Letter to the President

Mr. President,

Words can't adequately convey how disappointed I am by your decision to have the Justice Department file a brief opposing a challenge to the federal Defense of Marriage Amendment. Despite your stated opposition to DOMA during the campaign, it seems that you now feel that denying same-sex couples the same benefits as heterosexual couples is a legitimate means of "preserving scarce government resources".

In other words, equality is too expensive.

I have been with my partner for over six years. I am fortunate that my employer counts her as a "spousal equivalent" for the purposes of health insurance; however, unlike my straight married co-workers, the IRS considers this to be a taxable "fringe benefit". I also know that should my partner outlive me, she will not be eligible to receive my Social Security benefits; the same benefits that I've worked for all my life, just like any heterosexual person, would be denied to my spouse solely because we are both female.

How is it fair that I should be treated differently from any other taxpaying citizen based on my sexual orientation? How is this anything other than gross discrimination? Why is it acceptable to the U.S. Government to define my relationship as “less-than” because of my gender and my partner’s gender?

I was excited about your election. I honestly never thought that a family that looks like my family would ever be the First Family of the United States. I was also pleased that during the campaign, that you said you would be a "fierce advocate" for LGBT equality. However, since taking office, you have repeatedly and clearly sent the message that I am still a second-class citizen in the country of my birth, this time because of who I love rather than the color of my skin.

Fifty years ago, had either my partner or I of been male, we would still have been denied the right to have our marriage legally recognized in many states because I am black and she is white. Would the Justice Department have filed a similar brief to argue that interracial marriage should not be recognized by the Federal Government? Would you have argued that it’s more important that the government not spend tax money by denying benefits to taxpayers if they happen to fall in love with someone of another race?

If it’s not acceptable to tell me that I can’t marry the person I love because she’s white, why is it not only acceptable but desireable to tell me that I can’t marry the person I love because she’s a woman?

I truly did think better of you, Mr. President. I believed that you meant what you said. How sad to see that your words were empty. It seems that “change” and “hope” are only available for some Americans—not for all.

OH, BARACK OBAMA NO!

"The constitutional propriety of Congress's decision to decline to extend federal benefits immediately to newly recognized types of marriages is bolstered by Congress's articulated interest in preserving the scarce resources of both the federal and State governments. DOMA ensures that evolving understandings of the institution of marriage at the State level do not place greater financial and administrative obligations on federal and state benefits programs. Preserving scarce government resources — and deciding to extend benefits incrementally — are well-recognized legitimate interests under rational-basis review. See Butler, 144 F.3d at 625 ("There is nothing irrational about Congress's stated goal of conserving social security resources, and Congress can incrementally pursue that goal."); Hassan v. Wright, 45 F.3d 1063, 1069 (7th Cir. 1995) ("[P]rotecting the fisc provides a rational basis for Congress' line drawing in this instance."). Congress expressly relied on these interests in enacting DOMA: Government currently provides an array of material and other benefits to married couples in an effort to promote, protect, and prefer the institution of marriage. . . . If [a State] were to permit homosexuals to marry, these marital benefits would, absent some legislative response, presumably have to be made available to homosexual couples and surviving spouses of homosexual marriages on the same terms as they are now available to opposite-sex married couples and spouses. To deny federal recognition to same-sex marriages will thus preserve scarce government resources, surely a legitimate government purpose."

This is from the US Justice Department's filing in a challenge to the Defense of Marriage Act in California. This paragraph effectively says that it's okay for me to be taxed on Ruth's health benefits when my straight married co-workers spouses' benefits are tax-exempt--because there's only so much money, and the government has to preserve resources. If I die, Ruth doesn't get my Social Security benefits, and oh well, I guess that's the Gay Tax.

I distinctly remember Obama promising to work to repeal DOMA during the campaign. Yeah, only not so much.

The air is humming...

Could it be?

YES, WE DID!

"Rosa sat so Martin could walk, Martin walked so Barack could run, Barack is running so our children can fly."

That Old Earth Logic

Pressed about what insights into recent Russian actions she gained by living in Alaska, Palin answered: "They're our next door neighbors and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska."

To quote one of the commenters at Balloon Juice:

"And when I look out my window I can see the moon. Doesn’t make me a fucking astronaut now, does it?"

Smells Like Desperate

McCain's latest ad attacks Obama for sponsoring "Legislation to teach "comprehensive sex education" to kindergardeners."

SB 99 (which did not pass) would have lowered the start of sex ed from 6th Grade to Kindergarten. The bill included opt-out provisions for parents and specified that "all course material and instruction shall be age and developmentally appropriate. " It emphasized the consequences of pregnancy and STD as well as how to say no to unwanted sexual advances.

Why does John McCain believe that children should not be taught that it's okay to say no to inappropriate touching?

ETA: A noun, a verb, and POW:

"It is shameful and downright perverse for the McCain campaign to use a bill that was written to protect young children from sexual predators as a recycled and discredited political attack against a father of two young girls – a position that his friend Mitt Romney also holds. Last week, John McCain told Time magazine he couldn’t define what honor was. Now we know why," --Obama spokesman Bill Burton

"The Obama campaign has not disputed any of the facts in our ad, but if they want to question John McCain’s honor and record of service to this country, then that’s a debate we welcome."--McCain spokesman Brian Rogers

Also...

Can you just imagine the reaction if the Democratic National Convention had included a party featuring a band called "Hookers & Blow"?

Yay family values!

WTF2: Political Boogaloo

I'm actually starting to feel bad for Sarah Palin. More and more, her pick is looking like a spite choice on McCain's part, since Rove wouldn't let him have Joe Lieberman and McCain can't stand Romney. So he picks this unknown that he's met all of twice, without vetting her (clearly!), because she's a woman.

And now in addition to the fact that she has no experience to speak of and is in the middle of an investigation over alleged misuse of her office, her 17-year-old daughter is five months pregnant. Obama took the high road and said unequivocally that attacks on candidates' families are out of bounds. I think he's dead right. I also wish that the McCain campaign can't be counted on to do the same. Why be above mudslinging when you can pick apart the senior thesis that your opponent's wife wrote for possible anti-white sentiment? Or when you can try to tie your opponent--who was 8 at the time--to the actions of a '60's radical? Or when you can release ads implying that your opponent is the Antichrist? But I suppose you can't expect anything else from the guy who hired the man who slimed his family eight years ago to work on his currrent campaign.

There is a failure of judgement here, but it's not Palin's that I'm worried about. It's McCain's. Choosing someone to be your running mate without knowing everything there is to know first, and allowing yourself and your party to be completely blindsided tells me that you're either arrogant enough to think it doesn't matter or too short-sighted to realize it'll be an issue. Or both.

As for Palin, all that really needs to be said is that I believe that deciding whether or not to have a child is a private decision for each individual woman to make--and that it's too bad Sarah Palin doesn't agree.

WTF?

I'm still stuck there with regards to McCain's VP choice. I'm really starting to wonder if there's something to the idea that the Republican brand has been so tarnished that the GOP is saying, "Screw it; let the Dems have this one--they'll just have to clean up W's shit anyway."

Let's be real clear:

If he really wanted to choose a woman as his running mate, there were other alternatives with more substantive resumes, like Condoleezza Rice, Kay Bailey Hutchinson, Olympia Snowe, or even Carly Fiorina...except all of them are pro-choice or otherwise unacceptable to the hard right. Sarah Palin was chosen (after McCain had met her exactly twice) because she appeals to the American Taliban wing of the Republican Party (creationist, global warming denier, forced pregnancy hardliner) who've never trusted McCain, and because she's female, which the McCain campaign clearly thinks will appeal to the mythical hordes of disappointed Clinton backers.

Joe Biden wasn't my first choice, but if, gods forbid, something should happen to Obama, there's no question in my mind that he'd be up to the job. But even McCain's own people don't actually think she's qualified to step in if something happens to the 72-year-old guy who's had four bouts with cancer: "She's going to learn national security at the foot of the master for the next four years, and most doctors think that he’ll be around at least that long," McCain advisor Charlie Black said yesterday. Now there's a ringing endorsement.

Or you can let Palin speak for herself:

"I've been so focused on state government, I haven't really focused much on the war in Iraq." --2007

"What is it exactly that the vice president does all day?" --July 2008

She has zero experience at the national level. She has no experience with economic issues outside of Alaska, which is in a unique situation as a state with oil money coming in and a relatively small population. She has no experience with security issues, and being commander in chief of your state's National Guard doesn't count. (I certainly wouldn't count it for Arnie, and he's the governor of a state that ranks in the top ten largest economies in the world.) The only things she brings to the table are far right cred and two X chromosomes.

And you know what? It's no more unfair to call her out on that than it was to point out that Clarence Thomas was rated lower than any previous Supreme Court nominee by the American Bar Association, or to note that the only reason Bush I chose him was because it was Thurgood Marshall's seat and Thomas was black. Attacking her lack of experience is absolutely legitimate when the McCain campaign has been hammering on Obama's lack of experience since he became the presumptive nominee. I don't understand how criticizing Obama's lack of experience is acceptable, but criticizing Palin's is sexist. That sounds like, "You can't pick on her because she's a girl!" And that, my friends, is bullshit.

Obama's Speech

I'll have more to say later; I'm kind of worn out tonight. What I will do, though, is use a baseball metaphor, for which I totally and completely blame Telesilla.

Obama needed to hit it out of the park tonight. He did--but he waited until the bases were loaded and knocked out a Grand Slam.

This right here? Is history, folks.

Putting aside my differences with the Democratic Party and with Barack Obama, I just watched as Hillary Clinton moved to name Obama the nominee by acclimation.

Think about that for a minute:

The Democratic Party, which was originally formed as a pro-slavery party, just accepted a motion by a woman to make a black man their nominee for president.

Change does happen.

Biden. Huh.

I'm actually pretty pleased, and I think Biden's a good choice for several reasons.

He knows how many houses he has: one. In Delaware. He commutes between there and DC on Amtrak. He ranks at or near the bottom in terms of wealth among U.S. Senators. He's a Catholic from a working-class family in Scranton, PA--where they love him. He'll help neutralize Obama's so-called "Appalachian problem" and defuse the stupid "elitist" nonsense coming from Seven-House John.

He's got a personal narrative that can go up against POW John POW McPOW Cain's. His wife and daughter were killed in a car wreck caused by a drunk driver and his sons were badly injured. He was sworn in to the Senate for the first time from their hospital room. One of his sons is scheduled to be deployed to Iraq this October.

He's got serious foreign policy cred. This neutralizes another perceived weakness of Obama's while making it easier to chip away at the myth of McCain as some kind of foreign policy expert. Also, the Beltway Villagers like him--which is important, since Obama's got to work against the political press whose lips are surgically attached to St. John's Maverick dick. (I apologize for any permanent mental scarring caused by this image.)

He's an attack dog. Sometimes he misfires and shoots himself in the foot, no question. But he's also the guy who helped doom Rudy Giuliani's candidacy by calling him out and coining the phrase, "A noun, a verb, and 9/11" to describe him. He's already out there swinging: "John McCain will have to figure out which of his seven kitchen tables to sit at."

Biden's not perfect. I still remember his disgraceful performance during Clarence Thomas' confirmation hearings. He voted for the war in Iraq. He's only got a 60% rating from the ACLU. And he was responsible for the horrific bankruptcy bill that basically gives the credit card companies the right to fuck you up the ass without lube--and yes, that's personal for me. But he definitely brings stuff to the ticket--without being someone who will overshadow the nominee. And frankly, I'd much rather see him on the ticket than Bayh or Kaine. Sebelius would have been nice, but the reality is that she's largely unknown outside of Kansas, a state that's unlikely to go blue, and she does nothing to offset Obama's perceived experience gap, particularly in foreign policy. Richardson was my choice, but he's got some questionable stuff in his background with possible sexual harassment.

What I honestly don't understand is why anyone thought for a second that Obama was going to choose Hillary Clinton as his running mate. No matter where she'd be on the ticket, the visceral loathing many on the right feel for the woman they spent 8 years demonizing would bring out the vote--including the conservative evangelicals, who are largely underwhelmed by McCain. Also, there's no reality in which Barack wants Bill within 100 miles of the White House--and based on what we saw in the primaries, Bill is incapable of shutting the fuck up and not getting in Hillary's way.

I can't see Hillary accepting it, either. If Obama wins, then the VP's next chance at the top job will be 2016. Clinton will be 69, and given how much whispering there is about McCain's age, can you imagine what people will say about a nearly 70-year-old woman? More importantly, the VP's job is to support the President. Hillary spent 8 years doing that for a man she loves; why on earth would she want to do it again for a guy she doesn't like very much, who came in and captured the nomination when it was supposed to be her turn?

And honestly, in what universe did anyone really think the black guy wasn't going to pick a white guy for his running mate? Much as I'd have liked to see two people of color on the ticket (Obama/Richardson), I'm not sure this country's ready for one nontraditional candidate on the ticket, let alone two.

I'm just crossing my fingers in hopes that McCain will pick Mitt Romney for his running mate.

The Audacity of Hope

This is my great-grandfather. He was the first African-American elected to office in Memphis--and the last, until 1960.

I wish he could have seen this. And my grandfather as well. And my dad. And my aunt and my godfather.

When I called my mother today, she said she'd always hoped she'd live to see this.

And you know what? I agree with Michelle Obama.

For the first time in my adult life, I really am proud of my country.

My thoughts on the Democratic primary; let me show you them

Way back in elementary school, I knew exactly what I wanted to be when I grew up:

President of the United States.

That, of course, was before I discovered that I liked girls and boys, and that I was kinky, and that I had serious problems with Christianity--plus the whole anger control problem, being well to the left of most of the country, and, you know, being crazy. What didn't stop me, though, was the idea that I couldn't be President because I'm black and female. I just figured I'd be the first.

(Dude, I even memorized the oath of office. Just in case.)

Ironically, when the primary campaign started, I was planning to vote for a white guy: Dennis Kucinich. Not only was he against the war and had always been against the war, but he and Mike Gravel were the only candidates on record as supporting full marriage equality. I was annoyed by the presumption that I should vote for Clinton because she's female or that I should vote for Obama because he's black--though I will note that it was the Clinton supporters like Gloria Steinem and the head of NY NOW who rendered me invisible as a black woman--and frankly, I thought they were both way too centrist for my tastes.

Kucinich dropped out before Super Tuesday, and I had to decide between voting for him anyway (as I did in 2004 when I voted for Dean a month after he'd dropped out of the race), voting for Clinton, and voting for Obama. In the end, I voted for Obama because I believed that the number of people who won't vote for the black guy will ultimately be smaller than the number of people who won't vote for a Clinton, and especially Hillary, who the right spent eight years demonizing.

It wasn't until Obama's speech on race that I turned to and said, "You know, maybe there is something to this 'hope' stuff." The two things that struck me most were the fact that he wrote that speech himself, and the fact that, to paraphrase Jon Stewart, he talked to the American people as if we were adults--on the topic that has been called the "third rail" of American political discourse.

At that point, while I really did want Obama to get the nomination, I would still have felt okay with voting for Clinton. It would have been another "vote against the Republican" election, but I'm used to that; it's not like I was all that enthused about Dukakis, Clinton, Gore or Kerry. I was even making a concerted effort not to hold comments by campaign surrogates like Carville and Ferraro against the candidate herself, since I certainly didn't want Obama to be held responsible for every dumbshit thing someone said on Daily Kos.

Then Clinton did three things that pissed me off:

1. She talked about "obliterating" Iran.

2. She proposed her pandering, pointless gas tax holiday, and when even economists like Paul Krugman, who supported her, detailed how this was a bad idea, she dismissed criticisms from "experts".

3. She said in an interview with USA Today that she would be the better nominee because a recent poll showed that "Senator Obama's support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again...There's a pattern emerging here."

The first two are excellent illustrations of why the country is in the mess we're in right now. We have a leadership who thinks nothing of attacking a nation that hasn't attacked us and killing hundreds of thousands (we think--there's no official count of Iraqi dead) of civilians. We also have a leader who personifies smug ignorance, and doesn't need "experts" to tell him he's wrong. If I wanted more of that, I'd vote for McCain.

The third statement, in addition to being flat-out wrong--Obama got a greater share of the white vote in Pennsylvania, Indiana, and North Carolina than he did in Ohio; Clinton's information was based on old poll data--is using a particularly nasty racial dog whistle no matter how you slice it. Either she's saying that she should be the nominee because white people are still too racist to vote for the black guy, or she's saying that the only hard-working Americans are white. I don't actually think Clinton herself is racist, which in a way makes it worse, because it's another instance of her saying and doing anything to get elected.

Right now, if Clinton was the Democratic nominee, I'd have to think long and hard about whether or not to vote for her. Not because she's a woman or because she's white. Not because she cries or doesn't cry, or how "likeable" she is. Not because of her surrogates or the bloggers or anything other than the way she herself has conducted this campaign and the things that she has said that make me believe she would be a poor choice for President.