If you know the name Israel Hernandez, you probably know him as “Altoids Boy,” the young man in charge of George W. Bush’s breath mints. (He says his real Dubya-assigned nickname is Izzy.)
Hernandez was 23 when he signed on as the Charlie Young to Bush’s Jed Bartlet 14 years ago, and is like a member of Bush’s family.
Israel Hernandez was a fresh-faced college graduate from the Texas border town of Eagle Pass in the summer of 1993 when he landed a job in Dallas as the personal aide to the part-owner of the Texas Rangers George W. Bush.
Together, they spent months driving the dusty back roads of the Lone Star State to promote the team, Mr. Hernandez behind the wheel of Mr. Bush’s Lincoln Town Car.
“He would speak to a rotary or chamber and say, ‘You need to come to the ballpark and we’ll make it Athens, Texas, Day. We’ll put you in your own special section; we can say ‘Welcome Athens, Texas,’ on the big screen; you can come to batting practice, ‘’ Mr. Hernandez recalled…
Mr. Hernandez, who is so close to the Bushes that he moved in with them in Dallas after his apartment was burglarized,
Do the homo-haters in Bush’s conservative Christian base know that he used to travel all over hell and half of Texas with a hot young gay dude, and that same young homo also lived with the Bushes in Texas?
Despite evidence to the contary, George Bush is not gay. He is a hyporcrite. He attacks gay people in order to gain poltical advantage — leaving millions of his unsmart-American base with the impression that he hates queers as much as they do.
How do Republicans do it? How do they send their political goons out to whack gay people in the afternoon and then sit down to dinner with their Izzy Hernandezes, Mary Cheneys, Ken Mehlmans and, who knows, Josh Boltens and Condi Rices?
Worse still, how do these self-loathing gay people square the circle in their own minds that they are lap dogs to the masters of the same people who spend their days ensuring their continued oppression and disenfranchisement?
For his loyal years of service, Izzy, now 37, travels the world on the government dime as an assistant secretary of commerce, which, frankly, is the sort of job a pol would give a crony’s ex-mistress.
Good for him. I’m sure he deserves a reward after years of service to such an unpleasant, aristorcratic boor.
Obviously, Izzy has reconciled himself to the fact that this man to whom he devoted his youthful time and energy has done more to hobble the cause of gay civil rights than anyone else in our time — but I, for one, can’t imagine how.
Update: Corrected name of West Wiing character. Thanks, West Wing Fan!
Does Bush’s Homophobe Base Know His Longtime Sidekick Is Gay?…
If you know the name Israel Hernandez, you probably know him as "Altoids Boy," the young man in charge of George W. Bush’s breath mints. (He says his real Dubya-assigned nickname is Izzy.) Hernandez was 23 when he signed on as the Charlie S…
I don’t know, it gets awful lonely on those back Texas roads…
youre gay !
Maybe, just maybe the base does not know, but I am sure Bush knows. It is a possibility Jeff Gannon knows also.
[…] Pensito Review » Does Bush’s Homophobe Base Know His Longtime Sidekick Is Gay? “If you know the name Israel Hernandez, you probably know him as “Altoids Boy,” the young man in charge of George W. Bush’s breath mints. (He says his real Dubya-assigned nickname is Izzy.) … Izzy is also gay.” (tags: sex news politics interesting) […]
This website is interesting in that it is looks at all the facts that point to a fact that Bush is a self hating gay… http://mindprod.com/politics/bushismsgay.html
Charlie Young was the name of Jed Bartlet’s personal aide, not Charlie Shepherd.
As right as you may be, this article is littered with colourful language, loaded words and statements with little evidence to back them up. Sure, we all hate Condi but you can’t just run around saying she might be gay without having some inkling of supporting evidence. I’ve never exactly heard W say he “hates queers.” I haven’t exactly read over transcripts of everything he’s ever said, but I haven’t ever heard him say ANYTHING homophobic beyond saying he thinks marriage should be kept between a man and a woman.
I’m the farthest thing from Republican you could ever point to, but there’s a difference between journalistic integrity and tabloid writing. You might want to find out what it is.
Well Chad, we over here in the Republican Party happen to love Condi to bits, even though she might be both single and gay. You guys are going to have a lot of explaining to do to Hillary when Mr. Gay Friendly, Rudy Giuliani, wins South Carolina next year and wraps up the Republican nomination early. No, we’re not going to nominate Elmer Gantry just so Hillary can win. We’d rather hold on to the White House, thank you very much. Rudy will do that for us. Our “homophobic base” is not what you think it is…
But to the point of the screed, Chad is right. One of the problems with blogs, and the internet in general, is that it is in dire need of simple, editorial supervision. Sander Vinocur wrote this years ago. He was right, of course. This post, and zillions of others across the internet, use opionion and dress it up as fact.
Bad mojo. Kos can do that, but he’s got an excuse: he’s in it for the money. What’s your excuse?
Sure ain’t the money, Section9! For the record, our journalistic standards are calibrated to be precisely 100 times more rigorous than Limbaugh, Hannity and O’Reilly’s, combined.
You’re definitely right about that, Jon. Still doesn’t get you off the hook though. If you look on Reddit, many people seem to agree with me.
Chad - We welcome new readers but I have discussed Condi’s sexuality, or lack thereof, as well as Bolten’s, before in these pages. For the benefit of our of regular readers, I can’t go over the same ground every time I write a story.
Since you’re just tuning in here’s my take: If the roles were reversed, and a Dem president had a secretary of state and a chief of staff who were over 50 and had never been married, the attack dogs on the right would have a field day, picking through the trash outside the homes of these staffers, publishing lies and rumors etc. — until the sexuality of these staffers had the rightwing homophobic base riled up to Orange Alert over the fact that the country was being run by a bunch of queers.
Liberals don’t do that sort of thing, primarily because we are not obssessed with other people’s sex lives in the sick way rightwingers are, and because the base would respond pretty much as you did about what I wrote, which, technically, only implied they might be gay.
But I explicitly did not say Bush “hates queers” or has ever said he hates queers. (In fact, the point of the story is that his support for the anti-marriage amendment, etc., is all a pretense for political gain.) I said, “He attacks gay people in order to gain poltical advantage — leaving millions of his unsmart-American base with the impression that he hates queers as much as they do.”
(Sorry that I misattributed the question about doing this for money to you instead of Section9. I corrected above.)
Considering all the coincidences surrounding Bush’s sexual history (see Hipster’s post), and his extremely close relationship with former college roomie Victor Ashe…yyyeah, I would say they probably know. They just can’t say anything.
SmeargateSMEAR CAMPAIGNS –history
The Conservatives wandered in the wilderness from Coolidge until Reagan.
When Nixon resigned they went crazy with Hatred.
Reagan gave then a Soap Box to spread hatred.
When my Lord Clinton stomped Bush I they exploded with fury of Madness and Hatred.
They had a Congress whose leading spokesperson said in 1994 “If we get Congress we will investigate every decision made by this administration”.
True to his word Congress spent, according to GAO ($110,000,000), on Hearings and Investigations of the Clinton administration.
Their hatred became very abusive through right wing radio talk shows like Mush Dimbaugh who was recorded as spreading over 10,000 LIES(intent to deceive) in 4,000 hours of his transcripts. Edit by FAIR. Author’s extrapolation.
Their smearing of Clinton was local.
Now, the self-admitted Recovering Alcoholic Bush has made us a Worldwide Laughing Stock.
South America is electing leaders who exhibit true Christian virtues like “Care for the Least Amongst thee”.
Some are yelling—“WHO IS AFRAID OF THE BIG BAD BUSH”
World leaders who have met him laugh at his ignorance.
Oh! How I long for another Clinton Type leader.
One who is exceptionally intelligent
One who knows Governance.
One who truly cares about America.
One who cares for the less fortunate.
One who knows democracies thrive under a hugh middle class.
One who when he gets wealth uses it to do good for the least amongst us.
One who knows that when a small percent own the majority of the nation’s wealth
A Christian God will not allow them to survive for centuries.
The lower 80% will Revolt.
Had Clinton kept his zipper zapped I would put him on the Empire State Building in lights 100 feet high.
I love Bill Clinton. Very much.
Clarence Swinney
Political Historian since 1991 of Reagan-Clinton-Bush II administrations.
President-Retired-Lifeaholics of America
WORK FOR A LIFE NOT JUST A LIVING (like Bill Clinton)