What about the children?

Several states have some very controversial things on their ballots this election...two of the biggest, of course, involve abortions and gay marriages. In fact, in California, Proposition 8 (banning gay marriage) is in for a *very* close race. Another state is attempting to outlaw any single parent or non-married couple from adopting children (aimed primarily at...you guessed it - gay couples).

So, I don't get it. Beyond the fact that people are people and should be able to love whom they wish and make whatever choices about their body that they wish...where are the kids going to go? You know the kids...the hundreds of thousands of children in this country with no families and no homes?

Here's my thinking...there are already so many children waiting to be placed in their own "forever homes", and so many more already in foster care, that the system is already overburdened trying to keep track of, and take care of, them all. So, let's presume abortion is outlawed. You are now creating a situation where there will be thousands more of unwanted babies - many of them possibly special needs (Down's Syndrome, etc.). Because even if the child has significant health problems, abortion is not longer an option. Where are they going to go? Who is going to take care of them? The already over-burdened system? The same system where kids can just fall through the cracks until they are found chained to a bedpost, or beaten, or starved almost to death?

Then take the gay couples, married or not. Many of these couples want a family. They're not going to raise children to be gay. They're not going to raise them up as satanists. They just want to have children for the same reasons as other folks - to love them, to hold them, to be there for them and help them grow. Now, many of these gay couples adopt children from the foster-care system, thereby giving these previously unwanted children a home and parents who love them.

So, you're outlawing abortions and creating a potential crisis with the adoption system, and then you're taking away the rights of some people to adopt these children. Talk about stuck between a rock and a hard place! Now we have more children with no homes and no family and fewer people able to adopt them. Hm. Sounds like a terrific idea, doesn't it?

Then, while you're at it, we can decriminalize prostitution (Nope. Not kidding. See *California* above) and put a whole new meaning to "endangering the health of the mother" in the abortion clause...

How's your health?

Pray for knees all across America

I am so...depressed. I just learned that I am not a REAL American. All this time, worrying about the state of my country and the plight of the people within it, and I find out that my concern was wrong and unnecessary. I feel so...betrayed...by my naivete, my bleeding-heart status, my misplaced tears.

Apparently, REAL Americans live only in small towns, and only in certain portions of the country. Here is how you can tell the true patriots from...um...the rest of us:

*They do not believe in a woman's right to choose. They *do* believe in forcing a woman who has survived rape and/or incest to bear and birth a child from that terrible act.

*They do not believe in allowing gays to marry or to have the same rights as other humans. They *do* believe that gays can be "cured" by slapping them with enough religion to fell an angel.

*They do not profess to be racists or bigots. They *do* believe that anyone of Muslim descent is to be feared and hated...and that the wife of the African-American (oops. Better remove the "American"...) Presidential candidate should be "lynched" and "tracked down". But only if it's proven "100%" that she believes "that America is a bad country or a flawed nation"... (BTW - name just one country that isn't in some way flawed. I dare you.).

So basically, the rest of us are unnecessary and unwanted. If we have even a glimmer of hope that we might one day be considered real Americans, then we must hasten to do at least one of these things (Sort of like an initiation. But that would be Un-American.):

1. Pray for the eternally damned souls of women who have had abortions, regardless the circumstances.

2. Pray for the eternally damned souls of gays.

3. Pray for the eternally damned souls of Muslims (and anyone else who is not white-bread, "Christian" American).

4. Pray for the eternally damned souls of anyone who questions church and/or state.

And for those of you who thought you were grandfathered into the "real American" category simply because you or a loved one has served this country in the Armed Forces - guess again. Here's why - there are Muslims who have died for our country. Blacks have died for our country. But if they didn't, or wouldn't have, supported a McCain/Palin White House, then they were *not* REAL AMERICANS. So while you're praying, better pray for their eternally damned souls as well.

Better get some knee-pads.

Just some reflection...

I don't think I've *ever* watched an election as closely as I'm watching this one. There is so much as stake right now - and I'm absolutely terrified about the possibilities of the future, depending on who is elected. I can't stop reading the news, online and otherwise. I talk about it a lot (to the annoyance of many, I'm sure). I think about it almost constantly...How different our future might be from anything my generation has ever known.

I grew up knowing that my body was my own. I was raised to be respectful and proud of my body - but I was also raised knowing that if something were to happen, I could make the call as to how I would want to be treated. For example - I was raped several years ago, by someone I thought I could call a friend. I still have issues with it and continue to adjust. I can't even fathom if a pregnancy had come out of that. Even worse, if I was then told that I MUST bear the child to term, regardless of whether I plan to take care of it. Hatred can be a dangerous thing, and I guarantee you - had I been pregnant and forced to keep the pregnancy, I don't know how that would have affected me. I honestly don't know if I would have been able to keep the child - and if I had, if I would have been able to look at it as separate from the trauma. How would that be fair to either of us?

I don't think people are aware of the ramifications of Roe vs. Wade being repealed (and yes, it really could happen). Think of all the children that would flood the adoption system. The children that would be abandoned. Even worse - the children that would grow up knowing that they weren't loved like they needed to be, but were kept because that was the only option.

Here's another scenario for you...it's too far back for women my age to remember, but the documentation is certainly there. Back-alley abortion clinics, where the pregnancy was not always the only thing terminated. Women dying a bloody, painful death. In some cases, families left without a vital member if a rape was involved. Now granted, these days it wouldn't be quite that bad. I have little doubt that there would be sympathetic doctors and/or nurses out there somewhere who would set up lucrative practices. But why should it be illegal for a doctor to take care of a patient? Why should it be illegal for a woman to have full control over her own body? And in this day and age, why in the world is this a concern that we should even have?

I've said this before, but I'll say it again: Most religions that I know of require a person to offer themselves, to willingly join and convert. It has to be free will. I don't believe, and I haven't ever seen, that this includes being forced to abide by the rules and by-laws of a religion because someone else says so. If it is a sin to have an abortion, then that sin is between me and my God. I will be the one offering up the accounting in whatever afterlife, not whoever took away my right to choose. Let me make my own mistakes and take the consequences of those actions on my own. You're not my mother and you're not my God - so you have no place in the discussion of what rights I have for my own body.

And yes, I pray every night that this never becomes any more of an issue than it already is. Not only for myself, but for the future of my daughter and her daughter and so on down the line.

Hmm. Makes me wonder - does that mean that if this election turns out as I'm hoping, that God answered my prayers? What does that say for the drive to overturn Roe vs. Wade based on religious ideals?

Like the rest of us?

I was driving around today, getting son #1 to school and listening to a radio program, when I heard someone say that Sarah Palin is so wonderful because she is "just like the rest of us". Now, I know she projects that image (as she is supposed to), but I think I'm offended at the notion that she is just like me. Here's why:

1. I have never been under investigation for misuse of ANYTHING - let alone misuse of the power that comes with a public office. Sarah Palin is not undergoing just one investigation, however. She is in the middle of TWO. Concurrently. Unless I'm missing something, that certainly does NOT make her like the majority of Americans.

2. I have never endorsed the gunning down of any animals as a sport, let alone when it's done by airplane. In my mind, that kind of takes away any sport that might have been involved in the first place. Now, don't get me wrong - my family hunts deer and elk. I grew up hunting. But...it is not done for sport. We eat the animals as part of our food for winter, and we go into it with a profound sense of thankfulness for what we have.

Last I checked, wolves are not eaten for food. Not by humans, anyway. And even if they were - following a wolf pack in a plane and shooting animals down without AT LEAST taking the time and making the effort to track them down yourselves marks a hunter as less than honest and extremely lazy. In fact, I hesitate to use the term "hunter" for something like this.

Here's where we get back to Sarah Palin - as Governor of Alaska, she has not only allowed this travesty to occur, but she has openly ENDORSED it! I refuse to believe that I am "just like" her.

3. I believe in a woman's right to choose. Period. The driving force in the camp trying to remove this choice is that "it is a sin". Well, maybe it is. But I believe that sin is between a woman and whatever God she chooses to believe (or not) in. And the cornerstone of almost every religion is that 'true salvation' comes when a person CHOOSES to believe and repent - not when that choice is made for them by someone else. My body + My soul = My choice.

Having said that, I'm sure people would wonder - and the answer is no. I have not had one. I don't know if I know anyone who has. I'm not even sure that I would be able to convince myself to have one, regardless of circumstances. But that does not take away from the fact that I should be able to make the choice of what goes on with my body.

I'm sure it's obvious where Sarah Palin comes into play regarding this, but...if she has her way, the right to choose will no longer exist. Roe vs. Wade will go the way of the wolves in Alaska. Terminated from on high by someone who feels they have the right to play God.

So - am I "like" Sarah Palin? No. And I hope that I never become like her, for the sake of my daughter's freedom, the wolves' lives, and the existence of honesty in public office.