From the Arizona alternative paper Phoenix New Times:

Paul Babeu's Mexican Ex-Lover Says Sheriff's Attorney Threatened Him With Deportation.

You know, if I bent over backwards, I could not devise hypocrisies as perverse as the ones generated nearly every day by GOP officials.

Here are some paragraphs from the story:



Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu — who became the face of Arizona border security nationally after he started stridently opposing illegal immigration — threatened his Mexican ex-lover with deportation when the man refused to promise never to disclose their years-long relationship, the former boyfriend and his lawyer tell New Times. ... Jose says he met Babeu in October 2006 on gay.com, a dating website. What started with an online invitation from Babeu for the two to get together, he says, turned into not only a personal relationship but a professional one.

Read on ...

You gotta laff.

UPDATE: I originally ended the diary with the above comment. But, you know, it's not really all that funny.

People like Mr. Babeu would be marginal figures who could never stand for Congress were it not for intensely homophobic and racist institutions, both in government and media, that enable them.

When I wrote this short diary, I was thinking -- my god, what kind of weird psychological contortions would I have to put myself through to get into a situation like this? It boggles the mind.

But our society is producing this kind of sick behavior, over and over. These people are drawn to the GOP and they are made into heroes by the media. (Paul Babeu was a frequent guest on Fox News, where he spouted racist anti-Mexican diatribes.)

It's not funny.