D-Day

It looks like a decision has been reached.

The California Supreme Court decision on Prop H8 could be announced tomorrow, which, oddly enough, is the 30th anniversary of the White Night riots.

The riots were a reaction from the gay community in response to the extraordinarily lenient sentence--voluntary manslaughter--given to Dan White for the double murders of San Francisco supervisor Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone. The ensuing riots on May 21, 1979 caused hundreds of thousands of dollars in damage.

Even more strange is that the next day, May 22, would have been Harvey Milk's 79th birthday.

I hope the California Supreme Court makes Harvey proud, and moves this country one step closer towards equality for all it's citizens.

UPDATE: Now it appears the decision will not be announced tomorrow, so as not to coincide with the White Night Riots anniversary. It will, apparently be announced next Tuesday, the 26th, or Thursday the 28th or Monday June ist.

This Week In Holy Crimes

from Joe.My.God., of course.

West Virginia: Pastor Sandy Martin Cook sentenced to 20 - 60 years in prison for child molestation.

Alabama: Youth Pastor Charles Miller pleads guilty to possession of child pornography, may get 15 years in prison.

Connecticut: Pastor Vernitt Hoheb charged with sexual assault on 16 year-old parishioner.

Massachusetts: Pastor Ana Paula Almeida charged with rape of 13 year-old. Wisconsin: Pastor David J. Fogderud convicted of obstruction of justice in an altercation at a Burger King where he harassed two teen boys and demanded they accompany him to a Christian rock concert.

Rwanda: Father Emmanuel Uwayezu charged with war crimes in massacre of over 60 students at the Catholic school where he was headmaster.

This week's winner:

Florida: Pastor Robert Riddle will go to prison for 15 years for exploitation of the elderly unless he pays back the $90,000 he embezzled from a 91 year-old woman. The woman's family only agreed to the probation deal because they desperately need the money back to keep her in the assisted-living elderly home where she lives. Riddle has resigned from his church in another scandal over the purchase of a $300,000 personal aircraft. In 1988 he was sentenced to five years in prison for defrauding an Alabama church.

Bob and Carlos.....Angels and Demons...Which One Am I?

So, Carlos and I went to see Angels & Demons the other day. We enjoyed it, though it wasn't as thrilling as The DaVinci Code. But then the book wasn't as thrilling. Still it was good. Intrigue. Drama, Tom Hanks. Beautiful scenery, Hot Italian men.

But, as usual there are Carlos-isms to deal with. Like how I buy a soda before we go in, and I get the big one, the one that comes on wheels and has handles so you can shuttle it into the theater. As I sit down, I say to Carlos, "Do you want some soda?"

"Not yet," is his reply.

So we settle in and enjoy the movie. I, of course, have also purchased the garbage can sized bucket'o'popcorn and Carlos says he wants none of it. S'okay, I am a popcorn junkie and I know I'll finish it off. So I crunch the corn and sip the coke.

Crunch. Sip. Crunch. Sip.

Soon the corn is gone and it's SipSipSip. For two hours. The credits roll and then, and only then, does Carlos reach over, pick up the industrial vat of soda and whimper, "It's all gone."

Uh yeah, It's been two hours!

Now, another Carlos-ism. And I can read him like a book. Well, maybe not a book, but a short story....okay a comic strip. A single-panel comic strip.

We're watching Angels & Demons, and there is the obligatory high-speed race through Rome, and I know what Carlos is gonna say, so I sit and wait. And wait. And wait.

Finally, it comes.

"Pretty car."

We once sat through a very heavy dramatic film and in one extremely powerful scene, Carlos nudges me and says, "What do you think of that lamp for the living room?"

Now, I will, for purposes of full-disclosure, reveal my Bob-isms. The afore-mentioned Vat'o'Coke and Barrel'o'Popcorn we've already discussed. But I also do a very annoying cheerleader like clap when the previews begin. I do loves me some previews. And, of course, after each preview, I review it and give a one-word ruling.

No.

Rental.

Cheese.

Maybe.

Good.

Although lately I give more Nos and Cheeses than anything else.

What can I say, it's a gift.

No Change We Can Believe In

Here is the latest evidence of what our country is losing under Don't Ask, Don't Tell, the law that prevents gay men and women from serving openly in the US armed forces.

Lieutenant Colonel Victor J. Fehrenbach, a fighter weapons systems officer, has been flying the F-15E Strike Eagle since 1998. He has flown numerous missions against Taliban and al-Qaida targets, including the longest combat mission in his squadron's history. On September 11, 2001, as the terrorist attacks were going on in this country, Lt. Col. Fehrenbach was handpicked to fly sorties above our nation's capital.

He has received at least 30 awards and decorations including nine air medals, one of them for heroism, as well as campaign medals for Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraq. He is now a flight instructor in Idaho, where he has passed on his skills to more than 300 future Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force weapons systems officers.

Since 1987, when Fehrenbach entered Notre Dame on a full Air Force ROTC scholarship, the government has invested twenty-five million dollars in training and equipping him to serve his country, which he has done with what anyone would agree was great distinction. He comes from a military family. His father was a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel, his mother an Air Force nurse and captain.

Lt. Col. Fehrenbach has honored that tradition.

Now he's out of the Air Force. He's gay, so he's out.

This is what our country is doing to its dedicated servicemen and women.
This is not America.

Not In The City Of Brotherly Love?

Repugnant Senator John Eichelberger held a news conference yesterday to announce the introduction of a bill to amend Pennsylvania's Constitution banning marriage equality.

In other words, he would like discrimination written into the states Constitution.bill's introduction.

That's the bad good; the good news--or the not-so-bad news, is that similar measures in the last two sessions of the legislature have failed.

Now, while Pennsylvania law defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman, Eichelberger says writing the ban into the constitution would prevent a judge from overturning the law.

Again, I love how they can so easily say the words 'ban' and 'constitution' in the same sentence and not realize exactly what it is they are doing.

It will be an uphill battle, because amending the constitution requires approval from both the House and Senate in two consecutive two-year sessions before the measure goes to voters for final approval in a statewide referendum.

It takes a lot of work to get hate in to the Constitution.

The Little Church That Could

The Reverend Diana Holbert, pastor of little Grace United Methodist Church, took a swipe at big First Baptist Church of Dallas on Sunday with a sermon titled "Why Gay Is OK." Her message was in direct response to a sermon delivered by First Baptist Pastor Dr. Robert Jeffress entitled "Why Gay Is Not OK."

Now, I get that a lot of these holy-rollers don't like The Gays, but it always makes me wonder, how they can preach such things in the name of god--little g. It really is hatred and bigotry and ignorance and fear, all rolled up in a neat little package and served as an appetizer to Sunday brunch.

"I knew I had to preach about this," the Rev. Diana Holbert said, telling her diverse East Dallas congregation that homosexuality is not a big issue in the Bible and that Christians should be more focused on subjects such as health care, greed in the corporate world, and the welfare of children.

During her sermon, Holbert said, "God doesn't discard or discriminate....The Bible has often been used to attack gay and lesbian persons. Let's put a stop to that."

Dr. Jeffress issued his rebuttal to Holbert's sermon before her service began, saying--and this is another problem I have with these people--"I wonder if her follow-up message will be 'Why Adultery is OK' or 'Why Incest is OK.' "

Ah, yes, The Gays are the equivalent of incest and adultery; we caused the economic crisis and global warming; blame us for waterboarding, too, while you're at it. Lindsay Lohan and Perez Hilton? Our fault.

"The Bible says sex is reserved for a man and a woman in a marriage relationship," Jeffress continued. "Once you reject God's Word as our absolute authority in all matters, then any perversion is permissible."

So, if gay is OK, than any perversion will do.

Reverend Holbert, whose husband is a professor at Southern Methodist University's Perkins School of Theology, chose her words slowly, unlike Jeffress, in responding after her sermon. She said she had never met Jeffress. "I want to be careful," she said in an interview. "I don't want to call him anti-scholastic. I don't want to get in a fight with him. I kind of feel sorry for him."

I feel sorry for him, too, because if you believe that God--big g--is love, then Jeffress has missed the boat.

I Loves Me Some Ellen

Ellen DeGeneres Commencement Speech at Tulane University, May 16, 2009

Call Me Crazy, But......

.....if all football players looked and dressed like Mark Sanchez, perhaps I'd be more interested in the game.
Just sayin'.

Click 'em....you know you want to.

Foot In Mouth Disease

Arkansas state Senator Kim Hendren, the only announced Republican candidate for U.S. Senator against Democratic incumbent Blanche Lincoln in 2010, has apologized for referring to Senator Chuck Schumer as "that Jew," at a county Republican meeting last week.

Yes. He didn't call him Chuck. And he didn't call him Schumer. And he didn't even use a John McCain "That one." Nope, he said, "that Jew."

"I don't use a teleprompter and occasionally I put my foot in my month," Hendren explained.

I don't use one either Senator, and I have never spoken like that.

Then Hendren goes on: "At the meeting I was attempting to explain that unlike Senator Schumer, I believe in traditional values, like we used to see on 'The Andy Griffith Show.....'"

He apparently believes we need to live in a fictional B&W town of the early 60s.

".....I made the mistake of referring to Senator Schumer as 'that Jew' and I should not have put it that way as this took away from what I was trying to say."

Yeah, anti-Semitism has a way of taking away from your original intent, that of living in an all-white rural town from an old TV show.

Arkansas, really? You could be so much better than that.

Kibbles'n'Bits

Things that are funny, that bug me, or that I just plain don't like.
____________________________


Carlos went on a tear about the History Channel this morning.
The History Channel?
The History Channel.
Seems they did a story on logging and he didn't like it and he wants them to stop showing it.
Choose your sides people.

_____________________________


In the backwards state of South Carolina the legislature has tabled any discussion of raising the cigarette tax because they can't agree on how to spend the money. South Carolina's cigarette tax is the lowest in the country.
I have never seen so many smokers in my life. It's a wonder there isn't a permanent haze over the entire region.

_____________________________


Call me callous, but I am not liking the, what I think of as, exploitation of Farrah Fawcett's battle with cancer.
Don't get me wrong, I think it's important to discuss the treatments she's getting because it may give someone else hope in their battle. But do we have to show her son crawling into bed, crying with her? Does it have to get so personal?
I think someone is doing this for the money. Are you listening Ryan?

______________________________


Mel Gibson. Homophobe. Anti-Semite. Asshat Catholic.
Divorces his wife and now word is he has a pregnant girlfriend.
Yeah, he's a good Catholic. Pig.
In case you're wondering, um, I don't like him.
Yeah.

_____________________________


Anyone who knows me knows I do not like Celine Dion.
Almost as much as I don't like Mel. Almost. I never saw Titanic because of her and that damned song.
Sometimes I really wish her heart wouldn't go on.
I know, too much, but still.......So, when I saw this at The Gospel According To Mikey, I knew I'd post it.
Enjoy The Amazing? Celine Dion.

___________________________


Lindsay Lohan and Perez Hilton are apparently the most Googled Gays on the Internet.
Quite a pair.
I think the struggle for equality just got harder if these two media-whores are the most Googled Gays.
___________________________

Paris Hilton.

That's all.

Keep Your Promise Mister President

Please take a moment and go to the Courage Campaign website and sign the petition asking President Obama to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell. This is just another form of discrimination the LGBT community faces and one more hurdle we have to overcome.

Thousands have been discharged from the military because of three words:

I am gay.

It must stop. Now.

Sign the petition at Courage Campaign.

A New Kind Of Hero

On Saturday, Denver resident Ethan McNamee was front and center at the Colorado State Capitol pushing for same sex marriage in his state. McNamee arranged for the rally because he's been hearing a lot more anti-gay remarks used to taunt people, and because there is a same-sex couple that lives in his neighborhood who are not allowed the same rights and privileges as other Americans.

Ethan McNamee got angry, and then he got busy.

"Everybody is different in a good way," he said. Ethan believes that if two people love each other that is the only issue to be considered, so he took it upon himself to arrange the rally and line up the guest speakers. He admitted it was more work then he thought it would be, but adds it was fun.

So, listen and watch the news reports of Ethan McNamee's marriage equality rally in Denver.

Oh, yeah, one more thing: Ethan McNamee is in the third grade at Montclair Elementary.

Ethan McNamee is the future. And he's my newest hero.

Arkansas Asshat....Or Is That Redunant?

Is it just me, or does he look like he's about to break into "Texas (or Arkansas) Has A Whorehouse In It ... Lord Have Mercy On Our Souls"?

from the Arkansas Times about Doyle Webb, the head of the Arkansas GOP:

"What a stitch that guy is. First, he tells the Arkansas Times blog that it "doesn't ring a bell" that he might have warned his GOP brethren that a lesbian respresentative could ascend to head the legislature's budget committee. Then he tells Michael Wickline of the Arkansas Democrat Gazette--lying not being one of the family values engraved on his bosom--that he did, and here's why: she could "influence a change" in our attitudes toward marriage.

Webb, the state GOP head, tells Wickline he says he's afraid state Rep. Kathy Webb (no relation) could, once chairing the budget committee, undo Act 1, the new law enacted by Arkansas voters that would keep foster children away from all those evil homosexuals who are trying to snatch up little kids and throw them in the oven. Better they go to the homes of self-proclaimed Christians who are actually making videos of them in the bathroom.

Webb has been sounding the lesbian alert at Republican fund-raising dinners throughout the spring. He's spent a lot of time thinking about Kathy Webb and her partner, and their lesbian agenda, apparently."

Stupid and a liar. The same old GOP.

My Kind of Announcement!

I saw this over at Mark's place, Tales Of The Sissy, and thought I'd steal it....because I like it.....and because I can.

Thanks Mark!

(p.s. Click it....it gets bigger)

Wisconsin Readies For Battle

The Wisconsin State Supreme Court announced that it will hear a challenge to the 2006 constitutional amendment that prohibited same-sex marriage. This challenge was filed in 2007 by a straight man, Bill McConkey, a Door County resident who teaches at the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh, and who has a daughter who is gay. McConkey argued that the constitutional change was improperly put before voters in 2006; he said voters should have been asked to vote on two separate amendments, instead of the one put before them.

Lester Pines, McConkey's attorney, said the wording of the 2006 constitutional amendment improperly asked voters to do two things: define the only valid marriage as between a man and woman and define the legal rights of the unmarried.

Julaine K. Appling, president of Wisconsin Family Action, which helped lead the campaign to pass the amendment, is "cautiously optimistic" that it would be upheld by the court. The ban on gay marriage will stay in place if justices stay away from any "personal agendas" and "interpret the law, and not make law," Appling said.

The personal agenda of ending discrimination against a select group of Americans? That personal agenda. Miss Appling?

The decision by the Supreme Court to hear the case came days before the Legislature's Joint Finance Committee considers the proposal of Democratic Governor Jim Doyle to legalize registries that would give same-sex couples the right to register with local officials to obtain legal privileges now limited to heterosexual couples.

The governor wants a baby step, registries and such, while a father just wants his daughter to have the same rights and privileges afforded all Americans.

Michael $teele'$ New Tactic

Let's see. The Repugs tired to scare the hell out of us with gay marriage in 2000, and that worked...for a while.

Then they tried scarin' the hell out of us with threats of terrorist attacks in 2004, and that worked pretty well, too.

What to do now? All those activist judges and unruly legislatures passin' gay marriage left and right; we can't scare people with that.

What to do? What to do?

I got it! Hit 'em in the wallet. in these tough economic times let's scare the hell out of the conservatives by telling them that gay marriage will cost them money.

Apparently, to GOP Chair Michael Steele thinks the Repugs can reach a broader base by using same-sex marriage as an issue that could financially hurt small businesses that are forced to spend more on health care and other benefits, saying:

“Now all of a sudden I’ve got someone who wasn’t a spouse before, that I had no responsibility for, who is now getting claimed as a spouse that I now have financial responsibility for,” Steele told Republicans at the state convention in traditionally conservative Georgia. “So how do I pay for that? Who pays for that? You just cost me money.”

But, Michael, down here in South Carolina? I have a question? How is the idea of a male employee marrying another man, or a female employee marrying a women, any different than a male employee marrying a woman?

It doesn't cost more, asshat.

Same old GOP.....DOA.

And Michael? Yeah. Me again. South Carolina. Um, Mike? How do you explain this:

A new study says the over 12,000 same-sex marriages performed in Massachusetts since 2004 have pumped over $111 million into the state's economy.
Huh? What? Huh?
The report from the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law says a typical same-sex couple spent about $7,400 on their wedding, with one in ten couples spending over $20,000.

And a second study by the same group found that young, highly educated people in same-sex relationships were 2.5 times more likely to move to Massachusetts after 2004 than before gay marriage became legal.

Looks like gay marriage is a money-maker.

Back to the drawing board, Mikey.

Count Us In

Gay US representatives Tammy Baldwin, Barney Frank and Jared Polis, along with 48 other congressional members, recently sent a letter to Office of Management and Budget director Peter Orszag asking that the 2010 Census count same-sex married couples rather than altering their status.

See, last year, the Bush regime--citing the Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibits the federal government from recognizing same-sex unions--declared that lawfully married same-sex couples who marked “married” on their census forms would have their status changed to “unmarried partners” in the final count.

Now, congressional members are calling on Orszag to reverse course.

The U.S. Census Bureau conducts its survey every 10 years, and during the last census, no state had legalized same-sex marriages. Now, however, we have the great states of Iowa, Vermont and Massachusetts; meanwhile, Vermont, Maine, and New Hampshire have approved marriage-equality laws that will be in effect by the time of the count. And let's not forget that there are some 18,000 same-sex marriages currently in question in California that are reportedly unlikely to be annulled by the state supreme court even if Prop H8 is upheld.

The thing about the census: if you don't count us, we don't count.

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It's Hate, Y'all, No Matter How You Try To Mask It

This, y'all, is ignorance, South Carolina style.

Lawmakers have given key approval to a new teen dating violence policy that excludes references to gay relationships. In a 75 to 25 vote, the House approved a bill that will require the state's school districts to distribute information to parents and students about the dangers of abusive teen relationships. Repugnant Representative Greg Delleney included an amendment that all written materials reference heterosexual relationships only.

Y'all know, here in South Carolina the gay folks don't matter.

The sponsor of the bill, Repugnant Representative Joan Brady is fine with the amendment to her bill because most dating violence occurs in girl-boy relationships. “My intent is to make sure that every child is protected,” Brady said. “But the predominant occurrence of teen dating violence occurs in girl-boy relationships.” Yes, Joan, but there is violence is gay dating relationships, too, but apparently you think it's okay.

“I don’t want the Department of Education or school districts to teach children in grades six through 12 about (same-sex) relationships,” Delleney said.

They aren't teaching same-sex relationships, they would be protecting any student from being physically attacked. Apparently Greg Delleney thinks it's just fine for gay students to be abused because they're, you know, different.

Gay rights advocates say Delleney’s amendment is another attempt to ignore the gay and lesbian community. I say it's mush worse, it's saying that violence toward any gay or lesbian individual doesn't matter as much as violence toward a heterosexual person. Sounds like a simple case of hate to me.

We'll Have A Gay Old Time

He's funny.

He sings.

He dances.

He acts.

He adorkable.

And he's openly gay.

Win-win.

Emmy and Golden Globe-nominated actor, Neil Patrick Harris is gonna host the 63rd Annual Tony Awards on Sunday, June 7th.

As a big old homo, I have always loved the Tony's--sometimes in secret, but now, completely out. It isn't quite the Gay Superbowl, as i like to think of the Oscars, but it is The Gayest Show On Earth!

Looking forward to a good show, Doogie, er, Neil.