Unfortunately he’s not down the drain yet.

Big props to Joe.My.God for pointing to this video from yesterday’s Flush Naugle rally in Ft. Lauderdale. Executive Director of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force, Matt Foreman, was one of the speakers.

  (video by Father Tony)

UNITE Fort Lauderdale Rally’s Waymon Hudson passed on word that it was a great success.

Police estimate the number of attendees to be between 800-1000 people.  The crowd included citizens from the business, religious, legal, and neighborhood communities – a truly diverse representation of points of view and issues- all united to say that Jim Naugle does not speak for them.  The combined list of speakers came from all walks of life and spoke directly to affordable housing, global warming, tourism, respect, honesty, and diversity.  The threatened counter-protest turned out no more than 25 people, the majority of which came down from Pompano with the Rev. O?neal Dozier.

One of the main issues talked about at the rally were the mayor?s comments made at his 1pm press conference stating that our city shouldn?t reach out to gay tourists.  This is in spite of the fact that an estimated 1 million gay and lesbian tourists bring in between 1.2 and 2 billion dollars in revenue each year to our city (Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention and Visitors Bureau).

If you didn’t catch it in the earlier thread, below the fold is a hilarious on-site report from Blender banshiii, who was there. banshiii:

You guys and gals should have been there. It (the protest rally) was great. Planes flying overhead with Surrender Naugle signs. 100’s of people standing in protest. 20 exellent speakers, faith based, politicians, ACLU, EQFL…. It was quite a sight to behold. People driving by honking. Someone pulling a trailer with a fixed up potapotty called robopotty up and down Andrews Ave…. Just wild. The man is digging a bigger hole for himself. He’s stupid obviously. Here’s my thinking; We have a marriage amendment battle coming… well now. The fundies are already calling local elderly people. Thankfully some of them are PFLAG moms. Naugle is trying to burnish his wacko credentials assuming we won’t get him kicked out of office, perhaps wrongly so. I don’t think he was ready for that presser. LOL Never seen anybody turn tail and run like that. What was that about South Beach? HIV is a bad thing here in So Fla. true enuff. It’s not from public sex tho. We have homes, we have internets. we have sex. Stupid bois have unprotected sex. true enuff. Trying to tie that to an imaginary public sex problem? Well, that is reaching. grasping. This asshole throws his arrogant shit at the working class poor as well. I hope we run him out of town.

I know you all know that Ft. Lauderdale is an accepting, loving, beautiful place. We are free to live openly here in South Florida and our culture has grown and matured because of it. Aside from the wild bois, most of us live pretty normal (and yes happy) lives.

Stay tuned for more Florida fun……

Related:
* Fundie defends homophobic robo-potty mayor Naugle
* Pro-diversity rally in Ft. Lauderdale today to counter the $250K robo-potty mayor