DADT, Gay Marriage: Who cares?

Last week wasn't very good as far as blog posts went. And I'm sorry for that. This week, I've got three posts already written.  This one is considered "timely," as my Examiner.com editors like to say.



A while ago, I wrote an article about gay marriage in New York.  It was entitled: Gay Marriage, so what?  I suspect you can guess what my general conclusions were.



I collect all sorts of weird articles, and magazines.  On the one hand, I could read Guns and Ammo, then the Spring catalog for a major publisher, then Time Magazine (until they went anti-Semite), the list goes on.



One such magazine is Salute, the magazine of the archdiocese for the military services, USA.



Yes, the military has their own archdiocese -- their Cardinal is the Cardinal of New York City.



In their Summer, 2011 issue, there was a statement from Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio, the Archbishop for USA military services. (An Archbishop is more hands on.)



His statement was two pages long, and here's an excerpt ...

"The church is unwavering in her commitment to the pastoral care of all persons in need, regardless of sexual inclination or anything else.  All people in need are served by Catholc Chaplains with zeal and passion for bringing the reality of the Risen Lord to all.  Whether Don't ask don't tell persists or not is immaterial to that bedrock principle.  The faithful .... must never forget that those with a homosexual inclination must be treated with the respect worthy of their human dignity."  [Typed by hand, any typos are mine]

In short: that's nice, we don't care if they're outed, it doesn't matter to us.



The message then cited Federal law (1 USC subection 7)... which I believe is commonly known as the defense of marriage act (DOMA).



So, "yes, you have DADT repealed. Who cares? We don't like it, but we're not going to marry gays, and you're not going to make us. We can continue, business as usual."  Everyone can move on.



Which is pretty much what I said the first time about gay marriage.



It's so nice when the Catholic Church listens to me.

[More below the break]



Then, on September 30th, the Pentagon issued an order allowing all military clergy to perform gay marriage ceremonies ....



The response of Broglio?  It's pretty much the same. Not to mention, there is still DOMA.  It's a federal law.  How can a federal agency allow the existence of something that, legally, does not exist at the federal level?



And, come April, 2012, what will happen when all of the gay married couples file joint income tax? The IRS cannot acknowledge them -- the IRS is a federal agency.  Accountant friends (and relative) are already saying that the IRS will not accept joint filings from any of the new marriages from New York (et al) between two men, or two women.



Not to mention .... the military has bases all over the 50 states. Gay marriage is only passed in about ... Five? (CA, VT, MA, NY, HI).  Isn't that a bit of a problem? And arguing that they are federal institutions is a problem, when you consider that, again, DOMA is federal law. State laws do not matter in this instance.



Is it just me, or did someone not think this through?



As I said the first time: I'll start to care about gay marriage when someone comes after religion in its name.



I don't care just yet. Initial reports of this story said that "military chaplains are being forced to marry homosexual couples."  I cared for about five minutes, then I looked for more footnotes.



However, now that I found that it "allowed" gay marriage, instead of "requiring" clergy to perform them, I'm back to not caring. Though the legal situation is going to be hilarious.

Month in Review: October, 2011

October is the month where everything went very, very strange.  And, that was apparently a good thing.

I started out with something that pissed me off: DC Comics turning Starfire and Catwoman, two of their stronger female protagonists, into sluts, to put it charitably.  They were so totally reduced to sex objects, I wanted to throw rocks.

So I threw angry language at them instead.

Ironically, in one month, it has become the most read post on this entire blog, beating out Disasters to Marvel at, which is a year old.

Also, I decided to get back to creative writing, creating more surveys that my characters have filled out.  You know, the older online essays that used to be sort of fun.  I had one for the German spy Manana Shushurin, and another for the Secret Service agent and nerd, Wilhelmina Goldberg, as well as the lethal weapon, Irish Interpol Agent Maureen McGrail.

I didn't have all that many music blogs this month.  I threw up some John Williams marches, and Tom Smith taking his revenge on technology and Rob Granito

A false report on gay marriage in the military made me start an irate blog .... then I wanted a better footnote, discovered that the story I based my indignation on was bogus, and I was stuck with a blog I had to rewrite, very, very fast.

I put in another blog on writing. This time it was a matter of "how to exposition like crazy" -- when you have to dump a graduate paper's worth of information into one novel.

Also, I had a little conversation on how to write for disaster.  It's mostly how to write characters who are supposed to be terrified, when you yourself have never been quite that scared -- and, making certain that your character's fear is appropriate both to the situation, and the person.

And, there was my self-defense review for the month -- with my  my self defense columns for October. It had to do a lot with Occupy Wall Street, self defense for women, and self defense against the zombie apocalypse .... I'm serious about the zombie apocalypse part.

Catholic conspiracies 3.  This was almost a replacement for It was inspired after I saw a lot of idiots try to pin Occupy Wall Street on "crypto-Jewish Jesuit fascists founded by the Illuminati."

I want my Vatican ninjas.

Catholic Conspiracies 3: Jesuits, OWS, and the Vandals Are Here.

Vatican

Ninja

Remod

(Draft)

Once upon a time, very long ago, I discussed how the Catholic Church seems to be the favorite of multi-generational bands of abject nutcases.  I then expanded the topic, discussing how many fruit loops were involved, and that was titled The Revenge of the Vatican Ninjas.

In this case, we're going to add a bit of local politics.  And by local, I mean New York.

Has anyone heard of Occupy Wall Street?

If you haven't, that's okay, they're rather annoying -- essentially a fun bunch of anarchists hanging out in Zuccotti park who were told that 1968 was a really fun time, that bathing is bad for you, and it's quite okay to defecate wherever you deem fit.  It's not so much a political movement as an unruly mob. They're mad as hell, they're not going to take it anymore, and they are rebels without a clue -- when someone says they hate Wall Street, and the bailouts of Wall Street, yet they don't protest anyone who was bailed out, this spells stupid to me.

They've attacked police officers, and they want the redistribution of wealth, but they whine when their stuff is stolen.  At the end of the day, while they may appear threatening, they are mostly harmless.  And if you read any of the links, you'll notice that I spend most of my time making fun of them.  Just don't tell my editors, they may think I'm having too much fun.

So, what does this have to do with Catholic conspiracies?

Well, recently, I did a search on twitter for "Jesuits."

Big, big mistake. 

Apparently, now, the Jesuits are a crypto-Jews / Nazi / Zionist organization, bent on establishing the New World Order via Occupy Wall Street .... And, of course, founded by the Illuminati. 

As my friend Jason says,

"It's the internet. I'm not surprised about anything I find on it anymore. I think it was created by Cthullu, not Al Gore. It's a bottomless pit that WILL stare back at you if you look at it too hard. In the dark. On a cold winter night. With eerie music playing in the background (Cthullu has a MP3 player)."

I have to ask, now -- what are you people smoking?  Or is it that the internet goes to the loudest spammers, who happen to be nutjobs with unlimited time on their hands.

Either way, it's always good to see that nothing ever changes.

The amusing part of the Occupy Wall Street movement as "crypto-Jewish Jesuit conspiracy" is twofold, really.  One, they've got an emerging anti-Semitic group in there, with makes the whole "evil Jewish Conspiracy" part kinda stupid .... er.  

On the other hand, their fellow occupiers have issues with breaking other people's toys.

How so?

I'll give you one guess.

Their international branch at "Occupy Rome," in addition to firebombing cars, has taken upon itself to smash up religious icons.

All I can think is: if this happened to a synagogue, would the Mossad have already killed everyone in this photo by now?

But, no, it's just the Catholics.  So, who cares?

Ann Margaret Lewis, posted this to her facebook page and asked "Why?"

And isn't it obvious?  Because Catholics are "evil, baby-raping priests," and most of these people are too busy worshiping their iPads . And they like to talk about how they should "eat the Rich"-- and the Catholics are wonderfully rich and powerful, aren't they? They have so many shiny things, after all.... And, somehow, the sarcasm isn't burning a hole in my keyboard.

And, sure enough, someone said just that, responding with two recent stories.**   And by recent, I mean they happened the week before.  The words are "innocent until proven guilty ... unless he's Catholic," aren't they? But, it's nice to see anyone can justify a hate crime is the target is "right."

But, thus far, Occupy Wall Street has endorsements from the Nazi party of America, the Communist party, and David Duke.

Between this and the above "evil Jesuit plot," it seems that a faceless, aimless rabble makes for a great Rorschach test for ideologists of any stripe.  "Oh look, there's a group of angry protesters, they must hate who I hate," or "they embody everything I despise."

Vatican Ninja Chibi.

"Grr. Arrgh"

While it is quite entertaining to watch a group of people go slowly insane, it's time these guys ought to come up with a coherent message. Hell, the Tea Party's wants could be summed up as "We hate big government, we want fewer taxes, less spending and no Obamacare."

With the OWS, we have the Nazis, the Klan, the Communists, "we hate Jews / big business / brand names / we're wearing brand names/ we hate bailouts but won't protest those who got bailouts ...."  

Oh, yeah, and they're an evil Jesuit conspiracy.....

Can I have my Vatican Ninjas now?

**The footnotes are below the break.

Short Story by Memo. The first Pius promo

One of the things I've been doing during my time away was working on a novel called A Pius Man.  It fell under more Catholic than Conservative.  Though it gets more political as time goes on.

Here was a promo in the form of a memo from the head of Vatican Intelligence to the head of Papal Security, with attached resume.

********************************************

Memo
From: Msgr. Xavier O'Brien, SJ [XO@vatican.va]
To: Commander Giovanni Figlia, Vatican Office of Vigilance [Vigiles@vatican.va]
RE: Training.

Giovanni,

You will remember our conversation of the 21st relating to the Pope's idea of training the locals for self-defense. Attached, you will find the resume of a security specialist who has been recommended to us for this purpose. He is an American, and a former stuntman—what better way to guarantee nonlethal combat than from someone who had to restrain himself in his job?

-XO

*******************************************
From:Giovanni Figlia. [Vigiles@vatican.va]
To: Msgr. Xavier O'Brien, SJ [XO@vatican.va]
RE: Training.

Msgr. O'Brien,

I do not know what to make of your proposal. As I understand it, His Holiness wants the priests and the nuns to be trained in nonlethal combat. I understand, given his days spent in Uganda and the Sudan, he is concerned about someone coming after him. I understand, also, that he remembers that Ali Agca was first apprehended by a nun when he shot Pope John Paul II before the Guard could get a hold of him, and he would like the next nun to try such a thing to be trained for it. I understand this.

But did you READ this resume before sending it to me? He lists his resume by property damage!! And what are those numbers next to each job in his work experience?

-Gianni

**********************************************
From: Msgr. Xavier O'Brien, SJ [XO@vatican.va]
To: Giovanni Figlia. [Vigiles@vatican.va]
RE: Training.

Giovanni,

As I said before, this man had been recommended to Josh personally by a dear and trusted friend of the Vatican. Yours is not to reason why....nor is it to finish the rest of the quote...simply evaluate him.

The numbers you ask about are the people killed during each mission. He wants no one to be confused about what he does. Rather commendable, don't you think?

-XO.


*****************************************
SEAN ALOYSIUS P. RYAN
93-20 RODEO DR, CA 11002
347-990-6669
SAPR@SAPRassoc.net

OBJECTIVE:
To serve with honor, to protect my client, his or her principles, and to end whatever threat is presented. When I am done, the client should be well aware of proper security provisions, weapons, tactics, and should have no need of myself or my personnel. I am currently seeking a position where I can quickly make significant contributions

EDUCATION: Autodidact.

HONORS/AWARDS:
1999: Stuntman of the Year Award;
1999: Presidential Scholarship, St. John’s University Honors Program, (award declined)
1997-2002: Craziest Stuntman of the Year award.
2001: Craziest Stunt of the Year award; Phi Eta Sigma, National Freshman Honor Society

TRAINING.
1989-Present: Krav Maga training, under Michael Blitz, Kombat Masters of Long Island (Expert Level)
1989: Weapons training by FBI Agent Alice West (Family Friend)
1997: Quantico Defensive Driving Course, by Agent Emily Tierney (Mother)
1997: Tutoring with Special Agent Candice Delong (family friend)

WORK EXPERIENCE
2000-2002: Lord of the Rings, Stuntman.
January, 2003: Bodyguard, Director Stephen S*******g, Singer Barbara S*******d, (0)
March 2003-Present: CEO, Sean A.P. Ryan and Associates.
April 2003: Bodyguard, Actor Phillipe Nero (est 5, house destroyed)
June 2003: Bodyguard, Actress Mira Gajic (est 40+)
September 2003: Bodyguard, Natalie Boatman (est 50+, Frat house destroyed)

PERSONAL STRENGTHS:
Excellent oral communication skills and interrogation techniques…able to work well with people at all levels with good feedback techniques to assure proper communication…can analyze problems and quickly generate viable solutions… efficient time management abilities…organized and disciplined…excellent interpersonal skills…team player… high-energy level…reliable…have synthesized vast quantities of material and expressed them in audience-friendly form.

PERSONAL:
26, In excellent health, no children, willing to consider travel/relocation.
References available upon request.