Be the Change You Want! Congratulations, CA Newlyweds!

CONGRATULATIONS to all California newlyweds from two other California newlyweds! CJ and I got married in February 2004 at the San Francisco City Hall. We can personally attest to the joy and the transformation that sincere marriage vows create.

Maybe the most important thing about these weddings was said this morning by StarTrek star George Takei, quoting Ghandi: "Be the change you want!"

CA Siting AZ's Power Lines?

This update from the LA Times via HeadwatersNews:

California utility asks FERC to step into power line dispute with Arizona
After Arizona regulators denied Southern California Edison's request to build a 230-mile power transmission line between Phoenix and Palm Springs, the utility company asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to begin the process to override Arizona's denial, and if FERC complies, it would be the first such decision under new legislation that established "national interest" energy corridors. Los Angeles Times; May 19

Gee, I'm really not sure I want CA and Con Ed dictating where my state puts power lines, and based on this Administration's handling of Federal energy issues (think Enron and old ladies), I'm darn I don't want the Fed handling it.

Although Con Ed says I shouldn't, I do feel threatened. If I'm wrong, will someone who knows a lot about this issue please inform me? TIA.

California Supreme Court Gets it Right!

Speaking as an average American and as one of the 4,000 people who lined up to marry at the San Francisco City Hall in February, 2004, I am thrilled with today's announcement overturning CA's ban on gay marriage.
The ruling said, in part:

"the constitutionally based right to marry properly must be understood to encompass the core set of basic *substantive* legal rights and attributes traditionally associated with marriage that are so integral to an individual’s liberty and personal autonomy that they may not be eliminated or abrogated by the Legislature or by the electorate through the statutory initiative process."

And there you go.

Marriage must be understood as:

the core set of substantive rights and attributes that are so integral to an individual's liberty and personal autonomy that they may not be eliminated or abrogated by the Legislature or the electorate.

That is what we've been saying since Stonewall.

For all but the worst sort of people, this succinct statement should be sufficient to show the irrelevance of surface distinctions to the question of human rights.

PS: For anybody squawking about activist judges, the CA people changed their minds a few times. The CA legislature TWICE supported gay marriage and once voted to ban it. Swartzenegger vetoed the will of the people on supporting gay marriage. The matter went to the state supreme court for its opinion. See, the reason we have courts is to prevent the majority from tyrannizing a minority. Tyrannizing is different from out-voting. Tyrannizing is out-voting from bias in order to discriminate.

Migrant Mass Grave Alleged at Holtville, CA

For more photos and the photographer's compelling and persuasive report, see the Texas Civil Rights Review. For some reason, I don't suppose the UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights was taken to this site.

The mounting evidence of abuses in this country, on a scale reminiscent of lynching, the destruction of Rosewood, FL, in 1923, and the chronic and corrosive but far less publicized profit-driven violence against Native Americans begs one simple question which I address to every reader:

Where is your voice, proud American?

Why the silence? Where are the Democrats, the Independents, the decent Republicans? Why the averted eyes, the indifference, the complascent ignorance? Why the readiness to believe every bad thing you're told about people of color? (I have in mind not just Lou Dobbs and the rest of the haters, but also the ubiquitous, anonymous email spam that's flooding the US bloodstream to gin up still more hatred for "illegals.") There's a direct cause/effect relationship between all that toxic waste and the photos you see here.

Do you not know that the more fear you feel about speaking up, the more urgent the need to speak out?

If you don't stand for something, Americans, you stand for nothing. Which is it?