By Gary Barlow

Boy blues

An eccentric British aristocrat we’ve discussed before, Sir Benjamin Slade, is back in the news, this time with a peacock who went nuts on a blue Lexus parked at his manor.

The male peacock caused more than $8,000 damage to the Lexus. The peacock, named Ron Davies after a Welsh politician, is gay, Sir Benjamin reasons, because boy peacocks are blue and Ron is obviously attracted to blue things.

“He couldn’t control his urges and tried to shag it,” Sir Benjamin said. “The insurers, Lloyd’s of London, are not very happy about it.”

Well, I suppose not.

Sir Benjamin, you may recall, also has a gay dog, Jasper, who he hires out as “best man” when he rents out the estate for gay weddings. Now we’re not sure if Ron’s assault on the Lexus, or strong come-on, depending on your point of view, is proof of his sexual orientation. Who knows? Maybe he had a bad experience with a Lexus.

At any rate, Sir Benjamin has posted signs warning visitors about leaving blue cars unattended at the estate.

Boy twos

If you haven’t heard of the Dammann brothers yet, just wait.

The 21-year-old brothers, Eric and Todd, are all the rage on YouTube, where their acoustic cover of Britney Spears’ “Gimme More” had generated, as of last weekend, well over 100,000 views in just four weeks.

The Dammanns, who are not only gay but are identical twins as well, are picking up fans all over the world, with many commenting that their version of Britney’s hit is way better than the original.

The brothers, who hail from Seattle, aim to make it big in the music world, and their YouTube site (www.youtube/user/hendrixefd) includes more music—check out the cover of Edwin McCain’s “I’ll Be.” And if that’s not enough, they have a MySpace site as well, at www.myspace.com/dammanntwins, with even more music.

He said, he said

Last week, Mitt Romney’s march to the White House hit another bump in the road, this one supplied by the Log Cabin Republicans. The gay Republican group, to the Mittster’s consternation, unveiled TV ads in Iowa that show Romney distancing himself from Ronald Reagan when he ran for the Senate in Massachusetts in 1994.

At that time it was no asset in Massachusetts to be tied to Reagan so Romney went to great pains to tell voters there, “I was an independent during the time of Reagan-Bush. I’m not trying to return to Reagan-Bush.”

However, an ad with video of him saying that is no help right now since the Mittster is trying to convince right-wing Republican primary voters that he’s the reincarnation of Reagan.

There’s no love lost between Mitt and gay Republicans, since Mitt told them when he was running for office in Massachusetts that he was better on gay rights than Ted Kennedy and now is trying to persuade anti-gay voters in South Carolina that he’s somewhere to the right of Pat Robertson.

Anyway, Mitt was so upset by the Log Cabin ad last week that he called it a “personal, negative attack.” Sorry, Mitt, but as Log Cabin President Patrick Sammon pointed out, it’s just using your own words to let people know where you stand—or stood. Nothing like being attacked by your own rhetoric…

Better than TV

Finally the Republican leader in the Illinois House, Rep. Tom Cross, had a unique solution recently to resolving issues between our state’s feuding leaders—bring in psychologist and Oprah regular Kate Wachs.

Illinoize blogger Bethany Jaeger quoted Cross as saying, “One of the things she talks about is finding compromises that work for you and your partners. And I thought maybe she could come to a leaders’ meeting.”

Hmmm—somehow we don’t see an Oprah shrink being quite forceful enough for the relationship issues between Gov. Rod Blagojevich, House Speaker Mike Madigan and Senate President Emil Jones. I’m not even sure Dr. Phil would make much headway, though it would be interesting—“Now, Governor, you have a confession for Speaker Madigan, don’t you. Go ahead, look him in the eye.”

Nope, I’m thinking maybe the only person on TV who could settle the mess in Springfield is Judge Judy—“Wait a minute, Mr. Speaker, who’s this? Your daughter? Where does she fit into this?… And you pipe down, Governor, she can speak for herself.”

At least maybe we could sell some ads and cut the budget deficit a bit…