I love you America, but fuck you Wisconsin!

The election results brought me mixed feelings. I'm elated that the Democrats have taken control of the House, and are just about even in the Senate. I'm happy that Wisconsin re-elected a Democratic governor, and that the entire election culminated in Rumsfeld resigning (Bush says that it was a long-planned move, but that sounds like fibs to me).

Locally, two elections that I really had my heart on didn't go the way I wanted. Voters elected to amend Wisconsin's constitution to specify that a marriage is a union between a man and a woman, and that no other partnership would ever be recognized. This wasn't an amendment saying, "Oh, let's let gay couples marry." It was an amendment saying, "Let's never let them have any kind of partnership. Ever." So gay marriage wasn't legal here before, but now it's explicitly illegal.

It makes me feel sick. The only reason someone would vote this way is out of ignorance or hatred. Civil unions never hurt anybody, never threatened families. I know that some conservatives think that civil unions would mean the unraveling of the American family. I'd love some of them to come to my school and meet my students...then they'd know what unraveled families are. If I had the chance to move my students from their neglectful single-parent households, their abusive two-parent households, or their life of traveling from one relative to another, and place them with a stable, loving gay couple, I'd do it in a heartbeat.

The other amendment that passed allows the use of the death penalty in Wisconsin. Again, it makes me feel sick. They say that taking a life is the worst crime you can commit, but states all around the nation reserve that same right for themselves.

Mike actually debated with his parents on this point when we visited them last. His mother was voting in favor, and he did his best to tell her why it was wrong. In the end she said, "I don't know, I still think we need it."

"No we don't," I piped up. "All the worst criminals get killed in prison anyway."

"Oh," she said. "I never thought of that." But I could tell she didn't appreciate my interjection. I need to work on my debating skills.

So nationally I'm happy. Locally, not so much. But in a way that's good because I can work to change my city and my state. I'd have a harder time changing the nation.