Rep. Scott Franklin, Matt Gaetz's Polk County "wingman," hopes to divorce gay and interracial marriages one day

Franklin and Grady Judd seem miserable that other people might pursue happiness and follow their own consciences. And they want to make us miserable like them.

Thursday was a great day for happy, decent people.

But it was a sad one for politicians who think Matt Gaetz — and his alleged underage sex parties — are much better citizens than people in committed marriages. (Not to mention better than people who perform in happy, G-rated drag shows.)

Congress overwhelmingly approved bipartisan legislation protecting gay and interracial marriages from Clarence Thomas’s effort to invalidate them — including his own.

It was a happy historical moment. Sadly, I have actual footage of Lakeland Republican Congressman Scott Franklin’s reaction:

Never expect reciprocation from selfish politicians — especially those who are Matt Gaetz’s wingman

I recommended, publicly and privately, that Scott Franklin vote in favor of the eminently reasonable marriage compromise — as a gesture of respect and even political reciprocation.

Gay marriage vote gives Rep. Scott Franklin, R-Lakeland, a chance to be a unifying statesman

Polk voters and activists, including many LGBT voters and activists, just destroyed Scott Franklin’s CCDF rivals for control of the Polk County GOP in the last election. He was too weak and afraid to do it himself. So we did it.

I suggested that protecting same sex and interracial marriage, while protecting “religious freedom,” would make a gesture of solidarity and respect and gratitude to those voters.

The compromise federal law requires states to recognize any civil marriage performed by any other state (excluding polygamy, which is illegal anyway); but it does not require a state to issue a marriage license itself. It spells out that no church or religious group is obligated to participate in a same sex and interracial marriage if it hates the idea.

It covered every religious-freedom base except leaving open the future possibility of government-forced divorce by the corrupt, dictatorial Supreme Court.

But Scott Franklin voted to hold out that hope of future forced divorce.

He gave the finger to the 70 percent of Americans who support gay marriage, generally, and countless gay and interracial marriages in Polk County, specifically. Franklin gave the finger to the people who neutralized and stigmatized his potential GOP rivals.

I’m not at all surprised.

One of my most ironclad political axioms is this: never do something political on behalf of someone else based solely on the expectation of reciprocation. You won’t get it. Do political or civic things because they’re worth doing in their own right.

We smashed the CCDF for us — not for Scott Franklin and the respectables and their “wingman” Matt Gaetz.

Normal, decent Polk vs. people bitter that other people might pursue happiness

But, Scott Franklin’s selfishness and contempt for his constituents is very helpful in assessing where we are civically in Polk County today. If you look at the state of our civic life, public life you see two real factions:

1. The “people-centered” faction. These are happy, normal, constructive, forward-looking, problem-solving, welcoming people and leaders embodied by Lakeland Mayor Bill Mutz (a Republican) and School Board Member Lisa Miller (an NPA). This is the dominant faction in local civic life, which is why Lakeland, especially, is a great place to live — not the hellscape described by failed MAGA mayoral candidate Saga Stevin.

2. The “rage-and-lies centered” faction of Trump/DeSantis/Gaetz MAGA embodied by Scott Franklin and Grady Judd and Saga. It’s all menace and hatred and Debbie Downerism, expressed in language and deed. It is fundamentally unhappy and thrives on making others unhappy. It openly excludes at least half of its constituents (not talking about voters, talking about constituents.) “Rage-and-lies” is the dominant faction in Polk’s state-level political life. But the “human-centered” civic faction has dealt political defeat after political defeat to this angry faction at the local level in the last year-and-a-half. Mutz and Miller delivered the most resounding wins.

I know Lisa Miller and Bill Mutz very well. I consider both friends. And I promise that both will be very unhappy to see this put in this way. Both will likely yell at me — in their kind, gentle way. This is the last thing they want to read; and it’s not anything they’ve ever expressed. This is my observation alone. But you need to understand it.

Lisa and Bill, in different ways, are desperate to make constructive peace with #2. The “human-centered” Faction 1, as a whole, really just wants peace with the “rage-and-lies centered” Faction 2. We just want Faction 2 to leave us alone to follow our consciences and pursue our happiness. I know Lisa and Bill try and try and try for peace with Faction 2.

I once tried hard for peace, too.

But at some point, as a citizen, you must recognize when your leaders are at war with you; when your leaders reject your votes and your democratic sovereignty; when your leaders hate you more than they hate Nazis; when your leaders prefer the morality of Matt Gaetz and Rick “T.I.T.S.” Nolte to the solemn vows of your marriage to the person you love.

Faction 2 doesn’t want peace with Faction 1. It wants to dominate us. We should not let them.

Expect Matt Gaetz’s wingman and grumpy old man Grady Judd to take up the Nazi boy cause against drag performers

If you doubt me on this, watch what happens in the next couple weeks.

I predict Scott Franklin and Grady Judd and their poodle State Attorney Brian Haas — those “T.I.T.S.”-enabling paragons of justice and morality — are going to come after drag performers. They’re going to dunk the out-of-town Nazi boys’ alley-oop pass from last weekend.

They will have some stupid press conference together; and Grady’s gonna say this in his 1965 drawl:

We don’t like the Nazi boys, exactly, but the drag queens are worse. I’d have my deputies shoot ‘em in the genitals; but they already did that to themselves. Hahaha. Would you like a moon pie? It’s my only murder prevention policy.

Watch. They are that predictable. I guarantee you Grady’s got a genital “joke” teed up; we’ll see if he still uses it now.

We’re going to have a drag-focused parody of the late 1990s/early 2000s, when then Sheriff Lawrence Crow and Judd and former State Attorney Jerry Hill and “zealous” prosecutor Brad Copley went after exploitive, gross pornography and strip clubs. Copley is still around, doing nothing about the gross self-declared criminality of James Dunn and T.I.T.S. Nolte — just like Grady did and is doing nothing.

I despise gross pornography and strip clubs — in part because bros like Scott Franklin’s wingman Gaetz love them.

One could argue First Amendment stuff and the wisdom of Prohibition of sexually exploitive business. But by and large, I think Polk County is better off for that effort in its quality of life. If nothing else, it made it less likely that Matt Gaetzes would visit us until Scott Franklin invited them in.

Polk County will not be better off for persecuting people who find happiness and expression by dancing in clothing associated with a different sex.

That, of course, will include anyone taking part in Shakespeare’s As You Like It, a classic of drag, in which my daughter played the lead role of Rosalind some years ago at Harrison School of the Arts. Perhaps then-Principal and Vice Principal Craig Collins and Daryl Ward will be prosecuted retroactively for “grooming” her.

Careful what you start banning and criminalizing.

From Grady-the-funny to Grady-the-pornographer

Grady Judd once charmed people across the social and political spectrum. He was funny. He punctuated tough Grady-isms with actual humor and cleverness. He had interesting takes on issues sometimes.

But I haven’t laughed at him in forever. I suspect the George Floyd protests forced Grady over the edge — from sheriff to content-producer for the Kyle Rittenhouse 8Chan channel. He can’t bring himself back. Uncontainable bitterness emerges sometimes when a thoroughbred passes his peak.

All Grady does now is sell right-wing snuff pornography.

Shooting off people’s junk, hahaha; turn ‘em into cheese hahaha; all those books about gay people and black people are gross and nasty. I think it’s his way of raging against the dying of the light.

But it’s really just violent pornography for Nazi boys.

And Grady never produces his pornography about Nazi boys, except maybe after a “sex trafficking hunter” on meth murders an innocent Lakeland family. Or about GOP School Board members with “T.I.T.S. need to be more developed” manifestos.

Nazi boys and T.I.T.S. are his consumers, not his targets.

I know this is painful to acknowledge for many people who love the Grady of the past. He has been an institution. But you all know I’m right. It brings me no pleasure to be right. I don’t want to rub your faces in it because I really wish it was different.

But it’s not.

Scott and Grady’s Faction 2 tells the rest of us in Faction 1, every day, that there is no peace to make. There is only an onslaught to be survived until their time has fully passed.

Grady’s not that far off that, at least.

And after this week, neither Scott nor his wingman Gaetz can divorce you or your loved ones ay any time in the near future.

That’s worth celebrating while we try to survive. I assure you Grady and Scott are not celebrating it.