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Don't agonize, organize ... that's my mantra. Change won't happen unless you work to make it happen! But sometimes even your best efforts don't provide the results you were looking for. Or sometimes a situation is just so completely outrageous that all you can do is say ... YIKES!
2 comments:
BAC:
I haven't forgotten you. With my work, my responsibilities to my teammates at the DAILY PITCHFORK blog, and my co-hosts on the RAW DAWG BUFFALO RADIO SHOW, my blog surfing has been severly limited.
You do, however, deserve LOUD words of praise for having been so prescient throughout the campaign season 2008. While Barack Obama has shown himself to be far worse on every issue than I even feared and to be a man whose homophobia seems unlimited, Hillary Rodham Clinton, has not only set the standard for what a Secretary Of State should do, but has without much fanfare, made the fight against homophobia in her own department a signature issue.
I see these things especially clearly living in South America where the WORDS and DEEDS of both Obama and Clinton have material effect. Obama is LOATHED AND SOMETIMES FEARED down here. Clinton is BELOVED.
Latin America has a reputation for being "machista." It's bullshit. South America does not yet have PARITY in either the professions or politics, but it has become ground zero for left-wing power feminism in politics. Michelle Bachelet, President Of Chile, a proud atheist and survivor of the Pinochet/Robert Gates (yes, Obama's Secretary Of War) rape-rooms, is a hero to women and men alike. Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, Prime Minister of Argentina, has shown a strength of character in support of human rights and civil liberties which nobody expected from the "glamour, lady-who-lunches" candidate when she won.
Balbina Herrera, sadly, lost the race for the presidency of Panama, to the center-right White man, Ricardo Martinelli. She does, however, remain Chairwoman Of the Majority Party in the Assembly, the PRD. She and (openly gay) former Colombian President Cesar Gaviria will run the Latin American Peace Commission going forward. Herrera remains chair of the the Latina Feminist Sisterhood.
The rising star here is a young woman in local government in San Miguelito named Marlen Rodriguez. She's very young, around 26 or so, but most people on the Panamanian left are pretty sure the Presidency is within reach for her in 20 years.
In Colombia, Partido Liberal opposition leader, Piedad Cordoba, is now on even terms for the Presidency in 2011 against both Uribe and the "unnamed" Conservative Party candidate. A tip of the hat to Cordoba, Nancy Pelosi, Maxine Waters, Barbara Lee, Lynn Woolsey and Jim McGovern (D-MA) for noticing that Obama is a hawk and joining with Piedad Cordoba in her quest for a true peace process in Colombia in which the FARC and the Auto-Defensores would give up their weapons, stop the civil war, and join the political process as far left and far right parties instead.
Obama supports both center-right Uribe and the far-right guerrilla Auto-Defensores. To be continued...
...On the question of gay rights, out-going, term-limited, president Martin Torrijos of Panama deserves the world of credit for 442, the Human Sexuality Laws, for the anti-discrimination laws, and for the prevailing interpretation of contract law.
What the fuck could the latter have to do with gay rights? Quite simply, with no fanfare or bullshit, contract law here permits any two people of age of consent and of mixed or same gender to formalize their relationship any way they choose to under any name they choose, and a licensed notary seal gives that relationship the force of law.
This is exactly what your video clip was getting at. Marriage is NOT A "SPECIAL" RIGHT HERE. It's part of boring old contract law.
Somehow, the economy keeps growing, no military, militarized police, nor death penalty is necessary and no self-identified "straight" person is concerned about whether their gay and lesbian friends call their partners "husbands," "wives," "partners," or whatever.
Everybody is concerned, however, that President Obama has assumed a right of sovereignty over Switzerland, Panama and about 25 other nations' banking laws in defiance of signed, sealed, World Court-approved treaties.
Colombia for all sorts of cultural reasons has developed an enormous gay and lesbian tourist industry based upon the organic development of vibrant gay and lesbian scenes and neighborhoods in every city.
Uribe will not budge on "Marriage," however, which is expected but annoying. Nevertheless, the Ministries of Finance, Commerce, Trade and Tourism have made for wholly practical reasons having to do with the sovereign debt rating patronizing gay and lesbian owned businesses and clubs almost a "patriotic" issue.
In South America and Western Europe anyway, the "villain" McCain and Obama decried in the debates, Dmitriy Medvedev, President of the Russian Republic, has had to be the REAL global policeman guaranteeing national sovereign rights!
There's your international roundup.
Keep up the good work. Your particular logic and passion is essential for Americans to read and understand. I have the utmost respect for you.
Cheers,
K
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