GI Joe Needs to Go to Washington

I think COBRA Commander must be running Congress because lord knows that COBRA Benefits for the unemployed are not.

In the 1980s cartoon G.I. Joe, COBRA Commander was a character with a mirror face, but when the mirror was removed, you found an evil snake like man-creature with a lisp and a penchant for all out drag queen temper tantrums. COBRA was an evil organization out the rule the world.

Outside of the lands of Hasbro, COBRA is a government program, created in the 1980s, that allows workers leaving or let go from their jobs to continue their health care benefits for up to 18 months by paying the associated premiums and a small administrative fee.

COBRA led by snake face is bad. COBRA led by the U.S. government is good.

Up until May 31, 2010, there was a provision that was included in the stimulus package that paid subsidies of 65% of COBRA benefits for eligible workers that lost their jobs. As quoted in an article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, for a that has health care payments of $1,500 a month that subsidy drops the payments down to $525, a much more manageable figure.

As we all know, the latest unemployment figures still have unemployment hovering near 10% (9.7% to be exact), and while there has been slow growth in the economy, the numbers of jobs added have been pretty much pitiful. So it would seem to make sense that since the need for the COBRA subsidy is still great, and since the economy is only just beginning to recover that it would make sense to reauthorize the $7 billion dollar program. Right?

Wrong. Turns out that COBRA Commander (evil snake face) is alive and well and living in Washington. Blue Dog Democrats are howling at the moon because it is an election year and they fear that voting to re-extend the program, which will add to the deficit, will hurt their re-election chances.

Two notes here for you Blue Dogs, 1) Your job in Congress is to serve the people, not your re-election efforts, and 2) if you are an incumbent, you should start packing your bags any old ways cuz this year just ain't your year.

But, seriously, seriously, we are spending $12.2 billion dollars a MONTH on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan according to an article in U.S.A. Today published on May 12, 2010. That, ladies and gents, comes out to $145 billion (and some change) a year on those two wars. And, now we have some asshole Congressmen, such as Democrat Rep. Cardoza of California, magically worried about deficit spending of $7 billion for a year to cover millions of unemployed Americans?

We will pay to kill people living far far away, but we won't pay a fraction of that amount of money to keep our own people healthy and alive. Fail.

Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania and Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio are offering an amendment to re-authorize the COBRA subsidy program to a bill in the Senate to extend unemployment benefits. The bill has already passed the House where douchenozzle Rep. Clyburn of South Carolina led the charge to strip the COBRA Reauthorization from the bill. I think Clyburn should stop working for the EVIL COBRA and worry about the crazy shit going on in South Carolina right now in the gubernatorial and senatorial elections.

In the end, failing to reauthorize the COBRA subsidy is not only wrong and bad politics, it is bad economics. When those folks that have been able to maintain their health benefits are forced off of their private insurers, they will be forced to join the rest of the unemployed masses in using the country's emergency rooms as primary care facilities. This is absolutely the most expensive way to receive health care in our system, and it will only overburden and overtax a health care system while at the same time forcing local and state governments to pick up the costs incurred.

Smooth move, Congress.

Please contact your Senators and let them know that you support the COBRA extension, and, if necessary, that you support bringing in GI Joe to deal with Evil COBRA and the Blue Dog Democrats.

General Hawk signing out.

Unemployment is Good for Your Health

For the last seven weeks I have been one of the roughly 30 million (give or take a million) Americans that are unemployed. Being broke is a bitch. There was a report on CNN recently that there is a direct correlation between the newly unemployed and the development of new physical ailments from an increase of common infections to more serious life threatening diseases such as heart disease, hypertension, and arthritis! The potential for depression and anxiety increases exponentially. And being the only kid on the block that hasn't seen Wolverine, Star Trek, or Underworld 3 is totally sucky.

Seven or eight years ago I found myself in the same position I am in now. I was unemployed for almost seven months. That go round I sat on my couch, applied for jobs, and drank. A lot. I basically fell into a giant depressive hole. I vanished from society in general. Hell, my best friend lived across the hallway from me, and she barely saw me. I gained roughly 30 to 40 pounds topping out at 210 pounds. By the time I returned to work, I was depressed, fat, on medication, and my apartment looked as if Oscar the Grouch was my decorator. Nasty.

This go around I was determined not to repeat my personal history. I am going to let you in on a little secret: I am quickly approaching the best shape I have ever been in (my ass is gettin' so muscular that I did a squat today and blew out the seam in my boxer shorts), I am eating damnedly well, and though I have no money...I manage to even have a social life. There are some things you can do to make sure that your unemployment doesn't kill you. It is damned hard to pay off those students loans from Purgatory.

It's called the GOYA Philosophy (named after that delightful company that makes everything from spices to black beans). GOYA= GET OFF YOUR ASS!:

1. GOYA and Exercise: If you have a gym membership that you haven't had to ax yet...it should be the last thing you consider getting rid of after rent, food, and utility bills. I am dead serious. Now is the time to get into the shape that you have always wanted to get into. You have nothing but time...and no excuse not to make the time in your day to exercise. Committing one hour each day minimum that includes 30 minutes of cardiovascular exercise and 30 minutes of lifting weights will change your world and your outlook. Extensive research shows that cardio exercise and weightlifting when done every day is as good as psychotropic drugs that control for depression and anxiety (DO NOT STOP TAKING YOUR MEDS IF YOU ARE ON THEM!), but, as a person that does take psych meds...I can tell you that psych meds plus exercise has changed my world and my outlook.

If you do not have a gym membership but can afford to get one. Do it.

If you can't afford a membership then contact your local YMCA or YWCA. Both organizations have fitness in their mission and provide subsidized memberships or nearly full scholarships for low income folks and students.

Also, at any gym you join the staff will give you a free orientation to the gym and most gym memberships come with group fitness classes where you can do fun workouts with other folks and meet more peeps in your community. Networking networking networking.

2. GOYA and Eat!: I love to eat. Now is the time to train yourself to cook for yourself. Explore new foods. Experiment in the kitchen. Vegetables are cheap and good for you. I am a meat eater...and I have had to cut down on my meat intake because of the cost. I have discovered, however, that I LOVE many more veggies than I thought I did. I have also had a chance to explore with different foods and food combinations...and guess what...I am eating cheaply, well, and in copious amounts...and loving it.

3. GOYA and Go to the Museum: One of my favorite pastimes with David is to check out the fantastic museums in New York...for free. I have lived all over this lovely nation of ours, I promise you that if you live in or near a major city said city has cultural institutions that have FREE nights. Find out when the free nights are at your local museums and check out some art. No matter who you are...you will surprise yourself by what you find and what you find that you like...even I the grand hater of most modern art...has found artists whose work I adore. You never had time to check out that exhibit of Ancient Babylonian Dildos...now is the time to do it.

4. GOYA and Network: All over the U.S. folks are putting together speed networking events and other mixers where folks get together and exchange information. The best way to find a job is to find out from somebody who knows somebody. At a time when PhDs are fighting for manager positions at Taco Bell...who you know is just as important as the letters you may have after your name. Talk to anyone and everyone anywhere you are. That crazy lady sitting next to you talkin' to her reflection in the bus window might just be an eccentric crazy lady who owns an investment firm. Well...maybe not...but at social networking events you are guaranteed to meet folks that may have a connection to your area of expertise. Sitting at home watching Grey's Anatomy re-runs may keep you up to date with who has gone dyke this season but it probably won't help you get a job.

5. GOYA and Write: Or draw, or paint, or sing, or dance, or clog, or drag out that old saxophone...whatever it is that you used to do or haven't done in a while that lets you express your creative self...do IT! When you engage your creative self you get the hell up out of that part of your brain that keeps you fixated on what you don't have. Engage other parts of your brain that will help you think creatively and send out positive energy into the world or capture your negative energy and turn it into something positive. If you have ever wanted to learn how to do something...now is the time to do it. Take a free community class or dance class. Who cares if you aren't a pro at it...if you feel good doing it...do it...it keeps your outlook positive, your energy up, and your thinking fresh and invigorated...all things that will help keep you on the right path to finding what the universe is trying to send you.


I am no guru. I don't pretend to have a magic answer for you. I have lots of love and support in my life right now (if only I could cash that shit in and pay rent)...but I do know that by taking advantage of the time I have both to look for work and to enjoy the free time I have by filling it with productive, fun, and exciting experiences...I am able to stay away from dwelling on the fact that my bank account is as empty as Rush Limbaugh's head. Remember...GOYA...live by it...and you will be aiight.


Credit: The painting above is by Francisco GOYA.
Credit Update: My friend Rookie Scott has informed me that he just viewed this painting in Madrid. He also says that the thought is that GOYA may not have done it. Thanks for GOYA and letting me know Scott!

Obama and Gay Marriage or Shut the Hell Up and Let the Man Run the Country

So, I have seen numerous articles lately yellin' and screamin' and lambastin' Obama for not speaking out on the subject of gay marriage. Though President Obama has made his support for civil rights clear, and though he has made mention in the past that he supports civil unions, and though every indicator shows that if the Democrats in Congress got their thumbs out of their asses and passed a repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act he would sign it, still, certain, largely privileged white middle class gays, seem to think that Obama should stop his work on the economy, health care, two wars, and poverty in order to take up arms on the gay marriage front. Get a damn life people.

Obama is doing EXACTLY the right thing by NOT raising the queer marriage issue back into the national spotlight. The Republicans used, quite effectively, the spectre of gays getting married as a successful wedge issue for...well, almost fifteen years. Clinton, bowing to pressure from the right, signed the Defense of Marriage Act into law instantly catapulting the marriage issue onto the national stage. Marriage, in general, is a state's rights issue. Obama, who, I will remind everyone, was a constitutional law professor, is being extremely savvy right now. Since he has taken office three states, and a fourth one soon, have instituted the right to marry for same sex couples. Our constitution has a little itty bitty clause in Section Four part II called the Full Faith and Credit Clause, which reads:

Full faith and credit ought to be given in each state to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings, of every other state; and the legislature shall, by general laws, prescribe the manner in which such acts, records, and proceedings, shall be proved, and the effect which judgments, obtained in one state, shall have in another.

That means if you get married in Vermont then Minnesota must recognize that legal union. Since the U.S. Constitution requires full faith and credit, and since the U.S. constitution supercedes state constitutions, it doesn't matter if Minnesota has a constitutional amendment banning same sex unions (it doesn't actually)...once a nice quiet lesbian couple in New Hampshire decides to move to Utah...and is denied recognition of their marriage...they appeal..until they get to the highest courtin the land, and .a ruling by the Supreme Court will quickly annihilate those pesky state constitutional bans on same sex marriage. Sort of like Lawrence versus Texas. Remember that one people? With a quick little vote of the Supreme Court, anti-sodomy laws were invalidated across the country (and, ps, it was this court...with this composition...that struck down the anti-sodomy laws...all indicators are that Obama will be selecting three new justices sometime in the next few years...shift of balance of power...duh).

Of course, raising the issue of same sex marriage to the federal level again will rally the Republican base, create an INSTANT wedge issue between certain elements of people of color communities and the Democratic Party (which, of course, will split Obama's base), and it will raise again the spectre of a U.S. Constitutional ban on same sex marriage. It has been made clear that such a ban will never pass, but siphoning off precious political capital right now to fight off a re-energized Republican base and a split Democrat base on this issue will make it nigh on impossible for Obama to push the Republicans out of the way on the health care reforms we need, social security, social safety network issues, immigration and the border, and a whole host of other social justice issues that DESERVE and WARRANT immediate attention.

Obama knows that it is only a matter of time before a critical mass of U.S. states have approved queer marriage, and that, by such approval, will trigger a series of judicial events that will result in the extension of marriage rights to all queer folks in every state. At that point, the Defense of Marriage Act, if it has not been repealed, will be low hanging fruit and easily plucked off. How the hell would members of Congress justify “protecting” federal marriage rights when the Supreme Court has closed the case on the states rights side of the issue.

I am so damn frustrated with these half baked queer pundits that can't see past the ends of their own wedding rings to see the big picture. Obama is NOT standing in the way of queer marriage. He is keeping his party in check around the issue by NOT creating a situation where he has to worry about legislators turning their attention away from the issues that we NEED to address. It would be foolish, stupid, and untimely for Obama to stop what he is doing to focus on marriage when the fantastic efforts of local and state organizers are doing the work, swiftly, and with much success.

The road isn't easy towards justice, and, unfortuantely, in the system under which we labor there are times when STRATEGY dictates form (which it ALWAYS should). Folks that are running around pissed off because Obama hasn't hosted a mass queer wedding in the Rose Garden are demanding form without any strategy or strategic thought behind it.

Let's be clear: Obama is not perfect, but he is working on the bigger picture...which, right now, means getting the almost 10% of people in this country that are unemployed back to work. That means ending two wars that are draining tens of billions of dollars a month out of our economy and killing innocent soliders and innocent Iraqis and Afghanis. That means changing our health care system so that it makes sense and the 40 million uninsured in this nation have access to health care. THOSE are the issues that Obama should be focused on. THOSE are the issues that he is focused on. And the largely white gay men that are attempting to UNSTRATEGICALLY force his hand are going to do nothing but lay the groundwork for a base splitting circus that will, in the long term, hurt the queer movement and result in a retardation of the amazing work around marriage equality that has already been done.

Back off.