I’m tired of the Republican Party degrading me as a human being. It angers and hurts me that a party, which is supposed to be in favor of small government, is extending the hands of the government to give heterosexuals privileges it denies to homosexual couples.

The funny thing is you hear talk of “special rights” when it comes to the gay rights movement, primarily from the religious conservatives, when all we desire is the same privileges and dignity that are given to heterosexual couples.

It is they who advocate special rights, although I use the word privileges, while we ask for equal privileges.

With the New Jersey Supreme Court ruling in favor of equal privileges for homosexual couples to the ones heterosexuals are able to receive through marriage, the Republicans are once again capitalizing on my dignity as a human being, like they did in the 2004 presidential election.

On Nov. 2, 2004 I cast a vote for the libertarian candidate, who I knew had no chance of winning, because I didn’t care for either of the nominees from the two major political parties.

I am tired of having my dignity so callously insulted by the Republican Party.

A party that looks toward a base of evangelical Christians that find the concept of two men or women loving each other for the rest of their lives as a basis for an eternal afterlife of punishment. I am sick of the lack of respect for true human decency from the Republican Party. Elections took place Nov. 7 this year.

I voted, even if my vote didn’t count for much. However it functions as my bleak voice, showing one more person who does not approve of the Republican Party. It is my tiny statement that I don’t have respect for them, just as they have no respect for me. I do not fancy myself a Democrat, but if you were to read my ballot on Election Day you might confuse me with one.

This is how a party pushes away a voter who may have thought twice otherwise when casting his ballot. Congratulations. May you lose majority control of our legislative branch Nov. 8, 2006.

Rick Haneberg junior RTV