SquareState - Civil Rights

Calling on Straight Progressives -- Step Up To The Plate

peacemonger — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 17:02:31 GMT

First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn't speak up
because I was not a Catholic.
Then they came for me and there was no one left
to speak out for me.

~Martin Niemoller, Protestant Pastor and Social Activist, 1892-1984

If Martin Niemoller were alive today, I believe he would add gays and lesbians, as well as new immigrants, and people of color to this list. What happened in Nazi Germany can happen anywhere. What we are seeing in today's political landscape is what so many have feared -- with the rich getting richer, and the poor getting poorer, Americans have turned on each other. It's called scapegoating.

The New GOP has gotten more extreme every year, attempting to take away women's basic rights to health care, financial safety nets for the poor and the elderly, and our children's opportunity to succeed through public education. They blame our pain on us, and they target the most vulnerable among us -- gays and lesbians, American laborers, new immigrants, teachers and firefighters, people of color -- even minority children.

As we say in Judaism, "Enough!" "Dayenu!"

There is one antidote for scapegoating, and only one. It's when people of all stripes -- of all colors, all ages, all ethnic backgrounds, all religions, all sexual orientations, and all professions -- stand together and say, "This is our country. These are our bodies. These are our homes. This is our work. These are our beliefs. These are our choices. These are our friends. This is my life, and you are going to have to pry it from my cold, dead hands!"

I ask my straight friends and neighbors -- please stand with me on this year's Civil Unions Bill in Colorado. This bill is not just about giving compassionate equity to Coloradans who have been treated like second class citizens far too long, allowing them the same human dignities we enjoy and take for granted. It's not just about ensuring they can hold their loved one's hand at the end of life, or own a home together, or buy insurance policies together. It's not just about protecting their children's right to legal protections.

It's about holding tight to the America we love... the America that cares about every citizen, rich or poor, male or female, native or non-native, gay or straight. It's about fighting to hold onto what made this nation great -- it's diversity and it's compassion -- it's equality, it's dream, and it's potential.

As straight progressives, please stand with me every step of the way on the CO Civil Unions bill. Take a morning or afternoon off when it is time to testify. Bombard your legislators with phone calls, emails, letters, and faxes. Organize a rally. Start a letter, and get your neighbors to sign it with you.

Join me in speaking up, because when they come for us, we're going to wish someone's left to speak on our behalf.

Please join me.

Bigotry, Prejudice and CO's Civil Unions Bill

peacemonger — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 16:36:14 GMT

When I was a little girl living three miles outside of Detroit in a small house with eleven residents (my parents and nine children), my Dad had regular poker games in our garage. The garage was a working garage with a grease pit to fix cars (a 6 foot deep rectangular hole), which he covered with several layers of plywood on weekend evenings, in order to have his regular poker game on top of it. (Ever seen the Roseanne show? It was just like that, only our kitchen was much smaller than theirs.)

Dad was deaf from a childhood accident, but he heard the language of the streets through beer, cigarettes, cars, and frequent "gut checks". Everyone from the shop was invited to poker night, no matter what their faith, color, ethnicity, language, bank account, religion, etc. The only rule to be invited to poker night was you couldn't drive a foreign car. (I talked a lot about that here.)

We had one television, one telephone, and ten people fighting over them, so I read often, and listened to Canadian public radio, where my liberal curiosity was nurtured. I loved meeting all my Dad's friends from "the shop" -- each had a different accent, a different smell, a different look. When I studied Native Americans, my Dad had a friend who was a Native American Chief, and my Dad asked him to teach us. Chief Red Bird, a local volunteer at a state park, brought his daughter and some friends, and had a mini-Pow-wow in our living room. He even made us leather slippers, which we wore when we visited him at Detroit Metropolitan State Park.

Dad didn't discriminate, at least not in the usual ways. Although my father quit school in the eighth grade and only later went back to finish the eleventh grade (there was no special education offered for poor deaf kids in the forties), he was an expert at people. Dad made friends with everyone -- literally everyone -- and he brought them all home for poker. Jewish friends, Italian friends, Greek friends, African-American friends, German friends, Asian friends -- didn't matter. As long as they didn't drive a foreign car, they were all his friends.
At our local drug store, there was a woman with numbers tattooed on her arm, and when asked, she told us in a very thick accent how she had escaped Nazi Germany. My mother would not have approved of me asking such nosy questions, but when I was alone, I asked them of everyone I met. Ethnic Detroit in the 70s was the perfect place to learn about the world.

I remember being intrigued by one of my Dad's poker-playing friends, "German Joe". Joe's wife was the best baker, and he frequently brought over German anisette pastries. He also had an adorable schnauzer named Snoopy that did tricks and followed commands in three languages. I was about eight years old when I blurted out to Joe, "Are you a Nazi?" My Dad's friend became very serious and quiet, kneeled down to be eye level with me, and said (something like),

"When I was sixteen, I joined Hitler's army because I loved planes and they said I could fly them. I did not hate Jews. I did not hate anyone. I just wanted to fly planes. I worked for Hitler until I escaped and came to this country. Every day of my life, I pray to G-d to forgive me for being on the wrong side." With tears in his eyes, Joe continued, "When you grow up, remember to ask a lot of questions... because if you don't, you might end up on the wrong side, like me. Sometimes I wish I died in the war. You should never live like Old Joe."

I sensed Joe's deep shame, and never forgot it. I also never shared Joe's secret with my parents (my Dad was deaf, remember). Many of my father's nine brothers fought the Nazi's in World War II -- it wouldn't have gone over well. How could someone who appeared so kind have been part of something that was so unspeakably cruel?

Later, as a teenager, I started attending a synagogue and eventually converted to Judaism. In shul, I heard many more horror stories about the Holocaust, and often thought of Joe -- Joe with the sweet dog, the delicious cookies, and the horrible secret. Joe the Nazi, who flew planes for the most murderous regime in human history.

I learned as a kid, to talk to everyone, to assume nothing, and to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. It's easy to hate people; it's much more difficult to understand them. I studied Psychology in college for this reason.

I was thinking about all of this yesterday at the CO State Senate Judiciary hearing on Civil Unions. A young woman representing the Anti-Defamation League testified that people who opposed Civil Unions were motivated for many different reasons, but among them were bigotry and prejudice. A very tense exchange between the young woman and Senator Lundberg went something like this:

Lundberg: "Are you saying that anyone opposed to Civil Unions is a bigot, or is prejudiced?"
Woman from ADL: "No, I am saying there are many motives to oppose equality for gays and lesbians. Among those reasons is bigotry and prejudice. That's why I'm testifying on behalf of ADL".

Lundberg repeated his question in slightly different words, and the woman repeated her answer in a similar fashion. As the proverbial saying goes, you could cut the tension with a knife.

I thought about German Joe, and I thought about the woman with the numbers on her arm. I thought about Rosa Parks, whom I met when I was sixteen; my high school social studies teacher invited her in to speak to our class. I remembered her saying how important it was to the civil rights movement that white people joined the cause, too. I thought about one of my best friends who killed himself while struggling with his sexuality and the homophobic world around him, and I thought about Senator Lundberg.

When it was my turn to testify, I said,

"I'm sorry Senator Lundberg is out of the room..." (he and Senator King left the room frequently during the hearing, each missing approximately half of the testimony. Even while there, Lundberg rarely looked up from his laptop or Ipad, apparently doing his taxes, or something else equally more important than listening to the pain of gays and lesbians for hours). I continued, "because I wanted to tell Senator Lundberg I do not believe every person who opposes gay marriage or Civil Unions is a bigot, or is prejudiced".

On the break, I gave Senator Lundberg a copy of my testimony, shook his hand, and told him the same thing. And I meant it. I don't believe he hates gays.

In my testimony, I spoke of being homophobic while in high school. When I heard gay jokes as a kid, and laughed at them, I meant no harm to anyone. Like my Dad, I didn't hate gay people, or Jews, or African-Americans, or Italians, or anyone else. Hate has never been a part of my heart, even a little.

And yet, by not speaking up, by not showing up, by not standing up, I was part of the problem. When my friend Bret killed himself, and left a note, I found that I, too, in high school, shared something with German Joe.

Never again. Never again. Never again.

I will listen to all sides. I will strive to understand. I will assume everyone has good intentions unless I can prove otherwise. And I will never, ever stop asking questions. I will never stand quiet when those around me are persecuted. I owe it to the woman with the numbers on her arm. I owe it to Rosa Parks. I owe it to my friend Bret, and to many other millions of people who have been persecuted because of the (literally) thoughtless actions, or inactions, of others.

Senators Lundberg and King gave their reasons for not supporting civil unions. For King, he essentially believes civil unions are a veiled attempt at gay marriage, and defining marriage is the right of the church. To quote King, "Separation of church and state is there to protect the church".

Lundberg's argument was similar. He believes the Civil Unions bill is no different than the gay marriage attempts of the past. Because of the fact Lundberg only actually listened carefully to a few minutes of the five hour long Senate Judiciary hearing, he managed to avoid hearing all the reasons why the Civil Unions bill is very different from earlier gay marriage legislation (I sat immediately to his right in the completely packed chambers and watched him surfing the net for five hours -- that is, when he was even in the room).

"Ask questions", Senator Lundberg. "Listen. Engage. Understand." That's how we'll know you are not a bigot.

And to those who will conclude with a knee-jerk reaction to this piece that I am comparing Senators Lundberg and King to Nazis, please go back and read this again... carefully.

On Protecting The Innocent, Or, Is There A Death Penalty Compromise?

fake consultant — Sat, 24 Sep 2011 19:45:00 GMT

I don't feel very good about this country this morning, and as so many of us are I'm thinking of how Troy Davis was hustled off this mortal coil by the State of Georgia without a lot of thought of what it means to execute the innocent.

And given the choice, I'd rather see us abandon the death penalty altogether, for reasons that must, at this moment, seem self-evident; that said, it's my suspicion that a lot of states are not going to be in any hurry to abandon their death penalties anytime soon now that they know the Supreme Court will allow the innocent to be murdered.

So what if there was a way to create a compromise that balanced the absolute need to protect the innocent with the feeling among many Americans that, for some crimes, we absolutely have to impose the death penalty?

Considering the circumstances, it's not going to be an easy subject, but let's give it a try, and see what we can do.

Let's Fix An Error Dept.: Apologies are in order, because in our last story we identified The Riverside Church in Manhattan as the place where George Carlin learned to be Catholic - and that could not have been more incorrect. Bad research was the culprit here, and it's something that we'll obviously be working to improve. So, once again: sorry, and my bad.

Now if all the states want to limit the imposition of the death penalty to just the guilty (and after what we just saw in Georgia, that's no longer 100% certain), one way you could do it would be to make it a lot harder to prove guilt - and that's what we have in mind for today's proposal.

As you may recall, we convict today with a "burden of proof" that is described as "guilt beyond a reasonable doubt"; as we now know, it is possible to prove guilt, beyond a reasonable doubt, even when there's a whole lot of reasonable doubt to be found.

In Davis' case, he was given a chance on appeal to prove his innocence, and despite this conclusion from the Judge hearing the case...

"Ultimately, while Mr. Davis's new evidence casts some additional, minimal doubt on his conviction, it is largely smoke and mirrors..."

...Davis was still executed.

So the way I would get at this problem would be to change the burden of proof in these cases: if you want to execute someone who is facing an aggravated murder or other capital charge, instead of "guilt beyond a reasonable doubt", I would require "guilt beyond all doubt".

If you can't get to guilt beyond all doubt, but you can prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, then you could impose no sentence harsher than life without parole.

If this proposal had been in effect in Davis' case, there could have been no execution after he argued that he was denied the effective assistance of counsel, because that would have erased "all doubt"; after that he would have had the rest of his life to demonstrate that he was wrongly convicted.

There are going to be a few reasons people might not like this proposal, and I'll try to address some of them briefly:

Right off the bat, many will complain that because of the new burden of proof it will be virtually impossible to have executions at all; I would tell those folks that if that were to occur...then the system is working. The entire purpose of this plan is to make executions an extraordinarily rare occurrence and to move just about everyone on Death Rows nationwide to a "life without parole" future.

Beyond that, many will say that capital punishment is morally unacceptable under any circumstances, and to those folks I would respond that y'all make a pretty good point...but at the moment there are a lot of Americans who do not hold that moral position - and they have strong feelings too - and unless we can move them to a different point of view, then the best chance we have to prevent the innocent from being executed is to find some sort of compromise like this one.

(Don't believe me about that "strong feelings" thing? How many of the readers here would be OK with the death penalty for Osama Bin Laden, if he were proved "beyond all doubt" to have been the person behind 9/11?)

A similar line of thought is expressed in the idea that we are seeing more and more voters who do oppose capital punishment, and with a bit of patience, this problem will go away.

After what happened to Troy Davis, I think there's more urgency now than there was in times past, and that's because we now see that at least one State will quickly kill a prisoner in order to "clear the case", suggesting to me that patience is not as good an option as it was before.

Finally, I suspect many will feel that the effort to pass a proposal like this one would distract from the effort to end the death penalty, which is, again, a pretty good argument.

To those folks I would respond that we may get some states to end the death penalty today, but there are a lot of other states that are not going to want to give up the death penalty for some time to come (remember the people who cheered Rick Perry's execution record?), and if we aren't going to be able to end the death penalty completely, then I think we have to offer some sort of compromise; a compromise based on the concepts of "killing the innocent isn't The American Way" or "you could still execute Osama" could appeal to voters who simply won't give up on the death penalty altogether.

So that's what we have for you today: even though I personally would prefer that we end the death penalty and just go to life without parole for all these crimes, I don't think we're going to achieve that in a lot of states; with that in mind I'm proposing a compromise that would protect the innocent by ending virtually all executions, even as it allows an extraordinarily difficult to reach exception that could satisfy those who absolutely do not want to see the application of the death penalty come to an end.

It's an imperfect compromise, I'll admit - but in a big ol' swath of America that runs from roughly Florida to Idaho, it may be the best compromise we can make right now, and right now, in those places, that might have to be good enough.

Entirely Off The Subject Dept.: We are still trying to get signatures for the petition to change the name of Manhattan's W 121st St (one block from Seminary Row) to George Carlin Street, and we need your help; you can sign right here. The goal is to reach 10,000 signatures by Monday, so...get to it.

On Reopening For Business, Or, What? No Flying Cars?

fake consultant — Sun, 26 Jun 2011 11:05:41 GMT

So I took a bit of a break this past month, and I figured by the time I came back y'all would have things sorted out: people would be surely by flying around with jet packs by now, God would have sent fires and floods to smite the unrighteous, and, if I really got lucky, Barack Obama would have "grown a pair".

And now that I'm back, debt negotiations are about to commence between that same Barack Obama and the Republican Congressional Leadership, things like Social Security and Medicare cuts are apparently on the table in order to protect tax cuts for the rich, and certain quarters of the Republican Party aren't even trying anymore to hide their racism.

All of which suggests that I shouldn't be looking for a jet pack anytime soon.

But there is some good news: God is apparently working hard, and states like Oklahoma and Arizona and Florida and Georgia and Texas have been alternately aflame or aflood, apparently as a result of their unrepentant behavior...and on the economic front, New York City's Stonewall Inn is going to make a ton of money this summer hosting weddings.

That gives us a lot to talk about...so let's get right to it.

Pessimism is cowardice. The man who cannot frankly acknowledge the "Jim-Crow" car as a fact and yet live and hope, is simply afraid either of himself or of the world. There is not in the world a more disgraceful denial of brotherhood than the "Jim-Crow" car of the southern United States; but, too, just as true, there is nothing more beautiful in the universe than sunset and moonlight on Montego Bay in far Jamaica. And both things are true and both belong to this, our world, and neither can be denied.
--From "On Being Black", by W.E.B. DuBois

We gotta start with the most "WTF?!?" news first: Personhood USA is a group that figures the only reason we want to make sure that abortion rights are protected for women who are raped, either by members of their own family or others...is because we really don't understand how wonderful it can be for women to enter motherhood in this way, or for those children to enter the world; all of which presumably means that for these folks, the dark cloud of rape and incest has a silver lining that the rest of us never really think about.

To help make the point, and to help advance legislation that basically says that as soon as two sets of haploid chromosomes become a diploid a child is born (this to try to criminalize abortion in the State), Personhood Mississippi sent their representative, Rebecca Kiessling, on a week-long "Conceived in Rape Lecture Series".

"I am not the rapist's child!", Kiessling declares in a written statement, which I personally think is going to be tough to sell to some poor kid who's been forced by law to sit down at Thanksgiving dinner next to his father and grandfather - and there's only one guy sitting there. Especially in a State that isn't exactly big on providing mental health services to these victims.

But let's move on to happier subjects:

I live in Washington State, and for the past several years Democrats in what you might think is an aggressively liberal State are fighting a losing battle to keep it that way; much of this, frankly, rests on the shoulders of Governor Christine Gregoire, who, not unlike many other Democratic leaders nationally, has simply not chosen to take the fight to the Republicans.

But this may change, as Congressman Jay Inslee is apparently going to announce his candidacy for the State's top office on Monday.

I have to confess that I personally am looking forward to this, as Inslee has been pushing a lot of issues that I care about over the years, including real health care reform and an energy policy that tries to remove Saudi Arabia from their position as America's "best frenemy forever".

I don't have the exact quote handy, but I once saw Inslee, on the floor of the House, describe a Bush budget as having the same effect on someone as it would be if you hit them over the head with their own artificial leg, and I've been a fan ever since; if he takes that attitude to the campaign and governing we'll be the better off for the effort.

The number of states looking to screw over their workers is growing fast, and so far Barack Obama hasn't been able to locate those "comfortable shoes" he said he'd be putting on so he could march right alongside those same workers.

I want to be helpful here, Mr. President, not mean...so maybe you might want to check out the Nike Factory Store over there at the outlet mall in Potomac Mills, which is out in Virginia just a bit past Arlington National Cemetery. (It's right next to the Burlington Coat Factory and that Japanese place in the food court). I have shopped at one of those Nike stores a time or two, and they have lots of comfortable shoes - and boots, too, which are really great for marches.

Now I like these right here - but I wouldn't pay $120 for 'em; instead, I'd wait for them to drop to below $50...but workers in Wisconsin and Ohio and Michigan and New Jersey don't have that kind of time, so if I were you I'd pay the extra money and treat it as a campaign expense or something...and then I'd actually fulfill my promise and get out and wear those shoes, before the Republicans start running that pesky YouTube video as a campaign ad...which, sooner or later, they probably will.

When Osama Bin Laden was killed just a mile or so from Pakistan's military academy we all wondered how it was possible for the world's most wanted man to be there and, somehow, no one in authority knew about it.

And now (alleged serial killer, notorious Mob boss, FBI informant, and "Next Most Wanted Man") Whitey Bulger was just captured a few blocks from the Santa Monica pier, in an apartment he rented for 15 years, which just happens to be 4.5 miles from the FBI's Los Angeles field office up on Wilshire Boulevard.

Just sayin'.

Not a word from me about Anthony Weiner. Instead, go read what K.Flay had to say about all this, as she has it exactly right. (If you visit she will also, out of the kindness of her heart, hook you up with lots of her music, free of charge, which is très sweet.)

Olbermann is back, if you did not yet know, on Al Gore's Current channel, which means you probably have to go to the website to see him (unless you have either DirecTV, or Dish, or a cooperative cable company), but it's worth the effort.

Since Current lacks content, he can be seen "on air" at nearly any hour of the day (the "official" time: 8 PM weeknights on the East Coast, 5 on the West), which reminds me of "Spahn and Sain and pray for rain" in a couple of ways (much respect, "Vanguard"); we'll be watching to see how that shapes up over time with great interest.

Next up, perhaps the best story of "taking your enlightenment where you find it" in history:

So the Dalai Lama walks into a bar and tells the bartender:
"Make me one with everything"

Does everyone remember that guy in Florida a few weeks back who said God wanted him to burn the Qur'an, so he went out and burned him some?

Has anyone noticed that, just a few weeks later, Florida is now so overwhelmed with fires that they are running out of people to send to fight them...and that most of them, evidently, were started by lightning?

So...does that make you more or less likely to be an atheist - or a comic - or do you find that compassion in the face of the bad karma of others is the right way?

In our final comment today, we offer congratulations to New York's LBGT community, who, thanks to the passage of marriage equality legislation, are now just as free to be just as miserable as any other married couple in the State. In your honor, we'll close out today's story with a joke, courtesy of the great Henny Youngman:

So the wife and I are laying in bed, and she looks over at me and says: "What's the matter, honey? Can't you think of anyone else either?"

Jethro Bodineism Watch - Rand Paul Edition

Bill Egnor AKA Something The Dog Said — Wed, 01 Jun 2011 13:53:19 GMT

To my great chagrin no one in the national media has picked up the Bodineism meme, but they are starting to get the picture that there are some elected officials, particularly Republican elected officials, are about as dumb as sack of hammers.

The particular Jethro that I am talking about today is Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky. Of all the folks that I have compared to Jethro Bodine, Sen. Paul is probably the closet to the mark. By all accounts he is a pretty genial guy with a good smile and a nice manner. He is also so clueless as to be a text book (given that all books are printed in text, wouldn't that make them all text books?) example of self-satire.

Most recently Sen. Paul (gods greater and lesser that gives me chills just writing it, ugh) has managed to trample the 1st Amendment with his "ideas". Some of us on the Left side of the Blogasphere were more than a little happy that he was holding up the PATRIOT act renewal, by wanting to insert some amendments that would lessen the ability of the government to spy on its own citizens.

That was a good thing, but it does not mean that he was doing it from a deep understanding of the Constitution. You see after his ploy failed he went on Sean "The Manatee" Hannity's radio show and said the following:

I'm not for profiling people on the color of their skin, or on their religion, but I would take into account where they've been traveling and perhaps, you might have to indirectly take into account whether or not they've been going to radical political speeches by religious leaders. It wouldn't be that they are Islamic. But if someone is attending speeches from someone who is promoting the violent overthrow of our government, that's really an offense that we should be going after - they should be deported or put in prison.

Peel your palm off of your face. Yes, Sen. Paul, a man sworn to uphold the Constitution, just like every other elected official, seems to have an abject failure to understand the meaning, intent and workings of the 1st Amendment.

Since good ol' Sen "Jethro" Paul seems to have forgotten with the 1st Amendment says let me remind all of you:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Where the junior (so very, very junior) Senator form Kentucky gets into hot water is the part that says "right of the people to peaceably assemble". It does not matter what is said when they assemble, as long as the assembly is peaceful it is constitutional and it would be a violation of the Constitution to have any law that would deport or imprison people who attend such a gathering.

It does not matter if it is Billy Graham or Malcolm X or Britney Spears, if you are going to a gathering and the speaker does not say something to the affect of "Let's burn down City Hall, right now!" it is inside the protections of the free speech and the peaceful assembly grant of the 1st Amendment.

You might think that a supposedly Libertarian like Paul would be zealous in defending all rights, especially the ones that limit the ability of the government to prohibit actions of citizens. Instead this Jethro of a Senator wants to expand the ability of the government to arrest and imprison those who just attend speeches that are inflammatory.

This is not just dumb on a constitutional level either. It is a political hot potato on the Right. There are more than a few rightwing groups that preach the violent overthrow of the United States. The KKK has been known to do it, so have the so-called Sovereign Citizens groups. Militias pop up all the time with this as their main goal (though they never get close to it) and then there are the Dominationist groups that want to make the United States a theocracy and they are not shy about the idea of violence to achieve it either.

If Sen. Paul had his way all these groups would be in big trouble and so would anyone attending one of their rallies or speeches. These are groups that are part of his base. I know that is strong accusation, but if you want some back up, take a look at the efforts of Stromfront, a White Supremacist group to raise money for Paul's election campaign. You can find it at this link.

One has to wonder how far Sen. Paul really wants to take this? After all is there a lot of difference between taking violent racists money and listening to a speech advocating overthrowing the Obama Administration? Should we be putting a sitting United States Senator on the No Fly List or warming up a jail cell for him?

Of course Sen. Paul does not think this should apply to him. In fact it is really just a smoke screen for Islamaphobia. He is clearly thinking only of dark skinned men who happen to be Muslims for this special exception to the Constitution, but again being a Jethro he does not get that the Constitution applies to everyone.

Conclusive diagnosis of Bodineism is a difficult thing. There is no blood test or even MRI imaging. However when folks like Jon Chait and Alex Pareenee say things like "Rand Paul, Americas Dumbest Senator" and "He's not only an ideological fanatic, he's not even a terribly bright one." We can be relatively sure that Sen. Paul is a Bodineism suffer.

It is amazing to me that people even listen to the rube at all. Yes he is one of the more powerful people in the nation, since he is one of only 100 senators. Still when someone is so wrong so often on so many issues we have to say "Okay, Jethro, why don't you take a dip in the cement pond?"

I don't know about you, but if I were a Libertarian I'd be hanging my head in shame that this is the most high profile member of your movement. Someone that thinks the government giving doctors money to treat people is enslavement, someone who thinks that a pretty crappy writer from the 1950's has the last word on a problem that was not even recognized when she wrote and someone who does not understand the basic rights that Libertarians are supposed to be all about.

Having Sen. Paul as a standard bearer for your cause is about the same as having the original Jethro Bodine as your pilot; it'll be a ride with a lot of attention paid to it, but in the end you are likely to wind up in a crater.

The floor is yours.

Letter to Scott Walker

peacemonger — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 21:22:08 GMT

Dear Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker,

Thank you for your assistance in bringing together workers from every walk of life: teachers, firefighters, police officers, government employees, nurses, union members, people of faith, civil rights activists, environmentalists and many others. Thank you for giving us a reason, and a renewed commitment, to publicly declare that we stand together in solidarity to protect the middle class, and to ensure justice for workers. Thank you for helping us find our voice for democracy, and our passion for equal opportunity to the American Dream.

You see, when you and your corporate friends threatened the very fabric of our society -- the working middle-class people of America -- with your heavy-handed wrecking-ball policies, we woke up. We were not stupid; we knew this is not about the economy, or one state budget, or helping small businesses. We knew your power grab was really about weakening our voices -- the voices of millions of hard-working people, as well as students, youth, immigrants, and people between jobs. We knew it was a way to make more profits for billionaires, at the hands of struggling American families. We are awake now, and we are not going to let you take our country from us without a fight.

On Monday, April 4th, we will stand together with our working brothers and sisters all over America. We will participate in marches, vigils, teach-ins, rallies, demonstrations, protests, and other events. We will take back our country, demand jobs that earn a living wage, and make our country better for all working people.

You see, we've been here before.

In 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. joined a group of 1300 city sanitation workers who marched for economic justice in Memphis. Dr. King stood with civil rights leaders, the faith community, and worker's unions to demand justice for the striking workers. Together, they faced all who sought to suppress their free speech that day, and they won the moral battle.

The following day, April 4th, 1968, Dr. King was assassinated. We will not allow history to record that his life -- and his work -- were in vain.

Forty-three years later, Mr. Walker, you also threatened peaceful demonstrators -- your own good citizens -- that you would bring in the National Guard and illegally bar the doors of the Statehouse to the people of Wisconsin. You dared to take away the civil rights of hard-working Americans -- public servants who only want their right to bargain collectively. Like the unified voices of the people's movement four decades ago, our unified middle-class will not back down. We will not be intimidated. We will not be afraid.

We will stand together.
We will fight back.
We will WIN.

On April 4th, 2011, we will remember April 4th, 1968. Coloradans will join the people of Wisconsin, and Michigan, and all of the other United States of America, and we will honor the memory of Dr. King with our own courage and determination to reject your political over-reach, and your attempt to steal the American Dream. We will stand together for the future of our children, and for the future of this country. Together -- firefighters, teachers, police officers, students, small business owners, sanitation workers, and many others -- will take back America for the middle class.

Why? Because "We are One."

Sincerely,
The People of Colorado

For the Colorado Event Schedule, please go to http://local.we-r-1.org/ . Check it frequently, as new events are being added daily. See you there.

Sentenced For A Crime You Weren't Convicted Of? Only At Gitmo

Bill Egnor AKA Something The Dog Said — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 13:14:57 GMT

We all know how the U.S. justice system works. You're arrested, then tried, found guilty for a crime, then the court looks around for a different crime they are going to sentence you for. What? That is not how you think it is done? Well if you are a Guantanamo Bay detainee like Al Bahlul that is exactly what is going on today.

The Center for Constitutional Rights is highlighting this small bit of continuing legal (extra-legal?) chicanery going on in our Military Commissions Review in Cuba today.

Mr. Bahlul was part of the original prisoners brought to Guantanamo Bay nearly a decade ago. After serving several years without charge or conviction, he finally got a trial. He was charged and convicted on conspiracy, solicitation and providing material support for terrorism.

In the process of his appeals there has been a new administration, a Supreme Court decision, a reshuffling of the Court of Military Commissions Review (the appeals court in the Military Commissions system) and a decision that the appeal be held en banc (meaning that the whole appellate court heard the appeal). At this point the government has all but agreed that the charges that they originally convicted him on were not established at law-of-war offenses either under international law or U.S. law at the time they were committed.

This is an important fact as the U.S. Constitution bars ex post facto convictions Article One, Section 9 prevents the Congress from passing ex post facto laws. What this means is that you can not be held accountable as a matter of law for a crime that was not as crime at the time you committed it.
Say you famously hang-glide to the top of Mount Rushmore. The Congress can not wait two years then pass a law that makes it a felony to land on a National Monument in an unpowered plane. Prior to our so-called "War on Terror" and the very crappy legislation that came out it, if you were not a U.S. citizen and were not living in the U.S. you could not be charged with material support to the enemy.

In an effort to save their botched prosecution the attorney's for the government have resorted to a very dubious and troubling argument. They have argued that Al Qaeda is "very much like" the Native American resistance to the U.S. government in the so-called "Seminole Wars". Not only is this factually wrong, it brings in all the racist overtones that lead to the abuses of Native Americans and the Trail of Tears, which by today's standards would be considered a genocide.

Is this really the level of jurisprudence we want when we are talking about confining someone to a prison for the rest of their lives? Comparisons to other times when the United States acted in a way that has brought long lasting shame to our nation?

It would be bad enough if it were just the governments lawyers to be zealously still arguing that we should keep this spurious conviction, but it is a disgusting shame when the appeals court is looking for reasons to keep someone locked up for life based on crimes they were not convicted of at trial.

From the CCR press release:

The court appears to recognize this as well, because on January 25, 2011, it issued certified questions on its own and ordered the parties to address whether Mr. Bahlul's conviction can nonetheless be supported under a "joint criminal enterprise" theory of liability, or on the ground that he "aided the enemy," despite the fact that he owed no duty or allegiance to the United States. These questions are the subject of tomorrow's hearing.

What makes this really legally troubling is that at trial the government expressly withdrew their "joint criminal enterprise" theory and they have never charged or argued aiding the enemy. It is tough to argue that for people who have no duty to support the United States, as people who are not citizens and do not live in our country, have no such recognized duty.

I understand that the Guantanamo Bay Military Commissions were set up with the express idea of achieving convictions that would not be possible in federal court (even though that a meme that have been proven untrue time and time again) but to have it be so slip shod as for the Appeals Court of these tribunals to propose to hold and sentence a man for crimes that were never presented at trial flies in the face of our entire idea of justice.

History judges us all. It generally judges a people as a whole for the actions of their leaders. Our leaders, including the President I worked for and voted for have shown a shocking level of disregard for the rule of law. They have become so fearful or contemptuous the fair application of the law that they are acting in complete contravention of the Constitution they have sworn to uphold.

One of the anathema's that the Founders wanted to be sure was kept from their new nation was the ability of the King to change the rules after the fact and convict people of crimes that were not crimes when they committed them. The entire Military Commissions Act has been chipping away at our ideal of rule of law since its inception. If Mr. Bahlul is sentenced to life for a crime he was not convicted of or for ex post facto crimes that he was convicted of, we have taken a huge step backwards towards the time when Might made Right, and there was no real Justice.

The floor is yours.

On Taking It Back, Or, Wisconsin Recalls, Explained

fake consultant — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 07:22:10 GMT

News is suddenly moving so fast that it's becoming hard for me to keep up; that's why we're not finishing the story today that we just began Tuesday. You know, the one about Titan Cement suing two North Carolina residents who appear to be doing nothing more than speaking the truth.

Unfortunately, other important news has forced itself to the front of the line, and it's going to demand that we break schedule, whether we like it or not.

That's why today we're going to be talking about Wisconsin, and how workers there are fighting back against the State's Republican legislators and Governor, who seem to have gone out of their way this past three weeks to govern without the consent of the governed.

It's kind of chilly today in Wisconsin...but I can assure you, things are heating up fast-and it ain't because of spring.

"I will tell you this: Any business where two partners don't trust each other, any business where one party says, 'You need to do X, Y and Z because I told you,' is a business that is not only not run well, it is a business that can never be as successful as it can be,"
--Former National Football League Players' Association executive director DeMaurice Smith

As so often happens, we need a bit of background:

In Wisconsin, a recall involves first, the collection of signatures, then, if you get enough, a recall election.

Once the proper papers have been filed, those who want to recall an elected official have 60 days to gather signatures for a recall petition that equal 25% of the number of votes cast in the prior gubernatorial election in that "political subdivision".

What that means in English is that if you're looking to recall a State Senator and the last time a Governor ran, 50,000 votes were cast in that Senator's District, you need to gather 12,500 signatures in 60 days to force a recall election in that District.

The election is not to ask the question: "Should this officeholder be recalled?"

Instead, the incumbent will run against other candidates, and whoever has the most votes either keeps or takes over the office.

It is possible that multiple candidates will emerge from within the same Party; if that happens a "recall primary" election is held.

A primary would take place four weeks after the signatures are turned in, the recall election itself would be six weeks after, and both elections would be held on a Tuesday; all of this according to Article XIII, Section 12 of the Wisconsin Constitution.

You can't recall someone until after they've been in office for a year, so the Governor can't be recalled...today...but because the Senate elects half of its Members every two years there are a group of State Senators who can be recalled; they were elected in 2008.

If three Republicans were to be recalled and replaced by Democrats, the State Senate would change from majority Republican to majority Democratic.

If you've ever been to Embarrass, Wisconsin (home of The Chair That Grew), you've visited Robert Cowles' 2nd District. (For the record, it's more or less 100 miles due north of Milwaukee, and there's some football team that plays in Green Bay that's also in his District.) He's been a Senator since 1987, and in '08 he ran unopposed. His District voted 52-46 for Obama over McCain in '08, and chose Bush over Kerry by almost exactly the same margin in '04.

I do not have a feel for who might run against him, but I have some calls out to try to get an answer; if I learn more, we'll add it to the story.

One Senator who might be in trouble is Alberta Darling (so far as I know, she's unrelated to cricket great Joe Darling), who represents District 8, which is basically Milwaukee's northern suburbs.

In '08 she only won by 1007 votes (of about 100,000 cast).

It's worth noting, however, that her District cast the most votes for Governor in 2010; as a result her opponents will be required to gather more valid signatures than in any other District (20,343, by one reckoning).

Her opponent last time was Sheldon Wasserman; he's a former State Representative, an OB/GYN from Milwaukee, and a member of the State's Medical Examining Board.

(On a side note, it looks as though the Governor might be messing with the Board as well; he refused to allow two recent physician nominees selected by the Board to be seated, and he's apparently looking to nominate his own people.)

Just as in District 2, this District voted for Obama in '08, and Bush in '04.

Sheila Harsdorf, who currently chairs the Senate Committee on State and Federal Relations and Information Technology, was sent to Madison to look after the interests of the State's westernmost District, "The Fightin' 10th", as Sir Rev. Dr. Stephen T. Colbert, DFA, would say.

Even though she thinks State workers are taking too much from the public Treasury...her relationships with the Federal Government are so good that she had no problem taking in $195,000 in Federal farm subsidies over a ten-year period for Beldenville's Trim-Bel Valley Farms, of which she just happened to be a 50% owner as recently as 2008 (for all I know, she may still be an owner, more current information was unavailable).

This is another one of those Districts that went for Obama in '08 by about just the same margin as it went for Bush in '04.

Luther Olsen of the 14th (located about 40 miles or so due north of Madison) is another farm owner; he owns 20% of Waushara's Riverview Farm; they also happily accepted at least $58,502 of your money and mine, because Olsen, like Sheila Harsdorf, apparently believes that's a better use of our money than, you know, paying a public school teacher or something.

(Fun Fact: did you know Golda Meir, the former Prime Minister of Israel, used to be a Milwaukee public school teacher?)

Olsen did not face an opponent in '08...and once again, this District went Obama in '08, Bush in '04-although it went about 4 points farther for Bush than for Obama.

And that brings us to Randy Hopper.

This District (the 18th, which most notably includes Oshkosh and Fond Du Lac) is another one of those Republican seats that are considered among the most "gettable"; that's because just 163 votes separated Hopper and his '08 opponent, Jessica King.

There's also this:

"I have a lot of correctional facilities, a couple universities, and a couple of tech schools [in my district]. I have the second largest population of state employees in the state."

Hopper also chairs the Senate Education Committee...and there's also a story going around that his wife is telling people that he's been providing some "private lessons" to his 25-year-old mistress down in Madison; this according to the "MAL Contends..." blog-and that's not going to help a family-values candidate.

He owns two radio stations, one an AM-talk Ag Report and Hannity broadcaster, the other an FM station that caters to the "music at work" market; this may allow him to mitigate some of the potentially-about-to-occur bad publicity, and certainly can't hurt at election time.

Perhaps the most unrepentant Republican during this process has been Glen Grothman of the 20th (which actually, literally, includes Fredonia, and that has to have some deeper meaning...), and he can afford to take a strong stand.

This guy might well be a mortal lock in this District: the Sheboygan area is one of the most reliably Republican-voting regions of the State over the past 30 years, and of all the Senate candidates who faced opposition in '08, he won with a larger margin of victory than any of 'em. (He didn't get 61% of the vote in '08...he won by 61% of the vote.)

(Fun Fact #2: Our friends at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel created these two most excellent voting trend maps for your dining and dancing pleasure; they illustrates how Wisconsin can swing wildly back and forth between Republican and Democratic "electoral domination".)

Moving on: Mary Lazich, of the 28th, occupies another seat that is going to be tough to get-her District encompasses Milwaukee's western suburbs (a reliably Republican voting region; in both '04 and '08 Republican Presidential candidates won with over 60% of the vote), she did not face an opponent in '08, and this is another District that will require more than 20,000 signatures to force an election.

"...Fate has been hounding me like a Mormon missionary with an Amway franchise..."
--A. Whitney Brown, appearing on the television show "Almost Live!"

We're going to complete today's "Recall Roundup" with one of the most vulnerable of all the Senators: Dan Kapanke, the Senate Majority Caucus Chair (and a pretty good "get" if you're running a recall campaign). He's from the 32nd, which is all the way across the State from Milwaukee, on the Minnesota border, pretty much in Wisconsin's southwest corner.

He won by less than 3 points in '08, his District voted 61%-38% for Obama over McCain...and 53%-46% for Kerry over Bush in '04, which is the largest margin of any of the 8 Republican Senators currently under recall threat. (Go back and have another look at those voting trend maps, and look at what's happened to this corner of the State.)

He's hard right on social issues, but the Farm Bureau loves him.

He is quoted as saying that he expects the signature gathering effort in his District to be successful (only about 15,400 signatures are needed) ...and he's also quoted as having the belief that there is such a thing as a Wisconsin State Senate arrest, despite the presence of an "immunity from arrest" clause in the Wisconsin Constitution.

As of March 8th, 57% of voters in the 32nd would rather have "generic" than Kapanke in a recall election, and they had to close the road outside his house on Friday to keep the hundreds of peaceful protesters gathered there safe.

Now before we close today...we need to offer "big ups" to DavidNYC, who posted a fantastic interactive results spreadsheet at the Swing State Project site; we've been referring to it a bunch in this story and you should have a look at it yourself.

And with all that said, that's today's "scorecard", folks, and you can keep track of all the races-or volunteer to help-from one handy location: WisconsinRecall.net...so bookmark the spot, help out any way you can, and let's start with Wisconsin...and then move on to Ohio and Indiana and Michigan next.

Campaign Manifesto #1: In A World Of Phonies, It's Time For A Fake Candidate

fake consultant — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 14:08:18 GMT

We have spent the past two years watching as insanity has gripped Congress, and even more so with Republicans now running the House.

We have a wavering President, far too many feckless Democrats, and Republicans that have decided to dive headfirst into total "insane mode" in a full-blown effort to destroy this country just as fast as possible.

To give but one example, in my own District, WA-08, we are represented by the absolutely useless Republican Dave Reichert, whose best-known legislative achievement is that he has virtually no record of any legislative achievement whatever.

Now we've had a very interesting relationship, you and I, over these past few years; in my efforts to "bring you the story" I've been a fake political consultant, a fake lobbyist, even a fake historian...and now, I think it's time to try to bring our relationship to a new level.

And that's why, America, I'm announcing my fake candidacy for Congress.

It was almost too good to be true. Richard Milhous Nixon, the main villain of my political consciousness for as long as I can remember, was finally biting that bullet that he's been talking about all these years. The man that not even Goldwater or Eisenhower could tolerate had finally gone too far-and now he was walking the plank, on national TV, six hours a day-with The Whole World Watching, as it were.
That phrase is permanently etched on some grey rim on the back of my brain. Nobody who was at the corner of Michigan and Balboa on that Wednesday night in August of 1968 will ever forget it.
Richard Nixon is living in the White House today because of what happened that night in Chicago. Hubert Humphrey lost that election by a handful of votes-mine among them-and I had it to do again I would still vote for Dick Gregory.
--From " Fear and Loathing in the Bunker ", by Hunter S. Thompson

So let's start with the obvious question: why a fake candidacy?

Well...why not?

Obviously, I can be just as fake as any real politician, and, as we discussed before, we have years of history together to prove it.

Can I be more useful to the District than Reichert?
Hey...even a fake me can do that.

After all, it's not like there's a high bar to jump over or anything.

It was four years in office before he actually got anything passed...and according to Congress.org, by 2008 he was ranked number 401 out of 435 in terms of how much power he exerts in the House...and that's 9th out of 9 for the Washington State delegation. (Reichert's own Congressional website reports he was ranked 166th out of 435 in 2006-and that means he fell more than 250 spots in a single term.)

So basically, all I have to do is take the Oath of Office...and we're pretty much tied.

Now Dave tries to some extent to " straddle the middle ", as a result he supports environmental legislation but he's against "card check"; he also voted to extend children's health care coverage. He supported the repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell".

His stance on Social Security?

Do a search for Social Security on his Congressional website, and you get "No documents matched your query". Look for Social Security as an issue on his site and you can find this:

Congressman Reichert has fought to protect seniors' Medicare and Social Security benefits, preserve their access to needed health care services, and make prescription drugs more affordable

(You have to look under " Seniors " to find it...but at least it's there.)

According to FreedomWorks, Reichert had no position worth reporting on Social Security when they attended his April '05 Social Security workshop...although another attendee reports he had this to say about removing that "tax cap" that represents a giant tax dodge for the richest among us:

Raising the cap was portrayed by all three as a tax hike, which they oppose because "the government shouldn't be taking any more out of families' hard earned budgets."

OnTheIssues has this to say about his Social Security record:

No issue stance yet recorded by OnTheIssues.org.

By the way...did I mention that Reichert is currently serving on the House Subcommittee on Social Security ?

That's a pretty high level of useless, and it's exactly this kind of "get up and go" that explains how Reichert managed to fight his way right on up to number 401 in effectiveness among those 435 Members of Congress.

Me, I support the "Rich People Pay, Too" approach: no matter what your wage income might be, you gotta pay Social Security tax. No more "once you get rich, it's a free ride".

And guess what? If we just made all wage income taxable for Social Security purposes...the problem is actually solved...and it might not even require that much reform.

Law and order?

Reichert is a former Sheriff, and a man who cultivates the image that he personally caught the Green River Killer. When a bill came up to get the Justice Department off the backs of medical marijuana users, Reichert voted " no ".

I am most assuredly not a former Sheriff...and as a fake candidate, I would propose a different approach:

If you elect me, and we can get the bill passed, once a week I will personally dose up Members like Louie Gohmert and Michelle Bachmann and Joe Barton with large amounts of LSD...and I will then transport them right back to the House floor...and then one hour a day we'll set up something like the obstacle course on " MXC " and then have them run it...and I will introduce a bill to set up a special "Premium Content" partnership with C-SPAN that charges $14.95 a month so that you can see the uncensored "GoDaddy" version of the video, with the money to be used to lower the Federal deficit.

I support medical marijuana-but I would limit the co-pay, by law, to $10.

Civil rights?

Reichert opposes same-sex marriage, and only gets a 50% rating from the NAACP...and I'm one of the only people you'll ever meet who was officially notified he was gay by email...and if one of my family members had a "homosexual relationship", unlike some Members, I wouldn't keep it on the " down low ".

I'm more or less broke, just like you-and they tell me that, if you win, there's pretty good health insurance -but I'm not looking for donations, from any source...with one exception:

At the moment this is a fake candidacy, but I'm thinking about asking a group to consider underwriting this as a comedic art project-and if they do, that would be the only money the "fake campaign" would accept.

So there you go: from here on out, there will be more "Manifestos" from the fake campaign-and in the next one, we'll be talking, once again, about how you can support a candidate like Reichert, who's basically a joke...or you can support a candidate like me, who really is one.

AZ Should Not Feed Fred Phelps The Troll

Bill Egnor AKA Something The Dog Said — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 14:40:50 GMT

So the Westboro jackasses are going to be going to the funeral of the 9 year old victim of Jared Loughner's shooting spree. And they are going to get exactly what they want, outrage, attention and law suits. The State of Arizona is going to try to keep them away form the funeral, and they are going to lose. Which as much as it pains me to say is the proper thing.

You see the Westboro faux religionists are not in it to bring people to their deity with the message that "God Hates Fags". They could not care less about the state of your soul or if the nation reverses its trend towards full rights for gay citizens. They aren't in it for politics or religion, they do this for the money.
What money you ask? Well the money that comes from well meaning people and municipalities trying to stop them from harassing funerals with their hateful signs. You see they know they are being inflammatory. They know even people who are bigoted towards gay citizens will find it completely objectionable that they come and harass grieving families with their hate. This is trying to provoke a reaction, and when they do, they sue.

Several members of their so-called church (which is mostly the sons and daughters of Uber-Asshole Fred Phelps) are attorneys who have specialized in First Amendment issues. They know exactly what is going to be considered constitutionally protected speech and they stay within that boundary. They are not like the KKK or Neo-Nazis in who also spout unacceptable shit, they don't threaten anyone, they don't do anything other than spout an egregious set of speech that because it is loosely tied to the a political issue, civil rights for gay citizens, is fully protected.

When someone tries to prevent them or gets so outraged that they act out they are taken to court. When that person loses to Westboro in court, and they always do, the Westboro lawyers ask for legal fees, and they get them. This lets them fund more of their sick little field trips to other funerals and the cycle goes on. I don't know what the Phelps family charges themselves per hour, but Dad was a fairly high powered lawyer and he charged several hundred dollars per hour. I would guess the Phelps family attorneys value themselves in that range too. It could be a lot of money, though the courts will keep it to "reasonable expenses" but I bet there are a couple of accountants in the family too in order to document all the costs.

It is not religion or even politics, its is a legal scam. The thing is that we should not try to curb the rights of these scammers. Sure they are among the worst scum our society has produced, gaming our legal system and preying on the moral outrage and grief of others, but if we start to limit their rights, we start to limit our rights.

As objectionable as their speech is, and lets not kid ourselves it is as objectionable as possible on purpose, the right to say damned fool and objectionable things is too important to let a bunch of in-bred griffters force us to give it up. Anyone reading this benefits from the right to say any damned fool thing we like. If the Bush administration thought they could have gotten away with suppressing speech on the Left, they most certainly would have done so, but the same protections the Phelps family enjoy protect us as well.

I think that it is better to treat the Phelps's clan as trolls. We should not feed them even as we denigrate them. That is what they want, to cause a ruckus to get a well meaning someone to react in a way that will allow them to sue and make a profit on the trip.

The best thing we can do is ignore these bottom feeding disgraces to the human species. Groups like the Patriot Guard (Bikers who turn up at the request of grieving families) are the right response. They may be big and bad and ride bikes, but they don't turn up to kick ass, instead they hold up sheets to isolate the demented Phelps family from the mourners. It is still a disruption at time of grief but it is at the choice of the grieving families and not the Phelps's.

The best way to deal with objectionable speech is more speech not less. This applies to all the Right wing talkers who are trying to break the land speed record in disassociating themselves with the violent rhetoric that seems to have contributed to an environment where people like Jared Loughner can murder little children.

If we want to be able to speak our mind we will have to recognize that there will be those who speak their mind and it is sick and twisted mind indeed. What we can do to stop them from poisoning our discourse is to drown them out. To call them out in the most aggressive terms when they speak of killing Michael Moore or blowing up the New York Times building. Just as we would make our social and moral outrage known about Fred Phelps and his griffter children, we can push back on the Becks and O'Riley's and Limbaugh's of the world.

Perhaps the best way to stop this heinous and continuous call to violence is to lump the Rightwing talkers with the Phelps scammers. After all who would want to be in the same category as a ghoul who makes this money by provoking people at a funeral?

The floor is yours.

Go And Vote

Bill Egnor AKA Something The Dog Said — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 13:20:06 GMT

Go and vote. At this point I can't say much that will influence you as to who to vote for (as if I ever could) but go vote. It is one of your responsibilities as a citizen, and none of us should fail to fulfill it. 234 years ago today General Washington was on the run. His forces had been surprised at Chatterson's Hill and he was forced to retreat at night in order to avoid being decimated.

The War of Independence had been going on since before the Declaration, but now it was full blown and in earnest. The signatories to the Declaration had made their stand for an idea that was the United States and faced charges of treason if they were captured. They had pledged their lives, fortunes and scared honor to found a nation on the idea of equality (if a limited and flawed one) and they would fight for it until they won or were destroyed. They won and our nation was born. So go vote for the idea the Founders started.

136 years ago today the Civil War raged. There was a presidential campaign underway and General Sherman was about to start his "March to the Sea". We were a nation wracked by conflicting views of what the United States was and should be. The Union fought for an idea of freedom that we deem in line with best ideals of the Founders. They fought to retain the integrity of the nation and to end the pernicious institution of chattel slavery. The Gettysburg address was nearly a year before. President Lincoln speaking at the national cemetery there reiterated the idea that the United States was on the premise that a government of the people, by the people and for the people was right and true.

So, for the idea of a government for the people and the dead on both sides of the Civil War, go vote.

90 years ago, in August 1920 the Nineteenth Amendment of the Constitution finally granted women the right to vote at the Federal and State level. Off and on prior to that woman had the franchise in various states and lost it as well. After nearly twenty years of active protest and work, the half of our citizens who had been denied a voice were allowed to step up and be heard. It was not an easy struggle many of the Suffragettes were arrested and jailed, but justice eventually prevailed.

So, for the women who fought to be heard, who fought to be full citizens, go and vote.

46 years ago, James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner were killed for their work registering black voters in Mississippi. They had deiced to act on the idea of America the Founders had. They knew that it was critical that black citizens have their voice heard in places like Mississippi and elsewhere in the South. Democracy can't exist in any true fashion if one group is systematically denied the exercise of the franchise. They died because they would not let the power of the majority keep the minority from having its say in the governance of the nation and their state.

So, for Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner, who gave their lives for voting rights, go and vote.

Our nation has faced troubles and scandals. We have been callus and we have been great. We have kept some of our citizens from doing the thing you can do today with ease for political and ideological reasons. As long as this nation exists we will be in on the quest for a more perfect union. I believe that perfection is unattainable, but the quest, the struggle for it is of great value. One of the ways we continue this struggle is to vote, to have in our small way our say in the people who will lead our city, our state and our nation.

Making your voice heard at the ballot box in not the end all and be all of citizenship. It is merely the entrance fee. My father said that those who don't care about politics are destined to be ruled by those who do. The first step to being in the second group is taking every opportunity to have your approval or disapproval heard. If you can't vote for someone then vote against someone. If you can't stand your choices, then write in your choice. Be part of the democracy that so many have fought and died for over our history.

For all of them, those that voted, those that wanted to vote, those that risked everything so they and others could vote, go and vote.

The floor is yours.

On Asking Experts, Part Two, Or, What's An LBGT Voter To Do?

fake consultant — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 21:06:02 GMT

It's been a few days now since we began a conversation that addresses the issue of how frustrated some number of LBGT voters are with the Democratic Party this cycle; this because they find themselves either frustrated at the lack of progress on the civil rights issues that matter to them, or because they see both the Democratic and Republican Parties as unreliable partners in the struggle to assure equal rights for all.

In an effort to practice some actual journalism, I assembled a version of an online "focus group" at The Bilerico Project ("daily adventures in LBGTQ"), with the goal of gathering some opinions on this subject in the actual words of those frustrated voters.

Part One of this story focused on "stating the problem", and today we'll take on Part Two: in this environment, with Election Day staring us in the face, what is an LBGT voter to do?

As before, there are a variety of opinions, including a very informative comment I was able to obtain from a genuine Member of Congress, Patrick Murphy of Pennsylvania's 8th District, and that means until the very end you won't hear much from me, except to help "set the stage" for the comments that follow.

A monk asked Ma-tsu [Baso]:
What is Buddha?
Ma-tsu replied: "The mind is Buddha"
A monk asked Ma-tsu:
What is Buddha?
Ma-tsu replied: "The mind is not Buddha"
--From the book "Zen Flesh, Zen Bones: A Collection of Zen and Pre-Zen Writings", compiled by Paul Reps and Nyogen Senzaki

We'll begin today's discussion with a housekeeping note: in order to keep the story moving in a linear fashion, from one topic to the next, in some instances I edited portions of multiple comments from the same person into one comment. I also edited some comments for length.

The disclaimer out of the way, let's start the conversation with Zoe Brain, who sums up Part One rather neatly in one comment that absolutely did not have to be edited together:

We had a Dem super-majority in the Senate.
We had a Dem majority in the House.
We had a Dem president.
It wasn't enough. We need more. So let's use the only weapons we have for behaviour modification; our money and our votes, to make sure that the next time this can possibly happen, around 2020 (though 2028 is more likely), we won't have a repeat performance.

Andrew W responds with a bit of legislative "nuance"...and in doing so, he makes the point that looking beyond Democrats for solutions may be the way to go:

A "Democratic Super Majority" is different than an LGBT-Majority. We have never had an LGBT super majority. In the current US Senate we have only 56 votes. After November we will have 51 or 52 votes.
Stop saying "Democrats." It misses the point. Our challenge is to find 60 US Senators that support our equality.

SoFloMo makes a similar point:

Perhaps we have become too comfortable surrounding ourselves with other gay folks and straight allies. We're terrified of losing the only friends we've had in politics, so we cling to them despite the abuse.
We need to encourage one another turn our outrage into concrete action. Just feeling bad won't do any good.

Here's some more from Andrew W:

We spend way to much talking about the "Religious Right," bigotry exists in anyone that accepts the traditional Christian belief that we are wrong. That's 70% of Black voters and they are primarily Democrats...
... We need people as our allies, not organizations. We need to educate, enlighten and enroll our neighbors, friends, co-workers and even strangers. Two-thirds will support our equality - especially if we leave religion and politics out of the conversation. Both religion and politics divide people - we just want to ask people to stand for one thing, our equality.
Try it out over the next week. You'll be surprised.

So let's get to the big issue: vote, or don't?

Here's Bill Perdue's take on the question...

On Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010...vote left or cast your protest vote by sitting it out (barring important referenda, propositions or initiatives).
The only good vote is a protest vote. In a system run by competing gangs of like minded hustlers voting is not important except as a way of validating that system....
...It's a fool's errand to believe that participation in a rigged electoral system is the way to change. It's the road to perpetual lesserevilism, betrayal and defeat.
Elections can be used to organize and educate movements in struggle but elections don't bring change except in the sense that they (rarely) ratify changes forced by mass actions in the streets, workplaces and barracks. Those are the kind of battles we can win and those are the kind of battles that produce fundamental, permanent change as opposed to hopey-changey.

...followed by Andrew W:

While "mass demonstrations" may sound appealing or possibly effective, they aren't going to happen. The biggest crowd in D.C. is likely to be for two cable-tv comedians at the end of this month.
Polling data indicates the religious grip on "beliefs" (including the traditional Christian belief that homosexuality is wrong) is weakening. Of all those that define themselves as "religious" only about one-third are "literalists" and I would suggest their beliefs are virtually unchangeable. I'm not suggesting we try to change those minds, but rather we marginalize them by enrolling the other two-thirds. Most of them will put equality before religion.
The other dynamic is age - we are much more likely to get support from those under the age of 40 because they are less religious.
We need the young people that put Obama in office to turn out on November 2nd. Unfortunately, many in this audience have heard the GetEQUAL [a pro-civil rights group] narrative that "Obama didn't keep his promises." Young people are likely to believe that "we're angry" and not vote...

GrrrlRomeo has some thoughts as well:

The second thing I'd tell them is don't think of it as voting for Democrats, think of it as voting against conservatives. Look, anti-gay Christian conservatives have no problem holding their noses and voting for a Republican just to vote against gays or abortion.
I'm sorry that people were under the impression that we could really get this stuff done in 2 years. There are 420 bills backed up in the Senate. It's obvious to me that the Republicans were doing everything they could just to make the Democrats fail so that the progressive base would throw one of our predictable tantrums and not turn out.
I do understand. I was with the Green Party in 1996 and 2000 as I was unable to forgive Clinton. But whatever Obama hasn't done...he has not done anything so unforgivable as Clinton signing DOMA [the Federal Defense of Marriage Act].

What, Exactly, Is The "Radical Homosexual Agenda"?

Bill Egnor AKA Something The Dog Said — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 13:22:14 GMT

Okay, call me a dope if you must but I just can't figure out what the hell the "radical homosexual agenda" that so many conservatives talk about actually is. Yeah, yeah, you could insert a lot of sexual identity jokes here, but really that just plays into stereotypes about our gay citizens. The fact is, and most of you will be able to confirm this from your own experience is that gay, lesbian, bisexual citizens span the same range of good, bad, conservative and liberal as those who are heterosexual.

Just take a look at the Log Cabin Republicans (a group who has the best ability to compartmentalize and segregate concepts that I have ever seen), here is a Republican gay rights group. Almost a oxymoron in and of itself. Yet these are conservative gay citizens who support most of the Republican agenda.
In my life I have known a lot of people who are gay. I was a child actor associated with a couple of professional theater troops. As you might guess, some of the folks who acted, directed, did costumes or lighting were gay. In a way I think I was lucky, it was not an issue that Tom and Dan were living together and loved each other, it just was what it was and even a callow teen like I was couldn't get too worked up over two men in love.

The point though it this fear mongering idea of the "radical homosexual agenda". I suppose it is pretty dammed radical to want to not be fired because you boss is afraid of "the gay". In most states if you are gay or transgendered then you are working at the whim of the most homophobic of your management team. They can fire you for your gender identity or your sexuality with no recourse. Hell they can tell you that this is the reason that you're being fired and there is not a dammed thing you can do about it.

Trying to find out what the "agenda" is I went over to Conservapedia (to paraphrase Obiwan Kenobi "A more wretched hive of scum and villainy you will never find) They seem to feel that the "agenda" is all about making homosexuality acceptable. That's it really. Here is a quote that features prominently in the post from Justice Antonin Scalia:

Today's opinion is the product of a Court, which is the product of a law-profession culture, that has largely signed on to the so-called homosexual agenda, by which I mean the agenda promoted by some homosexual activists directed at eliminating the moral opprobrium that has traditionally attached to homosexual conduct.

That quote is from Lawrence v. Texas which invalidated the homosexual sodomy laws. That is also the case on which the overturning of Maj. Margaret Witt's dismissal from the Air Force under DADT was based.

I don't know about you, but is being accepted for who you are really that radical an idea? To me, not so much. After all, the argument from the Right on this is based primarily on their religious beliefs that the Abrhamic (Christians, Muslims and Jews having the same root god) god hates homosexuals. They are insisting that any attempt to give full rights to those who their god has said are bad is infringing on their rights. After all if you can't fire a faggot for being a faggot it must be an offense to God or something like that.

It is always telling that the folks who scream the loudest about us trying to extend tolerance to all people are the ones who use tolerance as the basis for their discrimination. They want us to tolerate their bigotry so others can't have tolerance or full civil rights under the law.

There is a lot of talk about indoctrination in the schools. Basically they are upset that there might be books where Jenny has two mommies or two daddies. In a way they are right, there is teaching (which can always be called indoctrination) going on here, but it is in response to the indoctrination or teaching that kids are getting in Church and at home. If there were not poisonous jackasses out there telling their kids that gay citizens are evil, it probably wouldn't be an issue.

This all seems to come down to the common Conservative trope that if one group gains full rights then the majority's rights are somehow diminished. It has been the primary argument against full marriage rights; that by allowing two men or women in love to get married weakens marriage. It was always a scarcity fallacy and the recent Prop 8 ruling by Judge Vaughn Walker eviscerated this premise in the finding of fact.

In the end, this all comes down to being a good scary phrase, this "radical homosexual agenda" rather than something they can point to which is actually radical. Gay folks want to be able to serve in the military, marry the love of their lives, be able to rent where ever they want, be able to be secure in their jobs from the small minded bigots of our older generations. That is nothing more than every American wants; to be able to live openly and proudly as whom they are, protected by the Constitution that our nation is founded on.

In the Declaration of Independence Thomas Jefferson wrote "We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, chief amongst these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness" at the time it was a radical idea. Today Conservatives think that our gay citizens wanting to redeem this promise for themselves is a still a radical idea. Who would have thought that people who want to wrap themselves in the mantle of the Founders would wind up on the side of the Monarchists?

The floor is yours.

New Case Challenges DADT On Due Process Grounds

Bill Egnor AKA Something The Dog Said — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 13:00:54 GMT

There are times in the life of a nation when ideas and attitudes that have been part of the conventional wisdom shift and there is very little that the forces of intolerance and the status quo can do about it. It seems we are reaching that point with the issue of full rights for our gay citizens. The recent decisions in the Proposition 8 case and the Don't Ask, Don't Tell (DADT) policy in California point are good indicators of this change.

While neither of these cases are finished by any means (though the issue of standing is one on Prop 8 is likely to end it at the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals) the rulings by the judges in each case have been devastating to the premise that our gay citizens are some how so different from the rest of us that they can be treated with a different standard of law.

This week another case will go to trial, again, challenging the military's DADT policy. Major Margaret Witt was an Air Force flight nurse. She was a veteran of the liberation of Kuwait, Operation Desert Strom. She also happens to be a lesbian (again and always the very least important fact about Maj. Witt, but one that too many of the more conservative of our citizens is obsessed about) .

According to the New York Times, Maj. Witt was took all the steps she could to keep her sexual orientation from the military. She fulfilled her part of DADT in that she did not tell. She did not go to social functions where dates where invited, she did not talk about her weekend plans, she did not invite work friends home lest they find some clue that would indicate her sexuality. She basically lived the military mandated lie, she was required to be in the closet if she wanted to keep the job she loved.

Then the world fell in. In 2004 Maj. Witt was outted by the husband of a woman she was dating. In 2004 Maj. Witt was contacted by another Air Force Major who told her he had been detailed to conduct an investigation of an allegation that she was a homosexual. At that time she declined to talk about her sexuality. She was then contacted by an Air Force Chaplin to discuss her homosexuality; she also declined to speak to him about this. Maj. Witt was upholding the don't tell part of DADT.

She was placed on unpaid leave and was unable to earn any points towards her military retirement, which was one year away at that time. She was also advised that she had the right to a administrative hearing on her proposed discharge. She filed for this hearing. It was found at the hearing that she had engaged in homosexual acts and this violated the DADT policy. She was given a honorable discharge in July of 2007.

Maj. Witt filed suit arguing that her Equal Protection rights under the 14th Amendment had been violated and under Fifth Amendment Due Process rights. The district court dismissed this case, as it had many others. However Maj. Witt was arguing a new line. Namely that the Lawrence v. Texas case set a new standard; in Lawrence v. Texas the Supreme Court found that statutes which ban homosexual sodomy were unconstitutional. This cuts the legs out of from under the administrative hearings finding of homosexual acts which Maj. Witt's discharge under DADT was based.

Major Witt has testified that she has never engaged in homosexual sex with any member of the armed services nor any one who works for the military in a contractor capacity. She also contends that her sexuality if it had been known would not have harmed the unit cohesion (the argument that the DOJ will almost certainly make, and which was stuck down in the recent case brought by the Log Cabin Republicans). She argues that the investigation and discharge of a popular officer was actually more harmful than open knowledge of her sexuality ever could be.

The 9th Circuit Appeals Court found this argument persuasive enough to over turn the dismissal of the case and has ordered that there be a full trial with attention given to the Lawrence decision and its affects on due process in regards to DADT. Given the recent finding of fact in the both the Log Cabin Republican and Prop 8 cases it there is a good chance that the district court will also find that the premise of DADT, namely that gay service members are so destructive they are unfit to serve, is based on rank bigotry. There never has been any evidence that homosexuals are unfit to serve. The experience of the dozen or so other militaries in the world who allow their gay citizens to serve openly and proudly should be proof enough that this meme is so much hogwash.

Maj. Witt is suing to be reinstated. If she prevails it will not be as sweeping repeal of the pernicious DADT policy. It will only apply to her case. However if Lawrence can be used as a defense in cases where there was no homosexual sex between service members then it opens up a new avenue for opposing the discharge of fine officers like Maj. Witt or Lt. Dan Choi.

The time when it is acceptable to use the fact of someone's sexuality to discriminate against them is coming to an end. The reality that citizens who are gay are not some danger to our society is one that is accepted by our younger citizens. It is time to end all policies that make the sexual orientation of a citizen an excuse for institutionalized discrimination. This nation has greatness in its promise of equal rights for all citizens; it is time to redeem that promise. We must end all policies that discriminate based on sexuality and gender. Here is hoping that Maj. Witt's case brings us that much closer to that reality.

The floor is your

On Living With Idiots, Or, An Open Letter To Islam

fake consultant — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 03:35:26 GMT

Dear Islam,

You know, it seems like every time I write a letter I have to begin by apologizing for not having written in so long, and that's the case again today.

We only get a few days of real summer up here every year, and I was out having fun at golf tournaments and doing a bit of climbing around the local hills-and you know, I do love doing a bit of nothing at all from time to time-but while I was away, things have gotten even crazier than usual around here...and I'm sorry to say, you've been on the pointy end of the crazy stick, which is something that never should have happened.

Things have been so nutty that you're probably thinking America has something against Islam-in fact, you might be wondering if we have something against our own Constitution.

Well, we don't, most of us, and I'll take a few minutes today to help y'all understand just what is going on in this country.
So you're going to be hearing a lot about this disturbed guy in Florida who thinks that he can save the world by burning Qu'rans on September 11th-and you're going to be asking yourselves: "Why would America allow anyone to do that?"

Well, the answer's kind of paradoxical, and it has everything to do with the same Constitution that protects freedom of religion in the first place.

You see, it also protects the concept of freedom of speech...which, in itself, probably requires a bit of an explanation.

Freedom of speech, as you can imagine, isn't absolutely free (for example, there is the famous "yelling fire in a crowded room" example), but to a far greater extent than you might think, we really are able to say things that would shock most of you not living here.

At the moment, just to illustrate the point, we have all kinds of people suggesting the President is taking the country in the wrong direction, or a secret Muslim (as if that were somehow bad)...or even that he's some sort of weird mixture of Stalin and Hitler and Satan Himself who was born in Kenya...and every one of them is free to stand on any street corner and hold a sign proclaiming exactly that, just as much as they want.

Matter of fact, those are the same people that are mad at you, Islam, for the moment, even if they know nothing about Islam...and that brings me right to the next thing I need to tell you.

The only reason a lot of Americans are mad at you, Islam...is because there's an election on, and the only way Republicans can win elections is to try to scare Americans into thinking that the United States will instantly collapse from whatever useful threat they think up-unless enough of us vote Republican.

Now in normal times, Islam, Republicans would be trying to scare us about gay people trying to eat our babies, or something equally stupid, but that hasn't been working as well as it used to lately-and what they would really like to say this election cycle, they can't ("Those Jesus-hating liberals elected a nigger and now they're gonna impregnate your daughters and gay marry your sons!")...and that leaves you, Islam, as the next most desirable overt target for Republican fear-spreading professionals.

(You and, of course, those "illegal aliens" who are busily beheading people in the Arizona desert every night.)

Now there is no doubt that a portion of our population is entirely ready to jump on this bandwagon with no encouragement at all, and that's where we get the fools who think having a Qur'an BBQ party somehow makes some kind of sense.

My guess is that about 20% of us are that stupid-and based on our current population, that means about 60,000,000 fools are bumping and stumbling their way across the American landscape on any given day, struggling, as Aimee Mann says, "with the undertaking of simple thought".

Apparently because it's just hanging there, many of them sort of slide down and congregate in Florida, and sure enough, a few of them did gather together in that particular State to form into the human blood clot that planned this little 9/11 protest, and that's how we got to where we are today.

Now I'm sorry that we can't just bring this to a stop, but we do allow idiots to say their piece in this country, whether it's a good idea or not...so they do, even if the Government and The Not Blindingly Stupid Among The Population don't like it...and all I can really tell you by way of consolation is that as soon as Election Day is past, much of this will come to an end-unless it works so well that Republicans keep it up for a few more election cycles, until it fails to work any more.

Anyway, Islam, try not to let it upset you too much, try to keep in mind that this is really about American electoral politics and the desperate need to create fear (which is all the Republicans have left)...and most importantly, try to keep in mind that if good old-fashioned American racial segregation was back in style then no one would even be talking about you-instead, the same people that are on your back today would all be doing their best Dr. Laura impressions 60 or 70 times a day, and they'd go right back to assuming Muslims and Hindus and Sikhs are all the same people, just like they did in happier times.

So that's what's been up around here, and I hope to hear from you soon as well-and of course, if you're in the neighborhood sometime, drop me a note and we'll go grab a coffee and laugh as the fools walk by.

Your friend,

fake

On Organized Fearmongering Revealed, Or, "Lock Up The Kids…It's The Gay!"

fake consultant — Sat, 07 Aug 2010 21:15:15 GMT

The airwaves (and the print and blog waves, for that matter) are filled with the news that a Federal Judge in California has declared that State's Proposition 8 to be unconstitutional, which could clear the way for the resumption of same-sex weddings in the State.

Ordinarily, this would be the point where I would present to you a walkthrough of the ruling, and we'd have a fine conversation about the legal implications of what has happened.

I'm not doing that today, frankly, because the ground is already well-covered; instead, we're going to take a look at some of the tactics that were used to pass Prop 8, as they were presented in Judge Vaughan's opinion.

It's an ugly story-and even more than that, it's a reminder of why it's tough to advance civil rights through the political process, and what you have to deal with when you're trying to make such a thing happen.
So first things first: one of the sites where my postings are to be found is The Bilerico Project, and over there Dr. Jillian T. Weiss has gone to the time and trouble of explaining the nuts and bolts of this ruling in a very accessible way; I'd commend to all of you who are looking for that background a visit to her story.

With that out of the way, here's what I want you to know about how Prop 8 was presented, promoted, and defended: the entire process was designed to use ignorance, fear, disinformation, and God to make same-sex couples a national threat to you and your babies-and when it came time to defend this proposition in court, those who supported Prop 8, frankly, ran away and hid, which had a lot to do with the eventual outcome of the findings of fact, and, of course, the findings of law.

(If you weren't aware, a court's opinion will often present as a narrative of the evidence, followed by "findings of fact", then "findings of law". In the appeals process, findings of fact are rarely overturned; findings of law are frequently overturned.)

The "Defendants and Defendant-intervenors" (to use the exact language of the Court) who support Prop 8 intended to call 10 expert witnesses to explain why Prop 8 fulfills some sort of rational purpose.

Some of them were "deposed" (a sort of "pre-interview" conducted under oath before trial)...and that did not go well: by the time the trial came around only two of the original 10 were actually called to testify. Of the missing eight, two had their deposition testimony offered into evidence by the Plaintiffs, who were able to use the testimony of the Defendant's expert witnesses to show the Judge that Prop 8 deserved to be overturned.

After that process was over, here's what the Judge had to say about the Prop 8 campaign's tactics:

The Proposition 8 campaign relied on fears that children exposed to the concept of same-sex marriage may become gay or lesbian. The reason children need to be protected from same-sex marriage was never articulated in official campaign advertisements. Nevertheless, the advertisements insinuated that learning about same-sex marriage could make a child gay or lesbian and that parents should dread having a gay or lesbian child.

One of the two defense experts who did testify was David Blankenhorn; he's the founder and president of the Institute for American Values. Here's what the Judge had to say about that testimony:

Blankenhorn was unwilling to answer many questions directly on cross-examination and was defensive in his answers. Moreover, much of his testimony contradicted his opinions. Blankenhorn testified on cross-examination that studies show children of adoptive parents do as well or better than children of biological parents. Blankenhorn agreed that children raised by same-sex couples would benefit if their parents were permitted to marry. Blankenhorn also testified he wrote and agrees with the statement "I believe that today the principle of equal human dignity must apply to gay and lesbian persons. In that sense, insofar as we are a nation founded on this principle, we would be more American on the day we permitted same-sex marriage than we were the day before."

Blankenhorn's opinions are not supported by reliable evidence or methodology and Blankenhorn failed to consider evidence contrary to his view in presenting his testimony. The court therefore finds the opinions of Blankenhorn to be unreliable and entitled to essentially no weight.

Just so everyone knows...in this story, I'm editing the Judge's opinion to remove various notes (example: "Tr 1900:13-18") in order to make things more readable.

There were four defendants who were there by virtue of their being the "official proponents" of Prop 8 (other defendants included the Governor, State Attorney General, and certain Public Health officials and County Clerks, each in their administrative capacities); one of those was Hak-Shing William Tam, and, again, I'll let the Judge handle this one:

Proponent Hak-Shing William Tam testified about his role in the Proposition 8 campaign. Tam spent substantial time, effort and resources campaigning for Proposition 8. As of July 2007, Tam was working with Protect Marriage to put Proposition 8 on the November 2008 ballot. Tam testified that he is the secretary of the America Return to God Prayer Movement, which operates the website "1man1woman.net." 1man1woman.net encouraged voters to support Proposition 8 on grounds that homosexuals are twelve times more likely to molest children, and because Proposition 8 will cause states one-by-one to fall into Satan's hands. Tam identified NARTH (the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality) as the source of information about homosexuality, because he "believe[s] in what they say.". Tam identified "the internet" as the source of information connecting same-sex marriage to polygamy and incest.

(The links were not part of the original text.)

The Judge referred specifically to a letter Tam sent to the "friends" of his website during the Prop 8 fight which really shows what these folks are thinking:

"This November, San Francisco voters will vote on a ballot to 'legalize prostitution.' This is put forth by the SF city government, which is under the rule of homosexuals. They lose no time in pushing the gay agenda -- after legalizing same-sex marriage, they want to legalize prostitution. What will be next? On their agenda list is: legalize having sex with children * * * We can't lose this critical battle. If we lose, this will very likely happen * * * 1. Same-Sex marriage will be a permanent law in California. One by one, other states would fall into Satan's hand. 2. Every child, when growing up, would fantasize marrying someone of the same sex. More children would become homosexuals. Even if our children is safe, our grandchildren may not. What about our children's grandchildren? 3. Gay activists would target the big churches and request to be married by their pastors. If the church refuse, they would sue the church." (as written)

You can gain more insight into Tam's thinking from his own trial testimony. Again, from the opinion:

Tam supported Proposition 8 because he thinks "it is very important that our children won't grow up to fantasize or think about, Should I marry Jane or John when I grow up? Because this is very important for Asian families, the cultural issues, the stability of the family."

Are these the views of just one very disturbed citizen, caught up in hyperbolic campaign frenzy?

Apparently not...because here's what the Catholic Church was saying a year after the Prop 8 vote:

Catholics for the Common Good, Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions Between Homosexual Persons, Excerpts from Vatican Document on Legal Recognition of Homosexual Unions (Nov 22, 2009): There are absolutely no grounds for considering homosexual unions to be "in any way similar or even remotely analogous to God's plan for marriage and family"; "homosexual acts go against the natural moral law" and "[u]nder no circumstances can * * * be approved"; "[t]he homosexual inclination is * * * objectively disordered and homosexual practices are sins gravely contrary to chastity"; "[a]llowing children to be adopted by persons living in such unions would actually mean doing violence to these children"; and "legal recognition of homosexual unions * * * would mean * * * the approval of deviant behavior."

Plaintiff's witnesses, without exception, were found to be credible, and among those was Dr. Gary Michael Sagura, a Stanford University Professor of Political Science:

"[T]he American public is not very fond of gays and lesbians." Warmness scores for gays and lesbians are as much as 16 to 20 points below the average score for religious, racial and ethnic groups; over 65 percent of respondents placed gays and lesbians below the midpoint, below the score of 50, whereas a third to 45 percent did the same for other groups. When "two-thirds of all respondents are giving gays and lesbians a score below 50, that's telling elected officials that they can say bad things about gays and lesbians, and that could be politically advantageous to them because * * * many parts of the electorate feel the same way." Additionally, "the initiative process could be fertile ground to try to mobilize some of these voters to the polls for that cause."

"[Proponents' expert] Dr Young freely admits that religious hostility to homosexuals [plays] an important role in creating a social climate that's conducive to hateful acts, to opposition to their interest in the public sphere and to prejudice and discrimination."

"[T]he role of prejudice is profound. * * * [I]f the group is envisioned as being somehow * * * morally inferior, a threat to children, a threat to freedom, if there's these deeply-seated beliefs, then the range of compromise is dramatically limited. It's very difficult to engage in the give-and-take of the legislative process when I think you are an inherently bad person. That's just not the basis for compromise and negotiation in the political process."

As the Judge notes, all this hating has had an effect on actual crime and violence:

"[O]ver the last five years, there has actually been an increase in violence directed toward gay men and lesbians"; "gays and lesbians are representing a larger and larger portion of the number of acts of bias motivated violence" and "are far more likely to experience violence"; "73 percent of all the hate crimes committed against gays and lesbians also include an act of violence * * * we are talking about the most extreme forms of hate based violence"; the hate crimes accounted for "71 percent of all hate-motivated murders" and "[f]ifty-five percent of all hate-motivated rapes" in 2008; "There is simply no other person in society who endures the likelihood of being harmed as a consequence of their identity than a gay man or lesbian."

So what can we make of all this?

How about this: there's a community of people who feel that Teh Gay poses an imminent danger to their marriages, their children, and their way of life-but when it comes time to actually explain why, in a court of law...they can't offer a bit of evidence, except to say "it's on the Internet" or "because God told me so".

In the meantime, the group who isn't actually a threat to anybody is the group most likely to be targeted for violent attacks-because some people are just so sure they're such a threat to our marriages, our children, and The Good Ol' American Way.

Political compromise is not likely-and political courage isn't either, which may be why there's still so much "not asking" and "not telling" going on these days.

Whether this opinion is upheld or not, its deeper truths remain for all to see; I'll close today's discussion with a deeper truth of my own:

If you belong to a political or racial minority...or if you're a "plain old White American", facing the prospect of soon becoming a minority group...you better figure out, and quickly, that those same forces of prejudice you're directing at these people can be turned against you, too (as they were, against the Chinese, not so very long ago, and as they are, against Blacks and Hispanics and Arabs, to this very day), just as soon as it's convenient for the political needs of another.

The reason we fight prejudice isn't just to protect the group being affected...but to protect us all from the people who will manipulate this stuff for their own use-and if you don't think the fear of The Gay Baby Molester, and the Scary Hispanic Border Jumper, and the New Black Panthers isn't being used by Conservatives, right now, to keep you from thinking about the problems they created as November draws nigh...well, then, Gentle Reader, you're missing out on Politics 101.

Judge Walker Destroys Bigoted Arguments, Sets Up Equality For All

Bill Egnor AKA Something The Dog Said — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 13:15:01 GMT

Depending on what study and what definitional criteria one wants to use the number of LGTB citizens is between 4% and 20%. It does not matter at all to me what this number is as I have had gay and lesbian family members, close (best) friends and acquaintances all my life. They were never "my lesbian friend" or "my gay cousin" they were just the people in my life and that they were family or a good friend has always been a hell of a lot more important than who they liked to frolic under the sheets with.

Still the fact of their sexuality was always an issue. Even if I didn't care, the rest of the world seemed to and this made them have to lead their lives differently for fear of being attacked or just legally discriminated against. It still breaks my heart on a daily basis to see good people who just want to live their lives like every other citizen having to hide or downplay what and who they are because of the irrational prejudice against them.
Yesterday Judge Vaughn Walker brought down a decision that goes a long way (but not all the way) to addressing one of starkest bits of inequality, namely the denial by popular vote of the right of California gay citizens to marry. The ruling is only the first step as the intent of the lawyers filing it has always been to get to the Supreme Court of the United States and get a firm decision that all such bans are unconstitutional.

Judge Vaughn has done a fantastic job with the trial and with the written opinion that he issued. During the trial he ran a tight ship and acted as a judge should by asking probing questions of the counsel and witnesses. By taking a couple of months to look at the transcripts and think about the credibility of the witnesses and the evidence before hearing final arguments he was able to ask questions that would either poke holes in his preliminary thinking or bolster it. The list of questions that he wanted the opposing sides to answer at closing arguments assured that he would hear the thinking of both sides.

His verdict in this case is an epic bit of law. He has methodically and completely addressed every aspect of the case and universally found for the right of gay citizens to marry. This is a very important aspect as the case will be going to the Appellate Courts. In our legal system the role of the appeals court is not to find fact but to look only at finding of law. It is the role of the District Court to find the facts. This is probably the biggest part of the whole decision.

Judge Walker issued 80 findings of fact. These are now the basis which the merits of the case should be judged. They will also be referred to in any other case that comes before a federal judge. Among the critical ones is that marriage is in fact a right; that there is no evidence that sexuality can be changed through therapy and other means (even though individuals may occasionally choose to have sex outside of this orientation); and that children raised by gay parents are just as likely to have a good outcome as those raised by straight parents.

These are now all accepted legal facts. It is true that another District Judge in another case might create a separate finding of fact that would dispute some of these, but up to now this has not been the case with a Florida judge also finding that there is no evidence that non-gay parents are better than gay parents.

Judge Walker also did not make a narrow ruling in this case. He had the option of three ways to overturn Proposition 8. If he found that gay citizens where a distinct minority, if there is not a good enough reason for the California to discriminate against gay citizens or if it is a fundamental right for gay citizens to marry. If any of these were true then he could overturn Prop 8.

Instead of taking the easy route with a finding that there was no compelling state interest in banning the marriage of gay citizens, Judge Walker went for all three. He found that gay citizens are indeed a specific minority and deserve protection. He found that there was no compelling reason for the state to deny them the right to marry (based on the changing gender roles) and that it is indeed a fundamental right of all citizens to form a family with the person they of their choice.

By ruling in this fashion he has set the stage to make it quite difficult for the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn the case. He has stayed in on the conservative interpretation of the law, and used the finding of fact as the building blocks for his decision. There is not a lot of wiggle room for Appeals Court to overturn him. This is Judge Walker's standard procedure. He is rarely overturned since he does not stick his neck out, but instead sticks to the facts presented and the law as it is currently understood.

Is this issue over then? No, not by a long shot; even with this decision there is always the chance of judges not being as scrupulous about the process as Judge Walker. For older Americans (and lets face it most of the Federal Judges are older) this is a visceral issue that their thinking on was set at a time when the acceptance of alternate sexual orientation was much, much lower. It is possible that they will not be able to put aside the prejudice they grew up submerged in and will try to find a way to over turn the District Court's ruling.

If it is not overturned this ruling has far reaching consequences. The finding of fact that homosexuality is not a choice and gay citizens are a distinct minority not only moves to invalidate the marriage bans, but it will call into question the discriminations in housing and employment against gay citizens that is allowed in 33 states. If that part of the verdict stands then these states will be open to law suits and so will those who are currently using sexual orientation as a criteria for hiring or renting.

Things are far better for the LGBT community than they were when I was a kid working in a theater. However better can never be the goal. There must be full equality for our gay citizens. It is the right thing to do for them as people, but it is also what a mature democracy and a world leading nation should do. There has never been a time in this nation where things were not made better by extending rights to the citizenry. This is the premise of our nation, that we have rights which can not be taken away by the will of the majority. It is a good day when we actually stand up for this premise, even for the forces of intolerance who have been pushing against full marriage rights.

Making it possible for more of the population to form permanent legal bonds as families with all the rights and responsibilities that entails strengthens communities. It increases the share of the population who have a stake in the stability of the community. It brings a level of confidence to the partners and the children that they are not living in a legal limbo and subject to the whims of the meanest spirited person they meet. The Radical Right should be happy that this is the outcome of full marriage rights. Of course they will not. They are intent on finding people to hate and fear. It is very sad that they would pick their fellow citizens.

In the end I am going bask in the idea that the gay and lesbian folks I know and love are one step closer to being equal before the law. This is not over, but any time one gets a win on one's issues, it is time to take a deep breath and smile.

The floor is yours.

Coming DADT Repeal Makes Religious Wingnuts Lose Their Minds

Bill Egnor AKA Something The Dog Said — Thu, 27 May 2010 13:23:10 GMT

What do you do when it becomes clear you're going to lose on a political issue? Depending on the issue you might get depressed, you might feel cynical about the whole situation, you might get really angry. Or if you are a conservative group like the Family Research Council or American Family Association, you might lose you freaking mind and start saying and supporting things that can only be described as bat-guano insane.

As the compromise on Don't Ask, Don't Tell repeal has taken form the uber conservative and falsely named Family Research Council has pulled out all the stops. Yesterday they rolled out a so-called study claiming that an end to DADT will mean a free-rape zone in the military. Talking Points Memo reports:

Here's how the Family Research Council envisions things going if Don't Ask, Don't Tell is repealed: first, more straight soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines will be fellated in their sleep against their will. Then, commanders afraid of being labeled homophobes will refuse to do anything about it. Eventually, the straight service members will quit out of fear.
On a conference call with reporters today, FRC Senior Fellow for Policy Studies Peter Sprigg delivered the results of what he said was the first-ever study of "homosexual assault" in the military. Joined by several former military officers opposed to allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly in the armed forces, he warned Congress that the DADT repeal language currently under discussion with the agreement of the White House will turn the U.S. military into a terrifying free-rape zone where no heterosexual is safe.

The FRC bases its analysis on the idea that there are only 3% of the population who are gay or bisexual. They also claim that 8.2% of sexual assaults in the military are same sex. This leads Peter Sprigg, who is authored the "study", to jump to the conclusion that gay or bisexual people are far more likely to commit sexual assault. This is a common trope about gay citizens that has no basis in fact. Dr. Gregory Herek of UC Davis has a great take down of this so called research, but his conclusion is what really matters.

The empirical research does not show that gay or bisexual men are any more likely than heterosexual men to molest children. This is not to argue that homosexual and bisexual men never molest children. But there is no scientific basis for asserting that they are more likely than heterosexual men to do so. And, as explained above, many child molesters cannot be characterized as having an adult sexual orientation at all; they are fixated on children.

This is not the only instance of a conservative group pushing the so-called danger of allowing gay citizens to openly serve their nation in the military. The American Family Association (you can just about bet if an organization has Family in the name it is going to be conservative and virulently anti-gay rights) has appointed a new Director of Issue Analysis for Government and Policy, one Bryan Fisher.

Mr. Fisher, who has a radio show, went on to push the meme of gay soliders being dangerous by saying:

So Hitler himself was an active homosexual. And some people wonder, didn't the Germans, didn't the Nazis, persecute homosexuals? And it is true they did; they persecuted effeminate homosexuals. But Hitler recruited around him homosexuals to make up his Stormtroopers, they were his enforcers, they were his thugs. And Hitler discovered that he could not get straight soldiers to be savage and brutal and vicious enough to carry out his orders, but that homosexual solders basically had no limits and the savagery and brutality they were willing to inflict on whomever Hitler sent them after. So he surrounded himself, virtually all of the Stormtroopers, the Browshirts, were male homosexuals.

It goes without saying there is no evidence to support this little bit of hate speech. In the fact free world of the Religious Right there doesn't have to be, it is all about emotion and tying any group that they don't like to the Nazi's. The idea that gay people would be more brutal than any other group is just insane. There are brutal people in every slice of the human race you care to take. This idea that Hitler went out of his way to find gay people to who could be savage ignores the fact that the gay population of any nation is going to be somewhere south of 10%. The subset that will be brutal is even less. Why bother looking for this small sub-group when you could find brutal people more easily in the general population regardless of sexuality?

Well if you are Rightwing Christainist like Mr. Fisher it all makes sense because Hitler was evil and gays are evil. Birds of a feather flock together, don't they?

All this hysteria about allowing soldiers who are already serving in uniform to be open about who they are is a symptom of the Right's obsession with controlling sexuality. We should not given anyone who is lining up with them a pass on DADT. It is time to start asking people like Sen. McCain if he supports the statements of the people who are on his side of this issue. Does the Senior (so very, very senior) Senator from Arizona believe that allowing people like Lt Col Victor Fehrenbach, who was decorated for valor in his actions during the Iraq war are really a threat to other service members. It is time to ask other member of Congress why they would allow citizens who are putting their lives on the line for our nation to be slandered by people like the FRC merely because of their sexuality.

We have many problems as a nation, one of them is our schizophrenic claim that we are the land of the free while we continue to deny gay citizens the right to server, the right to marry, the right to be who they are proudly and without fear. The new legislation to end DADT is not perfect (what legislation ever is) but ending the practice of kicking citizens out of the military for mere fact of their sexuality is one that has to end.

When it does and the claims of the homophobic Religious Right do not come to pass (as none of their claims ever do) then it will be just one more example of why people who let hate blind them to the facts and want to tell the rest of the nation how to live should be shunned.

The floor is yours.

How to throw Rosa Parks off the bus, by John Stossel and Rand Paul

MinistryOfTruth — Thu, 20 May 2010 22:03:51 GMT

STOSSEL: because private businesses ought to get to discriminate.
~snip~
(I)t should be their right to be racist.

"I want my country back"

Back to when? 1963? or 1910? or 1810?

When Rosa Parks was thrown off of a bus for refusing to sit in the back in accordance with discriminatory Jim Crow laws it helped begin the Civil Rights movement.

It was racist then, and it would still be racist now.

Except, of course, if you are a libertarian or a Republican.

In the last 24 hours, both Kentucky Senate candidate Rand Paul and Fox News Corp employee John Stossel have made the case that it is OKAY to throw Rosa Parks off the bus if it is owned by a private business.

More below the fold
What these people on the right are saying is that even if racism is wrong, private racism is okay by free market standards.

WTF?

The Pro Racism, free market Libertarians have spoken.

This all started when Rachel Maddow (who deserves a cape and a superwoman outfit) demolished GOP Kentucky Senate candidate Rand Paul for saying that he'd have marched with Martin Luther King Jr., but he opposes the law that forced businesses to serve him.

This, of course, caused Paul's fellow free market Libertarian and Fox News Corporation employee John Stossel to mount his white horse and don his white sheets in defense of a private businesses RIGHT to be able to discrimate against people, and, if necessary, throw Rosa Parks off of the bus.

Stossel calls for repeal of public accommodations section of Civil Rights Act
"Private businesses ought to get to discriminate"
STOSSEL: Totally. I'm in total agreement with Rand Paul.

~snip~
KELLY: But that's not what Rand Paul said. Rand Paul agreed that if it's run by the government, yes intervention is fine. He took issue with the public accommodations, with private businesses being forced to pony up under the discrimination laws.
STOSSEL: And I would go further than he was willing to go, as he just issued the statement, and say it's time now to repeal that part of the law
KELLY: What?
STOSSEL: because private businesses ought to get to discriminate. And I won't won't ever go to a place that's racist and I will tell everybody else not to and I'll speak against them. But it should be their right to be racist.

You can read the full transcript of Stossel's words at MediaMatters.org, but I have picked apart the choice pieces for those who really want to thrash Stossel's pro "business can discriminate against you" views.

Basically, what Stossel is saying is that it is wrong if a bus operated by the Government threw Rosa Parks off for not giving her seat in the front up to a white person when they demanded it, that would be wrong, but if that bus was operated by a private business they should have every right to throw Rosa Parks off for not sitting in the back with the rest of the Non-Whites. And if that doesn't make sense the mythical "invisible hand" will fix it, or something, just like it "Fixed" Wall St, Oil spills and every other Big Business created problem that might damage America if that sort of ever thing could be proven to happen.

Yes, WTF is putting it lightly.

In more modern terms, Stossel and Rand Paul are saying that if the PGA wants to ban Tiger Woods for being non white it is their business, and how dare anybody interfere with someone else's private property?

At the same time, these libertarians are saying "Sure, interfering with the civil rights of people who do not own property or people who are not white is fine"

WTF?

Megyn Kelly of Fox News, the unlikely voice of reason on this issue, presses Stossel further on this question of "Is private discrimination right or wrong?" As always, the free market is the answer when no other answer can justify discrimination.

STOSSEL: Because eventually they would have lost business. The free market competition would have cleaned the clocks of the people who didn't serve most customers.
KELLY: How do you know that, John?
STOSSEL: I don't know that for sure.

Dear John Stossel, when you are trying to justify a Republican Senate candidates private turned public discriminatory views, and you have painted yourself into a corner of stupid while twisting logic into a pretzel, and the best you can do is answer the question "How do you know that" with "I don't know that for sure." That is the exact moment when you should STFU, you MORON!

You see, what Libertarian, fringe right, free market extremists are arguing is the same logic Eric Cartman uses when he sings that "There are too many minorities at my waterpark" and someone should do "something"

Someone should "Do something" like allow Cartman's waterpark to ban minorities, or even repeal Title II of the Civil Rights Act, just as John Stossel says we should.

When Eric Cartman sings "This was our land, our dream, and they are taking it all away" that sounds a lot like the "We want our country back!" that was cried by at teabaggers at Town Halls and the same "We've come to take our country back" that was spoke by Rand Paul at his primary victory rally and Sarah Palin, his most recognizable backer.

It is the year 2010, not 1910, not 1810. WTF? The Civil rights Act passed in 1964. It is the law. WE ARE NEVER GOING BACK! Rosa Park stays on the fucking bus, and no mental gymnastics that pro business, pro racism, pro free market extremists try to pull is EVER, EVER going to be tolerated. I have news for you, dear free market fetishizing, pro racism Right wing fringers, you are NEVER getting your country back, we are going forward, America is going forward, with or without you.

Pretend that Rand Paul shouted "YOU LIE!" at President Obama, and let him have it!
Donate to Rand Paul's Senate opponent Jack Conway HERE

Because the same logic that would give a free market thumbs up to throwing Rosa Parks off a privately operated bus would also ban President Obama from attending private law school if that school wanted to discriminate based on race.

Seriously, libertarian, free market, fringe right people, WTF?????

I work for PeanutButterPAC! If you like my articles and want to support Progressive primary and general election candidates like Jack Conway, join PeanutButterPAC, the PAC that fights back!

Vote for me to get a DFA Netroots Nation scholarship!

You can follow me on Twitter at @JesseLaGreca

Crossposted at The Progressive Electorate.com

What Do You Want For America?

Bill Egnor AKA Something The Dog Said — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 14:00:00 GMT

In my professional life (such as it is) I am a 6 Sigma Black Belt. For those who don't know (most of you probably) that is a process improvement project manager. One of the tenets of Six Sigma is that you have to design the process to meet the needs of the customer, whoever that is. It is simply summed up as starting with the end goal in mind. This is applicable and important when we are talking about politics as well.

In the middle of policy fights, it is easy to get narrowly focused on the minutiae of the policy itself, while losing sight of the overall goals. This is even more of a problem when one does not have an overall set of goals in the first place.
As Congress takes up its work again this week I thought it might be a good time to take a step back and think about what we want America to look like in the future. This is not about short-term policy fights or goals, but what it is we are working towards in the ten to fifteen year time frame. Politics is about compromise, sometimes galling compromises which progress towards the overall goal. By knowing what each of our overall goals are, we can more easily determine if the compromises of today are actually worth having or must be resisted to the end.

This is not the easiest of mental exercises to be sure. But to make it a little less difficult let me set out some ground rules. The point of this is not to predict what will happen, but rather to determine what it is we want the future America to look like. We are also looking a decade or so down the road, so while we might have an ultimate end state that is pretty radical, being reality based needs to keep our goals within bounds. So, for those who would like to see us in a truly socialist political system that goal is probably outside the time frame.

Since this is my topic, I'll take a swing at it. For me national goals are always people based. It is a core belief of mine that the nation is its people, not the land or the government or the military, but the people who are its citizens. This makes my long term goals pretty easy, they are below in no particular order.

I am working for an America where workers can form a union and bargain collectively whenever fifty percent or more of a work group wants to. In this goal I envision card check being available and used with no pressure or coercion from any direction. It is a place where work is valued and rewarded with fair pay and the spread of compensation between the executive suit and the work floor is not measured in multiples of one hundred.

I am working for an America where we have a rational policy on immigration and do not have a shadow economy where undocumented workers must live in fear of their employers reporting them to immigration. In this goal those who are here and working now will be able to come out of the shadows, to choose to start the path to citizenship, to live with all the rights and protections of any citizen or resident without fear.

In the America I am working toward we uphold the rule of law. In this goal there is not only accountability for crimes committed in the name of national security, but a closer approximation of justice for those who are poor or uneducated. It is a goal that sees the balance between the need to prevent criminals from preying on the citizenry and the need to bring those who have served their sentence back into society, so they have a stake in making it work for all of us. It is a goal the makes the law the unbiased balancing it has always strove to be closer to being a reality.

In the America I am working toward we will return the biggest portion of taxation to wealth and remove it from work. It will see the people who earn in the top 2% of all earners pay the lion's share of the cost of funding our nation. It will put the cost burden back on those who benefit the most from the infrastructure and power of our nation.

In the American I am working towards everyone will have the choice of a publicly run, not for profit insurance plan. In this goal all citizens will have a way to access high quality health care without going broke. No one will be forced into bankruptcy because they or a family member became seriously ill. We will be moving towards ending private for profit health insurance and using the savings to cover all our citizens.

In the American I am working towards all citizens will have the same civil rights. They will be able to marry whoever they love, they will be able to stand before their community and take on the responsibilities and rights that come with marriage. They will be able visit their husbands or wives in the hospital, share property and children. No one will be able to discriminate against them because of their sexuality or gender status.

In the America I am working towards we will not be at war. We will have ended the military adventurism of the criminal Bush administration. In this goal we will recommit our nation to the idea of no preemptive wars. We will recognize that military power has real limits in its effectiveness and extreme costs whenever it is used. Military force will go back to being the last and dreaded resort, not the first tool reached for when there is a problem.

There you have it. Quite the list, I know, but they are the things that I want from my nation, they are the goals that keep me writing and working to change the way things are today. I urge everyone reading this to take a bit of time and think about what you want in for your nation in the next ten years. It will not be the same for everyone, we all have different views and different priorities, but knowing where you want to go and articulating it is the first step towards achieving it.

If we can come together behind a vision for our nation, we can do great things. The Right in the form of the Tea Partiers, the conservatives and the Republicans can articulate what they do not want. They can articulate what they do want only in terms of a return to a mythical time when we were untaxed, the market worked perfectly because it was unregulated and America was feared and respected universally in the world. This is a false choice they are offering the nation. It can be countered by goals that are positive and real.

Now you have my goals, why not share yours in the comments?

The floor is yours.