Posts under ‘Politics’

Fresh off their victory to funnel unnamed corporate money into misleading, dishonest, deceitful and vile language advertising disguised as political campaign advertising, Citizens United announced the creation of their new spot. Tentatively titled, “Obama wants to fuck your mother“, the spot will feature images of the President of the United States in a gang bang of white women with their horrified children and husbands being forced to watch.

Today, on the steps of the Minnesota State Capitol, US Senator Al Franken held a press conference to declare his intention to seek a second term as Minnesota’s junior Senator. Sen. Franken spent his entire first term in a lengthy court battle with The Party of “No”. With his wife Fran at his side, he addressed a large crowd of press, supporters and curious onlookers who seemed surprised to learn that Minnesota actually has two US Senators.

I took my 8 y/o daughter recently to visit the grave of my grandmother and grandfather. They’re buried in a little cemetery in Batavia, IL called Resurrection. My daughter said it was too bad that we didn’t bring flowers and I agreed. I’m not much of a cemetery visitor myself, but there is something about flowers.

We agreed to bring flowers next time.

Do you write about any of these issues and communities?

LGBT
TS/TG/TV
FETISH
SEX WORK
POLYAMORY
SWING
BDSM
TRANSHUMAN

Do you work with these communities as an advocate or ally and would like to write?  Would you like to make an impact across your own affected community and reach out to other SGB communities?  Would you like to help bridge the gap between all SGB identities to increase understanding, acceptance, rights and respect?

A new collaborative community blog is being launched that will bring these communities, individuals and issues together in frank, open discussion.  Contributions will come from anyone that wants to post at the site, cross-posters from other blogs active in a community and featured writers.

We are looking for Feature Authors for this site from among the following:

ESTABLISHED BLOGGERS
ADVOCACY AND RIGHTS WRITERS / BLOGGERS
PUBLISHED SGB AUTHORS
SGB JOURNALISTS

Interested parties please contact admin @ sexgenderbody.com with the following:
NAME
EMAIL / IM / TWITTER
PHONE
SGB ISSUE OR COMMUNITY OF YOUR FOCUS
BLOG ADDRESS
WRITING SAMPLE

The site is scheduled to begin in May 2009.  The selection of Feature Authors will be completed by April 15.

Thank you

This post is not about Sexism or Feminism, it is about my experience in talking about them.

I have had several conversations lately about how people engage in debate over sex / gender / body (SGB) identity issues. I am launching a blog that supports dialogue on those issues and in the communities that they create. As I frame the terms of the conversations and the goals of the site, I have begun to articulate my view on the structure of dialogue itself.

Simply put, I have been thinking about how we treat each other inside a conversation about SGB issues and identity. I noticed some patterns of how we seem argue with each other inside these conversations. This post is not about something specific to SGB issues, advocates themselves or the conversations. This is about how we speak to each other about those issues. SGB issue conversations are not somehow different from other conversations. I simply care about them more. This applies to Racism, Classism, TG discrimination or any other conversation regarding society and individuals.

Wikileaks just notified people that they are releasing over $1 billion dollars’ worth of reports gathered by the Congressional Research Services (CRS). These reports are provided to members of the US Congress and are legally in the public domain. However, they are only released to the public with the permission of Congress in a complex system of permissions and protocols. Needless to say, attempts to free this information from the ‘red tape’ that keeps it from actually being released to the public have been met with resistance.Well, leave it to Wikileaks to strike a blow for transparency.

According to this well written piece from David Porter, also carried at HuffPo – US Army General David Petraeus is working to override US President Barack Obama.  

CENTCOM commander Gen. David Petraeus, supported by Defence Secretary Robert Gates, tried to convince President Barack Obama that he had to back down from his campaign pledge to withdraw all U.S. combat troops from Iraq within 16 months at an Oval Office meeting Jan. 21.

But Obama informed Gates, Petraeus and Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen that he wasn’t convinced and that he wanted Gates and the military leaders to come back quickly with a detailed 16-month plan, according to two sources who have talked with participants in the meeting.

Obama’s decision to override Petraeus’s recommendation has not ended the conflict between the president and senior military officers over troop withdrawal, however. There are indications that Petraeus and his allies in the military and the Pentagon, including Gen. Ray Odierno, now the top commander in Iraq, have already begun to try to pressure Obama to change his withdrawal policy.

There have been a lot of conversations regarding the investigation and prosecution of Bush / Cheney & Co. for their criminal destruction of lives and property in pursuit of wealth for themselves and their friends.  There are also a lot of questions regarding the TARP money like where is it going and why?  Both lines of questioning are vital to our country.  Guaranteed that I myself will be sounding the charge on both of these as well as every progressive blog in the country.

I read Bob Burnett’s excellent and timely post yesterday over at HuffPo, entitled "Bush’s Day of Reckoning."  I recommend reading it in its entirety.  The topic is whether or not to proceed with criminal investigations of Bush, Cheney & their ilk over torture and any other violations of the Constitution.  Bob does point out that incompetence is not a crime and focuses on things like ordering torture or illegal spying on Americans, which are crimes.

(Image courtesy of indiesocial.com)

I walked onto the train platform in downtown Chicago today.  A woman had just finished shopping at Macy’s and had several red shopping bags.  She was trying to put everything into one bag.  The wind picked up and blew some of the empty bags down the platform.  I took off running and stopped them from blowing out onto the street. 

Then, she yells to me that: "It’s OK!  They’re empty."  Then she sits down and waits for the train with her two bags full of stuff.  The 5 empty big red bags are just out there on the platform and she makes no effort to pick them up.  I told her that I didn’t want litter for a Christmas present, picked them all up and threw them in the trash (no recycling on CTA platforms…dammit!).