Poland’s President Lech Kaczynski, who was a freakin’ dick to the country’s gays and went to great lengths to humiliate them, the First Lady, and an estimated 130 other passengers died when their plane crashed into a forest. There were no survivors. Mourners have been gathering outside the President Palace to lay flowers.
Paschal
He certainly wasn’t great to gays but we must sympathise with his family and all Poles. He was on his way to Russia to remember Poles who had been killed by the Soviets when his plane crashed. A pro-gay former deputy prime minister was also on the plane.
Amber LeMay
But did he deserve this praise from President Obama?
http://houseoflemay.blog-city.com/praise_for_polands_passed_president.htm
An Other Greek
He was a joke and a shame fro Poland…
A jingoistic, homophobic, conservative “child-actor” who assigned his twin brother an important position, Prime Minister!
yikes!
——————————————————————
Paschal
@An Other Greek: The President of Poland can appoint anyone he wishes to be Prime Minister of Poland but he usually picks someone who has the support of the majority of seats in the legislature. His brother had the support of the legislature but lost it after an election. He wasn’t pro-gay but he worked against the oppressive communist government of Poland. Thomas Jefferson owned slaves so not even people who do great things are perfect.
Michael
I guess Obama doesn’t know or care about Lech Kaczynski’s anti gay policies. Her is what Obama had to say:
In a statement, Obama said: “President Kaczynski was a distinguished statesman who played a key role in the Solidarity movement, and he was widely admired in the United States as a leader dedicated to advancing freedom and human dignity.”
Paschal
@Michael: The man just died. You can hardly expect President Obama to crack open a bottle of champagne and tell the press to celebrate.
Michael
@Paschal: But Obama did not have to go all out praising him for “advancing human dignity” when the man was a rabid homophobe.
Paschal
@Michael: He did good during his life as well as bad. It would be crazy for the head of state of the U.S.A. to not give a meassage of condolence such as the one President Obama gave to a head of state who fought the communist totalitarian government of Poland. The head of the Polish Army, the deputy foreign minister, a former deputy prime minister who was pro-gay, members of the Polish legislature, the First Lady of Poland, the governor of the central bankl leading historians, Polish church leaders, families of victims of Katyn massacre victim (approximately 20,000 were killed by the Soviets during World War 2) are among the dead.
Tom
I think we have to remember that our interests are not at the top of very many heterosexuals’ interests. Whereas we, very rightly, see people in terms of whether they are with us or against us, those without a dog in this fight do not. I think it is basic human nature, but not an admirable trait. This is why straight allies, while valued and important, often make mistakes in discounting issues that we feel are important; too often compromising on things they think are unimportant because they cannot feel how much certain things mean to those of us in the GLBT community.
alan brickman
Relax…..Obama’s just looking after the business interests…..like he always does…
AlwaysGay
His twin brother Jaros?aw Kaczy?ski is gay. It was likely he was as well.
Kevin
You people are awful. One of the most important figures in the general advance of human rights in the 20th century dies in a horrible plane crash along with hundreds of others and all you can do is excoriate him for a narrow slice of his policies. I mean, even Poland’s gays benefitted from his leadership and strength, insofar as we benefit as much as anyone from the expansion of freedom.
Dan
Are human rights truly advanced, when a scapegoat is yet again required?
jason
It’s sad that all these deaths occurred. My condolences to all the families.
Kaczynski was one of these “leftist conservatives”. These types are usually pro-workers’ rights but anti-gay and quite conservative in general social terms.
Alexandre
Wow…what is wrong with you Queerty? I am not saying this man is a hero, nor do I agree with what Obama said. But this man just died, and regardless of what he did (which may or may not have been politically motivated), he just died, and people are in pain because of it. He is a human, he had a family, and he had friends. He was a homophobe, and obviously that is wrong, but he represented a country that is also homophobic, but it doesn’t mean we can celebrate each time one of them dies. Saying he was a dick or making light of this situation is honestly sick. Some sensitivity while people are in mourning. We can’t forget ignorance and hatred, but we can and should forgive- it is more powerful than fighting back with mockery and anger.
tjr101
I wouldn’t wish a demise like this on my worst enemy.
May he, the first lady and all others on board that plan R.I.P.
C. McSparran
Crashed into a cemetery. So far, Poles have dug up 500 bodies.
Paschal
@Paschal: Correction: It was the head of the armed forces, not the army, who was killed.
Tallskin
I’d like to suggest the crash of the plane was due to Polish arrogance and stupidity for two reasons
Reason 1) the polish govt insists on using stone age flying machines to transport its people around, this is despite a recent helicopter crash which broke the spine of another govt minister – thus this Moscow plane crash was simply a tragedy that was inevitable. A disaster waiting to be slipped into the nearest time slot.
Reason 2) Moscow airport was thick with fog and just before the crash a “KGB” flight, piloted by a very experienced Russian pilot, was refused permission to land, and they flew on to a nearby airport. Then the polish flight arrived, containing this mad catholic fascist President Lech Kaczynski, and he was given the same advice DO NOT LAND HERE IT IS TOO FOGGY AND YOU MIGHT CRASH, but it seems the poles were out to prove something to the Russians and insisted on trying to land.
The rest is history. It’s unknown if President Lech Kaczynski was standing behind the pilot’s chair insisting personally on trying to land in thick fog in a rusty and ancient, dangerous plane, but it would in character for him to do so. After all he was renowned as a Fucking arsehole and flew into Georgia recently during the recent Russian skirmish with the Georgians, despite Russian warnings not to.
Since the catholic fascist president President Lech Kaczynski was such an ardent Katlick you have to assume that if there is such a sky pixie up there then said sky pixie didn’t like or approve of President Lech Kaczynski very much, otherwise why let the plane crash??
Ten points to the atheists, methinks.
SSCHIEFRSHA
@Kevin: See what I mean Queerty? Those could have been 14 comments praising or condemning his comment. This new rating icon is a farce.
Mike in Asheville, nee "in Brooklyn"
PLEEZE!!! A homophobic bigot dies in a plane crash and I’m supposed to have sympathy just because he’s dead? WTF?
How about this instead:
Ding dong the bigot is dead!
Which old bigot?
The wicked old bigot!
There are plenty of homophobic bigots in Warsaw who can show their sympathy; I’ll save mine for the next sad victim of a gay-bashing.
Just because Kaczynski wasn’t Hilter doesn’t mean he wasn’t a witch.
Paschal
@Paschal: Clarification: Anyone who is appointed Prime Minister of Poland can be rejected by the Polish legislature.
Sceth
It’s all well and fine that he worked against the communists successfully. He did his work. But he’s dastardly socially conservative whose relative usefulness has just about expired. Perfect timing.
ossurworld
By inference, we find where gays stand on Obama’s human dignity meter…
Rebellion
Did you fuckasses really expect Obama to degrade his death?
America is already by everybody in the goddamn world. No need the fuel the fire even more. Jesus.
So don’t even go there. There are WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY more important things to be concerned about than how Obama mourned a Polish president.
The LGBQT community needs to STOP with this victim mentality we have. We are not weak. We are not victims. Let’s act like survivors. Strong-willed. Jesus.
Please understand that people are entitled to their opinions but that doesn’t we have to give a fuck about it. Let them think their stupid ways and keep living our gay, jolly lives. I refuse to waste my life and time concerned about what some politician or person thinks of my lifestyle. I was not put on this earth to live my life for them and you all weren’t either.
Daniel
Quite an eerie news item for me, since Kaczynski is a villain in my forthcoming novel Krakow Melt(Arsenal Pulp Press)http://www.arsenalpulp.com/bookinfo.php?index=326
ossurworld
As Bette Davis once said of Joan Crawford, “They don’t change just because they’re dead.”
Rebellion
LOL @ rating my comment low when all it was saying was that the gay community should be a stronger community and not let ANYONE bring us down.
SouLKid
A dead gay man was dug out of his grave in senegal by homophobes. hundreds of other gay men die or get bashed every day around the world and Kaczynski was never bothered of such atrocity. And some of u are telling us we should mourn the death of a man like that?
Sorry…i just can’t find it in me.
Michael
@SouLKid:
Not only was Polish President Lech Kaczynski not bothered by atrocities against gays, he himself instigated violence towards gays in Poland. This was written in the Gay Liberation News on 2/10/2006 protesting his visit to Chicago back then:
Now that he is President, Kaczynski has rolled out his gay-hating agenda on a nationwide scale. Under the banner of his Law and Justice Party, gays are denied the right to freedom of assembly and are arrested for peaceful protest. Worse, police have stood by and allowed fascist skinheads to physically attack Lesbian and Gay protesters — and then arrested the peaceful protesters!
Ludwik Dorn, Kaczynski’s Minister of Interior, has publicly condoned the acts of police brutality towards Lesbians and Gays. In Poznan, the police stormed the LBGT Parade of Equality, swinging their truncheons, sending many to the hospital, and arresting 65 activists. Encouraged by the police, roaming mobs of skinheads pelted activists with eggs and shouted “Fags to gas,” and “We’ll do to you what Hitler did to the Jews.”
And on the BBC 1/29/2006
As mayor of Kaczynski twice banned a gay equality parade but allowed an anti-gay “normality parade” and is infamous for calling homosexuality un-natural.
Shortly after being elected the European Commission warned that Poland could lose their voting rights in the EU in part because of Kaczynski’s strong opposition to gay rights protected by the EU’s minority protection rules.