Confessions of a Ladies' Woman

This is primarily, of course, a political blog -- written from a progressive Christian perspective, but political nonetheless. But now that the election is over, I hope, at least occasionally, to lighten up and have some fun with it.

As I seek to make this Blog more regularly readable, I will be instituting some recurring categories for my posts. One regular feature, I will call "A Woman About Town."

There's a lot going on here in the greater Phoenix area. Some people assume that a Christian lesbian doesn't do much. But there are adventures to be had, I can assure you. When something comes along that I really find worth sharing, I will, from now on, be posting it here.

Readers frequently ask me about my love life. They assume that because I'm single, I don't have any. And I have been reluctant to write about it -- not because it isn't there to write about, but because many people assume that any single gay person's love life must be, if not entirely sinful, then somehow less godly than that of someone with a partner.

As I ponder the current struggle for same-sex marriage, I have come to realize that this assumption is nothing but a sort of neurotic prudery. Let people think whatever they like. I'm certainly not one of those gay folks who does not believe in marriage, but precisely because I DO believe in it very deeply (and yes, for gays as well as straights), I believe it is important to take my time, shop around and find the right partner.

I don't ever intend to be divorced. I want my first wife to be my last one. And -- I will admit it -- I am one picky broad. The pool of eligible mates is considerably smaller for us than it is for straights. This means that we should be willing to be patient and use those U-Hauls sparingly.

In the meantime, I intend to thoroughly enjoy my search for a wife. I'm a ladies' woman -- a "woman about town" -- and I will freely admit it. Nor will I apologize for it. I lie to no one, do my best not to hurt anyone, am always up-front about both my intentions and my limitations, and make commitments only rarely -- because when I make 'em, I take seriously my obligation to keep 'em.

My role-model, as a butch of culture and sophistication, is Warren Beatty. He had a helluva good time being single, sowed plenty of wild oats, and never made promises he couldn't keep. Every woman with whom he became involved knew exactly what to expect from him, and if she didn't like that, it was her problem. But he knew the right woman when, at long last, he found her, and he ended up with Annette Bening. By all accounts, they are very happy -- and his first wife does, indeed, look likely to last.

Okay, so I may not find another Annette Bening. But what the heck -- it certainly doesn't hurt to try.

Watch this space for regular "Woman About Town" adventures. I promise not to brag -- or to stretch the truth. Too much.

We Are At War -- In More Ways Than One

In case anybody out there is still somehow clueless and confused, let me spell out the official position of this Blog.

On September 11, 2001, Middle Eastern Islamists made war on the United States. Since that time, homegrown Christianists have made war on us as well. We are now at war in more ways than one.

Let me be perfectly blunt about this. The Christianists now bent on destroying our Constitution and our very way of life are traitors to this country. They are at war with each and every loyal American, and it is our duty to stop them.

The Christianists of the extreme Right Wing are no more genuinely Christians than the Islamists who blow up innocent people around the world are genuinely Muslims. It is as unjust to expect real Christians to share the "Christian" label with the treasonous domestic terrorists of the Right Wing as it is to expect real Muslims to bear the blame because of what Al Qaeda does.

Who would Jesus terrorize? Who would He murder? Who would He dehumanize? Those who answer that He would do ANY of the above, to anybody, are as pig-ignorant about the Bible as they are about the U.S. Constitution.

If you voted for measures that violate our Constitution -- especially as blatantly as do Proposition Hate in California and Proposition 102 in Arizona -- then you have committed an act of treason against this country. If you did so knowingly, then at the very least you should be stripped of your citizenship and transported somewhere else. Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia both come to mind, as they would doubtless be more to your liking. If you voted for this crap without realizing that you were committing treason, then shame on you for holding your country in such contempt that you didn't even bother to read the Constitution before casting your ballot. You have dishonored all the men and women who have ever given their lives for this great land, and you are a disgrace.

The U.S. Constitution was written at approximately eighth grade level. If you can' read well enough to understand it, then take an adult remedial reading course and bone up before you go out and vote again and do any more damage to it. Letting you vote is like letting a drunk drive.

I will fight -- to the death, if necessary -- any and every traitor who tries to destroy our Constitution by foisting off laws on us that violate it. I will also do my level best to educate my fellow Americans about what the Constitution -- and the Bible -- really have to say on the matters at hand. These matters are "controversial" only to the extent that people persist in wallowing in ignorance the way pigs wallow in mud.

Gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans are on the front lines of this war because we must be. Any American -- gay or straight, young or old, Democrat, Libertarian, Green, Republican or Independent -- who understands that we are at war and is willing to stand up and fight for this country is an ally of mine. And anyone else is an enemy.

To quote our (thank the Lord) soon-to-be-ex-Commander-in-Chief, "You're either with us or you're against us."

Bring 'em on.

I hope that I have now made it quite clear enough for everybody.

A Whack Upside the Head from the "Whiny Gay Left"

Although I'm (at least temporarily) glad Barack Obama won the election, by and large I'm as disenchanted with the Democratic Party as I was before. That's why I had to take a hike from it for a while, and why I gave myself some real exposure to libertarian and conservative ideas. I have conservative friends who still accuse me of not understanding them, but that's only because they can't stand to think I might reject their views precisely because I DO understand them.

My biggest problem with them -- besides the simple fact that I've come to disagree with them (for reasons now more rational than emotional)?

As far as the libertarians are concerned, I feel that they toady to big corporations, simplistically (and insanely) seeing them as somehow "freer" than big government. Libertarianism has become their religion, and I think they believe in it for reasons much more emotional -- and less rational -- than they want to admit.

When it comes to conservatives, my secondary beef with them is that they toady too much to the Republican Party -- an organization so corrupt they make the Democrats look like Little Bo Peep, while my primary beef is that they are just plain wrong. Wrong without the redeeming feature, sometimes possessed by the libertarians, of occasionally being right.

And as for the Log Cabin Republicans, yuck, yuck and yuck. The one gutsy and principled thing the organization has done in the last few years was refusing to endorse George W. Bush for reelection in 2004 -- but at least half of their membership wouldn't go along with it. They were too afraid they would get taken to the woodshed by the very bigoted assholes THEY should have been taking to the woodshed. A lot of people in the GOP have been very unhappy for a long time, and most of them are straight. It isn't like the Log Cabin folks couldn't have found some friends.

When they backed John McCain, I lost all respect for them.

John McCain has betrayed gays time and time and time again. He rah-rahed the vile Proposition 102 here in Arizona, which has left us here with a legal status on a par with slaves. He refused, as a matter of fact, to have much of anything to do with us -- except, of course, to appear on Ellen's TV show.

Sure he went on her show. She gave him some free publicity, and as bad as his campaign stunk up this country, he needed all the free publicity he could get.

The fact remains that of the two major parties (and sorry, Libertarians, but we still really only have two to choose from), the Democrats are better -- on the gay issue and almost every other -- than the Republicans. If you don't agree with me, then follow your bliss. I'm not part of the crowd who would call you names and abuse you just for being gay Republicans.

The GOP's "ideas are better," you say? Well then, why don't you folks do something you've been totally unwilling -- up 'til now -- to do?

Prove it. That's right -- just PROVE it.

Did it ever occur to the people crapping on the "Whiny Gay Left" that THEY THEMSELVES HAVE GIVEN US ABSOLUTELY NO GOOD REASON TO SUPPORT THEIR PARTY?!

You say that you believe in "individual responsibility." Well, try -- just this once -- taking a little "individual responsibility" for the political party you've chosen, and show us Lefty whiners why it is we're so wrong.

And no, the taunt that "there are bad Democrats, too, nyah!" does NOT constitute a reason. Not anywhere other than on a kindergarten playground.

The only intelligent and constructive reason for an embattled minority to join the very political party that leads the way in embattling it is to HELP TURN THE SITUATION AROUND. If you simply cave in to everything that goes on there, then what the hell good are you?

I keep hearing how "angry" I supposedly am because some gays are Republicans. But I'm not angry about that in the least. I'm overjoyed, as a matter of fact, that at least a few of us have the stomach to represent us to those who are, all too often, our opponents. I do that in the Christian churches all the time, so believe me, I can relate.

But gay Christians don't capitulate to every bigoted whackjob in the Church. If the Log Cabin Republicans had a tenth the gumption gay Christians do, I'd have some actual respect for them.

It WOULD be great to have both major political parties competing for our vote. Far from wishing that you'd leave the GOP, I have a totally different request for you.

Could you please, please, PLEASE -- just for a change -- do at least a halfway decent job of BEING gay Republicans?!

We don't need more traitors, cowards or mindless conformists. The Republicans would have quite enough of those, even if every last gay GOP-er left.

Praise the Lord...and Pass the Ammunition!

Well, wa-hoo, hallelujah and amen! We've DONE it! We, the People, have elected Barack Obama President of these United States!

Praise the Lord. And pass the ammunition.

In order to be elected, of course, politicians must appeal to "the center." Even a would-be progressive like Barack Obama is not immune to this necessity. As much as I'd like to believe that his progressive "base" did it all on our own, if I succumbed to the desire to believe this, I'd be living in a fool's paradise.

I believe I warned on this very Blog, some time ago, that he would do some things (or fail to do others) that would disappoint or heartily displease us. And he didn't wait long. Already he has disappointed me. The opposition he voiced against California's Proposition 8 (and, by extension, other anti-gay measures, like Proposition 102 in my own state of Arizona) was too little -- and too late.

He had to "appeal to the center," you see. And unfortunately, in this case, that was how he did it.

We've got to move the "center" to the left, folks, or we will effect no real progressive change in this country whatsoever.

All the "center" is, really, is what the combined forces of Left and Right make it. As its very name implies, the center has no relation to anything except in its relative position to everything else. That's why all claims to a "committed centrism" are so vapid. For its very existence, the center depends upon the Left and the Right, as it can exist nowhere except in between them. Without them, there's no "there" there.

Over the past thirty years, the conservatives and reactionaries in this country have succeeded in pushing the political framework so far to the Right that, were it to slide any farther in that direction, it would drop right off of the map and be devoured by sea-monsters.

Progressives MUST be the agents of change; that is our function. If we aren't bringing about change for the better, then we have no function. And because we sometimes err and make changes for the worse, society needs conservatives to balance us out. That is the Right's ONLY legitimate and constructive function.

The Right derives its very reason to exist from the Left. Without an active and vigorous Left, the Right is simply unnecessary -- or even destructive. And when the Right tries to effect change on its own initiative, disaster is the inevitable result.

That's exactly what this election was all about. The Right tried, all by itself, to run the country. And now that the sea-monsters gape before us, the nation has cried "stop!"

I believe that when President-elect Obama says he wants to effect change, he does, indeed, really mean progressive change. Including for marginalized and embattled groups like GLBT Americans. He says it, and I think he truly means it.

But we will have a war on our hands right here at home, trying to help our new leader bring that about. Our adversaries are wounded, but a beast is never more dangerous than when it's received a grievous and painful wound. They are also armed -- which means that we must be, too.

The anti-gay-marriage initiatives passed yesterday are unconstitutional. They violate the First, Ninth and Fourteenth Amendments. Were this nonsense ever to be passed at the federal level, it would violate the Tenth, as well. Thanks to the election of Barack Obama, we won't have to worry about a federal marriage amendment for at least the next four years. But during that time, we must beat back and reverse the horrible blows our Constitution received yesterday. This is more than an attack on gay people -- it's an attack on the very Constitution itself. If these measures are allowed to stand, then the supreme law of our land will not stand.

The American Taliban is still determined to take over this country and run all our lives. Barack Obama doesn't want them to do this. But he doesn't even pretend that he can govern all alone. He frankly and freely admits that he needs our help. And we must be ready to give him all the help he can handle -- and maybe even more than he may want.

May God protect our new President -- AND our Constitution.

This is a time to praise the Lord. It's also time to pass the ammunition.