Life, Love, and Liberty

The musical duet of Daryl Hall and John Oates has always been a delight for my ears and I love to move to it like crazy.

I’ve spent most of my time lately enjoying the two albums I received from my older sister Sarah and her husband Chad for christmas so I’ll list the songs from those CDs that I’ve been turning to time and time again…

Used To Be My Girl-Our Kind Of Soul

Soul Violins-Our Kind Of Soul

Man On a Mission-Do It For Love

Someday We’ll Know(with Todd Rundgren)-Do It For Love

Life’s Too Short-Do It For Love

Getaway Car-Do it For Love

She Got Me Bad-Do it For Love

Intuition-Do It For Love

Something About You-Do It For Love

The picks from earlier releases of theirs would have to be….

Rich Girl-Rock N Soul Part 1

She’s Gone-Abandoned Luncheonette

Kiss On My List-Rock N Soul Part 1

I hope fellow Hall and Oates aficionados can help me expand this list!

My musical recommendation for today comes from an album titled Give Up by The Postal Service that contains an enchanting piece called Such Great Heights.The catchy beat is fantastic and very lively so give it a chance.

A controversial issue of recent times has been whether the state should grant legal recognition to same sex couples by allowing them access to martial licenses with the accompanying benefits. This access should be allowed as long as the state is in the business of regulating martial relations in the first place. The opposition voiced on religious grounds isn’t applicable in the context of a secular government that shouldn’t make policy on the basis of religious beliefs in the manner of a theocracy. It’s important to keep in mind the crucial distinction between your personal beliefs and what the law’s stance on a particular question should be. The central issues at stake are equality before the law and access to benefits/tax breaks that gay/lesbian individuals are forced to provide the basis of via taxation. A resolution of these concerns should trump whatever a particular religious tradition may say on the proper definition of marriage even if it is very influential.

I am struck by the irony of an allegedly conserative president being the originator of an amendment to federalize marriage when conseratives proclaim their devotion to the ideal of limited government. This doesn’t seem to apply when it comes to using the power of the state to advance a religious agenda. I should add the disclaimer that people have the right to hold whatever view on the proper nature of marriage they want but that is different from infusing it with the power of government.

The solution I’d like to see would be a separation of state and marriage but I’d like to demolish an argument I find particularly faulty before diving into that. I’d sometimes hear people use slippery slope reasoning in their opposition to gay marriage that consisted of saying that it would lead to people marrying cars, animals, and so forth. It’s not hard to see the flaw in this argument which is that inanimate objects or organisms without the ability to perform conceptual thinking can have no idea of marriage. It’s also a pretty irrelevant point because human politico-economic systems are formed by and for humans.

A separation of marriage and state would make it a private contractual affair between individuals of any sexual orientation. There wouldn’t be benefits/tax breaks for anyone on the basis of martial status so the issue of equality before the law would be resolved. This is a live and let live approach that would allow those who wanted to adhere to a traditionalist conception of marriage to do so but without any ability to stop others from viewing it in a different light.

This isn’t likely to happen anytime soon though and gay/lesbian individuals should be allowed access to martial licenses. It’s especially important for this to occur when they are forced by taxation to help provide the basis for martial benefits/breaks in the first place.

Further reading:

http://www.indegayforum.org/authors/boaz/boaz2.html

I know next to nothing about the Divinyls but their tune I Touch Myself is a favorite of mine because of it’s catchy melody that I often groove too.

It contains some choice lyrics like…

“You’re the one who makes me happy honey
You’re the sun who makes me shine
When you’re around I’m always laughing
I want to make you mine”

Dynamite wording in my book!

I’ve been tagged by Chris Matthew Sciabarra with the Meme-of-Four questionnarie that’s been floating around the libertarian blogosphere so I’ll provide some answers.

Four jobs I’ve had:
1.Quasi-Professional Chess Player (The Skills of an Amauter But I’ve Competed for Cash)
2.Assistant Chess Instructor at Pembroke Hill School
3.Assistant For a Friend of My Mom’s-Misc. Tasks
4.Sporadic Volunteer at Franklin Center Restaurant

Four movies I can watch over and over again:
1.Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
2.The Original Blue Brothers
3.The Big Lebowski
4.Saving Private Ryan

Four places I’ve lived:
1.Kansas City, Missouri-Valentine Neighborhood
2.Silver Spring, Maryland
3.Kansas City, Missouri-Roanoke Court Apartments
4.Midwest

Four TV shows I love:
1.Roseanne
2.Family Guy
3.The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
4.Aqua Teen Hunger Force

Four highly regarded and recommended TV shows I haven’t seen (much of):
Tons!

Four places I’ve vacationed:
1.Colorado
2.New Orleans
3.New York City
4.Philadelphia

Four of my favorite dishes:
1.Fettiucine Alfredo
2.Pizza of All Kinds
3.Pepper Jack Cheese-I Am a Connoisseur of Yummy Cheeses
4.Lemony Greek Chicken-I Don’t Know the Precise Name But It’s Mighty Tasty

Four sites I visit daily:
1.Chessgames.com
2.Notablog
3.Once Upon a Time
4.Blogger.com

Four places I’d rather be right now:
1.At a Really Awesome Chess Tournament
2.Relaxing with Close Friends
3.New York City
4.Grooving Away at a Concert

Four (only four?!) albums I can’t live without:
1.Marvin Gaye-What’s Going on? Live in Concert
2.Hall and Oates-Do it for Love
3.Against Me-Searching for a New Clarity
4.Marvin Gaye Gold

Four new bloggers I am tagging
1.Arthur Silber
I don’t really know a lot of active bloggers.

I decided to take a dive into the genre of movie musicals today with Belle from the classic Beauty And The Beast. It sports a combination of fun lyrics and an engaging background melody.

It’s hard to pigeonhole me musically because I’ll listen to lots of different stuff and I see a person’s musical tastes as a very personal thing so these songs of the day will reflect my eclecticism.

I’ve gone from Marvin Gaye to a dancing tune in the past two days and now I turn to punk rock so I’m drawing from a diversity of genres but I wouldn’t have it any other way! The tune for today is a soothing song from the CD Against Me called Joy.

I discovered today’s song of the day when I was watching A Night at the Roxbury while doing my daily dose of chess problems and suddenly found myself inspired to do a little jig.

What is Love-Haddaway

What a beat to groove too!

It’s my father’s birthday today so I wanted to take the time out to wish him a very happy one!

I christened my web blog life, love, and liberty because each of those terms represents something of value in this world…

Life-The fountainhead of all our joys and sorrows that makes the pursuit of our dreams possible and exists even during our most depressive of times.

Love-That joyous connection we experience with another human being whether as friends or lovers that can make life all the more worthwhile.

Liberty-An often used term but I see liberty as being free of coercion and sovereign in your own person to the extent that you respect the same in others. It’s important to emphasize that liberty is not merely a political phenomenon but also a cultural one.

I am a huge fan of the music of the late Marvin Gaye so I am going to vouch for a live version of his classic Sexual Healing that I simply can’t get enough of. It makes me tap my toes and do a dance so I encourage folks to check the tune out.