I Feel Like This Sometimes...

From a friend's friend's blog:

'To paraphrase a friend "Everyone keeps telling me to look at the big picture, but they don't understand that I'm looking at an entirely different painting." '

Norman Lear Feels Like Celebrating the Coming Obama Administration?

I saw this at the close of Bill Moyer's Journal (transcript) last night but forgot to post it.

BILL MOYERS: Now, Norman Lear is campaigning for a new birth of patriotism on the part of every one of us, as an act of personal commitment, not just sentiment.

He'll be taking that message to Barack Obama's inauguration to the sound of music. Norman commissioned Keith Carradine to write a song, "Born Again American", that will be performed at a gala Sunday night at, where else, Washington's Renaissance Hotel, performed by singers and musicians from around the country. On the newly launched "Born Again American" website you can hear the entire song.

[video clip]

BILL MOYERS: There you have it-the promise of America is not alone a government project; it's in our hands, and requires each of us to take our own oath of commitment.
On our Web site at pbs.org, you can link to the Born Again American site, where you'll find their version of that oath. We also link to other organizations observing Martin Luther King Day on Monday as a national day of community service. As Simon Schama writes in the American future, this republic is shouting to be remade. That's a job for everyone.

I'm Bill Moyers. See you next week.

Lear discusses why he was led to the project at his web site.

PS:I think the song's web site also has better audio and video than YouTube's copy - JPC/FB

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( Lyrics... )

Watch It free on HBO Sunday

Click for More Details

A Message from Obama about the Inaugural Schedule

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A Morning Email from +Gene

From An Inch At a Time:

Dear Friends,

Well, in a few hours we'll be off to Washington for the inauguration. Here are a few items that might be of interest. Please feel free to share them with whomever you deem appropriate:


1. I will be blogging from Washington, using my summer's blogspot: "Tales From the Fringe" (Perhaps this should be renamed "Tales from Closer to the Center" but I didn't have time!)

2. Sunday's opening inaugural event at the Lincoln Memorial will be taped by HBO. What I DO know is that HBO will be airing it on Sunday evening -- and the signal will be available to EVERYONE, WHETHER OR NOT you are a subscriber to HBO!

3. The text of my inaugural event prayer will be available on our diocesan website on Sunday afternoon.

4. On Tuesday night, after attending the LGBT ball, sponsored by HRC and others, I will be Jon Stewart's guest on The Daily Show, a special live-from-Washington edition. At least here in the East, it is broadcast at 11:00pm on the Comedy Channel, and then rebroadcast the next night. Check local listings.

This promises to be an awesomely wonderful time. I am so honored and humbled to be so included. The President Elect has invited me to attend a small, private worship service on the morning of the inauguration, to attend the swearing in/inauguration itself, to view the parade from the Presidential viewing stand, and to attend the National Prayer Service at National Cathedral on Wednesday. I hope that through these invitations, in some small way, ALL of you will feel included in these events by our next president.

Please pray for me as I undertake this awesome honor. I hope to do us and the Episcopal Church proud!

+Gene

(no subject)

Since HBO decided to cut it from the TV coverage, despite having about 6 minutes to spare, Here's the text of Gene Robinson's Invocation:

A Prayer for the Nation and Our Next President, Barack Obama
Jan 18, 2009

A Prayer for the Nation and Our Next President, Barack Obama

By The Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire

( Text... )

As suggested at Joe.My.God., If you'd like to express your unhappiness to HBO, you can do that here.

[EDIT: Also, according to Joe.My.God., in a historic first, the Washington DC Gay Men's Chorus just performed at the inaugural concert on the National Mall, backing Josh Groban and Heather Headley. One wouldn't know that since the chorus was not announced when they took the stage, nor were they identified onscreen.

Good job 2009 Inaugural Organizing Committee and HBO.]

Hate on a map

Here's the result of mating the Prop 8 donor list with Google Maps. It's a detailed map of every Prop 8 donor in the nation. You have to zoom in on a particular city in order to see the incredibly large list (it may only look like a few if you're zoomed out). Wild stuff. And remember, it was the Prop 8 organizers - the bigoted Mormons and their religious right brethren - how came up with the tactic of exposing those who donated to the anti-8 side of the debate. So this kind of thing is their idea.

Here's San Francisco:

A Bottom in a Box

ReDefining 'Saddleback'

You probably fondly recall Dan Savage's successful redefinition of former Sen. Rick Santorum's last name, a legacy that will follow Santorum as long as teh interwebs exists.

Now Savage is looking to give Rick Warren's Saddleback Church the same treatment (I posted about this when Dan Savage first announced the contest). Here are Savage's suggestions; email your vote to him at saddleback@savagelove.net.

(1) "Logically, if 'barebacking' means having butt sex with no condom, then 'saddlebacking' should mean having butt sex with a condom."

(2) "Saddleback (verb): to submit someone to any kind of humiliating, unreciprocal sex act, either literally or metaphorically, consented to by passive partner due to submissive/masochistic tendencies, desire for approval, or other darker motive. E.g., 'I don't know why Obama is letting Rick Warren saddleback him into presiding over his inauguration.'"

(3) "The saddleback position involves placing your lubed dick between the butt cheeks of your partner. This position can be performed on your sides or on top of a facedown partner (maybe with a pillow under his or her hips). My favorite way of finishing up the saddlebacking is to lift up and come on my wife's sweaty back. The saddleback is a nice compromise position when your partner won't allow anal entry."

(4) "To saddleback is to rail against gay sex in public while secretly indulging in the same in private. Ted Haggard? Total saddlebacker. Larry Craig? Saddlebacker. Rick Warren? Probably a saddlebacker."

(5) "'Saddlebacking' should be the term for the phenomenon of Christian teens engaging in unprotected anal sex in order to preserve their virginities. 'After attending the Purity Ball, Heather and Bill saddlebacked all night because she's saving herself for marriage.' Please, please adopt this definition!"

(6) "Saddleback (verb): to ejaculate on the back of a partner at the culmination of doggy-style anal sex."

(7) "Before being invited to give the invocation, Mr. Warren was most noted for his book The Purpose Driven Life. Therefore, 'to saddleback' is to fuck with a purpose, i.e., to procreate. A heterosexual couple asked if they're trying to have children could reply, 'No, we're not ready for kids yet, but we'll probably start saddlebacking next year.'"

I like #5 followed by #4 and #6.

(no subject)

Maureen Dowd on George Bush's long goodbye:

Right now, though, it’s a huge relief to be getting an inquisitive, complicated mind in the White House.

W. decided there was no need to be president of the whole country. He could just be president of his base. Obama is determined to be president of as much of the country as possible.

We’re trading a dogmatic president for one who’s shopping for a dog. It feels good.

Only Males 18 and Older Need Apply

That rainbow advertisement has nothing to do with Gay Pride. The Moscow subway hire train drivers, hmm... only males older than 18 years old need to apply :-)

I Call...