My email box is full of invites to inauguration get togethers, but not even the end of the Bush cleptocracy can get me excited about tomorrow.

I am having a really hard time with it actually. I can’t get past the fact that the dude giving the invocation hates me and people like me, and that our shiny new president thinks that’s reason enough to give him a national platform. Hell, I’m a slutty single mom whose had abortions (Nazi!) and called the police on my Kid’s dad instead of heading to church to get counseling. Not to mention that I’m pretty flexy on the Kinsey scale. Rick Warren would tie me down and perform an exorcism if he thought he could get away with it.

But it’s not just Obama’s choice of national preacher that has got me down. I keep looking at the stimulus package, desperately combing through the details to find some tiny thing that might make my life easier. Some kind of funding that will go to jobs that I can do. No luck. No national healthcare either. Food stamp amounts are supposed to go up, but since I’ve been waiting for over 3 weeks for the local welfare office just to schedule an appointment to see if I’m eligible for them, I don’t know that it’s going to do me much good.

There is one bright spot, Hillary. I am tickled that women in the rest of the world will finally have a tough American ally standing up for them. But it’s bittersweet when at home we won’t be getting the same advocacy from our president. We are just a footnote for him. A secondary thing that he thinks about only rarely. Secondary. Woman may make up 52% of the population, but we are just a note in the margins to Obama. Perhaps he feels that if he does things to help out our husbands then we will benefit by proxy. Unless you don’t have a husband, or don’t sleep with men.

There was a line in The West Wing once about how “You’re not just the president of the people who voted for you”. But what I’ve seen so far is that Obama is the president just to people who never vote for him. Godbags and Milton Friedman die hards.

But at least I’m used to having a president who couldn’t give a rats ass about people like me. I do have 8 years of experience with that. The only difference is that I never expected a right wing Republican president to speak for me, but I do kinda expect the Democrats to. I mean, that is the reason for their existence after all.

“The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all of your time.”
Willem de Kooning

That is the signature on my email and it’s true. Poverty is giant time suck. It’s a waste of time and resources and even money that could be better spent finding a better paying job or going to school or helping your kids with their homework. But instead, those of us who live in poverty spend most of our days just trying to get the basics covered; food, rent, utilities, medical treatment. And in my state, getting all those things covered (or at least alleviated a tiny bit)is about to get harder for poor women.

In order to balance the budget, Governor Gregoire is cutting the funding that pays for nurses in Welfare offices. The nurses provide annual exams, prenatal care, birth control and most importantly- pregnancy testing. Washington is one of the few states in the country that pays for abortions for women on Medicaid, and the income levels to qualify for Medicaid are higher if you’re pregnant. But you can’t qualify unless you have proof that you are pregnant from a medical provider. If you are poor and without health insurance, you can either go to Planned Parenthood, spend 10 dollars (after the $20 you’ve already spent getting a drugstore test), pee in a cup and get certification that you are in fact knocked up. Then you have to go to the Welfare office and apply. It’s expensive for someone making less than $800 a month.

Or you can go the Welfare office when the nurse is in, pee in that cup for free and save yourself $10 plus bus fare for several trips.

The inauguration is coming and with it comes more news from the Obama camp about how the only people that really matter are dudes, straight dudes.

First comes Rick Warren, professional homophobe and woman hater. He’s giving the invocation at the inauguration. He thinks that abortion is a holocaust, which makes women like me Nazis. I guess I should get to sig heiling right quick.

He also hates teh gays. You know they are trying to corrupt the good clean youth of America with their dirty ass sex and liberal views. Or something. He thinks that gay marriage is as evil as rape. As a woman who was raped, I can tell you that there is a world of difference between the happy champagne toast of a committed couple and being pinned under a drunken lead singer who thinks it’s cute when you cry and scream “No!”. Not the same thing at all. Really.

But………..

Obama says he disagrees with Warren on these issues and he is just trying to bring some unity to the country. Unity for straight dudes only I’m thinking, since the person Obama has put in charge of writing his inauguration speech is none other than boob grouping, drunk face book star Jon Favreau.

Sweet. I wonder if Favreau can work in some funny sexist jokes about how us dumb bitches don’t know what’s good for us. Can’t we see the Obama is the change we’ve been waiting for? Change from having control over our own bodies restricted, change from being the sex class, change from marginalizing people bases on anatomy or sexual preferences?

From inauguration day forward, America is going to be a different place, a better place, if you have a penis and you sleep with women. But for the rest of us, it looks a hell of a lot like the last 8 years.

me: I’m doing yoga on the lama’s mat- whatcha gonna do about it

Ouyang: i’m gona send the walgreen’s police to repo your plan b
whoa…the links are blue and you turned off comment mod?

me: yep
but I didn’t know about the blue links

Ouyang: i think the already clicked ones…cuz i click all your links

me: awe
you lurve my links

Ouyang: wow…i left a link to a nikol hassler piece in that post of yours
but now i just found a screed about MTSS from a town hall site
it’s terrible
it still refers to Jane fonda as “hanoi jane”

me: really- I need terrible to rage at today

Ouyang: http://townhall.com/columnists/MaryGrabar/2007/12/19/sex_education_lesson_beat_up_the_virgins
go get ’em tiger!

Ouyang: vagina worshipping devils we all!

me: hell yes
my vag should be worshipped. I do kegels after all

Ouyang: me too!
shit…i am late for my twice daily abortion!

me: I got kung fu pussy grip baby
twice- shit I do it three times a day when I’m brushing my teeth
though it is getting harder to schedule around all the castration ceremonies

Ouyang: i know…such a tight schedule

me: it’s like I don’t have enough time for me anymore, what with the lesbian orgies and the domineering bitch classes

Ouyang: the castrations are just too much…must we keep doing them?

me: Until we can find a way to stop having boy babies, I fear they must continue

Ouyang: damn…someone get central and south asia on the line…i hear they got the ins on gender based infantcide

me: yes, but then you’re just going to have Angelina Jolie types running around adopting white male babies to save them from their horrible fates.
And that totes ruins our plan of ending men forever

Ouyang: damn them
and their baby collecting obsessions

me: I know

Ouyang: well…i guess we can’t win for trying
we will just have to keep selling misandry

me: We could abandon the castrating and just make them all slaves.
Think very Planet of the Apes men in lion clothes
loin
not lion
that would be weird
I can just see a big hairy mane where thier package should be

Ouyang: i like where you are going w/ this

me: Yes

me: I’m thinking that since they are SOOOOO sure that men must do manly work, we should make them all shovel out sewers and work in slaughter houses. That should make them feel better
No prissy thinking jobs for them. That’s women’s work!

Ouyang: there ya go!

So it seems I am not making a clear point when it comes to the black vote and prop 8, so I thought I would use an example we are ALL familiar with.

Imagine that you have a group of liberals who want people to vote a certain way on something. These liberals are the top of the privilege heap, white, educated, decidedly not poor or struggling. And they figure that with a few threats and comparisons they make their point perfectly clearly- voting the way I want you to is in your best interest, so you better do it.

Except, for a certain proportion of the population, that message doesn’t ring true. For many of us, it wasn’t good enough that Obama was better than McCain (marginally) on abortion when he was more than willing to use misogyny as a campaign tactic. For African Americans, perhaps the comparison to interracial marriage and equal rights wasn’t strong enough to overcome the pull of their churches and long held belief systems (that in fact have a very pragmatic reason for existing when you consider eugenics and slavery, etc).

For those of us who didn’t vote for Obama, the Roe V Wade arguments and the “stupid bitches don’t know what’s good for them” talk didn’t make us MORE likely to vote for Obama. Quite the contrary. So perhaps painting the entire black population of California as bigoted idiots who need to be schooled on human rights isn’t the best way to get them to come around to gay marriage.

We were all asked “What would it take for you to vote for Obama?” But we haven’t asked the black community what they need to comfortable with gay marriage. Do they need more liberal pastors, do they need more guarantees that their bodies and their children’s bodies will be safe from harm so that they don’t have to worry about attempts to wipe out their population (and we have tried to wipe them out, see crack, the fact that black women lose custody of their children to the foster system more often than white women, the schools to prison pipelines in black neighborhoods, the lack of living wage employment for black men).

Perhaps once we start addressing the black community as a whole, they will not feel so threatened by a part. Perhaps if Obama had addressed women as more than wombs with claws and crying streaks, we would have voted for him.

Americans spend a hell of a lot of money paying for things we don’t want, especially those of us on the left side of the country.

We paid for the hideous bailout that did nothing (and will be paying more, just you wait)

We pay for the prison industrial complex, the military industrial complex, the Iraq war. We pay farm subsidies so giant agri-business farmers can pump us full of genetically modified corn. We pay for executions and Guantanamo bay and Kangaroo courts. We pay for wire-tapping and eaves dropping and torture.

So I have been thinking about Obama and health care. First, thank god for Max Baucus and Hillary, without whom Obama might easily slide universal health care under the rug.But I am also thinking about Obama’s wishy washy, couldn’t give a damn attitude towards choice.

In the brave new world of healthcare reform, can we finally include birth control and abortion services in our coverage. Only a few states (WA included) cover abortion under Medicaid. They figured out that it was cheaper to pay for abortions than it was to pay for unwanted children. But more than just as a cost effective measure, when do we women get to have full rights to access the healthcare we need?

We pay for things we hate all the time. I think it’s about time that the wingnuts of the country had to pony up and pay for things they hate too. Like healthcare access for women. Even us dirty sluts who have sex and get pregnant and don’t want to be turned into a brood mares.

Open for Ridiculousness

ME: Hola chiquita!

OUYANGDAN:: what is up?
so i told the Kid that I would pull her out of school for a couple of hours to go vote w/ me

ME: cool
I always take The Kid with me

OUYANGDAN:: she was sooooo excited!

ME: Kid was the first time. Now he brings a book and ignores me

OUYANGDAN:: she was all “really! i can help you help pick the president?”

ME: sweet!

OUYANGDAN:: she is learning about presidents at school and was so friggin excited. she gets excited over the stangest things

ME: that’s not strange. I still get excited over voting

OUYANGDAN:: i do too…it just didn’t occur to me that she would get excited
so i offered to take her w/ me
and told her that she could ask me all the questions she wanted

ME: that’s soooo sweet. Dear gawd i want to eat your child
I’m dressing up as red riding hood because all the creativity I can muster is tying a red bedsheet over a black dress

OUYANGDAN:: works for me. i’m gonna be alice cooper b/c i have eyeliner
ME: Sweet!

EDITED FOR PICS OF OD’s bloody roommate

OUYANGDAN:: i know. he came home drunk monday night, w/ a new mohawk and demanded I bring the camera to forever collect how he is coming out of anesthesia

ME: Oh dear gawd- is he 15?

OUYANGDAN:: almost…23

ME: Ahhhh
They don’t become fully human till 24 or 25

OUYANGDAN:: i certainly hope so. hahaha
ME: wait- how old is The Guy?

OUYANGDAN:: he will be 24 in feb

ME: Haha- you married a baby!

OUYANGDAN:: i did
in fact do just that

ME: I can’t tease you too much. I’m sleeping with a puppy
a very very sexy puppy

OUYANGDAN:: how old is puppu?

ME: 27- but subtract a few years for lack of experience

OUYANGDAN:: hahaha
that is only a little younger than me!

ME: I know!

OUYANGDAN:: hahaha

ME: I just told him I’m a cougar and then did the meow/ claw thing
It was cute

OUYANGDAN:: i bet!

ME: I just want to devour him

OUYANGDAN:: facial pubes and all

ME: The facial pubes are nice actually. Not at all scratchy and lots of fun to play with
Plus- I’ve seen pics of him without the facial pubes- he looks like a stoned surfer. NOt HOT

ME: So ruth thinks I need to write a WHole Foods Shopper Manfiesto

OUYANGDAN:: hahaha
good idea
like on how to shop well on little or what?

ME: Nooooo- a satire about how fucking awful the uptight obsessives are there
and i say this as a person who will eat my own weight in whole foods butter chicken

OUYANGDAN:: hahaha…i know what you mean. it was awful in california
the aisles were so small and i was always having to squeeze past people, and they would look at me like i was some leper who had just touched them

ME: And their kids! The worst behaved spoiled brats in the universe!

ME: Someone just paid off the rest of my rent $

OUYANGDAN:: wow! yay!
about the rent. not the bratty kids

ME: yes

OUYANGDAN:: good for you!

ME: someone who i don’t know promised me last week (when i still needed a grand) that she wouldcover whatever was left this week

OUYANGDAN:: awww. that is sweet.
very very sweet

ME: I know
now I am all gooey inside

OUYANGDAN:: you are boring when you are gooey 😉
not really…i just had to say that

ME: I can’t hold a clear argument in my head. I don’t know if it’s too much sex (or almost sex- weve taken to dry humping in his car for privacy) or the fact that the world is no longer a cold and lonely place. But my head is all super gooey

OUYANGDAN:: well it is a nice break
however long it lasts
you could use less stress and more something to distract you from shitty stuff

ME: Yep- I’m a realist. It’ll be back to sucking sooner or later
did I tell you i started getting child support again?

OUYANGDAN:: you told me you got a stray payment. is it recurring?

ME: 3 regular checks so far

OUYANGDAN:: wow. sudden but welcomed!

ME: Oh hell yeah It almost doubles my income
OUYANGDAN:: and that is a lot
better
gah i can’t type

ME: gahhhh!
I must go feed the nicotine beast a smokey lung treat
back in 5

OUYANGDAN:: hahaha…OK

ME: miss me?

OUYANGDAN:: like the sun

ME: awe
I’m watching samantha b talk about McCain’s air quote

OUYANGDAN:: hahaha. she is so funny

ME: I just love her. And Sarah Haskins.
And Tina Fey and Amy Pohler
Who was that asswipe who said women aren’t funny?

OUYANGDAN:: no idea. i love it when people pull out the “well, this isn’t that big of a deal, not like issue X that is going on around the world”

ME: Ughhhhh

OUYANGDAN:: or “i am an activist for Y and I don’t think this is that bad

ME: I hate that
OUYANGDAN:: like good ol elspeth here
http://randombabble.com/2008/10/21/ya-know-whats-not-funny/#comment-2962

ME: that’s the whole- well it;s not offensive to ME- so it’s not offensive argument

OUYANGDAN:: i hate that
i really really do. i hate how presumptive it is to tell me what i should be “wasting my time” addressing

ME: Puppy and I were talking about abortion today. He said “I’m trying to go at this from a scientific, philosophical aspect”
I said “How nice that you can be philosophical about something that directly effects my body. What a luxury for you

OUYANGDAN:: pretty much
is PG porn hurting tons of people around the world? maybe not. does it make it seem like it’s ok to laugh at the accidental death of a woman who’s only crime was liking sex?
Yup

ME: And is it from people who should fucking know better? Because they’ve done pretty pro-feminist stuff before?

OUYANGDAN:: pretty much

OUYANGDAN:: I have actually thought about writing to Nathan Fillion to express my disappointment, but it doesn’t come out right
(he’s my friend on MySpace)

ME: Dear nathan Fillion-
I used to think you were the hottest thing ever. And I massively respected you for being in the very girl friendly Firefly series
And i had high hopes for PG porn.
But dude- violence against women, NOT FUNNY
Please resume your former hotness
Kthanxbai

OUYANGDAN:: hahaha…you have a way w/ words

ME: That is why I am an unpaid writer. If I was a complete hack I’d make a million dollars a year

A List:

1)Mrs. or Miss. Can’t we all be Ms.? For that matter, if I am filling out a form for say credit or even a fucking magazine subscription, why does my gender matter. Can’t we skip that whole box of questions and move on?

2)Uncomfortable underwear. Now I like my pretty girly undies, but there is no reason that pretty girly undies cant also be comfy. Same thing for bras. Why do I have to choose between wearable or pretty. And can we make some underwire that doesn’t jack up under my armpits and hurt? Like half an inch shorter with better sewing reinforcement would work to do that.

3)The gawd awful idea that school for children should start at the crack of ass. Kid gets on the bus at 6:30 am to be at school by 7:30. He’s exhausted (we had a mini meltdown this afternoon cause I told him he is going back to a 9pm bed time. You would think that I told him video games have been canceled FOREVER). Why can’t kids start school at the more reasonable 9am?

4)The idea that where you buy your groceries from makes you more morally righteous than everyone else. I’m talking to you- Whole Foods shoppers. It’s a fricken grocery chain started by a libertarian for fucks sake. Just because you overspend on produce does not make you the King of all that is Ethical! Just like people shopping at Walmart are not the scourge of the earth.

5) The lollipop head female ideal that has invaded Hollywood. Go watch some early Friends and check out the women that the guys dated. Still Hollywood pretty, but not severely, concentration camp style, undernourished. Some girls are slim by nature (Kyra Knightly) you can spot them because they don’t look like they need a neck brace. This is not true for most of the women in Hollywood or the world for that matter.

6) The stupid stereotyping done by “educated” liberals and conservatives alike that black kids don’t read or have books in their homes. If I have to hear one more jackass say that black kids are left to linger in the street while good kids like them read a book, I will punch someone in the face. A) It’s not true and B) How stocked is your public library with books where a black kid is the protagonist? Perhaps these kids that you don’t think read have already gone through every book available to them that has a character they can relate too.

7) Conversations that include phrasing like “Is Obama REALLY a black man, he’s only half” “Is Palin REALLY a feminist” “IS a transwoman/man REALLY a woman/man”. YES they are. You can quibble all you like with Obama’s condescending attitude towards poor black men or Palin’s anti-feminist views on abortion or birth control or transpeople’s different experiences from those of the majority of their gender. But people get to identify who they are themselves and you all are gonna have to suck it up and deal.

What do you want to do away with?