S LATEST PUNISHMENT OF IDOL-WORSHIP

I deliberately left the font big from the 'Republican Faith Chat' website because of its awe-inspiring evil!  You see, when natural disasters strike, gay people don't blame conservative Christians.  We don't say tornados are God's punishment for the priests who raped all those children.  We don't say that people get sick because God disagrees with their pious, cruel and judgmental lifestyle.  We don't say any of that.  It wouldn't be classy!

 

Y'know, having spent more than eight years wailing about the sick devotion to George W. Bush still shown by a remarkable 25% of the American public, I would obviously feel more than a little hypocritical about treating Barack Obama like our new saviour.

But I don't care!

I'm watching the inauguration on TV today, wearing Chris Bishop's hilarious T-shirt and basking in the thrill of watching history in the making. Honestly, I never believed we'd see a black president in my lifetime -- even Eddie Murphy said so in 1983:

Would John McCain have had a website this fun?  I don't think so!  So I'll be cheering Obama on today as he's sworn in as the 44th President of the United States, even while I tweak his image to pay tribute to my real hero. Seriously, my dog has done more for me than any politician ever!

Veteran gay journalist Rex Wockner says the weeklong protests following the vote to gay-marriage ban in California is "probably the most interesting thing I've seen on my beat as a gay-movement reporter since ACT UP." He wonders aloud if the massive protests planned this Saturday could become "Stonewall 2.0."

Why not? Gay Americans were second-class citizens in 1969 but now it's been written into state constitutions.  Act up?  It's time.  Here's the warm-up act from New York last night: 

The Mormon church is upset at being "targeted" for protest (consider it a 'gift-with-purchase' after the $22 million you spent!) but it's working -- many disgusted Mormons are now leaving their church over its bigotry:

My hero.  Kind of like Marvel Comics legend Stan Lee, who's producing a TV series for Showtime (home of 'Dexter' and 'The L Word') based on Perry Moore's novel "Hero," about a gay teenager with super powers. Ignore the cheerleader, save the world!

Such a series would be a nice antidote to all this ugly politicking and, ewww, the return of Mark Foley and the discovery of yet another foot in BC (Seven?  Seriously?), an antidote like this sappy-but-welcome video for "Better," the new single from the Irish group Boyzone. For the first time ever, gay member Stephen Gately gets a male love interest alongside the boys and their ladies. It's a controversial choice: will including a gay couple destroy the sanctity of boyband videos?

 

Seriously, it's not even funny anymore! This weekend, the US Republican Vice-Presidential nominee declared war on Iran, all-but-announced her own bid for president in 2012 already and insisted that the First Amendment right to free speech is in jeopardy because the press is criticizing her. She has gone through the looking glass, people.

Most astonishing of all Palin's slip-ups is this prank phone call from Canadian comedy duo The Masked Avengers pretending to be French president Nicolas Sarkozy. Despite the caller's goofy accent, weird comments and admission that he's calling from Montreal, Palin still didn't realize she was being had. No, I'm wrong and I take it back: it is still funny!

Gay singer/songwriter James Collins has found his inner Tina Fey, cowriting a cute anti-Palin ditty, but the real surprise was watching John McCain join Fey in making fun of his running mate on SNL this weekend. By tomorrow's election, the only person taking her seriously will be Trig!

At least the gays in her home state are done with her: a new poll says that 87 percent of LGBT Alaskans are voting for Barack Obama and Joe Biden. By this point, I'd ask what the hell the other 13 percent are smoking but oh yeah...Palin's hometown has been called "the meth capital of Alaska."

I laugh at the phrase "the gays" but Rachel Maddow laughs more at "the gay."

One typically classy Ayn Rand reader suggests that conservatives protest an Obama presidency by not tipping waitresses. The thought of these people winning again has a great number of Canadians wishing we could vote in this election too. This poll shows who for and this video shows why (won't someone think of the hogs?):

Journalist Rex Wockner bravely went to the giant Christian anti-gay-marriage rally in San Diego this weekend and, despite being surrounded by 15,000 people praying for homosexuals to be cured, came away from it still gay! That is one unredeemable heathen! 

Meanwhile, in LA, "Borat" star Sasha Baron Cohen infiltrated a right-wing rally and caused his usual trouble.  Very niiice!

One conservative Christian writer suggests it's time the homophobes rethink their marriage stance but I don't see it happening, especially when the deep-pocketed Mormons have come to help:

Fortunately, not everyone in these faith groups hates us: some Mormon moms staged a vigil for gay rights while more and more research is showing that evangelical Christian attitudes towards sex are more complicated than they seem.

A Catholic priest in New York has been suspended for having an affair with a woman he picked up when she was in his confessional booth! The story has shocked the public -- the priest had sex with a woman?

And finally, the 22nd annual Fashion Cares benefit for the AIDS Committee of Toronto was held this weekend and it was a terrific return to form, summed up in three words: Dame! Shirley! Bassey!