A North West View

With the nail biting election in the rear view mirror, with Obama winning the election handily once all the swing state cards feel into place, it is hard to believe that Obama's reelection is the cherry on the top of an amazing dessert.  It was a night that brought us the defeated of a proposed constructional ban of same sex marriage in Minnesota  with the public voting in favor of gay marriage in Maine, Maryland, and Washington, marking the first time in history that marriage equality has won at the ballot box.  Along with the the election of allies in congress and the senate, as well as in state government through out the country, and the first openly gay Senator Tammy Baldwin a Democratic from Wisconsin.  This is promises to be a watershed moment in history.

With only a week left until ballots mail out in Washington state, Protect Marriage Washington has started airing their first ad in what is doubtless to be a series of ads to run threw the election on Nov 6.  as the Seattle times says about this time in the election cycle  "for a ballot measure that isn't up on the air now is missing a big opportunity. Ballots mail out next week"  and it  appears  that even though they are late to the race compared to the  Approve   campaign  that has had ads running for months between Washington United for marriage and an ad run by Seattle Pride during the summer  Olympics   they seem to be  coming  out of the gate swinging using some of the same old  tactics  that have proven so  effective  in the past in scaring the public into voting their way.   although  this time they seem to have  thrown  in another tool to their  approach ...

There is something missing in the adds for marriage equality in Washington State (and in the 3 other state facing marriage equality measures this year) and that is the total lack of gay people in the ads, instead like in Washington they seem to have every one and their uncle from pro equality republican positions to clergy and family talking about why marriage equality matters, how gay people want the same things out of marriage as every one else in society and why they are deserving of the right to marry. Yet there are no gay people making the case, which even thought the ads that are being put out are good and do carry the message well and pull at the heartstrings of the views (like the video after the jump) it would seem to me, and meany others that to have gay people make the case would be a good way of going about it.  As we are the ones that this decisions ultimately affects why aren't we the ones ...

One of the newest groups to throw their support behind marriage equality in Washington state and take an official stance that Ref 74 should be a proved is the Seattle Chamber Of Commerce which represents 2,200 company's, it joins the ranks of company's like Microsoft and Starbucks, as well as many faith groups and Labor groups like my union UFCW 21, in voicing their support for the right of all citizens of Washington to be able to marry.   Of course being the chamber of commerce their reason boils down to the economics of it, in that it creates a simpler system of providing benefits to employees who have same sex partners, as well as helping to make it easier to attract and keep talent, especially when competing with other states (and countries) that have marriage equality. In addition to gaining another voice for equality Washington...

Well on Tuesday the backers of Initiative 1192 other wise know as I 1192 conceded that they did not and would not have enough signatures by the deadline of July 6th to make it onto the November ballot.  The backer of the  241,000     which would have changed state law to once again read that marriage is between one man and one women.  The backer of the measure S tephen Pidgeon, who is also a candidate for the state attorney generals office, (How unseemly) blamed the inability to collect enough signatures on the backers of Ref 74, and went so far as to say that the backers of Ref 74 chorused signature gathers to sabotage his Initiative campaign!  What this means though is that there is only one fight to be fought now on the November ballot and that is Ref 74.  Of-course like everything in this fight this is both good new and also some bad news at the sa...

Gay marriage or as it should be call marriage is something that is very important to me, and has been since I was little.  I have always know that I wanted to get married and to have a family of my own, the only thing that has changed is that as I finally came to terms with the fact that I was gay, a wife became a husband.  For me personally I have always wanted to find that person that I love and am meant to spend the rest of my life with.  The person that I want to build a family with, the house, kids, minivan the whole nine yards, and a big part of that is marriage.

The dead line for the opponents of marriage equality are nearing the deadline for them to turn all the signatures they have gathered to try and get Referendum 74 on the ballot in November, according to "Preserve Marriage Washington" (one of the most perverse name for a group that wants to take the basic human right of marriage away from people) they have enough signatures to get the measure on the ballot.  As of Wednesday they claimed to have over 150,00 signatures which is am amount that the Secretary of States Office recommends to insure a buffer for invalid and duplicate signatures in order to meet the legal requirement of 120,557 valed signatures.  They are cutting it close with Tuesday being June 5th and the deadline being Jun 6th, but if what they say is true, then sort of them having a much higher then average rate of non valid signatures, their me...

What is it with those that oppose same sex marriag e, otherwise know as marriage equality, when they feel like dancing around religious indignation they suddenly start pulling out the argument of   " Marriage to me is a word with specific meaning. To call something else by the same name is , I believe, a problem in semantics, confusing and illogical . Insisting on calling different things by the same name is to lose the language." ( emphasis  added) as if people and their love for each other are like an kitchen appliance or some other inanimate household object?  This is something that really gets under my skin and makes my blood boil. I mean I really just can't  comprehend  how some one can talk about other people like that!

So many of you may have already heard that marriage equality in the great state of Washington, my home, is already under attack by the anti gay rights lobby, we have two legal fronts that they are trying to attack us from, one being threw the referendum process, for which not even 3 hours after marriage equality was signed into law they had submitted their referendum which is now officially Referendum 74, R 74/Ref 74 for short.  They have the 3 month period starting with the end of this legislative session, in other words until June 6th, to submit 120,557 valid signature (non duplicate, signatures voters registered to vote in the state of Washington) and of the initiative they have until July 6th to tun in  241,153 valid signatures as well.  but the Initiative has been in the works (it was filed back in January).

Well we are just one vote away from marriage equality in Washington, with the announcement by state Senator Jim Kastama of his support of the legislation, that leaves us with 24 of the 25 votes needed to pass SB6239.  Not only are we now one vote away but today Microsoft officially came out in support of the bill as well, and posted a very well written  persuasive and eloquent (for a corperate blog) expression of support.  Which as has been mention in a previous post has been a key in garnishing the final needed votes to pass equality legislation.   Of course still being one vote away success can not be taken for granted simply for the fact that until that one vote is locked in the line could come down one vote short for us too, but there is much reason to be optimistic and bask in this little victory.

Only 2 yes votes are needed in the Washington state Senate for the marriage equality legislation that was introduced this week with 23 signatures to pass.  The senate is the key roadblock to the passage of the legislation as identical legislation was introduced into the State House, with 50 signatures which is enough votes to pass the legislation in the House. Things are so close yet still so far away, there is still a small pool of officially undecided/committed senators that could swing the vote into our favor, those senators are Senator Andy Hill, R-Redmond; Senator Joe Fain, R-Auburn; Senator Mary Margaret Haugen, D-Camano Island; Senator Jim Kastama, D-Puyallup; Senator Paull Shin, D-Edmonds  and Senator Brian Hatfield, D-Raymond.  Then there is Senator Doug Ericksen, R-Ferndale.  These are the people that we have to try to sway into our favor.

So as promised another update on the progress of the possible legalization of same-sex marriage in Washington state by the state legislature. There is no really question that the state house will vote in favor of the bill to legalise same-sex marriage as it has passed similar legislation in the past, not to mention that it is made up of 55 democratically held seats and 42 republican held seats (and one currently empty seat) the current sticking point is the state Senate which is comprised of 27 democrats and 22 republicans.

I was presently surprised to see an braking news email from he Seattle Times pop up in my inbox on my cellphone with the need that at a 11am news conference on Wednesday that governor Chris Gregoire is expected to announce support for gay marriage, which will be the first time she has formerly supported it, although she has been a steadfast supporter of gay rights, in the state. This comes in light of the grass roots efforts of Equality Washington to pressure the State legislation to pass a gay marriage law in 2012, this news conference takes place just before the start of the next legislative session starting on Monday.  I don't know how much motion can be expected to be made on this issue during that session,  which runs threw march 8th, in part because the legislature has to plug another 1.5 billion shortfall in the state budget which I for see being a nasty battle as there really is no "fat" left to trim let alone muscle, but that is beside the point. The goal is t...

So after rereading the last letter I posted for the umpteenth time, and also restudying the "proper" way to write Congressional representatives for the umpteenth time again as well, I finally decide that I was not quite happy with that letter, which I still had not mailed yet, and that instead it was time to start over again make another attempt at writing House Majority Leader John Boehner another letter.  Which I did, so after the jump is my letter to John Boehner version 2.0.

As has been in the news Prop 8 in California was overturned Wednesday, by federal Judge Walker, in a decision that the ban was unconstitutional. I don't feel a need to go into a detail recap of the ruling as it's already all over the news and web, instead I feel like focusing on some of the lunacy that the ruling has brought to the surface amongst those that oppose marriage equality, as well as my own personal feelings over the whole situation. As is not entirely unexpected with a ruling like this the anti marriage equality crusaders have very suddenly gotten their panties in a twist and have thus started to spout their over the top rhetoric not only about how this ruling is judicial activism, that it will destroy the family and nation as we know it but also about their conspiracy theories on why this decision was made the way it was in the first place. One of the most interesting being the FRC (family research councils) who in large part see this as a decades long conspirac...

OK today I am going to tackle the Catholic Churches threat to stop administering social services for the city of Washington DC, if (which looks pretty cretin) the city legalizes same sex marriage. The church with provides shelter for over one third of the city's homeless as well as run and administer many other social services. Not only does this make the church its self look morally corrupt, but then when the fact that the church is being paid by the city to perform those services it opens up another can or worms.