It is the Day, do or die time folks! This is the day we find out if money and lies can make the people of a State known for tolerance and live and let live attitudes vote to take away rights granted by the legislature. By now you have to know what I am talking about; today is the end of voting for Maine ballot question 1, the Citizens Veto of the landmark full marriage rights legislation in Maine.

Things could not be tighter. The polling is all within the margin of error. There is no way to know if we will win, that is get a No vote from the people of Maine or if we will lose. The turn out for off year elections (when there is no presidential or Congressional elections) is usually very low in Maine. 35% is the average. In order to win we have to get all the people we can to the ballot box.

Adam Bink is reporting over at Open Left that the Secretary of State for Maine is saying he just does not know if it will be an average year or if it will go all the way to a record (50.9%) so there is still time to make this work. It will be up to us. If you are at home today or have a couple of free hours you can still strike a blow for full civil rights for all citizens! Follow this link to get hooked up with the No On 1 Get Out The Vote action.

Why should you do this? After all it is Tuesday and there might be So You Think You Can Dance on TV tonight. Well here is why; our rights are only as good as the rights of the most oppressed. The Right has been whining for the last few years about how oppressed they are, how they are losing their rights to speak out or carry guns or put up religious monuments on public property. This is all a sham of course. The reality is they spend as much time trying to prevent other citizens from having the basic right to marry those who they love. These Conservative asshats want to prevent couples who have lived together, who are raising children together from accepting all of the responsibilities of having a legally recognized family.

But it is about more than just our gay citizens. This is the challenge of this generation, to stand up to unreasonable bigotry. In the 60’s it was about unreasonable bigotry in interracial marriage. Now it is about same sex marriage. Will we let our chance go by? Will we say there are too many issues of immediate import and this one will be solved by time? Or will we say it is not fair there are so many issues, but we will fight for them all, because that is the root of American Execptionalism? Our Execptionalism does not mean that we get a pass on the right issue, no, if America is exceptional it is because we do work on all the issues all the time, we do not let ourselves be overwhelmed even by the bigotry and intolerance of some of our fellow citizens!

If that is not enough to get you involved how about this; we know it is the national will of the people that all citizens have the right to marry. This is a new state of affairs and it has not fully sunk in, but if we manage to protect the marriage laws in Maine it is the first step to that national will.

All of this goes to you getting involved, now, for one hour, for five hours if you can give it. Go to this link. Sign up and start making calls.

I have done this, I will be doing it this afternoon (living in Denver means my afternoon is Maine’s early evening) . There is training if you have never done it before. There is a script. There are numbers to dial. All it takes is you, Citizen, making the commitment to our founding principals that all men and women are equal and should have equal rights in a nation of free people.

This is your chance to walk the walk and not just talk the talk. 25 years from now, when you are talking to your kids or grand kids or great grand kids you can point to November 3, 2009 and say “On this day I did what I could to assure all you kids would have the right to marry the one you love, to have the responsibilities and benefits of declaring that love in the community”. Surely that is worth a couple of hours of not watching the TV, isn’t it?

So, if you have called before, thanks, but we need more and you know what to do. If you have never called, this is your very last chance, don’t let it pass you by. In the end it is this kind of activism which matters more than all the billions of words written and read on all the blogs this year. ACT! It is the truest sign of a patriot.

The floor is yours.