What is your least favorite sport to watch? To play?
Caption This Photo
Father Juan Manuel Villar blesses a dog during the feast of San Anton, the patron saint of
Some Things Just Make Me Cry With Happiness
This is one of them.
Thanks, SpaceCowboy.
Find out more about Dancing Matt here.
Blog For Choice Day
I am pro-choice because no human being should be able to create legislation over the body of another human being. Forcing a woman to give birth against her will is Orwellian and immoral.
I am pro-choice because, even in this day and age, women can die during childbirth.
I am pro-choice because, like Litbrit, I believe that all women and pregnancies are not the same.
I am pro-choice because, like Shakes, I trust women to make up their own minds about their bodies and lives.
I am pro-choice because, as my friend Grendel said, I am not a woman, and it would be disingenuous for me to order women to face difficulties or decisions that I never have to face.
I am pro-choice because illegal abortion is deadly.
I am pro-choice because rape happens.
I am pro-choice because I care about what happens to children once they are born.
I am pro-choice because women are not baby machines.
Uh-Oh
Let’s take a look at McCain’s position over the last couple of months.
* Three months ago, McCain we should send 20,000 more troops to Iraq.
* Two weeks ago, McCain said 20,000 more troops aren’t enough.
* A day later, McCain said he wasn’t sure if 20,000 more troops would be enough.
* One week ago, McCain said 20,000 more troops are enough.
* And today, McCain is back to saying 20,000 aren’t enough again.
…Remember, McCain’s principal selling points as a candidate are a) his “expertise” on military matters; and b) his consistency.
Yes. You are.
Scrooge Lives
There's a very interesting discussion going on in a comment thread over at Feministe, spawned by a reprehensible post squished out by a blogger named Rachel Moran. She titles the post "No Homeless People Were Harmed During The Making of this Film," which comes across as a pretty snide attempt at humor when you read the content of the post. Apparently, Rachel has quite a bit of disdain for homeless people that dare to enter her airspace. (bolds mine)
Eddie also had an interesting story to tell about a homeless man, in Naples, who asked him for a dollar. Eddie told him no and got in his Caddy and the homeless guy started punching the glass, so Eddie got out of the Caddy and the homeless guy punched him in the jaw and Eddie left the homeless guy twitching in the street.Now, while "Eddie's" story sounds a little suspect to me (but I wasn't there, so who knows?) I found her weird tone to be rather striking. Leaving aside the "fuck, yeah!" response to her friend leaving a homeless man "twitching in the street," she begins this weird description of the confrontation between her sister and "this scraggly-haired homeless guy," where her sister is described as something more than human, and the homeless man is distinctly less than human, a clawed monster that cannot keep itself from touching the startlingly platinum blond shiny thing!
He told us this story at Mastry's during the second round and when he was done, me and Lil Sis went up to the bar to order more. I was waiting for the bartender to come around when this scraggly-haired homeless guy comes up behind Lil Sis.
He had his claw extended at her and he was probably about to touch her hair, because she is startlingly platinum blond and the light at Mastry's flickered an excellent, sexy pale blue onto her hair, like she was in a video game where she was, like, the leader of a gang of fierce cougar-girl mutants or something.
"Back up," I said to the homeless guy in very low, dangerous tones.
The story goes on, with much of the indignant "how dare these people speak to me" elements, along with more stories of Eddie getting beaten up by other homeless people, and how the "homeless problem" in her area is "completely out of control." And then things get really interesting:
Vagrancy should not be enabled. When you see a fucking bum stumbling drunk up on you, slurring about needing gas money or pleading with you that he is a good person, you just gotta ignore him and if he follows you, turn on him and sharply tell him, "Fuck off. Stop following me."Yep. "We're going to lure and agitate homeless people into getting violent, then kick the shit out of them." I find it really interesting how she goes from "solutions" like shelters and soup kitchens to violent assault. Throwing in a mention of "mental health support" while dehumanizing and advocating violence against the homeless is a meaningless gesture; it's obvious she's never given the slightest thought to the availability or effectiveness of support means for the homeless.
Real alleviation of the homeless problem requires broad action - cops telling them to move along, shelters to get them off the sidewalks, feeding stations, mental health support, day labor programs. Your five bucks tells the homeless man that he can get by panhandling in St. Petersburg and, frankly, that is not OK with me.
We are thinking about proving this nuisance and need for civil action by making a short film called "Eddie Rolls on the Homeless," whereby Mark secretly videotapes me and Lil Sis in a variety of situations to see how many homeless people approach us and, then, how many of these situations escalate into harrassment. Then, he's gonna videotape Eddie in the same scenarios, only Eddie is going to beat up every homeless person who escalates the contact after being told that his panhandling is illegal and annoying.
The discussion at Feministe is very interesting. Much of it is horrified reaction to this post, but there are also those that, while not supporting attacking the homeless, bring up bad or even violent confrontations with homeless people that they've had in the past, insisting that something needs to be done.
But here's the thing; they consistently speak as if a few violent homeless people are somehow representative of every homeless person you'd meet on the street. (One commenter even compares them to rampaging alligators.) In addition to this unfair generalization (and leaving aside very important aspects of this problem, like mental illness), they also seem to forget that homeless people are human beings that have to abide by the same laws as everyone else. When discussing violent altercations with the homeless, the question always is "What do we do about these people? What are you supposed to do when a homeless guy starts following you down the street, screaming at you?" Well, how about call a cop? It's as if we're in such a hurry to get the homeless out of sight, out of mind, that the only responses to an attack by a homeless person is either ignoring them completely or beating the shit out of them. This is not to say that I don't think a person is justified in using violence in self defense; it's that people are reacting as if these were stray dogs being discussed.
Check out the comments, and if you're interested, there's a lot more talk going on at Majikthise, Blurbex, Progressive Gold, and more on a different but similar story at World-O-Crap. Like aggressive pit bulls, apparently the only solution for homeless people that don't immediately scuttle out of sight is a good, hard beating.
Rachel, meanwhile, pulls an Ann Coulter:
I am astonished at how many people think that BAR TALK means my boyfriend is gonna film my sister’s boyfriend beating people up.
And contrary to your rambling opening, I’m not taking the post down. It’s on my MySpace page, it’s on my own blog and it’s at Sticks of Fire. I stand by everything in it, because I expect there are people in the universe who are not so literal as to think I am actually beating up homeless people.
"Jeez, can't you take a joke? I was just kidding!"
Of course, your "how cool!" reaction to your sister's boyfriend bragging about beating the shit out of homeless people would in no way influence people into thinking you might actually do this.
And you writing about this would in no way make other, more extreme people feel completely justified in doing exactly what you said.
INTERBAY SUPERSTARNo, you're not, and no, you don't. This all sounds too familiar:
<3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3
Hi! I'm the American Dream - 5'10", 36-26-36, shiny hair, blue eyes and a smile. I wear fur and diamonds. I dance like a dream. I make you happy.
The clerk, in letting Scrooge's nephew out, had let two other people in. They were portly gentlemen, pleasant to behold, and now stood, with their hats off, in Scrooge's office. They had books and papers in their hands, and bowed to him.
'Scrooge and Marley's, I believe,' said one of the gentlemen, referring to his list. 'Have I the pleasure of addressing Mr Scrooge, or Mr Marley?'
'Mr Marley has been dead these seven years,' Scrooge replied. 'He died seven years ago, this very night.'
'We have no doubt his liberality is well represented by his surviving partner,' said the gentleman, presenting his credentials.
'It certainly was, for they had been two kindred spirits. At the ominous word liberality, Scrooge frowned, and shook his head, and handed the credentials back.
'They are. Still,' returned the gentleman,' I wish I could say they were not.'
'The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigour, then?' said Scrooge.
'At this festive season of the year, Mr Scrooge,' said the gentleman, taking up a pen, 'it is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for the Poor and destitute, who suffer greatly at the present time. Many thousands are in want of common necessaries; hundreds of thousands are in want of common comforts, sir.'
'Are there no prisons?"
'Plenty of prisons,' said the gentleman, laying down the pen again.
'And the Union workhouses.' demanded Scrooge. 'Are they still in operation?'
'Both very busy, sir.'
'Oh. I was afraid, from what you said at first, that something had occurred to stop them in their useful course,' said Scrooge. 'I'm very glad to hear it.'
'Under the impression that they scarcely furnish Christian cheer of mind or body to the multitude,' returned the gentleman, 'a few of us are endeavouring to raise a fund to buy the Poor some meat and drink, and means of warmth. We choose this time, because it is a time, of all others, when Want is keenly felt, and Abundance rejoices. What shall I put you down for?'
'Nothing!' Scrooge replied.
'You wish to be anonymous?'
'I wish to be left alone,' said Scrooge. 'Since you ask me what I wish, gentlemen, that is my answer. I don't make merry myself at Christmas and I can't afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the establishments I have mentioned-they cost enough; and those who are badly off must go there.'
'Many can't go there; and many would rather die.'
'If they would rather die,' said Scrooge, 'they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population."
(Thanks, Lance.)
Remember This?
We're so bad, we know we're good
Blowin' your mind like we knew we would
You know we're just struttin' for fun
Struttin' our stuff for everyone
We're not here to start no trouble
We're just here to do the Super Bowl Shuffle.
Uh-huh.
I still remember almost all the words to this. I shit you not when I tell you we had to learn all the words in my fifth-grade music class. I still remember the lyrics hand-written by the music teacher and dittoed in blotchy purple onto individual hand-outs. Wow.
I predict within 35 seconds of posting this, Spudsy will call demanding to know why I'm trying to kill him. Hahahahahahahahaha!
Allies
There's an interesting article in the Miami Herald (via Towleroad) about Florida gay-straight alliance clubs, 80 or so of the approximately 3,000 GSAs nationwide. The whole thing is worth a read, but I just wanted to highlight one of the arguments being used by opponents of the clubs:
Okeechobee High Principal Toni Wiersma told [17-year-old lesbian Yasmin Gonzalez] that her club was unwelcome. Yasmin sued the Okeechobee School Board.Apparently, no one has informed Gibbs that GSA meetings aren't actually orgies.
''The objection is not to a GSA, per se. The objection is to the premature sexualization of the students. If this had been a heterosexual club, it would have been denied,'' said attorney David Gibbs of Seminole County, who represents the Okeechobee schools.
Okeechobee has an abstinence-only policy. The GSA would violate that, said Gibbs, who became well known in 2005 representing the parents of late coma patient Terri Schiavo in their fight to keep her alive.
There are a couple things I find amusing here about Gibbs' (and, via his representation, the Okeechobee School System's) position. In suggesting that a GSA "sexualizes" students, the implication is, of course, that being gay is only about having sex with a person of the same sex—that there's nothing else they could possibly be discussing, because there's nothing else to "being gay" than that. Yet, these same people would no doubt refer to being gay as "the homosexual lifestyle" and talk about a "gay agenda." So, on one hand, the GSA must necessarily violate the abstinence-only policy because it couldn't possibly be about anything but sex, and on the other hand, homosexuality is an entire lifestyle with its own agenda. Oy gevalt.
Realistically, the differences between being gay and straight are only about more than the sex of who you fuck because of bigotry. The actual substantive differences between Spudy's relationship with his husband and my relationship with Mr. Shakes are down to our being four unique people, not our being a gay couple and a straight couple. That makes for practical differences, like legal status and how strangers may regard us—and it is within those difference, the result of prejudice, that the necessity for GSAs lie.
In a very real way, people like Gibbs provide the raison d'être for GSAs as and because they object to them.
The other bit that just amuses me endlessly is that worrying about the premature sexualization of students in American high schools is fucking laughable. These are the same American high schools that have things called proms, with as much pomp and fevered expectation as the community can afford, overseen by the ultimate high school hetero duo, the prom king and queen? The same American high schools that have things called football games, where alpha guys essentially beat each other up and are cheered on by scantily clad alpha girls, and whose biggest game of the year is overseen by another proverbial hetero duo, the homecoming king and queen? The same American high schools who put on Back-to-School dances, and Halloween dances, and Christmas dances, and Sadie Hawkins dances, and spring formals, and junior proms? The same American high schools who teach abstinence-only until marriage, but sponsor mini-weddings like the prom every fricking year, feigning ignorance to the widespread tradition of "losing it" on prom night?
Those American high schools?
Yeah. I thought so.
Meanwhile, I'm reminded of a comment RachelPhilPa left, about funding "an increasingly large and vocal queer-identified (as opposed to gay/lesbian identified) community that is very supportive of trans folk—along with many third-wave feminists," which I've been thinking about for awhile. I've been meaning to write a whole post about her comment, and I still intend to, but for now, I wanted to mention it because these GSAs are both reflective of that community and an indicator that it will only increase. In spite of their rather restrictive nomenclature, gay-straight alliances at high schools are more than just what their name suggests and are increasing in numbers, I think, precisely because there is a recognition among young progressives that pro-choice, pro-recreational, third-wave feminist hets (in particular) have more in common with the queer community than not.
hear ye! hear ye!
Announcement time! Two things:
1. I've decided to go the way of Spudsy and do my blogging here.
2. I had a regular feature on my blog called "blog gourmet". It was a tongue-in-cheek label, due to the fact that I'm so not a gourmet chef. When talking with Shakes about blogging solely on here, I asked if she thought this would be a good feature to bring to here. I got the virtual thumbs up!
Now, this isn't going to just be about me--this is now Shaker Gourmet. I want your recipes! The plan, thus far, is to feature one a week. If I get a deluge of recipes, it may go to two. Please just send one recipe per email; include clear instructions and a link to your blog, if you have one. Email me at: fire.of.psyche (at) gmail.com They'll pretty much be posted in the order I get them, as best I can manage that.
To start us off, here is one of my own:
* 1 – 1.5 lbs stew meat
* 2 T olive oil
* 4 cloves garlic, chopped
* 2 15 oz cans tomato sauce
* 1 1/4 cups hearty red wine
* 1 10.5 oz can double strength beef broth, reserve 1/3 cup
* 4 -5 med sprig fresh rosemary or 3 tsp dried
* 1/2 tsp black pepper
* 3 bay leaves
* 3 med carrots, sliced
* appx 4 med red potatoes, diced
* 1/2 cup frozen peas
* 2 TB cornstarch & 1/4 cup water
—In a large pot/soup pot over med heat, brown stew meat in olive oil & 1/2 the garlic. Appx 5 minutes.
—After stew meat is browned, add in tomato sauce, wine, broth, rest of garlic, pepper, rosemary (take leaves off sprigs before adding), and bay leaves. Stir. Reduce heat to low/simmer.
—While meat & sauce are simmering, prepare the vegetables (chopping/dicing). Add them to pot along with reserve beef broth. Stir. Cover and let cook at least four hours, until veggies are tender and meat is falling apart. Stir periodically during cooking time.
—A few minutes before serving, mix cornstarch and water thoroughly. Bring stew to boil and add cornstarch mix to thicken, stirring constantly. It should thicken easily and take but a couple minutes. Thicken to desired consistancy.
Serve with warm biscuits and remaining wine.
You can easily adjust the vegetable amount to desired levels but be sure to use red potatoes and not baking potatoes. Baking potatoes will become extremely mushy and put too much starch into the stew while it’s cooking—you’ll get more mush than stew. I leave the skins on the potatoes as well.
Blog for Choice Day
Today is Blog for Choice Day, and the 34th anniversary of Roe v. Wade.
I support choice for a very simple reason: I want it. I want choice—for myself, and for other women. And I trust women to make the best choices for themselves. That's about the long and the short of it.
All the rest—the hand-wringing, the shaming, the religion, the science, the assertions of certitude about when life begins—is just so much noise, is just so many different ways of qualifying why, exactly, women aren't fit to make decisions for themselves about their reproduction. I trust women, and the only question I have for someone who rejects choice is: Why don't you? As we move forward in our fight to protect choice, I hope every last member of the anti-choice misogynistic crusade against women's personal autonomy is forced to account for their answer to that question.
And believe me, the fight isn't even close to over.
I'm 32 years old. My whole life, abortion has been legal, but its legality has never been totally secure, predicated on the composition of the Supreme Court, on our political and cultural leaders' resolve to unapologetically support and protect it, on pro-choice women and men's determination to defend it. Nevertheless, there are an incredible number of women and men in my generation (and its youngers) who subscribe to the understandably appealing but erroneous belief that Roe will never be overturned, who fail to realize it matters not whether Roe is overturned, if anti-choicers are successful in rendering it an empty statute. Such widespread complacency and ignorance has created a void in which anti-choicers have been frighteningly successful at chipping away abortion rights and access on the state level, leaving many women across the nation with the legal right to get an abortion, but no means to do so.
So on we march, from one battle to the next, fighting for the right to choose, to make up our own minds about our bodies and our futures. And in each place, of each new face who believes s/he knows better what's best for us, I hope we ask: I trust women; why don't you?
More Blogging for Choice: Jessica, Amanda, Mustang Bobby, Auguste, Evil Bender, Medbh, Red State Blues, Elayne, Roxanne, Jill (and here), Aspazia, Trish, Norbizness, Sarah in Chicago, Minstrel Boy, JackGoff, Deborah, Karen, Ravenous, Fritz, Afaeyre, LeMew, Lindsay, Pam, Kyso, QuakerDave, Shayera, and Konagod.
*Scrape, Scrape, Scrape* Holy Crap, Look What I Found!
Well, color me gobsmacked. Apparently, the bottom of the barrel does exist!
For those of you that have been following the Spocko story (short n' sweet: Blogger complains about right-wing eliminationist hate rhetoric on the radio, advertisers pull sponsorship, ABC/Disney shuts down his blog), or simply have an interest in right-wing radio hate speech, this should be interesting to you:
Rush Limbaugh, Friday the 19th:
"Look, let me put it to you this way: the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons. There, I said it."
Later that day, WJBC in Illinois:
The Rush is no longer going to be on the air on WJBC. Radio Bloomignton General Manager Red Pitcher announced this afternoon the syndicated Rush Limbaugh Show will air for the last time March 2, 2007. Pitcher tells WJBC's Steve and Beth on The Drive, local programming will replace Rush. Pitcher believes Limbaugh's popularity is declining becuse of controversial remarks that are offending even his Republican fans. He pointed to today's show in which Limbaugh compared players in the NFL with gang members. Details of the local programming line-up that will begin on March 5th will be announced in coming weeks.Now, I'm not sure how they're getting this information that he's offending "even his Republican fans," but this is very good to see. I'm sure we'll hear a lot of whinging from Rush about "censorship" before March 2nd (if he even noticed this happened), and I'm sure the Right will screech about the "liberal media" driving Rush off the air. Still, it's good to see at least one station refusing to let Rush's brand of racism lite be broadcast over their airwaves.
Now if we can just get rid of Savage....
Update: More from Shakes, who really needs to get the fuck out of my head, in the post below this one. Apparently, there was some sort of game yesterday.
(Bolds mine. Tip 'o the Energy Dome to Atrios.)
I Sit in the Middle of History
Three hours north of Indianapolis and less than an hour from downtown Chicago, I am in between the hometowns of the two teams going to the Super Bowl. Those teams are led by these men:
They are Indianapolis Colts' head coach Tony Dungy and Chicago Bears' head coach Lovie Smith, and they're the first black head coaches to go head-to-head at the Super Bowl in NFL history. It's a little bit of progress the realization of which gave me a face-cracking grin.
Just days ago, the hideous boil on the ass of humanity Rush Limbaugh disgorged another detestable bit of his typical "observational" swill, intoning that "the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons." Only one station dropped his show.
And yet, we're about to see history being made in spite of Limbaugh's vile transmissions of racism, as he struggles against the inevitability of progress, makes last-gasp attempts to rile his bigoted listeners' hatred in the waning days of their undeserved privilege. When millions and millions of people tune into the Super Bowl, they're going to see two teams, each with a black coach—and those who insist on clinging to their sad and desperate reserves of irrational hatred will feel no joy. Their racism will be ruinous. The rest of us will celebrate, or fail altogether to notice the passing of this historical benchmark, which itself is a rather notable commentary.
As for Shakes Manor, sitting as we are in the middle of the two teams, we'll be smiling when both Smith and Dungy take the field, but there's little doubt about for whom we'll be rooting. Mr. Shakes cared very little about American football when he was a wee thing 4,000 miles away, but there was one team that captured his fancy:
Go Bears. Go Lovie.
Oy
Seriously, if you're sitting around stroking your knob while waxing rhapsodic about what it would be like if Jeb Bush were president instead of George, it's time to get some fresh air.
(H/T Oddjob via RS.)
Dear Bill Kristol
I'll shut my big fat yap for six or nine months when you produce evidence of any criticism of the war which has directly affected its success.
Until that time, you can shove your whining straight up your ass—a place you'll no doubt be paying a visit in short order to fish for evidence of the old stab-in-the-back theory.
Fuck you hugely.
Love,
Shakespeare's Sister
National Irony Day
Happy National Sanctity of Human Life Day! I bet you didn't even know today was National Sanctity of Human Life Day, did you? Well, I'll forgive you for not getting me a card, since President Bush only proclaimed it into existence two days ago. Frankly, I feel two days is rather short notice to organize its celebration to include "appropriate ceremonies and to underscore our commitment to respecting and protecting the life and dignity of every human being," but I'm never one to question the president, so I'll do what I can…
Okay, I've got a bunch of people and some antiwar stuff—signs, a big banner, zany Bush masks, and the flammable effigy's on its way. With 19 more American soldiers killed yesterday, I can't think of a better way to recognize National Sanctity of Human Life Day than a good, old-fashioned war protest.
Oh, wait a second… I'm just looking at the president's proclamation again, and, uh, it looks like National Sanctity of Human Life Day is actually just about abortion.
We are vigorously promoting parental notification laws, adoption, abstinence education, crisis pregnancy programs, and the vital work of faith-based groups. Through the "Born-Alive Infants Protection Act of 2002," the "Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003," and the "Unborn Victims of Violence Act of 2004," we are helping to make our country a more hopeful place.Well, phooey.
(FYI: Tomorrow is the 34th anniversary of Roe v. Wade and Blog for Choice Day.)
(Via Maha. Crossposted at Ezra's place.)
In
Hillary Clinton and Bill Richardson.
Clinton: "'I'm in and I'm in to win,' Clinton said on her campaign Web site early in the morning, and then spent the day at her Washington home making calls to supporters, donors and friends. Her announcement was deliberately timed to come shortly before President Bush's State of the Union address on Tuesday night, campaign advisers said, so she can draw a contrast with the administration's record and help focus attention on the office of the presidency."
Richardson: "After years of freelancing his diplomatic skills from the unlikely position as governor of New Mexico, Bill Richardson is taking the first step toward a bid to become president and put his skills to work in the White House. Richardson plans to announce Sunday that he will soon file papers to create a presidential exploratory committee, several officials with knowledge of his plans said Friday."
Discuss.
UPDATE: Also In—Sam Brownback, who, unlike McCain and Giuliani, has plenty of cred with the fundies already. (Via Pam.)
Friday Rat Terrier Blogging
Rory wants all cats to know that she's ready for them.
I vant to bite your neck.
(She's just playing with the beagle, I swear)
