Mecklenburg County Commissioner Hates Dick (Burr)

A little over a year ago, on Dec. 16, 2009, during debate on the Mecklenburg County Commission over proposed domestic partner benefits for LGBT county employees and their partners, Republican Commissioner Bill James leaned over to fellow Commissioner Vilma Leake and said, "Your son was a homo, really?"

Commissioner Leake had just made emotional comments about her own son who died of AIDS.

Now Commissioner James is really, really morally outraged at fellow Republican and U.S. Senator Dick Burr, for voting to repeal "Don't Ask/Don't Tell."

We assume, also, that he won't be attending the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) convention, since that leading conservative group has invited the gay Republican group GOProud to participate.

What's becoming of the Republican Party and its confessed conservatives? Must Bill James fight this battle alone?

MeckCo Official Calls Colleague's Dead Son "A Homo"

Meet Bill James, Republican County Commissioner in Mecklenburg. He's a dick.

Tuesday night during a County Commission meeting in which a majority of commissioners agreed to offer domestic-partner benefits to county workers in same-sex relationships starting in 2011, Commissioner Vilma Leake spoke about her own son's death from AIDs, following which Commissioner James leaned over to Commissioner Leake and asked: "Your son was a homo, really?"

Leake responded: "You're going to make me hurt you. Don't do that to me. Don't talk about my son."

Yesterday Mecklenburg County Commission Chair Jennifer Roberts said that James should apologize for using the slur to a fellow commissioner.

Ever the jerk, Commissioner James has refused to apologize.