• How cute are InstaCouple Justin & Nick? Follow them on the gram of Insta here.
• Two men from Washington D.C. were arrested for drug trafficking as they tried to board a gay cruise leaving from the port of Miami. They were caught thanks to intercepted planning emails sent from one of the men's government-issued laptop.
• The ABC hit sitcom Modern Family has been renewed for its 11th and final season.
• Donald Trump loves to refer to it as the 'failing' New York Times, but facts are facts, and the Times' stock price just hit a 13-year high.
• Damon Wayans Jr. is just the latest celeb apologizing for past homophobic statements and 'jokes.' At least he has the decency to actually straight-up apologize.
• Out pop singer/songwriter Gia Woods drops her new music video, "Jump The Fence," which offers a groovy respite with shades of female empowerment and sexual freedom.
Billboard gushed about the new song calling it "a breathy pop ear-worm packed with tribal-like pulsations and distant howls that matches the musical climate while maintaining an undeniable edge."
Gia's breakout music video, "Only A Girl," has garnered over 10 million viesw and counting. The talented 22-year-old is prepping to release her debut EP later this year.
In the days after President Trump fired James B. Comey as F.B.I. director, law enforcement officials became so concerned by the president’s behavior that they began investigating whether he had been working on behalf of Russia against American interests, according to former law enforcement officials and others familiar with the investigation.
The inquiry carried explosive implications. Counterintelligence investigators had to consider whether the president’s own actions constituted a possible threat to national security. Agents also sought to determine whether Mr. Trump was knowingly working for Russia or had unwittingly fallen under Moscow’s influence.
The investigation the F.B.I. opened into Mr. Trump also had a criminal aspect, which has long been publicly known: whether his firing of Mr. Comey constituted obstruction of justice.
I'm also going to make a point to include this from the Times report:
No evidence has emerged publicly that Mr. Trump was secretly in contact with or took direction from Russian government officials. An F.B.I. spokeswoman and a spokesman for the special counsel’s office both declined to comment.
Clearly, I don't have the evidence that the FBI has gathered but we do know that Trump frequently praised Russian President Putin, taking his word over that of the US intelligence community regarding Russian interference in the 2016 election.
That alone that should give pause to any American.
The Donald's short little fingers flew across his iPhone's keyboard this morning in a Twitter rage complete with 'the Failing New York Times,' 'Lyin James Comey,' 'Crooked Hillary,' and a boast of being 'FAR tougher on Russia than Obama.'
Wow, just learned in the Failing New York Times that the corrupt former leaders of the FBI, almost all fired or forced to leave the agency for some very bad reasons, opened up an investigation on me, for no reason & with no proof, after I fired Lyin’ James Comey, a total sleaze!
...Funny thing about James Comey. Everybody wanted him fired, Republican and Democrat alike. After the rigged & botched Crooked Hillary investigation, where she was interviewed on July 4th Weekend, not recorded or sworn in, and where she said she didn’t know anything (a lie),....
....the FBI was in complete turmoil (see N.Y. Post) because of Comey’s poor leadership and the way he handled the Clinton mess (not to mention his usurpation of powers from the Justice Department). My firing of James Comey was a great day for America. He was a Crooked Cop......
.....who is being totally protected by his best friend, Bob Mueller, & the 13 Angry Democrats - leaking machines who have NO interest in going after the Real Collusion (and much more) by Crooked Hillary Clinton, her Campaign, and the Democratic National Committee. Just Watch!
I have been FAR tougher on Russia than Obama, Bush or Clinton. Maybe tougher than any other President. At the same time, & as I have often said, getting along with Russia is a good thing, not a bad thing. I fully expect that someday we will have good relations with Russia again!
Lyin’ James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter S and his lover, agent Lisa Page, & more, all disgraced and/or fired and caught in the act. These are just some of the losers that tried to do a number on your President. Part of the Witch Hunt. Remember the “insurance policy?” This is it!
You bowed to Putin, praised him throughout the campaign — as you secretly pursued Tower Moscow -- and believed him over American intelligence in Helsinki.
You appear to be completely owned by him — this tweet shows it too.We now know why FBI was rightly very concerned.
The New York Times has profiled Donald Trump supporters Bill White and his husband Bryan Eure, with the primary interest in the couple being they are that rare breed of openly-gay Trumpers.
In fact, they are organizing a $5 million fund-raiser for the Trumpster this winter and boast about having Don Trump Jr. on speed dial.
But that wasn’t always the case.
For years they enjoyed being a part of Manhattan’s liberal elite.
They supported both of Hillary Clinton’s bids for president quite whole-heartedly, paid Aretha Franklin to sing at their 2011 wedding, and even hosted President Obama at a high-end $39,500-a-plate fund-raiser at their townhouse in Manhattan’s uber-gay neighborhood, Chelsea.
But, per the New York Times, on election night November 8, 2016, while standing among the Hillary supporters in what everyone expected to be a celebration, White saw the writing on the wall in the election returns.
Without missing a beat, he jumped in his car and drove to the New York Hilton, where Trump was celebrating the surprise win.
“I didn’t want to be part of that misery pie; I’m not a wallower in self-pity,” White told the New York Times. “I really believe that once that decision is made, you have to get behind your president.”
Mr. Eure, a commercial insurance broker and a longtime Republican, was happy for the change of heart by his husband.
From that point on, it seems the duo have no problem explaining away any perceived negatives of the president.
When it comes to the many ways Trump’s administration has attacked or pared back LGBTQ protections, Eure waves off the accusations saying, “I don’t like identity politics.”
This from the the man who is married to his husband only because of the progress made by liberal Democratic politicians and activists.
When someone brings up the many lies of Trump, despite actual facts and video tape to prove such falsehoods, Eure dismisses the issue as mere “embellishments.”
“Exaggerations,” White adds. “He’s the marketer in chief for the United States. So what?”
Their drinking of the Trump kool-aid has earned them the ire of former friends with whom the couple used to hob-nob among.
Even Nick Merrill, a spokesman for Hillary Clinton says, “They ran to the other end of the spectrum and then walked off the ledge.”
“Our democracy has been set on fire by this president, and they want what, an invite to Mar-a-Lago?” Merrill added.
In fact, access seems to be very important to White and Eure.
The Times article recounts an episode earlier this year at Ralph Lauren’s Polo Bar in Midtown Manhattan where the two men couldn’t seem to get Chelsea Clinton’s attention across the room.
Incensed, White pulled out his phone and called Donald Trump Jr. According to White, Junior immediately offered to come right over.
Pleased with the answer, White explained, “Trump picks up on the first ring. If you want to get to Chelsea Clinton, you have to call through five people.”
Mr. Eure shares the story of the time he was traveling to Philadelphia to attend the former Secretary of State’s address at the Democratic National Convention.
As part of the story, he includes how the day’s inclement weather forced him to ‘borrow’ a friend’s helicopter. But upon arriving, they rushed to greet Clinton only to be blocked by a campaign official.
“This was about because we didn’t write a $25,000 check,” Eure explains of the late campaign timing.
But the Clinton campaign remembers the story differently.
“Some people give their time and resources to causes and candidates for the right reasons, some don’t,” said Merrill. “No better indication of which case this is than to watch a guy decide to embrace Trump and all he stands for because he couldn’t get his picture taken one night.”
It’s worth noting that the Times piece almost glosses over the fact that White, a former president of the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in Manhattan, suddenly resigned from his position in 2008 and was forced to pay $1 million restitution after the state of New York had begun an investigation into whether he might have engaged in unlicensed commercial fund-raising.
Along the way, White and Eure show little concern for the damage Donald Trump has done and will continue to do to the LGBTQ community.
From removing all mention of LGBTQ people from the official White House website within hours of Trump taking office, to attempting to remove all transgender military service members, to the recent leaked memo that details plans to ‘redefine’ trans people out of existence, these two don’t care as long as they have their access.
Just to show how the couple flip-flops from power center to power center, here they are happy to pose with President Obama at the Broadway musical, Hamilton:
Longtime LGBTQ activist and journalist Michelangelo Signorile chimed in on Twitter about the couple:
These people are vile, despicable gay men, supporting a man taking away their own people's rights, and the rights of others, basically because they are greedy bastards ---> How a Liberal Couple Became Two of N.Y.’s Biggest Trump Supporters https://t.co/EgTaTCxSOr
Actually, if you read the story, it’s beyond greed — it’s not about money. They’re just craven opportunists who want access to and accolades from whoever is the “winner.” Could be a progressive leader — could be a fascist. As long as they get star treatment. Vile.
six paragraphs from the bottom we finally get to something that should have been in the headline: this dude paid a million dollars in restitution for taking bribes from hedge funds who wanted in on the state pension fund when he worked for jailbird NYC comptroller Alan Hevesi pic.twitter.com/d2snGO5YgM
Twenty-six years after her death, Marsha P. Johnson, transgender pioneer & Stonewall activist is finally being recognized by The New York Times.
Noting that obituaries in the Times have long been dominated by white men, the new series Overlooked includes a lengthy paean to Johnson honoring her groundbreaking activism on behalf of the LGBT community.
Marsha P. Johnson was an activist, a prostitute, a drag performer and, for nearly three decades, a fixture of street life in Greenwich Village. She was a central figure in a gay liberation movement energized by the 1969 police raid on the Stonewall Inn. She was a model for Andy Warhol. She battled severe mental illness. She was usually destitute and, for much of her life, effectively homeless.
When she died at 46, under murky circumstances, in summer 1992, Johnson was mourned by her many friends, but her death did not attract much notice in the mainstream press.
In the years since, however, interest in her legacy has soared. She has been praised for her insistent calls for social and economic justice; for working on behalf of homeless street youth ostracized by their families for being gay or otherwise not conforming to traditional ideas about gender; and, later, for her advocacy on behalf of AIDS patients. Some have called her a saint.
Although the term transgender wasn't in wide use during her lifetime, Johnson identified by a rotating list of labels from gay, transvestite or simply "queen."
In a 1992 interview, Johnson declared, “I was no one, nobody, from Nowheresville, until I became a drag queen.”
In a life long riddled with strife and conflict, Johnson was known to live her joyful exuberance even as she worked for LGBT acceptance.
“As long as gay people don’t have their rights all across America,” she once said, “there’s no reason for celebration.”
In what can only be described as "stunning," President Trump told the New York Times that had he known Attorney General Jeff Sessions would recuse himself on all matters pertaining to Russia, he would have never fired him. Trump says the decision to recuse was "very unfair to the president."
In a remarkable public break with one of his earliest political supporters, Mr. Trump complained that Mr. Sessions’s decision ultimately led to the appointment of a special counsel that should not have happened. “Sessions should have never recused himself and if he was going to recuse himself he should have told me before he took the job and I would have picked somebody else,” Mr. Trump said.
In a wide-ranging interview with The New York Times, the president also accused James B. Comey, the F.B.I. director he fired in May, of trying to leverage a dossier of compromising material to keep his job. Mr. Trump criticized both the acting F.B.I. director who has been filling in since Mr. Comey’s dismissal and the deputy attorney general who recommended it. And he took on Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel now leading the investigation into Russian meddling in last year’s election.
Trump also draws a red line in the sand saying Robert Mueller should not look into his family's financial records, again raising the question, "What's he hiding?"
It's interesting how much Trump bashes the NY Times but then sits down with them for these lengthy interviews. It's like he wants their approval so very badly.
Listen to the president below then head over to the New York Times for the wide-ranging interview.
The President today effectively asked Sessions for his resignation. Will he resign or insist on being fired? https://t.co/bShMQJtrBI
UPDATE - AG Sessions told reporters today, “We love this job. We love this department, and I plan to continue to do so as long as that is appropriate."
AG Sessions on POTUS' comments: "I have the honor of serving as attorney general…I plan to continue to do so as long as that's appropriate” pic.twitter.com/5HglGhsuBZ
Dean Baquet, Executive Editor of the New York Times, spoke with CNN host Brian Stelter about Donald Trump's assertions that the venerable newspaper is "failing."
After host Brian Stelter noted that Trump has tried to get the nickname to stick by using the term “failing” 53 times on Twitter to describe the Times, he asked Baquet what the facts were. “We’re not failing at all,” the editor responded. “Our digital subscriptions are going through the roof. Even print subscriptions are up. We’re a profitable company.”
He then added that this was an “effort by this administration to minimize the press.” Baquet further explained that the president’s tweets are also designed to minimize other institutions that are there to hold him accountable. “I think that’s dangerous,” he said.
Regarding the use of anonymous sources, Baquet said, "I always know who the sources are for these stories. That's why I'm so confident pushing back at the Trump administration when they criticize the stories."
New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman live-Tweeted insights from this morning's Donald Trump / New York Times confab.
The meeting was scheduled then briefly cancelled, then reconfirmed hours later apparently due to an erroneous report from Trump advisor Reince Priebus to the Trumpster that the Times had changed the terms of the meeting. The Times confirmed no terms were changed on their part.
While part of the meeting was off the record, both sides agreed some of the exchange would be for public consumption.
Some highlights:
• Regarding the end of the campaign, Trump went into Michigan because his team learned Clinton's campaign was worried about the state.
• While he admits "We had a great victory" in the election, he did mention he's well-aware he did not win the popular vote. "I'll see every once in awhile someone says, 'Well, the popular vote.'" Says he was never a fan of the Electoral College "until now."
• Trump on alt-right supporters: "It's not a group I want to energize. And if they are energized I want to look into it and find out why."
• Trump says "no" when asked if he is taking investigations off the table for Clintons but adds he doesn't want to "hurt the Clintons." He added "I think it would be very very divisive for the country."
• Regarding the concerns about his businesses and conflicts of interest: "The law's totally on my side, the president can't have a conflict of interest." Furthermore, "I'd assumed that you'd have to set up some type of trust or whatever and you don't."
• On Bannon:"If I thought he was a racist or alt-right or any of the things, the terms we could use, I wouldn't even think about hiring him." Regarding Breitbart: "Breitbart is just a publication. The cover stories like you cover stories."
• Regarding Congress: "Paul Ryan, right now, loves me. Mitch McConnell loves me," Trump says. Then says, "I've liked Chuck Schumer for a long time."
• Trump asked about potential pushback on an infrastructure plan from GOP leaders. "Right now, they're in love with me," Trump says.
• Trump says he is "seriously considering" Mattis for DoD, says he asked Mattis about waterboarding, was surprised he didn't favor it.
• Asked about son in law Jared Kushner, Trump says he will probably not have a formal position in the White House but could "could be a player on Mideast peace.
• Trump gets asked about his commitment to first amendment, says, "I think you'll be happy."
Haberman is an excellent reporter you should definitely follow on the Twitter - @maggieNYT
For more details on the meeting, click over to the New York Times.
Donald Trump's machinations with the press are beginning to cause whiplash for observers.
After initially scheduling a meeting with the New York Times editors and reporters, Trump abruptly cancelled via Twitter over "inaccurate" reporting and "nasty tone."
Hours later, Trump changed course and announced the meeting would take place today.
Trump originally asked for the meeting with Times executives, and also agreed to meet on the record with reporters and columnists.
The Times announced the meeting on Monday. But on Tuesday morning, Trump said on Twitter that the "terms and conditions" had changed at the last minute -- a claim The Times denied, saying it was in fact Trump who had tried to alter the conditions.
I cancelled today's meeting with the failing @nytimes when the terms and conditions of the meeting were changed at the last moment. Not nice
A portion of the meeting will be an on-the-record interview, as the newspaper originally wanted.
"Mr. Trump's staff has told us that the President Elect's meeting with The Times is on again," Eileen Murphy, head of communications for the Times, said in a statement. "He will meet with our publisher off-the-record and that session will be followed by an on-the-record meeting with our journalists and editorial columnists."
After the New York Times published an article detailing the alleged sexual assaults on two women by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, the Trump campaign predictably and publicly sent a letter to the Times demanding the newspaper retract the story.
"The essence of a libel claim, of course, is the protection of one's reputation. Mr. Trump has bragged about his non-consensual sexual touching of women. He has bragged about intruding on beauty pageant contestants in their dressing rooms. He acquiesced to a radio show host's request to discuss Mr. Trump's own daughter as a "piece of ass." Multiple women not mentioned in our article have publicly come forward to report on Mr. Trump's unwanted advances. Nothing in our article has had the slightest effect on the reputation that Mr. Trump, through his own words and actions, has already created for himself."
See the full response below. Click the image to enlarge.
The venerable New York Times today endorsed Democrat Hillary Clinton for president.
I'm certain it's no surprise to Republican Donald Trump that his hometown paper doesn't see him as the future leader of the free world. In fact, the Times refers to him as "the worst nominee put forward by a major party in modern American history." (bolding is mine).
The editors focus here on the reasons why voters should consider Clinton this election cycle.
From the editorial board of the New York Times:
In any normal election year, we’d compare the two presidential candidates side by side on the issues. But this is not a normal election year. A comparison like that would be an empty exercise in a race where one candidate — our choice, Hillary Clinton — has a record of service and a raft of pragmatic ideas, and the other, Donald Trump, discloses nothing concrete about himself or his plans while promising the moon and offering the stars on layaway. (We will explain in a subsequent editorial why we believe Mr. Trump to be the worst nominee put forward by a major party in modern American history.)
But this endorsement would also be an empty exercise if it merely affirmed the choice of Clinton supporters. We’re aiming instead to persuade those of you who are hesitating to vote for Mrs. Clinton — because you are reluctant to vote for a Democrat, or for another Clinton, or for a candidate who might appear, on the surface, not to offer change from an establishment that seems indifferent and a political system that seems broken.
Running down the other guy won’t suffice to make that argument. The best case for Hillary Clinton cannot be, and is not, that she isn’t Donald Trump.
The best case is, instead, about the challenges this country faces, and Mrs. Clinton’s capacity to rise to them.
The Times goes on to list Hillary's considerable experience including her "substantial" achievements as secretary of state, her work on behalf of 9/11 first responders' health care, her efforts in the Senate Arms Forces Committee, her "unusual capacity to reach across the aisle," her life-long record of service to children and families, and her "reputation for grit and bipartisan collaboration."
The editorial board notes that Hillary's career spans the post-Cold War era of the 90s to today's ever-changing political landscape of a world "darkened" by the rise of terrorism.
The endorsement closes thusly:
Mrs. Clinton’s service spans both eras, and she has learned hard lessons from the three presidents she has studied up close. She has also made her own share of mistakes. She has evinced a lamentable penchant for secrecy and made a poor decision to rely on a private email server while at the State Department. That decision deserved scrutiny, and it’s had it. Now, considered alongside the real challenges that will occupy the next president, that email server, which has consumed so much of this campaign, looks like a matter for the help desk. And, viewed against those challenges, Mr. Trump shrinks to his true small-screen, reality-show proportions, as we’ll argue in detail on Monday.
Through war and recession, Americans born since 9/11 have had to grow up fast, and they deserve a grown-up president. A lifetime’s commitment to solving problems in the real world qualifies Hillary Clinton for this job, and the country should put her to work.
Excellent essay in the New York Times by Paul Krugman wherein he references the 2000 George W. Bush/Al Gore election, and asks journalists to hit pause occasionally and "ask whether they are reporting facts or simply engaging in innuendo." He also urges voters to try and read with a critical eye when taking in political news.
Just an excerpt:
True, there aren’t many efforts to pretend that Donald Trump is a paragon of honesty. But it’s hard to escape the impression that he’s being graded on a curve. If he manages to read from a TelePrompter without going off script, he’s being presidential. If he seems to suggest that he wouldn’t round up all 11 million undocumented immigrants right away, he’s moving into the mainstream. And many of his multiple scandals, like what appear to be clear payoffs to state attorneys general to back off investigating Trump University, get remarkably little attention.
Meanwhile, we have the presumption that anything Hillary Clinton does must be corrupt, most spectacularly illustrated by the increasingly bizarre coverage of the Clinton Foundation.
Step back for a moment, and think about what that foundation is about. When Bill Clinton left office, he was a popular, globally respected figure. What should he have done with that reputation? Raising large sums for a charity that saves the lives of poor children sounds like a pretty reasonable, virtuous course of action. And the Clinton Foundation is, by all accounts, a big force for good in the world. For example, Charity Watch, an independent watchdog, gives it an “A” rating — better than the American Red Cross.
"When Donald Trump's security escorted the Univision anchor Jorge Ramos out of a news conference on Tuesday, I decided that I was officially done." - New York Times op-ed columnist Charles Blow
I've been wondering all week why, after almost two decades of operation, the Department of Homeland Security decided to focus on, and ultimately raid, the offices of gay escort website Rentboy.
Especially when you consider that dozens of straight escort sites continue to operate in New York City. Why just target the gay escort site?
Apparently, I'm not the only one as the New York Times editorial board pens an op-ed questioning the motivation and ultimate goals of the office raid.
Prosecutors can credibly argue that the site’s operators were breaking the law. But they have provided no reasonable justification for devoting significant resources, particularly from an agency charged with protecting America from terrorists, to shut down a company that provided sex workers with a safer alternative to street walking or relying on pimps. The defendants have not been accused of exploiting sex workers, featuring minors on the website, financial crimes or other serious offenses that would warrant a federal prosecution.
Amnesty International announced this month that it would be pushing for the decriminalization of consensual sex work worldwide. After a lengthy and at times fraught debate, the organization’s experts concluded that sex workers were less likely to be harmed and exploited in places where the trade is lawful. Several gay and transgender rights organizations, including Lambda Legal and the Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders, issued a joint statement supporting Amnesty International’s position.
[snip]
The Rentboy bust may spook clients and sex workers for a while, but it would be naïve to think it will do much more. Federal authorities should consider whether continuing to spend time and money turning the website’s operators into felons is worthwhile, while far more serious crimes, including human trafficking and sexual exploitation, go unpunished.
I'll add that I personally support the decriminalization of consensual sex work. I think as long as no one is physically harmed and it's between two consenting adults, the government shouldn't be involved.
Ted Cruz's new book will not be appearing on the New York Times' Bestseller List, even though he outsold all but two of the other books sold this past week.
A Times spokesman said: "In the case of this book, the overwhelming preponderance of evidence was that sales were limited to strategic bulk purchases."
Apparently, political peeps like to buy copies of their own book to give away to supporters to spread their message. However, in the past that has also helped get their books to the top of the list.
The policy at the Times currently is to not count these bulk purchases as the powers that be want the list to more closely reflect the sales to individuals and not "strategic bulk purchases."
I'm sure the conservative Right folks will be hating on the NY Times, but as the pundits point out in the clip below, several right-wing characters like Bill O'Reilly and Charles Krauthammer have had #1 rankings on the NY Times list.
As the time draws near that the U.S. Supreme Court will hand down it's ruling on same-sex marriage (very possibly this week), Frank Bruni of the New York Times addresses some opponents concerns that this evolution on marriage has come "too quickly" and "in an instant."
Nothing about this juncture feels quick if you soldiered through AIDS and the country’s awakening then to just how many gay, lesbian and bisexual Americans there are, just how profound our bonds can be, just how fiercely we’re willing to fight for them, just how ardently we ache to be included.
Nothing about it feels quick if you consider that Evan Wolfson, a chief architect of the political quest for same-sex marriage, wrote a thesis on the topic at Harvard Law School in 1983, or if you remember how passionately the issue of same-sex marriage was debated in the 1990s, when the Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA, was passed.
Nothing about it feels quick if you’re among or you know gay and lesbian Americans who, in a swelling tide, summoned the grit and honed the words to tell family members, friends and co-workers the truth of our lives. Our candor came from more than personal need. It reflected our yearning for a world beyond silence and fear, and we knew that the only way to get there was through these small, aggregate acts of courage.
Same-sex marriage isn’t some overnight cause, some progressive novelty, especially not when it’s put in its proper context, as part of a struggle for gay rights that has been plenty long, patient and painful.
[snip]
Ask Edie Windsor. Her protest of the estate taxes that she was ordered to pay — but that a widow with a dead husband instead of a dead wife would have been spared — prompted the Supreme Court to gut DOMA two years ago.
She was married in Canada in 2007. When her wife first proposed to her, she gave Windsor a brooch instead of a ring, so that the diamond didn’t prompt questions from co-workers.
That was in 1967: nearly half a century ago. So don’t tell her that the idea of same-sex marriage needs more time to ripen.
A kiss is nothing. On the sidewalks, in the park, I see one every few minutes, a real kiss, lip to lip. It barely registers. It’s as unremarkable as a car horn in traffic, as an umbrella in rain.
And yet a kiss is everything. A kiss can stop the world.
The football player Michael Sam recently demonstrated as much.
[snip]
I feel robbed — wronged — if I sense that an awareness of other people’s gazes and a fear of their judgment are preventing him from doing that.
We shouldn’t be bound that way, and on the day of the pro football draft, in front of the cameras, Sam rightly declared that he wasn’t. He did so with a gesture at once humdrum and heroic, a gesture that connects everyone who has been in love and affirms what every love shares: physical tenderness, eye-to-eye togetherness. It was something to behold. It was something to hold on to.
Full essay (covering many of Hollywood's most famous kisses that broke society's taboos) here.
"The debate is essentially over, in the sense that the trajectory is immutable and the conclusion foregone. Everybody knows it, even the people who still try to stand in the way. The legalization of same-sex marriage from north to south and coast to coast is merely a matter of time, probably not much of it at that.” - from Frank Bruni's April 5th op-ed in the New York Times
A measure to outlaw discrimination based on gender identity or expression — the Gender Expression Non-Discrimination Act, or GENDA, sponsored by Assemblyman Richard Gottfried and Senator Daniel Squadron — passed the Democratic-led Assembly in April for the sixth time. There is a good chance it would also pass the Senate, with nearly all Democrats and some Republicans voting in favor. The challenge is getting the bill to the floor for an up-or-down vote before the end of the legislative session, scheduled on June 20.
Senator Jeffrey Klein, the Democratic leader in the Senate’s coalition leadership, must insist on a vote. He should tell Senator Dean Skelos, the coalition’s Republican leader, that bottling up bills like this one is not part of their power-sharing deal. It would help if Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a supporter of the bill, would commit political capital to enacting the legislation before the session ends. Sixteen states — including New Jersey and Connecticut — and the District of Columbia have enacted anti-discrimination protections covering transgender people. New York should not lag on this important civil rights issue.
The New York Times is reporting today that the nation's most influential pediatrics group has announced it's support for marriage equality and full adoption rights.
From the Times:
The academy’s new policy statement says same-sex marriage helps guarantee rights, benefits and long-term security for children, while acknowledging that it does not now ensure access to federal benefits. When marriage is not an option, the academy said, children should not be deprived of foster care or adoption by single parents or couples, whatever their sexual orientation.
“If the studies are different in their design and sample but the results continue to be similar, that gives scientists and consumers more faith in the result,” said Dr. Ellen Perrin, a co-author of the new policy and a professor of pediatrics at Tufts University School of Medicine.
President Obama holds a three-point advantage over Mitt Romney among Americans most likely to vote in November, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.
With their back-to-back political conventions behind them and the general election season fully engaged, the poll found Mr. Obama and Mr. Romney running essentially even among those seen as the most probable to vote. The president has 49 percent and Mr. Romney has 46 percent, a difference within the margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points on each candidate.
