**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201331_pf.html
Can a Gay Man Reconcile With His Catholic Upbringing?
Saturday, February 3, 2007; B09
On a recent trip to Philadelphia, I decided to duck into the magnificentCathedral Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul. As I entered I dipped my handinto the holy water and blessed myself. No sooner had I wiped off my wethand than I heard the quiet squeak of the new shoes I was wearing.
Well, maybe I was just being too self-conscious. I really didn't want todraw attention to myself. You see, I was with my partner.
That shouldn't be a big deal, right? The problem is I have always had tostruggle to reconcile my Catholic upbringing with my evolving sense of faithand values. I just can't abandon those deeply rooted family traditions.That's why it's still hard for me to pass a Catholic church without havingsome desire to peek inside. I've tried to admire the religion from adistance, acknowledge that it's not for me, and move on. But, when I told myvery Catholic family that I had decided to explore other faiths, in partbecause I am gay, they only reinforced feelings of shame and regret. I don'tsee them much now.
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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2007/01/28/anti_gay_marriage_group_raises_more_than_370k_in_2006/
The Boston Globe
Anti-gay marriage group raises more than $370K in 2006
January 28, 2007
BOSTON --A group pushing to put a proposed constitutional amendment banningsame-sex marriage on the 2008 ballot raised more than $370,000 in 2006 --more than double its contributions from the previous year.
A campaign finance report filed last week with the state Office of Campaignand Political Finance shows VoteOnMarriage.org spent more than $389,000 lastyear, including money raised the previous year.
It also used in-kind donations worth more than $60,700 in legal fees andstaff time from the Massachusetts Family Institute, which helped formVoteOnMarriage.org to raise money for the ballot question.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-un-gays-canada-sweden.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print
February 2, 2007
Canadian and Swedish Gay Groups Frowned on at UN
By REUTERS
Filed at 6:40 p.m. ET
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - A U.N. committee rejected credentials of aCanadian gay and lesbian organization seeking consultative status with theUnited Nations and deferred the application of a similar body from Sweden,according to documents circulated on Friday.
Accreditation, which has been given to more than 2,000 groups, enables themto take part in U.N. conferences and offer advice in their field ofexpertise, such as human rights, health and humanitarian aid.
Envoys from the Canadian and Swedish U.N. missions criticized the U.N.Committee on Nongovernmental Organizations (NGOs) at its Wednesday meeting,with Canada's Nell Stewart expressing dismay at the panel's ``pattern ofdiscrimination'' in treating groups on sexual orientation.
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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
BeyondChron.org
San Freancisco's Alternative Online Daily
February 1, 2007
http://www.beyondchron.org/articles/Leno_Migden_Showdown_and_the_New_Queer_Politics_4112.html
Leno/Migden Showdown and the New Queer Politics
by Tommi Avicolli Mecca
The race for California State Senate that will pit a termed-out gay StateAssemblymember against the incumbent lesbian Senator is yet anotherindication of the way that gay politics has changed in the past decade. Moreand more queer energy and time is being spent electing and re-electing outqueer politicians than on tackling the big issues within the LGBT community,such as homelessness and the lack of affordable housing for youth, seniorsand people with AIDS.
The fact that State Assemblymember Mark Leno intends to run against StateSenator Carole Migden for the Third Senate District seat probably has asmuch to do with term limits as it does with the fact that he feels he is thebest candidate. Leno is playing the new political musical chairs. SupervisorTom Ammiano, termed out on the Board of Supervisors, is doing the samething: He's seeking the seat Leno is vacating. Ammiano has Leno's blessing.Obviously, Leno doesn't have Migden's.
It's not an issue of creating divisiveness in the community. Queers have runagainst queers before: Former supervisor Harry Britt opposed Leno in hisfirst bid for Assembly. Lesbian activist Eileen Hansen almost defeated theincumbent Leno for District 8 supervisor. No doubt the city's queercommunity will be divided by the Leno/Migden showdown, possibly the way itwas during the Willie Brown-Tom Ammiano race for mayor a few years ago.Considering how easily Leno won at the recent election of delegates to theCalifornia Democratic Party, there might be less of a divide than anyoneimagines. Unless Migden can rally her forces.
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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.ukgaynews.org.uk/Archive/07/Jan/2802.htm
Sundance Special Jury Prize for Documentary Short of Dying Lesbian Cop'sFight for Equality
PARK CITY, January 28, 2007 - Cynthia Wade's nail-biting 38-minutedocumentary film Freeheld, chronicling New Jersey Police Lieutenant LaurelHester's struggle to transfer her pension to her domestic partner, StacieAndree, was awarded a Special Jury Prize last night at the 2007 SundanceFilm Festival.
The film is the only short documentary in this year's festival to receive aSpecial Jury Prize, an award that recognizes unique vision and excellence infilmmaking.
Detective Lieutenant Laurel Hester spent 25 years defending the citizens ofOcean County, New Jersey. In October 2004, doctors diagnosed Lt.Hester with terminal lung cancer.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/30/AR2007013001316_pf.html
About Isabella
Janet Jenkins and Lisa Miller got hitched and had a baby together. Vermontsays that's a simple tuth. Virginia said it was all null and void. Thefuture of a little girl hangs in the balance.
By April Witt
Sunday, February 4, 2007; W14
JANET AND LISA MILLER-JENKINS MADE LOVE IN THE MORNING BEFORE LEAVINGFORTHE DOCTOR'S OFFICE.
At least that's how Janet remembers it. "We had aconnection in the morning before we left," Janet said. Afterward, eager tokeep their tender connection alive amid the clinical setting of theinfertility specialist's office, Janet laid her hands upon her partner --one palm on Lisa's thigh, the other on Lisa's upper arm -- as a doctorinseminated Lisa with sperm from an anonymous man the two women knew only asdonor No. 2309. It was, according to Janet, a ritual the Virginia couplerepeated more than once before Lisa gave birth April 16, 2002, to a 5-pound,15-ounce baby girl named Isabella Ruth Miller-Jenkins.
"This baby was made in love," said Janet, now 42 and living in Vermont.
Lisa, 38, offers a dramatically different account of the begetting ofIsabella. According to her, Janet didn't even go with her to the fertilitydoctor's office on the day Isabella was conceived.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201462.html
Brokeback Mutton
By William Saletan
Sunday, February 4, 2007; B02
Just over the Montana border, closeted in their own private Idaho, the gaysheep are getting it on.
Well, it's not exactly private. They're doing it in front of scientists atthe U.S. Sheep Experiment Station. The scientists arrange the trysts. It'scalled "sexual partner preference testing."
According to an article by researchers involved in the project, here's howit works. In a 15-by-10-foot "arena," a young ram is offered four choices:two ewes in heat, and two rams. "The four stimulus animals are restrained instanchions so that they can only be approached from the sides and rear." For30 minutes, the unrestrained ram does as he pleases -- and the scientistskeep score.
A bare majority of rams turns out to be heterosexual. About one in fiveswings both ways. About 15 percent are asexual, and seven to 10 percent aregay.
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The Wall Street Online
http://online.wsj.com/public/article_print/SB117035477766895153-tt5sKNkAY6_opz6nqIbr9rTV3Q0_20080202.html
Gays Should Be Allowed to Serve
Openly in Military, Poll Finds
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL ONLINE
February 2, 2007
A new poll from Harris Interactive found that 55% of Americans think gaysand lesbians should be allowed to serve openly in the military.
By comparison, 19% of the 2,337 Americans polled said gays and lesbiansshould be allowed to serve "only if they keep their sexual orientation asecret," and 18% said they should "not be allowed to serve in the militaryat all."
The survey, conducted online between Jan. 11 and 18, also measured Americanattitudes toward the U.S. military's "Don't Ask, Don't tell" policy, whichprohibits the military from asking personnel about their sexual orientation,but allows homosexuality to be a cause for discharge from the military.
Forty-six percent of respondents said they oppose the policy, unchanged froma Harris poll in 2000, and 36% said they favor the policy, compared with 34%in the previous poll. However, the policy is supported by far more men (43%)than women (29%). And among political parties, Republicans are more likelyto support this policy (51%) than Democrats (25%) or Independents (31%),while 18% of Americans remain undecided about the policy.
The poll also asked whether Americans agree with comments by John M.Shalikashvili, the former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who wrotein a recent New York Times editorial that if gays and lesbians served openlyin the U.S. military, they would not undermine the efficacy of the armedforces. Fifty-seven percent of respondents said they agree with hiscomments, compared with 31% who disagree.
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KNDO / KNDU
http://www.kndo.com/global/story.asp?s=6026820&ClientType=Printable
Gay Rights Activists Introduce Initiative that Would Require Children inMarriages
Feb 1, 2007 11:16 PM
KENNEWICK, Wash.- A new initiative is turning heads around the state as thegay-marriage debate heats up again.
Washington Secretary of State Sam Reed has accepted Iinitiative 957, aresponse by gay rights activists to a State Supreme Court ruling lastsummer.
The Washington Supreme Court ruled that the state could prevent gay andlesbian couples from marrying because the state has a legitimate interest inpreserving marriage for procreation.
In response, the Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance filed theInitiative.
I-957 has five clauses that would have to be met for a legal marriage.
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The Express Gay News
http://www.expressgaynews.com/blog/index.cfm?type=blog&start=2/2/07&end=2/4/07#11190
Editing Anderson Cooper's sexuality
A trusty Blade reader e-mailed an interesting tidbit to me today. It seemsthere's been a debate raging over at Wikipedia about the biographical entryfor openly closeted CNN anchor Anderson Cooper.
The Blade and numerous other publications have written for years aboutCooper's sexual orientation. Cooper refuses to discuss his private life,even though he's more than happy to sit for endless interviews and to befeatured on magazine covers and in CNN's ubiquitous ad campaigns promotinghis show.
He told New York magazine in 2005, "You know, I understand why people mightbe interested. But I just don't talk about my personal life. It's a decisionI made a long time ago, before I ever even knew anyone would be interestedin my personal life. The whole thing about being a reporter is that you'resupposed to be an observer and to be able to adapt with any group you're in,and I don't want to do anything that threatens that."
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Express Gay News
http://www.expressgaynews.com/2007/2-2/view/columns/9931.cfm
End the tax on DP benefits
Same-sex couples are treated unfairly by the IRS and it's time for the Demsto make changes.
By JULIE ENSZNER
Friday, February 02, 2007
End the tax on DP benefitsAS OF JAN. 1, 2007, for the first time in my adultlife, I am on someone else's health insurance. That someone else is thewoman with whom I've lived for 10 years and to whom I have made a lifetimecommitment. Still, it makes me uncomfortable to not be working for my ownhealth insurance.
I'm grateful, however, that she works for one of the larger companies in theUnited States thatoffers domestic partner benefits. I'm also pleased thatshe's over the rage at the amount ofpaperwork that she had to complete to"certify" that we are domestic partners when herheterosexual colleaguesneed only say that they are married.
There are tax consequences to this arrangement, of course. We consideredthem carefully prior to making this decision. After all, I could havepurchased health insurance independently. The benefits that I am providedwill be taxed as additional income for her. This will increase our annualtax bill, filed and paid separately, as the IRS doesn't recognize ourco-mingled financial lives.
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Victoria News
http://www.vicnews.com/portals-code/list.cgi?paper=36&cat=23&id=824266&more
Gay firing riles churchgoers
By Brennan Clarke
Victoria News
Feb 02 2007
Gay Firing riles churchgoers
Priest removed from position after refusing to fire allegedly gay employee
Bishop Richard Gagnon claims the recent termination of Father Michael Favero'semployment was "just, fair and reasonable."
But the congregation of Holy Cross Church isn't buying it.
Hundreds of hurt and confused parishioners are expected to gather at HolyCross this evening to discuss allegations that Gagnon forced Favero toresign for refusing to fire a gay employee of the Gordon Head church. Itwill be the second such meeting in just over a week.
Last Friday, more than 300 members of the congregation gathered to demand anexplanation as to why Gagnon fired their beloved pastor. So far, all they'vereceived is a letter from the bishop blaming the situation on "rumours andaccusations that have taken on a life of their own."
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/02/020207cants.htm
Supreme Court Of Canada Declines Transsexual Case
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: February 2, 2007 - 9:00 pm ET
(Ottawa) The Supreme Court of Canada on Friday declined to hear the case ofa transsexual woman who was denied a job at a rape crisis center because shewas not born biologically female.
For 12 years Kimberly Nixon has been battling the Vancouver Rape Reliefwhich turned her down for a job at its facility in Vancouver which providesa safe-house for battered and raped women, and a crisis phone line.
Nixon, who was born biologically male but underwent a sex-change operationin 1990, was ejected from a training session for volunteer counselors when astaff member learned she had not always been biologically female.
Nixon won a British Columbia Human Rights discrimination complaint and a$7,500 award. The provincial Supreme Court later overturned the ruling andher appeal was dismissed.
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/02/020207mexico.htm
Mexican Bishop Denounces Civil Unions
by The Associated Press
Posted: February 2, 2007 - 5:00 pm ET
(Piedras Negras, Mexico) Mexico's first gay civil union has upset a RomanCatholic bishop in the state where it occurred.
Bishop Alonso Garza of Piedras Negras said Friday that Mexico's first gaycivil union -- which occurred Wednesday in his state's capital of Saltilloon -- was "a disgrace" and "a show."
Karla Lopez and Karina Almaguer, both of Matamoros, across from Brownsville,Texas, became the first gay couple in Mexico to register a civil union,taking advantage of a Coahuila state law approved in January.
"This is a disgrace," Garza said, and he lamented that the state hadattracted international attention for "this kind of situation."
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/02/020207nmex.htm
New Mexico Lawmakers Shelve Anti-Gay Proposals
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: February 2, 2007 - 9:00 pm ET
(Santa Fe, New Mexico) Two bills aimed at blocking same-sex couples frommarrying have been defeated.
The House Consumer and Public Affairs Committee voted down both a proposedamendment to the state constitution, and a separate Defense of Marriage billthat each would define marriage as a union of one man and one woman.
The vote was along party lines - all four committee Democrats voted in favorof tabling the measures; the three Republicans against it.
The tide was against both bills. Even if they had been approved at thecommittee level both would need to be passed in both houses of thelegislature.
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/02/020207nybens.htm
Bill Would Strengthen NYC Gay Partner Law
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: February 2, 2007 - 7:00 pm ET
(New York City) New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn hasintroduced a bill that would expand the city's domestic partner law.
In 1998 the city passed a domestic partner bill that was considered abreakthrough at the time but in the intervening time a number of loopholeshave been discovered.
The new legislation addresses that and expands the existing law.
While the City Council does not have jurisdiction over marriage, we do havelegislative authority over domestic partnerships," Quinn told Gay City News.
"[The Domestic Partners for Full Equality Act will] make sure New Yorkers indomestic partnerships have the same rights as married people with regard tocity benefits and services."
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The Advocate
http://advocate.com/print_article_ektid41696.asp
Senate chaplain cancels appearance at evangelical conference
U.S. Senate chaplain Barry Black has canceled his scheduled appearance at aChristian evangelical conference after he was pictured with columnist AnnCoulter and other prominent conservatives in a brochure promoting the event.Black told Senate majority leader Harry Reid he wouldn't be addressing nextmonth's "Reclaiming America for Christ" conference because his appearancewouldn't uphold the Senate chaplain's "historic tradition of beingnonpolitical, nonpartisan, nonsectarian," Meg Saunders, a spokeswoman forthe chaplain, said Thursday.
Saunders said Black, a Seventh-day Adventist and a former Navy chaplain, hadreceived "a very generic invitation" in the fall of 2005 to speak at theconference and had agreed because there was room on his schedule. Afterlearning more about the other speakers and the event's featured topics,Black became "concerned" and canceled his appearance, Saunders said. "Hefelt the information had been incomplete," she said.
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The Advocate
http://advocate.com/print_article_ektid41710.asp
McGreevey files for divorce
The nation's first openly gay governor filed for divorce Friday from hiswife of seven years.
Lawyers for James E. McGreevey filed a two-page document in Union Countysuperior court in Elizabeth, N.J., seeking to dissolve his union with DinaMatos McGreevey. A spokeswoman for the court, Sandra Thaler-Gerber,confirmed receiving the filing Friday.
The two have lived apart since November 2004, when McGreevey resigned as NewJersey's governor following a stunning public announcement that he was "agay American" who had had an affair with a male staffer.
"It's a sad day for everyone," McGreevey told the Associated Press Friday."It is something that had to be done. We are blessed with a wonderfuldaughter who remains our focus."
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The Advocate
http://advocate.com/print_article_ektid41708.asp
India to make "safe zones" to educate migrants about HIV
India will create "safe spaces" along migration routes in cities to protectmigrant workers from contracting HIV, reports Reuters, U.K.
The government plans to monitor migrant concentrations in cities and provideeducational programs about HIV for the migrants. The "safe spaces" will alsoset up HIV-testing centers and distribute condoms. India has an estimated5.7 million people living with the virus, and migrants are considered ahigh-risk group.
The new plan against AIDS will focus on the 12 to 15 million people whomigrate from their villages to high HIV-prevalence cities and back over ashort period of time. Experts claim the virus is spreading to the countryvillages because many male migrants from the countryside have sex withprostitutes in cities and later infect their wives. Over half of Indiansliving with HIV are in rural areas.
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/16608286.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Fri, Feb. 02, 2007
Spending on Wisconsin gay marriage referendum neared $5 million
Associated Press
MADISON, Wis. - Advocates for both sides spent nearly $5 million onthe November referendum in which voters approved a constitutional ban on gaymarriage, according to financial filings. Opponents of the ban spent most ofthe money.
The total is believe to be the most ever spent on a statewidereferendum, and one organization - run by former state Republican partychairman Steve King - apparently gave the largest contribution ever in astate referendum.
The pro-amendment Vote Yes for Marriage said it received nearly$392,000 in donations in late October from the Middleton-based Coalition forAmerica's Families, run by King.
Even with the donation, Vote Yes was vastly outspent by amendment foesFair Wisconsin, which poured $4.3 million into the campaign. Vote Yes spent$635,000 in total.
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Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/football/pro/dolphins/sfl-sbgaynfl03feb03,0,4176295,print.story?coll=sfla-dolphins-front
Gay players 'running in the shadows'
Opinions differ whether sexuality choice would still bring ostracism.
By Harvey Fialkov
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
February 3, 2007
As Atlanta Falcons defensive tackle Esera Tuaolo approached, quarterbackJohn Elway knelt to end Super Bowl XXIII at then Pro Player Stadium in 1999.Then Tuaolo walked off the field filled with dread and anxiety.
Not because his Falcons were pummeled 34-19, but because he was afraid ofbeing recognized by a television viewer who might have picked him up in agay bar years earlier.
"One of my biggest fears I had was someone recognizing me and outing me,"Tauolo said from his home in Minneapolis. He was also pained watching otherplayers and their families enjoy public events, while he and his partner,Mitchell Wherley, "were running in the shadows."
"It's every football player's dream to get to the Super Bowl, but for me itwas a conflict of emotions. It was fear, anxiety attacks and depression witheverything going in my life.
"We live in a society that really doesn't like us; and definitely, the NFLis one of the most homophobic arenas out there."
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The current issue of The Express Gay News is online
http://expressgaynews.com/
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
Saturday, February 03, 2007
NATIONAL & WORLD DIGEST February 03, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/opinion/03dowd.html
February 3, 2007
Op-Ed Columnist
No Way Out
By MAUREEN DOWD
WASHINGTON
"Everything you've heard and read is true. And I am deeply sorry about that." Who said it?
(a) George Bush, about the chilling new intelligence report on Iraq.
(b) Joe Biden, about his self-imploding prolixity.
(c) Condi Rice, on her ability to understand Peyton Manning'svulnerabilities better than Nuri Kamal al-Malaki's.
(d) Silvio Berlusconi, on his wife's Junoesque lightning bolt after hispublic flirting.
(e) Jacques Chirac, after giving a Gallic shrug at the prospect of Irangetting un or deux nuclear weapons.
(f) Hillary Clinton, on enabling the president to invade Iraq.
(g) Barack Obama, for the ultimate sin of not being black enough or whiteenough.
(h) Mary Cheney, on her decision to work on her terrifying dad's homophobiccampaign because the thought of John Kerry was "terrifying."
(i) Gavin Newsom, the mayor of San Francisco, about his affair with hiscampaign manager's wife.
The answer is Gavin Newsom.
It's rare to get a simple apology when a complex obfuscation will do.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201203_pf.html
In Va. House, 'Profound Regret' on Slavery
Delegates Unanimously Pass Resolution of Contrition About State's Role
By Tim Craig
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, February 3, 2007; A01
RICHMOND, Feb. 2 -- The House of Delegates unanimously approved a resolution
Friday expressing "profound regret" for Virginia's role in the slave trade,
a significant act of contrition by a body that used to start the day with a
salute that symbolized the state's Confederate heritage.
The resolution, one of several that lawmakers are considering as part of the400th anniversary celebration of the founding of Jamestown, is one of thebiggest steps any state has taken in offering remorse for the enslavement ofmillions of Africans and Caribbean islanders during the 17th, 18th and 19thcenturies.
The statement also condemns the "egregious wrongs" that European settlersinflicted on Native Americans.
"The General Assembly hereby expresses its profound regret for theCommonwealth's role in sanctioning the immoral institution of human slavery,in the historic wrongs visited upon native peoples, and in all other formsof discrimination and injustice that have been rooted in racial and culturalbias and misunderstanding," the resolution reads.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201524_pf.html
States' Map For Saving The Oceans
By Leon E. Panetta and James D. Watkins
Saturday, February 3, 2007; A15
Buried beneath the headlines about warming oceans, harmful algae blooms anddwindling seafood stocks is the fact that it is within our power to makeimmediate, measurable progress toward solving the problems facing ouroceans. Innovative state leaders are showing us the way, and the federalgovernment needs to follow their example.
Over the past three years, California, acting to preserve a vital stateresource, has developed an Ocean Action Plan; launched the mostcomprehensive approach to marine protected areas in the nation; and investedmore than $30 million in projects to improve water quality, protect oceanhabitats and manage sand on its beaches. In the past year, at least 18states have taken similar steps. Regional, bipartisan alliances were formedto protect the waters, shores, species and economies of the Gulf of Mexico,New York, Puget Sound and the West Coast.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201525_pf.html
Will We Lose in the Stem Cell Race?
By Joseph Fuller and Brock Reeve
Saturday, February 3, 2007; A15
Americans take it for granted that they are the world's leaders in the lifesciences. And it's true that, today, American companies account for 60percent of global pharmaceutical sales and 75 percent of biotech sales, andthat they dominate the market for medical devices. But complacency is apowerful enemy; our leadership position is not a national birthright. Wecould fumble it just as we fumbled leadership in the consumer electronicsand automotive sectors.
In science and technology-intensive fields, fumbling is particularly easy.Less than 30 years ago, five of the world's top 10 pharmaceutical companies,including the two largest, were European. Between 1980 and 1984, Europeinvented more than half of the world's new drugs. Observers assumed thatEurope would lead the anticipated revolution in biotechnology.
Today, however, American companies account for more than three-quarters ofworldwide biotech revenue and have almost 4,500 products in development -- 21/2 times as many as European companies.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/nyregion/03groundhog.html?pagewanted=print
February 3, 2007
The Groundhog Emerged, and Sounded a Lot Like Al Gore
By PAUL VITELLO
Groundhog Day has been part of the Western calendar since around the fifthcentury, which means it has survived centuries of Catholicism, theReformation, the Enlightenment, the Industrial Revolution, and the advent ofthe agriculture of cloned sheep.
But whether it will survive in an age of global warming was one question -albeit not the biggest one - raised by the awkward coincidence yesterday ofGroundhog Day 2007 falling on the same day a report was released by theIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change of the United Nations.
The report said that global warming was an unequivocal fact likely to makesummers hotter and winters warmer for the next few centuries, withpotentially dire consequences for the ecosystem. Groundhogs around thecountry, including the legendary Pennsylvania groundhog known asPunxsutawney Phil, basically concurred yesterday, shunning their shadows topredict an early spring.
But in this winter that almost wasn't, that hardly seemed an accomplishmentin prognostication - an untrained house cat could most likely have said thesame.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/us/03texas.html?pagewanted=print
February 3, 2007
Texas Is First to Require Cancer Shots for Schoolgirls
By RALPH BLUMENTHAL
HOUSTON, Feb. 2 - Texas on Friday became the first state to require all 11-and 12-year-old girls entering the sixth grade to be vaccinated against asexually transmitted virus that causes cervical cancer.
Averting a potentially divisive debate in the Legislature, Gov. Rick Perry,a Republican, signed an executive order mandating shots of the Merck vaccineGardasil as protection against the human papillomavirus, or HPV, starting inSeptember 2008.
Mr. Perry's action, praised by health advocates, caught many by surprise ina largely conservative state where sexual politics is often a battleground.
"I had no idea; I was absolutely caught off guard," said RepresentativeJessica Farrar, Democrat of Houston, who sponsored a bill to require thevaccinations starting this September. "Normally, the governor does not takethings like this upon himself, although I'm glad he did."
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020200587_pf.html
Democratic Presidential Hopefuls Take the Stage
By Anne E. Kornblut
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, February 2, 2007; 1:22 PM
Democrats, fired up by their recent midterm election victories, todaylaunched a campaign to win the White House in 2008.One after another,Democratic presidential candidates paraded into the Democratic NationalCommittee's winter meeting in Washington and, in seven-minute windows, gavesnapshots of their stump speeches.
In perhaps her most aggressive speech since announcing she is running forpresident, Sen. Hillary Clinton (N.Y.) repeated her mantra that she is "into win" -- and declared that victory in the presidential campaign was a toppriority.
"I know a thing or two about winning campaigns," Clinton said to anapplauding crowd. "When our party, or our candidates, are attacked, we havegot to stand up and fight back. I have always done that and I always will. Iknow how they think, how they act, and how to defeat them. And if you giveme the chance that is exactly what we will do together in 2008."
Clinton, widely seen as the national front-runner but in a close race inearly-voting states, followed a speech by Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, whodelivered a serious set of remarks that at times brought the hall to ahushed silence.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/washington/03cong.html?pagewanted=print
February 3, 2007
Republicans Plan to Block Iraq Debate
By CARL HULSE
WASHINGTON, Feb. 2 - Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican
leader, said Friday that his party would unite to block Senate debate nextweek on a bipartisan resolution opposing President Bush's troop buildup inIraq unless the Democrats allowed votes on at least two Republicanalternatives.
Mr. McConnell said even Senator John W. Warner, the Virginia Republican whois the chief author of the bipartisan proposal, and other Republicansbacking his plan had agreed to prevent the resolution from reaching thefloor Monday if Democrats did not agree to that demand.
"We're in a position to insist on a procedure for considering these mattersthat we think is fair to us," said Mr. McConnell, who has been negotiatingthe framework of the debate with Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majorityleader. "We can't dictate the outcome necessarily, but we're insistent upona process that we are comfortable with."
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/opinion/03sat1.html?pagewanted=print
February 3, 2007
Editorial
The Governor's Health Plan
Gov. Eliot Spitzer's plan to freeze Medicaid payments at current levels forhospitals and nursing homes is causing understandable consternation amonghealth care institutions that are already in precarious financial straits.But the governor's new budget proposal looks like a responsible way to freeup money to help pay for a huge increase in state aid for education andsubsidize the property tax cuts he deems necessary to win approval of hiseducation proposals - and accelerate much-needed reform in the way medicalcare is delivered.
New York currently spends roughly a third of the state budget, or some $46.5billion, on Medicaid, far more than any other state. That makes Medicaid areasonable place to look for savings. By ramping down the rate of growth,the governor's new budget proposes to save more than $1.2 billion fromprojected state spending on Medicaid and a related health program in thenext fiscal year.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201964_pf.html
Brazilians' Arrest Focuses Scrutiny on Evangelical Groups
By Monte Reel
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, February 3, 2007; A01
SAO PAULO, Brazil -- Before a service at Reborn in Christ Church this week,a man hawked gospel CDs outside the front door. In the cavernous nave,volunteers placed envelopes soliciting cash donations on each of about 1,000chairs, while cameramen working for the church's television network focusedon the altar.
Everything was ready, except the church's founders and spiritual leaders.
Estevam Hernandes-Filho and his wife, Sonia -- who oversee more than 1,000churches in Brazil and several in Florida -- were under house arrest inMiami, accused of carrying more than $56,000 in undeclared cash. Some of themoney had been stuffed between the pages of their Bible, according to U.S.customs agents who detained the couple last month at the Miami airport.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2007/02/02/BL2007020200807_pf.html
Cheney's Fingerprint?
By Dan Froomkin
Special to washingtonpost.com
Friday, February 2, 2007; 12:58 PM
The revelation yesterday that Scooter Libby acknowledged in November 2003that he and Vice President Cheney may have talked in July about whether totell reporters that Valerie Plame worked at the CIA further bolsters thetheory that Cheney may be the prime force behind this whole sordid tale.
The conversation in question took place on July 12, 2003, as Cheney and histhen-chief of staff were flying back from an event in Norfolk on Air ForceTwo.
According to multiple reports, Cheney was talking about how to discreditPlame's husband, Joseph Wilson, who was making trouble with his suggestionthat the administration manipulated intelligence about Saddam Hussein'sweapons programs to justify an invasion of Iraq. Wilson felt theadministration had intentionally disregarded the findings of a trip to Nigerhe had undertaken for the CIA.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/science/earth/03climate.html?ei=5094&en=20d5f48fa7a3c24c&hp=&ex=1170565200&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
February 3, 2007
Science Panel Calls Global Warming 'Unequivocal'
By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL and ANDREW C. REVKIN
PARIS, Feb. 2 - In a grim and powerful assessment of the future of theplanet, the leading international network of climate scientists hasconcluded for the first time that global warming is "unequivocal" and thathuman activity is the main driver, "very likely" causing most of the rise intemperatures since 1950.
They said the world was in for centuries of climbing temperatures, risingseas and shifting weather patterns - unavoidable results of the buildup ofheat-trapping gases in the atmosphere.
But their report, released here on Friday by the Intergovernmental Panel onClimate Change, said warming and its harmful consequences could besubstantially blunted by prompt action.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020200628_pf.html
British to Show Al Gore Movie in Schools
The Associated Press
Friday, February 2, 2007; 11:25 AM
LONDON -- Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore's global warming documentarywill be sent to every secondary school in England as part of a campaign totackle climate change, the government said Friday.
Environment Secretary David Miliband and Education Secretary Alan Johnsonannounced plans to distribute Gore's film, "An Inconvenient Truth," on theday the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report was published inParis. The report by leading scientists, said global warming has started andis "very likely" caused by humans.
"The debate over the science of climate change is well and truly over, asdemonstrated by the publication of today's report by the IPCC," Milibandsaid. "Our energies should now be channeled into how we respond in aninnovative and positive way in moving to a low-carbon future."
=
The Washington Post
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/benchconference/2007/02/the_libby_trial_two_weeks_in.html
The Libby Trial, Two Weeks In
Now that the perjury and obstruction trial of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby istwo full weeks in, and in case you haven't been following it from pregnantmoment to moment, it's time to identify a few kernels of truth about thecase.
1. It's now obvious why Libby's lawyers intend to focus on a "faulty memory"defense on behalf of their client. Witness after witness, several of thememinently credible, have come forward to tell jurors that Libby knew aboutValerie Plame Wilson, the covert CIA agent, before the time frame he laterdisclosed to grand jurors and federal investigators. If jurors have tochoose only between Libby's statements at face value and the testimony ofall those other witnesses, Libby will lose and be convicted. But if jurorscome to believe that Libby merely made a mistake, he has a chance.
2. In order to make it harder for those jurors to be willing to give Libbythe benefit of that doubt, special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald is doing amasterful job of introducing evidence, through testimony, that paints Libbyin a shoddy light. Prosecution witnesses, taken together, havecharacaterized him as a slimy bureaucratic operative who was more interestedin his own political survival than the good of the nation. Libby's lawyerswill have to counter this when their witnesses take the stand-- one reasonwhy Vice President Dick Cheney is still expected to be a prime defensewitness.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201638_pf.html
DNC Turns Focus to White House
At Party Forum, the Leading Candidates Jockey for Position
By Dan Balz and Anne E. Kornblut
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, February 3, 2007; A03
With Congress in their control and their eyes now on the White House,Democratic Party leaders took their first look at the party's field ofpresidential candidates yesterday at a forum in which the threefront-runners presented their positions on Iraq and jockeyed over who candefeat the Republicans in 2008.
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York presented herself as a tough,experienced pragmatist. Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois offered himself as aninspirational critic of politics as usual. And former senator John Edwardsof North Carolina made himself the keeper of the Democratic flame,delivering a call for Democrats to reclaim their heritage.
Addressing the Democratic National Committee's winter meeting, Clinton putfurther distance between herself and President Bush on Iraq. "I want to bevery clear about this," she said. "If I had been president in October of2002, I would not have started this war. . . . If we in Congress don't endthis war before January 2009, as president, I will."
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201575_pf.html
Pentagon Official Who Criticized Detainee Lawyers Quits
From News Services
Saturday, February 3, 2007; A06
A senior Pentagon official resigned yesterday, the Defense Departmentannounced, three weeks after criticizing lawyers who represent terrorismsuspects.
Charles "Cully" Stimson, deputy assistant secretary of defense for detaineeaffairs, called it "shocking" that major U.S. law firms representedGuantanamo Bay detainees free of charge and said they would likely sufferfinancially after their corporate clients learned of the work.
"I think, quite honestly, when corporate CEOs see that those firms arerepresenting the very terrorists who hit their bottom line back in 2001,those CEOs are going to make those law firms choose between representingterrorists or representing reputable firms," Stimson said in a Jan. 11interview on Federal News Radio.
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/16612700.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Sat, Feb. 03, 2007
Romney beats Kerry in flip-flop contest
BY ELLEN GOODMAN
ellengoodman@globe.com
Last spring when the tender shoots of John Kerry's ambition wererising again like a hardy perennial, I uttered a cri de coeur or, as we sayin English, a shriek: 'Stop Him Before He Kills (The Democrats' Chances)Again.''
Kerry is a good, honorable, thoughtful man but a God-awfulpresidential candidate. And so the one person who choked up at last week'sannouncement that he wasn't going to run again was, well, John Kerry.
But no sooner do we celebrate the demise of one Massachusettscandidate, then up pops the next one. The unlamented former Gov. Mitt Romneyis becoming a true contender, harvesting endorsements and attention inpursuit of the Republican nomination for president.
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
=
The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/opinion/03dowd.html
February 3, 2007
Op-Ed Columnist
No Way Out
By MAUREEN DOWD
WASHINGTON
"Everything you've heard and read is true. And I am deeply sorry about that." Who said it?
(a) George Bush, about the chilling new intelligence report on Iraq.
(b) Joe Biden, about his self-imploding prolixity.
(c) Condi Rice, on her ability to understand Peyton Manning'svulnerabilities better than Nuri Kamal al-Malaki's.
(d) Silvio Berlusconi, on his wife's Junoesque lightning bolt after hispublic flirting.
(e) Jacques Chirac, after giving a Gallic shrug at the prospect of Irangetting un or deux nuclear weapons.
(f) Hillary Clinton, on enabling the president to invade Iraq.
(g) Barack Obama, for the ultimate sin of not being black enough or whiteenough.
(h) Mary Cheney, on her decision to work on her terrifying dad's homophobiccampaign because the thought of John Kerry was "terrifying."
(i) Gavin Newsom, the mayor of San Francisco, about his affair with hiscampaign manager's wife.
The answer is Gavin Newsom.
It's rare to get a simple apology when a complex obfuscation will do.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201203_pf.html
In Va. House, 'Profound Regret' on Slavery
Delegates Unanimously Pass Resolution of Contrition About State's Role
By Tim Craig
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, February 3, 2007; A01
RICHMOND, Feb. 2 -- The House of Delegates unanimously approved a resolution
Friday expressing "profound regret" for Virginia's role in the slave trade,
a significant act of contrition by a body that used to start the day with a
salute that symbolized the state's Confederate heritage.
The resolution, one of several that lawmakers are considering as part of the400th anniversary celebration of the founding of Jamestown, is one of thebiggest steps any state has taken in offering remorse for the enslavement ofmillions of Africans and Caribbean islanders during the 17th, 18th and 19thcenturies.
The statement also condemns the "egregious wrongs" that European settlersinflicted on Native Americans.
"The General Assembly hereby expresses its profound regret for theCommonwealth's role in sanctioning the immoral institution of human slavery,in the historic wrongs visited upon native peoples, and in all other formsof discrimination and injustice that have been rooted in racial and culturalbias and misunderstanding," the resolution reads.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201524_pf.html
States' Map For Saving The Oceans
By Leon E. Panetta and James D. Watkins
Saturday, February 3, 2007; A15
Buried beneath the headlines about warming oceans, harmful algae blooms anddwindling seafood stocks is the fact that it is within our power to makeimmediate, measurable progress toward solving the problems facing ouroceans. Innovative state leaders are showing us the way, and the federalgovernment needs to follow their example.
Over the past three years, California, acting to preserve a vital stateresource, has developed an Ocean Action Plan; launched the mostcomprehensive approach to marine protected areas in the nation; and investedmore than $30 million in projects to improve water quality, protect oceanhabitats and manage sand on its beaches. In the past year, at least 18states have taken similar steps. Regional, bipartisan alliances were formedto protect the waters, shores, species and economies of the Gulf of Mexico,New York, Puget Sound and the West Coast.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201525_pf.html
Will We Lose in the Stem Cell Race?
By Joseph Fuller and Brock Reeve
Saturday, February 3, 2007; A15
Americans take it for granted that they are the world's leaders in the lifesciences. And it's true that, today, American companies account for 60percent of global pharmaceutical sales and 75 percent of biotech sales, andthat they dominate the market for medical devices. But complacency is apowerful enemy; our leadership position is not a national birthright. Wecould fumble it just as we fumbled leadership in the consumer electronicsand automotive sectors.
In science and technology-intensive fields, fumbling is particularly easy.Less than 30 years ago, five of the world's top 10 pharmaceutical companies,including the two largest, were European. Between 1980 and 1984, Europeinvented more than half of the world's new drugs. Observers assumed thatEurope would lead the anticipated revolution in biotechnology.
Today, however, American companies account for more than three-quarters ofworldwide biotech revenue and have almost 4,500 products in development -- 21/2 times as many as European companies.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/nyregion/03groundhog.html?pagewanted=print
February 3, 2007
The Groundhog Emerged, and Sounded a Lot Like Al Gore
By PAUL VITELLO
Groundhog Day has been part of the Western calendar since around the fifthcentury, which means it has survived centuries of Catholicism, theReformation, the Enlightenment, the Industrial Revolution, and the advent ofthe agriculture of cloned sheep.
But whether it will survive in an age of global warming was one question -albeit not the biggest one - raised by the awkward coincidence yesterday ofGroundhog Day 2007 falling on the same day a report was released by theIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change of the United Nations.
The report said that global warming was an unequivocal fact likely to makesummers hotter and winters warmer for the next few centuries, withpotentially dire consequences for the ecosystem. Groundhogs around thecountry, including the legendary Pennsylvania groundhog known asPunxsutawney Phil, basically concurred yesterday, shunning their shadows topredict an early spring.
But in this winter that almost wasn't, that hardly seemed an accomplishmentin prognostication - an untrained house cat could most likely have said thesame.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/us/03texas.html?pagewanted=print
February 3, 2007
Texas Is First to Require Cancer Shots for Schoolgirls
By RALPH BLUMENTHAL
HOUSTON, Feb. 2 - Texas on Friday became the first state to require all 11-and 12-year-old girls entering the sixth grade to be vaccinated against asexually transmitted virus that causes cervical cancer.
Averting a potentially divisive debate in the Legislature, Gov. Rick Perry,a Republican, signed an executive order mandating shots of the Merck vaccineGardasil as protection against the human papillomavirus, or HPV, starting inSeptember 2008.
Mr. Perry's action, praised by health advocates, caught many by surprise ina largely conservative state where sexual politics is often a battleground.
"I had no idea; I was absolutely caught off guard," said RepresentativeJessica Farrar, Democrat of Houston, who sponsored a bill to require thevaccinations starting this September. "Normally, the governor does not takethings like this upon himself, although I'm glad he did."
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020200587_pf.html
Democratic Presidential Hopefuls Take the Stage
By Anne E. Kornblut
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, February 2, 2007; 1:22 PM
Democrats, fired up by their recent midterm election victories, todaylaunched a campaign to win the White House in 2008.One after another,Democratic presidential candidates paraded into the Democratic NationalCommittee's winter meeting in Washington and, in seven-minute windows, gavesnapshots of their stump speeches.
In perhaps her most aggressive speech since announcing she is running forpresident, Sen. Hillary Clinton (N.Y.) repeated her mantra that she is "into win" -- and declared that victory in the presidential campaign was a toppriority.
"I know a thing or two about winning campaigns," Clinton said to anapplauding crowd. "When our party, or our candidates, are attacked, we havegot to stand up and fight back. I have always done that and I always will. Iknow how they think, how they act, and how to defeat them. And if you giveme the chance that is exactly what we will do together in 2008."
Clinton, widely seen as the national front-runner but in a close race inearly-voting states, followed a speech by Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, whodelivered a serious set of remarks that at times brought the hall to ahushed silence.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/washington/03cong.html?pagewanted=print
February 3, 2007
Republicans Plan to Block Iraq Debate
By CARL HULSE
WASHINGTON, Feb. 2 - Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican
leader, said Friday that his party would unite to block Senate debate nextweek on a bipartisan resolution opposing President Bush's troop buildup inIraq unless the Democrats allowed votes on at least two Republicanalternatives.
Mr. McConnell said even Senator John W. Warner, the Virginia Republican whois the chief author of the bipartisan proposal, and other Republicansbacking his plan had agreed to prevent the resolution from reaching thefloor Monday if Democrats did not agree to that demand.
"We're in a position to insist on a procedure for considering these mattersthat we think is fair to us," said Mr. McConnell, who has been negotiatingthe framework of the debate with Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majorityleader. "We can't dictate the outcome necessarily, but we're insistent upona process that we are comfortable with."
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/opinion/03sat1.html?pagewanted=print
February 3, 2007
Editorial
The Governor's Health Plan
Gov. Eliot Spitzer's plan to freeze Medicaid payments at current levels forhospitals and nursing homes is causing understandable consternation amonghealth care institutions that are already in precarious financial straits.But the governor's new budget proposal looks like a responsible way to freeup money to help pay for a huge increase in state aid for education andsubsidize the property tax cuts he deems necessary to win approval of hiseducation proposals - and accelerate much-needed reform in the way medicalcare is delivered.
New York currently spends roughly a third of the state budget, or some $46.5billion, on Medicaid, far more than any other state. That makes Medicaid areasonable place to look for savings. By ramping down the rate of growth,the governor's new budget proposes to save more than $1.2 billion fromprojected state spending on Medicaid and a related health program in thenext fiscal year.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201964_pf.html
Brazilians' Arrest Focuses Scrutiny on Evangelical Groups
By Monte Reel
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, February 3, 2007; A01
SAO PAULO, Brazil -- Before a service at Reborn in Christ Church this week,a man hawked gospel CDs outside the front door. In the cavernous nave,volunteers placed envelopes soliciting cash donations on each of about 1,000chairs, while cameramen working for the church's television network focusedon the altar.
Everything was ready, except the church's founders and spiritual leaders.
Estevam Hernandes-Filho and his wife, Sonia -- who oversee more than 1,000churches in Brazil and several in Florida -- were under house arrest inMiami, accused of carrying more than $56,000 in undeclared cash. Some of themoney had been stuffed between the pages of their Bible, according to U.S.customs agents who detained the couple last month at the Miami airport.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2007/02/02/BL2007020200807_pf.html
Cheney's Fingerprint?
By Dan Froomkin
Special to washingtonpost.com
Friday, February 2, 2007; 12:58 PM
The revelation yesterday that Scooter Libby acknowledged in November 2003that he and Vice President Cheney may have talked in July about whether totell reporters that Valerie Plame worked at the CIA further bolsters thetheory that Cheney may be the prime force behind this whole sordid tale.
The conversation in question took place on July 12, 2003, as Cheney and histhen-chief of staff were flying back from an event in Norfolk on Air ForceTwo.
According to multiple reports, Cheney was talking about how to discreditPlame's husband, Joseph Wilson, who was making trouble with his suggestionthat the administration manipulated intelligence about Saddam Hussein'sweapons programs to justify an invasion of Iraq. Wilson felt theadministration had intentionally disregarded the findings of a trip to Nigerhe had undertaken for the CIA.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/science/earth/03climate.html?ei=5094&en=20d5f48fa7a3c24c&hp=&ex=1170565200&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
February 3, 2007
Science Panel Calls Global Warming 'Unequivocal'
By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL and ANDREW C. REVKIN
PARIS, Feb. 2 - In a grim and powerful assessment of the future of theplanet, the leading international network of climate scientists hasconcluded for the first time that global warming is "unequivocal" and thathuman activity is the main driver, "very likely" causing most of the rise intemperatures since 1950.
They said the world was in for centuries of climbing temperatures, risingseas and shifting weather patterns - unavoidable results of the buildup ofheat-trapping gases in the atmosphere.
But their report, released here on Friday by the Intergovernmental Panel onClimate Change, said warming and its harmful consequences could besubstantially blunted by prompt action.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020200628_pf.html
British to Show Al Gore Movie in Schools
The Associated Press
Friday, February 2, 2007; 11:25 AM
LONDON -- Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore's global warming documentarywill be sent to every secondary school in England as part of a campaign totackle climate change, the government said Friday.
Environment Secretary David Miliband and Education Secretary Alan Johnsonannounced plans to distribute Gore's film, "An Inconvenient Truth," on theday the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report was published inParis. The report by leading scientists, said global warming has started andis "very likely" caused by humans.
"The debate over the science of climate change is well and truly over, asdemonstrated by the publication of today's report by the IPCC," Milibandsaid. "Our energies should now be channeled into how we respond in aninnovative and positive way in moving to a low-carbon future."
=
The Washington Post
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/benchconference/2007/02/the_libby_trial_two_weeks_in.html
The Libby Trial, Two Weeks In
Now that the perjury and obstruction trial of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby istwo full weeks in, and in case you haven't been following it from pregnantmoment to moment, it's time to identify a few kernels of truth about thecase.
1. It's now obvious why Libby's lawyers intend to focus on a "faulty memory"defense on behalf of their client. Witness after witness, several of thememinently credible, have come forward to tell jurors that Libby knew aboutValerie Plame Wilson, the covert CIA agent, before the time frame he laterdisclosed to grand jurors and federal investigators. If jurors have tochoose only between Libby's statements at face value and the testimony ofall those other witnesses, Libby will lose and be convicted. But if jurorscome to believe that Libby merely made a mistake, he has a chance.
2. In order to make it harder for those jurors to be willing to give Libbythe benefit of that doubt, special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald is doing amasterful job of introducing evidence, through testimony, that paints Libbyin a shoddy light. Prosecution witnesses, taken together, havecharacaterized him as a slimy bureaucratic operative who was more interestedin his own political survival than the good of the nation. Libby's lawyerswill have to counter this when their witnesses take the stand-- one reasonwhy Vice President Dick Cheney is still expected to be a prime defensewitness.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201638_pf.html
DNC Turns Focus to White House
At Party Forum, the Leading Candidates Jockey for Position
By Dan Balz and Anne E. Kornblut
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, February 3, 2007; A03
With Congress in their control and their eyes now on the White House,Democratic Party leaders took their first look at the party's field ofpresidential candidates yesterday at a forum in which the threefront-runners presented their positions on Iraq and jockeyed over who candefeat the Republicans in 2008.
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York presented herself as a tough,experienced pragmatist. Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois offered himself as aninspirational critic of politics as usual. And former senator John Edwardsof North Carolina made himself the keeper of the Democratic flame,delivering a call for Democrats to reclaim their heritage.
Addressing the Democratic National Committee's winter meeting, Clinton putfurther distance between herself and President Bush on Iraq. "I want to bevery clear about this," she said. "If I had been president in October of2002, I would not have started this war. . . . If we in Congress don't endthis war before January 2009, as president, I will."
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201575_pf.html
Pentagon Official Who Criticized Detainee Lawyers Quits
From News Services
Saturday, February 3, 2007; A06
A senior Pentagon official resigned yesterday, the Defense Departmentannounced, three weeks after criticizing lawyers who represent terrorismsuspects.
Charles "Cully" Stimson, deputy assistant secretary of defense for detaineeaffairs, called it "shocking" that major U.S. law firms representedGuantanamo Bay detainees free of charge and said they would likely sufferfinancially after their corporate clients learned of the work.
"I think, quite honestly, when corporate CEOs see that those firms arerepresenting the very terrorists who hit their bottom line back in 2001,those CEOs are going to make those law firms choose between representingterrorists or representing reputable firms," Stimson said in a Jan. 11interview on Federal News Radio.
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/16612700.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Sat, Feb. 03, 2007
Romney beats Kerry in flip-flop contest
BY ELLEN GOODMAN
ellengoodman@globe.com
Last spring when the tender shoots of John Kerry's ambition wererising again like a hardy perennial, I uttered a cri de coeur or, as we sayin English, a shriek: 'Stop Him Before He Kills (The Democrats' Chances)Again.''
Kerry is a good, honorable, thoughtful man but a God-awfulpresidential candidate. And so the one person who choked up at last week'sannouncement that he wasn't going to run again was, well, John Kerry.
But no sooner do we celebrate the demise of one Massachusettscandidate, then up pops the next one. The unlamented former Gov. Mitt Romneyis becoming a true contender, harvesting endorsements and attention inpursuit of the Republican nomination for president.
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
FLORIDA DIGEST February 03, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
Express Gay News
http://www.expressgaynews.com/2007/2-2/view/editorial/editorial.cfm
Time for BSO to police Wilton Manors?
Vehicle search raises serious Fourth Amendment concerns
By PHIL LAPADULA
Friday, February 02, 2007
About a year and a half ago when former Wilton Manors Police Chief RichardWierzbicki announced his retirement, some members of the gay communityrushed to the defense of the beleaguered Manors police department, believingthat a small local police force would be more sensitive to the concerns ofgay residents than the behemoth known as the Broward Sheriff's Office. Butafter recent events came to light, many people are now reassessing that
position.
On Nov. 29, a Wilton Manors police officer stopped John Pfaff, a local gayresident, allegedly because a tag light was out on his Chevy pickup truck.During the stop, Officer Gary Blocker asked Pfaff for permission to searchhis person and his vehicle. Pfaff said he consented to the search because hehad nothing to hide and felt intimidated by a man with a badge and a gun. Ashe began the search, Blocker asked Pfaff if he would "find anything strangelike a cock ring, lube or condoms," according to Pfaff's complaint.
=
Express Gay News
http://www.expressgaynews.com/print.cfm?content_id=3410
Two gay men robbed, one beaten in Manors
Police to hold prevention seminar for gays as nationwide crime wave hits S.Fla.
By PHIL LAPADULA
Feb. 02, 2007
Two gay men were robbed and one was beaten Jan. 17 on 6th Avenue about fourblocks from the Shoppes of Wilton Manors.
James Brummett, 28, said the attack occurred as he and his friend werewalking home after leaving the Alibi, a local gay bar. As the two walked up6th Avenue, Brummett said he noticed four young people walking behind them.
As the pair neared the intersection of 6th Avenue and 26th Street, two ofthe strangers came charging at them. One of the strangers pointed a gun intheir faces, Brummett recalled. While they were distracted by the twocharging at them, two other suspects came up from behind them, Brummettsaid. One of them punched Brummett, knocking him to the ground, he said.
Brummett said he was repeatedly kicked in the head while lying on theground. He said one of the suspects repeatedly called him a "nigger" as hekicked him in the head, even though Brummett is white. Brummett said hedidn't
recall the suspects using any anti-gay slurs.
=
Express Gay News
http://www.expressgaynews.com/2007/2-2/news/localnews/lcl.cfm
More Local News
First Diverse Minority Pride set for March 3-4
Friday, February 02, 2007
The area's first Diverse Minority Pride event is planned for March 3-4 atMills Pond Park in Fort Lauderdale.
The event will be a "two-day outdoor event celebrating and welcoming theminority GLBT community and its friends," said Sonia Mitchell, chairpersonof Diverse Minority Pride of South Florida in a press statement. In aninterview with the Express, Mitchell said the event is a way to bring thevarious ethnic and minority groups within the gay community together. Shesaid everyone is welcome.
"I believe in communities," Mitchell said. "Everyone is secluded in theirown little corners. This will allow them to be one big group, not littlepockets of people. This is not about one group of people; if you ask me, weare all minorities. It's a chance to get to know your neighbor."
=
St. Petersburg Times
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/02/02/news_pf/Tampabay/Crist_just_can_t_win_.shtml
Crist just can't win paternity debate
Sue Carlton
Published February 2, 2007
Forget for a minute the real issues being debated in our state, likeinsurance, paper ballots and stem cell research.
There's a question of paternity out there. And on this one, Gov. CharlieCrist can't win.
Think about it. If Crist agrees to take a test to prove he's not the fatherof an adopted St. Petersburg teenager, he has to surrender some privacy,maybe some dignity.
Take that test, and you pave the way for strapping on a lie detector cuffany time somebody with a shred of evidence points a finger at you.
Take the test, and let the sideshow that follows be a distraction from theserious business of trying to fix what ails this state.
=
Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-rxcanada03feb03,0,4675356,print.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
Drugs from Canada seized in So. Fla
By Bob LaMendola
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
February 3, 2007
Federal officials confiscated at least 37 packages of medicine from Canadashipped to South Florida consumers in late January, despite an Octoberpromise to stop targeting drugs imported for personal use.
A Food and Drug Administration spokeswoman Friday said in a brief statementthat Canadian pharmacy shipments were detained at Miami InternationalAirport for strictly routine reasons.
But South Florida seniors, Canadian pharmacy officials and Sen. Bill Nelson,D-Florida, said the number of seizures was far more than normal andquestioned if the Bush administration is reviving its controversial driveagainst Canadian drugs, which cost less but are banned in the United States.
"Not this again," said Tamarac retiree Norman Steinman, whose box of Diovanblood pressure pills was seized Jan. 25. "We thought this had ended inOctober. They say one thing and do another thing. It's not right that theywon't let people save money on drugs."
=
Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-fteams02feb02,0,4719039,print.story?coll=sfla-news-sfla
Crist, legislators back $240 million package for S. Florida's sports teams
By Linda Kleindienst and Sarah Talalay
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
February 2, 2007
Tallahassee · State taxpayers could foot the bill for up to $240 millionworth of stadium construction and renovations for South Florida's four prosports teams under a plan that has won a preliminary nod from Gov. CharlieCrist and legislative leaders.
"I think it is an economic development issue. I think it is important thesemajor league teams stay within the state of Florida," Crist, who once servedas general counsel for Minor League Baseball, said Thursday.
"We need to continue to nurture [the teams]," he said. "They provide jobsfor an awful lot of hardworking people throughout our state."
=
Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-fbudget03feb03,0,1029483,print.story
Crist budget stresses education and justice
Proposal envisions teacher bonuses, tax breaks for consumers.
By Linda Kleindienst
Tallahassee Bureau Chief
February 3, 2007
TALLAHASSEE · Gov. Charlie Crist unveiled his first state budget Friday, a$71.2 billion spending plan that pours money into building classrooms forFlorida's schoolchildren and prison cells for criminals, while providingbonuses for the best teachers and millions in tax breaks for consumers.
Many of the new governor's spending priorities reflect promises he made lastyear on the campaign trail, especially in the areas of public safety,health, education and economic development.
The spending plan includes $20 million to fund non-embryonic stem cellresearch and $32.5 million to replace controversial touch-screen votingmachines with machines that create a paper trail in time for the 2008presidential election. It also sets aside $2.35 billion in reserves as ahedge against an economic downturn or to help pay for a natural disasterlike a hurricane.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
=
Express Gay News
http://www.expressgaynews.com/2007/2-2/view/editorial/editorial.cfm
Time for BSO to police Wilton Manors?
Vehicle search raises serious Fourth Amendment concerns
By PHIL LAPADULA
Friday, February 02, 2007
About a year and a half ago when former Wilton Manors Police Chief RichardWierzbicki announced his retirement, some members of the gay communityrushed to the defense of the beleaguered Manors police department, believingthat a small local police force would be more sensitive to the concerns ofgay residents than the behemoth known as the Broward Sheriff's Office. Butafter recent events came to light, many people are now reassessing that
position.
On Nov. 29, a Wilton Manors police officer stopped John Pfaff, a local gayresident, allegedly because a tag light was out on his Chevy pickup truck.During the stop, Officer Gary Blocker asked Pfaff for permission to searchhis person and his vehicle. Pfaff said he consented to the search because hehad nothing to hide and felt intimidated by a man with a badge and a gun. Ashe began the search, Blocker asked Pfaff if he would "find anything strangelike a cock ring, lube or condoms," according to Pfaff's complaint.
=
Express Gay News
http://www.expressgaynews.com/print.cfm?content_id=3410
Two gay men robbed, one beaten in Manors
Police to hold prevention seminar for gays as nationwide crime wave hits S.Fla.
By PHIL LAPADULA
Feb. 02, 2007
Two gay men were robbed and one was beaten Jan. 17 on 6th Avenue about fourblocks from the Shoppes of Wilton Manors.
James Brummett, 28, said the attack occurred as he and his friend werewalking home after leaving the Alibi, a local gay bar. As the two walked up6th Avenue, Brummett said he noticed four young people walking behind them.
As the pair neared the intersection of 6th Avenue and 26th Street, two ofthe strangers came charging at them. One of the strangers pointed a gun intheir faces, Brummett recalled. While they were distracted by the twocharging at them, two other suspects came up from behind them, Brummettsaid. One of them punched Brummett, knocking him to the ground, he said.
Brummett said he was repeatedly kicked in the head while lying on theground. He said one of the suspects repeatedly called him a "nigger" as hekicked him in the head, even though Brummett is white. Brummett said hedidn't
recall the suspects using any anti-gay slurs.
=
Express Gay News
http://www.expressgaynews.com/2007/2-2/news/localnews/lcl.cfm
More Local News
First Diverse Minority Pride set for March 3-4
Friday, February 02, 2007
The area's first Diverse Minority Pride event is planned for March 3-4 atMills Pond Park in Fort Lauderdale.
The event will be a "two-day outdoor event celebrating and welcoming theminority GLBT community and its friends," said Sonia Mitchell, chairpersonof Diverse Minority Pride of South Florida in a press statement. In aninterview with the Express, Mitchell said the event is a way to bring thevarious ethnic and minority groups within the gay community together. Shesaid everyone is welcome.
"I believe in communities," Mitchell said. "Everyone is secluded in theirown little corners. This will allow them to be one big group, not littlepockets of people. This is not about one group of people; if you ask me, weare all minorities. It's a chance to get to know your neighbor."
=
St. Petersburg Times
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/02/02/news_pf/Tampabay/Crist_just_can_t_win_.shtml
Crist just can't win paternity debate
Sue Carlton
Published February 2, 2007
Forget for a minute the real issues being debated in our state, likeinsurance, paper ballots and stem cell research.
There's a question of paternity out there. And on this one, Gov. CharlieCrist can't win.
Think about it. If Crist agrees to take a test to prove he's not the fatherof an adopted St. Petersburg teenager, he has to surrender some privacy,maybe some dignity.
Take that test, and you pave the way for strapping on a lie detector cuffany time somebody with a shred of evidence points a finger at you.
Take the test, and let the sideshow that follows be a distraction from theserious business of trying to fix what ails this state.
=
Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-rxcanada03feb03,0,4675356,print.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
Drugs from Canada seized in So. Fla
By Bob LaMendola
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
February 3, 2007
Federal officials confiscated at least 37 packages of medicine from Canadashipped to South Florida consumers in late January, despite an Octoberpromise to stop targeting drugs imported for personal use.
A Food and Drug Administration spokeswoman Friday said in a brief statementthat Canadian pharmacy shipments were detained at Miami InternationalAirport for strictly routine reasons.
But South Florida seniors, Canadian pharmacy officials and Sen. Bill Nelson,D-Florida, said the number of seizures was far more than normal andquestioned if the Bush administration is reviving its controversial driveagainst Canadian drugs, which cost less but are banned in the United States.
"Not this again," said Tamarac retiree Norman Steinman, whose box of Diovanblood pressure pills was seized Jan. 25. "We thought this had ended inOctober. They say one thing and do another thing. It's not right that theywon't let people save money on drugs."
=
Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-fteams02feb02,0,4719039,print.story?coll=sfla-news-sfla
Crist, legislators back $240 million package for S. Florida's sports teams
By Linda Kleindienst and Sarah Talalay
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
February 2, 2007
Tallahassee · State taxpayers could foot the bill for up to $240 millionworth of stadium construction and renovations for South Florida's four prosports teams under a plan that has won a preliminary nod from Gov. CharlieCrist and legislative leaders.
"I think it is an economic development issue. I think it is important thesemajor league teams stay within the state of Florida," Crist, who once servedas general counsel for Minor League Baseball, said Thursday.
"We need to continue to nurture [the teams]," he said. "They provide jobsfor an awful lot of hardworking people throughout our state."
=
Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-fbudget03feb03,0,1029483,print.story
Crist budget stresses education and justice
Proposal envisions teacher bonuses, tax breaks for consumers.
By Linda Kleindienst
Tallahassee Bureau Chief
February 3, 2007
TALLAHASSEE · Gov. Charlie Crist unveiled his first state budget Friday, a$71.2 billion spending plan that pours money into building classrooms forFlorida's schoolchildren and prison cells for criminals, while providingbonuses for the best teachers and millions in tax breaks for consumers.
Many of the new governor's spending priorities reflect promises he made lastyear on the campaign trail, especially in the areas of public safety,health, education and economic development.
The spending plan includes $20 million to fund non-embryonic stem cellresearch and $32.5 million to replace controversial touch-screen votingmachines with machines that create a paper trail in time for the 2008presidential election. It also sets aside $2.35 billion in reserves as ahedge against an economic downturn or to help pay for a natural disasterlike a hurricane.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
Friday, February 02, 2007
GLBT DIGEST - February 2, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/printer2/index.asp?ploc=t&refer=http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/302171_hiv02.html
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
Four local men found to have drug-resistant strain of HIV
Friday, February 2, 2007
By TOM PAULSON
P-I REPORTER
Four men in King County have tested positive for a similar strain of HIVthat is highly resistant to drugs, public health officials said Thursday,raising the concern that others who had sex with them could also be infectedwith this aggressive and often untreatable infection.
"There may be more cases we don't know about," said Dr. Bob Wood, directorof the HIV/AIDS program for Public Health -- Seattle & King County.
"We are still working to learn more about these individuals and the virusthey have contracted," said Dorothy Teeter, interim director of the healthdepartment. "We are concerned for these individuals and their partners, andare continuing our investigation."
What's most concerning, added Wood, is that the virus identified in the fourmen is a similarly resistant genetic strain despite the fact that none ofthem reportedly had any contact with one another. All are gay men who usedcrystal methamphetamine and had many sexual partners, he said.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.washblade.com/2007/2-2/view/editorial/9929.cfm
Calling a faggot a faggot (Gay)
The debate over Isaiah Washington's homophobic slurs is a silly distractionfrom the real-life problems facing gays.
Friday, February 02, 2007
THE CONSTERNATION and uproar over Isaiah Washington's anti-gay slursdirected at his "Grey's Anatomy" co-star T.R. Knight reveal a lot about ourcelebrity-obsessed culture and our collective misplaced priorities.
One ignorant actor using the dreaded "f-word" doesn't strike me asparticularly surprising, but it has generated more mainstream mediaheadlines than any other gay topic in recent memory. Is it really newsworthythat someone called an out gay colleague a "faggot?"
This story seems to resonate much more among straight people, who forgetthat homophobia remains one of the last legally protected forms ofdiscrimination around.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.xtra.ca/public/viewstory.aspx?AFF_TYPE=3&STORY_ID=2601&PUB_TEMPLATE_ID=2
Is the religious right getting less scary?
SOCIETY / Even evangelicals are warming to homosexuality
Paul Gallant / Xtra / Thursday, February 01, 2007
you wonder why Canada and the US differ so much on social issues like guncontrol, abortion, the death penalty and, of course, homosexuality, look nofurther than statistics on religion.
Statistics Canada data from 2001 puts the percentage of Baptists here at 2.5percent, and "other Christians" including Apostolic, born-again andself-declared evangelicals at 2. 6 percent - that's a maximum of 5.1 percentof the population who could be said to be evangelical, compared to 43.2percent of the population that considers itself Roman Catholic, 9.6 percentUnited and 6.9 percent Anglican.
In the US, surveys from 2001 put the percentage of Baptists at 16.3, secondonly to Roman Catholics at 24.3 percent. The other denominations that couldbe described as evangelical add up to at least another four percent - morethan 20 percent of the American population is gung ho for God. No wonder weCanadians feel like dope-smoking, godless pinko perverts around them, why weworry when the US-based rightwing group Focus On The Family starts sendingmoney to its offspring in Ottawa. Evangelical views on gay and lesbianadoption, marriage and antidiscrimination laws are the main reason Canadahas such things and the US mostly does not.
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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/lancashire/6322075.stm
Gay rights bill 'threatens hotel'
A hotelier who runs a gay-only guest house has said the government'santi-discrimination bill would be a step backward for gay rights.The Sexual Orientation Regulations (SORs), which are due to come into effectin April, outlaw discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.
Mark Hurst, 47, said the proposed legislation would force him to open hisdoors to heterosexual guests.
He said that may put off many of his gay guests and put him out of business.
Mr Hurst, who runs Guyz hotel in Blackpool with his partner Steve, said:"Rather than improve gay rights, it will make things much worse. We run agay hotel exclusively for men.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.advocate.com/print_article_ektid41695.asp
Poll: 55 percent of Americans support letting gays serve openly in military
A new poll shows for the first time that a majority of Americans supportallowing gays to serve openly in the military.
A new poll shows for the first time that a majority of Americans supportallowing gays to serve openly in the military. The Harris Interactive surveyreveals that 55 percent of those polled say openly gay people should beallowed to serve in the military, and 57 percent agreed with former jointchiefs of staff chairman John Shalikashvili's assertion last month thatopenly gay people will "not undermine the efficacy of the armed forces," theWall Street Journal reports.
Only 19 percent of those polled said that gays could serve if they kepttheir sexual orientation secret, and 18 percent said they shouldn't beallowed to serve at all. In 2000, 48 percent said that gays should beallowed to serve openly.
On the specific question of "don't ask, don't tell," the military's officialban on openly gay servicemembers, 46 percent of respondents said theyopposed the policy, the same as in 2000.
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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.sovo.com/print.cfm?content_id=6457
Presidential hopefuls 'sincere' on gay issues?
Gay politicos impressed by Edwards, Obama
By JOSHUA LYNSEN
Feb. 02, 2007
Just weeks into their presidential campaigns, former Sen. John Edwards(D-N.C.) and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) are impressing some politicalobservers for their handling of gay rights issues.
With 21 months to go, Democratic National Committee GLBT Caucus Chair RickStafford and other politicos said Edwards and Obama have quickly outshinedan increasingly crowded field of other 2008 White House hopefuls becausethey're prepared to sincerely discuss gay issues.
Stafford said such genuineness is a key quality that many other candidates -including top Democratic contender Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) - have yetto demonstrate.
"When Obama and Edwards talk about our issues," he said, "I think there's asense that they speak from their hearts and they're willing to show thatthey're not there yet, where I'm not sure that kind of speaking from theheart comes from Hillary."
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.washblade.com/print.cfm?content_id=9925
Is faggot the new 'n-word'?
Longtime anti-gay slur matures to taboo status
By RYAN LEE
Feb. 02, 2007
The nickname Brian Thornton's friends gave him four years ago was asendearing as it was irreverent, as innocent as it was inflammatory. Its rootword is harmless enough to be freely bandied about between Thornton and hisgay friends, while retaining a viciousness that can bring the 32-year-old totears.
Thornton's work at the Lesbian & Gay Community Service Center of Clevelandand his presidency of the group that organizes Cleveland's gay Pridefestival inspired a moniker that captured his incomparable queerness:Faggoty Ass Faggot.
"Amongst my group of friends, we're pretty free-using of that word [faggot]," said Thornton, whose nickname eventually evolved into his onlinealter ego at faggotyassfaggot.com.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/printer2/index.asp?ploc=t&refer=http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1110ap_same_sex_benefits.html
Friday, February 2, 2007 · Last updated 9:33 a.m. PT
Michigan court: No same-sex benefits
By DAVID EGGERT
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
LANSING, Mich. -- Public universities and state and local governments wouldviolate the state constitution by providing health insurance to the partnersof gay employees, the Michigan Court of Appeals ruled Friday.
A three-judge panel said a 2004 voter-approved ban on gay marriage alsoapplies to same-sex domestic partner benefits. The decision reverses a 2005ruling from an Ingham County judge who said universities and governmentscould provide the benefits.
"The marriage amendment's plain language prohibits public employers fromrecognizing same-sex unions for any purpose," the court wrote.
A constitutional amendment passed by Michigan voters in November 2004 madethe union between a man and a woman the only agreement recognized as amarriage "or similar union for any purpose." Those six words led to thecourt fight over benefits for gay couples.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.kgw.com/sharedcontent/APStories/stories/D8N19OE01.html
WA Senate committee clears domestic partnership measure
02/02/2007
By RACHEL LA CORTE / Associated Press
A measure that would create domestic partnerships for same-sex couples inWashington is headed to a vote on the state Senate floor, over theobjections of opponents who argue the partnerships would essentially be thesame as marriage.
The bill would create a domestic partnership registry with the state, andwould provide enhanced rights for same-sex couples, including hospitalvisitation, the ability to authorize autopsies and organ donations, andinheritance rights when there is no will.
To be registered, couples would have to share a home, not be married or in adomestic relationship with someone else, and be at least 18.
Similar to California law, unmarried, heterosexual senior couples would alsobe eligible for domestic partnerships, if one partner were at least 62.
=
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/politics/4519828.html
Feb. 2, 2007, 1:17AM
Mary Cheney's privacy sparks a journalism debate
By JULIE MASON
Copyright 2007 Houston Chronicle
WASHINGTON - Private citizen Mary Cheney's decision to have a baby with herpartner, Heather Poe, raises some impolite questions about whether the grownchildren of elected officials are fair game for journalists.
Certainly her father, Vice President Dick Cheney, finds such inquiry shortof courteous.
"I think, frankly, you're out of line with that question," the vicepresident grumped last week when CNN's Wolf Blitzer ventured the topic in aninterview. "I think you're out of line."
Mary Cheney, 37, said this week that she also felt Blitzer's inquiry crosseda line, according to the New York Times.
=
Advocate.com
http://advocate.com/print_article_ektid41658.asp
Mary Cheney: Pregnancy "not a political statement"
The decision to become pregnant and raise a child with her female partnerwas not political, Mary Cheney, the lesbian daughter of Vice President DickCheney, said Wednesday.
The decision to become pregnant and raise a child with her female partnerwas not political, Mary Cheney, a daughter of Vice President Dick Cheney,told a Barnard College audience. ''This is a baby,'' Cheney said Wednesdayat a forum sponsored by Glamour magazine. ''This is a blessing from God. Itis not a political statement. It is not a prop to be used in a debate bypeople on either side of an issue. It is my child.''
Cheney, 37, announced in December that she and her partner of 15 years,Heather Poe, were starting a family. She did not say how the child wasconceived. The baby is due in the spring and will be the vice president'ssixth grandchild.
Dick Cheney became testy last week when CNN's Wolf Blitzer asked him what hethought of conservatives who are critical of his daughter's pregnancy.Cheney told Blitzer he was ''over the line.'' In a brief interview with TheNew York Times after Wednesday's panel, Mary Cheney said she agreed thatBlitzer had crossed a line. ''He was trying to get a rise out of myfather,'' she said.
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Mercury News
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/world/16595059.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Thu, Feb. 01, 2007
Gay and married
HOMOSEXUAL MEN IN CHINA PRESSURED TO WED, HAVE KIDS
By Tim Johnson
McClatchy Beijing Bureau
BEIJING - Like many gay men in China, 22-year-old Chen Lei enjoys thenewfound liberties of urban life. But he says he cannot fight his destiny:to marry a woman for whom he feels no attraction.
For economic, social and cultural reasons, the pressure on gays in China towed and raise families is high.
In Chen's case, his family hails from a village in Inner Mongolia, and hedares not tell them of his private life in the big city, knowing they wouldnot understand.
``I only have an older sister. So I'm definitely going to have to marry andhave children,'' Chen said. His mother already has made introductions to twoyoung women.
Attitudes toward homosexuality in China have relaxed in the big cities,where gay bars flourish and Web sites nurture a sense of community.Mentioning homosexuality no longer is taboo on TV newscasts and publicservice announcements, and government media have stopped lumping gays asdeviants along with prostitutes, gamblers and drug addicts. Gay groups havesprung up on university campuses.
=
Bloomberg.com
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601085&sid=apCLTMjLLULU&refer=europe
Vatican, Prodi Headed for Showdown on Gay-Marriage Proposal
By Flavia Krause-Jackson
Feb. 1 (Bloomberg) -- Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi and Pope BenedictXVI are headed for a showdown over gay marriage.
Prodi's cabinet plans to debate tomorrow a draft bill giving legalrecognition to long-standing, unmarried couples, including homosexuals. Thepope, who can wield considerable political power, has made it clear hestrongly opposes the move.
The last time church-state relations were this strained was more than 30years ago, when the Vatican, a city-state in the center of Rome, lostback-to-back battles against divorce and abortion, both of which votersapproved in popular referendums.
``The church is fighting a losing battle to stop some form of recognitionfor gay couples, but where it will succeed is in watering down thelegislation by dividing (Prodi's) coalition and mobilizing Catholics,'' saidAntonio Noto, director of IPR Marketing, a polling firm, in an interview.
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/02/020107putin.htm
Putin: Gays Linked To Declining Russian Birth Rate
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: February 1, 2007 - 1:00 pm ET
(Moscow) Russian President Vladimir Putin carefully sidestepped questionsThursday about Moscow's mayor branding gay pride parades as "Satanic".
Putin said he made it a policy not to interfere in local politics, and saidhe supported all minorities in Russia, but then suggested he supportedbanning gay events saying sexual minorities were linked to a declining birthrate in Russia.
Over the past decade Russia has seen its population decline by about 700,000a year. Last year in an effort to curb the decline he signed legislationthat gives Russian families about $10,000 for every child they have afterthe first.
On Monday Moscow Mayor Juri Lushkov, who refused to grant a pride day paradepermit last yet, infuriated gays by telling a Kremlin meeting of the RussianOrthodox Church that gay rights marches were "satanic," and that he willrefuse to grant a permit for a pride parade scheduled for this year. (story)
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/02/020107unions.htm
NH GOP Lawmaker Proposes Civil Unions
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: February 1, 2007 - 7:00 pm ET
(Concord, New Hampshire) As a New Hampshire House committee was hearingarguments for an against a proposed amendment to the state constitutionbanning gay marriage a Republican lawmaker was in another part of theCapitol saying he intends to bring in a bill to allow civil unions.
The state already has a law limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples.
Supporters of the proposed amendment say it isn't enough to prevent judgesfrom declaring it unconstitutional. Opponents say it would writediscrimination into the constitution.
The arguments weren't new. They were all made a year ago before thelegislature turned down a similar amendment.
But in a move that surprised some fellow Republicans former Senate LeaderBob Clegg told The Associated Press that he will introduce legislationgiving gays - and other adults who don't choose to marry - the same legalrights as married couples.
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/02/020107exxon.htm
Denies Rights To Gay Workers Exxon Posts Biggest Corporate Profit In USHistory
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: February 1, 2007 - 9:00 pm ET
(New York City) ExxonMobil the only major U.S. company to rescind anon-discrimination policy covering sexual orientation on Thursday posted thelargest annual profit by a U.S. company - $39.5 billion
The 2006 profit topped Exxon Mobil's own previous record of $36.13 billionset in 2005.
But for the past seven years the company has thwarted efforts to reinstatesexuality in its written nonbias policies.
Last May shareholders at ExxonMobil's annual meeting have voted down aproposal to include LGBT workers in the company's anti-discriminationpolicy.
LGBT workers had been included in employment policies at Mobil. In December1999 when Mobil merged with Exxon and under Exxon's direction, the policywas abandoned. At the same time, it closed Mobil's domestic partner benefitsprogram to any more employees.
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/02/020107ozAdopt.htm
Australia Moves To Block Gay Couples From Adopting Overseas
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: February 1, 2007 - 9:00 pm ET
(Sydney, Australia) The Australian government has announced legislation toprohibit the recognition of adoptions of foreign children by same-sexcouples.
The bill will be introduced in the new session of Parliament that beginsnext week.
Full details of the measure will not be known until the measure is formallybrought before the House but LGBT activists already say it is clear theLiberal government of Prime Minister John Howard wants to use gay couples asa wedge issue going into this year's election.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/01/AR2007020101167_pf.html
San Francisco mayor apologizes for affair
Reuters
Thursday, February 1, 2007; 5:03 PM
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom admitted onThursday to having an affair with the wife of his former campaign manager,who quit a day earlier after confronting the up-and-coming Democrat knownfor advocating gay marriage.
"I am deeply sorry," Newsom told reporters, admitting the affair after theSan Francisco Chronicle reported that Alex Tourk had resigned from Newsom'sreelection campaign after his wife disclosed the romantic involvement.
Elected in 2003, the 39-year-old mayor, now single, is a photogenicpolitician who gained national fame in 2004 for ordering city clerks toissue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, defying a state law definingmarriage as a union of a man and woman.
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Outsports Tribute
http://outsports.com/local/2007/0124anthonytribute.htm
Anthony Castro, R.I.P.
A tribute to a friend and an athlete
By Jim Buzinski
Discuss this article
Also: ESPN article 'The brilliant life of Anthony Castro'
It's hard to write about a friend who has just died, but people need to knowabout Anthony Castro, killed in a crash in the Southern California mountainson Jan. 21. He was 19.
Anthony was that rarest of people - an athlete out to his team. In Anthony'scase, he was out in high school to his football and wrestling teams, our twomost macho team sports. It took guts to take such a step but Anthony neverthought too much about it - he was not ashamed of who he was and if you wereuncomfortable, that was your problem.
My favorite Anthony story involves his senior year of wrestling. A fellowwrestler used to make snide homophobic remarks to Anthony.
Rather than file a complaint with the school, Anthony addressed the problemhead on - he challenged the wrestler to a put-up-or-shut-up match. It didn'ttake very long, as Anthony had the guy pinned in about 20 seconds. Thatstopped the heckling and Anthony told me the guy quit the team.
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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
Free Sex Change and Same-Sex Unions to Come in Cuba
http://www.progresoweekly.com/index.php?progreso=Cuban_Radar&otherweek=1170309600
Change of sex will be free
According to the latest edition of the newsletter Diversidad (Diversity),the National Assembly of Popular Power (parliament) will discuss the issueof free sex change surgery, meaning that the health care public system willtreat all persons who apply.
The measure would complement the present Identity Law that alreadyacknowledges the right of citizens to change name and sexual identity. Thisplaces Cuba at the vanguard of the legislations that acknowledge the rightsof transvestites, transsexuals and transgender in Latin America.
"We have decided to begin with transsexuals because they are the mostvulnerable from the point of view of physical and psychological health,"said Mariela Castro Espín, director of the National Center of SexualEducation (CENESEX).
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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.thestranger.com/blog/2007/01/forgive_me_father
Dan Savage
January 31 at 14:28 PM
Slog: Blogosphere
Forgive Me, Father
An Italian newspaper, L'Espresso, has done something wonderful, somethingother magazines and newspapers should do in their own countries. L'Espressosent reporters into confessionals all over Italy to ask the priest-in-a-boxfor advice about "sins" like taking an hopelessly ill person off arespirator, being gay, using condoms to prevent the spread of disease, andaborting a fetus with Down's Syndrome. The Guardian explains it all for us.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/1/31/114645/388
by CBrachyrhynchos
Wed Jan 31, 2007 at 10:03:35 AM PST
Blogosphere
Daily Kos: Why Gay rights matter for everyone
At the moment, reading a fair quantity of the web chatter regarding thenewly running Democratic presidential candidates, I'm picking up on adisturbing thread going around. Equal marriage rights (often framed as "gaymarriage") is a "wedge" issue exploited by Republicans to shock people awayfrom voting for Democrats. Therefore, Democratic candidates should avoidtaking a position on that issue. After all it's an issue that only affectsa small minority compared to health care or the Iraq War.
Or is it?
I suggest that equal marriage rights is a wedge issue in more ways than one.The tip of the wedge is a moratorium on "gay marriage," but the body is abroader attack on relationship privacy and family law.
CBrachyrhynchos's diary :: ::
The "wedge strategy" was admitted by groups advocating Intelligent Designinstruction in schools. Once the tip of the wedge, intelligent design,created a crack in public education, it would be easier to press morefaith-based curriculum into public schools. ID advocacy groups have neitherbeen adept at hiding this agenda, nor shy about it either.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
EU summit: Year of Equal Opportunities for All
http://pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-3601.html
Gay activists welcome first EU equality summit
30th January 2007 14:43
European and UK gay rights organisations have welcomed the first EU summiton equality, which began in Brussels today.
450 delegates from across Europe launched the 2007 European Year of EqualOpportunities for All at the summit, which is a joint initiative by theEuropean Commission and the German Presidency of the EU.
Representatives from the European branch of the International Lesbian andGay Association (ILGA) are attending.
The association works for equality and human rights for lesbian, gay,bisexual and transgender people in Europe.
Last week the Commission released recent Eurobarometer data ondiscrimination in Europe.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
Italy government to submit same-sex unions bill
By DPA
Feb 1, 2007, 10:40 GMT
http://news.monstersandcritics.com/europe/news/article_1254382.php/Italy_government_to_submit_same-sex_unions_bill
Rome - Italy's parliament has approved a motion that obliges the RomanoProdi government to draft a bill extending the rights of de facto couples -including same-sex unions - by February 15.
The motion, submitted by members of Prodi's centre-left Union alliance,received 301 votes in favour, 266 against and 10 abstentions in parliament'slower house late Wednesday.
Plans to introduce so-called 'civil pacts of solidarity' (PACS), along thelines of similar legislation adopted by France in 1999, have been met withstrong resistance in overwhelmingly Catholic Italy, particularly from theVatican.
Pope Benedict XVI has repeatedly condemned them as 'pseudo-matrimony' andhas been urging legislators to defend traditional families.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.nydailynews.com/city_life/advice/v-pfriendly/story/493344p-415540c.html
Asylum available for gays
Thursday, February 1st, 2007
Q Can I get asylum based on my sexual orientation? I am facing removal fromthe United States. I came here originally on a B-2 visitor's visa. I stayedlonger than allowed, then tried to get asylum in Canada. The Canadiansdenied my application and sent me back to the United States. The governmenthere wants to deport me. Will the judge let me apply for asylum given thatCanada has already denied my claim?
Billy, Brooklyn
A: You may apply for asylum to the immigration judge at your removalhearing. Having been denied asylum in Canada is not a bar to your applyingagain in the United States.
To get asylum, you'll need to prove that you were persecuted or that youhave a well-founded fear of being persecuted in your home country. You mustprove that the persecution was or will be because of your race, religion,nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.Persecution based on sexual orientation comes under the "social group"category. The law considers homosexuals a recognizable social group.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
EU summit: Year of Equal Opportunities for All
http://pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-3601.html
Gay activists welcome first EU equality summit
30th January 2007 14:43
European and UK gay rights organisations have welcomed the first EU summiton equality, which began in Brussels today.
450 delegates from across Europe launched the 2007 European Year of EqualOpportunities for All at the summit, which is a joint initiative by theEuropean Commission and the German Presidency of the EU.
Representatives from the European branch of the International Lesbian andGay Association (ILGA) are attending.
The association works for equality and human rights for lesbian, gay,bisexual and transgender people in Europe.
Last week the Commission released recent Eurobarometer data ondiscrimination in Europe.
It revealed that 50% of EU citizens consider discrimination on the basis ofsexual orientation to be widespread.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.thestranger.com/blog/2007/01/forgive_me_father
Dan Savage
January 31 at 14:28 PM
Slog: Blogosphere
Forgive Me, Father
An Italian newspaper, L'Espresso, has done something wonderful, somethingother magazines and newspapers should do in their own countries. L'Espressosent reporters into confessionals all over Italy to ask the priest-in-a-boxfor advice about "sins" like taking an hopelessly ill person off arespirator, being gay, using condoms to prevent the spread of disease, andaborting a fetus with Down's Syndrome. The Guardian explains it all for us.
-----
A yawning gulf between the stern doctrines preached by Pope Benedict andthe advice offered by ordinary Roman Catholic priests has been exposedby an Italian magazine.
One reporter for L'Espresso claimed to have let a doctor switch off therespirator that kept her father alive. "Don't think any more about it,"she was told by a friar in Naples. "I myself, if I had a father, a wifeor a child who had lived for years only because of artificial means,would pull out [the plug]."
Another journalist posed as a researcher who had received a lucrativeoffer to work abroad on embryonic stem cells. With the extra cash, hesaid, he and his wife could think about starting a family. So should hetake up the post?
"Yes. Yes. Of course," came the reply.
The church's official teaching is that homosexuality is "disordered" andthat homosexual behaviour is wrong. Yet a practising gay man in Rome wastold: "Generally, the best attitude is to be yourself-what in English iscalled 'coming out'."
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
Italy government to submit same-sex unions bill
By DPA
Feb 1, 2007, 10:40 GMT
http://news.monstersandcritics.com/europe/news/article_1254382.php/Italy_gov
ernment_to_submit_same-sex_unions_bill
Rome - Italy's parliament has approved a motion that obliges the RomanoProdi government to draft a bill extending the rights of de facto couples -including same-sex unions - by February 15.
The motion, submitted by members of Prodi's centre-left Union alliance,received 301 votes in favour, 266 against and 10 abstentions in parliament'slower house late Wednesday.
Plans to introduce so-called 'civil pacts of solidarity' (PACS), along thelines of similar legislation adopted by France in 1999, have been met withstrong resistance in overwhelmingly Catholic Italy, particularly from theVatican.
Pope Benedict XVI has repeatedly condemned them as 'pseudo-matrimony' andhas been urging legislators to defend traditional families.
Prodi's coalition vowed to introduce PACS in its electoral programme butneeds to overcome strong opposition from within its ranks. One of itsmembers, the small but influential Catholic- inspired UDEUR party, votedagainst Wednesday's motion.
Prodi can rely on a comfortable majority in the Chamber of Deputies butenjoys only a one-vote majority in the Senate. But while the UDEUR has threesenators, Prodi can generally count on the support of five or sixlife-appointed senators who have sided with the government in recent votes.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/1/31/114645/388
by CBrachyrhynchos
Wed Jan 31, 2007 at 10:03:35 AM PST
Blogosphere
Daily Kos: Why Gay rights matter for everyone
At the moment, reading a fair quantity of the web chatter regarding thenewly running Democratic presidential candidates, I'm picking up on adisturbing thread going around. Equal marriage rights (often framed as "gaymarriage") is a "wedge" issue exploited by Republicans to shock people awayfrom voting for Democrats. Therefore, Democratic candidates should avoidtaking a position on that issue. After all it's an issue that only affectsa small minority compared to health care or the Iraq War.
Or is it?
I suggest that equal marriage rights is a wedge issue in more ways than one.The tip of the wedge is a moratorium on "gay marriage," but the body is abroader attack on relationship privacy and family law.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.nydailynews.com/city_life/advice/v-pfriendly/story/493344p-415540c.html
Asylum available for gays
Thursday, February 1st, 2007
Q Can I get asylum based on my sexual orientation? I am facing removal fromthe United States. I came here originally on a B-2 visitor's visa. I stayedlonger than allowed, then tried to get asylum in Canada. The Canadiansdenied my application and sent me back to the United States. The governmenthere wants to deport me. Will the judge let me apply for asylum given thatCanada has already denied my claim?
Billy, Brooklyn
A: You may apply for asylum to the immigration judge at your removalhearing. Having been denied asylum in Canada is not a bar to your applyingagain in the United States.
To get asylum, you'll need to prove that you were persecuted or that youhave a well-founded fear of being persecuted in your home country. You mustprove that the persecution was or will be because of your race, religion,nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.Persecution based on sexual orientation comes under the "social group"category. The law considers homosexuals a recognizable social group.
Also considered a social group are men and women who have sexual identitiesof the opposite sex, even if they aren't homosexual.
Whether you have a good claim for asylum depends on how gays and lesbiansare treated in your home country, and what persecution you have faced or arelikely to face if you return home. To win your case, you'll want to presentboth evidence that shows how you will be treated as well as general evidenceof persecution of homosexuals in your country. The persecution can be fromgovernment authorities or from private individuals.
=
BroadcastBlurbFrom: GLSEN South Florida
To: rays.list@comcast.net
Sent: Thursday, February 01, 2007 9:54 AM
Subject: Colin Higgins $10,000 Youth Challenge Award
Colin Higgins Youth Courage Awards
Now Open for Nominations
Three $10,000 Grants to Be Awarded
The nomination period for the 2007 Colin Higgins Youth Courage Awards is nowopen! Nominators are encouraged to recommend a candidate for a Youth CourageAward through the NOMINATION FORM located on the website. A nomination formmay be downloaded in PDF format (~35K), which can be printed andfaxed/mailed to the foundation.
Please do not contact the Foundation via phone or e-mail regarding yournomination.
Self-nominations are not accepted.
Note: NOMINATIONS MUST BE RECEIVED BY 5PM (PDT), Friday, March 2, 2007 ORSENT THROUGH THE ONLINE NOMINATION FORM BY 5PM (PDT) ON THAT DATE.
Nominations received after the due date/time will not be considered and mustbe resubmitted in 2008.
In 2007, honorees will receive a $10,000 grant which will be presented inNew York City at the Trevor Project Benefit Gala. Honorees will also receivean expense-paid trip to the 2007 National Gay and Lesbian Task ForceCreating Change Conference this fall.
=
BBC'S SLURS GAY ICON AS "PAEDOPHILE"
Russian composer insulted with word unknown in his time
London 28 January 2007
In what seems to be an extraordinary blunder the BBC has allowed a characterin a new drama-documentary series on Pyotr Tchaikovsky, the 19th centuryRussian composer of 'Sleeping Beauty', 'Swan Lake' and the 'Nutcracker', tocall him a "paedophile" -- even though the word wasn't coined until threeyears after his death.
'Tchaikovsky: Creation of Genius', the first of a two-part drama-documentaryon the life and work of the composer, was broadcast on BBC2 television onSaturday night. Presented by Charles Hazlewood, the conductor, it alternatesperformances by young Russian artistes of some of Tchaikovsky's best knownworks with dramatized scenes from his life played by British actors. It wasduring one of these scenes, set in a public restaurant in St Petersburgwhere Tchaikovsky is shown talking with some of his close friends, thatanother diner -- supposedly angered at their blatant homosexuality -- callshim a "paedophile bugger".
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/printer2/index.asp?ploc=t&refer=http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/302171_hiv02.html
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
Four local men found to have drug-resistant strain of HIV
Friday, February 2, 2007
By TOM PAULSON
P-I REPORTER
Four men in King County have tested positive for a similar strain of HIVthat is highly resistant to drugs, public health officials said Thursday,raising the concern that others who had sex with them could also be infectedwith this aggressive and often untreatable infection.
"There may be more cases we don't know about," said Dr. Bob Wood, directorof the HIV/AIDS program for Public Health -- Seattle & King County.
"We are still working to learn more about these individuals and the virusthey have contracted," said Dorothy Teeter, interim director of the healthdepartment. "We are concerned for these individuals and their partners, andare continuing our investigation."
What's most concerning, added Wood, is that the virus identified in the fourmen is a similarly resistant genetic strain despite the fact that none ofthem reportedly had any contact with one another. All are gay men who usedcrystal methamphetamine and had many sexual partners, he said.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.washblade.com/2007/2-2/view/editorial/9929.cfm
Calling a faggot a faggot (Gay)
The debate over Isaiah Washington's homophobic slurs is a silly distractionfrom the real-life problems facing gays.
Friday, February 02, 2007
THE CONSTERNATION and uproar over Isaiah Washington's anti-gay slursdirected at his "Grey's Anatomy" co-star T.R. Knight reveal a lot about ourcelebrity-obsessed culture and our collective misplaced priorities.
One ignorant actor using the dreaded "f-word" doesn't strike me asparticularly surprising, but it has generated more mainstream mediaheadlines than any other gay topic in recent memory. Is it really newsworthythat someone called an out gay colleague a "faggot?"
This story seems to resonate much more among straight people, who forgetthat homophobia remains one of the last legally protected forms ofdiscrimination around.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.xtra.ca/public/viewstory.aspx?AFF_TYPE=3&STORY_ID=2601&PUB_TEMPLATE_ID=2
Is the religious right getting less scary?
SOCIETY / Even evangelicals are warming to homosexuality
Paul Gallant / Xtra / Thursday, February 01, 2007
you wonder why Canada and the US differ so much on social issues like guncontrol, abortion, the death penalty and, of course, homosexuality, look nofurther than statistics on religion.
Statistics Canada data from 2001 puts the percentage of Baptists here at 2.5percent, and "other Christians" including Apostolic, born-again andself-declared evangelicals at 2. 6 percent - that's a maximum of 5.1 percentof the population who could be said to be evangelical, compared to 43.2percent of the population that considers itself Roman Catholic, 9.6 percentUnited and 6.9 percent Anglican.
In the US, surveys from 2001 put the percentage of Baptists at 16.3, secondonly to Roman Catholics at 24.3 percent. The other denominations that couldbe described as evangelical add up to at least another four percent - morethan 20 percent of the American population is gung ho for God. No wonder weCanadians feel like dope-smoking, godless pinko perverts around them, why weworry when the US-based rightwing group Focus On The Family starts sendingmoney to its offspring in Ottawa. Evangelical views on gay and lesbianadoption, marriage and antidiscrimination laws are the main reason Canadahas such things and the US mostly does not.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/lancashire/6322075.stm
Gay rights bill 'threatens hotel'
A hotelier who runs a gay-only guest house has said the government'santi-discrimination bill would be a step backward for gay rights.The Sexual Orientation Regulations (SORs), which are due to come into effectin April, outlaw discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.
Mark Hurst, 47, said the proposed legislation would force him to open hisdoors to heterosexual guests.
He said that may put off many of his gay guests and put him out of business.
Mr Hurst, who runs Guyz hotel in Blackpool with his partner Steve, said:"Rather than improve gay rights, it will make things much worse. We run agay hotel exclusively for men.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.advocate.com/print_article_ektid41695.asp
Poll: 55 percent of Americans support letting gays serve openly in military
A new poll shows for the first time that a majority of Americans supportallowing gays to serve openly in the military.
A new poll shows for the first time that a majority of Americans supportallowing gays to serve openly in the military. The Harris Interactive surveyreveals that 55 percent of those polled say openly gay people should beallowed to serve in the military, and 57 percent agreed with former jointchiefs of staff chairman John Shalikashvili's assertion last month thatopenly gay people will "not undermine the efficacy of the armed forces," theWall Street Journal reports.
Only 19 percent of those polled said that gays could serve if they kepttheir sexual orientation secret, and 18 percent said they shouldn't beallowed to serve at all. In 2000, 48 percent said that gays should beallowed to serve openly.
On the specific question of "don't ask, don't tell," the military's officialban on openly gay servicemembers, 46 percent of respondents said theyopposed the policy, the same as in 2000.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.sovo.com/print.cfm?content_id=6457
Presidential hopefuls 'sincere' on gay issues?
Gay politicos impressed by Edwards, Obama
By JOSHUA LYNSEN
Feb. 02, 2007
Just weeks into their presidential campaigns, former Sen. John Edwards(D-N.C.) and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) are impressing some politicalobservers for their handling of gay rights issues.
With 21 months to go, Democratic National Committee GLBT Caucus Chair RickStafford and other politicos said Edwards and Obama have quickly outshinedan increasingly crowded field of other 2008 White House hopefuls becausethey're prepared to sincerely discuss gay issues.
Stafford said such genuineness is a key quality that many other candidates -including top Democratic contender Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) - have yetto demonstrate.
"When Obama and Edwards talk about our issues," he said, "I think there's asense that they speak from their hearts and they're willing to show thatthey're not there yet, where I'm not sure that kind of speaking from theheart comes from Hillary."
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.washblade.com/print.cfm?content_id=9925
Is faggot the new 'n-word'?
Longtime anti-gay slur matures to taboo status
By RYAN LEE
Feb. 02, 2007
The nickname Brian Thornton's friends gave him four years ago was asendearing as it was irreverent, as innocent as it was inflammatory. Its rootword is harmless enough to be freely bandied about between Thornton and hisgay friends, while retaining a viciousness that can bring the 32-year-old totears.
Thornton's work at the Lesbian & Gay Community Service Center of Clevelandand his presidency of the group that organizes Cleveland's gay Pridefestival inspired a moniker that captured his incomparable queerness:Faggoty Ass Faggot.
"Amongst my group of friends, we're pretty free-using of that word [faggot]," said Thornton, whose nickname eventually evolved into his onlinealter ego at faggotyassfaggot.com.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/printer2/index.asp?ploc=t&refer=http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1110ap_same_sex_benefits.html
Friday, February 2, 2007 · Last updated 9:33 a.m. PT
Michigan court: No same-sex benefits
By DAVID EGGERT
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
LANSING, Mich. -- Public universities and state and local governments wouldviolate the state constitution by providing health insurance to the partnersof gay employees, the Michigan Court of Appeals ruled Friday.
A three-judge panel said a 2004 voter-approved ban on gay marriage alsoapplies to same-sex domestic partner benefits. The decision reverses a 2005ruling from an Ingham County judge who said universities and governmentscould provide the benefits.
"The marriage amendment's plain language prohibits public employers fromrecognizing same-sex unions for any purpose," the court wrote.
A constitutional amendment passed by Michigan voters in November 2004 madethe union between a man and a woman the only agreement recognized as amarriage "or similar union for any purpose." Those six words led to thecourt fight over benefits for gay couples.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.kgw.com/sharedcontent/APStories/stories/D8N19OE01.html
WA Senate committee clears domestic partnership measure
02/02/2007
By RACHEL LA CORTE / Associated Press
A measure that would create domestic partnerships for same-sex couples inWashington is headed to a vote on the state Senate floor, over theobjections of opponents who argue the partnerships would essentially be thesame as marriage.
The bill would create a domestic partnership registry with the state, andwould provide enhanced rights for same-sex couples, including hospitalvisitation, the ability to authorize autopsies and organ donations, andinheritance rights when there is no will.
To be registered, couples would have to share a home, not be married or in adomestic relationship with someone else, and be at least 18.
Similar to California law, unmarried, heterosexual senior couples would alsobe eligible for domestic partnerships, if one partner were at least 62.
=
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/politics/4519828.html
Feb. 2, 2007, 1:17AM
Mary Cheney's privacy sparks a journalism debate
By JULIE MASON
Copyright 2007 Houston Chronicle
WASHINGTON - Private citizen Mary Cheney's decision to have a baby with herpartner, Heather Poe, raises some impolite questions about whether the grownchildren of elected officials are fair game for journalists.
Certainly her father, Vice President Dick Cheney, finds such inquiry shortof courteous.
"I think, frankly, you're out of line with that question," the vicepresident grumped last week when CNN's Wolf Blitzer ventured the topic in aninterview. "I think you're out of line."
Mary Cheney, 37, said this week that she also felt Blitzer's inquiry crosseda line, according to the New York Times.
=
Advocate.com
http://advocate.com/print_article_ektid41658.asp
Mary Cheney: Pregnancy "not a political statement"
The decision to become pregnant and raise a child with her female partnerwas not political, Mary Cheney, the lesbian daughter of Vice President DickCheney, said Wednesday.
The decision to become pregnant and raise a child with her female partnerwas not political, Mary Cheney, a daughter of Vice President Dick Cheney,told a Barnard College audience. ''This is a baby,'' Cheney said Wednesdayat a forum sponsored by Glamour magazine. ''This is a blessing from God. Itis not a political statement. It is not a prop to be used in a debate bypeople on either side of an issue. It is my child.''
Cheney, 37, announced in December that she and her partner of 15 years,Heather Poe, were starting a family. She did not say how the child wasconceived. The baby is due in the spring and will be the vice president'ssixth grandchild.
Dick Cheney became testy last week when CNN's Wolf Blitzer asked him what hethought of conservatives who are critical of his daughter's pregnancy.Cheney told Blitzer he was ''over the line.'' In a brief interview with TheNew York Times after Wednesday's panel, Mary Cheney said she agreed thatBlitzer had crossed a line. ''He was trying to get a rise out of myfather,'' she said.
=
Mercury News
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/world/16595059.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Thu, Feb. 01, 2007
Gay and married
HOMOSEXUAL MEN IN CHINA PRESSURED TO WED, HAVE KIDS
By Tim Johnson
McClatchy Beijing Bureau
BEIJING - Like many gay men in China, 22-year-old Chen Lei enjoys thenewfound liberties of urban life. But he says he cannot fight his destiny:to marry a woman for whom he feels no attraction.
For economic, social and cultural reasons, the pressure on gays in China towed and raise families is high.
In Chen's case, his family hails from a village in Inner Mongolia, and hedares not tell them of his private life in the big city, knowing they wouldnot understand.
``I only have an older sister. So I'm definitely going to have to marry andhave children,'' Chen said. His mother already has made introductions to twoyoung women.
Attitudes toward homosexuality in China have relaxed in the big cities,where gay bars flourish and Web sites nurture a sense of community.Mentioning homosexuality no longer is taboo on TV newscasts and publicservice announcements, and government media have stopped lumping gays asdeviants along with prostitutes, gamblers and drug addicts. Gay groups havesprung up on university campuses.
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Bloomberg.com
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601085&sid=apCLTMjLLULU&refer=europe
Vatican, Prodi Headed for Showdown on Gay-Marriage Proposal
By Flavia Krause-Jackson
Feb. 1 (Bloomberg) -- Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi and Pope BenedictXVI are headed for a showdown over gay marriage.
Prodi's cabinet plans to debate tomorrow a draft bill giving legalrecognition to long-standing, unmarried couples, including homosexuals. Thepope, who can wield considerable political power, has made it clear hestrongly opposes the move.
The last time church-state relations were this strained was more than 30years ago, when the Vatican, a city-state in the center of Rome, lostback-to-back battles against divorce and abortion, both of which votersapproved in popular referendums.
``The church is fighting a losing battle to stop some form of recognitionfor gay couples, but where it will succeed is in watering down thelegislation by dividing (Prodi's) coalition and mobilizing Catholics,'' saidAntonio Noto, director of IPR Marketing, a polling firm, in an interview.
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/02/020107putin.htm
Putin: Gays Linked To Declining Russian Birth Rate
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: February 1, 2007 - 1:00 pm ET
(Moscow) Russian President Vladimir Putin carefully sidestepped questionsThursday about Moscow's mayor branding gay pride parades as "Satanic".
Putin said he made it a policy not to interfere in local politics, and saidhe supported all minorities in Russia, but then suggested he supportedbanning gay events saying sexual minorities were linked to a declining birthrate in Russia.
Over the past decade Russia has seen its population decline by about 700,000a year. Last year in an effort to curb the decline he signed legislationthat gives Russian families about $10,000 for every child they have afterthe first.
On Monday Moscow Mayor Juri Lushkov, who refused to grant a pride day paradepermit last yet, infuriated gays by telling a Kremlin meeting of the RussianOrthodox Church that gay rights marches were "satanic," and that he willrefuse to grant a permit for a pride parade scheduled for this year. (story)
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/02/020107unions.htm
NH GOP Lawmaker Proposes Civil Unions
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: February 1, 2007 - 7:00 pm ET
(Concord, New Hampshire) As a New Hampshire House committee was hearingarguments for an against a proposed amendment to the state constitutionbanning gay marriage a Republican lawmaker was in another part of theCapitol saying he intends to bring in a bill to allow civil unions.
The state already has a law limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples.
Supporters of the proposed amendment say it isn't enough to prevent judgesfrom declaring it unconstitutional. Opponents say it would writediscrimination into the constitution.
The arguments weren't new. They were all made a year ago before thelegislature turned down a similar amendment.
But in a move that surprised some fellow Republicans former Senate LeaderBob Clegg told The Associated Press that he will introduce legislationgiving gays - and other adults who don't choose to marry - the same legalrights as married couples.
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/02/020107exxon.htm
Denies Rights To Gay Workers Exxon Posts Biggest Corporate Profit In USHistory
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: February 1, 2007 - 9:00 pm ET
(New York City) ExxonMobil the only major U.S. company to rescind anon-discrimination policy covering sexual orientation on Thursday posted thelargest annual profit by a U.S. company - $39.5 billion
The 2006 profit topped Exxon Mobil's own previous record of $36.13 billionset in 2005.
But for the past seven years the company has thwarted efforts to reinstatesexuality in its written nonbias policies.
Last May shareholders at ExxonMobil's annual meeting have voted down aproposal to include LGBT workers in the company's anti-discriminationpolicy.
LGBT workers had been included in employment policies at Mobil. In December1999 when Mobil merged with Exxon and under Exxon's direction, the policywas abandoned. At the same time, it closed Mobil's domestic partner benefitsprogram to any more employees.
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/02/020107ozAdopt.htm
Australia Moves To Block Gay Couples From Adopting Overseas
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: February 1, 2007 - 9:00 pm ET
(Sydney, Australia) The Australian government has announced legislation toprohibit the recognition of adoptions of foreign children by same-sexcouples.
The bill will be introduced in the new session of Parliament that beginsnext week.
Full details of the measure will not be known until the measure is formallybrought before the House but LGBT activists already say it is clear theLiberal government of Prime Minister John Howard wants to use gay couples asa wedge issue going into this year's election.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/01/AR2007020101167_pf.html
San Francisco mayor apologizes for affair
Reuters
Thursday, February 1, 2007; 5:03 PM
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom admitted onThursday to having an affair with the wife of his former campaign manager,who quit a day earlier after confronting the up-and-coming Democrat knownfor advocating gay marriage.
"I am deeply sorry," Newsom told reporters, admitting the affair after theSan Francisco Chronicle reported that Alex Tourk had resigned from Newsom'sreelection campaign after his wife disclosed the romantic involvement.
Elected in 2003, the 39-year-old mayor, now single, is a photogenicpolitician who gained national fame in 2004 for ordering city clerks toissue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, defying a state law definingmarriage as a union of a man and woman.
=
Outsports Tribute
http://outsports.com/local/2007/0124anthonytribute.htm
Anthony Castro, R.I.P.
A tribute to a friend and an athlete
By Jim Buzinski
Discuss this article
Also: ESPN article 'The brilliant life of Anthony Castro'
It's hard to write about a friend who has just died, but people need to knowabout Anthony Castro, killed in a crash in the Southern California mountainson Jan. 21. He was 19.
Anthony was that rarest of people - an athlete out to his team. In Anthony'scase, he was out in high school to his football and wrestling teams, our twomost macho team sports. It took guts to take such a step but Anthony neverthought too much about it - he was not ashamed of who he was and if you wereuncomfortable, that was your problem.
My favorite Anthony story involves his senior year of wrestling. A fellowwrestler used to make snide homophobic remarks to Anthony.
Rather than file a complaint with the school, Anthony addressed the problemhead on - he challenged the wrestler to a put-up-or-shut-up match. It didn'ttake very long, as Anthony had the guy pinned in about 20 seconds. Thatstopped the heckling and Anthony told me the guy quit the team.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
Free Sex Change and Same-Sex Unions to Come in Cuba
http://www.progresoweekly.com/index.php?progreso=Cuban_Radar&otherweek=1170309600
Change of sex will be free
According to the latest edition of the newsletter Diversidad (Diversity),the National Assembly of Popular Power (parliament) will discuss the issueof free sex change surgery, meaning that the health care public system willtreat all persons who apply.
The measure would complement the present Identity Law that alreadyacknowledges the right of citizens to change name and sexual identity. Thisplaces Cuba at the vanguard of the legislations that acknowledge the rightsof transvestites, transsexuals and transgender in Latin America.
"We have decided to begin with transsexuals because they are the mostvulnerable from the point of view of physical and psychological health,"said Mariela Castro Espín, director of the National Center of SexualEducation (CENESEX).
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.thestranger.com/blog/2007/01/forgive_me_father
Dan Savage
January 31 at 14:28 PM
Slog: Blogosphere
Forgive Me, Father
An Italian newspaper, L'Espresso, has done something wonderful, somethingother magazines and newspapers should do in their own countries. L'Espressosent reporters into confessionals all over Italy to ask the priest-in-a-boxfor advice about "sins" like taking an hopelessly ill person off arespirator, being gay, using condoms to prevent the spread of disease, andaborting a fetus with Down's Syndrome. The Guardian explains it all for us.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/1/31/114645/388
by CBrachyrhynchos
Wed Jan 31, 2007 at 10:03:35 AM PST
Blogosphere
Daily Kos: Why Gay rights matter for everyone
At the moment, reading a fair quantity of the web chatter regarding thenewly running Democratic presidential candidates, I'm picking up on adisturbing thread going around. Equal marriage rights (often framed as "gaymarriage") is a "wedge" issue exploited by Republicans to shock people awayfrom voting for Democrats. Therefore, Democratic candidates should avoidtaking a position on that issue. After all it's an issue that only affectsa small minority compared to health care or the Iraq War.
Or is it?
I suggest that equal marriage rights is a wedge issue in more ways than one.The tip of the wedge is a moratorium on "gay marriage," but the body is abroader attack on relationship privacy and family law.
CBrachyrhynchos's diary :: ::
The "wedge strategy" was admitted by groups advocating Intelligent Designinstruction in schools. Once the tip of the wedge, intelligent design,created a crack in public education, it would be easier to press morefaith-based curriculum into public schools. ID advocacy groups have neitherbeen adept at hiding this agenda, nor shy about it either.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
EU summit: Year of Equal Opportunities for All
http://pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-3601.html
Gay activists welcome first EU equality summit
30th January 2007 14:43
European and UK gay rights organisations have welcomed the first EU summiton equality, which began in Brussels today.
450 delegates from across Europe launched the 2007 European Year of EqualOpportunities for All at the summit, which is a joint initiative by theEuropean Commission and the German Presidency of the EU.
Representatives from the European branch of the International Lesbian andGay Association (ILGA) are attending.
The association works for equality and human rights for lesbian, gay,bisexual and transgender people in Europe.
Last week the Commission released recent Eurobarometer data ondiscrimination in Europe.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
Italy government to submit same-sex unions bill
By DPA
Feb 1, 2007, 10:40 GMT
http://news.monstersandcritics.com/europe/news/article_1254382.php/Italy_government_to_submit_same-sex_unions_bill
Rome - Italy's parliament has approved a motion that obliges the RomanoProdi government to draft a bill extending the rights of de facto couples -including same-sex unions - by February 15.
The motion, submitted by members of Prodi's centre-left Union alliance,received 301 votes in favour, 266 against and 10 abstentions in parliament'slower house late Wednesday.
Plans to introduce so-called 'civil pacts of solidarity' (PACS), along thelines of similar legislation adopted by France in 1999, have been met withstrong resistance in overwhelmingly Catholic Italy, particularly from theVatican.
Pope Benedict XVI has repeatedly condemned them as 'pseudo-matrimony' andhas been urging legislators to defend traditional families.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.nydailynews.com/city_life/advice/v-pfriendly/story/493344p-415540c.html
Asylum available for gays
Thursday, February 1st, 2007
Q Can I get asylum based on my sexual orientation? I am facing removal fromthe United States. I came here originally on a B-2 visitor's visa. I stayedlonger than allowed, then tried to get asylum in Canada. The Canadiansdenied my application and sent me back to the United States. The governmenthere wants to deport me. Will the judge let me apply for asylum given thatCanada has already denied my claim?
Billy, Brooklyn
A: You may apply for asylum to the immigration judge at your removalhearing. Having been denied asylum in Canada is not a bar to your applyingagain in the United States.
To get asylum, you'll need to prove that you were persecuted or that youhave a well-founded fear of being persecuted in your home country. You mustprove that the persecution was or will be because of your race, religion,nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.Persecution based on sexual orientation comes under the "social group"category. The law considers homosexuals a recognizable social group.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
EU summit: Year of Equal Opportunities for All
http://pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-3601.html
Gay activists welcome first EU equality summit
30th January 2007 14:43
European and UK gay rights organisations have welcomed the first EU summiton equality, which began in Brussels today.
450 delegates from across Europe launched the 2007 European Year of EqualOpportunities for All at the summit, which is a joint initiative by theEuropean Commission and the German Presidency of the EU.
Representatives from the European branch of the International Lesbian andGay Association (ILGA) are attending.
The association works for equality and human rights for lesbian, gay,bisexual and transgender people in Europe.
Last week the Commission released recent Eurobarometer data ondiscrimination in Europe.
It revealed that 50% of EU citizens consider discrimination on the basis ofsexual orientation to be widespread.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.thestranger.com/blog/2007/01/forgive_me_father
Dan Savage
January 31 at 14:28 PM
Slog: Blogosphere
Forgive Me, Father
An Italian newspaper, L'Espresso, has done something wonderful, somethingother magazines and newspapers should do in their own countries. L'Espressosent reporters into confessionals all over Italy to ask the priest-in-a-boxfor advice about "sins" like taking an hopelessly ill person off arespirator, being gay, using condoms to prevent the spread of disease, andaborting a fetus with Down's Syndrome. The Guardian explains it all for us.
-----
A yawning gulf between the stern doctrines preached by Pope Benedict andthe advice offered by ordinary Roman Catholic priests has been exposedby an Italian magazine.
One reporter for L'Espresso claimed to have let a doctor switch off therespirator that kept her father alive. "Don't think any more about it,"she was told by a friar in Naples. "I myself, if I had a father, a wifeor a child who had lived for years only because of artificial means,would pull out [the plug]."
Another journalist posed as a researcher who had received a lucrativeoffer to work abroad on embryonic stem cells. With the extra cash, hesaid, he and his wife could think about starting a family. So should hetake up the post?
"Yes. Yes. Of course," came the reply.
The church's official teaching is that homosexuality is "disordered" andthat homosexual behaviour is wrong. Yet a practising gay man in Rome wastold: "Generally, the best attitude is to be yourself-what in English iscalled 'coming out'."
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
Italy government to submit same-sex unions bill
By DPA
Feb 1, 2007, 10:40 GMT
http://news.monstersandcritics.com/europe/news/article_1254382.php/Italy_gov
ernment_to_submit_same-sex_unions_bill
Rome - Italy's parliament has approved a motion that obliges the RomanoProdi government to draft a bill extending the rights of de facto couples -including same-sex unions - by February 15.
The motion, submitted by members of Prodi's centre-left Union alliance,received 301 votes in favour, 266 against and 10 abstentions in parliament'slower house late Wednesday.
Plans to introduce so-called 'civil pacts of solidarity' (PACS), along thelines of similar legislation adopted by France in 1999, have been met withstrong resistance in overwhelmingly Catholic Italy, particularly from theVatican.
Pope Benedict XVI has repeatedly condemned them as 'pseudo-matrimony' andhas been urging legislators to defend traditional families.
Prodi's coalition vowed to introduce PACS in its electoral programme butneeds to overcome strong opposition from within its ranks. One of itsmembers, the small but influential Catholic- inspired UDEUR party, votedagainst Wednesday's motion.
Prodi can rely on a comfortable majority in the Chamber of Deputies butenjoys only a one-vote majority in the Senate. But while the UDEUR has threesenators, Prodi can generally count on the support of five or sixlife-appointed senators who have sided with the government in recent votes.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/1/31/114645/388
by CBrachyrhynchos
Wed Jan 31, 2007 at 10:03:35 AM PST
Blogosphere
Daily Kos: Why Gay rights matter for everyone
At the moment, reading a fair quantity of the web chatter regarding thenewly running Democratic presidential candidates, I'm picking up on adisturbing thread going around. Equal marriage rights (often framed as "gaymarriage") is a "wedge" issue exploited by Republicans to shock people awayfrom voting for Democrats. Therefore, Democratic candidates should avoidtaking a position on that issue. After all it's an issue that only affectsa small minority compared to health care or the Iraq War.
Or is it?
I suggest that equal marriage rights is a wedge issue in more ways than one.The tip of the wedge is a moratorium on "gay marriage," but the body is abroader attack on relationship privacy and family law.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.nydailynews.com/city_life/advice/v-pfriendly/story/493344p-415540c.html
Asylum available for gays
Thursday, February 1st, 2007
Q Can I get asylum based on my sexual orientation? I am facing removal fromthe United States. I came here originally on a B-2 visitor's visa. I stayedlonger than allowed, then tried to get asylum in Canada. The Canadiansdenied my application and sent me back to the United States. The governmenthere wants to deport me. Will the judge let me apply for asylum given thatCanada has already denied my claim?
Billy, Brooklyn
A: You may apply for asylum to the immigration judge at your removalhearing. Having been denied asylum in Canada is not a bar to your applyingagain in the United States.
To get asylum, you'll need to prove that you were persecuted or that youhave a well-founded fear of being persecuted in your home country. You mustprove that the persecution was or will be because of your race, religion,nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.Persecution based on sexual orientation comes under the "social group"category. The law considers homosexuals a recognizable social group.
Also considered a social group are men and women who have sexual identitiesof the opposite sex, even if they aren't homosexual.
Whether you have a good claim for asylum depends on how gays and lesbiansare treated in your home country, and what persecution you have faced or arelikely to face if you return home. To win your case, you'll want to presentboth evidence that shows how you will be treated as well as general evidenceof persecution of homosexuals in your country. The persecution can be fromgovernment authorities or from private individuals.
=
BroadcastBlurbFrom: GLSEN South Florida
To: rays.list@comcast.net
Sent: Thursday, February 01, 2007 9:54 AM
Subject: Colin Higgins $10,000 Youth Challenge Award
Colin Higgins Youth Courage Awards
Now Open for Nominations
Three $10,000 Grants to Be Awarded
The nomination period for the 2007 Colin Higgins Youth Courage Awards is nowopen! Nominators are encouraged to recommend a candidate for a Youth CourageAward through the NOMINATION FORM located on the website. A nomination formmay be downloaded in PDF format (~35K), which can be printed andfaxed/mailed to the foundation.
Please do not contact the Foundation via phone or e-mail regarding yournomination.
Self-nominations are not accepted.
Note: NOMINATIONS MUST BE RECEIVED BY 5PM (PDT), Friday, March 2, 2007 ORSENT THROUGH THE ONLINE NOMINATION FORM BY 5PM (PDT) ON THAT DATE.
Nominations received after the due date/time will not be considered and mustbe resubmitted in 2008.
In 2007, honorees will receive a $10,000 grant which will be presented inNew York City at the Trevor Project Benefit Gala. Honorees will also receivean expense-paid trip to the 2007 National Gay and Lesbian Task ForceCreating Change Conference this fall.
=
BBC'S SLURS GAY ICON AS "PAEDOPHILE"
Russian composer insulted with word unknown in his time
London 28 January 2007
In what seems to be an extraordinary blunder the BBC has allowed a characterin a new drama-documentary series on Pyotr Tchaikovsky, the 19th centuryRussian composer of 'Sleeping Beauty', 'Swan Lake' and the 'Nutcracker', tocall him a "paedophile" -- even though the word wasn't coined until threeyears after his death.
'Tchaikovsky: Creation of Genius', the first of a two-part drama-documentaryon the life and work of the composer, was broadcast on BBC2 television onSaturday night. Presented by Charles Hazlewood, the conductor, it alternatesperformances by young Russian artistes of some of Tchaikovsky's best knownworks with dramatized scenes from his life played by British actors. It wasduring one of these scenes, set in a public restaurant in St Petersburgwhere Tchaikovsky is shown talking with some of his close friends, thatanother diner -- supposedly angered at their blatant homosexuality -- callshim a "paedophile bugger".
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
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