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Ted Lieu said he designed the bill to deny parental rights. SACRAMENTO, August 30, 2012, (LifeSiteNews.com) - A first-of-its-kind state measure banning voluntary therapy for same-sex attraction for minors has passed California’s Assembly, moving it a step closer to law, pending the reconciliation of the bill’s versions this week. The latest version of the bill states that California has a compelling interest in protecting minors against “exposure to serious harms caused by sexual orientation change efforts,” and prohibits any mental health professional from providing sexual orientation therapy to individuals under 18 years old.  The measure passed by a 51-21 vote...

A new bill that’s the first of its kind has opinion hotly divided in California, this time over whether parents can be banned from trying to “cure” their gay children. Senate Bill 1172, which would prohibit all “sexual orientation change efforts” for minors, is through the legislature and slated to land on the governor's desk in September.

Ever since the Republican Red Tide that swept the country stopped at the Sierra Nevada in November, we've been wondering how California's GOP would attract new party members. (By the way, the Sierra also gave the Donner party problems in November, but that was a snowy winter nearly 165 years ago, and we digress.) The influence of Republicans, who hold just 43 of the Legislature's 120 seats, has been threatened again recently by newly drawn districts, particularly in the Senate. But judging by some votes cast in the Senate last week, members of the state's Grand Old Party aren't quite...

A Sacramento-based advocacy group has filed referendum papers seeking to let voters decide the fate of a new California law requiring public schools to teach about societal contributions made by gay and lesbian people. Capitol Resource Institute, which describes itself as a "watchdog for family values," filed its documents this month with the state Attorney General's Office, which is a prelude to launching a signature-gathering campaign. The group hopes to kill Senate Bill 48, legislation that Gov. Jerry Brown said "represents an important step forward for our state"

SAN DIEGO (AP) -- A former Navy operations specialist is organizing what is believed to be the nation's first military contingent of active-duty troops and veterans to lead a gay pride parade. Sean Sala says the group will march Saturday in San Diego's parade, the nation's fifth largest.

Gov. Jerry Brown has signed a controversial bill to include the contributions of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans in California's public school textbooks. After the governor signed the bill introduced by Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, he released a statement that said, "History should be honest. This bill revises existing laws that prohibit discrimination in education and ensures that the important contributions of Americans from all backgrounds and walks of life are included in our history books. It represents an important step forward for our state, and I thank Sen. Leno for his hard work on this historic legislation."

7-14-2011 SACRAMENTO – Governor Edmund G. Brown, Jr. announced today that he has signed the following bill: • SB 48 by Senator Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) – Pupil instruction: prohibition of discriminatory content.

The California state legislature has passed a book-banning law. Nobody is calling the book ban a book ban because the books the book ban bans offend homosexuals. If the legislature had extended legislative protection to the hurt feelings of, say, Mormons or evangelical Christians, then everyone would have agreed that it’s a book ban. But it doesn’t, so don’t call the book ban a book ban. You just might get banned, too. The legislation, awaiting the signature of Governor Jerry Brown, decrees that localities in America’s most populous state “shall not adopt any textbooks or other instructional materials for use...

Head of the class: San Francisco schools already teach LGBT history, and they’ve done so since 1992. Read more at the San Francisco Examiner: http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/2011/07/bill-mandate-teaching-lgbt-history-moves-closer-classroom#ixzz1RM19rOze Prominent figures in LGBT history could play a larger role in classrooms throughout the state after a bill requiring their inclusion into California curriculum passed the state Assembly on Tuesday and headed to the governor’s desk.The FAIR Education Act by Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, would require schools to teach at all grade levels the historical contributions of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.If signed into law by Gov. Jerry Brown, schools would have to...

Textbooks and history classes in California schools would be required to include the contributions of gays, lesbians and transgender Americans under a proposal given final legislative approval in the Assembly on Tuesday and sent to Gov. Jerry Brown.

<p>Reporting from Sacramento— Textbooks and history classes in California schools would be required to include the contributions of gays, lesbians and transgender Americans under a proposal given final legislative approval in the Assembly on Tuesday and sent to Gov. Jerry Brown.</p>

A California bill working its way through the state legislature providing more protection for transgender individuals in the workplace could allow for cross-dressing employees to wear whatever they want to work, despite workplace dress codes. AB 887, which passed through the state's Assembly on May 16, is causing a stir among critics who feel it's raising the identity of a transgender individual to the same level as one's ethnicity or gender.

Gov. Jerry Brown declared Sunday as the state's second ever "Harvey Milk Day," saying the slain politician's "life was cut short far too soon, but his legacy of hope, tolerance, and equality lives on." Sunday would have been Milk's 81st birthday. The San Francisco supervisor and gay rights leader was shot and killed, as was Mayor George Moscone, by another supervisor in 1978. "In 1977, Harvey Milk was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, becoming the first openly gay man in the history of the United States to be elected to public office," Brown's proclamation reads in part....

An overwhelming majority of Americans say elementary school is no place to promote the homosexual lifestyle, and even among liberals there is the strong belief that such lessons should be left outside the door of the classroom, according to a new poll. The results are from a WND/WENZEL Poll conducted for WND by the public-opinion research and media consulting company Wenzel Strategies. "Whether they object on moral grounds or simply out of concern that many U.S. schools are failing in their core missions of teaching basics doesn't really matter – the vast majority of American adults want this type of...

Reporting from Sacramento -- As the battle over same-sex marriage makes its way through California's courts, another gay rights fight is smoldering in the Legislature. Democratic lawmakers have revived a plan to require state schools to teach about the contributions of gay, lesbian and transgender Americans. They are reigniting a movement that halted five years ago when legislators approved such a requirement only to run into opposition from then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Now, with a Democrat in the governor's office, the lawmakers and gay rights activists are more hopeful that school curricula will be revised.

CA State Senator Mark Leno has issued a proclamation to coincide with the launch of "My Uncle's Wedding", a new book which introduces children as early as 4 to same-sex marriage (Amazon.com has the book listed under "Marriage & Divorce" and "Gay & Lesbian Parenting & Families"). Here is Leno's proclamation: “Congratulations as we celebrate the launching of ‘My Uncle’s Wedding!’ As one of the few children’s books that address LGBT issues, it serves as a conduit by which to bolster understanding in our community. The book plays a vital role in creating a brighter future for our lesbian, gay,...

The state Supreme Court voted unanimously today to decide the legal standing issue in the Proposition 8 same-sex marriage case now before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The federal appeals court had asked the state's high court to provide guidance on whether ProtectMarriage.com, the proponents of the 2008 ballot measure, could defend it before the 9th Circuit.

Lawmakers in the state of California are proposing a law that would require schools to portray lesbians, homosexuals, transsexuals and those who have chosen other alternative sexual lifestyles as positive role models to children in all public schools there. "SB 48: The worst school sexual indoctrination ever" is how officials with the Campaign for Children and Families describe the proposal, SB 48, sponsored by state Sen. Mark Leno. Openly homosexual, Leno boasts on his website of founding a business with his "life partner, Douglas Jackson," who later died of AIDS complications. That description as "worst" is considerable, considering the Campaign...

A few days ago I wrote about the homosexual activist’s witch hunt against normalcy. I pointed out that the latest threshold of insanity is being pushed in the textbooks in Great Britain where activists would indoctrinate children to accept homosexuality not only in health class but in math and science class.In that article I reminded readers how liberals in America continually look to socialist Europe and demand that the United States follow in those footsteps (to ruin). I said it would only be a matter of time before Leftists pushed it here. Little did I know that it was already...

While the courts continue to debate the legality of same-sex marriage, the battle over gay civil rights is moving into another arena: the classroom. State Sen. Mark Leno, a San Francisco Democrat, introduced legislation this week that would amend the state education code, mandating that LGBT history be included in the curriculum of public schools. The bill — dubbed the Fair, Accurate, Inclusive and Respectful Education Act — calls for accurate and fair portrayal of LGBT historical figures who have contributed to shaping social and political issues across the nation. Leno said a shift in education policy would have a...