This day begins a long road ahead, but for right now I am swept up in the moment and in the beauty of democracy.

Should gay people have the right to be married? Yes. Should the US allow state to state discrimination as each scrambles to either embrace or legislate against gay marriage? No. Should anyone listen to religious leaders (Rick Warren) who liken being gay to being an angry, violent, or shy person, a personality flaw to overcome? Absolutely not.

The second that marriage leapt from a religious ceremony to a licensed civil institution it should have become illegal to discriminate any two consenting adults from entering into it. Gay marriage will not lead to people marrying animals, this is not a slippery slope, it is sad that this is a point that has to be made again and again.

I cannot understand the need for people to spend their lives denying other’s life experiences that we take for granted. Being married means something, it means something for your relationship, for your families, and to society at large. Asking gay people to forgo this is tantamount to the discrimination suffered by the African Americans.
What? Have I gone too far? I don’t think so.

The idea that it is ok for gays to marry in some states and not in others baffles me. How is this right? How is this just? Let each state decide? This is allowing discrimination on a state by state basis. This should not be an issue of state sovereignty but of constitutional rights. I want my friends and loved ones to live freely right here. It is beyond sad that a gay couple may have to leave their home and their family to live as a married couple. How about we send all of the backwards bible thumping people to live in their own state and leave the rest of us sane people alone? That is an amendment I could really get behind.

Also on the receiving end of my adulation was Tim Russert. The day he died I got teary in front of one of my patients (who by the way did not know who Tim Russert was, I guess he was not a hero among the meth using community). It helped my grief when my darling Tom was named as host of Meet The Press in the interim.

Now David Gregory is to take over the position permanently. I have to say that while he was the obvious choice, I think that he is also the best for the job. Although I will miss seeing my beloved I will be giving David the benefit of the doubt.

The second and most discussed topic was Barack Obama’s desire to take away everyone’s guns. I live in a state were guns are EVERY WHERE. The majority of them are used for hunting. It is not unusual on my jogging route for me to trot by someone pulling half a deer carcass out of their Ford F-150. But these are not the guns that they are worried about. They want to make sure that their semi-automatics and assault rifles are still safely nestled in the protective blanket of the second amendment.

I came home, I googled, I read and a smile spread across my face. It seems that any measure whatsoever of gun control is taken as a desire to “take away all of our guns.”

I should admit that am not a champion of gun rights. I believe that they are dangerous and personally lost my friend in second grade when his brother accidentally shot him in the face while playing with Dad’s “unloaded” rifle. I admit also that I do not understand the need to have multiple assault weapons in the house. I am not in love with the idea that there are thousands of ignorant rednecks armed to the gills in my state. If that last statement sounds elitist, I am completely comfortable with that.

Now the gun loving are accumulating weapons that they never before wanted but now need lest certain fire arms become illegal. Insane. It’s like a woman getting pregnant on purpose and then having an abortion because at this time she has the right to have one.

I will take the time to remind everyone that even if President Obama wanted to rip every gun out of every American citizen’s hand (which he does not) he would have to get it through Congress first. Anytime a hysterical conservative wants to have a remedial lesson in how our democracy works please come to me. I will take your hand in mine and slowly, oh so slowly, walk you through the basics.

Now that I have cleared the air let me leap into why I am attacking Limbaugh today. It seems the pursuit of the true story about the initial settling of this country has been deemed un-American. Teaching school children that Thanksgiving didn’t have the warm and fluffy beginnings that we previously believed is also apparently teaching them to “question the decency and goodness of their own country.”

Why don’t we also forget some of the other less savory nuggets of our national history? Little issues like slavery, our treatment of the Japanese during World War II, or the fact that a completely incompetent moron was twice elected by the citizens of this nation.

Those that forget history are doomed to repeat it, right? What about those that just want to rewrite it to give their nation a sunnier past? What happens to those sad souls?

I know, let us all just stuff cotton into our ears, wrap ourselves up in the American flag and bury our heads in the sand. That way we won’t have to be accountable for anything past, present or future. I think that I could actually sell this plan to the conservative party, just as long as I made sure that I promised to be proud of my country while doing it.

2. Perhaps listening to a more eloquent President is confusing or upsetting to you. I suggest that you try inserting, “Ugh” after every third word President Obama says, if you find that this is not enough try imagining that his face is screwed into an idiotic smirk. There, thats more like what you have been used to.

3. President Elect Obama’s BFF Bill Ayers will be dropping by your house this week for dinner so that you too can pal arround with terrorists. He likes steak.

4. I understand that Joe Biden is not the kind of VP that you are used too, so we are in the early stages of talks to see if he is open to shooting anyone of his good friends in the face sometime during the next 4 years.

5. Also to quiet your reservations in the VP department we are going to ask that the Obama girls choose a pit bull for their new puppy. We will be sending them some lipstick for the pup in a complementary shade.

6. Put down Bill OʼReillyʼs Culture Warrior, Ann Coulterʼs Godless: The Church of Liberalism, and Obama Nation: Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality. Even though these very books mirror your thoughts and feelings perfectly, they will only make you feel angrier and more helpless about the future secular, intelligent, and culturally aware administration. We suggest supplementing your reading supply with the Enquirer, same level of writing but different subject matter.

7. If you are an atheist and a republican, continue to justify the policies of extreme, fundamentalist Christian politics. Maybe when Obama’s reign is over you’ll have developed the convoluted logic to support your two opposing beliefs.

8. To pass the time, set up charitable organizations for all of those poor rich people that will be taxed more. They need our help.

9. Don’t let any of Obama’s speeches sway you about togetherness, listening to Americans (even those he disagrees with), protecting human rights, or employing diplomacy to aid our ever declining international image. These issues are clearly unimportant and ridiculous.

10. If none of these suggestions are helpful to you remember that you can always move to Alaska. That way you can still be governed by a folksy, ignorant, and real American.

My family has been joking that in the event of a McCain/Moron (sorry I meant Palin) win that we will all be moving north to join the Canucks. I will not deny that the migration sounds more appealing than living with four more years under the reigning doctrine of the Conservative party, but it is all in jest.

If by some sad, sad, means we do find ourselves with another Republican for Commander-In-Chief, I will be staying here in America. I will continue to fight, and I do mean FIGHT for what I think is right. I think that others will do the same, a President McCain will probably find himself with an approval rating likened to Bush’s within a few months of office.

But none of that is going to happen. Obama will win, I will be running into the street tomorrow night drunk with both victory and wine. Tomorrow is a new day, and I am ready to start celebrating. Wednesday, the United States of America will start rebuilding and reclaiming what it was that made us great. It is the kind of promise that might be enough to turn this generation Y woman into a patriot.