More Saturday Male Beauty

Values Voter Summit: Christians Must Control the Government

This year's Values Voter Summit is yielding a huge harvest of Christianist lunacy and making it very clear that the ultimate goal of these untethered individuals is a takeover of the government and the imposition of a Christianist theocracy. Generally, these folks try to be at least marginally discrete in revealing their anti-Constitutional agenda, but a few of the truly unhinged have let loose and thrown the cards out on the table. One such loonie is Byran Fischer whose rant was caught and is available on You Tube care of Right Wing Watch. Fischer is the real face of the Christian Right - the one they try to hide come election time. Here's a sampling of the verbal diarrhea. The balance of Fischer's rant is at Right Wing Watch.

Here is a sampling of some of Fischer's other previous statements via Pam's House Blend that show the man is a bigot (and in my view, insane). Fischer has:
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** Demanded that no new mosques be built anywhere in America. (8/10/2010)
** Argued that inbreeding has caused Muslims to be stupid and violent. (9/10/2010)
** Says that Muslims should be banned from serving in the U.S. military. (11/9/2009)
** Insisted that all Muslims are traitors, called for the deportation of all Muslims from the U.S. (4/10/2010)
** Claimed that U.S. service members died in vain because the U.S. failed to make Iraq a Christian nation. (8/19/2010)
** Said that "homosexuals should be disqualified from public office." (8/5/2010)
** Insisted that gays are biased, sexually deviant felons, not to mention pedophiles, and should never serve on the Supreme Court. (4/15/2010, 4/16/2010)
** Called gay adoption "a terrible, terrible, inexcusable, inhumane thing to do to children." (8/10/2010)
** Argued that we should "impose the same sanctions on those who engage in homosexual behavior as we do on those who engage in intravenous drug abuse." (2/3/2010)
** Wrote: "The inescapable conclusion is that gay sex is a form of domestic terrorism." (6/10/2010)
** Said: "Hitler discovered that he could not get straight soldiers to be savage and brutal and vicious enough to carry out his orders, but that homosexual solders basically had no limits and the savagery and brutality they were willing to inflict on whomever Hitler sent them after. So he surrounded himself, virtually all of the Stormtroopers, the Brownshirts, were male homosexuals." (5/25/2010)
** Disparaged family values in the Hispanic community: "Also, the illegitimacy rate among Hispanic women is over 50%. I'm not sure pro-family values are as strong in the Hispanic community as Dr. Land wants to believe." (7/23/2010)

Prop 8 Wingnuts File "Standing" Brief with the 9th Circuit – Still Argue Procreation

The wingnut proponents of Proposition 8 have filed a brief on the issue of standing in Perry v. Schwarzenegger and, in addition to having a conniption fit over Judge Walker's alleged uncritical acceptance of the evidence submitted by Plaintiffs', the Christianists are continuing to whine about procreation being the lynch pin of marriage. Of course, they utterly ignore the fact that the marriage laws allow those past child bearing years to marry as well as the fact that there's no penalty for straights who marry with no intention of having children. Their rant also ignores two U.S. Supreme Court cases that I have mentioned before that cut their standing argument off at the knees. And again, the wingnuts ignore the fact that they had no legitimate evidence to refute the plaintiffs' evidence. If anyone utilized "unreliable" witnesses, it was the Prop 8 proponents. Here are some highlights of the wingnut's screed from Google News:
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Backers of California's same-sex marriage ban urged a federal appeals court to overturn the trial judge who struck down Proposition 8 by arguing late Friday that his consideration of evidence was "egregiously selective and one-sided."
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In written arguments to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, lawyers for the ban's sponsors alleged that Chief U.S. Judge Vaughn Walker "quite willfully" disregarded a 1972 U.S. Supreme Court precedent and other relevant information when he decided the voter-approved measure was an unconstitutional violation of gay Californians' civil rights.
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The appealing attorneys, who called two witnesses compared to 18 for the plaintiffs, asked the 9th Circuit to ignore the trial testimony on which Walker laboriously based his opinion, calling it "unreliable and ultimately irrelevant" to whether Proposition 8 passes constitutional muster.
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"The district court decision is an attack on the many judges and lawmakers and millions of Americans who rightly and reasonably understand that marriage is the unique union of a man and a woman," said Alliance Defense Fund attorney Brian Raum, who is part of the legal team fighting to uphold Proposition 8. "The Hollywood-funded opposition wants to impose — through a San Francisco court — an agenda that America has repeatedly rejected."
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The wingnuter's brief can be found here.

Latest Catholic Church Lie: Atheists Should Apologize For Adolf Hitler

During his controversial visit to the United Kingdom, Liar in Chief, Pope Benedict XVI tried to lay many of the world's ills, both past and present, on unrestrained secularism and even atheists. Indeed, he even went so far in his speech at Holyrood Palace as to blame Hitler and NAZI fascism on atheist. Obviously, Benedict's claims are untrue and I suspect that if all the needless deaths throughout history were totalled up, RELIGION would be the number one cause of all. As for atheists being responsible for Hitler and the NAZI nightmare, Hitler was a CATHOLIC. And Hitler disliked atheism which he saw as synonymous with communism. Here's a portion of the bullshit Benedict XVI spun at Holyrood Palace:
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Even in our own lifetime, we can recall how Britain and her leaders stood against a Nazi tyranny that wished to eradicate God from society and denied our common humanity to many, especially the Jews, who were thought unfit to live. I also recall the regime’s attitude to Christian pastors and religious who spoke the truth in love, opposed the Nazis and paid for that opposition with their lives. As we reflect on the sobering lessons of the atheist extremism of the twentieth century, let us never forget how the exclusion of God, religion and virtue from public life leads ultimately to a truncated vision of man and of society and thus to a “reductive vision of the person and his destiny”
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Once again, Benedict demonstrates the perils of shooting off one's mouth before doing a simple Google search and a tad of research. Here's what Wikipedia has to provide about Hitler's views on and personal beliefs on religion:
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At the Benedictine monastery school which Hitler attended for one school year as a child (1897–98), Hitler became top of his class, receiving 12 1's, the highest grade, in the final quarter. He also sang in the choir at the monastery.
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In public statements, especially at the beginning of his rule, Hitler frequently spoke positively about the Christian heritage of German culture, and his belief in the "Aryan" Christ. In a proclamation to the German Nation February 1, 1933 Hitler stated, "The National Government will regard it as its first and foremost duty to revive in the nation the spirit of unity and co-operation. It will preserve and defend those basic principles on which our nation has been built. It regards Christianity as the foundation of our national morality, and the family as the basis of national life."
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According to Hitler's chief architect Albert Speer, Hitler remained a formal member of the Catholic Church until his death, although it was Speer's opinion that "he had no real attachment to it." According to biographer John Toland, Hitler was still "a member in good standing of the Church of Rome despite detestation of its hierarchy, he carried within him its teaching that the Jew was the killer of God. The extermination, therefore, could be done without a twinge of conscience since he was merely acting as the avenging hand of God—so long as it was done impersonally, without cruelty."
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According to Steigmann-Gall, Hitler's reference to God as the "Lord of Creation" and the necessity of obeying "His will" along with several references to Jesus, reveals the infusion of Christianity into his thinking. Other sources also show Hitler's Christian thinking, according to Steigmann-Gall. He notes an unpublished manuscript where Hitler sketched out his world-view with similar Christian references, and he gives as an example a speech on April 1922 where Hitler said that Jesus was "the true God." Finally, Steigmann-Gall gives another example where in a private Nazi meeting Hitler again stated the centrality of Jesus' teachings to the Nazi movement.
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Hitler often associated atheism with Germany's communist enemy. Hitler stated in a speech to the Stuttgart February 15, 1933: "Today they say that Christianity is in danger, that the Catholic faith is threatened. My reply to them is: for the time being, Christians and not international atheists are now standing at Germany’s fore. I am not merely talking about Christianity; I confess that I will never ally myself with the parties which aim to destroy Christianity. Fourteen years they have gone arm in arm with atheism. At no time was greater damage ever done to Christianity than in those years when the Christian parties ruled side by side with those who denied the very existence of God. Germany's entire cultural life was shattered and contaminated in this period. It shall be our task to burn out these manifestations of degeneracy in literature, theater, schools, and the press—that is, in our entire culture—and to eliminate the poison which has been permeating every facet of our lives for these past fourteen years."
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In his childhood, Hitler had admired the pomp of Catholic ritual and the hierarchical organisation of the clergy. Later, he drew on these elements, organizing his party along hierarchical lines and including liturgical forms into events or using phraseology taken from hymns. Because of these liturgical elements, Hitler's Messiah-like status and the ideology's all-encompassing nature, the Nazi movement is sometimes termed a "political religion"
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Nice try Benedict, but except for simpletons, outside uneducated areas of the developing world, don't expect people to buy your bullshit.

Saturday Male Beauty

Wayne Besen on The Rachel Maddow Show - Christine O'Donnell Ex-Gay Fraud

My friend Wayne Besen was on Rachel Maddow's show last night were he and Rachel discussed Christine O'Donnell, Delaware’s bizarre and extreme GOP Senate nominee, and her deep roots in the so-called “ex-gay” industry. I've known Wayne for over seven years and often do legal and other research for him from time to time since we both want to see the fraudulent "ex-gay" myth killed once and for all. Wayne and Rachel among other things discussed O'Donnell's "The Savior’s Alliance for Lifting the Truth (SALT)," and its ex-gay program led by Wade Richards. Wayne had debated Richards during the period Richards had succumbed to the ex-gay brainwashing. When Richards finally came out of the closet - and found much more happiness - O’Donnell, like the "loving Christian," she pretends to be abandoned Richards and showed her true colors. Here's a video of Wayne and Rachel:
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Programs like the one run by SALT continue to harm LGBT lives and, worse yet, provide political cover for those who like to claim that sexual orientation is a choice. It's a lie, of course, but then lying is synonymous with "family values" and "pro-family" professional Christians.

White Supremacist's Name Removed from Virginia College Building

Change comes very slowly in Virginia and the state's less than illustrious history of racism and social backwardness at times is like a vampire which needs a truckload of wooden stakes to put and end to the sanitizing of the past. As noted below, Adolf Hitler copied some of Virginia's legal framework for eugenics as a model for the Nazi sterilization law. Fortunately, Radford University has taken the belated move of stripping the name of John Powell (at right), an influential white supremacist in Virginia, from one of it's buildings. Frankly, it's shocking that a little more due diligence had not been done back in 1967 when this bigot's name was first applied to the building. It is likewise shocking that the views of John Powell are still alive and well in organizations like The Family Foundation and other Virginia based Christianist organization. These groups may be more discrete in their statements than Powell was, but if you follow their web sites, the latent racism and bigotry is there to be seen. The Virginian Pilot has a story that looks at the building renaming by Radford University. (The Roanoke Times also has coverage) It is important to understand that people like Powell are still all too plentiful in the Commonwealth and that their bigotry needs to be exposed to the bright light of day. Here are some story highlights:
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Powell Hall is no more. The name of one of Radford University's arts and music buildings was stripped Friday by a unanimous vote of the school's board of visitors. The vote came five years after Radford history professor Richard Straw and his class discovered that the namesake of the building, John Powell, was an influential white supremacist in Virginia.
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Powell, as founder of the Richmond chapter of the Anglo-Saxon Club of America, was deeply involved in the drafting and passage of the act [Virginia's Racial Integrity Act of 1924 which was much in the news in 1967 when it was invalidated by the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark Loving v. Virginia ruling] and was an ally of an infamous Virginia state registrar of vital statistics and eugenics advocate, Walter Plecker.
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Both men were leaders in Virginia's drive to "purify" society of the "polluting" influence of blacks, Virginia Indians and others deemed "undesirable," "feebleminded," or "mongrel," according to attitudes prevalent at the time.
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Using the act, Plecker worked diligently to reclassify all members of Virginia Indian tribes as "colored" to exclude them, as well as blacks, from public schools and other institutions. "Some of these mongrels, finding that they have been able to sneak in their birth certificates unchallenged as Indians, are now making a rush to register as white," Plecker was quoted as saying at the time.
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Adolf Hitler used Virginia's legal framework for eugenics as a model for the Nazi sterilization law and efforts to purge Jews and other "undesirables" from German society. Hundreds of thousands were sterilized in the years leading up to the Holocaust.

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Virginia has some very shameful history. One would think leaders in state government would want to distance the state from past bigotry. Instead, individuals like Taliban Bob McDonnell and Ken "Kookinelli" Cuccinelli seem determined to continue this toxic heritage, with gays being a favored target.

Five Myths About Don't Ask, Don't Tell

I have long maintained that the real rational behind Don't Ask Don't Tell is RELIGION and RELIGIOUS BELIEF and the efforts of military leaders and Christianists to inflict their beliefs on all of society and in the military in particular. The goal has always been to punish gays for not conforming to the Christianist sexual mores and to devise means to utilize the nations laws as a way to send a societal message that gays are inferior - dangerous even. Incidents at the Air Force Academy and many other military bases, including local Fort Eustis confirm that there are far too many far right Christians in the senior ranks of the military. What better way to do so than to depict gays as unfit to serve in the military and at threat to military readiness. God forbid gays be shown to be brave, loyal, reliable and outstanding soldiers, sailors and airmen. Were this to happen, this would totally under cut the Christianist effort to depict gays as effete, often feminine acting, unmanly, sexual perverts/predators. The goal of DADT has ALWAYS been to maintain an anti-gay image that would help keep gays discriminated against in the larger society. A Washington Post article looks at five myths surrounding DADT and the first mentioned is the above described false premise of protecting military readiness. The others are about the falsehoods that anti-gay proponents of DADT continue to disseminate as excuse to delay or kill repeal. My Senator, Jim Webb needs to read this article and get his head out of his ass and support repeal NOW. Here are some highlights:
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On the long path to regulations that treat all troops equally, a number of myths have cropped up surrounding the law.
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1. DADT was created to promote unit cohesion and military readiness. DADT has never had anything to do with those goals. . . .
acknowledged to historian Nathaniel Frank that the policy was "based on nothing."
. . . . According to historian Anne Loveland, the architects of DADT knew they could not argue that the law should be based on their personal morality, so they used the unit cohesion argument instead. In her work on evangelical chaplains in the military, Loveland discovered a behind-the-scenes debate as the policy took shape in 1992-93. Though the chaplains and evangelical groups wanted to present a case that gays and lesbians are abominations, polls showed that most of the public didn't share their moral concerns; they knew would have a better chance if they talked about military necessity.
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As recently as 2007, then-Joint Chiefs Chairman Peter Pace was asked why the military still had a ban on gays, and he said he believed that DADT was necessary because homosexual conduct is immoral. . . . the problem really wasn't that Pace spoke out of turn. It was that he told the truth about a rationale that was supposed to remain unspoken.
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2. Repealing DADT will be complicated. Opponents of repeal are trying to depict the transition to an inclusive policy as a fragile and complicated process. . . . But the shift to an inclusive policy is not rocket science. Research by the Rand Corporation shows that the Pentagon needs just three things to ensure a smooth transition: The military must have a standard of nondiscrimination that mandates equal treatment for everyone. There must be a single code of conduct that applies equally to gays and straights and does not mention sexual orientation. And military leaders at all levels must show their support for the policy.
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All of these steps are simple, which is why the militaries of Britain, Israel, Canada and other U.S. allies have had such an easy time getting rid of their bans.
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3. The integration of women and African Americans into the military offers useful comparisons. The debates over gays, women and blacks in the military seem quite similar in many regards. Just as some people claimed that white enlisted personnel would not follow black officers, for example, others say that straight troops will not follow gay commanders.
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Operationally, the end of "don't ask, don't tell" will be a cakewalk compared with racial and gender integration, which took many years and faced huge logistical obstacles. In this case, a majority of troops already say that they know or suspect that they know gay peers and are comfortable serving with them. Symbolically, the comparison is wrong as well: It conflates homophobia, racism and sexism, which are distinct phenomena.
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4. The troops oppose repealing DADT. It is true that when asked their policy preferences, more troops say they favor DADT than allowing gays to serve openly. But there are several caveats: First, the margin is small, and a large number of troops say they have no opinion. Typically, polls find that about 40 percent of troops prefer DADT, 30 percent prefer open service, and 30 percent have no opinion. Second, the vast majority of troops say they are comfortable working with gays and lesbians. Third, even among those who have an opinion, very few feel strongly about it.
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5. DADT is a losing issue politically. More than a dozen polls in the past five years have found that roughly two-thirds of the public supports repeal. Majorities of regular churchgoers and Republicans now support allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly. The political risk for the Obama administration and the Democrats is in not following through on their pledge to repeal the policy.
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It is time that the foul policy known as DADT be thrown on the trash heap of history. It's also time for its proponents to admit that DADT is all about religious based discrimination and that it has NOTHING to do with military readiness. Jim Webb, stop undermining the U. S. Constitution.

NOM Spending Thousands to Unseat Iowa Justices - When Will the IRS Revke NOM's Non-Profit Status?

Other than serving as a vehicle to enrich Maggie Gallagher (at right) and Brian Brown, the sole purpose of the National Organization for Marriage ("NOM") is to elect (or defeat) political candidates and to lobby for and effect legislation. Given this reality, I keep asking myself, where the Hell is the IRS and why hasn't NOM's tax-exempt status been revoked? Yes, NOM has a PAC, but if one puts form over substance, NOM in no way should be a tax exempt entity. Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code provides in relevant part that in order to be tax exempt an entity:
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[N]o substantial part of the activities of which is carrying on propaganda, or otherwise attempting, to influence legislation (except as otherwise provided in subsection (h)), and which does not participate in, or intervene in (including the publishing or distributing of statements), any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for public office.
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Excuse me, but the entire mission of NOM is to do exactly what is forbidden. WTF is going on? Has Rick Warren interceded with Obama to protect NOM. It truly makes no sense whatsoever, that NOM is not being hit as a taxable enterprise. Especially given the private inurement accruing to Ms. Gallagher and Mr. Brown. Here are highlights from HRC Backstory on NOM's latest improper efforts to influence elections and political candidates:
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The National Organization for Marriage (NOM), which has a history of trying to defeat pro-equality state candidates in Iowa, this week reported spending more than $235,000 on a television ad that targets three justices on the Iowa Supreme Court who were part of a unanimous 2009 decision ruling that the equal protection provision of the Iowa Constitution guarantees gay and lesbian couples the same right to marry as heterosexual couples.
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NOM joined the American Family Association, referred to as “among the most vigilant and vicious and anti-gay activists operating today” by the Right-Wing Watch, in supporting the efforts of the AFA-affiliated Iowa for Freedom. Led by former Republican gubernatorial candidate Robert Vander Plaats, Iowa for Freedom has targeted three Supreme Court justices facing a judicial retention election in November.
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Why are Christianist organizations receiving special rights and retaining tax exempt status when other groups would quickly lose their exempt status if they did a fraction of whar NOM, FRC and other professional Christian organizations do?

Friday Male Beauty

"Values Voter Summit 2010" - A Coven of Christofascists

The ever toxic Family Research Council is hosting its 2010 gathering of Christofascists and far right extremists and the agenda of these folks ought to make rational, thinking Americans cringe. Especially if one is Hispanic or LGBT. When you listen to the rhetoric of these people one thing is clear: they want a WHITE, CONSERVATIVE CHRISTIAN nation. No one else is welcome in their world in which they want to impose their "Biblical world view" on every level of government. Here are the 2010 break out topics:
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* Who's Politicizing Science? The Obama Administration's War on* American Apocalypse--When Christians Do Nothing, Secularists Do Everything--The Case for Christian Activism
* Indivisible: Social and Economic Foundations of American Liberty
* Social Justice: Am I My Brother's Keeper?
* The Falsehood of the Inevitablity of Same-Sex "Marriage"
* The Economic Impact of Illegal Immigration
* How to Reach the Online Generation (Without Losing Your Soul)
* Against the Odds: Real Students Making Real Change
* A Special Polling Presentation: Who are Tea Party and Christian Voters and What Do They Believe?
* Establishing a Culture Impact Team In Your Church
* Why Christians Should Support Israel
* Getting Out the Vote on Election Day
* Who's Politicizing Science? The Obama Administration's War on Life

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If there's any war going on, its the "value voters'" war on the U. S. Constitution and the rights of other citizens. These people are truly the Christian Taliban - and the present a clear and present danger to constitutional government. The list of other dangerous organizations backing this event can be found here.

DADT Video Message from Lady Gaga - How a "Fierce Advocate" Should Act

One can only hope that Barack Obama is paying attention to Lady Gaga's advocacy for the repeal of DADT. She's demonstrating what a true advocate does - as opposed to talking and and doing nothing. Her new video that was released today is set out below. It's beyond disturbing that Gaga seems to have a better appreciation of Constitutional protections afforded to ALL citizens than does of spineless Commander-in-Chief and members of Congress only to happy to prostitute themselves to religious extremists who seeking to subvert constitutional rights of other citizens. Here are highlights from the Advocate:

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Lady Gaga released a video early Friday that directs viewers to call their senators in advance of next week's vote on the National Defense Authorization Act, which houses “don't ask, don't tell” repeal.

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Gaga addressed the message to her fellow Americans, youths, and Republican senators, including John McCain, who has threatened to filibuster “don't ask, don't tell” repeal.

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“I am here to be a voice for my generation, not the generation of the senators who are voting, but for the youth of this country, the generation that is affected by this law, and whose children will be affected,” said Gaga.

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“We are not asking you to agree with or approve the moral implications of homosexuality. We're asking you to do your job, to protect the constitution,” she said.

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Senator Jim Webb, are you listening?

U. S. Constitution - Article VI and Why Senators Must Vote to End DADT

I have frequently made the argument that members of Congress who support DADT and other religious based - read that Christianist - discrimination need to resign from office for breach of their duties under the U. S. Constitution which was adopted on September 17, 1787 in Philadelphia. Article VI of the Constitution makes two things very clear: (1) members of the House of Representatives and the Senate are REQUIRED to take an oath to support the Constitution - and that means ALL of it - and (2) religious tests are banned. Despite this clear language of Article VI, DADT constitutes a de facto religious test: only those who subscribe to an anti-gay belief system are allowed to serve in the U.S. military. DADT has always been ALL about religion and nothing else. Combat readiness and other canards are smoke screens that Judge Phillips found to be unsupported by the facts in Log Cabin Republicans v. United States last week. One has to wonder why the media doesn't DEMAND an explanation from DADT supporters to questions on camera: do they support the U.S. Constitution? If they answer yes, then follow up with the question of why they are supporting an unconstitutional religious test against gays. Talk Heads of the Christian Right should be likewise put on the spot and shown to be seeking to subvert the very Constitution they claim to support. Here's the text of Article VI:
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The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.

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In an editorial calling upon Judge Phillips to issue a permanent injunction against the enforcement of DADT, the New York Times reviews the falsehoods used to try to justify the clearly unconstitutional DADT. Here are highlights:
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For almost a generation, the argument against allowing gay men and lesbians to serve openly in the military rested heavily on the claim that they would damage the morale and readiness of America’s armed forces.
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A judicial opinion last week by Virginia Phillips, a federal trial judge in California, musters compelling logic and persuasive evidence to show that the policy has done the opposite and has damaged the interests of the United States. Judge Phillips also made a strong case that the federal statute enacting the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy violates the Constitution.
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While the administration waits for Congress to repeal the statute, it should halt enforcement of “don’t ask, don’t tell.”

On Thursday, the plaintiffs in the case, the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay organization, proposed that Judge Phillips keep Defense Secretary Robert Gates and others from enforcing the statute or applying the policy and suspend any pending investigations or discharges. The Obama administration must now decide how to respond. It would be in keeping with the judge’s opinion for her to do just what the plaintiffs propose.
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Judge Phillips found that it has contributed to “critical troop shortages” and caused the discharge of members with critical skills like fluency in Arabic, medicine and counterterrorism.
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The enormous investment has been squandered. The cost of replacing them also is high. While the military was discharging gay soldiers, it was redressing troops shortages in wartime by giving “moral waivers” to convicted felons who lacked the required education and physical fitness to serve and were more likely to be drummed out because of misconduct.
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While fighting Islamic extremism, it is far past time that the USA start fighting the religious extremism within its own borders and that extremism flow principally from one source - Christian extremists who seek to subvert the Constitution in order to enshrine their toxic beliefs in the nation's laws. The days of special rights for Christianity need to end.

Log Cabin Republican Lawyers File for Permanent Injunction Against 'DADT'

Admittedly, I typically have little use for the Log Cabin Republicans who I equate as the of Jews who would be members of the NAZI party. As a former Republican - an activist even - I know full well that there is no changing the GOP from within. Nothing short of crushing electoral defeats will force the GOP to change. True, there are some future thinking people in the GOP, but in reality they carry no weight and are viewed with disdain by the rank and file grass roots Kool-Aid drinkers. Hence why I left the GOP and until recently have had no official party affiliation - and even then I took that step to force local Democrats to hear the concerns of LGBT citizens. However, with the case of Log Cabin Republicans V. United States of America in which a federal District Court struck down DADT as unconstitutional, the LCR hit a home run. Not that it will endear them with most LGBT Americans or even less with members of the GOP and far right. Now, LCR has filed for a permanent injunction (LGBT Pov has the filing) which would bar the enforcement of DADT unless the case is appealed. (NOTE: The law firm White & Case, which is representing the LCR is a mega international law firm and no light weight in the legal world) Here are highlights from the Los Angeles Times:
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A week after a federal judge in Riverside declared the U.S. government’s ban on gays serving openly in the military unconstitutional, attorneys for the Republican organization that filed the lawsuit asked the court to permanently and immediately ban defense agencies from enforcing the "don’t ask, don’t tell" policy. The U.S. Department of Justice has seven days to respond to the proposed injunction. Agency officials could not be reached for comment Thursday.
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In her opinion, Phillips said the evidence presented showed that the policy had a detrimental effect on the armed services, including leading to the dismissal of “critical” military personnel. She noted that the Pentagon also violated the policy when it saw fit, routinely delaying the discharge of service members suspected of violating the law until they completed their deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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Log Cabin Republicans attorney Dan Woods, from the White & Case law firm in Los Angeles, said leaders of the organization have been invited to discuss the case with members of the Obama administration in the next few days.
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Justice officials and other legal experts have questioned whether the federal judge has the legal authority to issue an injunction prohibiting the policy from being enforced worldwide throughout the military, as opposed to just her judicial district in California. Woods, however, argued that past federal court rulings show that Phillips clearly possesses that authority.

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Clearly, this case has put the fire to the feet of Obama and the Congressional Democrats. As I have noted before, courts of law and the rules of evidence and prescribed burdens of proof will show that DADT is unconstitutional and when stripped of all else arises from one thing: illegal religious based discrimination.

More Thursday Male Beauty

Why Are a Recoed Number of Americans Living In Poverty?

The caption of this post comes directly from a Time article that looks at the abysmal state of the "American Dream" in the aftermath of 8 years of misrule by Chimperator Bush and the GOP Congress. Yes, Obama has dropped the ball and dropped it badly. But the main obstacle to helping fellow citizens are Republicans and members of the Tea Party who care nothing for the poor, the sick or the homeless - even though the vast majority of them outwardly wrap themselves in the flag and religion. Indeed, most of the Gospel message is ignored and/or thrown into the trash by these self-centered hypocrites. I enjoy money and the good life as much as the next person, but I do NOT condone leaving families homeless and hungry while I strive to hoard money and possessions for myself - all as I wear religion on my sleeve. Unfortunately, the media - including Time - are all too reticent to go after the Christianists and the GOP and label them to be the frauds, liars and hypocrites that they are based on objective fact. Here are some story highlights:
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The US Census Bureau is out with its annual report on poverty and incomes today and the results are striking: The number of people living in poverty in the US is at an all time high. The last time this many people were living in poverty in the US was in the late 1950s. In 2009, 43.6 million people lived on the equivalent of less than $5,500 a year. That was up from 39.8 million Americans in 2008. The 2009 number means that more than 1 in every 7 Americans live in poverty.
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Why is poverty a worse problem in this recession? It comes back to the particularly sticky unemployment problem this time around. Poverty is certainly not helped by jumps in unemployment, but the big driver of poverty is not just joblessness but persistent unemployment. And people loosing their job and not being about to get back into the workforce has been a particularly bad problem in this recession. In August, the percentage of unemployed people who have been out of a job more than six months was 42% [See chart below]. Second, income equality is a lot worse in the US than it used to be. The Census measures inequality by something called the Gini index. Back at the beginning of the 1980s, the Gini index stood at 0.374. It is now 0.458. That's a jump of 22%. And when you have more people living on the edges of the income scale, unemployment can quickly push the people on the bottom into poverty.
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The problem is these two issues, long-term unemployment and income inequality, while made worse by recessions, are not just recession problems. They are the result of big structural problems in the economy. Recovery or not, high poverty rates may be with us for some time.

The Tea Party Merges with the Christian Right - Details from Christine O'Donnell's Ex-Ex-Gay Acolyte

Personally, I have always believed that the Tea Party crowd and the Christian Right are for the most part one and the same. I make this statement based on over a decade's scrutiny of leading professional Christian organizations and their web sites and scrutiny of the Tea Party and its candidates. Both groups are about 95% comprised of white, conservative Christians who oppose (i) immigrants and immigration, (2) tax increases and any spending for the poor and/or homeless, (3) reject objective facts and modern knowledge, (4) hate and despise anyone they consider "other," and (5) re-write history to suit their own agenda. Nothing terrifies both groups more than non-whites, non-Christians, LGBT citizens, and modern knowledge and progressive ideas. Both groups are living mentally back in the 1950's and early 1960's. Thus, it was only a matter of time until Tea Party candidates like Christine O'Donnell and Sharon Angle would surface and confirm the merger. Mother Jones has highlights on this phenomenon. Here are highlights:
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Does the Delaware insurgent's campaign foreshadow the marriage of tea party and Christian right? . .O'Donnell's victory also marks a step forward for the Christian right, which her campaign has quietly begun to court—and which could end up riding the tea party wave back into the halls of power.
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O'Donnell has campaigned more as a tea partier, preaching against government spending and Democratic overreach. But she has also used the money that anti-government activists have poured into her campaign to obtain support from Christian and evangelical activists.
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Response Unlimited's president, Christian activist Philip Zodhiates, says . . . . "A great percentage of those that would consider themselves part of the tea party movement would hold very conservative beliefs…[on] issues like abortion [and] homosexual marriage."
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O'Donnell has supplemented her Christian outreach by buying lists from an online marketing firm called American Church Lists, according to her FEC filings. She's also hired religious-right activists for her campaign.
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A beneficiary of both tea party anger and religious right fervor, O'Donnell represents the potential overlap between Christian conservatives and anti-government activists. She's building this coalition just as the religious right's old power players are trying to ride the coattails of the tea party back into the spotlight. At his Faith and Freedom conference in Washington last week, former Christian Coalition director Ralph Reed attempted to cast small-government conservatism as an extension of God's will.
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And make no mistake about just how extreme O'Donnell and Angle are in their religious views. Angle has made her own outrageous statemeents and after O'Donnell's win this week, it seems people are coming out of the woodwork to give their evidence that O'Donnell is a full blown Christian Right whack job. Here are highlights from The Daily Beast that recounts the statements of Wade Richards, a former minion of O'Donnell in her support of the wholly discredited "ex-gay" myth:
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A little more than 10 years ago, Wade Richards, a tormented, deeply religious 20-year-old gay man, took his Bible school tuition money and used it to fly to Los Angeles to join forces with Christine O’Donnell, a budding Christian right activist. O’Donnell, a former spokeswoman for Concerned Women for America, had founded an organization called The Savior’s Alliance for Lifting the Truth, or The SALT, in 1996; it was meant to organize young people around opposition to abortion, sex education, and homosexuality. Richards had just graduated from an ex-gay rehab program and had been interviewed about it on 20/20. Ostensibly cured, he got in touch with O’Donnell and became The SALT’s outreach coordinator and spokesman on homosexuality.
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Richards, though, was having doubts, which he confided to O’Donnell. “I told her, ‘You know, Christine, I’m still super struggling with same-sex attraction,’” he says. “‘I don’t really know if this is real, if I can really be this changed person that I’m going around the country speaking and saying that I am.’” She paid little attention, he says. Campaigning against gay rights was too central to her mission.
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For O’Donnell, such gay-baiting was very much in character. Toward the end of the Clinton administration, she protested the appointment of James Hormel to be ambassador to Luxembourg, a posting the religious right opposed because Hormel was gay. “The SALT was concerned about Hormel’s ties to the pedophile-rights movement,” her website said, though there was not a shred of evidence behind the slur.
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O’Donnell’s demonization of gay people is especially striking given the fact that, according to Richards, she has a sister who is openly lesbian. Indeed, it was meeting her sister, he says, that helped him begin to accept his own sexuality.
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Richards finally came out in an article in The Advocate in 2000. After that, he says, O’Donnell “totally turned her back on me. I never heard from her ever again. That’s been my experience with the Christian community in general. The minute I was struggling and saying, ‘Hey, listen, I don’t know really where I am with this,’ that’s when everyone really turned their back on me.”
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Christine O’Donnell was toeing the party line at the expense of an individual. Often these groups, in pushing their dogma, they overlook that there’s a human being that’s having their lives upended.”

Thursday Male Beauty

The Real Winner of the Republican Primaries

David Frum - a rational conservative as opposed to a Kool-Aid drinking crazy like most of today's GOP - looks at the real winner of the GOP primaries and, sadly, he says it's Barack Obama. Perhaps the death by a thousand cuts that the GOP is inflicting upon itself that has emboldened Obama and the DNC to blatantly throw LGBT Americans under the bus yet again as the DNC erases LGBT agenda items from its civil rights agenda. Increasingly, the two political parties offer voters the choice between (1) certifiable crazies such as Christine O'Donnell, and (2) mealy mouthed spineless wonders like the current occupant of the White House. It's literally, a case of being forced to choose between the lesser of the poisons. It makes it truly difficult to feel much motivation at all to be excited about a candidate. Yes, Obama excited people in 2008, but sadly he's proven to be all talk and no action - and even less leadership. If Obama and the Democrats cling to power it will be not because they deserve it, but only because the GOP seems to have a death wish. A pox on both their houses seems the best analysis of the horrible choices facing voters this election cycle. Here are highlights from David Frum's column on the subject:
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The real action in this election cycle was in the Republican primaries, they are almost over, and we already know who won: (drum roll, please!) President Obama. American conservatives have suffered a crushing and lasting defeat. The center of gravity in American politics has shifted permanently and irreversibly to the left (and conservative ideology will eventually follow).
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The saddest thing is that this conservative calamity is mostly self-inflicted. More and more conservatives get Oprah-cized . . . They now believe that expressing their feelings (e.g. by nominating quixotic candidates) is more important than trying to influence government policies (e.g. by nominating viable candidates). They withdraw from practical politics and instead join a protest movement. They march in the streets in tricorn hats while the liberals (whom they unwittingly help to put in office) are creating new entitlements and raising taxes.
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Many vulnerable Democratic congressional candidates got their dream opponents (the latest example is Christine O’Donnell – unfortunately, just one of many, way too many, examples). So the GOP gains in November will be smaller than they could be. Furthermore, a lot of those gains will be easily reversible.
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Even if Republicans capture the House this November, they will have a barely functional majority – a 225-210 split is about the best we can realistically hope for – and will be almost certain to lose the House again in 2012, potentially even by a worse margin than in 2008. Such a scenario would be devastating to conservative causes, since Obama would claim that his own re-election victory combined with his party wrestling the House from the GOP (and expanding their Senate majority) gives him a clear mandate to implement his agenda (rather than pursue bipartisanship). And make no mistake, that’s the mandate Obama plans to get before pursuing his remaining agenda. All the talk about the importance of this year’s election in stopping Obama is just talk.
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The Senate seats that the Republicans threw away (the seat in Delaware has just been added to this list) will now be in the hands of Democrats for 6 years, and some of them will not realistically come into play again for much longer than that. Who knows, the Republican president in 2025 (I’m not very optimistic we will see one earlier than that) may have some important part of his agenda derailed because of coming up one Senate vote short (thanks to a Democrat rather than Republican representing Delaware).
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We will never know how many talented young people contemplating entering Republican politics (especially in swing states) will decide to pursue other career options instead because of all the ugliness they saw in this primary season (nor how many congressional Republicans will retire earlier than they otherwise would). But we can be sure that conservatism will be suffering for decades because of their decisions.

LGBT Civil Rights Vanishing on New DNC Web Site

Last evening as the LGBT liaison to the Hampton Democratic City Committee, I received an e-mail from the committee chairwoman telling me about and giving me the link to the supposedly new and improved DNC web page. I clicked the link and went to the site, signed in and low and behold, the "civil rights" page has been apparently sanitized in the minds of spineless DNC operative to removal all reference to the repeal of DOMA. You know, that same federal Defense of Marriage Act that our "fierce advocate' in the White House heretofore claimed needed to be repealed while campaigning. Every time I manage to rally some enthusiasm for putting forth efforts to elect local Democrats , the DNC and/or the White House does something else to throw Teh Gays under the bus yet again. Pam Spaulding with her usual wit and ability to get to the point has this to say:

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Jesus, the tire tracks on my back are really smarting today. The DNC has apparently boarded the bus that is driving over LGBTs and the immigration reform folks today with a lovely revamped site on "Civil Rights" that's, to be charitable, going in the the wrong direction. I can't help but cringe at the bitter irony of the logo: Change that matters.
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The DNC page disingenuously states as follows: "Civil Rights are not just abstract principles. They represent nothing less than our ability to provide for ourselves and our families and to live free from discrimination or persecution. For decades, Democrats have fought for these values, working to ensure that all Americans have the opportunity to fully participate in our society-to live in a place where there are no second-class citizens, where each of us can go about our lives without fear of discrimination." Nice words (and that's all we've heard from the White House), but a further reading of the PR piece quickly shows that second class citizenship is deemed to be fine and dandy for LGBT folk. Pam Spaulding continues saying:
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Wait - what happened to one of the promises candidate Barack Obama made during the campaign -- repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act? Nowhere, people. Not a priority, not on the list anymore. I guess that went up in smoke with the whole "full civil unions" (where's that going to come from?) hoo-hah.
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And tell me what is a "sensible way" to repeal DADT? It sure can't be by giving troops freepable surveys to fill out, non-confidential feedback e-boxes, and asking spouses what they think about enlisted homos moving next door. I guess "sensible" is whatever Bill Gates approves of.
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This situation is so damn sad -- and unnecessary from a PR perspective if you want to at least string along LGBTs to open the gAyTM. They aren't even trying anymore.
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LGBT Americans have apparently been written off. And my fellow City Committee members wonder why I'm not a happy camper? Why don't the powers that be at the DNC just go ahead and spit in our faces? The DNC agenda of alienating the party base has just ticked up a few more notches. I do not understand it. The DNC seems Hell bent to goe down in defeat come November 2, 2010, inspite of all of the GOP missteps.

More Wednesday Male Beauty

Lady Gaga Inspires Others to DADT Repeal Advocacy

I may be showing my age, but I will concede that prior to the National Equality March last October, I really did not know a great deal about Lady Gaga. She was a performer that my youngest daughter might mention and I had heard a couple of her songs. In fact, it was not until that gorgeous Sunday afternoon last October that I saw Gaga in action from about 20-25 feet back from the podium in the press area where we were positioned thanks to my Bilerico credentials. It quickly became obvious as she spoke that she's no blond bimbo and that she's not one to bite her tongue. I can still hear her in my mind as she yelled out to Barack Obama that it was time for fully equality.

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As I noted in a post the other day, Gaga made the repeal of DADT a visible issue at the MTV Awards where she was accompanied by four (4) victims of DADT and discarded from the military. This aggressive exposure of the issue continued to her web site that is linked to SLDN's web page and call for citizens to join her in calling their Senators and demanding that they vote for repeal. THIS is what a "fierce advocate" acts like. Not the simpering spinelessness which is all that is forthcoming from the White House. The following is a video inspired by Gaga - and the girls in the video DID call their Senators, one of who has responded and thanked them for their action. For readers in Virginia, the numbers to call are as follows: Mark Warner - (202) 224-2023; Jim Webb - (202)-224-4024. Call them now/tomorrow. I already have.

Irish Times Poll: 67% Support Gay Marriage - Along With More Signs of Catholic Church European Melt Down

Ireland was once considered a bastion of Roman Catholicism and the Irish people suffered greatly for their allegiance to the Church of Roman. Now, the Catholic Church is fast losing all moral authority in Ireland - and rightfully so given the moral bankruptcy of the Church hierarchy - and the Irish populace seems to care less about the constant anti-gay screeds issuing from the Vatican and Papa Ratzi. This has been confirmed by a new Irish Times poll that reflects that 67% of respondents support same sex marriage - something that is anathema to Rome. Frankly, there are no signs that the Church's free fall is about to halt any time soon. But Ireland is not the only European nation where the Church's toxic anti-equality influence is waning. In Scotland, the Scotsman reports that the expected crowd for Papa Ratzi's scheduled mass in Glasgow is a quarter of what greeted Pope Paul II (who we all now know was less than saintly and protected sexual predator Marcial Maceil Degollado) in 1982. Then there's Belgium where Time reports a similar downward spiral for an institution that turned a blind eye to the sexual abuse of children and youth on a global basis. Do I feel any pity for the Catholic Church? None whatsoever. First highlights from the Irish Times:
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JUST OVER two-thirds of people (67 per cent) believe gay couples should be allowed to marry, according to an Irish Times /Behaviour Attitudes social poll. It is one of a series of findings in a poll on “sex, sin and society” that indicates Irish people have adopted a more liberal attitude towards personal relationships and sexual behaviour.
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In addition showing strong support for gay marriage, a significant majority (60 per cent) also believe civil partnerships for gay couples will not undermine the institution of marriage. A large majority (91 per cent) also say they would not think less of a person if they revealed they were gay or lesbian. These numbers are consistently high across most age groups, as well as in urban and rural areas.
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The findings also indicate there is a growing consensus that living together before marriage is likely to result in a more stable marriage. A majority (57 per cent) believe cohabitation is a positive development. This view is reflected consistently across most age groups.
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Even higher numbers (79 per cent) do not regard sex before marriage as immoral. When broken down by religion, most Catholics – again, 79 per cent – did not see anything wrong with the practice.
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The apparent decline of the Church in Scotland is likewise significant. These highlights from The Scotsman:
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ONLY 65,000 Catholics are now expected to take part in the papal mass in Scotland tomorrow – one third fewer than originally expected and a mere fraction of the total number in the country.
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The Catholic Church denied that the controversy over the Pope's handling of the Church's child abuse scandal has undermined his imminent arrival. But critics of the visit claimed the figures revealed the extent of indifference towards the first visit by a Pope to Scotland for 28 years. The Catholic Church says more than 250,000 attended the mass in Bellahouston Park when Pope John Paul II visited in 1982.
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And lastly from Time these highlights on the continued fall out from the Church's reprehensible enabling and cover up of sexual abuse by priests over the decades:
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In the past few months, harrowing tales have emerged from almost every congregation in the country about priests raping and assaulting young parishioners. . . . Acknowledging the scale of the scandal, the head of the church in Belgium, Archbishop André-Joseph Léonard, vowed to do more to help the victims, collaborate further with law enforcement and punish the abusers.
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But abuse victims immediately slammed his pledges as vague and evasive. They pointed out that the church has yet to show how it will find and punish abusive priests. They also said there is no indication the church is ready to give the police and courts full rein in investigating and prosecuting abuse allegations within the clergy.
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"The reforms are smoke and mirrors," says Barbara Blaine, president of the Chicago-based Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), who flew to Brussels to hear Léonard's announcement. "These are bare-minimum, begrudging steps. Hundreds or thousands were raped and sodomized by priests, and the church has been covering it up for decades. But nothing that the bishops have offered gives us any hope that they will change."
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Ringlet suggests the church's inability to relate to real-life concerns partly explains its fading influence. While three-quarters of Belgians describe themselves as Catholic, churchgoing has slipped drastically in recent decades: 42.9% of Catholics said they attended Sunday Mass in 1967, but that figure plummeted to 7% by 2006. And the recent rash of awful headlines is only likely to speed the decline.

Wednesday Male Beauty

The very cute Kyle Kleiboeker who we met at the "Glitter Ball" party in NYC

Loonie Christine O'Donnell Wins GOP Primary

UPDATED: For more on just how batshit crazy Christine O'Donnell is, check out this post by Jeremy Hooper at Good As You:

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People had better get used to certifiable crazies like Christine O'Donnell (advocate of abstinence only sex ed and reparative therapy - and stamping out masturbation) - now the GOP candidate for U.S. Senate for Delaware - being the face of the GOP. O'Donnell underscores just how extreme and untethered the GOP Base/Tea Party crowd has become. Other than being a religious extremist, O'Donnell frankly has no real credentials. It will be up to the Democrats to expose just how far out of the mainstream O'Donnell is when it comes to social issues and how unqualified she is to hold any public office. In fact, O'Donnell strikes me as just about as crazy as Sarah Palin. It's one thing to be a reasoned conservative. It's something wholly different to be a religious fanatic and whack job. Unfortunately, given the massive flight of moderates from the GOP, we can likely expect more Christine O'Donnells to become the GOP standard bearers. The irony is that the GOP establishment initially allowed the GOP base and Tea Partiers to run amok - now they see that they have created a Frankenstein monster. Here are highlights from the Washington Post on the Tea Party win in Delaware:
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Christine O'Donnell, a "tea party"-backed long-shot candidate, stunned the Republican establishment Tuesday night by defeating nine-term Rep. Michael N. Castle in Delaware's GOP Senate primary, one of the most shocking upsets in an already tumultuous primary season.
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[T]he defeat of Castle, a former governor and one of the most popular politicians in the state, jeopardized the GOP's once-high hopes of winning the Democratic-held seat in November's midterm election. O'Donnell is viewed as a far weaker candidate, and Democrats say she is too conservative for the state. But her victory was a reminder of the unpredictable forces at work in politics this year and the power and energy of the antiestablishment sentiment among voters nationwide that could be aimed at Democrats.
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The outcome was the latest in a string of embarrassments for the Republican establishment this year, underscoring the civil war that continues to rage in the party. Last month, Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska lost her primary to political newcomer Joe Miller, who like O'Donnell had the support of Palin and tea party activists. Last spring, tea party forces defeated Sen. Robert F. Bennett of Utah at the Republican state convention.
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A senior Republican, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to offer a candid view, said the national senatorial committee would "walk" out of the Delaware race.
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Democrats moved quickly to try to paint O'Donnell as unacceptable to the Delaware electorate. "Today the Republican Party has shown just how far right it has moved," said Democratic National Committee Chairman Timothy M. Kaine. He called O'Donnell "a self-aggrandizing and divisive candidate" who favors "failed Republican economic policies." Democrats will find plenty of ammunition to use against O'Donnell from her fellow Republicans. One example came from Ross, who said earlier that O'Donnell "could not be elected dog catcher" in the state.

What Is A LGBT Democrat To Do In 2010?

I attended a meeting of the Hampton Democratic Party City Committee last evening and once again I was looked to for a comment on what's going among the LGBT and potential voters. Frankly, I summed up the Democratic Party's problem - at least in my view - in two words: Barack Obama. Other words might include broken promises, lack of leadership, lack of back bone, etc. Other activists who wanted to remain anonymous (hence no reference to their names or positions) shared with me their frustrations at the White House's self-inflicted wounds and the damage done to the moral of the Democratic base. From the LGBT perspective, David Mixner has a proposed game plan that makes sense to me, the most notable being: (1) vote and contribute to candidates that have voted the right way on LGBT issues, and (2) don't give a dime to Democratic Party organizations. Even if it may sadly be to late to avert disaster on November 2, 2010, the party needs to learn a severe lesson: alienate important portions of the base and pay a high price. Here are highlights from David's post:
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I know there are those who have had it with the Democratic Party and in many cases with good substantive policy reasons. Certainly the LGBT community can legitimately feel rejected, deceived and abused by the Party this year. With a vastly Democratic Congress and a Democratic President, the results for our community are pitiful. Some of that can be chalked up to a failure of leadership in our own national organizations.
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As a result, many of you are tempted to stay home or vote Green. . . . but I do not believe that is an effective strategy in a case it could either cause the defeat of a 'full equality Democrat' or elect a total destructive nut job like Sharron Angle to the United States Senate.
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[I]f you choose to vote Democrat, then this year you most certainly have choices and some good ones. This is a year we can be good citizens, participate in the battle for the best government we can achieve in these times and not blindly support any old Democrat. Here are some guidelines on those choices.
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1. Vote. For any person of any ideology not to vote is just criminal in my mind.
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2. Contribute to those candidates who support 'full equality including marriage equality' who are in tough races. I will do my best over the next weeks to point these tough races out to you. We have a number of US Senate races and Congressional races where the Democratic nominee supports us 100%. We should be there for them.
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3. Contribute to openly LGBT candidates who have a real shot either directly or through the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund.
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4. Do not contribute to Democratic Party entities. Do you want your money to go to Senator Ben Nelson or Congressman Ike Skelton who oppose us to the hilt? If you contribute to the Party establishment then you are contributing to them.
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5. Do support organizations that only support candidates for full equality. If they are supporting candidates with less than full equality then don't give to them.
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6. Also the battles in states like New York, California and Minnesota for marriage equality should be on the top of our lists. . . .
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There is a lot we can do to help as LGBT Democrats in this year's elections without being blackmailed or guilted into supporting horrible conservative blue dog Democrats.

A "Conversation on 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell'" With Glenn Nye

The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network will be presenting a "Conversation on 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell'" this Friday, September 17, 2010, at St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Hampton , Virginia . Representative Glenn Nye (D-VA) will speak about his support for repeal and the need for the Senate to act this month. Former Army Capt. Anthony Woods will also discuss his experience being discharged under DADT, and SLDN Legislative Manager Jeremy Wilson-Simerman will give an update on the bill's status.
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This is a unique opportunity to hear from Rep. Nye and learn about the latest updates on DADT repeal -- including how YOU can help. Not only can you participate in this special conversation, but you can also be part of an event to raise awareness about DADT repeal in Virginia , a crucial state in the upcoming Senate vote.

Where: St. Mark Episcopal Church Parish Hall

2605 Cunningham Drive, Hampton, Virginia 23666
Telephone: 757 826-3515

When: September 17, 2010 at 6:00PM

ALSO: On Sunday, September 26, 2010 at 3:00 PM the boyfriend and I will be hosting a "meet and greet" with Glenn Nye at our home. Those interested in attending, please drop me an e-mail at michaelinnorfolk@gmail.com