God, so last night I watched Larry King Live, and it was the funniest thing I’ve EVER seen. They had on there, The mayor of SF, a stupid republican who introduced the amendment, some idiot pastor and a hot hot gay boy, named Chad.
Anyways, it was very funny and everytime the rep would talk to the mayor, she’d be like, “What about group marriges, why aren’t you allowing those” and that was like the ONLY thing she said the whole time… Well that and saying that she was “Following the law”. She also said that the courts were stupid. Only in like 100 times more words!
The pastor was an idiot and everyone kept getting on him about seperation of church and state, and he just didn’t seem to get that idea, because everytime they talked to him he was like, “The bible says” or “God did this” or “Thye’re sinners, theywon’t get into heaven” To which Larry King said, “What if they don’t want into heaven, shouldn’t we let them get married while they are here on earth”.. That was a really good come back I thought.
The homo was kinda quiet, but really cute. And when he did speak he had really good points. No one could really rebut him…
I think this little snipit is REALLY good:
KING: All right, John, let me — let me move to other members of the panel. We have four members of the panel. I want to get everyone in. John, what do you say to those who say, What about Chad and the love of his life being together? Isn’t that better than, say, the heterosexual marriage where one of the partners cheats? Who is contributing more to the moral decay of the society, the adulterous husband with the female wife or the loving gay couple who don’t do that?
MACARTHUR: Yes, well, you’re asking me to do something I really can’t do, and make a judgment on which sin is better or worse than the other. We’ve suffered in this country from adultery, divorce, the abuse of children, pedophilia, you name it. I’m not going to classify those in rank. They’re sins, and they destroy the family. KING: And homosexuality is…
MACARTHUR: And homosexuality…
KING: … a sin to you.
MACARTHUR: Yes. And…
KING: Therefore, it’s a choice.
MACARTHUR: It’s a choice you make. It’s a sinful choice.
KING: Did you make a choice to be heterosexual?
MACARTHUR: I don’t think I had to make a choice to be heterosexual. I think that’s a natural thing.
KING: Wait a minute. Wait a minute. In other words, one is a choice and one is not?
MACARTHUR: Yes.
KING: So he was unlucky and you’re…
MACARTHUR: Because — because you’re not talking about — because it’s natural to be heterosexual. That’s built…
KING: What do you mean by natural?
MACARTHUR: Well, I mean, that’s the way God made us. That’s the normal…
KING: But if he doesn’t feel that way, what is he, then? He’s not a sinner. It wasn’t his decision.
MACARTHUR: Yes, I think it was his decision.
ALLEN: I would love, absolutely love for the pastor to point out for me when in my life I made that decision because I have to tell you, it caused a lot of pain in my family. It caused a lot of pain to me. It’s a very, very tough thing that I had to go through. I don’t remember making that decision. If I did, maybe can you point it out, but that wasn’t the case for me.
(CROSSTALK)
ALLEN: It’s who I am. You also said that it was in the fabric of the human being that — to understand that marriage was between a man and a woman and that’s what family was. It must not be because it’s not in the fabric of what who I am. It’s not the way I see it. I think families come in all shapes, sizes and colors.
MACARTHUR: Well, let me respond this way, Chad, and say it had to be in the fabric of humanity or you wouldn’t be here.
ALLEN: I believe that reproduction is. I’ll give you that. I absolutely believe that reproduction is. However, I think family, the definition of family and the definition of reproduction are very, very different things.
You can go read the whole transcript here.
It really was a good debate. And I was switching between that and the debate over exporting jobs in congress, which was also a good job. Apparently Bush wants to make McDonald type jobs a “manufacturing” job so that he can inflate the number of “manyfacturing” jobs in the US, since we have had the greatest loss during his presidency. The two democrats that were talking about it called it, “Traditional Manufacturing” and “McManufacturing”.
Speaking of McDonalds, did you all know that they also own Fazolis and Boston Market. Crazyness I do say! So now we can’t eat there anymore either. 🙁 Oh well. Not like I ate there alot anyways.
Anyways, before I did all of that, I wrote the first half of my second 1600 word paper. It’s going much better then the first paper, and I should be able to easily finish it tonight. Hopefully I’ll do as good on this one as I did on the last one. I’d like to get an A in that class… So far I’m on track to do that… I’ve got 22 out of the possible 25 points in there.
Umm, I didn’t do much else yesterday. My life is pretty boring as of late, same old stuff going on.
Though, I AM going to Cali in less then 9 days! Woot!
Anyways. I should go work now.
Laters all.
Tax on pornographic materials may be raised
By Alicia Ebaugh
Daily Staff Writer
Iowa residents could find themselves paying extra — a lot extra — for sex toys and pornography if a recently proposed bill passes the Iowa Legislature.
The bill, which would add a 25 percent tax on all sales and rentals at adult bookstores in Iowa, has begun to stir some opposition.
The bill, HF2242, referred to as the “Adult Enterprises Excise Tax Act,” would apply the tax to everything purchased in an adult bookstore including: condoms, dildos, vibrators, pornographic magazines and videos, video rentals and all tickets and admissions to adult stores.
Rep. Dick Taylor, D-Cedar Rapids, the bill’s author, said as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, it is his job to come up with “creative” solutions to garner more income.
“I’m not an evangelical-type person — this is merely a tax bill,” he said. “I think they can afford it.”
Taylor said his idea to apply a tax to the establishments came when he drove past a large adult bookstore near the Baxter exit along Interstate 80.
“[My wife and I] went in and looked it over and saw how much money they made,” he said. “We were only there for 20 minutes or so, but they took in a lot of revenue in that time.”
Ames has two adult book stores: Pleasure Palace II, 117 Kellogg Ave., and Peep Land, 520 S. Duff Ave.
These businesses are both part of a large chain of adult bookstores managed by Goalie Entertainment, which owns 11 stores throughout Iowa and more than 60 nationwide.
Taylor compared the activity at adult bookstores to gambling or any other adult entertainment and said the industry should be taxed accordingly.
However, Robert DePiano, an attorney representing Goalie Entertainment, said any comparison to gambling would be inaccurate because gambling is not protected by the First Amendment.
He said the bill singles out certain types of expressive material and taxes them differently than others.
“The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled on cases like this several times and these sorts of discriminatory taxes were found unconstitutional in violation of the First Amendment’s freedom of press guarantee,” he said.
DePiano said he would counsel Goalie Entertainment to challenge the bill depending on its final version.
“You don’t need Albert Einstein to tell you this wouldn’t be good for business,” he said.
As a result of this tax, prices of sex-related items could soar. Businesses can collect the tax by adding it to the sales price of all items sold, according to the bill.
“I think it punishes people who are safely trying to express their sexuality,” said Erica Carnes, junior in political science and member of ISU Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance. “I don’t think there’s necessarily any way around it, though. If you want porn, you’ll pay for it.”
Nearly 40 other legislators, including Rep. Jane Greimann, D-Ames, have signed the bill.
“[I] would not be unhappy to cut into the number of people frequenting adult enterprises,” Greimann said in an e-mail message.
The bill states all proceeds from the tax would be set aside to provide grants to care providers providing services to victims of domestic abuse, rape and sexual assault.
Taylor said he thought the allocation of the money in this way was appropriate. However, Nichole Feuerstein, president of the ISU Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance and junior in women’s studies, said she personally disagreed. She said linking higher taxes on pornographic materials, which can be empowering to women, to funding programs for abuse victims infers a negative link between the two.
“I think [Taylor] is making a lot of assumptions about the negative effects of pornography on women when little evidence exists to prove that,” she said.
1. Homosexuality is not natural, much like eyeglasses, polyester, and birth control.
2. Heterosexual marriages are valid because they produce children. Infertile couples and old people can’t legally get married because the world needs more children.
3. Obviously, gay parents will raise gay children, since straight parents only raise straight children.
4. Straight marriage will be less meaningful if Gay marriage is allowed, since Britney Spears’ 55-hour just-for-fun marriage was meaningful.
5. Heterosexual marriage has been around a long time and hasn’t changed at all; women are property, blacks can’t marry whites, and divorce is illegal.
6. Gay marriage should be decided by people, not the courts, because the majority-elected legislatures, not courts, have historically protected the rights of the minorities.
7. Gay marriage is not supported by religion. In a theocracy like ours, the values of one religion are imposed on the entire country. That’s why we have only one religion in America.
8. Gay marriage will encourage people to be gay, in the same way that hanging around tall people will make you tall.
9. Legalizing gay marriage will open the door to all kinds of crazy behavior. People may even wish to marry their pets because a dog has legal standing and can sign a marriage contract.
10. Children can never succeed without a male and a female role model at home. That’s why single parents are forbidden to raise children.
11. Gay marriage will change the foundation of society. Heterosexual marriage has been around for a long time, and we could never adapt to new social norms because we haven’t adapted to things like cars or longer life spans.
12. Civil unions, providing most of the same benefits as marriage with a different name are better, because a “separate but equal” institution is always constitutional. Separate schools for African-Americans worked just as well as separate marriages for gays and lesbians will.