In weeks to come opposition for healthcare reform will fade and any gay equality issues will fade too. This is the kind of crap Republicans do....they howl and scream irrationally for opposition to a policy that makes wayyyy too much sense to adopt but in the backrooms the deals are being made. It is called politics. This backroom deal we will see things like ALL inclusive ENDA fade. DADT fade, and any reworking of DOMA...fade. The Dem leadership will let it fade. Don't doubt it...Repukes can...

A Unregulated, unlimited, untaxed profit, freemarket, consumer economy is unsustainable. How about that for a sweeping generalization... I like it though, it does in a nutshell describe what the American (and global) economy is now realizing. Our governments encouraged profit making and profit taking. Corporate strategy is rife with words like "exploiting", "penetrating", and "dominating" markets. Competitive profiteering at a global level resulted in companies being caught in a negative fee...

From corporations, to politicians, religious leaders, government officials, celebrities to our athletes professional and amateur and to the people that officiate them, America has shown our true colors and they are shades of yellow. The cowardly yellow of a cheating liar. Cheats like Ken Lay, Jeffery Skilling, George W. Bush, Marion Jones and Barry Bonds. Add on slime balls like Ted Haggard, Richard Roberts and family we have created a nation whose image is tarnished across nearly all disciplin...

The first change is to vote for someone who will listen to them. The Democrats have a wide range of candidates that are listening to a wide range of the squishy political center. The disenfranchised Republicans are going to vote Democratic in vast numbers come next November as the Republicans are still lining up the same old dead wood. I finally figured out why DU has been a cesspool of pop culture and regurgitating MSM-TV news more now then ever. It is because the Republicans who have abandon...

As soon as the Repukes are held accountable....the Wall Street money starts running for cover in the form of major sell offs. The DOW dumped 400 points on the uneasy feelings in Washington and Wall Street that the Corporate, uber-rich friendly Bush Administration is about to be tarred and feathered. With the prospects of a protracted partisan battle on DC for the fate of the nation, the investment bankers are cashing in and dumping stocks that look to not benefit from a "bi-partisan" election y...

When we look back at this time will we.... 1. See it as a time when we could of stopped despots from dismantling 231 years of Democracy. or 2. See it as a time when the great experiment overcame yet another challenge and the democracy that our founding fathers designed lives on. I believe the constitutional crisis is real and that is our National Emergency, not terrorism. It is one of an internal dissolution of our system of governance by the systematic erosion of the checks and balances lai...

The "Court" already have protected substances illegal for minors...and now they have rules against individual speech. If the young man was advertising "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" t-shirts with that banner his rights would of been protected. So I say to that young man...make a t-shirt design, sell the shirts on a website and advertise them with another banner...with the appropriate disclaimer: This phrase is meant for entertainment and humor purposes for adults only and does not encourage the use of il...

Eventually the cost of shipping fresh produce and other consumables from giant production locations like California's central valley will become cost prohibitive. As fuel supplies dwindle and costs rise, our incomes will remain flat, inflation in our food and commodities markets will increase at a ever growing rate. The result will be we will be priced out of the market. This is a reality based on simply supply and demand economics. The demand will only rise, the supply will become more expensiv...

(Image) Isn't it ironic that our "50's Sitcom" image of American culture would have a crusty patina of rust on it in 2007? The people that buried that car must of thought themselves so special that they had to preserve selfish cultural icons of the time, thinking that they would be treasures today. Actually the rust and decay is in keeping of the decay our society has undergone and clearly represents a head shaking "What were we thinking?" moment. Given the condition of the car in it's sarcoph...

Is to make this war spending bill VETO proof and start working with Democrats on real progress. Cheney's little trip to Iraq has done ZERO to boost the public's confidence in thier handling of the war. If they keep clinging to the notion that the Iraq conflict is a contest that has winners and losers then they will see first hand what it is like to be BIG losers come 2008. The American people will sweep them right out of office.

Racial slur, denial, apology, forgiveness, making amends, racial slur, denial, apology, forgiveness, making amends...and on and on and on. While all this goes on people are still segregated and living completely separate lives based on skin color in this country. WHITE people are perfectly okay with it. As long as "they" are over there and we are here....all is well. As long as we don't have to drive through their neighborhoods it is okay and prevent them from driving through ours we are safe. ...

Where are the moon bases, the commercial space shuttle and moon transportation? Where are the large flat panel video phones? Where is the international space station with hotels and restaurants? Where are the personal flat panel tablet television displays the size of a piece of paper? Where are the computers that think like humans? What do we have instead? SUV's, flat panel televisions of crap, mega malls, mega churches, telephones in our pocket that work poorly, invasion and occupation, poor ...

We all want to believe that our individual beliefs are the best way. But what is the underlying fundemental basis for these beliefs? The OP indicates that it is selfishness...and I agree with that. An America filled with hybrid powered vehicles is still an America based on a car centric consumer culture. We will still "want" all the goodies our technological society offers. So yes the OP is correct. We are pretending at what it takes to really make a difference in our future and are still st...

The newly discovered "moderates" that flipped this election to the Democrats are opposed to marriage equity for same sex couples. For the most part the moderates are beholden to the religious organizations that oppose same sex marriage and perpetuation of the patriarchal control of women which includes the suppression of homosexuality. Suppression of homosexuality stems from the fundamentalist desire to control women and the roles for each gender as identified by traditional religious texts. In...

Government should not be in the "marriage" business. I wrote and essay that is very similar to yours three years ago. (see below) This I believe will ultimately become true. Marriage should be in the realm of religion. Then same sex couples wishing to marry can go to a church that welcomes same sex couples like Unitarian Universalists. (the church I attend) Our minister recently wrote saying she feels that the Wisconsin amendment that effectively bands gay marriage is unconstitutional at a fe...

Before November 7th I was a equal citizen of the state of Wisconsin. On November 8th I found that I was something less than equal. For eighteen years I lived in a loving marriage with a wonderful woman believing I was straight. Events in my life lead to my own discovery and disclosure that I was gay. I saw and opened the closet door. With feelings long buried and denied, I lived my life as someone I was not. Despite that, my life has been as good as one would expect, filled with love, good times...

Like 911, 117 changed the world. America woke up to the realities of global citizenship. On 911 we recoiled in fear and allowed our nation to be taken advantage of. On 117 we took back America in the best way we know, by voting. No tricks, no special judicial intervention required, we simply voted in large numbers to turn back the tide of corruption that had invaded our nation. On 911 I watched in horror the building collapse via broadband video piped into a cube of a IT infrastructure archite...

I understand now why so many gay people are particularly disinterested in politics. It is hard to be a participant in a cpntest when you are the ball. It is one thing to participate in the political process, it is another to be the puck in a face off or the ball tossed into the scrum. Everyone wants control of your fate and little care is given at the cost of getting there. As one side fawns all over the "idea" of support with many quietly wishing they didn't have too, the other side is ready...

The Republicans are on their heels and the Democrats are finally doing the pushing. Over the past decade we have heard conservative values talk from the right and that message sounded good to enough people to hand control of the U.S. government to narrow minded, selfish, power hungry, religious red-necks. But the patina of values has corroded of late. You can only throw so many coats of paint on a broken down house before it cracks, peels and exposes the rotten foundation. Conservative value...

"You’d get farther if you’d admit that the fight for gay marriage isn’t about benefits in the end, that it is about winning society’s approbation for homosexual relationships. Just say it, that the real goal is for society to regard same-sex unions as the equal in every way of woman-and-man marriages, and for society to be purged of any remaining view that homosexuality is disordered or objectionable on moral grounds." He is right. We all do want to purge society of that viewpoint. Actually yo...

The GOP is conspiring to use thier political power to enact laws to protect a specific person(s) from crimes committed while in office. What follows is a essay I wrote that may provide some fodder for legal challenges to any legislation enacted to protect W and exonerate him from crimes committed while in office. Ex Post Facto Protection for Crime Uncovering a Conspiracy to protect the Executive from Prosecution. (Originally published MArch 3, 2006 on Where Are The Weapons) The President has...

Second row, dead center...I met his good friend Ray. I've held off writing or reporting on the interview contents out of respect for the way Oprah handled the interview and it took some time digest it. But I now want to offer some insight pre-broadcast. And NO I am not being paid to or was I asked to do so. (ironic...here I am talking about TV...if you have seen my posts about TV you know my head is exploding...really I have had a headache for two days now.) Here goes... Oprah conducted fo...

Okay...here is a good dose of irony...and ample opportunity for me to eat a big hot plate of fresh crow. I don't watch TV...My wife does. I define "watching TV" as regular and habitual. I do neither. The last programs I saw was SNL only for Neil Young's 1st music segment, a documentary on PBS on recording folk music for the library of congress and ten minutes of some match racing on OLN (sailing). So yeah I have "watched" TV in the past 6 months. All of these occasions were brought to my atte...

Are you that bored? Is your life that dull? Do you have to bathe in the light of a endless stream of drivel to feel normal? I mean...COME ON PEOPLE! Television is THE BIGGEST PROBLEM facing our society RIGHT NOW. Television does nothing but perpetuate the corporatized consumer culture. There is nothing and I mean NOTHING that television gives you that you can't live without. But yet SO many people cannot function unless they are watching TV or talking about TV. HOLY SHIT Ammerica was no n...

A political party in name only? Edited: for my ignorance. lol Not for long. Lets face it we have Joe Lieberman a self-proclaimed Democrat taking the RW tag of "Soreloserman" to heart and running as independent...with many Democrats supporting him. Then we have the Democratic Leadership Council a moderate money soaked group of power broker right wing apologists seeking to consolidate power by taking the money and doing to ala-man right shuffle. All in a bad strategy to win the center away f...

...and I don't care to be forced to pray to "God". I find it offensive that someone would force me to acknowledge the existence of something I believe does not exist. It is disrespectful and ignorant in modern times to to so. Most "God" people do not understand that I REALLY don't want to pray to a "GOD" simply because "everyone else is..." I can accept that others wish to do so and do believe in a "God". I do not believe in God so why should I waste my time praying to one? To simply respect ...

The wheels on this bus will keep going around and around despite efforts of the regressionist right wing wackos and the moderate fearful enablers. Critical mass of pressure has been building up since 2000 and little by little the pressure is forcing the the whole show forward little by little. As we inch forward to a time when oil and it's associated wealth will no longer dominate our culture, government and society the conservative will be forced along kicking and screaming louder and louder ...

(Image) Photo: Lynn Radeka (Link) All we have to do is look at the cost of a daily commute to understand why gasoline will no longer be the primary source of transportation power...in our lifetime. One commute from Waukesha to Milwaukee (24 miles one way) I used to do this commute every weekday. Thousands of people do everyday in SUVs. In 2001 and it cost me less than $3. I have some feeling for people who make the commute everyday and many go farther as they are coming from the west side....

But you really aren't straight. You can't deny attraction forever. It builds up and manifests itself in all sorts of weird ways both in terms of odd behavior and strange physical maladies. I used to run everything through the "Does that make me look gay?" filter. Everything I did went through this filter. How I dressed, how I sat, how I talked...it got to be so that I instantly knew how I was supposed to behave. Unfortunately that led to all sort of other issues including hyper-tension, high bl...

That is it.... I am fortunate to of "come out" later in life...at 43. Not to bore you with the details, which I won't. I can say that I know that people who once would stand side by side with me, who once would laugh and joke and converse...they no longer do. Simply because of who I love. A fact that is that is really none of anyone's business but my own, my lover, and my family. So DU'ers....I challenge you NOW...say hi and keep this kicked. And say...NO I WILL NOT let my GAY friends and ne...