Civil Rights

By Dan Aiello
California Progress Report

In the last hours of the legislative session, Sen. Mark Leno (D-SF) successfully shepherded a resolution condemning the government of Uganda for the African nation's escalating persecution of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people after finding the 21 floor votes needed to pass the measure. 

Conservative Republican Senator Roy Ashburn, who recently admitted he was gay, voted against the resolution.

A similar House Resolution authored by Assemblymember Tom Ammiano (D-SF) was scheduled for a vote when the legislature reconvenes for the budget. Both Uganda resolutions are part of a package of 14 bills sponsored by Equality California this year.

By Maya Rupert
National Center for Lesbian Rights

If the goal of Glenn Beck’s “Restoring Honor” rally, held in the same place and on the 47th anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech, was irony, Beck should be proud.

While the rally was billed as nonpolitical, it was clearly the rhetoric of the Tea Party that was being espoused by Beck, Sarah Palin, and King’s niece, Alveda King, whose role, as best I can tell, was to be Black and a relative of King so that the hijacking of his legacy felt less like highway robbery and more like shoplifting. The theme: Government intervention is not the answer but the problem, and identity is irrelevant.

After the rally, Beck went on Fox News Sunday and sounded like a Bizarro King extolling the virtue of a colorblind society where “race should not be a part of politics” and no government action to address discrimination is needed.

By Marc Solomon
Equality California
Crossposted from The Advocate

The last few weeks in the California marriage battles have been at once hopeful and painful. First we rode an ecstatic wave upward: Judge Vaughn Walker issued a powerful opinion striking down Proposition 8, and we celebrated as couples made plans to get married across the state.

Then we rode downward when a three-judge panel of the U.S. court of appeals for the ninth circuit granted an indefinite stay of the decision — without explanation. Committed couples and their families, some of whom had begun making wedding plans, once again felt the pain of being denied not only a fundamental right but also the respect for and recognition of their love and commitment that only marriage offers.

By Dan Aiello
California Progress Report

Just one day before a new survey release showed California's incumbent Democratic Senator, Barbara Boxer, holding a narrow, one point lead over her conservative opponent,  Carly Fiorina, a new Texas-based and funded group announced its plan to assist the Texas native and former Hewlett Packard CEO in her bid to unseat Boxer and restore Republican control of the US Senate.

The Karl Rove-linked conservative group, Crossroads GPS, an affiliate of Rove's American Crossroads, announced it will hit Los Angeles airwaves Wednesday with a $1 million dollar ad campaign attacking Boxer's support of Medicare cuts that were a part of President Obama's health-care overhaul, according to the Los Angeles Times on Wednesday. 

By Earl Ofari Hutchinson
New America Media

Glenn Beck is either a liar or was simply mistaken as he claims that he got the date confused. The date is August 28, the same date as the 47th anniversary of the March on Washington. This is the date that Beck picked for his “Restoring Honor” rally in Washington D.C. Beck says he had no idea the date is a sacred day for civil rights leaders, and that it was pure coincidence he’ll rally that day.

Civil rights leaders don’t buy it, and neither do I. The provocative, over the top, incendiary talk show host doesn’t do anything by accident. He always has a keen eye on anything that he does. One eye is on what will shock, grab, and infuriate the largest number of people. That always ties in to his eternal hunt for ratings, ratings, and more ratings. Ratings are the mother’s milk of cable talk shows. Beck has delivered them better than most.

By Scott Martelle
Protect Consumer Justice

Wrong.

That’s the short response to a column over on Capitol Weekly that raises the specter of a “constitutional coup” by advocates of gay marriage, one of the odder pieces I’ve read about California’s Proposition 8, the legal challenge against it and U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker’s ruling that it is unconstitutional.

The gist of the column by Mathew McReynolds, staff attorney for the conservative Pacific Justice Institute, is that the Prop. 8 ruling is bad because it means supporters of gay marriage will be able to sue their opponents into oblivion if they don’t recognize gay marriage rights.

By Earl Ofari Hutchinson
New America Media

No president has ever had more pejorative labels slapped on him than Barack Obama. He’s been branded a Bolshevik, socialist, Nazi (go figure), an anarchist, leftist, an alien, and of course, un-American.

So it’s no surprise that so many Americans think Obama is a Muslim. This week, a new Pew Research Center poll found a big increase in the number of Republicans who believe this lie. Even a growing number of Democrats and independents think that the president is a Muslim, or at least, not a Christian.

By Kate Kendell
National Center for Lesbian Rights

In the weeks leading up to the Proposition 8 trial, much was made in the media, blogs, and everyday conversations about the unlikely duo leading the legal challenge against the shameful California ballot measure that stripped marriage from same-sex couples.

The two, Ted Olson and David Boies, are an unlikely pairing on many levels. They are political adversaries, and famously opposed each other in Bush v. Gore. They are each high-powered and highly paid inside-the-beltway lawyers. Ted is a long-time darling of the conservative movement, a former U.S. Solicitor General and a founder of the Federalist Society. David is a Democratic Party insider and an advisor to a number of key Democratic leaders. And, finally, both are straight, and had no apparent prior interest or experience in lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender issues.

By Brian Leubitz

This is cross-posted from the Prop 8 Trial Tracker

That's exactly what the American "Family" Association wants to do. In an email to their supporter list, the AFA called for Congress to impeach Judge Walker for failing to conduct himself with "good Behaviour":

Yesterday (August 4), U.S. District Chief Judge Vaughn Walker single-handedly overturned California's Prop. 8, which elevated protection for one-man, one-woman marriage to its state constitution.

In doing so, he frustrated the expressed will of seven million  Californians who went to the polls to shape their state's public policy  on marriage. ...

By Paul Hogarth
Beyond Chron

Judge Vaughn Walker’s decision Wednesday overruling Proposition 8 on due process and equal protection grounds was everything that marriage equality supporters could have hoped for. But despite all the exuberance, everyone knew that appealing the case was only a matter of time – and the U.S. Supreme Court would have final say. Walker’s legal analysis argued that “strict scrutiny” was the standard for laws that discriminate against gays and lesbians, but said that Prop 8 even failed the more lenient “rational basis” test.