• Samuel Alito has been confirmed as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court. Of course this only means more exposure for his "hot" son, Phil. The new guys (well, at least one of them) at Wonkette must be beside themselves. [NY Times]

• Fearing for their safety, Ford Bragg higher ups have moved those gay porn stars/paratroopers to a secret location. Wherever they are, keep them away from the video equipment and the Internet. Or not. [WRAL]

• The Cayman Ministers' Association has a problem with gay cruises and not the kind involving strangers in the park. [Caribbean Net News]

• Who says queens can't play sports? They're just falling over one another to get into the Gay Games. [Chicago Tribune]

• We’re no longer the gayest blog on the Internets. Look at these two queens over at Wonkette! [Wonkette]

• Pete Burns did not win Big Brother. But he was the fiercest. [WOW Report]

• Three men were sentenced in the Gwen Araujo slaying. Araujo was a SF Bay area transsexual murdered in 2002. [SF Chronicle]

• Tom Cruise looks like this year’s worst actor. And we’re not talking about his role playing “straight.” [Yahoo]

Anyone who frequents David Lat’s judiciary blog, Underneath Their Robes, knows about his frequent “female” contributor referred to only as Article III Groupie or A3G for short. A3G, of course, is Lat himself.

Lat's alter ego hasn’t come to his defense since the recent revelation that he wrote some pretty anti-gay articles while attending that bastion of collegiate enlightenment, Harvard University.

As A3G, Lat is very vocal and a bit of a go-getter. So Judge Sam Alito’s dreamy teenage son, Phil, better watch out. Lat thinks, “he’s a hottie.” A statement like that would pretty much make Lat anti-anti-gay, right?

For more evidence, we hark back to this weekend’s NY Times article where a former colleague talks about Lat’s lust for office gossip:

“He would linger in the men's room, and would report on what was going on in there.”

She paints a more accurate picture of Lat. A very pink picture:

He had this whole other side of flamboyant, theater-watching, Oscar-watching, shoe-loving, litigatrix.

Were we too quick to drop the gavel on Lat? Or is he just another right-wing closet case taking his self-loathing out on the rest of us? Sounds like a case only Judge Judy could handle.

(Item was updated from its original version with corrected information.)

He Fought the Law. They Both Won. [NY Times]
Underneath Their Robes

Yesterday we posted on David Lat, one of two bloggers who’ll soon take over the well-worn leather reigns from Anna Marie Cox over at Wonkette. We weren’t the only ones who commented on his anti-gay rant in the Harvard Crimson, and his site Underneath Their Robes has responded:

Based on the foregoing, some of you have accused David Lat of being "homophobic." Much could be said on this subject; but for present purposes, suffice it to say that nothing could be farther from the truth.

Just as Samuel Alito should not be judged based on statements in a job application from 20 years ago, Lat should not be judged based on his (literally) sophomoric ramblings in a college newspaper, from over a decade ago. These "youthful indiscretions" -- of a hotheaded, rabble rousing campus conservative -- should not be viewed as an accurate reflection of who Lat is today. Nor do they represent the views he currently holds on such issues as homosexuality, gay marriage, etc.

But nowhere in his response does Lat either explain or apologize for his past behavior. Just because he was in college when he made the statements doesn’t exonerate him – we were never that ignorant in college. And he wasn’t at Barnum and Bailey Clown College either. He was at Harvard. He should’ve known better. Lat should apologize or Nick Denton should give the job to co-editor Alex Pareene full-time. There are plenty of talented bloggers out there who aren’t homophobes and who won’t alienate basically all of Wonkette’s audience.

Or better yet, make Anne Marie Cox stay!

In re: "Those 'Happy Homos'" [Underneath Their Robes]

Gawker media’s political whore (don’t worry, she’d take that as a compliment), Anna Marie Cox, has left Wonkette for greener pastures, and she’s been replaced by what looks like a rampant homophobe. The new Wonkette is David B. Lat of the judicial blog Underneath Their Robes. The New York Times uncovers a very Bill O'Reilly-like past from his Harvard Crimson days:

He declared, among other things, that campus liberals had no "no broad, overarching philosophy." He lamented the revocation of Ireland's ban on divorce, and repeatedly castigated the school's Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Student Association.

In one column, entitled "Those 'Happy Homos'" he wrote: "National Coming Out Day is just another event in the recent rash of identity-based pride rallies. These alleged celebrations of diversity have devolved into mutual masturbation festivals. They reassure people who are still deeply troubled by their lifestyle choices and are desperately seeking a stamp of approval. We have a duty to deny them this approval."

If you notice the quality of Wonkette’s postings drop dramatically after Jan. 30 (when Lat takes the reigns), there’s your reason. Whereas Cox was a friend of Mary through and through (we share a mutual love for all things Anderson Cooper), Lat, we fear, will be content to do what most conservatives do best: Bore us and suck – and not in a good way. Um, Mr. Denton, we think you might have a bad hire with this one.

He Fought the Law. They Both Won. [NY Times]