April 1, 1998 to May 30, 1998
ST. CHARLES, Mo. (AP) 27th May, 1998-- The lawyer for the man accused of giving his son AIDS by injecting him with HIV-tainted blood tried to show at a hearing Tuesday that the boy could have gotten the disease any number of ways.
Brian Stewart, 31, of Columbia, Ill., was arrested in April, accused of injecting his son with HIV in 1992, when the boy was 11 months old. Now 7, the child has AIDS.
But at Tuesday's preliminary hearing to determine if there is probable cause for a trial, defense attorney Joseph Murphy contended the child could have become infected through one of several procedures that he received while being treated for other medical problems.
Murphy also said that the boy could have gotten the disease from contact with a drug user's needle. The boy's mother, who asked to be identified only as Jennifer, testified that her sister was once an intravenous drug user.
Jennifer said she once found a needle in her home. Her sister shared the home with the family.
Stewart sat passively during his ex-girlfriend's five hours of testimony. Police and prosecutors believe Stewart's motive was to avoid paying child support.
Jennifer testified that Stewart had access to HIV-tainted blood through his work at a hospital as a phlebotomist, a person who draws blood from patients. She said he had abused her several times and had threatened to use tainted blood as a weapon.
``He said he could inject anyone with any thing, and they would never know how they received it or how to cure it,'' she said.
While the two lived together, Stewart stored vials of blood in their freezer but wouldn't explain why, Jennifer said.
Doctors ruled out all other causes for her son's disease, she said. She said her sister tested negative for HIV, as did everyone who had been in her house or had contact with her son.
WASHINGTON- May 27, 1998 --- History is about to be made, and you can be part of it. That's the pitch on a flier recently used to lure people to a fund-raiser for Christine Kehoe, a candidate for San Diego's 49th House District. And the brink-of-a-breakthrough enticement is not just hype.
Kehoe, who is about to become the official Democratic nominee to run against Rep. Brian P. Bilbray (R-San Diego), has a shot at becoming the first acknowledged lesbian to be elected to national political office. And she's not alone.
Kehoe is one of four lesbians running for Congress this year. Together with two gay men seeking reelection to the House and a third gay man running as a challenger, they comprise the largest group of openly gay candidates to make a serious run for Congress.
Their candidacies have turned the 1998 midterm elections into a potential watershed for homosexuals.
"This is a breakthrough election," said Charles E. Cook, a political analyst. Most of the gay candidates "are running very, very competitive races."
The two gay House members--Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) and Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-Ariz.)--did not reveal their sexual orientations until after they had been reelected several times. So, if any of this year's homosexual challengers wins, they will be the first to enter the House as openly gay.
"To break that barrier, to change the face of Congress, will mean the gay and lesbian community will have advanced another huge step in attaining our full civil rights," Kehoe said.
Financial Edge for Gay Candidates
The strength of the campaigns most of the gay candidates are running is a tribute, in part, to a paradox of gay politics: Despite the potential political liabilities of their sexuality, gay candidates enjoy access to a national fund-raising base that can give them a financial edge in their races.
As of March 31, Federal Election Commission records show, three of the four lesbian House candidates each had raised more than three times the national average for congressional challengers. Kehoe, who faces no Democratic opposition in California's Tuesday primary, has even outdistanced Bilbray, surmounting the renowned advantages of incumbency.
She and the other promising gay candidates are the beneficiaries of significant contributions by gay-rights political action committees and individuals around the country who support gay causes.
Still, none of these politicians are running a campaign centered on sexual orientation. Instead, they offer themselves as candidates who happen to be gay.
"They are great stereotype breakers," Frank said. "These are lesbian candidates who look like any other candidates in America."
Three have traditional political credentials, having run for elective office at the state or local level. Kehoe is a member of the San Diego City Council. Tammy Baldwin, one of three leading Democrats for an open House seat in Wisconsin, is a state legislator. Susan Tracy, one of a pack of Democrats running for an open seat in the Boston area, is a former state legislator.
The fourth lesbian candidate is a former member of the military--with near- celebrity status. Retired Army Col. Margarethe Cammermeyer, expected to win the Democratic nomination to oppose Rep. Jack Metcalf (R-Wash.), became a hero of the gay community after she was discharged from the military in 1992 because she had revealed her homosexuality. A television movie was made about her.
Along with Frank and Kolbe, the other gay man running for Congress is Democrat Paul Barby, who is opposing Rep. Frank D. Lucas (R-Okla.) for a second time.
Kehoe, Baldwin Have Best Chances
Of the gay challengers, analysts said, Kehoe and Baldwin have the best chance of winning. Cammermeyer and Barby face steeper odds because they are running in more GOP-leaning districts. Tracy is running in a liberal district in which the Democratic nominee will be the heavy favorite but a very crowded field is seeking the party's nod.
Kehoe, given her City Council post, already enjoys high name recognition in the 49th District, which encompasses the northern half of San Diego. The district includes military bases, universities and the city's high-tech and biotech industries, and in recent years has been one of California's most competitive.
Bilbray won the seat in 1994 from Democrat Lynn Schenk, then a one-term incumbent. In winning reelection in 1996, Bilbray polled only 53% of the vote, causing analysts to peg him as vulnerable. Still, he may be hard to topple because of this year's strong pro-incumbent climate.
In Wisconsin, Baldwin is running for an open seat now held by Republican Scott L. Klug, who is retiring from office.
The Madison-based district leans Democratic, so her toughest fight could be the September Democratic primary, in which she is competing with two other popular Democrats.
Both Kehoe and Baldwin have the advantage of having been elected to other offices. If they win now, analysts said, it probably will not be because they are gay. "Their gayness isn't and doesn't appear likely to be a major issue," said political analyst Cook.
To be sure, all this does not signal an end of resistance to gays in public life. For instance, being an openly gay candidate in Bible Belt regions such as Oklahoma, House candidate Barby said, is "still a hurdle."
The boomlet of openly gay House candidates is a product, in part, of increasing numbers of gay officials being elected at the state and local levels. According to the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund, a group dedicated to electing gays, there are now 154 openly gay elected officials around the country. There were none as recently as 1973.
It may be increasingly difficult for gay candidates to run for office without coming out of the closet in this era of intense scrutiny of politicians' private lives. Tracy came out only recently, in part because she knew that her sexual orientation would become an issue. "You'd be naive to think you can run for office and not have people ask you questions about your personal life," Tracy said.
But for each of these House candidates, gay rights has not been a central part of their campaigns.
"They are clearly trying not to be perceived as single-issue candidates," said Brian Bond, executive director of the Victory Fund.
Said Baldwin: "The issues that I am running on in this congressional campaign are precisely the issues I expect Congress to be grappling with over the next several terms: health care, Medicare, educational opportunities."
So far, Republican opponents have not been making an explicit issue of gay challengers' sexual orientation.
Said Bilbray: "I don't see it as the real issue."
"I have never mentioned that, nor will I ever mention it," said Metcalf, the Washington state incumbent Cammermeyer is opposing.
Conservatives Likely to Weigh In
Some analysts predicted that, as election day nears, conservative groups will find ways to make sure voters are aware of the matter. "It's one way the conservative wing of the Republican Party can mobilize its troops," said Gary C. Jacobson, a political scientist at UC San Diego.
Arne Owens, a spokesman for the Christian Coalition, said the group likely will address the candidates' sexual orientation when they make their stands on gay rights public. Still, Owens insisted, "our response is focused on making voters aware of the issues rather than looking at candidates personally."
Even if GOP candidates refrain from directly criticizing their opponents for being gay, they may find subtle ways to remind voters of it.
The Metcalf campaign already is criticizing Cammermeyer for raising a lot of money from out-of-state sources--including supporters of gay causes.
But large sums of money are a big boon to a challenger. "I have names and addresses of donors in Phoenix and New York . . . San Francisco and Los Angeles," Kehoe said.
According to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan research group, the average House challenger had raised a mean total of $85,645 by the end of March 31, the latest figures available. Kehoe had raised $370,534, compared with Bilbray's $319,092. She picked up $2,000 last week from about 50 individuals who attended a gay-sponsored fund-raiser in Washington.
Baldwin had raised $384,647 by March 31--more than any of her opponents in the Democratic primary. And Cammermeyer has raised $300,542--almost as much as Metcalf.
Her celebrity has brought her a star-studded list of donors, including Barbra Streisand, who produced the TV movie about her; actress Glenn Close, who played her in the show; and Rosie O'Donnell.
That race may be the best test of the power of money to overcome the potential political liabilities.
"It wouldn't be a close race, except I know what money can do," said Chris Strow, Metcalf's campaign manager.
PROVIDENCE RI Newport Daily News, Friday, May 22, 1998-- The State Judiciary Committee voted Thursday to repeal the state's 100-year-old law criminalizing sodomy, calling it unconstitutional.
The 9-to-2 vote put supporters a step closer to their goal. The full Senate will debate the bill next week, probably Thursday. Advocates believe they have the votes to push the legislation through the Senate and to Gov. Lincoln Almond. The House of Representatives already has voted to repeal the law.
According to a source close to the governor, Almond will let the bill become law without his signature.
Opponents of the bill put on a last-ditch effort to kill the bill, trying to convince committee members that the bill was immoral. Sodomy is defined as oral and anal sex.
David K. Gadoury, pastor of the Cranston Christian Fellowship, said the bill was "a sinister movement to approve same-sex marriages."
Also, Philip H. Curtis, pastor of the 300-member Exeter Chapel, said, "You are opening a Pandora's Box and the intention is to move one step after another to allow homosexual marriages in the state."
Another opponent is Joanne McOsker, president of Catholics for Life. "I can't believe we're talking about this horrific bill," she said. "How far have we come down the slippery road of evil?"
Opponents said the law was a deterrent to those who would have sex in public and would force themselves on children. Repealing it would be sending the wrong message to children, they said.
But supporters told a different story--that the law was unevenly enforced and that it unfairly penalizes handicapped people who may have no other way to continue a physical relationship with their loved ones. There are already laws against any kind of sex in public and child molestation, they said.
"There is no reason why this should be enforced for unmarried adults and not for married adults if this conduct is truly injurious to the public," said J. Richard Ratcliffe, an attorney representing the American Bar Association.
Sen. John Roney, D-Providence, who sponsored the Senate version of the bill, said the law has historically been selectively enforced.
"This law is essentially like a speed trap," Roney said. "It waits to trap the unwary or the unlucky. It is the antithesis of what we really are. We are not a government of law; we are a government of men because it is a person who decides who will be charged."
Three different Superior Court judges have, in recent years, pressed the General Assembly to act on what they call an unconstitutional law, Roney said. Several committee members cited that when they voted for the bill.
"The issue tonight is the repeal of an antiquated, clearly unconstitutional statute," said committee chairwoman Sen. Teresa Paiva Weed, D-Newport.
"We can talk about the different problems that may arise, but the bottom line is that the law violates the equal protection clause of the United States Constitution and the Rhode Island Constitution," said Sen. Patrick T. McDonald, D-South Kingstown.
WASHINGTON New York Times, May 24, 1998 -- Democrats in the Senate are pushing Republicans for a showdown over President Clinton's nomination of James Hormel, who is openly gay, as ambassador to Luxembourg. The nomination means little in itself -- Luxumbourg is the size of Rhode Island -- but it helps Democrats in this election year portray Republicans as captive of their right wing.
Four senators have officially blocked the nomination since the Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved it in November. And Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott has refused to bring it to the floor.
But more than a dozen other Republicans, including Sen. Alfonse D'Amato of New York, support it. And an intense fight is under way behind the scenes for more support.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, said this month that she had signed up the Republicans to bring the nomination to a vote. Combined with virtually all 45 Democrats in the Senate, the senator said, she had the support of 58 senators -- two shy of forcing a vote.
D'Amato said in a brief interview that he would back Hormel, 64, a San Francisco philanthropist who is heir to the meat-packing fortune and is a major Democratic contributor.
Other Republicans who have indicated their support include Sens. Orrin Hatch of Utah, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, and Gordon Smith of Oregon, a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, which approved the nomination by a vote of 16-2.
Still, it is not clear how far rank-and-file Republicans will push. Gary Bauer, president of the conservative Family Research Council, said Friday: "In this current atmosphere of tension between pro-family groups and the Republican leadership, it's probably even less likely than otherwise to come up."
But Democrats indicated they would continue to press for a vote on the nomination, which, they said, helps cast the Republicans as intolerant. Sen. Paul Wellstone, D-Minn., said he would try to force a vote in early June by attaching the nomination to another bill -- any bill -- once the Senate finished with tobacco legislation.
With pressure beginning to build, Sen. James Inhofe of Oklahoma, one of the four Republicans blocking the nomination, took to the Senate floor Friday to assert his opposition to Hormel based on what he described as three pieces of evidence of what Republican critics say is Hormel's gay agenda.
He cited an October newspaper article that quoted gay activists as saying that the nomination was a reward by the Clinton administration for their support.
He cited an account from June 1996 in which Hormel said he had asked to be appointed ambassador to Norway because that country was hospitable to homosexuals.
And Inhofe cited recent comments by Faith Ryan Whittlesey, a Republican and former U.S. ambassador to Switzerland, that the administration was appointing diplomats with personal agendas.
Inhofe quoted Ms. Whittlesey as saying: "What they're trying to do is use the U.S. diplomatic service to open the way to change deeply held religious convictions and social mores in other countries. Ambassadorial appointments should not be used for the purpose of social engineering."
His confirmation by a unanimous vote late Thursday nonetheless left a partisan dispute raging over the stalled ambassadorial nomination of James Hormel, who is also homosexual. Hormel has been nominated to be ambassador to Luxembourg.
Hochberg has headed an investment firm and was president and chief operating officer of the Lillian Vernon Corp., a direct marketing company. He is also a former co-chairman of the Human Rights Campaign, a gay and lesbian political organization.
President Clinton nominated him for the SBA job last October. Sen. John Kerrey, D-Mass., a top supporter of Hochberg, said that while Republicans closely scrutinized Hochberg's fund-raising activities for the Democratic Party, his sexual orientation was never an issue.
"Fred's confirmation is a clear sign of progress, but great work remains to be done,'' Kerrey said in a statement today.
The Human Rights Campaign called Hochberg's approval "a demonstration of fairness and bipartisanship,'' and called on Republicans to treat Hormel the same way.
But Republicans said Hochberg's approval showed that the GOP was not blocking Hormel because of his homosexuality. They have said their opposition to Hormel is based on what they say is his aggressive pursuit of a gay political agenda.
Clinton nominated Hormel, a 64-year-old San Francisco philanthropist and Democratic Party donor, last year. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee sent the nomination to the floor in November.
WASHINGTON BLADE, May 15, 1998 ---- Moving to counter a pro-Gay court ruling in the state, Alaska lawmakers on May 11 voted to put a question on the state ballot this November, asking voters to amend the state constitution to give legal recognition to marriages only when they involve "one man and one woman."
Legislators rushed the amendment through the statehouse after state Superior Court Judge Peter Michalski in Anchorage ruled in February that Alaska cannot deny marriage licenses to same-sex couples unless it can prove that the government has a "compelling" need to do so. The state has since asked the Alaska Supreme Court to review Michalski's ruling.
The marriage controversy in Alaska closely resembles the one in Hawaii, where courts have also ruled thus far that the state must explain some compelling reason to deny same-sex couples marriage licenses. The Hawaii legislature has also put a measure on the November ballot to seek permission from voters to change the constitution to deny such licenses. The Hawaii Supreme Court, meanwhile, has not made its final ruling on a same-sex marriage lawsuit. The case, Baehr v. Hawaii, has been pending before the state supreme court for more than a year now without even a word yet on whether the court intends to hear oral arguments or just issue a ruling. The apparent lack of action, coupled with this November's ballot, has led some Gay legal activists to speculate that the court may try to avoid making a decision and let voters settle the matter.
The amendment for which the Alaska legislature seeks voter approval would change the state constitution to say that, "to be valid or recognized in this State, a marriage may exist only between one man and one woman." It was introduced into the legislature on March 2 by the state senate's Committee on Health, Education and Social Services and was championed by that committee's vice chair, Sen. Loren Leman, a Republican.
The Alaska Senate passed the amendment April 16 by a vote of 14 to 6 - the bare two-thirds majority needed on legislation involving constitutional amendments. The vote was along strict party lines, according to the Anchorage Daily News, with every Republican voting in favor and every Democrat voting against.
A fight erupted in Juneau shortly thereafter, the Daily News reported, with Leman complaining on the Senate floor that Alaska Attorney General Bruce Botelho signed a petition circulated by a group called the Committee for Equality, asking legislators to oppose the constitutional amendment. Leman said the attorney general should not have signed the petition because his agency is responsible for defending the same-sex marriage ban.
Botelho, however, said he should not be criticized for his private views.
"I signed the petition not as attorney general, but as Joe Citizen. I think I have the right to do so," Botelho told the Daily News.
Other officials who signed the petition included Labor Commissioner Tom Cashen and Public Assistance Director Jim Nordlund.
The House vote took place as legislators "scrambled" to wrap up old business before the scheduled session end on Monday, May 11, according to the Daily News. The vote came after an emotional debate in which supporters argued that the measure is necessary to pre-empt an anticipated State Supreme Court ruling in the Anchorage case, Brause v. Alaska. If the state supreme court upholds Michalski's ruling, the state would face the task of finding a "compelling" reason for the ban - an obstacle most legal experts consider insurmountable. Opponents of the constitutional amendment spoke of Gay friends or family members and warned that putting the measure to ballot could spark a "bitter and possibly violent" campaign against Gays.
State Rep. Con Bunde of Anchorage, the only House Republican to oppose the anti-Gay measure, said there was intense lobbying in favor of the ban from groups in the lower 48 states and that that suggests there will be a "nasty" campaign for the measure this fall.
"If this outpouring of intolerance, what I consider bigotry, lying, self-righteousness, is any indication of what Alaska would be in for," the Daily News quoted her as saying, "it certainly removed any doubts that I had about voting against this issue."
The Republican-controlled House approved the amendment Monday by a vote of 28 to 12.
Meanwhile, Alabama became the 29th state to enact an anti-Gay marriage law May 1, when Gov. Fob James Jr., a Republican, signed a bill to bar same-sex marriages in the state and to deny recognition to any marriages performed in other states.
"It is a sad comment on the world we live in today when a bill such as this is needed," said James in a special bill signing ceremony attended by the media and other officials, according to his spokesperson David Azbell.
"The governor is a strong believer in traditional family values and feels that Alabama should not be bound by [a] marriage between two people of the same-sex in another state when that is not part of the morals or values that the people of Alabama share," Azbell explained to the Blade.
Alabama Rep. R.P. "Phil" Crigler Jr. (R-Mobile) introduced the bill on January 13, amidst a massive lobbying campaign by right-wing Christian groups. Despite Gay activists' hopes that the bill would not come up for a vote before the legislative session adjourned, the House passed the bill 79 to 12 on April 9, and the Senate passed it 30 to 0 on April 27 - the last day of the session.
"It was outraging," said David W. White, state coordinator for the Gay & Lesbian Alliance of Alabama. "They're creating a class of second-class citizens by making Gay people different from everyone else."
White said the bill gained momentum as Democratic Lt. Gov. Don Siegelman began to emerge as the frontrunner in his gubernatorial campaign. In a strange political twist, White said, Republican lawmakers were hoping Democrats would quash their efforts to pass the bill so that they could use this against Siegelman in his campaign.
"We caught wind that some Republicans were actually working secretly against the bill," White said.
In turn, a number of Democrats who were opposed to the bill began helping it along, to prevent this from happening, White said.
But then, he said, a group called Save Traditional Marriages ran full-page ads in Alabama papers on April 26 warning that Alaska and Hawaii might soon legalize same-sex marriage and urging voters to ask their legislators to vote in favor of the Gay marriage ban.
"I think once those ads came out on the 26th, those Republicans knew that they had to move forward and pass the bill in order to look like champions," White said. "I'm not making this stuff up."
Gay activists were "pretty upset," White said.
"It was one of those things where we kept holding our breath, hoping the session would just die ... but it was kind of one of those things where we knew in the back of our minds that this was going to happen eventually anyway."
BEVERLY HILLS, Calif., May 14 (Reuters) ---- British pop star George Michael, who came out as a homosexual after being arrested in a public men's room, pleaded no-contest on Thursday to performing a lewd act and was fined US$810 and ordered to undergo sexual counseling.
Judge Charles Rubin also ordered the singer, who was not in court, to perform 80 hours of community service and banned him from the Will Rogers park in Beverly Hills -- an alleged meeting place for men seeking casual gay sex -- where he was arrested April 7 by an undercover policeman.
Michael's attorney Ira Reiner said the star was in Britain and had agreed to the sentence which had been worked out in negotiations between Reiner and the Los Angeles District Attorney's office.
Under California law, a no-contest plea is equivalent to pleading guilty. The 34-year-old singer, whose hit song ``I Want Your Sex'' was banned on many radio stations, did not have to appear in court because the charge was a misdemeanor.
Four days after being arrested, Michael, who was charged under his real name of Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou, said during a television interview he was a homosexual and apologized to his fans for the way in which he had been forced to reveal his sexual preference.
During the 15-minute hearing in Beverly Hills Municipal Court, the precise nature of the ``lewd act'' in the men's room where Michael was alone, was never divulged.
The offense carried a maximum sentence of six months in jail and a fine of US$1,000, but Rubin said he felt such a fine was insignificant to a man of Michael's wealth.
He fined Michael US$810 and sentenced him to 24 months ``informal probation,'' ordered him to perform 80 hours of community service and to attend five one-hour sessions of sexual counseling.
Deputy District Attorney Kathy Solorzano recommended that Michael erform his community service with the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center. She also told the court that Michael was already undergoing some sexual counseling.
``As long as he's getting counseling that's what important,'' said Judge Rubin. ``That's what the court's concerned about, so he doesn't get into this situation again.''
Outside the court, the singer's attorney Reiner had little to say to reporters, but prosecutor Solorzano said that the sentence was more than usual for such a case because it not only included a fine but also community service and counseling.
``The sense I'm getting is that he's always wanted to admit his culpability in this case and we didn't want to treat him more harshly than other people in this situation.''
During the sentencing, Judge Rubin referred to Michael by his Greek given name, but continually mispronounced it. When Reiner told him to call the singer simply Michael, the judge got it wrong and referred to him as Michael George.
He was released from jail in March and is cooking and cleaning in the Van Ness Recovery House and attending five Alcoholics Anonymous meetings a week. "In gay rehab, there's less chance of him getting into fights because of his fame.
And the bottom line is, he's very gay-friendly," says a friend. Downey was jailed for drug offences.
Tel Aviv Israel, May 14, 1998 ---Singer Dana International caused a ruckus in the lobby of the Knesset yesterday when she arrived in the building to attend a meeting of the Education and Culture Committee. Hordes of waiting photographers rushed to take pictures of the Eurovision song contest winner, knocking over a large flowerpot and several people who were in their way.
MK Avraham Ravitz (United Torah Judaism), witnessing the commotion, said "this is the height of the sub-culture of primitive modernism." MK David Azoulay (Shas), who walked out of the committee meeting before the singer's arrival, said, "I do not wish to meet a hermaphrodite who brings no honor." Committee Chairman Emanuel Zisman (The Third Way) was responsible for the invitation to International. Zisman greeted her and the writers of her winning song, Zvika Pik and Yoav Ginai, saying they had helped "elevate the spirits and boost the national morale of the Israeli people." Zisman said that the song's success in the contest was not only due to Dana's voice, but also to her "charm and charisma." He added that millions of people across Europe voted for the song to show their support for the freedom of culture and art in Israel. International, clearly enjoying the spotlight, added her two cents on the importance of freedom of expression. "It is very upsetting to see that there are so many people trying to stop the celebrations," she said. "I did not expect such harsh responses."
The victorious singer reiterated her joy at winning the annual Europe-wide contest, adding "this is not my victory as an individual, but our victory as a people and a cultural victory for the state of Israel." She called on the Education and Culture Committee "not to allow extremist groups to interfere with the freedom of expression and democracy in Israel. If there is no democracy, there will be no Israel." Labor MK Yael Dayan, chairman of the Knesset Committee for the Advancement of the Status of Women, also congratulated International. "This is an achievement for civil liberties and human rights, above and beyond the song's achievement," she said.
By Gregg K. Kakesako, Star-Bulletin
HONOLULU STAR-BULLETIN, May 13, 1998 ---- The Navy, fighting to discharge a Pearl Harbor submariner on charges he is gay, today refused to allow the news media to attend his promotion ceremony.
Senior Chief Petty Officer Timothy R. McVeigh was to be "frocked" this morning at Pearl Harbor's Submarine Training Center and promoted to master chief petty officer, the highest enlisted rank in the Navy.
But at the last moment, the Navy decided to bar the news media from covering what is normally a routine event.
McVeigh, who is not related to the Oklahoma City bomber, last night said he "was very disappointed."
"Normally, the Navy celebrates such an occasion because it's a chance to show off the best it has."
Cmdr. Kevin Wensing, Navy spokesman, blamed McVeigh and Lt. Cmdr. Derreck cole, McVeigh's military lawyer, for failing to follow proper procedures by not informing either his commanding officer, Capt. Rob Dunn, or Cmdr. Betsy Bird, Pacific Fleet Submarine Force spokeswoman, that the news media were invited to the brief ceremony.
Wensing siad there were two other Navy enlisted men who were to be "frocked" this morning, and he didn't know if they wanted such notoriety.
Wensing brushed off suggestions that the Navy was embarrassed by the McVeigh incident or that there were directions from higher Navy officials to keep the media away. "The ceremony is not considered a media event," Wensing said.
Cole explained that Navy policy allows McVeigh to be "frocked: and wear the rank of master chief, although he won't draw the pay until his orders are posted.
"He can assume the rights and responsibilities of the position, but the pay won't be forthcoming until he has orders," Cole said. The Navy has said that, depending on the needs of the service, that could be anywhere [sic] between now and next July.
The results of the promotion board were released Friday.
The decision to promote McVeigh was made solely on his record by a Navy selection board, which was not given any information involving his legal problems, according to a Navy spokesman.
Cole said McVeigh, 36, still has a pending June 1 court date, set after a federal judge told the Navy to give McVeigh his old job as chief of a nuclear submarine.
McVeigh, an 18-year veteran, was forced out of his position as senior enlisted man on the nuclear submarine USS Chicago in November when the Navy tried to discharge him on allegations that he is homosexual.
McVeigh, who has never commented on his sexual orientation, took his case to court, and U.S. District Judge Stanely Sporkin ruled in January that the Navy overstepped its bounds in its investigation.
The Navy has said that it intends to appeal Sporkin's ruling, which prevents it from discharging McVeigh.
McVeigh is now in charge of coordinating the Pacific Fleet's submarine training program.
Sporkin said the Navy violated the military's "don't ask don't tell" policy on gays when it linked McVeigh to an anonymous Ameican Online Inc. computer profile page.
The Navy also violated teh 1986 Electronic Communications Privacy Act by obtaining confidential nformation about McVeigh from AOL in what Sporkin described as an improper "search and destroy" mission, since it gathered the data without a warrant or court order.
Knowing more about this mechanism could help efforts to develop a vaccine against HIV, Dr. Richard Kornbluth and colleagues at the University of California San Diego said.
"This is potentially important information to incorporate in efforts to design an HIV vaccine, giving us a focus for boosting the body's own natural response system at the earliest possible stage of HIV infection, in order to prevent the destruction of the immune system," Kornbluth said in a statement.
The switch, known as the CD40 ligand, starts a cascade of immune reactions, they wrote in a report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
First CD40 stimulates the macrophages, immune cells that scavenge up invaders. The macrophages produce beta-chemokines, immune system signaling chemicals. These include MIP-1a and MIP-1b, as well as RANTES.
These chemokines protected another kind of immune cell, the CD4 T-cell, from infection by HIV, Kornbluth's group wrote.
To get into a T-cell the HIV virus uses some of the same receptors, or chemical doorways, as chemokines -- especially RANTES. So if the chemokine gets there first, it effectively can block the doorway.
That is what happened, according to Kornbluth. "This pathway may play a role in anti-HIV immunity," the researchers wrote.
"The discovery of CD40L as a master switch in the immune system was one of the most important recent developments in studies of the human immune system," Kornbluth added.
"Our findings indicate that when this switch is turned on, specific cells make proteins which appear to prevent HIV from infecting T-cells, and which also seem to recruit more immune cells to the site of infection as reinforcements to the developing immunological battlefield."
They said their findings also had implications for cancer, chronic inflammatory conditions such as Crohn's disease and lupus, as well as atherosclerosis or clogging of the arteries and multiple sclerosis.
NEW YORK May 12, 1998 --- In what it touted as an important advance in gay and lesbian rights, New York City plans to ensure that unmarried couples are treated the same as married ones on everything from housing to parking permits to burial rights.
The legislation "moves closer to the ideal of human rights, and treating everyone fairly,'' said Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, a Republican whose office drafted the proposal.
"I believe New York is setting the pace for the rest of the country,'' he said.
For years, the city has been recognized for accommodating policies toward gay and lesbian couples. A series of directives, at least one of which dates to 1989, extended to domestic partners the rights once reserved for spouses and family members, such as visitation in city jails and hospitals, and succession for city-supervised housing.
Giuliani's legislation, proposed Monday and written in cooperation with advocates for homosexual rights, would make those policies permanent by writing them into law. It would apply to heterosexual and homosexual domestic partnerships registered with the City Clerk.
There are about 8,700 registered domestic partners in the city, and at least 55 percent are heterosexual couples, according to the mayor's office. The proposal is likely to receive quick passage in the Democratic City Council, where it has the support of Speaker Peter F. Vallone.
Since the settlement of a lawsuit in 1993, the city has provided health and dental benefits to the domestic partners of city workers. Under the proposed legislation, labor negotiations would be required to extend to employees' partners the same benefits provided for employees' spouses, potentially opening the way for those benefits to be expanded.
But the legislation also would venture into new areas, like allowing domestic partners of police and other uniformed employees to be eligible for death benefits if the employee is killed in the line of duty.
A domestic partner would also have the right to be buried with a partner in the city-owned Canarsie cemetery, a right now reserved for spouses. Other changes involve rights to parking permits and disclosure statements filed by city employees.
"The thing that's really important in this law is it does as much as the city can do to recognize domestic partner relationships. That's not what other cities have done,'' said Matt Foreman, executive director of Empire State Pride Agenda, a gay and lesbian advocacy group that worked on the bill.
Similar issues have been debated around the country.
After a five-year fight by gay activists, Philadelphia's City Council approved a measure to extend health and pension benefits to same-sex partners of city workers. San Francisco has faced court challenges in its attempt to force the roughly 6,000 companies doing business with the city to offer the same benefits to employees' unmarried domestic partners - gay or straight - as they provide to spouses.
At a time when some states have been passing laws barring same-sex marriage, the New York legislation sends a powerful message, advocates said.
"We applaud Mayor Giuliani for taking this important step,'' said Kim I. Mills of the Human Rights Campaign, a national lesbian and gay political organization.
Giuliani, seen as a potential candidate for national office, was criticized by conservatives.
The mayor "has done a swell job cleaning up the streets, but the real problem is in the culture,'' said Robert H. Knight of the Family Research Council, which lobbies on conservative causes. "He is marginalizing himself, and will not be taken seriously as a national figure by introducing radical proposals like this.''
Honolulu, Hawaii- May 12, 1998 ---- It has just been learned that at 7AM Hawaii time (1PM Eastern Daylight Time), Wednesday, May 12, Senior Chief Petty Officer Timothy McVeigh will be granted the uniform and rank of Master Chief Petty Officer in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. In view of the Navy's recent attempt to discharge Senior Chief McVeigh, and McVeigh's subsequent victory in federal court in which the Navy was found guilty of violating the federal Electronic Communications Privacy Act and the President's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Don't Pursue" policy, advocates are asking that the Navy's entire case against McVeigh now be dropped.
McVeigh is one of only 16 electronic technicians selected for the new Master Chief Petty Officer rank, out of an eligible pool of 168 sailors worldwide. Wednesday's "frocking ceremony" permits him to wear the uniform and have the privileges of his new rank as Master Chief, while the actual "promotion" and salary benefits commensurate with the position will not come for several months, as is standard Navy policy.
Earlier this year, the Defense Department attempted to discharge Senior Chief McVeigh after Naval investigators violated federal wire-tap law in obtaining the sailors' confidential email account information from America Online. The illegally obtained evidence led the Navy to conclude that McVeigh was gay - it also led a federal judge on January 29th of this year to rule that the Navy had gone on an improper "search and destroy" mission against the 18-year veteran, and to order the Navy to reinstate him. The Clinton Administration subsequently appealed the ruling.
Asked to comment on his new position, the highest enlisted rank in the US Navy, McVeigh responded from his home in Hawaii: "I feel great, I have worked extremely hard for 18 years to keep Navy submarines mission ready and make them a better place for sailors to work. I look forward to continuing that challenging job." While clearly pleased about his imminent promotion, Senior Chief McVeigh asked to be permitted to congratulate the other new Master Chiefs as well: "I would like to take a moment to congratulate the other senior chief petty officers who were on the same list and selected for advancement as well."
Online advocates and others following the high-profile McVeigh scandal are now asking the Pentagon and the White House to drop their appeal against the sailor. "The simple truth is that when the Navy took politics and prejudice out of the equation, it found Senior Chief McVeigh deserving of its highest rank," said John Aravosis, an online strategist assisting McVeigh with his case. "It would now be the height of hypocrisy, not to mention an incredible waste of taxpayer dollars, for the Clinton Administration to promote Senior Chief McVeigh with one breath and kick him out with the other."
In spite of the Pentagon brass' concerted campaign to end the sailor's lifetime of service to his country, McVeigh's advancement to such a senior position comes as no surprise to those familiar with his outstanding record. In his performance reviews, available on his Web site, McVeigh's commanders had nothing but praise for his performance:
* "As Chief of Boat, he has been a superior leader whose innate ability to
motivate, inspire and train personnel significantly improved productivity
and command performance."
* "His stellar appearance and positive influence make him an outstanding
role model, and his embodiment of Navy core values guarantees success."
* "Ranked number 1 and recommended for early promotion."
* "Best diving officer of the watch, demonstrated poise and exceptional
shiphandling skills."
* "Directly responsible for high crew morale (and) for order and
discipline."
* "McVeigh's inspirational leadership permeates throughout my command."
* "His example has fostered unparalleled productivity and esprit de
corps."
* "Unfailing diligence...total dedication to excellence...an invaluable
asset to the Navy...promote now!"
"When you read his performance reviews and then look at the way the Clinton Administration has treated him, it's actually rather sad," said Aravosis. "Here's a guy who's done his job, served his country, and even moved in with his mother in order to care for her after a recent heart attack - and all the Clinton Administration and Pentagon brass can think about is ruining his career and destroying his life."
"America needs good sailors," said Aravosis. "The Navy made a mistake in going after Timothy McVeigh. Let's hope his promotion is a sign that they've finally decided to move on and leave this American hero alone."
Senior Chief McVeigh's frocking ceremony is to take place at 7AM Wednesday, May 12, 1998 at the Naval Submarine Training Center Pacific, Pearl Harbor, HI, on North Road. Any press desiring to attend would be required to get approval from the Submarine Force Pacific Fleet Public Affairs Office. The phone number is (808) 471-0911, contact: Commander Betsy Bird, submarine force pacific fleet public affairs officer.
WASHINGTON May 12, 1998 --The Human Rights Campaign praised AT&T and two of its unions for reaching agreement today on a contract that includes domestic partner benefits for the company's gay and lesbian employees.
"Every time a Fortune 100 company institutes these benefits, it demonstrates that domestic partner benefits make good business sense," said HRC Education Director Kim Mills, who oversees workplace issues for the organization. "AT&T and the unions agreed to these benefits in one of the most congenial negotiating sessions ever -- further evidence that these benefits are a cost-effective means of attracting and keeping good employees."
AT&T, the Communications Workers of America and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers announced today that they have reached a tentative agreement ona four-year contract. The settlement came nearly three weeks before the expiration of the current contract.
"Once this contract is ratified, AT&T will join the growing ranks of major U.S. corporations that have realized domestic partner benefits amount to equal pay for equal work," Mills said.
The Human Rights Campaign has documented more than 500 U.S. employers that offer such benefits to their gay and lesbian employees. Among them are such household names as Disney, Kodak, IBM, Hewlett Packard and Reebok. (The full list can be found on HRC's website at http://www.hrc.org/issues/workplac/dp/index.html.)
The controversy started in 1993, when Cincinnati voters adopted Issue 3, which is a charter amendment that prohibits municipal protections in employment, housing and public accommodations for gays, lesbians and bisexuals. The passage of Issue 3 prompted a lawsuit against the City of Cincinnati, among others, charging that the ordinance unconstitutionally violates Cincinnati citizens' equal protection rights based on sexual orientation.
Issue 3 was struck down in a U.S. District Court in August of 1994 but that decision was later reversed by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in May of 1995. The plaintiffs then asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review the case in August of 1995.
During that time, the Supreme Court in May 1996, in Romer v. Evans, struck down an almost identical law in Colorado. In light of their decision, the Supreme Court ordered a new review of Issue 3 by the Sixth Circuit. However, a Sixth Circuit panel again found Issue 3 to be constitutional in October 1997 and a request for review by the entire Sixth Circuit was later denied.
"I can't imagine that the Supreme Court is going to be very happy about again being asked to consider a legal matter that should have been a resolved a long time ago," said Scott Greenwood, the ACLU of Ohio General Counsel and a cooperating attorney.
"The Sixth Circuit is just wrong," added Counsel of Record Alphonse Gerhardstein, "and the Supreme Court should reverse it under Romer. Under our Constitution the civil rights of individuals do not depend upon majority approval."
Mayor Edward G. Rendell said he will sign the proposed ordinance and two others the activists sought.
Same-sex partners of city workers would qualify for benefits after proving they are involved in a ``life partnership,'' including shared bank accounts, dual property ownership and insurance beneficiary designation.
Other measures approved by the City Council would exempt same-sex partners from the real estate transfer tax and ban on-the-job discrimination based on marital status.
Dozens of municipalities and states around the country have similar domestic partnership laws.
The benefits and anti-discrimination bills passed 10-6. The City Council voted 9-7 for the real estate transfer tax.
The measures faced opposition from some religious leaders.
"We are supporting the Indigo Girls as they battle ignorance and intolerance, and we remain hopeful that the administrators responsible for the cancellation of these shows will engage in sincere dialogue with Amy and Emily and their local gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender communities," stated Task Force executive director Kerry Lobel. "We know from Amy and Emily that they are disappointed in the actions of these officials. They also understand that this situation presents them with a unique opportunity to educate students, teachers, and parents about the vast limitations of homophobia," added Lobel.
Last Wednesday in South Carolina, Irmo High School Principal Gerald Witt canceled a performance by the duo scheduled for today, saying through a spokesperson it was because Saliers and Ray are lesbians. The next day, the principal of Germantown High School in Tennessee called off a scheduled performance, claiming it was because of profanity in their songs¹ lyrics. And Tuesday, officials at another Tennessee High School nixed a show that was slated for yesterday. In the face of these insults, the Grammy Award winning duo is going on with the show. Today they will perform in Columbia, South Carolina but off high school grounds. The show is free to high school students.
"We¹re very concerned for the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender students of these high schools. We already know that sexual minority youth face more violence and harassment than non-gay youth, now, thanks to the actions of their principals, they may have more to look forward to," said Lobel. "It¹s unconscionable that these administrators are more concerned with appeasing a few intolerant parents than with the health and safety of their students," she added.
The Indigo Girls are deeply committed to social justice issues and actively support a number of causes. Later this year they will be performing a benefit show for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. "We are grateful for Amy and Emily¹s leadership and courage," said Lobel. "They are exceptional role models for all students," she added.
Ypsilanti, Michigan; Tuesday 5 May 1998 ----"The voters of Ypsilanti have spoken and affirmed what the City Council already knew: that discrimination is wrong and that all people must be able to live and work without fear of becoming victims of bigotry and prejudice.
"The defeat of Proposal C is a victory for equality in Ypsilanti as well as for people throughout the state who can take this as evidence that Michigan communities will not be held hostage by extremist forces that swoop down into a town or city to spread fear and promote division. This is a good community of good people. Obviously when left to their own wishes and their own sense of fairness, the people of Ypsilanti listen to each other and not some outside voices who pretend to be moralists while trying to sell a bill of goods that includes selfishness, suspicion and mendacity.
"If the outside forces that demean a community can be turned back in Ypsilanti, then we can all begin to realize the potential to keep such divisive forces out of all of our communities.
"Today's vote was a vote for humanity and decency. Now it is time for the good people of this community to come together and transcend the volatility that has characterized the months leading up to today's vote."
Senator says he'll amend a major bill to get ambassador hopeful considered
WASHINGTON San Francisco Examiner, May 5, 1998 --- A leading Senate liberal announced he will try to force Senate Republican leaders to allow a vote on the nomination of San Francisco philanthropist and gay rights advocate James Hormel to be ambassador to Luxembourg.
Hormel's nomination has languished for six months, blocked with parliamentary tactics by four senators who say his gay activism makes him an inappropriate choice for the job because Luxembourg is a predominantly Catholic nation.
Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., has said he will "definitely not" bring Hormel's nomination to the floor. Lott said the debate on the nomination would be too time-consuming.
Sen. Paul Wellstone, D-Minn., accused the Republicans on Monday of blocking a vote on the nomination because Hormel is gay, and vowed to fight what he called an "unconscionable" situation.
"This is just the beginning of turning up the heat," Wellstone said. Describing his mood as that of "quiet indignation," Wellstone said he has drafted an amendment demanding that Hormel's nomination be considered and is prepared to attach the amendment to any major legislation that comes up for a vote.
Wellstone could use this tactic to pressure Lott to allow a vote on the Hormel nomination.
"I think there will be an overwhelmingly positive vote once it comes to the floor," he said.
Hormel, 64, is heir to a meatpacking fortune and a founding member of the Human Rights Campaign, the largest gay rights organization in America. His nomination for the Luxembourg post was approved by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in November and sent to the full Senate for approval.
Last month, 42 Democratic senators, led by Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D- Calif., Robert G. Torricelli, D-N.J., and Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota, tried to ratchet up the pressure by sending a letter to Lott requesting a vote on Hormel's nomination. Lott refused to budge.
Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., said she would continue to work with Feinstein to push the nomination forward.
"Many senators feel that holding up this nomination is unfair," Boxer said. "He has the support of many senators on both sides of the aisle."
PHOENIX Arizona Daily Star, May 5 ---- Gays may get legal protection in Arizona against discrimination.
On a 16-13 vote, the state Senate yesterday approved an amendment that blocks state and local governments from subjecting anyone to different treatment in employment based on sexual orientation.
The amendment to HB 2392 bars discrimination against someone solely because he or she associates - or is believed to associate - with gays.
What future the provision has is uncertain. Despite its bipartisan approval in the Senate, the now-amended measure dealing with how the Attorney General's Office handles discrimination complaints must go back to the House. Chances are good the House will insist on a conference committee and try to delete the amendment.
"This is a good day for civil rights in the state of Arizona,'' said Sen. Elaine Richardson, D-Tucson, the amendment's sponsor.
Richardson said the idea isn't as radical as it sounds. She said many large companies, including American Express, AT&T, Banc One and Intel, have similar anti-discrimination policies.
Sen. John Kaites, R-Glendale, led the opposition.
"I don't think we ought to be legislating special rights,'' he said. Richardson insisted that no special rights are being extended. She pointed out that other sections of state law already bar discrimination based on age, sex, race, national origin or disability.
Her amendment specifically bars government agencies or contractors from giving preferential treatment to individuals based on sexual orientation.
There would be no direct cost from her proposal, she says. Employers would not be required to give the domestic partners of gays the same health and other fringe benefits reserved for spouses.
Among Southern Arizona lawmakers, only Sen. Keith Bee, R-Tucson, voted against Richardson's amendment. Sen. Ann Day, R-Tucson, was absent.
BAY AREA REPORTER, April 30, 1998 --- "I'm still catching my balance. I was caught totally off guard. I hadn't even heard rumors of ill health," said David Mixner, the national gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender (GLBT) rights advocate whose conflicts with friend Bill Clinton over the Pentagon's "don't ask; don't tell" policy made national headlines during Clinton's first term. He was speaking of his reaction to the announcement that California's state-wide gay rights and AIDS/HIV lobby, The Lobby For Individual Freedom and Equality (LIFE Lobby), would be ceasing operations by Friday, May 1.
Mixner continued, "Although I believe in a lot of options being kept open for creating change -- government, working for candidates, running for office, going to jail, the arts -- I militantly believe that we need a lobby in the state capital. The right wing has a very effective lobby. We can't assume Sheila and Carole [Assemblymembers Sheila Kuehl and Carole Migden] can carry things alone. A lobby is absolutely a critical component of an effective professional movement."
LIFE Lobby formed in 1986 as a statewide coalition of AIDS service and educational organizations, originally calling itself the LIFE AIDS Lobby. Its controlling body, the House of Delegates, was made up of representatives from the various grassroots organizations. The board of directors, a much smaller group, oversaw the organization and tended to the finances of the lobby. Because AIDS issues and civil rights issues were so inextricably intertwined at the time, the lobby eventually took on civil rights issues related to the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender community. For 12 years it has been the primary voice in the halls of the state capitol for California's GLBT community, supporting and sometimes helping to draft progressive legislation, and fighting to defeat regressive bills. With its extensive network of local organizations, it was able to rally support in virtually every legislator's district.
But the passion for policy was not always matched by a balancing passion for raising the necessary money to fund the operations. According to one former staffer, "When I got there, buying a Xerox machine was a six-month project."
Rand Martin, Chief of Staff to State Senator John Vasconcellos (D-Santa Clara) said of the lobby's financial woes, "It's been coming for a long time. When LIFE Lobby began, it was essential to give it as broad a base as possible to ensure credibility, but it was a model that was very challenging. The large number of representatives on the board and in the House of Delegates did a good job formulating policy. But it never matched the equally important need for fundraising. In recent years the two governing bodies gave lip service to raising money, but they never attacked it with the same passion as they did policy. People have worked with good intention, but you have to pay the bills."
As it turned out, for some time those bills, at least the salaries of the staff, have been paid by Southern California publisher Bob Craig. The executive director of LIFE Lobby, Laurie McBride has worked without a salary for months.
'Destined for obsolescence'
On the weekend of April 18, LIFE Lobby held its quarterly meeting of the House of Delegates (HOD), an historic event in itself because the delegates met for the first time in the Capitol Building in Sacramento. A faction of the leadership concerned with the continuing financial insolvency of the organization presented a proposal to streamline the lobby, giving more control to the board with a stipulation that board members would raise substantial donations for the support of the lobby's work. They proposed that the HOD give up voting for the Board and turn the responsibility for the by-laws over to the board. The HOD would remain the primary arbiters of policy.
As McBride summarized it, "We were trying to change the structure to incorporate more fundraising."
The meeting was rancorous, according to some in attendance. Those against the change accused others of a power grab. Much was made of the need to keep the current structure, to ensure the diversity of the representation and the breadth of the policy. Others argued that fundraising needed to be given more emphasis on the board, or the organization simply would not survive. There was also much discussion over whether or not to split the issues of civil rights and AIDS/HIV, and whether there was a need to streamline the decision-making process. In the end, the vote was to keep the status quo.
McBride said of the stalemate, "The structure has always been unique and has always been a challenge. The House of Delegates in this organization has always had control. It's very hard to change something as fundamental as who has control."
On the following Monday, Laurie McBride announced to the staff of LIFE Lobby in its Sacramento office that the money for operating the lobby would cease at the end of the month, and therefore the lobby would no longer function. Two days later, on Wednesday, April 22, the members of the gay and lesbian PAC, Capital Political Action Committee (CAPPAC), heard the news at their annual Table Sponsor Party from LIFE delegates and a board member. Most were taken by surprise. They learned that half of the LIFE board had quit since the weekend.
In the days that have followed the announcement, there has been a flurry of activity and discussion between leaders in the state trying to create the phoenix that they hope will rise soon out of the ashes of the LIFE Lobby.
As Assemblymember Carole Migden (D-San Francisco) put it, "It's tragic when an organization with LIFE Lobby's important mission cannot pay its bills. We're looking forward to a replacement that can lower the overhead or raise the funds necessary to support our community's agenda in Sacramento. The LIFE Lobby leaves a huge gap that must be filled."
Kuehl, Speaker Pro Tem of the California State Assembly, said of LIFE's demise, "The structure itself was greatly at fault. The board's refusal to change the structure forced everybody's hand." Kuehl expressed confidence that she and her staff, Migden and her staff, gay-friendly legislators, and the other gay and lesbian aides in the capitol, would be able to continue the vital work of addressing, for now, the community's agenda, but she added, "I would be extremely worried if something weren't being organized in the wings."
McBride has indicated that she will continue to "prowl the halls" of the capitol on a volunteer basis while discussions proceed on the replacement for LIFE.
And as one LIFE Lobby staff member said, "I just want to make sure Lou Sheldon doesn't have the playing field to himself."
Integral to the discussions crisscrossing the state is John Duran. He was involved with the founding of LIFE Lobby and served as its co-chair with San Francisco attorney Don Disler from 1987 until 1992. He says that this week, "I'm doing a lot of lunches."
Unlike most who heard the news about LIFE, Duran was not surprised. "Last year Laurie called and said, 'We're in trouble. I need you to come back to the lobby.' I said no. I am the Chair of the LIFE Institute, the 501(c)3 organization that served as the educational arm of LIFE. The Institute is still solvent and will continue, but we are prohibited from engaging in political activity. It's a gay and lesbian think tank. We need a corresponding organization in the political realm. But a group did look at the financial situation after Laurie's call and told the board that without change it was destined for obsolescence. That was coolly received. Two months later their task force came to the same conclusion."
Reinvention time
Duran and other leaders are considering a replacement for LIFE that will deal only with GLBT civil rights issues. They are counting on the large AIDS/HIV services in the state to organize a separate lobby for health issues, and Duran indicates that such discussions are beginning. AIDS Project LA had a full-time lobbyist in Sacramento until January, when the position became vacant. It has not yet been filled. The San Francisco AIDS Foundation has done lobbying from its offices in San Francisco, but does not have a full-time presence in Sacramento now that LIFE Lobby is gone.
Lafaso expressed a hope that any new organization would continue to respond to a variety of voices. "Urban funding is okay, but the voices from the rural areas must be heard too. I don't think there is anyone in this day and age who thinks the only gays and lesbians whose vote depends on gay and lesbian issues live in San Francisco or Los Angeles."
McBride hopes that the new lobbying entity will include forums throughout the state that will draw in local representatives to air their views and visions, but without the unwieldy decision-making apparatus of the LIFE Lobby. And this time, it must be funded.
"People need to realize that if we are going to have a movement, we have to invest in our work at the state level," she said. "There are 38 gay and lesbian lobbies in the country, and all of them are critically under-funded, with the exception of Pride Agenda New York. Their budget is $1.6 million. The combined budgets of the other 37 is only $2.4 million. We invest in what we care about. This work is critically important. It's 12 years since LIFE began. We have the network now. We have friends in the legislature. We have Sheila and Carole.
"Everybody involved cares passionately about having a gay and lesbian voice in Sacramento, but it must be one that fits the realities of the late '90s, of the changing face of AIDS and civil rights."
Echoing McBride's ideas, Duran hopes to see the new organization create a mode of communication similar to the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force's Creating Change seminars. The meeting could happen once a year to discuss broad policy issues.
He said, "I don't know that it makes sense anymore to have 100 people come together every three months to argue and debate. On the big policy issues -- marriage rights, child custody, job protection, housing -- there was always consensus. It was only the internal politics that divided the delegates."
Kuehl said, "I hope to see the new organization have geographical representation, but also geographical fundraising. Let the local representatives seek a place on the board with the expectation that they will have to raise money. You don't have to have monied connections, but you have to be willing to ask everybody, invest with spirit and with resources."
Of the changes now inevitable, Rand Martin concluded, "While some people may see this as a black day for the gay and lesbian and AIDS-affected communities, this is actually a very essential step in the ongoing evolution of our movement. We are always reinventing ourselves. We will shortly see a new organization rise to meet the needs of the community as we pass into the new millennium."
``Corpus Christi,'' likely to open on Broadway or off-Broadway in September or October, features a character called Joshua, the newspaper said. The name Jesus is a variation of the name Joshua.
Gilbert Medina, an assistant to McNally's agent, confirmed that the play is being produced by Manhattan Theater Club, the paper said. A reading of the play was held Tuesday at the club, and about three dozen people attended.
The sex in the play is offstage and just talked about, the newspaper said.
The play borrows dialogue from the Bible's New Testament, paraphrasing Pontius Pilate's questioning of Jesus Christ before his crucifixion, the paper said.
``Art thou king of the queers?'' McNally's Pontius Pilate character asks instead of ``Art thou the King of the Jews?''
``Thou sayest,'' the Joshua character answers.
Roman Catholic leaders denounced the portrayal.
``If that were true, that would be horrifying,'' said Joe Zwilling, a spokesman for the Archdiocese of New York. William Donohue of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights called the play ``sick beyond words.''
McNally, a three-time Tony Award winner who has written numerous gay-themed plays, was quiet about his work. His previous works include ``Master Class'' and ``Love! Valour! Compassion!''
``I don't want to say anything about it. It's new,'' McNally said Thursday.
April 26, 1998 --- Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou, 34, was charged earlier this month with ``lewd conduct'' in a public toilet in Beverly Hills, Calif.
Panayiotou wept and shook uncontrollably as he was charged. A broken man, with nothing to declare but his alias: George Michael, singer, international celebrity and, up until his arrest, self-styled coy boy of pop.
Some might say that George Michael's sexuality was always a headline waiting to happen. In his pre-fame teens, he would stumble away from parties, drunk and sobbing, in pal Andrew Ridgeley's arms, convinced that he was so fat and ugly that no one would ever look at him.
For Wham!, he invented a heterosexual caricature. A strutting amalgam of prole cool, silk shorts and carefully positioned shuttlecocks, his persona was so finely tuned that he managed to fool everybody, including maybe himself.
In years to come, as a solo artist, there were always as many rumors as there were supermodels smoldering in his videos or draped over his arm. However, Michael, an intensely private man, never denied or confirmed his sexuality. The infrequent statements he made on the subject were master classes of slippery ambivalence.
This drove the gay community to distraction - in particular, Boy George, who embarked on what could only be described as a one-queen crusade to drag Michael out of the closet.
However, even Boy George proved no match for Coy George. Michael kept quiet, perhaps fearing that he had too much to lose - his commercial pull, the respect of his Greek-Cypriot father, the mystique he had meticulously cultivated, post-Wham! And, of course, control. Michael, being Michael, would have dreaded losing that most of all.
For while George Michael once sang ``I'm Your Man,'' in reality, he was always his own man, or strove to be. The protracted, and, for Michael, disastrous, court battle with his former record company Sony had a good deal more to do with his desire to command his own destiny than alleged weak promotion.
Indeed, while many have spoken of his loyalty and niceness, there has always been another side to George Michael, that of a serious paranoiac who only ever allowed himself to be photographed from the left, hated giving interviews and resented appearing even in his own videos.
So how did Michael, careful, self-possessed George Michael, come to be giving an impromptu ``public performance'' in front of an undercover cop on a sunny Los Angeles afternoon? For whatever he may believe, his sexuality is not the issue here. It is the risk he took.
The most circumspect and cagey of men, he has never come across as a sexual exhibitionist. On the contrary, he has rather given the impression that he takes baths with his underpants on.
The answer may lie in love and death. Michael has had a tough time of it recently. His beloved mother died of cancer last year. He has also lost his close friends Princess Diana and Gianni Versace, and his lover Anselmo Feleppa, who died of an AIDS-related illness.
Of all these, the loss of Feleppa probably had the most bearing on recent developments. Although Michael never openly admitted that they were lovers, he dedicated his album ``Older'' to Feleppa and described their two-year relationship as the ``most enlightening I have ever had.'' He also admitted smoking up to 25 cannabis joints a day in an effort to come to terms with Feleppa's death.
It would appear that, in life, Feleppa was a powerful, liberating influence on Michael. In creative terms, the singer certainly never came closer to falling out of the closet for good than on ``Older,'' which had reviewers gasping over the ``overtly homosexual sentiments'' of the lyrics. And maybe Feleppa's death, coupled with that of Michael's other loved ones, helped him realize that life was too short for prim self-denial.
However, none of this satisfactorily explains why a celebrity of George Michael's international standing ended up risking it all in a public lavatory. Was he, as has been widely speculated, a victim of police entrapment? The scene of his downfall, the Will Rogers Memorial Park, is certainly not an established gay pick-up spot. However, if we must ask what the police were doing there, it is just as pertinent to ask what Michael was doing there himself.
One thing's for sure: George Michael is unlikely to take comfort from the fact that the public seems to find the whole business rather amusing. For all our love of the salacious, we are usually quite happy to accept gay celebrities, which is something Michael should have remembered all along. However, he is unlikely to see things that way. For a man who has spent years cultivating sexual mystique, it will come as a blow to see his libido reduced to the level of a joke.
George Michael could never seriously be accused of living a lie, but he could be charged with failing to have a sense of humor about himself. In the end, it wasn't anti-gay karma that sank the good ship George; rather, it was all those long years of unnecessary control-freakery.
For, let's face it: If Coy George had been openly gay all along, the developments of recent weeks would never have been so interesting. The real story was not so much that George Michael was ``bent,'' but that he had so dramatically, publicly, snapped.
A three-judge panel of the Ontario Court of Appeal ruled Thursday that the definition of ``spouse'' should be amended in the federal Income Tax Act to recognize same-sex couples as well as opposite-sex couples.
The ruling came in a case involving pension benefits and technically applies only to the Income Tax Act. But gay activists said it could set a precedent that would affect similar sections of other federal acts.
``It opens the door for same-sex pension benefits, certainly, but it's also a very significant statement by the courts that discriminating against same- sex couples is not only immoral, it's unconstitutional,'' said John Fisher, executive director of Equality for Gays and Lesbians Everywhere.
``Clearly the broader impact of the ruling is the federal government must reconsider the definition of spouse in all federal laws to ensure it doesn't discriminate against gays and lesbians,'' he said.
The case was brought forward by Nancy Rosenberg and her employer, the Canadian Union of Public Employees, regarding pension benefits which Rosenberg sought to arrange for her lesbian partner.
The union in 1992 amended its pension plan, extending its spousal benefits to include gay and lesbian employees.
But Canada's revenue department refused to recognize the amendment, arguing it violated the act's opposite-sex definition of spouse.
Without government approval, the union's pension plan would lose its tax- free status.
Thursday's court ruling gave the union the right to include same-sex partners in its private pension plan without losing any tax benefits.
``This is a groundbreaking case since the federal government has consistently refused to allow lesbian and gay couples to be treated equally for pension purposes,'' said Cynthia Petersen, a lawyer representing 13 organizations that supported Rosenberg's legal battle.
Revenue department officials said they hadn't decided whether to appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court of Canada.
LOS ANGELES, CA, THURSDAY, APRIL 23, 1998 ---Today, the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) expressed its disappointment with ABC's decision to not renew the groundbreaking television sitcom Ellen. After months of speculation regarding the fate of the show, ABC said today it is canceling the first and only program on primetime television with a lead lesbian or gay character.
"ABC's decision clearly denies the profound impact which Ellen has had on our society and the future of television programming," said Joan M. Garry, GLAAD Executive Director. "Ellen broke ground with her historic coming-out episode, and continued to do so throughout this past season, providing us with a strong and wholly positive television hero. Ellen will be sorely missed by GLAAD, our community, and her many fans from all walks of life."
Last April, Ellen Morgan came out of the closet to an audience of millions. Ellen DeGeneres and the show have been awarded a number of honors in the past year, including an Emmy and a Peabody Award for the "Puppy Episode." In October, ABC branded the sitcom with a parental advisory warning. Episodes that included any type of same-sex affection, including hand holding, were subject to the warning. Earlier this year, ABC placed the program on hiatus, giving Two Guys, A Girl and a Pizza Place the show's timeslot. Only last week, ABC decided only to air Ellen's finale, leaving two already taped episodes out of the schedule.
"Ellen didn't just open the closet door for lesbian and gay primetime characters," said Chastity Bono, GLAAD Entertainment Media Director, "she blew the door off its hinges. Like groundbreaking television programs in the past, Ellen will serve as a catalyst for even more gay-inclusive programming on television in the future."
Ellen's cancellation has been the topic of much speculation in the media, Hollywood and for a devoted nationwide audience. Since first learning about Ellen's emergence from the closet, GLAAD has worked to ensure her place in history, and since talk of Ellen's possible cancellation began, GLAAD has worked vigorously to support the show and encourage ABC to stand behind it. GLAAD's "Save Ellen" campaign has kept the nation, both gay and straight, up to date on the program's status and provided thousands with the show's weekly advertisers.
GLAAD is the nation's lesbian and gay media advocacy organization. GLAAD is dedicated to promoting fair, accurate and inclusive representations of individuals and events in the media as a means of challenging discrimination based on sexual orientation or identity.
WASHINGTON (AP) April 20, 1998 ---- Programs that let drug addicts exchange used needles for clean ones fight AIDS and do not encourage illegal drug use, the Clinton administration declared today - but it will not allow federal tax dollars to fund the programs.
The administration hopes that Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala's strong endorsement will encourage communities to start their own needle exchanges. But AIDS activists have said that federal money - so far banned - is key, and they are sure to see Shalala's decision as a defeat.
``The scientific evidence does show needle exchange programs reduce the risk of infection with HIV and do not encourage the use of illegal drugs,'' said an administration official today, speaking on condition of anonymity. But ``the administration has decided that the best course at this time is to have local communities use their own dollars to fund needle exchange programs.''
Shalala will tell state and local officials that to start a needle exchange, the programs must be part of a comprehensive HIV prevention strategy that includes referring participants to drug treatment and counseling. Also, needles must be made available only on a replacement basis, the administration official said.
Needle exchange programs are one of the hottest topics in the AIDS crisis. Half of all people who catch HIV are infected by dirty needles, sex with injecting drug users or are children of infected addicts - totaling 33 people every day, AIDS experts say.
Numerous scientific studies and public health groups have declared that needle exchanges reduce that risk, and 88 needle exchanges operate around the country with private, state or local funding.
But Congress had banned letting communities use federal tax dollars to pay for needle exchanges until Shalala certified that scientific studies proved they both reduced spread of the HIV virus and did not encourage drug use.
After a months-long review by her top scientific advisers, Shalala this morning decided that needle exchanges are scientifically backed.
The scientific review found that the needle exchanges that work best are part of a larger anti-HIV program that pushes addicts toward drug treatment.
Indeed, one study of a needle exchange in the Bronx, New York, found that providing clean needles to heroin addicts in addition to offering them methadone treatment both lowered the risk of HIV infection and lowered their overall drug use.
But whether to allow federal funding was a politically charged question that administration officials debated heavily over the weekend. Ultimately, Shalala decided that whether to fund a needle exchange was up to each community.
The decision came after Republicans in Congress had threatened to ban federal funding of needle exchanges altogether if Shalala did decide to attempt it. And President Clinton's own drug policy chief, Barry McCaffery, has vigorously fought that attempt, saying it would send the wrong message to children.
``Such a program would in reality use tax dollars and the authority of the federal government to push drug paraphernalia into already drug-ravaged inner cities. This is reckless and irresponsible,'' Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said in a weekend statement.
Public health experts directly dispute that: ``Does needle exchange promote drug use? A preponderance of evidence shows either no change or decreased drug use,'' an NIH consensus conference concluded 14 months ago, saying the ban on funding for these programs will lead to ``many thousands of unnecessary deaths.''
Shalala last year agreed that science proved that needle exchanges were effective in fighting HIV, but said at that time that she needed to review further data on how they affect drug use.
Supporters of James Hormel are demanding he at least get a vote while conservative opponents insist that Republicans take a stand on a key lifestyle issue.
Hormel, President Clinton's choice to be envoy to Luxembourg, was the only foreign relations nominee not acted upon at the end of last year's session. Three Republican senators, expressing concern that he would use the post to promote a gay agenda, put "holds" on the nomination, effectively freezing it.
Democrats now are demanding action. Before leaving for the Easter recess, 42 Democrats sent Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., a letter supporting the nomination and urging a vote.
Democrats also took to the Senate floor to express concern that confirmation was being held up only because Hormel is homosexual.
"Prejudice based on sexual orientation should have no place in this debate, no place in the Senate and no place in America," said Sen. Barbara Boxer, D- Calif.
Hormel, a 64-year-old San Francisco businessman, philanthropist, Democratic Party contributor and heir to the Hormel Meat Co. fortune, received unanimous Senate confirmation last May for another post, as an alternate to the U.S. delegation to the U.N. General Assembly.
He sailed through the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, winning approval on a 16-2 vote last November, after Secretary of State Madeleine Albright assured Chairman Jesse Helms, R-N.C., that Hormel was highly qualified and would not promote his personal interests. Helms voted against Hormel but let the nomination advance to the Senate floor.
In a letter to Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore., a committee member, in February, Hormel said: "I will not use, nor do I think it is appropriate to use, the office of the ambassador to advocate any personal views I may hold." He pledged to resign from most of his board seats, limit his charitable giving and prohibit use of his name in fund raising.
But that has not satisfied Republican Sens. Tim Hutchinson of Arkansas, Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma and Bob Smith of New Hampshire, who put holds on the nomination. Conservative groups also continue to oppose Hormel as a radical gay activist.
Gary Bauer's Family Research Council cited Hormel's financial support for a documentary aimed at educators that the group said promotes homosexual lifestyles. It also pointed to a gay and lesbian materials wing in the San Francisco public library supported by and named for Hormel that contains controversial literature.
Further, the council said, Hormel presided over a 1996 gay pride parade in San Francisco at which he was heard laughing at male drag queens dressed as nuns. Bauer said Luxembourg is 97 percent Roman Catholic, and "appointing an ambassador who shows nothing but contempt for certain groups of believers should offend every American who believes in the Constitution."
Hormel said he had no role in deciding the contents of either the library collection or the documentary. "I hardly view myself as a 'radical.' I am a businessman and lawyer with more than 30 years of commitment to public service, social justice and human rights," he wrote Smith.
In considering Hormel's nomination, Republicans must deal both with general gripes by social conservatives that they haven't done enough to advance pro- family programs, and conversely with concerns about being depicted as hostile to gays.
"I don't see how the Republican Party wants to be known as the party that discriminates on the basis of sexual orientation," said Winnie Stachelberg of the Human Rights Campaign, a leading gay political organization. Hormel is on the board of the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, the group's educational arm.
"It's not his sexual orientation," countered Herb Johnson, chief of staff to Inhofe, one of Hormel's leading Senate opponents. "The biggest problem is he has been inclined to use this to push an agenda that doesn't necessarily represent the agenda of the American people."
Jim Abrams covers Congress for The Associated Press.
SALT LAKE TRIBUNE, April 20, 1998 ---- Salt Lake City Council members have reached an uneasy truce on a proposed nondiscrimination ordinance.
As long as the words ``sexual orientation'' do not appear in a new law, there will be peace. Well, maybe not peace, but detente.
Last month, council members received city attorneys' generic answer to traditional civil-rights laws. Rather than listing protected categories as other civil-rights legislation does, the draft ordinance prohibits discriminating against city employees for anything other than ``job-related criteria.''
Councilwoman Deeda Seed vowed not to vote for the thing. Councilman Keith Christensen said he was satisfied. Councilman Tom Rogan wrote up amendments to the draft, stripping out whole sections of offending text.
Legal experts declared the proposal a dismal failure. Two University of Utah law professors even offered their own version. And City Attorney Roger Cutler was left trying to defend his work.
After stepping back for a breather and meeting with Cutler to revise the four-page document, City Council members are scheduled to tackle the issue again Thursday.
Cutler's draft, with council members' suggested amendments, would require city supervisors to make all hiring, firing and promotion decisions ``reasonably based on job-related criteria.'' Right now, only an administrative policy protects city employees from discrimination, and that policy does not list sexual orientation.
``I would love to see something that we all can agree on, realizing that it's not going to be everything that everyone wants,'' said council Chairman Bryce Jolley. ``We will come up with a good improvement on what currently exists.''
That is up for debate.
Late last year, a lame-duck council adopted an ordinance that prohibited ``discrimination against an otherwise qualified employee or applicant based on race, color, national origin, sex, religion, age, sexual orientation or disability.'' A new City Council repealed the law in January.
According to a Salt Lake Tribune poll, most city residents support such a law. Of 450 adults polled, 61 percent favor including ``sexual orientation'' in a list of job protections; 31 percent are opposed and 8 percent are undecided.
But 49 percent of respondents also believe a generic law, like Jolley's proposed substitute, could provide sufficient protection for gay city employees; 40 percent do not and 11 percent are unsure.
The original law mirrored a University of Utah policy adopted in 1991 and a 1992 Salt Lake County statute. Cities such as Seattle, Portland, Ore., and Ann Arbor, Mich., have adopted similar ordinances.
And companies like Delta Air Lines, Sears, Nordstrom and REI have anti- discrimination policies that protect gay employees. Coors, Levi Strauss, Microsoft and Time-Warner have extended benefits to gay employees' partners. Locally, American Express and US WEST have built protections for gay employees and benefits for their partners into company policies.
Civil-rights advocates lauded Salt Lake City for joining the movement. But Jolley took the decision personally. He complained that the council rammed through the law without appropriate decorum or consideration of his concerns. Jolley successfully orchestrated a plan to repeal the month-old law when a new council came on board in January. He promised something new and better, something without sexual orientation in it.
The resulting draft refers to state and federal laws, incorporating those statutes' protected classes -- but not sexual orientation. Cutler's draft adds new ``job-related criteria.'' They include: education and training as well as conduct that ``adversely affects job performance, disrupts the workplace, undermines the authority of management, impairs close working relationships . . . or otherwise impedes a safe, efficient and effective work environment.''
Finally, the new draft adds, ``personal or physical characteristics which are irrelevant to successful job performance are not `job-related criteria' as that term is used in this section and shall not be the basis for disciplinary action.''
The measure city attorneys drafted falls short for many. ``It would have been better had they kept the original ordinance,'' said Jon Davidson, supervising attorney for Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund's Western regional office in Los Angeles. ``The current proposal really doesn't do much of anything beyond what is already provided for by the Constitution.''
More than that, said Salt Lake City attorney Ross Anderson, the new attempt does damage. ``Nothing has really changed,'' Anderson said. ``This new council was not willing to stand up and say gays and lesbians have equal protections under the law. Why make this ordinance seem like something it really is not? Sometimes having the pretext of protection is more dangerous than being honest about having no protection at all and letting everyone know it.''
University of Utah law professors Terry Kogan and Karen Engle agreed. They wrote to the council: ``The ordinance subtly yet unmistakably fails to protect gay and lesbian employees from job discrimination. ``Rather than state that discrimination against gay people is permitted in city government, the ordinance achieves this same result through its vagueness and through a myriad of loopholes in its language,'' they said.
Davidson believes the council's rush to repeal created a dangerous working environment for city employees. The proposed ordinance will simply add to the confusion. Salt Lake City ``is in a worse situation than if the City Council had done nothing in the first place,'' he said. ``Some people might think the city stands behind them discriminating against people who are gay or lesbian. And employees might think the city does not back them up if they report such discrimination.''
Last month, Kogan and Engle suggested a succinct substitute similar to the law the council adopted last year. It read: ``All practices and decisions affecting city employees shall be administered using only job-related criteria such as experience, training, education, skills and job performance. Job- related criteria shall not include race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, age or disability.''
The council quickly rejected the draft when Seed presented it. Despite the amendments to Cutler's draft, some council members are skeptical.
``We've made some progress,'' said Councilman Roger Thompson, who sat in on the editing sessions. ``I'm not sure we're totally there yet.''
Seed will wait to see what her colleagues come up with. ``Using sexual- orientation language would solve the whole problem, but they're not willing to do that,'' she said. ``It's up to the folks who aggressively worked to repeal the law to follow through with their promise to come up with something else. The first attempt was not only inadequate but really counterproductive. I don't have high expectations for the outcome of this.''
Washington Blade, April 17, 1998 --- In the second known Gay-related incident since 1996, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is demanding that a support group for Lesbians with cancer agree to help "any women ... with cancer" in order to gain tax-exempt status.
The IRS ordered Kathys’ Group, a Rhode Island organization that provides support services for Lesbians with cancer and their families, to make "only" one change to receive tax-exempt status - the organization must alter its purpose to extend services to "any women who have been diagnosed with cancer."
The demand brought an outraged response from Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, a national Gay group representing Kathys’ Group. Lambda wrote the IRS this week insisting that the IRS withdraw the demand and immediately grant Kathys’ Group tax-exempt status.
Lambda staff attorney David Buckel, noting that the Lesbian support group incident follows a controversy in which the IRS initially rejected the tax-exempt application of a support group for Gay youth, said in an interview:
"The evidence is building that the IRS is infected with anti-Gay bias. ... We’re not saying there’s anti-Gay bigotry as a matter of policy, but we’re saying ... that the IRS needs some kind of policy directive or internal education of its agents to make sure there isn’t this kind of anti-Gay discrimination."
Lambda is concerned, Buckel said, "that there are a lot of [Gay] groups out there that either give in to these anti-Gay requests or give up [seeking tax-exempt status] altogether."
The IRS, citing applicants’ right to privacy, said it could not discuss any pending request for tax-exempt status.
"I can’t comment on how any specific agent acts ... or handles a specific case," said IRS spokesperson Jodi Patterson. Asked about Buckel’s charge of anti-Gay bias in the agency, Patterson said:
"If you look at the number of Gay and Lesbian groups that are tax-exempt, I think you’ll see that that is not a factor [in the approval process]."
In the case of Kathys’ Group, the IRS demanded in February that the organization alter its purpose. Kathys’ Group then sought help from Lambda, which on Tuesday made the incident public with a press release and a letter to IRS officials.
"There is no authority," wrote Buckel, "for the IRS to deny tax exemption on the grounds that a group seeks to address the needs of Lesbians. Nor can the IRS force applicants to change their missions based on the viewpoints of the IRS agent. The appropriate inquiry for tax-exempt status turns on whether the group meets the criteria for charitable/educational organizations."
In his letter to IRS, Buckel said an IRS exempt organizations specialist, Brenda Ivery-Rivers, had told Kathys’ Group in a telephone conversation that the group’s mission had to be changed to better serve the "public good."
"The IRS needs some kind of policy directive or internal education of its agents," said Lambda's David Buckel.
Buckel said that Ivery-Rivers, who subsequently faxed the group her demand for a change, apparently felt that "focusing on the needs of Lesbians was insufficient to serve the ‘public good’ or that a Gay-focused group was inappropriate or unworthy."
"[A]gency judgments about the need for this group are not relevant to the IRS’s inquiry and actions," Buckel wrote. "However, we wish to emphasize that the need is indeed profound. This underscores the importance of timely action by the IRS to correct for the obstacle and delay it has imposed on Kathys’ Group."
In an interview, Buckel noted that many organizations target specific groups. The American Association of Retired Persons, he notes, focuses on the needs of senior citizens and the NAACP focuses on the needs of African Americans.
Most nonprofit groups consider tax-exempt status essential for expansion because it encourages contributions from individuals who will then receive tax deductions as well as from foundations.
Until 1977, the IRS frequently rejected Gay groups’ applications for tax-exempt status. But that year, the IRS said Gay groups were entitled to tax exemption as long as they met other requirements.
In the last two decades, numerous Gay groups have routinely been granted tax-exempt status by the IRS, which is why activists and tax experts were shocked last year when a case involving a support group for Gay youth came to light.
In 1996, the IRS refused to approve tax-exempt status for Gay and Lesbian Adolescent Support System of Greensboro, N.C., unless the group proved it would not "encourage or facilitate homosexual practices ... attitudes and propensities by minor individuals."
Feeling intimidated, the group debated for months whether to drop its application. But after it sought Lambda’s help, Lambda publicized the case and protested to the IRS last summer. The tax agency quickly reversed itself and granted tax-exempt status to the youth support group, winning praise from Buckel for "swiftly [dealing] with internal discrimination against a Gay ... group."
Kathys’ Group was started back in 1995 when one member of a longtime Lesbian couple - both of whom are named Kathy - developed breast cancer. Although they are New Yorkers, they spend summers in Rhode Island, where their friends searched in vain for a support group for Lesbians with cancer.
Lorraine Galvin and Dorrie McCaffrey, a Lesbian couple who are friends of the Kathys, decided to start a support group for Lesbians with cancer in Rhode Island - and name it after the two Kathys. (Galvin says the two Kathys are away and she does not know if they want their last names disclosed.)
"We got some people on a board," says Galvin, now president of Kathys’ Group, which is based in Wakefield, R.I. "We talked to a therapist, who agreed to meet with women who have cancer." Services are provided free to Lesbians, their partners, and "whoever the Lesbian feels is a family member."
So far, 31 women have received services from Kathys’ Group, about half of them Lesbians with cancer and the other half members of their families. Support groups meet twice a month, with between 12 and 14 women regularly attending.
Kathys’ Group decided last year to apply for tax-exempt status, with an eye toward expanding services by stepped-up fundraising. When IRS agent Ivery-Rivers told the organization earlier this year that its mission statement would have to be changed, "we were outraged," says Galvin.
"We felt this, in fact, would change the whole tenor of what we wanted to do," says Galvin. "There are many other groups that get their nonprofit status. Why were we being singled out for not receiving it? Was it because we were a Gay group? ... We didn’t feel that was appropriate."
Ivery-Rivers, who works out of the Richmond, Va. office, could not be reached for comment; a recording at the office told callers that because of the April 15 tax deadline, no agents could be contacted personally.
IRS spokesperson Patterson said Marcus Owens, director of IRS’s exempt organizations division, who spoke to the Blade last summer about the agency’s general policies on tax-exemption, was out of the office and unavailable for comment.
Last summer, Owens said the IRS did not treat applications from Gay groups any differently from non-Gay groups. When any applicant believes it is being treated with bias, Owens said, "for whatever reason - religion, politics, their sexual orientation, whatever it is - our procedures are to reassign the case to someone else."
Patricia Cain, an openly Lesbian associate dean and professor of law at the University of Iowa and a tax specialist, said IRS rules do not permit the agency to order Kathys’ Group to change its mission statement.
"It sounds," said Cain, "like this person working for the IRS has made a determination that [Kathys’ Group is] not going to be tax-exempt if it benefits only Lesbians, and I think that’s wrong."
Cain said that, under the tax law, race is the only classification that a nonprofit group is barred from restricting from membership. Kathy’s Group, Cain said, is "not discriminatory in the way the tax law cares about."
"The only other test is whether there’s a sufficient public benefit," said Cain.
"If I set up a support group for the 10 Lesbians in my neighborhood who are my friends," said Cain, "that wouldn’t be a public enough purpose to get charitable donations. But if I set it up for all the Lesbians in the state who have cancer, that’s certainly a public enough purpose."
Galvin of Kathys’ Group says the Lesbian community in Rhode Island "needs to have a place to go where they’re comfortable. It’s not the same as when you go into a straight ... environment. There are issues that are not the same."
"There are several women in the [support] group," says Galvin, "who have told us the only reason they are in a support group is because it’s a Lesbian support group. They tried going to some of the straight support programs and found it was not a place where they felt comfortable talking about their partner, their circumstances, their sexuality."
Bev Baker, executive director of Washington’s Mary Helen Mautner Project for Lesbians with Cancer, said she was surprised when Lambda told her about the Rhode Island group’s difficulties with the IRS.
Baker said Mautner has a mission statement very similar to that of Kathys’ Group. When Mautner sought tax-exempt status eight years ago, Baker said, "To my knowledge, there was never a concern voiced by the IRS."
Baker said she was also unaware of any problems with the IRS encountered by other members of the National Coalition of Feminist and Lesbian Cancer Projects, which includes at least three dozen organizations.
It is ironic, Baker said, that while the IRS questions the public benefit of a group devoted to Lesbians with cancer, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is giving federal funds for cancer screening for Lesbians - including a $235,000 grant to Mautner this year.
Like Galvin, Baker stressed the importance of support groups where Lesbians with cancer feel at ease.
"If you have to go to a support group where you can’t be who you are," said Baker, "where you can’t talk about your partner or your life, that can be very stressful. And additional stress when you’re already dealing with the stress of fighting cancer is not [what you need]."
In his letter to the IRS, Lambda’s Buckel renewed his request - first made last year following the problems encountered by the support group for Gay youth - that "the IRS take agency-wide action to educate its staff and prevent further difficulties for Gay-related applications for tax-exempt status."
"We suggest a policy statement from the Commissioner," Buckel said, "and full agency trainings, or other similar steps, to ensure that charitable or educational organizations that serve Gay people do not face discriminatory obstacles in gaining tax-exempt status in the future."
Since last year, the prominent Washington law firm of Arnold and Porter has been assisting Lambda in a Freedom of Information Act request for IRS records in an effort to help determine the scope of anti-Gay bias at the tax agency.
Secretary of Defense William Cohen said in an April 1 letter to Attorney General Janet Reno that he strongly believes the Navy acted properly last year when it used a private, online computer profile to determine that a sailor is Gay and should be discharged.
To the dismay of Gay activists, Cohen also told Reno that a federal judge made a mistake by ordering the Navy not to discharge the sailor. Then he urged Reno to reject any effort by the sailor to obtain retirement benefits if he leaves voluntarily.
The Washington Times published excerpts of Cohen's letter in its April 8 edition. The newspaper said it obtained a copy of the letter from sources which the paper did not identify.
The ruling Cohen objects to was a preliminary but emphatic one: that the Navy had gone "too far" in pursuing information to enable the military to discharge McVeigh for being Gay. U.S. District Court Judge Stanley Sporkin ruled Jan. 26 that the Navy violated the Pentagon's "don't ask, don't tell" policy on Gays in the military when an investigator went to America Online and (according to AOL officials) claimed to be a friend of McVeigh's. An AOL representative gave the person McVeigh's supposedly private member profile (and the online service has subsequently acknowledged its error). The military, however, used the profile as evidence that McVeigh is Gay. McVeigh had entered the word "Gay" in a space on the profile that asks for members' marital status. Sporkin ordered the Navy to allow McVeigh to resume his regular duties on a submarine pending the final outcome of McVeigh's lawsuit to fight the discharge proceedings and for violating his privacy.
The Navy said it would appeal Sporkin's ruling, but shortly thereafter the New York Times reported that McVeigh offered to retire with full benefits rather than face discharge proceedings.
DOD officials reportedly balked at the idea of paying him full benefits, which are normally granted only after 20 years of service. McVeigh has been in the military for 17 years. According to the Washington Times, Clinton administration sources said Cohen's letter was aimed at discouraging the Justice Department - which represents the Navy in civil litigation - from agreeing to such a settlement with McVeigh. "The sources said this would leave the door open for other discharged personnel to gain retirement pay," the Washington Times said in its April 8 story.
Richard Socarides stressed that the secretary of defense opposes abuses of the military's anti-Gay policy.
The newspaper quoted Cohen as saying in his letter that he did not object to Reno's suggestion that a settlement be considered "so long as it is clear that any settlement of this case must be on terms acceptable to the Navy." Cohen asked Reno to make sure a proposed settlement does not "represent any diminution of your support for [the don't ask, don't tell] policy, and that you and your colleagues would be prepared to assist us in communicating that fact to the field."
The Washington Times quoted Cohen as saying in his letter to Reno, "We feel strongly that the District court's decision in [the McVeigh case] is plainly erroneous in numerous respects, and that it should be appealed. ... We understand that you share our view that the decision is erroneous, and that the Navy's action with respect to Senior Chief McVeigh were fully consistent with the statute governing homosexual conduct in the military and with our own regulations on that subject."
The Washington Times reported that Cohen sent his letter to Reno shortly after he met with Adm. Jay Johnson, the chief of naval operations, and that Johnson persuaded Cohen that the Navy acted within the rules of "don't ask, don't tell" when it sought to oust McVeigh. Cohen's views on the McVeigh case are expected to raise strong concerns among Gay civil rights leaders, who have expressed outrage over the action by naval investigators to investigate a sailor's private, online computer profile.
Richard Socarides, an openly Gay White House special assistant who serves as President Clinton's liaison to the Gay community, said Cohen's statements to Reno should not be interpreted as a "hard-line" position against the idea of Gays serving in the military.
"This was a private letter that was leaked to the Washington Times," Socarides said. "Its main point was that the secretary of the navy should be allowed to decide on whether or not a settlement is agreed to in the McVeigh case."
Socarides noted that Cohen has stated repeatedly to the press that military investigators should not be allowed to abuse the "don't ask, don't tell" policy by improperly investigating Gay service members. Cohen told reporters last week that "there should be no attempt to hunt or seek out those who may be homosexual" in the military.
LONDON Reuters, April 17, 1998 ---- Pop star George Michael, who was charged Thursday in Los Angeles with lewd conduct, hit out Friday at what he said were "total falsehoods" printed about him in the American press.
The singer's London lawyers issued a statement on his behalf accusing American tabloids of printing articles about him which "contain gross inventions and in particular attribute statements to George, none of which he has made."
The statement attacked The National Enquirer, The Star and the Globe for their coverage of the story.
Michael was charged Thursday with lewd conduct stemming from his arrest this month in a public restroom in Beverly Hills.
The Los Angeles District Attorney's office said the 34-year-old singer would be arraigned on the misdemeanor charge on May 5 at Beverly Hills Municipal Court.
The British-born star, now free on $500 bail, has hinted he is likely to plead guilty. The charge carries a maximum sentence of six months in jail and a $1,000 fine.
American tabloids have carried lurid articles on Michael's alleged sexual activities.
The statement issued by Russels, his lawyers, said: "In the media rush to give blanket coverage to the events of last week, certain sections of the media have presented inaccurate and unsubstantiated stories." It added: "George has already made public his remorse for the events of last week. "However he does not feel that his actions should give sections of the media unrestricted license to print total falsehoods.
"He wishes to make it clear that he is not prepared to allow these fabrications to continue unchallenged."
After his arrest in a public restroom in the Will Rogers Memorial Park in Beverly Hills, Michael used a television interview to issue an apology.
"I put myself in an extremely stupid position, I won't deny that. I won't even say it was the first time it ever happened. I can only apologize," he told CNN last week.
Michael, who has tried to keep his private life secret, broke his silence because he said he wanted to let his fans know he was "OK."
He also said he was gay, had not had a sexual relationship with a woman for 10 years, and his first homosexual relationship had occurred when he was 27.
Michael, who was born in London of Greek Cypriot parents, was charged under his real name, Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou.
ANCHORAGE, Alaska, April 16 (Reuters) - Unhappy at a judge's decision that same-sex marriages might be protected under Alaska's constitution, state senators Thursday passed a resolution that would amend the constitution to forbid such unions.
The measure passed by a 14-6 vote in the Republican-controlled Senate, which is meeting in the state capitol in Juneau. If it passes by a two-thirds margin in the Republican-controlled House, the measure will be placed on Alaska's statewide ballot in November for possible ratification by voters.
``The people of Alaska deserve to vote on an issue this important, which is the very definition on who we are as a society,'' State Sen. Loren Leman, the Anchorage Republican who sponsored the resolution, said after the vote.
The amendment would define marriage as a union between one man and one woman, a definition that ``has served us for more than 6,000 years of recorded history,'' Leman said in floor debate.
Another Anchorage Republican was more blunt. ``Do you think that a man and a woman should marry, or do you believe that a goat and a cow or two homosexuals should?'' Sen. Jerry Ward said in floor debate.
But Sen. Al Adams, a Democrat from Kotzebue, said the proposed amendment would violate Alaskans' embrace of diversity and personal liberty.
``I think what we are seeing here is the beginning of the erosion of personal freedom in Alaska,'' he said.
Leman introduced the proposed amendment in response to a Feb. 27 state Superior Court decision declaring that two Anchorage men who are seeking to marry each other have the right to do so under the Alaska constitution's explicit guarantee of personal privacy.
In that ruling, Superior Court Judge Peter Michalski refused to throw out a lawsuit filed against the state by Gene Dugan and Jay Brause, men who had been denied a state license to marry each other. Michalski said the lawsuit may continue, and that the state must demonstrate a compelling public interest if it is to deny Dugan and Brause the right to marry.
Michalski's ruling said that ``the personal choice of a life partner is fundamental and that such a choice may include persons of the same sex.''
That choice is protected by the constitution's right to privacy and must be upheld unless the state can show a compelling interest otherwise, Michalski concluded. ``Government intrusion into the choice of a life partner encroaches on the intimate personal decisions of the individual,'' he said in his decision.
Leman, who is considering a run for governor, said his proposed constitutional amendment has overwhelming public support.
But calls to a talk show on the subject broadcast Wednesday by Anchorage public radio station KSKA were mostly opposed to the amendment.
``Why are we wasting time over this nonsense over people's personal choice? It is ridiculous,'' one man told Leman and Anchorage attorney Allison Mendel, who were guests on the show, ``If a friend of mine is gay or lesbian and they want to marry someone of the same sex, that's their personal prerogative.''
Mendel said that even if the legislature and state voters approve it, the measure may be illegal because it would seek to enshrine in the constitution discrimination against a specific group of citizens.
Branstad signed the measure without comment, with his staff simply issuing a notice that the governor had approved it.
Branstad was expected to sign the ban on same-sex marriages which overwhelmingly was approved in both the House and Senate earlier this year. Senators gave approval 40-9, while the House approved 89-10.
Backers said the measure is needed because the state should make a statement that it believes in traditional marriages.
Critics said it isn't needed and is a cynical ploy to force a handful of lawmakers into taking a politically risky vote on gay rights.
The measure was sparked by a fight in Hawaii, where there's a court battle over whether the state can ban same-sex marriages.
Critics worry that same-sex marriages will eventually be legalized in that state, and that could cause problems in other states.
Because states typically respect the laws of other states, some worried that gay couples could travel to Hawaii and get married. Those critics then said the gay couple could return to Iowa where officials would be forced to recognize the marriage.
That has a significant impact on insurance, estates and other issues. State law in Iowa defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman. The measure Branstad signed makes it clear that the state does not have to recognize a same-sex marriage that is legal in another state.
Roughly half the states have approved similar legislation.
Critics argue that it is not needed because officials in Hawaii have scheduled a referendum this fall on the issue, and same sex marriages are virtually certain to lose in that voting.
FORT COLLINS Gazette-Telegraph, April 15, 1998 --- Opponents of a city ordinance that extends protection against discrimination to gays have turned in enough petition signatures to force an election, officials say.
City Clerk Wanda Krajicek said Monday that the petitions will be presented to the City Council at its meeting next Tuesday. The council can repeal the proposed revisions to the ordinance or put them on the ballot to let voters decide.
Initial action is expected at the council's meeting May 5.
The council would set the election through an ordinance, Krajicek said, which would require two public hearings. If the first is May 5, the second probably would be May 19, she said.
Councilman Bill Bertschy said the council likely will call for an election, possibly on the Nov. 3 general-election ballot to save money.
The council passed the revisions six weeks ago. One changes the city's process for handling human rights complaints; the other includes sexual orientation as a prohibited base of discrimination.
Opponents collected the signatures of 1,783 registered city voters needed to force the council to reconsider its decision.
Businessman Greg Snyder, who led the petition drive, said his main concern is with the first ordinance, which he said is unconstitutional.
"I don't want to get sidelined by the gays-vs.-straights thing," he said. "But that's going to be hard to do."
Ten years ago, a similar gay-rights ordinance was soundly defeated by Fort Collins voters following a bitter election campaign.
Mims Harris, chairwoman of the Fort Collins Citizens for Human Rights Committee, said her group plans to educate the public about the ordinance and sexual orientation.
LOS ANGELES, CA, WEDNESDAY, APRIL 15, 1998 ---- Today the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) expressed its shock at ABC's decision not to air two newly taped episodes of the award-winning sitcom, Ellen. Instead, the network has chosen to air only the season finale. The final, hour-long Ellen will air on May 13, with Two Guys, A Girl and a Pizza Place filling the two time slots that Ellen was originally expected to fill.
"American viewers deserve and expect to see Ellen's remaining season in its entirety," said Joan M. Garry, GLAAD Executive Director. "I am extremely disappointed in the network's decision to deny the viewing public this quality program. For months ABC has claimed that they stand behind the show. If this is how they support their programming, it is certainly a 'unique' approach. "
Ellen's imminent cancellation has been the topic of much speculation in the media, Hollywood and for a devoted nationwide audience. ABC's sudden decision came as a shock to the beleaguered show and for millions of fans. ABC may decide to show the unaired episodes sometime this summer. ABC told GLAAD that the final decision on Ellen's return next season has not been made, and that the decision not to air the two episodes is the result of Two Guys, A Girl and a Pizza Place's strong ratings.
Since first learning about Ellen's emergence from the closet, GLAAD has worked to ensure her place in history, and since talk of Ellen's possible cancellation began, GLAAD has worked vigorously to support the show and encourage ABC to stand behind it. GLAAD's "Save Ellen" campaign has kept the nation, both gay and straight, up to date on the program's status and provided thousands with the show's weekly advertisers. Recently, GLAAD placed "Save Ellen" ads in more than 15 community newspapers to encourage viewership and support for the show.
"Last year, ABC took a courageous step by offering American viewers television's first openly gay lead character. Since then, the network has been criticized for its lack of support. GLAAD feels that this latest decision exemplifies the network's lack of commitment to the show," said Chastity Bono, GLAAD Entertainment Media Director. "The impact of this program cannot be measured by numbers alone. The show depicts a lifetime of experiences for lesbians and gay men across America and is changing hearts and minds. We urge ABC to consider its broader responsibility as it makes programming decisions."
GLAAD is the nation's lesbian and gay media advocacy organization. GLAAD is dedicated to promoting fair, accurate and inclusive representations of individuals and events in the media as a means of challenging discrimination based on sexual orientation or identity.
SAN FRANCISCO April 10, 1998-- San Francisco can't force airlines to abide by most provisions of its first-of-its-kind domestic partners ordinance, a federal judge ruled Friday. But the city may still be able to demand that hundreds of other businesses do.
U.S. District