Diane J. Savino: The case for same-sex marriage

I find this so distasteful. that people will worry so much about what their neighbors are doing, that they take it to court, they fight in congress over it, that I worry for the future of our country. I've grown up hearing all this nonsense, all my life: "if blacks get the vote, they'll take over the country, then what will happen?" Okay, well, blacks had already had the vote. But you could plug any agenda item into that and any ethnicity. And same sex marriage is just one more. Fear, ignorance, selfishness (I have, so you can't), it's just the same old bigotry all over again. But we call it based in religion and everyone has to kowtow and back away.

If you want marriage to be a man and a woman, fine, marry an opposite sex partner. I did. In fact, I liked it so many times, I didn't it three and a half times, in my life. But if your neighbor wants to marry someone of the same gender, just how is that your business? 

This is, or used to be, America. We have the right to pursuit of happiness. Remember that concept? It's in the Declaration of Independence. This isn't the Constitution, I'll grant you, but it is the statement, the declaration of what the heart of this nation is meant to be. Or, do you think the Founding Father's should simply be ignored because our country's principles don't add up to what makes you feel comfortable. We were based upon the concept that people that made other governments uncomfortable, would be allowed to live here in freedom and with a lack of persecution. So deal with it. Show some tolerance, or move back to a Middle Eastern Fundamentalist Terrorist country. It's part of what bothers me about the Cradle of Civilization desert religions (Jewish, Catholic/Christian, Islam), religions that in practice, seem to be too intolerant to be allowed to continue in a modern world.

The pursuit of happiness is not supposed to be at the pain of others, but for you to mind your own damn business and seek YOUR bliss. This has nothing to do with stopping someone else from seeking THEIR bliss in life. And if YOUR bliss, is seeking to take someone else's bliss away, then you need a new hobby, mate.

Hours before New York lawmakers rejected a key marriage equality bill (38-24), State Senator Diane J. Savino made the passionate case for a government that recognizes and administers same-sex marriages. Here's her fresh, thought-provoking perspective on one of the most contentious issues in US culture, religion and government.

Diane Savino represents the 23rd Senate District in the New York State Senate.
This week's NPR article:

Republicans Mount Defense Of Anti-Gay Marriage Law

by Carrie Johnson

Lambda Gay and Lesbian Wedding site

The Killing - new AMC show set in Seattle

The Killing, is a new procedural by AMC and set in Seattle.That is to say in this case, another cop show. But I think, perhaps, not just "another", cop show.

I'm finding it very engrossing, well acted and directed and I want to see more. In the pilot, about half way through that episode, it had one of the toughest, most difficult "reveal" scenes I've seen.

I'm always pleased to find shows or movies set in Seattle. The Killing is such a show. Two things really annoy me about this show. One, I never heard of or about it. I accidentally stumbled upon it crusing through the upcoming menu of shows over the weekend. Second, it was shot mostly in Vancouver, British Columbia.

It is from writer, executive producer and series showrunner Veena Sud (Cold Case), The Killing is based on the wildly successful Danish television series Forbrydelsen and tells the story of the murder of a young girl in Seattle and the subsequent police investigation. Season one will consist of thirteen one-hour episodes and airs Sundays at 10PM | 9C. For a full list of The Killing broadcast times, Check out AMC's online schedule.

The murder victim is Rosie, played briefly by the beautiful Katie Findlay, who has also played Ellie on Stargate Universe and Jill on Fringe, two of my other favorite shows. She has a very short play in this series, so to give her a bit of sparkle here, she is Portuguese, Chinese, British and Scottish and was a ballerina for twelve years until she quit due to a back injury and for the opportunity to have "real people feet".

In some ways it's appropriate that this is originally a Danish show. Seattle has a high population of Scandinavians, not just Asians like many think.

The Killing is produced by Fox Television Studios and executive produced by Mikkel Bondesen (Burn Notice) for Fuse Entertainment. Fuse's Kristen Campo co-produces. That, is the good news. The bad news, is that it is filmed in Vancouver, B.C.. Another example of Seattle screwing up and letting yet another show claim it's based in Seattle but being shot in another country entirely.

Vancouver is a kind of sister city to Seattle, but more like that more gregarious sister that gets all the dates and gifts, leaving the misunderstood and just as attractive sister at home all the time. Considering all the films and shows that like Seattle now a days, Seattle really should get its act together so it's viable enough. I can't tell you how offensive it is to watch a show and not recognize scenes, or see them and recognize Vancouver.

In watching the show as I write this, I just saw an establishing shot of Seattle that was obviously the longer skyline of Vancouver. Not that anyone else would notice who never visited Seattle. They do intersperse some establishing shots of actual Seattle and some scenes that do look to have been actually shot in Seattle.


Mireille Enos is Sarah Linden, a Seattle homicide detective investigating the murder of Rosie Larsen. It's interesting and not odd for Scandinavian names in Seattle. Billy Campbell is Darren Richmond, the president of the Seattle City Council who is running for Mayor. Joel Kinnaman is Stephen Holder, Sarah's partner, recently assigned to Homicide from Narcotics, who seems like it, treating everyone he questions like they are something slimy who crawled out from under a rock.

What I can say is that so far, I like the show and I'm happy to give it a chance. Many great procedurals, crime and thrillers have come out of Scandinavia, not least of which are the "Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" series of books and films. And a long history of excellent dramas and thrillers.

Weekend Wise Words

Be Smart. Be Brilliant.

Although Albert Einstein was certainly not a Buddhist, these statements sound much like it:

"A human being is part of a whole, called by us the 'universe', a part limited in time and space.
He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separate from the rest
- a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness.
This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affectation for a few people near us.
Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion
to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty."

"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one."

From Living Buddha, Living Christ by Thich Nhat Hanh:

"Enlightenment for a wave in the ocean is the moment the wave realizes that it is water."

View on Buddhism

 Samuel Clemens
"We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it - and stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove-lid again, and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one anymore."

Dave Meslin: The antidote to apathy

I used to have a sign hanging in my cubicle when I worked at the University of Washington Personnel Office. It said (if I can remember this correctly, it was back in the early 90s): "Sometimes, Apathy, can be a good and healthy thing." My lead came up to me one day, after about a year, and said, "I always thought that was a stupid sign, but now I see, it actually makes a lot of sense and can be a life saver."

That is not to say, it's always a good and healthy thing. But there are times when you need to ride the Train of Apathy, to save your own sanity. But that is a temporary thing. To live a life that way, is untenable and ridiculous. It's not acceptable. If you find you are living on that train, look around, do you have a berth on that train, does it feel, lived in, are you starting to feel, comfortable on it? Apathy is a good an necessary thing, like, an aspirin, like a cold compress, or a heat pad. It is not a philosophy for a way of life.

Dave Meslin, in his talk (see the video), talks about how people seem much of the time to be stupid, lazy, but it's not true. It's not the people, it's our lifestyle, it's the train we are in and surrounded by. If we think of people in that way, we are only fueling that train. But once we stop, we take people for the positive forces for change that they can be, once we see their intelligence, their desire for good, suddenly, that train turns into something else.

Think about it. Treat a kid like he's stupid. Raise him that way. Now go back, treat that kid like he's brilliant, raise him THAT way. What do you think you will get in the end? Well, for me, I'm kind of backward. I was treated like, told that, I was stupid, because I talked about Aristotelian ideas when I was in 6th grade and no one around me knew about those kinds of thoughts. I was the first in my family to get a University degree. Butt I didn't know I was "smart" until I was told that by a Professor. I kind of thought it when I was younger but didn't really believe it until I started going to the head of my classes, having done not so well in K-12 (mostly because of authority issues).

However, if we try to look at people around us as smarter than they appear, as more interested if they can hurdle the issues holding them back, then things start to take a much lighter shade of production. People need to know they can affect change. Dave, in his video gives some very concrete examples of this.

Check it out!
Dave Meslin's video at TED on The Antidote to Apathy.

The future of space travel

Here are two important talks from TED, from 2006 and 2007, on Space Travel. We have many problems here on Earth. But we need to push out into space for so many reasons.

NASA's 100-Year Starship Project Sets Sights on Interstellar Travel

The only people who do not see that as an a priori truth are those who are short sighted and narrow minded. It is much like the person who is going to die if they do not jump into the river to swim away from the sinking boat. They can do the safe thing, stick with the boat, and drown, or they can risk swimming for the shore, which they can see from their position, and save them self.  We are drowning. We need to take the risk. We can see the shore. And we do need to, and we can, achieve the shore of salvation.

http://www.ted.com/talks/burt_rutan_sees_the_future_of_space.html
Bill Rutan, from 2006 at TED: 

"I want to start off by saying, Houston, we have a problem. We're entering a second generation of no progress in terms of human flight in space. In fact, we've regressed. We stand a very big chance of losing our ability to inspire our youth to go out and continue this very important thing that we as a species have always done. And that is, instinctively we've gone out and climbed over difficult places, went to more hostile places, and found out later, maybe to our surprise, that that's the reason we survived. And I feel very strongly that it's not good enough for us to have generations of kids that think that it's OK to look forward to a better version of a cell phone with a video in it. They need to look forward to exploration, they need to look forward to colonization, they need to look forward to breakthroughs. They need to. We need to inspire them, because they need to lead us and help us survive in the future"

"I'm predicting, though, as profitable as this industry is going to be -- and it certainly is profitable when you fly people at 200,000 dollars on something that you can actually operate at a 10th of that cost, or less -- this is going to be very profitable. I predict, also, that the investment that will flow into this will be somewhere around half of what the U.S. taxpayer spends for NASA's manned spacecraft work. And every dollar that flows into that will be spent more efficiently by factor of 10 to 15. And what that means is before we know it, the progress in human space flight, with no taxpayer dollars, will be at a level of about five times as much as the current NASA budgets for human space flight. And that is because it's us. It's private industry. You should never depend on the government to do this sort of stuff -- and we've done it for a long time. The NACA, before NASA, never developed an airliner and never ran an airline. But NASA is developing the space liner, always has, and runs the only space line, OK. And we've shied away from it because we're afraid of it. But starting back in June of 2004, when I showed that a little group out there actually can do it, can get a start with it, everything changed after that time."


http://www.ted.com/talks/bill_stone_explores_the_earth_and_space.html
Bill Stone, from 2007 at TED:

So, what if you could get your gas at a 10th the price? There is a place where you can. In fact, you can get it better -- you can get it at 14 times lower if you can find propellant on the moon. There is a little-known mission that was launched by the Pentagon 13 years ago now, called Clementine. And the most amazing thing that came out of that mission was a strong hydrogen signature at Shackleton crater on the south pole of the moon. That signal was so strong, it could only have been produced by 10 trillion tons of water buried in the sediment, collected over millions and billions of years by the impact of asteroids and comet material.

If we're going to get that, and make that gas station possible, we have to figure out ways to move large volumes of payload through space. We can't do that right now. The way you normally build a system right now is you have a tube stack that has to be launched from the ground, and resist all kinds of aerodynamic forces. We have to beat that. We can do it because in space there are no aerodynamics. We can go and use inflatable systems for almost everything. This is an idea that, again, came out of Livermore back in 1989, with Dr. Lowell Wood's group. And we can extend that now to just about everything. Bob Bigelow currently has a test article in the orbit. We can go much further. We can build space tugs, orbiting platforms for holding cryogens and water. There's another thing. When you're coming back from the moon, you have to deal with orbital mechanics. It says you're moving 10,000 feet per second faster than you really want to be to get back to your gas station.

You got two choices. You can burn rocket fuel to get there, or you can do something really incredible. You can dive into the stratosphere, and precisely dissipate that velocity, and come back out to the space station. It has never been done. It's risky and it's going to be one hell of a ride -- better than Disney. The traditional approach to space exploration has been that you carry all the fuel you need to get everybody back in case of an emergency. If you try to do that for the moon, you're going to burn a billion dollars in fuel alone sending a crew out there. But if you send a mining team there, without the return propellant, first -- (Laughter) Did any of you guys hear the story of Cortez? This is not like that. I'm much more like Scotty. I like this equipment, you know, and I really value it so we're not going to burn the gear. But, if you were truly bold you could get it there, manufacture it, and it would be the most dramatic demonstration that you could do something worthwhile off this planet that has ever been done. There's a myth that you can't do anything in space for less than a trillion dollars and 20 years. That's not true. In seven years, we could pull off an industrial mission to Shackleton, and demonstrate that you could provide commercial reality out of this in low-earth orbit.

We're living in one of the most exciting times in history. We're at a magical confluence where private wealth and imagination are driving the demand for access to space. The orbital refueling stations I've just described could create an entirely new industry and provide the final key for opening space to the general exploration. To bust the paradigm, a radically different approach is needed. We can do it by jump-starting with an industrial Lewis and Clark expedition to Shackleton crater, to mine the moon for resources, and demonstrate they can form the basis for a profitable business on orbit.

Talk about space always seems to be hung on ambiguities of purpose and timing. I would like to close here by putting a stake in the sand at TED. I intend to lead that expedition. (Applause) It can be done in seven years with the right backing. Those who join me in making it happen will become a part of history and join other bold individuals from time past who, had they been here today, would have heartily approved.

There was once a time when people did bold things to open the frontier. We have collectively forgotten that lesson. Now we're at a time when boldness is required to move forward. 100 years after Sir Ernest Shackleton wrote these words, I intend to plant an industrial flag on the moon and complete the final piece that will open the space frontier, in our time, for all of us. Thank you. (Applause)

Scottish Percussionist Evelyn Glennie

Meet Scottish composer and percussionist, the lovely, Evelyn Glennie (photos on Drummerworld). Wow, what a package. She is an amazing percussionist. I first heard her talk on TED. You can't tell she's is deaf by listening to her, either her words, or her speech.

The things she has to say are amazing, but they make so much sense once you hear what she has to say. Evelyn lost nearly all of her hearing by age twelve. Rather than having her deafness isolate her, it has given her a unique connection to her music and the world around her. She sought out the Royal Academy of Music in London. And got turned down. But, she turned the table on them and in the end, they did take her on. And her being there, changed how the institution related to and accepted or denied, students from then on. She is also the only musician in history to have made an entire career as a percussionist. 

Her diversity of collaborations have included performances artists such as Nana Vasconcelos, Kodo, Bela Fleck, Bjork, Bobby McFerrin, Sting, Emmanuel Ax, Kings Singers, Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Fred Frith.

From her web site:


"Evelyn has commissioned one hundred and fifty new works for solo percussion from many of the world's most eminent composers and also composes and records music for film and television. Her first high quality drama produced a score so original she was nominated for a British Academy of Film and Television Arts awards (BAFTA's); the UK equivalent of the Oscars. 

"Out of the 25 recordings made so far, Evelyn's first CD, Bartok's Sonata for two Pianos and Percussion won her a Grammy in 1988. A further two Grammy nominations followed, one of which she won for a collaboration with Bela Fleck. Evelyn's twelfth solo CD, Shadow Behind the Iron Sun (BMG Records), was based on a radical improvisational concept and has once again questioned people's expectations. 

"The Evelyn Glennie brand is constantly exploring other areas of creativity. From writing a best selling autobiography, Good Vibrations, to collaborating with the renowned film director Thomas Riedelsheimer on a film called Touch the Sound, to presenting two series of her own television programmes (Soundbites) for the BBC, to regularly appearing on television across the world, which include The David Letterman Show (USA), Sesame Street (USA), The South Bank Show (UK), presenting and performing on Songs of Praise (UK), Commonwealth Games Festival Concert, This is Your Life (UK), 60 minutes (USA), PBS Profile (USA) and many more."

This woman is a force to be reckoned with. I highly recommend you check her and her music out. These are truly the types of people we need more of in this world. 

For more, visit A Conversation with Bruce Duffie.
Evelyn on Sesame Street.

The Pusher - Steppenwolf

Don't run off. this isn't about guns. It's about music; more so, it's about learning, responsibility, growing up.

When I was a kid, my older brother, seven years older, decided he couldn't take it any longer and he headed out into these great United States, thus leaving my slightly older sister and myself at home to finish being kids. He left a few things with me. A .303 British bolt action rifle that the Brits used to kill elephants and WWII enemy soldiers with. A .20 gauge breaking, single-shot shotgun. And his entire record collection. This, was a bonus.

sort of like the old shotgun, though this one's nicer

It's interesting to note, that here I was living in the suburbs of Tacoma, WA, in the late 1960s, and I had my own firearms. I never misused them either. Well, once, well, not really. My sister was home from training to be a Flight Attendant for Northwest Orient Airlines and her ex jerk boyfriend got drunk and drove back and forth in front of our house repeatedly one night. I didn't think much of it until I heard her weeping in the foldaway bed downstairs (my little brother and I shared a bedroom and when she moved out, he took her room).

I looked out the window and watched the jerk drive back and forth, fishtailing his semi muscle car. One one pass, he fish tailed his tires spinning, so badly, that he lost control and almost totaled his car into my step-dad's truck. That did it, and I took down the shotgun, loaded it and put it out my second floor window, and waited for him to make one more run. I judged that between my height and our house was about six feet up a hill from the sidewalk, and the distance to the street, and the shotgun was only a 20 gauge, I would probably only blow out a window on his car. He seemed so drunk I figured he'd just drive off and go hide (being drunk while driving).

Well, he must have scared himself so badly that he never did make another pass. I emptied and put the gun away. Eventually, my sister stopped crying and fell asleep.

I never told anyone. But enough of that. The coolest thing I had of my brother's, was his record collection. Here I was a punk kid, and I was listening to the likes of John Mayall, Music from Big Pink by The Band, Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention, Cream, Steppenwolf, Sandy Bull, Paul Butterfield, Iron Butterfly, Simon and Garfunkle, The Beatles (I actually got to see them with my sister when they came to Seattle), The Rolling Stones (didn't like live albums back then, was into the perfection of studio work), and on and on.

I already had my own very interesting collection including electronic and synthesizer music by the likes of Walter Carlos and Morton Subotnick, Ian Whitcom (my first album that I traded a found High School graduation right for, to my brother's singer in his band), a bunch of classical records, Canada's favorite son, pianist , and many others.

I came to learn about music through my brother's albums as they were his, he had started his own rock band and he must therefore know what he was doing. So I tried to learn from his music. And I did. One of those albums, Steppenwolf's self titled album. Amazingly enough, "The Pusher" was a rock song written by country singer/writer, Hoyt Axton. Axton apparently did not record "The Pusher" himself until he included it on his 1971 album, Joy to the World.

The song was made popular by the 1969 movie Easy Rider which used Steppenwolf's version to accompany the opening scenes of drug trafficking. I actually got to see John Kay, the lead singer of Steppenwolf at the Coliseum in Seattle when he toured solo in the 70s.

I can remember sitting and listening to that song over and over again. Typically, under the influence of something, and as a senior in High School. There were a couple of statements in the song that stuck with me throughout that part of my life and I'm sure, kept me alive in certain situations.

The lines:
"But I never touched nothin'
That my spirit could kill"

I took that to mean (for whatever reason) that one should never do anything that your spirit, your inner power or self, couldn't win out over in the end. Be it drugs, alcohol, sky diving, racing, all things I was going to do in that future from when I was first learning that song.

The other part of the album that stuck with me was the differentiation between a pusher and a dealer. A dealer sells you what you want. A pusher sells you whatever he can push on you, force you to buy, or hook you into repeat business for. This wasn't only about drugs but about a general orientation toward people. That kept me away from people that I knew were shady, dangerous or out only for themselves.

"God damn, God damn, the Pusher man....!"

And I'm still here to talk about it.

THE PUSHER

You know I've smoked a lot of grass
O' Lord, I've popped a lot of pills
But I never touched nothin'
That my spirit could kill
You know, I've seen a lot of people walkin' 'round
With tombstones in their eyes
But the pusher don't care
Ah, if you live or if you die

God damn, The Pusher
God damn, I say The Pusher
I said God damn, God damn The Pusher man

You know the dealer, the dealer is a man
With the love grass in his hand
Oh but the pusher is a monster
Good God, he's not a natural man
The dealer for a nickel
Lord, will sell you lots of sweet dreams
Ah, but the pusher ruin your body
Lord, he'll leave your, he'll leave your mind to scream

God damn, The Pusher
God damn, God damn the Pusher
I said God damn, God, God damn The Pusher man

Well, now if I were the president of this land
You know, I'd declare total war on The Pusher man
I'd cut him if he stands, and I'd shoot him if he'd run
Yes I'd kill him with my Bible and my razor and my gun

God damn The Pusher
Gad damn The Pusher
I said God damn, God damn The Pusher man