#Kerry v Bush

[remembertheplunge]

Camped out over night, gays prepare to wed in San Fransisco (2004)

My journal entries February 2004

2/12/2004

San Fransisco Couple Wed. CNN 

"Complicated waters we are wading through “ CNN anchor Aaron Brown

This month in 1994, I came out to Mom, Dan and Mary.

10 years made it a non issue. Or at least, maybe, the elephant in the living room.

Exposed.

Out gay = exposed 

Raw. Visible.

Known.

No. Privacy. No. None.

Vul. ner. able

________________-

Is death about writing with a pen. And. Nothing comes out. No ink?.

---------------------------

(The Presidential election in November 2004 would be between John Kerry and George W. Bush, the current President at that time). 

I wrote in my journal: ”$100 million dollar war chest for WBYA (my nick name for Bush) 100 million dollars. My God!

The person most likely to get to the polls ia age 75 and registered to vote. Per CNN. My God!

Welcome to the Olympic Games in Athens 2004.

2/16/2004

“Camped out over night. Civil responsibilities. Gays line up to wed in San Fransisco, California.

End of entry

Note: 10/27/2024

Per Wickopedia, San Fransisco Mayor Gavin Newsom directed the city-county clerk to issue same sex couples marriage licenses being February 12, 2004. 4000 licenses were issues before the Supreme Court put a halt to it on March 11, 2004 and proceeded to void all of the licenses on August 12, 2004.

Re: my coming out, Dan was my Brother and Mary was his wife. 

Bush would go on to defeat Kerry in the 2004 election. 

The Presidential Primary in California was held on March 2, 2004.

[reptilia2003]

obama elected 15 years ago…man i feel old

[navree]

couldn’t think of an election from 2000 to now where the outcome wasn’t vastly better with a democrat winning, huh?

genuinely would love for some of the "both parties are the same" people to name me a single election in the entirety of the twenty first century where the outcome for the country wouldn't have been better if a democrat had won

[timaeusterrored]

The first Christmas after the relic incident and Vax actually coherent enough to participate is the first time Kerry gets to talk to Mama Welles and Vik without the space of a hospital or Vax on death’s door.

Vik is really unsure about Kerry, despite his willingness to do anything for Vax. To take care of him in his time of need. Maybe he just saw Vax as something to do. A charity case. He’d get bored once Vax was back on his feet. Though it had been over a year since Vax had gotten down, and Kerry was still here.

Their first Christmas with Kerry in their lives had been bleak. Vax still wasn’t talking and was still unsure if he’d actually make it. But now, he had begged Kerry to actually meet his family. No doctors or threats of death. And Kerry couldn’t help but agree.

Mama Welles was more inclined to give Kerry a chance, watching them from her window as the ‘Diva Rockerboy’ got out of the drivers seat in a baggy sweatshirt and jeans, helping Vax out of the car and comfortable on his crutches. The rehabilitation of V had been rough, lots of arguing and tears and stubbornness. But Mama Welles saw her son’s smile when he leaned for a kiss, and the way Kerry held his face like it was the most precious thing he had.

The dinner was nice, Kerry was mostly quietly. The charm couldn’t be on here. And he may be 90 years old, but meeting the parents was still just as stressful as it had been 20 years ago. Especially with the amount of scandals and drama Kerry had been involved in. He wanted these two to trust him with their boy.

Vax was all smiles, his favorite soup, his parents, his partner. It was perfect. Until Vik called him into another room- leaving Kerry alone with Mama Welles.

Mothers were always scarier.

“You love him.” It wasn’t a question. It was stone cold fact. One that Kerry was terrified of. He knew he loved V… but damn he did not wanna admit that. It was supposed to be a fling. Closure for Johnny. Then he saw those sad eyes in the Arasaka shuttle and his brain shut down. All he knew was that he needed V back.

So Kerry nodded. There was no beating around that bush.

“Good. He loves you. I went to a speech therapy session with him and you were all he talked about. It wasn’t even about your music, it was about you. I know more about how your hair feels than I do my own son.” God that kid was such a sweetheart what the fuck?

“He’s a sweet person, Ms. Welles. I’d do anything for him.”

“Oh I know. You got into a legal battle with Arasaka for him. And somehow won?”

Never mess with the gays as Nancy always said.

“I couldn’t lose. I had to win, for him.”

Mama Welles smiled and nodded, then took Kerry’s hand. Despite him being way older than her, he felt a comfort he hadn’t felt since his own mother had last held him… when he was 10.

“I see it in your eyes. You have my blessing. If you ever, Y’know, decide to get married again.” She patted his hand and pulled away when the sound of V’s crutches came back into the house.

“‘M Fuckin’ knee is about to give out.” Vax swore, making Mama Welles look up.

“Language!”

“Sorry mama!” Kerry chuckled, shaking his head. He didn’t deserve Vax… no one did. Not a single soul in Night City deserved him.

But Kerry was selfish, and he’d hold onto Vax for as long as possibly.

“I might take you up on that offer.” Kerry whispered, squeezing her hand on the table before going back to his partner.

[alliluyevas]

we did an election unit/mock election at my elementary school but they made us vote on which disney movie we wanted to watch because people had been arguing too much about bush v. kerry and i remember being irritated bc i felt that was infantilizing and i specifically wanted to vote against bush because i had been very upset by hearing about abu ghraib on the radio on the way to school and i had been telling my classmates that their republican parents were voting in favor of torture so looking back i was probably at least part of the reason why they switched to a disney movie vote. robin hood won btw.

[merge-conflict]

wip wednesday uhhhhhh

tagged by @streetkid-named-desire 🙏

workin' on:

adjusting to new work schedule without going insane

listening to schism on repeat until it stops making me feel things

finishing phantom liberty (things are going to go so bad I can feel it. reed and valentine are two birds of a feather. a songbird in hand is worth more than bush– ok idk where I was going with this. why is everyone in this dlc so hot. the edible hit just as lizzy wizzy was doing her thing I was absolutely 👁️👁️ zonked)

[outline] ffor - kerry vs manager death match meeting ft. valentine being the kind of incorrigible and professionally unpleasant asshole you want on your side in an argument –> well-crafted excuse to have johnny watch kerry and go through the confusing mess of jealousy, lust, possessiveness, smug superiority and affection from behind a screen where he can't pitch a fit or ruin everyone's day by being snide or making himself the new center of attention. lol

[draft] ch. 12 of the damn things overlap – putting johnny failover thru some horrors because it's fun ¯_(ツ)_/¯

Featuring my notes from PL on characters (going thru one of my adhd note-taking phases), not intentionally incomprehensible but uhhh gotta write fast while they're still talking:

And a snippet of Johnny definitely not Going Thru It (it's his body unless it's a fear response, then it's V's weird hormones or something idk):

The answering burst of distorted laughter sent adrenaline screaming up the inside of Johnny’s lungs. Half a century later and Smasher was less human than ever: a ghoulish half-skinned skull bolted onto a brutal metal frame and armored with enough heavy plating enough to make the float shift when he did. He towered over Oda, shoulders hunched so the launcher perched on his shoulder didn’t scrape the ceiling. Behind him was the smoking ruin of the hole he’d blown open, the unsettled dust and debris making his red eyes glow like hellfire. Arasaka’s oldest rabid dog. Something about the angle he was leering down at him made Johnny feel like he was standing in and out of a dream, unarmed and paralyzed while his mind tried to catch up with V’s hammering heart. His tongue was stuck to the roof of his mouth, and his arm ached bone-deep, numbness flickering up and down from his elbow to his fingertips. The air stank of charred flesh and scorched metal, like saltwater and bloated decay. He reached again for V, but she was gone and he was alone. No V, no Hand, just him. “Too stupid to stay dead,” Smasher spat, leaning over Oda in a way that made the man instinctively tense, grip tightening painfully. “That really you, Johnny-boy?” Time finally snapped back into focus, adrenaline reaching his smoldering gray matter, and Johnny felt his mouth twisting into a grin– V still haunting her own nervous system, dark laughter bubbling up out of terror like tar. “In the flesh, so to speak. More than I can say for you, you ugly bastard.”

it's missing something, but I won't know what until I take Johnny for more of a spin for the rest of the chapter...however it doesn't stop me from wanting to pick at it.

tagging @wanderingaldecaldo, @fly-amanitaa, @corpocyborg, @vox-monstera (no pressure!!! :3)

[mariacallous]

not to be like *that* but there is something...idk what the right word is, but there's something about coming of age in the Bush and early Obama years like...I can be washing dishes and something will remind me of almost fighting with a classmate over the Bush v Gore lawsuit and the stolen election in Florida, or about fighting with some kind of proto-MAGA fuck about Kerry's "effeminacy" and proposed "hunting ban" and Ohio in 2004, and having the "do the gheys really need rights" "debates"...having my AP Government and Econ classes happening at the same time as the Great Recession and the Paulson Bailout...

[cristo-salva]

MISTERIO DE INIQUIDAD: GOBIERNO DEL ANTICRISTO

DERECHA E IZQUIERDA TRABAJAN JUNTAS PARA EL NUEVO ORDEN MUNDIAL (cumplimiento de APOCALIPSIS 13, es decir el MISTERIO DE INIQUIDAD: GOBIERNO DEL ANTICRISTO)

[oldblackhat]

Give money for people to escape: https://gazafunds.com

Go to protests and rallies

Call your senators

Tell pollsters you’re not voting for Biden (even if you will but they don’t need to hear that)

Call him genocide joe and talk about how awful Americas support of genocide is and how it needs to stop

But not telling people in America to stay home November 5th.

“Don’t vote” is how Trump won last time

The GOP is in support of the genocide

And Trump will do a whole bunch of additional terrible things

Like the Muslim ban. Furthering restricting access to safe abortions. Treating illegal immigrants inhumanely. Getting into pissing masses with North Korea & practically sucking Putin’s dick (sorry for that image), letting Agent Orange be used as a pesticide, and so so much more.

Also he has basically admitted he wants to be a dictator if he ever gets elected again - and his people have been quietly getting themselves into positions of power since 2016

America is a shitty country but powerful - it will be a very very bad thing for the entire world if Trump did actually become a dictator

The idea that not voting in protest will show them only really works if American democracy continues long enough for another election cycle to happen

Here’s the thing - “the lesser of two evils” is like

Jimmy Carter v Reagan

Clinton v Bush

Al Gore or John Kerry v Bush

Obama v John McCain or Mitt Romney

Trump is a whole other animal from Reagan, Bush, McCain, Romney

Because all those republican assholes I just listed weren’t trying to become dictators (this isn’t a defense of them; it doesn’t make them good; it’s actually just the bare minimum we ought to expect from politicians)

This is the last two Republican nominees before Trump:

And both of them strongly publicly went against Trump in various ways.

This is what the Republican Party used to be like.

And they were bad and the Democrats were marginally better and so many of us held our nose and voted Democrat.

And many others of us criticized the “lesser of two evils argument” and abstained or voted third party

But Trump is different; Trump is a whole other animal from the Republican presidents (and candidates) we used to know - he is so much worse

And he would be going into this second term having had 4 years to strategize and set things up for what to do next time. and getting his supporters into positions of power

The first year of his first term was kind of a shitshow. Trump 2.0 will have way more strategy and preparation before he even takes the oath on January 20th

the Romney article’s clarifies he’d pardon Trump to make himself the bigger man and Trump the “little guy”. Which might be a cover for Republican spineless but anyway look at the other things Romney also says about Trump (again not a defense of Romney):

I have no love for McCain or Romney. But like pre-Trump when you’d say “I don’t agree with the ‘lesser of two evils’ argument - I’m going to stay home or vote third party” like this is the quality of human you’d be declining to vote against

I'm just going to leave this here, because this woman said what I've been trying to articulate for ages much more effectively and succinctly than I've been able to

[gamer2002]

As a first-time congressional candidate in 2006, Walz’s campaign announcement described him as "a veteran of Operation Enduring Freedom," an archived version of the press release shows. Two years earlier, in 2004, Walz organized a protest against then-President George W. Bush in Mankato, Minn. A photo of the rally shows Walz carrying a sign reading "Enduring Freedom Veterans for Kerry."

Such a title historically applies to someone who served on the ground in Afghanistan during the Global War on Terrorism. Walz, a 24-year veteran of the Army National Guard, spent time in Norway in support of NATO forces and in Italy working in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. He had never seen combat, he told Minnesota Public Radio in 2018.

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[timaeusterrored]

(Uncle Johnny and Baby Jackie Eurodyne)

Johnny was more surprised by the fact that he had woken up before Kerry and V had. The sounds of heartbreaking whimpers came from the baby monitor of V’s night stand is what woke Johnny up. He untangled himself from his partners and rubbed his eyes, unsure of why he was getting up instead of her parents. But they needed the sleep.

The door slid open to the nursery and Johnny rubbed his eyes as he approached the crib. Jackie looked up at him with big brown eyes full of tears. He couldn’t ignore the pain in his heart when he saw her, how upset she looked.

Johnny was terrified of kids, there was no beating around that bush. He didn’t even hold her unless Kerry or V was around to monitor them. But he reminded himself they needed sleep. So he did what he said he’d never do, he picked her up in his arms and grabbed her blanket.

He carried her out onto the balcony and sat down, having to pry her little monster hands away from his chest hair and laid the blanket over them. He had no idea what he was doing, and he was so far out of depth he couldn’t even see where he was supposed to be. Johnny Silverhand holding a baby, comforting her, singing to her- Singing to her?

He remembered Kerry talking about his kids, how he’d sing Never Fade Away to them as lullabies, even caught him singing it to Jackie well. Now he was doing it, a song full of heartbreak and hate used to calm down their kids.

Jackie had fallen back asleep on his chest, hands now relaxed from their little fists. She was going to be a fighter, he could feel it. And he knew she was going to give them all a run for their money and make Night City her bitch. As she should, and Johnny would be there to help her.

He kept singing, kept lightly rocking her when the door to the balcony slid open.

Kerry appeared, his robe haphazardly thrown on in his probable panic. Maybe he should have woken them up. He didn’t even think about how long they’d be out here.

Kerry simply watched them, processing what he was looking at. His baby rested on Johnny’s chest, sound asleep.

“She woke up.. I didn’t want to wake you and V up.” Johnny explained softly, hoping Kerry wasn’t mad. That was the last thing he needed.

“I hope you know how incredibly adorable this is and I’ve sent a picture to Denny and Nancy already.” Kerry smiled before leaning down for a kiss and then looked down at his baby.

“Now the fun part. Trying to get her back inside without waking her.”

Oh shit. Johnny hadn’t even thought of that.

[merge-conflict]

For a man supposedly having second thoughts, Takemura didn’t budge an inch, lips still on her neck and his thigh in between her legs. “Because you are…unwell. You should be resting.”

“I don’t want to rest. If I’m going to die I want to go out on a good note.”

“You are not going to die.”

“So say I live,” V said. Her voice was bitter but she was still curling around him like she thought he might actually pull away. “Then we’ll have plenty of time to catch up, will we?”

She never missed her mark when she was being nasty, but Takemura was clearly used to taking it on the chin. After a short, tense silence all he had to say was, “And Silverhand?”

Johnny would have preferred not being mentioned at all. He wasn’t going to ruin V’s chance at getting some decent head, especially considering her mood, but she had such shitty taste in men. And women, come to think of it. Cars. Clothing. Just a complete fucking gonk, from top to bottom. Sometimes made him wonder why he bothered.

<Don't say I never did nothing for you.>

“Forget about Johnny,” she said. “Is he the only one who gets to enjoy himself?”

“Mm.” Takemura sighed, making her shiver. “I think not.”

It was a bit of deja vu, to feel the old dog kissing her neck, the rasp of his beard over skin still sensitive from Kerry’s attention the night before. V had her eyes closed, so it was easy, even, to imagine it was Kerry back at it. Like it was Kerry’s hand skimming down over his bony rib cage and soft stomach, reaching the sickly hollow of his hip and dipping under the towel.

The illusion was shattered, of course, when V opened her eyes again to watch Takemura unwrap her like she was some expensive gift. But by then Johnny was already swimming too deep in her hormones, rapt with attention as Takemura began following the same trail his fingers had made with his mouth. Unlike Kerry he wasn’t the least bit surprised or bothered by her untamed bush, but then again he clearly already knew his way around.

V made a sound deep in her throat when he kissed her clit, eyes sliding closed again even as she bucked her hips. Johnny wondered if a brain dance could really replicate this feeling– he was always entwined with V in her head, but she was usually so damn miserable. And everything had always had that awful lag, like stuttering video over a bad connection. But now she was lit up like a Christmas tree, and for the first time they were burning in perfect sync, a bomb primed and clock ticking down.

[1929crash]

Austin vote fraud fixer

Remember our plan to again celebrate the LP Roe v Wade plank? (link) This is a letter to the editor this Greezy Wheels fan wrote to “the” newspaper in September 2008, when the Democrats were still sobbing “we wuz robbed.” Prohibitionist fanatic John Kerry had lost to prohibitionist George Waffen Bush the previous count. Michael Badnarik was running on the girl-alienating straddle plank platform…

[heystephen]

The first election I voted in was Bush v. Kerry your asks are making me feel ancient

omg i don’t remember if my school had a mock election that year, i don’t think so. if they did, i was only in kindergarten and definitely voted for bush because my dad liked him

[xirayn]

Dear Young Voters,

WTF

Sincerely,

An older Millennial