<HTML><BODY STYLE="font:10pt verdana; border:none;"><DIV>Tom and Carl and Dick, and the various folks they've quoted, all suggest that we need to find common ground, allow the President to lead us, get ourselves together. For some people, maybe that's possible. For me, looking at 11 successful anti-gay initiatives around the country supported by a President who wants the U.S. Constitution amended to harm my family, it's hard to imagine how that might work. The President, and most of his supporters, have made it painfully clear that they don't want me, and Joan, and our kids, and the other millions of gay and lesbian citizens and their families, in their world. In fact, they used those anti-gay initiatives as a way to turn out voters Gay and lesbian families were demonized to get white Evangelical voters to the polls. Is it surprising that we're not too eager to get in line behind the men who sold us down the river?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Luckily, I'm not discouraged. We're not going anywhere. This is my hometown, even when it descends into a nightmarish imitation of national hatemongering and dirty tricks--and what a pitiful spectacle, to see Barrett Schroeder, whom I have met with pleasure at a local Republican fundraiser after helping his dad beat back a weirdo challenger in the primary, accusing Shirley Ringo of evil attendance policies, or Tom Trail, for whom I have had a great deal of respect, hawking his Christianity as a qualification for public office. How awful to know that someone tried to discredit the MCA by making threatening phone calls apparently on its behalf. This *is* my country, whether it wants me or not. And pretty soon, when our Middle Eastern wars claim the lives of too many U.S. men and women, when more of us are poorer than ever before, when Social Security is gone, our national debt is unimaginably large, and we're divided by class, by race, by religion, by language, by sexual orientation . . . something *will* change.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I can wait. And in the meantime, I can try to clean up Moscow a little, and see if we can't get some hungry people fed, some poor people clothed, and some freedom proclaimed to the captives here and abroad.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Melynda Huskey</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px"> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt Arial">----- Original Message -----</DIV> <DIV style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt Arial; COLOR: black"><B>From:</B> Tom Hansen</DIV> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt Arial"><B>Sent:</B> Wednesday, November 03, 2004 12:47 PM</DIV> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt Arial"><B>To:</B> vision2020@moscow.com</DIV> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt Arial"><B>Subject:</B> [Vision2020] A Start</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <META content="Microsoft Word 11 (filtered medium)" name=Generator> <STYLE> <!-- /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {margin:0in; margin-bottom:.0001pt; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman";} a:link, span.MsoHyperlink {color:blue; text-decoration:underline;} a:visited, span.MsoHyperlinkFollowed {color:purple; text-decoration:underline;} span.EmailStyle17 {mso-style-type:personal-compose; font-family:Arial; color:windowtext;} @page Section1 {size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} --> </STYLE> <DIV class=Section1> <P class=MsoNormal><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">You are absolutely correct, Carl. We must look to tomorrow as a united people. If President Bush is true to his word, he will find a common ground for both liberals and conservatives. This country desperately needs someone to provide solidarity not in spite of our differences, but because of them. It has always been the case that our differences are what makes this country strong.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P> <P class=MsoNormal><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></FONT></P> <P class=MsoNormal><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Don’t get me wrong. I am not suggesting a national “group hug”, merely an understanding by each of us that those attributes that divide us should be fostered into a bond that unites us.<o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P> <P class=MsoNormal><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></FONT></P> <P class=MsoNormal><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Simply put, you cannot unite the whole by segregating its parts. In the interim though, keep your powder dry.<o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P> <P class=MsoNormal><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></FONT></P> <P class=MsoNormal><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Take care,<o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P> <P class=MsoNormal><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></FONT></P> <P class=MsoNormal><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Tom Hansen<o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P> <P class=MsoNormal><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></FONT></P> <P class=MsoNormal><FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 12pt">A good friend will come and bail you out of jail. But a true friend will be<BR>sitting next to you saying, "Damn . . . that was fun!"</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></P> <P class=MsoNormal><FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 12pt"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></FONT></P></DIV>_____________________________________________________<BR>List services made available by First Step Internet, <BR>serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994. <BR> http://www.fsr.net <BR> mailto:Vision2020@moscow.com<BR>/////////////////////////////////////////////////////<BR></BLOCKQUOTE></BODY></HTML><br clear=all><hr>Get more from the Web. FREE MSN Explorer download : <a href='http://explorer.msn.com'>http://explorer.msn.com</a><br></p>