**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US AT rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
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Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-flbethics1219sbdec19,0,1646779,print.story
Fort Lauderdale commissioners impose strict ethics law
By Brittany Wallman
December 19, 2007
FORT LAUDERDALE
City commissioners passed a law Tuesday intended to reduce the influence ofmoney on politics and votes, and eliminate any appearance of corruption.
By unanimous vote, commissioners imposed on themselves - and on any futurecity elected officials - strict new ethics rules that go much further thanthose in state law.
It is now illegal for a city elected official to seek money or help forcharities and causes from people who need their votes.
That means city politicians can't go to lobbyists, developers, people withcity contracts, residents seeking a rezoning, companies bidding on cityprojects and anyone else "having any issue that may foreseeably come beforethe City Commission for a vote," and ask them to contribute to a thirdparty, like a charity or a national political campaign.
If a developer has a hotel project headed toward a City Commission vote, hewon't be getting a letter in the mail from a city commissioner asking him togive money to the politician's pet charity, or to come to a nonprofitorganization's fund-raising gala "honoring" a city politician.
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Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/broward/sfl-flbbus1219sbdec19,0,1956094,print.story
Two Broward students report being abused on buses
By Kathy Bushouse
December 19, 2007
The legal guardian of an autistic girl allegedly mistreated by her schoolbus driver said she was never informed of the incident by Broward schoolofficials, and instead learned about it last week from a Sheriff's Officechild abuse investigator.
Linda Page, the girl's aunt and legal guardian, said she was told Thursdayafternoon that her niece was involved in the Sept. 26 incident aboard thebus from The Quest Center. The investigator told her that she had avideotape reportedly showing bus driver Michael Clough waving what lookslike a broom handle and ordering the girl to stay in her seat.
The video also reportedly shows Clough slamming the broom handle on a busseat and poking the girl in the ribs, said School District spokesman KeithBromery.
Page was stunned. "[The investigator] said, 'You were not aware of this?' Isaid, "Absolutely not,'" Page said. "People knew about this and no one saidanything? Do you understand the gravity of that?"
The district also did not notify the group home where the girl lives.
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www.pbchrc.org
PALM BEACH COUNTY BAN ON TRANSGENDER DISCRIMINATION TAKES EFFECT JANUARY 1
(West Palm Beach, Florida) At this morning's public hearing, the PalmBeach County Commissioners unanimously approved amendments to two countyordinances which will prohibit discrimination in employment, housing andpublic accommodations based on gender identity or expression.
Jeff Koons, Vice Chair of the Board of County Commissioners, had introducedthe amendments to the County's Equal Employment Ordinance and Fair HousingOrdinance at the request of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council.
"No one should be fired, harassed, or denied promotion simply because theydon't fit the stereotypes for masculinity or femininity," Council PresidentRand Hoch told Koons.
The new law, which covers public and private employers with fifteen or moreemployees, and most real estate transactions, goes into effect on January1.
"In a matter of days, all Palm Beach County residents will be judged on thequality of their work and will given an equal chance to succeed," said Hoch."No longer will an employer be able to fire an employee solely because sheis a woman with a masculine walk or he is a man with an effeminate voice."
With almost 1.3 million people, Palm Beach County will become one of thenation's largest jurisdictions to prohibit discrimination againsttransgender persons.
When the Palm Beach County ordinances take effect, close to 40% of the USpopulation will live in jurisdictions where it is illegal to discriminatebased on gender identity or expression.
Thirteen states (California, Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maine,Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont andWashington) and the District of Columbia have enacted laws prohibitingdiscrimination based on gender identity or expression.
In addition similar laws exist in more than 90 cities and counties acrossAmerica.
In Florida, the cities of Gulfport, Key West, Lake Worth, Miami Beach andWest Palm Beach, as well as Monroe County prohibit both public and privateemployers from discriminating based on gender identity or expression.
The cities of Largo, Oakland Park and Wilton Manors, as well as the Villageof Tequesta protect their municipal employees from discrimination based ongender identity or expression.
The Gainesville City Commission is expected to adopt an ordinance early nextyear which will prohibit discrimination in employment, housing and publicaccommodations based on gender identity or expression.
Civil rights activists are also working in both Broward and PinellasCounties to prohibit discrimination based on gender identity or expression.
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MiamiHerald.com
http://www.miamiherald.com/548/v-print/story/348564.html
School event axed over connection to racy MTV reality show
BY NIRVI SHAH
Posted on Tue, Dec. 18, 2007
A fundraiser for the band at a Coral Springs high school went down in flamesbefore it ever began.
Taravella High School hoped to raise money for the band Monday afternoon bycharging $5 for autographs of Deerfield Beach firefighter Dani Campbell, oneof two remaining contenders on an MTV reality show about a bisexual womansearching for love.
An organizer said fans were expected from as far away as Key West andOrlando to see Campbell, a lesbian who has repeatedly won over the namesakeof MTV's A Shot at Love With Tila Tequila.
On the show, Tequila has whittled a group of 32 men and women to two,Campbell and Bobby Banhart of New York. In the series finale, which airsTuesday, Tequila chooses the person she wishes to pursue a relationshipwith.
But when Broward School District spokesman Keith Bromery learned of theevent, he prodded other school district officials to take a look at the showon the Internet. A few scenes of a scantily clad Tequila and other castmembers cavorting and drinking were enough for the district to cancel theevent. An organizer said it had been approved a few weeks ago.
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Please join us for the next meeting of the Transgender Equality RightsInitiatives.
When: Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Time: 7:00 PM to 8:30 PM
Where: Gay & Lesbian Community Center of
South Florida (GLCC)
1717 North Andrews Avenue
Fort Lauderdale, FL 33311
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For Florida, party politics is all in the family
December 15, 2007
By Mitch Ceasar
Chairman of the Broward Democratic Party
Once upon a time, there were two dysfunctional families. The D family, andthe Rs. Through the years, these two American families grew large, yet veryunalike.
The D family thrived on dissent, varied opinions and very loud publicexchanges. The Ds were the typical American family.
The present-day Ds are a competitive family. Because of their nature,relatives from different regions think they are never paid enough attention.There is cousin California, the biggest of the relations. Cousin York, not"new" to the family, has been in the family business from the beginning andis the loudest and most brash.
There are other diverse cousins with seemingly little in common: Hampshire,Iowa, Nevada and "southern" Carolina. Later it may become clear thatgeography has everything to do with their alliance. Like the Rs, the Dschoose a family leader every four years. Both families call that a"nominee." If the family chooses wisely, that nominee will lead the entirecountry, taking power from their rival.
The head of the D family is Father Dean, who has the task of encouraging thefamily to play by the same rules. Dean knows this is a big job. Therefore,he has created a "rules" committee.
Then there is cousin Florida. Florida was not a prominent family memberuntil 1992 and, although underestimated, almost delivered victory forrelative Clinton. Since then, Florida has commanded great respect, at leastfinancially. First cousin from the South, Carolina has had no status fordecades, but voiced displeasure. Now she has been pushed almost to the frontof the line.
Well, cousin Florida does not like this, and members of the R family passeda rule that impacts her by changing the decision date. Although Florida cando little, "it's good to be courted," even without approval. This does notsit well with Dean or his committee, since Carolina asked permission first.
One of the elders from the Florida side of the family is Uncle Nelson. He isa traveler who goes places almost no one has ever visited and spends a gooddeal of his time in Washington representing family interests. He believeshis geographic family has certain inalienable rights.
Unfortunately, the family rules committee decided that cousin Florida wasnot a team player. They wrote a letter saying that no one from that part ofthe family can attend the big gathering in August 2008. It is at thismeeting all branches decide who will be their leader. In fact, Uncle Nelsonsued the other family members, but lost.
Cousin Carolina does not want to lose her place in line. She has convincedcousins Iowa, Nevada and Hampshire to join her in enforcing the familyrules. Participation at the four-year hoopla has already been decided byRoosevelt's committee, but cousin Florida is still receiving attention. Sothe four "early" cousins have convinced the family members running for"nominee," and their spouses, not to campaign for support with cousinFlorida's homesteads.
This chain reaction created in part by Florida, and cousins of bothfamilies, has made the schedule, "primarily" speaking, a mess! The Rs have asimilar problem, but they don't care. The reason for such disinterest may berelated to the head of their family. Their Uncle Martinez is from downSouth, where the sun always shines. In fact, when the R family has disputes,they are quickly settled; usually, with deference paid to a few rich uncles.
The good thing is there is a family rule that will help unite the nationalclan. The rule states that when a family nominee is chosen, they have thepower to invite the entire family to the national gathering. This willprovide for healing and allows the family dysfunction to become ancienthistory.
The wise old sages of the two families will probably never allow theirfunctions to suffer disruption in this manner again. Everyone has childrenwho act out and feel unappreciated. Possibly the two groups may allowdifferent branches of the clan to rotate, allowing the right to say whichrelative shall lead the family in the election battle. That way, no one islate to their own "party."
Mitch Ceasar is chairman of the Broward Democratic Party.
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St. Petersburg Times
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/12/19/State/Florida_s_early_votin.shtml
Florida's early voting: a wrinkle in the election cycle
The new wrinkle gives presidential hopefuls risk and reward.
By ADAM C. SMITH, Times Political Editor
Published December 19, 2007
As the political world consumes itself with how Iowans might winnow thepresidential field Jan. 3, many Floridians aren't waiting to see whathappens in church basement caucuses 1,300 miles away.
It's a little-noticed wrinkle in this topsy-turvy election: Floridiansalready are voting, earlier than anyone else in America, which creates acomplication, and opportunity, for the presidential contenders.
By some estimates, more Florida Republicans could vote by year's end thanthe roughly 85,000 Republicans who show up for Iowa's all-important caucusesin 2 1/2 weeks. Not only can presidential candidates bank votes, but so cansupporters and foes of the tax-cutting initiative on the ballot.
"Everyone's focused on Iowa and New Hampshire, but I can attest that as ofMonday there are 604 people in Pasco that have already voted," said PascoSupervisor of Elections Brian Corley, who mailed 3,808 absentee ballots morethan a week ago.
The votes won't be tallied until the Jan. 29 primary, but it means Florida'selection day is effectively six weeks long. So, some voters casting ballotsnow could end up voting for candidates who drop out before Jan. 29.Andcampaigns that play it right can head into primary day with a significantlead.
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Palm Beach Post
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/state/content/state/epaper/2007/12/19/a8a_pensions_1219.html
State's pension system healthy, report finds
By LARRY LIPMAN
Palm Beach Post Washington Bureau
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
WASHINGTON - Florida is one of only five states that have fully fundedfuture pensions for state workers, but ranks at the bottom in terms offinancing health care and other benefits for its retiring employees,according to a national report released Tuesday.
Over the next 30 years, Florida's pension liability is estimated at $111billion, but the state has been setting aside enough money to pay $117billion in pensions, according to the report by the nonprofit Pew CharitableTrusts.
Florida "has been fiscally responsible, generally paying the full or closeto the full amount of the annual required contribution to its pension systemevery year," the report said.
Florida's pension strategy assumes a 7.75 percent rate of return oninvestments. That is slightly more conservative than the median estimate of8 percent - meaning half the states in the nation expect their investmentsto return more than 8 percent and half expect them to return less.
But Florida has not put aside any money for non-pension benefits, primarilyhealth-care coverage. That bill is estimated at $3.6 billion over the next30 years, the report said.
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Sarasota Herald Tribune
http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20071219/REALESTATE/712190491
U.S. foreclosures slow, but Florida up to No. 2
The state follows Nevada with the largest amount of per-capita filings
STAFF REPORT
Article published Dec 19, 2007
The nation experienced its first double-digit decrease in foreclosures sinceApril 2006 during November, but Florida moved up into the No. 2 spot lastmonth for filings while Cape Coral-Fort Myers and Miami registered among thetop 10 metropolitan areas.
On a per-capita basis, Florida was behind only Nevada, with the SunshineState showing a foreclosure rate of one filing for every 282 households,reported RealtyTrac, the Irvine, Calif.-based company that tracksforeclosures nationwide.
Cape Coral-Fort Myers had the eighth-highest per-capita rate of foreclosures nationally, while Miami was at No. 10.
Data specific to Manatee, Sarasota and Charlotte counties or their citieswas unavailable from RealtyTrac on Tuesday.
Florida had 29,238 foreclosure filings in November, a 212 percent increasefrom a year ago, but a 3.15 percent decline from October when Florida wasthird in the nation for foreclosure filings, which include default notices,auction sale notices and bank repossessions.
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Miami Herald
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation/story/349812.html
Judge blocks Florida's voter registration law
BY GARY FINEOUT
Posted on Wed, Dec. 19, 2007
A federal judge ordered Florida election authorities to stop enforcing a2-year-old voter registration law, ruling Tuesday there is proof that thechange put in place by the GOP-controlled Legislature has resulted in``actual harm to real individuals.''
Secretary of State Kurt Browning, who has maintained that the law is meantto battle voter fraud, said the state will immediately appeal and hequestioned the timing of the decision. Florida residents who want to vote inthe Jan. 29 presidential primary must register by the end of December.
About 14,000 people have not been able to register since January 2006because of Florida's ''no match'' law, which requires Social Security ordriver's license numbers on voter-registration forms match those in federalor state databases.
The law has been challenged by the NAACP and other groups that say itunfairly blocks blacks and Hispanics from being able to register.
Among their complaints: that the process may be prone to error becauseHispanics sometimes use two surnames, which could throw the process off, andthat many blacks use nontraditional spellings for their names.
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Florida Times-Unio [Jacksonville]
http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/stories/121907/met_226766202.shtml
Crist holds his ground on property taxes, Medicaid
By J. Taylor Rushing,
Capital Bureau Chief
December 19, 2007
TALLAHASSEE - Charlie Crist's rookie year as governor is ending in a sort ofstalemate for the First Coast: The public likes him, but the enthusiasmisn't shared among local leaders.
While Crist has been cresting on polls that put his approval ratings in the70s - a stratospheric level for such a politically purple state - NortheastFlorida officials are finding their feet in standing up to oppose the ideashe is pushing.
Jacksonville Mayor John Peyton and Sheriff John Rutherford blame Crist'scrusade for property tax reform for potentially devastating city finances,and some City Council members are considering whether to sue the state tokeep taxing and spending decisions at the local level.
Among area legislators, Rep. Aaron Bean, R-Fernandina Beach, disagrees withCrist's health secretary, who opposes the expansion of Medicaid reform andtherefore leaves the experiment ongoing only in Baker, Clay, Duval, Nassauand Broward counties.
Crist, 51, sat down with the Times-Union on Tuesday.
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Tallahassee Democrat
http://www.tallahassee.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071219/CAPITOLNEWS/712190376
Biotech company moving to Florida
By Jim Ash
FLORIDA CAPITAL BUREAU CHIEF
Gov. Charlie Crist announced Tuesday that the state will spend $94 millionto lure a prestigious European institute to a growing high-tech corridor inPalm Beach County.
The Max Planck Institute of Bio-Imaging is coming to Jupiter in a part ofthe state that already is home to the Scripps Research Center and whateconomic development officials call a "health cluster."
Crist gushed at a morning press conference that the new venture will createmore than 1,800 jobs over the next 20 years, with $2.4 billion in "laborcompensation," and $5.3 billion in gross state product.
Local development officials will kick in another $93 million for theproject. Economic development officials said the state is still negotiatinghow long to stretch out its investment, with the window being between fiveand 20 years.
Researchers will specialize in the next generation of medical imaging,peering at the molecular level to map the origins of diseases like cancerand Alzheimer's.
"What this does is it helps people stay alive. Let's cut to the chase,"Crist said. "It's a big deal. It's a really big deal."
Senate President Ken Pruitt, R-Port St. Lucie, and Dr. Peter Gruss,president and chief executive of the Max Planck Society, joined Crist forthe announcement. The society is based in Munich, Germany. It employs 12,000high-tech workers, including more than 4,000 scientists, at 78 institutes.
"I thank both of you for this early Christmas gift," Gruss said.
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Palm Beach Post
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/sports/content/sports/epaper/2007/12/19/a1c_fsu_1219.html
FSU may bench 25 for bowl
By TOM D'ANGELO
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Florida State will suspend up to 25 football players for the Music CityBowl, including 12 who were listed on the first or second team at the end ofthe regular season, sources said Tuesday.
Although names have not been released, the team's top two players from PalmBeach County - running back Antone Smith of Pahokee and receiver PrestonParker of Delray Beach - and quarterback Drew Weatherford are not on thelist.
Most of the players who will be suspended are part of the academic scandalthat was first reported by the university in September.
The players involved in the scandal also will miss at least the first twogames and part of the third to start the 2008 season as part of theirpunishment, according to sources. Although Florida State still has notcompleted its 2008 schedule, the Seminoles' first two games are likely to beagainst Division 1-AA opponents Western Carolina and the University ofTennessee at Chattanooga.
"We have some players not traveling for one reason and some for another,including those who are ineligible for the bowl because of academic issues,"coach Bobby Bowden said Tuesday through a statement. "We cannot be morespecific than that at this time.
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[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
GLBT DIGEST December 18, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US AT rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/sfl-brmail814sbdec18,0,5037463,print.story
Gay tourism in Lauderdale and Florida's ban on gay adoptions
December 18, 2007
On Dec. 4, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel ran a story on the front of thebusiness section, "Leader in gay tourism," hailing Fort Lauderdale as a topdestination for gay tourists.
Unfortunately, there was no mention of the Dec. 3 Senate hearing in SouthFlorida, in which many citizens lined up and signed up to ask Floridalegislators to repeal the 1977 law that prevents gay men and women fromadopting. Yes, gay tourism brings over $1.2 billion to the Fort Lauderdalearea alone. For those interested in the financial bottom line, consider howmany tax dollars we could save if more children languishing in foster careand the child welfare system were placed in the capable hands of lovingparents.
And on a humanitarian level, we have over 4,000 children in foster care,many of whom are being denied the stability, security and love that couldeasily be provided if we removed discrmination from our adoption laws.
Allan Barsky
Fort Lauderdale
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Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/broward/sfl-flbgayban1215sbdec18,0,6892007,print.story
Gay marriage ban headed for vote
Group claims enough petition signatures have been gathered
By Susannah Bryan
December 18, 2007
A proposed constitutional ban on same-sex marriage is headed directly to theNovember ballot - setting the stage for a vigorous battle between gay rightsadvocates and opponents.
"We aren't advocating anything new or radical here," said John Stemberger,an Orlando attorney and chairman of Florida4Marriage.org, the group pushingthe ban. "We're just saying keep things as they are. We want the institution[of marriage] to be protected for centuries."
Stemberger claims the group has collected more than the 611,009 petitionsignatures needed to place the amendment on the ballot.
Florida law already forbids gay marriage, but Stemberger says writing a baninto the state constitution is the only way to ensure a permanentprohibition.
People who oppose the measure, however, believe it is a covert politicaltool designed to bring ultra-conservatives to the polls in a presidentialelection year.
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ExpressGayNews.com
http://expressgaynews.com/thelatest/thelatest.cfm?blog_id=15697
Gay marriage debate intensifies as conservatives get organized
National Organization for Marriage gears up for fight with radio ads
MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. (AP)
Dec 17, 10:43 AM
New Jersey's well-organized gay rights advocates are finding theiradversaries are also getting prepared for a coming legislative debate overgay marriage.
The National Organization for Marriage, established earlier this year inPrinceton, made itself known over the past few weeks with radioadvertisements urging people to call their lawmakers to tell them thatallowing gay couples to marry would undermine the institution.
The group set up in left-leaning New Jersey because it is one of a fewstates where there's a realistic chance in the next few years that lawmakerswill vote to allow gay marriage. That makes it a battleground for the issuesnationally.
"If our side continues to increase in its activism, I think we can stop thisin 2008," said Brian Brown, the executive director of the new organizationand former head of the Family Institute of Connecticut.
Steven Goldstein, the chairman of Garden State Equality, said the emergenceof the new group shows how close New Jersey is to becoming the first stateto enact a law to allows gay couples to marry.
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ExpressGayNews.com
http://www.al.com/printer/printer.ssf?/base/news/1197796741297050.xml&coll=2
Domestic violence afflicts couples straight and gay
Murder case illustrates reach of a societal woe
ERIC VELASCO
News staff writer
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Rita Hinkle felt betrayed when her partner ended their relationship toreunite with her former husband.
Hinkle made the deadly decision: If she couldn't have Deana Page, no onewould.
In a busy shopping center parking lot last year, Hinkle stood outside Page'spickup truck and shot the woman 15 times with a revolver, testimony lastweek in a Birmingham trial showed.
A Jefferson County jury last week said it was capital murder.
It's also an example of domestic violence, said Carol Gundlach, executivedirector of the Alabama Coalition Against Domestic Violence.
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ExpressGayNews.com
http://www.courant.com/features/lifestyle/hc-tshirtcompany.art0dec17,0,6127581,print.story
Wearing Their Hearts On Their T-Shirts
By ADRIAN BRUNE
SPECIAL TO THE COURANT
December 17, 2007
The symbol is known to many - three gold bars within a blue box, the HumanRights Campaign's ubiquitous sign, inspiring the fight for gay and lesbianrights and, apparently, T-shirts.
Seeing the bars on a bumper sticker during a drive with friends last spring,Reggie Solomon, a gay man living in New Haven, whimsically suggested aT-shirt expressing how the group in the car felt about gay marriage. Hedidn't realize the impact of his words.
"A friend of mine - a guy who made some money in the dot-com world -instantaneously said, 'I'll invest in that,'" Solomon said. During the ride,they came up with a design: a simple black fitted shirt with the slogan"[marriage is so gay]." When they came back to New Haven, Solomon and palsBen Berkowitz and Andy Horowitz got down to business.
Six months later, the three friends have sold a few hundred American ApparelT-shirts with the logo, successfully launched a company - www.issogay.com -and set their aim on combating the conventional with a series ofcounterculture T-shirts advocating, and raising money for, causes alignedwith their own values. Last week, they brought the cause to the nextgeneration - or the like-minded parents who dress them - with a black"[marriage is so gay]" onesie.
"We wanted to start bringing a lighthearted product to people who believedin certain causes - a shirt all people could wear," Solomon said on a recentnight after work at the Yale Office of New Haven and State Affairs. "Most ofmy friends are straight - think of the power of the message when a straightperson walks down the street with his wife and child wearing it."
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ExpressGayNews.com
http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/mpapps/pagetools/print/news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7140565.stm
Approval for once-a-day HIV pill
By Jane Dreaper
Health correspondent, BBC News
The first HIV medication which involves taking just one pill a day has beenapproved by the European authorities.
The go-ahead for Atripla represents what some experts say is a revolution in treatment for the virus that causes Aids, although it is not a cure.
People using the earliest HIV drugs in 1996 had to take up to 30 pills on anempty stomach at different times.
The decision means Atripla can be used in the UK but local health bodiesmust decide whether the NHS will provide it.
Taking Atripla does not reduce the risk of transmitting the virus.
The drugs regime has already reduced to just several pills a day for peoplenewly diagnosed with HIV.
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/12/121707hm.htm
Third Of Homeless Young New Yorkers Gay
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: December 17, 2007 - 5:00 pm ET
(New York City) A new study says there are at least 3,800 people under theage of 25 living on the streets of New York and that almost 30 percent aregay, lesbian or bisexual.
The study, by the Empire State Coalition of Youth and Family Services, hasbeen turned over to City Council, which paid for it.
Nearly half of all homeless young people were Black, about 25 percent wereLatino the study said. Those numbers would be proportionate to Black andLatino populations in New York.
But the high number of gays on the streets is about three times theestimated percentage of New York's LGBT community.
The survey found that while many homeless youth went to city shelters 42percent slept on the streets, subways or in empty buildings.
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/12/121707oreg.htm
New Oz PM: No Gay Marriage, Civil Unions
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: December 17, 2007 - 1:00 pm ET
(Sydney, Australia) Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says his governmentwill look at introducing a bill to create a national domestic partnerregistry but has no intention of legalizing same-sex marriage or allowingcivil unions.
Rudd was reacting to press reports on the weekend that claimed some cabinetministers had told LGBT leaders that a civil union bill was being written.
The Australian Capital Territory recently resurrected legislation rejectedby the former federal government to allow civil unions in the territory andRudd has said his Labor government would not intervene.
Rudd said Monday that gay and lesbian couples need protections, but on anational level he would not support same-sex marriage or civil partnerships.
"Our position has always been that marriage is between a man and a woman,and therefore that always will form the cornerstone of our view on thesematters.
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/12/121707nd.htm
Canadian Party Drops Transgendered Lawyer
by The Canadian Press
Posted: December 17, 2007 - 5:00 pm ET
(Montreal, Quebec) A lawyer from Quebec City says she was dumped as afederal New Democratic Party candidate because she is transgendered.
Micheline Montreuil alleges she was told by an NDP official her sexualityhindered party attempts to woo new Quebec candidates into the fold.
``They just said I do not fit in the NDP anymore,'' the prominent family andlabor lawyer said in a phone interview.
``They also told me... that many people who wish to be a candidate for theNDP do not wish to have their name associated with the name of MichelineMontreuil, because I am transgendered.''
In a letter, the party told her she lost the candidacy for statements shemade in media interviews, her difficulty maintaining support in the localriding association and for not working in a team, she said.
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/12/121707student.htm
Trans Student Accuses Mass. College Of Discrimination
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: December 17, 2007 - 3:00 pm ET
(Haverhill, Massachusetts) A transgendered student says he is the victim ofdiscrimination at a small Massachusetts community college because he isbiologically female.
Ethan Santiago says that Northern Essex Community College is refusing him touse the men's locker room.
Santiago, 20, began transitioning two years ago and has recently begunhormone treatment.
He presents as male and wears men's clothing.
But because he still has female sex organs the college says that he is indanger of being sexually assaulted in the men's changing room.
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Advocate.com
http://www.advocate.com/news_detail_ektid51154.asp
Florida Could Vote to Ban Same-Sex Marriage
December 18, 2007
Voters may decide next year whether Florida will become the 28th state toplace a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage. Sponsors of the proposedban claim that they have gathered the required 611,009 signatures necessaryfor a referendum vote, but Florida's Division of Elections website shows thegroup is 253 signatures short of its goal, the Associated Press reportedFriday. An election official has yet to formally verify the signatures.
Florida currently prohibits same-sex marriage, but John Stemberger, anOrlando attorney heading the group opposed to marriage equality, said aconstitutional ban would prevent judges from overturning the law.
"We believe kids need a mom and a dad, very simply," Stemberger told the AP."Moms and dads bring something different to the table. Dads are notoptional."
Opponents of the measure are worried that the amendment could supersede someFlorida cities' existing domestic-partnership laws, thereby affectingunmarried heterosexual couples as well.
"It's government saying this is the only sanctioned relationship that youcan have," said Stephen Gaskill, spokesman for Florida Red and Blue, anopposition group. (The Advocate)
=
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-6361.html
18th December 2007 11:05
PinkNews.co.uk staff writer
Hungary's parliament has approved the Registered Partnership Act. From January 1st 2009 lesbian and gay couples will have almost identical rights as married heterosexual couples in common law.
Notable exceptions are the right to adopt, access to fertility treatment and the right to take their partner's surname.
The Registered Partnership Act was passed with votes of the members of the Socialist-led social-liberal government.
Both gay and straight couples will be able to register their partnership, and will have protections regarding next of kin status, taxation, health care, inheritance, social security, pensions and shared possession of a home.
Government statistics show that there were an estimated 349,000 unmarried couples in Hungary in 2005, 12.2 per cent of all families, compared to 62,000 in 1970, 2.1 per cent of all families.
Hungary's opposition conservative parties refused to back the new law, which they regard as a "hidden attempt" to legalise gay marriage.
The Hungarian gay and lesbian associations have welcomed new law as a milestone while acknowledging it does not grant full equality.
Juris Lavrikovs
Communications Manager
International Lesbian and Gay Association
=
European Governments Must Do More to Tackle Hate Crimes
TEL AVIV - A majority of European governments get a poor grade in their efforts to tackle violent hate crimes, according to Human Rights First's 2007 Hate Crime Report Card released today at the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) meeting in Tel Aviv. This new study examines monitoring and reporting systems as well as the enforcement of hate crime laws in the 56 states that comprise the OSCE - from the Russian Federation and the Central Asian states across Western Europe and also including the United States and Canada.
The report is a follow-up to Human Rights First's 2007 Hate Crime Survey, which documented the disturbing rise in hate crimes across the OSCE region. The report released today examines government efforts to combat these violent hate crimes.
Human Rights First concludes that only 15 of the 56 participating states of the OSCE are fulfilling their basic commitments to monitor hate crimes, with countries in the European Union and North America leading the way. While more than 30 countries have legislation that allows for penalty enhancements when crimes are motivated by bias, there is little evidence that these provisions are applied in a systematic fashion in most countries.
"Europe has seen a worrying rise in hate crimes in recent years," said Maureen Byrnes, Executive Director of Human Rights first. "What's deeply troubling is that many states still fail to use the tools necessary to investigate and punish the perpetrators of such violence as a matter of priority - suggesting an underlying indifference," added Byrnes.
This past October, a Jewish school was torched in an antisemitic attack in Kiev, Ukraine. A year before five men attacked and murdered a Nigerian man living in the Ukraine in what was thought to be a racist attack. NGO monitors have reported a rise in such bias-motivated crimes throughout the Ukraine in recent years. Yet the Ukrainian government still does not publicly monitor or record the number of hate crimes committed in the Ukraine each year.
Ukraine is among nearly 40 countries where governments provide only limited or no public reporting on violent hate crimes. "How can governments combat the problem of hate violence if they lack a system to monitor and document such crimes?" asked Byrnes.
In Italy, where three Romanians were recently hospitalized after being attacked by a masked, club-wielding, anti-immigrant gang in an apparent hate crime, important new institutions have been established to combat discrimination, although violent hate crimes are yet to be included in their programs. The Italian authorities do not currently produce reliable data on such crimes.
Some changes have been pledged. In Norway, where no hate crime statistics are available, the Minister of Justice said in September that a study had shown that hate violence against gay men and others was rising and that police had begun to register hate crimes. In the Netherlands, where statistics are available only from NGO sources, authorities have announced new measures to begin in 2008 to track the implementation of prosecutorial guidelines by which bias motivations are to result in enhanced penalties.
While nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have filled the gap in some cases, there is ultimately no substitute for official monitoring. In the Russian Federation, for example, NGO monitors have documented a rising tide of hate crimes of alarming proportions, while the limited official data largely ignores the problem.
The new Human Rights First report includes individual country "report cards"
on each of the 56 OSCE participating states. Each country report details themonitoring and reporting mechanisms present and describes the legal framework applicable to crimes of violence motivated by prejudice and hatred. Comparative charts cover the compliance of all 56 countries with OSCE, Council of Europe, European Union, and other international standards.
more....
=
To Form a More Perfect Union: Marriage Equality News
Information, news, and discussion about the legal recognition of same-sexcouples and their families, including marriages, domestic partnerships,civil unions, adoptions, foster children and similar issues.
http://samesexmarriage.typepad.com/weblog/
Go to the website, above, for the following articles:
--
Whether or not the United Kingdom would force the Cayman Islands to accept legalised same-sex marriages was the main focus of questions to visiting Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office Meg Munn at the Chamber of Commerce luncheon last Thursday.Mario Ebanks started the questioning by asking Mrs. Munn if liberal programmes such as same-sex marriages, which he said ran very contrary to the traditions of the Cayman Islands, were something the UK wanted to see here.
"How far would Her Majesty's Government go to imposing these programmes on the Cayman Islands?" he asked. Mr. Ebanks also queried if the UK would extend United Nations conventions on human rights to Cayman. Mrs. Munn explained that some of those conventions had already been accepted willingly by some of the Overseas Territories. She said she had discussed the issue with the various participants of the Overseas Territories Consultative Council in London two weeks ago, and none of the territories had a expressed any problem with having the U.N.'s human rights conventions extended to them.
--
Canada: The Parish Council of St. Mary's Kerrisdale plans to put a motion before their annual Vestry (membership) meeting next month that would ask Bishop Michael Ingham to designate St. Mary's as a parish where the rite of same sex blessing may be performed. Eight parishes in the diocese have been authorized to perform the blessing. In every case, a parish is required to hold a Vestry vote before it can ask to become a place of blessing. In 2006, after a vote at Diocesan Synod, Bishop Ingham placed a moratorium on further uthorizations until after the national General Synod, which took place last summer. The eight parishes already authorized can still hold same sex blessings, but none of the diocese's 71 other parishes can.
--
A young California couple, Trent and Greg, talk about the meaning of the freedom to marry for them. Visit the site to view the video.
--
The symbol is known to many - three [sic] gold bars within a blue box, the Human Rights Campaign's ubiquitous sign, inspiring the fight for gay and lesbian rights and, apparently, T-shirts.Seeing the bars on a bumper sticker during a drive with friends last spring, Reggie Solomon, a gay man living in New Haven, whimsically suggested a T-shirt expressing how the group in the car felt about gay marriage. He didn't realize the impact of his words."A friend of mine - a guy who made some money in the dot-com world - instantaneously said, 'I'll invest in that,'" Solomon said. During the ride, they came up with a design: a simple black fitted shirt with the slogan "[marriage is so gay]." When they came back to New Haven, Solomon and pals Ben Berkowitz and Andy Horowitz got down to business.Six months later, the three friends have sold a few hundred American Apparel T-shirts with the logo, successfully launched a company - www.issogay.com - and set their aim on combating the conventional with a series of counterculture T-shirts advocating, and raising money for, causes aligned with their own values. Last week, they brought the cause to the next generation - or the like-minded parents who dress them - with a black "[marriage is so gay]" onesie.
=
National Gay News
http://nationalgaynews.com/
Go to the website, above, for the following articles:
--
Tutu Apologises for Persecution of Gays on BBC Radio Tonight
Archbishop Desmond Tutu has apologised to gay people all around the world for the way they have been treated by the Church.
The Archbishop recently criticised the church for being 'obsessed' with homosexuality but speaking on the only gay programme on the BBC he goes further and says he's 'sorry'.
--
Gay Law Professor Provokes Ire in Michigan for Suing University
The University of Michigan Law School is fighting a breach-of-contract lawsuit filed by a professor who says he was denied tenure because he is openly gay.
``I am the only male ever denied tenure by a vote of the law school faculty in at least 40 years,'' said Peter Hammer, who moved to Wayne State University in Detroit, where he is a tenured law professor.
--
GLBT Adults More Likely to Own a Pet Than Heterosexuals
Seven out of ten (71%) GLBT adults today say that they own pets, compared with 63 percent of heterosexual adults, according to the results of a new national survey. The same survey also shows that nine in ten (90%) GLBT pet owners say their pet is a member of their family and 64 percent also add that they have bought their pet a holiday present. The new nationwide survey of 2,455 U.S. adults, (ages 18 and over), of whom more than 6 percent, or 158, self identified as gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender, was conducted online between November 7 and 13, 2007, by Harris Interactive®, a global market research and consulting firm, in conjunction with Witeck-Combs Communications, Inc., a strategic public relations and marketing communications firm with special expertise in the GLBT market.
--
Breakdown in the Fast Lane
A foxy Philly anchorwoman - who once e-mailed sexy swimsuit snaps to a married TV talking head - became an anger woman yesterday, calling a female NYPD cop a "dyke bitch" and slugging her in the face, law-enforcement sources said.
--
Gay Sports History: Basketball Transformed
Certain sports seem to be a tougher nut to crack than others - they are more omophobic, more fiercely resistant to change. In the United States, basketball makes the short list of "tough nuts," along with football and baseball. Among the three, basketball stands out because of its unique history, which gives it a special place in American culture that even football and baseball don't have. After the first NBA player, John Amaechi, came out in 2007, he was asked by RealJock.com, "You worked for such a long time in this hyper-masculine, heterosexual NBA environment. Where do you feel that this comes from?"
--
Domestic Violence Afflicts Couples Straight and Gay
Rita Hinkle felt betrayed when her partner ended their relationship to reunite with her former husband.
Hinkle made the deadly decision: If she couldn't have Deana Page, no one would. In a busy shopping center parking lot last year, Hinkle stood outside Page's pickup truck and shot the woman 15 times with a revolver, testimony last week in a Birmingham trial showed.
--
Gay 4 Pay: Gay Obsession with Straight Guys in Porn
It's a phrase gay men use to describe themselves or to express an attribute that they seek in others. But what exactly does it mean? For some, the interest in straight guys is just to find someone who isn't overtly flamboyant. But for others, like Randy Blue, Sean Cody, Mike Hancock and Corbin Fisher, gay man's obsession with straight guys has created a booming Internet business that is raking in the cash.
--
Being Gay Not Hindering Polis' Race
Jared Polis, campaigning as the first openly gay candidate for Congress from Colorado, can't wait to take his partner to a delegation dinner in Washington, D.C. The Boulder Democrat wants to sit beside Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, a Republican from Fort Morgan, who tried to put a same-sex-marriage ban in the Constitution four years ago.
=
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
=
Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/sfl-brmail814sbdec18,0,5037463,print.story
Gay tourism in Lauderdale and Florida's ban on gay adoptions
December 18, 2007
On Dec. 4, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel ran a story on the front of thebusiness section, "Leader in gay tourism," hailing Fort Lauderdale as a topdestination for gay tourists.
Unfortunately, there was no mention of the Dec. 3 Senate hearing in SouthFlorida, in which many citizens lined up and signed up to ask Floridalegislators to repeal the 1977 law that prevents gay men and women fromadopting. Yes, gay tourism brings over $1.2 billion to the Fort Lauderdalearea alone. For those interested in the financial bottom line, consider howmany tax dollars we could save if more children languishing in foster careand the child welfare system were placed in the capable hands of lovingparents.
And on a humanitarian level, we have over 4,000 children in foster care,many of whom are being denied the stability, security and love that couldeasily be provided if we removed discrmination from our adoption laws.
Allan Barsky
Fort Lauderdale
=
Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/broward/sfl-flbgayban1215sbdec18,0,6892007,print.story
Gay marriage ban headed for vote
Group claims enough petition signatures have been gathered
By Susannah Bryan
December 18, 2007
A proposed constitutional ban on same-sex marriage is headed directly to theNovember ballot - setting the stage for a vigorous battle between gay rightsadvocates and opponents.
"We aren't advocating anything new or radical here," said John Stemberger,an Orlando attorney and chairman of Florida4Marriage.org, the group pushingthe ban. "We're just saying keep things as they are. We want the institution[of marriage] to be protected for centuries."
Stemberger claims the group has collected more than the 611,009 petitionsignatures needed to place the amendment on the ballot.
Florida law already forbids gay marriage, but Stemberger says writing a baninto the state constitution is the only way to ensure a permanentprohibition.
People who oppose the measure, however, believe it is a covert politicaltool designed to bring ultra-conservatives to the polls in a presidentialelection year.
more . . . . .
=
ExpressGayNews.com
http://expressgaynews.com/thelatest/thelatest.cfm?blog_id=15697
Gay marriage debate intensifies as conservatives get organized
National Organization for Marriage gears up for fight with radio ads
MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. (AP)
Dec 17, 10:43 AM
New Jersey's well-organized gay rights advocates are finding theiradversaries are also getting prepared for a coming legislative debate overgay marriage.
The National Organization for Marriage, established earlier this year inPrinceton, made itself known over the past few weeks with radioadvertisements urging people to call their lawmakers to tell them thatallowing gay couples to marry would undermine the institution.
The group set up in left-leaning New Jersey because it is one of a fewstates where there's a realistic chance in the next few years that lawmakerswill vote to allow gay marriage. That makes it a battleground for the issuesnationally.
"If our side continues to increase in its activism, I think we can stop thisin 2008," said Brian Brown, the executive director of the new organizationand former head of the Family Institute of Connecticut.
Steven Goldstein, the chairman of Garden State Equality, said the emergenceof the new group shows how close New Jersey is to becoming the first stateto enact a law to allows gay couples to marry.
more . . . . .
=
ExpressGayNews.com
http://www.al.com/printer/printer.ssf?/base/news/1197796741297050.xml&coll=2
Domestic violence afflicts couples straight and gay
Murder case illustrates reach of a societal woe
ERIC VELASCO
News staff writer
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Rita Hinkle felt betrayed when her partner ended their relationship toreunite with her former husband.
Hinkle made the deadly decision: If she couldn't have Deana Page, no onewould.
In a busy shopping center parking lot last year, Hinkle stood outside Page'spickup truck and shot the woman 15 times with a revolver, testimony lastweek in a Birmingham trial showed.
A Jefferson County jury last week said it was capital murder.
It's also an example of domestic violence, said Carol Gundlach, executivedirector of the Alabama Coalition Against Domestic Violence.
more . . . . .
=
ExpressGayNews.com
http://www.courant.com/features/lifestyle/hc-tshirtcompany.art0dec17,0,6127581,print.story
Wearing Their Hearts On Their T-Shirts
By ADRIAN BRUNE
SPECIAL TO THE COURANT
December 17, 2007
The symbol is known to many - three gold bars within a blue box, the HumanRights Campaign's ubiquitous sign, inspiring the fight for gay and lesbianrights and, apparently, T-shirts.
Seeing the bars on a bumper sticker during a drive with friends last spring,Reggie Solomon, a gay man living in New Haven, whimsically suggested aT-shirt expressing how the group in the car felt about gay marriage. Hedidn't realize the impact of his words.
"A friend of mine - a guy who made some money in the dot-com world -instantaneously said, 'I'll invest in that,'" Solomon said. During the ride,they came up with a design: a simple black fitted shirt with the slogan"[marriage is so gay]." When they came back to New Haven, Solomon and palsBen Berkowitz and Andy Horowitz got down to business.
Six months later, the three friends have sold a few hundred American ApparelT-shirts with the logo, successfully launched a company - www.issogay.com -and set their aim on combating the conventional with a series ofcounterculture T-shirts advocating, and raising money for, causes alignedwith their own values. Last week, they brought the cause to the nextgeneration - or the like-minded parents who dress them - with a black"[marriage is so gay]" onesie.
"We wanted to start bringing a lighthearted product to people who believedin certain causes - a shirt all people could wear," Solomon said on a recentnight after work at the Yale Office of New Haven and State Affairs. "Most ofmy friends are straight - think of the power of the message when a straightperson walks down the street with his wife and child wearing it."
more . . . . .
=
ExpressGayNews.com
http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/mpapps/pagetools/print/news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7140565.stm
Approval for once-a-day HIV pill
By Jane Dreaper
Health correspondent, BBC News
The first HIV medication which involves taking just one pill a day has beenapproved by the European authorities.
The go-ahead for Atripla represents what some experts say is a revolution in treatment for the virus that causes Aids, although it is not a cure.
People using the earliest HIV drugs in 1996 had to take up to 30 pills on anempty stomach at different times.
The decision means Atripla can be used in the UK but local health bodiesmust decide whether the NHS will provide it.
Taking Atripla does not reduce the risk of transmitting the virus.
The drugs regime has already reduced to just several pills a day for peoplenewly diagnosed with HIV.
more . . . . .
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/12/121707hm.htm
Third Of Homeless Young New Yorkers Gay
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: December 17, 2007 - 5:00 pm ET
(New York City) A new study says there are at least 3,800 people under theage of 25 living on the streets of New York and that almost 30 percent aregay, lesbian or bisexual.
The study, by the Empire State Coalition of Youth and Family Services, hasbeen turned over to City Council, which paid for it.
Nearly half of all homeless young people were Black, about 25 percent wereLatino the study said. Those numbers would be proportionate to Black andLatino populations in New York.
But the high number of gays on the streets is about three times theestimated percentage of New York's LGBT community.
The survey found that while many homeless youth went to city shelters 42percent slept on the streets, subways or in empty buildings.
more . . . . .
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/12/121707oreg.htm
New Oz PM: No Gay Marriage, Civil Unions
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: December 17, 2007 - 1:00 pm ET
(Sydney, Australia) Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says his governmentwill look at introducing a bill to create a national domestic partnerregistry but has no intention of legalizing same-sex marriage or allowingcivil unions.
Rudd was reacting to press reports on the weekend that claimed some cabinetministers had told LGBT leaders that a civil union bill was being written.
The Australian Capital Territory recently resurrected legislation rejectedby the former federal government to allow civil unions in the territory andRudd has said his Labor government would not intervene.
Rudd said Monday that gay and lesbian couples need protections, but on anational level he would not support same-sex marriage or civil partnerships.
"Our position has always been that marriage is between a man and a woman,and therefore that always will form the cornerstone of our view on thesematters.
more . . . . .
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/12/121707nd.htm
Canadian Party Drops Transgendered Lawyer
by The Canadian Press
Posted: December 17, 2007 - 5:00 pm ET
(Montreal, Quebec) A lawyer from Quebec City says she was dumped as afederal New Democratic Party candidate because she is transgendered.
Micheline Montreuil alleges she was told by an NDP official her sexualityhindered party attempts to woo new Quebec candidates into the fold.
``They just said I do not fit in the NDP anymore,'' the prominent family andlabor lawyer said in a phone interview.
``They also told me... that many people who wish to be a candidate for theNDP do not wish to have their name associated with the name of MichelineMontreuil, because I am transgendered.''
In a letter, the party told her she lost the candidacy for statements shemade in media interviews, her difficulty maintaining support in the localriding association and for not working in a team, she said.
more . . . . .
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/12/121707student.htm
Trans Student Accuses Mass. College Of Discrimination
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: December 17, 2007 - 3:00 pm ET
(Haverhill, Massachusetts) A transgendered student says he is the victim ofdiscrimination at a small Massachusetts community college because he isbiologically female.
Ethan Santiago says that Northern Essex Community College is refusing him touse the men's locker room.
Santiago, 20, began transitioning two years ago and has recently begunhormone treatment.
He presents as male and wears men's clothing.
But because he still has female sex organs the college says that he is indanger of being sexually assaulted in the men's changing room.
more . . . . .
=
Advocate.com
http://www.advocate.com/news_detail_ektid51154.asp
Florida Could Vote to Ban Same-Sex Marriage
December 18, 2007
Voters may decide next year whether Florida will become the 28th state toplace a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage. Sponsors of the proposedban claim that they have gathered the required 611,009 signatures necessaryfor a referendum vote, but Florida's Division of Elections website shows thegroup is 253 signatures short of its goal, the Associated Press reportedFriday. An election official has yet to formally verify the signatures.
Florida currently prohibits same-sex marriage, but John Stemberger, anOrlando attorney heading the group opposed to marriage equality, said aconstitutional ban would prevent judges from overturning the law.
"We believe kids need a mom and a dad, very simply," Stemberger told the AP."Moms and dads bring something different to the table. Dads are notoptional."
Opponents of the measure are worried that the amendment could supersede someFlorida cities' existing domestic-partnership laws, thereby affectingunmarried heterosexual couples as well.
"It's government saying this is the only sanctioned relationship that youcan have," said Stephen Gaskill, spokesman for Florida Red and Blue, anopposition group. (The Advocate)
=
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-6361.html
18th December 2007 11:05
PinkNews.co.uk staff writer
Hungary's parliament has approved the Registered Partnership Act. From January 1st 2009 lesbian and gay couples will have almost identical rights as married heterosexual couples in common law.
Notable exceptions are the right to adopt, access to fertility treatment and the right to take their partner's surname.
The Registered Partnership Act was passed with votes of the members of the Socialist-led social-liberal government.
Both gay and straight couples will be able to register their partnership, and will have protections regarding next of kin status, taxation, health care, inheritance, social security, pensions and shared possession of a home.
Government statistics show that there were an estimated 349,000 unmarried couples in Hungary in 2005, 12.2 per cent of all families, compared to 62,000 in 1970, 2.1 per cent of all families.
Hungary's opposition conservative parties refused to back the new law, which they regard as a "hidden attempt" to legalise gay marriage.
The Hungarian gay and lesbian associations have welcomed new law as a milestone while acknowledging it does not grant full equality.
Juris Lavrikovs
Communications Manager
International Lesbian and Gay Association
=
European Governments Must Do More to Tackle Hate Crimes
TEL AVIV - A majority of European governments get a poor grade in their efforts to tackle violent hate crimes, according to Human Rights First's 2007 Hate Crime Report Card released today at the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) meeting in Tel Aviv. This new study examines monitoring and reporting systems as well as the enforcement of hate crime laws in the 56 states that comprise the OSCE - from the Russian Federation and the Central Asian states across Western Europe and also including the United States and Canada.
The report is a follow-up to Human Rights First's 2007 Hate Crime Survey, which documented the disturbing rise in hate crimes across the OSCE region. The report released today examines government efforts to combat these violent hate crimes.
Human Rights First concludes that only 15 of the 56 participating states of the OSCE are fulfilling their basic commitments to monitor hate crimes, with countries in the European Union and North America leading the way. While more than 30 countries have legislation that allows for penalty enhancements when crimes are motivated by bias, there is little evidence that these provisions are applied in a systematic fashion in most countries.
"Europe has seen a worrying rise in hate crimes in recent years," said Maureen Byrnes, Executive Director of Human Rights first. "What's deeply troubling is that many states still fail to use the tools necessary to investigate and punish the perpetrators of such violence as a matter of priority - suggesting an underlying indifference," added Byrnes.
This past October, a Jewish school was torched in an antisemitic attack in Kiev, Ukraine. A year before five men attacked and murdered a Nigerian man living in the Ukraine in what was thought to be a racist attack. NGO monitors have reported a rise in such bias-motivated crimes throughout the Ukraine in recent years. Yet the Ukrainian government still does not publicly monitor or record the number of hate crimes committed in the Ukraine each year.
Ukraine is among nearly 40 countries where governments provide only limited or no public reporting on violent hate crimes. "How can governments combat the problem of hate violence if they lack a system to monitor and document such crimes?" asked Byrnes.
In Italy, where three Romanians were recently hospitalized after being attacked by a masked, club-wielding, anti-immigrant gang in an apparent hate crime, important new institutions have been established to combat discrimination, although violent hate crimes are yet to be included in their programs. The Italian authorities do not currently produce reliable data on such crimes.
Some changes have been pledged. In Norway, where no hate crime statistics are available, the Minister of Justice said in September that a study had shown that hate violence against gay men and others was rising and that police had begun to register hate crimes. In the Netherlands, where statistics are available only from NGO sources, authorities have announced new measures to begin in 2008 to track the implementation of prosecutorial guidelines by which bias motivations are to result in enhanced penalties.
While nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have filled the gap in some cases, there is ultimately no substitute for official monitoring. In the Russian Federation, for example, NGO monitors have documented a rising tide of hate crimes of alarming proportions, while the limited official data largely ignores the problem.
The new Human Rights First report includes individual country "report cards"
on each of the 56 OSCE participating states. Each country report details themonitoring and reporting mechanisms present and describes the legal framework applicable to crimes of violence motivated by prejudice and hatred. Comparative charts cover the compliance of all 56 countries with OSCE, Council of Europe, European Union, and other international standards.
more....
=
To Form a More Perfect Union: Marriage Equality News
Information, news, and discussion about the legal recognition of same-sexcouples and their families, including marriages, domestic partnerships,civil unions, adoptions, foster children and similar issues.
http://samesexmarriage.typepad.com/weblog/
Go to the website, above, for the following articles:
--
Whether or not the United Kingdom would force the Cayman Islands to accept legalised same-sex marriages was the main focus of questions to visiting Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office Meg Munn at the Chamber of Commerce luncheon last Thursday.Mario Ebanks started the questioning by asking Mrs. Munn if liberal programmes such as same-sex marriages, which he said ran very contrary to the traditions of the Cayman Islands, were something the UK wanted to see here.
"How far would Her Majesty's Government go to imposing these programmes on the Cayman Islands?" he asked. Mr. Ebanks also queried if the UK would extend United Nations conventions on human rights to Cayman. Mrs. Munn explained that some of those conventions had already been accepted willingly by some of the Overseas Territories. She said she had discussed the issue with the various participants of the Overseas Territories Consultative Council in London two weeks ago, and none of the territories had a expressed any problem with having the U.N.'s human rights conventions extended to them.
--
Canada: The Parish Council of St. Mary's Kerrisdale plans to put a motion before their annual Vestry (membership) meeting next month that would ask Bishop Michael Ingham to designate St. Mary's as a parish where the rite of same sex blessing may be performed. Eight parishes in the diocese have been authorized to perform the blessing. In every case, a parish is required to hold a Vestry vote before it can ask to become a place of blessing. In 2006, after a vote at Diocesan Synod, Bishop Ingham placed a moratorium on further uthorizations until after the national General Synod, which took place last summer. The eight parishes already authorized can still hold same sex blessings, but none of the diocese's 71 other parishes can.
--
A young California couple, Trent and Greg, talk about the meaning of the freedom to marry for them. Visit the site to view the video.
--
The symbol is known to many - three [sic] gold bars within a blue box, the Human Rights Campaign's ubiquitous sign, inspiring the fight for gay and lesbian rights and, apparently, T-shirts.Seeing the bars on a bumper sticker during a drive with friends last spring, Reggie Solomon, a gay man living in New Haven, whimsically suggested a T-shirt expressing how the group in the car felt about gay marriage. He didn't realize the impact of his words."A friend of mine - a guy who made some money in the dot-com world - instantaneously said, 'I'll invest in that,'" Solomon said. During the ride, they came up with a design: a simple black fitted shirt with the slogan "[marriage is so gay]." When they came back to New Haven, Solomon and pals Ben Berkowitz and Andy Horowitz got down to business.Six months later, the three friends have sold a few hundred American Apparel T-shirts with the logo, successfully launched a company - www.issogay.com - and set their aim on combating the conventional with a series of counterculture T-shirts advocating, and raising money for, causes aligned with their own values. Last week, they brought the cause to the next generation - or the like-minded parents who dress them - with a black "[marriage is so gay]" onesie.
=
National Gay News
http://nationalgaynews.com/
Go to the website, above, for the following articles:
--
Tutu Apologises for Persecution of Gays on BBC Radio Tonight
Archbishop Desmond Tutu has apologised to gay people all around the world for the way they have been treated by the Church.
The Archbishop recently criticised the church for being 'obsessed' with homosexuality but speaking on the only gay programme on the BBC he goes further and says he's 'sorry'.
--
Gay Law Professor Provokes Ire in Michigan for Suing University
The University of Michigan Law School is fighting a breach-of-contract lawsuit filed by a professor who says he was denied tenure because he is openly gay.
``I am the only male ever denied tenure by a vote of the law school faculty in at least 40 years,'' said Peter Hammer, who moved to Wayne State University in Detroit, where he is a tenured law professor.
--
GLBT Adults More Likely to Own a Pet Than Heterosexuals
Seven out of ten (71%) GLBT adults today say that they own pets, compared with 63 percent of heterosexual adults, according to the results of a new national survey. The same survey also shows that nine in ten (90%) GLBT pet owners say their pet is a member of their family and 64 percent also add that they have bought their pet a holiday present. The new nationwide survey of 2,455 U.S. adults, (ages 18 and over), of whom more than 6 percent, or 158, self identified as gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender, was conducted online between November 7 and 13, 2007, by Harris Interactive®, a global market research and consulting firm, in conjunction with Witeck-Combs Communications, Inc., a strategic public relations and marketing communications firm with special expertise in the GLBT market.
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Breakdown in the Fast Lane
A foxy Philly anchorwoman - who once e-mailed sexy swimsuit snaps to a married TV talking head - became an anger woman yesterday, calling a female NYPD cop a "dyke bitch" and slugging her in the face, law-enforcement sources said.
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Gay Sports History: Basketball Transformed
Certain sports seem to be a tougher nut to crack than others - they are more omophobic, more fiercely resistant to change. In the United States, basketball makes the short list of "tough nuts," along with football and baseball. Among the three, basketball stands out because of its unique history, which gives it a special place in American culture that even football and baseball don't have. After the first NBA player, John Amaechi, came out in 2007, he was asked by RealJock.com, "You worked for such a long time in this hyper-masculine, heterosexual NBA environment. Where do you feel that this comes from?"
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Domestic Violence Afflicts Couples Straight and Gay
Rita Hinkle felt betrayed when her partner ended their relationship to reunite with her former husband.
Hinkle made the deadly decision: If she couldn't have Deana Page, no one would. In a busy shopping center parking lot last year, Hinkle stood outside Page's pickup truck and shot the woman 15 times with a revolver, testimony last week in a Birmingham trial showed.
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Gay 4 Pay: Gay Obsession with Straight Guys in Porn
It's a phrase gay men use to describe themselves or to express an attribute that they seek in others. But what exactly does it mean? For some, the interest in straight guys is just to find someone who isn't overtly flamboyant. But for others, like Randy Blue, Sean Cody, Mike Hancock and Corbin Fisher, gay man's obsession with straight guys has created a booming Internet business that is raking in the cash.
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Being Gay Not Hindering Polis' Race
Jared Polis, campaigning as the first openly gay candidate for Congress from Colorado, can't wait to take his partner to a delegation dinner in Washington, D.C. The Boulder Democrat wants to sit beside Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, a Republican from Fort Morgan, who tried to put a same-sex-marriage ban in the Constitution four years ago.
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[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
Monday, December 17, 2007
GLBT DIGEST December 17, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US AT rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
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The Washington Poswt
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/13/AR2007121301469.html
Dividing Lines: Exploring the split between enlightened and evangelicalChristianity.
Reviewed by Stephen Prothero
Sunday, December 16, 2007; BW05
HEAD AND HEART: American Christianities
By Garry Wills
Penguin Press. 626 pp. $29.95
Denominational lines no longer matter much in the United States, not leastbecause few Americans know any more what distinguishes a Baptist from aMethodist or a Lutheran from a Presbyterian. As the furor over homosexualityin the Episcopal Church demonstrates, the issues cracking open U.S. churchestoday are political rather than theological -- gay marriage and abortionrather than baptism and Holy Communion.
In his latest book, Head and Heart, Garry Wills surveys the fault lines inU.S. Christianity and argues that the real fracture is between "Enlightened"religion (of the head) and "Evangelical" religion (of the heart). ThroughoutAmerican history, he writes, Christians have oscillated between these "twopoles of religious attraction." Wills is a liberal Catholic and an outspokenchampion of the separation of church and state, so it should not besurprising that his sympathies run with the enlightened camp. But the geniusof American religion, he argues, lies in our promiscuous mixing of the headyand the heartfelt, the Tin Man and the Scarecrow. And America's saints --among them, Martin Luther King Jr., Abraham Lincoln and the Quakerabolitionist Anthony Benezet (to whom the book is dedicated) -- are thosewho synthesize the two most effectively.
A popular history of American Christianity, Head and Heart starts in NewEngland with Puritan ministers, then lingers over the Unitarians of Bostonand the Transcendentalists of Concord before jumping rather abruptly intothe "culture wars" of the 20th century. Throughout, Wills focuses almostexclusively on the thinking of white men. Head and Heart reads, therefore,like U.S. religious history books of an earlier generation -- beforeinterest in Buddhism challenged the preoccupation of historians withChristianity, before historians of the West challenged our preoccupationwith New England, before scholars of ritual upended our preoccupation withreligious thought, and before women and blacks made places for themselves atthe historiographic table.
Another peculiarity of this book is its frequent shifting between historicaland biographical modes. Head and Heart contains more than 30 subsectionsdevoted to individual thinkers, so at points it reads more like anencyclopedia of American religious biography than a narrative of Americanreligion.
more . . . . .
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Inside Higher Education
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/12/17/assault
Averting Assault
Dec. 17
A new study finds that fraternity members who participate in a one-hour rapeprevention program are significantly less likely to report committing asexually coercive act during their first year of college than are fraternitymen in a control group.
The study is unusual in that it documents evidence of actual behavioralchanges in a campus setting, in addition to attitudinal changes (which havebeen the focus of most prior studies). "That has been something that peoplein the rape prevention community have sought to do for decades," said JohnD. Foubert, an assistant professor of higher education at the College ofWilliam and Mary and lead author of the study, which was scheduled to bepublished Saturday in the National Association of Student PersonnelAdministrators Journal.
The study evaluates the Men's Program, a prevention program offered by thenational nonprofit founded by Foubert, "One in Four," that maintainschapters at about 30 college campuses and also hires educators who travel byRV to offer the program at another 50 campuses per year. The study tracks565 men - 90 percent of males in the freshman class at a "mid-sized campusin the Southeast" - throughout the course of the academic year. Students inthe control group participated in a program that reiterated information onsexual assault already communicated during orientation, Foubert said, whilethe balance of students participated in the Men's Program.
The idea behind the Men's Program, Foubert said, "is that you're going toget a lot farther with men if you treat them as potential helpers ratherthan potential perpetrators." The Men's Program includes a screening of avideo that describes a male-on-male rape to foster empathy for survivorsamong the male participants, and focuses on how men can support survivorsand intervene to prevent possible assaults. The program has been the subjectof some controversy, as outlined in this 1999 Journal of College StudentDevelopment article, particularly because of concerns about the use of avideo depicting male rape to foster empathy for female survivors andobjections to the program's appeal to the "men-take-care-of-women archetype."
In the U.S. Department of Education-funded study, Foubert bolsters resultsfrom an earlier research finding that participation in the Men's Program isassociated with long-term attitudinal changes, in addition to behavioralones. Focusing on fraternity members, he finds that participants who went onto join fraternities as freshmen were more than three times more likely thanpeers to report committing a sexually coercive act - defined as everythingfrom unwanted touching to rape - during their first year of college. Foubertfound that 8 percent of freshmen who joined fraternities reported committinga sexually coercive act their first year of college, compared to 2.5 percentof men who did not join fraternities.
more . . . . .
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Forwarded from EuroQueer
New gay rights group voices concerns
Adam Harvey
Irish Times, 17 December 2007
A new group calling for gay civil marriages has vowed to "make a lot ofnoise" about the issue and held true to their word on Saturday, when theyenlisted gay choir Glória to help make their point.
At a carol session outside the Gaiety theatre, the choir was in full voiceas about 50 protesters from the new group, Lesbian Gay BisexualTransgendered (LGBT) Noise asked passersby to sign petitions.
Protesters wore pink badges and held placards with messages like: "Don'tbelieve in gay marriage? Don't marry a gay person" and "You don't have to begay to support gay rights".
LGBT organiser Mark McCarron (28) said the organisation hoped to drawattention to the lack of rights for gay couples.
"There's no obvious public protests for gays campaigning for civilmarriage," he said. "A lot of people say 'we don't hear from gay peopleabout this issue'. Well, here we are," said Mr McCarron. The group has aFacebook page and about 300 e-mail addresses of supporters, he said.
The Government has said that it will introduce some form of gay partnershiplegislation next year, but LGBT co-organiser Paul Kenny said that no oneknows what the Bill will contain.
Currently, said Mr Kenny, gay couples do not have the same rights asstraight couples when it comes to issues like pensions, wills, inheritanceand the care of children.
more....
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PinkNews.co.yk
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/politics/2005-6309.html
EU pressures member states on discrimination
11th December 2007 16:40
PinkNews.co.uk staff writer
The European Commission is examining replies from three member states afterit had warned them to transpose into national law a 2000 directive againstdiscrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.
The Commission had sent letters of formal notice to Italy and Latvia onDecember 15th 2006 and to Finland on January 3rd 2007.
Two members of the EU Parliament, Marco Cappato and Sophie In't Veld, lastmonth asked for the intervention of the Commission, which had given December2003 as a deadline to approve anti-discrimination legislation.
Cappato warned that there could be further action, including a ruling by theEU Court of Justice and subsequent fines, and urged the countries' lawmakersto comply with the EU rulings.
The infringement against Italy did not specifically deal with sexualorientation, but rather general problems covering all grounds ofdiscrimination.
more....
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Forwarded by Bill Stirling
wh_sterling@yahoo.com
Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-na-gaydad17dec17,1,6312451.story
Like fathers, like son
A gay couple succeed in becoming fathers of a baby boy. Their quest for achild was chronicled in a Los Angeles Times series last year.
By Jenny Jarvie
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
December 17, 2007
ATLANTA - At last, Chad and David Craig's quest to become fathers is over.They say they feel more happy, and more tired, than they have ever been.
The gay couple, whose attempt to create a pregnancy through a gestationalsurrogacy arrangement was followed last year in a Los Angeles Times series,welcomed their son, O. Jansen Hodge Craig, into their lives nine weeks ago.
"We just look at him and think he's a miracle," Chad said last week as hedrew Jansen, clad in a snug jumpsuit, close to his chest. "It's something wejust always believed in. Finally, he's here."
Chad and David's attempt to bring a child into the world involved a womanthey barely knew. After fertilizing her eggs in vitro using both men'ssperm, another woman would carry the resulting embryos to term. They had noidea whose DNA would carry the day.
Jansen's birth marked the end of a four-year journey that involved three eggretrievals, 65 eggs, seven fertilization attempts, three surrogates and morethan $200,000 in expenses.
There were many ups and downs. In June 2006, Chad's sister, who had agreedto take on the role of surrogate mother, gave birth to twins, Asher andHolland. But the tiny siblings were premature and lived for only three andsix days respectively.
Chad and David came out of that experience with enough hope to keep trying.They signed on with a new doctor, arranged for a third retrieval fromJessica -- the egg donor who had helped them produce the twins -- and founda new surrogate, a school crossing guard and mother of three fromMassachusetts.
Finally, they had found the right components to make it work.
Jansen was born Oct. 13 at Massachusetts General Hospital, weighing 8 poundsand 2 ounces. When a nurse read out the time of birth -- 6:16 p.m. -- hisfathers burst into tears. The time echoed the date of the twins' birthday:June 16.
more....
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The International Day Against Homophobia (IDAHO)
www.idaho.org.uk
IDAHO-UK PRESS RELEASE.
UK rallies against international homophobia.
2007 sees unprecedented support for IDAHO campaign.
The International Day Against Homophobia (IDAHO) campaign which is marked inover 50 countries on and around May 17th was highlighted by over 100initiatives and events in the UK this year. For the first time all parts ofthe UK were involved, as the IDAHO habit gripped such cities and areas asLiverpool, Southampton, Bradford, Northampton, Bristol, Lancaster, Tyne andWear and Yorkshire. Meanwhile, IDAHO veterans in London, Brighton, Oldham,Manchester, Sheffield, Surrey, Gloucestershire and Kent marked the day withbigger than ever events. IDAHO initiatives in Scotland were marked by amassive and enthusiastic contribution from LGBT Youth and an AmnestyInternational campaign. IDAHO was also celebrated for the first in NorthernIreland and Wales.
"Yes to Education, no to Homophobia" was a suggested theme for IDAHO eventsaround the world and this was reflected in several events in the UK.Students at the University of Arts in London designed posters celebratingthe diversity of the LGBT community, and addressing world homophobia. Thewinning posters were displayed at a major event on May 17th attended by 200people. Manchester's Lesbian and Gay Foundation announced "a new majorinitiative aimed at ending homophobia through education", called "ExceedingExpectations" and showcased this initiative at a major event at ManchesterTown Hall. The subject of homophobic bullying was also tackled indevelopment workshops commissioned and co-produced by "Queer up North" and"Stonewall". The Gay and Lesbian Humanist Association (GALHA) held a paneldiscussion on "Introducing Gay Families to Schoolchildren".
Hate Crime was a major concern of IDAHO campaigners, and this was reflectedin many events and initiatives. The BBC reported that there had been aseries of hate crime arrests to mark IDAHO. New campaigns to tackle hatecrime were launched in Brighton, Newcastle and Middlesbrough. 120 peopleattended a major event organised by Gay Surrey to highlight these issues. InBrighton campaigners released 77 lanterns, on the seafront, to mark the 77countries where homosexuality is a crime around the world. Campaigners inSouthwark, Lambeth and Wandsworth marked the day by remembering the victimsof homophobic and transphobic abuse in imaginative ways and in Camden,campaigners marked the day by planting pansies where homophobic andtransphobic hate crime had occurred, in collaboration with "The PansyProject". Community Safety Events were also arranged by the "East London OutProject", who also organised a major vigil outside Walthamstow Town Hall,and workshops with 4 local authorities.
more....
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UK
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-6348.html
Interview: Peter Tatchell's 40 years of campaigning
PinkNews by Peter Tatchell
should be of interest:
This extract from a recent interview given to the UK
PinkNews.co.uk: What do you think about the Vatican and its attempts tohamper protection and recognition for gay people?
PT: The sooner someone outs Pope Benedict, the better. His homophobicpolicies remind me of the Inquisition, and the Hitler Youth, of which he wasa member.
All the closeted homophobes in the Vatican should be outed, they aredestroying the lives of LGBT people worldwide.
PinkNews.co.uk: A few days ago, the pope said that gay people threatenpeace, how would you respond to that?
PT: These are the rantings of a semi-deranged Christian fundamentalist and atheocrat, whose ego is so enormous that he believes he has a hot-line toGod.
If any ordinary person in the street did it, they'd probably put them in amental asylum. It is amazing the indulgences that are allowed for theso-called "men of God."
Pope Benedict is the ideological inheritor of Nazi homophobia. He'd liketo eradicate homosexuality, but since he can't put LGBT people in physicalconcentration camps, he is doing his best to put them in psychologicalconcentration camps.
To read the full text of the interview, go to
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-6348.html
George Broadhead
Vice-President, UK Gay and Lesbian Humanist Association (GALHA)
www.galha.org
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Palm Beach Post
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/opinion/content/local_news/epaper/2007/12/16/s1c_bino_1216.html
Effort to nix same-sex unions lacks torch carrier
By FRANK CERABINO
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Sunday, December 16, 2007
We here in Florida get to beat up on gays during the next presidentialelection.
We're pretty late to the party.
In this case, we even have to catch up to Mississippi.
Most other states brought out their gay bunker-buster artillery during theGeorge W. Bush midterm election three years ago.
And next year's election bogeyman has already been booked. We're supposed tobe afraid of that horde of foreign-tongued, brown-skinned invaders from thesouth who mow our lawns, tar our roofs and clean our toilets forbargain-basement wages.
But Florida, as it is in so many endeavors, is behind the curve. So we'restill dealing with the gay menace, which is apparently a threat to my27-year marriage.
The state's Republican Party is the big financial backer for a group thatannounced last week that it has collected nearly all the 611,000 signaturesrequired to give voters next November the chance to amend the FloridaConstitution to protect marriage by defining it as "the legal union of onlyone man and one woman."
The state already has a law banning same-sex marriage, but theconstitutional amendment, its proponents say, would guard against "activist"judges.
Double-bagged for your protection.
Rudy-mentary plan for marriage
The hilarity of all this is that the same-sex-marriage amendment couldn'tcome at a more inappropriate time for its supporters.
I'm sure that nobody had an inkling three years ago, when this effort began,that Florida would turn out to be so family valueless.
All state polls agree that, in next month's political primary, Rudy Giulianiis the favorite among Republican voters. The latest Quinnipiac Universitypoll showed Florida's Republican primary voters preferred Giuliani to hisnearest contender, Mitt Romney, by 18 percentage points.
How could this be? These primary voters are the same people who are beingcounted on to enshrine the glories of heterosexual marriage.
If Giuliani ends up his party's nominee, Florida may have the distinction ofhaving an amendment on the November ballot that gins up fear of same-sexmarriage while having a presidential candidate that should make everybodyafraid of heterosexual marriage.
Giuliani is on marriage No. 3 to Judith Nathan, who was his mistress duringhis mayoral days in New York. Giuliani's second wife learned of theirupcoming divorce at a news conference, and the taxpayers of New York paidfor police protection of Giuliani's then-mistress.
That's just the short version of Giuliani's problems with the M word.
Serial marriages don't help cause
To his credit, Giuliani did, in answer to a question on national TV, say itwould be inappropriate for the Secret Service to provide protection for anyhypothetical presidential mistresses.
To make matters worse, Florida now has a governor that is in no position tochampion heterosexual marriage, either.
Three years ago, when the initiative started, Florida had a marriedgovernor.
But now we have Charlie Crist, whose one marriage lasted for six months, andwho, despite his good looks, position of power and occupancy of a big, emptymansion in Tallahassee, can't seem to land a steady girlfriend.
He's no help at all. And even though he signed a petition to support thesame-sex-marriage ban while he was running for office, he says he's notinterested in pushing the issue anymore.
"It's not something that moves me," he said last week.
Even Florida resident Rush Limbaugh, that go-to gas bag of sanctimony, willhave to sit this one out because of a hamstring injury of three failedmarriages.
So, who exactly is supposed to rally Floridians to be afraid of gaycommitment?
Don't look at me. I'm too busy brushing up on my Spanish.
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To Form a More Perfect Union: Marriage Equality News
Information, news, and discussion about the legal recognition of same-sexcouples and their families, including marriages, domestic partnerships,civil unions, adoptions, foster children and similar issues.
http://samesexmarriage.typepad.com/weblog/
Go to the website, above, for the following articles:
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Legendary international and Spanish LGBT rights advocate Jordi Petit hastied the knot with his partner of seven years, Frenchman Yves Bohic, in aceremony held yesterday in Barcelona that was officiated by the city'smayor, Jordi Hereu (yes, there are lots of Jordis in Spain).The wedding wasattended by more than 200 people (partial guest list here) including membersof Mr. Bohic's family who traveled from France to celebrate the couple'swedding.Jordi has been in the trenches as back as the 1970's when Spain wasstill under dictator Francisco Franco's rule and gays and lesbians werebeing persecuted (Jordi had already been arrested a few times for hispolitical involvement by the time he became active in the LGBT-rights in thelate 1970's).
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It is dismaying that the Rhode Island Supreme Court has ruled againstletting people of the same sex who were legally married in Massachusettsdivorce in the Ocean State. The ruling essentially locks homosexual couplesinto marriage in Rhode Island unless one or both members of the marriagemove back to Massachusetts and institute divorce proceedings there. That isnot equal justice under the law. After all, heterosexual couples who weremarried in the Bay State are allowed to divorce in Rhode Island. Of course,the larger issue is legalizing gay marriage in Rhode Island itself. Thestate would be better off - and would be doing the right and just thing - toextend full marriage rights to its homosexual residents. But until that daycomes, the state should at the very least recognize legal marriageselsewhere for the purposes of divorce proceedings. That can and should bedone quickly by enacting a clear statute on the issue - in the upcomingsession.
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Israel: In a few weeks, Yonatan and Omer Gar are scheduled to go to Mumbai,India, in order to take part in the first fertilization attempt of asurrogate mother who will bear their child. Yonatan, 29, who works inGreenpeace and Omer, 30, who works as a psychologist, signed a partnershipagreement about a year ago. In the past few months, they completedprocedures to locate a surrogate mother and an egg donor in India, withwhose aid they will bring their firstborn child into the world. "We've beentogether for over five years. About a year ago, we decided that we wanted toexpand the family and began examining our options. As fate would have it,neither of us has a womb. We would really like to adopt a child in Israel.The fact that this legal option does not exist in Israel is shocking. Thestate prefers that children grow up in a hostel or on the street, as long asthey don't grow up with same-sex parents."
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BOSTON - Gay-marriage advocacy group MassEquality will throw its weightbehind Rep. Barbara A. L'Italien, D-Andover, and other state lawmakers whoface election challenges in November and earlier this year voted to defeat aproposed gay-marriage ban.Marc Solomon, the group's campaign leader, saidMassEquality would mobilize its more than 200,000 members statewide to workfor those candidates. The group, which spent more than $1 million in 2006 todefeat the gay-marriage ban, also will ask its members to write checks tosupport the re-election bids of gay-marriage supporters, he said.
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New Jersey: Kenny Polnasek and Michael Kellison exchanged vows in a privateceremony 17 years ago, and since that time they've always consideredthemselves to be married, even though the state they lived in didn'tconsider that designation -- "marriage" -- to be legally valid. But inOctober 2006, the state Supreme Court ordered the state Legislature to granthomosexual couples the same rights it extends to heterosexual marriedcouples. The resulting legislation, a bill creating civil unions, tookeffect in February. "I'm a Jersey boy, born and raised, and when it (civilunions) came here I was like, 'Yeah, let's do it,'" said Polnasek, who saidhe had been holding out for gay marriage up until that time. So on Sept. 29,their 17th anniversary, Polnasek and Kellison exchanged vows again, thistime at their civil union ceremony.
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Elizabeth MacKenzie embodies the typical Canadian, according to Angus Reidpollster Andrew Grenville. Ian Smith, Vancouver Sun] "I am the cliche ofwhat it means to be a Canadian," says Elizabeth McKenzie.
And The Vancouver Sun's morality quiz shows the east Vancouver artist andmother is right. McKenzie, 52, is an Accepting MOR (Middle of the Road), thetype that Angus Reid pollster Andrew Grenville says embodies the typicalCanadianHer moral convictions echo those of the country, the values embeddedin Canadian laws and customs. McKenzie, a feminist, is relaxed aboutpersonal sexual ethics, but critical of prostitution and pornography. Likemost Canadians, she's open to homosexuality and sex outside marriage, butconcerned about animal cloning. "It's almost embarrassing how Canadian Iam," she says. "Canadians are very moderate people, and I almost feel that'sthe way I was brought up to be."
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MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. (AP) - New Jersey's well organized gay rights advocatesare finding their adversaries are also getting prepared for a cominglegislative debate over gay marriage. The National Organization forMarriage, established earlier this year in Princeton, made itself known overthe past few weeks with radio advertisements urging people to call theirlawmakers to tell them that allowing gay couples to marry would underminethe institution. The group set up in left-leaning New Jersey because it isone of a few states where there's a realistic chance in the next few yearsthat lawmakers will vote to allow gay marriage. That makes it a battlegroundfor the issues nationally.
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Australia: The Sunday Telegraph can reveal that several MPs, who are nowministers, promised during the election campaign that Labor would formallyrecognise same-sex relationships in government as well as removediscriminatory legislation. Former Australian Medical Association presidentProfessor Kerryn Phelps said she had received the commitment from severalsenior Rudd Government ministers. "Their reaction to it was they werecommitted to eliminating discrimination and ensuring real equality and not awatered-down version. Not proceeding with gay marriages or civil unionswould be a watered-down version of equality," she said.
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National Gay News
http://nationalgaynews.com/
Go to the website, above, for the following articles:
--
Gay 4 Pay: Gay Obsession with Straight Guys in Porn
It's a phrase gay men use to describe themselves or to express an attributethat they seek in others. But what exactly does it mean? For some, theinterest in straight guys is just to find someone who isn't overtlyflamboyant. But for others, like Randy Blue, Sean Cody, Mike Hancock andCorbin Fisher, gay man's obsession with straight guys has created a boomingInternet business that is raking in the cash.
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Marriage in the Nation's Capital?
Here is a great article on a new campaign to win marriage rights inWashington, D.C. The residents of D.C. are in a unique position in that thecity's mayor and an overwhelming majority of council members supportmarriage equality, but the federal government has the authority to "review"all legislation passed by the city council. This means that even if the D.C.passed a marriage bill the big fight would be with members of Congress whowill attempt to nullify the council's decision. As icing on the cake, wealso do not have voting representation in Congress.
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Single and the Holidays & Compromising Couples
The Holidays can bring warm images to mind like Norman Rockwell. But as aclient of mine put it, the reality for many is more like Norman Bates.Perhaps no one knows better the pain of planning your whole weekend around atrip to the food mart, spending a holiday alone, or being so starved fortouchthat an accidental brush from a stranger gives you a hard on.
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Canada: Coming up Rosie
A few years ago a soft spoken and unassuming lady did something very bravein the Halifax business community. he put on a red and white headscarf and ablue shirt and rolled up her sleeves. She said it was just a bit of a joke,but Rosemary Porter knew she was unofficially announcing and promoting hersexuality to the world.
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Transgendered Lawyer Claims NDP Dumped Her
A lawyer from Quebec City says she was dumped as a federal New DemocraticParty candidate because she is transgendered. Micheline Montreuil allegesshe was told by an NDP official her sexuality hindered party attempts to woonew Quebec candidates into the fold.
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The World's Sexiest Athletes: Andy Roddick
He just helped earn the United States their first Davis Cup victory in overa decade with his amazingly focused all court game and shockingly powerfulserves. The name Andy Roddick has become almost synonymous with Americantennis over the past few years as one of the top ranked men in the world whocan compete with the unstoppable Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. He is atough, intense, aggressive competitor on the tennis court, but it is hischarm, charisma, comedic behavior and incredible cuteness that have made hima fan favorite and one of the world's sexiest athletes.
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The Detroit News
http://detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071217/OPINION03/712170303
Truth squad exposes Giuliani's gay policy shifts
Deb Price
Monday, December 17, 2007
Then: New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani signed a sweeping domesticpartnership bill into law in 1998, explaining that he hoped it would "helpto move society more in the direction of equal treatment for everyone."
Now: Republican presidential candidate Giuliani appeared on Oct. 17 on FoxNews Channel's "Hannity & Colmes" and said any rights for gay couples"should just be contractual," parroting the buzzword of those socialconservatives who absurdly claim that gay couples can essentially get therights of marriage by signing a contract at a lawyer's office.
Flabbergasted by this kind of "then and now" change in tone and substance byGiuliani on a host of gay issues -- hate crimes, civil unions and domesticpartnership, a federal anti-gay marriage amendment -- a New York gay-rightsgroup recently launched "The Giuliani Files," which documents Giuliani'shistory (go to: prideagenda.org).
"I had seen this man change his positions in the amount of time it takes tofly from (New York's) La Guardia Airport to Des Moines," says Empire StatePride Agenda executive director Alan Van Capelle.
"With today's technology, we don't have to call Rudy Giuliani a'flip-flopper.' We can literally put up letters and videos from his eightyears as mayor and let people draw that conclusion for themselves."
more . . . . .
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[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
=
The Washington Poswt
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/13/AR2007121301469.html
Dividing Lines: Exploring the split between enlightened and evangelicalChristianity.
Reviewed by Stephen Prothero
Sunday, December 16, 2007; BW05
HEAD AND HEART: American Christianities
By Garry Wills
Penguin Press. 626 pp. $29.95
Denominational lines no longer matter much in the United States, not leastbecause few Americans know any more what distinguishes a Baptist from aMethodist or a Lutheran from a Presbyterian. As the furor over homosexualityin the Episcopal Church demonstrates, the issues cracking open U.S. churchestoday are political rather than theological -- gay marriage and abortionrather than baptism and Holy Communion.
In his latest book, Head and Heart, Garry Wills surveys the fault lines inU.S. Christianity and argues that the real fracture is between "Enlightened"religion (of the head) and "Evangelical" religion (of the heart). ThroughoutAmerican history, he writes, Christians have oscillated between these "twopoles of religious attraction." Wills is a liberal Catholic and an outspokenchampion of the separation of church and state, so it should not besurprising that his sympathies run with the enlightened camp. But the geniusof American religion, he argues, lies in our promiscuous mixing of the headyand the heartfelt, the Tin Man and the Scarecrow. And America's saints --among them, Martin Luther King Jr., Abraham Lincoln and the Quakerabolitionist Anthony Benezet (to whom the book is dedicated) -- are thosewho synthesize the two most effectively.
A popular history of American Christianity, Head and Heart starts in NewEngland with Puritan ministers, then lingers over the Unitarians of Bostonand the Transcendentalists of Concord before jumping rather abruptly intothe "culture wars" of the 20th century. Throughout, Wills focuses almostexclusively on the thinking of white men. Head and Heart reads, therefore,like U.S. religious history books of an earlier generation -- beforeinterest in Buddhism challenged the preoccupation of historians withChristianity, before historians of the West challenged our preoccupationwith New England, before scholars of ritual upended our preoccupation withreligious thought, and before women and blacks made places for themselves atthe historiographic table.
Another peculiarity of this book is its frequent shifting between historicaland biographical modes. Head and Heart contains more than 30 subsectionsdevoted to individual thinkers, so at points it reads more like anencyclopedia of American religious biography than a narrative of Americanreligion.
more . . . . .
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Inside Higher Education
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/12/17/assault
Averting Assault
Dec. 17
A new study finds that fraternity members who participate in a one-hour rapeprevention program are significantly less likely to report committing asexually coercive act during their first year of college than are fraternitymen in a control group.
The study is unusual in that it documents evidence of actual behavioralchanges in a campus setting, in addition to attitudinal changes (which havebeen the focus of most prior studies). "That has been something that peoplein the rape prevention community have sought to do for decades," said JohnD. Foubert, an assistant professor of higher education at the College ofWilliam and Mary and lead author of the study, which was scheduled to bepublished Saturday in the National Association of Student PersonnelAdministrators Journal.
The study evaluates the Men's Program, a prevention program offered by thenational nonprofit founded by Foubert, "One in Four," that maintainschapters at about 30 college campuses and also hires educators who travel byRV to offer the program at another 50 campuses per year. The study tracks565 men - 90 percent of males in the freshman class at a "mid-sized campusin the Southeast" - throughout the course of the academic year. Students inthe control group participated in a program that reiterated information onsexual assault already communicated during orientation, Foubert said, whilethe balance of students participated in the Men's Program.
The idea behind the Men's Program, Foubert said, "is that you're going toget a lot farther with men if you treat them as potential helpers ratherthan potential perpetrators." The Men's Program includes a screening of avideo that describes a male-on-male rape to foster empathy for survivorsamong the male participants, and focuses on how men can support survivorsand intervene to prevent possible assaults. The program has been the subjectof some controversy, as outlined in this 1999 Journal of College StudentDevelopment article, particularly because of concerns about the use of avideo depicting male rape to foster empathy for female survivors andobjections to the program's appeal to the "men-take-care-of-women archetype."
In the U.S. Department of Education-funded study, Foubert bolsters resultsfrom an earlier research finding that participation in the Men's Program isassociated with long-term attitudinal changes, in addition to behavioralones. Focusing on fraternity members, he finds that participants who went onto join fraternities as freshmen were more than three times more likely thanpeers to report committing a sexually coercive act - defined as everythingfrom unwanted touching to rape - during their first year of college. Foubertfound that 8 percent of freshmen who joined fraternities reported committinga sexually coercive act their first year of college, compared to 2.5 percentof men who did not join fraternities.
more . . . . .
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Forwarded from EuroQueer
New gay rights group voices concerns
Adam Harvey
Irish Times, 17 December 2007
A new group calling for gay civil marriages has vowed to "make a lot ofnoise" about the issue and held true to their word on Saturday, when theyenlisted gay choir Glória to help make their point.
At a carol session outside the Gaiety theatre, the choir was in full voiceas about 50 protesters from the new group, Lesbian Gay BisexualTransgendered (LGBT) Noise asked passersby to sign petitions.
Protesters wore pink badges and held placards with messages like: "Don'tbelieve in gay marriage? Don't marry a gay person" and "You don't have to begay to support gay rights".
LGBT organiser Mark McCarron (28) said the organisation hoped to drawattention to the lack of rights for gay couples.
"There's no obvious public protests for gays campaigning for civilmarriage," he said. "A lot of people say 'we don't hear from gay peopleabout this issue'. Well, here we are," said Mr McCarron. The group has aFacebook page and about 300 e-mail addresses of supporters, he said.
The Government has said that it will introduce some form of gay partnershiplegislation next year, but LGBT co-organiser Paul Kenny said that no oneknows what the Bill will contain.
Currently, said Mr Kenny, gay couples do not have the same rights asstraight couples when it comes to issues like pensions, wills, inheritanceand the care of children.
more....
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PinkNews.co.yk
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/politics/2005-6309.html
EU pressures member states on discrimination
11th December 2007 16:40
PinkNews.co.uk staff writer
The European Commission is examining replies from three member states afterit had warned them to transpose into national law a 2000 directive againstdiscrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.
The Commission had sent letters of formal notice to Italy and Latvia onDecember 15th 2006 and to Finland on January 3rd 2007.
Two members of the EU Parliament, Marco Cappato and Sophie In't Veld, lastmonth asked for the intervention of the Commission, which had given December2003 as a deadline to approve anti-discrimination legislation.
Cappato warned that there could be further action, including a ruling by theEU Court of Justice and subsequent fines, and urged the countries' lawmakersto comply with the EU rulings.
The infringement against Italy did not specifically deal with sexualorientation, but rather general problems covering all grounds ofdiscrimination.
more....
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Forwarded by Bill Stirling
wh_sterling@yahoo.com
Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-na-gaydad17dec17,1,6312451.story
Like fathers, like son
A gay couple succeed in becoming fathers of a baby boy. Their quest for achild was chronicled in a Los Angeles Times series last year.
By Jenny Jarvie
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
December 17, 2007
ATLANTA - At last, Chad and David Craig's quest to become fathers is over.They say they feel more happy, and more tired, than they have ever been.
The gay couple, whose attempt to create a pregnancy through a gestationalsurrogacy arrangement was followed last year in a Los Angeles Times series,welcomed their son, O. Jansen Hodge Craig, into their lives nine weeks ago.
"We just look at him and think he's a miracle," Chad said last week as hedrew Jansen, clad in a snug jumpsuit, close to his chest. "It's something wejust always believed in. Finally, he's here."
Chad and David's attempt to bring a child into the world involved a womanthey barely knew. After fertilizing her eggs in vitro using both men'ssperm, another woman would carry the resulting embryos to term. They had noidea whose DNA would carry the day.
Jansen's birth marked the end of a four-year journey that involved three eggretrievals, 65 eggs, seven fertilization attempts, three surrogates and morethan $200,000 in expenses.
There were many ups and downs. In June 2006, Chad's sister, who had agreedto take on the role of surrogate mother, gave birth to twins, Asher andHolland. But the tiny siblings were premature and lived for only three andsix days respectively.
Chad and David came out of that experience with enough hope to keep trying.They signed on with a new doctor, arranged for a third retrieval fromJessica -- the egg donor who had helped them produce the twins -- and founda new surrogate, a school crossing guard and mother of three fromMassachusetts.
Finally, they had found the right components to make it work.
Jansen was born Oct. 13 at Massachusetts General Hospital, weighing 8 poundsand 2 ounces. When a nurse read out the time of birth -- 6:16 p.m. -- hisfathers burst into tears. The time echoed the date of the twins' birthday:June 16.
more....
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The International Day Against Homophobia (IDAHO)
www.idaho.org.uk
IDAHO-UK PRESS RELEASE.
UK rallies against international homophobia.
2007 sees unprecedented support for IDAHO campaign.
The International Day Against Homophobia (IDAHO) campaign which is marked inover 50 countries on and around May 17th was highlighted by over 100initiatives and events in the UK this year. For the first time all parts ofthe UK were involved, as the IDAHO habit gripped such cities and areas asLiverpool, Southampton, Bradford, Northampton, Bristol, Lancaster, Tyne andWear and Yorkshire. Meanwhile, IDAHO veterans in London, Brighton, Oldham,Manchester, Sheffield, Surrey, Gloucestershire and Kent marked the day withbigger than ever events. IDAHO initiatives in Scotland were marked by amassive and enthusiastic contribution from LGBT Youth and an AmnestyInternational campaign. IDAHO was also celebrated for the first in NorthernIreland and Wales.
"Yes to Education, no to Homophobia" was a suggested theme for IDAHO eventsaround the world and this was reflected in several events in the UK.Students at the University of Arts in London designed posters celebratingthe diversity of the LGBT community, and addressing world homophobia. Thewinning posters were displayed at a major event on May 17th attended by 200people. Manchester's Lesbian and Gay Foundation announced "a new majorinitiative aimed at ending homophobia through education", called "ExceedingExpectations" and showcased this initiative at a major event at ManchesterTown Hall. The subject of homophobic bullying was also tackled indevelopment workshops commissioned and co-produced by "Queer up North" and"Stonewall". The Gay and Lesbian Humanist Association (GALHA) held a paneldiscussion on "Introducing Gay Families to Schoolchildren".
Hate Crime was a major concern of IDAHO campaigners, and this was reflectedin many events and initiatives. The BBC reported that there had been aseries of hate crime arrests to mark IDAHO. New campaigns to tackle hatecrime were launched in Brighton, Newcastle and Middlesbrough. 120 peopleattended a major event organised by Gay Surrey to highlight these issues. InBrighton campaigners released 77 lanterns, on the seafront, to mark the 77countries where homosexuality is a crime around the world. Campaigners inSouthwark, Lambeth and Wandsworth marked the day by remembering the victimsof homophobic and transphobic abuse in imaginative ways and in Camden,campaigners marked the day by planting pansies where homophobic andtransphobic hate crime had occurred, in collaboration with "The PansyProject". Community Safety Events were also arranged by the "East London OutProject", who also organised a major vigil outside Walthamstow Town Hall,and workshops with 4 local authorities.
more....
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UK
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-6348.html
Interview: Peter Tatchell's 40 years of campaigning
PinkNews by Peter Tatchell
should be of interest:
This extract from a recent interview given to the UK
PinkNews.co.uk: What do you think about the Vatican and its attempts tohamper protection and recognition for gay people?
PT: The sooner someone outs Pope Benedict, the better. His homophobicpolicies remind me of the Inquisition, and the Hitler Youth, of which he wasa member.
All the closeted homophobes in the Vatican should be outed, they aredestroying the lives of LGBT people worldwide.
PinkNews.co.uk: A few days ago, the pope said that gay people threatenpeace, how would you respond to that?
PT: These are the rantings of a semi-deranged Christian fundamentalist and atheocrat, whose ego is so enormous that he believes he has a hot-line toGod.
If any ordinary person in the street did it, they'd probably put them in amental asylum. It is amazing the indulgences that are allowed for theso-called "men of God."
Pope Benedict is the ideological inheritor of Nazi homophobia. He'd liketo eradicate homosexuality, but since he can't put LGBT people in physicalconcentration camps, he is doing his best to put them in psychologicalconcentration camps.
To read the full text of the interview, go to
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-6348.html
George Broadhead
Vice-President, UK Gay and Lesbian Humanist Association (GALHA)
www.galha.org
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Palm Beach Post
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/opinion/content/local_news/epaper/2007/12/16/s1c_bino_1216.html
Effort to nix same-sex unions lacks torch carrier
By FRANK CERABINO
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Sunday, December 16, 2007
We here in Florida get to beat up on gays during the next presidentialelection.
We're pretty late to the party.
In this case, we even have to catch up to Mississippi.
Most other states brought out their gay bunker-buster artillery during theGeorge W. Bush midterm election three years ago.
And next year's election bogeyman has already been booked. We're supposed tobe afraid of that horde of foreign-tongued, brown-skinned invaders from thesouth who mow our lawns, tar our roofs and clean our toilets forbargain-basement wages.
But Florida, as it is in so many endeavors, is behind the curve. So we'restill dealing with the gay menace, which is apparently a threat to my27-year marriage.
The state's Republican Party is the big financial backer for a group thatannounced last week that it has collected nearly all the 611,000 signaturesrequired to give voters next November the chance to amend the FloridaConstitution to protect marriage by defining it as "the legal union of onlyone man and one woman."
The state already has a law banning same-sex marriage, but theconstitutional amendment, its proponents say, would guard against "activist"judges.
Double-bagged for your protection.
Rudy-mentary plan for marriage
The hilarity of all this is that the same-sex-marriage amendment couldn'tcome at a more inappropriate time for its supporters.
I'm sure that nobody had an inkling three years ago, when this effort began,that Florida would turn out to be so family valueless.
All state polls agree that, in next month's political primary, Rudy Giulianiis the favorite among Republican voters. The latest Quinnipiac Universitypoll showed Florida's Republican primary voters preferred Giuliani to hisnearest contender, Mitt Romney, by 18 percentage points.
How could this be? These primary voters are the same people who are beingcounted on to enshrine the glories of heterosexual marriage.
If Giuliani ends up his party's nominee, Florida may have the distinction ofhaving an amendment on the November ballot that gins up fear of same-sexmarriage while having a presidential candidate that should make everybodyafraid of heterosexual marriage.
Giuliani is on marriage No. 3 to Judith Nathan, who was his mistress duringhis mayoral days in New York. Giuliani's second wife learned of theirupcoming divorce at a news conference, and the taxpayers of New York paidfor police protection of Giuliani's then-mistress.
That's just the short version of Giuliani's problems with the M word.
Serial marriages don't help cause
To his credit, Giuliani did, in answer to a question on national TV, say itwould be inappropriate for the Secret Service to provide protection for anyhypothetical presidential mistresses.
To make matters worse, Florida now has a governor that is in no position tochampion heterosexual marriage, either.
Three years ago, when the initiative started, Florida had a marriedgovernor.
But now we have Charlie Crist, whose one marriage lasted for six months, andwho, despite his good looks, position of power and occupancy of a big, emptymansion in Tallahassee, can't seem to land a steady girlfriend.
He's no help at all. And even though he signed a petition to support thesame-sex-marriage ban while he was running for office, he says he's notinterested in pushing the issue anymore.
"It's not something that moves me," he said last week.
Even Florida resident Rush Limbaugh, that go-to gas bag of sanctimony, willhave to sit this one out because of a hamstring injury of three failedmarriages.
So, who exactly is supposed to rally Floridians to be afraid of gaycommitment?
Don't look at me. I'm too busy brushing up on my Spanish.
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To Form a More Perfect Union: Marriage Equality News
Information, news, and discussion about the legal recognition of same-sexcouples and their families, including marriages, domestic partnerships,civil unions, adoptions, foster children and similar issues.
http://samesexmarriage.typepad.com/weblog/
Go to the website, above, for the following articles:
--
Legendary international and Spanish LGBT rights advocate Jordi Petit hastied the knot with his partner of seven years, Frenchman Yves Bohic, in aceremony held yesterday in Barcelona that was officiated by the city'smayor, Jordi Hereu (yes, there are lots of Jordis in Spain).The wedding wasattended by more than 200 people (partial guest list here) including membersof Mr. Bohic's family who traveled from France to celebrate the couple'swedding.Jordi has been in the trenches as back as the 1970's when Spain wasstill under dictator Francisco Franco's rule and gays and lesbians werebeing persecuted (Jordi had already been arrested a few times for hispolitical involvement by the time he became active in the LGBT-rights in thelate 1970's).
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It is dismaying that the Rhode Island Supreme Court has ruled againstletting people of the same sex who were legally married in Massachusettsdivorce in the Ocean State. The ruling essentially locks homosexual couplesinto marriage in Rhode Island unless one or both members of the marriagemove back to Massachusetts and institute divorce proceedings there. That isnot equal justice under the law. After all, heterosexual couples who weremarried in the Bay State are allowed to divorce in Rhode Island. Of course,the larger issue is legalizing gay marriage in Rhode Island itself. Thestate would be better off - and would be doing the right and just thing - toextend full marriage rights to its homosexual residents. But until that daycomes, the state should at the very least recognize legal marriageselsewhere for the purposes of divorce proceedings. That can and should bedone quickly by enacting a clear statute on the issue - in the upcomingsession.
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Israel: In a few weeks, Yonatan and Omer Gar are scheduled to go to Mumbai,India, in order to take part in the first fertilization attempt of asurrogate mother who will bear their child. Yonatan, 29, who works inGreenpeace and Omer, 30, who works as a psychologist, signed a partnershipagreement about a year ago. In the past few months, they completedprocedures to locate a surrogate mother and an egg donor in India, withwhose aid they will bring their firstborn child into the world. "We've beentogether for over five years. About a year ago, we decided that we wanted toexpand the family and began examining our options. As fate would have it,neither of us has a womb. We would really like to adopt a child in Israel.The fact that this legal option does not exist in Israel is shocking. Thestate prefers that children grow up in a hostel or on the street, as long asthey don't grow up with same-sex parents."
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BOSTON - Gay-marriage advocacy group MassEquality will throw its weightbehind Rep. Barbara A. L'Italien, D-Andover, and other state lawmakers whoface election challenges in November and earlier this year voted to defeat aproposed gay-marriage ban.Marc Solomon, the group's campaign leader, saidMassEquality would mobilize its more than 200,000 members statewide to workfor those candidates. The group, which spent more than $1 million in 2006 todefeat the gay-marriage ban, also will ask its members to write checks tosupport the re-election bids of gay-marriage supporters, he said.
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New Jersey: Kenny Polnasek and Michael Kellison exchanged vows in a privateceremony 17 years ago, and since that time they've always consideredthemselves to be married, even though the state they lived in didn'tconsider that designation -- "marriage" -- to be legally valid. But inOctober 2006, the state Supreme Court ordered the state Legislature to granthomosexual couples the same rights it extends to heterosexual marriedcouples. The resulting legislation, a bill creating civil unions, tookeffect in February. "I'm a Jersey boy, born and raised, and when it (civilunions) came here I was like, 'Yeah, let's do it,'" said Polnasek, who saidhe had been holding out for gay marriage up until that time. So on Sept. 29,their 17th anniversary, Polnasek and Kellison exchanged vows again, thistime at their civil union ceremony.
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Elizabeth MacKenzie embodies the typical Canadian, according to Angus Reidpollster Andrew Grenville. Ian Smith, Vancouver Sun] "I am the cliche ofwhat it means to be a Canadian," says Elizabeth McKenzie.
And The Vancouver Sun's morality quiz shows the east Vancouver artist andmother is right. McKenzie, 52, is an Accepting MOR (Middle of the Road), thetype that Angus Reid pollster Andrew Grenville says embodies the typicalCanadianHer moral convictions echo those of the country, the values embeddedin Canadian laws and customs. McKenzie, a feminist, is relaxed aboutpersonal sexual ethics, but critical of prostitution and pornography. Likemost Canadians, she's open to homosexuality and sex outside marriage, butconcerned about animal cloning. "It's almost embarrassing how Canadian Iam," she says. "Canadians are very moderate people, and I almost feel that'sthe way I was brought up to be."
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MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. (AP) - New Jersey's well organized gay rights advocatesare finding their adversaries are also getting prepared for a cominglegislative debate over gay marriage. The National Organization forMarriage, established earlier this year in Princeton, made itself known overthe past few weeks with radio advertisements urging people to call theirlawmakers to tell them that allowing gay couples to marry would underminethe institution. The group set up in left-leaning New Jersey because it isone of a few states where there's a realistic chance in the next few yearsthat lawmakers will vote to allow gay marriage. That makes it a battlegroundfor the issues nationally.
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Australia: The Sunday Telegraph can reveal that several MPs, who are nowministers, promised during the election campaign that Labor would formallyrecognise same-sex relationships in government as well as removediscriminatory legislation. Former Australian Medical Association presidentProfessor Kerryn Phelps said she had received the commitment from severalsenior Rudd Government ministers. "Their reaction to it was they werecommitted to eliminating discrimination and ensuring real equality and not awatered-down version. Not proceeding with gay marriages or civil unionswould be a watered-down version of equality," she said.
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National Gay News
http://nationalgaynews.com/
Go to the website, above, for the following articles:
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Gay 4 Pay: Gay Obsession with Straight Guys in Porn
It's a phrase gay men use to describe themselves or to express an attributethat they seek in others. But what exactly does it mean? For some, theinterest in straight guys is just to find someone who isn't overtlyflamboyant. But for others, like Randy Blue, Sean Cody, Mike Hancock andCorbin Fisher, gay man's obsession with straight guys has created a boomingInternet business that is raking in the cash.
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Marriage in the Nation's Capital?
Here is a great article on a new campaign to win marriage rights inWashington, D.C. The residents of D.C. are in a unique position in that thecity's mayor and an overwhelming majority of council members supportmarriage equality, but the federal government has the authority to "review"all legislation passed by the city council. This means that even if the D.C.passed a marriage bill the big fight would be with members of Congress whowill attempt to nullify the council's decision. As icing on the cake, wealso do not have voting representation in Congress.
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Single and the Holidays & Compromising Couples
The Holidays can bring warm images to mind like Norman Rockwell. But as aclient of mine put it, the reality for many is more like Norman Bates.Perhaps no one knows better the pain of planning your whole weekend around atrip to the food mart, spending a holiday alone, or being so starved fortouchthat an accidental brush from a stranger gives you a hard on.
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Canada: Coming up Rosie
A few years ago a soft spoken and unassuming lady did something very bravein the Halifax business community. he put on a red and white headscarf and ablue shirt and rolled up her sleeves. She said it was just a bit of a joke,but Rosemary Porter knew she was unofficially announcing and promoting hersexuality to the world.
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Transgendered Lawyer Claims NDP Dumped Her
A lawyer from Quebec City says she was dumped as a federal New DemocraticParty candidate because she is transgendered. Micheline Montreuil allegesshe was told by an NDP official her sexuality hindered party attempts to woonew Quebec candidates into the fold.
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The World's Sexiest Athletes: Andy Roddick
He just helped earn the United States their first Davis Cup victory in overa decade with his amazingly focused all court game and shockingly powerfulserves. The name Andy Roddick has become almost synonymous with Americantennis over the past few years as one of the top ranked men in the world whocan compete with the unstoppable Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. He is atough, intense, aggressive competitor on the tennis court, but it is hischarm, charisma, comedic behavior and incredible cuteness that have made hima fan favorite and one of the world's sexiest athletes.
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The Detroit News
http://detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071217/OPINION03/712170303
Truth squad exposes Giuliani's gay policy shifts
Deb Price
Monday, December 17, 2007
Then: New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani signed a sweeping domesticpartnership bill into law in 1998, explaining that he hoped it would "helpto move society more in the direction of equal treatment for everyone."
Now: Republican presidential candidate Giuliani appeared on Oct. 17 on FoxNews Channel's "Hannity & Colmes" and said any rights for gay couples"should just be contractual," parroting the buzzword of those socialconservatives who absurdly claim that gay couples can essentially get therights of marriage by signing a contract at a lawyer's office.
Flabbergasted by this kind of "then and now" change in tone and substance byGiuliani on a host of gay issues -- hate crimes, civil unions and domesticpartnership, a federal anti-gay marriage amendment -- a New York gay-rightsgroup recently launched "The Giuliani Files," which documents Giuliani'shistory (go to: prideagenda.org).
"I had seen this man change his positions in the amount of time it takes tofly from (New York's) La Guardia Airport to Des Moines," says Empire StatePride Agenda executive director Alan Van Capelle.
"With today's technology, we don't have to call Rudy Giuliani a'flip-flopper.' We can literally put up letters and videos from his eightyears as mayor and let people draw that conclusion for themselves."
more . . . . .
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[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
NATIONAL & WORLD DIGEST December 17, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US AT rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
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Inside Higher Education
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/12/17/texas
Creationist College Advances in Texas
Dec. 17
Texas is fast becoming a key state not only in debates over evolution butover what kind of government scrutiny is important and legitimate whenreviewing colleges with particular ideologies.
On Friday, an advisory committee to the Texas Higher Education CoordinatingBoard recommended that the state allow the Institute for Creation Researchto start offering online master's degrees in science education. Theinstitute, which has been based in California, where it operates a museumand many programs for people who don't believe in evolution, is relocatingto Dallas, where it hopes to expand its online education offerings.
In Texas, the institute needs either regional accreditation (for which isapplying, but which will take some time) or state approval to offer degrees.Some science groups are aghast by the idea that Texas would authorize master's degrees in science education that are based on complete opposition toevolution and literal acceptance of the Bible. And these groups areparticularly concerned because the students in these programs would bepeople who are or want to be school teachers.
Complicating matters, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board will betaking up the issue in the wake of an August ruling by the Texas SupremeCourt questioning the grounds on which the board had evaluated seminariesand warning the board not to impose secular values on seminaries. The rulingwas seen at the time as making it harder for the state to deny licenses toreligious institutions.
Raymund A. Paredes, commissioner of higher education for Texas, stressed inan interview Sunday that the advisory panel's vote was just that: advisory.But he noted that the board's decision next month would be "sensitive" andsaid he would be asking the board's general counsel to study the impact ofthe August Supreme Court decision on the issue.
more . . . . .
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/17/arts/17sava.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print
Boycotted Radio Host Remains Unbowed
By JACQUES STEINBERG
December 17, 2007
SAN FRANCISCO - The humbling of Don Imus last spring over his remarks aboutthe Rutgers women's basketball team has done nothing to quiet MichaelSavage, a radio host with a far bigger following and far more checkeredtrack record.
Mr. Savage, whose program reaches an estimated eight million listeners aweek on nearly 400 stations, suggested over the summer that a group ofcollege students on a hunger strike in support of easing immigrationrestrictions should "fast until they starve to death." In October the Boardof Supervisors of San Francisco, the city from which Mr. Savage oftenbroadcasts, took the unusual step of passing a resolution condemning him forthe remarks.
Then, a few weeks ago, Mr. Savage uncorked a cascade of invective aboutIslam. Among his on-air comments: the Koran is "a book of hate"; someMuslims, at least, "need deportation"; and adherents of Islam would do wellto "take your religion and shove it up your behind" because "I'm sick ofyou."
In response the Council on American-Islamic Relations, whose stated missionincludes correcting mischaracterizations of Islam, tore a page from theplaybook of Mr. Imus's critics. It made Mr. Savage's comments widelyavailable on the Internet and called on advertisers to boycott his program,which is behind only Rush Limbaugh's and Sean Hannity's in number oflisteners, according to Talkers magazine, an industry publication.
At least two of his major sponsors - Citrix, which sells remote access tocomputers, and Trusted ID, which provides protection against identitytheft - have pulled their spots. Thus far, Mr. Savage said in an interviewlast week, the boycott had cost his program more than a million dollars inadvertising revenue committed for next year.
more . . . . .
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/17/us/politics/17huckabee.html
Huckabee Draws Support of Home-School Families
By PAUL VITELLO
December 17, 2007
DES MOINES - Christine and Chuck Hurley have raised and home-schooled their10 children here, and five of those children will be eligible to vote in theIowa caucus on Jan. 3.
If Mr. and Mrs. Hurley have anything to say about it - and they do, beingevangelical Christians who have imbued their children with the mandates ofthe Ten Commandments, not least the one about honoring thy father andmother - those will be five votes for Mike Huckabee.
"Five votes - count six, if we get my son-in-law to the caucus," said Mrs.Hurley, 47. "That's eight votes right there, with my husband and I."
Politicians count sure votes at their own peril, but families like theHurleys seem to account for a solid core of Mr. Huckabee's support here inthe final weeks before the first balloting to select a Republican nominee inthe 2008 presidential election.
White, evangelical Christians make up about 38 percent of the Republicanelectorate in Iowa. Among voters in that group, Mr. Huckabee, an ordainedBaptist minister and the former governor of Arkansas, leads his closestcompetitor, Mitt Romney, by two to one, according to a poll released thismonth by the Pew Research Center.
more . . . . .
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Miami Herald
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/florida/story/347484.html
Obama fights stories about 'Muslim roots'
BY BETH REINHARD
Posted on Mon, Dec. 17, 2007
Max Holtzman, a Miami lawyer and fundraiser for Democratic presidentialcandidate Barack Obama, was in a downtown office building when he ran into ahigh-powered business consultant.
One of her major concerns about Obama, she confided, was his ``deep Muslimroots.''
''I told her that he's been a practicing Christian for a very long time,''Holtzman said. ``I cleared the air, and now she's a great supporter.''
Rumor control is rarely that easy for the Obama campaign at a time when amouse click can circulate ambiguously sourced, hard-to-trace and seeminglylimitless attacks. Two volunteers for rival Hillary Clinton in Iowa wererecently kicked out after they were caught forwarding incendiary e-mailsthat suggested Obama is an Islamic terrorist.
One of the chief rumor-mongers is Andy Martin, a former South Floridaresident and perennially losing candidate who now runs his ContrarianCommentary blog out of Chicago. Tens of thousands or hundreds of thousandsof people -- Martin said he's not sure -- receive his e-mail blasts.
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Southwest Florida's News Press
http://www.news-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071217/NEWS01/712170337/1002/NEWS01
Mack, Bono officially man, wife
Private ceremony included 32 family members
By Jason Wermers
jwermers@news-press.com
Originally posted on December 17, 2007
Fort Myers Congressman Connie Mack IV and Palm Springs, Calif.,Congresswoman Mary Bono were married Saturday in Asheville, N.C.
The couple held a small, private wedding, attended by 32 members of the Mackand Bono families, at the Richmond Inn, Mack spokeswoman Stephanie DuBoissaid.
Mack's father, former U.S. Sen. Connie Mack III, was the best man, andBono's daughter, Chianna, was the maid of honor.
The marriage will not affect either representative's position, at least fornow. Mack will maintain his Fort Myers residence, and Bono will maintain herhome in Palm Springs. The two will share a home in the northern Virginiasuburbs of Washington, D.C.
Mack proposed to Bono in August while the the two were on a camping trip atArches National Park in Utah. They had dated for two years.
Bono's father, Clay Whitaker, lives in Asheville. The wedding colors wereivory and gold.
The honeymoon is on hold for now. Both representatives need to be in thenation's capital this coming week because of the ongoing congressionalsession. They have not yet finalized honeymoon plans.
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Los Angeles
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-mccain17dec17,1,3132190.story?coll=la-headlines-nation&track=crosspromo
Lieberman will back McCain
Connecticut senator, the Democratic vice presidential nominee in 2000, willendorse the GOP presidential candidate because of his stance against Islamicterrorism.
From the Associated Press
December 17, 2007
MANCHESTER, N.H. - Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), trying to build momentumtoward a reprise of his 2000 New Hampshire primary victory, is piling uphigh-profile endorsements, including one from another political maverick,Sen. Joe Lieberman.
The Connecticut senator, an independent Democrat who was the Democrats' 2000vice presidential nominee, was scheduled to announce his support for McCainat a town hall meeting today in Hillsborough.
A Lieberman advisor said the senator decided to back McCain because hethought his colleague from Arizona had "the best chance of uniting thecountry in its fight against Islamic terrorism."
The advisor, who spoke on condition of anonymity in advance of the formal announcement, said Lieberman would continue to caucus with Senate Democrats,and said his decision was not a reflection of any lingering tension with hisold party after key Democrats abandoned him when he lost the Democraticprimary during his 2006 Senate reelection campaign.
Lieberman subsequently won reelection with an independent candidacy and hassince been the darling of many prominent Republicans, including former WhiteHouse advisor Karl Rove, for pushing hard in support of the country's war inIraq.
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New York Post
http://www.nypost.com/seven/12172007/news/columnists/ny_gop_cooling_on_rudy_230244.htm
NY GOP COOLING ON RUDY
By FREDRIC U. DICKER
December 17, 2007 -- FEARFUL New York Re publicans are rethinking their 2008campaign strategies because of former Mayor Rudy Giuliani's faltering bidfor the White House, The Post has learned.
Republican leaders, especially those involved in the crucial battle toretain GOP control of the state Senate, had hoped an energized Giulianicandidacy would attract independent and moderate Democrats to their ballotline in what is widely expected to be a big Democratic year.
But, pointing to his declining national polling numbers and his surpriseslide to third place in Florida, GOP strategists are privately callingGiuliani's own strategy efforts "lackluster," and an increasing number ofthem now predict that "America's mayor" won't be their party's nominee forpresident next year.
"Rudy isn't where we thought he would be and there's a growing likelihoodthat he's not going to be our nominee," said a leading New York Republican.
A GOP senate strategist said, "We're no longer planning our campaigns basedon the assumption that Rudy will be the nominee."
Furthermore, Republicans - who once hoped Giuliani could carry New York in apresidential contest - are now convinced the state won't be in play even ifGiuliani does end up as their party's nominee.
"New York isn't going Republican even if Rudy is the nominee," a GOPofficial conceded.
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Boston Globe
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2007/12/17/budget_bill_reverses_white_house_cuts/?rss_id=Boston+Globe+--+Today%27s+paper+A+to+Z
Budget bill reverses White House cuts
December 17, 2007
Congressional budget officials unveiled a $500 billion-plus catchallspending bill yesterday, reluctantly sticking within President Bush's totalsbut protecting politically sensitive domestic programs from White Housecuts. The bill covers the budgets for every Cabinet department except thePentagon and is expected to pass this week before lawmakers head home forChristmas. Democrats reversed cuts to heating subsidies, local law police,Amtrak, and housing. (AP)
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Boston Globe
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2007/12/17/romney_huckabee_rivalry_heats_up/
Romney, Huckabee rivalry heats up: Harsh words fly about Bush's legacy
By Michael Levenson, Globe Staff
December 17, 2007
Raising the stakes with his main rival in the crucial Iowa caucuses,Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney accused Mike Huckabeeyesterday of insulting President Bush and called on him to apologize forcriticizing Bush's foreign policy as "arrogant."
Huckabee refused, saying he was not attacking the president personally butlaying out a different vision for the US role in the world.
The exchange on national TV talk shows yesterday reflected the increasinglybitter battle between the former governors and one of the few instances inwhich Republican presidential hopefuls have been drawn into a confrontationover Bush's legacy. So far during the campaign, the candidates, wary ofembracing a president with low approval ratings, have preferred to comparethemselves to President Reagan, who remains unwaveringly popular withRepublican voters.
But Huckabee's surge past Romney in the polls in Iowa, where Republicanswill hold the first nomination contest on Jan. 3, has clearly shaken up therace. Romney, despite vastly outspending Huckabee, declared for the firsttime last week that he is now the underdog in Iowa, and yesterday he soundedlike one as he blasted Huckabee for calling Bush's foreign policy arrogantand indicative of a "bunker mentality."
"That's an insult to the president, and Mike Huckabee should apologize tothe president," Romney said on NBC's "Meet the Press."
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Houston Chronicle
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/politics/5383328.html
CAMPAIGN NOTEBOOK
Clinton touts endorsement from Kerrey
Dec. 16, 2007, 10:37PM
From wire reports
COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa - Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton celebrated onehigh-profile endorsement, from the Des Moines Register's editorial board, byannouncing a second Sunday: former Sen. Bob Kerrey, the renegadeNebraskan-turned-New Yorker.
Kerrey told an energetic crowd gathered at a high school here that he isbacking Clinton "enthusiastically and unequivocally." Clinton beamed. "I amabsolutely overwhelmed personally to have my friend of 25 years, Bob Kerrey,endorse me with such a vote of confidence," she said.
Now president of the New School in New York City, Kerrey served as a U.S.senator and governor of Nebraska.
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CBS News
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/12/16/national/main3624317.shtml?source=RSSattr=HOME_3624317
Top Republican Vows CIA Tape Probe
WASHINGTON, Dec. 16, 2007
(AP) The top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee defied the Bushadministration Sunday and pledged to investigate the destruction of CIAinterrogation tapes.
"We want to hold the community accountable for what's happened with thesetapes. I think we will issue subpoenas," said Rep. Peter Hoekstra, R-Mich.
The Justice Department has urged Congress not to investigate and advisedintelligence officials not to cooperate with a legislative inquiry.
"You've got a community that's incompetent. They are arrogant. And they arepolitical," Hoekstra said. "And I think that we're going to hold (CIADirector) Mike Hayden accountable."
Earlier this month, the CIA acknowledged destroying videos showing the harshinterrogation of top al Qaeda suspects. Hayden said the videos, which weremade in 2002, were destroyed in 2005 out of fear the tapes would leak andreveal the identifies of interrogators. Hayden said the sessions werevideotaped to provide an added layer of legal protection for officers usingtough interrogation methods authorized by President Bush to help break downrecalcitrant prisoners.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/17/opinion/17mon1.html?ref=opinion
Editorial: Disappointments on Climate
December 17, 2007
A week that could have brought important progress on climate change ended in disappointment.
In Bali, where delegates from 187 countries met to begin framing a newglobal warming treaty, America's negotiators were in full foot-draggingmode, acting as spoilers rather than providing the leadership the worldneeds.
In Washington, caving to pressures from the White House, the utilities andthe oil companies, the Senate settled for a merely decent energy billinstead of a very good one that would have set the country on a clear pathto a cleaner energy future.
The news from Bali was particularly disheartening. The delegates agreed tonegotiate by 2009 a new and more comprehensive global treaty to replace theKyoto Protocol. (Kyoto expires in 2012 and requires that only industrializednations reduce their production of greenhouse gases.) They pledged for thefirst time to address deforestation, which accounts for one-fifth of theworld's carbon dioxide emissions. And they received vague assurances fromChina - which will soon overtake the United States as the biggest emitter ofgreenhouse gases - and other emerging powers that they would seek"measurable, reportable and verifiable" emissions cuts.
From the United States the delegates got nothing, except a promise toparticipate in the forthcoming negotiations. Even prying that out of theBush administration required enormous effort.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/18/world/middleeast/18saudi.html?hp
Pardon Reported for Saudi Rape Victim
By KATHERINE ZOEPF
December 18, 2007
RIYADH - King Abdullah has pardoned a woman who was sentenced to 200 lashesafter pressing charges against seven men who raped her, a Saudi newspaperreported Monday.
There was no immediate confirmation from the Ministry of Justice or theMinistry of Information, but the newspaper, Al Jazirah, is close to thereligious establishment that controls the Justice Ministry, Reutersreported.
The case has provoked a rare and angry public debate in Saudi Arabia,leading to renewed calls for reform of the Saudi judicial system.
The rape took place a year and a half ago in Qatif, a small Shiite town inthe Eastern Province, center of the Saudi Arabia's oil industry. The woman,who has been publicly identified only as the "Qatif girl," said she met aformer boyfriend to retrieve a photograph of herself. They were sitting in acar together when seven men attacked, raping them both.
The woman and the former boyfriend were originally sentenced to 90 lasheseach for being together in private, while the attackers received sentencesranging from 10 months to five years in prison, and 80 to 1,000 lashes each.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/18/world/middleeast/18iran.html?hp
Russia Ships Nuclear Fuel to Iran
By MICHAEL SCHWIRTZ
December 18, 2007
MOSCOW - Russia made its first fuel delivery to Iran's Bushehr nuclear powerplant on Sunday, a spokesman for the Russian company overseeing the projectconfirmed Monday, although it remained unclear when the controversialstation would begin operating.
"The first phase of delivery has been completed," said Irina F. Esipova, aspokeswoman for Atomsproiexport, the Russian contractor on the project. "Asmall amount of fuel is already on the premises of the Bushehr station in aspecial storage facility." The company plans to deliver about 80 tons ofnuclear fuel to Iran over the next two months, she said.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the fuel would beunder the control of the International Atomic Energy Agency and that Iranhad given written guarantees that the fuel would only be used for thenuclear power plant.
"All fuel that will be delivered will be under the control and guarantees ofthe International Atomic Energy Agency for the whole time it stays onIranian territory," the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. "Moreover, theIranian side gave additional written guarantees that the fuel will be usedonly for the Bushehr nuclear power plant."
The statement added: "After the Russian fuel is processed at the Bushehrnuclear power plant, it will be returned to Russia for further processingand storage."
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WashingtonPost.com
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/16/AR2007121601565.html
Two Months in Pakistan
By Lally Weymouth
Monday, December 17, 2007; A21
When Benazir Bhutto returned from exile in October, she was disturbed by thegrowing strength of the Taliban and Islamic extremists inside Pakistan. Lastweek she sat down with Newsweek-The Post's Lally Weymouth in Islamabad.Excerpts:
Q: How do see your prospects in the upcoming election?
A: We all worried that the elections are going to be rigged in favor of theruling party -- the military's party, the Muslim League. . . . There are 148seats in the Punjab, the government has been told to give 108 seats [to]them. That means we'll only be fighting over 40 seats.
So [President Pervez] Musharraf's party will win the Punjab?
They won't win it. Hopefully we will make him lose it.
Do you think that's possible?
Well, observers are coming from the European Union [among others]. So Ithink if we can get observers to ensure that the ballots don't get siphonedoff, it'll be a huge setback to their rigging plans. . . . They've [also]got ghost voting stations.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/16/AR2007121601559.html
Egypt's YouTube Democrats
By Jackson Diehl
Monday, December 17, 2007; A21
Is the cause of liberal democracy in the Arab Middle East dead? It would beeasy to jump to such a conclusion in Washington, given the Bushadministration's shameless retreat from its "freedom agenda" and the recentcampaigns by Arab autocrats to crush liberal politicians, journalists andcivic activists. But it's also easy to overlook the fact that the MiddleEast's movement for human rights and democracy originated not in the WhiteHouse but in capitals such as Cairo, Beirut and Amman. There, it is stillalive, well -- and even growing.
I was reminded of this when seven Egyptian civil society activists touredWashington in advance of a meeting last week with Secretary of StateCondoleezza Rice. All are in their 20s; all are leaders of groups promotingsuch causes as women's rights, prison reform, religious tolerance andpolitical change. All believe that Egypt could become a liberal democracy intheir lifetime. And why not? They're not acquainted with the numerousWashington experts who have dismissed the possibility.
They do know a lot of people like themselves. "The majority of Egyptians arelike us, under the age of 35," said Ahmed Samih, the 28-year-old director ofthe Andalus Institute for Tolerance and Anti-Violence Studies in Cairo. "Ourpresident is 85, and far away from Facebook."
Samih, a fearless man who says he has been a political activist since age17, ought to know. Six months ago he founded a Facebook group called "Whathappens when Hosni Mubarak dies?" Mubarak, who has ruled Egypt under"emergency law" since 1981, is actually only 79. But he is noticeablyfading. And Samih's group has attracted 2,741 members, almost all of themEgyptian.
Facebook and YouTube are where the young Egyptian democracy movementlives -- mostly out of reach of Mubarak's secret police. There are more than60 Facebook groups devoted to liberal Egyptian causes; many of them havethousands of members. On YouTube, one can find hundreds of video clipsshowing demonstrations for human rights in Egypt, speeches by liberalactivists, sermons by reformist Muslim clerics -- and torture by Mubarak'ssecurity forces, captured on cellphones.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/16/AR2007121601564.html
The GOP's Budget Retreat
By Robert D. Novak
Monday, December 17, 2007; A21
Nearly the entire federal government would be funded by an omnibusappropriations bill to be unveiled today after covert negotiations. Insubsequent parliamentary maneuvering likely to extend through this week,Democrats will pare the spending level to the maximum demanded by PresidentBush in order to avoid a veto. Republicans will declare victory. In fact,they are in retreat.
As the minority party in Congress, the GOP will have less than 24 hours toread the massive bill before it comes up for a House vote tomorrow. While atleast coming close to Bush's limit, the bill will be passed over Republicanopposition because it contains no Iraq war funding. It then will go to theSenate on Wednesday, where Republicans will use a filibuster threat toinsert money for Iraq. Overall spending will be reduced to the Bush standardin the Senate by means of an across-the-board cut. That version then will bepassed by the House, though Speaker Nancy Pelosi says she personally willvote against this solution, which, in effect, finances the war at theexpense of domestic programs.
This solution is designed to win bipartisan support because it will containearmarks for pork-barrel spending dearly desired on both sides of the aisle.It became clear a week ago that Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell wasin negotiations with Majority Leader Harry Reid on a bill to financemultiple new earmarks by means of an across-the-board reduction ingovernment programs. What's more, a little rules chicanery will hide anestimated 12,000 new earmarks, including pork that previously had not beenpassed by any chamber and will be "airdropped" into the bill. The wilylegislators have found a way around new ethics rules that require disclosureof all such spending.
Nobody can predict even at this late date the outcome of this intricatelegislative process. It is not out of the question that an omnibus moneybill still will fail and that Bush will achieve his real desire. On Friday,the president advocated a continuing resolution keeping spending at lastyear's level without new earmarks. That is also the goal of the House GOPleadership. But because that is a very unlikely outcome, Republicanreformers believe that they have lost a golden opportunity to regain theirold "brand" of fiscal responsibility by fighting to the end in the budgetbattle.
The astute House Democratic Caucus chairman, Rahm Emanuel, observed whatMcConnell was up to and issued a statement last Tuesday accusing him oftrading valuable established domestic programs for earmarks:
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/16/AR2007121601563.html
Questions for Musharraf and Bush
By John F. Tierney and Aitzaz Ahsan
Monday, December 17, 2007; A21
One of us chairs a House of Representatives subcommittee tasked withoversight of U.S. foreign policy, and one of us languishes under housearrest after transfer from a Pakistani jail for the "heinous" and"seditious" crime of representing, in legal proceedings, the sacked chiefjustice of Pakistan's Supreme Court.
As members of the political opposition in our respective countries and aslawyers firmly committed to the rule of law, we have a few questions for ourheads of state:
-- How will you address the increasing anti-Americanism in Pakistan in lightof the growing, and not unjustified, perception among Pakistan's democraticmoderates that the United States is not willing to stand with the people ofPakistan against an increasingly authoritarian and anti-democraticgovernment in Islamabad?
-- How will you respond to the inevitable international condemnation of aparliamentary "election" in which journalists are muzzled; political partiesare prohibited from campaigning; Pakistani military and intelligenceservices visibly enforce an atmosphere of intimidation; and oppositionleaders are exiled, jailed or placed under house arrest?
-- How do you expect to effectively compete against extremist ideology whenU.S. education funding to Pakistan is one-fifteenth its military support andPakistani funding for public education remains woefully inadequate? Thirteenmillion children ages 5 to 9 -- out of 27 million total -- are not enrolledin school at all, leaving them exposed to extremist mentors.
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[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
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Inside Higher Education
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/12/17/texas
Creationist College Advances in Texas
Dec. 17
Texas is fast becoming a key state not only in debates over evolution butover what kind of government scrutiny is important and legitimate whenreviewing colleges with particular ideologies.
On Friday, an advisory committee to the Texas Higher Education CoordinatingBoard recommended that the state allow the Institute for Creation Researchto start offering online master's degrees in science education. Theinstitute, which has been based in California, where it operates a museumand many programs for people who don't believe in evolution, is relocatingto Dallas, where it hopes to expand its online education offerings.
In Texas, the institute needs either regional accreditation (for which isapplying, but which will take some time) or state approval to offer degrees.Some science groups are aghast by the idea that Texas would authorize master's degrees in science education that are based on complete opposition toevolution and literal acceptance of the Bible. And these groups areparticularly concerned because the students in these programs would bepeople who are or want to be school teachers.
Complicating matters, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board will betaking up the issue in the wake of an August ruling by the Texas SupremeCourt questioning the grounds on which the board had evaluated seminariesand warning the board not to impose secular values on seminaries. The rulingwas seen at the time as making it harder for the state to deny licenses toreligious institutions.
Raymund A. Paredes, commissioner of higher education for Texas, stressed inan interview Sunday that the advisory panel's vote was just that: advisory.But he noted that the board's decision next month would be "sensitive" andsaid he would be asking the board's general counsel to study the impact ofthe August Supreme Court decision on the issue.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/17/arts/17sava.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print
Boycotted Radio Host Remains Unbowed
By JACQUES STEINBERG
December 17, 2007
SAN FRANCISCO - The humbling of Don Imus last spring over his remarks aboutthe Rutgers women's basketball team has done nothing to quiet MichaelSavage, a radio host with a far bigger following and far more checkeredtrack record.
Mr. Savage, whose program reaches an estimated eight million listeners aweek on nearly 400 stations, suggested over the summer that a group ofcollege students on a hunger strike in support of easing immigrationrestrictions should "fast until they starve to death." In October the Boardof Supervisors of San Francisco, the city from which Mr. Savage oftenbroadcasts, took the unusual step of passing a resolution condemning him forthe remarks.
Then, a few weeks ago, Mr. Savage uncorked a cascade of invective aboutIslam. Among his on-air comments: the Koran is "a book of hate"; someMuslims, at least, "need deportation"; and adherents of Islam would do wellto "take your religion and shove it up your behind" because "I'm sick ofyou."
In response the Council on American-Islamic Relations, whose stated missionincludes correcting mischaracterizations of Islam, tore a page from theplaybook of Mr. Imus's critics. It made Mr. Savage's comments widelyavailable on the Internet and called on advertisers to boycott his program,which is behind only Rush Limbaugh's and Sean Hannity's in number oflisteners, according to Talkers magazine, an industry publication.
At least two of his major sponsors - Citrix, which sells remote access tocomputers, and Trusted ID, which provides protection against identitytheft - have pulled their spots. Thus far, Mr. Savage said in an interviewlast week, the boycott had cost his program more than a million dollars inadvertising revenue committed for next year.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/17/us/politics/17huckabee.html
Huckabee Draws Support of Home-School Families
By PAUL VITELLO
December 17, 2007
DES MOINES - Christine and Chuck Hurley have raised and home-schooled their10 children here, and five of those children will be eligible to vote in theIowa caucus on Jan. 3.
If Mr. and Mrs. Hurley have anything to say about it - and they do, beingevangelical Christians who have imbued their children with the mandates ofthe Ten Commandments, not least the one about honoring thy father andmother - those will be five votes for Mike Huckabee.
"Five votes - count six, if we get my son-in-law to the caucus," said Mrs.Hurley, 47. "That's eight votes right there, with my husband and I."
Politicians count sure votes at their own peril, but families like theHurleys seem to account for a solid core of Mr. Huckabee's support here inthe final weeks before the first balloting to select a Republican nominee inthe 2008 presidential election.
White, evangelical Christians make up about 38 percent of the Republicanelectorate in Iowa. Among voters in that group, Mr. Huckabee, an ordainedBaptist minister and the former governor of Arkansas, leads his closestcompetitor, Mitt Romney, by two to one, according to a poll released thismonth by the Pew Research Center.
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Miami Herald
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/florida/story/347484.html
Obama fights stories about 'Muslim roots'
BY BETH REINHARD
Posted on Mon, Dec. 17, 2007
Max Holtzman, a Miami lawyer and fundraiser for Democratic presidentialcandidate Barack Obama, was in a downtown office building when he ran into ahigh-powered business consultant.
One of her major concerns about Obama, she confided, was his ``deep Muslimroots.''
''I told her that he's been a practicing Christian for a very long time,''Holtzman said. ``I cleared the air, and now she's a great supporter.''
Rumor control is rarely that easy for the Obama campaign at a time when amouse click can circulate ambiguously sourced, hard-to-trace and seeminglylimitless attacks. Two volunteers for rival Hillary Clinton in Iowa wererecently kicked out after they were caught forwarding incendiary e-mailsthat suggested Obama is an Islamic terrorist.
One of the chief rumor-mongers is Andy Martin, a former South Floridaresident and perennially losing candidate who now runs his ContrarianCommentary blog out of Chicago. Tens of thousands or hundreds of thousandsof people -- Martin said he's not sure -- receive his e-mail blasts.
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Southwest Florida's News Press
http://www.news-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071217/NEWS01/712170337/1002/NEWS01
Mack, Bono officially man, wife
Private ceremony included 32 family members
By Jason Wermers
jwermers@news-press.com
Originally posted on December 17, 2007
Fort Myers Congressman Connie Mack IV and Palm Springs, Calif.,Congresswoman Mary Bono were married Saturday in Asheville, N.C.
The couple held a small, private wedding, attended by 32 members of the Mackand Bono families, at the Richmond Inn, Mack spokeswoman Stephanie DuBoissaid.
Mack's father, former U.S. Sen. Connie Mack III, was the best man, andBono's daughter, Chianna, was the maid of honor.
The marriage will not affect either representative's position, at least fornow. Mack will maintain his Fort Myers residence, and Bono will maintain herhome in Palm Springs. The two will share a home in the northern Virginiasuburbs of Washington, D.C.
Mack proposed to Bono in August while the the two were on a camping trip atArches National Park in Utah. They had dated for two years.
Bono's father, Clay Whitaker, lives in Asheville. The wedding colors wereivory and gold.
The honeymoon is on hold for now. Both representatives need to be in thenation's capital this coming week because of the ongoing congressionalsession. They have not yet finalized honeymoon plans.
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Los Angeles
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-mccain17dec17,1,3132190.story?coll=la-headlines-nation&track=crosspromo
Lieberman will back McCain
Connecticut senator, the Democratic vice presidential nominee in 2000, willendorse the GOP presidential candidate because of his stance against Islamicterrorism.
From the Associated Press
December 17, 2007
MANCHESTER, N.H. - Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), trying to build momentumtoward a reprise of his 2000 New Hampshire primary victory, is piling uphigh-profile endorsements, including one from another political maverick,Sen. Joe Lieberman.
The Connecticut senator, an independent Democrat who was the Democrats' 2000vice presidential nominee, was scheduled to announce his support for McCainat a town hall meeting today in Hillsborough.
A Lieberman advisor said the senator decided to back McCain because hethought his colleague from Arizona had "the best chance of uniting thecountry in its fight against Islamic terrorism."
The advisor, who spoke on condition of anonymity in advance of the formal announcement, said Lieberman would continue to caucus with Senate Democrats,and said his decision was not a reflection of any lingering tension with hisold party after key Democrats abandoned him when he lost the Democraticprimary during his 2006 Senate reelection campaign.
Lieberman subsequently won reelection with an independent candidacy and hassince been the darling of many prominent Republicans, including former WhiteHouse advisor Karl Rove, for pushing hard in support of the country's war inIraq.
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New York Post
http://www.nypost.com/seven/12172007/news/columnists/ny_gop_cooling_on_rudy_230244.htm
NY GOP COOLING ON RUDY
By FREDRIC U. DICKER
December 17, 2007 -- FEARFUL New York Re publicans are rethinking their 2008campaign strategies because of former Mayor Rudy Giuliani's faltering bidfor the White House, The Post has learned.
Republican leaders, especially those involved in the crucial battle toretain GOP control of the state Senate, had hoped an energized Giulianicandidacy would attract independent and moderate Democrats to their ballotline in what is widely expected to be a big Democratic year.
But, pointing to his declining national polling numbers and his surpriseslide to third place in Florida, GOP strategists are privately callingGiuliani's own strategy efforts "lackluster," and an increasing number ofthem now predict that "America's mayor" won't be their party's nominee forpresident next year.
"Rudy isn't where we thought he would be and there's a growing likelihoodthat he's not going to be our nominee," said a leading New York Republican.
A GOP senate strategist said, "We're no longer planning our campaigns basedon the assumption that Rudy will be the nominee."
Furthermore, Republicans - who once hoped Giuliani could carry New York in apresidential contest - are now convinced the state won't be in play even ifGiuliani does end up as their party's nominee.
"New York isn't going Republican even if Rudy is the nominee," a GOPofficial conceded.
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Boston Globe
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2007/12/17/budget_bill_reverses_white_house_cuts/?rss_id=Boston+Globe+--+Today%27s+paper+A+to+Z
Budget bill reverses White House cuts
December 17, 2007
Congressional budget officials unveiled a $500 billion-plus catchallspending bill yesterday, reluctantly sticking within President Bush's totalsbut protecting politically sensitive domestic programs from White Housecuts. The bill covers the budgets for every Cabinet department except thePentagon and is expected to pass this week before lawmakers head home forChristmas. Democrats reversed cuts to heating subsidies, local law police,Amtrak, and housing. (AP)
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Boston Globe
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2007/12/17/romney_huckabee_rivalry_heats_up/
Romney, Huckabee rivalry heats up: Harsh words fly about Bush's legacy
By Michael Levenson, Globe Staff
December 17, 2007
Raising the stakes with his main rival in the crucial Iowa caucuses,Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney accused Mike Huckabeeyesterday of insulting President Bush and called on him to apologize forcriticizing Bush's foreign policy as "arrogant."
Huckabee refused, saying he was not attacking the president personally butlaying out a different vision for the US role in the world.
The exchange on national TV talk shows yesterday reflected the increasinglybitter battle between the former governors and one of the few instances inwhich Republican presidential hopefuls have been drawn into a confrontationover Bush's legacy. So far during the campaign, the candidates, wary ofembracing a president with low approval ratings, have preferred to comparethemselves to President Reagan, who remains unwaveringly popular withRepublican voters.
But Huckabee's surge past Romney in the polls in Iowa, where Republicanswill hold the first nomination contest on Jan. 3, has clearly shaken up therace. Romney, despite vastly outspending Huckabee, declared for the firsttime last week that he is now the underdog in Iowa, and yesterday he soundedlike one as he blasted Huckabee for calling Bush's foreign policy arrogantand indicative of a "bunker mentality."
"That's an insult to the president, and Mike Huckabee should apologize tothe president," Romney said on NBC's "Meet the Press."
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Houston Chronicle
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/politics/5383328.html
CAMPAIGN NOTEBOOK
Clinton touts endorsement from Kerrey
Dec. 16, 2007, 10:37PM
From wire reports
COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa - Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton celebrated onehigh-profile endorsement, from the Des Moines Register's editorial board, byannouncing a second Sunday: former Sen. Bob Kerrey, the renegadeNebraskan-turned-New Yorker.
Kerrey told an energetic crowd gathered at a high school here that he isbacking Clinton "enthusiastically and unequivocally." Clinton beamed. "I amabsolutely overwhelmed personally to have my friend of 25 years, Bob Kerrey,endorse me with such a vote of confidence," she said.
Now president of the New School in New York City, Kerrey served as a U.S.senator and governor of Nebraska.
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CBS News
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/12/16/national/main3624317.shtml?source=RSSattr=HOME_3624317
Top Republican Vows CIA Tape Probe
WASHINGTON, Dec. 16, 2007
(AP) The top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee defied the Bushadministration Sunday and pledged to investigate the destruction of CIAinterrogation tapes.
"We want to hold the community accountable for what's happened with thesetapes. I think we will issue subpoenas," said Rep. Peter Hoekstra, R-Mich.
The Justice Department has urged Congress not to investigate and advisedintelligence officials not to cooperate with a legislative inquiry.
"You've got a community that's incompetent. They are arrogant. And they arepolitical," Hoekstra said. "And I think that we're going to hold (CIADirector) Mike Hayden accountable."
Earlier this month, the CIA acknowledged destroying videos showing the harshinterrogation of top al Qaeda suspects. Hayden said the videos, which weremade in 2002, were destroyed in 2005 out of fear the tapes would leak andreveal the identifies of interrogators. Hayden said the sessions werevideotaped to provide an added layer of legal protection for officers usingtough interrogation methods authorized by President Bush to help break downrecalcitrant prisoners.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/17/opinion/17mon1.html?ref=opinion
Editorial: Disappointments on Climate
December 17, 2007
A week that could have brought important progress on climate change ended in disappointment.
In Bali, where delegates from 187 countries met to begin framing a newglobal warming treaty, America's negotiators were in full foot-draggingmode, acting as spoilers rather than providing the leadership the worldneeds.
In Washington, caving to pressures from the White House, the utilities andthe oil companies, the Senate settled for a merely decent energy billinstead of a very good one that would have set the country on a clear pathto a cleaner energy future.
The news from Bali was particularly disheartening. The delegates agreed tonegotiate by 2009 a new and more comprehensive global treaty to replace theKyoto Protocol. (Kyoto expires in 2012 and requires that only industrializednations reduce their production of greenhouse gases.) They pledged for thefirst time to address deforestation, which accounts for one-fifth of theworld's carbon dioxide emissions. And they received vague assurances fromChina - which will soon overtake the United States as the biggest emitter ofgreenhouse gases - and other emerging powers that they would seek"measurable, reportable and verifiable" emissions cuts.
From the United States the delegates got nothing, except a promise toparticipate in the forthcoming negotiations. Even prying that out of theBush administration required enormous effort.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/18/world/middleeast/18saudi.html?hp
Pardon Reported for Saudi Rape Victim
By KATHERINE ZOEPF
December 18, 2007
RIYADH - King Abdullah has pardoned a woman who was sentenced to 200 lashesafter pressing charges against seven men who raped her, a Saudi newspaperreported Monday.
There was no immediate confirmation from the Ministry of Justice or theMinistry of Information, but the newspaper, Al Jazirah, is close to thereligious establishment that controls the Justice Ministry, Reutersreported.
The case has provoked a rare and angry public debate in Saudi Arabia,leading to renewed calls for reform of the Saudi judicial system.
The rape took place a year and a half ago in Qatif, a small Shiite town inthe Eastern Province, center of the Saudi Arabia's oil industry. The woman,who has been publicly identified only as the "Qatif girl," said she met aformer boyfriend to retrieve a photograph of herself. They were sitting in acar together when seven men attacked, raping them both.
The woman and the former boyfriend were originally sentenced to 90 lasheseach for being together in private, while the attackers received sentencesranging from 10 months to five years in prison, and 80 to 1,000 lashes each.
more . . . . .
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/18/world/middleeast/18iran.html?hp
Russia Ships Nuclear Fuel to Iran
By MICHAEL SCHWIRTZ
December 18, 2007
MOSCOW - Russia made its first fuel delivery to Iran's Bushehr nuclear powerplant on Sunday, a spokesman for the Russian company overseeing the projectconfirmed Monday, although it remained unclear when the controversialstation would begin operating.
"The first phase of delivery has been completed," said Irina F. Esipova, aspokeswoman for Atomsproiexport, the Russian contractor on the project. "Asmall amount of fuel is already on the premises of the Bushehr station in aspecial storage facility." The company plans to deliver about 80 tons ofnuclear fuel to Iran over the next two months, she said.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the fuel would beunder the control of the International Atomic Energy Agency and that Iranhad given written guarantees that the fuel would only be used for thenuclear power plant.
"All fuel that will be delivered will be under the control and guarantees ofthe International Atomic Energy Agency for the whole time it stays onIranian territory," the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. "Moreover, theIranian side gave additional written guarantees that the fuel will be usedonly for the Bushehr nuclear power plant."
The statement added: "After the Russian fuel is processed at the Bushehrnuclear power plant, it will be returned to Russia for further processingand storage."
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WashingtonPost.com
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/16/AR2007121601565.html
Two Months in Pakistan
By Lally Weymouth
Monday, December 17, 2007; A21
When Benazir Bhutto returned from exile in October, she was disturbed by thegrowing strength of the Taliban and Islamic extremists inside Pakistan. Lastweek she sat down with Newsweek-The Post's Lally Weymouth in Islamabad.Excerpts:
Q: How do see your prospects in the upcoming election?
A: We all worried that the elections are going to be rigged in favor of theruling party -- the military's party, the Muslim League. . . . There are 148seats in the Punjab, the government has been told to give 108 seats [to]them. That means we'll only be fighting over 40 seats.
So [President Pervez] Musharraf's party will win the Punjab?
They won't win it. Hopefully we will make him lose it.
Do you think that's possible?
Well, observers are coming from the European Union [among others]. So Ithink if we can get observers to ensure that the ballots don't get siphonedoff, it'll be a huge setback to their rigging plans. . . . They've [also]got ghost voting stations.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/16/AR2007121601559.html
Egypt's YouTube Democrats
By Jackson Diehl
Monday, December 17, 2007; A21
Is the cause of liberal democracy in the Arab Middle East dead? It would beeasy to jump to such a conclusion in Washington, given the Bushadministration's shameless retreat from its "freedom agenda" and the recentcampaigns by Arab autocrats to crush liberal politicians, journalists andcivic activists. But it's also easy to overlook the fact that the MiddleEast's movement for human rights and democracy originated not in the WhiteHouse but in capitals such as Cairo, Beirut and Amman. There, it is stillalive, well -- and even growing.
I was reminded of this when seven Egyptian civil society activists touredWashington in advance of a meeting last week with Secretary of StateCondoleezza Rice. All are in their 20s; all are leaders of groups promotingsuch causes as women's rights, prison reform, religious tolerance andpolitical change. All believe that Egypt could become a liberal democracy intheir lifetime. And why not? They're not acquainted with the numerousWashington experts who have dismissed the possibility.
They do know a lot of people like themselves. "The majority of Egyptians arelike us, under the age of 35," said Ahmed Samih, the 28-year-old director ofthe Andalus Institute for Tolerance and Anti-Violence Studies in Cairo. "Ourpresident is 85, and far away from Facebook."
Samih, a fearless man who says he has been a political activist since age17, ought to know. Six months ago he founded a Facebook group called "Whathappens when Hosni Mubarak dies?" Mubarak, who has ruled Egypt under"emergency law" since 1981, is actually only 79. But he is noticeablyfading. And Samih's group has attracted 2,741 members, almost all of themEgyptian.
Facebook and YouTube are where the young Egyptian democracy movementlives -- mostly out of reach of Mubarak's secret police. There are more than60 Facebook groups devoted to liberal Egyptian causes; many of them havethousands of members. On YouTube, one can find hundreds of video clipsshowing demonstrations for human rights in Egypt, speeches by liberalactivists, sermons by reformist Muslim clerics -- and torture by Mubarak'ssecurity forces, captured on cellphones.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/16/AR2007121601564.html
The GOP's Budget Retreat
By Robert D. Novak
Monday, December 17, 2007; A21
Nearly the entire federal government would be funded by an omnibusappropriations bill to be unveiled today after covert negotiations. Insubsequent parliamentary maneuvering likely to extend through this week,Democrats will pare the spending level to the maximum demanded by PresidentBush in order to avoid a veto. Republicans will declare victory. In fact,they are in retreat.
As the minority party in Congress, the GOP will have less than 24 hours toread the massive bill before it comes up for a House vote tomorrow. While atleast coming close to Bush's limit, the bill will be passed over Republicanopposition because it contains no Iraq war funding. It then will go to theSenate on Wednesday, where Republicans will use a filibuster threat toinsert money for Iraq. Overall spending will be reduced to the Bush standardin the Senate by means of an across-the-board cut. That version then will bepassed by the House, though Speaker Nancy Pelosi says she personally willvote against this solution, which, in effect, finances the war at theexpense of domestic programs.
This solution is designed to win bipartisan support because it will containearmarks for pork-barrel spending dearly desired on both sides of the aisle.It became clear a week ago that Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell wasin negotiations with Majority Leader Harry Reid on a bill to financemultiple new earmarks by means of an across-the-board reduction ingovernment programs. What's more, a little rules chicanery will hide anestimated 12,000 new earmarks, including pork that previously had not beenpassed by any chamber and will be "airdropped" into the bill. The wilylegislators have found a way around new ethics rules that require disclosureof all such spending.
Nobody can predict even at this late date the outcome of this intricatelegislative process. It is not out of the question that an omnibus moneybill still will fail and that Bush will achieve his real desire. On Friday,the president advocated a continuing resolution keeping spending at lastyear's level without new earmarks. That is also the goal of the House GOPleadership. But because that is a very unlikely outcome, Republicanreformers believe that they have lost a golden opportunity to regain theirold "brand" of fiscal responsibility by fighting to the end in the budgetbattle.
The astute House Democratic Caucus chairman, Rahm Emanuel, observed whatMcConnell was up to and issued a statement last Tuesday accusing him oftrading valuable established domestic programs for earmarks:
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/16/AR2007121601563.html
Questions for Musharraf and Bush
By John F. Tierney and Aitzaz Ahsan
Monday, December 17, 2007; A21
One of us chairs a House of Representatives subcommittee tasked withoversight of U.S. foreign policy, and one of us languishes under housearrest after transfer from a Pakistani jail for the "heinous" and"seditious" crime of representing, in legal proceedings, the sacked chiefjustice of Pakistan's Supreme Court.
As members of the political opposition in our respective countries and aslawyers firmly committed to the rule of law, we have a few questions for ourheads of state:
-- How will you address the increasing anti-Americanism in Pakistan in lightof the growing, and not unjustified, perception among Pakistan's democraticmoderates that the United States is not willing to stand with the people ofPakistan against an increasingly authoritarian and anti-democraticgovernment in Islamabad?
-- How will you respond to the inevitable international condemnation of aparliamentary "election" in which journalists are muzzled; political partiesare prohibited from campaigning; Pakistani military and intelligenceservices visibly enforce an atmosphere of intimidation; and oppositionleaders are exiled, jailed or placed under house arrest?
-- How do you expect to effectively compete against extremist ideology whenU.S. education funding to Pakistan is one-fifteenth its military support andPakistani funding for public education remains woefully inadequate? Thirteenmillion children ages 5 to 9 -- out of 27 million total -- are not enrolledin school at all, leaving them exposed to extremist mentors.
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