Volume 6, Issue 2
November 26, 2003

So I was home sick from work one day last week, and it was quite a big news day. The Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that a ban on same-sex marriage was unconstitutional, so of course, the lead story of each hour on the Fox News Channel was: "Law enforcement has arrived at Michael Jackson's Neverland ranch with search warrants." True to FNC's fair and balanced policies, Brit Hume did raise an eyebrow in response to Sen. Rick Santorum's (R-Penn.) assertion that, "It's because of the ruling in Massachusetts that Michael Jackson believed having sex with little boys was okay." Hume did not ask Santorum why he'd been discussing his interest in sex with minors with Jackson.

Other Republicans were quick to point out that their objection to gay marriage was purely a way to alleviate the tax burden on same-sex couples by preventing them from being subject to the marriage tax penalty, as codified in 2001 as part of their "Tax Relief for Fa... -Er, I Mean, Gay People Act." It figures that Massachusetts is the wacky state at the center of all this – in a true but [at the time] less funny story, I was once divorced in Massachusetts despite never having stepped foot in the state.

I'm kidding, of course, when I suggest that Republicans don't want to allow same-sex marriages. As specified on the Republican National Committee website, the official party position is that "Gay men may get married, but only one at a time, only to Liza Minelli, and only if they allow her to beat them senseless for the privilege." At least the Republicans have a position, though. As part of the Democrats' ongoing "Inspire No One" campaign, Dick Gephardt said in this week's debate, "Marriage is between a man and a woman but we support same-sex civil unions that provide all the benefits and legal protections of marriage as long as they don't call it 'marriage' and if the 57 people who participate in the Iowa caucuses don't have too much of a problem with that." Heck, even Strom Thurmond came to believe in gay marriage in the end, though the rejoicing among activists at Thurmond's position change was somewhat tempered by his qualifier, "as long as there ain't no black men marryin' white men, that is."

Continuing in the "Uninspiring Democrats" category, is it me, or is Rod Blagojevich just a complete weasel? He's starting to make me think, why couldn't the Schwarzeneggers move here? I mean, I don't think I'm capable of voting for a Republican (we named the dog Truman, for crying out loud), but if Maria ran for governor here, it'd save me from having to write in Glenn Poshard again.

Speaking of Blagojevich, let's be clear on this prescription drug issue. Want to buy your prescriptions from Canada? Sell your #$%&*# house and move there. Don't worry about the 85% in taxes you'll pay to qualify for your cheap drug prices. And if you need gall bladder surgery, it should only be 8 months or so for your appointment to come up. That should be fine – the 4 weeks we had gallstones visiting our house this fall were pretty easy. Sure, there was the pathological fear of eating, the near-constant moaning in pain and the puking all over the place ('Truman! Get away from that!'), but you all know what a whiner Kathryn is. Plus, in Canada, you'll get your generic Vicodin for $3 a prescription instead of $5, so it should all be worth it. By the way, if you ever need your wife to have abdominal surgery via four tiny incisions, I highly recommend Dr. John R. "Bob" Andrews and the folks at Lake Forest Hospital. The fact that for referrals I get 10% of his $3700-per-18-minutes-of-surgery fee should not influence you in any way.

[Note: Following the surgery, we adopted as our house slogan, "G.B. free in 2003." But I just noticed that gall bladder and George Bush have the same initials. So I'm not sure what to make of this, but we might be changing the slogan to "G.B. free: today, our house. Next year, the White House." Note that this has a better chance of being the winning presidential election slogan than many others, such as "Kucinich/Moseley Braun in 2004"]

Of course, any talk of Lake Forest brings us right back to the RNC. In another strange but true story, last week I received my signed picture of George Bush, on which he thanked me for my support of the party. Background – a few months ago, I had received a survey from the RNC inviting me to share my views on how the president was doing. For each policy question, I selected multiple choice answer: "(E) The president is a dangerous cretin," though I suspect they mistakenly sent me a survey from the Clinton era. In response, I received an offer to join President Bush at dinner for only $2500. Even though I wasn't able to make it to the dinner, I still got the photo [click here], so I guess my answers must have been helpful.

Also last week, the president took some time off from signing photos of himself to visit Great Britain, our staunchest ally, as indicated by the number of people who flooded the streets to give Bush a joyful and triumphant welcome. The official purpose of the visit was to console Prince Charles, who, you may have heard, was recently the subject of rumors not reported in the British press of one or a series of acts allegedly involving or perhaps not involving a Buckingham Palace manservant who may or may not have [deleted] Prince Charles [deleted] by means of [deleted], [deleted], and, oddly enough, a very valuable portrait of Henry VI, although palace sources insist the presence of the Queen's Welsh Corgis was entirely coincidental.

In the end, though, the visit was all for naught, as President Bush capped off his well-known "No World Leader Left Unalienated" global tour by joking with the Queen, "So I guess Charles will be moving to Massachusetts and getting married to Michael Jackson now, heh heh heh...."