Valentine’s Day is less than a week away – a happy day commemorating romance, whether you’re married, in a relationship or not. But for some LGBTs, it is a day of darkness, a day when society shames and ridicules same sex attraction, a day when thoughts of suicide become more real.
As it turns out, same sex attraction is not as difficult to deal with as is gay identity, according to a new study by a group of researchers at McGill University, the first separating sexual identity from sexual behaviors looking at poor or at risk mental health outcomes. The report is in the February issue of the Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry,which is not yet online. Please click inside to read more about the study and how to find help.
Every time I jumped up, pumped the air with my fist and yelled, “Who Dat? Who Dat?” my dogs jumped up too, started barking and thought someone was outside or at the door.
As the world probably knows after Sunday night’s incredible Super Bowl game in Miami between the New Orleans Saints and the Indianapolis Colts – “Who Dat” is short for “Who Dat?! Who Dat?! Who Dat say dey gonna beat dem saints?!”
The blaring headline on the New Orleans Times-Picayune website Sunday night was: “WHO DAT? NOBODY!”
“Who Dat?” was the background chant to Rachel Maddow’s Friday night show from New Orleans, which she dubbed “The Rachel Maddeaux Sheaux.”
At one point she said: “I am here to tell you that America wants New Orleans to be back – and in the run-up to this big, dumb game, it totally feels like it is.”
The Times-Picayune – whose reporters virtually lived in their offices to cover Hurricane Katrina for which they received Pulitizer Prizes – wrote an editorial thanking the Saints for the role they played in the recovery of the beloved city. Please click inside to read an excerpt (and please check out their photos from which this shot was taken).
I’ve known prodigious producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron since 1995 when I covered their important gays-in-the-military film, “Serving in Silence: The Margarethe Cammermeyer Story.”
Now I know the team is devoted to the musical (“Chicago,” “Annie”) so I’m sure their latest venture “Promises, Promises” with Sean Hayes and Kristin Chenoweth set to preview on Broadway on March 27 – is straight-up fun. Think “Mad Men” set to Burt Bacharach tunes.
But the plot of “Promises, Promises” – based on the award-winning Billy Wilder film “The Apartment” starring Jack Lemon and Shirley MacLaine – has at its core the societal acceptability of extra-marital affairs. Now coming off of covering the historic federal challenge to the constitutionality of Prop 8 where the ProtectMarriage side went on and on about the sanctity of marriage and how historically the purpose of marriage is the procreation of children – this show promises to be an laugh-out loud ode to heterosexual hypocrisy. Please click inside to see how.
As expected, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, Sen. John McCain’s running mate in the 2008 presidential election and a parallel star on Saturday Night Live, was a huge hit at the first Tea Party convention in Nashville, Tenn. Saturday night.
I watched on C-SPAN as the largely white, older crowd facially fawned over every mention of “the Constitution” and “the people,” as if they were insiders watching the run-up to a presidential bid. — Please click inside to read the rest of my quick thoughts on the event.
I wrote this analysis of the federal Prop 8 trial for DC Agenda, which they just posted on their website. Here’s the opening – please click inside for the full story.
Everyone packed into U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker’s courtroom in San Francisco on Jan. 11 knew they were watching history.
On one side of the court sat lawyers Ted Olson and David Boies, partisan foes in Bush v. Gore. Now the straight pair pledged to prove that same-sex couples deserved the fundamental right to marry. For them, the meaning of the U.S. Constitution is at stake.
On the other side sat Republican attorney Charles Cooper and a handful of supporting lawyers. It was what some might consider a strange sight. After the passage of Proposition 8 in California, the loss of same-sex marriage in Maine, New York and New Jersey and the gloating by ProtectMarriage affiliates such as the National Organization for Marriage, the anti-gay forces looked weak. In fact, throughout the trial, they portrayed themselves as David fighting Goliath……
After testimony ended in the Prop 8 trial, Judge Vaughn Walker allowed post-trial amicus briefs to be filed by Feb. 3. Most appeared to support the plaintiffs. Both sides have until Feb. 26 to respond to the amicus briefs – after which Judge Walker will hold a hearing to handle details and set a date for closing arguments. Please click inside to read some details about six of the briefs.
The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Executive Director Rea Carey presented the annual State of the Movement address today at the 22nd National Conference on LGBT Equality: Creating Change, in Dallas, Texas, where more than 2,000 lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights advocates have gathered to strategize on how to advance LGBT equality.
Please click inside to read the text of her remarks which reportedly received several standing ovations and will be broadcast on CSPAN.
All this talk about repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” – and the spotlight on Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain’s very public and embarrassingly obvious flip-flop over gays and lesbians serving openly in the military made me think about McCain’s predecessor – the late Sen. Barry Goldwater, the political “father” of the conservative movement. Perhaps his most famous quote from the early 1990s is, “You don’t have to be straight to be in the military; you just have to be able to shoot straight.”
But few remember that Goldwater wrote an op-ed calling for the ban on gays serving openly in the military to be lifted immediately. Click inside to read more about Goldwater and his entire op-ed.
Rachel Maddow fans know how she gets all geeky-giggly when talking about “infrastructure” – how great the need is to fix and maintain the crumbling structures and the highways and byways that keep America moving.
Perhaps someone in the US Interior Department should talk to Michael Fleming, Executive Director of the David Bohnett Foundation to see how it’s done. Late Wednesday, Fleming announced grants totally $500,000 to “refresh” the computers in 24 David Bohnett CyberCenters across the United States, including the CyberCenter at the LA Gay & Lesbian Center. (Pictured: Paul Moore, Program Manager, David Bohnett Foundation and Lorri L. Jean, Chief Executive Officer of the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center; photo by Patricia Williams.)
The “refresh” program was started in 2004 to keep the CyberCenters up-to-date with each CyberCenter receiving brand new state-of-the-art equipment on a consistent basis, about every three to four years.
Building self-perpetuation into a development plan – what a concept! But this is not just routine maintenance: this is social activism quietly at work. Click inside to read more about the program and what cities are getting grants
There was a flurry of activity Wednesday as individuals and organizations rushed to make the deadline to file amicus briefs in the federal challenge to the constitutionality of Prop 8. Since many trial watchers thought Ted Olson and David Boies won the day for the plaintiffs – even though the trial isn’t over – I thought it might be interesting to remind everyone of a ProtectMarriage video featuring constitutional arguments. The trial isn’t over until the plaintiffs actually win.
The LGBT blogospher exploded Wednesday morning with reaction to the historic Senate Armed Services hearing Tuesday during which Defense Sec. Gates and Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mullen announced their desire to repeal the discriminatory Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy, pursuant to President Obama’s State of the Union address saying he wanted to repeal DADT this year.
Retired General Colin Powell, the former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who supported congressional passage of DADT in 1993, also issued a statement Wednesday saying he supported the new approach.
The reaction to the repeal has been excitement that the end of DADT seems in sight mixed with cautious pushback over why the high commanders didn’t announce a suspension of enforcement while the policy is under review.
But for me – a military brat who’s been covering this issue since David Mixner first raised the prospect of lifting the ban on gays serving openly with presidential candidate Bill Clinton in 1991 – two developments I never thought I’d see also happened Wednesday: Mullen posted his opinion about DADT on his blog on the Joint Chiefs of Staff website (with a link to the full hearing transcript, video is coming) and the Pentagon featured a “straight” news report about DADT.
And here’s Rachel Maddow’s interview with Lt. Col. Fehrenbach:
At his Inauguration in 1960, President John F. Kennedy said the torch had been passed to a new generation. “Ask not what your country can do for you,” Kennedy said, “ask what you can do for your country.”
And young people by the thousands responded, joining the Peace Corp and creating a counter-culture that cared about eliminating racism and sexism and poverty. LGBT people were there, too – some on the frontlines like the late Morris Kight and Don Kilhefner who created the Los Angeles Gay Community Services Center as a refuge for those coming to terms with their gay identity.
But now, after 50 years of serving America in numerous ways – including automatically paying into Social Security – tax-paying LGBT seniors are asking their country to do something for them: they want – and need – the Social Security they deserve when a partner passes away. Many seniors are used to two-household incomes and without the Social Security supplement – especially in this economy – many seniors are finding themselves with huge bills, no money and living in their cars while awaiting precious and scarce affordable housing.
Leading a new campaign to bring awareness to the urgency of this issue is the LA Gay & Lesbian Center with the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. Wednesday they launched Rock for Equality, a rally & rock-in to call attention to and end the severe economic discrimination that is embedded in Social Security Administration policies and to secure equal recognition of same-sex relationships.”
They are producing a national event on either side of Tax Day. The first rocking rally will be held in Los Angeles on April 11, 2010, followed by another in Washington, D.C. on April 18.
Rock for Equality is also being lead by seniors themselves, some of whom are featured in this video and on the website. They are billing the event as “a new kind of protest for one of the most critical civil rights issues of the 21st Century: equal rights, equal recognition and economic fairness for LGBT Americans.” Please click inside for more info.
Secretary of Defense Gates says changes to “don’t ask, don’t tell” process will take over a year. In 45 days, a report is due back on how to make current policy “more fair.”
Watch the Senate Armed Services Committee hearing live now here:
http://armed-services.senate.gov/Webcasts.htm
UPDATE: ARCHIVE OF HEARING HERE: http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/291857-1
Admiral Mike Mullen, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at the first Congressional hearing on the military’s Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy in 17 years that “my personal belief is that allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly would be the right thing to do.” However, he cautioned that a year-long process in studying the effects of repealing the policy would be necessary.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates, saying that “the question is not whether the military prepares to make this change, but how we prepare for it,” named two Pentagon officials to head the study, which would focus on a variety of issues. Jeh Johnson, the legal counsel for the Defense Department, and Gen. Carter Hamm, the commander of US Army Europe, would lead that process.
Mullen’s statement, which Sen. Mark Udall (D-CO) said would be “long remembered for its courage,” stands in sharp contrast to the response of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the beginning of the Clinton Administration, the last time this policy was reviewed. Saying that he “understands perfectly the President’s desire to see the law repealed,” he stated his personal belief that the current policy “forces young men and women to lie about who they are.” In the end, Mullen said, “It comes down to integrity.”
SENATE ARMED FORCES COMMITTEE CHAIR CARL LEVIN LATER SPOKE TO REPORTERS :
Tony Perkins, head of the antigay Family Research Council, is hosting a webcast tonight to enable “the people” to respond to President Obama’s recent State of the Union address. Since Obama spoke about working with Congress and military leaders to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” – and the Senate Armed Services Committee is holding a hearing on DADT today – one might image DADT might come up during the webcast tonight. Here’s the invitation to join:
Webcast Tonight at 8 p.m. ET: The State of The Union, The Voice of the People
February 01, 2010
Last week, you heard President Obama’s take on where we are as a nation after his first year in office. Now hear the American people respond! Tonight at 8 p.m. (EST), FRC headquarters will be the site of a special webcast, “State of the Union, Voice of the People,” hosted by Herman Cain and tvTownhall.com. FRC and seven other organizations will give their response to last week’s address by the President, along with select video responses from across the nation.
Join me tonight at 8:00 p.m. EST for this live webcast, which will provide a voice to the American people and an opportunity for them to give their own State of the Union response.
Health and Human Services’ Secretary Sebelius announced the members of the Presidential Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS and included are Mario Pérez, Director of the LA County’s Office of AIDS Programs and Policy (OAPP), Phill Wison, founder and Executive Director of the Black AIDS Institute, and actor Rosie Perez.
Click inside to find out who else is on the council.
Let’s face it: the Commander-in-Chief and Congress are secretly afraid of the old men in the military. And the old men in the military, so accustomed to automatic deference by all branches of the US government, are afraid of losing their power as times and the culture change. They cannot fathom that younger soldiers and leaders, the ones the old men are sending to fight two wars, are no longer afraid of dropping their soap bar in the shower.
How else explain the compromise the Obama Administration, the Pentagon and Congress are expected to announce at Tuesday’s Senate Armed Services Committee hearing?
The military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy was a so-called “compromise” cooked up 17 years ago after Democratic Sen. Sam Nunn and Republican Sen. John Warner decided to teach the upstart new President Bill Clinton – who escaped military service during the Vietnam War – exactly how Washington worked. In an unprecedented publicity stunt that ignored eons of the military’s top-down structure, Nunn (angry at not being named Secretary of Defense) and Warner went into the bowels of a submarine and asked for the opinions of sailors whose training drilled into them that their opinions do not matter, they must only follow orders.
Here’s how that first hearing went, as reported by NBC’s Lisa Meyers (hat tip to the site devoted to Leonard Matlovich):
Please click inside to read my essay previewing the hearing Tuesday.
In the early 1960s when my father was stationed at Norton Air Force Base in San Bernardino, California, then a Strategic Air Command facility, there was much discussion about building an underground bomb shelter in our back yard in case there was a nuclear war. There’s a funny insight into this in the film “Blast from the Past” – but it was really no laughing matter at the time. We did the absurd “duck-and-cover” drills all the time.
The prospect of a terrorist cell exploding a homemade nuclear bomb was more recently explored in the fictional Fox series “24” when a bomb was detonated in Valencia, California.
Last Wednesday the prospect of that detonation became more real when the new documentary “Nuclear Tipping Point” premiered at Universal Studios. The documentary features former secretaries of state George Shultz and Henry Kissinger, former Secretary of Defense William Perry, and former Senator Sam Nunn who publicly wrestle with the necessity of reducing the US’s reliance on nuclear weapons.
In the documentary, former Secretary of State George Shultz notes that the longstanding US policy of nuclear weapons serving as deterrence to mutual self-destruction is now obsolete. Shultz says:
“If terrorists get their hands on nuclear weapons or materials and you don’t even know their return address – we will be faced with a very dangerous moment. If you think of the people who are committing suicide attacks and people like that get a nuclear weapon, they are almost by definition not deterrable.”
Producers pf “Nuclear Tipping Point” are offering a DVD of the documentary free on their website NuclearTippingPoint.org.
As the federal Prop 8 trial goes on hiatus for a month or two before closing arguments, Love Honor Cherish has re-emerged seeking signatures for their repeal Prop 8 in 2010 initiative campaign.
One of four locations for signature-gathering on Sunday is from 2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. at the Staples Center in advance of the Grammy Awards. Volunteers are asked to meet at the SW corner of Chick Hearn (11th) and Figueroa Blvds. (LHC advises to park in private lots east of Figueroa on Olympic Blvd. & 11th streets and note that it’s cheaper the further east one travels.
In their press release, LHC notes that they need 1 million signatures in the next 13 weeks. “Let’s get thousands this weekend!” Click inside for the other locations and news about antigay Grammy nominee Buju Banton.
BIENESTAR, the Latino HIV/AIDS and social services organization, is collecting life-saving medications to be sent to earthquake-devastated Haiti. This collection will take place February 1st. through February 5th at all BIENESTAR centers.
The medications can be donated and dropped off at a BIENESTAR center near you (see the list below). These medications should be unexpired, not require refrigeration and preferably sealed.
Medications needed more urgently: Antiretrovirals, Medications to treat Opportunistic Infections, Antifungals, Antivirals, Antibiotics, Antiparasite drugs, Antiallergics and Pediatrics.
Monetary donations can be made through AIDS Healthcare Foundation – click on DONATIONS, and in honor of HAITI. Please click inside to see the drop-off locations and more ways to donate.
Valentine’s Day is less than a week away – a happy day commemorating romance, whether you’re married, in a relationship or not. But for some LGBTs, it is a day of darkness, a day when society shames and ridicules same sex attraction, a day when thoughts of suicide become more real.
Every time I jumped up, pumped the air with my fist and yelled, “Who Dat? Who Dat?” my dogs jumped up too, started barking and thought someone was outside or at the door.
I’ve known prodigious producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron since 1995 when I covered their important gays-in-the-military film, “Serving in Silence: The Margarethe Cammermeyer Story.”
As expected, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, Sen. John McCain’s running mate in the 2008 presidential election and a parallel star on Saturday Night Live, was a huge hit at the first Tea Party convention in Nashville, Tenn. Saturday night.
I wrote this analysis of the federal Prop 8 trial for DC Agenda, which they just posted on their website. Here’s the opening – please click inside for the full story. 
After testimony ended in the Prop 8 trial, Judge Vaughn Walker allowed post-trial amicus briefs to be filed by Feb. 3. Most appeared to support the plaintiffs. Both sides have until Feb. 26 to respond to the amicus briefs – after which Judge Walker will hold a hearing to handle details and set a date for closing arguments. Please click inside to read some details about six of the briefs. 
The 
All 
Rachel Maddow fans know how she gets all geeky-giggly when talking about “infrastructure” – how great the need is to fix and maintain the crumbling structures and the highways and byways that keep America moving.
The LGBT blogospher exploded Wednesday morning with reaction to the historic Senate Armed Services hearing Tuesday during which Defense Sec. Gates and Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mullen announced their desire to repeal the discriminatory Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy, pursuant to President Obama’s State of the Union address saying he wanted to repeal DADT this year.
At his Inauguration in 1960, President John F. Kennedy said the torch had been passed to a new generation. “Ask not what your country can do for you,” Kennedy said, “ask what you can do for your country.”
Tony Perkins, head of the antigay Family Research Council, is hosting a webcast tonight to enable “the people” to respond to President Obama’s recent State of the Union address. Since Obama spoke about working with Congress and military leaders to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” – and the Senate Armed Services Committee is holding a hearing on DADT today – one might image DADT might come up during the webcast tonight. Here’s the invitation to join:
Health and Human Services’ Secretary Sebelius
Let’s face it: the Commander-in-Chief and Congress are secretly afraid of the old men in the military. And the old men in the military, so accustomed to automatic deference by all branches of the US government, are afraid of losing their power as times and the culture change. They cannot fathom that younger soldiers and leaders, the ones the old men are sending to fight two wars, are no longer afraid of dropping their soap bar in the shower.
In the early 1960s when my father was stationed at 
As the 
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