Now we have big, grown-up fears.

Global warming is very scary. I mean, the whole frickin’ planet is melting or something and there’s nothing we can do about it except wave goodbye to polar bears as they float away on what’s left of an iceberg. Remember when we were supposed to be afraid of icebergs? OK, we’re all a little too young for that but we’ve seen Titanic, right? We know what those suckers were capable of.

China is scary. It’s just so big. And all those people buying up America and putting chemicals in baby food. Now we have to be afraid of baby food and lead in toys and six year olds competing in the Olympics. It just never ends.

Cows are scary. They carry all kinds of diseases that can turn your brain to mush and they eat all that grain and people starve and then they have a lot of gas which burns a hole in the ozone layer or something.

Terrorists are scary and apparently they can be anywhere at anytime. Can’t say I’d know one if I saw one in the street but I’m afraid of them. Iran is scary. I know very little about Iran but what I know isn’t good, so I feel my heart beat a little faster whenever I hear about Iran.

Pakistan is scary, too. Not sure why but it has something to do with caves and terrorists, and you know what I think about terrorists.

The economy is way scary. What are we going to do when there’s no stock market left? I mean, we need a stock market, right? My fingers are actually sweating right now and I can barely type just thinking of what will happen when we no longer have a stock market. Or money.

We know this is going to happen, why do you think there were so many stampedes on Black Friday? People are stocking up on televisions and Elmos and DVD players because we all know in a few weeks money will be worthless.

Black Friday is scary too; people died. Enough said.

Living in America scares me. I mean, I’ve seen shit flush down a toilet slower than the decline of this country.

Whatever happened to bomb shelters? Anyone else think it’s a good idea to bring those things back? I think it’s a good idea.

Anyone here know how to grow food underground?

Weather is scary. Tornadoes, floods, hurricanes, wildfires. What the hell, man? We can send people to the moon but we can’t stop a hurricane? It’s all a conspiracy.

Spies are everywhere. Don’t think they aren’t. They could be reading this as I type. I may as well unplug everything and build a shack in woods. Worked for Thoreau. Well, not really, he ended up in jail.

Christmas is coming and that’s scary, too. You can’t say Merry Christmas without offending someone. You can’t say Happy Holidays without offending someone else. You can’t eat roast beef for Christmas dinner because of the cow thing and you can’t have a tree because of the global warming thing. You can’t string lights outside because they are bad for the environment and egg nog will clog up your arteries so fast it’ll make your head spin. It’s one huge PC landmine field and I’m in a panic just thinking about how I’m going to survive the next several weeks unscathed.

Even light bulbs are scary. Who knew? Carbon footprints frighten me. They are like that plaster cast of Sasquatch’s foot you see on television only bigger and blacker and looming over me so that I start to hyperventilate every time I turn on a light or run my lawnmower. I mean, I have to cut my grass, people! What am I supposed to do, get a cow to graze in my yard? I don’t think so.

There seems to be no way out of this mess. Our collective hand basket is full and careening towards hell at top speed and there’s no one left to talk us down off the ledge. Whoa. Mixed metaphors frighten me, too.

And if you think things are bad now, just you wait until 2012 or when the aliens land, or both. Then all this stuff will look like play-time; you can bet on it. If you have money, that is.

Someone once said we have nothing to fear but fear itself. I think that’s one of the stupidest things I’ve ever heard.

We have nothing left but fear. Right?

Numerous news sources have since reported that it was black voters who overwhelmingly voted to ban gay marriage. In fact, according to The Washington Post, seven in ten black voters in California who voted for Obama, voted for Proposition 8 to ban gay marriage.

And Barack Obama, ever the centrist, or should that be equivocator, claimed Proposition 8 was divisive, yet does not support gay marriage.

Add to this the 53% of Latino voters who were against Proposition 8 and gay marriage didn’t stand a chance in California.¹

In 2004, I had the good fortune to hear Coretta Scott King speak, and she stood up in front of a crowd of about a thousand people and demanded we fight for the rights of gays everywhere. Mrs. King saw the connections and made clear that the struggle never ends, but her views are not shared by other leaders of the Civil Rights movement, past and present.

The California chapter of the NAACP opposed Proposition 8 and the Sacramento chapter was so divided it did not even vote on the issue.²

The formidable Civil Rights activist Fred Shuttlesworth has also adamantly refused to even consider that gays should have rights and in recent years has done all he can to defeat any legislation to protect the rights of gays in Cincinnati, Ohio.

So, as much as I would like, I cannot fully participate in the celebration of the election of a black president. After all that has happened in America, to finally reach this point should be the greatest victory; instead, as Mrs. King told us that day four years ago, the struggle goes on. And on and on. Maybe one day, we’ll all understand at the same time that we all deserve the same rights and privileges and forgo the sad habit of forgetting where we once were and who still resides there.

1. Karl Vick and Ashley Surdin. WashingtonPost.com, Friday, November 7, 2008.
2. Susan Ferriss. McClatchy Newspapers. November 7, 2208. Freep.com