Nothing Like Knowing What You're Voting For, Is There?

I'm all for making things as simple as possible.  At least, I think that way when it comes to procedures.

Of course, some things can't be made simple, like the issues on which people vote.  But that doesn't stop some people from trying.

Believe it or not, the car bearing this bumper sticker was parked by the projects in Brooklyn.  

Although I don't agree, I can understand why someone would be anti-Obama.  But can anyone explain to me how being pro-gun makes somebody pro-life, let alone pro-God? 

Speaking Out Against Domestic Abuse

I don't watch awards shows.  Well, all right, I don't watch TV these days.  But even when I was tied to the tube, I didn't pay attention to the Grammys, Oscars or any of the others.

So I missed Obama's anti- domestic abuse message at last night's Grammys, or the speech by Brooke Axtell that followed.  But someone passed them on to me:

MLK And LGBT People

Sometimes President Obama seems to think he's channeling Martin Luther King Jr. when he doesn't think he's a reincarnation of President Lincoln.  I guess he can do worse for role models although, aside from his being black and his stated belief in civil rights, I don't see much connection between Barack and MLK.  The latter was a visionary, a prophet.  Whatever his merits, Obama is a politician.  That means MLK adopted views that aligned with what he perceived and exprienced; Obama is thinking about votes and donations.

I don't mean this as a condemnation of Obama.  After all, he did change his position on gay marriage.  However, it's hard not to notice that he opposed it during his first campaign for the Presidency; he finally came out in support of it after Vice-President Biden expressed his.  

On the other hand, he did voice his support.  Plus, even though he could have been more proactive, he's done more to support transgender people than all of the presidents before him did.  Then again, the best of his predecessors did nothing; the others did what they could to make our lives more difficult.

But, as I said, Obama deserves some credit.  And, perhaps, he can claim MLK's mantel after all.  Nobody knows for sure whether King would have supported LGBT equality, as he was slain more than a year before the Stonewall Rebellion.  But we do know that he never said anything negative about queer people, and didn't countenance a "literal" or "fundamentalist" reading of the Bible that interprets Leviticus and other books of the Bible as injunctions against loving people of one's own sex.

Furthermore, King allowed Bayard Rustin, a friend who happened to be openly gay, to serve as one of his closest advisors.  Plus, he when he wrote an advice column for Ebony magazine, he responded in a sensitive (though, not surprisingly, pastoral) way to a letter from a boy who confessed his feelings toward other boys.  Given the time--1958--it was a very tolerant and forward-thinking response.

Still, some insist that King would not have considered LGBT rights the next logical step in the civil rights movement.  One of them is his own daughter, Rev. Bernice King.  In 2005, she led a march her father's grave while calling for a Constitutional ban on gay marriage. During a speech at a church meeting in New Zealand, she said her father "did not take a bullet for gay marriage."

But King's widow, Coretta Scott King, vocally supported gay rights.  One of her closest aides was gay.  (Are you seeing a pattern here?)  Furthermore, the FBI tapped his telephone conversations, and he was one of the most surveilled people on the planet.  Yet no one could find a conversation, sermon, speech, lecture or letter of his that expressed any sort of anti-gay sentiment.

Given what I've seen and read, I think that if MLK had lived longer, he would have made LGBT equality part of his civil-rights platform.  After all, he didn't turn away anyone else whose rights were denied or trampled.  I suspect that, being a preacher from the South in the time in which he lived, he simply didn't think much about LGBT people because, well, they hadn't made it onto his radar yet.  The same could be said for any number of other people of good will from that time.

Because He Can

So...A few weeks ago, Barack announced that he's in favor of gay marriage--after Joe Biden's announcement of same basically pressured him into reversing the position he espoused in 2008, when he was running for President.


Beyond that, though, how much progress has he really made on LGBT equality?  

Sometimes I get the feeling he's taking LGB people for granted because most won't vote for Romney.  And I sense that he'll throw transgenders under the bus again if the election is close enough, and the economy isn't good.


Am I the only one who feels this way?

Leaving MLK Spinning

Today is Martin Luther King day.  Someone commented that his life and work weren't only about racial equality; rather, he stood for human right and justice.


If that's the case--which I don't doubt--I have little doubt that he would be appalled at the field of candidates for the Republican Presidential nomination.


Mind you, I'm no fan of Obama:  I think he's thrown transgender people under the bus.  However, even Ron Paul--the only one of the Republicans for whom I would even consider voting--makes Obama seem like, well, MLK by comparison.


At least Ron Paul voted against the Marriage Protection Act which, had it been amended to the Constitution, would have banned gay marriage.  Of course, his motives for his vote had nothing to do with any interest in LGBT rights.  Rather, he didn't want to vote for another law that would have allowed the Federal Government to, in his view, usurp authority that belongs to individual states.   Absent such a law, we have a few states that allow gay marriage, even if there is no Federal guarantee that same-sex couples will have the same rights as heterosexual ones. 


That vote alone makes Ron Paul seem like Sojourner Truth next to Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich or even Mitt Romney.  I can just see MLK spinning in his grave.

The Birthers and A Transgender President: Donald Trump Should Be So Proud!

Donald Trump is proud of himself.  He said so yesterday, after President Obama showed the world his birth certificate and Trump claimed that he forced the President to do so.

Of course, The Donald had to say something like that.  He is just smart enough to know how stupid he seemed in light of his claim that Obama was born in Africa.  Well, at least now we know that TD/DT is in the 25th percentile in intelligence:  One out of every four Americans still believes that the Obama wasn't born in the USA.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised.  After all, four centuries after Galileo and Copernicus, and five centuries after Columbus, we have a Flat Earth Society.  They might be jokers, but they're not kidding.

The whole (non-) controversy about Obama's birth certificate got me to thinking what might happen if we ever have a transgender President.  Let's say that person has been living "stealth":  His or her previous life is unknown even to his or her friends and closest work associates.  How long do you think it would be before someone with too much money and too much time on his or her hands finds out that Madame President had been a dude, or that Mister President had been a mistress?  

Would the President ignore the rumors, as Obama did about the birther's claims?  And, if he/she did, for how long?  Obama held out for two years?  Would our tranny president ignore the demand to know about his or her past?  

Would someone demand to see the original birth certificate of our great two-spirited leader?   Remember that in most states that issue new birth certificates (including Georgia, from which I got mine)  keep the original on file.  The original, of course, includes the gender to which the baby was assigned and the name he or she was given at birth.  So, even though my current birth certificate has the name by which you know me and an "F"  for sex, in Atlanta there is still a copy with the name I was given on the day I was born and an "M" where there always should have been an "F."  So, if I were to be elected President and someone who hasn't read this blog (How likely are both of those to be true?) heard about or suspected my past, would he or she demand that I show my original birth certificate?

Hmm...What if we were to re-fight the Civil War and I ran for President of the Union?  Would the fact that I was born in the Peachtree State make me ineligible?  

And would Donald Trump (or his future equivalent) be proud of him (or her) self for "forcing" me to show a birth certificate that indicates my birth as a boy named Nicholas in the state of Georgia?

I think he would.  I would let him be.  

The Elections: I Have No Expectations

Tomorrow's Election Day.


It seems that actual and would-be voters can be more or less divided into the following categories:

• the ones who aren't happy with the way things are but don't blame the incumbents
• the ones who aren't happy with the way things are and blame certain incumbents, e.g., Obama
• the ones who aren't happy with the way things are and blame the incumbents
• the ones who aren't happy, period.

Now, I can't blame anyone for not being happy about the state of the economy and international relations.  I feel the same way.  I also can't blame anyone who isn't happy with whoever's in power.  That's how I've felt almost continuously since I knew who was in power, or knew what it meant to be in power.

But, I'm also not disappointed.  How could I be, when I had such low expectations.  That's not hard to do when the Presidents under whose rule you lived during your adult life are Carter, Reagan, Bush pere, Clinton, Bush fil and Obama--and the other two Presidents of whom you have any clear memory are Nixon and Ford.  

Clinton was probably the last President--or elected official of any sort--for whom I had any real hope.  Of course, almost anybody looked good after Reagan and Bush I.  But at the time, it seemed that this country just might have a chance at a less invasive and interventionist foreign policy.  And civil liberties might just become part of the public discourse once again, I thought.  Then again, in those days I was still confusing civil rights with civil liberties.  In my own defense, I'll say that most people still confuse the two.

Some people say that Clinton wasn't as effective a President as he might've been because Republicans took over Congress midway through his first term.  If being effective means passing one's own agenda, I think the mid-term election was only so much of an excuse for Clinton's record.  Then again, I'm not sure that anyone knows what Clinton's agenda actually was.  After all, he did support "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" and the so-called Defense of Marriage Act before the Republican takeover.

But apres lui, la deluge.  After him, we got Bush the Younger.  If you're reading this, you know how that went.  

The only candidates for whom I had any flicker of enthusiasm in the 2008 election were Hillary, Obama and--as much of a contradiction as this may seem--Ron Paul.  Of them, the latter was the only one who seemed to understand that we were headed for economic trouble that couldn't be headed off or ameliorated by government policy.  And, while he wasn't the most LGBT-friendly candidate, at least he opposed marriage--for everyone.  At least, he didn't think that marriage should be defined by the government.  What that would amount to, in practice, is that every couple, straight or gay, could have a civil union.  And those who wanted their unions sanctioned by whatever God they believed in could find a clergyperson and institution who would wed them.  Finally, he has always endorsed a "humble" foreign policy in which the US wouldn't have military bases all over the globe.

Some of his supporters could be pretty scary, though.

Once he was no longer on the ballot, there were nothing but establishment candidates left.  Hillary is very smart, but I still felt she cared more about her own personal ambitions than about the causes she  claimed to espouse.  And, while I ultimately voted for Obama, the change that I really expected was that he would be in the White House and Bush The Second wouldn't be.

Nearly two years into his administration, about all we ever knew about him was that he was, or was supposed,   to represent "change."  And change he has:  namely, his positions on gay marriage as well as other issues.

The thing is, I don't know what any non-incumbent candidate can offer besides the fact that they're not the incumbents.  Yet that will get more than a few of the so-called "Tea Party" candidates elected to Congress and to a few governorships.  While I'm glad that Carl Palladino has about the same chance of winning as a mango tree has of surviving a Buffalo winter, I have no enthusiasm for Cuomo, much less the minor candidates.

Ramble On Waking Up Late

It's amazing how quickly the day goes by when you wake up late. I'm not so surprised about waking up late: Yesterday, the first day of the semester, was a Thursday, which will be my longest day of the week this semester, as it is in most semesters. It started with an 8 am class, and my last class didn't end until almost 6 pm. And, in between, it seemed that everyone was having a crisis. That's about normal for the first day of a semester at any college I've seen. Maybe things are different in the military colleges like West Point or in Swiss colleges. Then again, I never wanted to go to either one. Well, a Swiss school, maybe. And my father wanted me to go to one of the Armed Forces academies.

And how much sleep did I get the other night? About 2 1/2 hours. I probably shouldn't have bothered. I was preparing my syllabi and doing some other things to prepare, which took me a bit longer than I expected. Turning on Obama's speech didn't help. Even if he weren't the President, I probably wouldn't have slept through his speech, or any other he's given. Yes, he is probably the best speaker of any major public figure we've had since Martin Luther King, Jr. or Malcolm X. But Obama certainly doesn't have the vision--or, I think, the pure- and- simple grasp of reality--that either MLK or Malcolm had.

Even though I voted for Obama, he's really starting to seem scary to me. I can almost agree with those people who say that, at times, he seems like Hitler. It's in his body language: ramrod-still, except for his arm when he's jabbing his finger toward his audience.

The thing that really worries me about him, though, is this: No matter what issue is at hand, it's always about him. People like that aren't just frightening; they're dangerous. In fact, that trait alone makes him, given the current climate, far more dangerous than George W ever was. Bush the Younger was easily the worst President of my lifetime (Then again, Carter had only one term.), but I don't think he was the megalomaniac that Barry can be. Rather, I suspect that, if anything, he was a sort of King Lear figure who was led around by The Dark Side (personified by Dick Cheyney, who did the bidding of the military-industrial-financial plutocrats who really run things) and those who were simply mendacious or murderous. If anything, George II might have actually done better if he had been a bit more egotistical. Maybe those two could effect some sort of exchange.

All right...I shouldn't criticise Obama for everything being about him. After all, I've been writing in this blog, right. But then again, I never claimed that this blog is about anything but me. It's called "Transwoman Times," but I don't claim that the expereinces I describe and anything else on this blog are "typical" of transwomen, whatever that means.

I know, I'm rambling. I haven't had to be very focused today. I did a few errands. In the process, I probably frightened off a few kids and pets. Maybe a few adults, too. Actually, I probably appalled the adults, if they noticed me. I brushed my hair and put on some lipstick before I went out. When I got a glimpse of myself in the Starbuck's restroom, I saw the face of a middle-aged woman who'd just rolled out of bed, brushed her hair and put on lipstick. And I hope the transgender goddesses don't condemn me for the way I was dressed, much less for the weight I've gained. O great tranny goddess, you know that life doesn't always happen at our convenience. I had my surgery; for a few weeks after that, I had almost no appetite. But my appetite came back before I could ride my bike or engage in any other physical activity--and just in time for the holidays.

The War President And His Peace Prize

So we have a President who, in accepting a Nobel Peace Prize, talks about a "just war" that just happens to be the one to which he committed thousands of new troops.

I know I'm not the only one who sees the "disconnect." Even the producers of Faux, I mean Fox, News could see it, even if only because it gave them another way to pick at Obama. "War President Accepts Peace Prize." That's what emblazoned the screens of those who watched their so-called news program. I saw it in a diner in which I'd stopped on my way to work.

He said something to the effect that sometimes you have to make war in order to get peace. Well, there may be silver lining to his making a statement like that: At least I will never, ever have to explain 1984 again. My students can now see it happening before their eyes.

Let's see: You have to make war to make peace. You have to get fat to get skinny. You have to kill in order to give birth. You have to become poor to get rich. You have to ignore in order to learn. Hmm...This is an interesting line of logic, to say the least. Could repression be expression? Maybe Dr. Joyce Brothers (When was the last time you thought about her?) was right, in a way, after all! Maybe Obama should hire her as an advisor.

One more step of that kind of logic, and we come to this conclusion: You have to support repressive thugs in order to bring about democracy. You have to colonize in order to liberate. And, finally, you have to fail at invading a country like Afghanistan--as the Ottomans, British and Russians did--and have your empire fall as a result, in order to secure your place as one of the great powers in the history of nations.

All right. Obama may be ignorant of history. In that regard, he's not alone among Presidents. Nor does the fact that his speech was full of Newspeak make him terribly different from other rulers we've had. But there is one thing that sets him apart from even George W, who was easily the worst President of my lifetime: At least Bush the Younger had an exit strategy, however flawed, for the American invasion of Iraq. On the other hand, Obama is saying that we'll be out of Afghanistan within 18 months, but he's sending in more troops. Say what?

One other area in which he has out-Bushed Bush is in his declaration that people can be held indefinitely and without charge or trial, not only on the suspicion that they've committed crimes (Bush's decision), but just in case they may commit a crime.

The truth of the matter is that we can almost never predict whether or not someone will commit a crime. The most seemingly law-abiding citizen might find him or her self in dire circumstances; at that point, he or she may or may not "cross the line." And, there are plenty of people who would like to see the US destroyed but will not take any action to make it happen.

So, Obama is not only a "war president;" he is more of a foe of civil liberties than Bush the Younger, or any other President of my lifetime, could have dreamed of being.

And for that, he gets a Nobel Peace Prize? No wonder some people don't believe in God!

The Hate Crimes Law

I'm supposed to be happy that Obama signed the so-called "Hate Crimes Bill" into law today.

And I guess I'm supposed to vote for Obama when he runs for re-election.

Essentially, that's one of the reasons why he signed it: He figured that he'd get our votes that way. I wonder how many in the LGBT community will forget that he opposed gay marriage. Not that I think that winning that "right" will put gays on an equal footing with straight people: I think that marriage is none of any government's business. If people want to marry in their religious institutions, that's fine. But I don't think that a government--especially in a country that's supposed to have a separation between church and state--should have the power to decide who's married and who isn't. If they absolutely must be involved, they should just grant civil unions to everyone, and it shouldn't bring tax benefits with it.

All right, you're saying to yourself, she's not married and probably never will be. Point taken. Still, I think that in a secular country, a government should not be sanctifying marriage--or any other relationship between two or more people. That's, in essence, what it does with its policies on taxes and in many other areas.

For that matter, I don't think singlehood should have special privileges or status, either. No government ever forced me to get married, or to be single. Nor has this government forced anyone else into it. People who get married aren't veterans who were drafted into service. As much as I abhor war, I think that they're one of the few groups that should receive special benefits and tax breaks.

Anyway...Given that he opposed gay marriage at the same time Dick Cheney voiced his support of it, I think Obama is being more than a little hypocritical.

Plus, the Hate Crimes Bill is really a law that was added to a military-spending appropriation bill. Most people would see military spending and gay rights as almost polar opposites. But when you realize that the bill really isn't about gay rights, or any other sort of concern for LGBT people, you realize that it's just another way for the Federal government to expand its powers. And, of course, military spending is to government power as heroin is to an addict.

The fact that gay- and tranny-bashing are now, at least according to the letter of the law, Federal crimes will not stop them from happening. Nor will more zealous prosecution or "tougher" sentencing. Such things might stop someone who's thought about robbing banks, but it's not going to curb hate. In fact, if anything, I think that the so-called Hate Crimes Bill just might lead to more "hate crimes."

Think about it: Some person or group who hates gays (and probably lots of other people) can seem like a martyr to himself, or to his group, because he is dealt with more harshly than some other criminal because his victim happened to be LGBT. On a smaller scale, that's no different than the US going to war against Islamic countries that already view us as The Great Satan. Not only will they hate us even more; they will also feel all the more justified in seeing us as demons. And that will give young men with nothing to lose but their belief that 72 virgins are waiting for them in the afterlife all the more rationale for fighting a jihad against us.

Now, of course, I can't blame Obama for the fact that the law was attached to a military spending bill. Or maybe I could. After all, I don't think he's seen any kind of military spending that he didn't like. And look at how he's expanded this country's military involvement with Afghanistan. Does the man read history? Twenty years ago, the Russians, who were just over the border, sent in five times as many troops as we're ready to commit. And they couldn't mold Afghanistan to their will. What makes him think we can do it?

But back to what the law can't accomplish: It won't stop people from committing those crimes because it can't stamp out the hatred that leads to the crimes. And, really, how much can any law help a community--I'm talking about transgenders now--of whom 35 percent are unemployed and 59 percent make less than $15,300 in San Francisco. Let's face it: If you don't have a job, or some other legitimate source of income, you don't have power in this society. And that makes it that much harder to dispel the idea that we're freaks and, if we are working, it's in the sex industry.

Maybe I'm wrong and Obama meant well and this will actually help us. If things turn out that way, well...according to scientific principles, bumblebees shouldn't be able to fly. I don't think that any scientist who's ever opened a jar of honey minds being wrong about that. "If this be error and upon me be proved..."

For now, it hasn't been.

A Nobel Laureate and a Full Professor

Barack's daughters mentioned the Nobel Prize, the family dog's birthday and the upcoming long weekend in the same sentence. Not bad for kids who haven't even finished their first decade.

So why am I mentioning it? Because I'm going to talk about winning the Nobel Peace Prize and academic titles in the same breath, for essentially the same reasons Sasha and Malia made their breathless utterance.

Yesterday, I was talking--well, I had an exchange, to be more precise--with another prof in my department. She once held a couple of fairly prominent positions, but she essentially missed a couple of years due to an "illness" and is probably--or should be--very grateful she has tenure. Of that latter fact she let me know in no uncertain terms. I forget why, exactly, but she made it known.

Then somehow another professor's name came up in relation to a sort of academic blood feud that sometimes boils over at departmental meetings. She talked about some of the strange things this other professor--whom I tried to, but never could, like--did and got away with. "I guess she has tenure, too," I commented.

"She's a full professor," she reminded me in a bellowing intonation.

I probably should have known that. But, really, I don't pay attention to such things. I know who the President, provost and deans of the college are. I also know my department chair and the chairs of most other departments. And I know that a couple of profs have been teaching there since the day the college opened, and a couple of others for almost that long. But other than that, I really don't know who has the higher or lower stature among the faculty. And, truth be told, I don't much care. I talk to people for my own reasons, not because of their titles or status.

You might say that I'm not impressed by very many people. I am willing and learning to love; I am bound to care, but I have little or no reason to be in awe. And I have never done well in situations in which I was supposed to be impressed with someone because of his or her credentials or because someone else said I should be in the thrall of that person.

I'm not some kid feigning the insouciance of her elders. Kids (or adults) who do that are merely insolent. Rather, I have seen that giving someone respect simply for his or her title, or withholding said respect for lack of said credentials, is no different than judging someone for the color of his or her skin, or for any number of other external characteristics.

Actually, I feel I'm rather like Sasha and Malia who respect and admire their father for winning the Nobel Prize even if they don't quite know what it is. But. at the same time, they're only but so impressed, and are so to the degree that they are only because the announcement of his winning the prize came, from so many commentators, in tones that bordered on the reverential. So all those girls know is that their daddy did something that much of the world admires. They do, too, but to them, it's no more important than their dog or weekend.

The first time I saw those kids, I knew they were smart. They haven't disabused me of that notion.