Mefite yesster makes a compelling argument in this thread about the President's opposition to gay marriage.

[D]enial of marriage/civil union benefits to same-sex couples is not a "gay rights" issue, it is blatant gender discrimination. Look at it this way:

"I, Person A, wish to marry Person B. The government is not allowing this to happen because I am a man. If I were a woman, I could marry Person B, but I as a man cannot. This is gender discrimination."

Anyone out there in a gay relationship want to challenge their state on these grounds? I'd love to see it happen.

Well it's about time. It's about time this country gave the Presidential Medal of Freedom, its highest civilian honor, to Charlton Heston.

I mean, think about it. Think of all the millions of Hebrews he freed when he parted the Red Sea. If that isn't worth the Medal of Freedom, I don't know what is. I mean, they weren't Americans, but this country has never looked down upon Middle Easterners or shown them less respect than they would their own citizens.

And just think of how hard Heston worked to rescue all of earth's humans from the oppression of their simian captors in 1968. A champion of freedom, he is.

(And handsome too.)

And, man oh man, did he ever show us the meaning of freedom when he broke those bonds of slavery in 1959. Even the big JC gave him the nod back then.

Charlton Heston is a true American Hero, and this recognition has been too long in coming.

------------------------------

UPDATE - Since I posted the comments above, it has been brought to my attention that, in actuality, Charlton Heston is a Sociopathic Gun Nut Bigot™ who thinks that all the gun violence in this country is caused by The Blacks and is no more deserving of this honor than the boil currently festering on my dog's ass. I regret the error.

photo courtesy http://www.newyorkslime.com

I would like to call for a moratorium on the "tin-foil hat" meme. It is as lame a Christopher Reeve's peckerwood, but used infinitely more often.

----------------------------------------------

Whoa...sorry. I think I was just channeling dong resin.

OK, so the word is that someday--perhaps sooner than later--we will be able to reproduce asexually. Advances in cloning and genetic manipulation mean that the DNA from any two people of any gender could be combined, and gay and lesbian couples could have children of their own without involving the DNA of a third person. That's pretty cool. Here's my question, though:

Men have an X and a Y chromosome. Women have two X's. Does this mean that a lesbian couple would only be able to produce girls, as there is no Y between them? And does it then follow that two men could produce boys and girls and...a child of some altogether different Y-Y sex?

These are the things I think of when I don't feel like working.

George W. Bush's resume

Wow. Throw out half of these because of "partisanship" or "bush hating" or "just because"--hell, throw out 90% of them--and the Bush presidency is still an abject failure. (also avaliable in Adobe Acrobat format)
--via Archipelapogo

QUESTION: Mr. President, do you realize that many people hearing you say that we know these are bad people in Guantanamo Bay will merely fuel their doubts that the United States regards them as innocent until proven guilty and due a fair, free and open trial?

PRESIDENT BUSH: Well, let me just say these were illegal combatants. They were picked up off the battlefield aiding and abetting the Taliban. I'm not trying to try them in front of your cameras or in your newspaper.

TRANSLATION: You are right to have doubts that the United States regards them as innocent until proven guilty. I have decided that these men are guilty and I, as you know, along with my colleagues in the justice department, have thrown out many of the basic freedoms on which this country was founded. Next question...

I’m glad the media are finally waking up to [the reality of the situation in Iraq. But we] never should have ended up here in the first place. Where the hell were these people six months ago? Flaunting their damned flag lapel pins and giving us breathless puff pieces about military hardware and presidential determination, and debating whether the antiwar protestors were traitorous dogs or simply mindless dupes.... --Tom Tomorrow

Tom also notes something the President said the other day, which I somehow missed. "We gave [Saddam] a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn't let them in." He said that. George Bush said that. Just the other day. Think about that! That is perhaps the most patently untrue statement a president has ever utterred, and scarcely anyone noticed. [More in this Salon piece.]

We live in frightening times.

We recommend that you call an abrupt halt to attempts to prove Vice President Cheney "not guilty." His role has been so transparent that such attempts will only erode further your own credibility....We strongly recommend that you ask for Cheney's immediate resignation.

Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, a group of retired intelligence agents, has written to President Bush blaming Cheney for Nigergate (did I just coin that? probably not) and calling for his ouster.

Thanks to tizzie for the tip.

--------
MORE

The VIPs have been on this for a while. In another memo back in May, the group wrote:

One of the many lawmakers who believe they were deceived last summer and fall, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) wrote you a letter on March 17, asking that you explain why "evidence" that your administration knew to be forged was used with him and others to garner votes for the war....The continued lack of any White House response to Waxman's letter can only feed the suspicion that there is no innocent explanation and that the use of the forged material was deliberate.

Of course, a Cheney resignation would probably just give us Vice President Rice--who's probably equally at fault here and is probably only slightly less mendacious than Cheney.

My grandfather has been slowly suffocating for nearly 60 years. Albert and the rest of the 83rd Infantry (the "Thunderbolts") landed in Normandy in 1944 and fought in Hürtgen Forest and the Battle of the Bulge. In 1945, after being among the first to cross the Rhine, he took shrapnel from an 88 in the back and earned a Purple Heart. He's suffered from lung disease for much of his life and now, at 86, he's tethered to an oxygen machine 24 hours a day. A few years ago he had open heart surgery and when he woke up the doctor said he was amazed that he was still alive--not because of his heart, but because during the operation the doctor had seen Al's shriveled and misshapen lungs and could scarcely believe they worked.

"I remember going into a building with a couple of the other guys," Al told me, "when all of a sudden the gas started coming in. We couldn't breathe and some of us were sick and we couldn't get out."

I remember the German's had used mustard gas and other chemical weapons in the First World War, but I don't remember reading about their use in WWII. I told him that.

"That wasn't in Germany," he said. "It was in Indiana, during basic training."

"The doctor says that's why I can't breathe today."

In all fairness, it could be worse. He might have lost his legs in Belgium or taken a bullet in the head while crossing the Rhine, or the lung disease might have taken his life 30 years ago. He's lived a good, long life, and he gets a monthly check for his suffering. He holds no resentment toward the government that gassed him--in fact he loves this country more than anyone I know.

He frowns at me when I wear my "I still hate George Bush" t-shirt. "Why do you hate the President?" he asks me every time.

"A lot of people died who didn't need to," I answer. "This was a bad war."

His face changes when he hears that and suddenly he's back in 1944.

"That makes sense," he concedes. "I can see that."

I really wish that, before June Carter Cash died in May, she and Johnny had recorded the Magnetic Fields' "Papa Was a Rodeo". It's maybe a little cloying for the man in black, but I think it would have been fitting to record a love song before she left. Maybe it's just Stephen Merritt's baritone, but I can't help but think of Cash when I hear it:

I like your twisted point of view, Mike I like your questioning eyebrows You've made it pretty clear what you like It's only fair to tell you now

that I leave early in the morning
and I won't be back till next year
I see that kiss-me pucker forming
but maybe you should plug it with a beer, cause

Papa was a rodeo - Mama was a rock'n'roll band
I could play a guitar and rope a steer before I learned to stand
Home was anywhere with diesel gas - Love was a trucker's hand
Never stuck around long enough for a one night stand
Before you kiss me you should know
Papa was a rodeo

The light reflecting off the mirror ball
looks like a thousand swirling eyes
They make me think I shouldn't be here at all
You know, every minute someone dies

What are we doing in this dive bar
How can you live in a place like this
Why don't you just get into my car
and I'll take you away I'll take that kiss now, but

(boy) Papa was a rodeo - Mama was a rock'n'roll band
I could play a guitar and rope a steer before I learned to stand
Home was anywhere with diesel gas - Love was a trucker's hand
Never stuck around long enough for a one night stand
Before you kiss me you should know
Papa was a rodeo

And now it's 55 years later
We've had the romance of the century
After all these years wrestling gators
I still feel like crying when I think of what you said to me

Papa was a rodeo - Mama was a rock'n'roll band
I could play a guitar and rope a steer before I learned to stand
Home was anywhere with diesel gas - Love was a trucker's hand
Never stuck around long enough for a one night stand
Before you kiss me you should know
Papa was a rodeo

Before you kiss me you should know - Papa was a rodeo
What a coincidence, your Papa was a rodeo too