Bil Browning: Give Me $5 Now Please

from The Bilerico Project

Once again, a generous donor and Bilerico reader has offered to match donations to Bilerico Project’s ActBlue Maine Page up to $1000 to help protect marriage equality for all families! The deadline for this is in six hours!

We need your help, though! Our donor will only match if at least 12 people contribute. After all the excitement of the National Equality March, let’s come out in strong support of Maine and help us meet our goal!

Donate to No On 1/Maine marriage equality via Bilerico’s ActBlue page and your donation will be doubled! You have to act fast though – state law cuts off contributions for this reporting period at 11:59pm tonight! Donate now to get twice the benefit!!

If 1/4 of our RSS subscribers alone gave $5, we’d be able to give Maine an extra $6000 at the last moment when they need it most. If you can’t do much, can you give $5?

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Appeals Court: State Can Release R-71 Petition Names

by Gene Johnson | Seattle Times

Washington’s secretary of state can release the names and addresses of people who signed petitions calling for a public vote on the state’s expanded benefits for domestic partners, a federal appeals court said today.

A panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a previous decision by U.S. District Judge Ben Settle in Tacoma to block release of the petitions.

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Hartford Courant editorial

Photo by Jewel Samad for AFP/Getty Images

Barack Obama’s “fierce” support for gay rights, expressed well before he was elected president, had long come as sweet music to the ears of gay rights advocates accustomed to a mostly hostile reception in the halls of government.

Sadly, President Obama’s promises — reiterated once again Saturday night at the annual dinner of the Washington-based Human Rights Committee — are becoming a tired old refrain.

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Two Republicans Stand By Same-Sex Marriage

by Tim Craig | Washington Post

Two leading Republicans in the District have announced their support for efforts to legalize same-sex marriage in the city.

Robert J. Kabel, chairman of the D.C. Republican Committee, and Patrick Mara, an unsuccessful Republican D.C. Council nominee last year, pledged to lobby Republicans on Capitol Hill to stay out of the local same-sex marriage debate.

“On behalf of a large constituency of D.C. Republicans, we would like to thank you,” the two wrote to D.C. Council member David A. Catania (I-At Large) last week after he introduced his legislation. “We appreciate your efforts in supporting this long overdue legislation in the District of Columbia. . . . We would like to offer our support in aiding the advancement of this bill in Congress, particularly amongst Republicans.”

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Most Kalamazoo City Commission Candidates at Forum Say They Support Gay-Rights Ordinance

by Kathy Jessup | Kalamazoo Gazette

The Kalamazoo Alliance for Equality didn’t directly ask Kalamazoo City Commission candidates Monday if they support a proposed city gay-rights ordinance.

But the 14 hopefuls who appeared at a KAFE-sponsored candidate forum were nearly unanimous in expressing support for the measure that would make it an infraction to discriminate in housing, employment or public accommodations based on sexual orientation or gender identification.

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Gay Partnership Foes, Backers in Washington Await Ruling

from the Associated Press

Supporters and foes of gay domestic partnerships await a federal ruling from a three-judge panel on whether petitions for Washington states’s Referendum 71 should be made public.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments Wednesday in Pasadena, Calif., on whether signatures collected to repeal a domestic partnership law passed by the Washington Legislature during the last session should be released.

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Watch George Takei Discuss His Appearance on the Newlywed Game

Earlier this year, George Takei and his partner Brad Altman appeared on the Newlywed Game. Watch George Takei discuss the experience with the Newlywed Game’s host, Carnie Wilson.

Justice Department Seeks Action Versus Gay Discrimination

by Devlin Barrett | Associated Press

The Obama administration’s point man on civil rights said Wednesday he will seek to fight discrimination against gays, an area in which the Justice Department has had only a small role in the past.

Tom Perez, the assistant attorney general in charge of the department’s Civil Rights Division, said pending legislation in Congress will allow the department to attack discrimination against lesbian, gays, bisexuals and transgender people, a group often referred to by the acronym LGBT.

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