kick it-
"George Bush don't like black people"

you feel me?

i've got a terrible cold... ugh

speaking of my vacation this week, here's my mom taking some of her many pictures while she was here

so my birthday party friday night was awesome! my friends susan and beverly really did an amazing job of putting it together and i don't know how to express my appreciation appropriately through words. i just don't. but it was perfect.

i'll talk more about it and show pictures that jessie took of the party soon. my friend corby is still visiting and i'm still on my self-imposed vacation right now, but i'll write in more detail shortly.

all my life i always found 'september 23rd' as the saddest day of the year. it was the day after my birthday and it meant it was all over.... :-(

but this year we're having a party to celebrate my birthday and so this year 'september 23rd' is actually the coolest day of the year.

(although i'm a little nervous about the party because no one will tell me what's going on and i'm worried about rumors i've been hearing)

it's my day, yay!

anyone else in love with new orleans mayor ray nagin? he's so gorgeous!
i swoon every time i see him on tv.

Bush's "Faith-based disaster"

my parents are here! yay.

my dad's here for this and will be at the convention most of the time. my mom and i will be sightseeing. poor dad.

oh, and they gave me my birthday present early. how'd they know it was on my wish list? i love the simpsons and i must say the new season's going pretty well too. my grandparents got me a cd and my sister got me the cutest frog statue and i'm still trying to figure out the best place to put it in my house.

perfect.
On your watch, we've lost almost all of our allies, the surplus, four airliners, two trade centers, a piece of the Pentagon and the City of New Orleans. Maybe you're just not lucky. I'm not saying you don't love this country. I'm just wondering how much worse it could be if you were on the other side.-- Bill Maher (via David and Mike)

The performance by the two agencies calls into question claims by President Bush and others in his administration that Katrina was a catastrophe that no one envisioned...
The National Weather Service office in Slidell, La., which covers the New Orleans area, put out its own warnings that day, saying, "MOST OF THE AREA WILL BE UNINHABITABLE FOR WEEKS ... PERHAPS LONGER" and predicting "HUMAN SUFFERING INCREDIBLE BY MODERN STANDARDS."
And, from the side of leaders actually taking action: New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin (who has not gotten enough Giuliani-like credit during this whole ordeal even though he's done a great job and one wonders daily why he hasn't, hmmm....) has said he ordered an evacuation because Mayfield's call "scared the hell" out of him. "I just wanted to be able to go to sleep that night knowing I had done everything I could," Mayfield said.

so the countdown is on

next thursday (the 22nd) i officially turn 35.
unofficially, though, i prefer the digit-al route where adding the two digits together equals 8 (3+5=8). i suppose one could also subtract whereby i would be -2; multiply becomes 15; or dividing in which i would be 0.6. but i prefer to turn 8.

or, 35 is fine, really.

new column:

Arnold’s Big But

Oh, my, god. Arnold, look at your But. It is so big. It looks like, one of those Republicans’. But, y'know, who understands those Republicans? You only talk to us, because, you act like a total hypocrite, 'kay? I mean, your But, is just so big. I can't believe it's just so foul, it's like, out there, I mean - gross. Look! You’re now just such a joke!

I hate big Buts and I can not lie
You other faggots can't deny
That when Arnold walks in with an itty bitty case
And a total slap in your face
You get sprung, wanna rip out his tongue
'Cause you notice that But was stuffed
Deep in the lies he's swearing
I looked and I can't stop staring
Oh Arnold, I wanna get at'cha
And take your stature
Your friends tried to warn you
But with that But you got it makes us so angry
Ooh, Schwarzenegger
You say you wanna get with your friends?
Well, use them, use them
'Cause you didn’t just average condemn
I've seen you dancin'
The hell with romancin'
Your threat's, wet,
Gettin’ put out like a cigarette
I'm tired of Republicans
Sayin' that Buts are so in
Take the average John Q and ask him that
You gotta pack much back
So, faggots! (Yeah!) faggots! (Yeah!)
Did your Arnold give you the But? (Hell yeah!)
Tell him to f*** it! (F*** it!) F*** it! (F**** it!)
F*** that wimpy But!
Arnold get back!

(LA face with Texan looty)
Arnold get back!

So Arnold rolls a Hummer, playin' workout tapes by Wilson
But Wilson can’t do a replay in this second season
Our California don't want none
Unless you've got guts, hun
You can do side bends and sit-ups,
But unless you lose that But
We’re gonna have to play that "hard" role
And tell you that the But ain't gold
So we’ll toss you and leave you
And we’ll pull up quick to retreat you
So Karl Rove says you're phat
Well we ain't down with that!
'Cause your gut is small and your polls aren’t stickin'
And we’re thinkin' bout lickin’
To the financiers in the Party Republican:
You ain't It no more!
Give you a twista, they can resist you
California won't miss you
So you knucklehead tried to dis
'Cause our rights aren’t on your list
You had game but you chose to **it 'em
And we pull up quick to get wit 'em
So faggots, if the But is big,
And you want a recall, you dig,
Vote 11/08/2005
And tell him your angry thoughts
Arnold get back!

Little in the middle and you got no gut
Little in the middle and you got no gut
Little in the middle and you got no gut
Little in the middle and you got no gut

Arnold get back!

Little in the middle and you got no gut
Little in the middle and you got no gut
Little in the middle and you got no gut
Little in the middle and you got no gut

about a week or so ago i read the advocate's cover interview of portia de rossi about her coming out and her relationship with ellen degeneres. wow, i had no idea, she's wonderful. i mean, i liked her a little before, and i love her on arrested development, but i had no idea that she was such a wonderful beautiful human being. i kept wanting to hug her the whole time the article was in front of me (unfortunately, the link doesn't have the full interview and if you didn't read the hardcopy edition, you're missing out on some fine touching moments where she's constantly crying with happiness). it was totally beautiful and i now know i'm a huge fan of hers.

p.s. found a link to the full interview, so read that one. better in the full edition. she's so adorable.

THE BUSH ERA is over. The sooner politicians in both parties realize that, the better for them -- and the country.

i've purposely left up the last post about contacting arnold because i wanted to make sure it was still heightened. i still encourage people to email him and not let him get away with his evil bigotry without being heard from those of us who care about equality and civil rights. he can't veto the bill until we give it to him, and we're purposefully not giving it to him until the last day possible-- the 23rd. so there's time to send him a message. so send him a message. all that said, i want to also start talking again on here, so i'm back.

``The governor has said he supports the will of the people,'' said Sen. Sheila Kuehl, D-Los Angeles, one of the Legislature's six openly gay members. ``Well, let the people call him, let the people e-mail him, let the people be heard. Then he can say he's following the will of the people.''

``One man cannot terminate the civil rights movement,'' Gutierrez said. ``He will go down in history as the `discriminator.' ''
Tell Arnold what you think about him and his bigotry in vetoing equality.

and listen to this, just listen to how wonderful Assemblyman Leno is on here challenging arnold to a face-to-face: listen and swoon

he's vetoing it...

he didn't even make time to hear from us or our personal lives. he's just vetoing it directly after its passage.

he's done. he will never have a hollywood premiere or political function or anything without a protest and angry people for the rest of his life. any positive feelings towards him are now gone. he's done.

Tell Arnold what you think about him and his bigotry.

It passed! It passed! OMG it passed! If Arnold doesn't sign it, there will be hell to pay.
From ethnic corners, from communities of faith, from nations on our planet, we see that we are a part of something much bigger than ourselves. This is, in fact, an international civil rights movement.-- Assemblyman Mark Leno talking about his marriage equality bill as it passed the second of the two houses today of the legislature. If Arnold signs it, marriage for gay men and lesbians in the state of California will be sanctioned, legal, and approved. Think about that. Wow.

Tell Arnold to sign AB 849. Tell him you support Marriage Equality and Civil Rights for all.

the reality of the 'creativity' and 'originality' in hollywood:
"In an ideal world, people would say ‘OK, we have to think more creatively, we have to think outside the box and come up with new and different things,'" said Steven Friedlander, head of distribution for Warner Independent Pictures, which released [the documentary smash] "March of the Penguins." "But I'm afraid what's going to happen is, we're all going to sit in a room and say ‘We need more penguin movies.'"

evacuation regrets:
I'm sorry I wasn't more receptive to you when we first met, but I've never been much of a cat person. I'm sorry we hauled you down from New York, threw you into a house with dogs and things that weren't yours. But most of all, I'm sorry we left you behind. I'm sorry we didn't think longer-term, sorry we didn't consider the possibility that it might be a very long time before we could come back for you. I'm sorry that you're uncomfortable now and that you probably won't survive...

new newsletter's up

...[from] Aaron Broussard, president of Jefferson Parish near New Orleans. Sobbing, he told of an emergency management official and his mother, who, trapped in a nursing home, pleaded for rescue. Assured by federal officials, the man promised her repeatedly that help was on the way.
"Every day she called him and said, 'Are you coming, son? Is somebody coming?' " Broussard related. "And he said, 'Yeah, Mama, somebody's coming to get you.' Somebody's coming to get you on Tuesday. Somebody's coming to get you on Wednesday. Somebody's coming to get you on Thursday. Somebody's coming to get you on Friday. And she drowned Friday night. She drowned Friday night."
Broussard angrily denounced the leadership of America. "We have been abandoned by our own country," he said. "It's not just Katrina that caused all these deaths in New Orleans here. Bureaucracy has committed murder here in the greater New Orleans area, and bureaucracy has to stand trial before Congress now."

Several states ready and willing to send National Guard troops to the rescue in New Orleans didn't get the go-ahead until days after the storm struck...
Bush had the legal authority to order the National Guard to the disaster area himself, as he did after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks...
In addition to Guard help, the federal government could have activated, but did not, a major air support plan under a pre-existing contract with airlines. The program, called Civilian Reserve Air Fleet, lets the government quickly put private cargo and passenger planes into service.
The CRAF provision has been activated twice, once for the Persian Gulf War and again for the Iraq war.

What seems very odd is that every major television network had people on the ground within 24 hours of the disaster, but it's taken at least four days for the federal government to wade into the city with essential supplies and security. For most people, including myself, that doesn't make any sense.

Despite the warnings, money was cut from flood control as the federal government's focus shifted to terrorism. The Bush administration routinely provided less than half the money the Army Corps of Engineers requested for New Orleans flood prevention.

and i can't believe i'm quoting newt gingrich, but this is a good one:

I think it puts into question all of the Homeland Security and Northern Command planning for the last four years, because if we can't respond faster than this to an event we saw coming across the Gulf for days, then why do we think we're prepared to respond to a nuclear or biological attack?

this article needs to be listed here, in its entirety:

"Events in New Orleans are a reminder of why government matters"
By Molly Ivins

"Like many of you who love New Orleans, I find myself taking short mental walks there today, turning a familiar corner, glimpsing a favorite scene, square or vista. And worrying about the beloved friends and the city, and how they are now. "To use a fine Southern word, it's tacky to start playing the blame game before the dead are even counted. It is not too soon, however, to make a point that needs to be hammered home again and again, and that is that government policies have real consequences in people's lives.

"This is not "just politics" or blaming for political advantage. This is about the real consequences of what governments do and do not do about their responsibilities. And about who winds up paying the price for those policies. This is a column for everyone in the path of Hurricane Katrina who ever said, "I'm sorry, I'm just not interested in politics," or, "There's nothing I can do about it," or, "Eh, they're all crooks anyway."

"Nothing to do with me, nothing to do with my life, nothing I can do about any of it. Look around you this morning. I suppose the NRA would argue, "Government policies don't kill people, hurricanes kill people." Actually, hurricanes plus government policies kill people.

"One of the main reasons New Orleans is so vulnerable to hurricanes is the gradual disappearance of the wetlands on the Gulf Coast that once stood as a natural buffer between the city and storms coming in from the water. The disappearance of those wetlands does not have the name of a political party or a particular administration attached to it. No one wants to play, "The Democrats did it," or, "It's all Reagan's fault." Many environmentalists will tell you more than a century's interference with the natural flow of the Mississippi is the root cause of the problem, cutting off the movement of alluvial soil to the river's great delta.

"But in addition to long-range consequences of long-term policies like letting the Corps of Engineers try to build a better river than God, there are real short-term consequences, as well. It is a fact that the Clinton administration set some tough policies on wetlands, and it is a fact that the Bush administration repealed those policies -- ordering federal agencies to stop protecting as many as 20 million acres of wetlands.

"Last year, four environmental groups cooperated on a joint report showing the Bush administration's policies had allowed developers to drain thousands of acres of wetlands.

"Does this mean we should blame Bush for the fact that New Orleans is underwater? No, but it means we can blame Bush when a Class 3 or Class 2 hurricane puts New Orleans under. At this point, it is a matter of making a bad situation worse, of failing to observe the First Rule of Holes (when you're in one, stop digging).

"Had a storm the size of Katrina just had the grace to hold off for a while, it's quite likely no one would even remember what the Bush administration did two months ago. The national press corps has the attention span of a gnat, and trying to get anyone in Washington to remember longer than a year ago is like asking them what happened in Iznik, Turkey, in A.D. 325.

"Just plain political bad luck that, in June, Bush took his little ax and chopped $71.2 million from the budget of the New Orleans Corps of Engineers, a 44 percent reduction. As was reported in New Orleans CityBusiness at the time, that meant "major hurricane and flood projects will not be awarded to local engineering firms. Also, a study to determine ways to protect the region from a Category 5 hurricane has been shelved for now."

"The commander of the Corps' New Orleans district also immediately instituted a hiring freeze and cancelled the annual Corps picnic.

"Our friends at the Center for American Progress note the Office of Technology Assessment used to produce forward-thinking plans such as "Floods: A National Policy Concern" and "A Framework for Flood Hazards Management." Unfortunately, the office was targeted by Newt Gingrich and the Republican right, and gutted years ago.

"In fact, there is now a government-wide movement away from basing policy on science, expertise and professionalism, and in favor of choices based on ideology. If you're wondering what the ideological position on flood management might be, look at the pictures of New Orleans -- it seems to consist of gutting the programs that do anything.

"Unfortunately, the war in Iraq is directly related to the devastation left by the hurricane. About 35 percent of Louisiana's National Guard is now serving in Iraq, where four out of every 10 soldiers are guardsmen. Recruiting for the Guard is also down significantly because people are afraid of being sent to Iraq if they join, leaving the Guard even more short-handed.

"The Louisiana National Guard also notes that dozens of its high-water vehicles, humvees, refuelers and generators have also been sent abroad. (I hate to be picky, but why do they need high-water vehicles in Iraq?)

"This, in turn, goes back to the original policy decision to go into Iraq without enough soldiers and the subsequent failure to admit that mistake and to rectify it by instituting a draft.

"The levees of New Orleans, two of which are now broken and flooding the city, were also victims of Iraq war spending. Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson Parish, said on June 8, 2004, "It appears that the money has been moved in the president's budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq."

"This, friends, is why we need to pay attention to government policies, not political personalities, and to know whereon we vote. It is about our lives."