Happy Belated Martin Luther King/Robert E. Lee Day, Everybody!

Oh, man! I'm so mad at myself! Why did I have to take a day off yesterday? Why?! Not only did I not get to wish everybody a Happy Martin Luther King Day, but I didn't get to wish everybody in Arkansas a Happy Robert E. Lee Day!

As you can see from Secretary of State Mark Martin's official state holiday calendar, commanding general of the Confederate army Robert E. Lee's birthday was celebrated yesterday along with civil rights leader Martin Luther King's.

The two birthdays happen to be within a week of one another — King's on the 15th and Lee's on the 19th — but that seems like little more than serendipity. It's hard to imagine a more perfect pairing of celebrations.

I just feel bad for all the Arkansasians who must have been torn between attending a civil rights memorial service and human trafficking commemoration ceremony.

(via Reddit)

Tags: Arkansas, Civil War, Martin Luther King, Martin Luther King Day

Governor of Maine Invites Butt Affection Over MLK Day

Last week, the governor of Maine told a reporter to convey the sentiment that the state's chapter of the NAACP could "kiss my butt." What exactly provoked this sensual and erotic declaration?

Gov. Paul LePage, a businessman who this month became Maine's first Republican governor in 16 years, declined to attend or send a representative to a Martin Luther King Day event. When sponsors complained, LePage told a reporter Friday: "Tell them to kiss my butt."

LePage retreated slightly the next day, saying he would be happy to meet with civil rights leaders to talk about the needs for all the people.

Oh, the brand-new governor will surely rue the day he chose to speak so frankly! Surely the hue and cry from Maine's ginormous black population will ruin LePage's chances for reelection.

Still, it helps to take into account that LePage, the eldest of 18 children born to a French-speaking family in rural Maine, probably has no idea what a Martin Luther King is.

He does, however have an adopted black son, which adds an extra layer of weird to this tale.

Tags: Maine, Martin Luther King, Martin Luther King Day, Paul LePage

Glenn Beck's Message of Peace

Glenn Beck is a soothing balm in these harsh and painful times…

Noble words. Nobel words indeed.

Reminds me of when Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi got together to discuss their philosophies that one time.

(via Reddit)

Tags: Glenn Beck, Guns, Martin Luther King

Follow Glenn Beck to the Top of Mount MLK with Stephen Colbert

Martin Luther King has been to the mountaintop. And now, so has Glenn Beck! Follow Beck's summer-long trek up the mountain trail with this Colbert Report trail mix (or something)…

May 13: Glenn to the Mountaintop

More Glodly inspirational Beck/King clips after the jump.

The Colbert Report airs Monday through Thursday at 11:30pm / 10:30c.

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Tags: 8/28 Rally, Civil Rights, Glenn Beck, Martin Luther King, Washington DC

The Obligatory Glenn Beck 8/28 Rally Post

So, that just happened, and I guess there should be a post about it. And this post seems a fitting choice, given the title I already wrote out. So, what the hey.

On Saturday, a bunch of white people and a smattering of not-white people — 87,000 by conservative accounts, a million billion by teabagging accounts — converged on the Lincoln Memorial to honor a fictional version of Martin Luther King that Glenn Beck and the other speakers of the 8/28 Rally invented specifically for the occasion. This Martin Luther King, for example, was a total war hawk who preached against the evils of social justice, urged the institutional disenfranchisement of some minorities and beseeched Americans to be satisfied with what they've got. (Bizarro Martin Luther King is presumably chillin' with Bizarro Thomas Paine up in Tea Bag Heaven right now.)

Beck seems to think that this moment will live forever in the American psyche, and maybe he's right, but I've seen no evidence of that. To me, it just looked like a bunch of angry old people spewing a lot of unprovable platitudes about God and Country, trying to sound calm and reasonable but seething with anger and intolerance just below the surface, and growing increasingly agitated that people are listening to their rants. This'll probably get wiped over in the American psyche the next time the country is forced to go to another family BBQ. At least there'll probably be some good pie at that thing.

And that, more than anything that happened at this event, is something I'd imagine Martin Luther King could have gotten behind.

(Photo via Little Green Footballs)

Tags: 8/28 Rally, Civil Rights, Glenn Beck, Lincoln Memorial, Martin Luther King, Sarah Palin, Thomas Paine, Washington DC