Out in Politics: August 2008 Archives

The Advocate will go from being a twice-weekly publication to a monthly one, the new editor Jon Barrett confirmed at the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association's LGBT Media Summit in Washington, D.C.

"I don't think there is a need for a biweekly magazine anymore with the Web," Barrett said. "We will have more room for bigger stories and we're going to get better writers....You will see more news in the magazine."

Barrett's first issue is the one currently on newsstands that features a cover story about Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama. Here is an excerpt that is relevant to the debate that's been going on this week on this blog:

His promises to gay people -- full repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, a reversal of "don't ask, don't tell," immigration rights for same-sex couples, a fully inclusive Employment Non-Discrimination Act, and passage of the Matthew Shepard Act, which adds sexual orientation and gender identity to federal hate-crimes laws -- go further than any presidential nominee in history.

His stance on marriage is the one crashingly false note in his message to gay voters. It is difficult to understand his position as anything but calculated dissembling. Rick Garcia of Equality Illinois says, "I wish he was being brave and bold and doing the right thing, but it's his campaign's and his determination that it would not be helpful or beneficial when running for president of the United States at this particular time. I don't think he can risk any position other than the one he's taken."

Tracy Baim of Windy City Times observes that in Obama's most recent book, "he talks about a lesbian asking his position on marriage. He says, 'I might be on the wrong side of history....' Anybody who says that is self-aware enough to know that they in fact are on the wrong side of history."

Baim remembers pushing Obama in an interview to explain what she calls his "basic hypocrisy" on the issue: "I could sense someone who was trying to be practical and not treat it emotionally. I sat there and said, 'I don't have the same rights as you.' And he said, 'You're not going to get them right away, but here's what is possible.' That kind of equivocation can drive an activist crazy, but his job as a politician is to be practical."

Here is a LINK to the complete cover story by Michael Joseph Gross.

I guess Ellen and Portia won't be getting a wedding gift from Democratic Presidential nominee Barack Obama. He said over the weekend that "I believe that marriage is the union between a man and a woman...I am not somebody who promotes same-sex marriage, but I do believe in civil unions."

I'm not gonna be knee-jerk because this position is no surprise. But hearing him say it causes me to be very angry and disappointed all over again. Does he believe in equal rights for all or not?

You really didn't want The National Enquirer to get it right for once. But they did: After months of denials, John Edwards finally admitted on Friday that he cheated on his wife Elizabeth.

I have long liked Elizabeth Edwards more than her husband. The biggest reason is because she has unabashedly been a staunch supporter of equal rights for gay people - including their right to marry each other. John Edwards, like all other Democratic candidates, did not. John even went so far as to say that he just couldn't wrap his head around it, being a churchgoing Southern boy and all.

But I don't want to judge him on his infidelity. It happens. Marriages can survive it, or not.
But his lying about it publicly is what makes him look even worse. The former senator and vice presidential candidate did an exclusive interview with Bob Woodruff on ABC's "Nightline" last night. He seemed pretty open but also still not completely honest. So is it his baby? Why would he agree to meet this woman at the Beverly Hilton Hotel last month? Did he really know nothing about the payments being made to this woman?

(I give Edwards major credit for not dragging his wife out to be interviewed to try and save his ass. He said he asked her not to come)

In a statement released yesterday, Edwards tries to explain why he lied: "I recognized my mistake and I told my wife that I had a liaison with another woman and asked for her forgiveness. Although I was honest in every painful detail with my family, I did not tell the public. When a supermarket tabloid told a version of the story, I used the fact that the story contained many falsities to deny it. But being 99% honest is no longer enough.

He does say that he is willing to take a paternity test to establish the fact that he's not the father of the baby "and I am truly hopeful that a test will be done so this fact can be definitively established. I only know that the apparent father has said publicly that he is the father of the baby.

Here's the one part of his statement, which he also discussed in the Nightline interivew, that seemed 100% truthful: "In the course of several campaigns, I started to believe that I was special and became increasingly egocentric and narcissistic. If you want to beat me up -- feel free. You cannot beat me up more than I have already beaten up myself. I have been stripped bare and will now work with everything I have to help my family and others who need my help."
Elizabeth Edwards, had been diagnosed with breast cancer after the 2004 presidential campaign. But, her husband pointed out, was in remission when he had his affair (how does this make it better?). She has since been diagnosed with an incurable bone cancer.

Elizabeth released a statement that is supportive of her husband, but is also candid and real. Not like most political wives who would stand there smiling at their sinning husband and have no comment whatsoever: "Our family has been through a lot. Some caused by nature, some caused by human weakness, and some -- most recently -- caused by the desire for sensationalism and profit without any regard for the human consequences. None of these has been easy. But we have stood with one another through them all. Although John believes he should stand alone and take the consequences of his action now, when the door closes behind him, he has his family waiting for him.

John made a terrible mistake in 2006. The fact that it is a mistake that many others have made before him did not make it any easier for me to hear when he told me what he had done. But he did tell me. And we began a long and painful process in 2006, a process oddly made somewhat easier with my diagnosis in March of 2007. This was our private matter, and I frankly wanted it to be private because as painful as it was I did not want to have to play it out on a public stage as well. Because of a recent string of hurtful and absurd lies in a tabloid publication, because of a picture falsely suggesting that John was spending time with a child it wrongly alleged he had fathered outside our marriage, our private matter could no longer be wholly private.

The pain of the long journey since 2006 was about to be renewed.

Admitting one's mistakes is a hard thing for anyone to do, and I am proud of the courage John showed by his honesty in the face of shame. The toll on our family of news helicopters over our house and reporters in our driveway is yet unknown. But now the truth is out, and the repair work that began in 2006 will continue. I ask that the public, who expressed concern about the harm John's conduct has done to us, think also about the real harm that the present voyeurism does and give me and my family the privacy we need at this time."

There's a couple of really good political stories on AfterElton.com today including the lead story on Gay-Baiting and what kind of role it might play for John McCain in the presidential election. It is a must read.

This excerpt is from the accompanying article The Pundits Speak: Keith Olbermann and other traditional journalists on gay issues

"When nobody can afford to go to a gay wedding, a straight wedding or a protest of a gay wedding, [the issue] is not going to make any difference," said Olbermann, host of MSNBC's "Countdown with Keith Olbermann." "This is the danger of values, if you will, and that's used as a facetious term, values politics - when that's all you've got, when reality intervenes, like nobody can afford to keep their home or put gasoline or home winter heating oil in it this winter, people are going to say, "You're serious? You want me to vote for you when you've ruined the economy, ruined our place in the world, haven't stopped terrorism, made us kind of the bullies of the world, and I'm supposed to vote for you because you have some phony baloney belief that gay people shouldn't have the right to be just as miserable as all the straight married people?"

Really, I sense in the country a strong sense of incredulity to a lot of this and it's not just gender or sexual orientation issues, but all these other things are just being trotted out and thrown out and nobody's responding to them.

God bless Cyndi Lauper. I love this woman. I love her honesty, courage to speak out, and boundless energy to entertain and to do good works on behalf of LGBT people.

Here is an excerpt from her new interview with The Times in the UK that I just found stunning because of its forthrightness. So many people try to be politically savvy or correct when really all we want is to hear what is in their heart.

Here is some of what is in Cyndi's:

Lauper, of course, is very popular with gays. "But I hate that expression," she says. Like they are not quite real people." Unlike some artists, who turn up at GAY or produce an album for the gay fans whenever the hits dry up, Lauper's commitment to the cause is genuine. Her sister Elen is a lesbian, and for a few years in her teens Cyndi tried to convince herself that she was, too. "My sister was gay, my best friends were gay, so I figured I had to be gay. So I did everything they did. I tried kissing girls. But it didn't feel right for me and eventually I was forced to come out as a heterosexual."

In 2007 she launched an annual True Colours tour, which this year features artists including the B52s and Andy Bell, and helps to raise awareness of homophobia. "This community for me is my beloved community," she says. "This is not a money-making venture. I have been running with this community all my life, and when I hear people like George Bush talk about the gay community being antiAmerican it makes my blood boil.

"The guy who saved the White House, one of the heroes who crashed that plane on 9/11, was gay - the rugby player Mark Bingham, who died on United 93. And does Bush ever mention that? Does he f***! That gay guy saved his lousy ass. And this guy who says he prays to God, this guy who promotes hate and fear, this guy we call our President . . . This guy is the true anti-American."