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| Dear Daniel, Winston Churchill said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried. As this summer leads into the 2010 election season, it's not difficult to find examples of our system being complicated, gritty, messy and sometimes devastating-and equal reminders of why it is better than anything else we have ever tried. Thanks to the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision, corporations may contribute to certain political committees. As you have read in our action alerts and in the news, Target and Best Buy recently donated large sums of money to a Minnesota group supporting a strongly anti-LGBT gubernatorial candidate. Before making this contribution, both companies had excellent records of support for the LGBT community, scoring 100% on the Corporate Equality Index. Target has since refused to right its wrong, and Best Buy has not responded to our call to remedy its action. What does this mean for our democracy? Well, for starters, a democracy is as good as the players in it-corporations or humans. These companies made the wrong choice; knowing our opponents, that contribution could go to a dishonest campaign full of scare tactics and attacks. Fortunately, that is not the last word. This week, we announced that we will devote $150,000 of our own resources to help elect a pro-equality governor and legislature in Minnesota. Victory in these elections could put marriage equality within reach in the North Star State. Each campaign cycle becomes more expensive than the last. The cost of campaign ads drives fundraising higher and higher. In ballot measure campaigns, donors from across the nation often contribute. To ensure that the voting public has a clear understanding of who is behind each measure, many states have enacted disclosure laws. The laws don’t prevent anyone from exercising their free speech rights, but they do ensure that democracy is conducted in the light of day, and not by secret organizations lurking in the shadows. Although the public overwhelmingly supports knowing who is paying for the campaign ad that they’re watching, proponents of anti-LGBT ballot measures don’t. The so-called National Organization for Marriage, which contributed the majority of funds in the campaign to dismantle marriage equality in Maine, lost its challenge to Maine’s disclosure law. This ruling was yet another rebuke to NOM's efforts to undermine campaign disclosure laws that preserve democracy by letting the public know who is behind the ads and campaigns. Democracy is a competition among ideas and principles. If you believe in what you are asking someone to vote for, you can be honest. If you believe that people would vote with you if they knew who you were, then you could come out of the shadows. Our opponents' attempts to escape their obligation to be forthright speak more loudly than any ad that they finance. When Congress returns and as the campaign season moves forward, we will speak louder still.  Joe Solmonese President, Human Rights Campaign  |
Friday, August 20, 2010
Via HRC:
Thursday, August 19, 2010
Via Servicemembers United:
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Via JMG: Bull leaps into crowd in Tafalla Northern Spain 30 hurt
Walt Disney - Ferdinand The Bull - 1938
Via Courage Campaign:
Author Tom Dolby and his husband, Drew Frist, wrote the following message to the Courage Campaign community in the aftermath of the 9th Circuit stay of Judge Walker's historic decision striking down Proposition 8. Tom and Drew have been phenomenal supporters of our work, from funding Camp Courage to our Testimony campaign. Please read their very personal message below and help us build the "Courageous Families Photo Project" today. Thanks!
-- Rick and everyone at Courage
-- Rick and everyone at Courage
When we were married in Connecticut last year, we knew that the federal Prop 8 trial might change our lives in 2010. What we didn't know was that we would be anxiously awaiting the birth of twin girls, via a surrogate and egg donor.
So when we heard the news a few weeks ago that Judge Vaughn Walker had ruled Proposition 8 unconstitutional, we were overcome by emotion. In that moment, we realized that by the time our daughters were born, our family might have the same rights and dignities as every other loving family in California.
Unfortunately, that possibility of equality is on hold yet again, following the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals decision to stay Judge Walker's ruling indefinitely.
Still, we know that this journey to marriage equality is just the beginning. And we know that if we want our daughters to be raised with the inherent belief that their family is no less important than anyone else's family, we need to change the way Americans think and feel about LGBT families.
We need to change hearts and minds. All of us -- LGBT and straight -- together. Starting now.
That's why we're inviting you to join the Courageous Families Photo Project today. Will you send us a picture of yourself or your family, just like the one of us at our wedding below? We'll add it to a nationwide body of evidence demonstrating the joys of full equality and countering the destructive power of discrimination. Your family photo may even be chosen to be featured prominently on the Courage Campaign's web site. Just click here to upload your photo now:
So when we heard the news a few weeks ago that Judge Vaughn Walker had ruled Proposition 8 unconstitutional, we were overcome by emotion. In that moment, we realized that by the time our daughters were born, our family might have the same rights and dignities as every other loving family in California.
Unfortunately, that possibility of equality is on hold yet again, following the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals decision to stay Judge Walker's ruling indefinitely.
Still, we know that this journey to marriage equality is just the beginning. And we know that if we want our daughters to be raised with the inherent belief that their family is no less important than anyone else's family, we need to change the way Americans think and feel about LGBT families.
We need to change hearts and minds. All of us -- LGBT and straight -- together. Starting now.
That's why we're inviting you to join the Courageous Families Photo Project today. Will you send us a picture of yourself or your family, just like the one of us at our wedding below? We'll add it to a nationwide body of evidence demonstrating the joys of full equality and countering the destructive power of discrimination. Your family photo may even be chosen to be featured prominently on the Courage Campaign's web site. Just click here to upload your photo now:
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As we progress along this new journey of parenthood, with the joy and fear that every prospective parent feels, we've found ourselves wondering: Will our children feel that they are valued in the world, that their parents are just the same as any other loving couple?
We hope so. That's why we are supporting the Courage Campaign as it launches the next phase of Testimony: Equality on Trial -- an unprecedented online storytelling project to bring the Prop 8 trial into the lives of Americans and change the conversation about marriage equality across the country.
In the coming year, the Testimony project will collect your depositions in the form of videos, pictures and written submissions. Every two weeks, the Courage Campaign home page will feature a real family picture selected from those pictures submitted through the Courageous Families Photo Project. This campaign will demonstrate that no two families look alike, but all families share the common bonds of love and -- most importantly -- deserve equal dignity and respect.
All families are welcome in the Courageous Families Photo Project: LGBT or straight. Single or coupled. Legally married or not. Together for one month or 50 years. We are all in this together. Will you help to change the way Americans think about families by sending a picture of you or your family today? Just click here to upload your photo:
http://www.couragecampaign.org/CourageousFamilies
At our wedding celebration for family and friends in Sonoma, our celebrant quoted the activist Parker Palmer as saying, "There is often a tragic gap between what is and what could and should be. To live in this world, we must learn how to stand in the tragic gap with faith and hope."
We ask that you stand with us in faith and hope as we work to ensure a safe and loving society for all of our children.
Thank you for joining us in launching this special project.
Tom Dolby and Drew Frist
Courage Campaign Institute is a part of the Courage Campaign's multi-issue online organizing network that empowers more than 700,000 grassroots and netroots supporters to push for progressive change and full equality in California and across the country. To get involved in the Courage Campaign Institute, visit "Testimony: Equality on Trial" -- our year-long campaign to bring the Prop 8 trial into the lives of Americans.
To power our campaign to defend Judge Walker's decision striking down Prop 8, please chip in what you can today:
Via JMG: Mexico City Mayor Sues Catholic Cardinal Over Gay Marriage Accusations
Mexico City's Mayor Marcelo Ebrard has filed a defamation lawsuit against Cardinal Juan Sandoval after the cardinal told the press that Ebrard had bribed Mexico's Supreme Court justices to legalize same-sex marriage and gay adoption. Sandoval made the allegations on Sunday during an event in Aguascalientes state. He also used a slur against gays while decrying the recent high court decisions that were called victories for the gay-rights community, as L.A. Times correspondent Tracy Wilkinson analyzes in this story. Church authorities were not backing down. Sandoval said Monday he would not retract his comments, and the archdiocese in Guadalajara later said it had proof of the allegations against the Supreme Court justices. Statements in support were issued from the archdiocese in Mexico City, while the Bishops' Conference of Mexico also said it supports Sandoval. In the secular institutional corner, the Supreme Court censured Sandoval's statements unanimously, and Ebrard issued a stark warning to the highest-ranking prelate of Mexico's second-largest city: "We live in a secular state, and here, whether we like it or not, the law rules the land," Ebrard said, according to La Jornada. "The cardinal must submit to the law of the land, like all other citizens of this country."Earlier this month Mexico's Supreme Court ruled that same-sex marriages performed in the nation's capital must be recognized in all 31 states. Last week the same court upheld the constitutionality of allowing gay adoption in Mexico City.
ViaJMG: SAN DIEGO: 12 Activists Arrested In Marriage Protest At County Clerk's Office
A dozen activists were arrested today at a San Diego county clerk's office when they refused to leave without being issued marriage licenses. On the day hundreds of gay and lesbian couples statewide planned to obtain their long-awaited marriage licenses, a crowd of about 50 people gathered at the county clerk's office Thursday to protest a federal judge's stay of a federal ruling that Proposition 8 is unconstitutional. Three people were taken away in plastic handcuffs by sheriff's deputies early in the demonstration and an additional nine people were removed later. A deputy said they were detained for blocking access to a county office. Tony and Tyler Dylan-Hyde and at least one other couple came to the county clerk's office this morning at 8 a.m. asking to receive their marriage license. "We believe that county officials and the Attorney General have the authority and the obligation to allow marriage licenses to proceed based on both federal court findings and that Prop. 8 is unconstitutional and the governor's filings in Prop. 8 cases," Tyler Dylan-Hyde said. "We are asking you to do what's right."According to the linked news story, those arrested had blocked the entrance of heterosexual couples with appointments to get licenses.
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