Virginia's PR Disaster Continues

Bob "Jobs Governor" McDonnell has a unique way of advertising that Virginia is open for business: make the state look like a reactionary backwater and with of the help of his, in my opinion, delusional Attorney General create a firestorm that has swept all of the campuses of Virginia's nationally prominent colleges and universities. As if that will make businesses eager to relocate to a state where many of their employees would have less legal protections than household pets. One heck of a job, Bob. McDonnell's empty gesture in signing Executive Directive 1 (2010) - which contradicts his own previous Attorney General opinion and the argument his office made in a pending case involving a gay man fired because of his sexual orientation - is basically worth no more than the paper it is written on. It affords gay employees zero enforceable protections. Although the anti-civil rights agenda coverage has already been in every major newspaper in the state and literally world wide on the Internet, now Time Magazine has chimed in with an article entitled "Virginia Is for Lovers. But How About Gay Ones?" Here are highlights from the Time story:
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It's been a turbulent few weeks for gay rights, the Virginia attorney general and college students across the Old Dominion.
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First, Republican Governor Bob McDonnell issued an executive order last month that "specifically prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, sex, color, national origin, religion, age, political affiliation, or against otherwise qualified persons with disabilities." Left off the list, notably, was a mention of sexual orientation.
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Then five days ago, Republican Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli Jr. sent a letter to public colleges and universities advising them that state law prohibits "a college or university from including 'sexual orientation,' gender identity,' 'gender expression' ... as a protected class within it's non-discrimination policy."
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Cuccinelli, in his earlier directive, had acted on his own accord, building on the governor's previous executive order, but went too far, says a state political analyst who preferred to remain anonymous. The governor's clarification amounted to "a public spanking of Cuccinelli," says the analyst.
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The back and forth came after more than 1,500 students and supporters rallied Wednesday at Virginia Commonwealth University to protest Cuccinelli's letter. Waving rainbow flags, chanting "Down With Hate" and wielding signs that read "Jesus Had 2 Dads, Too" and "Homophobia Is A Sin," the animated band assembled near the student union, before 200 later broke away and marched down a main road within blocks of the Virginia State Capitol.
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"It's just a huge slap in the face to treat schools that poorly, and lesbians and gays in general," says Seth Kaye, a sophomore computer science major and president of the Queer and Allied Activism group at the University of Virginia. "We are being singled out. People are upset. It's really frustrating." Specific wording protecting gays, he contends, is important to help remind the UVA community to exercise better judgment.
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The letter was seen as a blow to the independence of the state's education institutions, which normally have "a great deal of autonomy," says Kirsten Nelson, spokeswoman for the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia. "Changes must be made by the General Assembly.
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More people in Virginia need to demand that their legislators clean up the mess and grant gays protection which is the last analysis religious based discrimination.