Following up on this story, meet the family that put a big crack in the gay adoption ban here in Florida.
Two months after the foster child came to live in Wayne LaRue Smith's two-story Key West home, the brown-eyed 5-year-old boy looked up from the kitchen table and, in a plaintive voice, asked what seemed a simple question.
''Will you be my daddy?''
At first, Smith, a foster father who has cared for 33 children in state custody, could not say yes.
Smith, who is openly gay, could raise other people's children. But in Florida, the only state that outright bans all gay people from adopting, he could never adopt a child of his own.
Until now.
Last month, a Monroe Circuit judge became only the second judge in Florida history to allow a gay man or lesbian to adopt a child.
Smith's may be a pyrrhic victory. Though Circuit Judge David John Audlin Jr.'s order will stand, it likely will hold little sway over future cases, scholars say. Moreover, the state Attorney General's Office will not appeal the order, meaning it will never be reviewed by a higher court.
With another legal challenge set to begin next month in Miami -- one that is being contested -- Audlin's order could become a historical footnote.
To Smith and his new son, though, it has the power of a landmark decision, he said.
''I knew that in our hearts, from that moment on that, one way or another, we were going to answer that question 'yes,' Smith said. ''It's seven years later, but now we can.''
''It was a defining moment,'' Smith said of the boy's request seven years ago. ''There are moments in life I won't ever forget. In that instant there was nothing I wanted more than to say yes. But this crazy state I live in won't let me.''
The Attorney General's Office, which is defending the adoption ban in the Miami case next month, has argued in court records they are upholding public morality and providing for the healthy development of foster children by ensuring they are raised by dual-sex parents.
''Chief among the interests served by Florida's adoption law is the best interest of Florida children,'' Assistant Attorney General Valerie J. Martin has written. ''Can it be seriously contended that an arguably rational basis does not exist for placing adoptive children in the mainstream of American family life?''
Gee, they look incredibly mainstream to me: a home, two loving parents, school, friends, even a white picket fence. The fact that they don't look mainstream to the state attorney general sounds more like his problem than anyone else's.
It's the first time in California history a murder conviction has been handed down for dog mauling.
In rejecting a defense lawyer's request for probation, Judge Charlotte Woolard of San Francisco Superior Court said the horrific circumstances of the attack Jan. 26, 2001, far outweighed Knoller's previous crime-free record.
Woolard said Knoller had not bothered to put a muzzle on her aggressive 140-pound Presa Canario dog before taking it out of the apartment. Knoller did not call for help, retrieve a weapon or dial 911 while the animal was mauling Diane Whipple for at least 10 minutes, the judge said. A second Presa Canario that Knoller and her husband and law partner, Robert Noel, kept in their apartment may have joined the attack.
Whipple, 33, the women's lacrosse coach at St. Mary's College in Moraga, bled to death from at least 77 wounds. Knoller, 53, was paroled from prison in 2004 after serving about three years for involuntary manslaughter, but was returned to custody Aug. 22 after Woolard reinstated the jury's murder verdict. Knoller's husband, who was not home when the attack happened, was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and paroled in September 2003.
Living in the Bay Area at the time, this story was continuously in the news; it was horrible. I remember watching and listening to Knoller—she didn't care; her indifference and lack or remorse was appalling. That, more than anything, caused so much of the community's outrage.
My heart goes out to Whipple's partner, Sharon Smith. Finally she can have closure.
Smith gave a statement to the court, and, according to the SF Chronicle, she looked at Knoller and said that more than seven years after "the worst day of my life and the last day of Diane's life, finally there is some justice."
CBS5 reports on the verdict:
As soon as heard about the ruling, I ran to tell my wife—we hugged, we cried. Finally.
Margaret Cho has posted a response to my critique of her misogynist commentary about Sarah Palin. Utterly ignoring my explanation about why using misogyny against a woman—even if she herself is not a friend to women—Cho defends herself by saying, "I am being accused of sexually objectifying Sarah Palin, and I did it because I think it is funny." Oh, well, that's all right then.
And, then, without a trace of irony, she writes:
She is an insult to feminism, a sickening example what a woman will do to other women in order to please men and further her own career. Women do shit like that to other women to keep them down – to make their achievement seem more extraordinary – to keep women out of their way, so they can enjoy all the power and the men themselves, and that stuff makes them worse than sexist men. It is worse to be a traitor than a perpetrator.
Well, gee—maybe Palin just does it because she thinks it's funny.
I hear that's a legitimate excuse for misogyny these days.
The curious thing is that Cho ends her post by citing policies that quite expectedly make Palin resoundingly objectionable to feminists/womanists and our allies—but uses them as some sort of fucked-up justification for unleashing vitriolic sexist attacks on Palin (I'm allowed to use sexism against this woman, because she deserves it). If she'd just instead stuck to Palin's heinously antifeminist positions in the first place, we wouldn't be having this conversation.
But some women will do terrible things to other women in order to further their careers, to keep other women down and make their own achievements seem more extraordinary. So I've heard, anyway.
According to an email I received this morning, the GOP has been busy urging people to vote in PBS' NOW online poll about whether Sarah Palin is qualified to serve as Vice President. When I last checked, the poll was 50% Yes to 48% No, with 0% Not Sure.
If your teaspoon needs exercise today, get on over there and vote:
Melissa and I were talking the other day about Warrant, those ridiculous hair farmers who sang the ridiculous hair farmer anthem "Cherry Pie." (And no, don't ask, it's a long story.) After discussing Jani Lane and Bret Michaels, the conversation continued on something like this:
Liss: Speaking of shitty bands, Iain ran into my girlfriend C at Walgreens the other day, and she told him to tell me that there's a ticket to the New Kids on the Block reunion tour with my name on it. But get this: It's EIGHTY-TWO FUCKING DOLLARS!
Deeky: What? Huh? Who says "Tell Melissa I got her a ticket for the New Kids on the Block reunion tour!" and expects that to be good news?
Liss: Well, we used to go to NKOTB concerts when we were like thirteen or whatever, so she thought it would be fun and nostalgic. Which it would have been...for, like, forty bucks. But eighty-two?! Who do they think they are — Menudo?!
Deeky: Seriously.
Liss: Whatevs.
Deeky: You should go. And blog about it.
Liss: (laughs) I'd have to do a fundraiser to pay for the ticket. "Help send me to the New Kids reunion tour!"
Deeky: (laughs)
Liss: Eighty-two dollars — harrumph. Dude, I could get like FIVE nutria skulls for that!
Deeky: (laughs harder)
Liss: Now that I've found out a nutria skull can be bought for only thirteen bucks**, I'm measuring everything in how many nutria skulls I could buy with it. It's like how the Brits weigh themselves in stones.
Deeky: And what the fuck is that all about? What is that, fourteen pounds? What kind of number is that?
Liss: "Jesus Christ, this breadmaker is fourteen nutria skulls! I saw one in K-mart last week that was only eight nutria skulls!"
Deeky: (laughs)
Liss: I wonder how many nutria skulls one ronpaulbuxxx can buy?
Deeky: Half.
Liss: Is this the dumbest conversation in the history of humankind, do you think?
Deeky: No. People discussing Ron Paul seriously are having stupider conversations.
Liss: Fair point.
** FYI, I am often scouring eBay for post-punk 45s, the occasional pickled fetus, rare collectibles (hookahs, Zuni fetish dolls, bronzed phalluses, what have you) with which to decorate Château Deeky. My finds and discoveries are often shared with Liss.
Okay, it's not just because I know who you are. It's also because you're an ass-flavored megadouche who waxes sincere about your "creative muse" with a straight fucking face, even as your new film prompts a reviewer for the LA Times to dryly snarl, "Watching this repugnant, angry male fantasy, I thought, 'You know what's missing? Jokes about date rape.' I wasn't disappointed for long."
Bush Cabinet member exhibits real human decency on behalf of female asylum-seeker; possibly sets important precedent for women:
[Attorney General Michael Mukasey] is trying to prevent immigration authorities from sending a Muslim woman to her home country, where she was a victim of female genital mutilation.
In a stinging order overriding federal immigration courts, Mukasey blasted a decision that said a 28-year-old citizen and native of Mali should be expelled "because her genitalia already had been mutilated [so] she had no basis to fear future persecution if returned to her home country."
Calling the rationale "flawed," Mukasey sent the case back to the Board of Immigration Appeals with orders to reconsider.
Mukasey's letter (pdf), which also addresses the 28-year-old Malian woman's concern about being subjected to a forced marriage, is an extraordinarily rare move by an attorney general, but Mukasey was moved to intervene in the low-level immigration case after Reps. John Conyers (D-MI) and Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) sent him an angry letter decrying the Board of Immigration Appeals' decision.
Mukasey has ordered reconsideration of the case based on "what he concluded were two significant factual errors in the court's rejection of her appeal."
"Female genital mutilation is not necessarily a one-time event," Mukasey said. He noted that the board in a previous case had granted asylum in to one woman whose "vaginal opening was sewn shut approximately five times after being opened to allow for sexual intercourse and child birth."
He also concluded that the Board of Immigration Appeals was wrong to assume that the woman "must fear persecution in exactly the same form [namely, repeat female genital mutilation] to qualify for relief."
I quite honestly don't know if I'm more shocked (and angry) that the BIA had to have that shit spelled out for the them, or more shocked (and pleased) that Mukasey actually did it.
In any case, fingers crossed that the BIA will make the right decision this time around. That would be some very good news indeed.
I was looking out the window last night and saw this amazing garden spider walking along the porch railing. So I went out and watched it walk along the rail for 10 minutes or so, then went back in and got the camera. (Pictures are tucked below the fold to save causing heart palpitations in the arachnophobes among us.) I've never seen a garden spider this large before; it was, in fact, so huge that I could see quite clearly each of its delicate legs moving as it strolled about on the porch. It was a friendly wee thing, too—didn't get nervous at all when I got close to it. Very cool.
Just hanging out on a metal plant hook on the front porch:
Rush Limbaugh—who is beyond description at this point except for the all-too-obvious-but-stark-in-its-simplicity horrible human being—spent a little time on his putrid radio show yesterday to make his audience totally smarter by telling them that Barack Obama is an Arab, not an African-American.
These polls on how one-third of blue-collar white Democrats won't vote for Obama because he's black, and -- but he's not black. Do you know he has not one shred of African-American blood? He doesn't have any African -- that's why when they asked whether he was authentic, whether he's down for the struggle. He's Arab. You know, he's from Africa. He's from Arab parts of Africa. He's not -- his father was -- he's not African-American. The last thing that he is is African-American. I guess that's splitting hairs, I don't -- it's just all these little things, everything seems upside-down today in this country.
In case I need to state the obvious, Barack Obama is not Arab, although who cares if he were. (Answer: Rush Limbaugh listeners.)
Amusingly, Limbaugh is, of course, technically right that Barack Obama "has not one shred of African-American blood," but he's also totally wrong. Neither of Obama's parents were African-Americans, but the fact that his father was African and his mother was an American pretty much makes Obama about as literally African-American as it gets. So I'm fairly certain that makes all his "shreds of blood" African-American.
Trying to parse Limbaugh logic makes my brain hurt.
A couple people have emailed me about Shakesville's Community Page at Disqus seeming to not recognize the top commenters anymore and there being a possible problem with the comment feed.
Our resident Disqus expert, Space Cowboy, is on holiday this week, so I'm not sure what's going on—but I'm guessing it's just part of updates they're making at the moment. If you have any other questions/concerns, leave 'em in comments.
Like her big sisters, especially Olivia, Sophie constantly wants to cuddle with me all day—which is adorable, but makes blogging rather difficult. Her favorite place to snuggle up for a nap is my boob shelf, but as soon as she gets really limp and sleepy, she slides off and whines miserably if I don't curl my arm under to hold her.
So this morning, after she'd been driving me bananas for about an hour with this new routine, I tucked the bottom of the tanktop I was wearing up under my boobs to create a little pouch, then stuck her inside, where she promptly fell asleep for about three hours.
Coincidentally, this is also Iain's favorite place to take a nap.
"We need this to be clean and quick, and we need to get it in place."—Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson on the proposed $700 billion Wall Street bailout, which he has urged Congress to legislate without delay and without linking it to any new programs.
"We cannot just turn over $700 billion in taxpayer money and not insist that that taxpayer is going to be protected in this."—Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd, who has introduced a bill (pdf) that would create a five-member oversight board to supervise the bailout, require the government to secure an equity stake equal to the value of the purchased debt, penalize executives for "inappropriate or excessive" risks, and compel executives to return profits earned based on inaccurate accounting measures.
"Treasury should now be required to explain why this isn’t a much, much better way to do this rescue."—Paul Krugman, on Dodd's proposed legislation.
"Barack Obama is someone who will lead for [LGBT voters], who will fight for them, fight for us." Remember that quote from Steve Hildebrand, Obama's deputy campaign manager? That sounded nice, I guess. How about what Obama said in his acceptance speech last month: "I know there are differences on same-sex marriage, but surely we can agree that our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters deserve to visit the person they love in the hospital and to live lives free of discrimination."
That sounded... well... I don't know if I'd call it nice, as such, but it was something. Sure, when my husband was in the ICU, it would have been great to have been able to visit him without having to lie about who I was. And yeah, thanks for making it clear that I should be able to live my life "free of discrimination."
So what's up with the Barack Obama: Faith, Family, and Values Tour? Specifically, what is up with Douglas Kmiec stumping for Obama as part of this tour? Douglas Kmiec, the man who recently authored an op-ed piece for the San Francisco Chronicle in support of California's Proposition 8. Prop 8 is the initiative that will, if passed, ban same-sex marriage in the state. Or, as Kmiec puts it, "re-secures a millennia of tradition and common sense."
Ah, yes, once again it's "tradition," "common sense," and "fuck you, faggots."
So, how am I supposed to reconcile Obama's promise of lives free of discrimination, with his tapping of an anti-gay, anti-equality bigot as his messenger in the final days of the campaign?
My assumption is that the authors and editors of The American Prospect are smart enough to know that. So I'm wondering why all three of their blogs—Ezra Klein, Beat the Press, and TAPPED, the latter of which is written by a group of contributors including several people who I know are smart enough to know that—are currently running this ad:
"Yet Another BUSH We Can't Trust"—seriously? Look, I don't give a shit about the "hilarious" double entendre the copy is employing; that's blatantly sexist. And it has no business at any blog that asserts to be feminist and/or progressive.
I'm sympathetic to bloggers and media outlets trying to make money doing the important work of advocating for progressive ideas—I'm one of them, after all. But what's the point if you're willing to undermine what should be a basic progressive principle like "women are more than the sum of their ladybits" when someone offers you a few bob for ad space? It's counterproductive—and quite literally self-defeating.
Last week, I also rejected an ad featuring a sketch of John McCain screwing Sarah Palin with the label "Drill, baby, drill!" It wasn't even a question. And it's not like I couldn't use the money—also last week, we got a medical bill for more than I've made from ad sales the entire year. I don't share that in search of a pat on the back; I'm no fucking hero (as if that weren't patently obvious). I'm an asshole and a fuck-up, but I'm also a progressive and a feminist, and, as such, I've got a path ahead of me arduous enough to traverse already without making the journey that much more difficult for myself by contributing to the morass.
When the whole rest of the world wants to subvert your teaspoon, there's no reason to give them help.
Welcome to Shakesville, a progressive feminist blog about politics, culture, social justice, cute things, and all that is in between. Please note that the commenting policy and the Feminism 101 section, conveniently linked at the top of the page, are required reading before commenting.
Two months after the foster child came to live in Wayne LaRue Smith's two-story Key West home, the brown-eyed 5-year-old boy looked up from the kitchen table and, in a plaintive voice, asked what seemed a simple question.
Melissa and I were talking the other day about Warrant, those ridiculous hair farmers who sang the ridiculous hair farmer anthem "Cherry Pie." (And no, don't ask, it's a long story.) After discussing Jani Lane and Bret Michaels, the conversation continued on something like this:
