Category Archives: Opinion

Jim’s observations and opinions on things

Everything Old is New Again: Resurgence of anti-LGBT

I’ve been having an ongoing chat with a gay man one generation younger than myself. That means he’s in his early 40s. I met him when he was in his early 20s. We’ve been bemoaning the insanity of our current times. I’m not sure if he meant Russia’s barbaric, unprovoked war against Ukraine, or Covid-19, or the resurgence of anti-LGBT legislation in several of the “united” states. But I took it as the latter.

This is an old script. It reminded me of the song “Everything Old is New Again,” written by Peter Allen (a gay performer/songwriter, once married to Liza, don’t you know). Not sure there’s much in this world that’s more gay than Peter Allen onstage with the Rockettes (sorry for the video quality):

Yet once again, a bully from Florida has given us a gift. Back when I was in my early 20s, that bully was Anita Bryant. Today, that bully is Ron DeSantis.

Anita’s gift to the LGBT cause in the late 1970s was called “Save Our Children.” Ron’s gift to LGBT today is nicknamed “Don’t Say Gay.”

Common to the resurgence of anti-LGBT legislation is this fetish to bully gay/trans kids and spread lies about gay people. Anita, bless her heart, wanted to roll back LGBT civil rights protections. She succeeded for awhile. Ron wants to “shore up parental rights” by eliminating references to gender and sexuality in certain grades (actually, this law makes it a crime to talk about any gender or sexuality, not just LGBT ones – expect those lawsuits to start flying soon).

Why This Is A Gift

This is a gift (and a warning) because there’s always a drift away from vigilance to complacency. I see it; I’m guilty of it too. The desire to rest on laurels is strong. After all, we’ve worked hard. We’ve been working on this for what seems like forever.

Finally, those wars for marriage equality, adoption equality, military equality, many (if not all, everywhere) civil rights have been won and enshrined in law.

Until they aren’t anymore.

It’s important to realize that, however we might dread it and want it not to be, the truth is they’re coming for us yet again.

Our enemies. The ones who hate us and lie about us. The institutional, the beyond-cynical Trumpian right wing.

They’re coming for our marriages. They’re coming for our kids. They’re coming for our rights in the dishonest guise of protecting “religious freedom.”

Disbelieve me at your peril.

Cleve Called It

Back in 2002, I made a short documentary called “Our Brothers, Our Sons.” It’s somewhat dated now, but it was comparing/contrasting safer sex messages around AIDS/HIV between Baby Boomer gay men and Gen X gay men.

One thing I’ll never forget from that film, however, is the quote from veteran gay activist Cleve Jones, who said of the younger generation then, referring to rights, that “they don’t realize it all could be taken away, just like that.”

(you can see that quote in the “Our Brother, Our Sons” trailer here on the Amazon page.)

Cleve was right. Gird up, folks. It’s not over, there’s likely dark days ahead of us and we’ll keep on fighting. We always do. We always live the Act Up slogan, Silence = Death.

We won’t be silent. We’ve been here before and we won. We will prevail again this time, I have no doubt.

One of the main reasons for that is the younger generation — of all stripes, is on our side. They’re on our side! Things really can change.

So thanks, bullies. For the warning. And one more thing: We’re not “united” with you, motherfuckers. Looking forward to seeing this resurgence of anti-LGBT legislation dying. Everything old may be new again, but that doesn’t mean that everything old is correct — or indeed ever was.

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Two Things I Don’t Care About: The Super Bowl and Valentine’s Day

I guess that the Super Bowl and Valentine’s Day happen almost adjacent to each other every year. I guess that was more apparent to me this year, 2022, since they are actually just a day apart.

I realized that these are two things I don’t care much about, have never cared about or celebrated in any meaningful way.

My father always told me that I was a contrarian and I suppose that’s largely true. Yet I’ve long since stopped wondering why it is I don’t seem to like these things that everybody else does. Or try to suss out the pathology inherent there.

What is wrong with you, blogger?

As it turns out, nothing! I’m just a sensible person with non-mainstream tastes, which is something to celebrate and admire.

Why I’m Not a Super Bowl Fan

It’s really that I’m just not a football fan, but the Super Bowl is the appropriate focus since it’s like the Yearly High Mass for this particular endeavor.

In December, I was visiting relatives in Wisconsin and stayed with my brother and sister-in-law. During that time, there was a Green Bay Packers (the Wisconsin State Religion) game on television, and I watched it with my brother. I enjoyed this because it was quality time with my brother, not because of the game, which even after all these years, I cannot figure out how they score. Or the rules.

The blogger (left) and his brother Dick
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Also, the quarterback Aaron Rodgers is quite easy on the eyes. It’s true and I enjoyed that part quite a bit.

Aaron Rodgers of the Green Bay Packers

But overall football is too violent and headache-inducing (for me, as the viewer). I can’t decouple it from stale cigar smoke which was my father’s habit when I was a kid, so to me football = unexpected, loud yelling and foul smelling air and the subtle creeping angst of having to go to school the next morning (likely in the cold and dark).

It’s complicated.

Why I’m Not a Valentine’s Day Fan

First of all, the colors — red, hot pink– not my faves at all, though I do have a red car and love that because it’s so easy to find in a parking lot. But I digress.

I think we’re all good at certain things. I have talents like rollerblading/ice skating (backwards, even), piano playing (sometimes, highly subjective), book writing (again, subjective) and my recipe for deviled eggs is not to be fooled with.

But romantic love has never been something I’ve excelled in. For everyone who seems never to be without a partner or a crush, this may seem unfortunate, even sad. Truthfully though, it’s just a way of being.

Valentine’s Day (to me) seems to be a way to force all of us to think “wouldn’t it be better to be part of a couple?”

Especially as I get older and care less about what people think (a gift) the more comfortable I am with myself and being single. If that changes, great. If it doesn’t ever change, that’s great, too.

It’s now really hard for me to imagine my life intertwined with another man’s. But it could happen.

Truth is, I’m more likely to get a dog. That will probably happen sooner than I fall in love with the Super Bowl and Valentine’s Day.

But not to rain on anyone’s parade. If you love these things, then you do you.

This is Betty, dead almost 30 years. Time for another furry friend?

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Pros and Cons on Watching the Beijing Olympics

I usually love watching winter sports, especially the figure skating, but also the ski races. This year, as has often been the case in the past, there’s controversy surrounding the Olympics.

Here’s some pros and cons on watching the Beijing Olympics.

Pros

  • It will entertain you and you will enjoy. Yes, this is important to your mental health, especially after all the turmoil and angst of the last couple of years (pandemics, politics, you name it!)
  • Support the athletes. Most of these young people have been working all their lives to get to this elite level to compete on the world stage. They deserve an audience, and for winter sports, that audience and window are brief.
Pretty, yes? Is not China, it’s Wisconsin, but it’s a winter photo from a couple of years ago. (there’s no snow where I live)

  • Support the tradition. At its heart, the Olympic ideal is a good one – to bring the youth of the world together in the name of sport. This, ideally, extends to their future lives where they will use this experience to work in the spirit of cooperation and diplomacy.
  • The commercials might be the best part. Rich corporations spare no expense to debut Olympics-specific ads during the games. This goes back to my first point on being entertained, but on a different level.
  • You need a break from Netflix, Hulu, HBO, Amazon and all the rest. Honestly. On a recent visit to my ophthalmologist, when he asked me what I’d been doing during the big P, I said watching a lot of Netflix. He asked, “did you finish?” I said I was close.

Where there are pros, there are also:

Cons

  • China is an authoritarian regime that currently operates concentration camps for its Uigher (or Uygher) Muslim minority. It’s criminal, it’s disgusting, it’s crimes against humanity. By watching the Beijing Olympics, you give tacit approval to the host country and its actions.
  • Don’t reward NBC. Like most giant media corporations, its news division will report on how awful China’s brutal regime is to the Uighers and Hong Kong, but still will rake in the bucks from the sports side, the Olympics. They went for the money instead of for what’s right and decent.
Not Los Angeles or China, the blogger in Shorewood, WI, in winter.
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  • Don’t reward China for its attempt at legitimization. By hosting these Olympics, the dictator Xi Jinping who runs China hopes to get world recognition for his authoritarian corruption. We’ve seen this movie before – Hitler in 1936, Moscow in 1980. At least in 1980, the United States found its balls and did not reward the USSR by sending a team there.
  • Finally, it’s a time suck and you know it. You have other things to do (like watch the Super Bowl, maybe? Needlepoint? Surely there’s something). It’s always a paradox: watching extremely fit young people competing for medals while you sink ever deeper into the recliner, your poor aging body atrophying by the minute. . .

Those are some thoughts on the pros and cons of watching the Beijing Olympics.

My choice? Perhaps it will be a hybrid, where I watch a few highlights after the fact on youtube or something like that. So I guess I will reward Google (owner of youtube) instead of NBC. Or maybe not. Maybe I’ll just find my balls and work on my own winter fitness.

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Old Enough to Know Everything

Fairly recently — I’d say maybe within the last couple of years, maybe more — I’ve realized that the world’s patience with me being uncertain — about basically anything — has ended. Because I’m old enough to know everything.

Subtle ageism, perhaps?

Blogger on the left at a callow 16/17. On right, at an uncertain 66.

I’ve always been a fan of the retort, usually attributed to Oscar Wilde, as said to any know-it-all: “I’m not young enough to know everything.”

Because there’s a truth to that. When you’re a young or young-at-heart person, you are sure of things. Even though you could be and often are totally wrong.

Which is something you learn as you mature. As you get older, because with age comes experience, at least lived experience. Even if you’re a total idiot in other regards. Which teaches you a few things:

There are Patterns

Actions come with consequences or results, which are often predictable. There’s less magical thinking and daydreaming, as you internalize the truth of, for instance, not doing the same thing over and over to expect new and different results (the 12-step definition of insanity, by the way).

So if you get a parking ticket and ignore it, it won’t magically go away. It will get more expensive and thus more painful for you. This pattern is endlessly repeated throughout life.

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The Only Constant is Change

I know it’s a cliche, but it’s really true that the only thing you can really count on is that things keep changing. This is one thing definitely reinforced by living longer because you simply get more evidence this is true.

Just when you think things are all set, something will happen to spin the story in an entirely different direction. To paraphrase another 12-step favorite, “if you want the universe to laugh at you, tell it your plans.”

True Catastrophes are Rare

I’m a fairly anxious individual and my go-to reaction for almost any obstacle is that it’s going to be a catastrophe. Possibly the worst thing that ever happened, and I certainly won’t be surviving it.

I felt this way when I got cancer. I’m still here. I felt that way when George Bush won a second term in 2004. Somehow we all survived that. Trump was/is a catastrophe but he hasn’t succeeded in destroying the country – not yet anyway. Climate change may beat him to it – but I’m optimistic. Because there’s really no other choice that makes sense to me.

Personally, I’ve been fired from jobs, had creditors actually come knocking on my door, had messy breakups with screaming men. Somehow I’m still an outwardly calm 66-year-old.

Perhaps that’s why people, younger mainly simply because there are more of them — can’t seem to tolerate any ambiguity from me. If I don’t possess the answers, then who does?

So, you know, ask me anything — since I apparently know everything.

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How I Stopped Longing for Silver Lake and Learned to Love the Valley

I never planned to live in the San Fernando Valley.

And yet, I recently passed my 10th anniversary of living in a nicely rent-controlled 1963 apartment in Valley Village. How did I learn to love the valley? (Or, if not love, at least accept. . .)

Author Jim Arnold in a fedora in his home office in Southern California.

How did this happen? In 2011, I sold a condominium in Palm Springs, bored with the desert and longing for a return to urban adventures. With the real estate closing imminent and a deal for a classic Koreatown apartment falling apart, I needed a place to land. Quickly.

How it Came to Be

I had a friend who lived in Valley Village (VV), and he responded to my SOS on Facebook. A couple of days later, I looked at the empty apartment in his building and figured it would be fine as a temporary home and signed the lease.

Despite not knowing much of anything about the neighborhood, there were some major advantages: the rent, first of all, was $300 less than the place in Koreatown, and that’s even before factoring in the extra I’d have to pay for parking. So, in effect, $400 cheaper since parking was included in VV.

Amenities: an all electric 1960s joint, but at least there was a dishwasher, disposal, AC. A pool, even if it was right outside my sliders (note to any reader: NEVER rent right next to the pool, if you value quiet).

Part of my balcony garden in Valley Village

At the time I was enthralled with LA’s burgeoning public transit system and this VV apartment was right around the corner from a main artery stop (the Orange Line Rapid Bus, now also called the G Line).

There were other advantages either in walking distance or a short bike ride or drive: a Gold’s Gym, a Public Library, two Parks, two major groceries and a few smaller markets, Rite Aid, Starbucks, a yoga studio (since closed, now another gym), many restaurants, even gay bars and a OMG! — a gay bathhouse.

In a nutshell, probably the most convenient neighborhood I’ve ever lived in.

And yet, I was not happy there.

The Valley is Like Another City Entirely

The line of hills (ancient crumbling mountains, really) that separate the LA Basin from the San Fernando Valley are more than just a physical barrier. They are also a psychological one.

For instance, say I’m 8 miles away from my nearest friend (which is actually true) on the other side of the hill in Hollywood. Now let’s imagine I lived in Los Feliz, and my nearest friend is also 8 miles away but in Carthay Square (near La Cienega/Olympic). I’d call that “across town,” but the former is “over the hill.”

The geographic barrier makes it seem qualitatively different even though the actual distance is about the same.

Part of Fryman Canyon, in the hills separating the Valley from LA Basin.

For Angelenos, it’s a much heavier lift to “go over the hill to the valley (and vice versa)” than it is to “drive across town.”

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So back to my premise of it being a separate city entirely, even though that is likely more a perception than reality.

Mourning Being Priced Out of Silver Lake as Hyperion ex-Royalty

During this period of discontent, I’d look at listings in the general Silver Lake-Los Feliz area (my favorite part of LA and where I lived previously for many years) and to my chagrin rent prices just kept rising. Eventually prices in those neighborhoods went so high that I, like so many others, was priced out of where I lived rather simply as a callow twentysomething.

How could this be? I was proud that I’d lived in what was a legendary gay neighborhood and felt very much part of it for so long. And then I moved away, and tried to move back, and it wasn’t happening. As another friend said, “I couldn’t get LA back.”

He meant, of course, the LA he knew. Places change, people change. Another friend asked, “Why do you want to move to Silver Lake? It’s not like the place you remember from the 80s or 90s.” He was right, too. It is different. Different people, different buildings, an entirely different vibe. So gentrified. So “straight.” (Not that there’s anything wrong with “straight” — if you’re straight.)

Silver Lake hills. You can see the Griffith Park Observatory on the hill near the top center of the photo.

It was a highly bohemian area but now the bohemians can’t really afford it. So what’s left, then? A veneer of past coolness?

Perhaps that’s all an illusion and folks that lived in Silver Lake in the 1950s or 60s lamented what it had become by the time I arrived in the 80s. We always remember the places where we were the happiest. And I realized that was what I was chasing.

Bloom Where You Are Planted

For the longest time my mother had this cheesy little plaque above the doorway in their kitchen that had some cute flowers and the legend “Bloom Where You Are Planted.”

I had internalized that as a kid and always thought it was good advice. And I was trying, trying my hardest, to like the Valley, to feel at home, to try and make friends that were closer than 8 miles.

Which happened — over the course of 10 years, many other people I knew got “priced out” of where they had been living in the LA Basin and also moved to Valley areas. And yet it still seemed “off” to me.

I realized that I had my identity all wrapped up in what my personal definition of Los Angeles was – which was where I was originally “plunked,” right there in Echo Park-Silver Lake, my first impression, if you will, which quickly became my lasting definition.

Which is, of course, subjective and not based on anything other than my own youthful experience.

Looking at My Environment with Different Eyes

So I realized I had better learn acceptance around my circumstances. What I had was valuable and was something people would kill for – an under-market and rent controlled apartment in a great and hugely convenient neighborhood.

I saw the advantages of all that convenience and other things I came to appreciate: less traffic, wider streets, flat bike lanes, the diversity I loved about LA, quirky locations, unique businesses.

Living with a multitude of schools that made mid-afternoon traffic more of a nightmare than was usual even for LA. Getting used to all the kids around. They’re the future, right? Better get used to it.

Now it’s an easy truce. I’ve lived here longer than any place in my entire life. It’s my neighborhood, now. And I’m grateful. Maybe I am learning to love the valley – most days, anyway.

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Some Thoughts on Social Media

For those who don’t remember, the social media 10-year Challenge was simply posting photos of yourself currently and from 10 years ago. It was a popular Facebook and Instagram thing in 2018, and there’s a reason for that: that’s about the time that Facebook got critically popular (even if launched earlier). Instagram itself launched in 2010 before being bought by Facebook a couple of years later. I guess ten years is a good interval to put out some thoughts on social media.

What I learned was that ten years of it was probably enough! Ten years of photos, rants, videos, sharing memes, sharing political opinions. I mean, did any of us think this was something we’d have to pursue forever?

11/28/11, Jim Arnold with Movember mustache
Jim Arnold in 2021 at the Pacific Ocean in NorCal

I had to ask myself: What has it gotten me? How has my life become better because of this? Because of all the precious time I’ve spent on social media?

Social Media Good for Author Presence?

To be honest, I mainly see a presence on social media as an avenue for publicity, ultimately resulting in curiosity about me sufficient to result in book sales. I don’t have much concrete evidence of that, although the concept is sound.

Perhaps that sounds selfish – but then again, I am under no illusions that I’m not the product on a service like Facebook or Twitter, where my data is being sold to advertisers. So for me to have loftier ambitions is really kind of silly when then entire enterprise is exploitive, right?

Yet I’ve never gotten over what I see as the lack of Integrity on social media and the ease of being an asshole, and of calling people names. I’m guilty of this myself. It’s so easy, when you’re behind a screen, to be a boor. (Especially on Twitter, I find.)

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Should I Ditch Twitter?

How hard would it be to give up Twitter? I call people names there, usually Republicans, led by Donald Trump or his surrogates. Maybe they deserve to be called names, but I tell you, even at age 66, soon to be 67, I still hear my mother’s voice telling me “don’t call people names.” That was good advice then and it’s good advice now. We were raised to be kind and decent.

Otherwise, I don’t scroll Twitter looking for information or to follow anyone in particular. There’s just too much there and I’ve always found that just daunting and basically uninteresting. I’d rather read a professionally edited newspaper I trust. That’s enough.

What About “Meta?”

Instagram would be harder because while I get almost zero comments or likes or anything on Twitter, I get more dopamine hits from Instagram. Although, still, it’s not a lot compared to true social media butterflies. I find my presence there low stress, and there’s not much animosity. So for now, I’m keeping it.

I recently rejoined Facebook for the author publicity reasons – I read a book on promotions that insisted a Facebook Page was a very good thing for authors, so I have one now. It’s only been a few months, but I find that Facebook itself is kind of boring these days and prefer looking at the photos on Instagram.

Still I really wonder about the opportunity cost of social media and is it really a worthwhile trade-off: there’s so many other things I could be doing, including fitness activities, piano playing, more writing, even. Work, certainly. Pursuing sex and lovers. Interacting with pets and animals. Cooking delicious food. Seeking more love in the world?

Those are some of my thoughts on social media, but the conversation’s not over. Stay tuned.

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A Few Lies About Retirement

A few lies about retirement, or, just a few things I know so far from personal experience and common sense.

You can’t retire with a mortgage

Well, here’s the thing. Of course you can retire with a mortgage! I’m not sure I know anyone who is retired who has also paid off the mortgage, although I do know a couple of high-earning folks who probably have. But honestly, they’re a tiny minority in my life.

My late father, my siblings who are retired, and closest friends who are retired all have or had mortgages when they stopped working.

Blogger in front of Liberace's house in Palm Springs
I wonder, did Liberace pay off his mortgage?
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I think this “rule” is a relic of that post-war past when middle class Americans could afford to buy a house with a middle income and live as a family on just that one income for 40 years, then retire for a few healthy years with a defined pension and their social security. And no mortgage, cause they paid it off in 30 years and they never moved!

Those days are ancient history for the vast majority. I know some contemporaries whose parents would have hit this sweet spot. But they’ve largely left the planet by now.

You can’t be a renter and retire: homeowner or else!

This myth is also something I often see in financial articles about retirement. Again, I think this is a bias that the financial press has about homeownership being the correct aspirational goal for everyone.

This is a hard one since we, as Americans, are conditioned to believe this myth from childhood. I used to have this argument with my father all the time. He was very invested in the idea of being a homeowner – well, he was a man with a wife and eight children, of course he’d want a stable home with something like a yard for his kids to play in. Also, I think he liked the security of knowing what the payment would always be.

The blogger perusing a box of Heartland granola in Dad’s kitchen.

I have a very different frame of reference. I’ve always been single, I don’t have children or other dependents, and both times I owned homes (condominiums, in my case) I soon felt antsy and trapped and really didn’t want the responsibility to take care of the many things that you get to be in charge of as an owner.

To get back to my main point – it may be desirable for the financial industry if everyone is a homeowner – more money for mortgage brokers, banks and real estate folks – but you can be a renter and retire just fine. I’m doing it, as are countless folks in apartments and senior housing around the country.

And one last point on that – a pet peeve of mine – are those who say you’re just throwing your money away on rent. How ridiculous! You are buying a roof over your head with that money – my current roof costs about $16 a day. If anything, the Great Recession schooled us on how foolish it would be to assume that real estate was always an investment that would appreciate endlessly. In most areas of the country, you’d be better off investing in an index fund.

And finally – for now, anyway, this lie about retirement:

You need a certain amount of money to retire

Is it $1.7 million? Seriously? If that’s true, most people will never be able to retire.

This is the headline for the above linked article on CNBC.com: Most Americans say you need $1.7 million to retire—here’s how much money to save each month to get there

So it might be nice – real nice – to have that cool $1.7 million when you finally stop working, but the truth is one day you’ll find yourself older and not working and realize you’ve “retired,” whether you’ve got the $1.7 mil or not.

Blogger on an Amtrak train, looking out over a peaceful landscape and feeling content.
The serene face of a new retiree who does not have $1.7 million in the bank. Happy anyway.

Usually the pundits base these numbers on income level just prior to retirement: they’ll say you should have 10x your most recent salary in retirement savings.

I think this – perhaps it’s a good, general, rule of thumb – but at its heart is the wrong metric. What you should focus on is spending level, not income level.

By focusing on income level, the financial gurus perpetuate as a truism that all people spend all of their income. But, let’s say, you make 150K per year and only spend 75K. Wouldn’t it make more sense to pin the retirement numbers on what you actually spent? I think so.

It makes way more sense. But then, of course, it’s a lower number for most people, then you wouldn’t need all these financial advisors and their investment products. Heavens! What then – the gurus who write these things for financial sites like the ones I’ve linked will be making less money.

As with so many things, it’s helpful to follow the money to figure out who’s really benefiting from this kind of advice.

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Here’s the List of Republicans Who Voted to Overturn Our Election

I’m not sure what to call these people. They voted to overturn the free and fair elections of November 3, 2020, in many cases even the elections where they themselves won, because they didn’t like the outcome at the top of the ticket.

Image of the American Flag to illustrate Jim Arnold's blog entry on the Republicans Who Voted to Overturn Our Election.
We will prevail over the Republican Insurrectionists.

Elections certified by all 50 states and the District of Columbia, and verified by the Electoral College. But again – they didn’t like the outcome.

Traitors is probably the wrong word, only because it has such a specific and narrow definition. Insurrectionists is closer, but that’s cumbersome. Complicit coup plotters? Haters of democracy? I’ll let you be the judge of what word to use to describe these people.

None of these people belongs in representative government. ever again. My fervent hope is that they are all voted out when next they come up for renewal. In the meantime, feel free to shame – and share widely.

Senate Republicans Who Hate Democracy:

Tommy Tuberbille, AL

Rick Scott, FL

Roger Marshall, KS

John Kennedy, LA

Cindy Hyde-Smith, MS

Josh Hawley, MO

Ted Cruz, TX

Cynthia Lummis, WY

Republican House Reps Who Hate Democracy:

Robert Aderholt, AL

Mo Brooks, AL

Jerry Carl, AL

Barry Moore, AL

Gary Palmer, AL

Mike Rogers, AL

Andy Biggs, AZ

Paul Gosar, AZ

Debbie Lesko, AZ

David Schweikert, AZ

Rick Crawford, AR

Ken Calvert, CA

Mike Garcia, CA

Darrell Issa, CA

Doug LaMalfa, CA

Kevin McCarthy, CA

Devin Nunes, CA

Jay Obernolte, CA

Lauren Boebert, CO

Doug Lamborn, CO

Kat Cammack, FL

Mario Diaz-Balart, FL

Byron Donalds, FL

Neal Dunn, FL

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Carlos Gimenez, FL

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Rick Allen, GA

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I Voted! And I want you to vote, too, on November 6, 2018

Yes sir, I sure did vote. Filled out the long ballot and dropped it off at the Post Office.

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This is the one day this year I can let my voice be known through the voting process. However you lean, it’s your voice, it’s your chance, don’t squander what others have fought and died for.

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Families Belong Together Rally, June 30 2018, Los Angeles

We’ve been at this for awhile. They said to wear white, so I dug out the 1993 March on Washington for LGBT rights t-shirt, which still is white and still fits, nicely, right? That and my red #ITMFA hat, which is a given for a rally like this.

Estimates of LA crowd around 70K. A lot of people, beautiful day, speakers included Mayor Garcetti, Senator Kamala Harris, Congresswoman Maxine Waters, future governator Gavin Newsom, entertainers/actors Laura Dern, John Legend, and a few others whose names escape me.

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