Reefmonkey

So I can take your nonresponse to the issue of childless couples as you conceding that your argument about gay marriage watering down the purpose of marriage (making babies) was preposterous?

The breeders of the world beat y'all to that title (marriage). Name it something else.

But I am not the one you have to worry about. Worry about your elected officals.

I happen to be a married breeder myself, of a 1 yo daughter.

The breeders of the world beat y'all to that title (marriage). Name it something else.

Are you seriously going to advance this as an argument? You sound like a 6 year-old on a Jungle Jim in a public park telling other kids "I was here first - go find your own."

There is no trademark on the term "marriage"

As I said, if it walks like a duck, it's a duck. With civil unions, they have the rights, they have the emotional committment to each other, they have united their daily lives together. Gay couples, even in jurisdictions that don't recognize gay marriage, are having ceremonies and calling themselves married, just as the first Christians to have christian marriage ceremonies in ancient Rome called themselves married even though SPQR didn't recognize their marriages. They are marriages, no matter what you call them. You can stick your fingers in your ears, say "nahnahnahnahI-can't-hear-you" as loud as you want, but that won't change the fact that these people are married. You do nothing more than expose your bigotry. One day, history will look back on people like you the same way it now looks upon people who insisted "separate but equal" was fair enough for black people.

The fact that there are 7b people, infertile coules, and DINKS has nothing to do with Hank and Harry being allowed to get married.

Okay, fine, ignore the population argument - I said to forget it for a moment anyway.

However, you opened the can of worms about infertile couples and couples who choose not to have kids when you said "let's not water down what marriage means. Making babies for man-kind". Your logic is:

A. The meaning of marriage is to make babies; and

B. Gay couples cannot make babies; therefore

C. Gay couples should not be married.

That means you must also accept:

A. The meaning of marriage is to make babies; and

B. Infertile heterosexual couples cannot make babies; therefore

C. Infertile heterosexual couples should not be married.

You made infertile couples and DINKS have everything to do with Hank and Harry being allowed to get married when you said "let's not water down what marriage means. Making babies for man-kind." Saying now that they have nothing to do with each other requires vacating that statement.

And you did not respond to this:

1. Exactly what do you think would be accomplished by allowing civil union for gay people but not allowing them to call it marriage? If it gives them all the legal rights and privileges that marriage gives straight people, and if the gay couple has a binding relationship to each other based on love, just like marriage - if it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it's a duck. It would be a marriage in everything but name. Not allowing them to call it a marriage would serve no practical purpose. It would be done for no other purpose than to spite a group of people that another group of people find "icky". In a democracy based on justice and equality, laws aren't supposed to be passed just to spite a particular group of people and make them feel like second-class citizens.

Yes I did. This is why I support Civil Unions (or whatever you want to call it) for MM or FF who need to seal the deal. Read my previous replies.

But let's just leave "Marriage" to the cheatin-Breeders.

Without Breeders there would be no gay people.

Show some respect and let's not water-down what Marriage means. Making babies for man-kind.

Two points:

1. Exactly what do you think would be accomplished by allowing civil union for gay people but not allowing them to call it marriage? If it gives them all the legal rights and privileges that marriage gives straight people, and if the gay couple has a binding relationship to each other based on love, just like marriage - if it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it's a duck. It would be a marriage in everything but name. Not allowing them to call it a marriage would serve no practical purpose. It would be done for no other purpose than to spite a group of people that another group of people find "icky". In a democracy based on justice and equality, laws aren't supposed to be passed just to spite a particular group of people and make them feel like second-class citizens.

2. Now let's talk about your not wanting to "water-down what marriage means. Making babies for man-kind." So if you are to be consistent, you must feel that every couple who has fertility problems and cannot conceive should not be allowed to marry, or should be required to have their marriage annulled, because obviously they are watering down what marriage means since they aren't making babies for man-kind. Every couple who chooses not to have children should likewise not be allowed to marry. Let's forget for a minute that, at nearly 7 billion people, the world is already overpopulated, and does not really need more babies made to produce more waste and consume more resources. Basically you are saying that any heterosexual couple who cannot have children or chooses not to have children is watering down what marriage means, and should not be allowed to call what they have a marriage.

Your argument rests on a foundation of quicksand.

Not exactly. There must be cohabitation, an agreement to be married, and put yourselves out to the public as married. The agreement to be married can be inferred from other acts, such as the signing of that lease, or filing joint tax returns.

Incidentally, not only is there commpn-law marriage (officially known as an "informal marriage"), but there is a common-law divorce as well. If the two of you split up, and no divorce proceedings are iniated within 2 years of the split, the State considers you informally divorced.

You're right, I did oversimplify it a bit. However, in the scenario I put out, the boyfriend and girlfriend who were representing themselves on the apartment lease certainly met the requirments you state - since they were getting an apartment together, they were cohabitating, they were putting themselves out to the public, at least to the landlord and neighbors, as married, and had it on paper in the lease. As you say, the agreement to be married could be inferred from other acts - such as the signing of the lease.

Now, I have a question. This couple may have taken on all the trappings of an informal marriage, but never really intended to be married - they just wanted to appear that way out of convenience. Let's say the guy always made a lot more money than the girl, and had accrued some decent savings while they were living together. Say they split up, and the girl decides she wants half of those savings. The guy is protesting that they were never really married, neither of them actually considered themselves married, they just claimed to be for convenience. The girl wants the money, so she says that's not true. In these informal marriages, how do the courts usually go in these cases? Also, if she wants to claim half his assets as community property, does she need to do so before two years have passed since the split, or does she have to wait until after two years have passed, so that they are now informally divorced?

It seems the best argument gays can provide for being married is having access to benefits and bank accounts.

That in itself shows me a need for recognized civil unions. We don't have to call is marriage becuae it is not.

And TJones, were you asleep or durnk during your vows? Did you forget the "for better or for worse" part?

What crap. Most gay people who want to get married do it for the same reason that straight people want to get married - they want to make a binding committment to the person they love.

The issue of benefits, bank accounts, and the right to make medical decisions come out in discussions about the issue because they are tangible legal rights that are being denied to these people, and so a little bit easier to have a constitutional discussion about than talk of binding commitments of love. Discussions about the right to make that binding committment of love aren't going to appeal to legal arguments, they only appeal to compassion and understanding. Gay people know they will never get any compassion or understanding from people like you so they don't waste their time trying.

I think you need to sign some forms before you're considered common law in Texas. I don't think you can be common law just by living together like you can in other places.

Actually, in Texas all you have to do to be considered common-law married - whether you want to be or not - is to have, at some point, represented yourselves as a married couple. You and your girlfriend want to keep Mr. Roper from clucking his tongue at you for living in "sin", so you claim to be husband and wife on the apartment lease - bing - now you are common-law married according to the state of Texas.

I think the allegation of judicial activism stems from the court's arbitrary determination of who has a "right to marry" and who doesn't. They decided that two people of the same gender have this right, but that two people in the same family, or that more than two people of any gender, do not. Why draw the line where they did?

The court explained their decision not to extend the "right to marry" to incestuous and or polygamous relations on the basis that

An interesting rationale, considering that many people think that same-sex relationships have a potentially detrimental effect on a sound family environment. It's all a matter of what you consider to be "detrimental" and "sound family environment." I'm sure there are many different opinions on that, but the real question is, why is the court making this decision? What gives them insight into what is detrimental to a sound family environment that the general public doesn't have?

They are talking about the fact that most polygamous and incestuous relationships are manifestations of emotional and sexual abuse. Show me a marriage between a man and five consenting adult (at the time of the ceremony) women whom he treats as his equals - just doesn't happen. Same with incestuaous marriages - even between brother and sister, there is usually a power imbalance there. I know, someone is going to bring up cousins, which probably wouldn't have the power imbalance- actually, contrary to popular belief, most states allow marriage between cousins - even first cousins - though in some states those first cousins may be required to prove that they are incapable of reproduction - proof that incest laws are also about avoiding the amplification of deleterious genetic disorders through inbreeding.

To the person who said they don't like activist judges but support this, that is a huge problem. It is not a judges job, regardless of whether or not you agree with them, to make/change law. We should be VERY, VERY scared of judges who take it upon themselves to legislate from the bench and usurp the power of the legislative branches and the will of the people.......

............However, it has been an alarmingly popular trend of late for judges to legislate from the bench based on political agendas/views and not the constitution.

"Legislate from the bench." Another one of those completely meaningless catch-phrases that AM talk show hosts turn into memes that they virally infect into the minds of gullible people.

Now whenever a judge issues a ruling a conservative doesn't like (usually, striking down a law the conservative does like), the judge is "legislating from the bench", as if that judge has somehow overstepped his/her boundaries. The bald implication is that the judge is making laws, something the conservative thinks a judge is not allowed to do. In the United States, we have a common-law system, so judges and courts are empowered to make case law through legal precedents, so, gwilson, you're wrong.

It also is a judge's job to excersize judicial review. Since in Marbury vs Madison way back in 1803, Article III (in part "The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish

This is a simple question that may require a complicated answer but why did the Sakowitz retail chain go out of business?

You are right, it is a complicated answer. Like isuredid says, the biggest problem was overexpansion. At the time, Sakowitz wanted to compete with Neiman's, wanted to become a nationwide chain. Most department stores that wanted to do that sold part of the business to investment companies to get the capital to do that, but Sakowitz wanted to remain family owned, so that overstretched them quite a bit. Certainly the mid-80s oil bust dealt the mortal blow - selling to the wives of rich Texas oilmen had been Sakowitz's bread and butter. Ultimately, it was Robert Sakowitz's poor management that drove the company into the ground, though. Up until Bernard Sakowitz turned over the reigns to Robert, the Sakowitzes who had run the company had been pretty conservative, low key. Robert was anything but. He loved to live in the limelight, be a jetsetter, hobnob with European royalty almost as much as his sister Lynn Wyatt. Growing the company too fast was part of his desire to make a bigger name for himself, but he was also taking money from the store to help finance his extravagant lifestyle and invest in questionable real estate ventures. Often he was tying these real estate deals to store expansion in a way that was unfavorable to the store in order to line his pockets - a clear conflict of interest.

Sorry, my mistake, I didn't quote the book, "The first Sakowitz Houston store opened in 1908 with Simon in charge while Tobe managed the Galveston store". "Sakowitz ...downtown store on Main at Dallas was opened in 1951 with 225,000 square feet of space..".

Okay, that sounds about right.

The book Houston - A History of a Giant (Authors Jim Hutton, Jim Henderson) (1976), states that Sakowitz's downtown store opened in 1951, a Sakowitz Shop opened in the Shamrock Hotel (1953), Sakowitz Gulfgate in 1956, Post Oak in 1959, expanded 1970, Town & Co. Village 1967...Sakowitz Stella Link Fabric Shop 1972... . Sakowitz claims many firsts, including "establishing the first Yves St. Laurent Boutique in America, launching Emilio Pucci menswear,...".

I'll check the Blood Rich book for the exact dates, but Sakowitz's original downtown store was open much earlier than 1951. They may have moved at one point. The Post Oak location year sounds about right, but I think it was actually a few years earlier than 1959.

Greens Rd. was once called Gears Rd.

Will Clayton Pky. was once Jetero Blvd.

Hwy. 249 was once FM 149

Veterans Memorial Dr. was once Steubener-Airline

There still is a Gears Rd. in that area.

There still is a Jetero Blvd west of IAH.

Wasn't that long ago that I remember them changing 149 to 249, and I'm only 32. There is still a business on 249 (is it a bar, and convenience store?) that is called the 149 such and such that I see when I drive up there.

Steubner Airline is still called that name, at least north of 1960.

I was just thinking about Sakowitz, what a great store it was in its day. Mostly we went to either the downtown Sakowitz or the Post Oak one, but I remember there was even a scaled-down Sakowitz in the Northwest suburbs, at FM 1960 and Champions Forest Drive. It's now a Sun and Ski Sports.

Growing up as little kid in just a bit of the late 70s and then the early 80s, I remember my mom taking us to Sakowitz to buy us our "sunday best" clothes. Mostly what we liked was going to the lunch room afterwards, and the meals they had for kids. They brought baskets of cheddar cheese straws and sweet orange rolls, and for kids there were peanut butter and jelly sandwiches cut into the shape of animals with raisins for eyes, as well as a great vegetable soup. It was also one of the few places my mom would let us drink chocolate milk (Luby's being the other, and she would let us buy it once a week with our lunch at school).

When the Post Oak store finally went out of business, they had a huge going-out-of-business sale, sometime when I was in junior high. Everything was for sale, even back office equipment, fixtures, displays, etc. My mom bought a huge wardrobe like the one in "The Lion The Witch and the Wardrobe".

If anyone has any pictures of the interior of either the downtown or Post Oak Sakowitz, or any old lunch room menus or other memorabilia they could post, that would be great!

I read an interesting book on the Sakowitz family: "Blood Rich: When Oil Billions, High Fashion, and Royal Intimacies Are Not Enough" by Jane Wolf. Utimately the book focuses on Oscar and Lynn Wyatt's feud and lawsuit against Lynn's brother Robert, but the first several chapters give great indepth historical background on the Sakowitz family and stores, going all the way back to the original Sakowitz brothers who emigrated from Russia and started a small department store in Galveston, later moving it to Houston just after the 1900 hurricane. It has some good pictures; I'll try to scan and post them this week.

I agree with Vertigo58, as a kid I used to feel like I was in NYC when I was in the Galleria Lord and Taylor. Also felt that way when I was at the dowtown Foley's.

Other stores I liked or remembered as a kid:

Sam Houston Bookstore - the only bookstore in Houston with a decent selection of James Bond books, which I got into reading after Living Daylights came out.

The coin store on the mid level of Galleria I, right around the corner from See's Candies (another favorite). I used to go there all the time when I was in elementary school and into collecting US coins - you could buy buffalo nickels, mercury dimes, wheatback pennies, indian head pennies, all sorts of out-of-circulation US coins, along with guidebooks and those blue folders to put them in.

The Florsheim store, where my dad bought most of his dress shoes.

Anyone else remember the Magic Pan crepe restaurant? Not just remember passing by it, but actually eating in it? I remember as a really young kid eating there as a "special occasion" once or twice.

...and here is something else. If Texas is a non-disclosure state (that is you do not have to disclose what you paid for your house to the appraisal district) - then how do they model their appraisals? They have to be getting the sales data, somehow...

It's the stupid MLS (Multiple Listing Services). Even though they have no legal obligation to report your sale price to the AD, they do anyway. Next time I buy a house I am going to have it written into the contract that the final price not be disclosed.

Anyone else remember the Houston Gamblers, a United States Football League team that existed for about two seasons in the mid-80s? I guess Spring/Summer football wasn't a sell in America, but I do remember the Gamblers doing well in those two brief seasons.

For all the talk of non-smokers coming in droves once the ban took effect, no one I have spoken to has seen it.

Did someone here on this board say they thought nonsmokers would come out in droves after the smoking ban? I certainly never expected that. I said the opposite, that the smokers wouldn't flee the bars and the bar owners wouldn't see decreased revenue post-ban. It's exactly what I surmised would happen - the smokers keep coming to the bars, they just go out on the patio to smoke, and us nonsmokers who have been going to bars all along and silently enduring are now breathing (now that we finally can breathe) a sigh of relief. I don't see why anyone on either side would expect to see a non-smoking, traditionally non-drinking person suddenly start going to bars because of a no smoking ban.

I don't know, in the bars I've been to, I haven't seen them empty inside. Maybe it's the nights you go. I do know that I've been requesting outside tables at restaurants and chosen seats on patios at bars a lot more recently the last couple of months - not to hang out with smokers, but to enjoy the nice fall weather we've been having. Hmmm. Maybe we should take a look in January, and again in August 2008 to see how many people are sitting on patios versus inside?

Some interesting findings that support this being a very real public health issue, not just for an individual's longterm health, but short-term health as well..

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,298418,00.html

ALBANY

Not everyone is pleased with Montrose's newfound popularity. The people who made Montrose a unique, charming neighborhood are rapidly being priced out of the market. Businesses that have existed for years suddenly find themselves under attack by people who chose to buy a new townhome next door. New development is taking away on-street parking, while creating more demand for parking spaces. Hundred-year-old trees are felled, and quaint bungalows razed. And a sense of community that took years to establish is dwindling.

Same thing happened to the Village in Manhattan, NYC. It was once one of the cheaper places to live - home of the gay community, artists, bohemians. They made it a colorful place to live, and that attracted the affluent yuppies, who priced them out of the market, and soiled their own nest by forcing out the very people who made Village the place that the yuppies had wanted to live.

Meyerland is the new gay community in Houston, for those priced out of Montrose by the yuppies and bobos*.

*Bobo: bourgeois bohemian: http://www.flakmag.com/books/bobos.html

Yeah, every time you bring up a weatherman Puma goes into a gay fantasy world were all weathermen are homosexuals which is not true. if you all don't believe me just look at his Houston Media board post's.

I don't know about ALL weathermen being gay, in general I don't think of meteorology or any other hard science as having any greater a gay representation than other disciplines, and in general the hard sciences tend to have a little lower gay representation than the general population. That's what makes KPRC's surplus of gay weathermen all the more surprising and interesting. Chuck George was definitely gay, he marched in the parades, attended the benefits, and my gay friends have seen him at the bars. I've heard enough about Frank Billingsley to believe that he is, too. More power to them! With all the rain we've been having, the people reporting our weather should have rainbow stickers on their cars.

Lest anyone think I am putting gay people or people I think might be gay down - I am an internet-ordained minister, and in addition to legally marrying a few heterosexual couples, I performed the marriage ceremony for a gay couple last year - which, sadly, is still not legal.

Another person at KPRC who should be fired instead of the weathermen - the guy who thought of spending weeks hyping up "Dominique Sachse has a secret" which turned out to be that she was pregnant. What a self-absorbed, solipsistic self-agrandizing thing to do. They might have just as well put up a neon sign over their studios out on the Southwest freeway that says "We don't report the news, we ARE the news." What's next, Katie Couric setting aside ten minutes from each CBS evening news broadcast to update us on her dating life?

The Army arranged to school him with a 4-year degree in the span of 18 months that was concurrent to his flight training in order to qualify as an officer.

They didn't actually give people a four year degree in 18 months. Now the military requires a 4 year degree to be an officer, but during the war, when having gone to college was not as common, and the military needed people to fill officer positions, especially pilots, they put them through OCS as 90 day wonders. If you had the IQ and the other attributes to fill the officer role they needed, you could be commissioned, but you didn't come out with a college degree, just basic, officer training, and your specialty training.

For single place pursuit planes (fighters), the Army Air Force would sometimes make a pilot without a college degree a flying sergeant, and possibly a Flight Officer, a type of Warrant Officer, and it was possible to become commissioned as well.

The only problem I had with Byron Miranda was his sense of style. His suits were just not very tasteful for a TV news show. Of course, his bad fashion sense fit right in with much of the Channel 2 news team - Dominique Sachse with her garish suits, gawdy jewelry, and frosted lipstick. Lauren Freeman isn't much better, and the morning traffic girl reminds me of Jackie from "That 70s Show". It all makes me long for the days of Chuck George, and I found him annoyingly chipper - but at least since he was gay he knew how to dress well.

The real person who needed to be fired was the person who thought it was a good idea to bring in Radar the Weather Dog. If there was anything that diminished KPRC's already flimsy gravitas as a serious and reliable news source, it was that.

And don't get me started on Roseanne Rogers "The Buzz Lady" who supposedly knows where all the hip new places in Houston are, and then recommends places like Drink Houston in the Marquee on I-10. What a clueless ho.

No. Dropping it unaturally would make me a yankee tool.

I don't use it frequently, but when I do...usually while inebriated, I want it to be pure, a true reflection of myself.

Right on!

I don't care about the idea of losing American jobs if the process of offshoring industries ultimately causes the cost of production of particular goods to decline, which in the presence of competitive markets results in the cost savings being passed back to American consumers

Well, that discussion probably deserves a thread of its own. I'd love to discuss it in depth with you, but I'm not sure where we could fit it on a website about Houston architecture. I'll just say the belief among white-collar workers "I'd buy American goods if they could be produced as cheaply as overseas goods...." has been common at least since the 1970s, and I have to admit I used to say it myself. It's easy for a white-collar worker to think that when it is just blue-collar jobs going overseas. I think some people are waking up to the reality, though, now that white-collar jobs like accounting and IT support are being outsourced to places like India and Malaysia. In the end, what good are low-priced goods if one day so many people are unemployed or underemployed due to overseas outsourcing that they can't even afford the cheap stuff?

Insofar as foreign workers understand that there are risks to working in the new plant producing goods for export, and they are willing to take the jobs there, I'm not all that concerned about their welfare. What would've been their alternative? Subsistence wages? Perhaps an even more dangerous employer? Surely they wouldn't have taken the job if they didn't perceive it as something that would have a better chance than not of improving their standard of living. If the U.S. enforces standards on imports that have the stated goal of looking after the safety of other peoples in other lands, but those standards have the effect of taking better jobs away from them and hindering the economic development of those nations, all the while depriving our consumers of less expensive goods, then I really have a hard time seeing how anybody wins.

It is seductive to think that by buying goods from developing countries and encouraging them to focus on production of exports, we are helping those countries' economies and the peoples' quality of life, but too often, that just is not true. Well-meaning NGOs, even the UN, encouraged several African nations to focus their agricultural efforts on exportable cash crops, such as cocoa, coffee, and sisal, and they neglected the development of food crops for these countries' domestic needs, resulting in food shortages and inflation, actually decreasing quality of life. Cote d'Ivoire's serious political instability is attributable to this. Manufacturing of goods for export in developing countries can and does often cause this kind of inflation. Oops, there I go, talking about it, getting off-topic. I'm not going to say anything else about it.

As far as second-hand smoke and cancer risk goes, I am not going to be less careful about exposing myself to carcinogens and just assume by the time I have cancer the medical science will have caught up. If it does, that will be great, but I am not going to depend on it. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, the man said.

The scientific community may not have conclusively proven how bad second-hand smoke is yet, but common sense tells me it isn't good for me. I don't need indisputable proof, nor is it very wise to wait for indisputable proof, to take action to prevent a potential negative effect. (There, see, I always manage to get back on topic in the end )

There have been some posts about intuition/perception/response/argument. I'll say right now: I've got nothing to back me up--but second-hand smoke, second-hand whatever, better living through 21st century agribusiness..... how long is the list? As if cigarettes are my worst enemy.

Forgive me being new to this board and tired of this topic. I hung in for quite a while. But come on.

And your point is????

No one is forcing you to read this thread or respond to it. If the discussion didn't hold your interest, then you are free to move on.