Conservatives Blame Obama for Sending Allegedly Gay Ambassador to Libya

Conservative blogs are saying U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens was gay and shouldn’t have been sent to the Middle East; Google’s censorship of the controversial anti-Muslim video proves Web companies have more power than governments; meanwhile, a Stanford University study claiming organic foods are useless is being called fraudulent. These discoveries and more below.

On a regular basis, Truthdig brings you the news items and odds and ends that have found their way to Larry Gross, director of the USC Annenberg School for Communication. A specialist in media and culture, art and communication, visual communication and media portrayals of minorities, Gross helped found the field of gay and lesbian studies.

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Right-Wing Blogs Allege Slain U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens Was Gay Conservative blog HillBuzz is reporting Stevens was gay—something supposedly widely known in his Chicago hometown—and blame the Obama Administration for knowingly sending a homosexual into a Middle Eastern country, where his death would presumably be inevitable.

Conservatives killed the liberal arts Destroying the humanities — and the notion of informed citizenship — is part of the conservative agenda.

Sins of a good Mormon boy Each year, the church asked me the same question: “Do you touch yourself?” Each year I lied, and hated myself more.

Radiating Death: How Walmart Displaces Nearby Small Businesses In 2006, months before a Walmart store was opened in the Austin neighborhood of Chicago’s West side, researchers counted 306 businesses in the surrounding area. Two years after the Walmart opened, 82 of those businesses had closed.

When All Else Fails, Paint Their Faces on Potholes Alexander Yakob, the city manager for the Russian metropolis of Yekaterinburg, was unfortunately caught once vowing to residents of the sprawling Ural city that “all streets will be repaired.”

What Social Security crisis?! The other day in class, David Ruccio made two—what he thought were very straightforward—assertions about Social Security, except none of the students believed him.

Google’s restricting of anti-Muslim video shows role of Web firms as free-speech arbiters Google lists eight reasons on its “YouTube Community Guidelines” page for why it might take down a video. Inciting riots is not among them.

Unions Are Necessary to Rebuilding Our Middle Class Last year the middle class received the smallest share of the nation’s income since these data were first reported, according to U.S. Census Bureau numbers released today.

Stanford Organics Study A “Fraud” – Linked to Cargill & Tobacco Money A new study, issued by scientists at the Freeman Spogli institute at Stanford university in California, that suggests that organic food has no medical or health values is deeply flawed, say outraged activists.

Should the Presidential Debates Include Third Parties? The Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) was started in 1987 by the Democratic and Republican parties to organize and host presidential election debates in the United States.