Saturday, January 17, 2009

Digg This: Marriage is a civil right.

Ganked with Glee from Declarations of Pride.

...above all else, marriage is about protecting property and relationships. Marriage isn't about God. I doubt, in spite of what you may have heard, whether God cares one way or another about who is married to whom? Those are the petty worries of man, not the lofty contemplations of a Supreme Being. Marriage is now, and has always been...Even before Christ, about the claiming, protection, and definition of property. How can so many ignore this obvious fact when you consider the history of this supposedly "sacred" union. Have we collectively forgotten about so-called "arranged marriages?" Those were not about love, God, or anything else so noble...They were about the planned & protected consolidation of power, heredity, wealth and property. Marriages are about protecting wealth and allowing for its preservation from generation to generation through a legally defined family unit. It is a construct of legal necessity, not one of religious wrangling.

Marriage is once and for all, a civil construct.

In the United States of America, marriage is a manifested by a government issued license that defines and legally binds a couple. It confers, without respect to race, creed, and we hope someday, gender, approximately 1,038 federal rights. Rights; which in the United States are by definition to be given equally to all citizens under the law. That's the ideal.

This is the reality. In many states, there will be so-called "Marriage Protection Amendments" that will exist to blur the lines of faith and the lines of government with one another. They are faith-based initiatives designed to push an agenda of hate into the legal construct of marriage. If left unchecked, this blending of religious myth and the law has far reaching and devastating potential for America. The religious-right uses so many false arguments to defend the position of need for these amendments. They claim the need for "protection." From what? They claim marriage is sacred. Then why all the divorce? They (the ones demanding the amendment) say many things, yet offer no factual defense of their own positions.

As usual, this is a cultural divide created by Americans who don't understand something, and who are praying on the fears of others who are woefully ill informed. Whenever that happens in this great nation we get anger, hate, and a call for division or punishment. Instead of growth or living up to our stated ideal of "equality" we turn to hate, and sink to the ugliest of American traits: hateful ignorance. The kind of hate that results in men lashed naked to fences. A place in our history where it is OK to hang a man from a tree by his neck as a cross is lit aflame. A place where Americans can tie other Americans to the back of trucks and drag them to their deaths. Fear has always worked to create hate in America. Fear builds towering walls between reason and logic. Hate obliterates what we know in our hearts to be right, and covers all with ignorant rage. That is the path we are on in the name of God.

I see this ignorance as the ultimate sin.
Amen. Selah. Digg it here.

"Joe the Plumber" may be an easy target....

But a bull's eye is still a bull's eye!



One commenter wonders - so that's a "Dirty Sanchez?" Yes, "Joe." Yes, it is.

Friday, January 16, 2009

Eh, Claudus? Arrest Bush 2009

Arresting Valentine 2-SideTemplate T-Shirt shirt


The Raw Story | 'Arrest Bush 2009' plans Inauguration Day protest:

"A group calling itself 'Arrest Bush 2009' has announced its intention to hold a 'Yes We Can Arrest Bush' event in front of the FBI Building in Washington, DC during the Inaugural Parade.

However, coordinator Jose Rodriguez insists, 'It's not a protest; it's a celebratory event.'

Arrest Bush 2009, which is sponsored by the Washington Peace Center, After Downing Street, and Shoes For Bush, is demanding that Bush be arrested for war crimes and for lying to the American people."
It's also interesting to observe that the Bush Administration has managed to extend international law - in a morbid and disturbing way - by establishing the idea of "extraordinary rendition," and asserting the right to arrest fugitive individuals regardless of whether the sovereign government would permit it.

I wryly observe that even a small power can contemplate such an operation. And I would imagine that the Secret Service is contemplating that contemplation. One does wonder, however, what position they will take should they become aware of it as an operational possibility.

Eh, Claudius?

Arresting Valentine 2-SideTemplate T-Shirt by webcarve

Let Money Ring: Senate Bill 453, The Indiana Honest Money Act

counterspinyc: Indiana State Senator Files Gold Money Bill: Senate Bill 453, The Indiana Honest Money Act: "Indiana Picks Up Where New Hampshire Left Off !

Indianapolis, Indiana -- State Senator Greg Walker of District 41, (R-Columbus), has officially filed a Bill that would allow Indiana to offer its citizens a choice of Gold (and Silver) coin or the Electronic equivalent in payable and receivable transactions with the state. This bold bill will finally bring Indiana back into conformance with the Constitution for the United States of America which states 'No state shall...make anything but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts...' Article 1, Section 10."


I'm not sure if a return to gold and silver currency is ultimately the way to go, but some form of verifiable honest currency IS needed. Gold and Silver certificates - which this ultimately is - can lead to issues with money supply, as I understand it. But then, this is where competing currencies and computers come in.

Ultimately, paper and electronic currencies are simply convenient symbols for trade; theoretically and properly bearing a one to one reference to something that has a stable, agreed upon value. That might be achieved by a "shopping basket"; a proportion of commodities that might vary in value according to supply and demand, but which could be bundled to achieve a stable target value.

I could easily be accused of "oversimplifying" the issue, but it's been the complexity and lack of transparency that has made it possible to exploit and pervert the world economy. The need for a simple, transparent and individually verifiable means of trade is of paramount importance.

Then again, it might be appropriate to make a philosophical shift; there is a commodity that IS fairly stable and is something that would be useful to value directly - labor. A unit of currency that values one person hour at minimum wage would be a useful economic indicator and might well address the problem of money supply - at least in an economy with a variety of currencies in circulation, smoothed by transparent electronic translations.

I'm no economist and no expert on money - but it occurs to me that is exactly the problem. We should not have to be experts to know if something we hold in our hands and rely upon to transfer value is in fact an honest measure and faithful representation. "Trust me, I'm an expert" is sounding just a little hollow these days. The test for Fairy Gold was to touch it to an anvil; that's what we need; A great big Acme Anvil dropped rudely into the money supply.

Then we can figure out what's real and what's not, and go from there.

Thursday, January 15, 2009

Mormons may have violated Election law and IRS Standards.



Whether or not a case may be proven without access to Mormon financial records is actually immaterial from the viewpoint of individuals such as myself. It's fairly clear that steps were taken to evade IRS and election oversight measures. In other words - words being echoed by various activist groups - the Mormon push on Prop 8 was clearly and deliberately intended to subvert the political process - which governs every citizen of a nation - in order to impose religious rules that apply only to a tiny minority of ... well, let's call it for what it is; religious bigots.

You see, not doing something or forgoing something for religous reasons, for yourself and to a limited extent, on behalf of family is one thing. Imposing conditions on other people in order to make it easier for you to adhere to your faith is quite another. One might seriously question the "faith" of persons who see social control as a tool of faith.

In any case, whatever is proven, this direct interference in the lives and moral choices of other people should be persuasive to persons of genuine faith and conscience. Homosexuality is not mentioned in the ten commandments - but adultery is. Adultery, in the Hebrew, speaks to "splitting apart" a relationship. It's speaking of any human relationship. It's considered to be as serious a matter as murder or giving false testimony in order to harm another.

This would seem to disqualify anyone in a leadership position from leadership if they could see this as a proper course of action for a church.

Shake the dust from your feet. Faith is about upholding and living up to standards to the best of YOUR ability - not imposing standards upon others and punishing people in the civil world for not setting examples you approve of. That's indistinguishable from pure bigotry, and you can find that sort of "faith" in any corner bar.

So, why not get a beer for your five bucks, if you are willing to settle for that sort of uplifting companionship?

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