The white knot is the new symbol for marriage equality. It takes two traditional symbols of marriage—white and tying the knot—and combines them in a simple way to show support for the right of gays and lesbians to marry. All loving couples deserve the same legal rights, benefits, and respect that civil marriage bestows.

Visibility is our goal. Whether you are gay or straight, please show your support by wearing the knot and telling people why you are wearing it. It may seem like a small thing, but imagine the white knot gaining the pervasiveness and instant recognition of the AIDS Ribbon.

Wear your white knot to work, to school, to your place of worship. Celebrities will be wearing white knots down red carpets this awards season. Together, we will keep the topic at the top of people's minds and keep the conversation going.

http://www.whiteknot.org

I've been married just over 9 years to the most wonderful man. We have two healthy, happy, incredibly smart and well adjusted children. We live in a nice home and my husband's work has excellent health insurance coverage for all of us. Because of this, we didn't think twice about starting our family. It saved us when our young daughter had meningitis and we had to take her to the hospital. God forbid if something were to happen to us, we could visit each other in the hospital. We could make decisions for one another, even if the worst were to occur. We are free to choose what happens from here on out, all the way to the end.

If we still lived in the Netherlands, this would be true if we were two men or two women. That's where my husband is from. Talk about separation of Church and State.

We now live in the States.

I'm fighting for you, my GLBT family.

Love,

helderheid

November 20, 2008
If Clinton Chosen, Campaign Debts Would Wait
By MICHAEL LUO

Vendors still owed money from Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s presidential campaign could be out of luck for years should she become secretary of state.

Mrs. Clinton still had about $7.9 million in outstanding bills from her presidential campaign at the end of September, according to Federal Election Commission records.

Philippe Reines, a spokesman for Mrs. Clinton, said she has since whittled it to $7.6 million, not including the $13.2 million she loaned her campaign out of her own pocket, which officials have said she does not expect to be repaid.

“Senator Clinton has said that paying off her campaign vendors is a priority for her,” Mr. Reines said in a statement, “and she remains committed to that goal.”

But the Hatch Act, which governs the political activities of federal employees, including cabinet officials, normally prohibits the solicitation and receipt of political contributions.

MORE >>>

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/20/us/polit...

Columns
Bob Fitrakis

Election Protection in Ohio (and America) Isn’t Over
November 17, 2008

By Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
As the sun sets on Bush 2, it is clear that a very thin line of electoral protection preserved Barack Obama’s victory in Ohio---and the nation.
And it’s no accident the vote count battle for a Columbus-area Congressional seat still rages.

The GOP’s 2008 electoral strategy again emphasized massive voter disenfranchisement and rigging the electronic vote count. The twin tactics very nearly gave Ohio to McCain/Palin, and threatened to set precedents capable of winning them the national election.

Prior to the 2004 vote, Republican Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell stripped some 308,000 Ohio citizens from the registration rolls in heavily Democratic districts. This mass disenfranchisement alone may have accounted for the 118,000-plus official margin that gave George W. Bush a second term in the White House.

After the 2004 vote, Blackwell disenfranchised another 170,000 voters in heavily Democratic Franklin County (Columbus).

But in 2006, Democrat Jennifer Brunner was elected to replace Blackwell. Ironically, the King-Lincoln-Bronzeville federal civil rights lawsuit filed against Blackwell over 2004 election irregularities has carried over, making Brunner the defendant (we are plaintiff and defendant in that suit). As a result, negotiations between Brunner and election protection attorneys have been on-going since she took office.

In the lead-up to the 2008 elections, the GOP tried yet another massive voter purge. Through the “caging” technique of sending unsolicited “do not forward” junk mail, GOP operatives obtained by returned mail the names of some 600,000 registered Ohio voters. Some were serving in Iraq. Also, the GOP once again fought to purge voters for “inactivity” as they sought to eliminate voters who hadn’t voted in four-years as opposed to eight, even if they voted in state and local elections.

MORE >>>

http://www.freepress.org/columns/display/3...

http://166.70.44.68/multimedia/2008/prop8/...

I just received this from this facebook group:

Subject: Open Letter to the Brave LDS Supporters of Marriage Equality

Dear Utahns for Marriage Equality,

This is an open letter to the brave LDS supporters of marriage equality in this group and elsewhere. First of all, all of us need to commend your willingness to listen to your conscience on this issue. We all understand the social pressures that you may feel to follow a different path. No doubt you have heard plenty of anti-LDS rhetoric recently and you will certainly hear more. Emotions are running high right now. But this letter is not an apology for the stance against the LDS Church nor is it a defense against the haters of the LDS faith. This letter is a response to the question many of you are asking the question:” Why target the Mormons? “

"Why target the Mormons?" was also the gist of the LDS Church press release in response to the Salt Lake City protest and those protests in California. This is not an attack on the sacredness of the LDS faith. The issue is with the intensity with which the institution of the LDS Church supported Prop 8 by calling on their members to canvass in California, donate money and participate in phone banks. Moreover, under a loophole in IRS non-profit law (that Scott McCoy explained to me), religious organizations can throw their weight behind a ballot initiative. But if they are to throw their weight to take away rights, then it is our responsibility to protest to keep those rights.

Look, I grew up Catholic and I am not proud of the Catholic Church’s statements but the bottom line is that we are not asking the LDS or the Catholic church (or any church for that matter) to perform same-sex marriages. We are simply asking that they stay clear of the inalienable rights of others who wish to marry. With that being said, I would like to pass along the thoughts of a few others on this topic:

>From Andrew Sullivan (Atlantic Magazine, http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http://and...
"The leadership of the LDS church has every right to do this; but equally gay people and their families now have every right to highlight the Mormon church as an enemy of civil rights and of gay people everywhere. This will be decried as bigotry. But gays are not fighting to remove the civil rights of Mormons; while Mormons have successfully campaigned to remove the civil rights of gays.

Tolerant and inclusive Mormons should not be forgotten; the Mormon tradition of church-state separation should not be ignored either. But toleration goes both ways. Gay people have every right to regard the Mormon church hierarchy as a mortal enemy. If they knock on my door any time soon, they will get an earful."

>From Eric Ethington (a local blogger and regular contributor to our FB group, http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http://eth... )

“I just wanted to make one or two comments to your very good question. The LDS church IS being targeted very heavily by the anti-Prop 8 movement. And although I agree with you that other churches and members of the traditional family coalitions should be receiving these protests as well, there is a very good reason that it has started with the LDS church. First, the LDS church donated more money than any other organization to the passing of these laws (off the top of my head I believe it was a little over 30% of the total donations). Second, it has been widely publicized that without the overwhelming physical support of the church's members, spurned by the letter written by the 1st Presidency and read over every pulpit in the church; and also the Bishops and Stake Presidents in Utah who were required to push their members (mostly in the single wards) to donate up to 20 hours a week calling Californian residents. The third reason I suppose is that although the LDS church has been
involved in politics in the past, it has largely through silent donations, they have claimed time and again that they would never openly get involved.

“The Church does not become involved in politics. We don’t favor any candidate. We don’t permit our buildings to be used for political purposes. We don’t favor any party.” - Prophet Gordon B. Hinckley, Larry King Live, television program, Sept 8. 1998

I would say that these are the main reasons that the church is being targeted. Although I would suggest that it is a little foolish of any church with a history of non-traditional marriage itself to be shocked or surprised when it comes under critique for backing an anti non-traditional marriage proposition. Let me know if you have any other thoughts! You also may want to read http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http://eth...

I hope this issue into perspective and if you have any more thoughts on this issue, please post them to the “Wall” or “Discussion Board” of this group page.

Regards,
MM

Mark Foley, Washington's favorite former congressman/pederast, will give his first major TV interview since resigning in 2006, the Atlantic reports. A source close to Foley says that the interview is set to air on the "Today Show" either next Wednesday or the following Wednesday.

Foley resigned Sept. 29, 2006, after ABC News' Brian Ross published sexually charged IM exchanges between the Florida Republican and underage male congressional pages, including one that will live in Capitol Hill infamy:

Maf54: Do I make you a little horny?
Teen: A little.
Maf54: Cool.

The scandal hit right before the 2006 midterm elections and heralded the end of GOP dominance on Capitol Hill. Foley, previously the chairman of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children, had led initiatives cracking down on online child predators, in one interview calling those offenders "sick people." Polls indicated that Foley's behavior, which was apparently covered up by Republican House leaders, cemented an impression among voters that the GOP was hopelessly corrupt. Democrats took control of the House and Senate for the first time in George W. Bush's presidency that November.

Following his resignation, Foley delivered the excuse du jour and entered rehab. Soon after, he admitted through a spokesman that he was gay and claimed to have been molested by a member of the clergy as a teenager. Months later, he was fully out though keeping a low profile. He is reportedly now working in real estate.

MORE >>>

http://www.examiner.com/x-1082-Philadelphi...

I've been planning on posting this for some time, hoping beyond hope that the election would be enough of a landslide that the Rs couldn't steal this one.

This is it, guys. It was a landslide. There was no denying it.

Now it's up to us.

No more stolen elections.
No more votes counted by corporations.
No more vote caging.



NOW IS THE TIME for REAL ELECTION REFORM.

Stand up and shout out - NEVER AGAIN should we ever question the validity of our elections. NEVER AGAIN.

We know from 2006 and 2008 you can't out and out steal a landslide, but we cannot always count on landslides.



This victory alone is not the change we seek. It is only the chance for us to make that change.
And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were. ~ Barack Obama

~ November 5, 2008 ~


www.nomorestolenelections.org

This is what my 8 year old son said to me this morning. Obama Biden DID Win!

Wednesday, November 5th, 2008

Friends,

Who among us is not at a loss for words? Tears pour out. Tears of joy. Tears of relief. A stunning, whopping landslide of hope in a time of deep despair.

In a nation that was founded on genocide and then built on the backs of slaves, it was an unexpected moment, shocking in its simplicity: Barack Obama, a good man, a black man, said he would bring change to Washington, and the majority of the country liked that idea. The racists were present throughout the campaign and in the voting booth. But they are no longer the majority, and we will see their flame of hate fizzle out in our lifetime.

There was another important "first" last night. Never before in our history has an avowed anti-war candidate been elected president during a time of war. I hope President-elect Obama remembers that as he considers expanding the war in Afghanistan. The faith we now have will be lost if he forgets the main issue on which he beat his fellow Dems in the primaries and then a great war hero in the general election: The people of America are tired of war. Sick and tired. And their voice was loud and clear yesterday.

It's been an inexcusable 44 years since a Democrat running for president has received even just 51% of the vote. That's because most Americans haven't really liked the Democrats. They see them as rarely having the guts to get the job done or stand up for the working people they say they support. Well, here's their chance. It has been handed to them, via the voting public, in the form of a man who is not a party hack, not a set-for-life Beltway bureaucrat. Will he now become one of them, or will he force them to be more like him? We pray for the latter.

But today we celebrate this triumph of decency over personal attack, of peace over war, of intelligence over a belief that Adam and Eve rode around on dinosaurs just 6,000 years ago. What will it be like to have a smart president? Science, banished for eight years, will return. Imagine supporting our country's greatest minds as they seek to cure illness, discover new forms of energy, and work to save the planet. I know, pinch me.

We may, just possibly, also see a time of refreshing openness, enlightenment and creativity. The arts and the artists will not be seen as the enemy. Perhaps art will be explored in order to discover the greater truths. When FDR was ushered in with his landslide in 1932, what followed was Frank Capra and Preston Sturgis, Woody Guthrie and John Steinbeck, Dorothea Lange and Orson Welles. All week long I have been inundated with media asking me, "gee, Mike, what will you do now that Bush is gone?" Are they kidding? What will it be like to work and create in an environment that nurtures and supports film and the arts, science and invention, and the freedom to be whatever you want to be? Watch a thousand flowers bloom! We've entered a new era, and if I could sum up our collective first thought of this new era, it is this: Anything Is Possible.

An African American has been elected President of the United States! Anything is possible! We can wrestle our economy out of the hands of the reckless rich and return it to the people. Anything is possible! Every citizen can be guaranteed health care. Anything is possible! We can stop melting the polar ice caps. Anything is possible! Those who have committed war crimes will be brought to justice. Anything is possible.

We really don't have much time. There is big work to do. But this is the week for all of us to revel in this great moment. Be humble about it. Do not treat the Republicans in your life the way they have treated you the past eight years. Show them the grace and goodness that Barack Obama exuded throughout the campaign. Though called every name in the book, he refused to lower himself to the gutter and sling the mud back. Can we follow his example? I know, it will be hard.

I want to thank everyone who gave of their time and resources to make this victory happen. It's been a long road, and huge damage has been done to this great country, not to mention to many of you who have lost your jobs, gone bankrupt from medical bills, or suffered through a loved one being shipped off to Iraq. We will now work to repair this damage, and it won't be easy.

But what a way to start! Barack Hussein Obama, the 44th President of the United States. Wow. Seriously, wow.

Yours,
Michael Moore
MichaelMoore.com
MMFlint@aol.com