Primary candidates: Felons, John Connor, and Anonymous

Now that the Republicans finally got their act together and nominated the guy who I'm positive will at some point rip off his shirt and start fighting terrorists with laser beams from his eyes, we can get down to business on the real primary challenge.

I'm talking, of course, of the Democratic primary. In Arkansas, Obama is getting fierce resistance from some dude named John Wolfe. Nobody has ever heard of this guy, but I believe it's actually just a clever alias for John Connor.

Connor's put on a little weight, apparently.

 Over in Kentucky, voters are torn between Obama and absolutely nobody at all, with 40% of the vote going to "uncommitted".

"About two out of every five Democratic voters in Tuesday’s presidential primary in Kentucky chose “uncommitted” instead of voting for President Barack Obama. …

“I’m at a victory celebration for ‘uncommitted’ who performed admirably,” said [state GOP chair Steve] Robertson. “I’ve never met the guy but know that he highly embarrassed Obama.”

Kentucky’s vote was notable, though, for the fact that there weren’t even any other candidates on the ballot. The most the “uncommitted” option won so far this primary season was previously 21 percent in the North Carolina primary earlier this month. Kentucky looks as though it will double that number.

What could be more embarrassing than almost losing when you don't have any opposition whatsoever? Maybe almost getting beat by a convicted felon who is currently serving time in another state altogether.

A federal inmate who is running for president won 42 percent of the vote in West Virginia’s Democratic primary yesterday. According to the Associated Press, Keith Judd is serving time at the Beaumont Federal Correctional Institution in Texas for making threats at the University of New Mexico in 1999.

 Naturally, there's no doubt Obama will actually win the nomination in the end. There's also the fact that he didn't have much of a shot in Kentucky or West Virginia anyhow, with them being all but card carrying members of the "anyone but that Obama character" club.

Still, it can't bode well if the Magic O is finding it hard to win against convicted felons and nobody at all. How hard can a fight against yourself actually be?

Pretty hard, as it turns out.

NC passes super extra ban on gay marriage

On Tuesday voters in North Carolina decided that simply having a law saying something is illegal is too ambiguous, so they had a voter referendum on an amendment to their constitution that made gay marriage super, ultra illegal. The referendum, which passed overwhelmingly with 61% of the vote, reinforces the existing statute (passed in 1996) that defined marriage as between one man and one woman.

Despite the fact that this changes precisely nothing about the current situation in the state, this turn of events has made huge waves across the country. Since I'm only gay when I'm with the military, and I don't live in NC, this has very little to do with me; but since when has that stopped me from having an opinion?

If you want to know where I stand on gay marriage in general (hint: I'm for it), I refer you to this blog, written jointly by Jonathan Rauch (a gay liberal) and David Blankenhorn (a straight conservative Christian). I'd also encourage you to read another excellent piece Jonathan wrote on his own, which is actually the article that changed my opinion on the subject. Both are persuasive because they do not start with the assumption that anyone who is against gay marriage is a hate monger. Quite the contrary, it admits and brings up a variety of completely legitimate arguments for not tampering with marriage, then addresses them.

In the specific case of North Carolina, I do not agree with how they stand. After all, what do I care who you make out with? That being said, I err on the side of the 10th Amendment, the one that tells the Federal Government to get the eff out of the State's business. The State's can and should decide this issue on their own. It is my belief that over time the views on homosexual marriage will soften, and society will come to accept it as an alternative in the future.

If you are currently gay, wish to become married, and live in North Carolina, I counsel you to move to somewhere less hostile. I say this not from the standpoint of "If you don't like Amurika you can get the hell out!" kind of rhetoric we usually hear. What I mean is, leave, and deprive the state of your talent, taxes, and resources. If states such as North Carolina lose otherwise fine, upstanding citizens due to decisions of this nature then over time it may effect change.