May 2005 Archives
Molly includes excerpts from the amazing floor speech against the measure by Black state representative Senfronia Thompson.
The courageous remarks by Representative Thompson are well worth reading in their entirety:
I have been a member of this august body for three decades, and today is one of the all-time low points. We are going in the wrong direction, in the direction of hate and fear and discrimination. Members, we all know what this is about, this is the politics of divisiveness at its worst, a wedge issue that is meant to divide.
Members, this issue is a distraction from the real things we need to be working on. At the end of this session, this Legislature, this leadership will not be able to deliver the people of Texas, fundamental and fair answers to the pressing issues of our day.
Let's look at what this amendment does not do: It does not give one Texas citizen meaningful tax relief. It does not reform or fully fund our education system. It does not restore one child to CHIP, who was cut from health insurance last session. It does not put one dime into raising Texas' Third World access to health care. It does not do one thing to care for or protect one elderly person or one child in this state. In fact, it does not even do anything to protect one marriage.
Members, this bill is about hate and fear and discrimination. I know something about hate and fear and discrimination. When I was a small girl, white folks used to talk about "protecting the institution of marriage" as well. What they meant was if people of my color tried to marry people of Mr. Chisum's color, you'd often find the people of my color hanging from a tree. That's what the white folks did back then to "protect marriage." Fifty years ago, white folks thought inter-racial marriages were a "threat to the institution of marriage." Members, I'm a Christian and a proud Christian. I read the good book, and do my best to live by it. I have never read the verse where it says, "gay people can't marry." I have never read the verse where it says, "though shalt discriminate against those not like me." I have never read the verse where it says, "let's base our public policy on hate and fear and discrimination." Christianity to me is love and hope and faith and forgiveness-not hate and discrimination.
I have served in this body a lot of years, and I have seen a lot of promises broken. I should be up here demanding my 40 acres and a mule because that's another promise you broke. You used a wealthy white minister cloaked in the cloth to ease the stench of that form of discrimination.
So, now that blacks and women can vote, and now that blacks and women have equal rights — you turn your hatred to homosexuals — and you still use your misguided reading of the Bible to justify your hatred. You want to pass this ridiculous amendment so you can go home and brag — brag about what? Declare that you saved the people of Texas from what? Persons of the same sex cannot get married in this state now. Texas does not now recognize same-sex marriages, civil unions, religious unions, domestic partnerships, contractual arrangements or Christian blessings entered into in this state — or anywhere else on this planet Earth.
If you want to make your hateful political statements then that is one thing; the Chisum amendment does real harm. It repeals the contracts that many single people have paid thousands of dollars to purchase to obtain medical powers of attorney, powers of attorney, hospital visitation, joint ownership and support agreements. You have lost your way; this is obscene.
Today, you are playing to the lowest common denominator; you are putting aside the real issues of substance that we need to address so that you can instead play on the public's fears and prejudices to deceive and manipulate voters into thinking that we have done something important.
I realize that gay rights are not the same as civil rights, but I can guarantee you we are going in the wrong direction. I cannot hide my skin color. In fact, in most of the South, people as pink as Rep. Wayne Smith were still black by law if they had a great grandparent who was African. I was unable to attend an integrated and equally funded school until I got my master of laws degree. There were separate and unequal facilities for nearly everything.
I got second-hand textbooks even worse than the kind you're trying to pass off on every public school student next year. I had to ride to school on the back of the bus. I had to quench my thirst from filthy coloreds-only drinking fountains. I had to enter restaurants from the kitchen door. I was banned from entering most public accommodations, even from serving on a jury.
I had to live with the fear that getting too uppity could get you killed — or worse. I know what third-class citizenship feels like. In my first term, one of my colleagues walked up and down this aisle muttering about how "nigras" should be back in the field picking cotton instead of picking out committees.
So, I have to wonder about Rep. Chisum's 3/5 of a person amendment. Some of you folks hid behind your Bible then, too, to justify your cultural prejudices, your denial of liberty, and your gunpoint robbery of human dignity.
We have worked hard at putting our prejudices against homosexuals in law. We have denied them basic job protections. We have denied them and their children freedom from bullying and harassment at school. We have tried to criminalize their very existence.
But, we have also absolved them of all family duties and responsibilities: to care for and support their spouses and children, to count their family's assets in determining public assistance, to obtain health insurance for dependents, to make end-of-life or necessary medical decisions for their life partner — sometimes even to visit in the hospital, even to defend our own country. And then, we can stand on our two hind legs and proclaim, "See, I told you homosexual families are unstable." And nearly every one of you on this floor has a homosexual in their extended families.
Some of you have shunned and isolated these family members. Some of you, even some of the joint coauthors, have embraced them within your own family for the essence of Christianity is love. Yet, you are now poised to constitutionalize discrimination against a particular class of people.
I thought we would be debating real issues: education, health care for kids, teacher's health insurance, health care for the elderly, protecting survivors of sexual assault, protecting the pensions of seniors in nursing homes. I thought we would be debating economic development, property tax relief, protecting seniors pensions and stem cell research, to save lives of Texans who are waiting for a more abundant life. Instead we are wasting this body's time with this political stunt that is nothing more than constitutionalizing discrimination. The prejudices exhibited by members of this body disgust me.
Last week, Republicans used a political wedge issue to pull kids — sweet little vulnerable kids — out of the homes of loving parents and put them back in a state orphanage just because those parents are gay. That's disgusting. Today, we are telling homosexuals that just like people of my ilk, when I was a small child, they too are second-class citizens. I have listened to all the arguments. I have listened to all of the crap.
Regrettably, the Texas Legislature went on to pass the bill anyway, by a vote of 101-29.
[via Tin Man]
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I've had a DirecTiVo DVR for several years, but over time the software had fallen way behind that available on non-DirecTV TiVo units. Jeff has one of those TiVos, and I've been jealous of some of the functionality available on his (though much happier with the satellite content and direct-to-digital capture on mine). Tonight we turned on the DirecTiVo to find this message, and now we're all upgraded on both machines. Yay!
And the little TiVo logo guy is just so adorable.
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A view of the main reading room from the meeting room level, from behind wire mesh curtains; here, I focus on the mesh.
See the companion picture.
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A view of the main reading room from the meeting room level, from behind wire mesh curtains; here, I focus past the mesh on the windows ahead and people below.
See the companion picture.
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In 1987, three years out of college, I was living in Boston and dating Hal, who at the time was just finishing college and living with his parents in a far northern suburb. After a year of dating, and for a variety of reasons, Hal and I decided we wanted to move away from Boston; we started discussing the places we'd want to live and we agreed upon Washington, D.C. At the time, it was supposed to be a limited relocation; I kept saying I'd be in DC "a year, two at most," and envisioned Hal and I moving on to Seattle or San Francisco, and eventually retiring together to Boston. My family just assumed--though they didn't necessarily like it, they'd mostly come to accept that I wouldn't (couldn't, really, and have any real prospects for personal or professional fulfillment) return to my rural southern hometown--that I would head west.
A year later, not even two, Hal and I were no longer together, yet eighteen years since I'm still in northern Virginia. What the hell happened?
To be sure, I did almost leave once, back in 1992. I had applied for a job with an Internet service provider in the Seattle area. My interview lasted eight hours, and included a statement from my prospective boss, delivered seemingly in utter sincerity, when I asked about the twelve- to sixteen-hour days to which I'd heard some employees allude, that "oh, not everyone works those kinds of hours; X, for example, tends to work just ten and then goes home." X, by the way, happened to be eight months pregnant at the time. I'm certainly not averse to long hours--while working at an Internet startup a few years ago, for example, I routinely worked 60- to 80-hour weeks myself--but at the time, I wasn't sure that it was the right fit for me. At the same time, I'd just recently become involved with someone back here, and I turned down the job offer when it came. Since then, I'd sporadically applied for jobs on the West Coast, but never pursued anything very vigorously.
Then, when my dad was sickest, it seemed best to stay put, where I would be no more than four hours away by car. Since his death, though, it's begun to feel more and more like it's time for me to move on from here; and the chilling political climate in Virginia, especially for gays and lesbians, has only added fuel to the fire. I suspect Gene will say, as is his wont, that we're just copying him, but the truth is that Jeff has always been clear about his intention after five years in DC--a milestone he'll hit this summer--to head back west, and for at least the last year and a half we've been starting to talk about it very seriously, more recently setting summer to fall 2006 as a soft deadline. Now that we're starting to pin it down, though, even if very loosely, I'm finding myself eager to go sooner rather than later.
Not that I don't have some anxieties; I don't know what it will mean to be living so close, perhaps even in the same town, as his parents, what kinds of pressures that might exert, for example (not that they're not wonderful people; they are, but family dynamics are challenging enough even for biological family, and ours is not the typical relationship parents expect to deal with). And, unlike eighteen years ago, when I moved here from Boston without having an apartment or a job lined up, I can't really afford to just pick up and go like that, especially somewhere that is even more expensive to live than here; I have a mortgage and car payments, and I'm eighteen years closer to retirement, things I never imagined having to worry about back when I was 25 and leaving Boston.
So, albeit perhaps prematurely, I've already begun to look and apply for jobs out there. I've completed a couple of applications for positions at Yahoo!, and I'm even looking at a lateral move to a position at another federal agency; there aren't a whole lot of federal jobs in San Francisco, so when I saw one in my field open up last week, I decided it would be almost reckless not to apply for it.
Over the coming months, then, if you know or hear of any positions in the Bay Area for which you think I might be qualified, please let me know.
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this sculpture sits in an interior courtyard at the U.S. Department of State's Harry S. Truman Building in Washington, DC
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this sculpture sits in an interior courtyard at the U.S. Department of State's Harry S. Truman Building in Washington, DC
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this sculpture sits in an interior courtyard at the U.S. Department of State's Harry S. Truman Building in Washington, DC
what I want to know is, just how does that loincloth stay up?
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this sculpture sits in an interior courtyard at the U.S. Department of State's Harry S. Truman Building in Washington, DC
you can see that the loincloth here is really just something the figure is sitting on; it's not attached around his waist in any way. so how does it stay on in the front?
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this sculpture sits in an interior courtyard at the U.S. Department of State's Harry S. Truman Building in Washington, DC
what I want to know is, just how does that loincloth stay up?
elfintech posted a photo:
this sculpture sits in an interior courtyard at the U.S. Department of State's Harry S. Truman Building in Washington, DC
what I want to know is, just how does that loincloth stay up?
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the one time Omaha Union Station, a train station, is now the Durham Western Heritage Museum
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the one time Omaha Union Station, a train station, is now the Durham Western Heritage Museum
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the one time Omaha Union Station, a train station, is now the Durham Western Heritage Museum
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taken on the Space Needle's outside observation platform, looking back towards the glass windows of the inner observation lounge, which in turn are reflecting Seattle's downtown
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In the past, Jeff has joked that he just waits for me to write up our travels, and then all he has to do is link to my posts, adding only what details I've forgotten or left out; true to form, I wrote up the primary reports of our April trips to New York and Omaha. This time, however, I decided to step aside graciously (ok, so my World of Warcraft addiction hasn't helped) and let Jeff document our latest trip, so you can read all about our wonderful (albeit much too short) Seattle sojourn over at Rebel Prince.
A few of my pix from that trip have begun to appear over on my Flickr site (and mirrored here), but you also can keep an eye on my Seattle set, as I'll be uploading more over the coming days.
We had a really great time; Seattle is on the short list of American cities in which I'd like to live (but more on that in a coming post), and we're certain to go back regardless. There were a lot of things there I'd still like to show Jeff that we just weren't able to manage on this go-round. (And given the amazingly salutary effect Seattle had on my libido and affiliated energy levels--what's the equivalent of "twice" and "thrice" for the number four? and that was just the first 18 hours--I suspect Jeff wouldn't mind if we visited Seattle often.)
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Monday, when we went to Seattle Center, turned out to be very gray and rainy (in contrast to our beautiful, relatively clear and dry Saturday). The original photo of the back entrance to the Experience Music Project, then, was rather drab, so I decided to focus on the red tree and play with the contrast, causing the silver walls of the EMP to fade away into the gray skies.
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Taken through a wire mesh covered opening on the observation deck of the Volunteer Park water tower at full zoom (300mm), the sides of the frame are a bit dark where the edges of the mesh are fuzzed almost to obscurity. That gave the original photo a bit of a lomo-like effect that I decided to highlight by adding some oversaturation, a histogram equalization and a little bit of grain, in order to give this the feel of a postcard from the era of the Seattle World's Fair (coincidentally, the very year I was born), and that treatment is more evident at the large size.
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