confusion

I took part today in the MoveOn [moveon.org] primary today. The goal is for them to pick a candidate to support—all the choices are democrats as MoveOn is a liberal organization. But whatever your personal convictions are or are not regarding politics, be you left, right or middle, donkey, elephant or just human understanding and participating in the election process is
important for every US Citizen old enough to vote. So:

–Register to vote [capwiz.com]
–Find out who is representing you [vote-smart.org]
-Learn:
 –The parties [politics1.com]
 –The candidates [vote-smart.org]
read the news papers and magazines, watch tv or listen to the radio, but pay attention so you know what is going on and can make an informed decision come election time. Don’t let other people make the decision for you.

The presidential election in 2000 was decided by five electoral
votes! The candidate who won the popular vote lost the election! (see
the numbers [cnn.com]) Don’t ever think that your vote does not
affect the outcome.

Bad officials are elected by good citizens who do not vote.

–George Jean Nathan (1882-1958)

The whole ‘genetically modified foods are going to be the end of civilization’ craze has kinda passed me by. I figure we have been genetically modifying food for a long time by cross pollination, we can just do it faster now by skipping the whole middle man (or middle men—the bees, et al.) and change the plant in a petri dish now. Then I read this article [www.cbc.ca] and I realized that this really is the end of the world! I mean, coffee plants that grow decaffeinated coffee?!?!?! That really is the dark side! What happens if one of these plants escapes the lab? Imagine one of these freaks getting in to the wild coffee plant population in Brazil. It might make no difference, but it could be the beginning of the end for all the worlds real coffee plants. Decaf is the devils work. This plant could be the anti-Christ! The end of civilization as we know it. We must unite to stop this research! Coffee without caffeine is just dirty brown water! Spread the word—just say no to decaf!

Saturday night while sitting in Xando’s on the corner of R St. and 20th with C██████ and some of her friends I saw it [www.segway.com]! It was going up the other side of Connecticut avenue. Someone must have a lot of extra money—or no (un)common sense!

Thursday, the twelfth of June, was the three year anniversary of C██████ and I meeting. I wanted to post something here on the twelfth about it, but I could not figure out what it was I wanted to say. Basically it all comes down to saying ‘thank you.’ Thank you for more than I can say. With out the love and friendship of C██████ over the past three years I would not be who I am today and I would be worlds away from where I am. I would not have gone to Europe, I would not have C███████ today, I don’t know where I would be but I don’t think it would have been as close to where I truly want to be as I am today. Thank you for everything, happy birthday, congratulations to you and Sebastian, congratulations on graduating, good luck in Germany. I will always cherish the times we had together—good and bad. And you will always have my love and friendship. If you ever need anything don’t hesitate to ask. I can never repay you for what you gave me.

I started writing this entry this morning at work, but got sidetracked by work—bet you didn’t see that one coming. It’s not really done, but I’m to lazy to go back and fix the flow and flesh out the rest of the thoughts… maybe it will make since, if not, sorry.

So the Toni Awards where given out the other day and Hairspray won for best score. No big deal, but the two guys who won it happen to be gay—not a shocker in the theater world, what has people cheering or jeering is the fact that the two of them kissed on stage, in prime time, on live tv. (found this story [www.guardian.co.uk] in the Guardian a UK paper.)

Mr Shaiman turned to Mr Wittman and said: “I love this man. We’re not allowed to get married in this world … But I’d like to declare, in front of all these people, I love you and I’d like to live with you the rest of my life.”

As a tangent the story mentions a recent backlash against gays and lesbians:

John Ashcroft, the US attorney general, banned an established gay pride event at the justice department. In April, a Pennsylvania senator, Rick Santorum, linked homosexuality to bigamy, polygamy, and incest.

Now the second comment we can throw out as a standard ‘I get a strange feeling in my tummy when I talk about gays’ textbook Christian comment. (though I would be interested to know the number of gays who become Mormon polygamist or West Virginians who are gay?) But John Ashcroft should be sued by the ACLU over banning a pride event at the DOJ. Personally I am against all ‘special interest group’ recognition days/weeks/months and such—I think it points out the differences and polarizes society because too many people cannot look beyond those differences once they are pointed out. However I have no doubt that John Ashcroft will not be banning any ‘black history month’ activities at the DOJ (political suicide) and there is no fundamental difference between black Americans celebrating being black and gay Americans celebrating being gay. John Ashcroft should be forced to set down for being a bigoted chauvinist.

What is it that people are so afraid of? What is it that two consenting adult people do together in their own home that scares so many people? Why do we hold on so tightly to our Judaic-Christian
fourth century b.c.e ethics? I just don’t understand. Somehow sodomy is so bad to Christians that they can conveniently forget about ‘brotherly love’ and acceptance. They can even kill? I thought there was a commandment against that.

I like this line:

Same sex kissing is not unheard of on US TV. The first, most memorable kiss was on LA Law in 1992 by Amanda Donohoe and Michele Greene. Roseanne, Ellen, Ally McBeal, Friends, ER, and Spin City followed suit. Gay male affection is far more rare.

No shit. That’s because guys love to watch girls kiss… so it’s more socially acceptable to be a homosexual woman. Even the fat, white, Christian men or greasy, redneck, white trash who make all the noise about gays like to see two women go at it.