Afternoon Drive: Let's Get Physical

I second the motion.  Bulked-out muscles aren't my thing, but some of these guys are like, wooof.  Hmm, wonder which ones are bottoms . . . .

See ya down the road, guys.  Have a good one.  If ya can't be good, at least have fun.

Today's Quote

Two good ones in the NYT, the first from Maureen Dowd about the party-crashers at the White House:

We live in an age obsessed with “reality” and overrun by fakers. The mock has run amok.

This decade will be remembered for the collapse of the Twin Towers, the economy and any standard of accomplishment for societal prestige. TV and the Internet wallow in the lowest common denominator.

Warhol looks like Whistler.

But if Congress investigates social climbing and party crashing in Washington, it won’t have time for anything else.

And the other from Roger Cohen about the fading of anti-Semitic attitudes in Britain:

I still believe the greatest strength of America, its core advantage over the old world, is its lack of interest in where you’re from and consuming interest in what you can do.

Bullshit Alert: Who Would Jesus Tax?

I know you guys are thinking I must be queer for Andrew Sullivan, because I quote him so often - even though he is sometimes a real dickhead on certain subjects.  Okay, okay, I'll admit, he's not exactly my type, but at the right place and time, I wouldn't turn him down; push him down more likely.  Grin. 

But this one is too good not to quote, and besides it's about a real gen-u-wine Texas fuckhead.  The kind I'm surrounded by out here.  Don't get me wrong, boys - Texas really is a great and beautiful place to live for lots of reasons, if only you could deport all the Republican fundamentalists.  But then it would only have the population of Rhode Island.

Anyway, here goes:

"Now, after someone dies and someone comes in and steals from them, we consider that in most society reprehensible. … But when the government comes in, because we have the power to pass laws and legalize theft that otherwise would be considered reprehensible, it’s okay. But it is not okay. … Jesus never advocated the government go steal. He said ‘you do it. Do it with your own money, don’t steal it from somebody else.’ And that is why this should not pass," - Congressman Louie Gohmert (R-TX), opposing a 45% tax on estates valued at more than $3.5 million ($7 million for a couple).

I seem to recall Jesus urging his followers to pay Caesar what was due to him - and never to confuse that with anything to do with God. I also seem to recall his saying quite clearly that only by giving away one's entire wealth to the poor could one enter the kingdom of heaven.

Yup.  You see how these Christianists are total, undiluted hypocrites?  They stand on every single word of the Bible when it comes to teh gayz; but when it comes to themselves - and especially their pocketbooks - hell, they can't even remember the most basic teachings.  And they just make shit up.

Just like they have made up their straight, white, male, heterosexual God.  I haven't abandoned my Christian faith; but I have abandoned that terrible, hateful, homophobic false god I was lied to about in church, that narrow, nasty little god that nearly destroyed me.

Bonus:  I love this observation by a commenter on Think Progress, where Sullivan got the story from:

Jesus provided free health care to everyone, fed the masses, and even supplied free wine from time-to-time.

Amen, brother. 

Geez, guys - when you stop and think about it, it does sound like Jesus was some sort of (horrified pause) . . . radical (gasp) . . . Frenchified . . . (big stage whisper) SOCIALIST.  I tell you what.  And not a family man at all.

Ain't that a helluva note?

Obama: Got Guts?

Yes, my friends, we are right to be disappointed and upset about the slow progress of equality and civil rights, including marriage rights, ENDA, DADT, and UAFA.

But in the midst of our justified anger, fellas - do keep it all in perspective.  My truckbuddy David Mixner, long-time activist, recently called the current situation in the United States "gay apartheid."

Now David has paid his dues and been on the front lines for civil rights for all Americans since the Vietnam era; and he's worthy of a lot of respect from those of us who, unlike David, have never been beaten or jailed for taking a public stand.

But I do think his phrase overstates the case.  As I've posted recently myself, things could be worse, much, much worse for gays, and in my own lifetime, they have been.

So while we're pissing and moaning about our own government - give a thought to the holocaust our brothers and sisters in Uganda are facing right now.

And I say, even if Obama doesn't do another goddamn thing for gays in his whole life, he must speak out against this genocide about to happen in Uganda.  Mixner thinks so too.  Don't you agree, boys? 

From Andrew Sullivan:

This gay Ugandan blogger's latest post is here - a heart-rending blend of disbelief, optimism and pessimism. From the comments section, a reader asks:

I hope the bill wont see the light of the day. How about your safety and that of other gay men at the moment?

The blogger's response:

Ha, life is unfair. No real assurance, or insurance to it.

Ok, seriously, what about our safety? Well, we are making lots of noise as and when we can now. When the bill becomes law, those of us who are out will be most likely hauled in for any more 'promotion' of homosexuality...!

But, sometimes, sometimes it is actually worth the while to hang out ones neck. Afterall, I will only die once.... Gallows humour. But, better than nothing.

"I will only die once." God have mercy.  The courage of the defenseless - the courage of St. Sebastian.

This law was inspired and directed by American fundamentalists, showing just exactly what they would do to us if only they could.

Wayne Besen, Truth Wins Out:

Earlier tonight, Rachel Maddow aired an excellent 10-minute news segment about the Republican and evangelical leaders who, despite deep ties to Uganda, refuse to tell their close friends in the Ugandan leadership not to proceed with an antigay genocide and mass suppression of the families, doctors, and pastors of allegedly homosexual Ugandans.

The segment implicates Senators James Inhofe, R-Okla.; Sam Brownback, R-Kan.; Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla.; Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., members of The Family, mega-evangelist Rick Warren, and others in silent complicity with genocide.

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Bottom Line:  You can tell the President what you think he should do about this murderous plan here.  He wants to hear from you, he said so during the campaign many times - remember?

I remember, as I've posted, being beaten by homophobic bullies in high school; yet they broke no bones, drew no blood, the only lasting scars were those on my soul.  But I hate a bully.  I look at what's happening in Uganda now, and I see the same thing, a million times worse, about to happen.  And I think, there but for the grace of God am I.

Will Obama stand up for just one shining moment and tell the bullies to back off and leave the little guy alone?  Does he have the guts to take a stand for what's decent, for all those precious human rights he loves to speechify about?  Will he lift one finger to protect those at the mercy of religious hatred over there? 

Will you?

Write.  You voted for him, didn't you?  You're paying his salary.  He owes us this much.  At the very least.

P.S. - This law will go into effect next month, if passed.  Time is short.  And I'm furious that other world leaders - Gordon Brown and Stephen Harper, to name just two - have already spoken out face to face with Ugandan leaders - but not one damn peep out of my President.

Why the hell aren't you East Coast boys picketing the gates of the White House already?  And the Ugandan embassy?  You got guts?  Or at least nuts?  Or not? 

Or is it really true, what they say about all us sissies?  You tell me.

Waitin' for the Weekend

Meredith Baxter Comes Out

Alex P. Keaton's mom is gay!  Somewhere, that little dickheaded Republican is having a nervous breakdown right now - and about damn time.

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Cheers to Meredith for having the courage to come out publicly, which as she is says in the NBC interview is indeed a political act, not merely a personal one; and which might just help to change a few people's minds.  Brava!

I always thought she was sexy - for a woman - in a cool, understated, got-my-act-together way.  Not a tits-and-ass blonde.  Not overly girly, either.  And just a very slight boyishness, but only a soupçon.  Looking back now, I can see the lesbian quality; but it never jumped out at me.  These things never do.  I mean hell, I never thought there was anything suspicious about George Clooney, either - until the ex-roommate made me sit through a whole movie of his.

And then I was like, Girlfriend, who are you trying to fool?

The ex-roommate and I chatted about Meredith on the phone last night; and we agreed that women's sexuality - gay or straight - is obviously a very different thing from men's.  Not something I can pretend to understand at all.

Because my first thought on hearing the news was, how the hell can you get to be nearly 60 years old and not know what it is you really want?

But then the ex-roommate pointed out that while men's sex drive peaks at about 18 or 19, it doesn't peak for women until they are in their 30's.  And women are socially conditioned to be the more-or-less passive receptors in heterosexual relationships.  So I sort of see how a woman could drift along, not terribly enthusiastic about sex with men, but thinking that's normal.

And actually, in the last decade I did know two different professional women at work who both were married and yet one day woke up to realize they were gay, got divorced, took up with female partners.  I never got to talk with them in depth about how all that occurred, but I do know it happens.  It's also rather tragic for the husbands; one of the husbands of these two women also worked in the same place, and I got to know him fairly well as a workmate.  The divorce really shook him up for a while; understandably so, when this life you've built for 20 years suddenly disappears.

But of course that's the chance you take with any partner, any spouse, isn't it?  Even if the gay thing is not an issue.  Despite all the prayers and promises and protestations of eternal love - well, there really are no guarantees in this mortal life.  Things change, people change.  You pays your money and you takes your chances.  And life goes on.

And the thought has occurred to me that if the sex roles had not been so very, very rigidly defined by church and state all these many centuries, well, perhaps we would all find our sexuality to be somewhat more fluid than we perceive it to be here in modern Western society.

I guess I can trust my Truckbuddies with this little secret:  once in a great while, and I do mean a great while, your Head Trucker happens to notice something about a woman in passing that otherwise he goes months and years without ever seeing, oblivious to it.  Or again, once in a long, long while, in a moment of repose, an image or thought will flicker through his head like a bat through a cave, a sudden surprise in the dark. 

Surely this must happen to some straight men too, the other way around; only they of course never, ever admit it.  Human nature being what it is, I just have to believe that most people probably wonder once or twice just what the grass on the other side of the fence is like. If it weren't for curiosity, we'd all still be living in the trees, right?

And then once when I was about 35, there was this smart, beautiful, friendly, charming girl in the next cubicle - oh but that was just stupidity on my part, I made a damn fool of myself for about a week with a truly ridiculous thought in mind.  And then wised up and moved on.

So a few times over the years, even I have looked in the mirror and thought with a shock, OMG what if I'm a closet bisexual?  Wouldn't that be a kick in the head?  Grin.

But I hasten to assure my readers that, these odd little side currents and eddies notwithstanding, the main tide flows on strong and full, undisturbed.  Old Man River, he just keeps rolling along, you know what I mean?

BTW - that Matt Lauer is something else, isn't he?  Killer smile.  If only he had a beard or at least a stache, he would be like, soooo damn hot!

Consolation Prize

 

From the Human Rights Campaign:

Yesterday Washington State officials (Governor Gregoire and Secretary of State Reed) certified the results of Referendum 71 — the measure that asked voters to approve or reject a comprehensive domestic partnership law passed by the legislature and signed by the Governor earlier in the ear. Voters approved the law in November’s elections and now same-sex couples will have critical rights and protections as of 12:01 a.m. Pacific time on Thursday.

The first voter-approved, all-but-the-name-marriage law in the nation. So you see, it does pay off to work for change at the state level, guys. Just not as quickly as we would like, as we deserve.

But we have to keep pushing, step by step, state by state, all the way down the long, sometimes heartbreaking road. You gotta have hope. You gotta have courage, you gotta have grit and the guts to keep going, sunlight or storm. When the horse throws you, get right back up in the damn saddle, cowboy up and ride on anyways.

You'll never win nothing if you're a scairdy-cat.

Marriage Equality Torpedoed in NY

God bless Sen. Eric Adams for his profound, courageous stand: 

"You don't have to be black to understand the pains of slavery.  You don't have to be gay to respect the rights of those who are."

More fine speeches from the floor of the New York Senate today here.

As Joe.My.God. and lots of others are reporting, the New York State Senate torpedoed marriage equality there today by a vote of 38-24 against.  In reaction, New York City gays and their supporters staged a protest in Times Square tonight.

Maggie Gallagher and her ilk are gloating, of course.

Shit.

Well guys, it's been a real downer, from the ecstatic high in May 2008 when the California Supremes green-lighted marriage equality to now, one of the low points in our struggle for full civil rights:  first Maine, now New York.  But you know, social change and progress have never come overnight in these United States. 

Look back at the women's suffrage movement, to simply give women the right to vote, no more:  first to last, that took FIFTY YEARS to accomplish, and our great-grandmothers had to endure heartbreaking defeats, over and over and over, in nearly all the state legislatures of that time.

And of course it took a HUNDRED YEARS for blacks to gain full equality under the law, from the end of the Civil War and slavery in 1865 to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and Loving v. Virginia in 1967.  And all that time they were having to endure the separate and very unequal reign of segregation in the South and contemptuous attitudes in other parts of the nation.

And we could make mention of the similar long struggles of Native Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans, and others, for liberty and justice and the equal protection of the laws.  It's a sad but unfortunately true fact of life that majorities with power are very slow to admit others, outsiders, to the charmed circle of equal standing:  barring the intervention of a higher authority, it simply takes a long time for attitudes to change.  Some of us need look no further than our own families, our parents and grandparents, aunts and uncles, to see the truth of that.

Just like all the other outsiders, we are having to endure the slow process of acceptance and enlightenment.  Our struggle for equal marriage has been going on only a relatively short time:  since 2004, when Massachusetts was the first state to grant it; or you could start the clock with the first civil unions law in this country, passed by in Vermont in 1999.  But when you stop and think about how far we have come in just one single decade, it's actually very encouraging:  at the moment, 5 states (MA, VT, NH, CT, IA) offer full marriage equality, 10 other states, including the District of Columbia, offer civil unions or domestic partnerships with varying levels of rights and benefits, and New York state recognizes out-of-state same-sex marriages.

So nearly a third of the states of the Union recognize and protect, to one degree or another, our relationships, our equality, our humanity.  That's really quite breathtaking when I stop and think about it, as someone who remembers vividly what life was like 40 years ago at the time of the Stonewall riots:  as I've already written in another post, homosexuality was a dirty, ugly word; gay people were completely invisible in daily life; homos and queers were shadowy sex fiends in the popular imagination, the unholy perverts whom nobody ever actually saw in the light of day, but whom everybody just knew lurked in some dark, underground, back-alley place, waiting to molest innocent kids.

Nobody was out; just the suspicion of being queer was enough to get you fired from your job, and booted out of your residence.  In most states, you could be arrested, fined, and jailed, even locked up for hard time in prison, for any sexual activity with another man, even just a kiss if the authorities wanted to take it that far.  You could also be locked up in a mental hospital and subjected to electroshock, lobotomy, castration, or psychotropic drugs to "cure" you of your "mental illness," all totally against your will and without your consent; uncounted numbers of horrified mothers and fathers subjected their own sons and daughters to such barbaric treaments. 

So once again I say:  when I consider how far, how very, very far gay people have come just in my lifetime, the change, the progress we and society have made really is a breathtaking thing.

You guys under 40, who don't remember a time when gay people were not out and visible, were never mentioned on the nightly news, never depicted in TV shows or movies - a time when you could live to be 23 years old, as I did, without ever once meeting a person you knew for a certainty to be gay - well, in the midst of all your justified anger and frustration and outrage, you would do well to take a mental step outside all that sometimes, and consider things from a historical perspective. 

You of the younger generation - who never felt the isolation and despair of feeling like you were the one and only gay person in the entire world - should count your blessings all the while you are fighting for equality.  Things could be worse, much worse.  They have been - and not so long ago.  I know; I was there.

For some of us, it's been a long, long wait already for equality.  Apparently, it's going to be an even longer wait, and it may be that I won't live to see full civil rights for gay and all the other LGBT people all across this land.  But I have faith that such a day will come eventually, even to the remote corners of Texas, and to every city and town, field and plain, hill and molehill of the nation.

It's getting to be a cliche, but Martin Luther King's words remain an anchor of hope and inspiration: 

The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.

Keep the faith.  Do what you can - for yourself and for all the generations to follow.  Keep hope alive.  Never give up.

Our day will come.  In fact, it's already here.

Snow!

Taken through the kitchen window.  It's way too cold (33) and wet to take my tootsies out in the back yard this morning.

Update:  I lied.  The bird/squirrel feeder was totally empty, I noticed, so I did go slop through the water, mud, and snow to feed my poor little critters, sans camera.  What else could a father do?

Obama Ups the Stakes in Afghanistan

As Commander-in-Chief, I have determined that it is in our vital national interest to send an additional 30,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan. . . .

If the video doesn't display, watch it here.

I have to believe what he says:  I have no training whatsoever in military science, and to tell you the truth, with few exceptions international relations hold little interest for me.  From my little outpost here on the windswept prairie, it's all very far away, incredibly complicated, and does not directly affect my day to day life one way or another.  Though of course I realize there are important indirect effects; and certainly where our national security is concerned, and the protection of American lives, and humanitarian concerns in any quarter of the globe, there needs to be an adult in the White House with a clear gaze and a steady hand on the levers of the greatest military and economic might the world has ever known.

Disappointed as I am - and nearly heartbroken - over Obama's failure to live up to his stirring promise to be a "fierce advocate" for gay rights, the fact nonetheless remains that he is a brilliant man; and he has access to all the detailed knowledge of people, places, and situations abroad that can be determined.  And whatever the reason for his footdragging on gay rights, I do believe his heart is in the right place, and his values good.  So I have to trust that he is doing the right thing here, what is ultimately in the best interests of the nation and the world.

Certainly I trust him to do the right thing infinitely more than I ever trusted that lying, conniving, manipulating, prevaricating, mendacious, monkeybrained son of a bitch who had the job before him. Not to mention his nefarious, slime-sucking puppetmaster cohorts. Though to give the devil his due, Bush at least has had the decency to come home to Texas and just shut the fuck up, as far as I know; whereas Cheney is reprising his role as National Bogeyman, and going for an Academy Award with it.

I'm not a warrior at heart; I don't like to kill things, though I would and I have when absolutely necessary.  In a general way, it hurts to think of more young troops going off to fight somewhere in some unpronounceable place on the other side of the world, to bleed and suffer and die for an uncertain result.  The British in the days of their great Empire tried for a hundred years or more to put a lock on Afghanistan, and couldn't do it.  Back in the 1970's, the Soviet Union, with all its immense resources right next door, tried to subdue the place, and they couldn't do it.  How can anyone ever really win a guerrilla war against fanatical fighters in a mountainous country? 

Being ignorant, as I said, of military science, I don't see how it's possible; no matter how many guns and bombs we bring to the field, there's no definite fighting front, and there's always another cave, another rabbit hole they can hide in, and come back to fight another day.  Or if not in a mountainous region, in a steaming jungle like Vietnam - which the President says is a false analogy.  Let's hope he's right about that; he knows much more about it than I ever will, and by this point he should have a very sharp idea of the odds.

Occasionally, I meet soldiers here, either just back from overseas or about to deploy.  I talk with their wives, see their kids.  These young people in uniform are very decent, ordinary, small town folks; flesh-and-blood human beings who live, love, laugh, and work, and go off to war believing sincerely that they are in some way helping protect all those they leave behind.  They're not just numbers on a chart, they're my neighbors.

So - God help our troops, and God bless America.  What else can an old shitkicker say about all that?

After the jump, a few excerpts that I found particularly compelling from the President's speech tonight at West Point.  Full transcript here.

Continued after the jump . . . .

World AIDS Day

For Tommy - and all the others.

Over a million Americans are estimated to be living with HIV. Worldwide an estimated 33 million people are living with HIV.

If you don't have it, don't get it.  Yes, you can live with it now for many long years; but I've watched what other people have to go through, even with the most modern drugs, and it's a hell of a routine, boys.  It's not like eating sugar candy; those drugs are powerful, and have all kinds of unhappy side effects.  It's not fun, guys.  God bless all those who do have to put up with it.

Gay Men's Health Crisis and Project Inform have a lot of good information on all aspects of HIV and AIDS, check 'em out.

And one more tip:  If you live in some little redneck town and you aren't comfortable talking to your doctor about stuff like this, Home Access offers the only FDA-approved home testing kits for HIV and Hep C.