Tomorrow I’m going around the corner to vote at the YMCA Youth Center here in my hometown of San Diego, California. And, I’ll be thinking youth in California; thinking about the their future.

Today I’m thinking about what my Dad told me a few months before he passed away in 2002.

I was raised up in Granada Hills, California. My neighborhood was mixed race — Hispanics, African-Americans, and Asian-Americans all lived in my neighborhood, and all went to school with me. In the last few months of his life, what my Dad told me about why we moved us — his family — to a mixed race neighborhood actually surprised me. He told me that he didn’t want his children to be prejudiced against others, so he wanted us to be raised in a diverse neighborhood where we would be exposed to all kinds of people.

When we moved to house in Granada Hills, it was 1964 — the year of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It amazes me that he was thinking progressively back then — I remember him as being pretty conservative guy, although actually he was probably more of an independent voter.

But before he passed away, I’d already grown to respect my Dad as a gentle, wise man. After finding out that he actually was more active than I knew in his desire that his children not be raised to have racial prejudices, my respect grew for him tremendously.

The No On Prop 8 campaign has put out a couple of ads in the past few days highlighting a similar belief of parents believing in a world without unfair prejudices:

From the script of the second video:

“We have an obligation to pass on to our children a more tolerant; more decent society. Vote No on Prop 8. It’s unfair, and it’s wrong.”

Amen to that. I know I’m going to appreciate parents who vote against Prop 8: The parents who are motivated by wanting the world their children are raised in to be a just and tolerant one.

~~~~~
Further reading:
* For some white voters, Obama’s race is seen as a ‘bonus’

The National Center For Transgender Equality has released some documentation on voting.

At NCTE, we believe in the importance of voting and we believe that it makes a difference in our work for transgender equality. People in elected offices make decisions that directly impact our ability to pass legislation that will protect you against discrimination and seek to decrease the violence our community faces.

Transgender people, however, sometimes face discrimination at the polls. In order to help you Lose Weight Exercise your right to vote, NCTE is reissued our Guide to Overcoming Voting Obstacles to help you overcome any barriers to voting that you encounter. The Guide also addresses additional challenges that some transgender voters face, such as racism, felony conviction and homelessness.

TRANSGENDER PEOPLE AND OUR VOTES

You have the right to vote!

You are only required to provide enough information at the polls to prove that you are the person listed on the voting records; many states only require identification for first time voters.

Note that in 13 states, there are more restrictive identification requirements, but even in these states, you should not be afraid to vote. If you live in one of these states (AZ, CA, CO, DC, FL, GA, MI, MO, NC, OH, PA, TX, VA), you can find specific useful information for your state from People for the American Way at http://site.pfaw.org/site/PageServer?pagename=voterid_toolkits.

If your current appearance or name does not match the name listed on the voting records, bring copies of your current and old IDs, any court orders changing your name and gender, or physician letters. Do not provide more information than is necessary. You may be more comfortable voting early, where it is available, because the polls may be less crowded and you’ll have more time to speak with poll workers about your particular situation.

See our Guide to Overcoming Voting Obstacles for specific information and contact one of the hotlines below if you encounter problems.

Autumn speaking here: Transgender people may face many of obstacles to voting in a year where the civil rights for gender variant people in years to come may be very much at stake. In this election, perhaps more importantly than any other election in our recent history, it’s so very important to vote. Transgender people can vote; transgender people should vote.

[Below the fold: A link to, and a copy of the Page 2 from the Guide to Overcoming Voting Obstacles. The page is the one entitled TRANSGENDER PEOPLE CAN VOTE, and gives specifics about issues such as your name on the voter role not matching the one on your identification, your identification picture not matching your current gender presentation, etc.]

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I get the news I need on the weather report.
I can gather all the news I need on the weather report.
Hey, I’ve got nothing to do today but smile.

After Barack, after Sarah, we may finally be getting our first honest snow job of the year here in Asheville.

Via CQ Politics: This is the answer Gov. Sarah Palin gave to the question of what a Vice President does:

Yesterday, Palin gave an interview to a local news station in Denver in which the anchor, reading a question submitted by a third grader, asked her what the vice president does. Her answer, in this video clip, suggests that she thinks the vice president runs the Senate:

“That’s a great question, Brandon. And a vice president has a really great job because not only are they there to support the president’s agenda, they’re like the team member, the teammate to that president, but also they’re in charge of the United State Senate. So if they want to, they can really get in there with the senators and make a lot of good policy changes that will make life better for Brandon and his family and his classroom. And it’s a great job, and I look forward to having that job.”

Talk about expanding the power of the vice presidency. Even Vice President Dick Cheney never claimed to be in charge of the Senate.

It’s hard to tell whether Palin just used a poor choice of words to describe what the vice president actually does in the Senate — presiding and breaking tie votes — or whether she really believes the vice president runs the place…

…Palin’s comments were a bit puzzling to Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, the man who actually sets the agenda for the Senate.

“Governor Palin needs to re-read — or perhaps read for the first time — the Constitution,” said Reid spokesman Jim Manley. “While the Vice President presides over the Senate, he or she is not “in charge of” it. Article I says, ‘The Vice President of the United States shall be President of the Senate, but shall have no vote, unless they be equally divided.’ The Senate is part of a co-equal branch of the federal government.”

Gov. Palin doesn’t know what the Constitution says what the job of Vice President is — still. And she’s running for the job. Not only is she not qualified to become President if McCain couldn’t complete a four year term, she — in terms of what most folk learned in Civics or Government classes in middle or high school — apparently isn’t even minimally qualified to hold the job she’s running for because she doesn’t know what the job is.

E-f***ing-gads!

After eight years of having a conservative, evangelical Christian in the White House, I haven’t been very comfortable with the idea that if elected President, Sen. McCain will have chosen to have an uncurious, anti-intellectual, conservative Pentecostal a heartbeat away from assuming the most powerful executive position in the world.

I was reminded what I specifically am concerned about is while watching CSPAN-3 this past weekend. There was a book tour event from 2006 that was being replayed where Michelle Goldberg was talking about her book Kingdom Coming: The Rise Of Christian Nationalism. Without going into a lot of detail, the book addresses how Christian Nationalists, while being only about 15% or less of the American population, have permeated all three branches of the federal government beyond their population numbers. Their basic philosophy of Christian Nationalists, as described by Goldberg, can be defined as:

[T]he “Christian worldview” that envisions Christianity governing “every aspect of public and private life, and [holds] that all — government, science, history, culture, and relationships — must be understood according to the dictates of scripture.” Christian nationalists have “biblically correct positions on every issue, from gay marriage to income tax rates.”

My guess is that Gov. Palin is another Christian Nationalist sympathizer in the mold of our current president.

So, let’s discuss an issue that’s not currently being discussed in the main stream media, but that the Liberty Counsel is currently discussing in both an “action alert” and a prayer request letter from one of the Liberty University School of Law’s Assistant Professors, Rena Lindevaldsen. It’s the custody case of Isabella Ruth Miller-Jenkins.

From an early 2004 Washington Post story on the custody case:

Janet and Lisa Miller-Jenkins made love in the morning before leaving for the doctor’s office. At least that’s how Janet remembers it. “We had a connection in the morning before we left,” Janet said. Afterward, eager to keep their tender connection alive amid the clinical setting of the infertility specialist’s office, Janet laid her hands upon her partner — one palm on Lisa’s thigh, the other on Lisa’s upper arm — as a doctor inseminated Lisa with sperm from an anonymous man the two women knew only as donor No. 2309. It was, according to Janet, a ritual the Virginia couple repeated more than once before Lisa gave birth April 16, 2002, to a 5-pound, 15-ounce baby girl named Isabella Ruth Miller-Jenkins.

“This baby was made in love,” said Janet, now 42 and living in Vermont.

Lisa, 38, offers a dramatically different account of the begetting of Isabella. According to her, Janet didn’t even go with her to the fertility doctor’s office on the day Isabella was conceived.

Lisa Miller, as she now is called, is identified by the Liberty Counsel as someone who has “left the homosexual life through the redeeming power of Jesus Christ.” The problem for Miller is that she doesn’t want to recognize the parental rights of her former partner Janet Jenkins with regards to Isabella: In Vermont where the two were “civil unionized,” the state statutes explicitly recognize parental rights of same-sex couples. In Virginia, where Lisa Miller has resided for a number of years, the state statutes don’t recognize parental rights for same-sex couples. Janet Jenkins won visitation rights in Vermont. And, to quote the Lindevaldsen Letter:

[Below the fold: the Lindevaldsen Letter's take on what to think, how to pray, and how this is an "evil" that to this point has triumped.]

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Well, tonight’s the VP debate (a few minutes away) … unless Sarah can do a Dan on Joe, she and McCain will be deader than any moose ever was in that old show.

Nevermind party differences.

(Forget transgender and GLB issues for a minute.)

The reckless, the imprudent and the improvident, no problem, they’re both for’em.

Where does that get us not in that category. Not very far.

There has been, and there will continue to be a stream of bull**** (moose or otherwise) from all concerned.

If anyone thinks any of this “$700B” is for real, you don’t know about the real “Northern Exposure” … or your “Southern Exposure.”

Whatever, feel free of McPain and believe happy days will soon be barack again.

I just wanted to bring y’all up to date on the progress of our trans fundraiser for McCain …

Not a pretty picture (well, me neither, for that matter), folks.

I’m getting the impression that some of you think you have better things to do with your money.

But, please, our goal is very modest … so fill that jar up … and, remember, change is good.

Awhile ago I mentioned that I donated to the Obama Campaign as part of a trans bundling of donations. I donated specifically because I wanted to send a message to candidate Obama that trans people have supported his campaign — it would be something to point to when ENDA and the Matthew Sheppard Act come up again in the next Congress.

As a group, trans people are pretty impoverished. When we did a needs assessment in San Diego, we found that the unemployment rate for trans people was ten times higher here than the unemployment rate for the general population, and we found that 57% of respondents were trying to live on less than $20,000.00 a year. Frankly, most of my subcommunity of the LGBT community doesn’t have a lot of resources to put to political campaigns. Passing a fully inclusive ENDA — one with gender identity and expression included in the bill’s text — is a real need for all gender-variant people who need jobs.

I’m on a fixed income. I’ve donated to political campaigns (No On Prop 8 and a few candidates) this year, including to the Obama campaign. I donated through the page the Stonewall Democrats/Act Blue set up to collect money from trans people and their SOFFAs (that’s Significant Others, Friends, Families, and Allies). The point isn’t that we get a bunch of folk donate the maximum of $2,300.00 to the campaign — a bunch of folk donating as little as $5.00 each to the Obama Campaign sends a message that trans people and their SOFFAs are thinking about what Obama has said previously about trans people and trans issues when they’re donating.

Well, it’s the end of the campaign finance quarter, and the Stonewall Democrats and I are encouraging those who are planning to donate this month to the Obama Campaign, consider doing it in a through this Act Blue campaign tool that sends the message to the Obama Campaign that you support the T in LGBT. And, if you weren’t considering donating in a way that says you support trans people before, please take a moment and consider it now — it’s important.

If you decide to donate, please let us know in the comments.

~~~~~UPDATE~~~~~
I should have mentioned earlier that this is a post for the Trans Blog Day For Obama. The further reading section includes some of the other trans bloggers posting for this coordinated blog event.

~~~~~
Further reading:
* Andrea James: Shared Experiences: Trans for Obama Day
* Caprice’s Glob: Trans-blog day for Obama
* A Dahl’s House: Trans for Obama Day
* En|Gender: Trans for Obama Day
* Gardens In Bloom: Trans-Blog Day for Obama
* Kate Bornstein’s Blog for Teens, Freaks and Other Outlaws: Gender Outlaws for Obama
* RiftGirl: Do It To Me, Obama (and her hilarious video on Gov. Palin here)
* Stonewall Oregon: Trans Bloggers Can’t See Russia From Their Front Porch, But………
* Transgender Workplace Diversity: Trans For Obama

On the 24th of September, 1980, I entered the U.S. Navy’s boot camp as a seaman recruit. The nation was in the midst of having incredibly high interest rates, stagflation, and high unemployment rates. I joined the Navy in large part because while living in Portland, Oregon — a city and state I’d only moved to a year earlier — I lost my job as a shipping and receiving clerk due to the bad economy and I just couldn’t find another job.

Twenty years and six days later (September 30th, 2000), I retired from the military as a Fire Controlman First Class.

I feel odd in thinking about this today; odd in the sense that the Navy was never a really good fit for me. I knew in the back of my mind from before I joined the Navy that I was gender-variant, although in the late seventies I had gone through some reparative therapy and believed God had healed me from being trans. I also tend to function from the perspective of cooperation, and military services tend to reward best the servicemembers who function from the perspective of competitiveness.

But beyond those personal issues, I was always was concerned about our nation going to war. I trusted that our leaders, especially after the political mess of the Vietnam War, wouldn’t send us to battle without exceptionally good reasons, a clear and limited set of objectives, and without some sort of an exit strategy. I was wrong of course. I feel fortunate that I got out of the Navy prior to September 11th, 2001, and that I was spared being sent to war in either Afghanistan or Iraq.

The Iraq War news I saw on the Rachel Maddow Show last night (September 23rd, 2008) causes me to feel incredibly fortunate that I’m not currently on active duty; I feel incredibly fortunate that by having a Veterans Administration (VA) disability rating of 100% and by being transgender there is a 0% chance I’ll be recalled to active service. And, it causes me some great concern about the military servicesmembers that are called, and will be called in the future, to serve in Iraq:

I would hope the time and the lives of servicemembers are more valuable to the American public that their time and lives appear to be to President George W. Bush and his administration. In my humble opinion as a former servicemember, we need to bring the troops home from Iraq as soon a possible — our servicemembers shouldn’t be separated from their friends and families or placed in physical danger for “political circumstances related to the domestic situation [in the U.S.].”

In two days we’re scheduled to have a presidential debate on foreign policy. If this subject isn’t broached — this subject of keeping military servicemembers in Iraq for 12 or 15 months at a time for reasons relating to “political circumstances related to the domestic situation [in the U.S.]” — then I believe the debate moderator will have seriously failed the American people.

~~~~~
Further Reading:
* Military: Your Stories: Autumn Sandeen
* Gay & Lesbain Times: Transgender Veterans: Beyond ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,’ transgender vets face different discriminations in the armed services (Story features my story as a transgender veteran)

This past weekend, Latter Day Saints (Mormons) were supposed get out and plant a million Yes On 8 yard signs in support of California’s Proposition 8. Well, I live in San Diego, and both the Yes On 8 and the No On Prop 8 are aware that San Diego County is very likely to be the key county that could very well decide whether or not Prop 8 passes or fails — I expected to see a lot of Yes On 8 signs throughout the county.

And yet, I’ve seen none of these yard signs. Having been an active Mormon myself for a year-and-a-half in the early eighties, I know as a group these are not a lazy folk.

So, I know I’ve been pretty curious as to why I haven’t seen any Yes On 8 yard signs. Well, leave it to Julia Rosen at Calitics to explain what happened:

This past weekend the Yes on 8 campaign had talked up passing out ONE MILLION lawn signs. It was going to be their big splash event, something big and bold to get a bunch of earned media.

To counter that push, the No on 8, Equality for All campaign organized a bunch of visibility events for the media and to raise the public face/profile of the campaign. Then shuttled the the volunteers back inside to do the work that will bring this election home: calling undecided voters.

But a funny thing happened…. There were no lawn signs, no big events from the Yes side.

I started hearing rumors that they had trouble with their vendor. It turns out they were stuck in China. Yes, China. Here is an email from a one Gena Downey, producer of the cult hit Mormon film (I’m joking about the cult and hit thing) God’s Army.

The YES on Prop 8 yard signs have been delayed in route from China. We expect to distribute them within the next two weeks. I will email you as soon as they arrive so we can make sure you have one immediately. In the interim, please continue to take note of any friends or family who would like one as well.

So, the Yes campaign, rather than purchasing some good old fashioned union made in America lawn signs, they went to some cut rate producer in China who blew the delivery date by at least three weeks. What, they couldn’t afford traditional American signs?

Heavens to Kolob — divine intervention, maybe?

Seriously, that’s a lucky break for the No On Prop 8 campaign; a lucky break for those of us who believe in the freedom to marry for California’s gay and lesbian couples. Every day the Yes On 8 campaign doesn’t have their yard signs up is a day they forever loseWeight Exercise to influence any California voters with those yard signs — and we all have less than six weeks to go until the November election.

~~~~~
Related:
* The Unexpected Message The Yes On 8 Campaign Sends To Jews, Mormons, And Other Non-Evangelicals
* California’s Prop 8: Polling Showing Voters Moving To Defeat Measure
* PROP 8 ballot wording rewritten: to ELIMINATE RIGHT of Same-Sex Couples to Marry
* The Fundamental Freedom To Marry
* Pam’s House Blend tags: Proposition 8; Prop 8; Marriage Equality

I don’t always connect dots in the ways others do, so it’s usually interesting to me when someone connects dots in a way I never thought about — especially when it’s a particularly interesting character who makes the connections.

On September 8th, a Jewish, conservative Republican — David Benkof — wrote a piece entitled Right-wing nonsense, where he questioned the Yes On 8 – Protect Marriage Campaign‘s hiring of the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) as their legal defense team:

I believe marriage is between a man and a woman, so I supported the man-woman marriage Proposition 8 in California – until I discovered the Proposition 8 campaign tolerates discrimination against Jews. ProtectMarriage.com‘s legal counsel, the Alliance Defense Fund, has in effect a “No Jews Need Apply” policy for legal and even secretarial positions. They say they’re not a law firm, they’re a “ministry” and thus have a right to discriminate against Jews and other non-Christians. But even if that’s true, Proposition 8 had hundreds of law firms to choose from. The fact they chose one that refuses to hire a Jew like me is very disturbing. Interestingly, Jesus himself was a Jew, so when a group has a policy that would lead them to refuse to hire their own Messiah, you know something’s seriously wrong.

I wanted to check to see if the employment policies of the ADF were as Benkof described these policies, and he’s correct on that facts, in that the ADF doesn’t hire anyone but those who ascribe to the ADF’s vision of Christianity:

[Below the fold: The employment policies of the ADF, and the interesting personal history of David Benkof]

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Forget Sarah Palin (who, rightly so, is going to be and should be “burnt toast” rather sooner than later … good take here on that today) … who’s not been in national government yet … or ever … I hope.

But, how some folks can so embrace some folks who have been in Washington — who’ve been part(y) and parcel to a big, bipartisan mess — and deny most responsibility for such — and take on greater patriotic airs, too … is beyond my simple comprehension.

Sorry, for me, it doesn’t work.

I don’t have any kind of secure position or entitlements.

Whatever I’ve scrapped and saved for, however prudent I’ve been, over the past decade … doesn’t mean shit to a tree … or pig …

… to the $66M man or to the poor old guy …

It’s going to be a “new” “Morning again in America” …

for them, anyway, either way it goes.

Party on …

… but they’ll be our piggies, one way or another.

Feeling grumpy, once again, America …

… “a container, a way to harvest energy and an information carrier.”

This is the sort of news that Zoe (who, I’m happy to hear, is back in the saddle) is much more apt to post about than I am — frankly, I haven’t kept up with cellular biology and such since my undergraduate days back in the Paleolithic era.

But, no doubt, the RNC and the McCain campaign have been closely following this research …

A team of biologists and chemists is closing in on bringing non-living matter to life.

It’s not as Frankensteinian as it sounds. Instead, a lab led by Jack Szostak, a molecular biologist at Harvard Medical School, is building simple cell models that can almost be called life.

[...]

The rest of “Biologists on the Verge of Creating New Form of Life” can be found at Wired.

Sunday night …

Fannie and Freddie, a “bi-gender” mess — a long time coming and a longer time payin’ … brought to us, “bipartisanly,” of course.

I just can’t focus on one candidate’s putative primacy on gay and transgender issues when both parties are and have been (and will be) parties to running the country fiscally, monetarily, militarily and every other which way into the ground … and I’m getting it you know where.

Some things trump other things and, as much as Ivana, I just can’t count on a Trump to help me out … as a poor tax payer of limited means.

By the way, St. Barney (Kat’s well-chosen appellation), who’s been so benificent on “T” stuff (sarcasm alert) — heck, you may not know which (pun alert) ENDA’s up, but Chairman Barney knows — there’s money for everything, like old times — something to look forward to in the “days” ahead … is a player in all this.

Frankly, I’m cranky … and not amused by any of this.

Sorry.

Last week I posted a word cloud of Barrack Obama’s acceptance speech. Here’s a similar word cloud of John McCain’s acceptance speech this evening …

Via Wordle