Q-Seattle Events: Tacky Tourist Clubs

Equal Rights Washington (ERW) has issued what they're calling an "urgent" notice for Washingtonians to their representaves about ENDA (Employment Non-Discrimination Act) legislation in the House. In this particular case, even calls to Seattle's Rep. Jim McDermott would be useful, according to ERW.

Like most (but not quite all) LGBT activist groups, ERW is opposed to the version of the bill that was passed last week by a House committee. That version (what we've been calling LGB-No-T ENDA) includes job protections for "sexual orientation", but not for "gender identity".

ERW's take:

[T]he bill being voted on (HR 3685) is a stripped-down version which does not include protection based on gender identity. Not only is this bad for transgender workers, it leaves everyone who does not conform to rigid gender stereotypes vulnerable to workplace discrimination. The original version (HR 2015) included protection based on gender identity.

Things are moving quickly and we need your help today.

At this critical juncture in the struggle for equality, we must tell Congress to do the right thing for all Americans--LGBT and straight. Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), the first openly LGBT member of Congress elected as a non-incumbent, has announced her plan to offer an amendment to HR 3685 that will restore gender identity protections. The Baldwin Amendment is our best hope to offer protection based on gender identity.

They're urging calls even to McDermott because -- although he's a usually reliable vote on the ERW-type side of most issues like this -- this particular activist v. politics issue has been more devisive.

They recommend this kind of approach:

Please call Rep. McDermott's office at (206) 553-7170. Please be polite and remember that your congressperson is not the problem. We need his leadership. The purpose of your call is to convey how important it is to you that gender identity be included in the ENDA.

When calling, feel free to use the following script outline:

Introduce yourself & then let them know why you're calling:

It is vital that the Employment Nondiscrimination Act (ENDA) include gender identity. As your constituent, I'm asking you not only to support the Baldwin Amendment, which would add gender identity protections to HR 3685 (the new version of the ENDA), but also to speak to your collegues and encourage them to support it as well. If the Baldwin Amendment fails I would ask Rep. McDermott not to support final passage of HR 3685. We would rather take the time to build support for HR 2015, the original and inclusive ENDA, of which Rep. McDermott is an original cosponsor.

Then ask the following questions:

Question 1. Is Rep. McDermott planning to vote for the Baldwin Amendment to HR 3685?

Question 2. Has Rep. McDermott decided how he will vote on HR 3685 if the Baldwin Amendment fails?

End the call with a thank you:

If you live outside of Seattle, a call to your congressman would be even more vital on this issue.

And, frankly, we'll leave it up to you to decide what you'd like to see happen if the Baldwin amendment doesn't pass and LGB-No-T ENDA comes up for a vote. But that's an issue for another day. The vote on the amendment is at least a test of where things will go with this activist dustup.

[post mirrored from seaQwa.com]

Labels: activism, ENDA, org:ERW, politics, rights legislation, state:WA

Yes, we're too late mentioning this (as we have been with just about everything) for you to get to the rally, but it's still worth noting that Seattle's activist groups have joined with almost all of their national cohorts to oppose a Congressional bargain that would move forward next week with a version of ENDA -- the Employment Non-Discrimination Act -- that would offer job protection based on sexual orientation.

The activist groups object to the legislation because it would exclude job protections based on gender identity. It's a compromise being pushed by the chamber's only out gay male member, Rep. Barney Frank, and by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi because they claim it's the only way to get the long-delayed rights bill passed.

A rally will be held this afternoon at the Seattle LGBT Center at 2pm. It's sponsored by Ingersoll Gender Center, Seattle LGBT Center, and Equal Rights Washington. Its purpose:

THIS RALLY IS FOR YOU! WE ARE MAKING OUR VOICES HEARD

Hundreds of organizations from around the country have joined the UnitedENDA.org coalition. Togeher in a matter of days we have generated tens of thousands of constituebnt contacts. The Democratic leadership is listening. Now we must prove that we can deliver votes, remained unified and educate the public about the importance of passing ENDA that includes gender identity.

This is a classic battle between activists and politicians. The politicians insist that a compromise is necessary if something important is to get done. The activists insist the the political compromise makes the whole effort meaningless.

You can pick your side on this one, but if you would like to add your voice to those of the activists, you can do it by visiting this link. which will help you send an email on the issue to your congress-critter.

Labels: activism, ENDA, Gay events, org:ERW, org:Ingersoll, org:SLGBTC, politics, rights legislation

The DC Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call reported yesterday that Idaho Republican Senator Larry Craig pleaded guilty to a charge of disorderly conduct after he was arrested during a police sting for bathroom cruising in the Minneapolis airport.

That guilty plea was finally enough to get the senator's home-state newspaper, Boise's Idaho Stateman to run a story they'd been sitting on for months:

Sen. Larry Craig, who in May told the Idaho Statesman he had never engaged in homosexual acts, was arrested less than a month later by an undercover police officer who said Craig made a sexual advance toward him in an airport men's room.

The arrest at a Minnesota airport prompted Craig to plead guilty to disorderly conduct earlier this month. His June 11 encounter with the officer was similar to an incident in a men's room in a Washington, D.C., rail station described by a Washington-area man to the Idaho Statesman. In that case, the man said he and Craig had sexual contact. ...

The most serious finding by the Statesman was the report by a professional man with close ties to Republican officials. The 40-year-old man reported having oral sex with Craig at Washington's Union Station, probably in 2004. The Statesman also spoke with a man who said Craig made a sexual advance toward him at the University of Idaho in 1967 and a man who said Craig "cruised" him for sex in 1994 at the REI store in Boise. The Statesman also explored dozens of allegations that proved untrue, unclear or unverifiable.

The Stateman story by Dan Popkey is truly a must-read for insight into the ways of the closet. When Popkey recounted for Craig the claims of the gay man who said he'd been cruised by Craig at the Boise REI, the senator responded,

"Once again, I'm not gay, and I don't cruise, and I don't hit on men. I have no idea how he drew that conclusion. A smile? Here is one thing I do out in public: I make eye contact, I smile at people, they recognize me, they say, 'Oh, hi, Senator.' Or, 'Do I know you?'

"I've been in this business 27 years in the public eye here. I don't go around anywhere hitting on men, and by God, if I did, I wouldn't do it in Boise, Idaho! Jiminy!"

Hmm. Sure does know a lot about what he wouldn't do if he were gay, eh?

The Statesman story is late in coming, but more damning because it's more carefully sourced than previous accusations about Craig's occasional bathroom escapades. Although the paper didn't print anything about it at the time, the Stateman started looking into the senator's sexual escapades after blogger Mike Rogers posted a report on blogactive.com on October 17 about the senator. Rogers claimed in the post to have talked to three men who claimed to have had sex with Craig. All three men wanted to remain anonymous, Rogers said in the post.

The Stateman was able to contact and interview one of the three men -- the man who said he'd had sex with Craig at DC's Union Station.

During its investigation, the Statesman interviewed 300 people, visited the ranch where Craig grew up, and made two trips to Washington, D.C.

On May 12, two days before its interview with Craig, the Statesman finally interviewed Rogers' "best source," the man who says he is certain he had a brief sexual encounter with Craig at Union Station, which is two blocks from Craig's office. The man said the sex occurred in two restrooms on a weekday afternoon. He estimated the encounter lasted three or four minutes.

The man's motive was twofold. A lifelong Republican, he recently had re-registered as a Democrat because he's angry with what he sees as the GOP's gay-bashing. Second, he was tired of Rogers picking on congressional staffers and offered him the chance to "out" a senator.

The Washington-area man's story has remained consistent, beginning with his Aug. 9, 2004, e-mail to Mike Rogers: "I've hooked up with Craig ... why not out some actual members and not their staffers?"

But that story wasn't enough for the Statesman until the report of Craig's arrest and guilty plea.

Until Monday's report, Craig was facing a lone credible accuser. Rogers told the Statesman he had lost track of his other two sources, who he said described encounters with the senator, one in Idaho and one in Seattle. Rogers concedes he doesn't know those two sources' last names. "I was an amateur," he told the Statesman.

The Statesman followed dozens of leads about alleged sexual partners. Two prevalent rumors swirl around two men who are dead. The Statesman has found no written record of sexual intimacy between those men and Craig. Relatives of those men are dead, unaware of proof to substantiate the rumors, or unreachable.

Two other alleged partners unequivocally denied having been intimate with Craig. Other accounts are simply unfounded. Some were inconclusive.

There are, however, the two men who told the Statesman Craig made passes at them. Craig denied those accounts in his May 14 interview.

So, then... There still appears to be someone out there in Seattle who talked to Mike Rogers last fall about Larry Craig and know a whole lot more about this story. But then, there are also some who still doubted the stories:

Last fall, Craig's neighbors at a Washington marina expressed disbelief at Rogers' attempt to out him. Ed Johnson is an openly gay man, former local elected official and has been an acquaintance and neighbor of Craig's off and on for 15 years. He is president of the Gangplank Slipholders Association, a neighbor to the smaller Capital Yacht Club, where Craig lives.

A Democrat, Johnson works for the American Humanists Association, which he describes as "the godless, liberal, left-wing atheists."

"If I thought there was truth to the rumor, I'd be first in line to out him," said Johnson, who agrees hypocritical public officials should be exposed.

"But after 15 years in a close-knit community where everybody knows everybody's business, to be that clandestine and never have anything said ? it's just hard to imagine. I mean, if somebody has a fight and breaks up with their boyfriend or girlfriend, you know it the next day."

Labels: Idaho, politics

A couple of legal issue bloggers expected the ruling to be appealed when the 10th Circuit Court ruled against the Oklahoma legislature's bizarre decision to deny birth certificates to children born in OK who had been adopted by same-sex couples (in other states, since that's not OK in OK).

Fortunately, that won't happen. The Oklahoma agency that issues birth certificates announced last week that it will honor the appeals court decision.

Tom Cross, the state Health Department's deputy general counsel, said the agency could not meet the requirements to have the 10th Circuit reconsider its opinion.

The agency does not believe that the U.S. Supreme Court would take up the case, he said.

"We will be issuing birth certificates for all adoptions, whether same-sex or not, for children born in Oklahoma," Cross said.

Lambda Legal, which filed cases challenging the hastily-adopted law, celebrated the decision.

"This is a monumental decision, not just for the couples involved in the case, but for lesbian and gay parents and their children nationwide," said Jon Davidson, Legal Director of Lambda Legal. "It means that when same-sex couples have an adoption decree recognizing both of them as parents, the adoption, and their status as their child's parents, must be honored no matter where they go."

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Still trying to recover a response at the Logo prez forum, Democratic presidential candidate Bill Richardson got some help from a not-so-desirable source, Fox's Bill O'Reilly.

When a viewer email questioned his previous remarks that Bill Richardson "looked bad by saying he believed homosexuality was a choice," Fox News' Bill O'Reilly responded, "I think everybody's got to relax on all this gay stuff."

You know you're in trouble if you?re a Democrat and O'Reilly comes to your defense. Huffington Post blogger RJ Eskow caught onto O'Reilly's probably unintentional 'Relax' reference, and so we offer this: (via YouTube)




But that wasn't O'Reilly's only indication during the week that he just can't bring himself to "relax about this gay stuff". He also flubbed a report about a poll that showed the votes of most folks in three swing states wouldn't be affected if a candidate were endorsed by a gay rights group. And then he flubbed it again when someone pointed out he'd been wrong the first time. (But then, he wasn't the only one. Politico.com headlined its story on the poll "Gay support could cost candidates".)

But the incident did help earn O'Reilly a not-so-rare two-fer on Olbermann's Worst Person nomination. [YouTube].

Labels: gay news, news bites, politics, TV

We posted some of the flurry of news stories on our news feed, but we might be the only gay-related blog that didn't do at least one post last week about Logo's forum for Democratic presidential candidates. But if you missed it, it's not too late to catch the full forum on Logo's website.

But, really, what we were waiting for is coverage of the event by Jon Stewart. You gotta love the bit about Melissa Etheridge's loooong questions. Although, of course, she did manage to ask the one question that really made news in the forum: Gov. Bill Richardson is still trying to recover from his flubbed response to the "rock star's" choice question.

Labels: celebrities, news bites, politics, TV

The comeback is one of the grand traditions of the entertainment world where they sometimes work. We see attempts even in politics (see, eg, Nixon) but the attempts rarely work out there. So here are a few recent news items that prompt a sense of "we've see that before..."

He's never really gone away, but Joe Fuiten, Bothell's rabidly anti-gay preacher/political activist is back under a new auspices. He formed his own group called after leaving Faith and Freedom Network. But now, he's folded that group into yet another new outfit called Family Policy Institute of Washington.

This one is under the philosophical umbrella (but not, they insist, the financial umbrella) of James Dobson's Focus on Family.

Fuiten's is also encouraging pastors throughout the state to get each member of their congrations to register to vote. Fuiten hopes to target legislators who voted for Washington's domestic partnership registry.
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And then there's Aubrey McClendon, the Sonics silent-partner co-owner, who helped bankroll one of Gary Bauer's anti-gay programs. Slog uncovered his funding of the Bauer project [background] at just about the time that the Sonics/Storm owners started threatening to move their teams away from Seattle -- both teams, including the Storm with its significant lesbian fanbase.

Well, McClendon stepped into it again with -- of all things -- a proposed real-estate development in Michigan. There are -- as often happens with these things -- a wealth of potential problems with the proposed beach-front development. Those potential problems have, of course, attracted a wealth of potential opponents of the development proposal. But, there's one extra problem for McClendon. It seems that his development proposal has drawn fire from an unlikely group -- gay folk in the area. Oops. McClendan bought an area of dunes and beach that is considered by locals to be the gay beach. Oh, boy...

McClendon's "people" gave a familiar response when asked about the opposition. "[B]ut after all, this is private property," said a spokesman.
---
And imagine, if you will, being famous as member of a "gay group" when you were never gay. Oh, the horror, eh? Maybe it would drive you to drink and drugs. Well, it seems that that's exactly what happened to Victor Willis former lead singer and "cop" of the Village People. But don't cry too much for the singer/songwriter. While racking up arrests and rehabilitation stints since leaving the group in the early 80s, Willis has made over a million dollars in royalties on 'not gay' songs he wrote for the disco group, including "In the Navy", "YMCA", and "Macho Man".

Willis is clean and sober now according to his "people", and ready to mount some sort of comeback tour after releasing a promised tell-all book in the fall. And yes, there's a regional connection even here. Turns out Willis wrote "YMCA" in Vancouver. According to his publicist, "Victor Willis wrote about the YMCA and having fun there, but the type of fun he was talking about was straight fun."

We'll have to wait for that tell-all book to get the nitty-gritty about what kind of not-gay fun the guys at the Vancouver Y were having way back when.
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In other 'not gay' news, there's Matt Sanchez, that hot-looking Marine conservative activist from a few months back. Soon after making several appearances on Fox News programs and hob-nobbing with Ann Coulter, Sanchez was identified as a former actor in gay porn known as "Rod Majors" [background]. He said then that making those movies was just a "summer job." Although he's remained a popular search topic on blogs, Sanchez mostly disappeared from News Corp TV. But he's not been forgotten by the company's many media outlets.

Cpl. Matt "Rod Majors" Sanchez turned up again as an expert source in an article in News Corp's Weekly Standard magazine.

Sorry, no local connection to this story.

Labels: celebrities, gay news, news bites, politics, sports

Does the air feel a bit different out there today? Something beyond this uncommon summer rain? Do you feel the earth shaking under "traditional marriage"? Yeah... Probably not. But today is the day when domestic partnerships for gay couples and some straight couples officially become recognized in Washington. Of course, it doesn't make a lot of difference until the Secretary of State's office opens tomorrow morning at 8 am in Olympia to begin processing the registrations.

And if you are planning to head to Olympia tomorrow along with all the TV satellite trucks, the office of Secretary of State Sam Reed warns that you should expect to wait in line:

Monday July 23 is the first day that the Office of the Secretary of State will accept registrations at the Dolliver Building. The doors will open at 8:00 am.

We are expecting long lines and long waits on the first days of registration. It is likely that we will not be able to complete every registration that we receive on the first day. Review this information to help us complete as many registrations as possible on July 23

• Consider mailing or leaving the declaration form and fee to be filed. All complete registrations will be effective on the date received. We will mail the completed registrations, certificates, and wallet cards to you. You can register in person and receive your certificates on the spot, but you may need to be patient.
• Complete the forms before you come in. We will post the forms on this website on Wednesday July 18. The forms will be in PDF format. Download the form; complete it on your computer. Then print the form.
  
  If possible sign and notarize the form before coming to the Corporations Division. We will have notaries available, but notarizing the documents will add substantial processing time to each application. The more documents we have to notarize, the fewer registrations we will be able to complete on the first day.
• Parking and transportation. There is very limited parking available at the Dolliver Building. On-street metered parking is available in the area but it is difficult to find a space. Free parking is available at the Capitol Visitor parking lot. See Map. Intercity Transit offers the free DASH shuttle from the Capitol Visitors parking and the Capitol Campus. This service runs every twelve minutes and stops one block from the Dolliver Building. DASH Shuttle information.

The registration fee for partnerships is $50. Once the two of you are officially partners, each partner will receive an original (and, we trust, frame-able) "Certificate of State Registered Domestic Partnership" along with a wallet card showing the registration of the domestic partnership. (It's not clear from the website if they give a wallet card to each partner, or just one. In either case, a replacement card is available for $10.) The secretary of state's office will also provide one file stamped copy of the registration document.

Reed's office also offers a nifty FAQ to answer a few frequently asked questions about the partnerships.

Reporters have been searching out gay and lesbian partners to profile in preparation for the big day tomorrow. A few of the stories:

[Seattle PI:] After spending this weekend relaxing in Olympia, Laura Mansfield and Marilyn Guthrie plan to walk from their bed-and-breakfast to an office of the Secretary of State on Monday morning and file a notarized form. ...

For Mansfield and Guthrie, the registration comes nearly a year after their pastor at University Congregational United Church of Christ conducted a wedding for them in the front yard of their Ballard home.

"We made our commitment then, before family and God and friends," said Mansfield, 43, director of communications for Seattle Central Community College. "This (registration) is recognizing our relationship legally."

Guthrie said she hopes gay couples would gain "not only the benefits but the responsibilities of full marriage equality."

Among those, she said, is involvement in the care of partners who are hospitalized, especially when they are in intensive care. Under current law, hospitals could limit access to spouses or other close family members.

Being relegated to the hospital hallway is "sort of the big scary thing out there that you don't want to happen," said Guthrie, 46, storm water program manager for the Port of Seattle.

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[AP via Boston Globe] Tom Richardson and Salvador Valenzuela first marked their commitment to each other with a city domestic partnership in Seattle. When Massachusetts became the first state to allow same-sex marriage, they married, and hyphenated their last names.

Now back in Washington state, the Richardson-Valenzuelas plan to register for a state domestic partnership here. ...

The only problem is that by doing so, they risk getting Salvador, a Mexican national, deported, because registering could jeopardize the temporary tourist visas he uses to enter the country.

"It's really important for our relationship to be recognized," said Tom Richardson-Valenzuela, who said they both realize that the immigration laws may catch up with them. "We are a legitimate couple. If we have to leave the United States, as much as we don't want to leave the country, we will."

The AP story in the Globe warns couples that include a foreign national or a member of the armed forces to carefully consider the risks before signing up for a domestic partnership. The registry is public information subject to disclosure on request.

[The Columbian] One couple who won't be waiting are state Sen. Ed Murray, prime sponsor of the domestic partnership bill, and his partner of 16 years, Michael Shiosaki.

"In Olympia on Monday morning, amongst all the general excitement and with great joy and pride in our hearts, Michael and I will get in line with everyone else to be registered as domestic partners by the Secretary of State," Murray, a Seattle Democrat, said in a statement.

State Rep. Jim Moeller, D-Vancouver, another openly gay legislator, said he and his partner will not be taking advantage of the domestic partnership law.

"We will be holding out for the big church wedding," he said. "When that becomes legal , and we can get a legal notice in your newspaper, we'll take advantage of that."

AP writer Dave Ammons offers a brief history of the legislative road that led to the domestic partnership law.

The state's first openly gay legislator, Cal Anderson, and other lawmakers struggled for nearly 30 years to get the civil rights bill through Olympia last year. Democrats padded their majorities in both houses and came right back to pass marriage-like rights this year.

On Monday, Sen. Ed Murray, Anderson's successor in the Legislature and in leading the charge, and his 16-year partner, Michael Shiosaki, will line up at the secretary of state's counter in Olympia to register their domestic partnership.

Then Murray will drive home and get started on the next phase of the battle that has sometimes consumed him.

What's next? The gay community isn't much interested in civil unions but plans to seek full marriage equality. How long that takes, say the advocates, will depend on how quickly public opinion continues to turn their way.

"I believe we will get there in a decade, if not sooner," says Murray, the senior of five gay men in the state Legislature.

Foes say they'll fight every inch of the way and insist they still have public opinion on their side. One leading evangelical, though, believes it likely is a losing battle and that gays will someday be able to marry here.

Labels: marriage equality, politics, SB5336, Washington

Under pressure of a lawsuit like that filed against Bellevue earlier this year, the Redmond City Council this week voted unanimously to grant benefits to the domestic partners of city employees that are equivalent to those offered to spouses of married employees. The move came only after the Eastside city had recieved a letter threatening suit by Lambda Legal.

Lambda Legal had threatened the city with legal action on behalf of two veteran city police officers, Cmdr. Kristi Wilson and Lt. Betsy Lawrence. In a strongly worded letter to the city on June 19, the organization called on city leaders to heed years of requests on the part of both employees and several unions, and grant equal benefits to all employees.

"We are pleased that Redmond has joined its municipal neighbors and other mainstream employers by adopting an equal family benefits plan for its gay and lesbian employees, said Lambda Legal Staff Attorney Tara Borelli. "Other cities should follow Redmond's lead by recognizing that their dedicated lesbian and gay employees deserve equal pay for equal work."

PI columnist Susan Paynter had given Redmond's council members added incentive to finally equalize its benefits package in a strongly-worded column published the morning before the vote was taken.

It's not a new benefit; it's one the city already provides. Certainly it's not "special treatment," says Redmond Police Cmdr. Kristi Wilson, a 20-year law enforcement veteran with 14 years on the Redmond force.

And, contrary to what cities and companies always say just before they cave, it's really not about money.

"If I were to leave (the job), they likely would hire a heterosexual to replace me and have to provide the same benefit they're denying me," Wilson told me. "The financial aspect just doesn't hold water. Look at the hundreds of companies around us. Microsoft, lots of other municipalities. The state. And they're not in bankruptcy."

The health-coverage scare struck home in January when Wilson was diagnosed with breast cancer. Thank God it wasn't her partner who wouldn't have been covered, or something catastrophic striking their two kids, now nearly 6 and 3 1/2 years old.

Equal benefits actually give employers an advantage in hiring and holding on to high-quality workers, not to mention the fact that it's just plain right, Wilson says. "There are human beings attached to this issue. I'm not an unknown commodity. They know me. My partner stays home to raise our kids. We are mainstream America."

Paynter's column, coming on the heels of Lambda's letter, may have helped humanize the issue for the council.

Redmond Police Lt. Betsy Lawrence has 23 years in law enforcement. She and her partner have five kids -- all but one of whom lives with them full time -- to feed and care for. And she has a deep sadness about the way we seem to crawl toward equality. "Employees with same-sex partners deserve the same compensations as those who are able to marry their different-sex partners," she said.

Ultimately, she'd love some legislative stroke of the pen to put this patchwork approach to bed. But, for now, this seems to be the way we do it.
Lawrence lauds the Redmond Police Department as the best bunch of dedicated, fair-minded folks she's ever worked with. If it were up to them, she said, they'd do this today. Instead, it's at the door of City Hall. ...

But, for Lawrence, her partner, and their kids -- 15, 11 and 5 and 19-month-old twins -- it's a matter of basic security. When the twins were born a month premature, the fragility of both their health and the family finances really hit her. Had she not rushed her already prepared adoption paper work to the courthouse within hours of the birth, hundreds of thousands of dollars from a month of ICU costs would not have been covered.

Lawrence thinks that everyone who works -- certainly those with jobs that put them in jeopardy -- ought to be able to handle a health care crisis without facing financial ruin.

She went into law enforcement in the first place in order to make people feel safer, to ensure that those who've already been hurt won't be harmed any more. "I just want the best for everyone, really," she said.

Labels: equal rights, politics, Washington

Just weeks after Bellevue responded to a lawsuit by allowing domestic partners of city employees to get the same benefits afforded spouses of married employees, Pierce County will consider following suit.

The Tacoma News Tribune reports that the county executive, John Ladenburg, announced the plan Tuesday. It's expected to be introduced to the county council next month.

Under the plan, the county would extend medical, dental and sick leave benefits to domestic partners for both same- and opposite-sex relationships. The county has no estimate of how many domestic partners would be eligible.

"We're joining the many cities and counties around the country that already provide benefits to employee partners," Ladenburg said in a news release. "It puts us on equal footing when it comes to attracting and keeping good employees."

In addition to Bellevue, King and Snohomish Counties, and Seattle, Burien, and Spokane offer similar plans to their employees.

Labels: equal rights, marriage equality, politics, Washington

We haven't heard much from Redmond pastor Ken Hutcherson lately about his discrimination initiative, I-963. If passed, Hutcherson's initiative would wipe out a law passed by the 2005 legislature that amends the state's civil rights laws to bar discrimination in housing, employment, and insurance because of sexual orientation or transgender status.

Despite the lack of publicity, the measure is being given a good chance in an analysis by Olympian reporter Brad Shannon of initiatives that have been introduced for possible placement on the November, 2008 ballot.

Hutcherson hasn't raised the kind of money usually required to qualify any initiative for the ballot, but an alliance of churches might still help him get his measure on the ballot, according to the report.

"Unless they are raising six figures, it's really hard to get things on the ballot.... It costs usually hundreds of thousands of dollars ... to get on the ballot," said Todd Donovan, a Western Washington University professor of political science who has authored books on the initiative process.

One potential exception is I-963, which seeks to repeal gay-rights provisions adopted by lawmakers in 2006. That law already survived Eyman?s referendum signature drive last year.

But this year's effort is led by Ken Hutcherson, the former professional football player who now serves as senior pastor at Antioch Bible Church in Kirkland; Hutcherson opposes same-sex marriage and civil rights protections for gays.

Donovan said other states have seen low-cost ballot measures succeed around the issue of gay marriage or gay rights.

"A lot of those were low-cost campaigns where they got a lot of signatures through churches," he said.

It's not mentioned in the Olympian article, but Hutcherson's recent activism on behalf of anti-gay groups in the Baltic republic of Latvia (see our posts) has probably helped to cement his alliance with some Russian-speaking churches in this area. His partner on the Latvia trips was anti-gay activist Scott Lively from Oregon. Russian-speaking immigrants in Oregon organized loud protests in Salem when the Oregon legislature considered a similar anti-discrimination measure earlier this year. The bill passed in Oregon.

Labels: I-963, initiative, ken hutcherson, latvia, politics, Washington

Bellevue's city council voted unanimously last night to grant to the domestic partners of city employees the same benefits now offered to married spouses of employees.

"It's definitely an exciting night and a giant leap forward for the city of Bellevue," George Einsetler, a Bellevue 911 dispatcher, told the Seattle Times.

Lambda Legal filed suit in April against the city on behalf of Einsetler and two firefighters who had been denied benefits for their partners. On May 14, the union representing Bellevue firefighters joined the suit. In a letter to Bellevue's mayor and council, International Association of Firefighters (IAFF) Local 1604 wrote, "We strongly urge the City Council to adopt a broad based domestic partner benefits program."

Bellevue firefighter Larry deGroen turned to Lambda Legal after being denied one day bereavement leave when his partner's father died.

deGroen told KING5, "I don't think I deserve to be treated like a second-class citizen, and I don't want my gay and lesbian co-workers to feel the pain that I felt in being told that my family doesn't matter... I think this lawsuit has really shown that... the time is right for the City of Bellevue to move forward."

deGroen is a firefighter and paramedic in Bellevue and has been an employee of the city for more than 12 years. He and life partner Tom Dixon have been together for more than 16 years.

Einsetler is the city's lead 911 dispatcher, and has been a city employee for 13 years. He and his life partner, Cameron Murdock, have been in a committed relationship for more than three years.

The other firefighter named in the suit, Faun Patzer, has a 17-year career as a Bellevue firefighter, and was the first female firefighter to successfully complete the city's prestigious paramedic training program. She has been with life partner Carrie Wurzburg for over four years.

IAFF had pressed for the domestic partner benefits in recent contract negotiations but had been rebuffed by the city.

After Lambda filed its suit in April, the city council directed staff to finally develop a "strategy" for equalizing city benefits. The council voted last night to adopt the staff recommendations, but benefits will not be implemented until the city's human resources department renegotiates contracts with unions, including IAFF.

In a May 14 letter to the city council, Lambda's lawyers for the case, Jennifer Pizer and Tara Borelli, wrote,

Lambda Legal and Local 1604 are delighted that the City Council is considering the adoption of a domestic partner benefits plan. As the plaintiffs in the deGroen lawsuit know well, a denial of family-support benefits inflicts real harms on dedicated, loyal City employees. Lambda Legal and Local 1604 therefore urge the City Council immediately to end the City's restriction of those benefits to only married employees.

King County and Seattle have both granted benefits to domestic partners for several years, as has the state, Snohomish County and other cities. The Seattle Times report notes that lack of benefits in Bellevue might have cost the city some employees.

Several gay employees have left the city in recent years because of the lack of benefits, according to the employees involved in the suit.

[Bellevue Mayor Grant] Degginger said he hopes the new benefits will help the city retain and recruit workers. "It's a challenging job market out there," he said.

Labels: equal rights, marriage equality, politics, Washington

Congrats to David Brewster's Crosscut for doing a second story on gay issues in a month. That's more than The Weekly would have done in a year while he was running the thing.

The latest story is by Austin Jenkins, "the Olympia-based political reporter for Northwest News Network, a consortium of public radio stations in Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. He covers Northwest politics and public policy as well as the Washington Legislature."

It's a good story about the influence of philanthropist/activist Tim Gill on Washington politics. But we're just slightly less than thrilled to see it because we saw the same story somewhere else several months ago. Where? Right here and here. That was February.

Unlike our story, Jenkins doesn't show the actual influence of the Gill group on Washington races, but he does add some quotations by folks who didn't comment for our story.

Washington state Sen. Ed Murray, an openly gay Seattle Democrat, says the gay lobby has traditionally focused on national races. But after the 2004 election, that started changing.

"In the last presidential election, the gay community had its clock cleaned," admits Murray, referring to the eleven states ? including Oregon ? that passed ballot measures banning gay marriage.

Murray and Guerriero say after that election, the gay community swung into action. Murray explains it this way: "What's going on is there's sort of a fairly low-grade, under-the-radar conversation that's going on in the gay community about investing at the state level."

...and...

The fact the Gill effort in Washington and Oregon is only now [???, ahem...] coming to light ? six months after the election ? concerns one defeated Republican. Former House member Toby Nixon says it's a sign the current campaign finance disclosure system may be inadequate.

"If there was some way in more real time during the campaign to find out that this kind of considered effort was going on, maybe a more effective response could be mounted," says Nixon.

But another defeated Republican, Luke Esser, a former state senator and now Washington State Republican Party Chair, refuses to bash the out-of-state money that came into his district. "I think it's incumbent upon Republicans and those who are not in favor of the gay marriage agenda to be ready to raise the money they need to win elections in the future," Esser says.

It's a story worth repeating and Jenkins tells it well, but really now... there's a thing out here sometimes called "the internets" and something on those "tubes" called, by some "the Google" or "the Technorati". Amazing things. You should try them out. We also understand that Brewster and his crowd of ex-Weekly-ites at Crosscut like to see themselves as arbiters of what is good and proper in journalism and much more, but really, now. Wouldn't you consider this kind of thing unseemly if it were done without attribution by someone else?

Labels: legislature, politics, tim gill, Washington

One of three announced candidates for the open post of Snohomish County Sheriff is bringing in Redmond's anti-gay activist preacher Ken Hutcherson for what is billed as a campaign fundraiser and "prayer rally."

Tom Greene a current bureau chief in the county's police force is running against Democratic state Rep. John Lovick and sheriff's Lt. Robert Beidler for the post which must be vacated by incumbent Sheriff Rick Bart who can't run again because of term limits.

Although they couldn't quite figure out where or what Snohomish County is, UK Gay News found it odd that someone running for sheriff would bring in as a campaign speaker the preacher who is reportedly being investigated for misrepresenting himself during his recent foriegn trips to Latvia.

With the White House denying that Hutcherson had been given any special status for his trip to Latvia, and Hutcherson claiming that he has "video proof" (though he is refusing to produce this), it is a certain case of "oh no we didn't" and "oh yes they did".

So, in true British pantomime tradition, perhaps there should also be the "behind you" message sent out to the Bureau Chief of the Snohomish County Sheriff's Office who is now campaigning for election as sheriff.

It's not clear from Greene's campaign site why he's invited Hutcherson to become involved in a Snohomish race for sheriff. But then, there are often code words used for these kinds of things. Maybe that makes it notoble that Greene touts as one of his "core values", "Live by the Boy Scout Law and Oath".

Labels: ken hutcherson, politics, Washington

Bellevue's Sheriff Dave (aka Congressman Dave Reichert (R-8)) joined 24 other Republicans and 212 Democrats (including all of Washington's D Congressmen) to pass a federal hate crimes bill this week that would expand an existing statute to include acts of violence explicitly motivated by the victim's perceived gender, sexual orientation, or gender identity.

The bill, dubbed "Matthew Shepard Act", would increase possible penalties, provide federal assistance to local jurisdictions under special conditions, and expand the conditions under which federal authorities could prosecute a bias-motivated crime under any of the categories which also include race, religion, sex, national origin.

In a statement released upon passage of the bill, Seattle Congressman Jim McDermott (D-7) said,

Every day somewhere in this country, an innocent person is victimized or traumatized because of their race, religion or sexual preference; that is wrong and intolerable and I will not stand by while civil rights are beaten back or shouted down. This legislation would provide local law enforcement with resources they need and don?t have to vigorously pursue and prevent hate crimes.

Reichert and the other Republicans who voted for the bill have been targeted by right-wing lobby groups and bloggers because of the vote. They're urging supporters to flood Riechert and the other Republicans with letters and emails. (Those who live in Reichert's district and support his vote should contact him as well.)

Even before the final vote in the House, the White House issued a statement saying that Bush would be advised to veto the hate crimes measure if it reaches his desk. The statement was issued after a heavy lobbying push by opponents of the measure.

A major right-wing talking point used by those who opposed the measure is that the bill -- which explicitly covers only overt acts of violence -- somehow creates a class of "thought crimes." An example:

Make no mistake about it, the Democrat[ic] House is trying to make thought a crime. ...

This is an insidious bit of legislation meant to create special laws to legitimize homosexuality and make a crime anyone attempting to advocate for a Christian worldview. This bill makes activism against the homosexual agenda, among other things, subject to prosecution as a "hate crime" because the definition of "hate crime" is being expanded to include sexual orientation.

Gay blogger Chris Crain -- who was himself once a victim of a gay-bashing assault -- patiently explained in several posts prior to the vote that the law would not criminalize thought.

Not only does the Shepard specifically limit itself to "violent offenses," the bill contains a special provision to prevent evidence of the person's views or affiliations being used as evidence of biased intent:

Evidence of expression or associations of the defendant may not be introduced as substantive evidence at trial, unless the evidence specifically relates to that offense.

Unlike McDermott, Reichert didn't release a statement explaining his vote, so we can only guess what might be behind it. The vote might simply reflect the changing politics of his district.

Reichert represents a once rock-solid Republican district that has started to tilt away from the party as the GOP has been pulled father to the right by so-called "social conservatives." He faced a tough reelection challenge in 2006 from Democrat Darcy Berner who is expected to run against him again in 2008.

But we suspect there's more. According to Human Rights Campaign (HRC), the gay lobbyist group that has made the bill a primary element of its agenda, the measure was backed by "the National Sheriffs Association, the International Association of Chiefs of Police, 26 state attorneys general and the National District Attorneys Association." Reichert's long career as a beat cop in the King County Sheriff's Department, detective, and sheriff might actually have helped him understand this law better than some of his GOP colleagues and have helped him to see beyond the misleading talking points of the right-wing opponents of the law.

In a slide show on its legislative lobbying agenda for the 109th Congress, the sheriff's association stated

The National Sheriffs? Association remains concerned about the continuing rise in crimes committed against individuals because of bigotry. While the crime itself is perpetrated against one individual or group, the effect is felt throughout the entire community and Nation. If hate crimes persist, members of the targeted group will continue to live in fear and no American should have to live in fear of violent attack because of their ethnicity, religion or belief.

The law that was passed by the House last week would, in specified instances, give local cops more federal help in the often expensive investigation of hate crimes. The cops and prosecutors who investigate the crimes understand that long-established category of "hate crime" does not criminalize thought. It does, however, give them more resources to lock up those who commit overt acts of violence. As an ex-cop, Reichert is in a better position than many in Congress to understand that evidence of motive is one of the factors considered by investigators in any kind of assualt case and becomes a factor in making a distinction between, say, manslaughter and capital murder. Courts have shown themselves capable of making fine distinctions when considering evidence of bias as a complicating factor in an assault case.

One of Reichert's constituents, Redmond's anti-gay activist preacher Ken Hutcherson, joined with several other black pastors to lobby against the bill in the weeks before its passage. Because of a series of inexplicable snafus along the way -- like a lost cell phone that prevented a scheduled appearance on Rush Limbaugh's show -- Hutcherson didn't get much of the publicity he prays for during his lobbying visit to the capitol, but the other pastors who tried to paint the bill as an anti-pastor measure did get some fawning coverage.

The handful of black pastors joined with white evengelical leader Lou Sheldon and others to brand the measure as an "anti-free speech and anti-religion bill." The ever-wacky Sheldon also dubbed it the "Pro-Homosexual/Drag Queen Bill."

If passed and signed into law, it will be used to establish a legal framework to investigate, persecute and prosecute pastors, businessmen and others whose actions are based upon and reflect the truths found in the Bible. So-called ?hate speech? could become the target of zealous pro-homosexual federal prosecutors ? which could include a pastor?s sermon against homosexual behaviors!

The blogger Republic of T, explained at length and with chilling examples why the preachers were wrong.

Nothing in there about preaching. But, essentially, those black ministers and their white evangelical counterparts want to leave bias-crimes based on gender, sexual orientation, and gender identity in a post-1964 state. ... There's nothing in either piece of legislation that would cause a minister to be dragged from the pulpit for anti-gay preaching, and anyone who says otherwise is either deluded or engaged in deliberate deceit.

The ministers and the rest who oppose the bill, and will likely cheer the president?s veto don?t have anything more to fear than the Ku Klux Klan, White Aryan Resistance, or any other hate group. They're still free to spout their hatred; as free as they ever were. There are consequences, as W.A.R and Tom Metzger found out in 1988, if their words include incitement to violence against a particular group, and those words lead to actions by those who received them. But, that's about it.

Residents of Reichert's district should thank him for seeing beyond the obfuscations offered for the past month by opponents of this bill.

Labels: ken hutcherson, politics, Washington

The Oregon Legislature passed a civil unions domestic partnership law this week that would grant to same-sex couples in the state virtually all of the state-granted benefits of marriage. The name was a subject of some controversy in the state (more on that later), but passage of the bill was greeted with warm fuzzies at the statehouse in Salem.

Advocates on the Senate floor cast HB 2007 in grand terms. Sen. Vicki Walker, D-Eugene, called the bill's passage "of historic significance as we make a giant leap forward for fairness."

Sen. Frank Morse of Albany, one of two Republicans to back the bill, said the day's vote would "define the heart of Oregon." Sen. Ben Westlund, D-Bend, said the Legislature's willingness to extend domestic partnership benefits represented a measure of its political will and courage. [Register-Guard]

Aisling Coghlan, interim executive director of Basic Rights Oregon (BRO) -- the activist group that served as primary lobbyist for the legislation, called the final legislative vote "a moral call that both the Senate and House have strongly answered and the Governor has pledged to meet."

Oregonians know too well the value of being able to protect our families--and this bill directly reflects that deeply held pro-family belief. Basic Rights Oregon applauds the Senators who voted in favor of basic fairness for all Oregon families, a value very much in step with the majority of Oregonians.

Oregon's law appears to deserve the strong words because, whatever its name, it appears to be indistinguishable from what are called civil unions in Vermont, other New England states, and New Jersey. It comes closer than either Washington's or California's limited domestic partnership laws to granting same-sex couples the full state-granted rights and obligations of marriage. (Like every other such law and even like marriages in Massachusetts, it cannot grant the many federal benefits of marriage to same-sex couples.)

The Oregonian explained the bill in a Q&A sidebar:

Q: What's a domestic partnership?
A: Domestic partnership, under the new Oregon law, is a legal contract recognizing the union of gay and lesbian couples. It grants them any "privilege, immunity, right or benefit" given to married couples in Oregon.
Q: How does a domestic partnership differ from a civil union?
A: There's no legal difference. Some states have chosen to call the same-sex contract a civil union; others, a domestic partnership.

Oregon couples would apply for a partnership certificate at a county clerk's office -- the same place marriage licenses are dispensed. (In contrast, Washington's DP certificates will be dispensed through the secretary of state's office and not through county courthouses.)

Adopting the name "domestic partnership" rather than "civil union" was controversial. A editorial in one of Portland's weeklies designated BRO and the bill's prime sponsor "Rogue of the Week" for accepting the change of terminology.

Five weeks ago, HB 2007 was a civil unions bill. But last week Kotek amended the bill to use the more poll-proven domestic partnership, borrowing a phrase from our neighbors to the south (California) and north (Washington passed it last week). New Jersey, Connecticut and Vermont call their same-sex couples civil unions.

"No matter what we call it, the reality is that we are getting a package of rights we've never had before,'' says Aisling Coghlan, BRO's interim executive director. "It's a historic victory that will change the lives of thousands of Oregon families."

Rebekah Orr, communications director for the House Democratic Majority, strongly agrees that the name change doesn't matter since the bill's effect remains the same and that name-change critics totally miss the point. At the same time, Orr, a former communications director for BRO, and others insist HB 2007 would have passed the Legislature if it carried the original civil-unions label.

Many took exception to the "Rogue" designation since its something Willamette Week usually reserves for people and groups that the paper's readers more clearly identify as scoundrels, but the name change still disappointed some.

The Oregonian Q&A offered one of the official explanations:

Q: The original Oregon bill called for civil unions. Why the shift in wording to domestic partnership in the legislation that passed?
A: Proponents opted for West Coast consistency (Washington and California have domestic partnership laws). They also decided that the term "domestic partnership," which is older, would be more familiar to Oregonians and more likely to win political support.

[For our part, we're all for "West Coast consistency". After all, most of us can pronounce the r's in "partner" which could be more of a problem in New England.]

The framers of the bill also omitted from the measure permission for religious folk to solemnize a partnership. With the changes, one major right-wing group in Oregon was willing to accept the law without promising an immediate ballot referendum to repeal it:

Nick Graham, spokesman for the conservative religious group the Oregon Family Council, said, "We have no plans at this point to run a referendum on HB 2007."

The group successfully pushed the 2004 gay marriage ban and lobbied against the 2005 civil unions bill.

Graham said his organization remained opposed to the bill, but wasn't planning to petition for a statewide vote because lawmakers provided opponents an opportunity to speak out against it and it differed from the 2005 version enough to soften some concerns. For instance, a minister cannot solemnize a domestic partnership, which was allowed under the civil unions bill. [Register-Guard]

Now, let's hope California's Supremes give Schwarzenegger cover to sign the same-sex marriage bill there and then we could really get to work on some West Coast consistency.

Labels: marriage equality, oregon, politics

Randall L. Tobias, a prominent and generous GOP donor who was given high-profile jobs in the Bush administration, resigned on Friday after being questioned by ABC News when his name turned up on a client list kept by a Washington, DC madam.

He admitted that he had hired call-girls from the firm run by "DC Madam" Pamela Martin. He insisted to ABC News that he had rented the call girls only for "massages" and that he had, umm... abstained from sex.

Tobias's latest formal title in the administration was "Deputy Secretary of State ." His job duties: director of U.S. Foreign Assistance and administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

USA Today summarized his reponsibilities:

In his post, Tobias oversaw about $18 billion in U.S. foreign aid. He was put in charge of both USAID and named the State Department's first director of U.S. foreign assistance in an attempt to better coordinate aid.

USAID, an independent federal agency that receives overall foreign policy guidance from the Secretary of State, has nearly 8,000 employees in Washington and in its 80 missions around the world.

Prior to that, Tobias had served the ambassador for the Office of Global AIDS Coordinator (OGAC) -- the administration's so-called "AIDS czar."

Slate finds a tasty quote from FrontLine in which Tobias explained his primary strategy for fighting the global AIDS epidemic:

Well, the heart of our prevention programs is what's known as ABC: abstinence, be faithful, and the correct and consistent use of condoms when appropriate. ...

And it's also not "ABC: Take your pick." It's abstinence really focused heavily on young people and getting them to understand that the best way to keep from getting infected is to be abstinent and not engage in sexual activity until they are old enough and mature enough and get into a committed relationship, such as a marriage. B is being faithful within that committed relationship. And A and B, those two things together clearly had a huge impact in bringing the infection rates down in Uganda.

C recognizes the fact that there are individuals in high-risk circumstances who either by choice or by coercion are going to find themselves unable to follow A and B, and therefore they need to have access to condoms, and they need to understand the correct and consistent use of condoms.

When the Senate considered Tobias's nomination for the USAID post that he just resigned from a coalition of womens' health groups objected, and pointed out that he hadn't paid much attention to the "C" part of his acronym while he was AIDS czar:

"Under Ambassador Tobias' watch at OGAC, the U.S. has carried out a controversial approach to HIV prevention that goes far beyond any congressional mandate, by, among other things, limiting access to condoms even in generalized epidemics and hampering effective outreach to sex workers," stated Jodi L. Jacobson, Executive Director of the Center for Health and Gender Equity (CHANGE). "Because Tobias has shown himself vulnerable to pressure by the extreme right at OGAC we feel his nomination to head USAID at this critical moment is cause for great concern."

The women's groups also charged that OGAC under Tobias's leadership had closely aligned itself with right-wing US religious groups.

"Ambassador Tobias' willingness to foster an ideological agenda under OGAC raises serious questions about his treatment of other sensitive issues that will fall within his purview at USAID, such as broader reproductive health and family planning programs," stated Jacobson. ...

Before confirming him for this post, "the Senate must ensure that Ambassador Tobias is committed to non-partisan humanitarian aid programs that seek the best methods -- and use the best people -- to improve health and reduce poverty worldwide. Humanitarian aid programs should respond to needs of people, not politicians," Jacobson concluded.

The ABC News story that prompted the resignation notes that he got the jobs at least partly through his generosity to GOP politicians:

Along with his wife, Marianne, Tobias donated over $100,000 to Republican candidates and political committees, according to the campaign finance Web site OpenSecrets.org.

Of course, Secretary of State Condoleza Rice, who had praised Tobias's work earlier this month, announced that Tobias was leaving "for personal reasons."

Huffington Post commentator James Love surveyed activists who pointed out that Tobias was doing the work of the late GOP Congress and of fellow GOP contributors in his global abstinence policies. They noted, however, that he might also have been doing the work of his former employer, phama giant Eli Lilly, in other AIDS policies:

I asked friends who would know, "How much of the 'abstinence only' efforts at USAID were the fault of Tobias, and how much from the White House." The push for this policy, which is actually mandated by a Congressional requirement, came from Republicans in Congress, the White House and the religious right.

Activists give Tobias much more blame for efforts to protect big drug companies from competition from generic manufacturers of AIDS drugs, for example, by undermining the World Health Organization's program to certify generic AIDS drugs (the WHO pre-qualification program) and forcing U.S. taxpayers to unnecessarily pay top dollar for brand name AIDS drugs in PEPFAR treatment efforts. This policy has been poorly covered in the press, but it is far more consequential than Tobias' sex habits.

After a career at Indiana Bell and at AT&T -- where he rose to become vice-chairman, Tobias joined Eli Lilly in 1993 as CEO. He joined drug company during a boardroom crisis and was credited with saving the company and significantly boosting its stock price during his tenure.

In a story on Tobias's 2003 nomination to the AIDS office, which carried an ambassadorial rank and required Senate consent, the New York Times found AIDS activists who worried about his ties to Lilly and to religious right groups in Indiana.

The activists worry that he will spend tax dollars on patented American AIDS drugs at up to $15,000 a year instead of generic copies from India or Thailand for, say, $300. Or that he will let drug companies fill the need through donations, which cost nothing but give the companies huge tax write-offs while shutting out generic competitors so they can control prices elsewhere. The critics also worry that he will adopt the religious right stand that condoms do not work and abstinence does.

Friends in Indiana pointed out that Tobias had shared some of the vast wealth he had accumulated at Lilly with Indiana's largest AIDS service group.

Labels: news bites, politics

Crosscut, David Brewster's new online newspaper for the Northwest run largely by Seattle Weekly alumni, has -- and this is remarkable -- used the word "gay" in a headline today, "Young gay-rights opponents get vocal in Oregon". That's news in itself, but more interesting is the story under the headline.

Those young gay-rights opponents were mostly from Russian-language (Russophone) churches in Oregon. They provide a link that helps explain the reasons for the recent visits to Riga, Latvia by Redmond's Ken Hutcherson and Oregon haulocaust revisionist Scott Lively. [See our previous posts on the visit and Latvia.]

The Oregonian reported on the Russophone anti-gay rally:

Twice in the past two weeks, hundreds of Russian-speaking Christians from Portland and Salem flocked to the state Capitol to protest efforts to bolster gay rights. They arrived by the busload, jamming hearing rooms, singing hymns under the rotunda and providing testimony.

The protests were organized in only a few days by Russian-speakers calling themselves The Voice of Oregon Youth. They pulled it off by using laptops, e-mail and phone calls to the tight network of Russian and Ukrainian churches in the area. Legislators estimated about 1,000 people showed up for a public hearing April 9, with 662 signing up to testify.

"We just went for it, no stopping," said Anna Zaichenko, 19, of Salem, a rally organizer. "I saw how passionate a lot of people became."

In February, months before the protests in Salem, Lively celebrated the activism of the Russophone youth, according to Willamette Week:

In front of about 30 people gathered recently in a Salem church sanctuary to celebrate the reunion of the Oregon Citizens Alliance, Scott Lively found cause for optimism about the rebirth of the anti-gay group.

Lively's reason to believe the OCA could return from dormancy to its glory days of the early 1990s, when it claimed to have more than 3,400 members and earned national notice for getting anti-gay measures on the state ballot, are immigrants from the former Soviet Union who haven't yet been indoctrinated by American culture.

[WWeek traced OCA history in 1998.]

While they were in Latvia, Lively and Hutcherson were guests of Alexei Ledyaev, a Russophone preacher in Riga. Lively showed a video at the February OCA-revival meeting that featured Ledyaev, according to Willamette Week:

The 45-minute video, which repeatedly refers to homosexuals as "terrorists," shows how conservative Latvians successfully stopped gays from marching [*] in their capital, Riga. (European news reports show anti-gay demonstrators throwing feces on the gays.)

The video also features Alexei Ledyaev -- a Kazakhstan-born Baptist pastor and leader of the New Generation Church, whose satellite broadcasts claim an audience of more than 200 million people -- leading large crowds in chants of "In the name of Jesus Christ, we curse the name of homosexuality!"

As OCA members cheered the video and chanted, "Amen," I tried not to laugh out loud at the one-sided images, which portrayed gay men as leather-clad deviants, whipping and licking one another in public.

Lively told the OCA-revival crowd in February, "There is a fairly sizable Russian population in Portland who is not poisoned to the OCA. That's a good place to start. They weren't poisoned by the sexual revolution."

Hutcherson had already started to draw Russophone churches in the Seattle area into his orbit, appealing for their help with his pro-discrimination Initiative 963.

Crosscut links to an LA Times story that focuses on the large and largely anti-gay Russophone emigre population in Sacramento.

Many credit the Slavic Christian immigrant community with filling a void left by the traditional American church and providing reinforcements in the ongoing culture wars over what should define family, acceptable sexual relationships and marriage.

"Russian Christians bring a fresh faith and uncorrupted family values to this country. They are a shining model for the rest of us in terms of faith, family, work ethic, patriotism and community," said Randy Thomasson, president of the Campaign for Children and Families.

Gay civil rights activists, meanwhile, accuse the demonstrators of hateful and aggressive tactics that they say sometimes lean dangerously toward violence.

There are plenty of preachers and other discrimination activists out there who hope to tie their own agendas to the energy of the young emigres. Hutcherson and Lively helped endear themselves by making sure that discrimination is a two-way street through their visits to Latvia.

* [A Latvian court recently ruled that it was illegal for the Riga city council to deny a parade permit in 2006 to the organizers of a gay pride event.]

Labels: I-963, ken hutcherson, latvia, oregon, politics, religion, Washington

Just days after Lambda Legal filed a lawsuit against the city on behalf of two firefighters and a 911 dispatcher, Bellevue's city council decided Monday night to launch a study about offering health, bereavement and related benefits to the partners of all of its employees.

As the council considered the long-simmering issue, the Seattle Times, which -- despite its name -- strives to be the hometown newspaper for Bellevue and other east side cities, had an editorial in the can urging the city to adopt the benefits. Under the title "Hostile Bellevue," the editorial appeared Tuesday morning.

Bellevue ought not cast a shadow on what has been a sunny renaissance by appearing to be hostile to gay city employees.

The city has been slow to extend family employment benefits to gay couples, leading to a potentially precedent-setting lawsuit by three employees alleging discrimination. If the lawsuit is successful, it could force public employers statewide to extend the same employment benefits to partners of gay workers as provided to heterosexual families.

This page sides with the employees. The right to care and provide for loved ones is the cornerstone of family, whether they are gay or heterosexual. Extending health care, bereavement and family leave to domestic partners pays off with a work force high in morale and productivity and low in turnover.

Bellevue is surrounded by good role models that offer domestic-partner benefits to employees. They include Washington state, King County and Seattle.

Thousands of private employers also recognize the positive impact on morale and retention by offering domestic-partner benefits.

Bellevue Mayor Grant Degginger personally supports domestic-partner benefits but is reluctant to commit without knowing the costs. Another Bellevue official points to the city's no-new-benefits policy.

But less-wealthy cities such as Burien, Sammamish, Tumwater and Pullman offer domestic-partner benefits. True, they are smaller, but as a matter of principle they stand tall.

Bellevue Mayor Grant Degginger said in a news release, "The time has come to take action and give clear direction." The city hasn't exactly joined with those forward-thinking burgs like Burien, but their council has at least shown that it can do "Seattle process" as well as its neighbors to the west: When faced with a problem, launch a study.

At a meeting Monday night, City Council members directed staff to prepare information on how the city might offer domestic partnership benefits for employees across all bargaining units, as well as nonunion workers. The staff was also asked to analyze how much it would cost. [#]

Lambda Legal's lawyers also showed their understanding of the process with an understated response:

"It is welcome news that the city has had a change of heart and is going to work up a domestic partner benefits proposal," said Lambda Legal attorney Jenny Pizer. "We're eager to look at the details."

Labels: Gay, LGBTQ, politics, Seattle, Washington

Governor Christine Gregoire signed the domestic partnership bill into law yesterday in what's being described as an "emotional" ceremony in the capitol building's ornate Reception Room.

She was surrounded by legislators who guided the bill through the two chambers and by several of those who had told their stories in legislative hearings. The best report we've seen on the ceremony is from reporter Kathie Durban of The Columbian in Vancouver.

In a ceremony infused with joy and tears, Gov. Chris Gregoire signed a landmark bill Saturday that creates a state domestic partnership registry for gay and lesbian couples, allowing them to make health care and end-of-life decisions for each other.

"This is a very proud moment for me as governor," Gregoire told a standing-room audience in the Legislative Building?s ornate reception room . She urged those who felt tearful to "let 'er rip!"

Personal stories of troubles faced by lesbian/gay couples had been important elements in each of the public hearings held during the session. Several senators and representatives repeated those stories in explaining their votes in favor of the bill. The governor did the same.

The governor repeated the story of Charlene Strong, a Seattle woman whose partner of 10 years, Kathryn Fleming, died last December after she was trapped by rising water in the couple?s flooded basement studio.

Strong was barred from Fleming's hospital room, and the funeral director who handled arrangements after Fleming's death refused to acknowledge the couple's relationship, although "he was more than willing to accept (Strong's) credit card," the governor said.

Strong was present for the ceremony. Many lawmakers said it was her moving testimony before legislative committees this year that gave the bill the margin it needed to pass both chambers.

Gregoire also told the story of a lesbian couple from Spokane. When their 6-year-old son was injured in a bicycle accident, the doctor refused to treat him because the parent who brought him in for emergency care was not his biological mother, she said.

"It's difficult enough in these tragic circumstances," she said. "Why then do we compound the tragedy?" she asked.

"Love manifests itself not in some cookie-cutter way," the governor said. "Love comes in many forms. Our families are different, but every one of our families deserves our undivided support."

Some reporters turned to anti-gay activists like Bothell preacher Joe Fuiten to issue, but his warnings that this bill could lead to full marriage equality had already been explicitly stated by supporters of the bill.

Sen. Ed Murray, D-Seattle, who led the campaign for last year?s gay rights bill, called the domestic partnership bill "a significant step in undoing the hurt this Legislature inflicted" on gay and lesbian couples in 1998 when it passed the Defense of Marriage Act, defining marriage as between one man and one woman.

The state Supreme Court upheld the law last year. Sponsors of the domestic partnership bill made it clear when they introduced the bill in January that their goal is full marriage equality for same-sex couples and that they viewed domestic partnerships as an incremental step on that path.

Dawn Prentice of Olympia and her partner of four years, Kriscinda Hansen, said the two will "more than likely" decide to register as domestic partners in order to obtain the health care and end-of-life benefits the law provides.

"I'd like to see equal rights," Prentice said. "I'd like to be able to marry the person I love."

From an AP report:

"Today is a beginning, not an end," said Sen. Ed Murray, a Seattle Democrat who sponsored the measure and who is one of five openly gay lawmakers in the state Legislature. "It offers the hope that one day, all lesbian and gay families will be treated truly equal under the law."

And here's a surprise item from The Columbian's report about the effectiveness of Fuiten's and other anti-equality lobbying efforts:

Rep. Jim Moeller, D-Vancouver, one of five openly gay state legislators who worked for passage of the domestic partnership measure, said he had not received a single negative e-mail about the bill.

Here are details of the law from the AP story:

To be registered, couples must share a home, not be married or in a domestic relationship with someone else, and be at least 18.

In a provision similar to California law, unmarried, heterosexual senior couples are also eligible for domestic partnerships if one partner is at least 62. Lawmakers said that provision was included to help seniors who are at risk of losing pension rights and Social Security benefits if they remarry. ...

The new law will take effect July 22. Couples can either register with the Secretary of State in Olympia, or download the form from the Web site and send it in to register and receive a certificate of the partnership.

Labels: legislature, marriage equality, politics, SB5336, Washington

Governor Christine Gregoire will sign the domestic partnership bill in a formal ceremony Saturday, April 21 at 9:30 am in the State Reception Room.

According to an announcement from Equal Rights Washington (ERW), the ceremony will be held in the State Reception Room on the third floor of the Capitol Building in Olympia.

The LGBT lobbying group calls Saturday "a historic day for the LGBT community in Washington State. This bill will provide emergency protections for many LGBT couples and families until the full rights and responsiblities of marriage are secured. "

ERW's statement urges all supporters of the legislation to thank their legislators for passing the historic measure. "The emails and letters you sent and the conversations you had with your legislators, friends, and families made a huge difference," according to the statement, which also recognizes that the new law goes only part of the way toward establishing full equality of rights for all citizens of the state. "We look forward to continuing our partnership with you," ERW states, "as we move toward marriage equality."

Labels: legislature, marriage equality, politics, SB5336, Washington

Conservative Christian activist Gary Randall said today that his pro-discrimnaition group, Faith & Freedom Network, will not attempt to field a referendum or initiative to target the domestic partnership law that was passed yesterday in Olympia.

Andrew Garber, of the Seattle Times, called me last night and asked if we were going to run a referendum to try to kill the domestic partnership law. I told him no, we have already launched a referendum on the lawmakers. We plan to "Change The State, in '08'".

He said that his group will sponsor an intensive effort to find voters and candidates who support their views on religion, politics, and civil rights.

He urges his followers on with this exhortation:

You, not gay and secularist lawmakers from Seattle and elsewhere, can decide what Washington State will look like for your children and grand children.

So, is domestic partnerships another step toward redefining marriage and society or is it a call to action?

It's all up to you.

Indeed.

For its part, Equal Rights Washington praised lawmakers who voted for the bill in a press release:

Equal Rights Washington (ERW) applauds the House for passing the Domestic Partnership bill today. The Governor, a longtime supporter of equality for gay and lesbian Washingtonians, has said she will sign the bill. ERW wants to especially thank Senator Ed Murray and Representatives Joe McDermott, Jim Moeller, Jamie Pedersen and Dave Upthegrove for working to immediately protect Washington's LGBT families, while simultaneously championing the cause of marriage equality.

ERW (as Randall tells his minions) has vowed to continue to work toward full marriage equality.

"We view this bill as an emergency protection act. We will continue to talk about the lives of LGBT families and the importance of marriage equality," said Barbara Green, ERW's Interim Executive Director. "The Domestic Partnership bill offers only a fraction of full marriage protections. This bill has been an important vehicle for talking about all the rights and protections currently unavailable to families formed by gay and lesbian couples. ERW will continue to work for marriage equality until we achieve it."

According to Green, "Marriage provides a legal and social safety net that is unparalleled in protecting families during times of crisis. Same-sex couples need the 400 plus statewide protections, and the 1,000 plus federal protections that come with civil marriage. Nothing short of marriage will provide LGBT families with the protections and dignity we deserve."

ERW has urged everyone who supports equal rights for everyone in the state to thank the lawmakers who voted yesterday for passage of the domestic partnership bill.

[Update:] Pastor Ken Hutcherson doesn't appear to be as willing as his sometime-political partner Gary Randall to leave this off the ballots. He asks his "Prayer Warriors" on his church email list

We need to pray for the state of Washington...last night they passed SSB 5336. Our state needs to work hard to get this bill repealed!

Also, pray for me tonight, Channel 13 news at 10:00, that my words will be used as I speak them, unedited, and will be used by God.

He doesn't explain what working hard "to get this bill repealed" will entail, but don't count out a referendum.

Labels: legislature, marriage equality, politics, SB5336

The Washington House easily passed the domestic partnership bill yesterday on a lopsided vote of 63-35 .

Three Republicans voted for the bill -- Shirley Hankins (R-8, Richland), Fred Jarrett (R-41, Mercer Island), and Maureen Walsh (R-16, College Place). Two Democrats voted against the bill, Mark Miloscia (D-30, Federal Way) and Tami Green (D-28, Lakewood).

TVW includes highlights of the abbreviated debate at the start of the April 10 Legislative Week in Review audio program. The full floor debate is also available in audio format only. Debate on the domestic partnership bill (SSB 5336) begins at time-stap 02:

The PI explains the debate process this way:

Under the current balance of power in the House and a three-minute rule that abbreviated debate, Democrats merely waited out a squall of opposition and voted down a flurry of Republican amendments.

Because some of the amendments required a voice vote, the debate is scattered, but here are a few highlights with timestamp:

[02:14:02] Rep. Mark Miloscia, one of the Democrats who voted against the bill said he was in favor of the underlying legislation except for the provision that would allow senior couples to enter into demestic partnerships.

"Our society in its history has treated terribly those individuals with a different sexual orientation those individuals who are gay and lesbian -- couples, even," Miliscia said in the floor debate on an amendment that would have stripped the senior-partnership provisions.

"Many of the institutions and parts of our society have treated these individuals in a horrible manner, and I feel a little guilty about that. And we have to deal with our brothers and sisters who are lesbian in a different way.... And we have to provide rights and protections to them and their families that they need."

But Miloscia argues that the provision that allows senior couples to enter domestic partnerships provides "an alternative to marriage for heterosexual men and women." He argues that this "marriage light" provision would "send the wrong example to our next generation."

Miloscia's amendment would have stripped that provision. It failed, as did all the others, but indicates that the vote was even closer than it appears from the 63-35 vote count alone.

It was a generally reasonable debate. Several of the proposed amendments would have significantly changed the intent or effect of the bill.

The floor discussion on the bill itself begins at 02:28:10 with remarks by Joe McDermott (D-34, West Seattle), one of the original House sponsors of the bill. McDermott admits that "I wish we were here to talk about marriage. Unfortunately in my opinion, we are not. Married couples recieve over 400 rights, responsibilites, and privileges under state law when they make this commitment. But same-sex couples are prohibited from doing this under our marriage laws, as are elderly couples who may suffer significant financial penalty. Therefore, today we advance a domestic partnership registry that provides some immediate protection for these couples."
McDermott went for a flourish with his conclusion: "From the Palouse to Alki Point, across the sate, this bill provides real relief. If you've ever fallen in love, I call on you to support this bill."

During the debate on the bill and the amendments, several opponents charged that supporters were trying to use the bill as "a precursor to same-sex marriage" [02:31:45].

Rep. Lynn Kessler (R-4) appears to assume her most ominous voice as she says, "This is a step, just as the civil right bill last year was a step. And that's the way I see it.... The next step is to solidify the domestic partner relationship in a marriage contract." [02:47:05]

The argument was less effective than it might have been because the supporters of the partnership registry admitted that full marriage equality is, indeed, their ultimate goal.

At a press conference after the vote, Rep. Jamie Pedersen said, "It's not marriage. There are more than 400 state law rights or obligations that don't come with domestic partnership and we are going to have our hands full trying to get those rights and protections, too. "

"Fifteen down, 408 to go," Pedersen added, referring to the oft-repeated list of rights, responsibilities, and privileges bestowed by the state's marriage laws.

At 02:33:00 into the floor debate, Rep. Jim Moeller (D-49, Vancouver), another of the prime sponsors, tells of burying his "gay peers" during the 80s and of the fear that, in death, they would not be able to share the life they'd built with a partner.

At 02:39:50 Rep. Dennis Flannigan (D-27, Tacoma) argues that the bill is a part of a broader long-term stuggle for civil rights. "Those of us who are not gay or lesbian have just as much a stake in this as anyone else." He said he was standing in the chamber only to grant to everyone the same rights. "I'm not here to do anything other than give you what I have, which is the right to visit my sister, to visit my partner, to visit my wife, to visit whomever needs to see me at any moment in any time, to have the right to go out and purchase a tombstone, to do the things that are so simple, so alive to the very purpose of living that I cannot be silent when it seems to me that the souls of the business we're in are at stake. Please support."

At 02:41:00 Rep. Jim McCune (R-2, Graham) gives a summary of the revisionist-historical argument that the chamber should be there to do God's work, which -- he argues -- the bill harms.

02:42:15 "Today, we did something that will help families who care for and love one another," said Rep. Lynn Kessler (D-24, Hoquiam). She recounts her days in the probate department of a Seattle law firm where she saw the effect that a reliable inheritance could have as survivors face the death of a loved one.

02:45:00 Rep. Schindler argues that she is only trying to protect "an institution that has been around for thousands of years." She argues that contract law should be enough for lesbian and gay couples. (She doesn't explain why contract law shouldn't also be adequate for heterosexual couples.)

At 02:49:00 Rep. Jamie Pedersen (D-43, Seattle), another of the bill's prime sponsors, points out that the Supreme Court decision upholding the state's "Defense of Marriage Act" also pointed out the gross unfairness of current law.

Rep. Glenn Anderson (R-5, Roslyn) makes a speech at 02:51:30 that might well be used as a platform plank for the satirical Iniative 557. "It's about children," Anderson inisists. He dismisses the stories that had been recounted in hearings about problems that couples face under current law because, he insists, that "the institution of marriage is about children.... Government's interest is not about how we love each other, but about how we care for our children."

You can hear the final vote, taken without reponse, at 02:58:30.

[5:00 An update adds a press-coference quotation from Jamie Pedersen. Sources linked.]

Labels: I, legislature, marriage equality, politics, SB5336, Washington

Alaskans had the chance to play the game we played last month here in Seattle when they were asked to weigh in on an expensive advisory vote. We were voting about what to do with an rickety old highway on the waterfront. They voted yesterday on what to do about a few government employees who were granted insurance benefits for their same-sex partners by a state court ruling.

Voters were asked if they wanted the legislature to craft an amendment that would deny benefits to the domestic partners of state and municipal employees.

State employees have been eligible for the benefits since the start of this year. Domestic partners of employees of the University of Alaska, city of Juneau, municipality of Anchorage and other public entities have been eligible for benefits for longer than that, and also would lose them under the proposed amendment.

And the voters decided-- well... Both sides are still arguing about what the voters decided. With virtually all precincts counted Wednesday morning, 53.4% favored holding a vote to amend the state's constitution. 46.6% voted against voting on an amendment.

Rep. John Coghill, a Republican from the town of North Pole who's been pushing hard for the amendment, spun the vote as a victory for his campaign. "I'm going to say to my colleagues, 'They said yes. Give us a constitutional amendment we can debate on,'" Coghill told the press Tuesday night.

But opponents of the amendment who have managed to bottle it up in the legislature for over a year said that the margin of the vote and the small number of voters who turned out at the polls sends a different message. Jesse Cross-Call of the Alaskans Together campaign against the constitutional amendment was positive Tuesday night, despite trailing at the polls.

"The other side is looking for an overwhelming vote, and I really don't think we're seeing an overwhelming vote tonight," he said.

Republicans control both houses of the Alaska Legislature. Their caucus opposes the benefits, but their leaders have been unable to win the necessary two-thirds vote in each house to place a constitutional amendment on the ballot. GOP leaders had hoped to persuade reluctant colleagues with the advisory vote, which is estimated to have cost the state $1.2 million.

State Sen. Kim Elton, D-Juneau, who opposes the amendment, called the results of the vote "resoundingly not definitive."

Such a close vote is unlikely to win more support for the measure in the Senate, he said.

"They didn't have it last year, and they're further away this year," he said.

[Quotes from Juneau Empire report. Registration required.]

A column in today's Juneau Empire from a voter who cast a "No" ballot, hints at some of the other issues that played into the balloting:

[I]t flies in the face of fiscal conservatism to spend more than $1 million of scarce public funds for an ancillary exercise in gauging public opinion. I am quite certain a far more exact picture of public sentiment on the underlying issue would result if Dave Dittman or another reputable pollster were given a fraction of the money and allowed to conduct a scientific survey.

Benjamin Brown says that legislators failed in their duty by approving the advisory vote.

A dispassionate analysis of the advisory vote, if one is possible, shows some value-neutral reasons to vote in the negative. I was particularly taken by the analysis of the League of Women Voters, which pointed out that when we elect legislators, we empower them to introduce the resolutions necessary to bring constitutional amendments before voters. It is not the ordinary course of business to conduct costly statewide elections to get a legislator to muster the courage to drop a bill or resolution in the hopper.

Activists who favor amending the state's constitution tried to cast the vote as a plebiscite on gay marriage

The signs are popping up all over town: "Vote Yes -- Protect Marriage."

Jim Minnery with a group called Alaska Family Action is behind the signs.

"We're often identified as the bigots and the hate-filled religious radicals, and in fact, what we're trying to do is have an open dialogue on what the vote was in 1998," said Minnery.

In 1998, Alaska voters passed a constitutional amendment defining marriage as between a man and a woman.

In 2005, the state Supreme Court ruled the state and municipalities must offer employment benefits to partners of same-sex couples.

"What the Supreme Court said was that because gay and lesbian couples cannot get married in our state, we should give them benefits that are equivalent to marriage and basically in our view create a counterfeit marriage in everything but name," said Minnery.

"The people of Alaska dealt with marriage in 1998," said Jesse Cross-Call, Alaskans Together campaign manager. "What we're talking about Tuesday is benefits and if you look at the language on the advisory vote the word benefits is in there. The word marriage is not."

An Associated Press report on the vote offers this summary:

The court fight over the benefits has gone on for years. It ended when the state Supreme Court in October 2005 ordered the state to provide benefits to partners of gay employees. The court found that denying the benefits to same-sex domestic partners violated the state?s constitution?s guarantee of equal protection.

Further political and legal wrangling delayed the benefits until the state?s high court this winter told the state it was tired of the delays and ordered it to provide the benefits as of Jan. 1.

During the open enrollment period, 67 state employees signed up their partners for benefits, according to the state Department of Administration. Based on the average claim costs in 2006, the 67 new enrollees could cost the state about $350,000 a year.

Labels: Alaska, equal rights, politics

Seattlest reports that John McCain's official page on MySpace (of all places) briefly offered a surprising message to browsers Tuesday morning: "Today, I announced that I have reversed my position and come out in full support of gay marriage ... particularly marriage between passionate females."

But, no... It wasn't a real change of heart from the straight folk on the "Straight Talk Express."

Seattlest explains:

A McCain staffer swiped a template page from Seattle-based news-sharing site Newsvine and when Newsvine CEO Mike Davidson figured out that the template was directing a lot of traffic to an image hosted by Newsvine he swapped it with his own message of tolerance. Instead of a generic list of links McCain's site began displaying an announcement of his support for gay marriage.

This (borrowed, but not hot-linked from Newsvine) is what the upper left corner offered to visitors until McCain staffers replaced the pilfered code with the current muddled mess:

Newsvine CEO Mike Davidson insisted that the prank wasn't meant to be political.

Before McCain fans comment on this, let me reiterate that this was a prank. I'm not politically inclined, I'm not anti-McCain, and I'd have a beer with the guy anytime. Election season on Newsvine is sure going to be fun though.

It was, instead, intended as a lesson in internet etiquette: Never link to an image on someone else's server without explicit permission. (I.e. use linking prophylactics.)

Since McCain staffers had violated that cardinal rule, changing their message was barely even hacking.

So, the only thing necessary to effectively commandeer McCain's page with my own messaging was to simply replace my own sample image on my server with a newly created sample on my server. No server but my own was touched and no laws were broken. The immaculate hack.

Be careful out there, especially when you're in nasty neighborhoods like MySpace.

Labels: blog-on-blog, link bites, politics

A story running on the German news service Deutsche Presse-Agentur (DPA) about Ken Hutcherson's recent visits to Latvia suggests that the visits and the flap over Hutcherson's disputed White House credentials might spill over to local politics in the Baltic republic.

After summarizing the dispute, the report concludes

The affair now has the potential to embarrass Latvia both domestically and internationally.

One of the four parties in Latvia's ruling coalition is closely linked with the New Generation church and has made its opposition to the pro-gay movement a key part of its agenda. Both Smits and Kastens are among its members.

The fact that both held meetings with a man whose representative status has been denied by the organization which allegedly sent him could well lead to awkward questions from domestic critics.

And Latvia has been criticized internationally for its attitude to gay rights after parliament last year attempted to block EU laws outlawing discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation in the workplace - an attempt which Smits initiated.

The news that a leading American opponent of gay rights has not only met with high officials, but has proposed opening a branch of his organization in an EU state for the first time, is likely to draw condemnation from gay-rights groups.

As he has with Slog's Eli Sander and the Seattle Times's David Postman, Hutcherson again responded defensively when DPA asked him about his claim during the trip to have been a White House envoy.

White House officials contacted by Deutsche Presse-Agentur denied that Hutcherson had any link with the office.

Hutcherson "was not appointed 'special envoy' by OFBCI," said White House spokeswoman Alyssa McClenning.

He has no official status or links with the body which would legitimately allow him to claim to represent the White House on a foreign visit, she added.

Hutcherson responded angrily to the comment, saying that he "did not appreciate being called a flat liar" and that the White House press office were unaware of his role.

"I never asked for a title: I asked for the power, the clout... The people in the press office don't know what's been going on in the upper office," he said.

The DPA story gives more detail about how Hutcherson used his claimed credentials during the trip:

While in the country he met with senior officials, including the minister for integration and the head of the parliamentary human-rights committee -- both of whom believed him to be linked with OFBCI.

"Yes, he is working as this organization's envoy," said the head of Latvia's parliamentary human-rights committee, Janis Smits.

"He said he was a representative of the office. The ministry of integration should be open to all, so I generally trust people and don't ask them if they have their credentials," added Integration Minister Oskars Kastens. Hutcherson was carrying a file bearing the US coat of arms, he said.

Hutcherson again claimed that the official imprimatur for his trips came from the White House Office of Faith-Based Initiatives. Smits and Katstens are both members of the "religious party," LPP, mentioned here in yesterday's post.

Kenneth Hutcherson, the founder and leader of the conservative Antioch Bible Church near Seattle, says that he came to Latvia with the knowledge and support of Jay Hein, director of the White House's Office of Faith-based and Community Initiatives (OFBCI).

"Jay says we have a partnership and we're going to work together again... I told him, 'There are things I want to do in Latvia, but I can do them a lot faster with your backing,'" Hutcherson told Deutsche Presse-Agentur

[Update:] Under the headline "Anti-gay Christian's White House scam," Britain's Pink News website picks up on the story with its own summary of the DPA report.

[Update 2:] And the news section of Gay.com UK offers its summary of the issue, and concludes

As a member of the EU, it's increasingly unacceptable that Lativia boasts a large, violent, organisation whose sole purpose is preventing pride marches from occurring in Riga.

The article by the site's primary news writer, "Stewart Who?" notes about Hutcherson's visit to Riga

The fact that he had the ears of Janis Smits, chairperson of the Latvian Parliamentary Human Rights Committee was particularly galling for Mozaika, Latvia's LGBT pressure group. Despite invitations, Smits failed to attend any of the events organised by Mozaika the week before.

Labels: ken hutcherson, latvia, politics

We're seeing a new round in the matter as a few of the newspapers constrained to follow with slow paper-based publication schedules have weighed in on the ongoing battle about whether HRC effectively executes its mission as the self-proclaimed "largest civil rights organization working to achieve gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender equality." (A good example of many sides of the debate's first round can be found in this Slog post from last week by Eli Sanders and its many comments.)

IN Los Angeles magazine weighs in with a new summary that includes some significant new criticism from California activists along with snippets of an interview with HRC Executive Director Joel Salmonese [links via QPDX].

If sustained, there is a possibility that the contentiousness could damage the credibility of the 27-year-old LGBT institution. Ask former CBS News anchor Dan Rather about the Wild West blogosphere's ability to erode an established reputation. ...

"HRC is like the George Bush White House -- it's so insular. There's no internal dissent," a prominent gay Democrat told IN Los Angeles magazine.

"HRC is like George Bush's White House," another influential gay politico told IN separately. "You have to be in lock-step like a cult or else there's anger and retaliation. It's a bullying 'us-against-them' mentality."

"I'm just automatically suspicious," said yet another gay Democrat. "I do not trust them."

A number of LGBT politicos interviewed by IN asked for anonymity because of their association with HRC. They described a "love-hate relationship," recognizing the need for a powerful, strategic lobbying group to represent the LGBT community on Capitol Hill and applauding some of HRC's work, but they're still angry over old wounds and distrustful of political strategies. ...

Solmonese explained HRC's creativity in helping the LGBT community despite congressional hostility, and their largely invisible work "in places that HRC has not traditionally been," such as Birmingham, Ala., where LGBT people fear for their safety and job security.

"In the last five years, we have been in an incredibly defensive mode with this Congress," Solmonese said. "And twice in the last five years, with an incredibly unfriendly Congress, we have had to marshal all of our forces to stop the Federal Marriage Amendment."

One "real achievement" was the provision put into Pension Protection Act enabling same-sex couples to leave one another their 401(K)s, tax-free, penalty-free.

"I thought this was a thrilling victory for our community, and I'm flummoxed sometimes when people sort of shrug their shoulders and say, 'Ah, incrementally,'" Solmonese said. Five or six years ago "[we looked] at the fact that we can't move forward in this Congress ... [and said] let's look out across the country and figure out where else we can go to make change ... It's going to be a while until we can pass legislation to safeguard people in the workplace. We'll go to the workplace and do it."

He doesn't note that groups like Seattle's Pride Foundation had been working on these issues for years before HRC started its "Corporate Equality Index."

Duncan Osborn, editor of New York's Gay City News, gets nasty in an editorial this week that calls the blogger critiques of HRC from Chris Crain and Andrew Sullivan "particularly idiotic." He sets up and easily dispatches several straw dogs to (mis)represent the critiques.

The Washington Blade reported last week that HRC, with an annual budget of $34 million, paid just over $26 million to buy and renovate its headquarters. The agency is saving about $1 million a year in rent and I have no doubt that the value of that building has increased since HRC bought it in 2002. Buying that building was a very smart move.

I called guidestar.org, a Web site that archives data on charities and non-profits, to ask about the Solmonese salary. Among 43 "civil rights, social action, advocacy" groups with annual budgets over $5 million ranked by guidestar.org, the average chief executive salary was $228,233.

"It sounds like a quarter of a million for an organization of that size is reasonable," a guidestar.org spokesperson said. ...

When an ad with disturbing content that many people saw as anti-gay is seen by tens of millions of Americans, HRC should do nothing. So ignore the message that is widely disseminated and focus on the one that is barely audible.

Then when some anti-gay bigot like Coulter insults us and is cheered by her right-wing toadies, HRC should respond, but it must first run its remarks by the gay commentariat to be sure that it has maintained ideological purity.

Got it. Perhaps one of these critics will explain to the community what this incoherent, thoughtless strategy will achieve, but I doubt it. They are too busy whining.

Finally, let's consider Andrew Sullivan and Chris Crain and their complaint that HRC is too cozy with the Democrats. These are the same Democrats who took control of the House and the Senate in last November's elections. Now Chris recently moved to Brazil so he may have missed the election results and Andrew is a Brit so he may not understand what those results mean.

Certainly the Democrats are not perfect, but they are far better on gay issues than the Republicans and, after years in the minority, Democrats are now in charge in both chambers of Congress. HRC made a big bet last year with its political donations. It backed far more Democrats than Republicans. Obviously, it bet on the right team.

Crain, with his new blog is no longer constrained by paper schedules and responded quickly here.

My central criticism of HRC, should Osborne choose to actually address it, was that the organization under Jacques and now Solmonese has aligned itself too closely with the Democrats, treating the interests of the movement as secondary to those of party, when they conflict.

That is and has been his central point, but he has taken off on several tangents in making it. It's still a good and valid point. HRC exec Salmonese should not have said in a Boston speech (one that's often cited by Crain) that HRC wanted to be seen as an interest group in the Democratic Party.

The current editor of the Washington Blade weighs in with a Solmanic editorial urging a truce in the battle.

Sullivan and others have faulted HRC for failing to successfully lobby Congress to pass pro-gay laws. Some of that is deserved, some is not.

HRC provided the Blade with a list of its accomplishments, which include: successful campaigns to defeat the Federal Marriage Amendment in 2004 and 2006; the inclusion of gay provisions in the 2006 Pension Protection Act; the successful effort to defeat anti-gay adoption bans in Missouri, Georgia and Ohio; and the donation of $1 million to MassEquality.

This list is lacking, of course. But just as it is unfair of HRC to take all the credit when something goes right, it?s equally unfair to assign it all the blame when things go wrong. The reality is that no significant gay rights legislation was going to pass the Republican-controlled Congress of recent years. And even now, if the Democratic Congress passes the long-suffering Employment Non-Discrimination Act, there is no indication that President Bush will sign it.

He admits that the bloggers might be right that HRC should take step away from internal Democratic Party politics, but suggests (as do both Sullivan and Crain) that only Democrats offer any real hope to pass pro-gay legislation.

But none of that history changes the dynamics of the modern Republican Party, which has been hijacked by religious conservatives.... It's hard to cultivate relationships with Republicans when they take their marching orders from Jerry Falwell and James Dobson.

HRC and the Democratic Congress have a short window to accomplish a lot, most importantly passage of ENDA. Failure to achieve that will expose HRC to much more damning criticism than it has so far encountered.

In the meantime, gay rights advocates across the political spectrum should declare a brief truce and focus on the shared goal of passing ENDA rather than continue to engage in "Gotcha!" finger-pointing and name-calling. There will be time for that after the votes are counted.

They do have a short window, but the Democrats have learned that they must leave the curtains on that window open to the Net Roots in all of its many, often nasty, forms. HRC can't close its own windows to that new world. They'll have to learn to deal with "gotcha!" finger-pointing, name-calling, and multiple irrelevant tangents as a new gay roots develops that is not as willing as much of the print gay press has been to simply regurgitate HRC's self-congratulatory press releases.

A local angle: The quarter-million salary given to Salmonese probably brings a smile to pioneer Seattle activist Charles Bryden who was an early champion of "professionalism" in LGBT activism. At a time when most gay activist groups in the country depended entirely on time given by volunteers, Bryden urged them to hire professional staffs to guide the volunteer efforts. He was briefly hired as executive director of what's now called NGLTF, The Task Force. He urged the group to provide just the kind of competitive salaries that are now offered to staff by HRC, NGLTF, as well as local groups like Lifelong, Pride Foundation, Equal Rights Washington, the choruses and several others.

In the mess that has become our local Pride celebration planning, we see what happens when a rag-tag burned-out group of overworked volunteers get in over their heads on something that would have benefitted long ago from a paid staff.

Labels: activism, gay organization, politics

Consider this: A domestic partnership bill is introduced into a state legislature but fails to make it through before mandatory adjournment of the session. The state's governor considers the bill important enough highlight it as one of the items he asks legislators to reconsider in a special session.

Where would that be? It might be a good guess that it could happen somewhere in New England. Maybe it will, but that's not where this story comes from. Instead, the story comes from one of the mountain states, New Mexico. The governor is Bill Richardson, who also happens to be running for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination.

Gov. Bill Richardson says lawmakers did great work in the legislative session that ended Saturday - just not enough of it.

The governor said while it was the most productive session in state history, "we still have business to finish."

He said he will call the Legislature back into a special session beginning Tuesday to act on a highway package, ethics measures, crime bills, a domestic partnership proposal, and more.

"We're on a roll, so let's continue that roll," Richardson told a room full of bleary-eyed legislative leaders and cabinet secretaries just after the 60-day session ended, by law, at noon.

In urging the lawmakers to reconsider the domestic partnership bill, Richardson told the legislators, "New Mexico families deserve our respect, no matter their race, creed or sexual orientation."

Contrast Richardson's stance with that of Washington Gov. Christine Gregoire who has given only tepid support to the weaker provisions of this state's domestic partnership legislation. The governor has quietly (oh, so quietly) indicated that she would sign SB 5336, the Washington law, but hasn't gone far out on a limb (or maybe it shoud be called a viaduct on-ramp) to promote it.

The bill in New Mexico that Richardson actively supports is modeled on a California law and is more comprehensive than the law making its way through the Washington legislature.

The proposed law would provide domestic partner rights and benefits, regardless of whether they are same sex. Gov. Bill Richardson, who rescued the bill from its near death in a Senate committee, said he will sign it.

With its passage, New Mexico would join the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Maine, and California in providing domestic partnership or reciprocal beneficiary laws that allow same-sex couples many of the rights that heterosexual couples enjoy.

Richardson's willingness to highlight this law in a special session is even more remarkable because he's running for president. Although all of the other Democratic candidates have indicated at least lukewarm support for something like domestic partnerships, the others have tried to keep the issue off of the front burner in their campaigns.

Of course, it's a sign that you're probably a political junkie if you even knew that Richardson was running along with a pack of others for the presidential nomination. Beltway media have assigned Richardson and the others to a "third tier" of candidates who rarely get mentioned in their frequent stories about Obama, Clinton, and -- sometimes -- Edwards.

This isn't the first time that Richardson has distinguished himself from the pack of candidates on an issue of interest to gay and lesbian folk.

Last week, both Richardson and John Edwards were quick to decry the remarks last week after the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Peter Pace, said the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT) should stay in place in place because homosexual acts are -- according to Pace -- "immoral."

"I voted against it when I served in Congress," Richardson said. "People should not be judged based on their sexual orientation. Throughout my entire career I have fought for equal rights and against discrimination of any kind."

Richardson said he supports civil unions and he pointed to legislation that he signed into in law that extends civil rights protections based on sexual orientation.

Richardson called Pace's remarks "unfortunate" and said the Bush administration should reject them.

When he was a Congressman in 1993, Richardson had joined a small minortity that voted against DADT.

In constrast, the annointed front-runners for the nomination, Obama and Clinton, both waffled before expressing disagreement with the general's remarks.

Democratic candidates Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama initially tried to sidestep the issue when asked about it this week, but both sought to clarify their opposition to Pace's comments on Thursday.

Obama did not directly answer on Wednesday when asked if same-sex relationships were immoral, Newsday reported. Obama issued a statement on Thursday, saying, "I do not agree with General Pace that homosexuality is immoral. Attempts to divide people like this have consumed too much of our politics over the past six years."

Clinton told ABC News Wednesday that it's for "others to conclude" whether homosexuality is immoral. On Thursday, she put out a statement saying that she'd heard from gay friends who said her answer sounded evasive.

"I should have echoed my colleague Senator John Warner's statement forcefully stating that homosexuality is not immoral because that is what I believe," her statement said.

Blogger Chris Crane contrasted the approaches of the candidates.

On the official campaign "Bill Richardson Blog," a poster argued that the governor's support for LGBTQ issues set him apart from the pack.

He's a principled Westerner who can compromise to get things done, but will always stand strong for our Democratic values when those values are under attack. Human equality, and the dignity of every single person, is a core Democratic value. More people should be asking where all of the major candidates stand on this issue.

Whatever happens in next year's telescoped and front-loaded nomination process, it is refreshing to see that one of the choices -- for now, at least -- is a candidate like Richardson who isn't afraid to address issues of interest to LGBTQ folk. It is unfortunate only that it's so rare in this too-early campaign season.

[Note: See a frequently updated digest of gay news items on our Squidoo gay news page.]

Labels: DADT, politics, SB5336

Bloomburg offers one of the best summaries yet seen of Initiative 957, sponsored by Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance (WA-DOMA)

Gregory Gadow calls his own ballot measure absurd.

The proposal he wants to put before Washington voters in November would require the state to annul any heterosexual marriages that don't produce offspring within three years.

The goal is to undermine a July state Supreme Court ruling that upheld Washington's ban on marriage between homosexuals. The court said the state has a fundamental interest in limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples because of their ability to procreate. Gadow hopes to force a review of the ruling, and rile social conservatives along the way.

"Making them choke on their own rhetoric is just a nice side benefit," said Gadow, 39, a Seattle computer programmer. ...

Local gay-rights groups aren't backing the measure because they prefer to push for legislation authorizing gay marriage. Opponents of gay marriage dismiss the proposal as a stunt.

"If they get many signatures, it will be mostly homosexual signatures," said Ken Hutcherson, senior pastor of Antioch Bible Church in Kirkland. A former National Football League player for the Seattle Seahawks, he organized a Washington, D.C., rally against gay marriage in 2004.

The story by reporter Dana Bass points out that Gadow and his friends have been working without much support from big names and organizations.

Gadow's idea has plenty of detractors. State Senator Ed Murray, one of five openly gay state lawmakers, said he opposes it because he prefers to focus on legislation permitting gay marriage.

Murray is in rare agreement with Jeff Kemp, president of Families Northwest, a non-profit group in Bellevue that opposes gay marriage. Kemp said Gadow's measure trivializes marriage.

"To throw away the model because in some cases people don't have kids is an insult to humanity," said Kemp, a former NFL quarterback and the son of 1996 Republican vice presidential candidate Jack Kemp.

If it's up to Gadow, I-957 won't result in any annulments.

He said the ballot measure is unconstitutional. His goal is to get it passed and struck down by a state court. That would contradict Andersen v. King County and lead to it being overturned, he said.

The story offers a concluding surprise in a quote from a UW constitutional law professor Hugh Spitzer who believes the initiative might stand up to judicial scrutiny if it ever did garner the required signatures and pass

He [said] that it might not be overturned at all: States may have a right to define marriage any way they wish.

"There's nothing fundamentally wrong with it," said Spitzer, who filed a brief supporting the Andersen plaintiffs. "If they think they're going to lose in court because it's unconstitutional, they may have another thing coming to them."

Declining gayborhoods

It's one of those stories that appears with each real estate cycle, but AP nonetheless weighed in on gay neighborhoods with a feature this week.

The story focuses mostly on San Francisco's Castro District, but here in Seattle, SOAP might be happy to learn that Seattle is dismissed as one of several places where a gay neighborhood has been replaced by "'Disneyfied' places boasting chain stores, restaurants catering to a diverse clientele and 'cleared of any reference to sex.'" (The quoted author appears to have mistaken Broadway as a street that was once something more gay than it is now.)

Brian Basinger sees danger in the proliferation of baby strollers on the street.

"When I see a stroller now, I see it as someone who evicted a person with AIDS, right or wrong," said Basinger, president of the Harvey Milk Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transexual Democratic Club.

The reporter, of course, finds those who dismiss worries about Castro's changing demographics,

But some activists point to cities with less-established gay districts as a sign of what could happen.

Honolulu's Kuhio district stands vacant after its gay bars were dispersed in the late 1980s. In Atlanta's Midtown, once the gayest area of that city, gay nightclubs recently have given way to condominiums.

When Basinger walks through the Castro these days, he sees the apartment building where he watched friends with AIDS die, too pricey these days for someone young, old or sick to afford. Or the corner where his efforts at community organizing are met with yawns. Up the street, the raunchy window displays at sex toy shops have brought complaints from parents, both gay and straight.

"We have Chinatown and Japantown and so forth, and that's important for minority communities in this country, to have a place where they can get a sense of being the majority," said Joe Curtin, an architect who serves as president of Castro Area Planning Action. "But if you took those away, you would still have China and Japan. If the Castro goes away as a gay neighborhood, there is nowhere else."

SOAP has argued for two years that Capitol Hill is the wrong place to celebrate LGBTQ Pride. They'll probably want to make copies of this article, crossing out a few of the graphs we've quoted here.

Labels: I-957, initiative, politics, Seattle, Seattle Pride, wa-doma

We can't speak for others in the blogoshere, but it was, admittedly, schadenfreude (taking pleasure in the discomfort of others) that us to jump quickly onto a story that a handsome marine who was given prominent coverage on News Corp. outlets including Fox News and New York Post was also a former gay-porn star. (That, and the excuse to post a few hot pics.)

On his own blog, that handsome marine, Matt Sanchez, has chronicled the blog+media flurry over the revelation that he once played the part of Rod Majors in porn flix.

(And here, since it hasn't been linked quite as much as other sites, is an old inverview with the "Rod Majors" persona who admits a slight interest in maybe doing a bi video some day.)

But there's a deeper (ahem...) significance to the story of Matt Sanchez that can be drawn from an oddly related story about a group called Soulforce that has, for the second year running, leased buses to take LGBT Christians and their supporters to a number of private religious colleges that place heavy restrictions on LGBT students and staff.

Several Soulforce demonstrators who tried to talk to students at Notre Dame's dining hall were arrested this week for trespassing. A Soulforce bus stopped at Dordt College in Iowa was defaced yesterday with anti-gay grafitti. (As usual, Andy Towle offers an excellent summary.) [See update below]

Last year, Soulforce demonstrators were arrested at Brigham Young University, Jerry Falwell's Liberty University in Lynchburg, West Point, the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma; and Regent University in Virginia Beach, Virginia which is affiliated with Christian Broadcaster Pat Robertson.

But what does any of that have to do with Matt Sanchez? It should be part of the same story if Fox were really interested in fair and balanced reporting.

The marine got his moment of fame on Fox News and the Post by relating a disputed story of an incident last year at Columbia University during which Sanchez claimed that fellow student Monique Dols and a group of demonstrators said mean things to him while he was near a table staffed by students from the ROTC group at neighboring Fordham University.

I figured that a dean so concerned about student inclusion would certainly look into a simple case of student harassment. You see, I had a problem: fellow student Monique Dols.

Back on Activities Day, Dols didn't just lecture me on my stupidity in serving our nation; she also yelled that I was a baby killer. For a Marine, being called a killer is almost flattering -- but for months Dols and her friends had been disrupting pretty much every event I attended.

Most famously, her crowd rushed the stage at another group's event, preventing the guest (from the border-enforcement advocates, the Minutemen) from delivering his remarks, and nearly causing a riot.

Dols claims that Sanchez started the confrontation. After getting a complaint about the incident from Sanchez, a Columbia panel didn't do anything about it, which upsets the powers at News Corp.

Sanchez became a campus activist to encourage better treatment at Columbia for the veterans among its student body -- an admirable task. He's reportedly been successful in getting the school to offer more support for veterans to get through the bureaucratic mazes that are an unfortunate part of academic life. (See the first response to this post by right-wing columnist Michelle Malkin.)

But that's not what Fox News commentators focused on as they gave Sanchez his several minutes of air time.

Despite the sketchy story on which Sanchez's claims were based, Fox News and the Post gave him prominent coverage and the Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) gave him an award because they considered his story of standing up to what Fox's Bill O'Reilly called "far-left radicals disgracing Columbia University."

Like Notre Dame, Brigham Young, and Dordt College in Iowa (schools where Soulforce demonstrators were arrested or harassed), Columbia is a private school. Unlike the others, the Ivy League's Columbia has a decidedly liberal bent to its policies. And it is that, rather than any question of academic freedom or freedom of discussion, that seems to be the issue that bothers the News Corp outlets.

Columbia does not allow military recruiters on its campus partly because of the military's Don't Ask Don't Tell (DADT) policy which is considered to violate the school's anti-discrimination policies. Although the long-standing exclusion is subject to long-simmering debate on campus, ROTC sessions also cannot be held there, but Columbia students enrolled in ROTC can take classes and training sessions at neighboring Fordham University, another private school.

But the problem arises when those who have chosen to serve their country in the military, like Cpl Sanchez are treated unfairly on a campus because of their service. Sanchez has done a good job of highlighting that problem at Columbia even if he does it in the partisan voice that appeals to the radio audiences to whom he's been given extraordinary access because of his activism.

It's a problem that should be fixed even if the majority of students, faculty, and administration at a school think the current war is wrong for whatever reason. Veterans should not suffer because of those views.

But if it's a question of academic freedom as O'Reilly and Hannity suggested it is, then the reaction to Soulforce at conservative colleges should be equally abhorent to the commentators. Accoring to the activist group, the college where the Soulforce bus was defaced counts "sexual activity with someone of the same gender" as possible grounds for "an employee's discharge or a student's dismissal."

It's a kind of discrimination that is usually overlooked at conservative campuses, but highlighted by Soulforce. If a gay or lesbian student wants to be subjected to the kind of education offered by those schools (and there's good reason to want that at some of the schools), then they should be allowed to participate as full members of those academic communities. They should, however, be ready (and even encouraged) to challenge to collective wisdom of what they might hear there about their own beings.

So too, should veterans or those who support contrary views of the military be allowed to participate as full members of the academic communities at Columbia and other liberal colleges.

But here's our question: Where would someone with the same history as Matt Sanchez find a more welcoming academic community? At Columbia, where obnoxious student activists call him names? Or at Dordt College, where he'd probably be kicked out?

How long do you suppose it will be before we hear O'Reilly call for administration at Dordt College or Notre Dame "get out from under their desks and deal with this problem."

Update: Dordt College apologizes

In a sign of the true meaning of Christian compassion, officials at Dordt College have apologized to Soulforce for the graffiti slurs that were painted onto the activist group's bus during a stop at the college.

College officials were "saddened" to learn about the vandalism, said Dordt spokesman Norlan De Groot. The school apologized to the group and the incident was reported to police.

"We don't want to see that happen here," De Groot said.

Labels: celebrities, eye candy, politics

In Wednesday's Seattle Times, columnist Danny Westneat asks a politically incorrect question that many others have been asking: Why doesn't the state let churches keep the word "marriage" for themselves and abandon regulation of "civil marriage" licenses altogether.

I have long thought the solution to the marriage fight is to get government out of the marriage business. Let churches marry -- or refuse to marry -- whomever they choose. Have the state support families through civil contracts. For the most part, families are what they define themselves to be.

It's not a new argument. Local columnist Michael Kinsley argued for a similar solution years ago in Slate.

Westneat points out that heterosexual couples have been redefining "marriage" for years.

For the first time in more than a century, married households now are the minority in America. In Seattle, a whopping 67 percent of households are headed by unmarried adults.

A Washington Post story Tuesday said marriage now is "a luxury item" that "only the well educated and well paid are interested in."

That leaves a lot of families that don't fit the old stereotype. Most are heterosexual. If we're giving the oldest ones a new legal option for familydom, why not the rest? The middle-aged, the twentysomethings? Any couple that live together and care for one another?

So I agree: Why can't it be for everyone?

The answer is that because once it is for everyone, the rationale for keeping marriage laws as exclusive as they are evaporates. There'd be no reason for marriage laws at all.

It's an argument that is often advanced in web posts about the issue, but don't expect to see this kind of argument picked up anytime soon by marriage equality groups like Equal Rights Washington or Legal Marriage Alliance. Although the original charges of a "homosexual agenda" were overblown when they first appeared over a decade ago, gay activist groups eventually recognized that it would be valuable to adopt some kind of agenda even for the wildly diverse viewpoints of the LGBTQ folks they hoped to represent. And the word "marriage" is very much a part of the agenda adopted by activist groups.

Westneat found out why:

Rick Bartholomew, a family attorney in Olympia who backs [the domestic partnership] bill, says the path to equality is to grant gay marriage. He said my idea of instead giving everyone the same options for domestic partnerships is nuts.

"If you think it's tough winning gays the right to marry, wait until you propose to end civil marriage," he said. "That's a complete non-starter."

What's odd, however, is that religious groups including the Catholic Church and Gary Randall's pro-discrimination lobby group, Faith & Freedom Network tried to extend the domestic partnership bill to include a wider array of non-married couples. Theirs was not a genuine attempt to broaden rights to cover all, but rather an attempt to sabotage the DP bill by adding complex array of rules and regulations to it. But still, they were the ones who proposed the notion of a broadly available "marriage light" that would probably do more to make the government program of civil marriage even more irrelevant than it already is.

We're not going to see marriage equality groups like ERW supporting this notion of "marriage light" any time soon. Their agenda is tied maintaining civil marriage as a state program.

It's an example of the strange-bedfellow syndrome in politics wherein both the groups opposed to and supporting marriage for gay and lesbian couples insist that marriage itself as a government institution should be supported. It has become even odder in this year's legislature as anti-equality groups have tried to extend "marriage light" in the legislature to cover a broader group of people while the gay activist groups and legislators were busy protecting marriage -- as a civil contract -- from dilution.

Labels: equal rights, marriage equality, politics

PI columnist Robert Jamieson thinks that we should ignore the the anti-gay political contributions of Sonics co-owners Aubrey McClendon and Tom Ward in debate about funding their proposed sports palace. He says we should ignore it because, well... at least one of their good friends is gay.

The gay friend of Sonics managing partner Clay Bennett and co-owner McClendon is Jim Roth, an openly gay councilman for the county that includes Oklahoma City. Roth wrote a letter to the Seattle Times that was printed in today's sports section. Roth says that he's recieved support from both Bennett and McClendon

When I was elected in 2002, I became Oklahoma's first openly gay elected official. From the beginning, Clay and Aubrey initiated a genuine kindness and friendship toward my partner and me. They have publicly and consistently supported me, even pushing back when right-wing attacks have occurred. Their support is unconditional and has helped improve the overall climate for expanding tolerance here at home.

That support is significant because Roth faced considerable obstacles in winning his seat. The Washington Blade outlined it in a January profile of gay and lesbian office-holders in the heartland:

Oklahoma County Commissioner Jim Roth could be considered one of the most patient gay candidates on the campaign trail, having endured an anti-gay onslaught from his Republican opponent, David Mehlhaff, a Southern Baptist deacon.

"He came to see me in my office and challenged my faith," says Roth. "He got down on his knees, grabbed my leg and prayed for God to save my wretched soul my last year in office."

Mehlhaff also disparaged Roth publicly.

"He said I wasn't right with God and that I had a warped world-view based on my 'chosen lifestyle,'" he says.

Roth began his political career as chief deputy commissioner and staff attorney for his district in 1995. He was named deputy county clerk in 1999, and after being elected commissioner in 2002, he was reelected last November. His platform has included fiscal accountability, improved roadways and infrastructure, better care for senior citizens, home ownership, and job growth and economic development.

"We had a great track record based on what we?ve done for seniors and bringing humanity to the treatment of prisoners in the county jail," says Roth. "I received significant support from the Chamber of Commerce and business leaders, who also wanted to reject bigotry."

Roth says Mehlhaff tried to get black ministers to oppose him, but they ended up supporting him instead.

The PI's Jamieson talked to Roth about his letter to the Times.

As we spoke, Roth recalled a formal public ceremony soon after he took office where Bennett left the head table to visit Roth and his partner. "He said, 'I'm so thankful you are both here,' " Roth said. "He made us feel so welcome."

When Roth first ran for commissioner, his backing largely came from Democrats and gay rights advocates. When he ran for re-election last year Bennett & Co. stepped up to back Roth, prompting an Oklahoma paper's headline: "Unlikely Support."

Bennett donated more than $2,000 to Roth's campaign, according to news accounts, though Roth tells me the figure actually topped $4,000. McClendon gave $5,000. Bennett praised Roth for his "progressive ideas."

It's good to know that Bennett and McClendon, at least, aren't bigots. In his letter, Roth says that the contributions by McClendon and Ward to Bauer "were probably more about economic interests, ballot measures swaying Senate control and impact on the energy sector." Jamieson figures that's enough to end the discussion.

Some Seattleites, somewhat histrionically, liken the money contributions to financial support of the KKK.

Well, a lot of Americans do support traditional marriage, and they don't lynch gays, burn down their houses or march in parades.

But Jamieson surely knows that most of the politicians who benefited from the KKK in its heyday didn't lynch blacks or burn down their houses. They didn't do it themselves. But those politicians benefitted from the racism -- much of it deeply felt and "faith-based," by the way -- of that group. Those politicians used the racism of the KKK for thier own agendas, but, in doing so, contributed to the culture that prompted the lynchings and burnings.

Gary Bauer, whose group was financed by two of the Sonics/Storm co-owners, probably wouldn't even use the word "faggot" as Ann Coulter did the other day, to rousing applause from conservative activists. He wouldn't use the word that was also used last month by a kid in Detroit as he beat an old man to death. But the hate speech of Coulter and Bauer and of those who support them finanacially builds the culture of hate that powered the kid's arm to swung that pipe.

News that the Sonics ownership group might not believe actually in the cause of non-equality for gay folk doesn't make their contributions to an anti-gay campaign seem less like old-time support for the KKK. The news that they were using the contributions for non-related business purposes makes it sound more like that.

Labels: politics, Seattle, sports, Washington

Take a moment this weekend to write a note of thanks to your senator if he or she voted yesterday for passage of the domestic partnership bill, SB 5336. And while you're at it, it would be a great idea to write another note to your representatives urging them to vote for the bill when it comes to the House. (Find your legislators with this web form.)

Here's the roll call of votes on the bill. Each name links to the senator's email form at the legislature's website. You'll have to add in your physical address so the system can check to see if you live in the senator's district. (It will still let you send a message even if you don't live in the district.)

Note: In general, the form of a direct email address is last.first@leg.wa.gov. Here is the list of all direct email addresses. Some senators may not monitor for messages at the address, however, so the web form is a safer bet.

These are the senators who voted for passage:

• Berkey, Jean (D-38)
• Brandland, Dale (R-42)
• Brown, Lisa (D-3)
• Eide, Tracey (D-30)
• Fairley, Darlene (D-32)
• Franklin, Rosa (D-29)
• Fraser, Karen (D-22)
• Haugen, Mary Margaret (D-10)
• Hobbs, Steve (D-44)
• Jacobsen, Ken (D-46)
• Kastama, Jim (D-25)
• Kauffman, Claudia (D-47)
• Keiser, Karen (D-33)
• Kilmer, Derek (D-26)
• Kline, Adam (D-37)
• Kohl-Welles, Jeanne (D-36)
• Marr, Chris (D-6)
• McAuliffe, Rosemary (D-1)
• Murray, Ed (D-43)
• Oemig, Eric (D-45)
• Poulsen, Erik (D-34)
• Prentice, Margarita (D-11)
• Pridemore, Craig (D-49)
• Regala, Debbie (D-27)
• Rockefeller, Phil (D-23)
• Spanel, Harriet (D-40)
• Tom, Rodney (D-48)
• Weinstein, Brian (D-41)

Voting Nay: Senators Benton, Carrell, Clements, Delvin, Hargrove, Hatfield, Hewitt, Holmquist, Honeyford, McCaslin, Morton, Parlette, Rasmussen, Roach, Schoesler, Sheldon, Stevens, Swecker, and Zarelli

Excused: Senators Pflug and Shin

Labels: legislature, marriage equality, politics, SB5336, Washington

The domestic partnership bill introduced this year by the legislature's gay caucus passed through over its major hurdle today when it was passed by the Senate on a 28 to 19 vote.

The bill is expected to easily pass in the House where half of the members have signed on as co-sponsors. Gov. Christine Gregoire has indicated that she will sign it when the measure reaches her desk.

Among other things, the bill would allow domestic partners to:

• Inherit when there is no will.
• Give consent for health care if a partner isn't competent.
• Make funeral arrangements.
• Authorize organ and tissue donation.

The bill requires a central state registry of domestic partnerships that would be kept at the Secretary of State's Office. Couples would have to file an affidavit of domestic partnership with the office and pay a filing fee.

A semi-snarky PI blog post includes extensive excerpts from the floor debate that is described by the Times as "long, emotional and at times heated."

Here's part of Ed Murray's speech:

Imagine for a moment if your spouse was in the hospital, if your spouse was in the hospital and dying, and you could not go into your spouses room, you couldn't hold their hand. Well for lesbian and gay families in this state, that has happened and this bill will do the work of justice and end that hurt.

Imagine if you were trying to make the funeral arrangements for your spouse and you couldn't and you couldn't have the right in the future to be buried next to them. That has happened to lesbian and gay families in this state and this bill will do the work of justice and end that hurt.

Imagine that you lose the home that you lovingly created over years, that has happened to gay and lesbian families in this state and this bill will do the work of justice and end that hurt.

There are some who argue against this bill because they believe it will lead to marriage equality for lesbians and gays in this state. Legally it will not and we know that. I wish it would and morally I believe it will, but legally it will not. I hope though, that through this debate you will realize when you hear the stories of our families, that there is really only one answer for all families and that is marriage.

But this bill will not allow me and my partner Michael who we have shared our lives together for 15 years, it will not allow us to marry. We still won't be able to marry. We met when Michael was in his 20's and I was in my 30's and I am in my 50's and still I can't marry.

There are some who argue against this bill because they believe that rights can be purchased, these rights can be purchased at a reasonable price or because it goes against the beliefs of a particular religion. Such a position defies the promise of the American Revolution, the promise of equality that brought so many people to our shores....

My grandparents left a country were rights were purchased, and where a state religion dictated beliefs that were not their own. Our grandparents did not move to this country for their grandchildren to have to purchase rights. We are citizens of a republic not subjects of a monarchy."

An audio webcast of the Senate floor debate is now available from TVW. after the usual housekeeping matters, the debate begins at 47:10 with an amendment by the Republican caucus that tried to circumvent passage of the bill by sending it to a public vote. The amendment was defeated on a vote of 18-29-2.

The actual debate starts with Murray's statement at 55:50. Sen. Val Stevens's (R-39) frightfully bigoted speech in opposition starts at 1:03:00. Hold onto something that can't be tossed before listening to her.

In his more reasoned statement at 1:08:00, Sen. James Hargrove (D-24) introduced the arguments that have been pressed by right-wing discrimination activists like Gary Randall and Joe Fuiten.

At 1:17:17 Sen. Rosa Franklin (D-29) begins a touching statement in support of the bill. She says that she stands on the shoulders of those who came before her, who fought for rights so that she, a grandchild of slaves, could sit in a legislature and vote on such a law. "The civil rights movement... brought people together of all religions... in order to fight for the rights that were denied to Africans Americans. ... Standing on the shoulders of my ancestors -- and I did not get here alone, I got here with the help of everyone ... -- so to my good friend, your partner, and all who contribute, gay lesbian, I support you."

Labels: legislature, marriage equality, politics, SB5336, Washington

While Sonics/Storm spokespersons try to convince us that the political activities of the team's new co-owners shouldn't be of concern to us "out here," anecdotal evidence from blogs and elsewhere indicates that it does matter.

We were sent a copy of an email sent by a gay man who lives on Beacon Hill to his senator, Margarita Prentice (D-11), who is prime sponsor of a "multi-purpose arena bill," Senate Bill 5986. The complicated measure could provide tax money for the construction of a new arena for the Sonics and Storm. It's a modification of a state law that currently provides funding for some arts programs, for retiring Kingdome debt, and for paying off debt incurred in building Qwest Field and Safeco Field.

Prentice's district is centered in Renton where the new $500 million basketball arena would be built, but stretches north to encompass much of Seattle's Beacon Hill neighborhood.

The idea of getting a sports stadium in Renton on industrial land now owned by Boeing is popular among Renton officials, including Prentice. But her Beacon Hill constituent asks her to reconsider, given the anti-gay political activism of two of the team's owners.

Their values are so contrary to the values of Seattle and the Pacific Northwest. At this point, I'm just fine with the prospect of the Sonics (and the Storm, if necessary) leaving town, rather than have my tax dollars subsidize wealthy business people who are homophobic bigots. I also believe it would do all professional sports some good if Seattle (as Los Angeles has done with football.) says no to the economic blackmail game of the franchise owners.

He urges Prentice to "disavow your sponsorship of the 'multi-purpose' arena bill. It tarnishes your fine reputation as a civic leader to be associated with these people."

The letter writer establishes his fan credentials before asking Prentice to disavow the arena deal.

I am a constituent of yours -- I live on west Beacon Hill -- and I?ve been a Sonics fan since their first season. I attended my first game in December of 1966, and I celebrated all night on Capitol Hill the night the Sonics won their only championship in 1979, with Gus, DJ, Downtown, et al. When I lived one block from the old Coliseum in the late 70s and early 80s, I attended several games a year and continued to do so into the mid-90s.

That was back when the tickets were affordable to anyone with a little bit of disposable income. That's not the case anymore. The business model for professional basketball is broken. A Sonics game now is only for people far more affluent than me, who go to watch multi-millionaires who are employed by mega-millionaires and billionaires. It simply doesn?t make sense to me that hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars would be used to subsidize the profit-making ventures of such a non-essential enterprise.

Despite his frustrations with the team and with the NBA, the letter writer says he was willing to stay on the sidelines of the political battle over a new arena until he heard about McClendon's and Ward's political activism.

Up until now, I haven't been motivated to contact you to express myself on this issue. But now, I am motivated.

After learning about the huge political donations by Sonics co-owners Aubrey McClendon and Tom Ward to the religious bigot Gary Bauer's campaign against equality for sexual minorities, I must speak out. Why on earth would I, as an honorable gay man who was taught by my Christian, Republican parents to be honest and to work for justice for all people, ever want to support the efforts of people like Mr. McClendon and Mr. Ward? Why would you?

After an Olympia hearing on the stadiums bill Monday, Sonics/Storm managing partner Clay Bennett again instisted that the political donations of his co-owners shouldn't matter #.

Bennett brushed off the connection Monday night and said after the hearing that the reports were "unrelated to our process."

But this one letter and dozens of blog posts indicate, it does matter "out here" when owners of a team asking for $300 million in state tax money use their own money to support a bigot.

Labels: politics, Seattle, sports, Washington

Tacoma News Tribune reports that the NBA has clarified its position on anti-gay activities: It's OK for owners to pay other people to say hateful things about gay folk, but not OK for former players to say those things.

The NBA on Tuesday said it did not consider the antigay activities of two of the Seattle SuperSonics' owners the same as the antigay comments uttered by Tim Hardaway before the All-Star break.

On Monday, it was revealed that Sonics owners Aubrey McClendon and Tom Ward combined to contribute $1.1 million to the Christian conservative group Americans United to Preserve Marriage, a group led by Gary Bauer that opposes gay marriage.

Because that information came to light so closely after Hardaway said in a radio interview that he hates gay people -- comments that got him banned from the All-Star Game by NBA commissioner David Stern -- the issues were deemed analogous by many.

The NBA does not see it that way.

"The Hardaway situation was one that was filled with hateful language and bigotry," league spokesman Tim Frank said. "That is not the same as making political contributions."

A Sonics spokesperson again insisted that the contributions of the co-owners have no affect on the teams.

Karen Bryant, the team's chief operating officer who has said publicly that she markets the Storm to the gay community, said she does not take issue with McClendon's and Ward's views.

"Political contributions made by two of our owners have no bearing on how we operate and manage the Storm," Bryant said. "I'm proud to say that our Storm fan base represents the diversity of our community.

"Over the past seven seasons, we've demonstrated an environment of inclusiveness to all of our fans and that will continue to be our approach in building an audience for and marketing the Storm."

Bennett, the team's chairman who recruited McClendon and Ward into his investment group, the Professional Basketball Club, issued a release that did not specifically address his partners' political contributions or the effect they might have on the team?s pursuit of a new arena.

If the state does not grant the Sonics the $300 million, Bennett has said he will move the franchise, likely to Oklahoma City.

Labels: politics, Seattle, sports, Washington

Members of the Teamsters Union employed by the Port of Seattle will be eligible for the same health and welfare, dental and vision benefits received by other spouses of port employees, regardless of gender, since 1994. About 250 port-employed union members are expected to affected by the deal which was approved unanimously by the Port Commission Tuesday night.

The port agreed to cover the additional cost -- about $16.40 per employee per month -- of the extended benefits.

Josh Friedas, advocacy directory for Equal Rights Washington, told the PI that the port deal with the Teamsters "can now be a model for other negotiations and agreements."

A Teamsters Union official estimated that the deal could eventually affect about 20,000 union members in the state if it can be replicated in other contract negotiations. Those teamsters are covered under 500 individual contracts, however, so that's a lot of negotiating.

While most of those contacted by the PI lauded the deal, the prime sponsor of a domestic partnership bill in the House, wasn't all that impressed according to the PI story:

What the union is doing isn't groundbreaking, said state Rep. Jamie Pedersen, D-Seattle. Other unions, such as Service Employees International Union and the Inland Boatmen's Union, have already secured some, if not all, of their members domestic-partner benefits.

Local chapters of SEIU provide the domestic partners of their janitor members with health-care benefits through a union trust, but non-janitor members of their union are subject to their individual employers standards.

"I'm happy the Teamsters are on board, but I think that there are a lot of other unions that have been there for a long time," Pedersen said.

What's this? Teamsters didn't support his campaign or something?

Labels: marriage equality, politics, Washington

The right wing anti-marriage-equality group, Americans United to Preserve Marriage, has taken down its website. This morning, the site included at least six press releases and a long biography of its founder Gary Bauer. Now it has only the graphic header on its home page with the statement, "under construction."

This is the group that was bankrolled by Seattle Sonics/Storm co-owners Aubrey McClendan and Tom Ward.

Perhaps this isn't the kind of publicity Bauer or Ward and McClendon wanted, eh? Aside from the obvious problems for NBA/WNBA owners like Ward and McClendon, it doesn't do Bauer much good to have it revealed that just two guys paid for one one of his operations.

Sample headlines:
Seattlest: Howard Schultz Sold the Sonics to Bigots
Supersonicsoul: Sonics New Owners: Jerks and Bigots
Down with Pants!: Go Sonics! and Take The Bigots With You
Dustbury: Backlash, or forelash?

Not everyone is hoping they'll make a quick exit back to Oklahoma. Lachlan at My So Called Blog says she "would like to flip the virtual bird to the owners and tell them to do their hate-mongering in Oklahoma," but pulls back with a repeat of this prior post about why the Storm are so important to her and many other lesbians in town:

Since the rumors and eventual sale of the Sonics and Storm began, I've had one thought about what it would mean to lose the Storm in particular:

Seattle's lesbian community would be devastated. Bayou and I have attended several games in the past, and two within the last month. Both times, I looked around, and thought: "Wow, I can't believe how many lesbians are here."

Everywhere, wall-to-wall dykes, couples, femmes, singles, sports dykes, families with one or more kidlets, goth riot grrrls. It was an absolutely diverse microcosm of gay women and their loved ones.

The blessing of the Storm games is the lack of 'meat-market' attitude. It's a great meeting place for friends and groups of friends. If the Storm leaves town, it will leave a big, gaping hole in the lesbian community here.

Hmm. Think they might be willing to sell the Storm and leave it here even if they take the Sonics to OKC?

Labels: politics, Seattle, sports

The PI today picked up on Josh Feit's reporting about Sonics/Storm owners support for an anti-marriage equality group run by right wing homophobe Gary Bauer. Without crediting Feit, the PI reporter repeated most of his enterprise reporting, but managed to add a response from a Sonics spokesman who insisted that the co-owners Oklahoma politics shouldn't matter "out here."

Sonics spokesman Jim Kneeland said the co-owners' contributions and political activity do not contradict the NBA's recent condemnation of bigotry.

"First of all, (Clay Bennett), who is the managing partner in this effort, is not involved in anyway," Kneeland said. "That's a key distinction.

"People are entitled to have their views, they are not views that I happen to agree with ... but they are not trying to impose them on anyone out here," Kneeland said.

"I won't argue that some of the owners may have more conservative political views than the norm out here; one of the things that they agreed to when they bought the team is that they would leave their politics at the state line," Kneeland said. "They have done that. They were not involved in the election cycle out here last year and have no intention of doing so."

Ward is the chief executive officer of an oil and natural gas production company. McClendon is chief executive of a natural gas production company. Both companies have headquarters in Oklahoma City. The ownership team of which they are a part also owns the WNBA's Seattle Storm.

Feit points out that Bauer's group, which lobbied for a federal discrimination amendment, was trying to impose their views "out here."

Um, that's the whole point of Americans United to Preserve Marriage. They're trying to impose their view that gays can't get married onto gay couples that want to get married.

Labels: politics, Seattle, sports, Washington

The Stranger's Josh Feit reports on Slog that the new owners of the Sonics and Storm bankrolled right-wing homophobe Gary Bauer. The Times' David Postman picks up on Feit's reporting with this summary:

It turns out that in 2004 and 2005 Aubrey McClendon and Tom Ward ? principals in the ownership team ? were the top two donors to Americans United to Preserve Marriage, according to records at PoliticalMoneyLine. The group is led by conservative Christian activist and former Republican presidential candidate Gary Bauer.

Feit points out that the contributions from McClendon and Ward kept Bauer's group in business:

[T]he controversial group doled out $1,056,962 in the 2004 election cycle, which means Storm owners Ward and McClendon basically bankrolled the whole thing. Indeed, records show that between the 2004 and 2006 cycles the group spent $1.3 million total while Ward and McClendon?s donations total $1.1 million.

Storm, the women's basketball team, not only attracts a signficant lesbian fan base, but actively markets to lesbian and gay fans. As Feit notes, the team's owners might find that market less responsive having discovered where the management team sends its money.

These are the same folks who are now asking the legislature to approve $300 million in taxpayer money to finance a new stadium in Renton for their teams. Postman notes the political implications:

But the Oklahoma group's decidedly conservative political bent is likely to be of concern to many more in liberal Seattle than just Storm fans. And that could matter at a time when the team is looking to the Legislature to approve a taxpayer subsidy for a new arena. That's the same Legislature that is expected to approve benefits for domestic partnerships this year. And the NBA is the same league that recently banished a former player from All Star weekend because of his anti-gay comments.

Labels: Gay Seattle, politics, Seattle, sports

Supporters of equal rights for all citizens of the state will gather tomorrow in Olympia for the third annual Equality Day rally and lobbying workshops. The rally and citizen lobbying event is sponsored by the Religious Coalition of Equality and Equal Rights Washington.

Advocacy workshops begin at 9 am at various locations on the capitol campus. The rally starts at 11:45 on the capitol steps. It features performances by Seattle Men's and Women's Choruses and several speakers. Visits with legislators have been scheduled for the afternoon. The event closes with a showing of the Seattle-produced movie, Inlaws and Outlaws at 6:30 pm.

Pre-registration was requested, but if you can make it to the Capitol City at the last moment, expect them to try to make room for you. A charter bus (or two) will leave from St. Mark's Cathedral [get directions] at 7 am. (Again, pre-registration was requested, but there might be room.) A donation of $20 is requested for the trip on comfortable Grayline buses.

ERW has an example form of a support email to send to your legislators if you can't make it to Olympia.

If you're looking for additional inspiration, consider this speech given in Wyoming's legislature by a Republican House member, Rep. Dan Zwonitzer, who cast the deciding vote to kill a bill that would have declared out-of-state marriages or civil-unions between gay couples invalid in Wyoming. [via Pam's House Blend]

Thank you Mr. Speaker and Members of the Committee.

I am not going to speak of specifics regarding this bill, but rather talk about history and philosophy in regards to this issue.

It is an exciting time to be in the legislature while this issue is being debated. I believe this is the Civil Rights struggle of my generation.

Being a student of history, as many of you are, and going back through history, most of history has been driven by the struggle of man against government to endow him with more rights, privileges and liberties to be bestowed upon him.

In all of my high school courses, we only made it through history to World War 2. It wasn't until college that I really learned of the civil rights movement in the 60's. My American History professor was black, and we spent a week discussing civil rights. I watched video after video where people stood on the sidelines and yelled and threw things at black students walking into schools, I've read editorials and reports by both sides of the issue, and I would think, how could society feel this way, only 40 years ago.

Under a democracy the civil rights struggle continues today, where we have one segment of our society trying to restrict rights and privelges from another segment of our society. My parents raised me to know that this is wrong.

It is wrong for one segment of society to restrict rights and freedoms from another segment of society. I believe many of you have had this conversation with your children.

And children have listened, my generation, the twenty-somethings, and those younger than I understand this message of tolerance. And in 20 years, when they take the reigns of this government and all governments, society will see this issue overturned, and people will wonder why it took so long.

My kids and grandkids will ask me, why did it take so long? And I can say, hey, I was there, I discussed these issues, and I stood up for basic rights for all people.

I echo Representative Childers concerns, that testifying against this bill may cost me my seat. I have two of my precinct committee persons behind me today who are in favor of this bill, as I stand here opposed, and I understand that I may very well lose my election. It cost 4 moderate Republican Senators in Kansas their election last year for standing up on this same issue. But I tell myself that there are some issues that are greater than me, and I believe this is one of them. And if standing up for equal rights costs me my seat so be it. I will let history be my judge, and I can go back to my constituents and say I stood up for basic rights. I will tell my children that when this debate went on, I stood up for basic rights for people.

I can debate the specifics of this bill back and forth as everyone in this room can, but I won't because the overall theme is fairness, and you know it. I hope you will all let history be your judge with this vote. You all know in your hearts where this issue is going, that it will come to pass in the next 30 years. For that, I ask you to vote no today on the bill. Thank you.

And, thank you, Rep. Zwonitzer.

Labels: Gay events, gay organization, legislature, politics, Washington

Because it can't enforce state rules on employee benefits covered by a federal statute, the state's Human Rights Commission yesterday declined the rule on the substance of the first case brought before it under the state's newly modified civil rights law.

The measure protects gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered Washingtonians from discrimination in matters of housing, lending, employment, and insurance. But most insurance programs offered by private employers are covered under the 1974 federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) which supersedes state law.

Senator Ed Murray, who guided the civil rights law through most of its 30-year journey in the legislature, told reporters that he wasn't surprised by the ruling. "We can't regulate the federal insurance market," he said. "That would be true of any health care issue we're talking about right now."

"We never addressed the issue of health benefits in the bill -- just as the underlying anti-discrimination law does not address the issue of health benefits," said state Sen. Ed Murray, D-Seattle, a prime sponsor of last year's bill.

"Frankly, that's a separate discussion, and one that we're having this legislative session, as we seek to extend domestic partnership benefits for same-sex couples," he said.

"There's no story here. Our progress has not been curtailed. Our protections remain in place."

The case was brought by a woman named Sandi Scott-Moore who worked for Honeywell International in Redmond. Scott-Moore claimed discrimination because Honeywell offered insurance benefits to the unmarried domestic partners of lesbian and gay employees, but did not offer similar benefits for her unmarried male partner.

The Right Commission, which is charged with investigating civil right complaints, did not rule on the substance of Scott-Moore's complaint because its investigators determined that federal law applies in the situation.

"Effectively, because of the federal law, in this type of case, our hands are tied," said commission director Mark Brenman.

Brenman said the hole in the state law's coverage illustrates the need for federal statutes prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation.

"It's not pointing up a problem with the state law," Brenman said. "It's pointing up a problem with the lack of protection on the federal level."

A federal employment non-discrimination act (ENDA) has been introduced for many years in Congress, but has rarely gone beyond preliminary hearings. The law is expected to do better under the Democratic leadership of the current session.

Labels: equal rights, politics, Washington

Equal Rights Washington (ERW), the state's largest LGBT-rights lobbying group, has released a statement on Initiative 957 which was filed by an unaffiliated ad-hoc group, the Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance (WA-DOMA). ERW highlights the serious purpose of the ironic initiative, but points out that the group will not be helping in the effort.

The statement is part of a weekly email sent out by the group. We haven't been able to find it on the ERW website, so we print the whole thing:

Proponents of Initiative 957 Never Want to See it Enacted

An initiative has been filed that would require couples to file a form saying they can procreate, and it would dissolve childless marriages after 3 years. Below is ERW's statement on Initiative I-957.

For exactly the same reasons that same-sex couples should have the right to marry, Initiative 957 should never be enacted. The laws of Washington State should help families, not hurt them. The Washington State Supreme Court ruled that gay and lesbian couples do not have the right to marry because they do not procreate. Initiative 957 helps people understand the absurdity of the court?s rationale for denying same-sex couples the right to marry. Not all heterosexual couples marry with the intention of procreating or raising children. Some couples who wish to raise children must adopt or use reproductive technology. Many heterosexual couples have childless marriages, or marry for the first time in their older years and never have children. Many same-sex couples are raising children and often these children are the biological children of one of the partners. Gay and lesbian couples often adopt and open their homes to foster children. Some same-sex couples do not have children but marry for the same reasons as do childless heterosexual couples.

The filing of Initiative 957 and the outrage it has sparked among the religious conservatives showcases the absurd legal reasoning of the Anderson case and the hypocrisy of the radical and religious right. The right has long claimed that gays and lesbians should not be allowed to marry because they do not procreate. Initiative 957 seeks to apply the same standard to heterosexual couples. Initiative 957 is showing Washingtonians the truth about the radical right: it is not pro-family--it is simply anti-gay. Obviously Initiative 957 will never be enacted. Most in the gay community would vote it down because we would never seek to take rights away from others. Even the proponents say they would never want to see the initiative enacted.

ERW will remain focused on protecting the state's historic anti-discrimination law that is presently being threatened by a possible initiative. We will provide an update about the initiative to undo the Anderson-Murray anti-discrimination law in next week's e-news.

But is it true that "even the proponents say they would never want to see the inititive enacted"?

What we've heard Gregory Gadow, who filed the initiative, say is that he doesn't expect the initiative to be enacted and that he wouldn't want to see it enforced if it were enacted. But he's also said that enacting the initiative would force the Washington Supreme Court to reexamine its flawed reasoning in the Andersen decision.

But one of the more remarkable phrases in the statement is, "Most in the gay community would vote it down because we would never seek to take rights away from others." Really? And how do they know that?

It offends us a bit to hear an activist group like ERW or even WA-DOMA make those kinds of broad generalizations. ERW can and should speak for the small and tightly-knit group of political activists that form their network. It doesn't surprise us to hear that they would vote against the initiative in the unlikely event that it were to make it to the ballot. But we're not convinced that they can or should try to speak for "most in the gay community" on this particular issue.

The closed network of bloggers (with whom, by the way, ERW seems unwilling to speak) certainly can't represent "most in the gay community," but this closed network has shown considerably more support for Gadow's "political street theater." Many of us would would be perfectly willing to push this parody all the way back to the Supreme Court.

Labels: I-957, initiative, politics, wa-doma, Washington

WA-DOMA's Initiative 957 got a Tip of the Hat last night from Stephen Colbert. (And, you've also gotta love the Wag he gave to John Howard, Australia's wedge-issue PM whose son worked on the 2004 Bush/Cheney campaign).

We're guessing the folks at WA-DOMA will want to put this honor on the shelf in front of the Shrammie they picked up last week from that guy on one or another of the KOMOs. (He keeps popping up. Maybe we should watch or listen... On second thought, no!)

Schram insists, "I get it." He gives Gregory Gadow and crew "high marks for the 'hoot' factor," but insists that the humor is misdirected.

The problem is Gregory doesn't get it.Mocking marriage does nothing but provoke
P.O.'d people to dig deeper for reasons to discriminate.

Hey, I've long been a strong supporter of gay marriage.

And I'll admit Gregory got me to laughing. But Greg [which isn't his name] doesn't need me slapping my knee.

He needs gay marriage opponents slapping their foreheads and thinking.

So, for sacrificing substance for silliness; for taking a shot without first taking aim, and for making a point with no thought of making headway, take a bow Gregory, 'cause this "Schrammie's" for you.

But all that assumes that the more vocal opponents of marriage equality are willing to engage in something like "slapping their foreheads and thinking." There is too little evidence of that. The legal argument that managed to get procreation tied so closely to marriage in a Supreme Court decision was put forward by the "Family Research Council."

They are the ones who made this a precedent in state law. They are the ones who convinced the court to turn a silly argument into a precedent that could, perhaps, be used by a clever divorce lawyer for a childless couple to deny benefits to one of the parties. The Family Research Council did that. Although it's a weak precedent because it was accepted only by a deeply divided court, it's still on the books as a result of the Andersen decision.

Will the vocal opponents recognize that because of I-957. No. But the less vocal opponents just might engage in that kind of epiphany of forehead-slapping as a result of the discussions spurred on by this bit of political street theater. Maybe.

Labels: Colbert Report, I-957, initiative, politics, video, wa-doma, Washington, wikiality

If the domestic partnership bill becomes law this year as expected, there will no doubt be celebratory gatherings in Seattle and other cities as there was last year when the civil rights law finally passed.

If it happens, we could expect to see at the Seattle gathering most members of the legislature's informal gay caucus along several pastors and rabbis from Religious Coalition for Equality There would also be the by-now standard parade of executive directors from an alphabet soup of agencies. One name that we probably wouldn't hear and one face that we certainly wouldn't see is that of reclusive Denver philanthropist and former software entrepeneur Tim Gill. We won't hear from him, but if the bill passes, he might deserve as much credit as any of those who take the podium during the celebration.

Gill is profiled in a long article in the current Atlantic Monthly. Former Washington Blade editor and now blogger Chris Craine reflects on his importance to gay politics here and here.

The Atlantic mentions that Washington was one of nine states where Gill targeted contributions in local legislative races that he thought could tip the balance of state control to a more gay-friendly majority. According to the article, the consultants at Gill's action fund compiled a national list of "seventy races in which a key antigay candidate was vulnerable or the outcome of a race was likely to affect control of the legislature."

The article doesn't explain how the Gill Fund affected state races, especially not the ones here in Washington. But a search of Public Disclosure Commission (PDC) records tells more of the story.

In Washington, Gill gave moderate contributions to six candidates, according to Public Disclosure Commission records:

Candidate	Dist/Chamb	DP Spon?	Gill contrib.
Oemig, Eric	45-S	Y	675
Tom, Rodney	48-S	Y	675
Kilmer, Derek	26-S	N	675
Seaquest, Larry	26-H	N	675
Eddy, Deborah	48-H	Y	675
Green, Tami	28-H	N	675

That's an interesting list of candidates. All of them also recieved donations from Equal Rights Washington (ERW) PAC. Five of the six got contributions from Washington Won't Discriminate (WWD), a group that was formed to counter an expected initiative to invalidate last year's civil right law. After the anti-rights initiative failed to get on the ballot, WWD disbanded and distributed the money it had raised to candidates.

Rodney Tom was one of the candidates endorsed by both ERW and SEAMEC, the Seattle Metropolitan Elections Committee. He's a former-Republican turned Democrat who voted for the LGT civil-right bill when he was in the house and ran against conservative Republican Luke Esser for an open senate seat.

Like Tom, Oemig was ran as a Democrat in an eastside district that had long sent only Republicans to Olympia. In its endorsement of Oemig, the PI noted that Oemeg's GOP opponent "votes against the district's interests on too many important issues, including transportation, school funding and gay civil rights."

Oemig eventually won the seat that had been relinquished by Bill Finkbeiner, a Republican who shocked his caucus in 2005 by casting the deciding vote that allowed the LGT civil rights bill to squeak through despite votes against it by a few Democrats.

The election of Tom and Oemig, along with Derek Kilmer's victory in Kitsap County helped the Democrats gain a more solid majority in the senate. Although it's still not certain to pass in the upper house, it's unlikely the domestic partnership bill would have made it through this year without that extra margin.

Without the extra margin of tolerance that the election of Tom, Oemig, and Kilmer provide, the GOP might, instead, have been able to push through its marriage-discrimination amendment this year.

It looks like Gill picked just the kind of tipping-point candidates described in the Atlantic article.

"The strategic piece of the puzzle we'd been missing -- consistent across almost every legislature we examined -- is that it's often just a handful of people, two or three, who introduce the most outrageous legislation and force the rest of their colleagues to vote on it," Gill explained. "If you could reach these few people or neutralize them by flipping the chamber to leaders who would block bad legislation, you?d have a dramatic effect."

All of the candidates that Gill backed in Washington won in tight races. All of them defeated an opponent who had been a vocal opponent of equality of rights.

But still, whatever the significance of the candidates Gill contributed to, $675 is barely enough to make a ripple in campaign funding. It might print a small stack of yard signs or a few stacks of campaign brochures, but it isn't significant by itself. Both Tom and Oemeg won razor-thin victories, however, which means that even small infusions of cash might have made a difference.

An oddity in the contribution figures for those six candidates demonstrates the kind of networking described in the Atlantic article: Most of the candidates on Gill's list also show $675 donations from the same group of six out-of-state donors. In each case, those out-of-staters donated only to candidates on Gill's own list. Some of them donated only to four or five of the Gill-supported candidates.

We've combined the donations of those six out-of-staters into the "Gill group" column in this table. It also shows amounts donated by the Equal Rights Washington (ERW) PAC, by Washington Won't Discriminate (WWD), and by Vashon Island donor George Heidorn, a retired Microsoft engineer, who is one of ERW's largest donors.

Candidate	Dist.	Spn.	Gill group	Heidorn	WWD	ERW	Total
Oemig, Eric	45-S	Y	4725	1400	1400	1400	8925
Tom, Rodney	48-S	Y	4725	1400	1400	1400	8925
Kilmer, Derek	26-S	N	4725	1400	1400	1000	8525
Seaquest, Larry	26-H	N	4725			700	5425
Eddy, Deborah	48-H	Y	3375		1400	700	5475
Green, Tami	28-H	N	4050		700	700	5450

Here's more background on four of the contributors that we've identified as the "Gill group" in this table. WWD, ERW PAC, and Heidorn all donated to a far broader list of legislative candidates.

$4725 tips toward a significant contribution amount for any candidate. When combined with donations from other LGBT-supportive donors, the amounts given by that group of out-of-staters begins to give financial teeth to the "gay agenda" that right-wing groups have often propped up as more powerful and significant than it usually was.

Labels: HB1351, philanthropy, politics, SB5336, tim gill, Washington

Tim Gill seems to be doing in political activism the same kind of thing he did over a decade ago in software development. He brings to the table a different "model" of how things should be done.

In software development and technology, the "first mover" is often thought to have a built-in advantage. The first developer to release a new product defines the market. Seattle-based Aldus was the first mover in a then unheard of product class that came to be called "desktop publishing." The PageMaker program from Aldus created a new must-have tool and began to change entire industries.

But PageMaker eventually lost its market-leading position to a newer startup, Quark, founded by Tim Gill in Denver. Quark's XPress stole the thunder from PageMaker.

It's impossible to summmarize that whole geekey market fight in many paragraphs, let alone a few sentences, but one way that Gill and Quark managed to take control of the publishing desktop was by looking at the issue from a different perspective, by creating a different model of the process of creating a page for publication.

Aldus founder Paul Brainerd had worked with mainframe-based newspaper production equipment. He brought that model of page creation to the desktop. Gill, on the other hand, appears to have observed how "creatives" built up a ads and posters on a lightboard using x-acto knives, waxed paper, lines made from rolls of colored tape, and sometimes press-on type. Gill's Quark XPress came much closer than PageMaker to being a model on the screen of that kind of creative process.

Brainerd's model was "desktop publishing." Gill's initial model was "desktop layout."

Designers and layout technicians responded by insisting on XPress as their tool of choice and eventually made it the market leader, making Gill very rich in the process. (Of course, Paul Brainerd didn't do so badly himself as any politician in Washington could tell you when they watch his money pore into causes and candidates.)

The market leaders in political giving are organizations like megachurches or the NRA on the right or, in queer politics, HRC or ERW in Washington. They are large organizations with boards expensive fundraising processes, and complex rules on how to spend the money raised.

The model Gill has created is a different kind of beast. It seems to be more like the informal email chains that can develop when a group of friends talk to each other about politics. Rather than building a big organization that must spend as much time begging for money as it does lobbying, Gill's group apprears -- for now at least -- to be a more informal group that does the research to kick-start one of those informal email chains. The Gill Action Fund didn't contribute any money to Washington campaigns, but it does appear to have done the research and generated the relatively informal email chain.

What's unique about Gill's emails, however, is that they go to people who have a lot of money.

Two of the six in what we've called the "Gill group" don't percolate to the surface in Google searches, but bios of the others show that they clearly belong:

Jon Stryker: A Michigan billionaire architect who inherited his vast wealth from the medical equipment company founded by his grandfather. Stryker's Arcus Foundation actively supports lesbian/gay civil rights issues. Its mission: "[C]ontributing to a pluralistic society that celebrates diversity and dignity, invests in youth and justice and promotes tolerance and compassion."

Henry van Ameringen: His father founded the International Flavors and Fragrances Company. van Ameringen is a major donor to New York LGBT and HIV organizations through his self-named foundation.

Esmond Harmsworth: The Boston literary agent Literary agent gave the notable sum of $25,000 to Fair Wisconsin, a group opposing a marriage-discrimination amendment on the 2006 ballot in that state. (The amendment passed.)

Weston Milliken: In its 2005 annual report [pdf], the Gill Foundation describes the West Hollywood business consultant as a philanthropist who has matured "from a reactive check writer to a collaborative and strategic giver."

The California business consultant directs about 90 percent of his philanthropy to support lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender youth initiatives. "The idea is to teach people how to lead and be effective at what they are doing in life," he says.

Labels: philanthropy, politics, tim gill, Washington

The two bills that would grant significant rights to gay, lesbian, or senior unmarried couples have cleared all committee hurdles and are now just a vote in each house away from passage. Gov. Gregoire has indicated she will sign the measure.

Although she told the Times' David Postman that she hasn't yet counted the votes, Lisa Brown (D-Spokane), the senate majority leader said, "I believe we will have enough votes to pass it."

Over half of the legislators in the house have signed on as co-sponsors of the bill, so passage there is virtually assured.

Nonetheless, a right-wing pastor from Bothell is making a last-ditch effort to scuttle at least one of the bills.

House Bill 1351 and Senate Bill 5336 would give partnered gays or lesbians and unmarried seniors rights to visit a partner in the hospital, inherit property when there's no will, and to make decisions on such matters as emergency health care and funeral arrangements.

Even right-wing Bothell pastor Joe Fuiten indicated to the TNT reporter (#) that he thinks the bills will pass. But that hasn't stopped him from issuing an "Urgent Call for Action!" [pdf] that he expects fellow right-wing pastors to distribute during services this Sunday.

In the alert, Fuiten tells fellow discrimination activists that

The constitutional lawyers tell us that a bill like this will be used as the basis for overturning our DOMA laws in federal court. We see this as a critical bill for the eventual imposition of gay marriage upon an unwilling public.

Hoping to strip away just enough votes to defeat the measures, he asks church-goers to contact their legislators about the bills through the legislature's hotline at 800-562-6000.

He, of course, asks callers to tell their legislators to vote against the bills. But that last-minute field-turf-lobbying makes it just as important to contact legislators urging them to vote for the bills. If you're not sure which district you live in, find out by entering your address in the legislature's district-finder (Click the "Find your district" tab). And then call 800-562-6000 and tell your senator and house members that you support SB-5336 or HB-1351 as a matter of basic fairness.

ERW also has a relatively automated email service that allows you to send a customized email message to your legislators.

As we indicated earlier, support for the senate bill has been weak in districts outside of the Puget Sound circle. That makes it especially important for those who live beyond Seattle and the eastside 'burbs to contact senators, since those are the districts that Fuiten's group has been targeting.

That makes a second step even more important for those of us who live within Washington's blue circle: Send emails to friends beyond the inland coast urging them to contact their legislators. (You could even email a link to this post with a personal note if you think that might help. Click the envelope icon below.)

Labels: equal rights, gay news, HB1351, legislature, marriage equality, politics, SB5336, Washington

All that odd political wrangling going on with our red-state neighbors to the north, has one Alaska blogger seething:

Queer Alaskans are a friendly people but right now they're as pissed off as a polar bear with his nadds on the barbie. As the state gets ready to consider a proposal to amend the Alaskan Consitution for the soul purpose of discriminating against Gay couples us Queer Folk are getting organized, digging our fox holes, and building our armory. Nothing can be wasted -- each shot must count.

Tenpa points out that Alaska doesn't have a statewide LGBT advocacy group. "We depend on the local chapter of the ACLU and activists (we like to say AKtivists) in Juneau, Anchorage and Fairbanks," he explains.

He lists a large network of those "AKtivisits" who have banded together to raise money and to lobby to defeat this latest round in the long-running battle. And he quotes a friend who is one of the 55 people for whom legislators are spending millions to overrule a program that would cost the state, at most, a few hundred tousands per year:

"Tenpa, look what I have! It is my new insurance card and it includes my other half! Can you believe it! All of these years it has been so hard. Now we don't have to depend on public assistance and grants for his medical care and medications. Now I don't have to worry every month if I will have enough money to keep him going. My co-pay will be my co-pay. Our life can now be regular ?.. more predictable. I never thought this would happen!"

Labels: Alaska, LGBTQ, link bites, politics

Legislators in Alaska made another bizarre move this week in their years-long effort to deny court-ordered benefits to the partners of LGBT state employees. The state house voted to authorize a non-binding advisory vote on the issue. The balloting would cost the state about $1.2 million, according to some lawmakers. That's about four times the annual cost of the benefits that the legislature is refusing to pay.

The ballot measure was first approved in a special session last November. This week's vote occurred after its Republican sponsor offered another bill to cancel the election.

"I still think that's the right thing to do, to ask the question. I was just really pondering, is it the right time, can we get enough information out?" Rep. John Coghill, R-North Pole, said when he introduced the bill.

But then Coghill, who had been the prime sponsor of the bill that set up the ballot, appeared to change his mind again and decided he might let it go ahead.

One exasperated Democrat in the Republican-controlled house commented, "If our purpose is to find out what Alaskans think about same-sex benefits, we should pay 12,000 bucks and get a scientific statewide opinion poll, not pay $1.2 million for an unscientific opinion poll."

Several Democrats have offered a bill that would delay the vote until the legislature to passes a special $1.2 million appropriation to pay for the vote.

All of this stems from a lengthy series of court cases responding to a 1999 suit that was filed by the ACLU and nine state employees in 1999. After several circuits through the judicial system, the state and the municipality of Anchorage had been given a January 1, 2007 deadline to begin offering the benefits. Anchorage complied and now offers benefits to same-sex partners of city employees.

The state tried to block benefits despite some stern words from the courts that had first mandated the benefits in 2005. The legislature went into an expensive special session late last year to address the issue. They authorized the advisory ballot and also passed a law specifically denying the benefits. That law was deemed unconstitutional, however, by the state's attorney general and was reluctantly vetoed by the state's new governor, Republican Sarah Palin. That allowed benefits to be offered.

The benefit enrollment period for the employees began Jan. 1. AP reports that [#] 55 same-sex dependents are now under state health plans and another 22 are pending, according to the state Department of Administration. The cost of the 77 new enrollees is estimated to be $313,562 a year.

The vote authorized by the legislature would be a non-binding vote because the court ruling that requires the benefits cannot be overcome without an amendment to the state's constitution. It would take a two-thirds vote in both the house and senate to put a proposed amendment on the ballot. Opponents of the benefits have not been able to muster the super-majority needed to put an amendment on the ballot.

In an editorial today, the Anchoage Daily News scolded legislators [free reg required] about their waste of money.

Perhaps legislators are realizing it's a million-dollar public opinion poll dressed up as an election.

This isn't like the 1999 advisory vote that buried a proposal to use some Permanent Fund earnings to help balance the state budget. That was a purely political decision that did not involve the fundamental law of the land and equal-rights protection. The Supreme Court's benefits ruling does.

That leaves foes of same-sex benefits a straightforward path to follow if they're serious: They need a two-thirds vote of each legislative chamber to put a constitutional amendment before the voters.

If there's passion enough for that, let the Legislature try to summon the votes. If not, then let's not bother with a vote that doesn't count. Anchorage Rep. Mike Doogan and 11 of his colleagues have introduced a bill that would stop the special election. If lawmakers act quickly, they can pass the bill and save a million dollars.

Let's cut our losses at the $175,000 already spent on ballot printing and let life go on.

Labels: Alaska, equal rights, gay news, legislature, politics

We missed this on Saturday when he posted it, but the Times' David Postman has a great explanation of what one opponent of the domestic partnership bills is doing to stop the bills.

Right-wing Bothell Pastor Joe Fuiten is sponsoring an intensive lobbying effort to convince selected legislators to vote against both the domestic partnership bills (HB 1351 and SB 5336) and the sex-education bills (HB 1855 and SB 5297) [see prior post]. Postman posts a copy of the robo-call sent to districts represented by members of the House judiciary committee.

Equal Rights Washington sent out an action today alert asking supporters of the bills to contact their legislators and, of course, to contribute money to them so they can counter the money Fuiten's Positive Christian Agenda is pouring into their campaign against the bills.

The domestic partnership bills are still given a good chance of passage, despite the intensive lobbying efforts of Fuiten's group and of his former political partner, discrimination activist Gary Randall of the "Faith and Freedom Network."

Labels: HB1297, HB1351, HB1855, legislature, marriage equality, politics, SB5297, SB5336

The Seattle Times, PI, and local TV stations have now picked up on WA-DOMA's Initiative 957 and through them, the AP and just about everyone else.

And that's released a flood of blog posts on the measure that its sponsors call "political theater."

The Carpetbagger Report has a great discussion in the comments to this explanatory post. Ridenbaugh Press gives the measure a typically insightful analysis. The ever-wonderful Towleroad explains

The Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance has filed an initiative in an attempt to expose the misguided philosophy behind the July 2006 State Supreme Court ruling that claimed a "legitimate state interest" allowed the Court to limit marriage to couples able to have and raise children together.

Several general themes or "memes" in blogospeak emerge from the coverage:

The parody meme

The initiative's prime sponsor, Gregory Gadow, has been busy explaining that this is one primary impetus for the measure.

Many get it.

Andy Heyman, on his blackwhite blog, is at least grinning:

This is the first time, that I know of, that satire and irony have been used as a legal strategy. It strikes me as pure genius.

"Sara no H" couldn't stop giggling after reading about the initiative in Daily Dose of Queer:

Okay, so I'm over here cackling like a mad old bat and cheering on this initiative, and my housemate is pursing his lips and saying, "But that's not fair to people who can't reproduce." And, probably because I'm not versed in disability rights and I'm too rapturous right now to employ any sound other than a glee-filled giggle, I can't think of a single thing to say to that. Help me out?

Michael Hanscomb, in his blog eclecticism, gives the initiative a thumbs up:

This has my support, my signature if I find someone canvassing for signatures, and my vote if it should actually make it to the ballot: the Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance's Initiative 957....

I'd add that the language as written is also unfair to heterosexual couples who can't (or for any reason prefer not to) have children, hetero- or homosexual couples who adopt, or any other combination or situation you can come up with that's not the husband, wife, and two point five children scenario. I was disgusted with the ruling them, I still am, and I'm quite amused by I-957's approach to poking at the issue.

Sign me up!

Hard 7, a political blogger in Spokane calls it "Finally, a ballot measure on marriage worth supporting."

Hey, that's the only fair way to apply the court's Defense of Marriage Act ruling, right?

You might recall that I made some similar proposals last fall to take illogical anti-gay arguments to their logical extremes.

Even the kids at a fan-site message board for juvenile-shock-jocks Opus and Andy are mildly amused:

This kinda makes me laugh. How many men do you think are rushing to sign this thing? "Sorry Honey, but I don't want kids. It's not my fault, it's the law."

Queerty points out that the parody of I-957 isn't all that far from what could actually happen.

Although it may sound far-fetched, it's not out of the realm of possibility to think that the baby crazy crazies would hop on the propagation band wagon. Surely they won't do so if they know the Defense Alliance just means to take the judicatory piss, but if the proposal were being put forth by, say, Focus on the Family - we can totally imagine the ultra-right signing up for the baby battle.

The I-don't-get-it-meme

Metblogs explains how this one works, but the best example of the meme in action comes from the lawyers and professional marriage-equality activists who responded to the Times for its article:

Other gay-rights groups don't appear too eager to back the proposal, either.

Longtime gay-rights activist Bill Dubay said that while he gets the point of the initiative, it is unlikely he'd sign it.

"I don't think anybody in the gay community wants to take someone else's rights away," he said. "We just want to gain the rights that everybody else has."

The gay-rights organization Equal Rights Washington also won't endorse it, pointing out that families come in all forms, some of which don't include children. State laws, it said, should help ? not hurt ? families.

The deny-the-argument meme

One meme among those upset by the initiative is to claim that procreation has never actually been a Christian-right argument against marriage equality.

"Beth", who writes "A Worshiping Christian's Blog" is upset:

This has to be one of the most ignorant, ridiculous, things I have heard in all my life. An initiative in Washington by same-sex marriage proponents would require heterosexual couples to prove they are able to have children before getting a marriage license and actually have children within three years or else have their marriage annulled. This type of irrational behavior by same-sex advocates does nothing more than make a mockery of their 'cause'. I get that they are trying to prove a point, but the fact is that same-sex marriage is not just an issue of gay couple not being able to procreate. It is an issue of homosexuality being wrong in the eyes of God and in the eyes of the majority of men and women. If this weren't the case, then it would be legal in all 50 states and completely accepted.

She then quotes the usual-suspect Bible passages. But, Beth, those passages are not what the Washington Supreme Court based its decision on.

"Darlene" also tries to mute the arguments made by anti-marriage activists before the Supreme Court:

Certainly, children are the focus of much of the debate. But that's children and their rights, not fertility. Social conservatives don't argue from the individual point-of-view of whether or not same-sex couples affect opposite-sex couples, their arguments generally fall into institutional ones, on how a radical redefining of an institution will affect society at large.

Hmm. The Supreme Court sure did have a lot to say about "procreation and child-rearing," the first of which pretty much requires fertility (about which the Court didn't have much to say).

Here are bits of what the justices wrote [pdf]:

The State contends that procreation is a legitimate government interest justifying the limitation of marriage to opposite-sex couples. The State reasons that partners in a marriage are expected to engage in exclusive sexual relations with children the probable result and paternity presumed....

...DOMA [the Washington "Defense of Marriage Act"] is constitutional because the legislature was entitled to believe that limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples furthers procreation, essential to survival of the human race, and furthers the well-being of children by encouraging families where children are reared in homes headed by the children's biological parents. Allowing same-sex couples to marry does not, in the legislature's view, further these purposes....

DOMA bears a reasonable relationship to legitimate state interests -- procreation and child-rearing.

...Under the highly deferential rational basis inquiry, encouraging procreation between opposite-sex individuals within the framework of marriage is a legitimate government interest furthered by limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples.

...We conclude that limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples furthers the State's interests in procreation and encouraging families with a mother and father and children biologically related to both.

The Christian-right "Family Research Council" submitted an amicus brief to the Court in which they presented the argument that the controlling ruling of the Court accepted:

that there is no fundamental right to same-sex marriage under the Washington constitution, and that the state has a legitimate and compelling interest in protecting traditional marriage to encourage responsible procreation and the optimal environment for raising children. [our emphasis]

But Christian-right discrimination activist Gary Randall of the "Faith and Freedom Network" isn't pleased to see their arguments reflected back at them. Randall isn't laughing, but he's also not repeating the arguments that he and his allies used before the Court:

Marriage, as the union of one man and one woman, has historically served the human race well for more than 5000 years. Clearly there have been abuses of that standard. However, there is no case where alternatives to one man, one woman marriage have constructively served the common good.

The backlash meme

Another opposition meme is the "backlash" argument. "Mark Smith" put it this way in a comment to a post about I-957 on the blog blackwhite -- modern thought control:

This proposal is a dumb move.

I'm a strong supporter of gay marriage. However, my wife and I are both childless by choice. This proposal is an attack on our marriage. I respond to attacks on my marriage from any source (family members, outsiders, legal maneuvers) VERY strongly.

This is likely to cause a backlash against the gay rights community by the very people who are straight and support them.

The aforementioned "Darlene" put it this way:

Political stunts, especially cynical, insulting stunts served up merely to "dose" one's opponents with "their own medicine" rather than attempting actual persuasive arguments have a tendency to backfire.

As sympathetic as I am to having same-sex couples be afforded some legal institution to afford them contractual rights, I'm hoping this puerile initiative born of street theatre gets the derision deserves.

Interesting way to put it: "As sympathetic as I am...". We take it, from the rest of her post that she means: "Not very."

A fellow who writes a "Moonbat Early Warning System" blog cuts to the meat of the matter with this cleverly swishy quick-take:

OH, PUH-LEEZE! Don't the homorons in Washington state have anything better to do with their lives? Get a grip, people! This is just plain stupid silliness and only serves to demonstrate a childish attitude and a complete lack of common sense.

The they-won't-get-it meme

In this one the humor of I-957's "political street theater" is recognized, but a questioned is raised about everyone else. Are they clever enough to recognize it. In a comment on Blue Oregon, "jamie" explains

i loves me a good satire, but i heard once that something like 30% of americans understand satire. the rest will yelp "rush is right! the gays are attacking marriage!"

i hope this measure makes its point, but i've lost massive amounts of faith in the intelligence of the american electorate in the last seven years.

The makes-me-mad meme

This one crops up in just about all of the discussions. We'll take a comment from one of our own prior posts as an example:

I can't believe this. Its ridiculous. After having one miscarriage 3 years into my marriage and not being able to get pregnant since would make my marriage annulled if this was a law. I cannot believe that someone even lacks the mental capacity to even think of this.

So then, maybe jamie has a point about the effectiveness of satire in politics.

Over at a conservative outfit that apparently aggregates posts, one "Doug Peyton" whines,

They can't talk about it until they get their whining done first. And frankly, the debate was pretty much over in Washington State when the same-sex marriage ban survived the path up to and including the state Supreme Court. This is just the rantings of children who didn't get their way.

Except, of course, DOMA didn't survive "up to" the Supreme Court. It was only in the high court that lower-court rulings striking it down were defeated by a slim and contentious majority.

Labels: I-957, initiative, marriage equality, politics, wa-doma, Washington

A proposed amendment that would enshrine marriage discrimination in the state constituiton has been introduced in the Washington Senate by six Republican Senators and two Democrats. It's Senate Joint Resolution 8219 [pdf]. [via Slog]

This is the full text of the proposed amendment:

Article I, section . . .. Marriage in Washington state shall consist solely of two persons, a male and a female. The uniting of two persons other than a male and a female in any marital relationship is not valid in this state, and, although valid in another jurisdiction, is not recognized as valid in this state. The legislature may provide for such restrictions or sanctions on marriage related to age or degree of kinship as it deems necessary.

The resolution has been assigned to the Judiciary Committee which has not yet scheduled a hearing on the issue.

The resolution was introduced by Senator Dan Swecker (R-20, Centralia). Co-sponsors are Senators James Hargrove (R-24, Port Angeles/Hoquiam), Don Benton (R-17, Brush Prairie/Vancouver east) , Tim Sheldon (D-35, Shelton), Jenea Holmquist (R-13, Moses Lake/Cle Elum), Mike Carrell (R-28, Lakewood/Fort Lewis), Pam Roach (R-31, Auburn/Enumclaw), Joseph Zarelli (R-18, Castle Rock/Battle Ground), Jim Clements (R-14, Yakima), Jerome Delvin (R-8, Kennewick), Marilyn Rasmussen (D-2, Eatonville/Orting).

The resolution has high-profile support among the GOP minority. Prime sponsor Sen. Swecker is the Republican Caucus Vice Chair. Co-sponsoring Sen. Delvin is the Republican Deputy Whip. Sen. Carrell is the GOP's Deputy Floor Leader. And Pam Roach? Well, she's probably packing.

Labels: gay news, legislature, marriage equality, politics, SJR8219, Washington

In the first of several meetings around the state to prepare for Equality Day lobbying event later this month, advocates of marriage equality met in Olympia last week to discuss the domestic partnership bills (HB1531 and SB5336) and the marriage equality bills.

According to The Olympian,

Josh Friedes, advocacy director for Equal Rights Washington, urged people to tell legislators, as well as neighbors and co-workers, why they support same-sex marriage.

"When people know the truth about our lives, they support us," Friedes said. "We will win if we simply talk to everyone we know."

Attendees also heard from Jerry Hebert, Washington's human-rights commissioner.

"I believe with all of my heart that marriage equality is a natural progression in equal rights," Hebert said. "I believe it's our obligation ... to show the world, not just the state of Washington, that we here are forward-thinking and progressive."

The Senate version of the DP Bill, SB5336, was passed out of committee last week. Its next step is a floor vote which has not yet been scheduled.

Sen. Adam Kline, D-Seattle, one of the bill's sponsors told the Associated Press that the partnership bill is just a small step in granting equal rights to all of the state's citizens. He said that are more than 400 legal rights connected to heterosexual married couples, while the partnership bill addresses only a dozen or so.

"This is hardly a gay-marriage bill," he said. ?We're affording some (rights) to a small minority who do not have the legal right to marry."

The advocates meeting in Olympia, sponsored by Equal Rights Washington and Lambda Legal, was the first of five. A similar meeting will be held Wednesday in Spokane at the Unitarian Church at 4340 West Fort George Wright Dr. A Seattle meeting will be held Thursday at the First Baptist Church, 1111 Harvard Ave. The final meeting will be held Sunday in Vancouver at the YMCA.

The meetings are designed as preparation for major citizen lobbying event, Equality Day, that will take place on the Capitol campus in Olympia on Monday, February 26.

On Equality Day, members of LGBT communities are expected to gather with clergy and people of faith -- both straight and gay -- and with other allies to lobby their legislators to end legal discrimination against gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender individuals and families.

A noontime rally will provide legislators and others an opportunity to hear prominent clergy and community leaders speak in support of gay rights. The Equality Day rally typically draws over 1,500 attendees.

Labels: equal rights, HB1351, legislature, marriage equality, politics, SB5336, Washington

Now that it has been given its official number, I-957, by the Secretary of State's office, the proposed measure sponsored by Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance is starting to create a bit of a stir. If passed, the measure would require married couples to have children.

A blogger with the wonderful site name "Daily Irrelevant" has this to say:

On the one hand I don't think this is the right way to fight right-wing bigotry, on the other hand, only when a majority recognizes that tyrannizing minorities has consequences for them will the costs of bigotry be properly accounted for.

The initiative's prime sponsor, Gregory Gadow, (apparently) discusses the measure under the user name TechBear_Seattle in an enlightening thread on the discussion board for Democratic Underground website.

He cheekily explains, again, the reason for the initiative:

We, conscientious citizens that we are, are only trying to clean up the huge mess the Court left behind.

And anyway, if same-sex couples can be barred from marriage because they can not procreate together, the state constitution's requirement that all laws must be enforced equally requires that all couples that can not or will not procreate must equally be barred from marriage. It's only fair.

And it is, of course, fairness that is the ultimate goal of this grossly unfair initiative.

A poster complained, under the heading "Passive-aggressive gay-bashing" that the initiative is "anti-gay marriage."

Gadow responds

...well, that's how we do things in Seattle. If you ever want to see real passive-aggression, sit in on a meeting of the City Council

The problem is that any initiative to create equal marriage would very likely fail. Failure would only entrench the current view of marriage as a special right exclusive to heterosexuals. And strictly speaking, there is no more recourse regarding state law because the state Supreme Court has ruled, so our options are a bit limited.

Another poster notes, "I had to read this twice before I was sure it was parody. It's scarily close to the truth."

As all good parody is.

Tri-Cities TV station KNDU put it this way in the intro to their report on the initiative: "A new initiative is turning heads around the state as the gay-marriage debate heats up again." [KNDU video]

Although he mentions in the report that "many people consider the initiative over-the-top," the reporter delivered the story without the smirk or ironic eyebrow that Aaron Brown would have added to the story if he were still on KING or KIRO (or ABC or CNN or anyplace else). Despite that, the young KNDU/O reporter did a good job of summarizing the measure:

Washington Secretary of State Sam Reed has accepted Iinitiative 957, a response by gay rights activists to a State Supreme Court ruling last summer.

The Washington Supreme Court ruled that the state could prevent gay and lesbian couples from marrying because the state has a legitimate interest in preserving marriage for procreation.

In response, the Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance filed the Initiative.

But they interviewed the pastor of Kennewick's LGBT-focused Metropolitan Community Church who apparently didn't catch the parody.

"There are many marriages that are not about having children. There are many couples who marry later in life, they marry for companionship, they marry because they want to create a family," said the Reverend Janet Pierce.
"They don't necessarily marry to have children," Pierce said.

Exactly. But the Rev. Pierce missed a golden opportunity (or the station's tape-editors didn't keep it) of pointing out that this is the very kind of inequality that the Supreme Court condoned in its Andersen decision.

A commenter to an earlier post on this blog about the initiative approached it in the same way:

I am for Gay marrage, but this new initiative 957 I belive is ridiculus and could ruin support that you have gotten from infertal couples.....LIKE ME.

The Stranger's Slog has noticed the initiative, but hasn't yet had much to say. But that hasn't stopped their active commenters who've called it "the craziest thing I've seen all week," "a travesty," "hilarious," "Awesome!" and more.

Gadow slogged in on the comment thread to offer the best explanation he's yet given:

Initiative 957 is political street theater. We are taking the conservatives' own rhetoric, which became the basis of last year's state Supreme Court ruling, and beating them over the head with it.

Our choice of name came from one of our early ideas, to play ourselves up as wide-eyed conservatives trying to prevent screams of "Activist court!" Try to imagine Stephen Colbert sponsoring this. That idea fell by the wayside early but not until after we had filed papers with the state. Now, the official story is that we are "reclaiming" the initials and defending the cause of equal marriage.

If we can get I-957 on the ballot, we will have won. The bigoted meme of "marriage exists for the sole purpose of procreation" will be the subject of discussion around the country. For the first time, conservative objections to equal marriage will be under the national microscope. This can only help further the cause of equality, as discrimination and injustice fear few things more than the spotlight.

It would be great if I-957 passes. The Supreme Court would no doubt strike it down, which would critically weaken, if not kill, the earlier Andersen ruling which prompted this initiative.

Most likely it will fail, and (hopefully) by the biggest margin in state history. At that point, I-957 is a referendum on Andersen, and any position rejected by 80% of the voters (90%? 100%) would have to be carefully considered by both the courts and the state Legislature.

But before the initiative can either pass or fail, it needs to get on the ballot. And we need the signatures of a lot of Washington voters to do that.

LiveJournal users discuss the initiative here, with the starting comment, "Unconstitutional on its face. But I applaud the effort - if anything, it's a brilliantly-executed prank. Bravo!" But many of the subsequent comments miss the point and must be corrected by others who approach it without the requisite ironic raised eyebrow.

[Update: 2/5/07]: Timesman David Postman has now noticed the iniative via the Slog post. He comments, "Of course in order to have the full-blown absurdist argument the sponsors of I-957 will need to get signatures from 224,800 registered voters by July 6." Wouldn't that be fun?

Seattle.metblogs noticed it via the Postman post. "I'm not sure that absurdist dialogue is going to work when it comes to government.... [our long ellipses] I think it's hysterical, but a little part of me worries...[theirs] what happens if it doesn't work out that way?"

Labels: gay news, I-957, initiative, marriage equality, politics, wa-doma, Washington

The Rev. Ken Hutcherson now has a number for his initiative "related to discrimination." It will be Initiative 963.

Remember that number, decline if you're asked to sign 963.

Although the number is assigned, the initiative text is not yet available from the secretary of state's site. You should be able to read it shortly by following the link above.

Labels: equal rights, gay news, I-963, initiative, ken hutcherson, politics, Washington

The Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance (WA-DOMA) has been given a number for its proposed initiative to make procreation a requirement for legal marriage. It would become Initiative 957 on the November ballot if supporters can gather 224,880 valid signatures by July 6.

The prime sponsor of the initiative is Gregory Gadow who emphasized the initiative's serious purpose in a press release announcing the number assignment.

"For many years, social conservatives have claimed that marriage exists solely for the purpose of procreation," Gadow said in the printed statement. "The Washington Supreme Court echoed that claim in their lead ruling on Andersen v. King County. The time has come for these conservatives to be dosed with their own medicine. If same-sex couples should be barred from marriage because they can not have children together, it follows that all couples who can not or will not have children together should equally be barred from marriage. And this is what the Defense of Marriage Initiative will do."

"Our agenda," Gadow explained in an accompanying statement, "is to shine a very bright light on the injustice and prejudice that underlie the Andersen decision by giving that decision the full force of law."

If passed, Initiative 957 would:

• add the phrase, "who are capable of having children with one another" to the legal definition of marriage;
• require that couples married in Washington file proof of procreation within three years of the date of marriage or have their marriage automatically annulled;
• require that couples married out of state file proof of procreation within three years of the date of marriage or have their marriage classed as "unrecognized;"
• establish a process for filing proof of procreation; and
• make it a criminal act for people in an unrecognized marriage to receive marriage benefits.

Gadow says that I-957 is the first of three initiatives planned by WA-DOMA. "The first initiative will make procreation a requirement for legal marriage. The second would prohibit divorce or separation when a married couple has children together. The third would make having a child together the equivalent of marriage."

It's a fascinating strategy that's far from the official position on marriage equality taken by groups like Equal Rights Washington and legislators in Olympia, but Gadow has similar aims even if he and his co-conspirators are approaching them in an unorthodox manner.

"Each of the initiatives we get passed will, no doubt, be struck down as unconstitutional by the state Supreme Court," Gadow admits.

He welcomes court challenges to the initiatives, calling such challenges WA-DOMA's "ultimate goal."

"Each ruling against these initiatives will also be a ruling against the basis for keeping the state?s Defense of Marriage Act," Gadow explained. "Eventually, Andersen will fall apart under the weight of judicial opinion, and equal marriage -- the marriage which we seek to defend -- shall become a reality in this state."

The WA-DOMA website has been relaunched, with more information about I-957 and a summary of things voters can do to help in the process.

Labels: I-957, initiative, marriage equality, politics, wa-doma, Washington

Prayer Warrior, horse-breeder, quickly washed-out football player, and discrimination activist Ken Hutchinson, who is awaiting review by the Secretary of State's office of his new discrimination initiative, admits to the Seattle Times writer Janet I. Tu that he has a "tremendous ego."

"That's why I played pro football," he said. "I'm taking that same ego and energy that benefited me in football and now putting it in for the glory of God to do his will and his work."

In that regard, his ambitions are bigger than ever. He talks of organizing an international summit: "I am building a force around the world."

And he's starting by trying to build pro-discrimination coalitions with Slavic immigrant churches in the Puget Sound area. Tu takes a look at one of them, in Kent, for today's fawning piece in the Times.

Hutcherson now hopes the alliance will result in signatures for an initiative he filed last week seeking to repeal a state law, passed a year ago, that adds sexual orientation to a state law banning discrimination based on race, gender, religion and other categories.

"We've got a lot of churches to reach," said Hutcherson, who must gather at least 224,800 valid signatures by July 6 to put the initiative on the fall ballot.

"We want to get the Slavic churches, the Russian-speaking churches, the Korean churches, Philippine, Chinese, white, cross-cultural. ... If we're going to win this fight on protecting traditional marriage, we're going to need all churches to work together."

But even if he doesn't eventually get the signatures, Hutcherson is generating plenty of publicity for his ministry at a church in Redmond that holds Sunday services in a public high-school. And he does seem to enjoy that publicity.

Ken Schramm, a fellow who apparently passes for something other than a right wing conservative within Fisher Broadcasting's local media constellation, last week awarded Hutcherson a Schramm bobble-head doll boobie prize called "The Schrammie" that seems to be a regular feature of one of Schramm's programs. Said the Schramm:

It takes a special kind of person to openly advocate for discrimination.

In this instance, it takes a man of stilted thinking; a man of narrow-minded focus, not to mention bigoted determination.

Indeed, in this case it takes...a man of God.

So would Rev. Ken Hutcherson please, step away from the pulpit and come on down.

Last week found the senior pastor at Antioch Bible Church trudging to Olympia to file an initiative that would repeal a state law banning discrimination against gays and lesbians.

It's been a while since we heard or saw one of his commentaries, but Schramm seems downright reasonable in this one instance:

The otherwise personable Rev. Hutcherson is on a crusade to smite those who seek nothing more than fair and equal treatment under the law.

So, for rising to his self-imposed challenge by sinking to an ecclesiastical low; for his disdain of the human condition and his spiteful desire to steal civil rights under the guise of God, take a bow Rev. Hutcherson, 'cause this "Schrammie's" for you.

Of course, he got plenty of emails from good Christians who attempted to explain to him why the man Schramm called "holier-than-thou self-proclaimed tool of God's avenging hand" really is just that. (But who didn't seem to explain why on earth that -- even if it's the case -- should be the basis for a state's laws.)

The reason we're not up on the current state of Mr. Schramm's thinking is this: The closest we ever get to KOMO, KVI, or any of Fisher's radio outlets is the wonderful Blatherwatch blog where Michael Hood is a kind of Perez Hilton of local talk radio (except, or course, that Blatherwatch uses funny and often insightful words instead of silly pictures -- which makes him not at all like Perez).

But even BlatherWatch had to mention Hutcherson clarifying an earlier note about what Ken Hutcherson does in his spare time.

We said Rev. Ken Hutcherson who raises race horses. We were wrong. He wrote to say: "I do not own race horses, they are cutting horses, quarter horses, for roping and cutting out cattle from the herd." The mega-churched ex-Seahawk preacher began his referendum signature drive to undo civil rights legislation for gays on Monday.

Hmm. "Cutting out cattle from the herd." We're not surprised he'd be enjoy that kind of thing.

BlatherWatch adds parenthetically (and probably all too hopefully):

If he doesn't succeed in getting it on the ballot and getting it passed, that'll prove once and for all that God is on the gays' side, and the good reverend will just go away, right?

After reading, in Slog, a reprint of Hutcherson's Prayer Warrior announcement touting yet another in an endless stream of media appearances, Northwest Progressive Institute detected a certain misunderstanding of the whole initiative process.

They kindly schooled the preacher in the technicalities, before concluding,

The real difficulty is getting enough signatures. It's hard to distort what this is about -- legalizing discrimination -- and most Washingtonians aren't interested in condoning bigotry. A signature drive that lacks a ton of money needs superb organization and coordination to make the ballot. At this juncture Hutcherson doesn't appear to have either, and that's good news. We'll be watching closely to see if he gets any help from someone who knows what they're doing.

Labels: equal rights, gay news, I-963, initiative, ken hutcherson, local bites, politics, Washington

One thing you've got to say for the opponents of the domestic partnership bill over at Faith & Freedom Network (FAFREN): They've figured out these interwebs tubes better than the folks at Equal Rights Washington (ERW).

While ERW sticks with occasional notes to their well-worn old-timey email list-server, FAFREN pumps out frequent updates on their issues by both email and and active blogs.

And it was FAFREN, not surprisingly, that got the first news to the tubes about today's hearing on the DP bill. And, in so doing, offer an early interpretation of the bill that oddly matches the criticism it's been getting from the hipsters at Slog [or maybe it's just the any-way-to-get-at-Pederseners at Slog].

Their report was written by FAFREN Olympia lobbyist Jon Russell and posted not just once, but four times to their site:

SB 5336 grants benefits commonly associated with marriage to same sex partners and unmarried heterosexual couples where at least one partner is over the age of 62.
The committee hearing-room was packed with an overflow audience in another room for large screen viewing. The testimony was broken into a panel of 8. Four people spoke in favor and four spoke against SB 5336.

The proponents of SB 5336 were four middle-aged lesbian women who have all experienced problems in life due to a non-legal standing associated with their choice not to be married [sic. Playing one of their old tunes]. All of the four proponents recognized that all of these domestic benefits are already available to them, but they have to pay more money than a married heterosexual couple to obtain legal contracts.

As for the opponents of the bill, four individuals spoke about the discrimination aspects of this bill. Our side was able to explain that by only limiting benefits to two groups of people, the bill discriminates against other relationships. This bill should also include siblings, a daughter taking care of her ailing mother and so forth. They also made the argument that the bill would most undoubtedly be challenged in court for discrimination of non-married heterosexual couples under the age 62.

The post doesn't mention if FAFREN will lobby to amendments to include more people within the scope of the bill, but it seems logical to expect that they will if this is really what bothers them about it. The post also doesn't explain why siblings or children aren't covered under current family visitation rules.

Russell notes that both a lawyer [unnamed in the post] who testified after the panels and Sen. Ed Murray both said that the difference between civil marriage and domestic partnerships would be "a political and emotional benefit."

Russell was pleased with his activist group's showing at the hearing:

As I sat and watched the faces of the supporters of SB 5336 standing around the room, I could tell we had called them out on their discrimination game. They expected our side to come in and use the same argument of incremental-ism. But truth has been revealed: this is a discriminating bill which is poorly written and, in our opinion, will not stand in a court of law. For this they had no answer.

A liberal State Representative was overheard in the hallway saying, "This most certainly changes the debate."

Labels: equal rights, legislature, marriage equality, politics, SB5336, Washington

In more light-hearted initiative news, the Secretary of State's office is also reviewing an initiative filed on January 10 by one Gregory Paul Gadow and his "wa-doma.org". DOMA? As in "Defense of Marriage Act"? What could be light-hearted about that?

Well, you must read the initiative on the website (which, sponsors say, will soon be upgraded with even more information).

Gadow takes last year's Washington Supreme Court decision to its absurd satirical limits with his initiative. Since the Court decided that marriage has meaning only as a mechanism for making babies, the WA-DOMA iniative sets a fecundity [such a great word] standard for marriage licences and creates the required bureaucracy to enforce the standards.

The website explains:

Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance was created on July 27, 2006. This January, WA-DOMA will propose an initiative to the people that will give Andersen the force of law while defending marriage from the worst consequences of that ruling. Under the initiative:

• Marriage will be restricted only to those couples able to have children together.
• Couples married in Washington will have three years from the date of their marriage or 18 months from the date the initiative becomes law, whichever is later, to either have children together or provide documentation that they have fulfilled the primary purpose of marriage. Failure to comply would result in the marriage being annulled.
• Couples married outside of Washington who live in this state will have three years from the date of their marriage or 18 months from the date the initiative becomes law or 30 days from the date they move into this state, whichever is later, to either have children or provide documentation that they have fulfilled the primary purpose of marriage. Failure to comply would result in the marriage being unrecognized as a valid marriage until proper documentation is filed.

We caught up with Gadow (via email) between his frequent news-list postings, and slipped on our woefully undeserved Mrs. Colbert hat to ask a few questions:

In its marriage decision last year, the Court gave a lot of advice to the Washington legislature, but failed to note the obvious need for a law like the one you're proposing. Is it frustrating for you to do the work of the Court?
It is. The Washington Suprme Court found that there is a "legitimate state interest" in preserving legal marriage for the purpose of "having and raising children." And yet the state constitution prohibits laws which are not applied equally (see Article I, Section 12.)

We are disappointed that the Court did not follow through on their ruling: if legal marriage does, in fact, exist for the purpose of having and raising children, and if for this reason same-sex couples may be barred from legal marriage, then the Washington constitution requires that marriage be reserved ONLY for the purpose of having and raising children, regardless of the genders of the married couple.

When the Court refuses to act and the Legislature dares not legislate, it is necessary for the People to take action.

Do you plan to run for a position on the state Supreme Court?
Most certainly not. My skin is too thin, my financial backers are too few and my sense of justice is far too strong.

Would you change your name to "Johnson" if you ran?
No.

Clearly you are worried about the fecundity of Washington's married couples. Do you think your initiative will contribute to a baby explosion in Washington?
I don't think that will happen: most childless couples I know would rather have their marriage annulled than become parents. I dare say that is a common sentiment.

Have you asked for campaign donations from the maternity department at Swedish Hospital?
There's a thought. I will put them down on my contact list, thanks.

Have you considered asking for donations from anti-immigrant groups? (After all, they're often worried about the fecundity-gap between nativists and immigrant groups?)
Another good idea. Could you provide some recommendations and contact info?

Do you think your initiative will help close the fecundity gap?
We haven't discussed this initiative in terms of a "fecundity gap." The only gaps we've been concerned with are the logical gaps found in the lead opinion for Andersen v. King County.

Have you asked for campaign contributions from Mars Hill Church which is also concerned with the fecundity gap?
My contact list already includes a large list of individuals who should find the Defense of Marriage Initiative perfectly aligned with their rhetoric. Included on that list are the Rev. Mark Driscoll of the Mars Hill Church in Seattle and the Rev. Ken Hutcherson of the Antioch Bible Church in Kirkland.

You're asking for donations to help fund your initiative campaign. Do you plan to move to Mukilteo?
Good gracious, NO! I already live on Capitol Hill in Seattle, in walking distance to both my job and the entire downtown retail core. Why on earth would I want to move anywhere else?

The initiative is still being reviewed by the Secretary of State's office and has not yet been assigned a number.

Labels: gay news, I-957, initiative, marriage equality, politics, wa-doma, Washington

Discrimination activist and Eastside preacher Ken Hutcherson on Friday filed his expected pro-discrimination initiative with the Secretary of State. It has not yet been given a number, but is expected to be virtually identical to a version that he filed in November.

Hutcherson filed the new initiative under his name using an Olympia PO Box, Antioch Church telephone numbers, and the email address HutchforTraditionalMarriage@hotmail.com. In November, 2006, he pre-filed an initiative "Related to amending the laws against discrimination." Last year's filing allows for quicker review of the current version. The text of the 2006 initiative is available here, in pdf format.

Hutcherson, a one-time NFL football player who is pastor of a large Redmond church that meets in a school building, achieved a spot of fame in 2005 by protesting Microsoft's then-quiet support for the anti-discrimination law that finally passed last year. Hutcherson managed to get Microsoft to temporarily withdraw its support for the law in 2005, but it was a short victory. After an outcry from employees, the Redmond company reaffirmed its support for the law and backed its passage last year.

After the anti-discrimination law passed last year, Hutcherson announced that he would lead a boycott of Microsoft because of that stance, but little was heard about the boycott beyond an initial flurry of press releases from Hutcherson's church.

Hutcherson's November filing was what liberal blogger David Goldstein called a "warning shot" that had this extra advantage:

By refiling the identical initiative on Jan. 2, with the initiative language already approved, Hutcherson gets a few extra days in 2007 to gather signatures, and four extra weeks this month [Dec. 2006] to organize his anti-fag army. Hutcherson is many things, but stupid is not one of them.

That initiative was, in turn, virtually identical to Tim Eyman's Initiative which failed to qualify for the ballot last year. It "This measure removes references to "sexual orientation" or "sexual preference" including heterosexuality, homosexuality, bisexuality, gender expression, identity, appearance and behavior from the state's law against discrimination in employment, housing, and public accommodations."

Goldstein wasn't impressed by last year's Equal Rights Washington (ERW) spinoff that was set up to battle Eyman's initiative.

It will take far more than a smug (and white) group of Seattle libs launching a web site and handing out flyers to derail Hutcherson. It will take money -- a lot of it. It will take a prolonged statewide media campaign featuring a bipartisan roster of Washington's political, business, and cultural leaders. And it will take serious outreach into Hutcherson's religious base of support, speaking with pastors, other religious leaders, and their congregations about, for example, Jesus' teachings on discrimination, forgiveness, and the judging of others.

Goldstein's smug Seattle-lib dismissal of last year's efforts by the awkwardly named "Washington Won't Discriminate" (which becomes "WWD" and therefore sounds vaguely Cheneyesqe) fails to recognize that WWD was born of two groups, both ERW and the "Religious Coalition for Equality". The Coalition's "Faith Statement in Support of Antidiscrimination" and outreach to religious leaders throughout the state did just what Goldstein says they should have done.

WWD was disbanded after Eyman's initiative failed to qualify, but the campaign certainly seemed to understand the need for media outreach and for the money needed to make that happen. Would their campaign have worked or would they have dismissed as "a smug (and white) group of Seattle libs"? Since the campaign never really got under way, it's impossible to tell. Unfortunately, we'll have another chance this year to find out.

Labels: equal rights, gay news, I-963, initiative, ken hutcherson, politics, Washington

The anti-equality activist at the so-called "Faith & Freedom Network," (aka Gary Randall) reports that a hearing will be held in the House for the domestic partnership bill on Thursday, January 25 at 3:30 p.m. in Olympia.

He promises, "We will be at the hearing."

Labels: equal rights, gay news, HB1351, legislature, marriage equality, politics, Washington

The domestic partnership (DP) bill introduced early in this session has garnered 21 co-sponsors in the 49-member Senate and 56 co-sponsors in the 98-member House. Senate cosponsors include both the chamber's majority leader, Lisa Brown of Spokane's 3rd district, and the president pro-tem, Rosa Franklin, who represents Lakewood, Parkland, University Place in Pierce County.

That's a good start, but a map of the Senate sponsors' districts demonstrates the kind of Cascade + Sound curtain that is all too familiar in Washington politics.

Blue on the map shows the districts of the Senate sponsors. There isn't a lot of blue on a statewide map because most of the initial support for the bill comes from Senators who represent heavily populated urban districts. (Legislative districts are drawn to give each a statistically equal population, so more densely populated districts cover less area.)

Even Brown's Spokane district which wraps around Gonzaga is the most densely populated district in that mostly Republican county. There is also a touch of blue in Clark County where Craig Pridemore represents much of Vancouver and the area north toward Hazel Dell.

King County sponsors

• Ed Murray, D-43 Seattle (Capitol Hill, U District)
• Jeanne Kohl-Welles, D-36 Seattle (Queen Anne, Ballard, Fremont)
• Adam Kline, D-37 Seattle (Madrona, Rainier Valley, Seward Park)
• Ken Jacobsen, D-46 Seattle (Laurelhurst, Lake City, Northgate, Greenwood)
• Erik Poulsen, D-34 West Seattle, Vashon Island
• Margarita Prentice, D-11 South Seattle, Tukwila, Renton
• Karen Keiser, D-33 Des Moines, Sea Tac, Kent
• Darlene Fairley, D-32 Shoreline, Lake Forest Park, Kenmore
• Rosemary McAuliffe D-1 Bothell, Mountlake Terrace, Maltby
• Eric Oemig, D-45 Redmond, Woodinville, Duvall
• Rodney Tom, D-48 Bellevue (north), Redmond, Clyde Hill, Medina
• Brian Weinstein, D-41 Bellevue, Mercer Island, Newcastle

Snohomish, Pierce, and Kitsap County sponsors

• Jeane Berkey, D-38 Everett, Marysville
• Steve Hobbs, D-44 Snohomish, Marysville, Lake Stevens, Mill Creek
• Phil Rockefeller, D-23 Bainbrige, Kingston
• Debbie Regala, D-27 Tacoma (Commencement Bay)
• Rosa Franklin, D-29 [President Pro Tem] Lakewood, Parkland, University Place

Other Puget Sound area sponsors

• Harriet Spanel, D-40 Bellingham, San Juan Islands
• Karen Fraser, D-22 Olympia, Tumwater, Lacey

Sponsors from beyond Puget Sound

• Craig Pridemore, D-49 Vancouver, Hazel Dell
• Lisa Brown, D-3 [Majority Leader] Spokane (Gonzaga area)

Sponsorship of a bill is only one sign of the eventual support it might have. The DP bill and its companion marriage equality bill (which doesn't yet have a Senate co-sponsor to join Murray) haven't yet been given even their initial hearings. The DP bill, especially, is likely to gather more support from legislators willing to vote for it, but not to sign on as sponsors.


But the early list of sponsors shows that the bill already runs the risk of being tagged an urban measure. The problem is obvious even in King County where sponsorship support falls off significantly in the south end.

The county's expansive 5th District, which stretches along I-90 from Issaquah to Snoqualamie Pass and includes Maple Valley, is represented in the Senate by Cheryl Pflug, a Republican and in the House by two Republicans, Jay Rodne and Glenn Anderson. Like all members of the GOP caucus, they're keeping their distance from the DP measure.

South of there, the 47th District, encompassing much of the Green River valley including Covington and Black Diamond, is represented by three Democrats, Senator Claudia Kauffman and Reprentatives Geoff Simpson and Pat Sullivan. Although there is significant support in their party caucus for the DP measure, none of those legislators has signed on to sponsor the bill. [Update: Both Rep. Sullivan and Rep. Simpson are co-sponsors of the house bill. Sen. Kauffman has not signed on as a co-sponsor of the senate version.]

The 30th District (Federal Way, Milton, and Pacific) is reprented by two Democrats -- Sen. Tracey Eide and Rep. Mark Miloscia -- and a Republican -- Rep. Skip Priest . None of them have become co-sponsors.

The 31st District, including Auburn, Enumclaw, Sumner, and Buckley, is split between King and Pierce Counties and represented by the Roach family -- Ma' Pam in the Senate and sonny Dan in the House -- and by Democratic Rep. Christopher Hurst. The Roaches are among the more conservative salons in Olympia and are likely to be active opponents of the bill. Hurst is a former cop who returns to the House after leaving his seat six years ago. He contributed to the Democrat's landslide last November by winning a tightly contested race but his is considered a conservative district. He's an unlikely sponsor.

But the eventual fate of the bill will depend on supporters of this baby-step toward equality contacting their legislators in all those parts of the map that aren't colored blue. Equal Rights Washington [ERW] urges supporters to contact legislators. Anti-equality activists are also gearing up to defeat even the relatively innocuous domestic-partnership bill.

The marriage-equality bill is not expected -- even by its sponsors --to pass in this session, but the simpler partnership bill that would grant limited rights and benefits to domestic partners including "hospital visitation, health care decision-making, organ donation decisions, and other issues related to illness, incapacity, and death." [From the bill [pdf].]

The regional and the urban/rural split in sponsorship indicates that bill's fate depends a great deal on the statewide network that both ERW and the Pride Foundation claim to have built. This will become a significant test.

Labels: equal rights, gay news, HB1351, legislature, marriage equality, politics, SB5336, Washington

• Mess-o-potamia: Activists say that Bush's proposed surgelette of American troops in Iraq is unlikely to help gay and lesbian Iraqis who continue to be targeted by death squads, sometimes operated by US-allied factions.
• Noble scolding: Nobel laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu scolded his fellow Anglicans -- and especially his fellow African bishops -- for worrying too much about gay priests in the US and not enough about disease, poverty, and malnutrition in Africa. But then, rich conservative US parishes aren't lining up to join Tutu.
• Silly scolding: ABC scolded its Grey's Anatomy star Isaiah Washington for once again using the a slur at the Golden Globes. He apologized and refrained, this time, from using the word yet again.

• Sillier: Before firing him, the Donald scolded a hawt gay Apprentice candidate for being too gay. At least he didn't call him a "degenerate."
• Irredeemably silly: American Id... No, we can't stand to even think of it, let alone link.
• Cost of censorship: Little Sisters, the great LGBT bookstore in Vancouver won't be getting any help from Ottawa for the huge legal bills it racked up over two decades of fighting "oppressive and dismissive" customs officers who tried to keep foreign erotica out of the store.
• Sort of supportive: Gov. Gregoire kind of said that she kind of supports Murray and Pedersen's domestic partnership bill and indicated to LGBT activists that she might, kind of, sign it if it passes. (If it could be made really noisy, ugly, and view-blocking, it might have a better chance with her.)
• Supportive congregation: Parishioners prayed outside a hearing where church officials gathered to decide the fate of the gay Lutheran minister who got into trouble because he has what folks used to call a "companion."

Labels: gay news, news bites, politics, religion, TV

We've mentioned a few other cases similar to this in News Bites, and now we find another divorce case -- this one in Rhode Island -- is that might raise interesting issues about marriage rights.

After it was asked by a family court trial judge to rule on legal issues in a divorce petition from a lesbian couple married in Massachusetts, the Rhode Island Supreme Court said yesterday that it needs more information about a gay couple?s marriage before it can decide whether a state court has jurisdiction over what is believed to be the Rhode Island?s first gay divorce case.

Some conservative groups worry that this case, and others like it, are stepping dangerously close to the kind of marriage equality that they fear. A Massachusetts anti-equality activist called the case a "ploy to get the legal system to recognize gay marriage, through divorce."

Attorneys for the gay couple say they aren't asking Rhode Island to recognize same-sex marriage, just same-sex divorce. But Peter LaBarbera with Americans for Truth doesn?t buy that argument.

"I think if you recognize same-sex divorce, you're recognizing same-sex marriage. It's amazing how political the activists are. The problem here is we're dealing with a very political movement and Americans on the side of decency and truth just aren't as political as the gay activists."

The same fellow can't believe that this could be a situation where a couple is just trying to sort out personal legal issues after the dissolution of a long-term relationship.

"The modus operandi of the homosexual activists is to use anything possible, even divorce, to win approval of their lifestyle. That's what the main agenda is. They are desperate for approval of their lifestyle and even if it means recognizing gay divorce as opposed to gay marriage, they'll do that."

(And, of course, the modus operandi of conservative groups is to use any case like this to push their pro-discrimination agenda. Isn't it amazing how political those activists are?)

Ever at the ready to plumb such fears, Fox News argues that these cases could become more common.

Courts nationwide could soon find themselves facing similar dilemmas, especially as more and more same-sex couples are married in Massachusetts, said Janet Halley, a professor at Harvard Law School who researches the topic. Marital status could potentially become an issue in insurance, benefit, child custody and property cases, among others.

Back in September, the San Francisco Chronicle considered some of the issues faced by lesbian or gay couples after a partnership dissolves. Few of the issues seem to be related to any kind of movement "agenda."

Many of the problems arise when ex-partners calculate their federal income taxes. For example, a California judge might order one to regularly pay the other a certain amount of money, like alimony. But, because the federal government does not recognize same-sex couples, the Internal Revenue Code treats that income as a gift and taxes it at a higher level than alimony. And, although alimony payments are deductible for straight ex-spouses, someone who has left a same-sex union can't take that deduction.

Similarly unsettled issues arise with pensions, retirement accounts and other property....

"Courts are going to be facing cases involving same-sex relationships that they haven't faced before," said Ellen Kahn, director of the Family Project for the Human Rights Campaign, a national gay and lesbian rights organization.

Vermont, which recognizes same-sex civil partnerships, has slowly started to tackle new issues in divorce. "This is truly a brave new world for us," Vermont's deputy secretary of state William Dalton told the Chronicle. "Anyone who steps out first is going to create as many questions as answers."

California courts have recognized a Canadian marriage and a Vermont union in order to dissolve them. Those dissolutions likely would hold up in a Vermont courtroom, just as an out-of-state divorce decree would, said William Dalton.... But that remains untested.

A New York Law School professor who edits a monthly newsletter on LGBT legal issues and regularly blogs on the issues, believes that the justices in Rhode Island might be concerned that they would, indeed, have to address broader issues if they were to take the divorce case.

Arther S. Leonard detects the concern in the questions that Rhode Island's Supreme Court directed back to the family court judge.

In posing these questions, the court seemed to be signalling a suspicions that this was some sort of put-up case rather than a genuine case, solely brought for the purpose of getting the Supreme Court to make a definitive ruling on whether Rhode Island will recognize same-sex marriages that Rhode Islanders contract in Massachusetts.

But Leonard doesn't think the Rhode Island courts have to worry about anything but the specific case before them of a broken relationship.

So - to hazard some speculation here, I would suggest that what the Family Court judge should really be thinking about is whether there is some important reason of established Rhode Island public policy for refusing to make its courts available to its own residents for the purpose of dissolving a marriage that was validly made in another state, or, put another way, whether denying access to its courts for this purpose would significantly advance any important state policy. The RI Supreme Court is trying to make this into a de facto marriage recognition case, but it needn't be unless they really want it to be.

Divorce is generally a painful process for any couple that breaks up -- whether they're gay or not. Activist agendas might contribute to a couple's decision to marry, but it's far less likely to play a role in divorce.

Labels: gay news, marriage equality, politics

The good news is that over three-quarters of school districts in Washington let their teachers at least mention homosexuality in sex-ed courses. The bad news: In 23% of the state's districts, it can't even be mentioned. (The bright side: Given what they'd probably say if they mentioned us, we should be relieved that they aren't talking.)

This shouldn't be surprising in a state where even Al Gore's award-winning documentary on global warming proved too controversial for the Federal Way district.

According to a report released yesterday by a coalition of groups lobbying to require "medically accurate sex education" in the state, there's a ways to go in that regard:

Nearly a third of Washington's school districts do not allow teachers to discuss condoms or any other form of contraception except for abstinence in their sex education classes, according to a new report paid for by a coalition working to reduce pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases among teens.

A bill in the current legislative session aims to change that situation.

The new state guidelines outline medically and scientifically accurate sex education. Rep. Shay Schual-Berke, D-Normandy Park, introduced a bill Tuesday that would make medically accurate sex education mandatory in Washington schools that choose to teach sex education. HIV-AIDS education is mandatory in Washington, but general sex education is not.

The medical doctor turned legislator said she is optimistic about the bill's chances this legislative session, because leaders in both the House and Senate have said they would make its approval a priority.

Schual-Berke explained the importance of medically accurate sex education by talking about the impact when a teacher tells her students that condoms don't work, presumably because they want to discourage kids from being sexually active.

Instead, research has shown, the students are sexually active, but they don't use condoms because they think they don't work, Schual-Berke said.

Lifelong AIDS Alliance lists the "Healthy Youth Act" as one of its legislative priorities for this session.

Lifelong notes:

As estimates suggest that 25% of new HIV infections occur among young people 22 and under, a comprehensive approach is crucial to giving young people the tools they need to prevent HIV infection.

Labels: gay news, HB1297, HB1855, legislature, politics, SB5297, Seattle, Washington