What the Fuck Sam Adams?

I interrupt normal blogging this week to bring you my frustrations about Portland's mayor, Sam Adams. Adams became mayor on New Year's Day this year, making Portland the largest U.S. city ever with an openly gay mayor and Sam Adams is the coolest mayor in the world. The first time I met Sam was at a fashion show I was in called "Junk to Funk", where we wore fashion outfits made out of recycled material and this bad ass man hosted the event in a pair of pants made out of old tires... have you ever seen your mayor in rubber pants? Yeah, that's what I thought. Sam hosted the local drag show competition and sang karaoke at a recent GLBTQ event, he's a cool motherfucker. Portland started to pride itself in the idea that our mayor was a hip, cool dude that cared about the people of his city and had a genuine desire to make it a better place.

After being in office only 20 days, our very gay mayor pulled a Bill Clinton and admitted to lying about a sexual relationship he had with an 18 year old intern. What the fuck Sam Adams? In a press release issued on Tuesday, Adams admitted that he lied to cover up his relationship with a teenage legislative intern because a potential mayoral candidate had spread rumors that Adams had sex with a minor and that he lied because he was afraid voters wouldn't believe that his young lover had turned 18 before they started having sex. The irony around all of this is that the Oregon Constitution has a stipulation in it that prohibits mayoral recall in the first six months that the mayor is in office. (It was put in the constitution nearly 100 years ago so that poor losers couldn't recall their competitors.) All the people that are pissed about having a gay mayor, or a sexually promiscuous mayor, can't do shit about it for another five months and Sam Adams has been adamant about stating that he is going to stay in office, deal with the aftermath of his decisions, and not resign.

Every time that I feel like we make strides as a community to feel and be respected, something fucks it up. I have no problem with Sam Adams dating an 18 year old; what sucks is that we just keep adding to the list of things for straight people to throw back in our faces. Seriously Sam Adams, what the fuck? Couldn't you have just kept your mouth shut? In all fairness to Sam, at least he's going to be a man and stick out the consequences.