Wednesday, May 27, 2009

18,000 Gay Marriages Have Harmed Straight Marriage How?

In light of the recent CA supreme court ruling that is mixed, I'm just wondering a couple of things.
There have been 18K married gay people in California for several months now. How has that hurt the straights who have married?

Really, the argument that there just might be some other obscure allowance for marriage (read polygamy and the like) is not an argument against allowing gays to be married today. I still have not heard one plausible reason why two people in a monogamous relationship (consenting adults) can't be married regardless of gender that doesn't involve bigotry or the bible or both.

Care to try again folks?

Blog on friends. Blog on all.

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Reflections on Memorial Day

Given that many view Memorial Day as simply a time to cook outside, consume large quantities of beer, and the like, I thought it would be helpful to remind ourselves what it really is about. These are snaps I took from the National Cemetery yesterday.









Judgement Day

Del died a few months later, before Proposition 8 passed. She died a married woman. As far as I know, we're still married. They haven't ruled yet about the people who got married, but most people think they're not going to cancel those marriages.
Where's the harm if Del and Phyllis are married?
They were a San Francisco couple who had been together 51 years at that time. Talk about a relationship of love and devotion and constancy: It was really what marriage should be about.



Isn't it about time the bigots lose one? I suppose we will know in a handful of minutes.

Blog on friends. Blog on all.

Sunday, May 24, 2009

After Tuesday, We Will Know

Of course, the Supreme Court of the State of California will finally make public their ruling on the Prop H8 case: Tuesday at 10:00 AM. I'm hoping they stay sane and prove that the tyranny of the majority will not inflict it's warped sense of values on a minority that deserves protection under the law. After all, the Court is there to prevent such things from happening; protecting those who cannot protect themselves.

As to why any one would suggest that there is something sanctimonious and worth protecting about straight marriage is beyond me. Spare us the biblical references as I'm quite certain even those who most strictly follow the teachings therein violate some obscure and mundane rule stipulated in black and white. You can't selectively preach, teach and follow only those rules you like. As they would say, those who are without sin should cast the first stone.

This issue is about basic human rights. People should be allowed to marry and obtain the same freedoms no matter their sexual orientation. Those opposed are bigots.

Really, I know both gay and straight parents and found that some gay people are substantially better parents than the straight ones. As to why you would want to invalidate that family by disallowing their marriage simply based on gender is really foolish. If you really were wanting to do what is right for families and children you would ban three types of marriages: among the obese, smokers and celebrities. All have led to very dysfunctional and unhealthy upbringings for children. If you are about protecting families and marriage, why not start where there is some proof of harm.

I'm still waiting for the plausible explanation as to how two same sex individuals getting hitched will harm a straight marriage. Care to give it a whirl?

Blog on friends. Blog on all.

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

So, Let Me Get This Straight

In case you have not been watching moves that the CSU Board has been taking to offset costs of running an operation that the State seems increasingly reluctant to cover (Well, shit, lets be blunt here- it seems like the public really doesn't care much about education across the board as a social good otherwise they may complain more profusely that kids/students are being regularly used as political pawns), they have resolved to hike tuition, which would be calculated as much as a 78% increase in cost to some students. Here's the irony. Bend your mind around this.

Let's say, you are a starving student, working part time on your MBA at a CSU school. Granted, the economy is in George Bush's inelegantly-built-over-eight-years crapper and you expected tuition to go up, but here's the irony. According to the resolution: university presidents
are directed to set aside a minimum of 25% and not more than 33% of the Graduate Business Professional Fee revenue for need-based financial aid, with such funds to be used first to meet the demonstrated financial need of student in campus professional graduate degree programs in business....
So, they increase your fees and collect your money which causes you to be in greater financial duress. This in turn requires you to petition for financial aid because you need help to pay them the increased fees. Essentially, you are loaning the University your money so that they may - at best give back to you and at worse loan to you to cover that additional set of fees which you may not have needed had they not increased the fees.

Of course, the top level CSU folks make a combined total of over 10 million dollars and perks. And what does that get the students? Any one else there want to holler WTF from the roof tops yet? I say cut at the top first.

Friday, May 15, 2009

The GOP: America's Cancer

With the resurgence of the Big Dick Cheney grabbing the microphone, and the effervescent challenges to Nancy Pelosi, it seems like the GOP has become a cancer for America.

We know full well that for 8 years, the W, Rove and Co was in the business of spreading propaganda, mongering fear, and building a case to justify an illegitimate war in Iraq. But as of late, it seems the GOP cannot seem to pull itself away from their icons even though they are being led from the fifth to the sixth layer of hell by them.

Any one who believes that the CIA was fully disclosing all the details to congress way back in 2003 or earlier forgets that initially there was no congressional oversight for the moves the W, Rove and Co made back then. And, whatever oversight was allowed, it was completely de-powered and the moves were perfunctory. The W, Rove and Co had unleashed the hounds, and there was no calling them back.

There is a litany of reasons why I believe the GOP is a cancer for America, but I thought I would toss this out as a conversation generator. What say you blogosphere?

Is the GOP a Cancer, a boil that should be lanced? Or, will the GOP be able to help us out of the mess their leadership accelerated by tossing the gasoline on the fire one signing statement at a time?

Blog on friends. Blog on all.

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

10 June 2009 - Marking 5 Years On the Blog

Okay peeps, been a bit sidetracked as I took on a hefty volunteer assignment and needed to spend some ramp up time getting a blog rolling for the group - bringing an organization into the new Millennium isn't easy when they operate like it's 1979.

I've got two questions for today. First, as I roll up on 10 June - my five year blogaversary - I thought I would ask regular (or irregular) readers what topic I should cover. I've never asked readers for their thoughts on what to post about. Perhaps it's time to see what interests you. So, this comes up on question 1 - What would you like me to blog about as I mark the five year milestone?

Second, lately, the Big Dick Cheney seems to be getting a lot of air time. Why does the media continue to give him the microphone?
I'm wondering how much he gets paid for his "testimony" on various "talk" shows. "I don't think we should just roll over when the new administration ... accuses us of committing torture, which we did not, or somehow violating the law, which we did not," Cheney said. "I think you need to stand up and respond to that, and that's what I've done."
Last I checked water boarding was a lot like torture & the W, Rove and Co spent a great deal of time, energy and taxpayer dollars bending the law to suit their wanton lust for torture.

So, question 2) What's up with the Big Dick? Isn't he undermining the authority of the President, exactly the thing he would profusely and vociferously lament while Veep?

Sunday, May 03, 2009

GIs Still Coming Home In Flag Draped Boxes


George Bush thought that letting people snap and share photographs of GIs returning home in flag draped boxes was the wrong message and disallowed it. I say, not.

The American people are not made of solidified high fructose corn syrup and we won't melt in the face of bad, rotten, or even worse news. In fact, sharing the grim reality helps us a) come to terms with how bad things really are, and b) possibly more readily contribute to a solution.

There was a lot wrong with how George Bush ran his Whitehouse. His legacy lives, unfortunately. And, the war that George Bush and his cronies brought us, is still delivering sadness in the form of dead GIs in flag draped boxes.

Fortunately, the new President is treating us like adults rather than children, and is hopefully going to put an end to the unnecessary expense of American GI lives. In the meanwhile, for the families that lost their loved ones, the grief is very real.

Blog on friends. Blog on all.

Friday, May 01, 2009

Coming Up On Five Years of Blogging

I may be a relic, with the advent of facebook and twitter which were only a twinkle in some profiteer's eye when I first started. But tempus fugit.

Come June, I'll be five years old in the Blogoshpere. Can't really explain why I'm still around. Haven't cracked 100K hits, but maybe by then.

Is it's the fame and glory that drive me? Nope. I'm not certain I'm even famous to 15 people let alone had my fifteen minutes.

Or, it's all that money I made with adsense? Given that I've not made enough so far to even have google send me my first check, nope.

Or is it the ability to exercise the First Amendment almost daily? Perhaps.

Mainly, it feels like I've been pissing in the wind, occasionally doused with my own urine. Some times it feels nice, warm and refreshing. Others, cold damp and foul, like the stench of having consumed asparagus at the last meal.

In the end, I'm feeling like I'll continue. What say you blogosphere?

Blog on friends.

Blog on all.