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Starbucks has joined the fight for gay marriage, as Washington state edges closer to becoming the seventh state to approve marriage equality. Executive vice president of Partner Resources at Starbucks sent an email to business partners yesterday afternoon with the subject, "RE: A Message From Kalen Holmes: Starbucks Supports Marriage Equality." "Starbucks is proud to join other leading Northwest employers in support of Washington State legislation recognizing marriage equality for same-sex couples," Holmes wrote.

A father has told a court he was only doing his duty as a Muslim by handing out leaflets calling for gay people to be executed. Kabir Ahmed, 28, said he handed a leaflet called Death Penalty? to a policeman and stuffed them through letterboxes across Derby because he was spreading the word of God as taught by Islam. He said: 'My intention was to do my duty as a Muslim, to inform people of God’s word and to give the message on what God says about homosexuality.' Married Ahmed, who has a nine-month-old daughter, is on trial with four...

The Advocate, an LGBT magazine, has released a list of what it says are the "gayest" cities in the U.S. The equation breakdown used is a bit different from what you may have expected. The magazine takes into account such parameters as LGBT bookstores and "International Mr. Leather competition semifinalists" among the nine criteria used to compile the list.

Candace Gingrich-Jones, the homosexual-rights activist half-sister of GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich, came out strongly against his candidacy because of his position on gay rights. “My brother is out of step with history on this issue,” she said. “Since a main thrust of his campaign is based on his knowledge of history this has got to be a red flag for voters. Do they want to elect someone who will try to block the inevitable tide? Or do they want someone who will go with the flow?” The person who will “go with the flow” according to Gingrich-Jones is President...

Texas Gov. Rick Perry said today that using foreign aid to combat human rights abuses against homosexuals in foreign countries is “not in America’s interests” and attacked President Obama’s decision to require U.S. agencies operating abroad to promote equal rights for gays as part of the administration’s “war on traditional American values.” “Just when you thought Barack Obama couldn’t get any more out of touch with America’s values, AP reports his administration wants to make foreign aid decisions based on gay rights. This administration’s war on traditional American values must stop,” Perry said in the statement. “Promoting special rights for...

Republican presidential candidate former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum speaks during a Republican presidential debate Tuesday, Oct. 18, 2011, in Las Vegas. Republican presidential candidate and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum laid out an ambitious social policy agenda on Friday during the first in a series of three policy speeches he will deliver over the coming weeks. The program Santorum outlined, the Des Moines Register reports, would include reinstating “don’t ask, don’t tell,� pursuing a constitutional ban on abortion, enforcing the Defense of Marriage Act and abolishing the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which has traditionally been liberal-minded. While other presidential...

Boy Scout/Cub Scout Charter Discussion Bob Casey—Pack 303, Britt Kennedy-Troop 303, Brad Schnell, PTO liaison, and Joe Mueller from the Greater St. Louis area council represented the Boy Scouts and answered questions. PTO members checked in at the door and received a blue card to be exchanged for a written ballot. The voting process was explained. Issues: Executive Committee role in supervising scouting activity and concerns if this is the role of the PTO. Boy Scouts/Cub Scouts are the only organizations that the PTO charters. Issues were brought to the Exec Council this summer and the PTO Exec council did...

Remember the 2002 Winter Olympics in Utah? Of course, that was what helped put Mitt Romney on the map nationally and internationally. Financially, the Salt Lake Organizing Committee (SLOC) was deep in the hole. Then the bribery scandal surrounding the bid hit the news in a big way. The foundering committee turned to Mitt Romney, a guy with a great track record in turning around failing businesses. Romney came in and made everything better than even the most optimistic had hoped. The games went well (except for the ice skating scandal) and made money. Romney, who had previously failed in...

Ever since liberals drug-tripped their way into thinking that marriage is a right, we've been bombarded with insipid comparisons between gay rights and the civil rights movement. Realistically, democrats started the gay rights movement during the civil rights movement when they had a raunchy love affair with Jim Crow.© (That's pretty clever, if I do say so myself. Kind of want to copyright that. ETA: Done.) This has given rise to a new gold standard in liberal insults: homophobia. Some clever little person realized that a few very vocal anti-gay people turned out to be fruity themselves. An energy-saving light...

"When I joined the military it was illegal to be homosexual, then it became optional... And now it's legal. I'm getting out before Obama makes it mandatory." -Gunny Sgt Harry Berres, USMC ______________________________________________________ More news, views, and right-wing humor at Reaganite Republican

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Like so many parents, Jessie and Cooper Odell spend their days helping their 8-year-old with homework, taking him to the park, playing football or attending church on Sundays. But their journey to becoming a typical family was anything but routine. "Until recently I always felt like I had to look over my back,'' said Jessie Odell, 39, a Palm Beach event planner who has cared for the boy since July and is finally able to adopt him. "God has finally given us what we've been fighting for.''

TULSA, Oklahoma -- Openly gay men and women don't have to hide their sexual orientation if they want to enlist in the military. The "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy in place since 1993 was repealed at midnight. Today, the Dennis R. Neill Equality Center hit the ground running and invited military recruiters for the very first time. The director of Oklahomans for Equality says It's an historic day and they wanted to celebrate. He says this is the only gay community center in the country to invite military recruiters to their facilities. Misty McConahy has served in the Oklahoma National...

President Barack Obama on Tuesday hailed the end of the policy banning gays from serving openly in the armed forces, as the Pentagon vowed "zero tolerance" for harassment of homosexuals in the military. "Today, the discriminatory law known as 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' is finally and formally repealed," Obama said in a statement. "As of today, patriotic Americans in uniform will no longer have to lie about who they are in order to serve the country they love." The repeal went into effect on Tuesday, ushering in a new era in the armed forces. The law had allowed gay men...

After years of debate and months of final preparations, the military can no longer prevent gays from serving openly in its ranks. Repeal of a 1993 law that allowed gays to serve only so long as they kept their sexual orientation private took effect Tuesday at 12:01 a.m. EDT.

A former Rainbow PUSH employee who filed a sexual discrimination complaint against the organization and Rev. Jesse Jackson with the Illinois Department of Human Rights in 2010 has now filed a lawsuit making similar allegations. Tommy Bennett, of Chicago’s South Shore neighborhood, alleges in the lawsuit that co-workers at Rainbow PUSH mocked and harassed him because he is gay when he worked for the civil rights group from 2007-2009. Bennett’s lawsuit, filed in Cook County Circuit Court, names Jackson and Rainbow PUSH as defendants.

Rick Welts is resigning as the president and chief executive of the Phoenix Suns, only four months after becoming the most prominent sports executive to publicly say that he is gay.

San Francisco -- Supervisor Scott Wiener's proposed legislation about the nude guys in the Castro is already a success. That is, assuming his intention was to make kooky San Francisco a national joke while doing nothing about the core problem. Wiener has come up with a plan to compel the nudies to put something under their bottoms when they sit in public chairs and cover up in restaurants. "What I am proposing is noncontroversial," he said. "Rather than try to hit one out of the park and take on the broader issue of public nudity, I am proposing a modest...

WASHINGTON — US officials have approved the distribution of a gay-themed magazine at Army and Air Force bases for the first time, coinciding with the end of a ban on openly gay troops, according to activists. OutServe Magazine, which caters to gay members of the armed forces, said it would deliver a special "repeal issue" on September 20, the day the prohibition against openly gay US service members is due to officially end. The upcoming edition will feature photos and biographies of nearly 100 service members who will be openly acknowledging their sexual orientation, the magazine said on its website...

According to a gushing Carol Marin column, State Representative Deborah Mell (D-40th) “quietly made Illinois history last week” by marrying a woman in Iowa. Judging by Marin’s tone, this must have been the equivalent of Abraham Lincoln issuing the Emancipation Proclamation. Quietly making history? Really? If a same sex marriage conducted in Davenport is splashed across the front page of a daily Chicago metropolitan newspaper, does it make a sound?

Several well-known researchers recently made unexpected arguments on pedophilia at an academic conference in Baltimore. Liberty Counsel Action's Matt Barber attended the conference and says he felt he was on a different planet, as the presenting professionals aimed to remove pedophilia from the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). That would mean that pedophilia would no longer be considered a mental disorder. "The entire focus of the event was on the victimhood of the pedophile," Barber accounts. There was "very little concern for the children who are the victims of these individuals when they...

One of the few issues on which opinion has moved left over the last few years is same-sex marriage. In 1996, Gallup found that Americans opposed it by a 68 percent to 27 percent margin. Last May, Gallup found Americans in favor by 53 percent to 45 percent. That’s a huge change in 15 years. Other polls have shown similar movement. Pew Research reported last week that 45 percent favored same-sex marriage and 46 percent were opposed — a dead heat. Pew polls in 2008 and 2009 found only 35 percent to 40 percent in favor. This is an issue...

Three city council members have been appointed to the advisory board of Iowa Republicans for Freedom, a GOP advocacy group aiming to promote and protect civil marriage for gays and lesbians in Iowa. Jeff Angelo, chairman of the organization, announced Thursday that Jason Gordon of Davenport, Craig Patterson of Grimes and Matt Walsh of Council Bluffs have been appointed.

WSVN-Fox 7’s Louis Aguirre, co-anchor of the popular entertainment show Deco Drive, is posting Facebook photos of his travelsin Berlin and Prague. Meanwhile, someone has posted five photos – purporting to be Aguirre –including two shots of a man’s genitals.

Rep. Allen West has made a bold statement in the defense of LGBT rights, sort of. The Tea Party-backed Republican Congressman known for some controversial views explained local paper South Florida Sun-Sentinel that he believed that “everyone has the same basic rights,” but “people can change their sexual behavior” like any other behavior, not that he wanted them to do that. “I can’t change my skin color,” he explained to an off-camera interviewer, “[but] people can change their sexual behavior– I’ve seen people do that.” He explained that, growing up in Georgia, he had a “very different perspective on human...

LOS ANGELES (CBS) — Will the Children’s Television Workshop give way to same-sex puppet love? An online campaign is calling for the producers of TV’s “Sesame Street” to allow characters Bert and Ernie to get married in an attempt to “put an end to the bullying and suicides of LGBT youth”, according to the group’s Facebook page. The petition letter adds that “[w]e are not asking that Sesame Street do anything crude or disrespectful by allowing Bert & Ernie to marry”, suggesting that the show “even add a transgender character to the show…in a tasteful way”.

Pundit Ann Coulter has joined gay conservative group GOProud as Honorary Chair of its Advisory Council, the group announced today: Coulter’s official title will be “Honorary Chair and Gay Icon.” “Ann Coulter is a brilliant and fearless leader of the conservative movement, we are honored to have her as part of GOProud’s leadership,” said Christopher Barron, Chairman of GOProud’s Board. “Ann helped put our organization on the map. Politics is full of the meek, the compromising and the apologists – Ann, like GOProud, is the exact opposite of all of those things. We need more Ann Coulters.” “I am honored...

An underground gay group in the military wants recruiters to reach out to the gay community in the same way they target blacks, Hispanics and women. The Pentagon’s ban on openly gays members is due to be lifted Sept. 20, meaning avowed gay people can sign up, those in the ranks can come out of the closet and the military will no longer discharge personnel because of sexual preference. What is unclear is the number of post-ban policies that might be adopted to meet the demands of gays and ease integration of different sexual identities. The group OutServe, which claims...

Very soon, the United States military will progress like much of the country already has. At the end of September, the military's discriminatory ban on gays serving openly will end. With the official abolishment of "don't ask, don't tell," gay service members will no longer be forced to lie in order to serve the country.

Willow Creek Community Church is no longer an affiliate of Exodus International, ending a relationship that spanned across several decades. Willow Creek spokespersons say they just wanted to rethink the South Barrington megachurch's affiliations, but Christianity Today reports that Exodus President Alan Chambers believes the church split from his organization to avoid public criticism. "The choice to end our partnership is definitely something that shines a light on a disappointing trend within parts of the Christian community," Chambers told the publication, "which is that there are Christians who believe like one another who aren't willing to stand with one another,...

Very short notice, but per Woofie, no info as to the subject matter, but he will be in the Briefing Room.

Friday night on CNN's Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees, the lead story was on a counseling clinic owned by presidential candidate Michele Bachmann (R-MN) and her husband. Cooper spoke of "allegations that the clinic engages in so-called reparative therapy," described by Cooper as "based on the theory that gay people can be turned into heterosexuals through a combination of prayer and willpower." The host's use of "so-called" set the stage for CNN political analyst Paul Begala to fulminate. Using the word "crackpot" to characterize reparative therapy no fewer than nine times, Begala insisted Mrs. Bachmann should be interrogated: BEGALA: She should...

SAN DIEGO (AP) -- More than 200 active duty troops and war veterans waving small American flags alongside rainbow banners are marching in San Diego's gay pride parade. It's believed to be the first time an identifiable group of active duty troops has participated in such an event in the U.S.

The media are at it once again with a real vendetta towing a hypocritical line. Enter CNN and HLN. Wolf Blitzer. Anderson Cooper. Dr. Phil and Dr. Drew, just to name a few. What has these networks and individuals – along with homosexual extremists and liberals – so fuming mad? Michele and Marcus Bachmann. If you haven't noticed lately, Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann is one of the fastest rising superstars in today's political arena – a Republican frontrunner in the race for the 2012 office of the president of the United States. Bachmann is Christian and conservative. She has a...

Former Dallas Cowboys great Michael Irvin appears shirtless on the cover of this month's gay men's magazine Out and discusses his passion for equality issues. Irvin publicly acknowledges that the impetus for taking a stand comes from his relationship with his gay brother, Vaughn, who died of stomach cancer in 2006. Irvin had not spoken publicly about his brother previously, according to the magazine.

Now that same-sex marriage has been legalized in New York, at least a few large companies are requiring their employees to tie the knot if they want their partners to qualify for health insurance. Should companies require gay employees to marry if they want health coverage for their same-sex partners? Corning, I.B.M. and Raytheon all provide domestic partner benefits to employees with same-sex partners in states where they cannot marry. But now that they can legally wed in New York, five other states and the District of Columbia, they will be required to do so if they want their partner...

Hate crime and battery charges have been filed against three teens accused of hurling anti-gay insults at a man and threatening him with a knife in a confrontation that began in a bathroom at Chicago’s Millennium station. Mack Heard, 17, and Kendrick L. Towner, 18, both of Richton Park, were ordered held in lieu of $50,000 bail each when they appeared today before Judge Maria Kuriakos Ciesil on a felony hate crime charge and a misdemeanor count of aggravated battery in a public place.

As a son of Georgetown University, I laughed at the pathetic Irish of Notre Dame when they made news for putting on their board Roxanne Martino, who gave a measly $27,000 to EMILY’s List, a group that works to elect pro-abortion politicians. That’s a trifle by Georgetown’s standards.

My eyes just about bugged out of my head when I saw a post about this on AmericaBlog. Of course they popped out when Anderson Cooper and Matt Drudge made the list in years past. Maybe since the word "gay" isn't in the official top 50 list, they can't get sued? But then, the truth is a defense in a libel case, and telling the truth really can't be defamation either, right? And I'd have to think that Out Magazine must be pretty sure about the orientation of the people they picked. And Shepard placed sixth! Welcome to the club,...

SAME-SEX WEDLOCK became lawful in New York last week after the state legislature passed a bill recognizing "otherwise-valid marriages without regard to whether the parties are of the same or different sex." Governor Andrew Cuomo, a fervent proponent of gay marriage, signed the bill into law Friday night. No one was a fervent proponent of gay marriage 44 years ago this month when the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that laws barring whites and blacks from marrying were unconstitutional. Same-sex marriage wasn't even a fringe issue on June 12, 1967, the day the court handed down its landmark decision in Loving...

<p>SPRINGFIELD, Mass.—Nine people, ages 12 to 19, are facing hate crime charges in connection with the beating of an openly gay man in Springfield.</p> <p>Sgt. John Delaney said the beating occurred shortly after 3 a.m. Tuesday as the 30-year-old victim walked down a Springfield street.</p>

CHICAGO (CBS) — Was the vandalism of 51 floats for the Gay Pride Parade this past weekend a hate crime? Police say they are not investigating it as such. But the parade organizer and the owner of the floats both said they believe it was. The Pride Parade went on as always in the Boystown neighborhood, with appearances by Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Gov. Pat Quinn, among other dignitaries. Hundreds of thousands of people gathered along Halsted Street, Broadway and Diversey Parkway, high-fiving and embracing strangers and wishing them, “Happy pride!” But the tire-slashing put a damper on the event...

President Barack Obama spoke to LGBT supporters (and generous contributors) at a gala fundraising event in New York City Thursday night. Because of the event's location and timing -- smack in the middle of the New York state legislature's debate on gay marriage -- the president was under intense scrutiny; some same-sex marriage backers hoped (despite warnings to the contrary) that the president might finally offer them his unequivocal support. They were almost universally disappointed. "Instead of discussing his stand on the issue -- one on which his aides have said he’s 'evolving' -- the president described the battle underway...

SAN DIEGO -- History will be made at this year's San Diego Pride Parade when active-duty military members will march openly through the heart of Hillcrest. "To my knowledge [it is] the first time in the history of Pride in the United States, ever, that we have said, 'Active duty, you are welcome,'" organizer Sean Sala said. "We want you to be there without fear of repercussions, because we love you." Sala, an active-duty sailor, said he was bothered to see that police and firefighters were represented in the Pride parade, but not the people who serve this country. "I...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama's "evolving" stance on gay marriage was headed for a high-profile test Thursday as he prepared for his first-ever fundraiser for gay donors just as New York lawmakers maneuvered toward a historic vote legalizing gay nuptials. The outcome of the negotiations in Albany, the state capital, remained uncertain, but the vote could occur just hours before Obama's event Thursday evening in New York City.

TORONTO, ON – A new study by psychologists at the University of Toronto and Tufts University shows that a woman can more accurately identify a man's sexual orientation when looking at his face, when she is closest to her time of peak ovulation. Further, having romantic thoughts or a mating goal heightens a woman's ability to discriminate between straight and gay men. "This effect is not apparent when a woman is judging another female's orientation," says Professor Nicholas Rule of the Department of Psychology at the University of Toronto, lead author of a new study published in Psychological Science. "This...

The Cubs are sending a message of support to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender youth, becoming only the second professional sports team in the country to join the anti-bullying "It Gets Better" campaign.

A new study by the Center for Work-Life Policy think tank has found that 48 percent of college-educated lesbian and gay Americans hide their sexual orientation at work. About a third of them are leading "double lives," the report says--staying in the closet at the office while being "out" in their personal lives

The iconic rainbow flag that flies over the Castro in San Francisco is the topic of Thursday's Castro/Upper Market Community Benefit District meeting as the board decides whether to ask the Department of Public Works to convene a meeting on the flag. Concern over who controls the flag came to a head in March when community members requested that the flag operators, the Merchants of Upper Market and Castro, lower the flag to mark the death of gay icon and actress Elizabeth Taylor, Castro Benefit District executive director Andrea Aiello said. MUMC denied the request, the group's president Steve Adams...

Here is an AFA action alert Old Navy selling 'gay' shirts - donates profits to activists Old Navy selling 'gay' shirts - donates profits to activists How would you feel if you knew that 10% of your Old Navy purchase would be donated directly to a homosexual activist organization? http://www.afa.net/Detail.aspx?id=2147507169