Why I'm Both Happy and Pissed about Warren

Background: Obama picked a homophobic prick named Rick Warren* to invoke the sky giant at his inauguration. Rick Warren is the stereotypical evangelical asswhipe, who, for example, thinks that, if we allow gay marriage, we have to also allow incestuous marriages and pedophiliac marriages. 'Cuz, you know, homosexuality is exactly the same as incest and pedophelia in his eyes.

People are very pissed that Obama has invited such a jackass to his inauguration. There are certainly reasons to be pissed, but there are also reasons not to be.

1. Obama is able to use this outrage as cover to say things like this:

It is no secret that I am an advocate for gay and lesbian Americans.

Without this controversy, there's little reason for Obama to make such a statement, which, btw, is something no president-elect has ever said before.

2. The coverage is all about what a jackass Warren is. Some Americans knew before all this that Warren was a dumbass. Now, a larger percentage have heard about the quote comparing gay marriage, incest, and pedophilia. The coverage is making sure he continues to appeal only to the intolerant jerks that he already appealed to.

3. This is going to work on some percentage of people. Idiots who agree with everything Obama says other than the "fact" that he's Muslim can say, "Oh, if an evangelical idiot like me invokes God for him, I guess he must not be Muslim." Maybe they can leave the idiotic side of their personality behind and vote for the stuff that matters, and maybe they can even listen to Obama and learn something.

4. It's the part of the inauguration where they ask the sky giant to pay attention, and Obama picked someone who he does not agree with. In other words, Obama doesn't give a shit what the sky giant thinks. He's doing this for politics, and the religious side of it doesn't factor into his decision. That's great.

All that said, Warren is a big pile of idiocy. He was a big supporter of Prop 8, which was already a kick in the teeth to LGBTs on election day (I mean, it was also a kick in the teeth to those of us who think that kind of thing is evil, but not as directly aimed as it was at the LGBT community). So I can see how this makes people continue to think they aren't wanted. 

But here's the other part of all of this: it is our job in this play to be pissed off. Numbers 1-3 rely on as much of the left being pissed off about this pick for a meaningless post as possible. So, fuck Warren. And dammit Obama, why did you pick someone so bad that I'm considering digging through the Urban Dictionary to find an insult scathing enough to fit him. You should have picked someone who didn't matter at all.

* People keep calling this fucktard "Reverend" Warren. Fuck that. Reverend means "worthy of reverence." Why do we still use that term for idiots who clearly aren't worthy of reverence? Tell ya what, if people will agree to refer to people who work in education as "The Brilliant Jon Harmon," for example, perhaps I'll start calling these jerks "Reverends."