Sanders Is Only Major Candidate to Sit Out Both LGBT Forums

When it comes to LGBT issues, Bernie Sanders has never left me with a warm and fuzzy feeling. Indeed, the man comes across as perpetually angry and not the empathetic type. Now, Sanders is seemingly avoiding two candidate forums on LGBT issues - the only major candidate to do so.  His claims of "scheduling conflicts" sadly simply do not seem to ring true and one has to wonder why he is snubbing the LGBT community, a reliable segment of the Democrat Party base. Personally, I do not believe Sanders is electable for three reasons: (i) he is too far to the left on issues, (ii) he is too strident and appears unwilling to work with others, and (iii) he is simply not likable. All issues that could prove harmful in the 2020 general election. A piece in The Advocate looks at Sanders' slight to LGBT voters.  Here are highlights:

Progressive presidential candidate Bernie Sanders is the only frontrunner who will miss both events aimed at discussing LGBTQ equality and rights.

The rest of the frontrunners will be on hand Friday for an LGBTQ Presidential Forum, cosponsored by The Advocate in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. And, according to CNN's schedule for the event, all of the heavy-hitters other than Sanders will also attend the Human Rights Campaign/CNN’s LGBTQ Town Hall slated for October 10 in Los Angeles. The senator from Vermont’s team has cited “scheduling conflicts” for both events.

Among those attending the LGBTQ Forum cosponsored by The Advocate and GLAAD are Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg, Julián Castro, Amy Klobuchar, Tulsi Gabbard, Joe Sestak, and Marianne Williamson. Pose star Angelica Ross will host the event that features columnist Lyz Lenz of eastern Iowa newspaper The Gazette, One Iowa Policy Director Keenan Crow, and Advocate Editor-in-chief Zach Stafford as moderators.

Since taking office, the Trump administration has made over 100 actions to roll back rights and safety for LGBTQ people, including the trans military ban and his administration's support of allowing businesses to discriminate on the basis of sexual and gender identity.  

The candidates slated to attend the HRC/CNN Town Hall are Harris, Warren, Biden, Klobuchar, Buttigieg, Booker, Tom Steyer, Beto O’Rourke, and Castro.

There have been three major Democratic debates in the past few months but moderators have not posed a single question regarding LGBTQ equality to the candidates.

A recent report highlighted how coverage of LGBTQ issues has "essentially vanished" from mainstream media outlets "after Trump was elected and have remained largely absent from coverage for the past three years."

Is Sanders taking LGBT voters for granted or does he simply not like us? Those are questions Sanders needs to answer.

Anti-LGBT Rep. Marcia Fudge May Challenge Pelosi for Speakership

Fudge is seemingly part of  the "civil-rights-for-me-but-not-for-thee crowd"
and has voted against protecting LGBT Americans. 

Surveys have shown that 82% of LGBT voters supported Democrats at the polls in the 2018 midterm elections and many gave generously to Democrat candidate campaigns.  Indeed, in some very close Democrat victories, the LGBT vote may have won the day for Democrats (the LGBT community, including the husband and I, worked very hard for Virginia Governor Ralph Northam's winning campaign).  Enter Ohio Rep. Marcia Fudge who has opposed the so-called Equality Act that would expand non-discrimination protections for LGBT individuals and women and by adding those categories to the Civil Rights Act.  Fudge now wants to challenge Nancy Pelosi - a long time LGBT ally - for Speaker of the House of Representatives.  Unlike Fudge, Nancy Pelosi wants to make passage of the Equality Act a Democrat Party priority.  I can think of few ways to more thoroughly insult and alienate the LGBT community than to put someone like Fudge in as Speaker of the House.  Some in the LGBT community have described Fudge as part of the "civil-rights-for-me-but-not-for-thee crowd."  Others have noted that the rest of the Congressional Black Caucus supported the Amendment to the Civil Rights Act, so Fudge is an out of the mainstream outlier.  A piece in Roll Call looks at a meeting meeting between Pelosi and Fudge.  Here are excerpts:

Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi met with her potential competition for the speaker’s gavel on Friday, Ohio Rep. Marcia Fudge, who left the meeting still contemplating a bid.

“No,” Fudge told reporters when asked if Pelosi asked her not to run. “What she asked me was basically how we could get to a point where I could be supportive.”

Asked if such a point exists, even if she opts not to run against Pelosi, Fudge said, “There is a point, yes, but it’s going to take some.”

Fudge said she used the meeting to tell Pelosi about some of her concerns, adding that she needs more time to talk to people and think about whether she will run against her. The Ohio Democrat is headed home for Thanksgiving and plans to announce a decision shortly after the holiday.

She also told Pelosi she would speak with her again after Thanksgiving, presumably before any public announcement.

Asked if the meeting encouraged her toward running, Fudge said, “No, but it didn’t discourage me either.”

If she does run, Fudge said she hasn’t decided yet whether she’d seek the caucus nomination on Nov. 28, in which only a simple majority vote is needed to be selected the caucus’s choice for speaker, or challenge Pelosi during the floor vote Jan. 3. 

Pelosi clearly is trying to avoid a floor fight.

“I think her goal is to try to quickly as possible unify the caucus, and I understand that,” Fudge said. “And that is why I thought it was important that when she asked me to come and see her that I did so.”

The conversation with Fudge was “candid and respectful,” Pelosi said in a statement.
Among the issues discussed, according to Fudge, were succession planning and “the feeling in the caucus of people who are feeling out and left behind.”

Politico reports that the Pelosi-Fudge meeting was at the behest of incoming House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings (D-Md.).  Here are highlights:

Nancy Pelosi sat face to face with her potential challenger, Rep. Marcia Fudge of Ohio, on Friday as the California Democrat continued her fight to reclaim the speaker’s gavel.

The two women huddled at the behest of incoming House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), a key Pelosi ally and senior member of the Congressional Black Caucus who is also close with Fudge, the CBC’s former chairwoman.

Pelosi also spent Friday afternoon meeting with incoming Democratic lawmakers who during their campaigns vowed to oppose her as speaker, including Reps.-elect Max Rose (N.Y.), Jeff Van Drew (N.J.), Mikie Sherrill (N.J.) and Haley Stevens (Mich.).

After Pelosi met with the incoming freshmen who had called for new leadership during their campaigns, some skeptics left the room expressing an openness to supporting her.

With her opponents continuing to work against Pelosi, the California Democrat's allies are hitting back in her defense.

Illinois Rep. Jan Schakowsky blasted Pelosi’s critics for defying “the majority voice of the caucus.” She suggested they are worse than the House Freedom Caucus, the group of conservative rabble-rousers who banded together to defy GOP leadership for years.

“The majority rules!” Schakowsky said, aghast. “The very idea of organizing without even an opponent. … They do not have a candidate.”

I'm not necessarily a Pelosi fan, but I surely do not want an anti-LGBT individual like Fudge in the position of Speaker of the House.  Similarly, I do not want an inexperienced novice in the position given that the next 2 years will require a Speaker who can play hard ball and hold Trump and other GOP misogynists to account.

“The Canaries Are Dying”: Republicans Pick Their 2018 Poison

Donald Trump  - along with his chief sycophant, Mike Pence - continues to be a blight on America.  Outside the toxic core of the Republican Party base which is comprised of religious extremists and white supremacists, Der Trumpenführer remains unpopular and it would seem that he is doing all in his power to further alienate minorities, the LGBT community, those concerned about gun control or moral decency.  Indeed, the list goes on and on, leaving Republicans up for reelection forced to choose between embracing Trump to appease the ugliest elements of the party base or distancing themselves from him at the risk of those same ugly elements staying home on election day.  Meanwhile, Democrats have been raking up surprise wins in a number of traditionally red districts. A piece in Vanity Fair looks at the choices facing the GOP as the 2018 mid term elections approach.  Here are highlights: 

These races are like canaries in the coal mine,” Steve Israel, a former New York congressman and chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, told me last week. “For Republicans, the canaries are dying.”

The day before we spoke, Democrats had picked up a statehouse seat in a deep red district in Missouri, the latest in a series of electoral upsets the G.O.P. has suffered across the country in recent months.

Republican candidates are facing an impossible strategic choice, one that is to some degree independent of the president’s approval rating or any economic factor: tack toward Trump, and potentially lose the center, or forgo Trumpian red meat and watch the base stay home. “What you do when you appeal to that 33 percent is you peel off another 50 percent of the voters who will go, ‘Fuck you, I will crawl over broken glass to vote against you because you are a goddamn Donald Trumper,’” Rick Wilson, a G.O.P. strategist and vocal Never Trumper, told me, adding that without Clinton, Trump “has to stand on his own two feet.” And although Trump won’t be on the ballot in 2018, every Republican candidate this fall will be viewed as a Trump proxy. Meanwhile, Democrats will have the luxury of focusing their energy elsewhere. “They get to do that because they’re out of power. That’s a big advantage to them,” the Republican strategist, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told me. “They let the national environment take care of it and they run on issues that are local and important.” Since Donald Trump took office, Democrats have flipped 36 statehouse seats from red to blue—a solid down payment on the the ones they lost under Obama—and are aiming to rob the G.O.P. of 24 House seats to secure the majority in the lower chamber. Holding the upper chamber, however, is a lighter lift for the G.O.P., which enjoys several structural advantages. “It’s a poor environment for us. I think the real question is, do we hang onto the Senate?” Terry Sullivan, a G.O.P. strategist who served as Senator Marco Rubio’s 2016 campaign manager, told me. “I don’t think it’s a guarantee. I know the math is in our favor, but I don’t think it is a foregone conclusion that we do.” A string of Democratic upsets in conservative strongholds in special elections since the New Year have opened G.O.P. eyes to the challenge. Last month, Democrat Patty Schachtner secured a nine-point victory in a contentious battle for a state Senate seat in Wisconsin’s 10th District, which Mitt Romney and Trump won by 6 points and 17 points, respectively. Trygve Olson, a G.O.P. strategist who previously managed campaigns in the district, warned on Twitter, “A wave is coming . . . This a suburban-rural district. If the G.O.P. is losing WI-10 lookout!” Republicans were similarly rattled by the Democratic performance in two Missouri special election races. Democrat Mike Revis edged out his opponent by three points in Missouri’s 97th District, which Trump won by 28 points and Romney won by 12 points. Strategists have also noted a trio of elections for bellwether seats in Florida—the state’s 40th Senate District in Miami-Dade, the St. Petersburg’s mayoral race, and Florida’s 72nd House District—in which Democrats triumphed. “This is beyond a trend. The results are in. Also troubling for the G.O.P. is the rate at which Democrats are outraising Republicans. In the final quarter of 2017, more than 40 House Republicans were outraised by at least one, if not multiple, Democratic opponents. The fear is that the Republican Party will be forced to defend traditionally safe states, such as Texas where Democratic Congressman Beto O’Rourke outraised Senator Ted Cruz last quarter in the race for the former presidential hopeful’s Senate seat. The Democratic Party is also recruiting higher quality candidates than in past cycles. “One of the effects of the Trump administration’s negativity is that [there is] a record-breaking number of people who want to run for office . . . . And, Israel noted, whether it’s a result of higher quality Democrats or Trump fatigue, Republican incumbents are bailing. Thirty-five House Republicans have called it quits—roughly half of whom are vacating vulnerable seats—and three G.O.P. senators, Bob Corker of Tennessee, Dean Heller of Nevada, and Orrin Hatch of Utah, have announced plans to retire. While the political environment may seem primed for a blue wave in the fall, anti-Trump sentiment alone won’t be enough to flip the House. And, fortunately for Republicans, Democrats have struggled to coalesce around a party message.          
For Republicans, meanwhile, the political calculus becomes whether Trump suppresses turnout, or whether voters—Republican women, in particular—ignore the current White House occupant and vote on other issues. “I think [suburban Republican women] voters are critical in order for Republicans to win their seats because it’s whether they turn out or not. It’s not that they’re going to necessarily vote for the Democrat, it’s whether they stay home,” Sullivan said. “It’s a demographic that Donald Trump did not do well with at all. We’ve got to.

The contours of any potential blue wave will begin to show over the summer. Wilson says Republican lawmakers will begin putting daylight between themselves and the president around August, while television-advertising buys closer to the election will reveal where both parties are focusing their efforts. “You will start to see some Republicans finally start to discover that they weren’t Donald Trump sycophants all along—they were actually strong, principled Republicans,” he said, the sarcasm palpable.

If More LGBT People Had Voted, Hillary Would Be President

I continually find it utterly mind numbing that a considerable percentage of LGBT individuals - the same goes for other minorities targeted by Republican policies - fail to register to vote and get themselves to the polls on election day or fail to vote via an absentee ballot.  With the GOP and its Christofascist and white supremacist base posing an existential threat of LGBT and minority rights, it is tantamount to a slow moving form of suicide to not register and vote.  New analysis suggests that had more LGBT citizens registered to vote and gone to the polls and cast votes against anti-LGBT Republicans, Hillary Clinton would be in the White House now and the LGBT community would not be facing an all out war against our civil rights. Of course, more Millennials getting registered to vote and voting against GOP policies harmful to their long term future could also have prevented the current national nightmare.  A piece in LGBT Nation looks at how the Trump/Pence scurge on America might have been avoided. Here are article excerpts:

Trevor Burgess was the first out gay man to lead a publicly traded bank in the United States. Now he’s turning his attention to a different numbers game.

Burgess has launched a digital voter registration platform for the LGBTQ community in a bid to increase the community’s involvement in the political arena. While big money organizations regularly endorse and stump for their chosen candidates, the real power is in the ballot box and getting people there to cast their votes.

“We’ve seen it time and time again, one vote can make all the difference. Our community has a duty to the next generation to make sure we are heard at the ballot box,” Burgess said in an emailed statement.

The #QTHEVOTE initiative aims to register as many queer voters as possible before the 2018 midterm elections.

Burgess points out that while Hillary Clinton won the popular vote in the last presidential election, her small losses in five states tipped the balance in favor of Donald Trump. With the results amounting to less than 1.5% of the vote in each state, the #QTHEVOTE initiative estimates that there were more unregistered LGBT voters in each state than the amount of votes that cost Clinton the election.“It’s simple math, analyzing data from Gallup and Project Vote, if every LGBT American had voted in 2016 we would not have our fundamental rights under attack today,” Burgess said. “We can and should be the most powerful and passionate voters in America.”

In Michigan alone, for example, Clinton lost by 13,000 votes but the group estimates there are over 87,000 unregistered LGBT voters.

The group will target potential voters through social media, online advertising and partnerships with other organizations.

The laziness and irresponsibility of  a minority is harming the entire LGBT community.  And as for gays who vote Republican, in my view it is long past time that they let go of their internalized homophobia, racism, and/or greed and stop voting against their own interests and those of our community.  They need to remember that there were wealthy and influential Jews in 1930's Germany that thought they were safe from the Nazi regime.  History proved them wrong and it cost many of them their lives.  No sane LGBT American, in my view, should ever vote Republican given the current toxic and hate driven nature of the GOP.   For those who don't like this assessment, I'm sorry, but you need to get your head out of your ass. 

The Advocate: Hillary Clinton for President

There are some members of the gays community - delusional ones, in my opinion - who try to argue that Donald Trump is the most "pro-gay" of the presidential candidates.  Similarly, I have had Republican friends (perhaps brainwashed by Fox News) try to argue that Hillary Clinton is not really a friend of the LGBT community and that some of my posts have been unduly harsh toward Trump. Having been authoring this blog and following political issues from an LGBT perspective for over nine (9) years and having been a political activist for over two decades, I beg to differ with such criticisms of Clinton and, in my opinion, unsupportable claims favoring Trump.    I do not see myself as a single issue voter - health care reform (I favor a single payer national system), addressing climate change, immigration reform, fixing a dysfunctional economic model are but some of the issues that hold my attention.  But as a member of the LGBT community who has first hand experienced being fired for being gay, harassed by homophobic police, and threatened with physical harm by homophobes, I cannot ignore how important the 2016 presidential election is for LGBT Americans.  The main editorial in the October print issue of The Advocate makes the case for Hillary Clinton wonderfully well.  Here are excerpts:

Elections matter, and this election dramatizes that notion like no other. This is only the second presidential endorsement by The Advocate; the first was for President Obama’s second term. Prior to 2012, there had never been an Oval Office candidate — or incumbent — who fully embraced marriage equality, an essential position to earn this publication’s endorsement.

Now The Advocate endorses Hillary Clinton with enthusiasm.

Clinton has made LGBT inclusion a pillar of her campaign, from the first video announcing her candidacy. She has produced the most complete and impressive LGBT platform of any presidential candidate ever. In it, she has vowed to champion the Equality Act, the legislation that would enact federal nondiscrimination protections with regard to sexual orientation and gender identity. Clinton’s policy platform called for an end to the ban on transgender military service — now officially gone — an end to quack “conversion therapy” for minors, an end to discrimination against LGBT families in adoptions, improved school conditions for LGBT students, expanded shelters for homeless LGBT youth, affordable treatment for people with HIV, expanded access to PrEP, expanded data collection and other measures to stem the disproportionate violence against trans people, and improved access to correct identification for trans people, along with many other positions that directly affect the rights, health, and welfare of our communities. 

Clinton has raised these issues with consistency during the primary season, and they have become a hallmark of her campaign heading into the general election.

Clinton’s opponent, real estate investor and reality-show host Donald Trump, has no voting record and an arm’s-length relationship with the truth, making his policy positions hard to pin down. But the Republican nominee has indicated his eagerness to abandon civil rights in pursuit of an electoral win. His selection of Indiana governor Mike Pence (a sop to the conservative base), who rose to national prominence by signing a disastrously discriminatory anti-LGBT bill into law, underscores Trump’s abject refutation of LGBT rights as a principle he considers with any seriousness.

While in Congress, Pence voted against the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, the repeal of “don’t ask, don’t tell,” and the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr., Hate Crimes Prevention Act. He opposes marriage equality and supports traumatic “conversion therapy.”

Trump’s own statements make him an unsuitable choice for the presidency. The stakes are far too high for LGBT Americans, when so much progress for our rights has been advanced under Obama’s leadership. . . . . He has vowed that if elected president, he would rescind Obama’s executive orders that protect trans people from discrimination in health care coverage and in public schools, and the executive order that bans discrimination against LGBT employees of federal contractors (which comprise an estimated 20 percent of the American workforce). He has endorsed the unconstitutional First Amendment Defense Act, a nationalized version of a RFRA, and has said he’s interested in appointing Supreme Court justices who would overturn the Obergefell marriage equality ruling. He’d leave marriage equality, access to insurance, employment nondiscrimination, and the option to deny people the use of school and public bathrooms to the states.

Clinton is a calm, deliberative leader with decades of public service experience and an impressive command of policy, detail, and the concerns of overlapping minority communities. Whereas Trump alienates women, Muslims, immigrants, and LGBT people, Clinton’s record as a U.S. senator is marked by bipartisanship, and her campaign is marked by inclusivity.

To imagine that the election result is a foregone conclusion — that Clinton will handily and easily defeat Trump in November without serious effort on the part of an engaged electorate — is a mistake. The U.K.’s Brexit vote is an example of left-leaning activists and voters wrongly assuming that voters will exercise “common sense.”

There is no foregone conclusion. There is no obvious outcome. But there is only one capable candidate in this election, and only one candidate who is a champion of LGBT causes. That clear and necessary choice is Hillary Clinton. 

Bernie Sanders Cancels Meeting with HIV Activists

With both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders courting all aspects of the LGBT vote, especially in advance of the New York State primary last month, both Clinton and Sanders agreed to meet with HIV activists this month in Indianapolis.  Now, Sanders has cancelled and failed to reschedule or communicate with activist groups he had agreed to meet with.  The Washington Blade looks at the strange cancellation and cessation of communications.  Here are highlights:

Bernie Sanders has cancelled a meeting with HIV advocates his campaign affirmed days before the crucial New York Democratic primary he would attend, according to the activists who sought to arrange the meeting. The 30-minute meeting between Sanders and HIV advocates was set for May 13 in Indianapolis.

Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton also agreed to meet the activists, who say they’re are still on track to meet with her Thursday for one hour in New York City.

Hilary McQuie, director of U.S. policy and grassroots mobilization for the HIV/AIDS group Health GAP, told the Blade the Sanders campaign cancelled the meeting without explanation. “He did cancel — no reason given and they have not rescheduled,” McQuie said. “We feel a bit burned by the bern, and hope they will answer our emails now.”

Peter Staley, a New York-based gay rights and HIV advocate, told the Blade HIV advocates before the unexpected cancellation were in daily contact with the Sanders campaign. “They sent a ‘need to reschedule’ email last Sunday (for our Tuesday meeting), and then bizarrely stopped communications completely after that,” Staley said.

“We’ve been emailing and calling every day since then, including warning them days ago about our intent to go public.” According to a statement announcing the cancellation from the Brooklyn-based HIV and homeless advocacy group Housing Works, attendees were informed on April 30 the Sanders meeting was cancelled, which was two days after many of them purchased expensive, last-minute plane ticket to attend the event.

Although the Sanders campaign promised to “reschedule” as soon as possible, it has yet to propose a new date, time or city, the statement says. The Sanders campaign didn’t respond to a request for comment late Sunday to confirm the meeting with HIV advocates was cancelled or to explain why the event would be nixed.

Charles King, CEO of Housing Works, said in the statement he’s among Sanders’ supporters, but the candidate’s decision to cancel the meeting is “incredibly disappointing.” “I have been a supporter of Bernie Sanders, and was proud to vote for him in the New York primary,” King said.

“It is disheartening to see the ‘revolutionary’ candidate who claims to value grassroots organizing and visionary politics not make time in his schedule to meet with us. He is supposed to be the guy who walks the walk, but all we’ve heard the past six weeks is talk—and fairly tepid, reactive talk at that.”

Ramon Gardenhire, vice president of policy and advocacy for the AIDS Foundation of Chicago, said Sanders should remain true to his word to meet HIV advocates. 

Nancy Reagan Finally Started a Conversation About AIDS -- 35 Years Too Late

With her death Nancy Reagan belatedly began a serious conversation about HIV/AIDS.  Sadly, the conversation has begun 35 years too late to help the tens of thousands who dies of AIDS during her husband's presidency, a presidency that marked the beginning of the Republican Party's selling of its soul to the Christofascists who have played a major role years later in the rise of Donald Trump and what I can only hope will be a catastrophic loss for the GOP in November.  True, Hillary Clinton unwittingly provoked even more conversation with her totally false initial remarks about the Reagan's foul legacy of turning a blind eye and cozying up to hate-filled modern day Pharisees (Clinton has twice apologized for her untrue remarks).  The good news is that at least in some circles, the much needed conversation about HIV/AIDS has been reignited.  Michelangelo Signorile has a piece in Huffington Post looks at the positive aspects of the aftermath of Nancy Reagan's death and Hillary's major case of foot in mouth.  Here are highlights:

Suddenly, Bernie Sanders has an AIDS/HIV policy paper.  It went up on his campaign website over the weekend, shortly after he attacked Hillary Clinton for her bewildering comments on Friday about Nancy Reagan in which Clinton claimed the now-deceased former first lady was a "low-key advocate" for people with AIDS during the Reagan administration, who, along with her husband, "started a national conversation" about AIDS.

Sanders now calls for establishing "a multibillion-dollar Prize Fund to incentivize drug development" that would "provide virtually universal access to lower-cost life-saving medicines for HIV/AIDS as soon as they are approved for sale." He doesn't address expanding access to PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis), the drug combination approved to prevent HIV infection among HIV-negative people at risk, nor many other issues, but his "Prize Fund" is a start.

On CNN on Sunday morning, Sanders said, "I just don't know what she was talking about," regarding Clinton, though he was "glad she apologized." Clinton in fact apologized twice. The Clinton campaign had tweeted a statement from Clinton, a terse apology --"I misspoke...I'm sorry" -- sent on her feed on the day of Reagan's funeral, within hours of Clinton's comments, after a quick backlash had ensued.

Then on Saturday Clinton posted a fuller response online that lauded AIDS activists as those who truly started the conversation, talked about what she'd done as first lady on AIDS (and it should be noted that it was Bill Clinton's administration that turned things around after the horrific Reagan/Bush years), as a U.S. senator and as secretary of state. In her online post, Clinton took on the harsh HIV criminalization laws that stigmatize and criminalize people with HIV, and she discussed some plans if elected president, including making sure there's access to drug treatments, including PrEP for HIV negative people at risk.

It was a terrific statement, got a lot of media attention, and had the Sunday talk shows discussing the terrible, callous record of the Reagan administration on AIDS, when, during a period of years, thousands died as the president stayed silent, bowing to religious zealots while Nancy wouldn't even help her dying friend Rock Hudson when he reached out.

All of this, honestly, is a great thing to see. But there needs to be much more. Whatever caused Clinton to make such a strange gaffe, is, at this point, less important than the discussion itself: It got her to put out some details reminding us of her commitment in the past and offering some ideas moving forward, and it moved Sanders to rush out a policy statement with ideas as well.

But statements aren't enough. We want to hear from the candidates directly and in more detail. Clinton spoke in a live broadcast (on MSNBC) about Nancy Reagan when she made the regrettable comments. Judging from social media, many believe she should now speak directly about her plans and engage in dialogue. I've invited her to come on my radio program on SiriusXM Progress to discuss the issue, and to talk about many other issues affecting LGBT people, and I've invited Senator Sanders on as well. And I'll continue to do so.

We've seen no discussion of LGBT issues in the Democratic debates at a time when a furious backlash against LGBT equality has erupted across the country, as states push forward with "religious freedom" bills meant to enshrine discrimination in law after last year's marriage equality ruling from the Supreme Court. Both candidates have tweeted condemnation of these laws, but there's been little to no discussion among them in the media.

While that ignorance during the debates could be laid at the feet of the media and moderators, it's also true that neither candidate has spoken with a gay journalist or interviewer specifically about issues LGBT voters care about. 

This election cycle, it took Nancy Reagan 's death, ironically, to get a discussion going among the candidates about an issue important to LGBT people. But there's more to talk about on that issue -- actually talk, beyond the position papers -- and there are more issues affecting LGBT people to have a dialogue about.

The campaigns surely know that the LGBT electorate plays an outsized role in elections, raising money, working in the campaigns, getting the vote out, inspiring younger voters around issues of equality. In the past few days, gay voters -- and their allies -- were jarred by Clinton's Reagan comments, which have them asking questions and wanting to hear more from her on issues concerning them, even after her sincere apology. And they want to hear from Sanders, too, on the whole range of issues, not just a mention of "gay rights" from a podium or a position paper on a website.

With the brutal campaign of Donald Trump unleashed and barreling forward, it's important to get every group, every Democratic voter, energized. We've seen an entire Democratic debate rightly focused on concerns of Latino voters, and an important one which took place in racially-polarized Flint, Michigan. Both debates were meant to discuss issues vital to constituencies in the party's base. But again, there's been no focus in the campaigns on issues important to LGBT voters.

Given the reality that some studies indicate that the LGBT vote is what flipped Ohio and Virginia to Barack Obama in 2012.  Any sane candidate on the Democrat side of the aisle ought to be courting the LGBT vote even as the GOP seems to be doing all that it can to totally alienate LGBT voters.  

Will Gay Men Deliver Today for Hillary Clinton

Click image to enlarge

In this political season, the number of polls and who is conducting them is proliferating.  Now, the dating/hook up app Scruff indicates that it polled its gay male users as to which of the Democrat presidential candidates they will be supporting.  The findings?  From the 15,000 app users surveyed, Hillary Clinton is the clear favorite with more than double Sanders’ support.  Indeed, she would win the gay vote in every Super Tuesday state other than Sanders' home state of Vermont.  The Bilerico Project has details.  Here are highlights:

As Senator Bernie Sanders and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton battle it out for the Democrat presidential nomination, Super Tuesday is seen as a make-or-break moment for the Sanders campaign. Sanders, who has surged in popularity over the past few months, has to do well in the 11 states holding primary elections today.

According to a new unscientific poll of Scruff users released last week, Clinton is the clear favorite of gay men who use the app. Clinton’s support is more than double Sanders’ and she would win the gay vote in every Super Tuesday state except for Sanders’ home state of Vermont. The poll surveyed nearly 15,000 Scruff users in the United States.

63% of respondents indicated they prefer Clinton over Sanders who garnered 31%. Nine times as many respondents (72%) identify as Democrats as versus the 8% who affiliate with Republicans.

While the limits of the poll are obvious since the hookup app only polled gay men who use their service, it’s still worth a second look. Why would respondents so clearly choose Clinton over Sanders by a larger margin than the general population?

While Clinton has a mixed history on LGBT issues, in recent years she’s become a champion of LGBT rights. Formerly opposed to same-sex marriage, she has now “evolved” on the issue and has always supported LGBT nondiscrimination protections. As Secretary of State, she famously declared that “gay rights are human rights” in a speech to the United Nations and pushed for greater acceptance of LGBT people worldwide.

Sanders has also been a supporter of LGBT rights including voting against the Defense of Marriage Act, so why are voters turning toward Clinton?

While Clinton has become linked to President Obama’s push for LGBT rights, Sanders has remained a relative unknown to the gay community. With a focus on income inequality, Sanders’ record on LGBT issues hasn’t been forefront in his campaign. Clinton, however, has been actively courting the gay vote for years and her publicity for facing down homophobic world leaders has kept her in the queer media. Until the presidential primary, Sanders has barely registered in the LGBT community.

LGBT People Aren't Exempt from Trump's Bigotry

As I listen to tonight's Republican "debate" - having my finger nails pulled out with pliers might be less painful - the lack of substance and any hint of plans and policies is mind boggling.  The anti-immigrant rhetoric is over the top and Trump's claim that he will force Mexico to pay for a wall along the Mexico -USA border is beyond ridiculous.  There is NO legal basis on which Mexico can be forced to pay for such a wall.  Moreover, Trump insulted Telemundo, the largest Hispanic network in America.  Yes, Trump's outrageous statements play well with the white supremacist in the GOP base and garner wingnut applause, but they are disingenuous and dishonest, and deliberately so.   But Trump's bigotry is widespread and as Michelangelo Signorile points out in a column in Huffington Post, the LGBT community is among Trump's targets.  Here  are excerpts:

There's been a theme in some of the media, and certainly among some gay Republicans -- as I focused on a few weeks ago -- that implies Donald Trump isn't so bad on equality for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people, or is at least better than most of the other GOP candidates. It's absolutely false -- he's as extreme as Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, and will do nothing for LGBT rights -- and it's time to disabuse the media and everyone else of this notion once and for all.

Trump very publicly, often in large media forums, offers up vague hopes about attaining justice (on a whole range of issues, with his "make America great again" mantra), without explaining how he'll do that. He has in the distant past said that he supports non-discrimination laws that protect gay people, and even said last year, when asked on Meet the Press, that gay workers shouldn't be fired from their jobs because of their sexual orientation -- though didn't offer support for laws barring such discrimination, and certainly didn't say he'd pressure Congress to pass such a law.

Trump very publicly, often in large media forums, offers up vague hopes about attaining justice (on a whole range of issues, with his "make America great again" mantra), without explaining how he'll do that. He has in the distant past said that he supports non-discrimination laws that protect gay people, and even said last year, when asked on Meet the Press, that gay workers shouldn't be fired from their jobs because of their sexual orientation -- though didn't offer support for laws barring such discrimination, and certainly didn't say he'd pressure Congress to pass such a law.

[H]e [Trump] is definitely speaking forcefully on his anti-gay positions to evangelicals on their media platforms, in their language, using the dog whistle on LGBT rights even if he's using the fog horn on other issues. Trump is much smarter than many give him credit for. By speaking with the fog horn on many issues it gives the impression that he places low priority on the issues with which he's using the dog whistle. In fact, he's calibrated what to speak softly on and what to take big, no matter that the positions may be equally extreme.

In his Nevada victory speech, he said, "I love the evangelicals!" Only looking at Christian evangelical media forums, however, would you understand why they have reason to love him back:

Last week in an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network's David Brody, Trump called the Supreme Court's Obergefell marriage equality ruling "shocking" and told evangelicals to "trust me" on the issue, telegraphing that he would get the marriage equality ruling overturned.

On Fox News Sunday, Trump in fact said he'd consider appointing judges who would overturn the Obergefell ruling, taking up a position that Marco Rubio had announced weeks earlier.

Trump came out in support of the First Amendment Defense Act (FADA), which anti-gay Republicans introduced in Congress last year. It would allow government entities, non-profit organizations that receive government funds and businesses contracted with the federal government to discriminate against gays. Basically, it would allow for the kind of exemption on a whole v

While Trump had initially criticized Kim Davis in the mainstream media for not doing her job, he later quietly backtracked in talking to evangelical Christian-focused media outlets and when pressed in an interview with me at the Values Voter Summit last fall, he expressed support for Davis and her position.

Trump has attacked Chief Justice John Roberts -- who voted against LGBT rights consistently -- as insufficiently conservative, and recently promised in a Christian Broadcasting Network town hall with Pat Robertson at Robertson's Regent University that he would put far right extremists on the court who would get Roe v. Wade "unpassed."

As we've seen, Trump is a master of manipulation (of media and of constituencies) who learned that on the gay issue he could give mixed signals, implying "tolerance" of LGBT rights while on the campaign trail but then speaking to anti-gay bigots within their forums and telling them exactly what they want to hear. 

[H]e knows evangelicals, who've suffered defeats, will accept someone who more quietly makes promises -- as long as he's a winner. And they're intent on making him a winner and holding him to those promises.

Meanwhile, so far, the GOP "debate" has been a study in childish insults and sound bites devoid of any substantive plans or proposals.  The contrast between the GOP circus and the Democrat "town hall meetings" are enormous.  The Democrats focus on policies, proposals, and solutions.  The GOP, it's all about demagoguery and self-prostitution to extremists.  As for LGBT voters, anyone supporting a Republican candidate is in my view akin to a Jew in 1930's Germany supporting the Nazi party.

Clinton Beats Sanders in Survey of LGBT Voters; Trump Is Top Republican With 2%

After the last presidential election in 2012, some analysis concluded that in close election states the LGBT vote ultimately decided which of the presidential contenders ended up carrying the particular state.  Among the states reviewed were Virginia and Ohio.  Seemingly, the Republican Party and this year's GOP presidential candidates learned nothing from 2012 as the GOP contenders compete to see who can be the most stridently and hatefully anti-gay.   Moreover, the issues that play well with the Christofascists and religious extremists in the GOP base garner little support or interest on the part of LGBT voters.  It seems that the GOP is striving to set up a replay of 2012 where strident anti-gay policies literally cost the GOP the White House. Here are some highlights from Towleroad:

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tops a new survey of likely LGBT voters, although fellow Democrat and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders is viewed as the candidate who would be most supportive of equality, according to Community Marketing & Insights.

Forty-eight percent of the 563 likely voters surveyed said they would support Clinton if the election were held today, followed by Sanders at 41 percent.

Businessman Donald Trump led the Republican field among LGBT voters, with just 2 percent, followed by Gov. John Kasich and Sen. Marco Rubio with 1 percent each. Four percent said they were undecided, and all other candidates received less than 1 percent each.

In the 2012 presidential election, LGBT voters made up 5 percent of the electorate, with 77 percent supporting President Barack Obama and 23 percent supporting Republican Mitt Romney, according to exit polls.

“What is striking in this research is how little support the current group of Republican candidates have among the LGBT community in the 2016 presidential elections,” said David Paisley, Senior Research Director at Community Marketing & Insights. “Unless something changes, the party may largely forfeit about 5 percent of adults in the United States to the Democrats, which can cause important swings in tight elections. Republicans perhaps could connect with LGBTs on issue like the economy, taxation and influence of government in private lives, but instead have chosen policies not supportive of LGBT Americans.”

When asked which Republican is most supportive of LGBT rights, 73 percent said none is supportive, while 6 percent said Kasich and 4 percent said Trump. All of the remaining candidates received 2 percent or less.

The survey was conducted Feb 7-10 and included voters in 46 states. More from Community Marketing & Insights, which conducted the survey:

Participants were asked, “When choosing a President, how important is it to you that the candidate shares the following views on important issues facing Americans today?” Of the 18 issues presented, civil rights issues were in the top categories: 

• 98% indicated that “supporting LGBT civil rights” was very or somewhat important

• 98% indicated that “nominating LGBT supportive Supreme Court candidates” is very or somewhat important.

• 96% of LGBTs indicated that “addressing racism/racial inequality in the U.S.” was very or somewhat important.

• These civil rights issues were equally important as improving the economy at 98% importance.

. . . . conservative issues garnered little support among the LGBT community:

• 89% indicated that “reducing or eliminating abortions” is not an important view of their preferred candidate, or is a view they disagree with.

• 87% indicated that “repealing the Affordable Care Act/Obamacare” is not an important view of their preferred candidate, or is a view they disagree with.

• 72% indicated that “protecting gun ownership rights” is not an important view of their preferred candidate, or is a view they disagree with.

• 59% indicated that “stopping illegal immigration to the U.S.” is not an important view of their preferred candidate, or is a view they disagree with.

Of course, the GOP is likewise doing its utmost to alienate Hispanic, black, and non-Christian voters as well. 

Warner Squeaks By Gillespie in Bleak Night for Democrats

The Midterm elections were a disaster for Democrats - and by extension LGBT citizens and other minorities.  Thankfully, Virginia Senator Mark Warner squeaked by GOP lobbyist Ed Gillespie with slightly under 17,000 votes (1,067,342 v. 1,050,534).  Elsewhere, the GOP used a combination of hatred for Barack Obama and hatred for gays and minorities to turn out its base of angry whites.  As Democrats, I suspect voter turnout figures will prove that many just stayed home and by default, voted for Republicans.  Hate it seems is a far stronger motivator than belief in progressive policies and believing that the nation benefits through the common good.    What is perhaps most frightening is the extremism of some of the new Republican senators who, delusional as they are, will see yesterday's results as a mandate to enact all kinds of batshitery.  For blacks who stayed home, brace yourselves for more measures to disenfranchise minorities.  For gays who stayed home, expect legislation granting special rights to discriminate against us.  The Washington Post looks at Mark Warner's close win.  Here are excerpts:

U.S. Sen. Mark R. Warner (D) declared victory over Ed Gillespie (R) late Tuesday in a remarkably close contest for a second term that is likely to tarnish the Democrat’s image as an untouchable force in Virginia politics.

The contest was so close that Warner’s opponent declined to concede, but the Democrat promised to serve a second term working across the aisle with a new Republican majority in the Senate.

The outcome represented a shocking reversal of Warner’s sweeping victory in 2008, which first propelled the former governor into the Senate. A recount is possible, and Gillespie didn’t rule out requesting one in remarks to supporters late Tuesday.

The race came against a national backdrop that was expected to be bad for Democrats, especially for incumbents with close ties with President Obama and his trouble-plagued health-care law. But Warner had been expected to escape that fate, with polls giving him an increasingly narrow but consistent lead through the final days of the race.

This year, the senator saw his support in rural Virginia drop off sharply. He had forged ties to Southside and Southwest even before he ran for governor, earning goodwill in the economically depressed regions as a job-creating entrepreneur.

“It breaks my heart to say it, because these are my people, but racism was a huge factor in this,” he said. “I think in many areas of rural Virginia, racism is still prevalent, and they dislike Obama more than they like Mark Warner.”

Gillespie’s chief line of attack was that Warner’s moderate image was just that — one that did not match reality. He said Warner had voted with the president 97 percent of the time, most notably for the Affordable Care Act.

Election night results showed an electorate of over 2 million, about even with the 2010 election but far below the 3.8 million who came out to vote in 2012, the Department of Elections said.

There's more in the article.  Note that 1.8 million fewer Virginians voted than in 2012.  Besides chiding Democrats who stayed home, let me make one thing clear, rural Virginia - especially Southwest Virginia - is VERY racists.  And it seems to be getting worse.  As is the far right hysteria over gay marriage being legal in Virginia.  I can only wonder when tourists from the Northeast are going to start avoiding the backwards areas all together.   You won't find the husband and me visiting rural Virginia outside the areas around Charlottesville or to visit my daughter and her family. 

It's Republicans Who Don't Know the Real America

Ensconced in their reality denying bubble Republicans claim to represent "real Americans" and seek to uphold a version of America that in many ways never really existed outside of small pockets and, of course in the programing of shows like Leave It to Beaver.  Most people never existed in this false idyllic world, but that doesn't matter to those who want to keep America white and Christian and hold contempt for most Americans.  The real America, however, is changing rapidly and underscores the alternate universe world of today's GOP.  A piece in Politico looks at the phenomenon and the need for Republicans to come outside their bubble.  Here are highlights:

Republicans’ post-election soul-searching has to go beyond a simple self-reflection about who we are – we know our core belief in small government and individual liberty remains unchanged. Rather than look inward, it’s time to look outward and finally get to know the people we seek to represent.

The days and months and years ahead must be about a nationwide effort to introduce ourselves and get to know the millions of people and thousands of communities that make up our 21st-century America.

We all know the GOP has become synonymous with older, white males. This isn’t entirely accurate, but it’s public perception, and perception is reality.

 

As we evolve, it doesn’t just matter what we say but who is saying it.  Howie Long and Charles Barkley are two of America’s most popular and successful sports analysts today. That’s because they have credibility: Football fans know that Howie understands football, and basketball fans know that Barkley gets hoops. We respect their opinion because we believe they know what they’re talking about.  It’s the same in politics.

No citizen will support a candidate they don’t think understands them. After all, the whole point of representative government is putting into office someone who represents your values.  The focus has got to be on inclusion – welcoming minorities, women, youth and all Americans into the party and giving them a voice in shaping who we are, not just a one-way conversation in telling them what we believe.

[I]f all we’re doing is looking inward, we’re going the wrong way.  Look outward and find out who America is instead. We have a lot of people to get to know.

Will Republicans take heed of this message?  I for one will not be holding my breath.  Frankly, I believe that the Christianist base of the GOP cannot and will not change.  No real change will occur until several more generations of angry whites die off.

More Evidence That Gays Won the Election for Obama

With the general populace becoming more accepting of LGBT citizens and a plurality supporting same sex marriage, the Republican Party is increasingly setting itself up for electoral defeat by licking the boots of the Christofascists and subscribing to their anti-gay jihad.   Analysis of the vote in four states, including Virginia, confirms that but for the GOP's near total alienation of LGBT voters (in Virginia, Obama received 76% of the LGBT vote), shows that the lopsided pro-Obama LGBT vote is what allowed Obama to win all four states.  Here are highlights:

There are states with large and visible LGBT populations where marriage equality may present a more formidable challenge. Had LGBT voters not cast their ballots in Ohio and Florida, Governor Romney would have won those states. 

If the LGBT vote in Virginia had been less lopsided in President Obama's favor and more evenly split between the two candidates, Governor Romney would have also won that state. All three states have sufficiently large LGBT populations to influence a close election, but none have sexual orientation or gender identity anti-discrimination laws nor any relationship recognition rights for same-sex couples.

With Ken Cuccinelli about to be crowned as the GOP candidate for governor in 2013, the Virginia GOP will likely even further alienate LGBT voters and shifted even a higher percentage of the LGBT vote to the Democrats.  The Virginia GOP's continued willingness to prostitute itself to hate merchants at The Family Foundation will hopefully help see Cuccinelli defeated in 2013.

CMI Poll: 90% of Gays & Lesbians Vote for Barack Obama

A new Community Marketing Inc. poll indicates that LGBT Americans voted for Barack Obama at perhaps the highest rate ever received by a presidential candidate.  Not, of course, that Mitt Romney and the GOP party platform hadn't given a huge incentive to do so.  Here are some of the poll findings:

The Community Marketing & Insights (CMI) pre-election poll showed that 90% of gay men and lesbians voted for Barack Obama. . . . . LGBTs represent an estimated 5% of United States voters and an overwhelming majority supported the coalition that produced Barack Obama’s victory.

90% support for Obama was seen in all Battleground States. The LGBT percentage was just below the level that Obama received from the African American community.

Demonstrating the importance of the election, 95% of LGBTs indicated that they would vote in the election and 41% indicated that the had already voted before election day.

Final data indicated that 90% supported Barack Obama, 6% for Mitt Romney and 4% a third party candidate.   41% of gays and lesbians gave money to the Obama campaign.

 Given the closeness of some of the results, LGBT voters clearly were important to Obama's victory.  These finding also ought to show GOProud and the Log Cabin Republicans that their organizations are increasingly a joke in the face of the radical anti-gay agenda of today's Republican party. 

Worthless Tim Kaine to Remain DNC Chair

Perhaps my view of Tim Kaine is colored by his failure to do ANYTHING to support his own executive order allegedly protection gay Virginia state employees when it was challenged after the leadership of the Virginia Museum of Natural History fired a young gay man for being gay. Or maybe it's because he seemed more focused on the DNC than he did on being governor during the period that his DNC responsibilities overlapped with his term as governor. In any event, I for one am less than thrilled with Kaine remaining as DNC chair for another two years. Kaine - while giving lip service to LGBT rights - is anything but a strong ally in my view and activists in national LGBT rights organizations need to recognize that lip service will likely be all they see from Kaine - hence why I am leaving the "Don't Ask, Don't Give" link on this blog for the time being. Unless court decisions force change, I don't see either Obama or Kaine championing our equality over the next two years. These highlights from the Washigton Post look at Kaine's decision to remain DNC chair:
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Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine said Sunday that he plans to stay at the helm of the national party another two years because that's where President Obama wants him to serve.
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"My agreement with the president is I was going to do what he wants me to do," Kaine said on CNN's "State of the Union." "And what I know sitting here today is he wants me to continue in this spot and that's what I'm going to do with excitement, you know, traveling all around the country, going through the TSA lines like everybody else, going out and being the president's advocate and promoter. And it's a wonderful job and I intend continue it."
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Obama campaigned for Kaine's gubernatorial bid in 2005; two years later, Kaine became the first major elected official outside of Illinois to back Obama's White House bid. He also was on Obama's vice presidential shortlist in 2008.
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Late last year, Politico reported that senior Democratic officials were floating the possibility of White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs succeeding Kaine as DNC chairman, with Kaine potentially in line for a Cabinet job. At the time, the White House pushed back against the speculation and a Kaine aide noted that the chairmanship is a four-year term.
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My prediction with Kaine: two more years of mealy mouthed lip service to LGBT equality, but no leadership or action at the DNC chair level. It's unfortunate, but I believe it's the true reality.