We have MSNBC on all day, every day in my home. Scott and I are loud and proud liberals, which can be a little tough living in the Richmond VA area. We live in Eric Cantor’s (uugggghhhhhhh) district and there’s lots of Tea Party license plates and road signs along my daily commute. Our neighborhood is primarily working class African-Americans, which is awesome and means I don’t worry about my car getting defaced for the Obama stickers. But outside our little pocket, we’re surrounded by our political foes.

The Governor’s mansion is currently occupied by Bob McDonnell, or as Rachel Maddow calls him, Governor Ultrasound. A while back, he tried to make trans-vaginal ultrasounds mandatory for all women seeking abortion services, even when medically unnecessary and against doctor and patient wishes. The governor obviously has never had a trans-vaginal ultrasound, so he had no idea how invasive and uncomfortable the procedure is when it *is* necessary. That little attempt to diminish women’s reproductive freedom garnered a lot of national attention and left me angry and embarrassed of my state. But he’s just the tip of the intrusive, faux-conservative iceberg.

Our Attorney General, and Republican gubernatorial candidate, is Ken “The Cooch” Cuccinelli. He’s the worst. When he came in to office, he altered our state seal on pins and around his office because OMGTITTIES. I refer to him and McDonnell as faux-conservative because they are. They’re anti-“big government” when it comes to social programs and services – Medicaid, welfare, food stamps, Head Start, free school lunches and a whole litany of services that directly affect me and mine because of the whole autism thing – that I just can’t even get started on because I’ll have a ragestroke and now isn’t a good time for that. So, small government, nanny state, free market, job creators, blah blah fucking blah.

EXCEPT! Except, except, except when it involves consenting adults getting their freak on. You see, The Cooch is currently trying to fight for sodomy laws! Sodomy laws? What’s that, you ask? OH, it’s when the only legal sexual act occurs between a man and a woman who are legally married, and then only if it’s P-in-the-V. My life, where I co-habitate with a dude, is illegal. Two ladies? Illegal! Two dudes? Noooope! More than two people? No way! Things ending with “job”? Not here! Go the fuck to jail, sluts.

You, being a sane person, might be thinking, “That’s fucking bullshit!! Will there be cops peeping into bedrooms? How can that be enforced? WHY would that be enforced?” Here’s why – to persecute people like me and my friends. Some social worker thinks the boys need to be taken from our home? They could accomplish that simply by filing a police report about my “deviant” relationship, and I’m suddenly a felon. Or, how about, someone has a grudge with their gay neighbors? Your piece of shit ex is pissed about your new relationship? Your employer wants to fire you because of your sexual orientation? Your parents don’t approve of your lifestyle? Why, just report them as sodomites and they can go to prison!

These laws were notoriously used to arrest, prosecute and imprison gays. That’s why THE SUPREME COURT ABOLISHED THEM. But the Cooch doesn’t think Virginia should have to adhere to that ruling. He’s stated repeatedly that same-sex relationships are a perversion of natural law. (Natural law in this case does not refer to a scientific, biological understanding of our world. It means the Christian Bible as understood by Ken Cuccinelli.) And I’m sure that my lack of a marriage license falls under the totally valid “Jesus said unh-uh” legal argument as well.

So, “big government” is the root of all of our problems, as is sex between consenting adults. Let’s quit regulating, say, food and education and pharmaceutical companies, which would free up some money and manpower that could be rededicated to regulating whose bits are going where and with whom. Let’s all regain our personal freedoms, break the shackles of the federal welfare state, and get back to what our founders intended America to be – free of sodomy (unless, of course, it’s with a slave).

This isn’t how smaller government works. This isn’t what the Republicans I know believe in. I’m a firm believer in a two party system, that opposing views are necessary, that dissent and compromise make us a stronger nation. I understand that there are fiscal conservatives and isolationists – and I can even agree with them sometimes. But this retro trend of sex and vagina policing is incomprehensible to me. Can’t we all agree that one of the best things about being an adult is consensual sexyfuntimes? We have that and alcohol to balance all of the work and responsibilities. The government should be concerned with roads and schools and emergency services, not bedroom hijinks. That information should only matter to you, your sexing-partner, and all of your other friends at brunch. And since I’ve never sat across from The Cooch while sipping mimosas, eating waffles and gossiping, he needs to SHUT. UP.