O Dan Savage will know they are Christians

by their hurting gays even in death.

How un-Christ-like is that? You find out that a valued employee and Navy veteran, whom you promised to the family to provide a memorial service for, is gay, and you cancel the memorial 24 hours before it is to happen?

The church’s pastor, the Rev. Gary Simons, said no one knew Sinclair, who was not a church member, was gay until the day before the Thursday service, when staff members putting together his video tribute saw pictures of men “engaging in clear affection, kissing and embracing.”

‘It’s not that we didn’t love the family’
Simons said the church believes homosexuality is a sin, and it would have appeared to endorse that lifestyle if the service had been held there.

Oh, fuck you, you sanctimonious cock. I'm so fucking sick of this "lifestyle" talk. This guy's "lifestyle" involved showing up at Gary Simons' church and doing his job, sharing time with his family, eating dinner, watching TV, you know...blasphemous stuff like that. The only time he strayed from behavior Gary Simons (unless he's been Haggarded, too) shares is when he wanted to have private, consensual sex with his partner. Or, when, you know, he "engaged in clear affection, kissing and embracing". The horror - expressing his love with his loved ones! Wouldn't want to "endorse" that, would we?

1 John 1:5 - 2:12

And this is the message which we have heard from him and announce unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him and walk in the darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: but if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanseth us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

My little children, these things write I unto you that ye may not sin. And if any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: and he is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the whole world. And hereby we know that we know him, if we keep his commandments. He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him; but whoso keepeth his word, in him verily hath the love of God been perfected. Hereby we know that we are in him: he that saith he abideth in him ought himself also to walk even as he walked. Beloved, no new commandment write I unto you, but an old commandment which ye had from the beginning: the old commandment is the word which ye heard. Again, a new commandment write I unto you, which thing is true in him and in you; because the darkness is passing away, and the true light already shineth. He that saith he is in the light and hateth his brother, is in the darkness even until now. He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is no occasion of stumbling in him. But he that hateth his brother is in the darkness, and walketh in the darkness, and knoweth not whither he goeth, because the darkness hath blinded his eyes.

The point to John's words in this context is that the followers of Jesus should walk as he walked - Jesus loved, served, and spent time in the company of all manner of sinner. It's also that if you claim to love Jesus, but hate your brother (and we are all brothers as we are all children of God), you've left the light of the lord. This is the book you believe in, you follow it or you don't. This "endorse the lifestyle" nonsense is unchristian, unbiblical, and is pure nonsense to provide cover for bigotry, fear and hatred.

And Gary Rivers can claim all he wants that he "loves the family" or this isn't about hate, but refusing a man's memorial in his death is a hateful act. I can 100% guarantee you if a murderer or rapist dies and their family wants a memorial service at this church, they'll get it. So fuck you and your sanctimonious, unchristian refusal to provide this man one last dignity as he leaves this earth.

Bush's Gas-tax Economic Impact (Bush is a pussy)

So yesterday, Bush announced that we "won't raise" the gasoline tax $.05 (I put it in quotes, because the Transportation Appropriations committee will make that decision, not him).  He feels that, instead of raising a tax, the Senate should "prioritize".  In other words, since the transportation budget that he agreed not to veto isn't quite enough money to simply maintain our roads at the status quo, he believes they should magically use that money to improve our roads. 

Here's the deal.  The US uses 137 billion gallons of gas annually, which translates to just under $7 billion in taxes raised if we raise the gas tax by a nickel.  To put that in "you" terms, that's about $5 a week.  (assuming 2 weekly fillups for 2 cars at roughly 13 gallons per fillup, and doubling the tax to a dime so the oil company can weather the incredible strain of taking in an extra nickel.  IOW, this is an aggressive estimate).  (Oh, and let's say you drive a big duallie pickup with a 40 gallon tank and fill up twice a week.  That comes to about $8 and a heaping helping of personal responsibility - you chose the big truck, you can pay the bills) $5 a week is about $270 for a 2 car household.  George Bush believes this $270 will "affect economic growth", and thus opposes it. 

Never mind, of course, that the imploding credit situation in this country is guaranteed to have a negative impact on economic growth - he's not concerned about already strapped folks losing their homes and having their credit destroyed, he's concerned about folks paying a tax.  And losing one viente latte a week.  That's the deal, folks.  We can pay the $5 a week and share the responsibility for restoring our infrastructure to the finest and safest in the world (and get home safely), or we can keep our latte and continue our slide into life-threatening third-world irrelevancy. 

Seriously, does anyone think $5 a week is going to "affect economic growth"?  That's just bullshit from a President who's afraid to anger his anti-tax zealot bosses in the Party.  The cost of saving actual lives, not to mention preventing the economic impact of a broken infrastructure that can prevent the movement of goods, is around $200 billion.  That's just to fix our roads, and doesn't take into account our failing steam pipes, sewer systems, eroding electrical grid, etc.  $200 billion dollars is 17 months in Iraq.  You want to talk about priorities?  Get our military spending out of the stratosphere, put our kids in responsible, strategic locations (i.e., not Iraq) with efficiently made weapons and raise a small gas tax, and you've got a safer country with a rebuilt infrastructure.  Just like that.  But this giant pussy is afraid to ask Americans for an extra 5 cents. 

You think collapsing bridges don't impact economic growth?  Did you know that more than 500 bridges failed in the U.S. during the 90's?  Wanna guess if the loss of those access points affects the ability to move commerce?  Luckily, most of those bridges, like most things, gave warning before they failed - you know, warnings like the Alaskan Way Viaduct is giving that we'll ignore until it collapses on some nice tourists from Illinois.  But the time is coming when what happened in Minnesota will be more and more frequent.  Our system can only age so much before it fails.

So that you see where Bush is coming from in his no new taxes stance (and in case you're wondering if the GOP is already circling the wagons to protect their ideology from any fact), the Investor's Business Daily led the way with an editorial blaming this on state legislature's spending priorities.  You see, in their world, we're enjoying a "Bush boom" and surging tax revenues.  Well, we are certainly enjoying a boom in service sector jobs.  But those tax revenues?  They're not up because of the economy (which is failing AGAIN, btw, thanks to the economic ideas the IBD has promoted, like, ahem, subprime lending and the bankruptcy bill).  No, they're coming from the increased sales taxes, service fees and property taxes that states and municipalities have had to levy thanks to the GOP's massive cuts in state funding.  You want to talk priorities, IBD?  How about deciding to cut taxes on wealth while raising taxes on work, and depriving local governments of the money they need to repair this infrastructure.  Check this out:

But cities, towns, counties and states aren't spending on unsexy projects like bridge and highway infrastructure, which benefit everyone. No, they're focusing their efforts on entitlements, opting for easy votes over public safety. When the time comes for infrastructure spending, funds get diverted instead to day care centers, "affordable housing" and other pork — not bridges, ports and roads.

...

Nevertheless, something failed that will probably require more spending for infrastructure. The latter is not as sexy as day care centers, bilingual education or global warming boondoggles. But it's far more badly needed.

The fucking gall.  Guess why we need that affordable housing?  Because of the increased number of people living in poverty thanks to this administration's economic policies - you know, the IBD's "Bush boom".  Yay, I've got a job at Wendy's!  Now I can live in a shit apartment and drop my kids off at the 10% subsidized day care where I hope they won't be molested, while my boss writes off his capital gains.  Thanks, George Bush!  To call affordable housing and day care for the millions of people Bush's policies keep in poverty "pork" shows an appalling disregard for traditional American principles. 

Well, all the bilingual education, global warming investment and affordable housing spending in this country combined falls far short of the money needed to fix our infrastructure - and I think anyone who understands our system of government, common human decency, and simple responsibility to our own nation can see that one need not be sacrificed for the other.  Unfortunately, George Bush and the anti-tax zealots just don't see it that way.  Get used to collapsing bridges.