Politics

[solarbird]

God. I am so fucking sick of this I could just scream. I'm sick of being under goddamn siege. I'm sick of seeing smug Republican fucks talk on message boards about how 'selfish' we're being for caring more about this than lower taxes or the war in Iraq. I'm sick of seeing cars with Republican bumper stickers and wanting to smash in their windows. I'm sick of this whole vicious, hate-filled, sanctimonious, theocon administration and their use of me and MY GODDAMN FAMILY as a LEVER to GET OUT THE FUCKHEAD VOTE. I'm sick of people telling me that I'm taking a goddamn constitutional amendment to mandate government discrimination against me at the Federal level "too personally," and I'm sick of people trying to tell me it's not really serious. YES IT GODDAMN WELL IS REALLY SERIOUS.

I'm sick of one side treating me like a leper and the other side trying to shoot me. I'm sick of blood libel standing uncontested by straight politicians who are supposedly on "my" side. Why the FUCK don't the fundies get called on this crap? Why is that okay?

I'm sick of being told that what America wants is for us just not to exist, and how the "best" thing to do politically is ignore this issue and take the punches to the face because the other side doesn't care insomuch as they just don't want to hear about it.

God DAMMIT I'm just so fucking sick of it all.

Rant brought on by:

-1. Bush's radio address this week. There's apparently a theocon/new Republican trick of refusing to mention gayfolk as a group by name. Sullivan's been pointing this out; he's theorising that they think it grants us too much dignity, to be referred to as a group.

-2: People saying "Well, it's good that people don't care; talking about it just annoys them, so the more Bush and the fundies bash you, the more people will tune them out." Strategically, I realise that's somewhat a positive, but really? Fuck that. Have some fucking backbone, you fucking assholes.

-3: This article in the NYTimes, which includes some discussion of how the fundies are going to purge the Republicans of social moderates. Some excerpts:

...

With the Senate set to begin debate on Friday, Dr. James C. Dobson, a popular conservative Christian self-help author and broadcaster, devoted two episodes of his radio program this week to urging listeners to call their senators and reciting the names of 69 senators who had not yet agreed to support the amendment.

"We may not have the votes to win it," Dr. Dobson said in the broadcast. "I am afraid we don't, and our listeners need to let their senators know right now that they are watching, that they are paying attention and they will remember the vote that occurs this week on this critical issue."

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, a conservative Christian lobbying group, said, "Social conservatives are looking at this issue so we know who needs to be educated on this issue or removed if that is possible."

...

"The president has bet the farm on Iraq," Paul Weyrich, a veteran Christian conservative organizer, warned in a recent e-mail newsletter. "Given what the continued killing has done to the president's standing in the polls this far, it is a lead-pipe cinch that as we lead up to the first days of November 2004, violence is going to be horrific."

Mr. Weyrich's solution said his solution was to "change the subject" to the Federal Marriage Amendment.

"Ninety-nine percent of the president's base will unite behind him if he pushed the amendment,'' he said. "It will cause Mr. Kerry no end of problems."

As for the gay Republicans whose votes Mr. Bush might then lose, Mr. Weyrich wrote, "Good riddance."

...

A group of other conservative Christian groups plans to present the Senate on Friday with 1.4 million signatures on a petition in opposition to gay marriage. On Sunday, several prominent conservative Christians, including Dr. Dobson, the former Watergate figure Charles W. Colson and Dr. Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention, will conduct their second emergency telecast to churches and Christian radio and television stations around the country. Many of the same people and groups are sponsoring a rally in Washington scheduled for Oct. 15, just in time for the election.

---

And if you're still reading and haven't contacted your Senators and Representatives about opposing this yet, what the fuck is wrong with you? Here are two easy URLs again:

http://www.hrcactioncenter.org/campaign/senate_oppose_fma

http://www.campaigntoprotect.org/campaign/takeactionnow

Comments

[solarbird]

I should add that at the local level, Democrats are not treating me like a leper these days. There are good Republicans, too - I spent several years trying to move the GOP away from the fundies and failing abjectly. I'm speaking nationally and in averages, and particularly in reference to this current travesty calling itself a debate.

[banner.livejournal.com]

The problem is, that no matter what Republicans and Democrats do, 'Gays' as a group will never vote Republican and will always vote Democrat. So the Republican's have finally written off the gay vote and just don't truely give a damn anymore.

That's what happens when as a group you stick with one side no matter how that side treats you (and Democrats really have not treated gays any better than the Republicans, but gays never ever give democrats crap about anything). Democrates take the gay vote for granted now, they know they'll get it no matter what they do. Ask any gay man or woman, 99 out of one hundred vote the straight democratic ticket. No matter what.

So why should the Republican's give a crap? However the fundies, who do move their votes to whomever panders the most won't vote for Republicans if they're not getting what they want. So Republicans are forced to cater to them if they want their votes. It's called politics. If the gay vote hadn't marginalized itself as hardcore democrates the Republican's would be forced to listen to them. But if Bush came out of the closet tomorrow and married Andrew Sulliven there isn't a single gay man or woman who'd change their vote from democrat to republican. And that's the problem.

People only listen to you if they think you might vote for them. If you could deliver a lot of gay voters to republican senators and congressmen, this amendment would die the day after the election, if not sooner.

[avram]

If the fundies manage to purge the GOP of moderates, that’s good news for Democrats.

Right now the electorate is highly polarized. You’ve got your hardcore Republicans, who are gonna vote for Bush no matter what, and your hardcore Democrats, who won’t vote for Bush no matter what, and neither group is large enough to carry the election without the moderates in the middle. If Bush courts his base and offends the moderates, that helps Kerry.

Most of the moderates are of the opinion that (1) people of the same sex shouldn’t be allowed to marry, but (2) the Constitution should not be amended to prevent this. So right now, the best thing for the Democrats to do on this matter is keep their mouths shut and quietly round up enough Senators to kill the amendment. The more the Bushies keep pushing for it out in the open, the more they offend the middle.

[cafiorello.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I've already gotten back my senators' weasely "Thank you for sharing your views. However...." AAAAARRRRGGGHHH!

Yes, this is fucking serious! The first time anyone has tried to amend the damn Constitution to discriminate instead of protect rights, and we're supposed to take it lying down? I think not!

Who died and left the Religious Right in charge, anyway?

On another group, someone reminded me about Yeats' The Second Coming:
"The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity."

And my brother sent me this reminder of Langston Hughes, Let America Be America Again:
O, let America be America again--
The land that never has been yet--
And yet must be--the land where every man is free.
http://www.poets.org/poems/poems.cfm?prmID=1473

Cathy

[cafiorello.livejournal.com]

And "quietly" killing the amendment is going to happen *how*??? When most if not all of the point of the damn vote is to flush out moderates so the Religious Right can target them?
Cathy

[avram]

I don’t understand your question.

[solarbird]

The problem is, that no matter what Republicans and Democrats do, 'Gays' as a group will never vote Republican and will always vote Democrat.
Historically this is untrue. Republicans got a solid 40% of the queer vote until they let Pat Robertson tear into the fags at the '92 convention - it dropped then to, I think, 15%. ('88 to '92, iirc.) Then it started climbing back up, peaking at 33% - until there was another around of fag-bashing, where it dropped back down to 15%. I think this time, they'll be lucky to get 5%.

[solarbird]

Also, there's the LA LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR you factor, with - last I heard - the Republicans deciding not even to allow the Log Cabin Republicans to have a presense at the convention this year.

[solarbird]

I might remind you that nationally, the Democrats are only marginally better. That margin is enough for me to send them money - which, bluntly, makes me feel dirty - but it's only marginally.

They're definitively not taking the high road here. They're saying "we oppose it because it's unnecessary," not "we oppose it because we think it's EVIL AND WRONG." Our choices, more or less, are between the party actively trying to kill us and the party who isn't, but is happy to sell us out for an appropriate fee.

[banner.livejournal.com]

Don't count on the Democrates to kill anything. They'll happily ram this through congress if they think it will get them votes. Notice they didn't do anything to stop the 'defense of marriage act'. President Clinton could have veto'd it. Why didn't he? And why doesn't anyone seem to remember that little issue?

It comes back to what I said before, the Dems take the Gay vote for granted, so they really don't care if they offend them or not. Which is why (I think) the gay vote has lost a lot of power.

[cafiorello.livejournal.com]

How do the Dems quietly round up enough Senators to kill the amendment? Any attempt to kill the amendment is going to be trumpeted by the Right as immorality.
Cathy

[avram]

How do the Dems quietly round up enough Senators to kill the amendment?

The same way you quietly do anything in the Senate, by having discussions and making deals out of the public eye.

Any attempt to kill the amendment is going to be trumpeted by the Right as immorality.

Let the right trumpet. The more they do that, the worse the Republicans do on Election Day.

[avram]

Here's a rare thing: Me more-or-less agreeing with Banner. The Dems aren't so much good for the gay community as they are less bad than the GOP.

On the other hand: Of the 14 Senators who voted against the DOMA, all were Democrats, and one was John Kerry.

[chipmunck.livejournal.com]

That is what pissed me off the most. I concider myself a fringe Log Cabin Republican and it PISSES me off that they are being swept under the carpet. I do not want to 'go to the Dem's' for I am not a Democrat for my own reasons. But I do think that Republican folk that think like me are being challenged. I am ready to put a Vote for Nador, and Naror KNOWS that he is grabing voters like me away from Bush.

But that is also the problem. Grrrr. I don't want to be yelled at for being 'wrong', hence why I tend to shut my face because people are so charged up on the topic that they can't talk nicely with others. I tend to confront this because I have 90% liberal friends who are against me and love to yell at me, but I realize folk like Kathryn have actually 'won' more sympathy from me by actually talking to me. So I am up for learning and talking and sharing ideas with anyone.. but this "I don't care attitude" is driving me nuts, but I sometimes feel I have no one to talk to.

SOoooo thank you for posting this, I saw Anna's post before yours.. and I went 'searching' for someone on LJ to talk about this then be worried about quizes. :)

I got really upset and scared when I hear talk of Election's not happening, and instead of outrage from the Media I hear "how will US cancel elections"... piss me off. :P

I want Bush out of office, but I am not quite comfortable, for some weirdo reason beyond me, which I will look into, voting for Kerry/Edwards. I want Nador!! There is a man who I feel would follow through. He stands by his words and he is for people. At least that is the feeling I get from what he says.

I feel that Bush is following through on what he says, but he is doing the wrong things.

Anyways... :P I want to be more educated and I am going to contact my rep/sentator. Thank you for being so active.

This is one person who WOULD like to talk to you, as long as you understand I don't respond well to people calling me a "no good idiot biogot" when talking politics. hehe. :)

I hear ya, and I want to get more active!!!! I also want to make sure I am correctly registered to vote in my new location of residency. I want to put signs on my front lawn! I want to work for a cadidate I can believe in.
I want to get people who say "Bush can't become president, but I won't vote" to VOTE!!!!!

anyways.. :P
Steffi

[chipmunck.livejournal.com]

Just curious.. Something that bothers me about this situation:

I am a republican that WILL NOT vote for Bush, nor do I feel right voting for Kerry at this stage. I am seeing only from what I am perseving is that there are several republicans like me who won't vote for either and will most likely vote our conscience and end up voting for Nador.

I am soooo afraid that if I vote my conscience and vote Nador or even the Libertarian Candidate that Bush will still win.
But at the same time I feel like I am doing a wrong thing by Voting for Kerry, though I would rather have him in there by me not voting Bush.
okay, that must have come across as confusing?

So.. how does Kerry win if: Bush supporters vote Bush, Kerry gets a lot of votes, then the offended Reps do not vote Bush but vote Nador... do you think there is enough of 'us' that won't vote for Bush so Kerry can win?

[flashfire.livejournal.com]

E-mail has been sent to my Senator.

[9thmoon.livejournal.com]

Hooray for smashing in windows.

[solarbird]

And I say this as a goddamn former Republican delegate. You know, back when then William Weld/Republican Liberty Caucus people weren't considered Suspect Republicans, and I had this idea that the Republican party could be salvaged. Of course, I guess all that just adds to the feeling of betrayal.

But today's vote helped a little. HA HA COULDN'T EVEN MAINTAIN PARTY DISCIPLINE - SUCK IT DOWN, MOFOS!