civil unions for all

there’s a great thread on the daily kos site about gay marriage and civil unions today. the gist of the argument is best stated by a poster named pastordan, a minister:

“I believe that God sanctifies the covenant made between two people, and the state legally recognizes that same covenant, whether made in a church or not. It’s one less piece of paper for me to sign, and one step toward a more equitable society for all of us.”

this seems so simple, so clearheaded. why isn’t this happening?
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what i saw

boy have i been lazy.

not really. i helped cook thanksgiving dinner, and more importantly, i ate it, which takes much more time. i also helped put together all of our holiday cards. it’s kirk’s year to design it (we take turns) but i help out. not to mention everyday life stuff.

so i haven’t blogged for many days. my sincere apologies…i’ll get back on the stick.
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the menu

be jealous. be very jealous. kirk and i love to cook, and any excuse will do. thanksgiving is an especially good one. we usually go to his parents’ house in reading, pa., but this year we are staying home and they are eating at cracker barrel, which is legal now, at least for me, since they stopped firing all the gays.
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random radio musings

first off, i missed my first day of blogging since i started this mess. i had wanted to keep an unbroken streak for as long as possible, but i worked my butt off around the house yesterday until late into the night. at 12:03, when i had finally sat down for a few minutes to watch u2 on saturday night live, i realized i had missed blogging.

it’s not a catastrophe. but i’m a little disappointed in myself. just a little. and this blogging software doesn’t allow you to cheat and backdate an entry, which i like. dirty little secret of blogging revealed.

but this morning, here i am blogging again. after a nice calm morning of npr, which i’ve decided to rediscover.
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abc news, reevaluated

i’m an abc news fan. i think it’s a holdover from when they actually were the best in the business. and i have a very dear friend who was a producer at abc news, and she’s told me so many great stories of how they were the best and why, that i still watch them almost exclusively.

post-election, though, i’m taking a break from tv news. i was overdosed, and needed a bit of a break from it. so, news fast time.

but, while watching abc news pre-election, i had started to notice a conservative slant to their reporting. not so much as to compromise integrity, but subtle things. i wondered if ownership had influenced news decision making, or if it was an inevitable product of budget cuts and pooled coverage.

then today i read a story about an upcoming 20/20 story on matthew shepard that, while i haven’t seen it and thus have not finalized my opinion, has the potential to send me over the edge into full-blown rage.
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childhood unconsciousness

everyone has their backlog of stories. i sure do. i really respect a person who has the confidence to be able to tell a story or two on themselves. a little humility and self-deprecating humor goes a long way with me.

so, in that spirit, i’ll occasionally tell a story or two on myself on here. that way when the probably inevitable senility sets in (both my mom and my dad have alzheimers. poor kirk.) i’ll be able to read these stories (assuming i still can) and say, “my, what an interesting life this fellow had.”

don’t be offended. you gotta laugh. what else can you do?
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my vote for rev. al

it’s been a weekend full of projects. the coffee soda always helps with that–i don’t normally drink beverages with caffeine (although i have nothing really against them…) so when i do it’s look out world. these are the thrills you get when you are 41 and boring. it’s come down to this.

so i’ll take a break from the furniture reclamation (we found a great hutch top on the street that makes an awesome bookshelf), the making of homemade mozzarella (astonishingly easy, you should try it), the general cleaning (kirk calls it “zipping” because i zip around the house like a maniac) and tell you about the day i voted for rev. al sharpton for president.
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the big thing

ronald reagan got everything wrong, as i’ve said numerous times already in these blogs. you could look it up.

except that he got the one big thing right. the soviet union and the cold war. say what you will about that rat bastard, and i do, he got that right, even when at the time everyone was telling him he was getting it wrong. he stuck with what he thought was right and it turned out to be right.

was he lucky? i don’t know. were we lucky? damn straight we were.
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the game

i’m reading “the poisonwood bible” by barbara kingsolver.

i’m a great believer that things and events come to you when they are supposed to, and it’s up to you to figure out why or be open enough to possibilities to let the intended meaning reveal itself, and this book is no exception.

the book was lying on a table of free stuff at work just before the election, and it said to me, “pick me up and read me.” so i picked it up and, after the election when i wanted some distraction, i started to read it. aaaargh.

it’s about a family of fundamental christians. just what i needed, to get my mind off of current events.
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two-sided demonization

karl rove was on “meet the press” and various sunday shows yesterday. i didn’t watch any of them, as i’m still on my news fast. getting over the overload.

i did see a clip of him on fox news. i wasn’t watching fox news; some other channel ran the fox news clip. just to clarify.

and, of course, he claimed his mandate from 51% of americans and proclaimed that mr. bush would be hotly pursuing the passage of the anti-gay-marriage constitutional amendment. it’s a priority.

you could have put money on that. but we were getting screwed by the democrats too.
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changing the subject

i’m forcing myself to change the subject today. not, understand, because this massively messed-up election and electorate isn’t on my mind twenty-four seven. because it is. i dream about it, and i daydream about it. and i’m far from finished with telling you what i think. i haven’t even really started yet on the governmental and economic inequities between red and blue states, which is becoming my obsessive passion.

but i have to force myself to take a break, because my little inner voice is telling me to do so. not those big loud voices that talk to me inside my head, which i’ve had to name to palliate them a bit. not those. my little self-preservation voice is telling me to do so.

so i’ll tell you about richard teeter, and el goya.
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