Gay marriage shouldn't be a campaign issue

Just when I thought the presidential campaign had enough distractions, here comes the California Supreme Court's ruling on gay marriage.
So far, I haven't seen any video clips of reporters jamming microphones in front of Hillary Clinton, Barak Obama and John McCain, demanding that they take a stand on the issue.
But that isn't stopping speculation that the court ruling will be sliced and diced among supporters and detractors until the November election, if not afterwards.
In Maine, we have our own Official Morality Police Force known as the Maine Christian Civic League. The executive director, Michael Heath, is ready to launch a petition campaign to repeal the state's gay rights law and spike any further funding for middle school civil rights teams, which he claims are nothing more than cover groups to promote homosexual practices.
Whether Heath gets enough signatures to get the issue on the ballot remains to be seen. But I'm guessing that the California ruling will add fuel to the fire on both sides.
Personally, I could care less about the ruling. I think the whole concept of gay marriage is silly.
Marriage is the union of a man and woman, period. It's a legal contract and institution that's stood the test of time for centuries.
But if the California Supreme Court wants to declare that grapefruit is a mineral instead of a citrus fruit, that's fine with me. It doesn't change the character of the grapefruit.
I also could care less what adults do in the privacy of their own home. One columnist paraphrased his grandmother's view on homosexuality: I don't care what they do, as long as they don't do it in the middle of the road and scare the horses.
I know plenty of gay people. None of them has ever tried to put the make on me. That's probably because I'm married and not very good looking.
I don't feel threatened by homosexuals any more than I feel threatened by someone wearing a turban at Wal-Mart.
Unfortunately, my live-and-let-live views aren't widespread. That's why I'm hoping that gay marriage won’t become an issue in the presidential race.
All three major party candidates say they are basically opposed to gay marriage, but they don't want to dictate what individual states can do. They also oppose a constitutional amendment to ban the practice.
And that's fine with me.
Right now, I'm worried about dipping into my meager IRA to pay for fuel oil this coming winter, not whether Alice and Agnes say “I do” in San Francisco.
Our roads are crumbling because the state and individual towns can't afford to fix them.
One in five Maine residents is on a free or low-subsidy health care plan.
Our school budgets are going up, but some kids are still graduating with marginal reading skills.
The war in Iraq is costing us billions and the country still doesn't have a stabilized government.
We'll be spending more billions in the future on disability payments for soldiers who are coming home with traumatic injuries.
Those are the things that trouble me, not a marriage between Frank and Freddie or Mary and Martha.
Let's stick to the issues that matter the most.
And better yet, let’s find some solutions to the problems instead of whining about them.
Otherwise, we'll have more people staying home on Election Day because they're thoroughly disgusted.
And that would be a real tragedy.

It's the season for Stupid Candidate Tricks

Normally I don’t watch the evening news.
First, it’s too depressing. Who wants to watch a half-hour of earthquakes, cyclones, bloody mayhem, job losses and toenail fungus commercials?
Second, I’m usually tuned in to the Red Sox pregame show.
But I did happen to catch a glimpse of a potential You Tube classic recently: Barak Obama trying to bowl tenpins.
Yep, there he was, decked out in what appeared to be a $75 Pierre Cardin white shirt and tie, easing a bowling ball down an alley somewhere in Indiana. Or maybe it was North Carolina. All bowling alleys look alike.
In any case, the Barak ball limped into the gutter about a quarter-way down the lane. He simply grinned, shook hands and went on his merry way.
This moment of trying to be “one of the guys” was preceded by Hillary Clinton, who showed up at a blue-collar pub in full view of the TV cameras, and downed a shot of Old Overshoe bourbon and washed it down with a mug of beer.
That was sight to behold, really. But as one of her local critics quipped, “If I was married to Bill Clinton, I’d drink too.”
The number of entries in the 2008 edition of Stupid Candidate Tricks will no doubt accelerate as the campaign draws to a merciful end in November.
But before then, I sincerely hope all the candidates put Maine on their itinerary.
I expect to see Obama on a ferris wheel at the Skowhegan State Fair this summer, kayaking in The Forks – wearing a custom-made Ralph Lauren life jacket – and shooting pool at the Madison VFW.
Mrs. Clinton will be photographed tossing horseshoes at the St. Albans Summerfest, stuffing herself at the Bingham Summer Festival pie-eating contest and driving a 4-cylinder Enduro car at Get ‘Er Done Raceway.
I’m not sure what John McCain has been up to lately. After all, he really doesn’t have to campaign until after the Democratic slugfest where the eventual candidate won’t be known until after the convention.
But McCain is a true blue-collar guy. He likes to work in the yard, hunt, fire up the barbecue and probably bowls and shoots pool, too
I can picture him sitting at the local watering hole with a frosted mug debating whether Dice-K will win 20 games for the Red Sox this year or walk 200 batters.
Of course, none of these attributes or hobbies has anything to do with their abilities to run the country. We’re electing the president of the United States, not the captain of the bowling league.
But in order to appear to be “in touch” with the common man or woman, candidates often do things that show just the opposite. In other words, they look insincere.
This is nothing new. Remember Gov. Michael Dukakis and his infamous ride in a tank? I’m not even sure he knew how to put the helmet on. And no, he wasn’t driving.
Lyndon Johnson was the last “good old boy” president. He used to irritate animal lovers by yanking on his hunting dogs’ ears to make them yelp. Once, he took off his shirt to show off the scar from his gall bladder surgery.
But LBJ would have clearly looked out of place wearing a tux at the Metropolitan Opera.
Nevertheless, I’m not complaining. With the potential of hundreds of Stupid Candidate Tricks making their way to TV and the Internet, we could have a very entertaining summer.
And I’m very sincere about hoping that Obama, Clinton and McCain visit Maine this summer.
Who knows? I might even buy Hillary a beer.
But not until after the pie-eating contest.

He's outside talking to the squirrels

I don’t get a lot of phone calls nowadays.
After I decided not to run for reelection as Elks Lodge secretary, the number of calls from curious, irate or bored members decreased significantly.
I’m still doing a great deal of writing, but most of my news contacts use e-mail.
On the rare occasions I do get a phone call, however, I’m often tied up and can’t respond right away.
So I always tell my better half to grab the phone and tell the caller that I’ll get back to them as soon as possible.
“Do you want me to tell them what you’re doing?” she once asked, with a grin.
“Well, not all the time.”
“Like, for instance?”
Well, sometimes people are too honest. When I worked at an auto parts store one summer, it was not uncommon for the counterman to answer the phone and inform the caller that the manager “is taking a crap right now. He’ll call back later.”Of course, the level of honesty also depends on whether the caller has a sense of humor.
One day I was out in the yard trying to convince two red squirrels that they were better off trying not to empty the bird feeders, since I was packing a loaded pellet gun.
The pair was perched on a branch about 10 feet above my head.
So I simply displayed the pistol and informed them, “You know better than that!” I then slammed a stick against a chewed-up wooden feeder and said in a rather annoyed tone, “That’s where you eat!”
I’ll be damned if they didn’t scramble down from the branches onto the feeder.
At that point, I could hear the phone ring in the house and my wife responding, “Michael? He’s outside right now, talking to the squirrels again.”
So once in awhile, I’ll run into someone who asks me how my “outdoor pets” are doing.
Actually, I’d rather deal with a few red squirrels than the raccoons who like to tear up everything in sight after the sun sets.
Last year, one four-legged bandit not only emptied the bird feeder, but took a shit at the bottom of the porch steps. I “discovered” it by accident one morning when I went out to retrieve the Bangor Daily News. What fun!
A few years ago, however, my wife’s honest response was even more humorous.
We had some Abyssinian guinea pigs, including one male named Louie who had quite a shaggy coat. I’d bathe him in the bathroom sink once in awhile and finish up the grooming with a hair dryer.
So one day while I was finishing up the task, the phone rang and my wife informed the caller that I couldn’t come to the phone right away. “He’s in the bathroom right now, blow-drying his guinea pig.”
I’m sure there was dead silence on the other end before the laughter.
Fortunately, we don’t have any riding stables in the neighborhood, so there’s no possibility of another classic answer: “No, he can’t come to the phone right now. He’s in the saddle.”
I'm sure the obvious follow-up question would be, "With who?"

Another clean-up and catch-up day

Since the weather is going to be lousy at least part of the day (Thursday), it’s time to do some cleaning up and catching up.
First, I’ve added a few new links, dropped one and renamed another one.
I’m not a big fan of New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who strikes me as the latest in a succession of gun-grabbing liberals to run the city.
Nevertheless, Bloomberg.com is an awesome business news site. They often beat the mainstream media in major stories; and with oil prices and the housing market dominating the news, I felt more people would like a convenient link to a good source.
So Bloomberg.com has been added to the link list.
I also added the Maine Web Report, a feisty site owned and operated by Web designer and Internet marketing guru Lance Dutson of Searsmont.
Dutson is credited with breaking some major stories in the past about incompetence in Maine government – sorry for the redundant phrase – and usually keeps us posted on political developments.
It’s no secret that Dutson also provides Internet services for Sen. Susan M. Collins’ re-election campaign, although he’s roasted a few Republicans on his grill over the years.
Tony Bessey, a semi-regular on AsMaineGoes.com, started Ordinary Maine a few days ago. While he doesn’t have much content yet, I expect Tony to liven up the Blogosphere in the near future. He’s also a Masonic brother and fairly active in the craft.
My favorite motorsports columnist, Travis Barrett of Central Maine Newspapers, switched from a Google Blog to something called Type Pad. I have no idea why, but the content is still pretty good. Unfortunately, I can’t increase the font size on the screen so I’m not reading it on a regular basis.
In any case, I’ve simply renamed the blog by its proper title: Green-White-Checker. If you want to keep up with the local motorsports scene, Travis’ blog is the place to do it.
I’ve dropped the Seattle Times link because few, if anyone, is accessing it.
It’s a pretty good paper, but not in the same vein as the Boston Globe, New York Times or Chicago Tribune.
I don’t have the Times or Globe links up because they require registration. I can link individual stories, however, when I think you’d be interested in reading them.
I put the Tribune link up simply because the paper has some very talented writers. I don’t know one end of Chicago from another.
It’s fairly easy to add and delete links on a blog, so if anyone has any thoughts about sites that should be added to this one, drop me a note in the comment section.
I don’t necessarily publish all the comments I receive, and always respect the wishes of those who don’t want their remarks revealed.
I don’t publish my email address for obvious reasons. Despite a good filtering system, I still get a lot of spam and assorted crap in my in-box every day. A lot of messages are unsolicited offers for products I don’t want and don’t need.
Once your email goes into a semi-public domain, you might as well put it on a bulletin board in downtown Portland – if they were still legal in Maine.
But I always read the comments.