Today's Key Reads: AmericaBlog's credibility problems & Prop 8 repeal

Law Dork once again raises important questions concerning the credibility of one of the most popular sites in the progressive blogosphere - AmericaBlog. Since I started blogging -- interestingly enough, after hearing AmericaBlog founder John Aravosis speak -- I've been both fan and critic of his work. I love the fact that he picks up on issues quickly. I love his fighting spirit, but too often I've clicked on his links only to learn that his posts exaggerated, or even twisted, the facts. This isn't always true, but I've seen it happen often enough to cause me to worry when I read AmericaBlog.

I agree with Law Dork in this instance. While Aravosis claims that Obama's CNN interview proves that the President no longer wants to get rid of "don't ask, don't tell," I don't see it. Watch the video, and decide for yourself.

Meanwhile, Pam Spaulding is pleased that a coalition of LGBT activists representing people of color want to delay repeal of Proposition 8. While other activists want to mount a repeal campaign as early as 2010, the Prepare to Prevail coalition has announced that it wants to hold off until 2012. We are still waiting word from Equality California on its plans for Proposition 8.

Personally, I'm torn. A 2010 campaign could capitalize on the newly energized movement, but it could also fall flat because of tight resources and a lack of time to organize. The communities represented by Prepare to Prevail also may well prove to be the key to victory. Ignoring their wishes could be a very bad idea.

Serious concerns about the accuracy of Americablog reports

I have neglected following up on this, and I'm rushing now to get back to friends who have just come into town, so here's the short version: There are now serious concerns being expressed about the accuracy of some of Americablog's reports on the DOJ DOMA brief.

At issue is whether the DOJ has much leeway in defending an existing law and whether the DOJ brief compared same-sex marriage to incest and pedophilia. Lawdork says John Aravosis is flat-out wrong. Alex Blaze also complains.

Lawdork and Alex are making good points. We need to listen to them.

Obama appears to have just thrown LGBT America under the bus

It's beginning to look like it Obama just threw us under the bus -- and broke a campaign promise while doing so. In a 54-page brief defending (DEFENDING!!!) the Defense of Marriage Act, Obama's Justice Department compares marriage equality to incest and trots out every other familiar homophobic attack on LGBT people.

You can read the brief here.

Kudos to Americablog for getting the brief and breaking the details of the story. John Aravosis write:

I cannot state strongly enough how damaging this brief is to us. Obama didn't just argue a technicality about the case, he argued that DOMA is reasonable. That DOMA is constitutional. That DOMA wasn't motivated by any anti-gay animus. He argued why our Supreme Court victories in Roemer and Lawrence shouldn't be interpreted to give us rights in any other area (which hurts us in countless other cases and battles). He argued that DOMA doesn't discriminate against us because it also discriminates about straight unmarried couples (ignoring the fact that they can get married and we can't).

Pam Spaulding writes, and the emphasis is hers:

Friends, is this is the watershed mark, the line in the sand, the utter moral betrayal of this administration in black and white? Does this mean that we are not only expendable to this Administration, but that it has decided we can also be vilified as a constituency at will and not receive any blowback? That's balls. A brief with language like this could have been written by Liberty Counsel it's so homophobic; that it's written in legalese doesn't blunt the arguments being made here. It will be used to cause lasting damage to future civil rights gains.

I'm just now going through the brief in detail, but it is certainly looking like Pam is right.

LGBT groups and the ACLU express outrage.

See Americablog for breaking news.

Good point

From AmericaBlog on the blogstorm about the Human Rights campaign and DADT:

(N)o one believes that the White House has any intention of doing anything, regardless of any timetable.

That is, I think, the conundrum HRC is facing. If the White House has decided to distance itself from the gay community (and that's certainly what the community believes), and HRC is seen as in cahoots with that White House, the community will naturally assume that HRC signed off on the White House's effort to put gay rights on the back burner indefinitely.
....
People may generally love Obama. But gay people are pissed. And growing more so by the day. The overall impression in the gay community is that we've been, or are about to be, had by this administration; that someone in Obama-land (rhymes with Rahm) is telling the President that we're political pariahs who must be shunned at all costs. You don't get brownie points for being seen with those kind of friends.

My take: He's right on the money.

Happy Last Day

Happy Last Full Day of the Bush Presidency!* I saw this line on another blog, and just had to steal it. What a joy to be alive today.

Hat tip to AmericaBlog.


*Pass it on.

How LGBT America can defeat ourselves, or "nasty" doesn't win elections

Under the category of how LGBT America can defeat ourselves, comes today's comment from John Aravosis at AmericaBlog. (The emphasis is mine.) Speaking about the aftermath of the recent demonstrations protesting Proposition 8, he writes:

What comes after the protests? Postcard campaigns won't cut it. Nor will having a day without gays. We need a real campaign, a real war, real strategies - mean, nasty, vicious and, above all else, effective strategies targeted at achieving a concrete goal that moves our movement, moves our rights, forward.

Aravois' entire post is worth reading because he is right that we won't win equality by doing nothing more than protesting. But "mean, nasty, vicious" is neither effective politics nor right. Attempting to out-nasty our political opponents will only make us look like the villains.

To win equality, we have to learn how to better exercise political power, but we also have to win hearts and minds. The good news is that we are already doing the latter. The bad news is that we'll lose that battle in a heartbeat if we decide that the only way to win is to be vicious.

Personally, I also refuse to be part of a movement that is based on hurting others. Isn't that what we're fighting against?

Thank you, Massachusetts

By Diane Silver

I'm still thinking about the victory for marriage equality today in Massachusetts.

I am stunned by how important this is to me. I'm sitting here in Kansas, nearly 1,500 miles from Boston, yet I want to cry.

From a practical point of view, today's win means that the gay rights movement doesn't have to spend the next year pouring resources and energy into keeping same-sex marriage alive in Massachusetts. That will free up people and money to work for fairness in the rest of the country.

But the victory in Massachusetts means far more than that. If there is equality in one place in this nation, there is hope for equality everywhere.

Even here in Kansas. Even here.

Check out this powerful post at AMERICAblog for a first-person account of today's events.

The hidden national nastiness of gay marriage bans

By Diane Silver

When we fought the Kansas ban on same sex marriage in 2005, I was struck by how vigorously our opponents claimed that the ban would never hurt a soul.

Over and over again, they assured voters that voting "yes" on the constitutional amendment would only ban something that was already illegal. In the end, Kansas voters gave in and approved the ban.

It has now been just over a year since voters passed that amendment in Kansas. In other states, similar constitutional amendments have also been approved.

Meanwhile, with every passing day there is new evidence that everything the religious right said about these amendments was a lie. People are being hurt. Both gays and straights are losing health insurance and other employment benefits. Some are even losing the right to prosecute abusers for beating them up, and that's just the start.

At issue are the strictest of the marriage bans, such as those passed in Kansas, Michigan, Ohio and Kentucky. Denying marriage equality to millions of citizens is bad enough, but the strictest bans also use vague language to deny anything that might look remotely like marriage. At the very least, these horrendous amendments outlaw civil unions.

However, officials in many states are going much further than that. Here are just a few of the problems law-abiding citizens are encountering because of these so-called "harmless" bans.

*The city of Kalamazoo, Mich., has just taken away health benefits from the partners of its lesbian and gay employees. Domestic partner benefits may soon also be taken away from the domestic partners of lesbian and gay state workers, and employees at the University of Michigan and Wayne State University. All of this has happened because of the Michigan constitutional amendment banning gay marriage .

*The attorney general of Kentucky this week issued an opinion saying that the University of Kentucky and the University of Louisville will be violating that state's constitutional ban if they provide health insurance benefits to domestic partners. Those benefits were planned to go in effect on July 1.

*In Ohio, a straight woman was unable to pursue charges against an abusive boyfriend because of the marriage ban.

* The governor of Ohio says the marriage ban will make it hard for the state to outlaw workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

What I have never understood is how it helps this nation to keep LGBT citizens from getting jobs and having health insurance. What does the religious right think it gets by hurting lesbian and gay families and their children?

I don't know if those questions can be answered. Perhaps, like many voters in Kansas, people just aren't thinking. Perhaps they don't understand the consequences of their votes, or perhaps, as John Aravosis says over at AMERICAblog: "The religious right pretty much wants us dead."

I know some like Fred Phelps do believe that all gays should be put to death. On the other hand, I know that many other honest Americans don't. I think it's time for folks to wake up and understand what their votes are doing. It's time to stop believing the lies of the religious right.

Pam at the House Blend has some interesting comments and questions for the Democratic presidential candidates on this topic.
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PHOTO: Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon -- together for more than 50 years -- on Feb. 12, 2004, when they were married in city hall in San Francisco. Six months later their marriage and those of many other same sex couples were legally voided.

Jerry Falwell is dead, & this lesbian is sad

By Diane Silver

Wow. I just saw the news on the Washington Post. One of the founders of the modern religious right, Jerry Falwell, has died at age 73.

If you want the angry reaction to Falwell, look here at Americablog.

Everything John Aravosis says in that post is true.

Falwell caused a lot of pain and hurt many people. His rhetoric may well have fueled laws that helped break families apart and take children from loving parents. His words gave gay bashers an excuse to assault anyone they thought was queer.

I'm not going to talk right now about his impact on choice, the rights of women and other issues. I'm not going to talk about the political work he did through the Moral Majority and all those hurt by it, or the impact of Liberty University, or go into detail on how he seemed to demonize everyone who didn't agree with him.

All of that is true, but I'm not dancing today. I'm not shouting for joy because a human being is dead, and truthfully, I don't think that's what Aravosis is doing. He's angry and fearful, and he and all Americans have a right to be angry and scared.

At this moment, though, I don't seem to be able to work up any indignation. I'm a lesbian. Falwell hurt my people, hurt me, in a thousand ways, yet in this moment all I feel is sadness.

I'm sure Falwell has a family. I'm sure he has loved ones and children and friends who will miss him enormously. My sadness has a bit to do with mourning the death of anyone, but even that's not all of what I feel.

My sadness is over the loss of a chance. Falwell, apparently, was never able to come close to a loving God, the God of inclusion, the God of welcome. If he had, he wouldn't have been able to say or do what he did. He must have carried a lot of pain to not be able to see that all-inclusive God of love. For that lost chance, for Falwell's lost chance, I mourn.

May his family, friends and loved ones find peace and support in dealing with their loss.