Blade Gets Even More Tabloid

You’ve got to see it to believe it:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Classy. Reeeeeeeeeeal classy.

Must Read/QOD

From a great article in Rolling Stone where Matt Tiabi went undercover to Hagee’s Church. 

“In the name of Jesus, I cast out the demon of handwriting analysis!” shouted Fortenberry.

Handwriting analysis? I jammed the bag over my mouth and started coughing, then went into a very real convulsion of disbelief as I listened to this astounding list, half-laughing and half-retching.

“In the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, I cast out the demon of the intellect!” Fortenberry continued. “In the name of Jesus, I cast out the demon of anal fissures!”

h/t BoingBoing

And while I’m harping of the disconnect between religions and gays, this topix thread is still going strong.  I even got a few words in. 

Get Carter

As if we needed proof that people are idiots . . . well, here it is.

I don’t really know who Heidi Carter is, but put that name on yourwebsite and watch the traffic jump a bit from all the pervs out there. 

You know who you are.

While I like extra traffic as much as any guy (write your joke in here), I would prefer that it come because of something interesting or just maybe insightful that I wrote.  However, one extra comment on this blog post where I did just the smallest scratchings of an investigation, and now my email has become perv central. 

The only one-handed emails I want sent to me better be from Keanu Reeves.  (I get a pass.)  Not married men.  And two of the emails are supposedly from Ms. Carter herself. 

Vt Marriage Commission Releases Report

The full report can be read here.  I’d like you to read it yourself (it’s quite comprehensive), but I do have a couple of interesting sidenotes to point out:

Based on the state’s tradition of equality under the law and of strong families, for over 30 years, Vermont probate courts have qualified gay and lesbian individuals as adoptive parents.  (Ed–I did not know that fact.  And Florida still won’t let us adopt!)

Supporters of same-sex marriage (at the hearings) outnumbered opponents by roughly 20 to one.

Finally, I’d like to quote one small passage of testimony from the report:

A man from Randolph wrote about how his father refused to attend his civil union
ceremony while he happily attended the marriage of the man’s gay brother in Massachusetts a short time later.

“My father emphatically would not attend a civil union ceremony. In his mind, a civil union was something for and about gay people. Not gay himself, he felt apart from it, and was unable to conceptualize a role for himself in this gay ceremony. . .[In attending my brother‟s wedding, my] father understood what marriage means, and he understood his social role in welcoming a new son into his family through marriage. A marriage meant something to my father that a civil union could in no way replicate. . .I urge you to consider the deep social significance that marriage has, and to acknowledge in your report to the State Legislature the inability of civil unions to replicate that.”

In The “Snowball’s Chance” Category:

Leiberman, Smith introduce Federal domestic partners legislation:

Sen. Gordon Smith and Sen. Joe Lieberman introduced legislation that will extend domestic partner benefits to federal employees Wednesday, according to a press release from the U.S. Senate.

“The federal government should be leading the way rather than following when it comes to providing benefits,” Sen. Smith said.  “Rights and benefits must be afforded to all employees equally. This bill corrects the current inequity.” 

No way in hell is Bush going to sign this, but still it’s nice to see the effort being made.  Hopefully one day we’ll all be able to take care of our families adequately, no matter how they’re comprised.  We may soon have same-sex marriage in Vermont, and the tax-filing problems for gay couples alone if there’s a discrepancy between Federal and State policy are going to be a nightmare. 

Those problems are already happening:

She and her partner recently wrongfully were taxed by the state of Vermont on their health insurance payments after she was added to her partner’s policy, she said. This was apparently due to a software error that did not note they were joined in a civil union, she said, and it may have happened to other same-sex couples too.

As last night’s meeting in Montpelier showed, gay couples are proving that this we’re not “mocking” marriage–indeed, we’re strengthening it:

Members of the Vermont Commission on Family Recognition and Protection heard only statements of support for moving past civil unions to same-sex marriage during the two-hour hearing at Montpelier’s Statehouse. . .

But of the 8,516 civil unions performed here since they became legal in 2001, only 161 have had their unions dissolved, he said, a rate likely far lower than the percentage of divorces during the same period.“A lot of people tend to think gays and lesbians are not normal,” Vinton joked. “Well, as far as marriage goes maybe they are right.”

Yer darned tootin’. (Too colliquial?  That means the statement before it was undeniably correct.)