The Rick Warren kick in the gut

The Advocate's Kerry Eleveld sums up my feelings about the Rick Warren debacle the best.

Does anybody else feel like they are in an abusive relationship?

It seems like every time lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people start feeling a sense of hope, President-elect Obama, America’s single greatest civil rights advancement in a century, manages to deal a blow to the community.

The Politico and others who claim that our screams of pain are about flexing gay political muscle or "looking for a fight," don't have a clue about what is really happening here. This isn't politics. Obama's pick of someone who campaigned against our rights -- a person who equates our deepest love and our families with sexual perversion -- isn't political. It's personal, and it hurts.

Going back to Eleveld's point about the LGBT community's relationship with the president-elect feeling just a tad abusive... Obama and his team should take note. At some point, most folks will leave an abusive relationship.

Great new resource for tracking the presidential election

By Diane Silver

I'm becoming a big fan of Advocate news editor Kerry Eleveld and her Election 2008 blog. This is, by far, the most sophisticated and useful resource I've seen for LGBT voters to use to track the presidential race and our issues. Eleveld appears to be a careful reporter, and she is certainly a clear writer who is familiar with LGBT issues.

PHOTO: Eleveld interviews Bill Richardson after his Logo/HRC Debate goof. For the full photo, see here.

Today's Must Read: Judging the best presidential candidate for gays

By Diane Silver

Kerry Eleveld has posted the best analysis I've seen, yet, on whether Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama or John Edwards would make the best president for LGBT Americans. Eleveld is the news editor of The Advocate. She frames the question in an interesting way.

The question for LGBT voters seems not to be which of these candidates is more supportive of gay issues – they have all conducted more LGBT outreach than previous politicians in their shoes. It’s more a matter of which candidate one believes will achieve the best results – the strategist, the bridge-builder, or the journeyer.