Marriage Equality in IL, Day 10: From the Front Lines

This, in a word, is hell.  Ever since the frogs started raining down over a week ago, it's been impossible to get anything done.  The dog can’t go outside, so…things…are backing up, as they say.  The Boy, unable to attend school, has gone feral.  Sweetie…well, it’s just heartbreaking the way our marriage remains thoroughly unaffected….  

At least the brimstone started coming down good-n-hard, today, so that should clear up the frogs and insects.  (The locust and flies have been competing for space, but in their Darwinian struggles, they’re getting glitter EVERYWHERE.)  Alas, there goes the brand new wicker patio furniture.  I imagine Williams-Sonoma will still expect us to pay.  Thankfully, our homeowner’s policy covers Acts of a Vengeful God.

I don’t know how much longer I can resist.  The conversion power of The.GAY was underestimated, if anything.  They’ve been more persistent than Jehovah’s Witnesses…and better groomed.  Even now, I can wear nothing but organic cotton/linen blend V-necks and skinny jeans (though the boils make custom fittings a VERY painful process).  And that shawl collared cardigan…it calls to me….  

I fear June 1st….

I fear fer ‘Mer’kuh…

SAVE YOURSELVES…you fools!

PR Tip for Local Business Owners, or: Do you like lucre, filthy AND clean?

Entertain whatever political beliefs ya want, but realize not everyone in your targeted customer base will agree, so maybe...slap some camo on your Reich-Wing nutjob talking point dumbass horseshit and also: suck it.

As many of you know, your hero and mine (that's me, sillies) forgot his ipod today, and was therefore  reduced to listening to (*cough*)commercial(*gag*)radio(*WHEEZ*) for the first time in YEARS. While that experience alone was as 1st-world horrible as you might imagine, it did expose me to something I've not gone through in a LONG time: local business advertising. 

One local business (I'll not drop its name because it would have...ltd...recognition and likely doesn't care because it can probably...af-FORD...to lose me as a customer) has a spot in heavy rotation, touting the benefits of its particular brand vs. others. The main thrust: Obama sucks, so buy something you can...af-FORD...and trust, because the other guys are somehow tied to that dang ol' ni...politician.  The spot specifically went out of its way to refer to GMC as "Gub'mint Motors" SEVERAL times because of the auto bailout from several years ago. (Of course, it fails to mention GM credited the bailout for its survival, that GM paid the money back IN FULL, and is now solvent and stronger than ever due to intelligent intervention during an historic economic upheaval brought on by deregulation and worldwide economic panic exacerbated by Bush the Lesser...but I digress and wax badass.)

The narrator THEN touts the "fact" their af-FORD-able brand didn't take a bailout, which was true...that time. However, it conveniently left out one thing: Ford (OH! WHAT A GIVEAWAY!) had kept $28B (IIRC...this ain't a research paper) in reserve from the time they DID take out a shitload of gub'mint help a few years earlier, which they used to ride out the worldwide economic calamity brought on by bush and his bidness-fellating cronies.

But that was hardly the most egregious shit-stain in the spot. 

Oh, no...they had to outdo the out-doers....

THEN, the narrator goes through a list of supposed Obama-specific failures/broken promises that read like something freshly-shat from the deepest and most crooked of Rupert Murdoch's bowels and birthed from his foul haunches: failure to turn around the economy (...yeah...the DOW went from 7,000 and falling to breaking 13,000 in just a couple of years, inflation is in check, and interest rates have fallen while the housing market has rebounded); failure to bring economic stability (see above), and failure to "bring peace to the streets of Chicago," whatever to Murgatroid THAT means....

So buy Ford...only for a...ltd...(see what I did there? Protected my ass from recrimination, I did)...time. 

Because: OBAMA-BOO!

So guess what, Fuckstick McBlowmestein? You.Ain't.EVER.Gettin'.Money.From.Me. 

P.S. Neither is any asshole who posts gunshops should display signs telling Obama voters to leave because they're too stupid to own guns. That's gonna SUCK for someone when I upgrade my duty weapon to a .45 (along with the accompanying gear) AND replace my trusty Mossburg with a Saiga.

P.S.S. Business people, you serve a WIDE range of customers. The local economy is too small to piss off very many.

Marriage Equality in IL

Today, the IL legislature takes up debate on marriage equality in my home state.  I'm sharing this with my local reps and urge you all to share your thoughts with them, as well.

Dear Rep. _______:

I'm a lifelong IL resident and have spent nearly all of that life in So. IL.  I graduated from ____ in 1986, ___ in 1991, and am currently employed as a police officer in ____.

Until the age of 18, I was as dedicated a homophobe as ever existed.  I was a jock (among other things) and raised in church, so I always knew how gay people were to be treated, even though I didn't personally know anyone who was openly gay.  While I never actually engaged in any direct bullying, myself, I certainly condoned keeping gay people in their rightful place: in hiding.  Gay people could live as they saw fit, as long as they kept that to themselves.

I've since learned how shameful, un-Christian, and un-American it is to oppress people for being nothing more than gay.  When I went to college, I actually met gay people, quickly realizing in-full their agenda: to live free, open lives while bothering no one, expecting the same treatment from their fellows in return. Within weeks of arriving on ... campus, everything I'd been taught and everything I thought about homosexuality was laid bare as naked bigotry and fear, so I returned to the words of Christ regarding homosexuality...and found He said nothing on the subject. In fact, I discovered “Love thy neighbor as thyself” ended with a period, not an asterisk. Many of my college friends happened to be gay and I learned a great many lessons, including not one of them CHOSE to be gay any more than I CHOSE to be straight and each had an extraordinarily difficult struggle when they realized they were indeed born gay. Interestingly, none of them tired to “recruit” me into the "gay lifestyle," either.

I happen to be straight, but I still know to the core of my being that no American should be treated as a second-class citizen. The 1st Amendment clearly states “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof....” Many churches and denominations fully recognize gay marriage as what it is: marriage. Therefore, the government has no right to tell two consenting adults what kind of social contract they can arrange for themselves, nor can it tell a church what it may or may not recognize as a holy union, so long as no one else's fundamental rights are at risk. No one's rights are violated by two gay people making a public commitment to grow old together.

I consider the last 26 years of my life to be penance for the first 18.  It is absolutely wrong to allow this inequality to continue, so I urge you to vote in favor of marriage equality so that our fellow Illinoisans may pursue their happiness without interference from their government.

Thank you for your consideration...and go 'Cats.