Saner heads prevail - posted at 21:35

In the run-up to Super Tuesday, it seems that a lot of other pretty important news stories are being glossed over. Luckily, in between speculation about who will win in what state and blah blah blah (OH MY GOD, PEOPLE, IT IS STILL NINE MONTHS UNTIL ELECTIONS AND I'M WAY PAST SATURATION) NPR played a snippet about Oregon passing a law allowing civil unions for same-sex couples during their hourly news broadcasts. I wanted to hoop and holler in the car!

See, I consider myself half from Oregon (living in Washington in a suburb of Portland will cause this sort of confusion) and it was a really, really sore point with me when Oregon passed a civil union ban during the last Presidential election. Its passage always puzzled me - the bulk of the population lives in the liberal western side and anyone who has wandered the streets of downtown Portland at night would share my befuddledment. Anyway, it would appear that the state is going for redemption now, which is awesome, because really, people, laws that restrict rights have no place in any constitution, be it a state's or a nation's. Granted, the law that bars access to marriage to people with matching fun bits is still on the books but at least cooler heads are trying to find a way around it.

So kudos to you, Oregon. You make me proud.