I would vote for Hillary Clinton

I know. Just yesterday I said that I wouldn’t vote for somebody who thought that s/he should have more rights than me. And I would only vote for a progressive. But those Clintons! They’re charismatic! They make you feel all warm and fuzzy when they sign the Defense of Marriage Act and Welfare Reform and NAFTA and the WTO and when they open large pristine tracts of wilderness for oil exploration and they bomb third world countries based on shaky (and ultimately false) “intelligence” reports. Why is it that the left still loves Bill ater he did all those bad things? Why do we love Hillary? Why would I vote for her? It doesn’t make any sense. Yet, for some reason, I would. So would a lot of people. If the election were held tomorrow and she was running against Bush, surveys show that she would win. Maybe she could have Kucinich as her running mate.

No More Politics

A band that I like, The Disposable Heros of Hiphoprisy, have a song where the refrain is a guy singing, “All I ever think about is music and politics.” This song often gets stuck in my head.

My life

In personal news, um, not much has happened. I had band practice today from 1:00 to 6:30. A couple of songs got cut from our Vegas set list cuz I can’t play them. One of them I spent a couple of hours practicing last night. Bleah. It may have the hardest bassline out of all the songs. I still feel sniffly. I read a book about the history of non-synthetic dyes and paints. All those crayola colors make sense now. Sienna was the name of a color manufactured in Sienna, Italy. Burnt Sienna is that same color after heating. Midnight blue used to be called Prussian blue and was invented by some guy in Prussia. Err, you can see that all of the data absorbed into my thick skull and now I can give detailed histories. Or not. It’s what comes of reading while sick.
There used to be codes for “first mourning” and “second mourning.” All this is myserious to me. People are/were suppossed to refrain from certain activities and wearing certain colors while mourning. This knowledge, tucked among tales about how Britian fought a war to get Belize as a colony so they could use logwood to dye fabrics black, has made me feel defensive. One is probably not suppossed to get married less than year after one’s mother passes on. Vince told me that people sepnd up to 75% of their time trying to justify decisions that they’ve already made. So here is my justification: I’ve wanted to marry Christi for many years. In 1998, we went to Hawaii right before the November election so we could get married there in case the Hawaiian supreme court overturned gay marriage bans. There was an amendment on the ballot that would undo this court action. So it could have been the case that the supreme court would have legalized gay marriage and then, only a few days later, Hawaiians would have amended their constitioun to make it illegal again. But the people who got married in between would be married. So we went to Hawaii and sat on the beach and got a newspaper every day. The supreme court backed down and the amendment passed and the window of opportunity never opened. But if it had, we would already be married now.
Well, now, five years later, we can get married. We will get married. (Although the location might change if Massachusetts’ supreme court rules next tuesday to legalize same sex marriage there. We would be in a better legal position if we get married in a US state.) We’ve waited a long time.
I used to worry, five years ago, what to say to my grandmother. You’re supossed to tell your grandma (obviously) if you get married, but I thought she might not understand. But she died. And my cousin died. And my mom died. and the number of family members to be distressed about this marriage things is constantly declining. I’m digressing.
Now might not be the time to get married and throw a big party. It’s past the time I would have picked. Look, I’m about to leave. There’s a lot of folks I might not see for a long while. It seems like the right thing to do. But I dunno. Hamlet said something about the funeral meats coldly furnishing the wedding banquet, but that was a dead spouse, not a dead parent. If people weren’t so biggotted and stupid, Christi and I could have gotten married in 1998 and my mom could have come to the wedding.

Black dye, Belize, Puritans

Puritans wanted black fabric and were willing to pay for it. But dying things a true black is difficult. The old method was to dye a piece of fabric in many shades , dipping it mutiple times, until it came out black. The it was discovered that logwood, a new world import, made a wonderful back, but it faded unless dyed over indigo. So indigo was imported from south east Asia and logwood came from Central America. For a long time, logwood was illegal in Britian (so was indigo, but that’s another story), because the Spanish had a monopoly on it. But then Britian fought a war with the Spanish and got control of Belize (formerly British Honduras). As part of the peace settlements, all the privateers were to stop hassling Spanish trade, so pirates were out of a job. They went to work in the mangrove forests of Belize harvesting logwood and were paid for their effort in rum. so the puritans were financing all sorts of debauchery and things they found morally wrong (like slavery – many current Belizeans are decended from slaves imported to harvest logwood) in order to get acessories to show their piety. America really does still have puritanical culture.

More Politics

The Human Rights Campaign sponsored another presidential forum. It seems like there are a lot of these forums. The HRC is a very mainstream gay rights organization. They fight battles that are “winnable.” This means that for a long time, they were anti-trans (note: trans means “transsexual,” “transgendered,” etc), because trans issues weren’t “winnable” and so they didn’t want to try to win rights for all queers. Maybe they would drop lesbians if mysogony became more popular? I’m cynical about the organization although they seem to have kind of come to their senses on including trans people and I give them small donations now.
Anyway, all the Democrats went to see them and answered questions. Only two democrats, Carol Mosley Braun and Dennis Kucinich support legalizing gay marriage in the US and, therefore, presumably, only those two support recognizing gay marriages performed abroad. This means my marriage. Dean, weasley stated that gay marriage is a matter for states to decide and not the federal government. Funny, the Supeme Court did not agree with that in Loving vs. Virginia. Dean, presumably wants to return to a system where marriages would be valid in one state and not others, something that the Supreme Court clearly ruled as unconstitutional when the struck down bans on interracial marriage. But it’s not surprising that Dean wants to return to such a system, since he backs civil unions, a seperate-but-(un)equal notion.
Lieberman, closet Republican, would not even go that far, saying that marriage was sacred and gays deserve some rights of marriage, but not all of them, he would pick and choose in office. A right here. A right there. Oh, not that tax one. That’s sacred!
Al Sharpton criticized all the weasly, homophobic candidates saying that talking about “gay marriage” this way is like talking about “white marriage” or “black marriage” and implies that queers aren’t just folks like everyone else who just want to get married and live their lives. Go Al!
the HRC, again focussing on what’s “winnable,” gave high marks to all the presidential contenders, even though some of them clearly do not deserve marks as high as others. Kucinich also said that he would appoint a gay, lesbian or trans supreme court justice, provided that he or she would uphold Roe vs Wade. See why I like this guy?
I know all you pro-Dean folks have noble intentions. Maybe you agree with everything he says. Or maybe you don’t. Maybe you agree with more progressive views like the Green Party holds or the Kucinich platform. But you’re worried about what’s “winnable,” and want to back somebody with whom you disagree on many issues, but you want to get Bush out. Well, the most “winnable” democrat is Lieberman. He loves blowing things up. He doesn’t like gay people. He likes invasive security measures. Heck, he wants to blow more things up. Are we bombing enough? Boy-oh-boy, is Lieberman “winnable.”
So what? You’re trying to temper “winnablity” against palatablity, is that it? Well a vote for Dean is a vote for Dean’s platform is a vote for second class status for queers. If you don’t agree, with this, why are you encouraging it? Why not vote for the man or woman who most matches your views? Braun and Kucinich aren’t “winnable,” but it doesn’t matter, cuz they’re not going to win. They may even run out of money and drop out before super tuesday. Clearly, Dean is going to be the nominee for 2004. Backing Kucinich now (sadly), will not change who will end up getting the nomination. But it will change the terms of the debate.
the more support the pro-gay marriage, anti-drug war, pro-peace guy gets, the more those issues get discussed and the more the progressive view point is heard and acknowledged. I can hear people thinking, “Middle America is not Progressive.” Well, maybe it is and maybe it isn’t. If it’s not, maybe it’s because progressive voices are being censored. You can’t agree with what you’ve never heard. The progressive message will resonate because it makes sense. It’s logical. It doesn’t use convoluted rhetoric to argue the illogical. Some people might be fooled when Bush says that privatising Medicare will be good for seniors. Most won’t. and if Democrats roll over for corporate donations and agree with him, well, why bother voting at all? The plutocrats clearly own everyone, so why cares who wins. This attitude is deadly to Democrats. Only pro-plutocrat people will bother to vote, and they will vote republican.
Getting the progressive message out will save the Democrats. It will bring back Greens. It will bring back apathetic folks. It will start discussions and debates among non-plutocrats who will realize that corporate-drive neo-liberal policies are not good for the country because they not good for people. These activated people will go to the polls in the general election and vote for a Democrat, because they will have heard the progressive message and it will resonate with them. If you want Progressive ideas to come up during the campaign, you have to back a Progressive for the primaries. Whoever gets the nomination will be forced to adopt a progressive stance, which will be good for everyone.
Of course, like Bush, they could pretend to be a Progressive or a Compassionate Conservative and quickly morph back into a bloated plutocrat the second they’re sworn in, but a girl can dream, can’t she?
Anyway, I’m not voting for anyone who thinks that I deserve fewer rights than they do. Never again.
Kucinich 4 Prez

Calling in Sick

I’ve been sick since last thursday. Christi has been sick forever. Tiffany is sick. I think one of the cats may be unwell. We all sit around and sniffle and nap frequently. I’ve done nothing of value the last week. Christi has though. First, she accidentally deleted all the work she’s been trying to do while sick. And then today, she created a blog for the dog. She’s also writing a letter to NAACP to complain about their misplaced condemnation of Kucinich. He, along with two other Democrats, skipped the NAACP presidential forum. The other two dems were off sipping caviar and dining with ruch plutocrats or had some other lame excuses. But Kucinich was busy voting on against privatizing Medicare, which passed the House by one vote (and had Lieberman decided to stay in DC, he could have voted against it too, but he was busy drinking champagne with whoever he pals around with during his free time).
Medicare Privatization passed the House by one vote. Was this a newspaper headline I missed while napping? The sky is falling! The sky is falling! This is exactly what sick people over 65 need: crappier healthcare. when my mother was diagnosed with cancer, she was over 65 but was still using her private policy because all the forms for medicare were not filled out yet. Her private policy denied coverage for chemotherapy that Medicare would have covered. Anyone would have covered it. And eventually her insurance did cover it, but only after my dad hired a lawyer and threatened to sue.
Hiring a lawyer is often too difficult for sick people. What would have happened to my mom if she had no kids and her partner didn’t know to contact a lawyer?? She would have died a slow, lingering death in October, but with a better quality of life leading up to it. But in principle, this would be very very bad. It seems that “profit,” “healthcare” and “elderly” don’t belong in a sentence together unless one is talking about the evils of imperialism. This is evil evil evil.
So it seems *cough* misleading to condemn Kucinich for taking such a moral stand against evil. So Christi is writing a letter. And I’m going to go take a nap.

Getting Political

I’m registered Green. I did that because economic and enviromental justice are important to me. I’m tired of Democrats, like Al Gore, Gray Davis and Joe Lieberman who are owned by corporate interests and about as inspiring as shower mold. They talk about the same issues as republicans and often offer solution barely differing from republican solution. this is logical since, as I learned in high school civics, the major political parties are not ideologically based. People calling each other “rinos” aside, the major parties exist just to get themselves elected and not to push any particular agendas except what will them support of voters and donors.
the donors are clearly winning. They’re winning by such a large margin that hardly anyone bothers to vote anymore. Do you really beleive that a Gore Lieberman administration would be any less war-like when you consider that Lieberman has criticized Bush for not bombing enough and that he drew up plans for a new government office that was appropriated by Bush to become the office of homeland security. No wonder progressives have switched to the Green party. But we would come back for somebody compelling who had values that weren’t owned by McDonalds, McDonald-Douglas and Clorox.

Dennis Kucinich is da man

Dennis Kucinich could bring back alienated greens, progressives and leftists. His proposals are actually logical and make sense. He wants to quit throwing all of our effort, culture and money at war. He wants to use the “peace dividend” to pay for education and social services. Remember social services? There used to be a radical idea that our taxes should somehow benefit people who need it, rather than going to subsidise gigantic, already-rich corporations. Kucinich wants to resurrect the New Deal and expand it Canada-like to include universal health care. And he supports civil liberties and equal rights for queers. What’s not to love? He wants to end our culture of fear (that Moore documented in Bowling for Columbine).

Random Anecdote

One of my highschool band teachers, Kristen Strom, plays with with a Saxaphone Orchestra called The Nuclear Whales. Early in the Democratic primary season before the 1992 election, they heard that one of the unknown candidates was a saxaphone player. So they contacted his campaign and offered to play at some rallies for him. The campaign took them up on it and the candidate met them and was eager to try out the contra-bass saxaphone, so they got back some pictures of them hanging around with him around while he tried to play it. Then, when he went on to win the white house, they got to be “Friends of Bill” and were invited to the inaguration. Pretty exciting, huh? So I contacted the Kucinich campaign and said that Tennis Roberts could play at rallies and fundraising parties. I hope he gets elected.

Vegan Wedding Cakes

SF:

Millennium
http://www.millenniumrestaurant.com/catering/gallery.html
(great reviews)

Petite Patisserie, San Francisco, CA, 415-794-0319
Email: rachel@petitepatisserie.com, Web site: www.petitepatisserie.com
A freelance bakery chef using organic, local ingredients and fair trade
chocolate to make custom wedding and special occasion cakes, as well as fine
French pastry.
(found her on a vegan/organic page – donno if she can do vegan or just fair
trade – she has a note on her web page about how it’s good to find a baker
3-6 months in advance.. But the cakes are so amazing looking)

Berkeley:

Urban Kitchen
Co-chef/co-owner Sascha Weiss writes that Urban Kitchen is “a full-service
vegetarian catering company that specializes in vegan wedding cakes.”
1734 San Pablo Ave.
Berkeley, CA 94702
(510) 527-8970
Research by Christi

Doctor Doctor

So I called up a doctors office in Cupertino yesterday and got an appointment for today. The local Berkeley clininc told me that I would have to wait weeks and that it would cost an arm and a leg. The Cupertino place was entirely reasonable. And, surprisingly, not homophobic.
Lesbians have higher cancer death rates that straight women and are less likely to see doctors, especially gynocologists. It doesn’t require a huge study to figure out why. Being hassled at checkups does not usually result in quality medical care or a desire to return any time soon. My experiences with the south bay have been such that it was a pleasent surprise not to be hassled or lectured about my poor birth control habits (so far 100% successful) and the many other things doctors have found it in their hearts to misunderstand and condemn.
But I still hate doctors’ offices with their ugly faux-sterility and their false promises of health and cures. The fasting for blood tests doesn’t help matters. So when I got my signed paperwork for school, I was out the door and on the road before it occurred to me that I was supossed to get preventative stuff against the sort of ear blockage that Christi had. (Caused by the type of ear plugs that we both wear and apparently very common in ear-plug wearing rock musicians.) Ooops. Didn’t turn around. Didn’t go back. Even very nice doctors are still doctors.
I can only imagine what my mom, who worked for many years as a medical technologist, would think of my anti-healthcare attitude.

Dear Bossy

Dear Bossy,

some lesbians I know are about to get married in Canada. Should I respond by talking about how Canada is about to split apart like the Balkands and fall into war, disarray, terrosrism and famine?
confused in Cupertino

Dear Confused,

No. Grit your teeth and say, “congratualtions.”

Dear Bossy,

On the subject of lesbian marriage: when I talk to lesbians who are planning on getting legally married overseas, should I just avoid the issue by not bringing it up? I don’t want to hurt their feelings by telling them that they’re damned to hell.
Silent in Silicon Valley

Dear Silent,

No, most certainly do not tell them that they will buring in hell. They’ve obviously heard it before and it hasn’t changed their mind. The problem is that if you say nothing at all, they will assume that you think that they’re hellward bound and you’ve hurt their feelings anyway. Grit your teeth and say “Congratulations.”

Dear Bossy

I’ve been invited to the reception of a lesbian wedding. I have nothing against sodomites personally, but I beleive that marriage is only for people who aren’t disgusting perverts. These sodomites are friends of mine. Do I have to go?
Disgusted in Daly City

Dear Disgusted,

Your responsibility ends with saying, “congratulations.” You are free to skip the reception. Say that you will be in the Balkands or Canada and can’t make it. Be sure to respond to the RSVP, though. You can also skip sending a gift (in fact, your friends may not want gifts…). If you are especially close, you might send a card.