by Peter DelVecchio and Karen Ocamb

Schwarzenegger Signs Marriage, Milk Bills

On Oct. 11 Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law three bills sponsored by LGBT legislators and activists, LGBTPOV.com reports. One requires California to recognize as valid same-sex marriages performed out-of-state during the months in 2008 when gay marriage was legal in California. A second recognizes slain San Francisco supervisor and LGBT rights pioneer Harvey Milk’s birthday, May 22, as an annual day of significance in California. The third will help leverage funding for same-sex domestic violence services.

Signing the marriage bill, which was authored by Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, the governor wrote: “Consistent with the California Supreme Court’s decision that upheld the validity of those in-state marriages entered into prior to the passage of Proposition 8, Senate Bill 54 clarifies that California must also recognize as married couples those legally married in another state during the same period of time in which same-sex marriage was legal in California.”

Couples married in other jurisdictions after Proposition 8 passed will be afforded the “same legal protections that would otherwise be available to couples that enter into civil unions or domestic partnerships out-of-state” under the new statute, the governor wrote.

The law, which received very little publicity prior to its passage, is expected to generate outrage among marriage equality opponents.

The Milk law, a version of which Schwarzenegger previously vetoed, designates May 22 as “Harvey Milk Day,” but does not make it a state holiday. “The Milk Day Bill marks the very first time an openly LGBT person has been officially recognized by any state government,” said Geoff Kors, executive director of Equality California.

Schwarzenegger vetoed two other LGBT bills, one to afford better access to birth certificates for transgenders, and one to institute protections for LGBT prisoners. The governor labeled the prisoner bill “unnecessary.”

Lieberman to Be White House DADT Point Man?

Hard on the heels of President Barack Obama’s latest pledge to repeal the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, made at a Human Rights Campaign dinner Oct. 10, the White House is consulting with certain senators, especially Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., about repeal, The Advocate reports.

DADT prohibits gays from serving unless they keep their sexual orientation secret.

“On ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,’ this administration is talking directly to the Hill—we are in direct discussions with Sen. Lieberman,” said John Berry, director of the Office and Personnel Management and the administration’s highest ranking openly gay official. Lieberman sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Lieberman’s office confirms the contact. “Sen. Lieberman has had discussions with representatives of the administration and others on the best way to reverse this policy, which he has opposed since it was first proposed in 1993” said Marshall Wittman, Lieberman’s press secretary.

A bill to repeal DADT introduced in the House of Representatives in March by Rep. Patrick Murphy, D-Penn., who is straight, now has 177 co-sponsors.

The White House hopes to introduce a repeal bill in the Senate with bi-partisan support, Berry told The Advocate. Lieberman is viewed as a good candidate to run with the bill because of his influence on the Armed Services Committee, his good rapport with the military and because of his ties with Maine’s two moderate Republican senators, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, seen as potential repeal supporters.

The military is transmitting mixed signals on DADT, according to an Oct. 8 post by Aaron Belkin at huffingtonpost.com. An official military journal, with the approval of the office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently published a study calling for repeal of DADT by Air Force Col. Om Prakash, who serves in the Secretary of Defense’s office. The essay even won a military essay contest.

But late last year, Lt. Col. Edith Disler, who taught at the Air Force Academy, was punished and barred from teaching for “lack of judgment in not recognizing that negative publicity could follow” after she invited three LGBT combat veterans to campus to discuss gays in the military.

Meanwhile, women are being discharged under DADT “at rates up to three times higher than their overall ranks,” according to statistics obtained by the University of California, Santa Barbara’s Palm Center, the AP reported Oct. 8.

GLSEN Honors Bohnett, HBO and Shonda Rhimes

The GLSEN Respect Awards on Oct. 9 at the Beverly Hills Hotel fell so close to the 11th anniversary of Matthew Shepard’s murder on Oct 12, the organization’s mission to stop bullying in schools took on an added significance. That death, harassment and humiliation of LGBT youth has ripple effects was underscored by still-grieving Sirdeaner Walker, the mother of 11-year-old Carl Walker-Hoover, who committed suicide after unrelenting bullying.

“I believe in my heart that bullying isn’t a gay or straight issue,” Walker said, at times chokng back tears. “It’s a safety issue.”

But there was also laughter and a standing ovation for 18-year-old Austin Laufersweiler, who received GLSEN’s inaugural Student Advocate of the Year Award. Also honored were HBO’s major domo Michael Lombardo and Shonda Rhimes, creator of Grey’s Anatomy and Private Practice, whose acceptance speech was delivered by Chandra Wilson as Dr. Miranda Bailey.

In his powerful acceptance speech, honoree David Bohnett of the David Bohnett Foundation said, “It’s time to combat head-on the religious organizations that are funding the opposition to marriage equality and safe school legislation. [We must] confront bigotry and lies with facts.”

For more on GLSEN visit glsen.org.

Maine’s NO on 1 Raises $2.7 Million; Vote Close

NO on 1/Protect Maine Equality announced Oct. 13 that “nearly 12,000 donors have contributed nearly $2.7 million to its campaign to defeat Question 1 and allow committed Maine couples to marry and be treated equally under the law,” a NO on 1 release states. Roughly equal amounts were donated by Maine residents and out-of-staters.

Question 1 is a measure on the November ballot in Maine that would prevent that state’s new marriage equality statute from taking effect.

“What we’ve seen is that as more and more people have focused on Maine, more and more people have wanted to participate, whether that’s writing a check or staffing a phone bank,” said NO on 1 campaign manager Jesse Connolly.

Roughly 52 percent of likely voters said they would vote no on Question 1 or were leaning that way in a recent Pan Atlantic SMS Group poll. Yes and yes-leaners were about 43 percent, with 5 percent undecided.

A Democracy Corps poll released Sept. 29 showed Question 1 losing by approximately nine points, with 9 percent in the “don’t know/refused” column.

Obama to Nominate Out Ambassador

President Obama nominated an openly gay man to be ambassador to New Zealand and Samoa, LGBTPOV.com reported Oct. 7. David Huebner is a partner in the law firm of Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP and is well known in the Los Angeles LGBT community as the longtime counsel to the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. If confirmed, Huebner would be the third out U.S. ambassador, the New York Daily News reports.

“He is a superb nomination,” said Dean Hansell, a partner in the law firm of Dewey & LeBoeuf who serves on GLAAD’s board with Huebner. “The point with him is that you get a first rate attorney who happens to be gay.”

The news came just days before Obama addressed a Human Rights Campaign dinner Oct. 10 amid growing concern in the LGBT community that he is not keeping campaign promises made to gays.

Olson-Boies Prop. 8 Challenge Moves Forward

For two hours on Oct. 14, U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker listened to arguments from former Solicitor General Ted Olson and trial lawyer David Boies, who are pressing a constitutional challenge to Prop. 8 in Perry v. Schwarzenegger on behalf of two same-sex couples who want to but are now unable to marry in California.

Chuck Cooper argued for a summary judgment to dismiss the case based on precedent and tradition. The judge rejected Cooper’s argument and the trial is now set for Jan. 11 in San Francisco.

“Importantly, Judge Walker struck a blow today to proponents’ claimed state interest of protecting ‘traditional’ marriage, finding that ‘tradition alone is not enough,’” wrote Chris Geidner in his blog LawDork.

But there was a moment of levity in the hearing, according to the Wall Street Journal’s Law Blog: “Cooper argued that marriage existed to support and to encourage ‘natural procreation’—something that gay couples can’t do. Judge Walker scoffed at that idea, saying the last wedding he officiated was between people aged 95 and 83. ‘I did not demand that they prove they intended to engage in procreation,’ he said.”

Marriage Bill Introduced in D.C.

A bill has been introduced in the Washington, D.C. city council that would legalize same-sex marriage in the nation’s capital, the Washington Blade reports. Out councilmember David Catania introduced the measure Oct. 6. Nine of the council’s 12 other members were co-sponsors, virtually ensuring that the measure will be passed and sent to Mayor Adrian Fenty, who has said he will sign it into law.

“[M]arriage is a basic human right, which our civil and secular government is duly bound to extend to same-sex couples in the same manner that it is made available to opposite-sex couples,” Catania said.

D.C. currently recognizes same-sex marriages performed in other jurisdictions. Gay marriage is currently legal in Massachusetts, Vermont, Connecticut, New Hampshire and Iowa. Maine passed a marriage bill earlier this year, but its going into effect depends on the outcome of a November ballot measure.

Census Launches LGBT ‘Complete Count Committees’

The division of the U.S. Census Bureau charged with “educat[ing] people” is forming “Complete Count Committees” targeting the LGBT community for the 2010 census “[f]or the first time ever in the nation,” according to a piece by census employee Jennifer Giles posted at LGBTPOV.com Oct. 11.

A “Complete Count Committee’s” purpose is to educate so-called “hard to count” (HTC) populations, which the bureau says includes LGBT people, as to why census “participation is safe, easy and important to the lives of those they care about.” The bureau identifies HTC populations in various ways, including “language barriers, illiteracy [and] cultural fear or distrust of government.”

Tim Olson of the bureau’s Partnership and Data Services Program recently kicked off the Los Angeles committee, and Gary Gates, LGBT demographer at UCLA’s Williams Center will appear at a roundtable discussion on LGBT census participation in San Francisco Oct. 22.

Gays Protest ‘Kill Gays’ Singer

About 20 LGBT protesters chanted and carried signs outside Cabana Club in Hollywood in a quickly organized demonstration after the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center confirmed that Buju Banton, the controversial Jamaican reggae singer, was performing there. Banton is the target of an international boycott because of violent anti-gay lyrics in some of his songs.

Though the club originally honored the boycott, they rescheduled Banton after the singer met with LGBT community representatives on Oct. 12. A photo of the meeting was used by Banton’s management to generate positive PR.

“While there certainly was little movement on his part,” Michael Pretelis wrote about the meeting on his blog, “and we didn’t agree to tell any other gays to stop protesting his concert tour or suggesting he do more to confront the terrible, and sometimes deadly, anti-gay violence in Jamaica, we felt it was a very positive first step forward that the meeting took place.”

Club patrons, unimpressed by the protests, lined up one hour before Banton’s show.

VID PICKS

Judy Shepard, mother of Matthew Shepard, addresses the National Equality March in Washington, D.C. Oct. 11. Matthew Shepard, a 21-year-old college student, was murdered in 1998, the victim of a brutal anti-gay hate crime. A bill named after him that would extend federal hate crimes laws to cover gays is expected to become law soon. tinyurl.com/yffnoec

Director, screenwriter, film and television producer and LGBT rights activist Dustin Lance Black addresses the National Equality March Oct. 11. tinyurl.com/yzp8bub

QUICK PICKS

On Oct. 10 West Hollywood City Councilmember John Duran celebrated his 50th birthday at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery with a fundraiser for the Gay Men’s Chorus music education program at which singer Erin Hamilton performed. On Oct. 12, Duran played Dennis Shepard in the Chorus’ version of The Laramie Project, commemorating the murder of Matthew Shepard.

QUOTE - UNQUOTE

“All the football players used to call me ‘sissy.’”

—Singer Justin Timberlake on the Oct. 12 edition of NBC’s The Jay Leno Show, answering a question about his nicknames growing up.

“Black people, of all people, should not oppose equality. And that is what gay marriage is all about. No people of good will should oppose marriage equality. We have some real and serious problems in this country. Same-sex marriage is not one of them. Since when did we believe trust, loyalty and love are bad things?”

—Julian Bond, chairman of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, giving the keynote address to the National Equality March in Washington, D.C. Oct.11.

As of 10:11 a.m., Oct 12

American Deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan: 5,221 icasualties.org

American Wounded in Iraq: 31,527 antiwar.com/casualties

Iraqi Dead since 2003: 93,540 -102,071 iraqbodycount.org

Cost of Iraq and Afghanistan Wars: $919,549,000,000+ costofwar.com

National Debt: $11,913,774,643,438.12 brillig.com/debt_clock

U.S. Trade Deficit: $509,679,000,000+
americaneconomicalert.org/ticker_home.asp