I'm finally back in Nashville, after my travels to California and Texas. I don't mind telling you that San Antonio is an awesome city with friendly people, great food, and a lot of history. It was also about one hundred degrees and humid, which, standing at the Alamo and feeling faint, made me wonder how it was exactly that we won this land from the Mexicans. Davy Crockett must've been a heck of a fighter!
Since this is Monday, it means I missed my usual Sunday politics blog. But fear not. I shall try to catch up. Saturday night was the annual White House Correspondents dinner, which this year could easily have been mistaken for the Oscars. From the CNN coverage I saw during happy hour in the hotel I was staying at in San Antonio, it looked like every celebrity on the planet was there. Shockingly, I was not invited. Maybe next year???
I was also appalled to learn while watching Bill Maher (and thanks Bill for telling me something I didn't already know) that our military have been handing out Bibles and Christian literature in the Middle East...in full U.S. military uniform. I am horrified by this on many levels. First of all, America is supposed to represent a place of freedom of every kind and that includes religious freedom. It is no more appropriate to invade someone's country and try to convert them than it is to fly planes into towers in the name of another religion. Both are equally wrong. And by the way, why have we not been hearing about this in the news? Handing out Bibles in military uniform says to the world that all Americans believe this way and that this is a government condoned military Christian mission. And maybe that was true for George W. Bush. In fact, it probably was. However, this is a new day, and if it is still going on now, then President Obama needs to address it and put an end to it. If Christian missionaries want to go there on their own, then let them - in civilian attire and without the shield of the U.S. Military to hide behind. But I for one do not want my beliefs (which these are not, by the way), imposed on anyone else any more than I want their beliefs imposed on me. It is un-American and it must be stopped.
Gays in the military. I'm having flashbacks to 1992 and the beginning of Clinton's first term. But before I get worried that history will repeat itself, I must tell myself that we are living in different times and that we are progressing as a nation. Arguably that progression is not always voluntary. Some are dragged kicking and screaming, but then again, people weren't so thrilled when women got the right to vote, or when schools became integrated, or when rock 'n roll came along either. This is what I tell myself. But gays in the military? I just don't understand what the fear is. Do people really not know that there have always been gays serving in the military, not to mention in every single area of life? Do people really not know they are our sons and daughters, aunts, uncles, and cousins, our neighbors and our friends? And I hate to break it to you, but pro football looks an awful a lot to me like a bunch of men jumping on each other. Do you really think they're all straight? I don't. And lastly, while I'm on my big gay band wagon, those of us who are straight and have enough sense to know that people are born homosexual just like others are born heterosexual, need to speak up. Those of us heteros who understand that it is only fear and ignorance casting a dark cloud over this human rights issue need to speak up now. It cannot just be the group that's being persecuted. And it is a human rights issue. It is targeting one group of people and denying them the same rights as every other group of people. And this is a slippery slope to go down because I guarantee that eventually hatred and prejudice will find its way to the group that we are a member of to target.
Well, nothing like a few days away to get me fired up and back on my soap box! Thanks for stopping by and please tell your friends.
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