When Worlds Collude

Tonite is the "victory" party for the Save Muni Wireless rare defeat of SBC in the Texas Legislature. It's not over until it's over, but a win is a win.



It's hard to feel good when elsewhere in the Legislature evil bastards are working to marginalize me as a human being. It makes me wonder if I've been putting my efforts into the wrong battle. In short, the Legislature passed a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage or any legal status identical or similar to marriage. Hey straight people, this seems to include domestic partnerships and common law marriage.



The amendent strategy forces challenges to the existing ban in state law to be heard on the national level as opposed to the Texas Supreme Court. Perry says it will prevent judicial activism. That's code for pre-empting the checks-and-balances in his own state.



Because the federal appeals process is so lengthy, this will increase the amount of time that Texans are oppressed. Does oppression seem like too strong a word? According to Rep. Thompson, the amendment "repeals the contracts that many single people have paid thousands of dollars to purchase to obtain medical powers of attorney, powers of attorney, hospital visitation, joint ownership and support agreements." Read more on this in Molly Ivins' response.



To make things worse, "our" lionized governor shamefully signed the bill from within a church. Clearly, Christian arrogance has reached the point where it's now okay to brandish their stranglehold on public policy from the pulpit. What more is in store for those of us deemed "not Christian enough" in their view? I find myself struggling to sympathize with "modern" Christian views when these guys are Hell bent on making my life difficult. Although I was raised and educated with Christian ideals, I feel very little left in common with these extremists who have turned the faith into a power-hungry, hate-mongering cult.



Today my legislative worlds passed into each other's orbit when a friend sent me a link from Eugene Mirman's site about a Christian telephone company trying to get people to switch from "Gay T&T". Apparently, the big telcos allegedly support the gay agenda. Can it be so? Do I want these guys as allies? The Christian telco absurdly claims that MCI sponsors a pedophilia site in Canada and Verizon "trains their employees to accept the gay lifestyle." Mirman's recorded conversations with these Christian telco nutjobs provides several minutes of, um, entertainment. It doesn't feel right to laugh. With such strange-bedfellows, I'd rather sleep alone.