Random Musings

It's keeping on ... four more democrats have come out for equality!

#51: Bill Nelson, Democratic Senator from Florida:

"If we are endowed by our Creator with rights, then why shouldn't those be attainable by Gays and Lesbians? Simply put, if The Lord made homosexuals as well as heterosexuals, why should I discriminate against their civil marriage? I shouldn't, and I won't."

#52: Heidi Heitkamp, Democratic Senator from North Dakota:

"I have concluded the federal government should no longer discriminate against people who want to make lifelong, loving commitments to each other or interfere in personal, private, and intimate relationships. I view the ability of anyone to marry as a logical extension of this belief. The makeup of families is changing, but the importance of family is enduring."

#53: Joe Donnelly, Democratic Senator from Indiana:

"I oppose amending either Indiana’s or our nation’s constitution to enshrine in those documents an ‘us’ and a ‘them,’ instead of a ‘we.’ With the recent Supreme Court arguments and accompanying public discussion of same-sex marriage, I have been thinking about my past positions and votes. In doing so, I have concluded that the right thing to do is to support marriage equality for all."

#54: Tim Johnson, Democratic Senator from South Dakota:

"After lengthy consideration, my views have evolved sufficiently to support marriage equality legislation. This position doesn't require any religious denomination to alter any of its tenets; it simply forbids government from discrimination regarding who can marry whom."

That leaves Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Senator Mary Landrieu of Louisiana as the only Democrats not endorsing marriage equality. Manchin reaffirmed his opposition last week and Landrieu says she supports same-sex marriage but won’t endorse it because her constituents do not.

Around here folks don't call it Walmart, they call it The Walmart. However, I call it The Place To Avoid At All Costs Because They Treat Their Employees Like Crap And Everything They Sell Is Made In China. It's long-winded, yes, but you get the idea. 

But that picture is a funny reason I don't shop at that place. Someone bought loads of those shirts to sell and not one person in the corporation thought it might be slightly off? Proves that no gays work at The Walmart.

h/t to BosGuy for the photo.

Look! Here's a Democrat whose against marriage equality; what a rare and stupid breed.

Arkansas Senator Mark Pryor:

“I am opposed to gay marriage ... I also discussed whether gay couples should receive benefits if they work for the federal government. On the benefits issue, I said to ‘put me down in the undecided category.’  By that I meant that, depending on what the U.S. Supreme Court decides, I will evaluate whether federal benefits should be available to gay couples. Of course, I will consider the impact any extension of benefits would have on the federal budget.”

Ass.Hat.

Then we have Utah Republican Senator Orrin Hatch, who thinks Civil Unions are the answer:

"I’ll say this, I do believe this could be solved greatly by a civil-union law that would give gay people the same rights as married people. I think we can solve this problem without undermining the very basis of marital law in our country."

But then you have a very clear case of Separate But Equal; all the same rights, but let’s call it something different. No.

After tiny Bisbee City in Arizona approved Civil unions for same-sex couples, it looks like a larger Arizona city might follow suit.

The Tempe City Council will be getting legal advice on civil unions. Councilman Kolby Granville requested the executive-session discussion and plans to ask for council action on civil unions in coming weeks. Granville says it’s an issue of civil rights and that civil unions would be the next best thing to same-sex marriage. Well, it's the less than next best thing.

In the case of Bisbee City, though, Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne will be taking the case to court to block Bisbee’s new ordinance because he said the town council acted outside its legal authority because state laws control things such as community property.

The Oklahoma House approved, by a vote of 84-0, a resolution reaffirming marriage as between one man and one woman, and also reaffirming Oklahoma’s support of DOMA, which prohibits recognition of same-sex marriages.

Not such big news considering that it’s Oklahoma, but what was surprising was that all 29 House Democrats, including House Democratic Leader Scott Inman and openly gay Congressman Kay Floyd, walked out of the chamber in protest instead of voting.

The resolution doesn't carry the weight of law, and is just intended as a message to the Supreme Court, which recently heard arguments in cases concerning same-sex marriage. It now heads to the state Senate.

Here’s a message from me Oklahoma Republicans: Bugger off.

So, Margaret Thatcher died this week and there was praise for her, and there was also rejoicing in her passing; Thatcher was nothing, if not divisive. But, on a funny note, when the story broke of her death on Twitter folks began Tweeting and Hash-tagging about it like this:

#nowthatchersdead

I see it. But, without the use of spacing--which cannot be used in a proper hashtag, y'all--and without the use of any capital letters, many people read the hashtag like this:

#now that chers dead

And Twitter went cray-cray.

Silly Tweeters, if Cher had actually did, and you know she never will, Twitter would have literally exploded.

On the marriage front: interior designer Nate Berkus and former Rachel Zoe assistant Jeremiah Brent are engaged. They have been dating about 9 months and Berkus proposed atop Machu Picchu in Peru.

Also getting married are musician, songwriter and record producer Linda Perry and actress and The Talk host, Sara Gilbert, who told of the engagement on TV this week:

"We go to a park, we have food and we're eating it, it's really sweet and there's this guy sitting playing guitar, like a street musician ... He starts playing this song that we love. I'm like, 'Oh, that's so weird, this is so magical and amazing.' ... Suddenly the people picnicking next to us pull out string instruments from under the blanket and walk over and they start playing 'Love Song'."

Perry then popped the question, spelled out on five different t-shirts, before pulling out an engagement ring.

Congratulations to both couples, and let’s hope this starts a trend of congratulating same-sex couples all across the country.

I recently found out that, when commenting on other blogs that have the captcha, that I don’t need to put in the numbers—which are sometimes impossible to read—but I can get by with just typing the letters. Am I the first to find this out, or the last?

This just in: Uruguay gave final approval to marriage equality when its House voted 71-21 to pass the bill. President José Mujica says he intends to sign it.

Uruguay now joins The Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Canada, South Africa, Norway, Sweden, Portugal, Iceland, Argentina, and Denmark as the 12th nation to offer its citizens nationwide marriage equality.

Brazil, Mexico, and the U.S. offer it in parts of the country. Funny, how all these other countries can so easily adopt and adapt to marriage equality across their entire land, yet here in the ‘progressive’ US we stutter and stammer along.

Ah, the GOP, in the weeks and months after losing the White House again began spewing nonsense about rebranding the party, becoming more inclusive.

Yeah, not so much. See, this weekend the Republican National Committee will be meeting to discuss their goals and aspirations for the future, and one of those discussions is to vote that marriage always and ever be a One Man and One Woman deal.

Rebranding themselves as the same old losers. Not so smart.

When Turtle, er, Mitch McConnell learned that actress Ashley Judd might run against him for his seat in Congress, he got his big boy pants all in a twist and vowed to spend every dime he had to defeat her. But, since he is Turtle, er, Mitchy, he decided to play as unfair as possible.

Some secret recordings of meetings between McConnell and his strategists reveal that they had planned—and I say planned because Ashley Judd recently announced that she would not run for office—to destroy Ashley Judd by playing her up as mentally ill.

Nice. Don’t run on the issues, Mitchy, run on rumor. But, now that the tapes have been released and people are all up in arms about McConnell’s underhanded ways, is he trying to back-pedal and apologize?

Of course not, Mitchy is complaining that he’s the victim because he was recorded being a dick and no one told him.

That’s because Ya ‘are a dick, Mitch. Ya ’are a dick.

The Montana House is moving forward with a measure to repeal an obsolete state law that criminalizes gay sex, despite a committee's decision to table it.

Openly gay Congressman Bryce Bennett [that's him up there] made the motion to take Senate Bill 107 out of the House Judiciary Committee and place it on the agenda for a House vote. Bennett says the law emphasizes inequality and pointed to the 1997 Montana Supreme Court case that ruled the language criminalizing gay sex was unconstitutional.

"Under this law, I am considered a felon," Bennett said. "I am not your equal."

Yeah, in Montana being gay and having consensual sex makes you a criminal. And, in the eyes of the Fear-Baiting GOP, legalizing gay sex would lead to societal degradation and gay sex being taught in schools' sex education classes; like this: Insert Tab A into Slot B. Or something. Grow up.

UPDATE: the vote is in, and gay sex is no longer a crime in Montana! The vote was 64-36, with 25 Republicans crossing the aisle to vote with all 39 Democrats!

UPDATE: Ben Carson is out. No, not the closet, silly, though that wouldn’t be a surprise given how virulently homophobic he is. No, Dr. Ben has stepped down as this year's Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine commencement speaker because he didn’t want to “distract from the celebratory nature of the day."

Funny how he voluntarily withdraws and makes it look like his decision when many at the school students and staff, wanted him uninvited long ago.

Take a seat Dr. Ben you’re no longer needed.

I am loving Nashville because I loves me some Connie Britton and I loves me some hot men singing to me. Chris Carmack--wearing a lot of tight t-shirts--and hot Latino Jay Hernandez just joined the show, and look good with Sam Palladio and Charles Esten.

TWEET OF THE WEEK:

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