I tried to find the violin thing on You Tube.  I found this David Garrett video. I don’t think it is the one I heard It sounds different from the one I heard, but it is very cool.  Who knew classical instruments could rock out?  (Yes, I know, plenty of people knew that.)

The German lady speaks until about :50 in.

You can find the video of the original Michael Jackson Smooth Criminal here. (Embedding disabled, unfortunately)

Then there is always the Alien Ant Farm version, if you’re into post-grunge alternative. The video is a fun homage to the King of Pop himself, including the light up sidewalk a la Billie Jean. But, somehow I remember the song sounding much better when I was 25. (Man, I hate getting older.)

Again, embedding disabled, so you have to follow the link.

It’s amazing how accustomed to the constant stream of electronic media kids are these days.

“I can’t stand it,” he wrote in his journal on the second day of a one-week attempt to survive without television, iPods, cellphones, BlackBerrys and computers. “I woke up last night but I was still kind of asleep and I was having a dream about my phone and I started to bang my head against the pillow. I AM GOING CRAZY!!!”

They survived and even discovered that there is more to life than electronics, such as reading, family, and even birds.

Without her headphones blocking out the real world, Flor Salvador heard strange chirping sounds.

“I didn’t know we had birds!” she wrote in her journal.

I just have to say, first, I hate this issue.  I wish it would just go away – and it would, if the left didn’t want to keep it around to scare people into voting against the scary Republicans.*

That said, my core beliefs, which are more libertarian conservative than traditionalist conservative, keep me from supporting laws that favor the moral values of one group over another, unless the law is needed to protect the rights of others.

My husband and I have had this debate over and over, where I say, laws should not be based on my moral beliefs, and he reminds me that all laws are based on someone’s moral beliefs.  Why shouldn’t we fight for ours?

Well, because two wrongs don’t make a right.

At the same time, I end up living under laws that reflect someone else’s forced morality.

And those people are a bunch of intolerant bigots, guided by fear, if I could borrow their language for a moment.

Merriam-Webster defines bigot as: a person obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices: one who regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance.

I would say that this reflects the attitudes coming from the left regarding conservative Christians, no?

The problem with being libertarian these days is that no one else is, not enough people to prevent our rights from being trampled, anyway.

So, I realize that, even though I believe in the biblical definition of marriage, not everyone does, but everyone deserves the same legal protections.

In return, Vermont is one step closer to silencing Bible-believing Christians and forcing them to violate their religious beliefs – and they are giddy about it.

Over at my favorite blog of tolerance, Green Mountain Daily, people were spouting off about the idiot-bigot-moron opposition to same-sex marriage, because, of course, anyone who disagrees with them has no good argument, where someone said that no one has been harmed by same-sex marriage.

I pointed out that the Catholic Charities of Boston was forced to adopt children to gay couples after Massachusetts passed a gay marriage law, so they closed their doors.  I would consider that harm.  The state should not force a religious organization to violate its beliefs.  Then there are all of the children who were harmed by the closing of an organization known for finding homes for difficult-to-adopt children.

But Freedom of Religion is just one of those unimportant little freedoms that was merely listed in the First Amendment.  It’s not like the Freedom to Marry, which is made up, or the Freedom from Intolerance, which is a farce.

Besides,

That’s not being negatively affected by same sex marriage, that’s being negatively affected by bigotry.

Ah, the magical B-word that shuts down all disagreement as invalid.  If they just agreed with me, they wouldn’t have had their rights violated.

Then there’s this,

To me, this is an example of the problem with Church structure.  The staff and board of Catholic Charities recognized that gay people often make great adoptive parents.  Yet their experience and judgment is not respected because in the Catholic Church power flows one way from the top down, and not much common sense flows with it.

See!  It’s not the rights-violating actions of a state that refuses to recognize the freedom of religion we are supposed to have in this country; it’s that pesky church!  If only it would use some common sense and abandon its centuries-old beliefs.

At least there are some straight shooters, who are willing to lay it all out,

Here’s the problem: religious beliefs, if granted unconditional freedom, will inevitably be used as a justification to infringe the freedoms of those who do not share them.

I see, so let’s just beat them to the punch and infringe on religious freedom.

That gem was accompanied by this enlightening quote, “Man will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest.”  Beautiful.

So this is what we face.  I guess that’s what I get for supporting other people’s rights, huh?  I get a nice big, thanks, but now we have to continue on with our war against your beliefs.

Let me bottom line this rant, no one has a right to be accepted.  You just don’t.  The law should not be used to force people to approve of your lifestyle, even if you claim you were born that way.

Live and let live needs to work both ways.

Frankly, I am pretty pissed about this.  I am sick and tired of the left going on about freedom, when all the while they have no respect for freedom; they just want their way.  But when it comes to someone else’s freedom, they couldn’t care less about protecting it.  In fact, they want to restrict it.

My only consolation is knowing that there will be a lot more people lining up to fight back, including me.  We might have supported your pursuit of legal rights, but we are not on your side in your crusade to suppress religious freedom.

.

*The Democrats – who control Congress, and have – could make civil unions federally recognized and force gently persuade the states, by threatening to withhold money, to offer civil unions.  With equal legal protection, gay marriage would be wholly unnecessary.  This is a compromise that would give both sides most of what they want.

I woke up thinking about a post on this topic, but life called me away from the blog today.  As it turns out, Emerson Lynn’s Same Sex Marriage: The Conservative Case reflects some of what I was going to say and what I think is the strongest point.

The crux of the issue is one of social stability. Marriage connotes commitment. The more couples that seek that commitment, the more stable we are as a society. The greater the barriers to that commitment, the less stable we are. That has been conservative dogma for eons.

Thus, the more couples that marry, the more stable we become. If that is accepted, then it also follows that same-sex couples would add to society’s stability, not subtract. That should be something conservatives embrace.

And of course, this point,

The opposition has always been that gay marriage would do harm to one of society’s most fundamental social institutions. In fact, it’s just the opposite. Gays have not done any harm to the institution, heterosexuals have.

I don’t have time to lay out my thoughts on this issue, so for now, a link to Mr. Lynn’s piece will have to do.

Hey, maybe Fox will let us call in with our votes at the end of the broadcast.

If you liked the president’s speech dial 1-866-yes-pres, or text “yes” to 62262.

The TV execs are none too happy, either.

“At a time when we’re struggling not only financially but to build audiences, this doesn’t help on either front,” one network executive said. “These repeated interruptions — and the rumor of even more to come — really make it difficult to build audience flow and loyalty. We will all lose one or two million dollars for this.”

Don’t sweat it.  I am sure you can always ask for a bailout.

Oh, and if you ever wondered what Barack Obama’s TelePrompter does in between prime time addresses, wonder no more.  It now has a blog.

For the record: no, I do not watch American Idol.

Is there anything we can say anymore?

Hope and change in Obama’s post-racial America!

I wonder what will happen to our cultural literacy with all of these banned phrases.  I once saw someone taken to task on a blog over the phrase, “beyond the pale.”  As in, it’s racist.  I kid you not.

Then there was that “black hole” kerfuffle.

Personally, I think these incidents make the accusers look ignorant of culturally acceptable expressions and their meanings.

Now, if conservatives look at the comic and see a reference to infinite money theorem and liberals look at the comic and see a reference to Barack Obama, who is the racist?  I’m just saying.

Anyway, didn’t Pelosi write the bill?  Did Obama even actually write any of it?

I cannot deal with this for for years.

Andrew Leigh notes:

Does anybody else find it supremely ironic that Ben Stein made a documentary about academia’s intolerance toward those who question evolutionary theory — and then a university effectively rescinded an invitation to speak? Seems to me that nothing in Ben Stein’s Expelled is more compelling evidence of the truth of his thesis than that.

Heh.

When the political blogosphere starts to drive me mad, I escape to the “crafting” folder in my feed reader for solace.

But these days, I have to put up with crap like this:

Crochet Obama

and this:

Obama Quilt

And there is more.  Much much more, ranging from the amazingly talented to the freakishly odd.  Obama cupcakes, Obama embroidery, Obama jewelry, Obama knitting.  There is even a portrait of Obama made out of – wait for it – change!  (Actually, that one is pretty cool, so I’m going to link to it.)

It’s like the whole nation is under some kind of bizarre spell.  It’s weird.  I don’t get it.

I don’t begrudge people the right to worship Obama, and I certainly respect that people can do what they want with their own blogs, but it is such a bummer that now I have nowhere to go when I want to get away from politics.

I certainly hope that changes soon.

“This was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow, and our planet began to heal.” – Barack Obama

The day is finally here.  The day we have been reading about on bumper stickers for years.  01.20.09

I have been trying to look past my own disagreements with the people who will be running this country for the next four years and remember that this is historic.  From slavery to segregation to the Office of the President.  Wow.  What a great day this is in America’s story.

Still, the coverage could stand to be slightly less nauseating.

As I have done since the election, I will continue to hold off on my nay-saying until tomorrow, at the earliest.  (I am still battling what has now been identified as bronchitis, so blogging will continue to be light.)

A few notes, Althouse is live blogging the Obama-palooza Inauguration festivities.

Ace of Spades HQ has a new banner, with the new name “Obama is Aces HQ” and a haiku contest.  (You have to go to the main page to see the new banner.)

Locally, The Burlington Free Press is hosting a live chat, the 7Days staff blog, Blurt, has lots of coverage, and of course, Vermont Daily Briefing and Democracy for America are holding an inauguration orgy down at Nectar’s in Burlington.  According to the aforementioned Blurt, it is pretty packed.

I am going to go watch the swearing in on TV, from the comfort of my own bed.

I will leave you with an open thread, of sorts.  A place to leave your Inauguration Day comments, if you’d like.