Image via WikipediaLGBT community will fight for equality with or without Congress - The Hill's Congress Blog
Saturday, November 6, 2010
LGBT community will fight for equality with or without Congress - The Hill's Congress Blog
Image via WikipediaLGBT community will fight for equality with or without Congress - The Hill's Congress Blog
Conservatives Praise Gay Voters’ Shift to the Right
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WGLB: Conservatives Praise Gay Voters’ Shift to the RightSome gays think that it was the intelligent thing to do, when disappointed with Obama's pace on LGBT rights, to vote GOP. BUT:
". . . A sizeable percentage of the gay vote disagreed. Whatever the extent of gays voting Republican might have had on the outcome, the election results--which saw the defeats of GLBT equality supporters Russ Feingold in the Senate and Patrick Murphy, the sponsor of legislation that would have repealed DADT, in the House-- may yet give the country’s GLBTs cause for remorse, according to some equality advocates. The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force’s Rea Carey was blunt about this, saying, "The shift in the balance of power will very likely slow advancement of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights legislation in Congress."
Gays Reassess After GOP Gains | News | The Advocate
Image via WikipediaThe very best comment left on this article sums it up nicely:I see the Log Cabin Republicans (and their "fellow travelers") are doing what they do best: bending over and telling the GOP to "do them"! Yes, the Democrats may not have delivered EVERYTHING, but the Republi-Cons won't deliver ANYTHING. Privatize Social Security as the way to get benefits for your "partners"? Want to bet the "traditional values crowd" will insist that such accounts can only be left to family members, since anything else would "weaken marriage"!
Gays Reassess After GOP Gains | News | The Advocate
Elected Anti-Gay Politicians Will Undermine Rights | IMAGINE 2050
Image via WikipediaFor those in who still fight for equality, gay rights shouldn’t be dismissed as a back-burner issue.. .
Groups like the National Organization for Marriage, major funders of campaigns opposing same-sex marriage, have been clear that although they don’t consider gay marriage “the number 1 issues these elections [it’s] still important and Republicans abandon it at their peril.”. . . For every encouraging win such as Jim Gray, who was elected Mayor of Lexington, Kentucky, and David Cicilline, who won a Congressional seat in Rhode Island – both are openly gay – there are discouraging examples like Tea Party backed Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann.Bachmann has asserted that gays are “a part of Satan” and that being gay is “personal enslavement.” She also spoke out against the federal hate crimes bill protecting gays and lesbians.
On the side of progress, California elected Jerry Brown as its new governor (hugely positive as he supports same-sex marriage and refuses to defend Proposition 8); however, Missouri elected Republican Vicky Hartzler to Congress, who is largely considered one of the most virulent anti-gay Republicans.
With a well documented history of stigmatization and marginalization coupled with the recent jolt from a surge of anti-gay violence, it’s clear these are critical campaign results. The distance the gay rights movement has progressed is commensurate to the distance yet- to-be covered. The shift to the right represented by Bachmann and Hartzler will replenish other anti-equality politicians, as has happened historically. We must monitor these newly elected officials in order to organize and to respond together—to preserve equal rights we must understand them as just that, rights, not privileges.
Elected Anti-Gay Politicians Will Undermine Rights | IMAGINE 2050
Friday, November 5, 2010
Whither Now the Tea Party?
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"There will be a conflict within the Republican Party," says Prof Schiller.
The Tea Party is loosely-organised, leaderless and libertarian
The low taxes-small government campaign movement known as the Tea Party has helped the Republicans to big gains in the US mid-term elections. But what will this potent, libertarian strand of politics do with its newly-won power?http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11685512
Rejection of Iowa judges over gay marriage raises fears of political influence - latimes.com
Rejection of Iowa judges over gay marriage raises fears of political influence - latimes.com
California Supreme Court chief justice voices concerns about partisan pressures on jurists and backs a single, 15-year term without being put to a vote.
California Supreme Court chief justice voices concerns about partisan pressures on jurists and backs a single, 15-year term without being put to a vote.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Gay Marriage Foes Boosted By Minn. GOP Takeover - wcco.com
Gay Marriage Foes Boosted By Minn. GOP Takeover - wcco.comGay rights activists in Minnesota thought 2012 would be the year they could finally make a serious push for same sex marriage in the state, but a surprise Republican takeover of the Legislature has them back on the defensive instead.
Tom Prichard, president of the Minnesota Family Council, said Thursday his group will push for a statewide vote in 2012 to ban gay marriage and civil unions in Minnesota's Constitution. Previous efforts to do so in 2004, 2005 and 2006 met a firewall in the strongly Democratic state Senate, but that liberal majority crumbled in Tuesday night's elections.
GOProud Exults In GOP Wins
Image via WikipediaJoe. My. God.: GOProud Exults In GOP Wins"According to CNN, 31% of self-identified gay voters supported Republican candidates for the U.S. House. This number is a dramatic increase from the 19% GOP House candidates won among gay voters in 2008. The gay left would have you believe that gay conservatives don’t exist. Now we see that almost a third of self-identified gay voters cast ballots for Republican candidates for Congress in this year’s mid-term. This should be a wake-up call for the out-of-touch so-called leadership of Gay, Inc. in Washington, D.C., which has become little more than a subsidiary of the Democrat Party.". . . Among GOProud's 2010 endorsees was Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK), who voted for a ban on gay adoptions in Washington DC, voted for the Federal Marriage Amendment, and who has called the LGBT rights movement "the greatest threat to our freedom that we face today." Coburn has a 0% rating from the Human Rights Campaign. Additionally, he is a member ofThe Family, a DC-based coalition of GOP lawmakers and Christianist activists best known for their promulgation of Uganda's "kill gays" bill. GOProud would like you to know that they are delighted with Coburn's reelection.
Election results in FLA pose threat to recent LGBT gains
Watermark Online - Your LGBT Life. Daily. - Election results threaten recent LGBT gains: "“Florida has now elected the most anti-gay government since the 1970s, with veto-proof majorities in both chambers of the state legislature and a governor who believes that gay people are undeserving of any civil rights protections, or adoption privileges, or even foster parent privileges,” said Orlando activist and documentary filmmaker Vicki Nantz. ���"
2010 electoral results bad news for secular issues: Culture Wars may reignite
Image by Thomas Hawk via FlickrFrom Washington Post's On Faith"2010 electoral results bad news for secular Americans"
It is undeniable that the economy dominated campaign 2010 and that cultural issues at the nexus of religion and politics were downplayed, but the results are nevertheless very bad news for for those who care about achieving secular goals. Because the Republicans who now control the House, and have increased their numbers in the Senate, are all social and religious conservatives, there is not the slightest possibility in the next two years that any more progress will be made on such hot-button issues as the status of gays in the military. . . "Americans did not vote to stoke the fires of the culture war," Lynn notes, "but they may have done so inadvertently."
Here's a roundup of the potential bad news from Washington Post's "On Faith"
Yes, Tuesday was a bad night for Democrats. It was a worse night for those who, over the past 30 years, regarded the increasing encroachment of religion on government with alarm and were just beginning to see glimmers of hope that the process might be reversed.
One third of Gay Vote went GOP: Will there be regrets?
Image by Lone Primate via Flickr
One third of the gay vote went to Tea Party or Republican candidates. Will these live to regret it? 
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