Via JMG: Happy Harvey Milk Day!

Today is the first annual Harvey Milk Day in California and observances are taking place from the Castro to West Hollywood and elsewhere in the state.

posted from Joe

Via JMG: BAY AREA: Christianists Force End To School District's Anti-Bullying Program

As you can see by the above headline from World Net Daily, Christianists are celebrating their successful campaign to force the Alameda Unified School District to drop their planned anti-bullying campaign. WND exults:

A lawsuit that demanded a right for parents to opt their young children out of a "gay" indoctrination program in a California school district was dropped after the district suddenly killed the worst of the curriculum, officials told WND today. Brad Dacus, president of Pacific Justice Institute, had been working on the case pending against the Alameda Unified School District. Dacus said the case was filed because parents wanted to uphold a state law allowing them not to have their children participate in health education programs if they choose. But he said the decision to drop the case was made when the district announced it was canceling "Lesson 9" of the Caring School Community curriculum, which was adopted by the school board last year. "We're very pleased," he said. "But we're calling upon parents all across the country to investigate and find out just what material is being pushed in their school district. "We're hoping that this school district learns tolerance is a two way street. One way tolerance is not tolerance at all. It's tyranny," he said.

You simply cannot teach children not to beat up gay kids. That is tyranny. And indoctrination!reposted from Joe

Via Buzz: Unequal Protection

“If you wonder why and when giant corporations got the power to reign supreme over us, here’s the story.” — Jim Hightower

CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFO

A Thom Hartmann Autographed Edition. Newly Revised and Updated "Unequal Protection: How Corporations Became "People" -- And You Can Fight Back." Expanded Edition to be Released on May 14th.

By Thom Hartmann

BuzzFlash.com's Review (excerpt)

This is the hot off the presses updated and expanded version of Thom Hartmann's prescient book, which warned of the dangers of corporate personhood, and provides its historical shaky legal grounding dating back to the late 1800s.

Thom Hartmann's Update and Expanded Edition of
Unequal Protection

Includes discussion of the infamous January 2010 Supreme Court Citizens United case allowing "corporate personhood" to more easily buy elections.

Especially Autographed for BuzzFlash Readers by Thom Hartmann for a limited time.

Released on May 14, 2010

The Rise of Corporate Dominance and
the Theft of Human Rights

• By America’s most popular progressive radio host

• Updated throughout, including analysis of recent critical Supreme Court decisions

• Reveals how corporations achieved their current near-imperial status and what we can do to change it

Unequal taxes, unequal accountability for crime, unequal influence, unequal control of the media, unequal access to natural resources—corporations have gained these privileges and more by exploiting their legal status as persons and by winning special protections that enable them to avoid the responsibilities that come with these rights. How did something so illogical and unjust become the law of the land? Is there a way for American citizens to recover democracy of, by, and for the people? Thom Hartmann takes on these difficult questions and tells a startling story that will forever change your understanding of American history.

Americans have been struggling with the role of corporations since before the birth of the republic. Hartmann uncovers evidence that the Boston Tea Party was actually a protest against actions of the East India Company—the world’s first modern corporation—making it the great-great-granddaddy of today’s World Trade Organization protests. But eventually the corporations won. Hartmann tells the astonishing story of how an offhand comment by a Supreme Court justice led to the Fourteenth Amendment—originally passed to grant basic rights to freed slaves—becoming the justification for changing the status of corporations from “artificial persons” with limited rights to persons entitled to the same rights granted to human beings.

Unequal Protection details the deeply destructive results. Corporations now enjoy extraordinary privileges that make them virtually independent kingdoms. This new feudalism is not what our founders intended. Hartmann proposes specific legal remedies that could truly save the world from political, economic, and ecological disaster. It’s time for “we, the people” to take back our lives.

With huge corporations now benefiting from massive taxpayer-funded bailouts, Hartmann’s hard-hitting critique of corporate personhood is more timely than ever. This new edition has been thoroughly updated and features Hartmann’s analysis of two recent critical Supreme Court corporate speech cases.

Read The Full Review >>>

http://www.buzzflash.com/store/reviews/2181

Product Description

Buy more progressive premiums to support BuzzFlash progressive news and commentary (we accept no advertising, corporate or otherwise to maintain our complete independence)by going to The BuzzFlash Progressive Marketplace.

Learn More >>>

http://www.buzzflash.com/store/items/2181

Via JMG: Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) Introduces Federal Anti-Bullying Bill

Today Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) and 21 fellow Senators introduced a federal bill intended to protect LGBT students from harassment and bullying. Via the ACLU:

The Student Non-Discrimination Act (SNDA) would help to end entrenched biases towards lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) students in our education system. A similar bill was introduced in the House of Representatives in January by Rep. Jared Polis (D-CO) and currently has over 100 co-sponsors. The American Civil Liberties Union strongly supports these bills and urges swift action by both chambers. The ACLU is currently involved in a case that underscores the need for the SNDA. In April, the ACLU filed a complaint with the Itawamba County School District in Fulton, Mississippi urging the school district to reverse its decision to forbid a lesbian student from attending a prom with her girlfriend and from wearing a tuxedo to the prom. After school officials canceled the prom altogether rather than allow Constance McMillen to attend the dance in a tuxedo with her girlfriend, the ACLU then filed a federal lawsuit. In a preliminary ruling in April, the court found that Itawamba County School District officials violated McMillen's First Amendment right to freedom of expression, and the case is expected to go to trial.

Franken says that he and others are working on language to define what constitutes bullying. But he says that most people know it when they see it. As noted in the above-linked story, Rep. Jared Polis introduced similar legislation in the U.S. House earlier this year. Here's the list of Senate co-sponsors:

SNDA is co-sponsored by Senators Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), John Kerry (D-Mass.), Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), Bob Casey (D-Pa.), Patty Murray (D-Wash.), Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.), Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.), Ben Cardin (D-Md.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), Mark Begich (D-Alaska), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.), Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Robert Menedez (D-N.J.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), and Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii).

a repost from Joe

Via JMG: Will Rekers Scandal Affect Prop 8?

Following up on the New York Times story about the legal implications of the Dr. George Rekers scandal, Amanda Terkel at Think Progress has found four instances of Rekers' ties to the Perry Vs. Schwarzenegger trial to overturn Proposition 8. I don't usually excerpt another blogger's work so extensively, but this is a must-read.

1. Blankenhorn was the defendants’ star witness and was eviscerated on the stand by attorney David Boies, who was arguing against Prop. 8 for the American Foundation for Equal Rights. Blakenhorn has claimed that he is “not familiar” with Rekers’ work and didn’t “cite anyone named ‘Dr. Rekers’” in his “expert testimony submitted to the court.” However, Blankenhorn did reference Rekers’ work the bibliography of his “expert report” for the trial:

This Rekers declaration that Blankenhorn references has statements such as “The inherent structure of households with one or more homosexually behaving members deprives children of vitally needed positive contributions to child adjustment and to the child’s preparation for successful adulthood adjustment that are present in heterosexual homes.” (View it here.)

2. One of the witnesses arguing against Prop. 8 was Ryan Kendall, a gay man who was forced to undergo “reparative therapy” as a teenager to make him straight. He “was first sent to see a Christian therapist and then the National Association of Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH),” and the experiences left him contemplating suicide. Rekers was on the board of NARTH during the Prop. 8 trial and only recently stepped down after the “rent boy” scandal broke.

3. Rekers is a member of the American College of Pediatricians (ACP), which submitted an amicus brief to Chief Judge Walker in the Prop. 8 trial. ACP is a sham, right-wing group. When “the American Academy of Pediatrics passed its policy statement supporting second-parent adoptions by lesbian and gay parents in 2002, a fringe group of approximately 60 of the AAP’s more than 60,000 members” broke off and formed ACP.

4. The Prop. 8 defense had a witness named George Robinson who was going to testify about how being gay is a choice, although he was eventually withdrawn. He had also based some of his expert report on Rekers’ Prop. 22 declaration.

Excellent work by Amanda Terkels! Let's hope that Judge Vaughn Walker takes notice of this during the upcoming closing arguments.

reposted from Joe

Via JMG: U.S. State Department Condemns Conviction Of Malawi Gay Couple

The U.S. State Department has denounced the Malawi government's conviction of two gay men for "unnatural acts and gross indecency."

"The United States is deeply disappointed in today’s conviction of same-sex couple Tiwonge Chimbalanga and Steven Monjeza in Malawi," said assistant secretary Phillip J. Crowley at a press briefing Wednesday. "We view the criminalization of sexual orientation and gender identity as a step backward in the protection of human rights in Malawi. The Government of Malawi must respect the human rights of all of its citizens. The United States views the decriminalization of sexual orientation and gender identity as integral to the protection of human rights in Malawi and elsewhere in the world."

Thank you, Secretary Clinton. It may not help these poor men, but it's better than silence.reposted from Joe

Via JMG: Two Birds, One Gay Stone

Super damn funny.



(Via - Queerty)

posted by Joe

From the San Francisco ENDA Rally

Dear Friend of NCLR,

From Washington D.C. to San Francisco, NCLR is working tirelessly to make sure we pass ENDA, and we won’t stop until we get these crucial employment protections for our community.

Check out video of me and NCLR staff at yesterday’s ENDA rally outside Speaker Pelosi’s San Francisco office, and make sure you stand with us in our call to pass ENDA now!

watch video

In Solidarity,


Kate Kendell
Executive Director, NCLR

Dear Daniel --

Ever feel like your relationship isn't working out the way you think it should?

Well, our friends at AMERICAblog, CREDO Action and Open Left are wondering the same thing... about the Democratic Party when it comes to fighting for LGBT equality. . We all felt so strongly about it, we thought it was time to write a letter to the Democrats.

This isn't just any letter, mind you. It expresses concerns that many of us -- both straight and LGBT -- have been feeling recently. Here's the beginning of the letter:

Dear Democrats,

We need to talk.

This may be a hard letter to read, but I need to figure out if this relationship is still healthy for me...

Click here to read the rest of our open letter to the Democrats. If it says what you're feeling, sign your name to it and then forward this message to your friends. We will deliver your signatures to Democratic Party leadership:

http://www.couragecampaign.org/DearDemocrats

Rick Jacobs
Chair, Courage Campaign

Courage Campaign Equality is 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 support our campaign for full equality, please chip in what you can today:

Via Belirico: Sam Brownback's Pastor Problem: Evangelical Extremist Lou Engle

Filed by: Waymon Hudson

May 18, 2010 2:30 PM

American Evangelical Extremist Lou Engle is making waves again. Readers may remember Engle as the fringe pastor behind TheCall Rally in California supporting Proposition 8, where he called homosexuality a "spirit of lawlessness" and called for "martyrs" to become "God's Avengers of Blood" to stop the "homosexual agenda" at all cost.

He also recently held another TheCall Prayer Event in Uganda where he praised the country's "courage" and "righteousness" in promoting the horrific Anti-Homosexuality "Kill the Gays" Bill. The bill calls for gays to be executed, says "known Ugandan homosexuals" abroad should be extradited back to Uganda for "punishment", and that people in Uganda must report anybody known to have committed a homosexual act within 24 hours, among other horrific provisions.

Now Lou Engle is back in America and causing a major headache for Republican Senator Sam Brownback in the Kansas gubernatorial race. It seems people aren't taking to kindly to Engle and Brownback being so close, including being former roommates and "soldiers for salvation" together. Brownback even appeared at a TheCall Rally as a special guest of Engle.

Continue reading "Sam Brownback's Pastor Problem: Evangelical Extremist Lou Engle" »

Daniel Radcliffe's Trevor Project PSA

Via Belirico: Bullies: The Wizard of Oz and Tomato Soup

Filed by: Peter Monn and Alex Paredes

May 18, 2010 5:00 PM

Editors' Note: Peter Monn (and his partner, Alex) is a Bilerico-Indiana blogger. We've lifted this up to the main site to share with everyone.

We have this amazing little girl that lives next door to us. Everyday when we take the puppies out she comes running over, filled with stories about her two younger siblings and frustrated that our oldest dog won't let her catch him. She is 6. Today, I came home and she was dressed, from head to toe, like Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz, complete with sparkling ruby red slippers. Her hair was tied back in braids and she was carrying a basket on her arm as she ran around the backyard, her sister, dressed like a beautiful princess in pink taffeta, chasing her around, reaching for her in the wind.

And I thought...what a wonderful thing to be a child.

But not for everyone.

Not for me.

Continue reading "Bullies: The Wizard of Oz and Tomato Soup" »

Neo-Neands