Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse...
Miami Dade County steps up to the plate with this proposal from Pepe Diaz:
“WHEREAS, this Board wishes to provide each commissioner the ability to establish a trust fund for the collection of tax-deductible private sector contributions for such public purpose projects in the commissioner’s district.”
Read more good news and details over at Eye on Miami regarding “this decaying rat smelling, money funnel idea” -Geniusofdespair
10:07 am • 9 February 2010 • 1 note
"For most of my career in the Navy, I lived two lives and went to work each day wondering if that would be my last. Whenever the admiral would call me to his office, 99.9 percent of me was certain that it was to discuss an operational issue. But there was always that fear in the back of my mind that somehow I had been “outed,” and he was calling me to his office to tell me that I was fired. So many simple things that straight people take for granted could have ended my career, even a comment such as “My partner and I went to the movies last night."
—
Retired Navy Capt. Joan E. Darrah
My secret life under ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ - CNN.com
(via apsies)
ugh. =\
(via ktt)
(via caraobrien)
11:25 am • 6 February 2010 • 38 notes
(via maeby)
I’m always liking Maeby’s post, but I really appreciate this one.
11:21 am • 6 February 2010 • 9 notes
So much for all those parties happening on the beach.
7:52 pm • 5 February 2010
"At the center of our government lies a bankrupt institution: Congress. Not financially bankrupt, at least not yet, but politically bankrupt. Bush v. Gore notwithstanding, Americans’ faith in the Supreme Court remains extraordinarily high—76 percent have a fair or great deal of “trust and confidence” in the Court. Their faith in the presidency is also high—61 percent. But consistently and increasingly over the past decade, faith in Congress has collapsed—slowly, and then all at once. Today it is at a record low. Just 45 percent of Americans have “trust and confidence” in Congress; just 25 percent approve of how Congress is handling its job. A higher percentage of Americans likely supported the British Crown at the time of the Revolution than support our Congress today. The source of America’s cynicism is not hard to find. Americans despise the inauthentic. Gregory House, of the eponymous TV medical drama, is a hero not because he is nice (he isn’t) but because he is true. Tiger Woods is a disappointment not because he is evil (he isn’t) but because he proved false. We may want peace and prosperity, but most would settle for simple integrity. Yet the single attribute least attributed to Congress, at least in the minds of the vast majority of Americans, is just that: integrity. And this is because most believe our Congress is a simple pretense. That rather than being, as our framers promised, an institution “dependent on the People,” the institution has developed a pathological dependence on campaign cash. The US Congress has become the Fundraising Congress. And it answers—as Republican and Democratic presidents alike have discovered—not to the People, and not even to the president, but increasingly to the relatively small mix of interests that fund the key races that determine which party will be in power."
— Lawrence Lessig (via azspot) (via robot-heart-politics)
11:48 am • 5 February 2010 • 33 notes
Commissioner Sorenson not running for re-election
I haven’t posted or even paid attention to anything about Miami Dade politics in a while because it had become so frustrating I needed a break. But this is sad news. I am for term limits for the County Commission, however, Katy Sorenson stood out to me a genuinely wanting to serve the public, not profit from the discretionary funds allowed to commissioners (I’m trying very hard not to get into that).
“I am troubled right now with the relationship between citizens and government. There’s too much mistrust and too much ill will. And it isn’t just between citizens and government, it’s between governments—city vs. county, county vs. state, county vs. school board—and even within our government we have fights between the legislative and executive branch, between elected officials and staff. People seem to forget that it’s not us and them – we’re a government OF and BY the people. We’re all in this together.” - Katy Sorenson
9:15 am • 5 February 2010
caraobrien:
feminally:
smalltowngayblog:
notemily:
amberlrhea: dominickbrady: productiveatwork:
There’s photoshop and then there’s this …
A Florida judge awarded custody of a 1-year-old boy to the foster family he’d been living with, saying the boy was “happy and thriving.”
The adoptive parents, however, happen to be gay.
And that didn’t sit well with the Florida Family Policy Council of Orlando, who sent out an alert to its members about the judge’s “arrogant judicial activism.”
On the left is the picture that the Policy Council used to illustrate the gay couple that was awarded custody. On the right is the actual couple.
(from The Orlando Sentinel)
…what.
8:52 am • 5 February 2010 • 610 notes
