Public Comment Period on Virginia Gay Adoption Reopens

The Virginia Board of Social Services has opened a new 30-day comment period during which public comment can be submitted on whether Virginia should allow state-licensed groups to reject prospective adoptive and foster parents because of their sexual orientation. The Christofascists at The Family Foundation will be working in overdrive to flood the Board with anti-gay comments. Thus it is crucial that readers in Virginia take the time to submit comments in support of gay adoption and foster parenting. State licensed groups, many of which receive state funds, should not be given a free rein to engage in religious based bigotry. Comments can be submitted electronically by going to http://www.townhall.virginia.gov, clicking on the public comment forum section and scrolling down to "Minimum Standards for Licensed Private Child-Placing Agencies (DSS)." Our enemies will take the time to submit comments even if the LGBT community does not. Here are more highlights from the Chronicle:

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — A new public comment period has begun on whether Virginia should allow state-licensed groups to reject prospective adoptive and foster parents because of their sexual orientation.

The Virginia Board of Social Services opened the 30-day comment period Monday.

Last month, advocacy groups asked the board to reopen public comment on regulations approved in April that would strip a ban on discriminating against prospective parents based on sexual orientation, political beliefs, age, physical disability and family status. The board unanimously agreed.

More Tuesday Male Beauty

Crinianl Complaint Filed with International Criminal Court Against Benedict XVI

I have consistently believed that until such time as members of the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy are criminally prosecuted and preferably placed behind bars for the aiding and abetting of sexual predator priests, the Church will not reform itself. Now, in a development that is hard to tell whether or not it will lead to any real justice for Catholic Church sex abuse victims, a criminal complaint has been filed with the International Criminal Court at the Hague against Pope Benedict XVI, the Vatican Secretary of State and two other high-ranking Holy See officials. Personally, I would love to see Benedict XVI and others put on trial. Regardless of the ultimate outcome, the dirty linen that would be aired would be delicious. Here are highlights from The Guardian:

Victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests have accused the pope, the Vatican secretary of state and two other high-ranking Holy See officials of crimes against humanity, in a formal complaint to the international criminal court (ICC).

The submission, lodged at The Hague on Tuesday, accuses the four men not only of failing to prevent or punish perpetrators of rape and sexual violence but also of engaging in the "systematic and widespread" practice of concealing sexual crimes around the world.

It includes individual cases of abuse where letters and documents between Vatican officials and others show a refusal to co-operate with law enforcement agencies seeking to pursue suspects, according to the Centre for Constitutional Rights (CCR), a US-based organisation that represents the claimants.

Pam Spees, human rights attorney with CCR, said: "The point of this is to look at it from a higher altitude. You zoom out and the practices are identical: whistleblowers are punished, the refusal of the Vatican to co-operate with law enforcement agencies. You see the protection of priests and leaving them in the ministry and because of these decisions other children are raped and sexually assaulted."

According to the document filed by CCR, the pope, as head of the Catholic church, is ultimately responsible for the sexual abuse of children by priests and for the cover-ups of that abuse. The group argues that he and others have "direct and superior responsibility" for the crimes of those ranked below them, similar to a military chain of command.

The others named in the complaint are Angelo Sodano, dean of the College of Cardinals and former Vatican secretary of state; Cardinal Tarcissio Bertone, now secretary of state, who previously served at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), the organisation tasked with handling sexual abuse cases under the pope when he was Cardinal Ratzinger; and Cardinal William Lavada, head of the CDF, whose handling of previous sexual abuse cases has been criticised in the past.

Amnesty International's latest annual human rights report, which cited the Holy See for the first time, concluded there was widespread evidence of child sexual abuse by members of the clergy over past decades, and an "enduring failure" of the Catholic church to seek redress.

The other hoped for result of the filing and any subsequent trial, if any, is that perhaps more Catholics will wake up and walk with their feet until such time as a whole sale house cleaning of the hierarchy occurs.

GOP Controlled North Carolina Legislature (with Help of Black Uncle Toms) Pass Anti-Gay Marriage Measure

Click image to enlarge

Sadly, today the GOP controlled North Carolina Senate followed in the foot steps of the GOP controlled North Carolina House and passed a measure placing an anti-gay amendment on the statewide ballot next May. The measure would not only ban same sex marriage but also recognition of civil unions or domestic partnership. In short, all recognition of same sex relationships would be banned.

Even more disturbing is the fact that joining those voting for passage were black members of the legislature who were spurred on by many "Uncle Toms" in the ranks of the black clergy who continue to be the water carriers for white Christianists who given their druthers would re-institute slavery. The historical ignorance of these blacks is frightening. Would these boot licking water carriers have supported putting interracial marriage on the ballot and "letting the majority decide?" No wonder the far right wants to re-write history so that the ignorant of all races can be successfully duped and played for fools.

The chart above from Gallup suggests where interracial marriage equality would be if it had been up to the majority to decide if blacks and whites could legally marry. Yes, you are reading the chart properly: majority approval wasn't achieved until about 1995. Where would these water carrying bigots be today if their rights had depending upon achieving a popular vote majority?

The Death of Decency and Morality in the GOP

There are those who wonder how Germany sank to a point under Hitler and the Third Reich that many citizens not only knowingly but willingly closed their eyes to the extermination of Jews and the murder and mistreatment of many other minorities. Under the Nazi regime, through constant lies and propaganda political enemies and disliked minorities were dehumanized to an extent that their murder and torture was deemed morally acceptable by those drinking the Nazi Kool-Aid. Frighteningly, I feel that we are beginning to see a similar process among the Tea Party and GOP base, the vast majority of whom disturbingly claim to be "godly Christians." Twice now during the GOP presidential debates we have witnessed applause at statements that ought to make one cringe. Or at least cringe if one has a shred of decency and gives any credence to the Gospel message. The clip above shows the Tea Party/GOP response to a hypothetical where a 30 year old uninsured individual suffered from a medical catastrophe.

The Washington Post has a column that comments on this chilling episode as well as where the execution of a prisoner - who might have been innocent - came up. It's frightening in that I can see these Tea Party followers/Christianists willingly executing those they dislike, LGBT citizens and non-Christians, of course, topping the list. Here are highlights:

[W]e can now add this debate audience cheering for people dying without health insurance to the last GOP debate audience cheering for executions to our understanding of the current Republican Party.

[T]he GOP keeps spinning farther and farther from the general election median voter every week. And, in many cases, reality — do these folks really believe that the biggest economic problem today is runaway inflation? That Americans are desperate to rid themselves of Social Security? That policies enacted by Barack Obama and the Democrats in 2009 (whatever you think of those policies) caused a recession that began in 2007? That “exceptionalism” is the beginning and end of foreign policy?

Andrew Sullivan is rightfully shocked and appalled. Here are brief highlights from his reaction:

[T]hat cannot excuse the emotional response to the issue in the crowd last night. Maybe a tragedy like the death of a feckless twentysomething is inevitable if we are to restrain healthcare costs. But it is still a tragedy. It is not something a decent person cheers. Similarly the execution of hundreds, while perhaps defensible politically and even morally (although I differ), is nonetheless a brutal, awful business. You don't delight in it. And the same is true of torture. Even if you want to defend its use in limited circumstances, it remains an absolute evil, no humane person would want to do it, and no civilized person would brag of it or dismiss any moral issue with it at all. And yet that is what Dick Cheney and Liz Cheney have repeatedly done. They are positively proud of their torture record. The fish rotted from the head down. Last night, we got a whiff of the smell.

In my view, it is rapidly becoming morally impossible to remain a Republican if one has any moral decency and is a true Christian as opposed to the greed driven, flag and Bible waving modern day Pharisees of the Christian Right and the ranks of the professional Christian set.

Tuesday Morning Male Beauty

Morning Reflections on Being Back in Virginia

We arrived home in Hampton last night after a wonderful time in New York City. Yes, it's good to be back in our home and our dogs went crazy with excitement when we walked through the door. Beyond that, I'd be lying if I said I was happy to be back in Virginia. The vibrancy of New York City, the feeling of innovation and progress in the air, the acceptance of diversity (and legal protections for LGBT individuals), and the obvious huge public investment in efforts like the Hudson River Park which has transformed a once ugly waterfront, all are the opposite of what one sees here in Virginia.

Back in May, 2010, I wrote about a Brookings Institute report that might be summarized as describing Hampton Roads region as "old, slow, and not too bright" given its aging population and net brain drain of college educated residents. Sadly, I do not see things changing, especially under the current Republican administration in Richmond that embraces the anti-modernity mindset described by Andrew Sullivan in a post on this blog yesterday and which slavishly kisses the hate-filled asses of bigots and religious extremists at The Family Foundation. It is truly depressing.

Getting back into the grind will take some effort. Being gone just two days and I have much to do at the office and I have to put together materials for a seminar I am presenting at the new LGBT Center in Norfolk on Saturday. The topics will be estate planning for LGBT couples, pointers for transgender individuals seeking to amend their records and the legal rights of LGBT Virginians (i.e., basically none). Yes, I am in a funk - but I will rally as I always do.

The Hypocrisy of Eric Cantor

Virginia has much to embarrass the state on the national stage, not the least of which are local nutcase and bigot, Pat Robertson, and of course the theocratic loons at Liberty University and Liberty Counsel in Lynchburg. Then in the political realm we have Bob "Taliban Bob" McDonnell and Ken "Kookinelli" Cuccinelli. Currently drawing the most attention, however, is Virginia Congressman Eric Cantor, who continues to lick the boots of the Tea Party and the Christofascists of the GOP base who likely despise the man because he's Jewish yet put up with him for now since he's acting as their water carrier in his self-absorbed quest for power. What is really ass backwards is the fact that (1) Cantor will invest money in Iraq where it's like flushing money down a toilet but not here in the USA, and (2) Virginia is one of the largest recipients of federal government spending which means that if Cantor succeeds in slashing spending Virginians will be among the hardest hit. I suspect most whores have more integrity than Cantor. Thing Progress looks at Cantor's willingness to squander money overseas but not invest in America:

Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) voted for over $120 billion to rebuild Iraq and Afghanistan, funds that were used to construct and repair schools, roads, bridges, and other critical infrastructure.

Now,Cantor is opposing President Obama’s proposal to spend $30 billion to modernize 35,000 American schools. Reuters has the story: U.S. House Republican Leader Eric Cantor said on Monday he will not support President Barack Obama’s proposal to renovate U.S. schools as part of the administration’s bill to spur job growth. He added that Obama should focus instead on cutting federal regulations . . .

Construction and building projects generally create about 10,000 jobs per billion spent. At a time of high unemployment, the funding that Cantor opposes would create about 300,000 jobs. Economist Jared Berstein explains that funding to modernize schools is “a smart way to get a lot of people who really need jobs back to work, fix a critical part of our institutional infrastructure, save energy costs, provide kids with a better, healthier learning environment, and do so in way that everyone can see and feel good about each morning when they drop their kids at school.”

Contact your member of Congress HERE and tell them that it is time to rebuild America now rather than foreign nations.

Quote of the Day- Andrew Sullivan on the GOP as a Religious Movement

I have said many times on this blog and elsewhere that the beginning of the end of the Republican Party as a rational fact based political party began when the Christian Right infused itself into the GOP and the party began to lose grasp of the concept of separation of church and state. Over the intervening 20 years, the cancer of religion intertwining with politics has metastasized in the GOP. The party has now become a fundamentalist based quasi-religious movement just as dangerous in its own way as Islamic fundamentalism. Andrew Sullivan sums it up well with these comments:

[T]he GOP, deep down, is behaving as a religious movement, not as a political party, and a radical religious movement at that. . . . . Most theo-political movements need an anti-Christ of some sort; and Obama - even though he is the most demonstrably Christian president since Carter - fills the role.

And so this political deadlock conceals a religious war at its heart. Why after all should one abandon or compromise sacred truths? And for those whose Christianity can only be sustained by denial of modern complexity, of scientific knowledge, and of what scholarly studies of the Bible's origins have revealed, this fusion of political and spiritual lives into one seamless sensibility and culture, is irresistible. And public reminders of modernity - that, say, many Americans do not celebrate Christmas, that gay people have human needs, that America will soon be a majority-minority country and China will overtake the US in GDP by mid-century - are terribly threatening.

But all these nuances do not therefore vanish. The gays don't disappear. China keeps growing. The population becomes browner and browner. Women's lives increasingly become individual choices not social fates. And this enrages and terrifies the fundamentalist even more. . . . .

That's how I explain the current GOP. It can only think in doctrines, because the alternative is living in a complicated, global, modern world they both do not understand and also despise.

My fear - and it has building for a decade and a half, because I've seen this movement up-close from within and also on the front lines of the marriage wars - is that once one party becomes a church with unchangeable doctrines, and once it has supplanted respect for institutions and civility with the radical pursuit of timeless doctrines and hatred of governing institutions, then our democracy is in grave danger.

I sincerely believe that our democracy is in grave danger and that it is those who claim to be the nation's strongest protectors who are in fact destroying the country.

What It Means to Be "Out"

I've spoken many times about the importance of being out to family, friends, employers and co-workers. Yes, it carries risks - I was forced from a law firm for being gay - but it is the single most powerful thing that any of us can do. Putting a face and personality on what is often a faceless term to those constantly hearing anti-LGBT messages makes people stop and think. Some will remain closed minded bigots, but many more will be forced to rethink their preconceptions. I have seen it happen time and time again in my own experience and as the boyfriend and I move in social circle that sometimes might not be initially LGBT friendly. The more well known and prominent one is, the more powerful the potential to open minds and hearts. A letter to the editor in the Advocate looks at Jane Lynch's example of using celebrity to push the pro-LGBT message. Here are highlights:

Her understanding of being out is far different from the “I’ve never been closeted” line I read so often from celebrities (sometimes in this publication) insisting that telling their parents and friends that they’re gay equals being out. Lynch was out. Those others most often were not.

You’ll forgive me if I descend into a professional gripe over this point. Being out is the most fundamental thing we can do to improve the lives of future generations, and for most of us, it’s as basic (though not to say easy) as telling the people in our lives. But if you’re a person in the public eye and you refuse to say you’re LGBT in a public forum, you’re unequivocally not out. Yes, you have a different standard than the nonfamous. While telling someone how and when to come out is pushing the point further than I care to do, who among us — more than the wealthy and famous — has the luxury of coming out and doing a ton of good in the process? Entertainers, come out. The water’s fine.