Exercises in democracy

[imagine_that]

This has been a hell of a week. It started out nicely when I had a long visit from my ex-bf <a href="http://www.livejournal.com/users/qualinestron>qualinestron</a>. We wandered all over Cambridge and wreaked havoc at the Garment District. Couldn't get him to try on those leopard print jeans though. ;) Oh well. Tuesday I spent large portions of my day at the State House. There was a huge rally for the supporters of gay marriage (and therefore the opponents of the constitutional amendment). I am told that we had at least 2500 people inside the building and at least 1000 outside that couldn't get in because of fire codes. I believe it too. I was one of the last people let in the building before they closed it off 5 people behind me. The streets were still jammed at this point. I had to go up to the crowded balcony to even get a glimpse of the speakers. But what speakers there were. The keynote speaker was the Rev. Peter Gomes, a black clergy member from Harvard Divinity School. He is the self-styled Bishop of Cambridge. He was incredible. He pointed out that the <i>Goodridge</i> decision is scheduled to take effect on the anniversary of the <i>Brown v. Board of Education</i> decision. This cannot be a coincidence from the SJC. He made comments about the fact that many people consider Massachusetts out of the mainstream. He said "Thank G-d we are!" He asked why we should follow the mainstream when since the birth of this nation we have been the ones to shape what the mainstream is! He also disparaged his fellow black clergy members and said that this issue has nothing to do with religion. I know that a number of Rabbis in the state feel the same and support us even if they could never justify it religiously. This is a civil rights issue. Anyway, we heard from a couple who has been together 40 years, we heard from gay cops and firefighters. The MA heads of the SEIU and the ACLU came to speak. I won't bore you with details, but if anyone wants to hear about the speeches (since the newspapers didn't report on this much) I can tell you. I spoke with my legislators to give them my support because they have both stuck their necks out for us, and I felt they could use some support. Wednesday found me in front of the tv for 7 hours watching the debate. Someone once said that you should never watch laws or sausage being made, but on the whole I was pretty impressed by how seriously people took everything. There were some dirty tricks by Finneran, but everyone was aware of those tricks and brought him down. I watched two anti-gay amendments get voted down very narrowly on Wed. Thursday was a mess. I had class and had to run around in Brookline in the Butcherie for kosher meat, and I didn't get home until after 4pm. I spoke with Hillary Goodridge who had been watching all day. She is such a nice person, and she has been so helpful to me. Then things went screwy in the chamber and more dirty tricks were played. All in all they voted down one amendment yesterday very narrowly, and the discourse got much nastier. You had members leaving so there wouldn't be a quorum, you had people talking during one woman's story about being Jewish in Nazi Austria. Everyone had been dead silent when the black legistators had spoken, but Jewish suffering, that they don't have to be respectful of. The newspapers are claiming that our side tried to fillabuster last night, but I was watching most of that (got interupted many times by phone calls), and as far as I can tell the speeches were of the same sort and quality as had been going on for two days. Tell me how that is a fillabuster? Ah well, off to make beef stew before Shabbos. Thanks for reading anyone who has gotten this far.

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