San Diego Mayor Supports Gay Marriage

This is the most touching and moving speech by a politician.

**Warning** This is a tearjerker. It really is.

Sonnet XVII: Pablo Neruda | A LOVE POEM

A client gave this to me and while she read it to her husband in my office I burst into tears!! It was a beautifully worded piece and wanted to share it with you all.

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of
carnations the first shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be
loved.
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as
the plant that never blooms
but carries itself the light of hidden
flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the
earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or
when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or
pride;
So I love you because I know no other way.

but this,
where I do not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my
hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.

I just loved it as it reflects the darkness that turns into light for our couples. It certainly has happened for Mike and me. This really spoke to me.

Happy Rosh Hashana September 12, 2007

In the Jewish Religion it is Rosh Hashana which means "a new year". I invite everyone to use this time to renew and refresh your lives as I do each Jewish New Year.

Here is a funny youtube about Rosh Hashanah.

Warmly, Joe Kort

80's Cher Doll

Many of you know that I am an loyal diva fan of Cher and Diana Ross. As a child I was not allowed to play with dolls so I would do so in hiding. My sister had Barbies and I would play with them when no one was around and watching.

In the 1990's with the popularity of ebay.com I started collecting the Barbie Dolls I always wanted. I now have most of the dolls I have always wanted and am still collecting more.

Now there is a new Cher doll for 2007. The doll is made to look like Cher from the 1980's.

I always say, "It is never too late to have a happy childhood!"

Can't We All Just Get Along?

Here is an article I wrote about the problems gay men have in terms of being competitive.

Mixed Marriages: Interfacial Couples in Different Cute-gories!

A humorous essay was written in in Time Magazine called, When Your Spouse is Hotter than You by BELINDA LUSCOMBE an editor with Time Magazine on April 26, 2007.

The author talks about the discrimination couples face when one partner is more attractive than the other partner. While this article is in jest, it also should be taken seriously in terms of the prejudice that exists for these couples.

Luscombe writes:

I've been in a mixed marriage for a decade and a half now and gotten used to the stares and nudges. I've even developed a couple of airy responses to the inevitable comments that arise from co-workers and friends along the lines of "Um, your husband is so hot..." Sometimes I go with "Oh, that's not my husband--that's my twin brother," and other times a dismissive "Yeah, but back in Australia I'm considered a great beauty. It's Nicole Kidman who's the hag." Each time, it hurts just a little less.

Like so many in my situation, I didn't mean to intermarry. It wasn't that I had ideas above my station; it was just that I was young and naive enough to think love would conquer all. Also, to be perfectly frank, I didn't think he was that hot. That's what makes this type of discrimination particularly insidious: it's not clear that couples have transgressed against hotness-equality laws until they're already married.

Nobody minds if you date outside your tribe, and people applaud an ambitious play for the hubba-hubba human across the room, but--as my brothers and sisters in the gay community have found--there's a world of difference between what people will accept in the innocent suburbs of hooking up and the judgmental metropolis of marriage.There is even an Urban Dictionary definition.

Elizabeth Hasselbeck from The View on marriage for gays

Elizabeth Hasselbeck from "The View" makes some great points about why gays should be able to marry.

1. For the children.

Children deserve a couple in a committed relationship.

Did you know that in Michigan and some other states, you cannot adopt as a gay couple. You have to adopt as a single person. If people insist on two parents than how could can this be logical that as a lesbian or gay person you cannot be a couple to adopt a child? Insane!

2. For hospital rights and visitations.

Did you know that if you are not legally married you do not have rights within a hospital setting to be in the room with the patient because you are not family.

3. Marriage is a covenant between two people.

4. Civil Unions only provide a certain amount of rights.

The couple does not receive the 1300 and more Federal rights that heterosexuals have. If one partner dies there will not be social security benefits of the other because that is a Federal law privilege not a civil law one.

THANK YOU Elizabeth.