Frank Kameny

Back in my high school days, if a guy wanted to insult another guy, he'd accuse him of sucking dicks. Not being a worldly person, I assumed that this was all talk, that nobody actually did that sort of thing. Yes, I was a totally overprotected being.

When I started college in 1968, I became interested in the wonderful world of campus protest. One day, a man named Frank Kameny showed up and gave the first speech I had ever heard on gay rights. I was quite taken aback that, not only did homosexuals exist, but that this man publicly admitted to being one.

I don't suppose that I can say that from that very day my eyes were opened, but I had definitely learned a thing or two.

The memory of that day was freshened for me today on a Daily Kos diary by one Michael Petrelis. Mr. Petrelis wants President Obama to give Frank Kameny the Medal of Freedom.

Here is a link to Petrelis's blog (and I hope he doesn't mind my linking there):

http://mpetrelis.blogspot.com/

The post in question is from May 31, 2010.

Frank Kameny was the bravest of men, campaigning for gay rights when things were many times more dangerous for a homosexual than they are today.

Cardio-gasp-vascular... puff... fitness

I went to Yosemite last week, for the first time since I was in my twenties--I'm 59 now. I wondered if my back would give out on some trail, and planned only easy day hikes.

Easy. A few hundred feet up the trail on my first hike, I was so winded I thought I might faint. It was the famous aha! moment.

I didn't expect hiking to be as easy as when I was 24... or maybe I did. I was shocked by how out of shape I am, even though the ugly extra 30 pounds of gut I see in the mirror gave me fair warning.

I'm hoping that, instead of merely becoming dispirited, I take measures to improve my cardiovascular fitness. Stair climbing would seem to be appropriate exercise. You've got to climb to get out of the valley.

During my park visit, I bought a book about Yosemite trails, and reading it does excite me--I long to see some more places in the high country before I die. That desire is a good impetus to get fit.

Birdbrains

In a recent column, George Will claimed that power-generating windmills will kill more birds than the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Other conservatives have called the windmills eyesores.

Eyesores. The Right is deeply offended by these eyesores.

After hundreds of years of smoke-belching factories, coal mines, oil derricks and refineries suffered without complaint, the Right has suddenly developed compassion for animals and a sense of aesthetics.

Bafflement

I was just watching a video on Youtube of a prayer being given at a college graduation ceremony. A young woman was repenting for "worshipping the intellectual mind" and "the humanism that we have embraced."

Why... did... you... go... to... college?