The Outing of Proposition 8

Life is hysterically funny and deadly serious all at the same time. For years, LGBT people have had to decide to "come out," remain "in the closet," and/or risk being "outed."

As the battle heats up for and against proposition 8, the "outing" has started. All supporters with donation amounts both for and against Prop 8 are available online. So all you closet homophobs, you've just been "outed." And all of you slackers, get your donations in today or risk this fate:

First they came for the Communists,
      and I didn’t speak up,
          because I wasn’t a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews,
      and I didn’t speak up,
          because I wasn’t a Jew.
Then they came for the Catholics,
      and I didn’t speak up,
          because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me,
      and by that time there was no one
          left to speak up for me.

    ~~by Rev. Martin Niemoller, 1945

This is way too cool. Find OUT about your friends and neighbors here. Don't you just love the irony?

McCarthyism & Talk Radio

So this weekend I drove from San Diego to Carpenteria and back in a 1991 Geo Metro with a busted radio that is stuck on one AM station 24/7. Here in San Diego, that gets me El Voz del Pueblo out of Rosarito in Baja California - a great way to at least practice listening in Spanish. But as I drove north through Los Angeles, it picked up a conservative talk radio.

Now personally, I think Barak Obama is conservative and his two great qualifications to be president are he's one step to the left of John McCain and he's not a white man (we've had too many of them for president). I think Cynthia McKinney is a great, grounded candidate and her politics more closely represent the direction I think this country should go. That being said, financially I'm supporting both Obama and McKinney and hope if you're in a swing state you vote for Obama.

So back to talk radio - the alleged topic of today's monologue.

Apparently in the world of conservative talk radio, Mr. Obama is a socialist and would create a government far to the left of Great Britain and France. Given that terms left/right, conservative/liberal have no meaning for today's political climate (another topic for another day), and given that the standard of living, life expectancy and amount of vacation time are greater in those two countries and the infant mortality rate is lower (the US being better than Crotia but worse than Cuba, the UK and France), I don't see how this is a bad thing. But obviously I don't understand the psychology of talk radio unless it's as simple as fear.

McCarthyism is alive and well on talk radio. Of course now we have new words as well. In addition to communism, we have socialism and terrorism. If you don't like someone, pick your word and label them, pick your word and they go directly to jail. So which is it? Is Mr. Obama a socialist or a terrorist? And does it matter? The point is to label "others," people so different from us as to no longer be living breathing creatures that are worthy of compassion and respect. Labeling people as socialists or terrorists allows us to dismiss them or kill them on the battlefield. Defining the "enemy" as "other" is one of the fundamental rules of warfare.

Once you make friends with someone formerally labled as "other", they can no longer be labeled or dismissed. They must be dealt with as a living breathing human being with wants and needs similar to your own. Then we can move foward into finding ways of living that respect all of us from the Muslim to the anarchist.

Are Americans still so guilable as to fall for McCarthyism in what ever form it takes? Unfortunately, I fear the worst. American prove me wrong.

Marriage for All Who Want It

Personally, I'm not a fan of marriage. During my life I've met a handful of people whose lives seem to be more fulfilling, more creative, more exciting because they were married. I've met thousands of couples whose marriage seems nothing more than something to gripe about, like potholes in the road.

But that being said, I don't think anyone has a right to define marriage for all people under the eyes of the court.

The eyes of the church, any church, are different. Some churches decree only one marriage is valid before God, and if that's what a subset of people believe, I have no problem with that. If your faith believes marriages should be arranged between consenting adults, I have no problem with that. If you believe alcohol should not be served at a wedding, I have no problem with that.

If, as some people postulate, the point of marriage is to stabilize society and provide for children, I have no problem with that.

I guess about the only thing I have a problem with, is people trying to impose their faith on me. I'm OK with my beliefs, thank you very much. So feel free to create your own church and make your own rules about who and how to marry. Just don't expect your rules to apply to everyone.

On a more practical level, marriage provides jobs for thousands of people, from caterers to divorce attorneys. With the way the economy is, we should all be promoting weddings as a way to stimulate the economy.

And while you're at it, Vote No on Proposition 8 - why shouldn't my homosexual friends have the same rights to be in a fucked up marriage as everyone else?

Arnold Schwarzenegger & the DMV

When Governor Gray Davis was recalled from office and the steroid fueled characteture of an action hero ran for Governor, his rallying cry was repeal the car tax because when Gray Davis repealed the discount - during a bust cycle - he was villified for it.

Well first off it wasn't a car tax, it was a discount on our annual registration fees that had been granted to the people of California because the state had so much funds, they didn't need it. But the law required the discount to be repealed when the budget wasn't so fat.

Well guess what, in typical California boom and bust cycles, we've gone bust again this year and the discount has been repealed. Last year I paid $48 to register my 1956 van that I bought in 1997 for $300, this year the state is charging me $62.

Don't get me wrong, I think it's the right thing to do, but after having to listen to the muscle man campaign on the evils of his predecessor for repealing the discount, I'm amazed this wasn't all over the headline news. In fact, I only found out about it today when I reviewed my Vehicle Registration Renewal Notice.

Talk about a double standard. Does this mean it's time to recall Schwarzenegger? Some people think so. Apparently the California State Prision Guard's Union submitted a petition calling for the man's recall - unfortunately, the state rejected it for not meeting the legal requirements. But's it's not only prision guards who are mad at Arnie, apparently his approval rating is just above that of GW, and the president of the California Republican Assembly refered to him as a complete failure according to the Houston Chronicle in today's paper.

I guess that's what happens when people elect a movie star for high office. I personally want smart people running things. People who are smarter than I am - a whole lot smarter than I am. Since when did being smart disqualifying a person from holding elected office?

What I want to know about the candidates

I contacted three presidential campaigns today with the following question:

Where do you stand on medical marijuana, assisted suicide and the ability of states to set stronger emission control standards than the federal government requires?

Can't the City of San Diego Get Anything Right?

City Council has resurrected their plan to rid the city of RVs, gardeners, plumbers and the rest of us messy folks. I guess the pension mess is resolved, we now have money to pay our Liberians and repair our parks, and the streets are no longer riddled with huge holes.

From R.V.’s United For Fair Parking:

Proposed Parking Ordinance Affecting All of San Diego!

This ordinance would prohibit ALL oversize vehicles, trailers, and recreational vehicles from parking on public streets between 10 pm and 6 am, 7 days a week! An over sized vehicle is defined as being over 7 ft high OR over 22 ft long. A permit to park your RV in front of your house overnight is available (72 hour max). Each permit would cost you $3.50 and you are restricted to 24 per year.

COMMERCIAL vehicles are included in this ordinance. NO permit is being considered for them. Your plumbing vehicle, tow truck and or gardening trailer will be banned from overnight parking on city streets.

I don't know about you, but when I come home at 9 PM or 2 AM, there is no parking in front of my house. So the person with the Hummer can park in front of my house for free, while I have to have a permit. What's up with that?

This is an issue the city keeps bringing up and I've attended many of the meetings over the years. The people opposed are a cross section of our community and their reasons as different as their lives. Seems to me this ordinance is geared towards our working class communities. People with enough land around their houses to park on their own property with a $250,000 RV will not be impacted. But me with a small, but tall van living in a crowded neighborhood get regulated to death.

The next thing you know we'll have to pay to park our bicycles at the beach.

STAND UP!

I'm Angry

And very sick to my stomach.

The corporate bailout has me fuming. When I fume I write letters to people. Since I read the San Francisco Gate online to remind myself of what twenty first century people think, I wrote them to vent my anger at my elected officials and anyone who cares to read. Find my letter online under the title US of C.

Here's the letter that was published by the San Francisco Chronicle on Friday, October 3:

US of C

Editor - I can't believe the Senate supported this horrendous bailout of large companies.
Small business is the engine that runs the American economy, and they bail out the large corporations? What kind of insanity is that?
In an economy when our future has been hocked by President Bush, the Senate just sentenced us to living with his mistakes for the next 20 years. How can they justify that? I'm guessing it's because the companies they are bailing out are the major contributors to their campaigns. Democracy is dead in the United States of Corporations.
KARIN ZIRK
San Diego

Senatorial Credulousness

Senate approves bailout after revisions, 74-25.

~ Need I say more....

Is Chocolate Helping or Harming Me?

I've been depending on the sweet, pure kick of organic fair trade dark chocolate as a motivator, pick me up, warm blanket and reward, but now as I'm aging, chocolate is starting to mess with my life - eye twitches, blurry vision after too much dark chocolate. I'm desperate. How do people survive life without chocolate? Can I continue to function while still reducing my chocolate intake?

Inquring minds want to know!