little3wing

I am now boyfriend-free. Look out boys! Actually, I don't know anyone in this town. The only friends I had were through my ex, so that's out. I need to find some friends. Maybe I'll whip up some applications.

Protect Marriage Washington, an anti-gay rights group organized in response to a referendum recognizing civil unions and all that they imply for gay couples, has released a commercial that I found pretty interesting. In particular, this part:

"In May of 2004, Gay marriage was legalized in Scandinavia...

What Happened..? Did you know... That year alone suicide rates doubled. The illegal drug rate increased 19 times. And to say the least the traditional picture of Marriage being One Man One Women was completely shattered. What about our country? Did you know..77% of ALL aids cases in the United States are related to homosexuality? Also, recent news reports indicate that the legalization of gay marriage will start a movement that will result in YOUR CHILDREN being taught about gay marriage as a normal form of life. Are we willing to let this happen? Whose future is really at stake?"

First off, I guess they don't know that Scandinavia isn't a country. In fact, Denmark, Sweden and Norway legalized same-sex partnerships in 1989, 1993 and 1994, respectively, but partners are still unable to marry in a church or adopt children. I can't find any evidence that anything happened in May 2004 in any Scandinavian country regarding gay marriage. So far, we have shot down two of the three points about the state of Scandinavia these days. Here's another: the research I have found indicates that suicide rates in all three countries have gone down in the last decade. So gay couples having legal partnerships (not even marriages) couldn't be the cause for a so-called increase in suicide by any stretch of the imagination.

Now, as for the fact about AIDS cases in the US, their numbers are pretty old. The statistics for 2007 indicate that AIDS cases related to homosexuality are more like 50%. So...I don't even know.

Lastly, I really don't think gay marriage will be taught in school as a normal form of life. In fact, I don't remember a whole lot about being "taught" about any form of marriage or relationship. I do know that I and some of my friends were either children of divorced parents or unmarried parents. At no point did any teacher sit all of us down and teach us about how it's perfectly fine to get divorced or have children out of wedlock. And trust me, never once did I hear an elementary school teacher even say the words "gay" or "lesbian". So it would follow that gay marriage would not be part of the public school curriculum, right?

And how can a "news report" indicate future trends? It's the news. It's not science, it's reporting things that happened and are currently happening.

I don't know if I can change anyone's mind about gay marriage. It's not really what I'm intending. I just want all of you to know when someone is spreading false information about it. In my opinion, it takes a special kind of hate to make up horrible statistics simply to deny consenting adults to marry other consenting adults, and it would be pretty pathetic if my marriage prospects hinged on that.

On October 6, a bill introduced by Sen. Al Franken which would bar the U.S. from doing business with contractors that include a "rape-clause" in their employee contracts was passed. It's pretty much a no-brainer, but why would we have to have this bill in the first place?

In 2005, a 20 year-old female employee of Halliburton/KBR was allegedly drugged and gang-raped by seven of her co-workers. The legal papers include this information:
"When she awoke the next morning still affected by the drug, she found her body naked and severely bruised, with lacerations to her vagina and anus, blood running down her leg, her breast implants ruptured and her pectoral muscles torn‚ which would later require reconstructive surgery. Upon walking to the rest room, she passed out again."

She was treated by a US army doctor "who gave forensic evidence to company officials. She says the firm placed her under guard in a shipping container and she was released only after her father asked the US embassy to intervene." (That's right; she "was detained in a shipping container for at least 24 hours without food, water, or a bed, and 'warned her that if she left Iraq for medical treatment, she'd be out of a job.'") "When the forensic evidence was handed to investigators two years later, crucial photographs and notes were missing."

Let me point out that one of her rapists actually confessed.

When she returned home to the United States, she was told that she could not file charges against either her rapists (even the one who had already confessed) nor the company. Apparently, it said so in the fine print of her contract.

Even more disturbing, this is not an isolated case. More allegations have recently come out. One woman claims she was fired after making complaints of sexual assault. Some I won't even write here because they are even more graphic (one woman remembers exactly what happened when she was raped by two co-workers).

So, when Al Franken introduced his bill and it passed, one would imagine this would be the end of my blog. However, there are a couple very important points left to talk about. Yes, the bill passed, but it passed 68-30. Thirty people in our Senate think that it's okay to have contracts with companies who contractually give immunity to rapists. Who are these thirty senators? Well, they were all Republicans. (On the Senate floor, Jeff Sessions (R-AL) called Franken's bill “a political attack directed at Halliburton.”) Because I think it's important that you all know who supports companies that legally protect rape, here are all of the senators who voted nay:

Alexander (R-TN)
Barrasso (R-WY)
Bond (R-MO)
Brownback (R-KS)
Bunning (R-KY)
Burr (R-NC)
Chambliss (R-GA)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Corker (R-TN)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
Ensign (R-NV)
Enzi (R-WY)
Graham (R-SC)
Gregg (R-NH)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Isakson (R-GA)
Johanns (R-NE)
Kyl (R-AZ)
McCain (R-AZ)
McConnell (R-KY)
Risch (R-ID)
Roberts (R-KS)
Sessions (R-AL)
Shelby (R-AL)
Thune (R-SD)
Vitter (R-LA)
Wicker (R-MS)

 

8-16-09 Meet the Press with guests Tom Daschle, Tom Coburn, Rachel Maddow, and Dick Armey.

When questioned on the health care bill's end-of-life decision inclusion, Tom Coburn says that "government shouldn't weigh in on it". I don't understand why people think this is a government decision. The government does not weigh in on our end-of-life decisions. The bill simply proposes that patients are covered for consultations with their doctors about this issue. It is completely voluntary for every American under this bill. No one wants to kill you or me.

Apparently, on the issue of health care, the President is approved by 43% and disapproved by 49% of those polled. I didn't catch who administered the poll.

Dick Armey cannot refute the fact that he and his organization, FreedomWorks, is associated with groups that glorify violence at town hall meetings. The group in question is Tea Party Patriots, which has a video of a violent incident at a town hall meeting on their front page, and which is a partner of FreedomWorks. Rachel Maddow really kills him on this point.

Now, Tom Coburn says that most people who get a referral have already had one opinion. Speaking from my own experience and the experiences of people close to me, this is not even almost the case. If I know I want to see a dermatologist, or a psychologist, or a whatever-ogist, I have to go to my general practitioner and get a referral to some doctor in my network. Not because I want a second opinion. I want a specialist. Sarah's advice: if you have an argument to make, don't make points that every American can refute.

When David Gregory brings up the subject of the public plan in the bill, Tom Daschle says that if we want to keep costs down and keep insurance companies accountable (yes, please), a public option is the answer. Dick Armey, of course, claims that the bill is unfair, and that it will discourage private options. I'm not sure what his point is here. Honestly, I have a private plan, and I'm pretty discouraged. Maddow, who is my girl, says that the fact that so many of us are uninsured (and I might add, unhappily insured) won't be solved by Coburn, Armey, and most Republicans' beloved option to be able to buy insurance across state lines, but rather what we need is health care reform with a public option.

Coburn's ending statement proclaims that your and my doctor won't be able to do what he knows is in your and my best interest. Because the big bad government won't allow it. Completely unlike your and my insurance company, who decides that surely we only need to see a specialist "x" times a year and we already had cancer before we came to them, so they can't be expected to pay for anything.

I think Tom Daschle made the ultimate point in the discussion: "...Are we building this plan for insurance companies or the American people?"

There are many more ridiculous, comfortingly sane, and inciting points that I missed as a result of my attempt at sort-of-liveblogging. If anyone has anything to add, please do.

Politicians have been telling people things that have been spreading like wildfire. Like, the health care reform bill sets up a "death panel" that judges whether a given citizen is worth the cost of health care. And that every five years, the elderly will have mandatory consultations with their doctors who will tell them how to end their lives sooner (I don't even know what to say to that one).

The thing is, the "death panels" already exist. They are your health insurance policies. Yours and mine. Read up on it. Private health insurance companies decide if it is cost effective to pay for your surgeries and treatments.

Furthermore, a whole lot of people who are worried are already on government health care--Medicare. Ask your grandparents, it's pretty popular.

But this is the funniest thing I've seen yet. An article in Investor's Business Daily says,

 

What if your boyfriend's parents, while joking about his accidental journey into a bad part of Chicago, said that he was "the wrong shade of tan for that part of town. You can get a tan on vacation, but it's still the wrong shade of tan..." Maybe you suspect his parents are these super Italian, rich white people that have a lot of cars and a big house and they say that fat women look like "...you know...country women"

And then the very next day, you find out that your deadbeat Puerto Rican grandfather was actually your black grandfather.

Do you tell your boyfriend that no, he's not dating a latino chick, he's dating a black chick?

I'm watching Pat Buchanan on the Rachel Maddow Show, and I sincerely feel ill. Why do people go to him for his comments? Is it just for shock factor? Is is because they can count on him saying something so disgustingly offensive and possibly even make up facts to support it? He claims that the reason 108 of 110 Supreme Court justices have been white is because white men wrote the constitution and founded our country, which means they deserve it more. (At one point he says "100% of the people who died at Gettysburg were white men" History lesson: slaves and ex-slaves fought in the Civil War on each side respectively.)

Since Barack Obama announced his nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court, I've heard so many things that disturbed me. That the democrats picked a "Hispanic chick lady" (I'm actually quoting Glenn Beck) as a part of affirmative action. That she was racist for her "wise Latina" comment which was taken grossly out of context, but which, in context, I wholly agree with.

I doubt any of you have actually been watching the confirmation hearings. I've watched a little during the last two days, and it turns my stomach. It seems to be the Republican strategy to try to alienate Hispanic voters. Not only did they constantly refer to the "wise Latina" comments (again, completely out of context), but they kept comparing her to other Puerto Rican judges. "Had you voted with Cabranes, himself a — of Puerto Rican ancestry — had you voted with him, you could have changed that case." Yep. Apparently, Senator Sessions is of the opinion that Puerto Ricans should stick together. Senator Graham said she was a bully judge and asked her if she had a "temperment problem". Senator Coburn joked around for a moment, doing a Ricky Ricardo impression (telling Sotomayor, “You’d have lots of ’splaining to do.”) Now, I might let that one slide, because it could have been completely innocent. But after bringing up race so much in the hearings of a Puerto Rican judge makes doing impressions of Cuban tv characters seem like a bad choice.

I'm really not sorry for my soap box moment. If you made it to the end of this entry, I thank you, and hope you take some time to think about the people who are going to ask for your vote in the future. I don't hate Republicans. But I hope most would agree that the ones in Washington are shockingly ignorant douchebags.

By the way--yes, I'm Puerto Rican.

 

NYT confirmation hearings liveblog

 

 

Things I will miss about Chicago when I move to St. Charles on Saturday:

- my friends

- First Aid Comics (James Nurss is a great comic-guy to have)

- the Borders two blocks from my apartment

- the autographed pictures of Obama plastered all over the local Walgreens

- the University of Chicago campus

- downtown in general

- Chicago Transit Authority (I'm not even being sarcastic. Having access to anywhere in Chicago at almost any time is worth the fart smell.)

- thinking I'll actually go to Belmont sometime, even though I never do

- thinking I'll actually go to Angels & Kings

- concerts

- crazy and/or homeless people doing crazy things (wheelchair fight on the #6, guy sitting on sidewalk saying to me "What's up, Jesus?")

- the Point

- Star of Siam

- Edwardo's on 57th

- having a grocery store across the street from my apartment

- my new hot neighbor who my boyfriend doesn't need to worry about because she's a girl

- city pride

- being able to claim references in Fall Out Boy songs

Texas lawmaker: Asians should change their names to make them 'easier for Americans to deal with.'

On Tuesday, State Rep. Betty Brown (R) caused a firestorm during House testimony on voter identification legislation when she said that Asian-Americans should change their names because they're too hard to pronounce:

"Rather than everyone here having to learn Chinese - I understand it's a rather difficult language - do you think that it would behoove you and your citizens to adopt a name that we could deal with more readily here?" Brown said.

Brown later told [Organization of Chinese Americans representative Ramey] Ko: "Can't you see that this is something that would make it a lot easier for you and the people who are poll workers if you could adopt a name just for identification purposes that's easier for Americans to deal with?"

Yesterday, Brown continued to resist calls to apologize. Her spokesman said that Democrats "want this to just be about race."

I recorded "America's Suitehearts" for the Fall Out Boy karaoke contest on myspace. I need at least 100 plays to qualify for the contest. *hint, hint*

http://ksolo.myspace.com/actions/showSongProfile.do?rid=1113155&sid=28320&uid=3112310

I'm thinking very seriously about finishing my sentence at Columbia College. Maybe cultural studies. Maybe even journalism. I don't know. I have crazy butterflies in my stomach. It may be a horrible idea. Then again, the other idea is moving in with the boyfriend and getting my associate's from Elgin Community College before going...somewhere else...to get my BA. In...something. Ergh, I don't know.

Russell Tice, former National Security Agency analyst, just revealed on Keith Olbermann that the government had access to all Americans' communications--and monitored all communications.

He says that he was ordered to look at certain organizations in order to determine which ones were no threat and didn't need to be looked at further. However, it eventually became apparent to him that the "discard pile" of organizations was actually the "save pile". Some of these targeted organizations, according to him, were news organizations, reporters, and journalists.

The United States spied on our journalists. And everyone else.

As all of you know, wiretaps fall under the category of a search, and therefore require a court-ordered warrant in order to conduct. That is, in recent years, unless the government can make a clear, direct link to terrorist activities. Obviously, most of us are innocent of terrorism...so....

So 1984.

Er, in my drunkenness last week, I misspoke. Or mistyped or whatever. I represented two people as a one people two journals ago. Our ex-President admitted to giving the go-ahead on the torture of a bad dude, but we apparently didn't get any information from him until we quit torturing him and started buddying up to him. So, yeah.

Bishop Gene Robinson, first openly gay bishop of the Anglican Church is on Rachel Maddow right now.

It just made me think of the fact that the Catholic Church doesn't shun homosexuality--just as long as you have sex with little boys.

P.S. Cheers to Bishop Robinson for giving the prayer at the pre-inauguration whatever-it-is on Sunday.
P.P.S. Pastor Rick Warren isn't giving interviews until after the inauguration. "His prayer will speak for itself". Translation: he's a fraud. He compared homosexuality to incest and pedophelia in an interview, then in his own vlog he denied believing that. Wow. You do realize that many of the things you say are recorded, right? On tv?

I'm drunk. I wanted to hurry and write this so I can take advantage of my drunkiosity.

This, I should mention, is the first time I have ever been drunk.

I know that wine is supposed to help with cramps, so I drank some. However, after drinking my glass of really disgusting wine that Kaile and I picked up at Binny's, I noticed that the glass I was drinking from was quite large. You see, I have absolutely no concept for measurements. Added to the fact that I never, ever drink, this means I am now thoroughly drunk.

So, I've already drunk dialed my mother and Kaile while watching Keith Olbermann (the one thing that protects my dignity), saying that:

The alleged would-be 20th 9-11 hi-jacker, who is held (I think) at Guantanamo Bay, cannot be prosecuted, according to the woman in charge of prosecution at the Pentagon, because we tortured him. Yes, we subjected him to sleep deprivation and cold to the point that it was "life-threatening" and, at one point, his heart rate fell to 35 beats per minute. So this means his confession cannot be trusted. So, either we have been holding an innocent person for years (which is bad) or we have been holding a guilty person for years but now cannot prosecute him and thus deny justice to all of the people who have suffered as a result of 9-11 (which is also bad).
Also, President Bush has admitted--in a televised interview--that he had a say in the torture of this suspect. When this person was captured, he brought in lawyers to advise him as to whether or not certain acts of torture were in fact torture or not. He (obviously) picked particularly radical lawyers to advise him, and people in the know say that he cannot hide behind his bad legal advice. It is spelled out clearly that torture isn't allowed in the Geneva Convention, so Bush can't pretend he didn't know what was done was wrong. So that means we could see Bush and Cheney and many others in court. This is both unbelievable and awesome to me.

In conclusion, this blog was reallllllly hard to write in my current state.
I am a passionate drunk.

I found this article on Newsweek.com (courtesy of Perez Hilton) on the Christian argument for gay marriage. It's pretty impressive, and I only hope people against same-sex marriage actually read it.

Gay Marriage: Our Mutual Joy

A few observations I made throughout the first Presidential debate of '08.

(1) McCain proposes freeze in spending on everything but defense, veterans (and third thing I don't remember). Not really feeling this.

(2) McCain is a little too partial to nuclear power for my taste. I think nuclear waste is something we should think about a little more seriously.

(3) Obama reference's this administration's "orgy of spending". I approve.

(4) McCain, please learn to say "Guantanamo" properly.

(5) McCain keeps calling Iran an "existential threat". I really don't think that's what he means. Existential means "Of, relating to, or dealing with existence." Maybe he means that it is a threat that exists? Well, that's obvious. Maybe he means that Iran threatens the existence of...the world? I'm not exactly clear on this.

(6) CRAP! Cable goes out for a minute while still talking about Iran. But we're good.

(7) On meeting with Ahmadinejad, Chavez, and Castro: speaking to people we disagree with does not legitimize their actions. McCain seems to want to punish baddies by refusing to talk to them.

(8) Obama: "Ahmadinejad is not the most powerful person in Iran. Maybe he's not the person we should be talking to." Thank you for making an intelligent point I've not heard from a politician. Ever.

(9) No preconditions "doesn't mean we invite them over for tea". -Obama. Once again, thank you for being rational and clever.

(10) Obama points out that when we cut off talks with N. Korea, things went way south when it comes to the threat level. Didn't get exact figures.

(11) Some of McCain's own advisors agree with meeting without preconditions. Really? McCain, you got some 'splaining to do.

(12) On Russia: Though they seem to pretty much agree, McCain can't resist calling Obama naive. Also, says that he "looked into Putin's eyes and saw three letters: a K, a G, and a B". You're silly.

(13) McCain voted twenty-three times against alternative energies? Damn.

(14) We can see that you're super into off-shore drilling, McCain. Please ease off on it. It gets old.

(15) Gold star for McCain for saying that we need better trained interrogators so that America never tortures. Of course, as a former POW, we'd expect him to take issue with torture.

In conclusion:
McCain relies way too heavily on calling Obama naive. Continually answers questions in the form of "Senator Obama doesn't understand..." Obama, on the other hand, tends to give McCain credit when they agree. Seems much less bitchy on the whole. But mainly, DEAR GOD, JOHN, WE KNOW YOU WERE A POW. Can the man not engage in a conversation without pulling out his medals?

It's troubling to me that when I go to my profile it shows that I only have seven friends. However, when I go to edit my friends it shows all of them. I just hope my profile isn't sick. That's all.

Okay, not that there's anything wrong with using matchmaking websites, I just never thought I'd do it. Argh. I see this as not so much a sign that I'm looking for a meaningful relationship as a sign that I fail at life and am destined to end my days as a crazy cat lady. You know, the one whose house you never walked too close to because she was a witch? Yeah, that's me. I'll die amongst the piles of decades-old newspapers I'll horde, and by the time my corpse is found, it will be partially eaten by my seventy cats. I'm more of a dog person, but I'm willing to be flexible.

It seems like people I know from back home keep dying.

A month before I graduated highschool, a guy who was going to ask me to prom my freshman year died in a wreck. Since I've been away, my ex-boyfriend died, a friend's dad, a childhood friend who was only eighteen, and yesterday, my friend Krista's brother drowned at the lake. They still haven't found him.

I barely remember Josh but my heart really hurts for Krista. We used to go to her grandad's house, which was next door to mine before I moved into town, and spend all day in his backyard. We were convinced his well-house was haunted. We dug a tomb for a dead bird we found once, and buried a dead beetle in a pen cap. We made bookmarks decorated with pressed flowers in his travel trailer (which, if I remember correctly, was also haunted) and decided to go into business. A couple of years ago her grandad passed away too.

Things have changed so much since I left home three years ago. About half of the girls I went to school with are married or engaged, and a few have had babies already. Marriages have ended, people have been involved in sex scandals (mostly with minors), and some of my friends have changed so much that I can hardly recognize them. I've found out that one of the people I lean on the most has attempted suicide over a man. Nothing stays the same, but it's hard to watch the life I used to know change so much, especially when I'm not actually there to see it.

I don't mean to be depressing. Things sometimes just seem too surreal.