Recommended read: If Obama can throw his pastor under the bus, what will he do to us?

If you're like me, you're still trying to get a handle on Barack Obama's speech yesterday. Was it a "profile in courage" or was it "politics as usual"? As you sort through it all, I encourage you to read this post over at Bilerico Project:

If Obama can throw his pastor under the bus, what will he do to us?
by Rev Irene Monroe

When the religious narrative you tell about your life to the American public is revealed to be vastly different than the one you actually lived, you have more than a credibility problem - you have a dilemma as Obama is finding out.

And the dilemma is not just that Obama's religious narrative is fictitious, but so too is the media spin on his pastor.

While the moral high ground to address the public's shock with Rev. Jeremiah Wright's condemnations on America's foreign and domestic polices appeared to be Obama's address on race, Obama actually ran aground with many African American Christians by anchoring the public's outrage and his fear of losing the presidential bid on the back of one of this nation's most revered African American ministers.

"He's used Jeremiah, and Trinity is his strongest base. He handled the media abysmally, and the uncle reference was demeaning. Many of us said we saw it coming," a member from Trinity told me in anonymity not to have the press come after him.

Rev. Wright was the man who brought Obama to Christ, presided over his nuptials baptized him and his daughters, and was the inspiration for his bestseller, The Audacity of Hope.

And while Obama has now denounced Rev. Wrights' incendiary remarks, after twenty years of hearing them, suspicion nonetheless still surfaces about his professed faith as a Christian.

As a central, powerful and revered institution within the African-American community, the Black Church captivated Obama's attention. He says he came to understand "the power of the African-American religious tradition to spur social change." However, how much Obama really covets the power of the Black Church for his own political aggrandizement, rather than for its religion, now raise questions in the minds of many black Christians since his address.

While MSNBC talk-show host Tucker Carlson was the first to publicly suggest Obama's faith is "suddenly conspicuous," suggesting that Obama has only recently begun addressing his religious background as part of "a very calculated plan on the part of the Democratic Party to win" religious voters in the 2008 presidential race, the suspicion is now looming even larger.

If Obama, however, is indeed using religion to win votes, he unfortunately placed himself in a difficult quagmire - not only with LGBTQ and liberal voters, but also by still being a member of Trinity. Why? Because he worships in a conservative black church within a liberal denomination. And Trinity is provisionally opened to the idea of same sex marriage.

In July 2005, the UCC General Synod overwhelmingly passed a Resolution of Marriage Equality. But in August 2005, Wright spoke against the Synod's position causing many LGBTQ parishioners to leave.

Read the rest of the story here.

So, while yesterday's speech was a glorious example of Sen. Obama's oratorical skills, I still don't know where he stands on issues of basic equality for all Americans. In stating that Rev. Wright provides him with spiritual guidance, Obama only undercuts his message of unity and hope for all Americans, and adds further murkiness to his positions.

The more I find out about Barack Obama, the less I know what he stands for.

Maryland Attorney General Voices Opposition to State Marriage Ban

What do you know? Some indication of sanity from our elected officials. From today's Baltimore Sun:

Attorney General Douglas F. Gansler has become the most prominent official in Maryland to endorse gay marriage, telling state legislators yesterday that he believes the current ban on same-sex unions amounts to discrimination.

"It would be hard for me to have this job knowing there is something so wrong in our society," Gansler told the Senate panel considering a bill to legalize gay marriage. "I just think it's wrong to discriminate against any people because they think differently or because of their sexual orientation."

Anyone who wonders why we need elected officials to take the lead on subjects like this need simply read the words of a stay-at-home mom who testified for keeping the ban in place:

the "homosexual lifestyle" is "devastating. Redefining marriage is an activity undertaken to the peril of our civilized society."

That would be the same civilized society that sentenced the Lovings of Virginia to a year in prison in 1959 for marrying inter-racially. They had violated something called "The Racial Integrity Act." According to the judge in that case:

Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, Malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix.

So, yeah. That civilized society.

Happy Valentine's Day. Now can I please marry my partner?

Ah yes, love is in the air. My sweetie and I will be going out to dinner tonight to celebrate this international day of love. We've been together for almost 10 years, through graduate school, career changes, unemployment and underemployment, no health insurance, home buying, surgery, family deaths and births. In other words, through sickness and in health, for richer, for poorer, for better, for worse, in sadness and in joy.

But god forbid we get in an accident tonight and one of us has to go to the hospital. You see, we have basically no legal rights to make decisions of health or welfare for each other. For example, although we both pay the mortgage, only my name is on the deed. The cost of adding my partner's name is prohibitive. It is easily affordable to add one's spouse to a deed, but of course, she's not my spouse. In the eyes of the law, she might as well be a renter. And thank god she has a job with health benefits now -- for 5 years she didn't, and I couldn't add her to my health insurance. We paid a lot of money out of pocket during those years for a trip to the emergency room and for prescription drugs.

We, like so many of your neighbors, are taxpaying good citizens. We mow our lawn and plant flowers. We recycle. We're members of the neighborhood association. We live in a committed relationship of marriage. Yet in an instant our lives could be turned upside down should some health or financial tragedy strike.

This is the 11th annual national Freedom to Marry week. The Constitution's guarantee of equal protection and the right to marry belongs to us all. Please join me in signing the marriage resolution from the Freedom to Marry to help end this discrimination. When we protect and value all of our citizens, we build a stronger and more stable community -- and nation.

President Gore supports gay marriage, shouldn't you?

Somewhere — in the alternate universe that is "reality" — Al Gore is the President of the United States. In that universe, we are not fighting a war over oil, we are funding alternative energy sources, and wow: we have civil rights for all Americans! Yes, in that alternate universe we have a president who is not afraid to support gay marriage (I mean, this guy's even comfortable saying the "L" word!).

Please watch:



Here in Maryland, legislation will soon be introduced under the Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act. It is important that this bill be passed to ensure my rights to enter a civil marriage contract with my partner, while ensuring your right to maintain whatever misguided beliefs you and your church have about homosexuality. See? It's win/win!

Now, back to your universe and a look at the man some of you chose over President Gore (warning — safe for work, just gross):

Pope Benedict: Teh gays a threat to peace

Wow. We've been accused of a lot of things before, but does the Pontiff really think we're the cause of violence around the world?

"Those who are hostile, even unknowingly, to the institution of the family ... make peace fragile for the entire national and international community," the Pope told crowds gathered in a sunny St. Peter's Square.

"I wanted to shed light on the direct relationship that exists between the family and peace in the world," the Pope said.

"The family is the primary agent of peace and the negation or even the restriction of rights of the family ... threatens the very foundations of peace."

The irony, of course, is that internationally so many gays and lesbians are in fact involved in the peace movement. If only the Pontiff would turn his peace-lovin' attention toward the religious right who preach hate and intolerance. That is the true threat to "the very foundations of peace," sir.