Via AmericaBlogGay: Big News from Denver: Sujey’s deportation halted by Immigration Judge

Following up on the post about Sujey and Violeta from earlier today, looks like the couple got some good news. Sujey's deportation has been halted by an immigration judge. Lavi Soloway just tweeted:

 

Victory! Denver Judge Halts Deportation 4 Sujey & Violeta, Sets 2012 Date to Consider Marriage-Based Application http://t.co/lmzihrX

UPDATE @ 7:02 PM: Lavi sent this statement:

"Today Immigration Judge Mimi Tsankov halted the deportation of Sujey Pando and scheduled a new hearing to consider an application based on her marriage to her U.S. citizen wife, Violeta Pando. Because today's hearing was intended to be a final decision day on Sujey's deportation, the judge's action was unusual; she spent 45 minutes methodically considering the procedural posture of the case. In the end, the Judge set aside the intended purpose of the hearing, citing developments including the Attorney General's intervention in a similar case in May (Matter of Dorman) and noted that the issues involved in this case existed in a context that was "fluid" and "in a state of flux." The Judge referred to events that occurred as recent as yesterday as having an impact on how to proceed. Yesterday, the DHS Secretary Napolitano ordered a review of all pending deportation cases for possible closure, including those involving LGBT families." 

Congrats to Sujey & Victoria. And, great work by their legal team, led by Lavi.

Violeta and Sujey

Jeanne Moos - The Best Tv Interview Walk Offs

Via JMG: Perkins: 'It Gets Better' Is Disgusting

Right Wing Watch reports that the Family Research Council's latest plea for donations uses the It Gets Better Project as its topic. Because anti-bullying efforts are "disgusting" and all good Christian children should have the right to beat those "perverts" whenever they deserve it.

Labels: bullying, Christian Love, douchenozzles, Family Reseach Council, fascists, hate groups, Tony Perkins

reposted from Joe

Tim Hardaway turns it all around, and is now publicly supporting gay rights

Via Yahoo Sports

Usually when a famous person goes on an offensive rant that flies in the face of tact or compassion or both at the same time, the real hope that stems from the expected fallout is that the voice behind the rant will come around to a more enlightened way of thinking. And not, as is usually the case, just issue the standard "to anyone I may have offended" apology before moving on.


Former NBA All-Star Tim Hardaway, who infamously and proudly stated his homophobia in a radio interview four years ago, has done a bit more than move on. Not only has he taken on a kinder view of the LGBT community, but he's also standing up for those who are trying to stand up for its rights. The Chicago native and Miami denizen was back in El Paso, Texas, this week (where he went college) to lend his support to a trio of politicians who are in danger of being recalled due to their stance on gay rights.

The El Paso Times can take it from here:

Via JMG: "Mommy, They Are Just Like Me"

This is too good to excerpt. Just go read it.

Labels: GLEE, possibly gay youth, television

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Via JMG: NEW JERSEY: Bridal Shop Rejects Lesbian Patron For Her "Illegal" Wedding

An opinion columnist from the Philadelphia Inquirer reports that the manager of a bridal shop in New Jersey has refused the business of a lesbian because her coming wedding constituted "illegal activity."

Apparently, Donna was stunned to learn, after reviewing your customer-information sheet, that you're a lesbian. On the paperwork, you'd crossed out the word "groom" and written "partner" instead, and then inserted your fiancée's name. "She said she wouldn't work with me because I'm gay," you recalled. "She also said that I came from a nice Jewish family, and that it was a shame I was gay. She said, 'There's right, and there's wrong. And this is wrong.'" She also said - and you have the voicemail to prove it - that what you were planning was "illegal" and that "we do not participate in any illegal actions." "I was devastated," you told me. "I was crying. I called her a bigot; I told her, 'I am a happy person and you are a miserable person.' Then she hung up on me." You admit to using some choice words when you called her back. But trust me, whatever you said was probably poetry compared with what I believe most decent people would've spewed at her on your behalf.

(Tipped by JMG reader Frank)

Labels: assholery, gay weddings, New Jersey, retail

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Via JMG: Olbermann: GOProud Moneyman Peter Thiel Is The Worst Person In The World

GOProud's fundraiser with Ann Coulter was held in billionaire Thiel's Manhattan loft. The Paypal founder and Facebook part-owner wants to build floating cities that are exempt from taxes and banking laws. Because being a fucking billionaire is never enough when the man is demanding his due.

Labels: Current TV, GOProud, homocons, Keith Olbermann

reposted from Joe

it gets better: wisdom from our gay elders

Via Aatombomb:

williterate:

I love my mom. If you told me 13 years ago that my mom would be an almost annoyingly supportive mom to her 2 gay sons, I woulda spit in your face and called you a liar. She’s a case study in how family dynamics can evolve from absolute denial and/or disappointment to full acceptance and love.
PS: I love how she so politely tells Bachmann to “get a brain.”

You don’t see very many awesome Facebook posts, but Will’s mom seems intent on fixing that problem.

Via AmericaBlogGay: Pope Benedict will be greeted by another Spanish same-sex kiss-in

Pope Benedict the 16th Century is visiting Spain again, a trip that's garnering enormous controversy. And, Spain's LGBT community is doing its part by holding another kiss-in for the pontiff:

Spanish gays and lesbians say they will hold a separate protest homosexual "kiss-in" after the pope's arrival Thursday.

The kiss-in, being organised on Facebook, is to protest against the Church's "moral condemnations of sexuality," said Jaime del Val, a spokesman for one of the gay groups involved, Asamblea Transmaricabollo de Sol.

When the pope last visited Spain in November last year, he was confronted by a homosexual kiss-in in Barcelona.

About 200 gay men and women couples locked lips to demand the Church recognise their right to be gay as he paraded through Barcelona's streets November 7 in his transparent "popemobile".

The Facebook page is here.

As we know, leaders of the Catholic Church are obsessed with the gays. And, I suspect many in the Pope's traveling party will be quite excited to see the kiss-in.

Via AmericablogGay: We’re supposed to respect Phillip Hinkle and his family after he spent years attacking ours?

I can't seem to get the story about the anti-gay Indiana legislator, Phillip Hinkle, and his hypocritical gay scandal out of my head. It isn't because this is the first time this sort of thing has happened, of course. There is no need to count the number of times an anti-gay conservative legislator has been caught weakly disguising his compartmentalized sexual orientation by getting busted having a wide stance. The examples of hypocritical projection and homophobia of gay / anti-gay conservatives have become legion. In fact, it is because I'm weary of hearing from concern trolls, or the defenders of these hypocrites, that we need to "respect the privacy of the family." Hinkle's attorney, Peter Nugent, implored everyone to leave Hinkle and his family alone.

Wednesday, Nugent faxed this "official statement": 

"Representative Hinkle is aware of the inquiries by The Indianapolis Star and we are investigating the matter at this time. We request that everyone respect the privacy of the family at this time."

First of all the adage, "Those who live in glass houses should not be throwing stones," applies. Secondly, if the family was aware of Mr. Hinkle's predilections they should have begged him to not become a Republican public figure who crafts hateful, conservative, anti-gay policies for others. Had he been a progressive then I would have no problem whatsoever with him or his family and would be happy to respect their supposed privacy.

If his family is not culpable in knowing his tendency to have sexual relations with young men while presenting himself as a bastion of conservative anti-gay "family values," I do feel sorry they are having to find out in this horrible way, but imagine how his gay constituents and their families feel? I'm sure they haven't deserved the victimization of having a representative who applies second class citizenship to them in order to camouflage his secretive gay liaisons. Like so many of his brethren, Hinkle has projected the mirage of a red blooded conservative heterosexual image in his twisted attempt to define himself as the conservative's dogmatic ideal, and very rare, nuclear stereotypical all American family.

Until our gay families receive the same rights as Phillip Hinkle's by having our marriages recognized by our government then I will not be following any exhortation to "respect his or his family's privacy."

Ise Oluwa for the It Gets Better Project.m4v

Via JMG: Michele Bachmann Linked To Uganda's Pastor Martin "Kill The Gays" Ssempa

The Atlantic reports that Peter Waldron, the campaign aide who steered Michele Bachmann to her first place finish in Iowa, has quite the shady past, including an arrest for terrorism in Uganda where he boasts a friendship with Pastor Martin Ssempa. Ssempa, as most of you probably know, vigorously backed Uganda's proposed death penalty for homosexuality.

The evangelical organizer who helped Michele Bachmann win the Ames Straw Poll in Iowa Saturday was previously charged with terrorism in Uganda after being arrested for possession of assault rifles and ammunition in February 2006, just days before Uganda's first multi-party elections in 20 years. Peter E. Waldron spent 37 days in the Luriza Prison outside Kampala, where he says he was tortured, after being arrested along with six Congolese and Ugandan nationals for the weapons, which were described variously in news reports as having been found in his bedroom or a closet in his home. The charges, which could have led to life in prison, were dropped in March 2006 after a pressure campaign by Waldron's friends and colleagues and what Waldron says was the intervention of the Bush administration.

Warren Throckmorton provides the link to Waldron's relationship with Ssempa.

The American doctor also says he is a friend of the first family and a friend of Pastor Martin Sempa, according to the article, written by one Stuart Price. [snip] "They embrace Americans here,” he said enthusiastically. Indeed, as we sat together, a steady stream of young admirers who had seen Waldron in church came up to greet him. They made complicated handshakes, the way Ugandans do, and Waldron boasted to me that he had met privately with President Museveni and his born-again wife.” “It struck me that, for many Americans of faith, Uganda – a country where homosexuality and abortion are outlawed, where politicians freely mix church and state, and where outward displays of religious devotion are the norm – represents a kind of haven.” Waldron is said to have talked to several high-ranking government officials on arrest including some powerful ministers.

Just so we're clear here, Rep. Michele Bachmann, a leading Republican candidate for the presidency of the United States, has a top-ranking employee who was arrested for allegedly smuggling assault weapons to a foreign regime that is presently working to legalize the executions of gay people. Everybody got that?

Labels: 2012 elections, Christianists, gay death penalty, GOP, Martin SSempa, Michele Bachmann, Uganda

reposted from Joe

Via JMG: HomoQuotable - Jeff Buchanan

"The innocence of a child should not be required to wrestle with the complexities involving same-sex orientation. Nor should a parent be forced to educate their child on these issues before that child is mature enough to understand and cope with those complexities. Unfortunately, the current culture is going to force parents and church leaders to address the issues surrounding homosexuality and same-sex marriage with younger and younger kids. When Tommy comes home from preschool and asks, “Why does my friend Jennifer have two daddies?” we must be ready to provide sound answers grounded in compassion and truth. Theirs will be a generation that must face an assault upon their innocence unlike any generation before." - Exodus International vice president Jeff Buchanan, who will go to his grave as a homosexual man.

Labels: "ex-gay", brainwashing, Exodus International, hate groups, HomoQuotable, religion, scam artists, still totally gay, torture

reposted from Joe

Via JMG: Frothy Mix: Gays Wrecked The Economy

 

"Letting the family break down and in fact encouraging it and inciting more breakdown through this whole redefinition of marriage debate, and not supporting strong nuclear families and not supporting and standing up for the dignity of human life. Those lead to a society that’s broken. [snip] And you can’t say that we’re gonna take morality out of the public square, morality out of our schools, God out of our schools, and then expect people to behave decently in a country that requires, capitalism requires some strong modicum of moral consciousness if it’s gonna be successful." - Frothy Mix.

Labels: 2012 elections, assholery, crazy people, GOP, Rick Santorum

reposted from Joe

Via Buddha Groove:

http://www.buddhagroove.net/2011/03/visiting-spiritual-nepal.html

Via AmericablogGay: Update: Indiana Coroner is working to release body to Santiago's partner and family

The post to which John linked below has been updated twice. 

Via Billerico:

NOTE: This story has been updated to include the information that Santiago's aunt will be allowed to claim the body.

UPDATE: Alfarena Ballew from the Marion County Coroner's office called to offer this statement, "Her friend and her aunt are working together with the life partner to take care of the remains. We have nothing in writing from the partner asking to claim the body. Our records show that the next of kin is her aunt. Our understanding now is that they're all working together to release the body and take care of the services." Ms. Ballew described the incident as a "misunderstanding" and says the office is on track to release the body shortly.

UPDATE 2: The organization Santiago was a board member of, Amigas Latinas, has put out this statement:

Amig@s. We've seen a few posts asking folks to call the media because of a claim that Alisha's wishes aren't being respected because the tragedy took place in Indiana. This is NOT TRUE! We appreciate the passion for equality and justice on behalf of these mujeres, but everyone has been working together to honor Christina Santiago. Please intervene if you see this news...

A commenter on the post says she is afraid she misspoke to the media. I did not speak to this person for my story.

My UPDATE: This wouldn't be a story if we were just allowed to marry, and our political leaders would evolve along with the majority of Americans on this issue.

O Buda de pedra sabão // The Buddha from Soap Stone

Asked a guy in the feira de pedra sabão to make me a Buddha from a bronze one I have from Nepal... it turned out grand...

Via JMG: DODGEBALL: Crazy Eyes Ripped By CNN

Labels: Anderson Cooper, CNN, GOP, Michele Bachmann

reposted from Joe