Who goes there? Please leave comments so (An Aries Knows)!
Using a Hi-Point Model JHP .45-caliber semi-automatic pistol, an employee of Atlantis Plastics in Henderson Kentucky, killed five employees and injured another, Noelia Monroy, before taking his own life. The dead included:
• Joshua Hinojosa (28 years old)
• Trisha Mirelez (25)
• Israel Monroy (29)
• Kevin G. Taylor (30)
• Rachael Vasquez (26)
Yesterday I wanted to do a political post that somehow expressed my feelings about the current presidential campaign and Thomas Paine. It never really came together.
It was the anniversary of Thomas Paine’s death in 1809 at the age of seventy-two. When I think of him, I think of how he wrote the documents that inspired a group of rebellious individuals to overcome their personal disagreements and inner squabbles and turn thirteen young colonies into one new country full of hope for the future. He’s the person who came up with the term “United States of America.” He despised any kind of dictator or tyrant. He disagreed with slave ownership and said so. His beliefs and concerns for the rights of all people were expressed in concepts that would eventually become minimum wage, public education, and social security.
He also entered into a lifelong feud with George Washington that, along with his views on organized religion, led to a loss of esteem for him in the country he helped create. He had entire other lives in France and England until then-President Thomas Jefferson invited him to return to the U.S. His writings were eventually held in high regard by many great philosophers and thinkers, including Thomas Edison and Abraham Lincoln. Yet when he died, only six people followed his coffin to the grave, among them two freed slaves who wanted to pay their respects.
I suppose in every age, we are unjustly hard on forward-thinking individuals. We pick apart their flaws as humans and turn a deaf ear to their ideas and dreams for a better future. Two quotes from Thomas Paine:
We have it in our power to begin the world over again.
Only LiveJournal members can support a nomination to the LJ Advisory Board. As it happens, Timothy J. Lambert and his running mate, Rexford G. Lambert, are hoping you will support Timothy’s nomination to the Advisory Board. His key issues are creativity, content, inclusiveness, and goofy dog pictures. You can read his self-nomination speech and vote for him at this link right here.
As you know, in Becky World, it’s all about Tim, and it doesn’t hurt that he has a cool dog. Thanks for your support, and you are more than welcome to ask your LJ friends to support Timothy’s nomination.
On March 18, 2008, the son of an auto wrecking yard owner shot four people to death at Black Road Auto in Santa Maria, California, using a semi-automatic handgun. There were no other injuries. The dead included one of the perpetrator’s relatives and two employees.
• Golden “Dave” Duboise (45 years old)
• Ricardo Cardenas Leal (33)
• Robert Louis Leeds (66)
• Terry Edward Majan (38)
And now I don’t remember what that post was.
So, a post full of random:
W. H. Auden was born on this day in 1907. Of all the poetry by Auden that I’ve read, why is it that the only lines I can ever remember are the ones that were quoted so touchingly in Four Weddings and a Funeral?
I tried to early vote today, but the lines were too long. Apparently, it’s going to stay that way, which is good, that people are so engaged. I decided it was okay to try again another day because I’d also forgotten my cheat sheet which tells me who’s who and what’s what in the local elections. However, just so you know, in the big primary race, I’m voting for Hillary, and I’m not ashamed to say so. Smart women with vision and ambition make me feel good. They’re the kind of women who got other women the vote in the first place, and I don’t take that for granted for a moment. I’m a Gore person and an Edwards person, but I have no trouble being a Hillary person since my guys aren’t running.
I was going to make chicken and dressing tonight. Midway into food prep, while on the phone with Denece, I remembered that I have no oven. But the new stove comes tomorrow. ::BIG STUPID SMILE::
The laptop and I are being abducted by a generous friend at the beginning of next week. Mr. Laptop and I will be putting the finishing touches on the last chapters of A COVENTRY WEDDING in beautiful New Orleans. I hope Greg and Marika haven’t used up ALL the inspiration that floats on the air there.
Speaking of Greg, have any of you ever played 1000 Blank White Cards? Here’s one of the cards that was made when Tom, Tim, Mark, Lisa, Rhonda, Lindsey and I played one night.
I got a massage today, and the massage therapist did some trigger point work on me in all the most necessary places. Now I’m sore in a good way and chugging water.
The weather is dreary. It’s hard to get motivated. I just want to lie in bed and read. Today I went to Tim’s for a while and only wanted to lie on his couch and babble, which made Rex huffy. The dog has about ten favorite sleeping spots in the TimLair, but heaven forbid I take the one he wants at that moment. I sort of understand why he resents it, however, since everybody else wants to be in his luxurious crate all the time and he always shares.
To thwart the weather and my dull mood… Look! Another photo of two hot guys!
And psst, David, hanging on the baker’s rack in the lower left–it’s the poison cup.
Several recent e-mails and posts about politics and art made this quote I stumbled across in Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way so timely:
Northern Illinois University School Shooting, February 14, 2008
Catalina Garcia 20, Cicero
Julianna Gehant 32, Mendota
Ryanne Mace 19, Carpentersville
Daniel Parmenter, 20, Westchester
Gayle Dubowski, 20, Carol Stream
On December 9, 2007, a shooter opened fire in two locations: Arvada, Colorado, where he used a 9mm handgun, and Colorado Springs, Colorado, where he used a Bushmaster XM15-E2S rifle, resulting in the following deaths and injuries:
Tiffany Johnson 26 Youth With a Mission center, killed
Philip Crouse 24 Youth With a Mission center, killed
Dan Griebenow 24 Youth With a Mission center, wounded
Charlie Blanch 22 Youth With a Mission center, wounded
Stephanie Works 18 New Life Church, killed
Rachel Works 16 New Life Church, killed
David Works 51 New Life Church, wounded
Judy Purcell 40 New Life Church wounded
Larry Bourbonnais 59 New Life Church, wounded
A security person at the church opened fire on the perpetrator, shooting him ten times, before the shooter turned his 9mm handgun on himself and died.
I was awed and delighted by the news on my welcome screen this morning. Congratulations to Al Gore, who, along with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change headed by Rajendra K. Pachauri of India, won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. Gore plans to donate one hundred percent of his proceeds from the award to the Alliance for Climate Protection.
Gore has been an outspoken advocate for our environment since the late 1970s, and I agree with his warning that the negative impact we’re having on our planet is a great threat to the peace of the future. This award makes sense to me. It’s also gratifying when the rest of the world recognizes the positive efforts and accomplishments of a U.S. citizen.
Have I mentioned before that Gore’s an Aries? =)
As I’ve watched the ENDA debates play out across the blogosphere, I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. This is the one fight that should never be a fight. ALL employees should be protected from discrimination in the workplace. Period.
No matter what language it includes, when ENDA gets to Bush, he’s going to veto it. Period.
An unwinnable fight is still worth the effort when it’s for justice and equality under the law. Sooner or later, when we stop letting ENDA’s opponents–and shockingly, its supporters–divide and conquer us, we’ll get the workplace protection that over 86 percent of Fortune 500 companies, seventeen states and the District of Columbia, and 88 percent of Americans polled concede is fair.
In light of that debate, I’m glad that Joe.My.God. made me aware of this letter that Julian Bond wrote in the context of an entirely different news story. It’s an eloquent perspective of why a struggle for equality is everyone’s fight.
Marsha Ellison, President
Fort Lauderdale, Florida NAACP
1409 NW 6th Street Fort Lauderdale, FL 33311
Dear President Ellison:
Thank you for your courageous stand against homophobia in your community.
I am astounded by those who believe hostility toward homosexuals and the denial of civil rights to them is not a civil rights issue.
That’s why when I am asked, “Are Gay Rights Civil Rights?” my answer is always, “Of course they are.”
“Civil rights” are positive legal prerogatives – the right to equal treatment before the law. These are rights shared by all – there is no one in the United States who does not – or should not – share in these rights.
Gay and lesbian rights are not “special rights” in any way. It isn’t “special” to be free from discrimination – it is an ordinary, universal entitlement of citizenship. The right not to be discriminated against is a common-place claim we can expect to enjoy under our laws and our founding document, the Constitution. That many had to struggle to gain these rights makes them precious – it does not make them special, and it does not reserve them only for me or restrict them from others.
When others gain these rights, my rights are not reduced in any way. Luckily, “civil rights” are a win/win game; the more civil rights are won by others, the stronger the army defending my rights becomes. My rights are not diluted when my neighbor enjoys protection from the law – he or she becomes my ally in defending the rights we all share.
For some, comparisons between the African-American civil rights movement and the movement for gay and lesbian rights seem to diminish the long black historical struggle with all its suffering, sacrifices and endless toil. However, people of color ought to be flattered that our movement has provided so much inspiration for others, that it has been so widely imitated, and that our tactics, methods, heroines and heroes, even our songs, have been appropriated by or serve as models for others.
No parallel between movements for rights is exact. African-Americans are the only Americans who were enslaved for more than two centuries, and people of color carry the badge of who we are on our faces. But we are far from the only people suffering discrimination – sadly, so do many others. They deserve the laws’ protections and civil rights, too.
Sexual disposition parallels race – I was born black and had no choice. I couldn’t and wouldn’t change if I could. Like race, our sexuality isn’t a preference – it is immutable, unchangeable, and the Constitution protects us all against prejudices and discrimination based on immutable differences.
Many gays and lesbians, along with Jews, worked side by side with me in the ’60s civil rights movement. Am I to now tell them “thanks” for risking life and limb helping me win my rights – but they are excluded because of a condition of their birth? That they cannot share now in the victories they helped to win? That having accepted and embraced them as partners in a common struggle, I can now turn my back on them and deny them the rights they helped me win, that I enjoy because of them?
Not a chance.
Opponents of homosexuality have the right to their opinion: they do not have the right to use their beliefs to denigrate and marginalize others. A people who suffered bigotry in the past and suffer from it today ought to be the last people in the world to tolerate bigotry towards others.
Best wishes,
(Signed)
Julian Bond, Chairman
NAACP National Board of Directors